Pew Poll: 'Moral Values' Has Tumbled as Voter Priority

Reader Comments
Back to blog

Dear "Floored,"
I'm glad you turned out okay, and I say that without any sarcasm at all. But for every one of you, there are many kids born with some addiction, or a mother who was not "made more responsible" to take care of their children because of her pregnancy. Do you deny that? So then you have an unwanted child getting in the way of their addiction.
Don't expect people to stop having sex - it's not going to happen. Responsible or irresponsible, people are going to have sex, married or not. If you think people are going to stop having sex when they are not financially and emotionally ready to give a child a good life you are kidding yourself.
And to "Asinus" that is just stupid to give a poster a hard time about one typo. Let's be fair here.

Erik of WA 12:54AM January 20, 2012

The comment, "Peopele simply need to be more responsible instead of using murder as a way out. People are more important than plans. Having an abortion because you didn't plan for a pregnancy is STUPID!" is full of confused thinking. Is that evidence of stupidity?
Talking about abortion as "murder" is stupid propaganda. It is false that abortion is murder. It is legal in all the states of the USA. An abortion does involve killing, but only a stupid person assumes that all killing is murder.
Since fetuses are not "people" (or peopele), it is quite appropriate to focus on the pregnant woman and her choice regarding her actions and life. That some pregnant women make a different choice than I think they should is irrelevant to the issue of their being responsible.
There are a very large number of reasons why people have abortions. One factor running through many of them is that the pregnancy was not planned. The fact that it was not planned is largely irrelevant to the issue of whether it is the wisest choice in the circumstances that the pregnant women face.
I happen to think it is idiotic to try to make all of the less than the wisest choices possible illegal. Stupidity is not illegal; nor should it be.

Asinus Gravis of TX 6:05PM June 04, 2009

People have lost their sense of morals. I am still wrapping my mind around the notion that people would rather abort a baby than control their desires. If you are dead set against having a baby then the best option is to not have sex. I am all for birth control, but if you don't want a baby then birth control still poses too high of a risk for pregnancy, SO STOP HAVING SEX!!!! I still have a hard time believing there are so many people who would murder their own child, just to save themselves from having to change their lifestyle to include someone else. We have three children, two which were planned and the third, our 2 month old daughter, who was a total surprise to us, and I could never imagine murder being an option. We were scared to death when we found out I was pregnant because we hadn't planned financially for a third, and we weren't sure of how we were going to make it work, but having her now and looking back I feel really silly for worrying in the first place. We are doing just fine. We have had to make some major adjustments to our lifestyle, but we couldn't be happier.
I am also the "product" of a rape. I asked my mother if she ever considered aborting me and she said, "Not even for a second". She said I ended up being the person who saved her from herself because she had to adjust her life to having a baby which made her a more responsible person in the end. She said she was most certain she would be dead from drug overdose by now hadn't I come along. She said that a lot of people told her that looking at me daily would always be a constant reminder of the rape. She could never understand the concept that somehow having a child from a rape was going to be a constant reminder of an event that she would never forget whether she got pregnant or not. I haven't lived at home for years and she still has flashbacks. So no there is really no reason for an abortion.
Peopele simply need to be more responsible instead of using murder as a way out. People are more important than plans. Having an abortion because you didn't plan for a pregnancy is STUPID! Hell, I even know a woman who got an abortion because she had been planning and saving for a trip she wanted to take for two years and she simply could not have a baby get in the way of that. Sick, sick people.

Floored by the stupidity of our society of MO 5:10PM June 04, 2009

Right now we are still trying to digest the murder of a doctor because his specialty was helping his patients make an intelligent decision about aborting an unwanted and un needed pregnancy......this is a medical decision and not a political decision whether the right wing likes it or not....there are out there in every major city children who are neglected and abused by their parents because the parents really do not care for their offspring.....Morally people who bring children into the world and cannot take care of them are at the bottom of the social ladder and that is where they put themseves.....Planned parenthood is the way to go....period...

Steve Roisman of CA 5:11PM June 02, 2009

Muser correctly points up the squirrelly nature of "moral values" as used in this poll.
The poll in effect asks people to compare apples, oranges, lemons, and figs to fruit, and say which most "matters." Duh!!!

Asinus Gravis of TX 5:03PM June 02, 2009

correctly diagnosed at a fundraiser in California last year that people who find themselves left out of economic prosperity tend to cling to religion and guns for their validation. He later, I'm sure, regretted that quote being made public for derision by the Palinites, but he was spot-on correct nonetheless---for the past.
NOW, though, with MANY more jobs lost, health care slipping away from MANY people, retirement dreams slipping away from MANY people, and schools more appearing as play places, drug dens or war zones in the eyes of MANY parents, we are having a shift of national attention.
The narrow bunch of "moral" issues that have been stressed by the GOP in the past are being replaced by a new and broader set of moral issues. They are called health care, education, responsible energy, jobs, and opportunity for the lower classes (a term that now includes the former "middle" class). People just no longer are so willing to believe that out-lawing abortion and homosexuality is going to "fix" everything for their families.

Muser of NM 11:15AM June 02, 2009