I think that any so called "doctor" who practices the exectution of babies in thier mothers' wombs should be shot down like a dog. They have sworn the hippocratic oath to preserve life. Instead they kill babies and line thier own pockets will the blood money. I applaud the bombing of the abortian slaughter houses that kill these innocent babies. I think the planned parenthood movement should be outlawed and it's authors executed. Whose is with me?209 responses total.
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That's utter nonsense. If you kill a pregnant women the court has every right to try you for two murders. Legal precedent is already established.
Every sperm is sacred ...
Hey, for that post jazz actually could have googled, cut and pasted. :)
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The "planned parenthood movement" is one of the primary advocates of avoiding abortions. You should be supporting them. But, in any case, don't forget to thank liberals for your relative freedom to advocate murder (and the liberal ACLU for defending your right to free speech, if you are charged with criminal conspiracy for advocating murder). (Whose WHAT is with you?)
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I didn't not mention party affiliations.
I don't advocate murder..even misguided doctors who have been indocrinated to believe that a "fetus" is just tissue. I am not serious. I did it because I knew it would expose your liberal hyprocrisy. If I kill a doctor who practices abortion..then I AM a murderer. If that doctor kills an innocent baby in it's mother's womb then he's a hero. We should honor and respect human life in every form. When you support abortion you fail to respect and honor life.
The ACLU has republican lawyers....bullshit. Name one.
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YAWN. Can we get a decent troll in here, or do we have to put up with sabre?
sabre, in #0 you advocated murder - and now you say you weren't "serious". So, if someone took your advocacy in #0 and went out and murdered a doctor, you would disclaim any responsibility because you were not "serious"? You are the one that is hypocritical. You say we "should honor and respect human life in every form", and yet, what about the thousands of innocent, or even combatant, people we deliberately killed in executing the war in Iraq, or the people we kill with the death penalty, or the people others kill in self defense. None of those is honoring and respecting human life in every form. The fact is, we make *choices* and give people the moral license to kill with no prejudice or penalty. We think nearly nothing of it. The same must be true for the right of women to control their own bodies. They should not be made slaves to society just because their bodies can support a fetus. The *ethical* course is to make pregnancy only possible with the full license and will of the woman, without coercion, much less by force. But society is very far from implementing this, and in fact the illiberals actually oppose giving women these rights.
)Pathetic. Sabre posts some unoriginal garbage in hopes of pissing people off, and then the first time people call him on it, he runs away screaming "I didn't mean it! I didn't mean it!" Who's trolling whom here?
rcurl...I damn sure would. Any moron that one go kill someone because it was allegedly "advocated" in a lame ass bbs should take total responsabily for his own actions. You sound like a goverment censor that wants to determine the kind of movies made,songs written and videos game played. In forum such as this one can play "devil's advocate" all he wants. I guess you think that the beatles are responsable for Charles Manson's helter skelter killings. About the innocent people we "deliberately killed"..that's pure bullshit. Your argument is tangent and the analogy weak. I am talking about true innocence...an unborn baby in the womb. Go post that babbling in the conspriracy thread. Pregnancy IS only possible with the full license and will of the woman. All she has to do is use a dildo.
"Pregnancy is only possible with the full license and will of the woman?" Do you ever read what you write?
Of course I do...She gave full her lincense when she opened her fucking legs. She made her choice and exercised her WILL.
I think abortion is great. Every girl should have at least one. Heck, how about mandating abortion for girls under 21 and those under a certain income level? We don't need poor people having kids.
<Begin Counter-Troll Mode> So what's the big deal about killing an unborn baby anyway? There's no shortage. The world could do with a good deal fewer new babies. If you abort a 6 month old fetus, what the heck, it only takes six months and a modest amount of effort to replace one. We only think babies are precious because we are programmed by evolution to want to care for our little ones. It's part of survival of the species. But the species is in no danger of dieing out and that particular evolutionary impulse is not 100% appropriate in a world where overpopulation is a bigger issue. Killing a baby is more of a crime against the parents, than it is a crime against the fetus. The fetus is hardly a thinking being at all. A gerbil has more awareness. If the parents have all sorts of hopes and aspirations for the fetus, and an emotional attachment to it, then nobody should have the right to deprive them of their baby. It's a pursuit of happiness thing - lots of people find children vital to their happiness, so they have a right to have them. But if the parents don't want it, then it has no value to anyone, and aborting it is the best outcome all around. <End Counter-Troll Mode>
re #17: You have no idea how disturbing it is to hear sabre articulating (sort of) the same arguments I'm heard from my mother countless times.
Re #17: I guess you do read what you right. My next theory is that you don't get out of your barrel much.
You know IM a college educated man but I cant follow the opening piece.
<troll mode off> What? Come on man. By that reasoning you could justify killing some of the 6 billion people who have been born. After all they are easily replaced. Lets start with the retarded and the handicapped. Then we can kill off people when there are too old to be useful anymore. And THEN..we can kill everyone who disagrees with us. Get real. That "fetus" is a human being. <troll mode on>
No it's not.
Re 23: No, that reasoning would not support killing the handicapped, at least not the vast majority. If a person was a complete vegetable, so that they had no functioning self-awareness, no consious hopes or desires, and if there were no loving friends or family who wanted the person alive, then that reasoning would permit the person to be killed. Why not?
Because of principle. Out of respect for human life. Because to do so puts you in a position to do something you don't have an ETHICAL right to do Last but not least....because God loves them all and to kill them will anger him
Respect for human life is so... so... *liberal*. :)
When the IRS starts supporting "you're a full-fledged human at conception", then I'm on board.
Start taxing them, too.
Most of 'em don't have much of an income. Don't own property either, unless you count the space they take up in the womb, and there isn't usually any resale value on that.
I'm getting such a kick out of visualizing sabre screaming, "My God is fucking mad at all you fucking bitches for spreading your legs for every fucking dick that wants in. You'd be better off, slut, to use the fucking corn God grew for you." This show is too much of a train wreck to be real. But as train wrecks go it's pretty funny.
What sabre's actually doing is sitting at home, giggling, and saying "I knew those predictable dumbasses wouldn't be able to resist this one."
A true "universal respect for human life" requires denial of the death penalty, murder, war, and the means to cause, by action or inaction, the deaht of e.g. a bum. Anything else is a qualification. Foetuses are not self-aware, therefore imho, abortion for god reason like in the case of a child who would be unloved because of a rape incident, or a pregnancy whose termination would result in the death of the mother, is admissable if ver carefully considered and agreed upon by the mother, the father (when applicable, i.e. when the father is able and willing to ACT as a father) and MD/surgeon.
Has anyone considered that sabre might be the sort of person who invests so much ego in everything he says that the effort of defending #0, which he didn't even believe when he wrote it, could actually turn him into the rabid anti-abortion type he's impersonating? Psychology 101. I mean, everyone knows what Rane et al. are gonna say anyway, so why not say "Why, sir, that is most justly observed," or something? (Generic "he" there. sabre could be Mary Remmers for all I know.)
Mostly I think 'sabre' is a misnomer. 'epee' might be more accurate.
I miss mulberry.
resp:19 whoa, he's making *you* do the dance? Well, I responded a while back to other stuff (maybe not as long) so I guess it was coming. resp:31 an interesting and witty way of putting it. Sometimes, it seems more like a rotten apple pie fight. resp:32 Why yes! True, Joe. Wait for my other brother, sabre. So juicy, plump, BIG! *clop clop clop*
Duh!! People still post on this guy's threads???
If every thread that deserved being ignored were ignored, it would be rather silent around here.
