I’ve tried very hard to see abortion from the perspective of the anti-choicers. The only way I can get even close is by assuming that a fetus is fully, 100% equivalent to a child or adult human being — that there is absolutely nothing to distinguish the fetus from its mother on a moral level. In that case, you could make an argument that the rights and happiness of the fetus deserve consideration — although even in this most optimistic case the best solution you can arrive at is a compromise, not an absolute prohibition of all abortion.
However, the equivalence of mother and fetus is an untenable proposition. A mouse has more complexity and autonomy than a fetus, and we don’t even hesitate when the choice is between the life of a mouse and a human being. We don’t even argue about it. And to argue that a single-celled zygote or even an embryo with a few dozen cells at implantation is anything but a negligible component of any moral equation is utterly absurd. It’s a fantasy of the deeply ignorant, the kind of people who think the babies on Pro-Life Across America billboards are actually accurate representations of the age-specific fetus, to think that there’s something cute, adorable, personable about a self-organizing mass of cells.
So I have to agree, and think the only reasonable conclusion, is reflected in this memorial to Dr George Tiller, the man murdered by an anti-choice fanatic.
Dr. Tiller listened to his patients, he trusted their decisions, and he knew that the people he was helping deserved his ear and his trust. He treated his patients like people (which really shouldn’t be such a radical position but, because of how anti-choicers have shaped the narrative around abortion, it is). He believed that those he helped were more important than the fetus inside of them. That is not a morally-bankrupt position. THAT IS THE MORAL SIDE.
Trusting patients, seeing them as individuals, believing in their abilities to make decisions for their own specific lives: THAT IS THE MORAL SIDE.
Thank you for everything you did, Dr. Tiller. Thank you for everything and everyone you championed. Thank you for risking your life to provide your patients with a safe and legal medical procedure. Thank you for doing so with no regrets, no animosity, no judgement, and no apologies.
You, sir, were a moral man on a moral mission. And I won’t forget it. WE ARE THE MORAL SIDE.
That’s not enough for you? Read the story of Henlek Morgentaler, the man who fought to secure women’s reproductive rights in Canada, and who just recently died.
Or read the stories of doctors who had to deal with the aftermath of illegal abortions.
“The worst, God, I’ll never forget. She was one of our gynecology floor nurses. She’d cared for these girls before and she knew what could happen. She was beautiful, and smart, and kind. One of our best nurses. I was on call when she arrived. She was grey, had a low blood pressure, and a rigid belly. She must have known what that meant as we wheeled her back to the operating room. She was full of pus and so we cleaned her out as best we could. I was the one who called her family. Her father hung up on me.”
He paused and wiped his eyes. “You know Jen, we all took turns sitting with her as she died.”
Oh, hell yes, we are the moral side. Don’t ever forget that when dealing with the amoral side.
jimashby:
One cannot murder someone who has not yet been born; thus, your opinion is based on an incoherent idea.
Precisely: there is only a woman who is pregnant, not a woman and a baby.
Who the fuck are you jimashby to tell any woman what to do with her body. Discuss the bodily autonomy you want, then that goes to the woman. She never loses her humanity or her right to bodily autonomy. Who gives a shit what the immoral laws say?
You’re entitled to your minority opinion, Nerd of Redhead.
Which is why making a law specifically to outlaw them is an onerous, unnecessary, and unjustifiable exercise of state tyranny.
The life-threatening complications of late-term pregnancies that require emergency abortions most commonly arise AFTER the time period of fetal viability, you pathetic ignorant inhuman piece of shit.
These are WANTED pregnancies, you pathetic ignorant inhuman piece of shit, anticipated and desired until disaster strikes after the 30 week mark.
The women and families involved are in MOURNING, you pathetic ignorant inhuman piece of shit, and you want to add to their private burden with onerous and tyrannical state regulation.
Your OPINION, you ignorant, murderous, inhuman piece of shit, is a MINORITY one. No jurisdiction in the civilized world grants human rights to fetuses, viable or not, even the ones that outlaw late-term abortions. Fetuses may be granted some consideration in some laws in some places, but NO WHERE are they granted full human rights. Not even in the bible, where a viable fetus is a piece of property equivalent in worth to one cow.
A fetus is not a baby, you murderous inhuman piece shit. Abortion is not murder.
It is not convenience, you pitiful inhuman piece of shit. Viable pregnancy terminations done for convenience are done by INDUCED BIRTH, and the fetus lives. Abortions are done for MEDICAL EMERGENCY.
It is in fact about murder. The MURDER, by inhuman murderous pieces of shit like you, jimashby, of sick and suffering pregnant women.
@mildlymagnificent,
Yes, it does seem silly, doesn’t it? But in actuality, the reasons given are pretty interesting. Here’s what Wikipedia has to say . . .
In 1987, the Alan Guttmacher Institute collected questionnaires from 1,900 women in the United States who came to clinics to have abortions. Of the 1,900 questioned, 420 had been pregnant for 16 or more weeks. These 420 women were asked to choose among a list of reasons they had not obtained the abortions earlier in their pregnancies. The results were as follows:
71% Woman didn’t recognize she was pregnant or misjudged gestation
48% Woman found it hard to make arrangements for abortion
33% Woman was afraid to tell her partner or parents
24% Woman took time to decide to have an abortion
8% Woman waited for her relationship to change
8% Someone pressured woman not to have abortion
6% Something changed after woman became pregnant
6% Woman didn’t know timing is important
5% Woman didn’t know she could get an abortion
2% A fetal problem was diagnosed late in pregnancy
11% Other
And you, you murderous piece of inhuman shit, jimashby, are entitled to keep thinking your opinions are not minority ones, when they in fact are.
The blood of dying women and the tears of their loved ones are on your hands, jimashby. You and the rest of your murderous ilk.
16 weeks, notably, is BEFORE THE PERIOD OF VIABILITY.
In addition to being a murderous inhuman piece of shit, jimashby, it appears you are also a pathetic liar.
First, note that the survey was taken from women at 16 (not 20) or more weeks into pregnancy. So there’s no telling exactly how this fits the discussion. But it gives a pretty good indication.
Amphiox,
The FSM loves you.
Note that post 508 (mine) comes 1 second after post 507 (Amphiox).
jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit. jimashby is a loathsome piece of shit.
Now fuck off you callous arsehole.
AArrgghh . . . one minute, not one second.
Who cares about the opinion of a fuckwitted idjit like yourself. Discuss bodily integrity to be a non-fuckwitted idjit.
Lofty,
The truth hurts, don’t it? I don’t blame you for feeling so pissed.
Sometimes, when people disagree with me, I get so pissed off that I haul off and tell them why I disagree.
I guess that’s asking too much of you.
Why is jimasby AFRAID to discuss bodily autonomy/integrity, and concentrates on a subhuman parasite? Inquiring minds want to know.
We’ve outlined in exhaustive detail why you’re wrong. You have admitted that you don’t read what we write (I’m guessing that any post more than five lines long or that doesn’t contain any insults that you can act all aggrieved about gets skipped). Therefore, I can only conclude that you’re here to troll. Trolling, insipidity, repetition, all seem like evidence for banning.
(Please, cry about your precious freedom of speech now at the possibility of being banned from one blog where you were allowed to bloviate for dozens of comments)
I heard you in your first post. Now you are trying to bully us to agree with you by repeated posts that don’t respond to what we say. Like discussing bodily integrity. You came here. You posted here. You are the one being aggressive at the moment. You need to get yourself under control. Fade into the bandwidth to do so.
It is well known that the later the pregnancy, the rarer the number of abortions. So among those past 16 weeks, only a tiny proportion are viable. That number is likely less than 1% and can easily completely fit into the “medical need” categories.
jimashby, inhuman murderous dishonest piece of shit, is lying once again. His “data” is not indicative of anything and is wholly irrelevant except for one detail.
That exception is the 48% of the women who wanted but could not get an abortion earlier. That is telling and entirely on the head of inhuman pieces of shit like jimashby, whose actions make early term abortions hard to get.
Okay, well, there’s not much point in continuing unless somebody can tell me why reproductive rights trumps the human rights of the viable fetus . . . why it’s preferable to murder the fetus than see the mother experience inconvenience or hardship.
And, let’s face it, that’s not going to happen. There is no smoking gun. The controversy has played itself out and it’s no wonder that almost all 152 of the countries that allow abortions DON’T allow late-term abortions. Most people recognize that hardships, while undesirable, are a fact of life. Everybody has them. Avoiding them is not grounds for denying the human rights of others — especially those who can’t defend themselves.
Reproductive rights is NOT the only consideration in late-term abortions.
Oy Jim, stop lying. This lie you’re telling either yourself or the rest of us in the hope that if you repeat it enough it will become fact, that it’s about “reproductive rights vs viability”, has been addressed numorously and just makes you look more dishonest every time you repeat it.
Also, I note that you have nothing to say about my post: freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/06/01/abortion-rights-are-human-rights/comment-page-1/#comment-631629
to explain why it doesn’t completely refute your VIABILITY argument, or about the question of why a legal expert should be necessary to make a medical decision, either.
So basically, you’re really outing yourself as dishonest and not worth engaging with here. Are you sure that’s what you’re going for?
Damn bork link. All hail Tpyos. Here
Comment, which I’ll repeat for your convenience and so as to not give you any excuses:
Oh yes, do run along jimashby.
All you’ve got is a trifecta of fallacies: false equivalence, appeal to the majority, and strawmanning. Repeating them yet again won’t change that.
You are the only one talking reproductive rights. We are talking bodily integrity, which is part of various human rights declarations, and well established in law. Show us this alleged human you claim its rights are being violated, so I can take a picture of it with my digital camera. All I see is a woman. And her rights can’t and won’t be violated due to your inane presuppositions.
You’re right, you are wasting your time here until you stop talking fuckwitted opinion, and start discussing the real facts. Like bodily integrity.
@Nerd,
You always make me chuckle.
—————
@Gen, Uppity Ingrate,
Why should a legal expert be making medical decisions? Let me repeat: the mother’s physical health and safety ARE valid reasons for late-term abortion. You guys will have to get used to no response if you’re merely rehashing what I’ve already addressed. There’s WAY too many of you!
—————
@FossilFishy(Anti-Vulcanist),
When I point out a logical fallacy, I specify exactly why they are fallacies. Simply asserting logical fallacies is meaningless. Prove it.
We heard your hypocritical fuckwittery the first time. Don’t repeat yourself.
Still not discussing bodily integrity. Still not showing scientific evidence for your claims. Still thinking your OPINION is anything other than drivel to us. Make it something other than drivel by discussing the real issues, not your inane imagufactured drivel.
He might simply not have seen those comments, so he pretends they can’t possibly exist.
Remember, this is the asshole who said he doesn’t have time to read every comment, but writes new ones anyway!
Oh dear jimashby, my summation was not intended for you. You’ve demonstrated over and over that you have no interest in addressing the flaws in your arguments.
But in the spirit of point out the bloody obvious:
False equivalence: foetus =/= adult woman.
Appeal to the majority:
Strawman: Reproductive rights are not the same thing as the right to bodily autonomy.
The only thing that remains to be seen is if you’re aware your intellectual dishonesty and thus are lying in order to promote your beliefs, or you’re just that stupid. Given the number of times all this has been pointed out to you my money’s on the former.
Jim, you didn’t answer the questions. Your reply of
doesn’t answer why a legal expert should be required for making a medical decision.
Here they are again:
1.) You want a pregnant woman to petition court for a late term abortion. WHY would a legal expert instead of a medical expert be the one qualified to make such a medical decision?
2.) Quoting myself: “So yes, jimashby, there are actually limits and choices on who gets to live, and those limits become more stringy and harsh the less money there is available. So what does that mean for the VIABILITY argument?”
The pathetic liar that is jimashby stated this long before #519, and received multiple replies informing him just how wrong he is. That he still repeats this lie with a straight face is the epitomy of intellectual dishonesty.
The controversy has NOT played itself out. It is still very much ongoing. In all of those 152 countries there are powerful forces still trying to roll back abortion rights.
Nearly all the 152 countries that allow abortions DO allow late-term abortions, for a variety of reasons. Some have more stringent restrictions than others, but few have blanket bans. Nearly all allow them to some degree.
What IS true about the majority opinion in the world is almost none of the 152 countries that allow abortions have what jimashby murderously advocates for – they do not require a special appeal to some judge to get a late-term abortion for medical reasons. They simply require a medical opinion regarding need. They do not put up inhumane, unjust, and onerous roadblocks in the way of women facing medical emergencies.
What IS also true about the majority opinion in the civilized world is that ‘personhood’ amendments have never succeeded in popular referendums. The majority popular opinion in the world is that fetuses are NOT people and do NOT have human rights.
There is probably majority opinion out there that a viable fetus has some worth as a potential human being. This may even be a majority opinion among people who support full abortion-on-demand rights. There may well be a majority opinion that disagrees with the bible and thinks a viable fetus has a worth greater than that of one cow.
All that is irrelevant to the question, and no matter how jimashby tries to murderously dissemble, it will always remain irrelevant to the question. Because the question is about the bodily autonomy of women.
Jimashby is the one erecting a strawman argument.
Jimashby is pretending that everyone here is arguing for *recreational* abortions at 30 weeks
Jimashby cannot come up with any evidence that women have recreational abortions past the recognized point of viability (24 weeks)
Jimashby is full of it.
The important thing to note is just how high (48% in that study quoted earlier) the number of women who can’t get an early abortion because of the forced birth camp. Honestly at this point I’m worried I could get pregnant yet be unable to get an abortion at all. So I’d be sitting there at 30 weeks wanting an abortion, tried to get an abortion yet unable too. I’d fucking loathe that situation. I’d loathe the fetus I’m carrying. I’d still want my fucking abortion because my rights were taken away from me. Best case scenario is giving up the child for adoption which is RIFE with HUGE problems. We’d (me, my daughter, the newborn) be totally fucked over because of assholes like jimashby
Stop enabling the forced birth side. Stop giving them an inch, they are working on the mile already. Abortion, always freely no-strings available for everyone. Otherwise, shit happens like the erosion of abortion rights in the USA. Jimashby keeps saying viability and 16 weeks or 20 weeks inter-fucking-changably. Clearly, he doesn’t give a shit. Clearly, he doesn’t get it. Clearly, it’s all the fucking same to him since it’s not his rights up for “debate”.
Goddamn, how I fucking hate this “oh, you can’t be rude and mean to me. I’m being calm and rational.” Well, of course you are, it’s all hypothetical to you! It’s REAL to me. These roll backs on my bodily autonomy effect me, scare me, could ruin me.
Jim,
I note for the audience that you have not addressed or even acknowledged Iain Walker’s and my direct refutation of your claim that fetuses have “human rights”. You have not explained why you believe that killing a human fetus is murder but killing a cow is not.
For convenience, those posts can be found here (mine) and here and the following post (Iain Walker’s).
This is not an argument based on bodily autonomy, which you appear not to find significant for reasons yet to be explained.
Quoted for truth and in the vain hopes that Jim will actually read it.
Oh, that’s just life throwing you a lemon. According to Jim:
Why, just the other day, I had a hangnail!
taking a leaf from (I think?) Jadehawk’s book:
vs.
Which is it jimashby? White or Black? Either a legal expert makes medical decisions or they don’t. Either your misogynistic dream is getting women to petition a court for a vital late-term abortion or you don’t think the courts have anything to do with this. Presumably you feel getting the courts involved will cut down on the non-existent problem of recreational late-term abortions. As has been explained to you in those posts you didn’t read late-term abortions happen either because of some tragedy or because forced birthers like you prevented a woman who wanted an abortion from getting one. Neither is good.
And I’m so glad that as a courageous non-conformist you constantly take solace in thinking your opinion is the majority opinion. Actually no, fuck you. You aren’t special jimashby, you’re the latest in a long line of shitty anti-choicers who have come to this blog to argue against human rights. Frankly I’m glad you finally came out and just said you consider the rights of the fetus more important than the rights of woman. I mean you claimed it was a “viable” fetus, but because you march in lock-step with the current abortion laws which set the cut-off date long before the fetus is viable you merely reveal once again that you argue in bad faith.
Come on Jimashby, just cut loose and stop dancing around your real feelings. If you really think that those horrible sluts deserve to suffer and that babies (hopefully male babies) are more important than the incubator carrying them just say it.
534
Rey Fox
I lol’d.
But I do want to stress just how fucking privileged this “oh well, you’ll get over it. You’ll be fine with another mouth to feed.” Just no. That’s so dismissive and condescending and just OMG WTF is wrong with you? So I’m struggling to support my child as it and I’d love to give her a better life, but instead let’s just add another child! Yeah, that’s going to work out so well. This is just so blatantly “sluts get punishment and need to be held accountable for daring to have sex”.
I have a 10 year IUD and haven’t even had sex in over a year yet I’m fucking terrified because another pregnancy would ruin everything. In this fucked up state of AZ, getting an abortion would be impossible. I’d be so screwed. My young daughter will be screwed.
Seriously, cute little babies doesn’t always bring happiness and joy. Get over this “only monsters and barbarians don’t want a child” attitude. It just makes everything worse. I’m actively terrified of pregnancy and babies. DO NOT WANT. I’d get my fucking tubes tied if I could, but NOOOOO, society is all “But you’re a woman, what if you change your mind? What if your future husband wants kids?”.
Just…fuck it all, man, fuck it all. Tear it all down. Restart. Send me to another planet. I’m just so far fucking done.
Since MANY people have already told you exactly why, there is indeed no point continuing in engaging with a hypocritical, murderous, inhuman liar such as you, jimashby.
But for the sake of others who might be late to this thread, observers more humane and decent than the inhuman lying murderous hypocrite that is jimashby, I will do so, yet again.
1) Human rights do not include the right to violate any other human being’s bodily autonomy. No human being in any civilized jurisdiction on this planet has this right. Human rights do not include the right to commandeer another human being’s uterus against her will.
2) The viable fetus does not have any human rights. No jurisdiction in any civilized nation on this planet grants such a right. Some jurisdictions grant value, of varying degree, to a viable fetus, but not human rights.
@jimashby
Why do repulsive monsters like you never talk about consequences for the father, even though it takes two to make a baby? Of course, fetuses are just cudgels you use to beat women with.
Consequences for what? For being too poor to get an early abortion? For living in a place where anti-choice dipshits like you make women jump through unnecessary hoops? For being raped? For having her contraception fail? For having a complication late in the pregnancy? See, this is why we rightly call you abominable. All you want is to condemn women to death for daring to do what they want with their bodies.
Fuck you. Fuck you to death with a thousand burning fucksticks. You’re a wretched git and every word that comes out of you is poison. You’re everything that’s wrong with the world of today – too many opinions and too little empathy. If there’s any hope for humanity, your ilk will die out as the train of History leaves you behind, yelling at clouds.
And JimAshby should also know that monsters like Gosnell exist, and late term abortion exist because his buddies in the forced birth camp WANT TO MAKE FIRST TRIMESTER NON-SURGICAL ABORTIONS PROHIBITIVELY EXPENSIVE FOR MOST WOMEN.
I’ve always had the opinion (which you must take as seriously as you want me to take yours jimashby) that everybody who wants a woman to not have an abortion should pay half the cost of bringing the new baby to maturity and educated. Which nowadays costs $250,000 and up depending on higher education costs. Harvard and Yale are expensive, especially for post graduate work.
Oh, and jimashby, if the non-aborted fetus wants to be doctor, add $500,000 to the tab. That is called putting your money where your mouth is. Ignored by all hypocritical anti-choice fuckwits like you. But it does show your lack of character….
Just half the cost, Nerd?
It should be the full cost. After all, THEY are the ones that desire the baby. Let THEM take personal responsibility for their desires.
Who am I to argue that point. Let jimashby show his stuff…
And if at any time after the moment the woman had decided she wanted that abortion, something happens and the pregnancy she wanted ended but which jimashby insisted that she continue should go south, jimashby and his ilk should be fully legally liable for medical injury and losses the woman suffers in that event, as well as responsible for the full cost her medical care.
It was jimashby and his ilk who chose to force the woman to continue her pregnancy, and her pregnancy complication was the consequence of THEIR choice. Let them take personal responsibility for their choices.
Why do I smell a liberturdian response (absolute evasion of responsibility) before the answer is even given? Oh, the fuckwittery posed so far by jimashby and his ilk….
Yo Jim!
Have you read up on the list of human rights I helpfully linked for you back @449? I don’t have life, so I know nothing of the terrible burden you bear. Nonetheless, I managed to read all the articles in less than a half hour. You’ve had a few days.
So, are you clear on what types of rights all humans have? If so, congratulations you have now been introduced to rights that apply to all born human beings.
I realize viable fetuses are not mentioned anywhere on the list. Maybe I have a bad one. Do you have a copy of the list of human rights you use? I presume your list has #1-the fetus’ right to life trumps the mothers rightS.
Of course, you’ll need to explain WHY a fetus-upon viability-magically gains ONE right that supercedes the mothers’ rightS. Then you’ll have to explain WHY-upon birth-babies don’t retain this magical right. May as well explain why no born human has this right either.
Just to be clear, the right that you speak of–that you absolutely have not explained:
The “right” of a fetus to make use of the body of a woman regardless of her desires.
By the way, what makes a fetus so special that they get a short lived right that no born human possesses?
Tony!
That’s a ridiculous non sequitur argument. The U.N. declaration of human rights is not about abortion. It says nothing — pro OR con — about abortion.
Also, a fetus doesn’t have rights unless it’s viable. Then it has the full compliment of human rights. As the Supreme Court ruled, the mother’s right to privacy MUST BE BALANCED AGAINST the rights of the unborn human life within her.
As for the second half of your post . . . You’re just making the same circular argument as others here. You’re all begging the question by asserting (in one form or another) that, “The mother’s body is hers to do with as she chooses because it’s her body.” Yes, her body is her body but that completely ignores the body of the viable fetus within her. You’re asserting that the woman has rights AND denying that the viable fetus has any. You’re begging the question: “Why doesn’t the viable fetus have any rights?” What everybody here is answering is a form of: “Because the mother has the right to do as she pleases with her own body.”
Aside from dodging the question, the assertion itself is incorrect. Women (and men) don’t have the legal right to do what they want with their bodies. We can’t defecate or urinate or masturbate in public view. We can’t legally prostitute ourselves or inject heroin into our arms. The law can, and does, limit what we can do with our bodies. We can’t legally attempt suicide, for instance. If we can’t legally kill ourselves, why is it unusual that we can’t legally kill viable fetuses either?
After all . . . it’s our bodies. Right?
jimashby:
Your argument depends on blind authority to the law; the reality is that bad law exists.
(Do you worry about viable sperm, too?)
Sorry, it doesn’t have rights then. It isn’t born you fuckwitted idjit. Your unevidenced assertions are dismissed as fuckwittery. Still ignoring bodily integrity, and pretending the “viable fetus”, better known as parasite, IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN THE WOMAN WHO IS A PERSON WITH FULL HUMAN RIGHTS INCLUDING BODILY INTEGRITY. Not so the fetus. If you lie about that, what else will you lie about. Everything from the looks of it.
I be 10 e-ducats that in the morning, JA will not have shown how a subhuman fetus trumps the humanity of full adult woman. That takes tap dancing he is incapable of, but if he can’t address that issue with evidence from non-law (the law is an ass) sources outside of himself, he has nothing cogent to say to us. His opinion matters not to us. Until he makes our opinions worth arguing with, his are dismissed when written. After all, that is the Golden Rule in effect. If he has absolute evidence he needs to present it.
Unevidenced assertion. Show where we must donate kidneys at the whim of someone else, or withdraw the assertion. PUT UP OR SHUT THE FUCK UP.
Non-sequitur, you know you’re losing the argument, and are grasping for strawmen. What a loser if you can’t admit defeat when so far behind the pity rules come into effect.
Jim,
FUCK! Now that I have your attention, remind me again why a viable human fetus has rights and a cow does not.
No, there’s another argument on the table. You’re just ignoring it, presumably because you don’t have a good answer to my questions.
Which are, for the tenth time (and I’ve counted), why is it wrong to kill a viable human fetus and why do you believe that a viable human fetus is a person? Optionally, you could get full credit by explaining why it’s wrong to kill a person in general and then explain why you believe a viable human fetus is a person in light of that explanation.
Saying “it’s illegal” means diddly squat, btw. Where I live it’s illegal to serve prisoners margarine. It is not immoral or unethical to do so.
What you’re not recognizing is that there is no human right to use someone’s body as a life support machine without their consent. You don’t have that right. I don’t have that right. Nobody has that right, because it isn’t a right. The right of bodily autonomy is also not a “reproductive right” (as you claimed, or perhaps as you ignored what we’ve said and invented other arguments for us). It is a plain old right that everyone has, whether or not they are reproducing.
It would not matter if I needed to use your organs or your body to survive. My life, liberty, happiness, etc., does not outweigh yours. It would be necessary that you consent and that you continue to consent as long as I would use you as my life support. If you wanted to pull the plug, that would not be unethical, because you would be “the plug,” so I along with everybody else could not justifiably claim you’re obliged to act as if you’re not a moral subject who has needs and feelings and interests of his own, but instead as machine or a slave which we can treat however we want. Women have the same rights, and should be treated exactly the same way when they’re pregnant, not as slaves or incubators for society to pump out babies for us, who will then most likely have their rights disrespected as well. If you can’t at least accept that this is the argument you have to address, not some nonsense about “internality” or “viability” or “personhood,” or with what the laws are or how many agree with the laws, then you’re very blatantly being a dishonest shithead.
It’s literally all he has.
Doubtful.
Jim:
Please point out where I said anything about the UDHC referring to abortion.
You won’t find it.
I brought it up because it is quite relevant to a discussion about humsn rights, since it is about human rights. Non sequitor? Damn. Go learn your fallacies better.
So now you move on to claiming a viable (there’s that arbitrary word again that you think means anything of significance) baby has the full complement of human rights.
According to who?
Your opinion counts for nothing.
Back up your assertions with proof.
Evidence that a viable fetus possesses full human rights.
It won’t be in the UDHC, since that document refers to BORN human beings.
Did you even read the thing?
”
Article 4.
No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.”
Interesting. In the delusional world you dwell in, fetuses magically acquire full human rights upon viability, yet now their hosts are slaves to them. In your world after viability, women must, whether they wish to or not, continue carrying the fetus to term. That fetus is using the woman’s body and jeopardizing her health.
She is held in servitude by a fetus that cannot even conceive of slavery, freedom of speech or due process. People like you want to grant fetuses human rights and don’t care that they violate a woman’s rights.
So now we return to a question I posed earlier: allowing for your fanciful scenario of full fetal human rights, what is to be done when one persons rights come into conflict with anothers? Moreover, one of the two in question is adversely affecting the health of the other.
I know you don’t have a coherent answer, as nothing youve said in this thread has advanced beyond anti-choice tv ads.
—-
By the way, even if you could somehow come up with evidence for any of the above, you have still lost the argument.
Remember that full range of rights you think viable fetuses possess?
Those rights DO NOT include the right to make use of another human beings body. Ever. That is not a human right. If you’re going to try and argue that it is, be prepared to give me your kidney.
Seriously, go back to anti choice sites. You’re so far out of your depth and refuse to educate yourself, it would be almost pathetic, if you didn’t serve as an abject lesson to lurkers.
547
jimashby
Not our fault you’re too stupid to understand how birth is when rights are granted. Not viability, birth. We’ve repeated explained this and why. You’ve just claimed the precious baby could maybe possibly survive so you want to give it special treatment. That’s a fuzzy, blurry and downright STUPID line to take. Again, we’ve explained why.
Yes. We’ve explained and presented evidence for why this is. You’re just incapable of understanding and flat out ignoring some posts. Like mine. Guess reality is too much for you too handle? Can’t take how real people are effected by your bullshit?
Let me repeat that for emphasis:
flat out ignoring some posts. Like mine. Guess reality is too much for you too handle? Can’t take how real people are effected by your bullshit?
I’m against those laws. The laws create more problems and victims.
I’m against those laws. It’s a horrible way to punish someone when clearly they need help more than anything. Or in the case of euthanasia, I think someone has the right to end their life and their terms and aren’t mentally ill for that.
So, if you live in an anti-sodomy and anti-oral sex state where those acts are illegal, does that mean you won’t do those anymore? What about those that outlaw pre-martial sex? In Utah, it is a felony to persistently tread on the cracks between paving stones on the sidewalk of a state highway. Will you follow that law?
Why are you so authoritarian? You should try thinking and reasoning for once instead of mindless parroting and blind following.
554 consciousness razor
QFT. Even if you give a viable fetus rights, it doesn’t excuse reducing women to incubators. I just went all ranty in another direction but wanted to endorse this.
Jim:
BTW, I left a link with a source detailing human rights. That list supports my opinion that human rights belong to born humans.
The list does NOT support your silly belief.
I will be waiting in breathless anticipation for you to post a link that supports your assertion.
Nerd, pass the Grog please :)
The full complement, eh? Let’s look at a couple of particular humans that might shine some light on what this means. I presume there’s no argument that school age children do have these rights that you’re so fond of.
So how come a woman’s existing, born children don’t have the right to claim the organs or to use the organs of the mother who gave birth to them not many years before, but a foetus which might or might not become another child-who-cannot-make-use-of-their-mother’s-body does have rights that they don’t have? And if the pregnancy results in a live birth, those rights will expire the moment it is born.
There. is. no. point. in constantly saying that a foetus has the same rights as born people when there is no right for anyone, including her own children, to use (or occupy or exploit or damage or destroy) a woman’s body in the way that a foetus does.
I suppose I’ll just keep repeating this for as long as jimashby keeps on repeating this futile point.
Another bizarre component of jimashby’s fractal wrongness, which hasn’t really been addressed….
He claimed in one comment that (1) it’s just a matter of opinion, and (2) that we, or liberals in general, are “Fascist all the way.” So it’s too late to avoid Godwin’s law here. What I don’t quite get is if I’m supposed to conclude he merely has a with fascists (leaving aside the whole “treat people as slaves” thing), or if he merely says this kind of bullshit (but doesn’t mean it) so he can protect his “opinion” from criticism.
He also whined about civility and our “political correctitude,” ironically enough. This is all after pretending to have a pro-choice position, talking about how “we” have won, etc. I don’t know if he’ll return, but I just want to know if there’s a limit to the amount of stupidity someone can display in a single thread.
Not in any civilized legal jurisdiction on this planet, it does not.
Citing a set of inhuman, cruel, unjust, (and frankly ridiculous and unenforceable) laws in support of proposing another set of inhuman, cruel, unjust, and murderous laws is pitifully comical.
That’s right. The viable fetus does not have human rights. No civilized jurisdiction on this planet affords such rights to viable fetuses. Some of them afford some value to a viable fetus, but that is all.
Civilized jurisdictions do not afford the viable fetus the right to vote, to own property, to free speech.
Civilized jurisdictions, even the ones that outlaw abortions of viable fetuses, do not charge women who abort viable fetuses with murder, nor do they subscribe penalties to women and doctors who abort viable fetuses that equivalent to the penalties subscribed for murder.
It is plain and unassailable fact that no civilized jurisdiction on this planet afford human rights to any fetus, viable or not.
Poor jimashby, still talking out of the wrong orifice! Still totally confused.
Once again, assuming he is in the US, I go back to the actual text of the judgment in Roe vs Wade. Curiously enough, that makes no mention at all of foetal rights, of a balance of rights or of any right of the state to determine viability.
Here is part of what it actually says, at section 3
” … the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which protects against state action the right to privacy, including a woman’s qualified right to terminate her pregnancy. Though the State cannot override that right, it has legitimate interests in protecting both the pregnant woman’s health and the potentiality of human life, each of which interests grows and reaches a “compelling” point at various stages of the woman’s approach to term. Pp. 147-164.
(a) For the stage prior to approximately the end of the first trimester, the abortion decision and its effectuation must be left to the medical judgment of the pregnant woman’s attending physician. Pp. 163, 164.
(b) For the stage subsequent to approximately the end of the first trimester, the State, in promoting its interest in the health of the mother, may, if it chooses, regulate the abortion procedure in ways that are reasonably related to maternal health. Pp. 163, 164.
(c) For the stage subsequent to viability the State, in promoting its interest in the potentiality of human life, may, if it chooses, regulate, and even proscribe, abortion except where necessary, in appropriate medical judgment, for the preservation of the life or health of the mother. Pp. 163-164; 164-165.’
So, the State can put in place rules and procedures to monitor and regulate but it says in so many words that it cannot override the pregnant woman’s right to privacy. It cannot say, “Right, Missus, you are now x weeks pregnant and your rights are thus surrendered to the State Legislature (or whoever.)”
I remind those who might have forgotten that this ruling is 40 years old. We now know a whole lot more about all sorts of things, so that the idea of compelling points is now barely tenable, including the nasty and deceptive tricks the anti-abortionists get up to.
So reliance upon what the law says to prove yourself right is not a wise move here. It becomes even more ridiculous when you rely upon something called viability as the cut-off point and say that you know where that falls because the law defines it. So does the progress of a pregnancy depend upon where you live? In some jurisdictions the Magic Marker line is at 12 weeks, in others 20, in others 24 or 26. In other jurisdictions the concept of viability – real or imagined – does not exist in the law and that’s true at both ends of the spectrum taking, say, Canada and El Salvador as exemplars.
As for suicide, where I sit this minute I have an absolute right to commit suicide and have had since the Suicide Act of 1961 (9 & 10 Eliz 2 c 60) which you can look up on wikipedia. There are, of course, social pressures upon me not to do it too messily, not to do it in a way which involves vast expense for the police and the mountain rescue teams, to choose my moment if I can rather than do it the day before one of my offspring marries, for instance.
My right to kill myself, though, is absolute and under the rule of law.
So, ya-boo-sucks, jimashby. Just admit that you are beaten then I can get down to the river and photograph water fowl and all the others here can get on with something enjoyable or useful.
@jimashby
We are denying that the fetus, viable or not, has one specific right – the right to nullify someone else’s bodily autonomy. Nobody has that right.
Consciousness razor @561:
I think Jim has a long way to go before he reaches Lee Coye territory…
What. The. Everloving. Fuck?!
Is the U.S. really this backward?
Yeah, I don’t think that people who attempt suicide are arrested or anything like what seems to happen in Jim’s head. Assisted suicide, on the other hand, is illegal most places, though many are fighting against this.
jimashby :
Wow, that’s dumb.
How many countries would have to allow slavery before you would consider it a perfectly moral construct?
I assure you that there have been times when far more than 152 countries practiced institutionalized racism – did that make it moral then? If 152 countries could be shown to practice it now, would that make it moral for you?
And if not, why do you use this argument?
Moving on…
So, some sort of privacy screen should be in order, then?
No street-performance abortions?
Or is that actually a titanically stupid equivalence to attempt to draw? (maybe it sounded better in your head..)
Sex work is legal in a number of places.
Narcotic use is legal in a number of places.
Alcohol use, even, is legal in some places.
Again, sounded better in your head, I’ll bet.
And yet, there is a substantial movement for this to be a basic human right – would you like to argue why you think it shouldn’t be?
Or would you like to argue that the law isn’t always correct about this sort of issue?
“Daddy sez you can’t” doesn’t fly very well around here, sorry.
It may come as a shock to you, but there have been laws that have not been fully moral. Even more startling, people have broken the law in justifiably moral ways. Discovering this might require some knowledge of history, or the world at large, but I imagine if you start now you’ll make up at least a little of the clear deficit you have in this area.
(PS, if you already know that the law is not perfectly moral – why do you keep bringing it up?)
In most municipalities in the US, an attempted suicide will garner an involuntary commitment to a psychiatric hospital for a period of 48 hours to 14 days (depending on the local laws). Which, for me, involved being cuffed and stuffed into a cruiser for the trip to the hospital. The cuffs didn’t come off until I was in the psychiatric hospital. Where I spent two weeks.
That said, claiming that since we are not allowed to commit suicide women are not fully human is just fucking bizarre.
Sorry for the delay of this answer to a previous post, it’s tough for me to keep up with the pace of this thread.
Ibis 3, ( #496) — Thank you. Very useful.
Gen, U.I. (#497) — Thank you, too. But while the organ donor argument works brilliantly in the US or perhaps elsewhere, it’s less powerful here. In Finland the dead are dead. The consent is assumed (not sure about other Nordic countries, although usually their laws are quite similar), so there is no requirement of an explicit consent of the deceased or the family. The organs of the deceased person are legally available to be transplanted to another person, unless the deceased has explicitly prohibited it or it is reasonable to assume the deceased wouldn’t consent to it.
So while I agree with you in general and anyone can, with some effort, refuse to donate their organs after death, doing so would be considered pretty strange and very unethical in our culture. I think the legal position of a deceased organ donor and a live, pregnant woman are just too different, so I would avoid that comparison in my arguments.
According to his FB page, he’s from LA, currently in the Philippines. Where abortion is illegal. His ignorance is perhaps somewhat excusable, his stupidity and callousness less so.
JimAshby is most likely a concern troll, imo.
You can tell because he is pretty good at trotting out all of the standard anti-abortion arguments.
Most telling is the ‘but we don’t have absolute bodily autonomy anyways’ line. That one is part of the forced birther HANDBOOK.
And Jimbo, I will repeat, just for you, since you seem to ignore all of my posts: I have not seen anyone here advocate ‘late term recreational abortions’. You are sticking to this lie, because you can’t ‘win’ the debate any other way.
If you look at the laws of many western nations, you will probably find prohibitions against suicide on the books in many of them, not just the US.
It is an artifact from the time when Christian theology was dominant in the legal thinking (your body is a gift from god, therefore damaging it via suicide is a sin).
They are very rarely, if ever, enforced these days.
It is just one of many examples of archaic, outdated, often stupid, laws that no one really enforces anymore, but remain on the books because no one has ever bothered to actually go to the effort of officially repealing it.
Which is yet another reason why using the letter of the law as an argument for ethics is asinine.
Every important ethical and moral advance ever made began with someone breaking the law in a justifiably moral way.
It is even in the bible. God flat out commanded Moses to break Pharaoh’s laws.
jimashby (#499):
And you continue to play on the ambiguities of terms like “human” and “humanity” willy-nilly. A viable foetus and a premature baby are equally human in the sense that they are both early developmental stages of a human organism, but why should that be morally relevant? A non-viable foetus is just as human in this sense, but you don’t seem to have a problem with a woman removing one of those from her body.
Biologically it’s not more or less human than any of the earlier stages – it still falls taxonomically within the species Homo sapiens. The fact that it’s more readily distinguishable to the non-embryologist as belonging to that species rather than another is morally relevant … how?
You see, I really don’t get the impression that you’ve really ever reflected on your moral stance. You don’t seem to be able to explain it to us, which suggests to me that you don’t even know how to explain it to yourself. You throw buzz-words like “human being” about without any sense of having really examined what they mean for this discussion, and you repeatedly appeal to a perceived majority opinion (inaccurately and irrelevantly, as many people have pointed out) rather than advancing supporting arguments of your own.
Now I’ve explained to you why I (for instance) don’t consider a pregnant woman and a foetus to be morally equivalent – the former is a person with all the cognitive capacities implied by the term and the latter is not. You have not explained why you think they are equivalent – you have merely asserted this. And you cannot simply brush this off as a mere difference in opinion – the difference is between a position for which supporting arguments have been advanced and which have not yet been refuted, and a position for which no supporting arguments have been advanced at all. That’s not a two-sided difference in opinion – that’s a very one-sided failure to engage in debate.
Disabled people, yes. I.e., actual persons with a capacity to think, desire, feel, and to assign value, meaning and purpose. All the things that a foetus can’t do because it lacks the neurological development necessary for that kind of cognition. You’re comparing apples and oranges here (or more accurately oak trees and acorns). A disabled person and a foetus (viable or not) differ in their capacities by a considerable margin. There is nothing inconsistent in the view that it is morally unacceptable to kill a disabled person yet it is also morally acceptable for a woman to have a foetus removed from her body even if that results in the foetus’s death.
(#547):
Holy crap. So you’re arguing that because someone doesn’t have the right to use their own bodies in any way they see fit, it’s all right for some other entity to use their bodies without their consent? That’s a whopping great non sequitur even by your standards. That we may not have a positive right to do something to ourselves does not mean that we do not have a negative right not to have similar things done to us.
And it’s bodily autonomy as a negative right, the freedom from having one’s body used for another’s purpose without one’s consent, that is the crux of the matter here.
@576:
Great post.
Shall we place bets now on how much he will understand?
Come to think of it, the limited character format of Twitter that many bemoan might be a better way to communicate with this numbskull.
@Iain Walker
Once again, the strawman pays me a visit. And I quote:
————————
“There is nothing inconsistent in the view that it is morally unacceptable to kill a disabled person yet it is also morally acceptable for a woman to have a foetus removed from her body even if that results in the foetus’s death.”
————————
I agree. This strawman waters down what I’ve said. You’re attacking YOUR own secnario, not mine. Why? Because I have no problem with a fetus being removed from a woman’s body, “even if that results in the foetus’s death” A non-viable fetus will die if removed — it, by definition, is likely to die. That’s fine. But a VIABLE fetus can (might) survive once removed: that’s why it’s called a viable fetus. Get it? So, if the mother wants to exercise her reproductive rights, then let her have the fetus removed. But remove it ALIVE and give it proper post-natal care as one would any preemie. She might have reproductive rights but she doesn’t have the right to murder.
The problem comes when doctors kill the fetus in utero. I’m not sure about modern practices but it used to be routine for doctors to kill the uterus in utero and remove it dead — specifically to avoid being charged with murder. Once a fetus is delivered alive, it’s a (premature) baby: so killing it is murder. It used to be common practice for doctors to kill the fetus in utero. It might still be, for all I know.
The bottom line is that EVEN IF THE MOTHER HAS A LATE-TERM ABORTION, IT’S NOT NECESSARY TO KILL THE FETUS. The fetus MAY die or it may not. I may develop disabilities or it may not. Reproductive rights do not include (nor do they need to) the right to murder a viable human life.
If a viable fetus survives removal, that’s a GOOD thing. No murder was sanctioned. The (now) preemie baby may or may not die or develop complications. That’s up to fate . . . NOT you.
No. YOU HAVEN’T DEMONSTRATED VIABLE FETI ARE KILLED and this a widespread problem.
Why is this a problem? You aren’t there, and shouldn’t be. Who gives a shit about an OPINION where bodily autonomy of a woman is dismissed out of hand. You have nothing cogent to say, just emotional fuckwittery of the semi-comatose religious communities.
Ever stop to think fuckwit, the defintion of a late term “abortion” (stopping pregancy) of your alleged person is called an early delivery? THERE IS NO PROBLEM EXCEPT IN YOUR MIND. You have never evidenced that woman doesn’t have the same bodily autonomy as a man, so its not surprising your lack of intelligence and due diligence in finding the real facts, not your imagufactured scenarios.
P.S.
I realize my prior post goes beyond what the law allows. I say, let the woman abort ANYTIME. But if the fetus is viable, remove it ALIVE. The woman’s reproductive rights remain intact WITHOUT committing murder. The (now) preemie baby may or may not survive — with or without disabilities. The mother can keep the child or give it up for adoption (there’s more than plenty of prospective adoptive parents available).
So, under this scenario of early delivery, the mother’s reproductive rights are not compromised: she can get rid of the fetus any time she likes. By law, no murder is committed. If she’s concerned about the ability to — or hardship of — raising a child, she can give it up for adoption.
The mother, the baby, the adoptive parents, the doctors . . . everybody wins.
Is there anything wrong with this?
This is nonsense that is dismissed out of hand. Bodily integrity of woman is an absolute. Until you admit the truth, you have nothing cogent to say, and your opinion is dismissed as utter and total fuckwittery and presupposition.
Nothing intelligent here folks. Blather from an overzealous idjit.
Yes, you have no say in the matter. You know that. Your OPINION is dismissed since you provide no evidence to back it up per
(first quote).
@Nerd,
————
Bodily integrity of woman is an absolute.
————
Once again, an edict with a reason. Why is it absolute? Don’t bother answering. There is no reason because it’s not true. Bodily integrity might make a nice mantra but it doesn’t address the bodily integrity of the viable human fetus . . . unless, of course, the bodily integrity of the viable fetus is also absolute.
I don’t know why I’ve never heard of this option in which the viable fetus is delivered early.
It occurs to me that the woman would likely be advised to hold off on early delivery if she wants to deliver before the fetus is FULLY viable. To tell you the truth, I don’t think “bodily integrity” is enough reason for the woman to hold off on an early delivery . . . unless there were a clear and present danger to her life.
After all, if bodily integrity is absolute, it’s absolute for the viable fetus as well. Barring mitigating medical conditions, why not hold off?
Oops . . . should read “Once again, an edit withOUT a reason.”
Why would it be murder if the fetus was killed again?
Just so you know, the reason that fetuses are sometimes terminated instead of delivered is that abortions are far, far less risky than delivery or C-section. This used to be the standard of care for difficult births, like shoulder dystocia. Of course, perhaps it would be better to cut apart the unwilling woman’s pelvic bones, the better to protect a non-sentient, non-sapient being at the expense of a sentient, sapient being’s permanent disability.
Damn, another typo:
I don’t think “bodily integrity” is enough reason for the woman to hold off on an early delivery
should be
I don’t think “bodily integrity” is enough reason for the woman NOT to hold off on an early delivery
quote: “The bottom line is that EVEN IF THE MOTHER HAS A LATE-TERM ABORTION, IT’S NOT NECESSARY TO KILL THE FETUS”
THAT’S WHAT EVERYONE HAS BEEN SAYING THIS ENTIRE TIME BUT YOU REFUSE TO ACKNOWLEDGE THAT AND GO ON PRETENDING THAT WOMEN WANT TO HAVE RECREATIONAL ABORTIONS AT 30 WEEKS FOR…FOR WHAT EXACTLY??????????
You are the ONLY one jimbo, who has been erecting strawman arguments.
@Nepenthe,
We ALL develop sentience in due course.
But, obviously, you’ve got to let that course develop.
Potentiality is not actuality.
I don’t know why it never occurred to me that unwanted viable human fetuses could simply be delivered early instead of murdered . . . but it must surely have been considered (and rejected) by courts around the world. I have to disagree with the courts on this point. If they want to balance the rights of the mother and the unwanted viable fetus, early delivery is the answer — not forced, full-term, pregnancies.
Legal concerns for personhood and murder need not arise if women can have abortions before fetal viability and early deliveries after fetal viability. But I’m not a judge or lawmaker, so I’m not sure why no country has pursued this option.
It seems a better alternative to me than existing abortion laws.
No it’s not. the fetus isn’t a person. Your presupposition is fuckwitted idiocy. You haven’t had me take a picture of this alleged human, ergo it doesn’t exist. That is called EVIDENCE. You know, what your inane argument lacks…
Why should I care what your OPINION is. You don’t discuss the proper things. Ergo, dismissed.
@Valde
“Potentiality is not actuality.”
Yes. I agree. Not even full-term babies are guaranteed to survive.
There is jimashby in one, in his own words.
Okay Sparky,
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
If it’s obvious that you’ve got to let that course develop, then why are abortions in the first trimester acceptable to you? After all, human embryos will also develop sentience, provided that the women growing them choose to continue doing so.
Similarly, why is “letting that course develop” more important than preventing the suffering of an already sentient, sapient agent?
If the potential to become sentient is what qualifies for personhood to you, I really hope that you’re a vegan. Cows? Pigs? Sentient in actuality. Human fetuses? Not sentient.
So again, I ask, why is it wrong to kill a viable fetus?
*I like how you disappeared the sentient, sapient agent causing a fetus to develop, aka the pregnant woman. And by “like” I mean “find both telling and loathsome”.
Nor are you a doctor. Hint hint.
What the fuck does this even mean? Do you know what it’s supposed to mean?
You should not hook me up to your body for life support without my consent, because I have bodily autonomy. If I refuse to consent, your bodily autonomy is not being violated, and there’s nothing unethical about it. Your continued existence is at stake; but my body isn’t your property to do whatever you want with it, such that you have autonomy over it, the right to dictate what happens to it. That is why you should shut the fuck up, instead of spewing even more confused, dishonest nonsense.
So, you guys won’t even go for abortion before fetal viability and early delivery after viability? Your precious bodily integrity remains intact. The viable fetus is given a chance at life. Potential adoptive parents will have more selections. What’s NOT to like?
If it’s about bodily integrity, right to privacy, reproductive rights, or whatever you want to call it . . . then why not (if your concern is not violated)?
Sorry fuckwit, it doesn’t. It only remains intact if the only persons in on the decision are the woman and her doctor. Your and your OPINION have no place in that room. What part of that don’t you understand? Oh, the part where the fetus never will be an equal person to the woman until it is born. Funny how you miss the obvious. And that makes your analysis BULLSHIT.
Jesus fucking tap-dancing krist, Jim. What the fuck are you looking for here? Someone to validate your goddamn feelings? This shit has been explained to you by very patient people. It’s been explained to you by people who are understandably exasperated with your crap. I’m not going to bother. Just reread this thread. If you still have questions I recommend the search engine of your choice. If you still insist on this line of ‘inquiry” would you please take it to the thunderdome? Or better yet, there are plenty of anti-choice blogs out there who would love you, would make you feel all welcome and warm and validate your feelings for you. I can point you toward some crazy-ass pentecostals that would think you’re a freakin’ genius if you need.
You are welcome to you MINORITY opinion, jimashby, you piece of murderous, inhuman shit, but no civilized jurisdiction on this planet agrees with you.
Notice how there’s no mention whatsoever of the woman, her health, her economic situation, the quality and availability of medical care, or anything other than the fucking fetus. Instead we draw the line with the fetus’ “viability” (whatever the fuck that means), and it’s supposed to make some kind of fucking sense, so that we’re supposed to give a one-size-fits-all answer about it. As if you’re a fucking doctor. But you don’t even want doctors to make that decision: you want the fucking courts to decide it, presumably based on testimony from a medical expert (since judges, lawyers, legislators aren’t doctors, and you’re none of the above) but without regard to the medical expertise of the doctors who are actually treating the pregnant woman. It’s totally fucking incoherent and useless.
Fuck you.
You guys are ideologues. Actually, you’re worse than that. You don’t really want to protect a woman’s reproductive rights. A woman’s reproductive rights aren’t violated if she can expel the fetus by either abortion or early delivery. So your ideology of reproductive rights is just a mantra that obfuscates your real objective.
What you’re actually advocating is killing unwanted fetuses before they become unwanted babies because you don’t want the hardship of raising them OR the guilt of giving them up for adoption. Otherwise, you’d support early delivery and adoption for viable human fetuses.
This is pure hypocrisy masquerading as concern for the mother.
I thank you all for clarifying the issue for me. I finally see, without obfuscation, the truth. I doubt I would have gained these insights without your collective feedback.
No. Sorry. My precious bodily integrity does not include having my pelvis sawed open against my will. Nor does it include me being forced to have a Cesarean section against my will. Nor does it include me being forced to undergo the risk of vaginal birth against my will.
Especially for a being which has slightly less moral standing than a mouse.
Especially not to make you feel more comfortable or to provide a healthy-appearing,* white baby to a family which has already turned down hundreds of thousands of actual children who need a home.
No.
And anyway, why are you so concerned? Why is it wrong to kill a viable fetus?
*The disabilities take a while to show up in my genetic line.
You are a pathetic liar, you inhuman piece of murderous shit.
The above is actually the MAJORITY OPINION ON THIS BLOG and this thread, and has been for years.
Early delivery, ie INDUCED BIRTH, which I and many others have alluded to many times in this thread (which you, you murderous piece of dishonest inhuman shit, have always deliberately ignored), is the preferred medical procedure in these cases. Almost EVERYONE HERE has long ago agreed with this and acknowledged this.
But sometimes it is not possible. Those circumstances are usually medical emergencies and terrible tragedies for the families involved. Abortion is the alternative in those cases. The decision of which of the two procedures is best and proper is extremely difficult, complex, and highly dependent on the details of individual cases. It is an intensely PERSONAL decision made by women, their families, and their doctors.
And you, you inhuman piece of murderous tyrannical shit, want to insert state oppression into this situation. You want to put bureaucratic roadblocks that slow down action in MEDICAL EMERGENCIES. You want to make what should be a nuanced decision into something authoritarian and absolute, and you propose a course of action that will result in the deaths of vulnerable women, REAL HUMAN BEINGS, with REAL HUMAN RIGHTS, and real BODILY AUTONOMY.
The ONLY role the law has in these situations is to ensure that it is as easy and streamlined as possible for FREE INDIVIDUALS to made their difficult personal choices unhindered.
I’m done. Thanks again.
Then fuck off, before you lie some more about what we do and don’t advocate.
I rather doubt that.
Please, please stick the flounce.
Still lying, you pathetic piece of inhuman murderous shit?
Still bearing false witness against us, you pitiful murderous piece of inhuman shit?
If this is your pathetic attempt at a flounce post, good riddance to you.
Pot, Kettle, Black.
You were done a long time ago, you pitiful dishonest piece of inhuman murderous shit. You were just too stupid to realize it, and wasted days of everyone’s time repeating the same pieces of inhuman murderous shit.
Yeah, fuck you Jimmy. I’ve waited to pull out my story, but that’s fucking it.
The reason I support abortion on demand at anytime–besides the philosophical–is because of the 5 minutes I spent in a drugstore bathroom after I woke up from a daze four months after being raped and realized that I couldn’t remember when I last menstruated. Because if that window had turned pink and I wasn’t able to get an abortion, I would have died, either from poor health or suicide.*
And of course, you’ve never fucking answered my question you cowardly piece of shit. I hope the next hamburger you eat is covered in invisible cow shit and you get some sort of intestinal parasite that turns you inside out for at least a week.
