Controversial

The more I observe the phenomenon, the more convinced I am that the current potential Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization isn't really the Pro-Life position winning but the Pro-Choice side overreaching until the average person notices what's going on and deciding to get involved.

The phenomenon is a refusal to accept victory and go home.

It's distinct from a win in an incremental strategy were a positive ruling is one step towards a larger, stated, goal.

The pro-gun movement is doing such an incremental approach in getting laws struck and legislation passed.  The goal is unfettered 2nd Amendment rights and until we get there it's just wins, not victory.  Someday, though, we're going to have to address that that average person doesn't want machine guns to be easily and widely available.

But abortion and gay rights goals were stated and achieved... then they presented new goals and began advancing on those causes.

As the goals get further out of synch with everyday Americans, the less support they have as they accumulate more political power until...

Punctuated equilibrium from the electorate slams them in the face.

The first time I noticed this was with MAAD.  They were going to get real punishments for drinking and driving, did studies, pressed the flesh and made real changes.

One important change was getting "you're too drunk to drive" defined at 0.10% blood alcohol content.  This definition was arrived at through extensive studies of when the average person becomes impaired.  I was a rational standard to adopt.

And it was.

After a round of very public enforcement, the average, rational, person looked at the new severe punishments for drinking too much and driving home then made a rational decision to not drink so much before heading home.

Thus, substantially fewer drunk drivers and this was reflected in a dramatic drop in the police catching and prosecuting them.

Victory, right?

MAAD realized they were now irrelevant.

So a new campaign to move the standard down to 0.08% BAC.  A level that wasn't shown to be associated with impairment for most people.  But it got arrests up again, got their name in the public's mind again and (most importantly) got the donations flowing to the organization again!

Which brings me back to abortion.

Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and the leak has put the debate back into people's living rooms and many people are discovering that there's a much larger overlap in the Venn diagram between Pro-Life and Pro-Choice once they are allowed to talk to each other and explain what they mean.

People are discovering that their position was based on the fringe of the other side and not the everyday person.

The everyday pro-life person didn't really want a full ban, but was hearing the advocates of partial or full birth abortions and saying they would not support that.  The national pro-life organizations are captured by religious organizations who DO support full bans, and are thusly the voice of the pro-life side.

The everyday pro-choice person didn't really want second or third trimester abortions, let alone partial birth and outright opposes full birth.  But the national organizations and national voice does.

Most people, after comparing notes, are realizing that they're OK with abortion being legal with a cut-off date.  There's debate about when that point should be, but it rarely extends past the first trimester.

Both sides appear to be shocked to learn that such a cut-off is in Roe v. Wade!

[D]uring the first trimester, governments could not prohibit abortions at all; during the second trimester, governments could require reasonable health regulations; during the third trimester, abortions could be prohibited entirely so long as the laws contained exceptions for cases when they were necessary to save the life or health of the mother.

- Wikipedia article on Roe v. Wade.

 Most people are content with this.

But the pro-choice fringe wouldn't leave it alone.  Now the fringe from the pro-life side might be getting a big win and taking the momentum to a place that most people don't want.

This whipsaw oscillation between two tyrannies of the minority pisses people off.

LGBT people just wanted to be people, like everyone else.  To not be second class citizens by law because churches had gotten regulatory capture of marriage so long ago it preceded the term.

But their national orgs couldn't let that victory sit.  And they took it all the way to where the religious fundamentalist bigots said the average queer wanted: Pederasty.

The average bent person didn't want that!

And after looking at the utter lack of compassion I've seen from members of a religion founded on the idea of forgiveness towards trans-genders, I totally understand the motive to stick a knife in the eye of a Christian fundamentalist and give it a good twist.  Even if that twist is pederasty.

Again we're trying to make the fringes happy and pissing off the middle.

You think they're on your side because they're not noticing you and thus not opposing you.  But wait.  You will overstep.  Again.

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