Simpsons: PHDs / Grad Students

It's funny because it's true.

CNN Arizona Republican Debate

Debate summary:

Community: Troy and Abed off Hiaaaatus!

Community is back on NBC's schedule!

"Community" is back on NBC's schedule! The fan-favorite comedy is returning on Thurs., March 15 to its old 8 p.m. EST timeslot according to series creator Dan Harmon who tweeted the news.

Terry O'Neill: (~C Tu is ~C Si) & ~ (Tu is Si)

On this evening’s episode of the Ed Show, Terry O’Neill, president of N.O.W., stated that the Virginia Transvaginal Ultrasound Bill amounts to state-sanctioned rape.

Terry O’Neill: To take that experience and make it state mandated, even when it is medically inappropriate, there are a number of women who have begun to say let's look at the state definition in fact the new FBI definition of rape. And that would include vaginal penetration against the will without the consent of the woman. now --

Ed: Is it rape in your opinion?

Terry O’Neill: I think it is.

Ed: You do think it's rape?

Terry O’Neill: I think it is, Ed, I do.

Ed: Clearly it's something that a woman would be forced to do so she would lose control of her body.

Terry O’Neill: It's non-consensual. If it's non-consensual penetration of her vagina I don't know what else you call it but rape.

Last Friday I posted about this. Apparently I was not clear enough. So, let’s try this again, in the form of a dialog.


Terry: A non-consensual transvaginal ultrasound is rape.

Jay: Rape is non-consensual sexual intercourse, yes?

Terry: Of course.

Jay: So a non-consensual transvaginal ultrasound is non-consensual sexual intercourse?

Terry: Yes. That’s what I said!

Jay: So a consensual transvaginal ultrasound is consensual sexual intercourse?

Terry: Not at all! I never said that!

Jay: For simplicity’s sake, let’s utilize the following abbreviations for the rest of the argument:

Non-Consensual: ~C
Consensual: C
Transvaginal Ultrasound: Tu
Sexual Intercourse: Si
Rape: R

Agreed?

Terry: That’s fine.

Jay: So,

~C Tu is R
R is ~C Si
---
Therefore: ~C Tu is ~C Si

Terry: Yes. ~C Tu is ~C Si. And ~C Si is R. So, ~C Tu is R!

Jay: Now, watch what happens when we remove the ~C from each side: Tu is Si.

Terry: YOUR LOGIC HAS WARPED MY WORDS!

Jay: No, my symbolization of your argument belied the fundamental problem with your position: you have argued that Tu is Si.

Terry: But it’s obviously not the case that Tu is Si.

Jay: Then how are you arguing that ~C Tu is ~C Si?

Terry: Your symbols are blurring the argument; when there is no consent, the insertion of a probe into a vagina is rape. But when there is consent, it’s just a medical procedure.

Jay: Isn’t it a medical procedure in both cases?

Terry: Yes, but the medical procedure forced on women by this bill is unnecessary.

Jay: That doesn’t change its being a medical procedure.

Terry: Alright. But it’s still rape!

Jay: You seem to be claiming that where consent is not present, sexuality is present.

Terry: Yes! Exactly! The lack of consent makes the procedure sexual.

Jay: Is that the case with any act to which one does not consent?

Terry: Well, not any act. Only sexual acts!

Jay: So, a transvaginal ultrasound is a sexual act?

Terry: No, of course not! It’s only sexual when there is no consent!

Jay: What makes a ~C Tu a sexual act?

Terry: They’re inserting a probe into a woman’s vagina against her will!

Jay: And the insertion of a probe into a vagina is sexual?

Terry: No! Of course it isn’t! It’s only sexual when it’s not consensual!

Jay: I can understand how a sexual act is a sexual act, and a non-consensual act is a non-consensual act. I don’t understand how you’re relating a lack of consent to a presence of sexuality.

Terry: It is sexual because they are inserting a probe into a woman’s vagina!

Jay: That’s what they do in a consensual transvaginal ultrasound. But when they insert a probe into a vagina, within a context of consent, you don’t think that’s sexual.

Terry: Of course it isn’t sexual; it’s a medical procedure.

Jay: But when they perform the exact same medical procedure within a non-consensual context that medical procedure, which is not sexual in a consenting context, becomes sexual?

Terry: Exactly.

Jay: So where there is no consent, there is sexuality?

Terry: No!

Jay: But the lack of consent for these transvaginal ultrasounds makes them sexual?

Terry: Obviously.



I don’t know how to make Terry’s position sensible, unless we maintain (C Tu is C Si). If we aren’t going to do that, then we’re left with a very bizarre position wherein the absence of consent yields a presence of sexuality.

Which, by the way, is fucked up.

Purple Cabbage is [chat]y

Purple Cabbage is like a freaky alien cocoon.

Transvaginal Ultrasound: Rape?

Virginia is on the verge of passing a bill that would require a woman seeking an abortion to undergo a state-required transvaginal ultrasound. For some reason I do not understand some people want to call this state-sanctioned rape. I think the term “rape” is inapplicable to this situation. We can say the bill is repulsive. We can say it violates a woman’s privacy. But “rape” isn’t a word that applies to the situation, given Virginia’s definition of rape:

§ 18.2-61. Rape.
A. If any person has sexual intercourse with a complaining witness, whether or not his or her spouse, or causes a complaining witness, whether or not his or her spouse, to engage in sexual intercourse with any other person and such act is accomplished (i) against the complaining witness's will, by force, threat or intimidation of or against the complaining witness or another person; or (ii) through the use of the complaining witness's mental incapacity or physical helplessness; or (iii) with a child under age 13 as the victim, he or she shall be guilty of rape.

Here’s my argument: Rape is non-consensual sexual intercourse. The insertion of an ultrasound probe into a vagina is not sexual intercourse. Therefore, etc.

Some people take issue with my argument. They want to insist the bill would result in women being raped by the state. To explain why I think their position is foolish, I shall utilize this handy-dandy chart:

Object:	Probe	Probe
Action:	Insertion	Insertion
Sex Organ:	Vagina	Vagina
Consent?	No	Yes
Label:	State-Sanctioned Rape	Transvaginal ultrasound
Sex Act?	-	-

My argument lives in that last row. Either:

1) All transvaginal ultrasounds are sex acts.
2) The lack of consent renders an act to be sex.

Both of these options are fucked up.

My guess is that most of my interlocutors would go with option two. But if the insertion of a probe for a medical procedure is not sex, then how does that change when the medical procedure is not consensual? They would have to say that force causes the act to be sex; the label “sex” applies when an act is forced on an individual. But there are plenty of actions imposed upon individuals that are not considered to be sex despite the presence of force. If the state forces you to pay a speeding fine that is not “rape”.

Maybe the issue is that genitals are involved. It’s not the force; it’s the insertion of a probe into a vagina. But that would seem to favor option one: All transvaginal ultrasounds are sex acts. Yet I doubt that a woman would think her partner reasonable if he accused her of infidelity after visiting her gynecologist. I’m pretty sure that we don’t want to consider any insertion of anything into a vagina to be sex.

So why are some calling this "rape"? Fuck if I know.

I understand that we’re against this bill. I understand that it abuses women, that it violates their privacy. But we don’t gain anything by calling this “rape”; the invocation of the term is not beneficial to our cause. We can find fault with the bill and fight against it without calling it “rape”.

Why do we need to invoke that term?

Oklahoma Personhood Act: Miscarriage is Manslaughter

If you are in favor of the Oklahoma Personhood Act, then you are an unreflective, unthinking moron.

Given the nature of ethical or moral claims, one can allow for some divergence between different person’s beliefs. If you, like Kant, believe it is always wrong to lie, and I maintain that there are some situations within which lying is ethically permissible, then we can discuss our contending ethical positions in a thoughtful, rational manner. After some argument, we’ll find that the differences in our ethical positions ultimately result from our differing primary assumptions about reality. Once we realize this, we can respectfully agree to disagree, each person maintaining their own self-consistent system.

But when it comes to legality, we leave the realm of personal conviction and enter into the social, legal, aspect of life. We’re no longer pleasantly philosophizing over inconsequential self-conceptions of what shall or shan’t be considered “naughty”, but rather find ourselves creating the rulesets by which persons can or cannot be sent to prison.

This is why the Oklahoma Personhood Act is immensely stupid. By mistaking a moral / ethical argument for a legal argument, the shitheads who think that zygotes look really cute in onesies completely blind themselves to the legal consequences of their idiotic position. They want abortion to be illegal, and they don’t care much for contraception. But instead of dealing with these particular issues, they cast aside nuance and specificity in favor of the “idea” that if they can get zygotes the legal status of persons, then everything will just take care of itself: If an embryo is a person, then abortion kills a person, and so abortion is murder. Take that Roe V. Wade!

It’s cute an all, but perhaps the dipshits ought to consider these realities:

1) If a zygote is a person, then a miscarriage is involuntary manslaughter.
In a miscarriage, the fetus ceases to perform the acts of a fetus and, so, “dies”. If a fetus is a person, then a miscarriage results in the death of a person. If you support the Oklahoma Personhood Act, then you support the idea that a woman who has a miscarriage ought to be charged with involuntary manslaughter, since she involuntarily manslaughtered a person, in your feeble little mind.

2) If a zygote is a person, then in vitro fertilization is mass murder.
In vitro fertilization costs a lot of money. Because of this, doctors usually implant more than one fertilized egg in a woman’s uterus, in order to increase the likelihood of a pregnancy. Let’s say that a doctor implants five fertilized eggs in a uterus. In the best case, four of those “persons” will die. Who goes to jail for those deaths? Do we punish the woman, the doctor? Is the sperm donor an accomplice?

3) If a zygote is a person, then IUD means intrauterine DEATH.
This one is tricky, since we apparently don’t know how IUDs work. But here’s the idea: If an IUD works by irritating the walls of the uterus so that a fertilized egg cannot implant, then an IUD kills a person. Instead of growing within the uterus, the person ends up being flushed down the pisser. Now, I’m pretty sure that if you flushed a five year old down the toilet that’d be murder. Therefore, etc.


These three examples capture the general concept that a non-retard will grasp less than two minutes after reading the Oklahoma Personhood Act. If a fertilized egg has the legal status of a “person”, then we’re cast into a legal chaos wherein miscarriage, in vitro fertilization, contraception, and being a sexually active woman are basically all tantamount to murder.

Of course, the idiots over at personhoodkansas.com would categorize the above as all “scare tactics”. According to their F.A.Q., nothing that I have said is true, and I’m just a big foolish meany-head who hates Jesus and human life.

But they’re liars. They have to lie. Because when you’re a fetus fetishizing fuck, the only way to get people to listen, and the only way to make legal progress for your antiquated positions, is to lie about them.

The first lie, of course, being that this is a person: