Contrary to what we hear shouted from both sides of the pro-choice/pro-life divide, abortion actually is a complicated issue. Is it possible to make progress on an issue that seems to straddle the line of our deepest philosophical differences? If it is, it certainly won’t be done with pictures of dead fetus’ or insisting that a women’s right to choose is the only morally relevant factor to consider.
This RD extra is a debate between Justin Schieber and John Barron on the issue of abortion. John keeps a blog at Siftingreality.com. There John blogs about Christianity, atheism, gay marriage and, of course, abortion.
Or subscribe and listen in iTunes or any podcast client:
Some interesting search terms to occupy an afternoon…
* ‘Tetragametic chimerism’
* ‘Hydatidiform moles’
* ‘HeLa cells’
* ‘Clonally transmissible cancer’
* Immune cell ‘somatic recombination’
* ‘Retrovirus’ and ‘Endogenous retrovirus’
* ‘DNA methylation’
* ‘Microbiome’ and ‘Gut flora’
But., a woman’s right to choose is the only relevant factor. That’s the only argument you need- women are not mindless incubators and do not have to accept the presence of a parasite if they do not choose to.
No it’s not murder but denying a woman an abortion to remove a non-viable , miscarrying fetus because it still has a heartbeat is, when she dies of sepsis ( after 3 days of agonizing pain):
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2012/1114/1224326575203.html
Just my opinion, but then what do I know, I’m just someone who has actually had to have a D/C after a miscarriage because it wasn’t complete, and then there was the first miscarriage, the one where I went into shock. Maybe medical decisions should be made by the patient and their doctor not the church or the state.
I just love seeing debates about issues that will affect my life and health and my daughters life and health as if it were a completely philosophical question. My body, my life, my decision. Period.
to #3 – Seconded.
It cannot possibly be considered murder unless the fetus would be viable outside the womb. I have always wanted to present one of those males who talk about pro-life [a 1984 type Big Lie, if ever there was one] with a fetus and point out that since they care so much, the survival of that ‘person’ is their responsibility.
It probably helps that even when I could be persuaded that the soul was a real thing, I believed that we grow souls, we don’t start with them.
@Trina #2:
While those phrases are concise and intelligible to you, given that the people you’re arguing against have been primed to hear anything you say as dehumanizing a segment of the population to rationalize killing them for convenience… you might get farther arguing against the heinousness of forced birth and borrowed organs (for anyone else’s benefit, regardless of personhood)… or moral obligation to hypothetical persons that don’t exist, taking priority over the consent of women who do exist (and who are not incapable of withdrawing consent weeks/months after sex).
Then again if you find yourself talking to someone who only cares about DNA and unhindered growth of homo sapiens tissue… In order to argue the latter, you’d first be reiterating Justin’s case that people matter more than cell colonies… And apparently that ‘people’ can be shown to exist, and is not merely an empty buzzword to excuse the depravity of ending even one cell’s metabolism before ‘apoptosis’ (another search term that’ll lead to interesting factoids).
What makes the argument that the developing baby in the womb is a parasite so loathsome is the underlying intention to make the baby to be an affront to the mother, an invader, an attacker, an enemy. It is designed to replace feelings of nurturing and love with hostility and resentment.
http://siftingreality.com/2011/11/01/parasite-abortion/
The “woman’s right to choose” argument is one of many that fails to complete the sentence: “. . . the right to choose to destroy an innocent but unwanted human being.” She can’t do that outside the womb, so the only question is, “What is the unborn?” The scientific fact is that “it” is a human being from fertilization. At least that’s what all those pesky embryology textbooks say.
“Viability” is irrelevant. Infants aren’t viable if you don’t take care of them, but that doesn’t mean you can crush their skulls and rip their limbs off with impunity (at least not yet).
2/3 of states consider it murder to kill the unborn unless mommy is the one paying an abortionist to do it.
The question of “murder” is a legal one.
Re. the complexity of the issue: The situations surrounding abortions are psychologically complex (pressures on the mother to abort, economic concerns, etc.) but morally simple (you don’t kill unwanted humans outside the womb for those reasons, so you shouldn’t kill them inside the womb for those reasons). Their size, level of development, location and degree of dependency are not reasons to ignore their right to life.
Pro-life reasoning is simple and accurate: It is a scientific fact — http://tinyurl.com/yfje8lq — (and basic common sense) that a new human being is created at fertilization. It is simple moral reasoning that it is wrong to take the life of an innocent human being without proper justification, and that is what happens during 99% of abortions.
Pro-abortionists work overtime trying to dehumanize the unborn, but they are always human beings at a particular stage of development: Human zygote, human fetus, human toddler, etc.
“My body, my life, my decision. Period.”
Your argugment, like most pro-abortion sound bites, ignores the body that you pay to have crushed and dismembered. It ignores her life.
“That’s the only argument you need- women are not mindless incubators and do not have to accept the presence of a parasite if they do not choose to.”
The parasite argument is a pro-abort concession speech. Using that logic you could take a delivered baby before the umbilical cord is cut (or when breast feeding) and kill her any way you like, including smashing her or spraying her with RAID. After all, that’s acceptable to do with parasites, right?
Trina, clearly a women’s right to choose is hugely relevant, but if there is a child with a right to life that will die from the procedure, clearly it is a morally relevant factor too – that is all I was saying. Perhaps you mean to say that a women’s right to bodily autonomy necessarily trumps all other rights of all other persons in all circumstances. That may be true – I dont know. My only goal in this debate was to show that the vast majority of abortions occur at a time when the organism has no moral status other than being the status of being property of the female in which it resides. If I’m right, then most abortions are akin to destroying a painting you don’t want anymore.
The question is, are the arguments presented sound not what sex are the debaters.
@eMatters,
“That it is wrong to take the life of an innocent human being without proper justification is common sense.”
No, it is not. It is clearly wrong to take the life of an innocent person without proper justification. Calling humans ‘innocent’ only begs the question by giving all humans moral status to fit your conclusion.
If you think the biological category of ‘human’ includes a moral status, you need to give an argument.
Yes, all women feel the instinct of motherhood at all times, because women are all the same. Women are all pre-mommies; women who don’t have children inevitably regret their terrible mistake. Women like myself would never feel that an embryo occupying our bodies is an invader or attacker unless someone else, probably a man who has real man thoughts, planted that feeling in our minds. When I wake covered in cold sweat from a nightmare about being pregnant is probably the result of indigestion and propaganda; after all, I’m a woman and my purpose is making babies. Plus, pregnancies never go wrong and in no case is a fetus actually killing its “mommy”.
Furthermore, women never become pregnant as a result of rape, where a conceptus has been violently forced into their bodies. That’s totally unlike an invasion and results in happy, fluffy lady feelings in all real women.
I certainly never tire of men dispassionately debating the course of my future as a fun intellectual exercise. It doesn’t feel dehumanizing at all, especially when the arguments of one side explicitly rely on my non-personhood and non-individuality.
“Calling humans ‘innocent’ only begs the question by giving all humans moral status to fit your conclusion.”
Stating the obvious isn’t begging the question. If you think that the unborn aren’t innocent and that they’ve committed capital crimes deserving death, then you are the most super-duper-pro-capital punishment person I’ve ever heard of.
The “bodily autonomy” argument ignores the bodily autonomy of the human being that gets crushed and dismembered.
And taking that to its logical conclusion means that you could kill the child in any manner you choose as long as the umbilical cord hasn’t been cut (or if she is breast feeding). I realize that some moral freaks will gladly hold that view, but I’ve found that most squirm away from that argument once they realize its logical conclusions. And the discussion helps to sway the middle ground people, most of whom only support 1st trimester abortions.
“If you think the biological category of ‘human’ includes a moral status, you need to give an argument.”
I already did. I noted that the size, level of development, location and degree of dependency are not reasons to ignore their right to life. Those are the reasons typically given by pro-aborts to rationalize away the right to life and to justify abortion based on vague definitions of “personhood.”
@Nepenthe
We weren’t debating your future.
@eMatters, clearly the point was missed here.
Let me rephrase for you. Calling humans ‘innocent’, ‘guilty’ or any other moral value-laden term begs the question by giving moral terms to a biological category.
If you listen to the debate, you would have heard me bring the same point up. This move needs an argument. It is only taken for granted by people who agree with you.
But interactions between human beings is moral. Killing human beings is a moral issue. The morality is determined by innocence or guilt. Innocent human beings cannot be killed for frivolous reasons morally.
Restating that Klusendorf talking point wasn’t an argument to justify your inclusion of moral status in a biological category, it’s a response to my position. One that is false if you were to actually listen to the debate.
Even if it was a good objection (it isn’t), it still doesn’t mean that your position wins by default. You still need an argument for your position that species membership entails a right to life.
So I guess it’s misogynistic for a man to make philosophical arguments for the pro-choice position because in doing so he is dispassionately discussing an issue that effects women’s health. I’m so glad Nepenthe raised my consciousness on this matter. Boy do I feel like a dick, though. I actually thought Justin Schieber was advancing the cause of feminism by offering a robust defense of abortion rights. Now I realize he was just playing an intellectual game for his own amusement.I mean as a man there is NO CHANCE that he might actually care about women’s rights and wish to use his personal set of skills to defend them. He even had the audacity to say there is more to the pro-choice position than “my body, my choice, period.” From this fact alone (it’s not like I’m actually gonna waste my time listening to the debate) I can confidently conclude that Justin thinks women are stupid and need a man to defend them…I mean that’s the only explanation, right? If he really respected women he’d either shut up or grow a pair of tits.
You’re either lying to try to fool the rubes or you’ve deluded yourself that you aren’t a loathsome anti-human Forced-Birther.
“Right-to-life” is the reason typically given by pro-female-slavery Forced-Birthers to take away a woman’s autonomy and to justify treating women like breeding cattle.
Horrible people like you should never be allowed to have any input into anyone else’s decisions. Never. Not even a decision about what your friends (if you have any) should have for breakfast, much less a life-altering decision by a woman who knows better than anyone else what she is willing to bear.
The arguments about embryos being full-fledged human beings seems like a rhetorical strategy. Afterall, if embryos are full-fledged human beings, then killing an embryo is no different than killing an infant or teenager, and just as wrong. But, not even the pro-life crowd believes that fertilized embryos are full-fledged human beings. All you have to do is consider the thought experiment of a burning building with six embryos in a petri dish and a toddler. You can only save one, which do you save? I’d bet 9 out of 10 pro-lifers will say the toddler. By making this choice, they are saying that embryos (all six of them) have a lower status than one toddler. So, why don’t pro-lifers believe that embryos have the same status as an infant? This shows us that the pro-life strategy of claiming that embryos have the same status as an infant is wrong – not even they believe it.
