When “Force” Ceases to Have Meaning
I’m only shining a spotlight on this guy because he represents a broader pattern. Check this tweet out:
Now I looked and thought, “That has to be complete BS. They are passing a law forcing women to buy rape insurance? Huh?!” They’re making it sound like the police are forcing women to have such insurance to cover their investigation costs etc. (a la the controversy over Sarah Palin when she was governor).
Now if you click the link, at first it seems the Tweeter wasn’t kidding. For the HuffPo article starts like this: “Michigan lawmakers passed a controversial measure on Wednesday that will ban all insurance plans in the state from covering abortion unless the woman’s life is in danger.”
Let me stop right here. That HuffPo opening sentence? IT IS FALSE. That is not at all what the Michigan law does. Even if you read the very next sentence in the HuffPo article, you start to get a better sense of what actually happened: “The law, which takes effect in March, will force women and employers to purchase a separate abortion rider if they would like the procedure covered, even in cases of rape and incest.”
Starting to get the picture?
Since it’s obvious no information can be gleaned from the HuffPo article or our friendly Tweeter, let’s click the HuffPo link to the actual website explaining the bill (now law?):
An initiation of Legislation to enact the Abortion Insurance Opt-Out Act. The initiated law would require the purchase of coverage for elective abortion in a health care plan to be by an optional rider only; require notice to employees for whom elective abortion coverage is purchased by their employer; and provide penalties for violations of this act.
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN ENACT:
Sec. 1. This act shall be known and may be cited as the “Abortion Insurance Opt-Out Act.”
Sec. 2. A qualified health plan offered through an American health benefit exchange in this state pursuant to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, Public Law 111-148, as amended by the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010, Public Law 111-152, shall not provide coverage for elective abortion. This section does not prohibit an individual, organization, or employer participating in a qualified health plan offered through an American health benefit exchange in this state from purchasing supplemental coverage for elective abortion outside of the exchange by an optional rider as provided in this act.
Sec. 3. An expense-incurred hospital, medical or surgical policy or certificate, or health care corporation group or nongroup certificate delivered, issued for delivery, or renewed in this state, or a health maintenance organization group or individual contract offered outside of an American health benefit exchange shall provide coverage for elective abortion only by an optional rider for which an additional premium has been paid by the purchaser.
Sec. 4. An employer may purchase an optional rider to provide coverage for elective abortion if the employer provides notice to each employee that elective abortion will be included as a rider to his or her health coverage and that the coverage may be used by a covered dependent without notice to the employee.
Everyone see that? I included the screen shot just so there could be no excuse for the HuffPo writer’s falsehood: This is about not having tax dollars used to fund abortions. This doesn’t “force” anyone to buy “rape insurance,” except in the sense that the government “forces” me to donate to my church (since the government won’t use tax dollars to support it).
Now, in light of what this law actually does, you can see just how absurd our original Tweeting friend is.
How can we even rationally discuss politics if people are throwing around words in this fashion? And is it really so inconceivable that some people might object to having their tax dollars used to pay for what they honestly believe is the killing of babies?
Normally I don’t like to discuss abortion but ObamaCare has sort of forced this upon us, hasn’t it?
“And is it really so inconceivable that some people might object to having their tax dollars used to pay for what they honestly believe is the killing of babies?”
I don’t want my tax dollars going to drone bombing wedding parties in the Middle East (http://www.latimes.com/world/worldnow/la-fg-wn-yemen-drone-strike-wedding-20131213,0,4137970.story), either, but that doesn’t stop the pigs in government from stealing my money to do just that.
Remember all those Mcdonald’s workers who are “forced” to work at their current wage levels? They are the modern slaves comparable to those in the Antebellum South!
Or those adjunct professors of “my favorite topic” studies who “have to” work for so little. Why don’t we have the same outrage at the low pay of video game testers?
I really have seen complaints about the low pay of male porn stars. AND they have to endure all that objectification.
Find any blog/site/forum related to the video game industry populated by mostly left-of-center folks and there absolutely is. I’ve seen *plenty* of cries for increased government regulation of game testers on such websites…
“And is it really so inconceivable that some people might object to having their tax dollars used to pay for what they honestly believe is the killing of babies?”
No. But you need to understand that is a feature not a bug. I am not joking in the least. “Smell the glove” is a HUGE part of the appeal of provisions like that. The Huffpo guy knows what he wrote isn’t actually true;so do his readers. It is not functionally a factual claim at all, it is a taunt. The truth of it is irrelevant if they can snort and chortle over it. They will view your persnickety insistence on accuracy as missing the point. And in a way it does.
