It isn’t? “I would not have an abortion or recommend that someone else have one, even if it would mean that 5 other people don’t have abortions at some future date” is an example of rejecting consequentialism. So a non-consequentialist position might be “I won’t support legal abortions even if some solid studies show that allowing legal abortions reduces the total number of abortions.” If you allow the premise (that abortion is murder), this is similar to saying that you won’t support gladiatorial combat to the death, even if doing so reduces the number of murders by more than the deaths in the arena.
In order for not voting for a pro-choice candidate to be an example of rejecting consequentialism, you have to believe that the act of voting for someone who has professed support for a sin is itself a sin of sufficient magnitude to reject all possible consequences of reserving your vote. Otherwise, you are simply weighing the consequences of a pro-choice candidate with many positive qualities vs. a pro-life candidate with many negative qualities.
There may be some people who believe that supporting a sinful policy is itself sinful and that voting for a candidate means supporting all their policies, but I think most people who reject pro-choice candidates do so for other reasons or at least don’t apply the same standard of judgement to the policies of those they do vote for (especially since the vast majority of them who vote in the US are voting for Trump).
JoshL
5291
If your policy (or the policy of those you vote for) is that you want abortions to be illegal, regardless of whether the actual number of abortions goes up or down, you’re not anti-abortion. You should carefully consider what it is you are actually against.
magnet
5292
Yes. Or more to the point, you don’t even care about the consequences of reserving your vote.
Let’s take a hypothetical example.
Suppose you were told that by wearing a Nazi armband to your grocery store, you would spark a chain of events that would ultimately lead to a denunciation of Nazism and reduction of Nazi sentiment in your community. Would you do it?
I sure as hell wouldn’t. Even if the end result is fewer Nazis, I’m not wearing a Nazi armband anywhere. Because it’s not me. And I don’t care if my decision means a missed opportunity to reduce the number of Nazis who live here. That’s not even a factor in my decision.
That’s what rejecting consequentialism looks like.
Well, it’s a single example of one particular rejection. If on the other hand the act were less odious, but still distasteful — like going to war to kill Nazis? — I imagine you might be more amenable.
magnet
5294
Yes, it’s just an example.
War is a whole can of worms for non-consequentialists.
But I’m not sure anyone should consider killing less distasteful than wearing an armband.
My point is that there are few if any people who have wholly rejected consequentialism. They might have an example like this one to trot out, but in their daily lives they engage in consequentialism all the time.
magnet
5296
Yes, of course.
People find it hard to consistently practice what Christianity teaches.
But that’s true of everyone. There are liberals who shop at Amazon. Does that mean that liberals don’t care about worker rights? No, it just means that not everyone who cares about worker rights will act accordingly all the time.
A whole generation of people did! And we call them heroes.
magnet
5298
Interesting point!
But what do you call the people who refused to carry arms?
I call it one thread derail too far! 😉
magnet
5300
Fair enough! Back to current events…
Obligatory idiotic tweetstorm:
No President has done more for the Evangelical community, and it’s not even close. You’ll not get anything from those Dems on stage. I won’t be reading ET again!
JoshL
5301
Did he really misspell “CT”?
If you come for the (vindictive narcissist) King, you better not miss.
My brother sent me a link to this blog post in response to that article, and more importantly the responses to it, which I thought was excellent.
Not everyone in the evangelical community is blind to the hypocrisy of supporting Trump.
Nesrie
5307
This is bothsidism piece is supposed to be proof of not everyone is blind in the evangelical community? ehh
I’m disappointed by this reaction. The author’s point is that everyone - particularly his audience, the evangelical community - should be thinking for themselves.
Yes, he says to apply this in seeking to understand the opposing viewpoint.
If that’s bothsiderism, I’m all for it.
I mean.
Yes, it would be great if the evangelical voter bloc thought for themselves, weighing beliefs held against observable phenomena.
But if that were the case, we wouldn’t fucking be here now, would we?
Timex
5310
Well, there is indeed a chunk of evangelicals, 20%, who have rejected Trump.
Whether that block can be grown, i dunno. I think maybe there is a possibility for the Democrats to peel off some, if they can get someone to talk more about the progressive aspects of Christianity, which are many.
