Look, I know it's been overdone - but abortion - yay or nay?
POSTED BY: FLF
UPDATED: Wednesday, November 29, 2006 13:13
VIEWED: 24147
PAGE 14 of 26
Quote:
Originally posted by HKCavalier:
Women get to be special like that--always have, always will.
:Wiping tear: Damn, HK, you know how to write! I concur with Chrisisall--I always look forward to seeing what you have to say, even if I disagree. You should have your own blog.
(BTW, I apologize to RWED that I haven't written or posted in a while. Just moved twice, and then got into a car accident. Now changed computers, lost emails, basically disorganized. Also been very busy doing some political lobbying for an issue very important to me here in my state. I may post less and less here, but I always think of you guys and drop in to read from time to time, even when I can't post.)
My two cents, not that anyone here needs it. I believe abortion is murder. I think war is murder and capital punishment is murder. But hell, as HK pointed more eloquently, there are different types of murder and some can be understood and even pardoned.
I used to be rabidly pro-life. Then I became less rabid when someone I really cared about got an abortion, and I couldn't say I blamed her. The day I officially turned pro-choice was when I read a story about a Serbian muslim woman who was captured and raped several times a day for 6 months. She got pregnant. As a prisoner, she could not get an abortion. As soon as the baby came out, she murdered it. She was arrested and jailed for murder.
Now this was a case of undisputed murder of an innocent life. But I daresay there are very few women who would not sympathize with her. For me, I believed she did not deserve to be in jail. She wasn't going to go around murdering babies. She simply did not want to raise that one.
I have been reading a lot about innocent children being abused and killed the world over, with not so much a peep or care from most prolifers. Not that they are hardhearted, but that they don't even know about these kids. I believe the effort to enforce legislation would be better spent taking care of children who are already born--prevent THEM from being murdered first.
And lastly, although I believe abortion to be murder, I uncompromisingly believe in the right of other women to disagree with me.
Can't Take My Gorram Sky
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canttakesky,
Good to see you back! Sounds like you've been having to deal with a number of high stress events. I hope things are improving and that you weren't hurt in the car accident.
Finn,
Well, I'm a lot happier as a liberal than I was as a Limbaugh-listening ultra-conservative. So there's that 
.
It sounds like you would support what is called abstinence-plus education. This is similar to comprehensive sex education and very different from abstinence-only education. I found a really good intro to the topic here: http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2005/shelbyknox/special_overview.html
Unfortunately, from my point of view, the US government only funds abstinence-only education. The amount of money spent is increasing each year (it started under Reagan, kind of stayed at the same level for a while, and then took a big jump under Clinton. Bush has taken it to another level).
Quote:
from http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2005/shelbyknox/special_overview.html
In subsequent years, federal funding for abstinence-only education has increased substantially. In 2005, $167 million was earmarked for abstinence-only education, up from $80 million in 2001. President George W. Bush's proposed 2006 budget includes $206 million for such programs. This is the only portion of the federal budget targeted towards sex education in public schools, meaning that to qualify for this supplemental money, schools must adopt a sex education program that meets the federal standards for abstinence education. Schools that choose comprehensive or abstinence-plus curricula must fund the programs out of their general budget, provided by local and state governments.
It's getting pretty bad out there. In Louisiana, for example, all public schools are abstinence-only education (or at least they were in 2002). Which means that no Louisiana public school students are learning about contraception. None. That should scare the shit out of all but the far right fringe.
I'd be much happier if we funded comprehensive or abstinence-plus sex education.
* edited to add on to penultimate paragraph.
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Quote:ummm... Because you seem to have an opnion about it and you put it out to a discussion board?
My commitment to human life, huh? So my answers to your questions are going to decide, in your mind, my “commitment to human life?” Why do you think I should defend my commitment to human life to you?
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
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Finn,
I have read through all the posts and you seem to be a pro-lifer. If that is the case, my goal is not to bash you (or any other pro-lifer) for your position. As covered in the "Evil" thread, it's all relative to me. The pro-life stance is as valid as the pro-choice stance.
It's the inconsistencies in most pro-lifer's positions that I have a problem with and that is what I was trying to point out in my above post.
You appear to argue pretty consistently that a fetus is human life. I could go through and pick sentences out of your posts, but I hope you will spare me that task. If I have misunderstood and misstate your beliefs, just forgive and correct me.
But, if in your mind, a fetus is a human life and has a right to live, how does a (potential) mother's health concerns change this? Does any health concern trump the right to life? Must the mother's life be in grave danger or would the most pedestrian of concerns be sufficient? If your answer is grave danger, how grave? Is a 5% chance of certain death enough? How about 51%? Must it be above 90%? Finally, do you think there is a reasonable chance of reaching a consensus on this, even within the pro-life community?
My point is that there is really only two positions on this issue. The "right to life" is either relative or it is absolute. You have an exception. It may be different than those of the explicitly pro-choice people, but it's still an exception. And just as the pro-choicer's exceptions are inadequate to you, your exception is inadequate to the people on your right.
It's all perspective and no view can be proven to be more valid or invalid than another. So, if every position is potentially invalid, how can we rightly force others to follow our possibly invalid beliefs? And if we do, why stop with abortion? This moral/religious conflict extends far beyond the abortion debate and it's a very slippery slope.
