Abortion: Rights and Responsibilities

The following article is written by Paul Raynault, a member of the Ethical Culture Society of Bergen County. It is presented as part of our Members Forum series. We welcome all comments and hope that this article and other articles in this series will stimulate a lively dialog among members and friends.

Everyone has heard the saying – with rights come responsibilities.

Unfortunately this is often forgotten in the discussion about abortion. Some people ascribe an absolute right to the fetus’s existence and others ascribe an absolute right to an abortion at any time.

Of course any absolute right will eventually conflict with other rights. The absolute right of free speech conflicts with the responsibility not to yell fire in a crowded theater just for fun. Similarly the rights of the fetus to exist and the right of a woman to exercise control over her body need to be tempered with a measure of responsibility.

What is the extent of a pregnant woman’s responsibility to a fetus? When and how does that responsibility start and how long does it last? This different perspective on such a complex issue may lead to decisions that provide a more acceptable balance between conflicting rights.

The objective of this paper is to develop a set of guidelines for abortion that are reasonable and based on the highest human ethical standards. These standards could then be incorporated in the discussion we have with our children, both as parents and in our Sunday School.

Please read the following and take part in this grand dialog by sending your comments.

Responsibility and Abortion

Background
Abortion is a very, very emotional, complicated subject. How can I, as a male, be able to address this in a way that captures all the subtleties of the situation? The first step was to show the original proposal to a wide range of people (mainly females) with varied backgrounds and positions favoring one or the other side. They have provided excellent perspectives and pointed suggestions, which I’ve tried to incorporate in this version, causing it to double in size.

Abortion, Sex and Female Rights
Any discussion of abortion must acknowledge that it is not a standalone subject. People’s views on abortion are strongly related to their views about sex and female/ male relations. Hopefully this proposed approach can be accepted by people with widely varying views about these related topics, allowing a consensus to develop between people who might disagree on these other issues.

This proposal is strictly about abortion, about when it might be justified and when it should not occur. This does not address the closely related issue of sexual relations that lead to pregnancy, although examining that from a responsibility viewpoint may also be helpful.

Current Status
Abortion is one of the most difficult concepts to discuss because facts and emotions are so strongly intertwined. Sincere, well-meaning people have been struggling with this issue for a long time.

Currently there are three basic approaches to abortion:

1. A complete ban – Based on the concept that the fetus before birth has as much right to live, or at least not to be actively killed, as any human after birth.
2. Unlimited abortion at any time – Based on the concept that the mother has a right to control her body and cannot be forced to care for an unwanted fetus.
3. A restricted right to abortion – Most people are uncomfortable with both extremes so they choose a varied, almost arbitrary, set of restrictions on abortions, short of a full ban.

Actual Practice by Country
The general world wide acceptance of each of these three options is indicated to some extent by how many countries choose each (see Appendix 1 for details of abortion options by country):

Option Number of Countries
Unlimited abortion 27
Some restrictions 92
Only if woman’s life in danger 68
Complete Ban 5
==
Total 192

Ambivalence between Two Principles
The large number of countries with some restrictions and the wide range of restrictions illustrate how ambivalent people are about these two important concerns – the rights of a fetus to exist and the rights of a woman to not be forced to care for an unwanted fetus.

The two extremes of no abortions and unlimited abortions are based on clear guidelines. The third option of restricted access to abortions is the one that most people intuitively favor but for which there are currently no clearly articulated philosophical or biological guidelines.

Two Conflicting Principals

Value of the Fetus
Philosophers and religious thinkers have long grappled with the issue of when does life begin and what is the status of the fetus. There is obviously an unbroken chain of development from when an egg and sperm come together until about 14 years later when the resulting human can start the cycle again by contributing an egg or a sperm. There is also a clear transition when the fetus leaves the mother.

Peter Singer, a well known philosophy professor at Princeton, has highlighted how arbitrary is birth as the point when human life starts by postulating a rule – any entity that has not reached a level of development that shows self consciousness can be killed. In 1979 he wrote, “Human babies are not born self-aware, or capable of grasping that they exist over time. They are not persons.” As a result, he says, “the life of a newborn is of less value than the life of a pig, a dog, or a chimpanzee.” He goes on to state, “The liberal search for a morally crucial dividing line between the newborn baby and the fetus has failed to yield any event or stage of development that can bear the weight of separating those with a right to life from those who lack such a right.”

In other words, there really is no bright line between the last few minutes in the womb and the first few minutes after birth. In his view, late term abortion is consistent with infanticide for at least the first month after birth. He uses this as a reason to support abortion and infanticide. Others might use the same reasoning to support a ban on all abortions, as an extension of the ban on infanticide.

There are four general approaches to valuing a fetus:

1. Those who put a value equal to that of a child, precluding all abortions
2. Those who put no value, justifying abortion at any time for any reason
3. Those who are reluctant to address the issue because they are afraid any discussion will lead down a slippery slope that ends with a ban on all abortions
4. Those who try to grapple with the issue, try to find an approach that puts a high value on the fetus while not precluding all abortions

Partial rights are possible. For instance, a pet is considered to have some rights, such as the right not to be tortured. Similarly, if a person is suffering strong pain from a terminal condition, there is a generally recognized right to not prolong the life through extraordinary means. These analogies may help determine how a fetus should be treated.

Woman’s Rights
The most extreme example of a woman being forced to do something is to preclude an abortion in the case of rape. The woman clearly had no say in the matter, yet she is forced to carry a fetus to term. Those who believe a fetus is deserving of full protection would argue that the harm done to the mother being forced to carry to term is less than the harm done to killing/aborting a fetus. This is probably the most direct example of the conflict between a woman’s right to choose and a fetus’s right to life.

Responsibility
An alternative approach is to consider responsibility rather than rights. What is the extent of a pregnant woman’s responsibility to a fetus? When and how does that responsibility start and how long does it last? This different perspective on such a complex issue may lead to decisions that provide a more acceptable balance between conflicting views. The objective is to develop a set of guidelines that are reasonable and based on the highest human ethical standards, guidelines we would gladly pass on to our children and friends.

(See Appendix 2 for a brief discussion of Responsibility in general.)

Alternative Based on Responsibility

Basic Principle
The responsibility approach provides a bright line based not on how far along the fetus has developed but on whether someone has taken responsibility for its life while it is unable to function on its own.

A woman who accidentally becomes pregnant would decide, as soon as she finds out she is pregnant, whether she wants to take responsibility for that fetus or not. If she does not want the responsibility, there may be two options:

• If technology permits, transfer the fetus to another woman or to an artificial womb.
• If not, secure an abortion immediately to minimize the development of the fetus.