Re #32: If all else fails, I'm sure that's what he'd prefer to have us think he is up to. I have no idea who sabre is and what he is thinking. I respond to please myself, serving my own agenda. If that happens to also serve someone else's agenda, then I have no problem with that. Re #26: I do have a problem with that handy, dandy, pocket-sized God you got there. That's a funny kind of God that you can just whip out of your pocket any time you need him to back up your opinions. Now, me, I happen to believe in God too, but I believe that God is at least as large and complex as the universe, and at least as difficult to understand. It's entirely beyond me to attempt to state with any certainty what God thinks about any particular issue. If God has opinions, I expect they are all way too large to fit into my brain. Maybe after I've completely understood the entire universe, I'll be ready to start making semi-confident guesses about what God thinks. I don't believe you are enough smarter than me to know what God thinks. I don't think that thing you are calling "God" is God. I think that thing is a little sock puppet you've stuck your hand into so it will conveniently back you up on any opinion you might care to offer. Forgive me if I am not impressed by either the strength of your argument or the depth of your faith.
RE:#5 Here's an example tod http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/lacicharge1.html RE#31 You're funny....you made me laugh RE# 32...You read me like a book RE# 35 dcat? what a pussy ass name. I saw your photo on the web. A little faggot like you shouldn't say a word about anyone else's handle #38 You stupid moron. Do you realise how fucking stupid you sound when you do the very thing you're posting against? You are a fucking post whore. #34 md..You'll never know. #39. That is so true. every bbs needs a few trolls to stir things up. You lamers are so *yawn* BORING. #33 Don't get your panties in a wad twenex.
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Re #7: When Rane uses the word "liberal", it's not the common usage that is a synonym for "Democrat". Re #31: LOL.
<twenex untwists panties>
Fop.
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Sorry but i don't agree with what you say, everyone has a right to give up thier child, but what is not acceptable is that the man cannot decide as well, it is totally up to the female.
I've occasionally thought that someone who's identified as the impregnator of a pregnant woman should get a choice: pay her the price of an abortion and give up all parental rights to the child should she decide to have it, or pay child support normally and keep parental rights.
Sounds reasonable to me.
He is charged with two counts of murder one.
Prosecutors throw as many charges as they can, and see what sticks. In this situation, she might have given birth in the process of being killed, which would make it clearly two murders if he killed the baby as well.
Re #47: How would a father's right to decide be enforced? Suppose you suspect that your girlfriend is pregnant. Would you have a right to force her to take a pregnancy test? Can any man require this of any woman just by claiming that they had sex together, even if she denies it? If the test is positive, do you have a right to force her to undergo an amnio (which entails some risk to the fetus) so a genetic test can be done to test whether or not the baby is yours? Suppose the fetus is proven to be yours, she wants an abortion, you want the baby. Does she have to go through with the pregnancy? How much control over her behavior during the pregnancy do you now have? Can you regulate what she drinks and eats, and how much she exercises? All these things can effect the health of the child - if she doesn't want the child and you do, then presumably she can't be trusted to behave optimally. What if she wants to take a business trip to another state or country where the law would allow her to get an abortion without your permission. Would you have the right to prevent her travelling? Suppose she turns up one day no longer pregnant. She says she miscarried. Miscarriages are probably about as common as abortions. What kind of tests can you demand she has to go through to determine whether or not she deliberately aborted the child? It's a fundamental issue that if you really want to force a woman to have a baby that she doesn't want to have, then you have to be prepared to strip her of nearly all her normal rights during the period of her pregnancy. You practically have to jail her. Is this sane? How does three minutes of pleasure give a man such rights to control a woman's life and to intrude so much into her privacy?
What "Rights" does pregnancy interfere with?
Isn't that question answered by the bulk of my previous response? If you intend to force a woman to continue a pregnancy that she doesn't want, or if you want to be able to be able to detect when a woman has an abortion, then you need to encroach very closely on her privacy and freedom of choice. If you want to outlaw abortion, but don't intend to be at all serious about enforcing it, then there isn't a problem. Any woman can find out if she is pregnant by peeing on a stick, and abort an pregnancy by swallowing a pill. That can be done pretty easily without leaving a paper trail that the law can easily detect. Unless you are willing to seriously restrict and intrude on women, outlawing abortion would be about as effective as outlawing marajuana has been.
The murky bottom of the slippery slope of outlawing abortion can be seen in the history of Romania, when Ceaucescu required every woman to have four kids or provide medical proof why she couldn't. Abortion was strictly outlawed, and every fertile woman was subjected to monthly pregnancy tests by the state health system. If she miscarried, three doctors would have to agree or she would face criminal charges. Romanian wombs were transformed into the property of the state, an Orwellian nightmare that a close friend of mine was lucky enough to escape.
Some men just naturally think of women as pawns, to be pushed around as they wish. Some of it is probably genetic, because men are physically more powerful than women on the average, but I think most of it is indoctrination.
I think #55 is kind of where you need to go if you are really serious about
outlawing abortion, but I would have said that no nation had ever had the will
to go that far. So I did some web searching.
Best two pages I found to look at seem to be
http://eileen.undonet.com/Main/7_R_Eile/Romania.htm
http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/policy/abortion/ab-romania.html
The first is a story, the second is statistics. Before 1966 the abortion rate
in Romania was very high - between 75% and 80%. In 1966 Ceaucescu banned
abortion and contraception, aiming to increase the size of his population
(and thus his army).
Mandatory pelvic examinations at places of employment were imposed
on women of reproductive age. Informers for the security police were
stationed in maternity hospitals. Doctors could be prosecuted for
performing unauthorized abortions, and nurses were to make unannounced
supervisory visits to new mothers to determine whether they were taking
proper care of their infants.
All women were supposed to have at least four (or five according to some
sites) children. Economic sanctions were applied to women who failed to
produce four children.
The rate of legal abortions dropped to 28% between 1966 and 1967 and the
number of live births almost doubled. The legal abortion rate there after
started drifting upward and the birthrate downward. Meanwhile the rate
of abortion-related maternal mortality rate increased to 10 times the rate
of any other European country. In 23 years, 10,000 Romanian women died from
unsafe abortion.
Many, many children were put in orphanages. At the time Ceaucescu was
overhrown, 150,000 to 200,000 children were in institutional orphanages.
Death rates of infants were also higher.
In 1989, after the revolution, the law banning abortions and contraceptives
was one of the first legacies of the old regime to be discarded. The
legal abortion rate lept back to around 75% but has been steadily dropping
ever since, reaching 52% in in 2000. Maternal mortality fell by 50% in the
first year after the law was removed. The slow fall in the abortion rate
is attributed to some improvement in the economy. Also health care providers
have been slowing rediscovering contraceptives, after 23 years of illegality,
and the Romanian people have been slowly regaining some trust in the medical
establishment.
Answer my question. What rights does pregnancy interfere with? What can't you do while your pregnant that you can do when your not pregnant?
