Is AHA an organization?

A prominent abolitionist emailed me to complain about my terminology. I will reproduce my side of the correspondence. This is edited to eliminate personal references. His statements are indented:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You don't even attempt to offer a substantive rebuttal. You don't try to show how my interpretation of the AHA post I quoted is fallacious. It's just your knee-jerk defense of whatever anyone at AHA says or does. 

The AHA post uses a straightforward argument. Resort to violence is logically entailed by the argument it gave. 

Also "at AHA" is a meaningless statement, which I've corrected you on before and on which is based many of your misrepresentations. Yet you forge ahead without taking into account the correctives I offer. THAT is knee-jerk.

You mean, because I don't accept AHA's hairsplitting, nonsensical distinctions about how it's not an "organization" or even a "group"? 

It's AHA that's redefining words. You say it's not a "group," but you say it's a "movement." Well, a movement is a group of people. You say people can't "join" or "belong to" or be a "member" of AHA, but, needless to say, people can belong to a movement.

Likewise, AHA has "societies." Well, what are societies if not "groups." 

In fact, you try to have it both ways:

First, “Abolish Human Abortion” is not a group. 

http://blog.abolishhumanabortion.com/2015/01/is-aha-cult.html 

"Abolitionists are a group of people..." 

http://abolishhumanabortion.com/societies/start-a-local-society/

I don't accept the propagandistic redefinition of words.

I notice that you haven't even attempted to offer a plausible alternative interpretation of the statement I posted. 

Movements aren't groups, or organisations. They're movements. Because words mean things, Steve.
It's not fair to say we're REdefining words. We're defining WHO WE ARE. Just like it would be wrong to say that Calvinists are fatalists. You're not being fair, and that's not loving of you.

Consult a few dictionaries. Movements are organized groups of people, with a common ideology, working together to advance a common cause. 

Yes, you're defining who you are...by twisting language.  

AHA is a social movement. It deploys group action to further its agenda.

Stop saying "AHA says" and "AHA is a group" and stuff like that, because it's false, and you know it's false. The question is: Do you care?

You're being preposterous. Take this:

http://abolishhumanabortion.com/faq-about-abolition/

Or this:

http://abolishhumanabortion.com/abolitionism/the-five-tenets-of-abolitionism/

Or this:

http://abolitionistradio.com/Declaration%20of%20Sentiments%20International%20Coalition%20of%20Abolitionist%20Societies.pdf

You're going to tell me that's not what AHA says? If that doesn't represent AHA, who or what does it represent? Disneyland? 

An, an "ideology" can't speak for itself. An ideology is an abstraction for what the ideologues say it is. People define an ideology. It's a set of ideas by a person or persons. 

A group can have subsets. Groups within groups. Collectives. 

Your effort to drive a wedge between the singular and the plural is arbitrary.

Abolitionists define AHA as both an ideology and a group. Groups can say things. A member of a social movement can speak for the movement.  

It's bizarre that abolitionists are so hung up on these artificial, semantic quibbles. 

You're being simplistic. To state "AHA says" is shorthand for "representatives of AHA say."

To state "CBS said" is shorthand for "a CBS reporter said."

Do you really need to have anything that elementary explained to you? 

It's true that at one time AHA was spoken of as a group, but for a long time now we have been trying to reform our language and be careful to speak of it as what it actually is - an ideology. Sometimes even the most experienced of us slip up. You ought to be engaging what our position actually is, though, not slip-ups.

You can't obligate me to use your irrational descriptors, any more than I'm obliged to call Bruce Jenner a woman or Caitlyn. 

Like it or not, AHA is an organization. It has spokesmen. They post on the AHA blog and Facebook wall. 

AHA isn't just an ideology. Rather, it's a social movement, an organized group of people united by a common ideology and a shared purpose.  

It's a waste of time…

You emailed me, not the other way around. You're wasting my time. 

You don't get to define who we are or what we have set up, especially not in the face of our protestations to the contrary. You're the Arminian insisting that Calvinism is fatalism despite many reasons to the contrary. You're that guy. Stop being that guy. 

As a matter of fact, I do have the right to define things in the face of protestations to the contrary. I have a right to define homosexuality and transgenderism in the face of protestations to the contrary. I have the right to define atheism in the face of protestations to the contrary. 

A social movement or ideology is not entitled to dictate how other people must view it simply because it wants to be viewed a certain way. It only gets to define itself if in fact its definitions are reasonable–which is not the case with AHA's fabricated, illogical dichotomies and disjunctions. That's not something you get to impose on other people just because you say it or just because it serves your purpose.  

When open theists redefine omniscience, then say they affirm omniscience, I reserve the right to say they deny omniscience. 

Intellectual honesty would demand you deal with who we really are, not who you want us to be. 

Well, John Reasnor is an XRecon theonomist, and he used that to define AHA in your sponsored debate with Wilcox. Is that what AHA really is? 

Intellectual honesty demands that I distinguish between who you really are and who you imagine you are. 

Part of your mistake is thinking of AHA as a top-down group. We are neither top-down nor a group. It may be difficult for you to imagine that, as I get the feeling you're in the rut of thinking everything has to be some sort of institution. 

I notice you don't quote anything I've said to that effect. That's just your idiosyncratic definition of an organization, as if, by definition, an organization must be a top-down group.

I notice you've reciprocated nothing about love in your emails. 

I'm amused by your hypocritical refrain about love, when AHA routinely slanders prolifers.