If, through inaction or a positive decision, she takes responsibility for that fetus, she should not later change her mind and abandon the fetus just because it is inconvenient. She should continue caring for the fetus until the point where medical technology allows the fetus to survive outside her body.

Exception – Life in Danger
If her life is in danger, she has a primary responsibility to herself. But she should not use the issue of inconvenience or reduced income or other lesser reasons to change her mind. Any physical or mental health impact exception must be narrowly construed or it ends up justifying abortion for any reason.

Deliberate Pregnancy
By contrast if a woman is actively trying to become pregnant, then she should start immediately with the responsibility for any resulting fetus.

Malformed Fetus
If the fetus does not develop properly, then the issue becomes more complex. Two clear guidelines:

• Serious deformities can be compared to a situation where a person is suffering and cannot live without life support. These are cases where society accepts pulling the plug. The same is true of strongly deformed fetuses – a woman can stop helping the fetus to live.
• Mild deformities should not be considered as a good reason, just as they are not for humans.

Between these two extremes many difficult situations will need to be decided case by case.

Find Out
Women who have sexual intercourse are responsible for monitoring their situation. For instance, a woman should take responsibility to find out if she is pregnant by seeing a doctor or taking a pregnancy test if she misses two periods within her normal menstrual cycle or exhibits other signs.

Immediately
What is immediately? One to two weeks after finding out should normally be enough time for a woman to make this serious, possibly very emotional, decision whether to schedule an abortion. Local conditions as to availability of abortion would determine how soon it could occur.

Summary
Abortion would be appropriate to anyone who:

• Finds out she is unexpectedly pregnant and acts quickly to schedule an abortion.
• Is in danger of serious personal harm from the pregnancy.
• Has a fetus with significant defects.

Abortion would not be appropriate to someone who:

• Deliberately gets pregnant.
• Waits more than one or two weeks to make a decision to abort after finding out she is pregnant.
• Changes her mind later due to changed circumstances, such as work, finances or inconvenience.

Resolution of Conflicting Goals

The Fetus:

• Full protection as soon as it has been accepted by the mother.
• If the mother deliberately conceives, the fetus is deemed accepted immediately.
• If the conception is an accident, it is either ended immediately or accepted.
• No fetus would develop more than a few weeks after discovery without gaining full protection or being terminated.

The Mother:

• Full right to control the decision at inception.
• If conception is accidental, she has the right to accept or reject responsibility.

Impact of Responsibility Approach
Consider the list of reasons often used for justifying abortion compared to the responsibility approach:

Reasons Often Cited: Responsibility approach

• On demand - no restriction: Restricted to a short period after discovery
• Woman’s life at risk : Any time
• Physical health : Any time if health effect is serious, narrowly construed
• Mental health : Any time if mental effect is serious, narrowly construed
• Rape: Restricted to a short period after discovery
• Fetal defects: Any time if defect is serious, narrowly construed

Three Views
Those who put high value on the fetus and less value on a woman’s right to decide may be willing to accept abortion under these circumstances, where the value of the fetus is not questioned, only the issue of responsibility. Some will still claim that a pregnant woman must take responsibility even if the pregnancy is accidental. Hopefully, many of those who value the fetus will also be willing to consider that responsibility should not so quickly be forced on a person.

Similarly those who put a high value on a woman’s rights and relatively low value on a fetus will not see the need for any restrictions. Hopefully, many of those will agree that once a woman deliberately accepts responsibility to nurture a fetus, it gains value and it should not so easily be terminated on a whim or change of heart.

The vast majority, looking for some reasonable basis for deciding, should feel more comfortable that the responsibility rule is grounded in concrete human reality that respects both the right of the woman to decide and the right of the fetus to a quick, irrevocable decision.

Open Issues:
This approach needs to be developed further to see how it might help illuminate related issues:

• Age of responsibility – Who decides for a 12 or 14 year old?
• Fetal deformity – How much impairment justifies aborting?
• How much should a woman’s health be affected to justify abortion? For instance, if a woman has frequent headaches, is that sufficient?
• Male position – What is the father’s role or responsibility? Could the father make a decision to avoid responsibility at the beginning, as a woman could, or is the father bound by the decision of the mother?

Summary
Free to choose, but once the choice made, live with the consequences.

Action

How would this approach be implemented?
There are three levels of action possible:

1. Personal
2. Social
3. Governmental

Personal
The easiest, most important and most direct action would be for each individual to internalize this approach and act on it whenever a situation arises that involves a decision about abortion. Parents should also expose their children to this view.

Social
The next level is to discuss this approach with family and friends. Ideas like this cannot be imposed from above. They are best spread through one on one or small discussion groups. It is sufficiently different that it needs extensive exposure to many people before it will be accepted as a social norm.

The second type of social action is a negative one of showing very firm disagreement with someone who disagrees, to the point of reducing social interaction. Such social approval or disapproval is the most effective way of causing social change.

This means that one should express strong disagreement with both sides:

• Those who are in favor of a total ban
• Those who favor unlimited abortion

Governmental
In the United States, unlimited rights to abortions were decided by the Supreme Court, rather than by the normal democratic process. This has led to an ongoing polarization between the three groups who favor complete ban, limited access and unlimited access to abortions. However this dialog is not being conducted directly, but rather through conflict over Supreme Court appointments.

It would be a mistake to try to legislate any change. Instead it should be given a chance to spread socially. No government agency or medical association should monitor and control individuals' private behavior. People should internalize proper procedures and act responsibly.

Slippery Slope
This idea needs an opportunity to develop in more detail through dialog and experience. It would be a mistake to rush to firm action at this early stage.

Both those in favor of abortion and those opposed generally reject any move toward a middle position because they are afraid that any such move will slide into the more extreme position they oppose.

Thus an especially important point is to show that taking this step does not lead to a slippery slope that would justify other unintended action.

Discussion

The rest of this write-up covers several items that arose from email dialog. More such interaction would help both flesh out this proposal and provide more detail.

Comparison to a First Trimester Rule
The most common approach in countries with partial restrictions is to allow unlimited abortion in the first trimester while severely restricting it thereafter. As a practical matter, such an approach is very similar to this approach based on responsibility.

If a woman waits till missing two periods, then takes two weeks to decide, then schedules an abortion for say two weeks in the future, the abortion is effectively almost at the end of the first trimester. Since most cases will be judged based on the word of the woman, women can also exaggerate to definitely have an abortion any time in the first trimester.

Status of Fetus

• The first trimester refers to the age of the fetus, implicitly assuming there is some line crossed after one trimester. The responsibility rule is based on the action, or inaction of the mother. She must make a positive decision to “walk away” very quickly or take responsibility by default.
• The first trimester rule is an unrestricted right. The responsibility rule precludes abortion if a person deliberately conceives. Again, the orientation is not on the fetus but rather on the woman to decide.
• The status of the fetus is much higher under the responsibility rule. The fetus is considered important enough that once someone takes responsibility, she cannot change her mind, even in the first trimester. This heightened acceptance of the value of the fetus will help society accept some abortion without needing to allow more deliberate mistreatments of the helpless, i.e., the slippery slope concern.