Read my posts. I never said pregnancy interferes with any rights. However, if you want the government to be able to force every woman who becomes pregnant to stay pregnant, then you cannot do that without encroaching on a lot of her rights. It is not that state of pregnancy that interferes with her rights, it is the process of detecting that state and ensuring that it is preserved that interferes with her rights. If you want the government to want to detect all abortions, then the first thing the government has to do is detect all pregnancies. Apparantly Ceausesco required that all women be given mandatory month pelvic exams in their work places so they would know when a woman got pregnant. I'd consider having the government closely monitoring every vagina in the country would be a wee little infringement on women's right to privacy, wouldn't you? So what isn't a pregnant woman allowed to do? Let's assume the government has good reason to suspect a pregnant woman doesn't want to have the baby. Can they prevent her from travelling someplace where abortions are legal? (Keep in mind that if Roe vs. Wade is overthrown, then it will be up to the states whether or not to ban abortion, so abortion will my be legal in Ohio while illegal in Michigan, so you'll have to prevent pregnant women from crossing state lines, not just the national border.) Certainly that kind of restriction on the right to travel freely would be unprecidented. Would pregnant women be allowed to run, or ride horseback? Some people think that kind of behavior can induce miscarriages. (They are probably wrong but it's the kind of thing women used to do to try to induce abortions.) Shall they be banned from smoking and drinking? That can increase the probability of miscarriages (and birth defects). My they drink raspberry tea? There are lots of different things that could place the health of a fetus at risk, and any of them could cause an abortion. Many are also likely to place the health of the mother at risk and if they fail, lead to baby's with substantial birth defects. There are about a zillion different ways to cause an abortion, mostly dangerous and of uncertain effectiveness. You need to ban women from doing a whole range of things that they are currently allowed (but not advised) to do. I don't know if that violates any specific rights, but it's a huge contraction of women's personal freedom. The day you ban abortion, several thousand people will put up web sites detailing supposedly safe procedures for performing home abortions. Are you going to ban those web sites? If so, that's a contraction of freedom of speech. It is certainly possible to ban abortion and do none of these things. But the ban will be a joke. Any woman who wants an abortion will have thousands of easy options. Only the poor and the stupid will be prevented from having abortions. The sane way to reduce abortions is to improve the quality of and access to birth control. Then women who don't want babies won't get pregnant and then won't have abortions. I don't object to encouraging abstinance either, since that has the same effect, but I don't think that is a solution by itself. Men and women who don't want babies are never going to stop wanting sex. I don't object to people trying to talk women out of having abortions. Probably making improvements to the systems in place for handling adoption would encourage more women to give babies up for adoption instead of aborting them. There are a lot of sane and sensible things that could be done to reduce the abortion rate. Illegalization is not one of them. The fact that much of the pro-life camp has no interest at all in things like improving access to contraception means to me that their goal is not to reduce the number of fetus's killed. A narrow focus on illegalizing abortion as a solution to the abortion problem means to me that a fundamental part of the agenda is a desire to control woman's sexuality. Improving contraception would be solving the abortion problem by increasing women's control of their own sexuality, instead of by taking it away. Can't have that, now can we.
You keep spouting what some deposed dictator in some pickyune country did years ago. You keep spouting off what could be done. That is not the question. You speak of rights. Current rights here in the U.S. in the year 2003. What rights does a pregnancy interfere with? Conversely. What rights does an abortion interfere with?
A pregnancy, or a forced pregnancy, Bruce?
My answer to bru's questions, even though the questions are rather irrelevant, are: Pregnancy interfers with no rights as long as women have the option to terminate it. Abortion interfers with no rights if performed in the first two trimesters or to protect the health of the woman.
Bru: The premise hidden in your questions is: unless it can be shown that pregnancy somehow interferes with any of the pregnant woman's rights, then abortion is wrong. The premise is bullshit. Give me one reason why a non-viable fetus should not be aborted for any reason the woman pleases. If your answer is that you feel the fetus is a human being, I'll answer that it obviously isn't. If you can't do that, then the truth is that the pregnant woman has a right to have an abortion, and your aim is to give the government the power to deprive her of that right. Talk about slippery slopes.
Bruce, you keep asking "what rights does a pregnancy interfere with?" I've answered repeatedly: none. So now I'm going to ask you, repeatedly if need be, "what does you question have to do with anything?" Or, if you prefer, you can answer a more useful question that even falls a bit into your area of expertize: How would you suggest that a ban on abortion would be enforced?
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Hmmm. I'm enjoying Jan's posts a great deal in this item. I half hope that bru will continue to whine and make cliche'd arguments as if he's coming up with things that are original, because Jan's responses are well worth reading. Pregnancy isn't something you can or should do halfway. Actually, I kind of liked a previous suggestion that women under a certain age or certain income shouldn't be allowed to have kids.
I should stop argueing about this. You who oppose me may never understand why I see this as an infringement of a basic human right, the right to life. If you can rationalize the murder of an unborn child, you will have no problem accepting the right to murder others under the right circumstances.
Do you have trouble accepting the right to murder others under the right circumstances?
I see it as an infringement of the right of a woman to control her own body - and not have it controlled by the "state" - to not allow an abortion after due consideration.
Whenever someone is murdered, there will always be someone to rationalise it. Abortion I don't think makes much of a difference there. Are you suggesting that if we had had tighter controls on abortion in the early 20th century, fewer blacks would have been lynched since we couldn't have rationalised the practise so much?
My objection to the last paragraph of resp:67 is not that it is wrong, but that it is vacuous. Everyone accepts the right to kill under some circumstances. If someone starts shooting at a fellow customs agent, Bruce is going to go for his gun without spending a lot of time worrying about his right to kill, and nobody is going to criticize him much afterwards. But he said "murder" not "kill". And the difference is ... um ... "murder" is unjustified killing. If we accept his choice of word, then we agree with him. If we don't then the statement is meaningless. All he is saying is "abortion is murder because I feel it is." Can't argue with that, but don't expect it to convince anyone either. I asked Bruce how he would like to see a ban on abortion enforced. He didn't answer. I have never yet seen any pro-life person address this question, which I think is absolutely essential to consider. There just seems to be this quiet assumption that when we illegalize abortion it will go away. But that's absurd. When we illegalize abortion, it becomes the job of our law enforcement officiers to make it go away. How would they do it?
I've never understood why instead of fighting for or against a woman's right to choose, they both don't fight for full (and fool) proof contraception.
i love readin janc's responses. i usually always agree with him. but jan, 3 minutes of pleasure????
I think I read a study once that said that the average duration of a sexual encounter for American couples was 3 minutes - just enough time to fit in during a commercial break. I suppose the minimum is lower. I suppose I should have left out the "of pleasure" part, which isn't that compatible with the "3 minutes" part.
Re #72: I don't understand either why those that are anti-choice are also often anti-contraception. This combination is even the policy of many current governmental leaders.
Because every sperm is sacred, and killing a sperm is the equivalent of killing a human being. Likewise, I understand that this is the reason that masturbation is sinful.
Every sperm is sacred??? Hahahahahahahahahahahah.
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"I'm one of those kooky types that doesn't consider "life" to be official until "birth" ie. when a BIRTH certificate says you were BORN. " Someone needs to tell those tribes out in Africa, they're not alive!! ;)
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and that means if someone aborts a baby during the 8th month by cutting it out of the mother it isn't murder?
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During the 8th month, in the womb, it is not a baby but a fetus. How many abortions are done during the 8th month?
The only ones done that late in this country are those where the mother is at extreme physical risk. Usually risk of imminent death.
I want to parse the subtext out of #77 paragraph 3: > If you can rationalize the murder[a] of an unborn child[b], > you will have no problem accepting the right to murder others > under the right circumstances. Taking point [a], I recall that murder is defined as "the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought". Bruce is asserting that abortion is unlawful (false), that what is being killed is a human being (debatable even in the third trimester), and that the act is always malicious rather than possibly defensive (false). Ergo, Bruce's conclusion depends entirely on two complete falsehoods and one questionable assertion; in other words, he's WRONG. This is all too typical of his reasoning abilities as exhibited here. Point [b] illustrates this. Bruce probably cannot wrap his mind around the possibility that a fetus might be not YET a child; he's shown no ability to consider this in a rational manner before, and I doubt he will in the future. He appears to take it as an article of faith. Well, okay, Bruce, it's an article of faith with you. You're welcome to it. Now, will you stop trying to force EVERYONE to practice YOUR faith? Others differ on this, and they will have abortions if they believe and feel it necessary. Can't you just mind your own business?
(Prediction: he will not be able to just mind his own business.)
I strongly agree with Jan and Russ and others here, but I do admire Bruce for sticking up for his point of view. It shouldn't be necessary to insult him over this.
nope, I cannot. Anynore than I could stand by and watch a 12 year old raped and murdered in a parking lot, or a 6 year old beaten to death by a group of bullies. Sperm is sperm, it has no righ to remain alive or procreate. An egg is an egg, with no more rights to life than the sperm. A zygote is a zygote, but tell me the day and hour it becomes a fetus and I will accept abortion prior to that date.
