Friday, August 9, 2024

Single Issue Voters

Something I have encountered a lot lately is the right-wing one-issue voter who pretends to not be a one-issue voter. A conversation might go like this:

Other guy: I can't vote for Democratic candidate "A", he thinks we should have open borders
Me: [debunks that position]

Other guy: Yeah, but [presents garbled attack on his military service]

Me: Here's a news article debunking that

Other guy: [Yet another unsubstantiated position]

Me: [Easy debunking]

Other guy: Well, he believes in killing babies!

And there you have it. You can expound upon women's bodily autonomy or the immorality of forcing women to put their lives in danger or the ethics of requiring rape victims to give birth to their rapist's baby all day long, but you're going to make no headway against someone who believes that the moment of conception is the start of a fully human life, i.e. "a baby". Anyone who believes that is not statistically likely to be open to debate about the subject and fully believes that an abortion is "killing a baby". 

But this post isn't really about abortion (I get similar reductive "arguments" that end with equating gender-affirming care with "mutilating children"), it's about derailing every political policy discussion and disregarding it in favor of that one issue. If abortion is the issue that overrides every other issue, if it doesn't matter if the pro-choice candidate is for literally every other issue that you think is important, or if the anti-abortion candidate is against literally every other issue that you think is important, then don't waste my time bringing up the border, or taxes, or inflation and just tell me you can't vote for any candidate who is pro-choice. 

Then we can go about our respective days.

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