Social
Most people have friends or relatives in whom they confide. If the responsibility rule becomes a well respected social norm, a woman who lies will still have to face the impact to her reputation. In most societies, reputation is often a significant factor in being able to function effectively. Thus the social restrictions would be stronger than any legal rules in making sure that abortion was done responsibly.

A third party such as the husband may be in a position to be an effective witness to any dispute whether the woman is being truthful. For instance, if the man and woman had planned a pregnancy, and then the woman changed her mind, the man would know and may tell others.

Personal/ Moral
Most people live by a personal code of conduct and suffer considerable internal anguish when they violate it deliberately, especially when it is for somewhat selfish ends. If the concept of personal responsibility and value of a fetus becomes internalized, women are more likely to accept this guide to behavior. They are less likely to lie for personal convenience after accepting responsibility.

As it is, many women have strong reservations about having an abortion where it is legal and there are no social norms. There are many stories of how some women regret such decisions later. If a woman first decided to assume responsibility for a fetus and later changed her mind and lied about it to her friends, she would have even more anguish since she would have two regrets – changing her mind and lying about it. If, however, she decided firmly at the first opportunity to have an abortion, she would be less likely to suffer future regrets, because she acted responsibly and followed accepted norms.

Male Role
Clearly there is an asymmetry between the male and female roles in deciding about abortion. The male generally has the responsibility to support the female financially and emotionally during pregnancy. However, this responsibility is similar to that of the mother, i.e., it cannot be forced on the father. The father must decide at the beginning, in the same way the mother does, whether he wants to take that responsibility or not. If he decides to, he cannot change his mind until the child is born.

Because the female has the more complicated situation, the final decision should rest with the mother. However the mother will likely be strongly influenced by the views of the father in most situations. Certainly if they intend to stay together, they need to agree on a decision on such a major issue. Even if they are not staying together, the mother may still be strongly influenced by the extent to which the father intends to support the pregnancy, especially financial support.

The most important responsibility of the male is to make sure that the decision is made on a timely basis. The male should not procrastinate or hinder the female but rather should encourage the female to decide promptly.

After it is born, a female is allowed to give the baby up for adoption, rather than care for it. A male has no such rights. If the mother chooses to keep the baby, the father must provide child support and cannot put the baby up for adoption. Conversely, the father could take sole custody but cannot force the mother to provide any support. There is a lack of symmetry that could be better resolved if the concept of accepting responsibility was used as the starting point.

External Inducements
Deciding whether to have an abortion can be influenced by external factors. For instance, those who place a high premium on minimizing abortions may want to offer financial or social inducements to influence the decision. Similarly, in a climate of overpopulation, those trying to limit births may also want to provide inducements to have the abortion by making it free, for instance. The government in China strongly encourages abortions because of a fear of overpopulation. The governments in France and Italy provide major inducements not to abort because of a fear of declining population.

Slippery Slope
Does this approach imply that the right to life depends on someone taking responsibility for you? There are two aspects to a right – negative and positive. The negative right to life means no one can deliberately end your life. The positive right to life means supplying all the necessary resources when you cannot supply them yourself. Most societies do not force individuals to feed the hungry or care for the homeless. Governments in richer countries often supply such support. As a result, an individual’s right to life is not an absolute imposition on other individuals. You can walk by a destitute person and not inquire as to whether help is needed without being punished. People do die of starvation in Asia or Africa and no one in Europe, Japan or North America feels any need to take personal responsibility.

So the answer is that this approach to caring for a fetus has strong similarities to caring for any being that is unable to function alone. There is no absolute requirement that an individual care for a stranger. By extension, even though the fetus is not quite a stranger, this approach is based on the concept that it has no more rights to life than an indigent or incapacitated stranger. When someone starts caring for a stranger, the moral calculus changes. The same is true for a fetus.

Viability
A related concern is that the issue of viability should not determine whether a life should be preserved. This is partly discussed in the quotations from Peter Singer. This is also why there is no discussion in this approach as to whether a fetus is a human, or a proto human or any other label. Instead the basis is that a fetus deserves the same consideration as a stranger. If you start taking responsibility for a stranger, you cannot loosely change your mind and walk away. The fetus is entitled to the same respect because of
• its status as an aspiring human, and
• its initial acceptance by the mother.

Status of Fetus
Those who want to ban all abortions may view this approach negatively, since it does allow abortion. They could also view it positively because it has two important features:

• It limits abortions, especially post first term abortions.
• It is more likely to be widely accepted, while a complete ban is highly unlikely.
• It recognizes the status of the fetus as deserving protection.

Allowing abortion is sometimes characterized as starting down a slippery slope, similar to legalizing marijuana. However this approach provides a very different perspective that blocks all such simple minded reasoning as it actively recognizes the status of the fetus as deserving protection. This can only help society develop guidelines for the status of all that need help to survive, including the helplessly ill.

Unlimited Abortions
By contrast, those who support unlimited abortions may find this approach as too burdensome to a woman. They have developed a position that the fetus has no rights under any circumstance and only exists at the will of the woman. Their approach justifies partial birth abortion, where a fetus that could survive outside the womb is deliberately ended because its life is at the sole discretion of the mother.

Clearly the emphasis on responsibility developed here is incompatible with such a view.

Personal Statement

I believe strongly in personal responsibility, but I also believe strongly that a community needs to have a dialog on what is acceptable behavior. There is much value in hearing from one’s neighbor on confusing subjects and is a motivating factor to attend Sunday platforms.

My first goal would be to start such a dialog on this proposed way to reconcile what I would hope are two fundamental ethical principals – the rights of the individual and the rights of the least viable members of the community.

I recognize that the fetus is alive and is developing towards becoming but is not quite the same as after birth. I also try to bring out that a fetus is not magically a full human the day after birth and a non entity, deserving of partial birth abortion even though it might be viable, the day before birth. I don’t believe the change in the status of the fetus happens suddenly, but rather it is a constantly evolving status.

This is not a call to ban or endorse abortion, but rather a call to emphasize the teachings of responsibility, of the need to balance objectives when they are in conflict and the need to put a reasonably high value on the fetus as well as not forcing responsibility unreasonably.

I realize that in the political atmosphere in the US, some people feel strongly that assigning any value to a fetus is a slippery slope that could lead to a total ban on abortions. I am strongly urging people to try to go beyond such concerns and honestly engage in a discussion about the fetus.