I'm glad that you will accept abortion up to *some time* after conception. This is exactly the issue the Supreme Court addressed in Roe vs Wade, and they chose up to the end of the second trimester. So, if you would prefer a different date, then argue it with the Supreme Court. What is important is that you accept abortion under a woman's judgement for a reasonable period of time.
Re #88: In other words, you refuse to distinguish between innocent individuality (the right to be left alone) and infringement upon the very body of another? The distinction between embryo and fetus isn't a bright line that's crossed in an instant; the transformation is a process, and the criteria appear to be based largely on appearance. The thing that actually makes a human being (the brain) takes a long time to catch up. Are you saying that *outward appearance* of humanity is more important than the fact? This is eerily similar to the primitive superstition that putting a face on a doll gives it a soul. IIRC, RU-486 acts during the zygote/embryo phase. If so, you should have no objection to its use.
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As I said, I do not believe in abortion because I do not believe you can state the time and place when they become a human being. zygote, embryo, fetus, baby, infant, child et al are just conventions we have established to try and define when a human being reaches a certain stage. But the age of the stage varies from person to person. Some people are still children developmentally even after they have reached the age of majority. some children are much more adult than some parents I have known. My wife, Twila, was born at a stage in the pregnancy when it would have been legal to abort. Yet she survived adn I am thankful for it. I know some people say that at cetain points, teh brain is not fully functional, but evn some adults do not have fully functional brains, and to kill them would be considered murder. even if you have a person who is brain dead, adn you pull all life support, sometimes the body will go on living. and if you were to kill one of these people, it would be murder. So, if we cannot define a set of criteria that we all can agree on to say "this is life and it is sacred" How can we make the decision to end a life because it is inconvenient for us?
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Re #92: in fact, you would be completely oblivious of it if the fetus later named Twila had been aborted. You would probably now have a wife anyway about whom you might say the same thing, but it would be equally meaningless. It is the human condition that we must make many choices of ages when things are permitted or unpermitted. We choose the age 18 to vote and 21 to order alcohol (in Michigan) - although there is no instant at which a person converts from should not be able to vote to should be able to vote (or drink, or drive, or be president, or anything else for which we choose specific ages). Doing the same for the right to abort a fetus is just as necessary. Since you accept the right of abortion but only quibble about the date at which it goes from permitted to unpermitted, the only recourse is to have society make that choice - which is has done through the action of the Supreme Court.
Re #92: You're saying Twila was born during the first trimester, or that
abortion later than that was legal at the time she was born?
Re #92: I can state the condition under which a human organism is no longer a human being despite vital signs (brain death). Given that one can also measure the appearance of the neurological attributes of humanity (much more accurately and reproducibly than their disappearance), it's my opinion that your opinion is unsupported by anything resembling a fact and deserving of no weight in public policy. Defining "a set of criteria that we all can agree on" is impossible so long as you have one holdout who refuses to accept them because they fail to support their preconceived conclusion. This is why we have nonsense like the claim that a zygote is a human being from the moment of fertilization; the people behind this wanted to justify their stand against contraceptives which prevent implantation, so they argued themselves into a stance which forces them to stand against in-vitro fertilization as well; they want more babies, as long as you don't make them THAT way! Ironies abound.
Jim heard something on the radio about in-vitro fertilization to the effect that the leftover zygotes must be stored forever, they cannot be 'adopted', or disposed of, or used for research. Apparently zygotes outside of a womb have more rights than zygotes inside a womb. I have heard of bizarre cases where a divorced woman wanted to use a zygote made with her ex's sperm. I don't know if child support would have been required. It went to court and stayed there for a long time.
A zygote outside the womb does not have a chance to become a baby. Whereas one in the womb does. So it's understandable that a woman would be able to make a decision regarding the zygote in her womb wihout getting the courts or anyone else for that matter involved. It's still part of her body. While it is bizarre to think that once the zygote leaves her womb, she has no say, I can see how they would argue that her rights were different now. About the divorced woman wanting to use a zygote with her ex's sperm, would she have had to have the court involved if she wanted to destroy it, as opposed to using it?
Re #97: Definitely false. Many zygotes are discarded every year. There has been a case where frozen zygotes became the subject of a property/custody dispute during a divorce. The ex-wife wanted to have more children (her ovaries were no longer good), the ex-husband didn't want his genes being used by his ex-wife without his consent. Consent won out over the right to reproduce. I'm not quite sure how I feel about this, but given that the ex-wife would have been sterile anyway and she always had the option to buy an egg to use with a future partner, I think I see how the judge balanced things and probably got it right. (Especially given that the issue of custody and support would have to have been settled, perhaps inconsistently by someone else, if he decided for the ex-wife!)
WARNING: The following post may be hazardous to the beliefs of pro- choice fanatics and to those who think President Bush's judicial nominees are out of the mainstream of American thought. Proceed at your own risk. Thank you. "Progress and Perils: How Gender Issues Unite and Divide Women" Conducted for Center for Gender Equity by Princeton Survey Research Associates, Oct. 2001 . . . Women's opinions on the issue of abortion itself are sharply divided and entrenched. Only one-third (34%) or women say abortion should be generally available to those who want it. Forty-five percent held the opposite view and want access to abortion limited. Thirty-one percent want it limited only to cases of rape, incest, and to save the woman's life. . . .
So 34% of women want it to be available without any restrictions. Do the 45% who want "access to abortions limited" want these limitation to be in the third trimester only? Not clear from your quote. If so that would hardly be the opposite of what that no restrictions group wants. And even that last group of 31% sees abortion as suitable in some situations, so that's hardly hardcore pro-life. So that adds up to 110% of women want abortion kept legal to some degree. Wow. Good news. ;-)
That study may be found at http://www.advancewomen.org/womens_research/PartOne.pdf It's long and says many things. Here's a quote: Of 12 issues investigated in this study as possible priorities for a women s movement, only abortion generates sharp differences of opinion. Half of women (49%) say keeping abortion legal should be a top priority of the movement, but 24 percent assign it a lower priority, and 25 percent reject it outright as an issue that should concern a women s movement. In a different context, 55 percent of women say "reproductive rights is a public issue that is very important to them personally, ranking lowest out of eight public issues tested. Women s opinions on the issue of abortion itself are sharply divided, and entrenched. Only one-third (34%) of women say abortion should be generally available to those who want it. Forty-five percent hold the opposite view and want access to abortion limited: 31 percent want it limited only to cases of rape, incest and to save the woman s life and 14 percent say abortion should never be permitted. Nineteen percent of women prefer a middle ground, saying abortion should be available, but under new limitations. These might include limitations, for example, on the timing of abortions, or on the steps that must be taken before a woman can have an abortion. Overall, 81 percent of women say they never have second thoughts about their own position on the abortion issue. This percentage is up sharply from the 60 percent of women who said they never had doubts about their opinion on abortion when asked about this in a slightly different way in a 1988 Gallup Poll. Women are more likely to take the view that abortion should be generally available as their level of education increases. Less than a quarter of women who did not complete high school (22%), 28 percent of high school graduates, 35 percent of women who attended college but did not graduate, and 49 percent of college graduates support the general availability of abortion. The effect of education is particularly strong among older women. In fact, college graduates age 50 and older are the only demographic sub-group of women where a majority (54%) favors having abortion generally available to women who want it. Race and ethnicity also influence attitudes about the availability of abortion, with Hispanics most opposed and African-Americans most supportive. Overall, one in five Hispanic women (20%), 35 percent of white women and 40 percent of African-American women support the general availability of abortion. Since education affects these attitudes and African-American women attend college at lower rates than white women, the differences between whites and African-Americans are reduced when the two groups are compared in total. Half of African-American women who have attended college (50%), but only 42 percent of comparably-educated whites, support having abortion generally available.
