Talking Points From The Last Week

Highlights of two interesting conversations I had last week:

First, I ran into two acquaintances in Harris-Teeter a week ago Sunday, and as part of our conversation one of the people- both were women- mentioned that in Freakanomics the point was made that abortion has helped to lower crime, poverty, the welfare rolls etc. because more poor women have abortions than those of other socioeconomic classes. I said that statement made sense, but there were two weaknesses in it. The first was that the ?positive? side of abortion depended on your priorities, in this case murder vs. crime, poverty and welfare. The second was that her statement was analogous to saying black people benefited from slavery because survival of the fittest kicked in to make blacks more athletic in the modern age. (She agreed with me that it was analogous.)

Secondly, in the middle of last week, I got into a long discussion/debate with two Muslim women, one a convert who spent time in the American military before her conversion and the other a lifelong member of Islam who grew up in America. We began discussing Arab and Muslim terrorism against the United States, and particularly the recent shootings at Fort Hood. I made the argument that a high percentage of terrorist attacks against this country have been made by Muslims- see an LA Times article today about the threat of homegrown terrorism- and so I did not find it hard to believe that Americans might be a bit hesitant around someone of the Islamic faith or appearing to be Arabic, and the Fort Hood shootings did not help the Muslim cause in America. The two women made a great case, however, that it was not the fault of the Muslim faith that the Fort Hood shooter went after his fellow soldiers. Instead, they claimed that the man was mentally unstable, and what he said was merely what he knew and how he spoke. The lifelong Muslim said that if a Jew or Christian was to kill a lot of people in a similar manner, she would not blame the Christian faith but would instead chalk it up to mental instability. They also said it was the fault of the Army for not recognizing the man?s mental illness and taking action before he killed his fellow soldiers.

I disagree with that mental illness was the main cause of the Fort Hood attack as opposed to his Muslim faith; but I found their argument very interesting and something I hadn’t considered (that Hasan was merely expressing his thoughts in the way he had been taught) and I definitely agree the Army failed to protect its soldiers.