Some believe a woman’s rights to have an abortion are absolute. As a practical matter, there are not many partial birth abortions and they are usually because of extreme health risk. But the relative frequency of this procedure does not negate the issue that currently in the US it is justified in all circumstances, even if it is the whim of the mother.

Others believe that the right to life of a fetus is absolute. They would force all women to carry to term, even those who were raped. Again, I would deny that a woman can be forced to care for a fetus that was not deliberately planned or responsibility taken, at least through inaction.

The issues of morning after pills are ideal from my vantage as they minimize the time of fetal growth.

My ideal objective would be to have various Leaders teach this concept, and especially that it is taught to our teens. When teens ask for suggestions about this subject, this viewpoint should be brought to their attention, as a possible way to respect nascent life while also not forcing a burden on someone.

There are obviously right ways and wrong ways to approach our teens, but they cannot be left alone to face this issue. Otherwise why have a Sunday School? It is well recognized that children are eager to learn from others. After they have heard, they can decide. But they should not be expected to decide in a vacuum. They deserve hearing what humans have thought about ethical issues over the centuries.

There is a tradition of not punishing those who are insane because they are not responsible. Similarly, some people are forcibly committed for insanity. I believe these techniques are often overused, that the decision that someone is not responsible for actions should be very rarely invoked. Similarly, I believe that teenagers should not have their views overturned by their parents or legal guardians so easily. I also believe that the teen years are a time of transition, so teens should be required to hear their parents thinking on a subject before making a decision.

Appendix 1 – Worldwide Abortion Practices

The 192 countries who report their abortion rules were evaluated based on this list:

• On Demand – no restriction
• Woman’s Life
• Physical Health
• Mental Health
• Rape
• Fetal Defects
• Socio Economic

(See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_law)

Very easy rules for abortions

On Demand – Some countries allow abortions for any reason:
At any time: 27 (includes the U.S., Canada, Australia and China)
In first two trimesters: 1 (Singapore)
In first trimester : 29 (includes France, Italy, Russia and Germany)
No reason needed: 57

Of the rest, several accept almost any of the reasons listed above:
Any reason of 6 listed above 9 (includes Japan, Great Britain and India)
Any reason except Economic : 12 (includes Spain and Israel)
Any reason except Rape : 2 (Belize, Zambia)
Almost any reason allowed: 23

Very restrictive rules for abortions

Full ban on all abortions 5 (includes Chile, El Salvador and Vatican City)

Some ban abortions except to protect a woman’s life:
Restricted protection, woman’s life: 15 (includes Egypt and South Korea)
Only woman’s life in first trimester: 5
Only woman’s life: 48 (includes 19 African countries and Ireland)
Only woman’s life: 68

Variety of reasons for abortions

None of the others allow abortions on demand or for Social or Economic reasons
All allow abortions if the mother’s life or physical health is at risk
All allow one or more of the following reasons:

Mental Health
Yes: 25
No: 4
Not Specified: 10
Total: 39

Rape
Yes: 9
No: 30
Not Specified: 0
Total: 39

Fetal Defects
Yes: 3
No: 36
Not Specified: 0
Total: 39

Variety of reasons 39
===
All Countries 192

Appendix 2 – Aspects of Responsibility

What does Responsibility mean?
Being responsible means being held to account for the consequences of your action or inaction with respect to a particular situation, object or person. You can’t blame others or say you didn’t care.

How do you become responsible?
You become responsible when you actively follow the steps of taking on responsibility or fail to decline responsibility when there is a chance to do so. Taking responsibility is a personal decision.

When is responsibility not true responsibility?
You cannot be forced to take responsibility in this sense. Forced responsibility is only an obligation to avoid the consequences of being personally hurt. It ends as soon as the threat of force ends. Then you have the choice of voluntarily continuing the action and thus taking true responsibility or not.

What are the resulting obligations?
Although there are limits to responsibility, such as putting your own life at risk, generally acting responsibly means at a minimum taking steps to prevent serious harm to the party or object involved, even if such steps are costly in time, energy or resources.

How can you back out?
Once responsible, you are obliged to continue until the situation no longer involves the potential for harm or you can find someone else who is able and willing to take it over. You cannot just abandon a person because you are tired or just feel like it without making alternative arrangements.

What if you act irresponsibly?
If you have taken on a responsibility and then try to shirk it, you are liable for significant consequences:

• Legally – under some circumstances you may be open to a lawsuit or criminal charges.
• Socially – your reputation would be very strongly affected. Since reputation is so central to normal life, this negative reputation could affect your work, your friends and your family relations.
• Personally – most people have a social conscience that they have to live with. Shirking responsibility, especially if it caused serious harm, would affect most people very directly.

Can you avoid responsibility?
You can deliberately walk by a situation and avoid all involvement. However, this also has its downside. The penalties are minor compared to shirking responsibility after taking it, but not zero, especially if it is not obvious that anyone else knows about the situation or can act in a reasonable time. The minimum responsibility in such cases is to at least inform others to see if there is an alternative.

Examples
Children, Elder or Sick Relatives, Friends
Generally you have a responsibility as soon as you are aware that someone close to you needs help, just by nature of your relation. At a minimum, you must make it clear as soon as possible that you do not intend to take on such responsibility, to allow others to do so.

Good Samaritan - Strangers
By contrast, you do not have any inherent responsibility to a stranger. However, if you are near someone in trouble and stop to offer help and the help is accepted, then you have an obligation to carry through or find someone else who will. You cannot start helping, decide you are too busy or it takes too much effort and just walk away, leaving that person in the lurch. Once you decide to be involved, you have taken on a responsibility that you cannot easily shirk.

Why the World Needs Ethical Culture

The following article is written by Beth Stein, a member of the Ethical Culture Society of Bergen County. It is presented as part of our Members Forum series. We welcome all comments and hope that this article and other articles in this series will stimulate a lively dialog among members and friends.

Although I am not a big fan of TV, I always look forward to sitting down for “60 Minutes” every Sunday night. Last night however, I saw something truly appalling and it wasn’t the war in Iraq, terrorism or global warming, but something much more insidious. I am referring to the segment about a new trend in crime – beating up on the homeless.

In this shocking piece, which I am sure many of you saw, Ed Bradley interviews one of three teenage boys, now in prison, responsible for the beating and killing of a homeless man, whom they discovered living in the woods near their homes.

When asked why they did this, the teen replied, “I don’t know …it was exciting …it was fun”.

More disturbing, according to this story, has been the recent rise in this type of crime against the homeless, who are often attacked when they are asleep and at their most vulnerable.

