Obama Tries To Force Catholic Institutions To Provide Contraceptives

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Just because I can't resist getting caught up in an analogy argument:

If you wanted to compare seat-belts to this situation, the seat belt situation would have to be something like this:

a) It is not a legal requirement to wear a seatbelt.
b) Some car companies offer a free seat belt option, some don't offer seat belts at all.
c) The government is now forcing all car companies to provide the option of free seat belts, even though seat belts are not a legal requirement.

After all, the government does not mandate the use of condoms. If they did, we'd have to lock up all the parents... So in brief, the seat belt analogy completely misses the point.

Why are these differences relevant? Why would the seat belt situation have to be like that?


The hypothetical christian car manufacturer would be wrong to oppose seatbelts because regardless of their opposition to speeding, it is immoral to ban something life saving because it might encourage people to speed. That moral belief is not respected by law, religious by not, as many other moral beliefs are not respected by law, religious or not.

Some with the hypothetical christian health care provider--an opposition to certain kinds of sex* does not make a ban on contraception legitimate. Do you think the taliban's opposition to all vaccination is legitimate? If there was a government funded program for it do you that would be wrong cause it took there tax dollars? Besides the point that everyone in our country pays taxes despite the fact that their money is used for something or other that they think is immoral.

Economic and legal trivia are not relevant to the analogy. It's an analogy about moral reasoning and when it's legitimate.

*in whatever strange theological way it is expressed

[Myrddraal]

Why would the seat belt situation have to be like that?

Because that would make it a direct analogy:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

a) It is not a legal requirement to wear a condom.
b) Some medical institutions offer free condoms, some don't offer condoms at all.
c) The government is now forcing all medical institutions to provide the free condoms, even though wearing a condom is not a legal requirement.

Why are these differences relevant?

There no law enforcing the use of condoms. There are several laws enforcing the use of seat belts. Surely that makes the legal arguments for enforcing the provision of condoms and seat belts quite different?

I have a question (not rhetorical): In the US, does the government legally require a medical institution to provide any other form of 'treatment'? To be clear, I'm not talking about life saving or health restoring treatments, I'm talking about preventative treatments such as vaccines.

Edit: clarifying question above

[Sasaki Kojiro]

It's not "Since we have seat belt laws, we must have this law, to be consistent". That's one kind of analogy. It's "If you understand why the seatbelt law is wrong (figuring you already do) then you should understand why this law is wrong". This is another kind of analogy, the kind people almost always use. And then the person they say it to generally spends a lot of time arguing that it isn't the first kind, qed.