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Sorry, I had to run off and start taking care of a population problem in our neighborhood- a feral cat problem. We have a mom cat who adopted us. Trouble is, she's BIG cat, a good mom, and a kitten-factory. This was the second litter of five on our yard. I managed to trap two of the kittens (Wings and Tabby) and had to take them to a spay/neuter clinic. Next time I hope to trap the remainder (Mom, Collar, and Fancy. Cloud seems not to have survived) for the same. Also rabies and flea treatment.
FINN... I'm not trying to make you "defend" your commitment to "human life", just to clarify what you mean. And I think in that process of clarification you'll find at least one gaping schism in your mental constructs and probably more than one.
I've read your posts in the past. As I recall- and I may be wrong- you're in favor of the death penalty. Even your signature (Those who want peace must be prepared to wage war) tells me that you, at least, are willing to kill in order to achieve a goal. But you will not permit women and their doctors (who may be men) to do the same.
I can think of all kinds of ways to parse this seeming contradiction and we can dance around terms like "innocent", "human", "deliberate", and "authority" but quite frankly I don't think that's where the schism is. From your posts, I perceive and entirely different reason WHY this seeming contradiction pops up and it is related to how you fundamentally look at the world. It shows up in pharses like fully developed and complete.
If you want to discuss it, fine. If not, then I would say you're frightened of possibly having your mind changed.
CANTTAKESKY
OMG, is there anything we can DO? A series of events like that would make a rubber room look kind of tempting!
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Reality sucks. Especially when it contradicts our cherished ideas.
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Just wondering here, what if you could prove 100% that the woman who was planning to abort a child, would one day go on to invent a cure for cancer; however, if she had it - she wouldn't get a chance to complete her education and the cure wouldn't be found for many years costing perhaps millions of lives.
In this case, would it be acceptable for her to ahve an abortion?
Just wondering - and I'm not OBVIOUSLY not saying this is always the case - I'm just pondering on your stance if it was.
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I think everyone should have the right to choose. But that being said, I also believe that one should use birth control! Abortion should never be used because one is too lazy to take a pill or doesn't want to use a condom. Yes, the man had a part in this too.
There are times when I believe it is necessary, or maybe it would be better to say allowed. Rape is one of those times.
We've also let our zeal to save lives move further along than our ideas of quality of life. Children are being born today that I believe God never meant to go to term because our doctors have the knowledge to keep a 24 week (the normal being 40) damaged premie alive. (not all 24 weekers are that bad, but ultra sound and other tests can give us a lot of info)
But when it all comes down to it, it is the choice of the people envolved, what they live with, and no elses, including the governments.
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
"Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it." - The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
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Okay, time for a little brain-stretching exercises here. Let's just consider religious implications here to begin with...
First, as to the question of at what point the soul enters the developing embryo/fetus:
As I mentioned above, Hindu theology states that the soul (prana) enters the body with the first breath (also prana). Therefore, one would assume that, from a Hindu standpoint, abortion would be a non-issue; the equivalent of scraping a car while it's still on the assembly line, long before anyone is sitting at the wheel.
Further, in any religious structure that incorporates belief in reincarnation (Buddhism, Hinduism, Wicca, etc.) it wouldn't matter whether the embryo had a soul or not-- if not, you've killed animal meat, if so, then it would simply be an interrupted journey in the soul's karma, and it would move on to its next incarnation. No harm, no foul.
Looking at things from a Judeo/Christian viewpoint:
The Old Testiment standard was that the soul entered at "The Quickening" -- the point at which an ear placed against the mother's belly could differentiate the fetal heartbeat from the mother's. (Somewhere between the fourth and fifth motnths--well after the first trimester.) The idea that the soul enters at conception is relatively new (less than 200 years old) and stems from a statement from a Roman Catholic Pope -- hardly an idea one would think binding on American Protestant Sects, especially considering their historical animosity towards "Papist" ideas.
But, even accepting the idea of "Conception as soul start" at face value, it should have no effect on United States law. "Soul" is not a legal or scientific concept, but a religious one.
The question thus becomes, "At what point in the development of the embryo/fetus does it become legally human?"
That's not as simple as it may sound. There may be several diffent answers. As a parallel, consider the idea of "age of consent".
If an adult (18+ years of age) has consensual sex with a minor under the age of consent (generally 16) it is considered statutory rape--
But--
If the minor's guardians have given consent, the adult and the minor can be legally married at ages ranging down to 14 or younger, depending on the state.
The same act, legal under one standard, proscribed under another.
So--a doctor aborting a first-trimester fetus in the womb could be considered legal, under Roe V. Wade, yet still be murder if a miscarriage resulted from an assault on the mother. It's a matter of intent and contract...
I'm signing off here, due to outside world necessity, without having concluded my points. Sorry. But I hope I've still given people food for thought...
"Prove you have a soul. Draw--Soul! Present--Soul!" -- H. Beam Piper
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CTS - I was wondering where you were ! (How are your little ones BTW?) If there's anyting we can do, let us know - OK?
Lots of interesting posts.
"Ah, but you're forgetting that in the case of rape or incest, the woman didn't enjoy herself. Therefore she can be freed of the punishment of pregnancy." I laughed out loud. This captures it perfectly.
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Quote:
Originally posted by canttakesky:
hoping the car accident was minor!
----
Bestower of Titles, Designer of Tshirts, Maker of Mottos, Keeper of the Pyre
I am on The List. We are The Forsaken and we aim to burn!
"We don't fear the reaper"
FORSAKEN original
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