According to “60 Minutes,” one of the possible causes for the increase in these crimes has been linked to a series of DVDs called “Bumfights,” produced by a 23-year old “entrepreneur” with a video camera who persuades homeless people to do all sorts of harmful and humiliating things on camera for five dollars or a six-pack of beer. When interviewed by Ed Bradley, this young film-maker, who shockingly has earned over $1 million in profits from this series, seemed to have little regret. Yes, he agreed, it is degrading to homeless people, but he said he did not put a gun to anyone’s head to be in the film. The “bums” are plentiful and willing to do just about anything for a little alcohol and people think it’s pretty entertaining, so what’s wrong with that?, he argued. But no, he denied that his films were responsible for the recent outbreak of attacks on homeless people by young men across the country.

After my initial repugnance settled a bit, I kept replaying in my mind all that I had just viewed and came to the conclusion that perhaps I agreed with the film-maker in that “Bumfights” was not the cause of these crimes but only a symptom of the very sick society in which we live today. While I am sure that these films may have provided the impetus in some cases, it is the fact that so many copies of them were sold in the first place that speaks volumes to me.

Because Mr. Bradley did not give us any insight into the backgrounds of the teenagers who committed the crime shown, one can only make suppositions as to the kind of family environments in which they were raised. Furthermore, in a world where war and terrorism and the killing of innocent people are daily fare, it is not a huge leap to see where a random act of violence against an “insignificant bum” fits onto the plate.

All of this made me keep thinking about Ethical Culture, our Sunday school and how our children are being raised. How I can feel good about knowing that these children are being raised to value human life. How a sense of connectedness and community is encouraged in a world where kids spend so much time on the computer or in front of a TV that they don’t know even know how to play together much less talk to each other. How extra-curricular activities include feeding the homeless, not beating them.

In short, I can only say that our Sunday School students give me some comfort and hope for the future of a society that is in great need of more humanists.

It reaffirms my belief that joining our Society was the best gift I could give to my child — and the world — and hope that we will be successful in getting others to join us as we strive to make this a better place for all of us.

Non-fiction Book Group Recommendations

(Submitted for Mary B.)
Several weeks ago I said that I would send the two of you names of books I have recently read, books that I would like to discuss with others.

It all started with:

1. Ferguson, N. (2002) Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the Lessons for Global Power. New York: Basic Books. Some of Ferguson's articles in The New York Times motivated me to read this book. I also wanted to consolidate what I knew about the British colonies. I finished the book while flying to Zurich on Labor Day, 2005, and groaned audibly with disappointment as I closed the book. The man sitting next to me heard that groan, questioned me, and then suggested I read other books by the same title. (It turned out he was a Princeton professor.) Even though I disagreed with his thesis, Ferguson does a fine job with the histories of various colonies.

2. Hardt, M. and Negri, A. (2000). Empire. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. These authors distinguish between the British colonialism and today's empire that draws upon the U.S. Constitution and ideas related to hybrid identities and expanding frontiers.

3. _________. (2004). Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire. New York: Penguin Books. The authors pick up where the first book left off and argue that the US and its allies so control the world that the needs and interests of the multitudes cannot be heard in political arenas. Thus, they are not heard; their concerns are not dealt with. That's why multitudes take over the commons at times: the WTO meetings; the torchings in France, etc.

4. Pitts, J. (2005). A Turn to Empire: The Rise of Imperial Liberalism in Britain and France. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Pitts traces philosophic thought from Adam Smith, Edmund Berke, Jeremy Bentham, James Mills, John Stuart Mills, and Tocqueville in regard to colonialism and shows how the thinking dramatically changed. James Mills, John Stuart Mills, and Tocqueville trivialized natives living in places like India, China, the West Indies, and Algeria and came to believe that the despotism found in British and France colonialism was necessary to establish a European government and civilization in such places.

5. Mehta, U. S. (1999). Liberalism and Empire: A Study in Nineteenth-Century British Liberal Thought. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Mehta argues that the imposition of European rational thought, utilitarianism, and the liberalism of the colonial period resulted in despotism. These thought patterns, assumed to be universal, were unable to accommodate the strange and the unfamiliar. He believes phenomenological and hermeneutic approaches should have been taken.

6. Weaver, M.A. (2000). A Portrait of Egypt: A Journey Through the World of Militant Islam.New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. Mubarak and the blind Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, now imprisoned in solitary confinement for life in NYC, were born only miles apart in one of the poorest parts of Egypt. One became Egypt's political leader; the other, disturbed about deep, unending poverty, became a sheikh, developing his own militaristic philosophy of how to change the world and teaching his ideas to Osama bin Laden, leaders in Somalia, and elsewhere. This book provides an excellent background to help explain what is going on in the world today.

My cousin, who lives in Cairo and works for the Department of Antiquities there, sent me this book just before I went to Egypt. It was, indeed, an eye-opener, leading me to ask many questions and to go many places beyond where the tour went.

The above books provide an understanding or a set of different lenses through which to view what is going on in today's world.

The Ethical Society Without Walls

Here's a link to the newly created Ethical Society Without Walls. According to an article about the site published in this month's Dialogue, the site was developed as a way of providing Ethical Culture community to people not associated with an Ethical Culture Society. It's a neat site containing discussion forums, platform addresses, resources for social action and ways for members to connect with each other. Check out the site, and if you know of anyone who might be interested in Ethical Culture, but doesn't live close to an Ethical Society, invite them to visit the site.

Our tv ad is posted to You Tube and Google Video

Here’s our commercial –-- Does anyone know why static got tagged on the end? Same with the Google Video, but not on the file I uploaded. Please let me know if you have any ideas.

We've got company..

...in the blogosphere. The Brooklyn Society for Ethical Culture now has an unofficial blog which you can visit here.

It would be terrific if we could find a way to use these blogs (and the internet, in general) to forge stronger connections and dialogues between ethical societies and other fellow humanists.

An Important Event

On Sunday, October 15, 2006 is a very special event at the Bergen County Ethical Culture Society at 687 Larch Avenue in Teaneck. From 11 AM - 12:15 PM, there will be a panel discussion about the humanitarian aspect of the bone marrow transplant. Dr. Richard Bernstein will moderate the panel, consisting of member and donor Scott Harris; the young recipient and his parents; and representatives of Holy Name and Hackensack Hospitals. This promises to be an important and informative platform; all are welcome.

After the panel discussion, everyone will be invited to join the National Bone Marrow Registry. All that is required is a swab of cheek cells for tissue typing.

Every day, thousands of cancer patients are searching for a bone marrow donor. When you join the National Bone Marrow Registry, you join more than 6 million people who stand ready to give someone a future. Even with a Registry of millions, some patients are unable to find a suitable match. You could be the one a patient needs. You'll never know unless you join.

You could save a life. Take the first step to give someone hope.

Joe Chuman Speaks Out

Our leader, Dr. Joe Chuman, has a recently published letter in the NY Times Book Review and an editorial piece in the Bergen Record.

Thanks, Joe.

How Might We Use This Blog?

Here's a first stab at a list of the ways that we might use this blog:

1. Transcripts of Joe Chuman's Platform Addresses and Essays.

While the society website already posts transcripts of Joe's platform addresses, it might make sense to also post them on the blog as the comments section could be used as a way for members and friends to comment on and discuss the topic raised in the address. Here's an example.

2. Announcements of Upcoming Society Events.

This blog provides an easy online way for members to announce upcoming events without always having to go through the webmaster.

3. Announcements of Upcoming Local Events of Interest to Members and Friends.

This blog can also be used to announce upcoming local events that might be of interest to members and friends such as concerts, films, lectures, sit-ins, protests, etc.

4. Discussion of Issues Relevant to the Society.

Society members could use this blog as a venue to highlight issues that are relevant to the work of the Society in order to engage in a meaningful dialogue with members and friends.

5. Postmortems on Recent Society Events.

Another use of the blog might be for members to provide a recap of past events so that those who were unable to participate can find out what they missed. Here's an example.

Any other ideas or thoughts?

Non Zero and Next Non-fiction Selection Recommendations?

Six interesting people gathered in the main room of the Society to discuss NonZero (see entry below.) It never fails to amaze me how the folks attracted to Ethical and to these kinds of events are the most interesting people I've met. Everyone brimmed with ideas that related to Wright's thesis for-and-against. Wonderful intellectual experience.

We need to pick the next book. At one participant's suggestion, I asked Joe Chuman, our ECS Bergen leader, to help us come up with a non-fiction book that we would enjoy and not tax our amateur level. Alternately we could do a few chapters of a more scholarly work. Moral Man in Immoral Society has always tempted me, but it looks too imposing without the help of a group to get me through!

Suggestions?

By the way, I found this fascinating and tangentially related to Non-zero:


"Richard Wrangham, a primatologist at Harvard, has proposed that people are a domesticated form of ape, the domestication having been self-administered as human societies penalized or ostracized individuals who were too aggressive.
Dr. Paabo said that if Mr. Albert identified the genes responsible for domestication in rats, “we would also look at those genes in humans and apes to see if they might be involved in human evolution.”
Human self-domestication, if it occurred, would probably not have exactly the same genetic basis as tameness in animals. But Mr. Albert said that if he could pinpoint the genetic difference between the tame and ferocious rats, he would compare the chimp genome and the human genome to see if they showed a similar difference.
One possibility is that a handful of genes — perhaps even just one — underlie all the changes seen in domestication. A structure in the embryo of all vertebrates, known as the neural crest, is the source of cells that constitute much of the face, skull and pigment cells, and many parts of the peripheral nervous system and endocrine system. If the genes in the neural crest cells were delayed just a little in coming into action, a whole range of tissues could be affected, including the maturation of the adrenal glands that underlies the first fear response of young animals, Dr. Fitch has written."

Terrific, terrific… The Ethical Culture Society is just the kind of place that would benefit from having a blog to record the intentions, debates and good feelings that bubble up from our "real world" community.

Thanks swurgle for making it happen.

Just to note, tomorrow the Society is hosting its new non-fiction book club. We'll be discussing Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny (Tuesday July 25 at 7:30pm).

The Sunday before last’s NY Times Op Ed section included a page-spanning piece by the author entitled An American Foreign Policy That Both Realists and Idealists Should Fall in Love With. The policy recommendations refer to this book. It's not too late for new comers to chime in - if you’d like to be familiar with the ideas and participate in the discussion, an excellent summary is available on Wright’s web site at http://nonzero.org/.

Welcome to Ethical Focus Blog

This blog has been created as a project of the Ethical Culture Society of Bergen County, New Jersey. The purpose of this blog is to provide an online venue for members and friends to engage in an ongoing, freewheeling dialogue about the issues that are relevent to the work of the society. This blog is designed to complement our official website.

For those who are unfamiliar, the Ethical Culture Society of Bergen County is a religious, progressive and humanistic community. While most religions are concerned with ethics, only Ethical Culture puts ethics and human flourishing at the center of the search for a meaningful life.

Ethical Culture is also a unique religion in that it is non-theistic. We deal with all aspects of human behavior, the physical world and even spirituality without addressing a reality outside of nature. In fact some members consider it a philosophy. The philosophy is fluid and growing, but it is rooted on the simple principle that for the world to become a better place, we must all bring out the best in ourselves and each other. To that end, we put deed before creed and acknowledge the basic worth of every human being.

We have been a community in Teaneck, New Jersey since 1953 and we offer a full range of programs. We welcome people of all heritages -- ethnic, religious and racial. The way we look at is this: If you are an ethical person who is not currently practicing the religion you were born with, you may already be practicing ours.

The Politics of Fear and the Dulling of the American Mind

Referring to the prerequisites of a free society, Thomas Jefferson in 1820 wrote the following. “I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the people but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not take it from them, but to inform their discretion.” Jefferson passionately believed that in order for a nation to be democratic and free, and to remain civilized, the people as a whole need to be educated and informed. And if they lack that education it is the responsibility of our nation’s leaders to provide the wisdom and education, as Jefferson proposes, to “inform their discretion.”

As America looks to a new presidential administration, it seems more than obvious that the public cannot turn to our leaders to ensure that we are educated and that those in government are responsibly and wisely guiding our discretion. On the contrary, to be an American at this moment feels more like being the victim of a massive swindle, and to be hoodwinked by self-aggrandizing con artists who want to ensure that they aggressively concentrate greater power and wealth in their own hands at the expense of the rest of us. What is the interest of our leaders in ensuring a politically educated public? And, frankly, where is the public’s discretion when it comes to assessing the political issues that affect our nation and our society in profound ways?

What does it say that 60 senators voted to confirm Alberto Gonzalez as the chief law enforcement agent of the United States, a man who affirmed that the president is above the law? What does it say when our senate has just installed as attorney general a man who violated international and federal law as well as the fundamental standards of civilization by sanctioning the use of torture? What does it say about America to the rest of the world, and moreover to us, the American people? When one steps back and looks at this through moral eyes, it is nothing less than an abomination, and we might ask, how did it happen?

Last Wednesday night, in his State of the Union address, President Bush triumphantly heralded the election in Iraq and the virtues of freedom, which he has trumpeted as the cornerstone of his ideology. He let us know that building democracy and freedom in Iraq is worth the cost of now more than 1,400 dead Americans, perhaps 100,000 dead Iraqis, and who knows how many more as we wage this war without foreseeable end. Yet, does he think that our memories are so short that we forget that the primary rationale for this war was not to bring freedom to Iraqis, but to rid Iraq of its putative weapons of mass destruction? It is a war based on monumental intelligence errors and lies, and as such comprises the greatest “bait and switch” scandal within living memory. Yet, most Americans seem to buy it.

How do we explain the fact that a majority of Americans continue to believe that Saddam Hussein was guilty of the 9/11 terrorist assaults on the United States? Could it be that Americans are so inattentive to the news, so superficial in their thinking or so prejudicial in their views, that they draw the blanket assumption that all Arabs who have evil designs are thereby indistinguishable from each other in all their particulars? Again, how are we to explain this?

What does it say about those who won this past election that they were able transform John Kerry (not my favorite candidate) a bona fide war hero into a wimp unworthy of standing up to the terrorists who threaten us, while George W. Bush, who evaded Vietnam with a silver spoon military assignment, and Dick Cheney, who received four draft deferments and publicly stated that he had more important things to do than to go off to Vietnam, are somehow deemed worthy of our trust as warriors?

With the same bravado with which he concocted the false dangers that Saddam Hussein posed to America, Bush is now creating a false crisis over social security, when there is no crisis. 82% of Americans in a recent poll ranked the social security “crisis” as more important than homelessness and poverty and racial injustice. It didn’t take long for this fabricated emergency to preoccupy the concerns and anxieties of the American public and so divert their attention, as social programs are slashed, and tax giveaways to the super wealthy become permanent.

Included in Bush’s State of the Union address was his call for a Constitutional Amendment to ban gay marriage. Has anyone yet articulated how homosexual unions will, in any concrete way, threaten heterosexual marriage? Yet Bush wants to drive us to change the US Constitution over this issue.

There are other issues, somewhat more removed from the national spotlight, though they raise similar issues. Just last Friday, in his column in the New York Times, Bob Herbert wrote, “Only half of America’s high school students think newspapers should be allowed to publish freely, without government approval of their stories. And a third say the free speech guarantees of the First Amendment go too far.” A spokesman for the agency that did the survey Herbert cites concluded that “These results are not only disturbing – they are dangerous.” Perhaps, Herbert ponders, we shouldn’t be too hard on the kids, since after all they may just be following the lead of an administration that has held in contempt our most cherished liberties. Maybe.

This followed another Times article that caught my attention just a few days before. Titled “Evolution Takes a Back Seat in U.S. Classes” it described how many high school science teaches simply avoid or soft-pedal the teaching of evolution, fearful that their principals will come down on them or fearing community backlash.

The denial of evolution and its replacement with creationist theories derived from the book of Genesis is no small matter. Evolution is not a wispy or ambiguous footnote to a major scientific theory. It is one of the pillars of modern science for much more than a century, has been verified under laboratory conditions, and has no serious opposition in the scientific community. To discard evolution is to do away not only with modern biology, but geology, physical anthropology, much of physics and a lot else. There is no country in the industrialized world where upwards of 45% of the population doubts the theory of evolution. To posit creationism as a replacement for evolution is as idiotic as believing that the moon is made of green cheese or the earth is flat. Whatever it is, creationism is certainly not science. But we can hardly look to our president for wisdom on this matter either, or to inform our discretion, because George W. Bush has himself declared that the jury is still out on the theory of evolution. I wonder why George Bush and all other advocates of a strong military don’t realize that there is a dangerous contradiction between wanting to maintain a cutting edge military based on science and technology, and eviscerating from the very guts of science education, one of the primary pillars on which modern science stands. Again, evolution is not a quaint add to modern science; it is foundational.

All communications involves at least two parties – those who utter the communication, and those who receive and interpret it. There is an ethics of speech communication that falls upon both entities. Those who launch the message, especially those who carry the weight of authority, need to be honest, and those who receive the communication need to be attentive and discerning with regard to what is said to them.

What all the phenomena I cite have in common is that they ignore reality. They result in conclusions in which facts are badly distorted and in which facts don’t seem to matter. When one looks at all these disparate phenomena, and the irrationality they can seem to all reveal, one can ask in dismay “What in the world is wrong with this country?” As a Katha Pollitt, wrote in a recent column in the Nation. “It’s as if everyone has been sprinkled with idiot dust.”

The ultimate question we can ask is – how much fantasy, how much neglect of fact-based reality can one society absorb and still remain viable, democratic and free?

As a rationalist I hold to the simple and elegant rule of thumb that one’s beliefs need to be proportionate to the facts, and that my intellectual integrity, and ultimately my fiber as a moral human being depends on exercising that proposition. The philosopher, William James, who was also a scientist, was willing to stretch that standard a bit by arguing that in certain special cases we are permitted to have our beliefs extend beyond the facts. So, for example, if I come to a cliff, and am confronted with a chasm that is three feet wide, and I either successfully jump the gap or lose my life, I am permitted to believe that I can do it, despite the fact that I have never leapt that far before, on the assumption that so believing will maximize my chances of survival. Fail to believe in advance of the facts, and I will surely perish. Dare to have faith in my ability to jump beyond the facts, and that faith may just be the very difference between destruction and survival. In other words, my will to believe beyond the strict limits of the facts, will at times, James asserted, help to create the facts.

I am willing to accept James’s reasoning in a few select cases and will concede that even though my beliefs therefore need not be exactly proportional to the facts, at least my beliefs need to be, we might say, controlled by the facts. They must be responsible to the facts. But beliefs that are completely divorced from facts, I think, is totally disreputable for anyone who possesses a mind, and can often lead to behavior which is not only preposterous but dangerous. Especially if we are citizens in a democratic society, I believe that each of us carries a special responsible to be reflective and discerning about what are leaders are telling us, just as they have a responsibility to honestly “inform our discretion,” as Jefferson put it. But it seems these days, that rather being intellectually reflective, probing, and even just thoughtful, people are willing, often with conviction, to base their beliefs on sounds bites, half facts, slogans, stereotypes, prejudices, and on the cache of imagery, and not on thought.

But why such widespread ignoring of the facts, at a time when, at least formerly, more Americans are more educated than even before. In each of the cases I cite, from believing that John Kerry is a wimp, to believing that Saddam Hussein was behind the assault on the World Trade Center, to 60 senators giving a pass to Alberto Gonzalez, to the refusal of science teachers to teach evolution, there are, no doubt, multiple and complex causes. We can look to the mainstream media, which have substituted probing, analytical journalism, with sound bites, clichés, and name-calling. We might lament the lack of rigor of the school in teaching basic civics, science, and the skills of critical thinking. All this is ominously true.

But I believe there is one other cause that pervades all these issue. And that is that we live in a time of fear.

One dynamic exploited by those in power in order to divert and manipulate the public mind is the element of fear, and its emotional sibling, anxiety. Our political decisions and our political thinking seem, to a great degree, to be driven by fear. The media are afraid or looking too liberal. Democrats are afraid of being marginalized by being called “liberals,” or losing whatever remaining turf they have to Republicans. The left is afraid of appearing too secular or being unpatriotic, and the public at large is feeling at least a bit anxious about the next terrorist attack.

