Supreme Court halts contraception mandate for religious groups

[Igel]

59. I suspect we're arguing in a semantic vacuum.

Given that we don't know the definitions of the words we're using, we're bandying about words and think they mean something when they're as meaningful as "arpil" or "frigulity".

Prescribe desogestrel/ethinyl estradiol and it's a couple of chemicals. Do you recognize it as something that can be used for birth control?

A pharmacist would know it has a variety of uses, all interrelated. It can be a birth control pill. It can also suppress the symptoms of endometriosis and allow for the endometriomas to be treated in other ways. It is what it is, but we usually name it for what it's used for. Then we think that's what the substance or object is, inherently. It's like saying a screwdriver can only be used to drive in screws. "Outside-the-box thinking" would allow it to punch a hole in a can of condensed milk or a person's cranium. Some uses are proscribed, some aren't; the same, I'm betting, for the sisters. It's not the substance, but the purpose.

The sister's object to "birth control pills." Not to "desogestrel/ethinyl estradiol". Don't use it for birth control and they're probably fine. Call them "birth control pills" and you're stating the use in the name. It's like selling a "thin, cylindrical flat-headed murder device" for driving in screws.

Similarly, there's this running debate about Viagra. It can be used to give a guy temporary priapism. Or it can be used to treat a real physical condition with psychological and emotional consequences. Viagra is marketed under a slightly smaller dose for pulmonary hypertension in children 1-17 and called Revatio. Drug =/= drug's most common purpose.

This is a distractor argument that gets away from the real issue involved.