So yeah, lots of women aren't pro-choice, especially if they are young and poorly educationed. Golly, that's a shock.
That is quite interesting since if Roe v. Wade were overturned, it would mostly be young, poorly educated women who would have trouble obtaining abortions.
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The young poorly educated women can always go on welfare if they have unwanted babies.
Yeah, because you can really live it UP on welfare. *snort*
Re #100: Regardless of what the mainstream is this week, the Constitution prohibits the majority imposing its will on matters religious without repealing the First Amendment. (You may recall that the Constitution is specifically designed to prevent transient passions from changing the law of the land [aka mob rule].) I also seem to recall that the "mainstream" view as propounded by the radical right is built on half-truths and a number of outright lies. My sympathies for their agenda are diminished accordingly, and I expect that the jurists who take their duty of impartiality seriously feel likewise. Right-wing ideologues are another matter.
re: "#103 (janc): So yeah, lots of women aren't pro-choice,
especially if they are young and poorly educationed. Golly, that's a
shock."
Do we detect a tinge of condescending snobbery here by the self-
annointed?? ("If they had only gone to college we could have
brainwashed them.")
This illustrates how self-insulated and poorly informed the radical
pro-choicers tend to be.
Just remember this information the next time we hear a report of who may
or may not be in or out of the American mainstream on this issue.
Yup, I think that young people and less educated people generally know less than old people and more educated people. Such a snob I am. The "golly, that's a shock" part is specifically about your strange notion that these statistics are any big surprise to anyone. The specific numbers vary, and the interpretation is difficult, but everyone knows there are lots of people on both sides of the issue. If, like you, I was interested in painted a oversimplified image that tended to favor my side, I'd have quoted just the first of the paragraphs above.
No response to my claim of lies from your side, Kerry? Are you afraid of a discussion of the facts, out here in the open? If you look at my Bronowski quote in item 21, you'll see why I think that dogmatists like klg and Bruce are so dangerous. They admit no doubt, and will allow no test of their veracity.
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Just so Kerry has something to work with, I've got a partial list
of anti-abortion lies for him:
1.) "Fetal pain". During the stage at which most abortions are
performed, foeti simply do not have the parts of the brain
where pain is experienced, and the nerve connections to the
rest of the body are quite incomplete. Without nerves, you
don't feel (non-phantom) pain; ask any spinal injury victim.
Heck, ask yourself after the dentist gives you Novocaine.
2.) "Post-abortion syndrome". It probably doesn't exist, or
wouldn't if the "pro-life" forces didn't try to make every
woman who's had an abortion feel like a murderer. Having
a baby is no mental-health picnic, either; post-partum
psychosis, anyone?
3.) "Partial-birth abortion". The term itself is slander, but
the the impression that the anti-abortion forces spread about
it being either common or done except in the gravest cases
is disgustingly false.
4.) And one I saw on a billboard: abortion is "the #1 preventable
cause of breast cancer". Funny, the research shows no effect,
whereas smoking and overweight are probably #1 and #2.
You really have to wonder about people who lend their support to a cause
that's justified with a bunch of blatant lies. Like, how can they look
at themselves in the mirror and not feel ashamed?
There's a certain tendancy, when people argue passionately to support a position, to throw in any argument that seems to support their cause, in the vague hope that someone out there somewhere will be convinced by that one, even if it's stupid. So in any passionate argument, you tend to get lots of stupid arguments for or against being floated. Their existance should not be taken as evidence that good arguments don't actually exist.
My, my, Mr. russ! You seem to have worked yourself into quite a snit over the posting of results from a public opinion poll. Perhaps in the future it would behoove you to observe helpful "warnings" so as not to risk a coronary thrombosis or otherwise imperil your well-being. Please try taking some deep breaths.
Re #114: Except this isn't random people, Jan. These are the major organizations behind the cause, so far as I can tell. The only thing they accomplish with these things is to discredit themselves in the eyes of anyone who cares about truth. What really gets me is that most of the organizations opposed to abortion have an explicit Christian affiliation, yet they do not show any concern about these lies. Which denominations teach that it's okay to lie about people who differ? Or are these people hypocrites even by the teachings they claim to follow? (I lean toward the latter explanation.)
Religion=faith=nice-sounding word for believing things without demanding proof, or not carefully examining one's premises. Pretty much everyone who follows a religion (at least, the ones I'm vaguely familiar with) is buying into someone else's story of what happened a Really Long Time Ago and following someone else's rules for how to live life. So, they're used to taking someone else's word on things without necessarily examining it thoroughly (or some of them, even thinking about it to make sure it makes sense). Can you tell that I think Dubya's "faith-based charities" idea is a load of bullcrap?
I have not faith in the idea of an atom. How are you going to prove they exist.
Another complete non-answer from klg. You might almost think that he has no interest in intellectual issues or matters of truth and fact, and just posts here as a troll without any interest in taking responsibility or ownership of what's posted under his name. Oh wait...
118: The nature of matter is a theory, albeit an extremely well-supported one. I am thus far stisfied with it because it has proved consistent with all situations. If an alternate theory came forth which equally well explained all observed phenomena, then I would consider that as well. I have no interest in going through all the reasons that I find the atomic theory acceptable, because I don't have any respect for your opinion and trying to convince you of these things is not worth my time.
/cheer
Re 118: The computer monitor you're using to read this response is a good demonstration of electrons. Or perhaps elf magic! Seriously, there's a *lot* of science in the background all around you. Things like computers, plastics, food additives, medicines, etcs. were mostly created by researchers & scientists. This stuff is quite thoroughly used in many fields of study. If you mean to debunk it, you've got some serious work ahead of you.
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I don't mind if people have faith. I mind if theyput a gun in my mouth and force me to follow the rules of their faith.
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Heh, I have a friend whose family has a cottage up in Greenville.
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See 124. People can believe pretty much whatever they want, cry out for help to whomever they want, and as long as they're not bothering me I could care less. To a certain extent, even if they are bothering me I'll ignore them anyway. However, I am trained as a scientist and when people misinterpret data on purpose it rubs me the wrong way. When they start citing made-up statistics without bothering to check veracity for the purpose of inflicting their arbitrary values and morals on my uterus, all of which is justified because of their "faith", then I have a problem with that.
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Re #118: There is ample evidence to prove the existence of atoms, and just off the top of my head I'll recount how science arrived at that conclusion and held to it. (The Greeks initiated the concept, but did not have the scientific method to actually test theories.) In the nineteenth century, researchers noted that substances could either be made from, or broken down to, consistent ratios of other substances. This supported (but did not prove) the theory that substances were made of discrete and identical atoms which could be combined in different ways. Nothing in chemistry ever gave reason to challenge this idea, once some kinks were worked out. In the 20th century, researchers found an odd phenomenon called radioactivity. One researcher working with alpha particles found that most of them went through a gold foil with small deflections in their paths, but occasionally one would bounce almost straight back at the source. This was described with words something like "it was like firing a cannon ball at a piece of tissue paper and having it bounce back and hit you." From this it was concluded that atoms not only existed, but their positive charge was concentrated in a very small (and heavy) region. Since then we've done huge amounts of resarch work, all of which confirms the existence of atoms as previously understood and none of which seriously questions it (experimental error aside). The new knowledge fiddles at the edges; none of it shakes the center. And, Bruce, you *should* have known this, because it's been at the core of introductory science texts since before you and I went to school. It is simple, it is clear, it is unequivocal. If you have not even bothered to acquaint yourself with the evidence which led to the conclusion that atoms exist as science understands them, you have no legitimate right to an opposing opinion on the subject. Yet when asked to mind your own business on ANOTHER subject where you appear equally ignorant, you say "nope, I cannot. Anynore than I could stand by and watch a 12 year old raped and murdered in a parking lot..." with the implication that you'd feel entitled to use deadly force to enforce your unexamined dogma on other people. Need you wonder why I think you're a threat to liberty and tolerance?
129: Good, because I think you *should* have an abortion. I'm happy to hear you're defending your right to it.
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Walking on water is not witchcraft?
russ, can you be any more dense? However I notice you are not the only one. Sigh! Certainly I believe and accept that atoms exist. Protons, electrons, mouns, and every other sub atomic particle. I also believe in God. There is just as much visual evidence for each.
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re #133: There are a couple kinds of magic that have been believed in. One draws on some power inate to the magic user. This is basically the kind of magic we saw on "Bewitched". The official doctrine of the old time Catholic Church was completely in agreement with modern science on that one - there ain't no such thing. Another form of magic works by calling on supernatural beings to act on your behalf. The Christian Church used to believe in this in a big way (and still believes in it in somewhat smaller ways). There are two main variations to this recognized by the Church: calling on God, or calling on the Devil. The "calling on God" variation is basically praying for a miracle. Catholic priests used to do lots of this stuff - blessing crops, finding lost objects, healing the sick - all by invoking God. Astute observors noticed that they had simply taken up all the roles previously occupied by pre-christian witches. Various reformers wanted excise all this hocus-pocus form the Church. That's a core part of where Protestantism comes from. It's all been trimmed back a bit in the modern Catholic Church as well. Any supposed magic conducted by any means other than conventional prayer was considered to be the other kind: calling on the Devil. Didn't much matter if people claimed they had never made a pact with Satan - if they appeared to do magic and weren't clergy, then they were assumed to have a pact with Satan, any other kind of magic being officially impossible. So, no, Jesus wasn't a witch. If he'd made a pact with Satan to allow him to walk on water, then he'd be a witch. I'm not sure whether he actually is supposed to have had inate power of his own (being an aspect of God and thus an exception to the rule that humans can't do magic) or whether it was just God doing things for him in recognition of his faith. I think the latter. Of course, Harry Potter doesn't appear to call upon the power of Satan either. The book seems to be assuming that magic power is innate in certain individuals. The claim that the book is Satanic rests on the old theory that no humans can have such power, so, somewhere in the chapter breaks, Harry must have slipped off and sold his soul to Satan in exchange for power. Of course, this logic has some cogs loose. You could equally well argue that Star Trek is Satanic because faster than light travel is impossible, so Captain Kirk must have sold his soul to Satan. I guess some people have trouble with the concept of fantasy.
It's not necessarily that the people themselves don't have a concept of fantasy, although I'm quite willing to believe they don't. It's that they don't think their *kids* do. It's a variation on the theme that's been used against the video game industry --- that kids can't distinguish fantasy from reality and these games 'teach' violence / these books 'teach' witchcraft to kids. Personally, I'm *extremely* offended when someone tells me I can't tell the difference between a world on a screen where I can jump hundreds of feet in the air, shoot various kinds of weapons at people without any sort of recoil, and return to life seconds after being killed; and reality, but maybe that's just me. Or maybe there *is* life after death . . . ;-)
Can someone explain to me the evils of "The Coneheads"? I'm still stuck on that . . .
Probably it has to do with representing the possible existence of alien life, which causes all sorts of quandaries with respect to creationism and "in God's image and likeness".
Oh man. You're joking, right?
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It should be noted, too, that (according to other news reports) the book-burners also fried up some Bibles that were not of the godly King James version.
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Bruce, can YOU be any more dense? There is a huge amount of reproducible evidence for atoms; every one of the essential experiments gets re-verified millions of times a day, in the world's chemical plants and oil refineries (even ignoring chemistry labs). In contrast, there is NO way to reproduce the revelations on which you base your beliefs about abortion. None. If they could be reproduced and verified, there wouldn't be more than one religion worldwide, just as there is one science worldwide. Your claim that everything not visible is equivalent is absurd. You can't see microbes with your eyeballs either. Does that mean that incense and voodoo chants are equivalent to antibiotics when trying to get rid of them? Some people believe that. They're WRONG. What really gets me about you, Bruce, is that you put more outward credence into the unsupported dogma fed you by some clergyman than you do in the verifiable evidence of the world. It's obvious that you have more emotional energy invested in it. If you actually gave weight to beliefs according to the certainty with which you can verify them, dieties would rank somewhere below theories of Jimmy Hoffa's resting place.
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russ, you have absolutely no idea what I believe or why I believe it. And as I have said before, my position on abortion is not religious, but humanitarian. , and to some extent constitutional. As far as proofs of God verses atoms, while I see the interactions of atoms every day, I also believe I see the interactions of God every day. Believing in science does not equate a disbelief in God. Just because you choose to disbelieve, to think you can make me.
146: Somewhere back there you made a comment along the lines of "no one here will ever understand why I feel abortion is evil." Sure we understand it--get over yourself. Most of us simply don't agree. Me, I'm a trained scientist. Logical explanations supported by hard evidence win out over smug self-righteous posturing and hand-waving about imaginary evidence every time. Meanwhile, I think you should go read Atlas Shrugged, because I'd enjoy watching your head explode. Russ' post isn't aimed at making you deisbelieve, it's just pointing out that there's nothing solid on which your faith is based. Congratulations. You're a textbook example of my point in 117. Thanks.
re: 135- Yeah. Sort of. Wanna come do my upteen loads of laundry so I can sit in a nice, hot, wet bath instead? <eg>
Re 125. I'm amused that the author goes out of his way to claim that Greenville is a nice, friendly, tolerant town. I remember Greenville as the place where the city government seized and leveled all of its historic downtown buildings. I assume a minimall was built to replace the destroyed downtown area.
Given that the byline is 'Tamara Audi', it might be safer to assume the author is female.
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Yes. If one happens to be a termite.
Downtowns tend to be brick. They probably wanted more space for cars.
Bruce said in #146: >my position on abortion is not religious, but humanitarian... Humanitarian concern for organisms which cannot think or even feel? (Brain patterns characteristic of consciousness do not appear until the 30th week. That is SEVEN months, the THIRD trimester.) What about humanitarian concern for the woman... or is she irrelevant? >and to some extent constitutional. The same Constitution which refers to "citizens born or naturalized"? I don't think so. If those excuses were horses, you'd have shot them.
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I don't disagree with Bruce's distaste for abortion. Society would be much better if it was much rarer. I like to think I know a bit about science, and I certainly believe firmly in science, but I'm unaware of any scientific basis for deciding if abortion is OK, or for making any other moral choice. Science is useful for getting your facts straight, always a good first step in addressing a moral issue, but it won't resolve the moral issue. That's a values issue, and there is no science of values. So I disagree with the tendency of some pro-choice people to dismiss the nastiness of abortion, and say isn't bad or it doesn't matter. But also I disagree with the pro-life idea of banning abortion. Depending on how you implement such a law, it is either absurdly ineffective or a brutal intrusion into the private lives of adult women. Most likely both. You can argue about whether or enforcing a law against abortion would be more or less evil than abortion itself. I really don't care. I think there are lots of things we could do that would be more effective than illegalization and be less of an imposition on women. Some of those should plainly be attempted before we even think about banning abortion.
We find it un Jan-like to dichotomize the world into two polar opposites: Pro-Choice vs. Pro-Life. Does he not generally see the world in terms of shades of gray rather than black vs. white? Why would not this apply to the abortion debate, as well?
You think I invented the "pro-choice / pro-life" business? There aren't two such entrenched camps anywhere else on the political landscape. But it's not really a dichotomy. They aren't even opposite each other. "Anti-choice" and "anti-life" really exist only in the imaginations of the respective "pro" camps, neither image quite fitting the real opposition. It's no wonder that all the debates consist mostly of both sides shooting arguments at non-existant targets, while the folks on the other side scatch their heads and wonder why their opponents think what they are saying has any relevance to the issue. Personally, I like to define myself as "pro-choice and pro-life". Hey, the government promises us "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness," so why should I have to choose between life and liberty? I'll take both. In practice, the place I end up at is more compatible with the "pro-choice" camp than the "pro-life" camp, but it does give me the opportunity to disagree with both from time to time, and allows me to co-opt the best arguments from both sides.