I really do believe that 9/11 has affected the American mind in subtle, but significant ways. It has leeched its way under our collective skins and has taken up residence in our collective psyches. We walk around edgier and more circumspect. I am still hit, from time to time, with a sense of disbelief when I gaze at lower Manhattan, and take in the fact that the World Trade Center, which was a sturdy fixture on the landscape, isn’t there any longer -- like the feeling you get when someone whom you knew well and long and peopled your mind dies and disappears forever. The feeling of anxiety, occasioned the terror assault, partly conscious and partly beneath our consciousness, is new to Americans, but is something that Europeans, even of the post World War II generations, know quite well. This anxiety and fear is also something our leaders can exploit for their own political ends, and they do. Fear is a highly effective weapon is the arsenal of those who wield and seek to retain power. It was Niccolo Macchiavelli, who, in his advice to princes who wished to retain the reins of power believed that subjects could be manipulated by either love or fear. But he concluded, “If we must choose between being loved or feared, it is far safer to be feared than loved.” Fear paralyzes action. It causes people to fall in line. Rene Descartes, the French philosopher, counseled that if you are ever lost in a forest, choose one direction to walk in, and then once chosen, never deviate from a straight line, if you wish to survive.

Fear is like that. It keeps our thought processes in a straight line, as it drives out dissenting and conflicting ideas. I remember during the Maoist period in China, when government authority seemed arbitrary and the Chinese legal system was not well codified and subject to political vagaries, government bureaucrats, out of fear would hoe the straightest most conservative line, lest they bring attention to themselves. Fear paralyzes action, and inhibits creativity and initiative. It causes people to fall in line. Frightened people want to appear loyal and eschew dissent. They do not stand out. They do not ask questions.

Deeper and more far-reaching than fearful emotions are the feelings associated with anxiety. Whereas fear is usually conscious in that we fear a specific object from which we can flee or fight, and the fear passes once we have fled or overcome it, anxiety is a state of being which extends much deeper into the nether reaches of our psyche. What usually differentiates anxiety from fear, is that anxiety is more free floating, and vaguer in its sources. Unlike fear, which almost always has an object, anxiety is a state in which we do not know usually from where the threat comes. Fear is relatively superficial, but anxiety seems like a threat to our very being. And it is intolerable.

In my own view, different people have different anxiety thresholds. Some people just temperamentally are more anxious than others. But our environments, environments of stress and of danger, can also induce anxiety, and aggravate it. Anxiety can also have many emotional and behavioral consequences. Anxiety is an uncomfortable, indeed, intolerable state because it makes us feel deeply threatened and powerless, and unlike most fearsome situation, anxiety seems to threaten us at our very core. But anxiety also does other things. It makes us angry; it makes us impatient and it engenders hostility. And, in line with my thesis this morning, anxiety also clouds, befuddles and blocks our thinking. I know from my own experience, when I am especially anxious that’s the time when I cannot concentrate. It is time to exercise, or to do something mindless, not the time to work on my next platform address. It is the emotional condition in which I am most likely to accidentally bang my knee against the bedpost, have an assignment fall out of my head, or surprise myself when I find that I mysteriously put the coffee pot in the refrigerator, rather than where it belongs on the counter. In other words, anxiety induces the shutting down of our minds, and I argue leads us therefore more vulnerable to being led astray by those in leadership who want us to pursue their agendas in the assertion of their political power. It is not idiot dust, but anxiety that dulls the American mind at this political moment.

I believe that these are dangerous political times, in which the health and viability of American freedom and democracy are especially vulnerable. A fearful and anxious populace is a populace open and vulnerable to having their cherished freedoms whittled away as the price to pay for security. An anxious climate, intensified by the fear of terrorism, can readily be swayed to accept as commander-in-chief a man who presents a swaggering image of toughness, even if there is no substance in his resume to back it up. An anxious people can be swayed to accept a Patriot Act, and believe they have too many freedoms, if by yielding those liberties, they can feel more secure. An anxious populace can accept a torturer as their attorney general as a small price to pay if they feel threatened. A populace, anxious over diversity on the American landscape, can readily find refuge in old time religion, with its authoritarian and often misogynist, anti-modernist, illiberal, and homophobic values. An anxious populace can prefer simplistic, feel good image-driven answers to complex problems over reflective, analytic and critical approaches to those problems. An anxious public will forgo dissent and choose conformity. And I ask, where has the cherished, noble freedom-saving tradition of dissent gone in American life. Where is it in American life, and where is it moreover in the corridors of American power; in the Senate and in the House and in the precincts of government?

Authoritarianism is an important concept here. Noting that anxiety is an emotional state that is ultimately intolerable for human beings, and from which we naturally attempt to flee, we will seek to find refuge in what the social psychologist, Erich Fromm, called mechanism of escape. One such mechanism of escape is to attempt to overcome one’s anxiety and sense of powerlessness, by melding with the herd in the service of conformity and by giving oneself over to strong leaders who will quell one’s anxious fears. In other words, anxiety on the social level is the seedbed of fascism. And though I am not paranoid, and believe that our society remains pluralistic and plastic in its creativity, and democracy still retains room in which to breath, and I marvel still at the surprising rebelliousness that is inherent in American individualism, I cannot help but ponder with great concern whether we as Americans are in a proto-fascist moment. But paranoid or not, I firmly believe that just as war is too important to be left to the generals, so freedom is too important to be left to the politicians. To be clichéd, for a moment, “freedom is as freedom does” and the cost of freedom is eternal vigilance. Friends, if we cherish freedom, we cannot be too cautious.

With my thesis this morning, I am not attempting to give a comprehensive theory to explain the dulling of the American mind. The causes are innumerably complex and issue from the designs of leaders and the dispositions of the people themselves. All I am attempting to do is to isolate one factor in a phenomenon that frustrates and disturbs me greatly.

But what is the antidote, and how at least can we respond to the anti-intellectualism and the irrationalism that seems so much a part of our public lives. What are we to do?

I have no exhaustive answers at the moment, and the time is growing short. But let me say, I never thought that to strive to be rational, was an act that requires much courage. But in the face of an administration that claims that it is not “reality-based” to be loyal to reality, to facts, and to reason seems not only to be courageous, but also subversive. But I say “Let us be so!” And let us find the confidence and inspiration from our Ethical Culture tradition, and from the wisdom of all great humanists of the past who understood that reason is a prerequisite for both progress and freedom. And armed with that faith let never falter to speak the truth as we understand it. The times we are in demand it.

Dr. Joseph Chuman
February 6, 2004