If you’re on Twitter Ken B., you should check out my exchange with Noah Smith on this. You will see your theory confirmed.
Ken B. without being too vulgar, what do you mean by “smell the glove”? I tried googling and all I get is the Spinal Tap reference, so I don’t know exactly what you mean in a political context.
I mean what the spinal tap reference is to. the victim is made to sniff the (leather) glove that will be used when whipping him; its an act of submission, “you’ll take it and like it”. its a bdsm sex thing, here used as a way to characterize an attitude. “make you my [female dog]” catches a similar idea.
You are probably correct that inside the “Progressive” circle-jerk fantasy they are making themselves feel big by imagining their victim in submission.
The sad thing is the supposedly intended victims don’t actually get it, and they just see it as a load of dishonest propaganda. That’s certainly how I see it.
After a while you stop even bothering to look up the references, because those guys talk shit so often that the chance of this time being different is small… and I’m not going to live forever. If they want to also picture themselves as masters, then as Hillary Clinton would say, “What difference does it make?”
Tel,
Today humanity is plagued with 2 things. Rampant egoism and the compulsion to argue(talk shit.) Sounds like you have learned to walk past these bad behaviors and enjoy your life ( as much as possible in an unfree world.)
“The Huffpo guy knows what he wrote isn’t actually true;so do his readers. It is not functionally a factual claim at all, it is a taunt. The truth of it is irrelevant if they can snort and chortle over it. They will view your persnickety insistence on accuracy as missing the point. And in a way it does.”
You’re giving that “HuffPo guy” way too much credit. The psychopathic progressives who circle the HuffPo like flies around horse manure, are the types of people who believe as true that an absence of government coercion, is the real coercion against individuals who must fend for themselves, and, by the same token, government coercion is not coercion at all if it is for “a good cause.”
They are the types of people who believe that if the government doesn’t finance birth control at the taxpayer’s expense, then they are coercing women into becoming pregnant. They believe that if the government doesn’t finance, at the taxpayers expense, brainwashing institutions for children, i.e. public schools, then they are coercing children and modest income families into impoverishment.
So the Michigan law prevents bundling of insurance.
In which case, why not make it specifically an anti-bundling law and split up insurance into all sorts of categories and force them to be priced as line items? Why make a big deal over abortion?
In the case of insurance, I think anti-bundling is a good idea, because the item prices provide more information and more control to the buyer. However, deciding on sensible splits for the categories would require some medical expertise. I’m sure it could be done.
Because, according to these politicos, it is very important that my desire to not have to fund what I consider baby killing be recognized, but not my desire to not fund your general healthcare, the killing of wedding parties in the Middle East, or the generally accepted protection racket headquartered in Washington DC.
“Alright, you don’t have to fund baby killing, but you DO have to fund mass murder, protection rackets, and age-based Ponzi schemes! Ah, compromise is grand, right?”
When I think of the word “force” in political discourse, I generally tend to think of it as referring to requirement, not necessarily physical force.
When I think of force in political discourse, I always track back the root of motivation. If all paths lead you to the end of a government gun, then indeed, it is force.
Suppose I choose not to abide by actions you call requirements.
Now what?
I have discussions with left leaning Canadians. They say ridiculous thing about America and Americans in the same tone as this twit. I point out even huge errors –like Canada has higher violent crime rate –and it never ever makes a difference.
Oops a typo. I must have meant tweet not twit. Or maybe some other short word starting tw and ending in t, if any such exist.
The abortion debate is one that consistently mystifies me. On the one side you have people saying essentially,
“I honestly think that is a baby and that preventing its live birth is the same as murder outside the womb.”
and then you have other people saying essentially,
“No, you don’t, you just hate one half of the human race so much, you want them constantly inconvenienced by pregnancies.”
Just the conceptualization of such a worldview, leaving behind the consideration of that concept, and the decision to give it voice, reminds me of a scene from the movie Street Fighter, when upon viewing a television broadcast of a bomb countdown happening close-by, a henchman says,
“Quick! Change the channel!”
Same category of stupidity.
Sec. 4. An employer may purchase an optional rider to provide coverage for elective abortion if the employer provides notice to each employee that elective abortion will be included as a rider to his or her health coverage and that the coverage may be used by a covered dependent without notice to the employee.
This seems like insanity. I know a lot of pro-choice, left-wing, feminist-supporting guys out there, but I can’t imagine there’s a long line of men saying “Gee, I wish I could pay more for my health insurance so that I can get coverage that allows my wife (or daughter I guess) to get an abortion without telling me about it.” Is there really a demand for this sort of service?