My impression is that the pro-life movement contains a very wide variety of beliefs and a great deal of internal conflict...and one of the greatest advantage that they've collectively enjoyed is that the pro-choice movement is too blind to notice this or too stupid to make effective use of it.
Re 158: The klg's are trying to derail your argument over some little detail, Jan. The goal is to waste your time, since he/they are obviously not capable of actually arguing against you.
I tend to fall in the pro-life and pro-choice camps to a degree. Personally I don't like the idea of abortion, and I think there are better alternatives (I mean wouldn't slapping a condom on your dick be rather less of an inconveneicne than having an abortion?). I also tend to try to respect the right to live of all living things as much as possible. The "child" that is killed in an abortion procedure (whether the hair splitters agree if it is a child or not) could very well be the man/woman to cure cancer one day. Or it could just end up being a nobody (each of whom I would say the is of equal value in humanitarian terms). However, enforcing such a law that bans all abortions would be unenforceable in practise . . . it would be like a law outlawing masturbation . . . you can outlaw it but realistically speaking there is no real way to enforce it. The same sort of argument can be applied to legalising prostituion . . . you ay think it a nagative thing, ut outlawing it just makes it harder to regulate and makes things worse. Aslo I really dislike the idea of women beiong forced to adopt what someone else ragrds as a universal morality. It is ultimately the bearer of the child that will be supporting that child for the next 20 years or so. Some people are not qualified to be parents, and they know it, for financial or emotional or whatever other reasons. What is the alternative for these people who do it because they feel they have no other choice? Are there droves of anti-abortion activists willing to foot the bill for these children once they are born if the mother agreed to their argument? If the child will be given uop for adoption after birth, is there any guarantee of a decent family taking the child inas their own? Politicians like to narrow this down to a simple black and white issue, but it is not quite so simple. I found later in life (mid-20's) that my mother considered aborting me since they had so little money. I can't balme them for considering that option, even when it was illegal, considering their circumstances, but I seem to be glad for even th meager potential that I have been able to reach thus far.
If you want to solve abortion you go to the source of the problem - sperm. If men were held responsible for their sperm both the woman's pregnancy and the dead baby wouldn't be happening. Men must be held accountable for what they do with their sperm under penalty of law. Any God worth His salt would agree.
In an ideal world, true. But in practise it is usually the women who` get stuck with the unwanted children. Even if the male contributes money, there is a lot more involved in rearing a child than cash.
Oh, I don't know. I suspect after the first few thousand guys are chemically castrated the word would get around and there would be fewer unwanted pregnancies. Chemical castration would be an invasion of men's privacy and rights to free ejaculation, you say? Well, so is being forced to have a baby. Deal with it. I don't see why this approach is any less realistic than telling a woman she has no choice.
Oh, sorry, didn't know that was what you were talking about. If chemical castration were the issue, I think it would be a good idea. I think there are certain drugs that can do this now, like Depo_provera and such, but not sure if it's legal. Know where I can get any?
Seems like a vasectomy would be simpler. The problem with Mary's plan is that it is too late. The way to solve the abortion problem is step back and solve the "unwanted pregnancy" problem. If people who didn't want baby's didn't get pregnant, then there would be no abortions. Chemically castrating the man after the woman is already pregnant is too late. You know, vasectomies are sometimes reversable. What we need is a reliably reversable form. Basically a vasectomy with an on/off switch, be it chemical or surgical or whatever. All men get "turned off" before puberty. Let's say with a surgically implanted valve. Like a vasectomy, these would not interfere with sexual function. If a man wants to father babies, they need to get "turned on". Maybe take a pill with a chemical that the valve senses and which causes it to turn on as long as the chemical is present in the blood stream. The pill should have some observable and discouraging side effect, like persistant nausea or turning your skin orange. If the side effect is obnoxious enough, men could get family leave while "on the pill." The advantage of doing this on the male side instead of the female side is that there would probably be fewer risks to the health of babies. A male just has to produce a motile sperm with undamaged DNA. A woman's body has to do way more than that to successfully bring a baby to term, so mucking up her body's cycles is far riskier. Obviously there are some technological problems to be solved here, but it seems like something of this sort could be achieved. You'd probably also get a population decrease for free - an added bonus. It sounds silly, but its a less stupid solution to the abortion problem than outlawing abortion is.
Sorry to tell you the facts of life, but it takes two to tango. Sperm are nothing without egg, and I can tell you from personal experience it isn't always the guy who wants to tango, nor is it always he who refuses the use of a condom. RU 486 is a very viable and acceptable option as far as I am concerned, but how many women want to take the responsibility to get it and use it after every interaction? That is really an unfair question, I know. But is there a "morning after"pill women would use every time? Some times they actually want to get pregnant and change their minds after they find out he doesn't really care.
Dude, if she doesn't want to use birth control you can still choose not to insert.
Any kind of "after" pill is an abortion. It may be OK with you (and I'm glad you think so) but many people still find it troubling. Though I don't know anything at all about RU-486, I don't think that it could possibly a very "gentle" medication. It's got to do something that causes the pregnancy to abort, which really means a fairly serious interuption of the normal function of a woman's body. I doubt if that is anything anyone would want to do with any regularity. I can't imagine it would be wise to use RU-486 or anything like it as a routine substitute for birth control. Yes, I know it takes two and people don't always want to use condoms. That's just the point of my customized version of Mary's proposal. Stopping an unwanted pregnancy after the act is abortion and undesirable. Stopping it during the act (conventional birth control) depends on the sensible behavior of people with other things on their mind, and is demonstrably unreliable. So stopping it before the act is the sensible solution. You don't need to sterilize both sexes - that would be redundant. One will suffice. It might as well be men, since the male reproductive system is so much simpler, and anyway, women already bear the brunt of the inconvenience in reproductive issues. And it changes the psychology of having a child. It becomes something that you have to decide to do well in advance, not an accident or spur-of-the-moment decisions. I wouldn't be surprised if the birth rate fell something like 25% under such conditions (I expect more baby's are "accidents" but many are "welcome accidents" so that the parents would have eventually decided to have a baby if it hadn't happened "by accident"). Such a cut in the birth rate would be a boon for mankind, plus there'd be substantially fewer neglected children.
re167: did you just proclaim that you are a rape victim and that the woman who raped you didn't even have the decency to provide you with a condom? you really have an interesting life, deputy.
(methinks novomit's sarcasm detector needs recalibration.) I'm sort of half with Jan and half not. Ideally, contraception would be perfect and abortion would be used only when nature goes badly wrong. Unfortunately, people are falliable (else Bruce would not have a grandchild) and sometimes drugs conflict in a way which defeats one or both of them (did you know that certain antibiotics dramatically reduce the effectiveness of birth-control pills? This has come as an unwelcome surprise to many users). Ignoring crimes such as rape and incest, we still haven't found a way to prevent nature from screwing up in ways such as anencephaly, trisomy-21, and the like. If something like this happens in a context where people are able and willing to handle the results, fine; no harm done. Unfortunately, the accidents happen most often to people who are young and typically unable to support a family, and too many cannot face the idea of giving up a child for adoption. The "alternative" to abortion then becomes unprepared, unstable, often single parenthood which places the child at high risk of failure in school, a criminal record, and other problems. I don't think much of this "alternative"; it's bad for the kids. In short, I'm strongly pro-choice because I'm strongly pro-child.
re: "#162 (mary): . . .If you want to solve abortion you go to the source of the problem - sperm. . . ." My, my. Aren't we being sexist today? Mr. janc may wish to consider those on the pro-choice side, for example orthodox Jews who would allow abortions under somewhat more restricted conditions. Is he aware that Jewish law would require abortions in certain circumstances?
Ha, yeah, what Mary said is a bit silly.
I don't know much about Jewish law. I'm the only member of my family who isn't Jewish. Arlo is the only member of the family who might be sufficiently religious to have more than an academic interest in Jewish law, and it's not likely to be an issue for him for a while. However, I've always been interested in theological thinking, so I'd be interested to hear how Jewish law sometimes requires abortion. Yeah, polytarp. It's silly. You don't have to think about it.
I like thinking about silly things.
Just call me clueless. I usuallt canna tell sarcasm when I read it unless you add a P.S. saying it was intended sarcastically. P.S. My finger hurts.
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(171: methinks your post would be just as valid
without peoples' personal lives discussed.)
A Guide to Jewish Religious Practice, by Isaac Klein. (This is a book published by the Conservative Jewish branch, and is probably closer to the Orthodox than the Reform branch, but I wouldn't know for certain. The 2 pages on this subject meerely skims the surface of writings on it. I would presume that any decision of this nature should be made by the competent parents in consultation with medical personnel and, when possible, with religious authorities.) "The question of abortion, though not new, has become an acute problemin our day, and there is extensive literature on it. . . (A)bortion necessarily involves the death of the embryo or the fetus. . . "Where the mother's life is threatened, the law is clear and explicit, the mother's life must be saved . . . as long as the child is in the womb. Once part of the child is out, i.e., the head or the greater part of the rest of the body, it is not touched because a life may not be saved at the expense of another life. . . "When the mother's health is imperiled, a distinction is made between the early and late stages of pregnancy. In the early stages, therapeutic abortion is permitted. . . "Opinions differ about what constitutes the early stages. . . definitions range from 40 days to 3 months. . . "Some authorities would extend the permissibility of therpeutic abortion to any maternal need. This would include cases of incest or rape where shame or embarrassemnt to the mother . . . are considered threats to her health. "There is a consensus of opinion that mental health is on a par with physical health. . . We would therefore conclude that abortion in the early stages of pregnancy is permissible in a case where the woman's physical or mental health is threatened by her fear that the may bear a deformed child. . . "When abortion is desired for reasons of convenience, however, it is forbidden. . . ."
No big surprises there.
Re #166: The DISadvantage of doing that on the male side is that one male can impregnate a lot of females. In situations such as war men can be killed, taken out for military service and otherwise be made unavailable, but I've read that the birthrate doesn't fall much until females outnumber males by something approaching 6:1. If orange skin was a sign of fertility, I could see a market in orange skin dye so that guys could get the attention of baby-minded women. Bathe in it before going to the bar, shower after getting laid. Of course, solving the pregnancy problem wouldn't do a thing to help the STD problem, and might even make it worse. These things cannot be considered in isolation. Re #167: Bruce, folks of your stripe are fighting to keep morning-after pills unavailable. Wal-Mart won't carry them, to give one example. Neither will pharmacies in Catholic hospitals. They seem to be doing everything they can to make abortions necessary.
Re: #181 "Re:#167" Russ, saying that folks who you see as similar to Bruce are working to make something he suggests unavailable is, at best, meaningless. You probably remind him of some folks who he doesn't think too much of, too, but perhaps he's too on-topic or polite to mention it.
I really like Jan's idea. Wish it would be feasible, without hormonal tinkering, for women, too-- in this day and age, many women want to be able to "play" without fear of producing a child they are not ready to raise. On the other hand, some "accidents" work out better than some "plans". Perhaps we ought not to remove *all* avenues for providence...
Yes, Russ is right that this plan could cause an increase is STDs, as one of the two major reasons for not having unprotected sex is diminished. However, this proposal is aimed primarily at reducing abortion, not improving people's sex lives. Each child has one mother and one father. I don't see what the ability of one male to father thousands has to do with anything. We aren't taking men out of the population, as WWI did. The "turned off" men are still available for sex, and any can still father children. The whole war analogy just doesn't apply. And anyway, our goal is to reduce abortions. Any population reduction we get is a fringe benefit. There is, of course, always a damping effect in population reduction - if people notice the population falling, they are likely to choose to have a few more children. But I expect that a technology like this would lead to a substantially lower equilibrium population. It'd be interesting to see how the abortion camps would re-align if such a technology appeared. Suppose a corporation appeared with some kind of technology for a male switchable vasectomy, with features such that a woman could tell if a man has it, and whether it is off or on. You could have at least three politcal camps: allow it, ban it, and require it. I could see pro-life and pro-choice people scattering all over that spectrum.
Intercourse is not the only point at which it is desirable to prevent or terminate a pregnancy. Women should also be able to abort for other reasons as the pregnancy progresses. For example, for genetic or congenital errors, or because of a change in the woman's circumstances. It should even be possible for cases where a man insists on unprotected sex even against the woman's wishes. It happens.
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they should offer free abortions at the 7-11?
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*groans*
Sure Rane. Do you think I disagree? I started from the premise that illegalizing abortion is a stupid solution to the abortion problem. Nothing in this hypothetical solution would make it any less stupid to illegalize abortion.
No, I didn't think you disagree, but there were many responses that seemed to assume that the question of abortion would be resolved if pregnancies were prevented. But many pregnancies occur without a woman's consent, and there are reasons for terminating pregnancies that were desired - including convenience. Why should any woman be required to continue a pregnancy during the first two trimesters if she doesn't want to, including changing her mind about the whole thing? There are more substantial reasons than just convenience, but convenience should be sufficient.
...given the extreme inconvenience of a pregnancy, I think I actually agree with rane there. Shhh, don't tell anyone.
Re #182: Pointing out the conflict between Bruce's values and the actions of his ideological neighbors is intended to be informative to all (many people do not know Wal-Mart's tricks) and allow Bruce to reconsider his position if he feels like it.
Yup, I'm not claiming to have a plan to eliminate abortions. I'd settle for eliminating 95% or so. Which is more than I believe any feasible abortion ban would ever do.
What are Wal-mart's tricks?
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Russ brought it up
Wal-Mart loves to censor its product offerings to conform to
the politics of its management. Among other things, they:
1.) Demand bowdlerized versions of mass-market "music". (I
consider these things to be words over noise, but Wal-Mart
is not objecting to the lack of artistic merit. They
would probably object to "Compared to what" for several
parts of the lyrics. Phillistines.)
2.) Drop magazines because they don't like them. In many cases,
Wal-Mart is the biggest retail outlet for periodicals in
their local markets; refusing to carry a magazine may mean
it is effectively unavailable except by subscription.
3.) Drop drugs because they don't like them (not because people
don't need them). This includes morning-after pills. When
Wal-Mart's pharmacy has driven the independents out of business,
this may make certain drugs effectively unavailable in a
considerable geographic area.
In addition, Wal-Mart is brutal to suppliers. They demand large
advances and very liberal terms on returns, so a supplier has to lay
out large amounts of money to make product which Wal-Mart then
returns if it doesn't sell on schedule. Many businesses have been
driven out of business by a Wal-Mart "opportunity". Wal-Mart is
cannibalizing small and medium US enterprises and throwing Americans
out of work, but its management doesn't care.
All of this has led me to buy nothing from Wal-Mart unless I cannot
obtain it anywhere else.
I have not set foot in a Wal-Mart in years for those very reasons.
Yeah, I have a weird Wal-Mart dilema. They sell the only jeans that I really like. And they are cheap. :(. So, even though I dont like WalMart, I still buy the jeans there because I like them more than I dont like WalMart. heh
I won't buy from Wal-Mart for those reasons either.
i don't shop at any gigantic super-chains with obscene flourescent lighting and muzak.
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ambience is really good with old elpaso taco sauce.
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mom...is that you?!
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Heh...that's a good one...
heh
You have several choices: