No, I didn’t, and it’s equally bad — but then, has the governor of Delaware recently proposed changing the abortion laws, thus making the abortion stats in Delaware a common subject for conversation?

Thanks for your information for Cuomo’s claimed motives for his proposal. I don’t think I buy them, though — overturning Roe would make it easier, not harder, for New York to make any abortion laws it wanted, including no restrictions of any kind, because overturning Roe would kick the whole thing back to the states, excepting things like performing abortions in federal facilities or with federal money. There’s no need for such a pre-emptive strike. I’m not sure whether I’m more likely to believe that Cuomo doesn’t understand that, or that he’s just plain being disingenuous about the politics of this law.

The whole point is that until you came along, the “explanation for why” was not at issue, except in your assumptions about what other people were thinking. It doesn’t matter why the abortion rate is high, unless you’re in a discussion about how to reduce it. But we weren’t in a discussion about how to reduce it — we were in a discussion about how apparently the governor thinks it’s not high enough.

And actually, yes, if someone popped up and informed everybody that the reason that the rate of bilingual people was high was that there were a high number of people whose first language was not English (which might be stated in short-hand as “bilingual-prone,”) I would equally consider that a non-contributor to the discussion, except perhaps in the mind of the person who wrote it, who is trying to overthrow some assumption that he believes that must be defeated, that no one has shown any evidence of holding.

Graham Combs,

I don’t see any arguments for abortion in this thread. Trying to explain why the abortion rate in New York City is so high is not arguing for abortion.

It’s like coming to Mass and getting up and screaming . . .

Writing a comment on a First Things blog, even a comment disagreeing with the First Things point of view, is not like screaming at Mass. There is a comment policy, and comments are welcomed.

And demographics dictating morality is the Confederacy’s argument.

No one has argued demographics dictates morality. Knowing the demographics of New York City gives some insight into the high abortion rate. It says nothing about the morality of abortion.

No one dies of AIDS in the obituary columns of the NY Times.

Note the following:

Spencer Cox, AIDS Activist, Dies at 44
Published: December 21, 2012

Spencer Cox, an AIDS activist whose work with a cadre of lay scientists helped push innovative antiretroviral drugs to market, creating the first effective drug protocols to combat the syndrome, died on Tuesday in Manhattan. He was 44.

His death of AIDS-related causes at the Allen Hospital in Upper Manhattan was confirmed by his brother, Nick. . . .

And demographics dictating morality is the Confederacy’s argument. Then again this president should not be compared to Lincoln but to the other president of the 1860s.

If someone wanted an explanation of why there are so many people in New York City who are bilingual, do you think an adequate explanation would be that New Yorkers are “bilingual prone”?

Giving a demographic analysis of New York’s high abortion rate is far more explanatory than saying a lot of New Yorkers are “abortion prone.” If group X has a consistently high abortion rate nationwide, and group X has a high abortion rate in New York City, it’s not something about New York City that causes that group to have a high abortion rate. That does not mean New York should not try to do something about it, but if you expect New York politicians to try to put all kinds of roadblocks in the way of women seeking abortions, that is unrealistic. New York is not Arizona.

And it is also a legitimate point against Cuomo’s odd working assumption that abortion is too hard to obtain in New York State.

If you read the news coverage you will find that this law is being considered not because Cuomo thinks “abortion is too hard to obtain” in New York right now. It has safeguards to protect existing abortion rights in the event that Roe v Wade is ever overturned. So you have attributed something to Cuomo that is not true.

Did you know, by the way, that Delaware has the highest abortion rate of any state in the country? It is higher even than New York (State). How often do you hear that?

Regardless of the demographic predictability of astronomical abortion rates in New York City, it is still a shame, a scandal and, yes, worth writing about. And it is also a legitimate point against Cuomo’s odd working assumption that abortion is too hard to obtain in New York State. Regardless of how abortion-prone a population is, you can’t get rates that high if there are significant barriers to it.

Only because you eisegetically discover blame being applied to liberal politics do the demographics matter in the sense you wish to bring them into the discussion. (Of course they matter as a means of attempting to address the problem, but they don’t matter in that “but, wait!” sense you’re introducing them.) But I don’t see anything in either the Chiaroscuro piece or the comments here to imply that.

So again, point out that the abortion rate is high in New York because there’s an abortion-prone population is tantamount to pointing out that before we take another step, we all need to realize that the murder rate in Chicago is high because a lot of people there are murder-prone. It’s inarguable, but it’s a vacuous point.

It’s bad enough that New York redirects $10 million per year from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (a program that provides temporary food, transportation and shelter) to family planning (read: family destroying). Now the state wants to put women in the hands of those personnel no more qualified than back-alley abortionists.

I am basically discussing demographics. To focus on New York City’s abortion rate alone without discussing the demographics of New York City gives a very incomplete picture. Some people would like to blame the city’s high abortion rate on liberal politics, and no doubt that plays some part. But I would contend it is largely explained by demographics. Certainly the 41% figure is shocking. Certainly more must be done. But if you want to understand why the rate is so high, the answer is only partly that New York has liberal abortion laws. Demographics plays a much larger role.

I’m sure that Chicago has a high murder rate because there are a lot of people there who are murderers, as well. Is that a meaningful statement?