A contrarian being all "contrary" (commonsense notwithstanding)

In The Australian Mark Steyn declares:

I salute Danna Vale. You don't have to agree with her argument that Australia's aborting itself out of recognition and that therefore Islam will inherit by default to think it's worth asking a couple of questions:

* Is abortion in society's interest?

* Can a society become more Muslim in its demographic character without also becoming more Muslim in its political and civil character?

Is abortion in society's interest?

Let us ignore for the moment the fact that a word like "society" is so vague that it renders questions like these virtually meaningless (like the term "family" in "family values"). I'm going to assume that when Steyn says "society" he means "liberal democratic society"--in which case I'd have to answer in the affirmative. Yes: it is in the interests of a society based upon the principle of individual soveriegnty that individuals be granted sovereignty over their own bodies, regardless of their gender.

Here's Steyn's response to his own question:

One can understand that 17-year-old Glenys working the late shift at Burger King and knocked up by some bloke who scrammed 10 minutes after conception may believe it's in her interest to exercise "a woman's right to choose", but the state has absolutely no interest in encouraging women in general to exercise that choice.

(Righties just love to rag on their own political base, don't they?)

Anyway, leaving aside the logical fallacy that a thing is encouraged simply by virtue of the fact that it is permitted, let's see what happens when we rework's Steyn's scenario ever-so-slightly:

One can understand that 17-year-old Glenys working the late shift at Burger King and raped by some bloke who scrammed 10 minutes after conception may believe it's in her interest to exercise "a woman's right to choose", but the state has absolutely no interest in encouraging women in general to exercise that choice.

Get it? Steyn's generalist argument against a woman's right to choose applies in equal measure to rape victims as it does to women he doesn't like (i.e. irresponsible white-trash whores who'll no doubt end up as burdens on the welfare system and pursued across a car park by this dickhead). Abortion is abortion, after all. Shorter Steyn: a female rape victim who falls pregnant and who claims the right to exercise more sovereignty over her own body than either Steyn or the rapist wants to grant her is not operating in society's interest (i.e. in the interests of keeping the White Anglo-Celtic birth rate up).

Danna Vale might as well have argued that Australia was liberal democracy-ing itself out of existence.

Can a society become more Muslim in its demographic character without also becoming more Muslim in its political and civil character?

It may depend the society in question. In Australia--no. Emphatically, no. Australian Muslims, as a rule, love democracy, love capitalism, love the 'burbs as fervently as Michael Duffy does--and I daresay a sizeable number of them even look favourably upon John Howard and the Coalition. I confidently predict that their embrace of Australian liberal democracy will continue, regardless of the abortion rate in the non-Muslim community, and regardless of what percentage of the Australian population happens to be Muslim in 50 years time.

Of course, the Islamophobia doesn't help, Mark.