Oh wait, you’d never eat a hamburger. Potential for sentience and viability = personhood, so eating beef is exactly like eating babies, right?
*Guess what you don’t get to take while pregnant: the antidepressants that have kept me alive for over a decade.
This argument wasn’t about reproductive rights. Only you claim that. It is about a woman’s right to bodily autonomy/integrity. No mention of reproduction there, although it is included in the package. It’s obvious that you kept trying to define the argument in terms favorable to your idiocy. Notice we didn’t go there. We have had years of experience with idjits like you. We kept the argument where it belonged focused on the woman, and you had nothing new to say, and no evidence to present. Same old shit from the same old presuppositional bullshit we’ve heard for years.
If you search ‘Jim Ashby youtube’ you will see that he is most likely just a troll.
Made some snarky comments about PZ and others.
Tf00t fan as well it seems. Why do I get the feeling that this thread is about to be quote-mined and held up as an example of something nefarious?
Well, golly, gee whiz. Who’da thunk it.
Jim:
I have just about had it with your intellectual dishonesty.
Fetuses, viable or otherwise ARE. NOT. PEOPLE.
They do not have the full range of human rights you pompous condescending shitstain.
That’s why I gave you a damn link to a list of human rights drafted by humans to be used ad a guideline for the rights all humans should have.
Once A-fucking-GAIN–fetuses, viable or not are not included on that list of human rights.
I asked you to provide a source for your repeated, unevidenced assertions that fetuses are people. You still have not. You appear capable of stringing words together. Go do a damn Google search for human rights. Bring something more to the table than your anti-women views.
Then, when you return, even if you found something reputable to support your opinion on Google Scholar, you would still be wrong.
one of the rights that all BORN human beings possess is bodily autonomy. Among other things. This means that no one can make use of the body if another person witout their consent. That precious viable fetus that you are hung up on IS VIOLATING THE WOMAN’S BODILY INTEGRITY. She has every right to employ self defense to stop the unwanted attacker.
Oh and by the way, there are times when various rights we humans enjoy can be tak en from us (being convicted of a crime and sent to prison. Parents who opt to remove their comatose child from life support
This rancid pissant actually made me laugh:
The ‘solution’ to balancing the bodily autonomy of a pregnant woman and the nonexistent bodily integrity of the fetus is to FORCE a woman to give birth!
Pat Condell too. Quelle surprise.
How wretched.
A thunderf00t supporter.
No wonder he was a sexist fucker.
Even without factoring in rights, the “potential human” argument is stupid because it assumes the way in which that potential will be realized will necessarily turn out superior to never getting born. It’s an argument that belongs to people who believe in souls and minds independent of brains and hereditary sin and saviors and afterlives. If humans are just meat that can think and not meat suits for immortal souls, what does it really matter to a fetus if it never develops sentience? Nothing at all; it hasn’t the mind to care before it’s all over. But it could potentially regret having been born.
Dropping this one for the lurkers.
The fetus is using the woman’s body to sustain itself. The opposite is not true. The two situations aren’t equivalent at all.
The choice of method in abortion is a MEDICAL decision, not a LEGAL one. Ultimately, it falls on the woman, advised by a qualified medical professional, the decision of how to terminate her pregnancy. It should not be forced by law. Your argument relies on the (wrong) assumption that pregnancy and childbirth carry no risk.
CR @,
Yeah.
—
If one orders roast chicken, one doesn’t expect a roasted (but viable!) chicken fetus.
(It’s just not the same)
Jim, you’re still an idiot. Even though you have now admitted that a woman has the right to terminate a pregnancy at any time (you may not have wanted to admit that, but you have (say, in your #592)) you fail to grasp a few simple facts.
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1) Abortion = the termination of a pregnancy. If the foetus dies during this process that is incidental. The point of an abortion is to end a pregnancy.
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2) Nobody carries on with a pregnancy for weeks and months and then aborts because they like the idea of aborting later rather than earlier; later abortions are forced on women because idiots (many of them very like you) prevent access to early abortion (which is quicker, safer, easier on the woman and on medical services). They do this by supporting a system that makes early abortion legally and practically and financially difficult to access. They do this by closing down clinics and services; they do this by imposing legal barriers; they do this by imposing unnecessary expense – unnecessary and irrelevant procedures such as an irrelevant ultrasound, a mandatory wait period, a long journey etc.
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3) The overwhelming majority of extremely late abortions are of wanted pregnancies, made necessary by medical emergency. In cases like this medical staff will often go to great lengths to keep the foetus alive after the abortion (abortion means termination of a pregnancy, remember). You have clearly demonstrated that you have not got the first idea about the reality of these situations. Medical decisions are and should be based on whatever is the best course of action – on medical grounds – in each individual case. No two will be alike, and every second counts. What is the precise state of the woman’s health, the precise nature of the medical emergency, the precise condition of the foetus. Only the woman and her physicians are in a position to make decisions as to the best course of action.
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All you now want to do is add legal complications into the mix of a medical emergency. All you want to do is tie the physicians’ hands in the middle of the OR.
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You are an idiot, and a callous egocentric misogynistic idiot to boot. You are cordially invited to fuck off.
jimashby (#576):
[Sigh] You’re the one who drew a comparison between killing disabled persons and killing foetuses. I pointed out that this was a false equivalence. If you didn’t mean to draw that equivalence, then you phrased your post poorly and your point about killing the disabled was simply irrelevant to the discussion.
[Sigh, again] Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t. It depends on the medical condition of the mother, of the foetus, the resources available etc etc. It’s up to the doctors to ensure that the removal procedure is as safe as they can make it for the woman, i.e., the actual person involved. That may result in the death of the foetus or it may not. That’s the point – not that it’s okay to off foetuses willy-nilly (because no-one here has been defending that), but that the woman’s interests are the primary ones in this scenario, and that any attempt to keep the foetus alive should be made within that context.
(#582):
Including cases where the mother has long term health problems because a less safe procedure was used to remove the foetus alive, cases where the prematurely delivered infant develops severe developmental problems, cases where the adoptive parents (if you can find any) struggle to meet the needs of a severely disabled child, cases where the doctors get sued for using a less safe procedure? Yes, everybody wins, all the time, because nothing ever goes wrong in the cosy, simplistic little world you picture.
(#605):
Says the person who shouts “Strawman!” every time someone ventures a criticism of his own confused ramblings. Dear me.
What, we’d support a blanket policy that we already know to be unworkable? As opposed to allowing women and their doctors to decide the best solution in their own individual cases, with as little legal interference as possible? There’s a guy called Procrustes on the phone, jimashby, and he wants to know if you’ll go into a Bed & Breakfast business with him.
Oh, and you never explained why “viability”, with all its grey areas and uncertainties, should be the magical point around which all other considerations revolve. This isn’t an invitation to come back and tell us, btw, since I suspect you still don’t really know yourself. I’m just noting it for the record.
All of this just goes to show that the forced birthers are woefully ignorant when it comes to pregnancy, childbirth, and fetal development.
Yeah, avoiding the pain of birth, the expenses of childraising, AND the mental trauma for both parents and children of adoption IS a major reason I have for supporting abortion on demand without restriction. What’s the fucking problem? What’s wrong with choosing the least traumatic and costly option? There’s seven fucking billion human beings on the planet. Your bronze age morality is designed to make more and more and more humans. That’s actually immoral at this point – it’s calling into question the survival of entire ecosystems and civilizations. You need to catch the fuck up.
They’ll do that regardless. How unsurprising that an anti-choice, anti-woman asshole is also a Tf00t fan.
Oh! Oh! I’ll hazard a guess. Maybe it’s because it a lady problem (i.e. not something “real people” have to deal with outside of fun little hypotheticals). It’s what our lady parts are for. Why are we treating childbirth like it’s such a big deal? It’s what we’re made to do, right?
*runs off to vomit*