I once posted that “burning building” question to a strong pro-lifer (who was against abortion even in cases of rape and incest). She said she’d save the toddler (indicating that embryos are not given the same moral status as a toddler, despite claiming that embryos and infants are 100% equivalent). She said that the embryos are in a petri dish, and somehow that was a distinguishing factor. (In other words, an embryo inside a woman should be given full-status as a human, but an embryo in a petri dish should not be.) It was an interesting answer, though it does raise the uncomfortable question about why an embryo’s status as human or not human should depend on its location in space. I would certainly consider it bizarre if my status as human depended on my location in space – e.g. I’m considered “human” when I’m inside my home, but considered “not human” when outside my home. Meanwhile, pro-lifers will say that embryos are fully human based on their uniquely individual genetic traits (which would mean being in a petri dish should be entirely irrelevant). Such is the contradictions of the pro-life position.
I will admit, however, that pro-lifers can argue that embryos are of a lower moral status than infants, and still argue that embryos should not be aborted. Pro-lifers cannot, however, simultaneously admit that embryos in petri dishes are less than infants, but then turn around and pretend that both are equivalent in order to make arguments about how destroying an embryo is equivalent to tearing apart an infant (as an earlier comment tries to argue).
B, good point. I have also used that thought experiment with identical results. It is well-crafted. It is especially strong when they say they would save the child when you have given a specific number of embryos. An in your story, if somebody saves the child, it means that each embryo is either less-than or equal to 1/6th of the moral status of the child. Strangely enough, the results are reliably the same if there are 6 embryos or 600.
Someones emotional response in an emergency doesn’t tell you anything about the nature or status of the embryos. After all when you have a screaming toddler its more reactionary to take them.
But if two toddlers were at risk but could only take one, that doesn’t mean the other has less worth, only that you decided on one over another.
This objection to the humanity of fertilized eggs doesn’t really create the dilemma you seem to think.
Yep. They’re either lying or at best self-deluded.
More evidence that they don’t mean what they say about fetuses being “human beings”:
So-called prolife families don’t have a funeral for a miscarriage. The prospective parents may grieve, even get together with friends to mourn their loss, but they don’t have a funeral. They know it wasn’t a baby, wasn’t a “full human being”.
So-called prolifers don’t fight against IVF. They don’t protest in front of fertility clinics. They don’t assassinate fertility doctors like they assassinate ob-gyns. Hardly any of them refuse IVF for themselves when they personally suffer from infertility. But this is in spite of knowing that the procedure almost always creates more viable embryos than can be implanted, and in spite of the fact that the very best IVF embryo selection still has less than 50% chance of implanting – while in more than 50% of the cases, the freshly created “full human being” simply dies at 6-8 cells. If they truly believed that all products of conception are “full human beings” this would be every bit as much an issue for them as surgical abortion.
So-called prolifers are all liars or fools who as a whole are more concerned with forcing women to suffer what they believe are justified consequences of any sexual contact than they are with saving what they claim are “innocent lives”.
@ John B:
> But if two toddlers were at risk but could only take one, that doesn’t mean the other has less worth, only that you decided on one over another.
You’re right: if you have two things of equal value, and you pick one over the other, it doesn’t mean the one you picked has more value. Both could be of equal value and you arbitrarily picked one over the other (i.e. there is no implication of higher value). However, when people consistently and quickly pick the toddler over a single embryo, it does imply that they quickly decided that one was more valuable than the other (otherwise, we’d see a 50-50 split in results). And if you increase it to six embryos versus one toddler, they are saying that six embryos are of equal or lesser value than one toddler. You can’t really get around it that easily.
What under god’s blue heaven is wrong with you? This isn’t a scenario which has actually happened in real life. No one has entered a fertility lab which is on fire and had to rescue a screaming toddler. No one had an “emotional response in an emergency”. This is a thought experiment, you fool. No one is “reactionary” when they respond to this hypothetical moral question.
If we asked hundreds of people which of two toddlers to save, in a thought experiment, if they could only take one, we would expect to get responses about not being able to choose. People would answer “I don’t know” “I guess I would grab the one nearest the door” “How could I choose?” “I’d go crazy trying to save them both” …
But we have already asked hundred of people which to save if they can only choose one toddler or a pile of embryos, and we don’t get a fifty-fifty split. Every person chooses the toddler. No one values the embryos more. Embryos are objectively worth less than an already-living toddler.
Yes, this thought experiment absolutely proves that even so-called prolifers don’t really think a pile of embryos is worth as much as a born child, at least not if they’re honest with themselves.
Of course, being honest is usually difficult for forced-birthers.
B:
me:
Jinx! You owe me a Coke.
Point of order: when hospitals with attached laboratories are evacuated in cases of emergency, the order of operations for priority goes like this:
1. Patients.
2. Lab animals, starting with primates and working towards rodents.
3. Embryos (starting with human, then working towards other species) together with other cells, frozen or cultured.
Practically speaking, in an emergency, few evacuations proceed past the midpoint of (2). Many don’t even get beyond finishing (1). Other places adopt a policy of “euthanize as many lab animals as possible, for the sake of mercy.” But when the time comes, the staff leave.
Lab staff may well be told to go to the hospital and help carry stretchers. So yes, the container of embryos/born human debate has happend, and there are guidelines for this.
There are real-world implications for this. When NYU Medical Center was evacuated during Sandy, the human patients were all evacuated. The lab animals were left to drown (and drown they did). The incubators and freezers containing cells? They lost power, which, in the overwhelming majority of cases, leads to death in a short order.
With regards to abortion: there is a difference, a huge one, between a full-term fetus and a neonate. Even if it is the same individual separated by half an hour. That difference is this: the fetus, by virtue of being inside a woman’s body, is completely dependent on her in a manner that cannot be provided by any other person. By contrast, a neonate, while also hugely dependent, can be cared for by a person other than its mother. A neonate can be given away by its mother (this is called “adoption,” for the ignorant). A fetus cannot be thusly given away unless it ceases to be a fetus and becomes a neonate.
@hotshoe #27:
I suppose ’embryo cryopreservation’ might be an arguable exception to defend that word choice, but the subtlety would be lost on folks who think “things that metabolize are alive” is clever, spend an inordinate amount of time stating that gestation isn’t about hauling around inert matter as if that were a revelation, and ironically insist sperm and eggs aren’t aren’t life before they merge.
When does life begin?
The generally accepted theory is that Abiogenesis occurred approximately 3.5 billion years ago.
Thanks for the helpful points, Esteleth!
Yet more proof that so-called prolifers don’t really believe what they claim to believe about “full human life” of every embryo:
There are no protests at Con Ed’s NY offices or at the fertility clinic about how they murdered all those innocent unborn frozen babies when they let the power go out because they were too cheap to provide enough backup generators.
Not one person thinks a pile of frozen embryos is worth a second thought.
John B, choke on it!
Me, I’m outraged that the lab admins didn’t have a disaster plan for the truly innocent already-born lab animals. Given the reality of global climate change, they had better get their act in gear because this “once-in-a-lifetime” disaster is going to happen again. Sooner than we’d like.
Glad to hear the already-born humans all got out safely, though. I remember Katrina.
Correction accepted. You’re right about the “subtlety” being lost on our opponents.
You know, it’s pretty upsetting to be having this “debate” when a wonderful woman has just been killed by anti-abortionism. Horrible people, exactly like John B, killed her when their immoral fetus worship caused them to choose it over her human life. If it weren’t for evil people just like John B, her heart would still be beating, she would stilll be alive, she would still be in the arms of her loving family, she would still have a mind, dreams, plans, memories, and a future.
The politics of pro-female-slavery Forced Birthers like John B kills already-born innocent humans.
# 14 says
“Stating the obvious isn’t begging the question. If you think that the unborn aren’t innocent and that they’ve committed capital crimes deserving death, then you are the most super-duper-pro-capital punishment person I’ve ever heard of.”
I find this statement interesting. According to Christian belief, every baby is born with original sin. This means the infant is not innocent and is somehow deserving of eternal damnation or at least is not worthy enough to be in god’s presence for eternity. The baby must be baptized in order to be ‘saved’ and cleansed of this original sin. If a baby is in immediate danger after birth, anyone can perform an emergency baptism so s/he does not die in sin, thus putting her/his eternal soul in jeopardy.
So,if the newly conceived is completely innocent, but the newly born is filled with original sin
–at what point in the pregnancy does this transformation from innocent to sinful take place?
–And does this mean the newly conceived does not yet have a soul? If it does have a soul, then it can not be called innocnet until original sin is purged by baptism.
By their own argument, newly conceived and newly born are not considered equal.
I didn’t find Justin’s argument very convincing – and I’m pro-choice. It seemed to be a very abstract, arcane argument (that most people wouldn’t even understand), that didn’t quite deliver the goods. I kept waiting for the coup de grace which made the point and the connections, but it never came.
I agree that the dividing line between “acceptable without question” and “questionable, requires much more justification (preferably medical)” should be at the development of brain structures and functions. Before then, there simply isn’t anybody home. But I don’t feel that Justin’s argument added any easily-graspable, clear, convincing support for it. We need to come up with some better arguments.
Case in point was the opposing side in the debate itself, John Barron. He clearly didn’t grasp the argument either.
Not that his were any more convincing. Especially during his rebuttal, he quickly devolved into emotional arguments, even rhetorically waving the bloody-fetus-pictures under our noses. Emotional arguments have their place and their uses, but I do not find them convincing.
Lastly, removing the “women’s right to choose” issue from the discussion and focusing ONLY on the topic question of “is abortion murder?”, is to my mind invalid. The entire issue of abortion is all about BALANCING the rights of the woman against the rights of the fetus. It is no different in that respect from any other legal-and-moral issue; every one must balance competing rights and responsibilities. And counter to what Mr. Barron implied, murder isn’t as clear-cut as he’s trying to say with his neat little definition. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have various degrees of murder and manslaughter built into our legal codes, but would instead simply prosecute everyone who takes a life under the same single, simple charge, regardless of any of the circumstances (either mitigating or aggravating), motives, or anything else.
As far as I’m concerned, the woman’s right to choose takes precedence until the brain develops, then the pendulum slowly slides over to the other side, allowing the newly-forming person’s rights to become more and more important. Late-term abortions should be rare (and they are) and medically justified on strict grounds (life of the mother or severe, late-discovered disabilities). Balance.
I do have sympathy for the pro-life stance, and I understand the desire for clear, bright dividing lines, and the impulse to assign value to human life (even if I don’t share that impulse). But I do NOT understand or sympathize with the concurrent dismissal of the woman in question, along with her rights, her desires and wishes, her plans, and everything else. To dismiss all those many reasons given for having an abortion out of hand as “insufficient” is mind-bogglingly cold-blooded and uncaring.
There are two interesting arguments that I have recently discussed:
1) that God loves abortion, designing, being responsible for and allowing a system whereby up to 75% of fertilised eggs are naturally spontaneously aborted:
http://skepticink.com/tippling/2012/09/29/god-loves-abortion/
2) that personhood starting at conception is biologically problematic, as molecular biologist Andreas Schueler points out:
http://skepticink.com/tippling/2012/11/14/life-starts-at-conception-but-what-about-personhood/
Let’s change the “burning building” question.
There is a burning building and there are one child and on adult at risk. Your are their only hope to survive and you can only save one of them. Who would you choose?
Does it mean that you consider the one you wouldn’t have saved is not human or less valuable?
I think ‘parasite’ is a pretty accurate word and not necessarily a pejorative one- however I realise its been taken as an attempt to dehumanise an embryo. I don’t feel the need to do that- I freely acknowledge that an embryo is a potential human life. Potential, not actual.
Ematters: an embryo doesn’t have any bodily autonomy. Until birth, it is 100% dependant on the mother. So your argument is a rather moot point. We’re not ignoring anyone’s bodily autonomy.
Pro-lifers really should just stand proud behind their anti women stance instead of trying to hide it behind a smokescreen of concern for people who don’t yet, and may never, exist.
All you “pro-lifers” that consider any potential life sacred and worth forcing considerable medical and mental risks on an unwilling woman:
I assume you are all regular blood-givers, that you have put yourselves on the bonemarrow and kidney transplant lists as willing to give up parts of your own bodies to save a human life? Because if you have not, this means that you are not yourselves willing to do the same that you would blithely force others to do. And that means that your view is not really about life, it is about controlling women.
I am unwilling to marry every battered wife, but I can still speak up about how evil it it and that it ought to be prevented.
For starters, innocent can no more be applied to a fetus than it can to a rock. It has no agency, therefore innocence and guilt are purely romantic notions in it’s regard.
Second, a woman has the right to defend herself against any human being attempting to use her body against her will. She may revoke her consent to the use of her body at any time. And she may enforce that revocation with anything up too and including lethal force.
There is no moral difference between telling a woman she has to submit to an unwanted pregnancy and telling a woman she has to submit to a rape.
@barefootbree,
Thanks for your thoughts. Remember though, I didn’t disregard a woman’s right to choose as irrelevant – clearly it is extremely relevant – I was merely saying it is not the only morally relevant factor. I leave the question as to the permissability of abortion post 24 weeks as an open question simply because I was only concerned in showing that the vast majority of abortions happen to non-persons.
@Other commenters
As to Judith Thompson’s famous violenist argument which argues that a right to life does not entail the right to use another person’s body against their will, I am sympathetic to it. I don’t think it is without its flaws though. Boonin’s book also gives the most complete defense of the argument I’ve ever seen.
@42WithinThisMind – I liken it to forcing a person to give up a kidney, or bone marrow or part of their liver because someone else needs it. Do we do this? NO Why? Because a person has a right to their own bodily autonomy and no one should be able to make them undergo those risks and give up those body parts without their consent.
Pregnancy and birth carry real risks for anyone who undergoes it. In my extended family alone we have: placenta previa plus uterine rupture resulting in hemorrhage that required crash C-section and hysterectomy; Toxemia and Pre-eclampsia resulting in kidney failure and requiring C-section; Post-partum hemorrhage; pelvic floor damage resulting in pain and life long incontinence, partial miscarriage requiring D/C to prevent infection/sepsis, Pregnancy induced diabetes.
And these are common pregnancy complications that, since they developed in people living in a country with modern obstetrics, did not result in any deaths.
I think that the person taking the risks to their life and long term health should be the one to make the decision to continue the pregnancy, or not.
The pregancy comes from sexual act.
If a woman doesn’t want become pregant, the effective ways are no sex or safe sex.
We know: sex is fun, but one must accept the responsabilities of our acts.
JohnB November 15, 2012 at 1:32 pm
What relevance does marrying has in this debate on what can be legally done or not done to human tissue?
And why on earth are you so conceited as to think every battered woman would WANT to marry you? This comment is, in fact, revealing your view on women in general. They should belong to a man and not be able to abort his DNA. Right?
And, as a bonus, you’re willing to force every battered wife to be used as an incubator by her abuser. Look up “contraception sabotage” sometime for one of the more fun sides of partner abuse.
As do his blithe statements about instincts and purposes in the blog post he links above.
Justin, no you weren’t explicitly debating the question “If Nepenthe is impregnated, should she be forced to attempt to carry to term?”, but I should hope that you’d see the connection between a theoretical debate about abortion and that debate.
1. “Safe sex:” Birth control fails, you know: condoms break, perfect adherence to use of hormonal birth control has a small (but non-negligible) failure rate, et cetera.
2. “No sex:” Ever heard of rape?
If they are consistent, everyone making the “parasite” argument would judge this woman not guilty of any crime or moral wrong as long as she slit the infant’s throat and stabbed her before the umbilical cord was cut or while she was breast feeding — http://onlineathens.com/local-news/2012-11-14/athens-woman-slit-infants-throat-after-giving-birth .
Judith Jarvis Thomson’s “violinist” argument plays on the right to destroy an intruder to your body – even if she is innocent – but that has a foundational fallacy: We know how the “intruder” got there. She was created by the mother and the father.
The sole biological reason for sex is procreation, so engaging in that activity is tacit acceptance of the responsibility to carry any human beings is creates to term.
The bodily autonomy autonomy assumes that it is absolute. But there is no absolute right to do anything you want with your body. Prohibitions against prostitution, illegal drug use and selling organs for profit do the same thing. And of course, there is the classic, “Your right to throw a punch ends at the other person’s nose.”
Also, the bodily autonomy argument trades on the alleged morality of withholding support, but abortion doesn’t do that. Abortion actively kills the innocent human being.
“All you “pro-lifers” that consider any potential life sacred and worth forcing considerable medical and mental risks on an unwilling woman:
. . . And that means that your view is not really about life, it is about controlling women.”
Like nearly every pro-abortion argument, you ignore the life of the unwanted human being destroyed via abortion.
“I freely acknowledge that an embryo is a potential human life. Potential, not actual.”
Your argument is with science, not me. Check out any embryology textbook. It is a living human being from fertilization.
If it is a potential life then have a potential abortion.
“Ematters: an embryo doesn’t have any bodily autonomy.”
That is an ill-defined and arbitrary criterion designed to rationalize the killing of an innocent but unwanted human being.
Are you OK with slitting the baby’s throat after delivery provided the umbilical cord hasn’t been cut?
“Until birth, it is 100% dependant on the mother. So your argument is a rather moot point. We’re not ignoring anyone’s bodily autonomy.”
It is also dependent after birth. Do you support infanticide? Toddler-cide?
“Pro-lifers really should just stand proud behind their anti women stance instead of trying to hide it behind a smokescreen of concern for people who don’t yet, and may never, exist.”
Yeah, all the women I know that work at, volunteer at and financially support Care Net Pregnancy Center are anti-women.
And how about all of those who oppose gender-selection abortions, nearly all of which kill females for the sole reason that they are female?
And you are obviously an anti-science zealot if you deny the existence of these human beings.
I’m too pro-science to be pro-choice.
“According to Christian belief, every baby is born with original sin. This means the infant is not innocent and is somehow deserving of eternal damnation or at least is not worthy enough to be in god’s presence for eternity. The baby must be baptized in order to be ‘saved’ and cleansed of this original sin. If a baby is in immediate danger after birth, anyone can perform an emergency baptism so s/he does not die in sin, thus putting her/his eternal soul in jeopardy.
So,if the newly conceived is completely innocent, but the newly born is filled with original sin
–at what point in the pregnancy does this transformation from innocent to sinful take place?
–And does this mean the newly conceived does not yet have a soul? If it does have a soul, then it can not be called innocnet until original sin is purged by baptism.”
That is some convoluted reasoning. First, do you really want to let Christian doctrines guide the law? I’m OK with that, provided that you actually understood it.
Original sin is real but it means you have a sin nature. It doesn’t mean you have committed any crimes, let alone any capital crimes.
And the Bible doesn’t teach infant baptism or that it saves you (that is an error within the Catholic religion).
“that God loves abortion, designing, being responsible for and allowing a system whereby up to 75% of fertilised eggs are naturally spontaneously aborted:”
That’s a great argument, unless your opponent has the ability to see the difference between:
A. Human being dies of natural causes (inside or outside the womb)
B. Human being has skull crushed and limbs ripped off by a 3rd party (inside or outside the womb)
eMatters,
Your inability to understand the scientific term ‘parasite’ is not our problem. Please educate yourself before continuing further. Thank you.
“What relevance does marrying has in this debate on what can be legally done or not done to human tissue?”
John was pointing out that protesting an immoral act does not obligate you to take care of its victims. You can protest spousal abuse without having to marry the women, child abuse without having to adopt the kids, etc.
If 3,000 toddlers per day were getting crushed and dismembered because they were unwanted, could you oppose that without being obliged to care for them to adulthood? Or would that mean you didn’t care for them?
And by the way, pro-lifers do lots of things with their own time and money to help women and children. And unless you are insisting that all poor women get abortions, then you would have the same obligation to help women who choose life.
Nope. We don’t. We just acknowledge that it, like every other human being out there, does not have the right to use a woman’s body against her will.
So, in your mind, once a woman has agreed to go on a date with a man, she has no choice but to submit to sex because consent is something that is both implied and something that cannot be revoked.
Ultimately, you are just continuing to demonstrate that morally, you are no different than a rapist. The consent and feelings of the woman do not matter to you at all, as long as your desire is sated.
eMatters, did infant formula suddenly become unavailable since the last time I was at the grocery store? What happens to all the infants whose mothers have died? Infant adoption doesn’t happen?
I didn’t realize that neonates were biologically dependent on their incu–mothers and that severing the umbilical cord was so difficult.
Ignored? I believe that that’s the “potential life” MariaO is referring to. In your response, you purposely wave aside the “medical and mental risks on an unwilling woman”.
Why? This is an is-ought fallacy, plus a naturalistic one. The “purpose”, whatever that means, of sex is reproduction, therefore we ought to use sex only for reproduction.
Should women who would be killed or disabled by childbearing never have sex? And if they didn’t realize that before hand, well, at least they would suffer or die knowing that they had fulfilled their purpose? But what of their husbands, who have a probably have a god-given right to be serviced?
But if someone wants to use my uterus, that’s cool. Gotchya.
You people have no idea how abortions are actually done, do you? Must be why my state has a medication abortion ban. Nothing to take good propaganda pictures of.
16,000 children die each day of starvation. If asshats like you put in a third of the effort you spend trying to dehumanize women into dealing with that issue, it would be handled.
You don’t give a shit about the lives of the ‘babies’. All you care about is controlling women.
Well, maybe not a date but marriage, certainly. Because the purpose of marriage is formalizing a sexual relationship, thus anyone who enters into a marriage must accept the responsibility to carry on a sexual relationship. Obvs.
“If 3,000 toddlers per day were getting crushed and dismembered because they were unwanted, could you oppose that without being obliged to care for them to adulthood? Or would that mean you didn’t care for them?
16,000 children die each day of starvation. If asshats like you put in a third of the effort you spend trying to dehumanize women into dealing with that issue, it would be handled.
You don’t give a shit about the lives of the ‘babies’. All you care about is controlling women.”
Thanks for the concession speech! I appreciate that. You see, you couldn’t answer my simple question without admitting your error so you had to resort to personal attacks. Charming.
Oh, and I didn’t know you had access to my calendar and checkbook to “know” that I don’t do anything to help the poor. How judgmental of you! Since you obviously know how “greedy” I am, please tell everyone how little I give and how much you donate. After all, by your logic you have complained about children dying of hunger. And you’d never do that without adopting a bunch of them yourself, right?
Obviously, in addition to not understanding science, or term ‘parasite’, you do not understand basic logic.
Yes, I am 100% confident you don’t actually give a rats ass about kids or do anything to help them. If you did, if you had any empathy at all, you’d be doing everything you could to support birth control, including abortion, because that has a direct positive impact on the lives of the existing children.
Oh, and your ‘question’ went unanswered because it was a strawman. The ‘crushing and dismembering’ form of abortion takes place only when the mother is in danger and the fetus can’t be saved, or the fetus is already dead.
“eMatters, did infant formula suddenly become unavailable since the last time I was at the grocery store? What happens to all the infants whose mothers have died? Infant adoption doesn’t happen?
I didn’t realize that neonates were biologically dependent on their incu–mothers and that severing the umbilical cord was so difficult.”
Of course it isn’t difficult to sever an umbilical cord or to buy formula. But that isn’t the argument of the parasite / bodily autonomy crowd, is it? Your point is that this awful thing has attached itself to you — as if you had no idea how it got there — so you have every right to kill her.
So why get cold feet and abandon your argument? By your definition it is a parasite and impacting the mother’s bodily autonomy. So is it ok to kill the parasite as long as it is a “parasite” or not?
“Obviously, in addition to not understanding science, or term ‘parasite’, you do not understand basic logic.”
I understand all those things. It is a scientific fact — http://tinyurl.com/yfje8lq — (and basic common sense) that a new human being is created at fertilization.
I can spot your logical fallacies (equivocation, straw man argument, etc.) a mile away.
“Yes, I am 100% confident you don’t actually give a rats ass about kids or do anything to help them. If you did, if you had any empathy at all, you’d be doing everything you could to support birth control, including abortion, because that has a direct positive impact on the lives of the existing children.”
LOL. You pro-abortion extremists are in a different world. Crushing and dismembering innocent human beings = compassion. Wow.
Still waiting on you to tell us how much time and money you donate to help the poor . . . after all, since you complain about it you MUST be doing lots to help them — with your money, of course, and not just voting to take other people’s money. Otherwise you’d be a big hypocrite.
“Ignored? I believe that that’s the “potential life” MariaO is referring to. In your response, you purposely wave aside the “medical and mental risks on an unwilling woman”.”
Scientific fact: It is a living human being. Nothing potential about it. Go have a potential abortion.
We support abortions to save the life of the mother. The mental risks wouldn’t justify killing those outside the womb, so they shouldn’t justify killing inside the womb.
“But if someone wants to use my uterus, that’s cool. Gotchya.”
That “someone” would be your child — the one you are so eager to kill, and in 99% of the cases the one created via consensual sex.
“Oh, and your ‘question’ went unanswered because it was a strawman. The ‘crushing and dismembering’ form of abortion takes place only when the mother is in danger and the fetus can’t be saved, or the fetus is already dead.”
I think it is pretty obvious who doesn’t know about abortion here — http://tinyurl.com/yzjq4lv, but feel free to substitute your own terms for “crushing and dismembering” and then answer the question.
Again, if 3,000 toddlers per day were getting crushed and dismembered (or starved, or killed in their sleep, or whatever) because they were unwanted, could you oppose that without being obliged to care for them to adulthood? Or would that mean you didn’t care for them?
Hint: We both know why you aren’t answering the question. If you are trying to save face you’d be better off not answering at all rather than changing the subject again and attacking me.
By the way, social animals have sex for fun. They use it to bond with others. Bonobos use sex for conflict resolution among other things. If humans were “meant” to have sex only for procreation, women would have an estrus cycle.
Doesn’tMatter, please in the future read entire paragraphs before responding. The ‘crushing and dismembering’ form of abortion takes place only when the mother is in danger and the fetus can’t be saved, or the fetus is already dead.
I am pro-choice.
I am also a mother.
Please sweep up the shattered remnants of your mind before someone steps in them.
Still a strawman. Still a fantasy. Still based on ignorance. Completely irrelevant, since it isn’t actually occurring, nor is anything remotely resembling it occurring. Please limit your spewing to situations which actually exist.
BTW – that 16,000 dead from starvation? Real number. Not strawman. Not fantasy. Actually happening. To real, living, breathing, thinking, feeling children.
Oh, and you wanted to know how I am helping said children? I’m fighting tooth and nail against asshats like you, who would deny the live-saving medical treatments of birth control and abortion that would help with some of the leading causes of starvation in children, one of which is the nearly 1 in 7 maternal mortality rate in the areas in which starvation is most prevalent. And though I know you don’t give a shit, the phrase ‘maternal mortality’ means that the mother died giving birth.
So, let’s address your ‘logic’, shall we?
Are you a vegan? Somehow I doubt it, so I’ll just assume no. And even if you were, still irrelevant, since you’ve no doubt blown your nose at some point in your life, and plants are alive.
We kill to survive. Bacteria. Plants. Animals. The fact that something is alive isn’t a good enough criteria for us not to kill it, if we perceive killing it as beneficial to us.
So what makes the life of a human being ‘worthy’? What makes a human life ‘sacred’? Hint – It’s something you are having trouble using.
It’s called the brain. The brain is what makes us self-aware, capable of thinking, feeling, and in most cases (not yours) rationality.
And at the point that most abortions (99.99999% of elective abortions) are done, that part of the brain doesn’t exist. There is no conscious thought. There isn’t even an ability to feel pain.
So even if we acknowledge that this thing is ‘alive’ (and it’s alive the same way a sperm or skin cell is alive – as a completely meaningless phrase) why should it have more rights/value than the actual person it is inside?
And even if we did acknowledge it as a full on human being, why should the woman be enslaved to it, with her thoughts, feelings, emotions, and even physical well-being judged as secondary to it’s existence?
Why do you support rape?
Why do you support slavery?
Why do you view women as second class citizens?
Why are you okay with a existing children growing up without a mother, even knowing that in many cases, that dooms the existing children to death from malnutrition?
@Esteleth
1. Do you tell me cunninlynguis isn’t safe sex? There are ways to make safe sex.
Even lessenig the risks, if one take the chance one must be responsible.
2. Well, I had heard of rape and I accept your objection. But my intention wasn’t make an absolut statement but one targeted to the standart abortist.
Also, little troll that doesn’t matter, note a very distinct difference –
At best, our viewpoint is ending potential lives.
Your viewpoint, on the other hand, is killing actual people.
So when you say you care about life, you are lying.
“Doesn’tMatter, please in the future read entire paragraphs before responding. The ‘crushing and dismembering’ form of abortion takes place only when the mother is in danger and the fetus can’t be saved, or the fetus is already dead.”
1. I read it all. You were wrong.
2. You dodged my question. Again. Thanks for conceding the point and admitting your hypocrisy.
“Still a strawman. Still a fantasy. Still based on ignorance. Completely irrelevant, since it isn’t actually occurring, nor is anything remotely resembling it occurring. Please limit your spewing to situations which actually exist.”
Nope. Still a concession speech on your part. I merely pointed out that protesting an immoral act does not obligate you to take care of its victims, and I offered an hypothetical (not a straw man . . . you might want to read up on the actual definitions of logical fallacies). Hey, pick your own hypothetical and insert it. I don’t care.
Just answer the question: Why do you insist that protesting an immoral act obligates you to care for its victims? And why don’t you follow your own moral imperative?
“I’m fighting tooth and nail against asshats like you, who would deny the live-saving medical treatments of birth control and abortion that would help with some of the leading causes of starvation in children, one of which is the nearly 1 in 7 maternal mortality rate in the areas in which starvation is most prevalent. And though I know you don’t give a shit, the phrase ‘maternal mortality’ means that the mother died giving birth.”
LOL. So you offering up logical fallacies on a website and promoting the destruction of innocent but unwanted human beings qualifies as charity on your part? Ha!
“And at the point that most abortions (99.99999% of elective abortions) are done, that part of the brain doesn’t exist. There is no conscious thought. There isn’t even an ability to feel pain.”
Your figure is wrong (surprise!) and even if it wasn’t it is irrelevant. You could kill people outside the womb in a completely painless manner but that would still be immoral. Wow, you pro-aborts really work hard to justify death!
Maternal mortality arguments are a strawman. I already noted that abortions to save the LIFE of the mother are consistent with the pro-life ethic. And we aren’t arguing against birth control, so that is another strawman.
“So even if we acknowledge that this thing is ‘alive’ (and it’s alive the same way a sperm or skin cell is alive – as a completely meaningless phrase) why should it have more rights/value than the actual person it is inside?”
More bad science. You are talking about a unique human being, not merely a part of another human being.
And we aren’t saying it has more rights, but the same right: A righ to life.
“little troll that doesn’t matter”
Oh noes! She is calling me names! Thanks for another concession speech. You might as well just admit you have no valid arguments.
“And even if we did acknowledge it as a full on human being, why should the woman be enslaved to it, with her thoughts, feelings, emotions, and even physical well-being judged as secondary to it’s existence?”
Scientific fact: It is a “full on human being.” She is a unique human being at a particular stage of development. Her right to life is no less than a toddler’s, just as a toddler’s is not less than a teen’s.
She isn’t a slave to her child. Using your logic she could commit infanticide. And using your logic she could slit the baby’s throat while breast feeding or still connected to the umbilical cord.
“Why do you support rape?”
Straw man. You are the one supporting Planned Parenthood and their systematic hiding of statutory rape and sex trafficking — http://4simpsons.wordpress.com/2011/04/08/planned-parenthood-overview/ . You are the rapist’s best friend.
“Why do you support slavery?”
Straw man and equivocation.
“Why do you view women as second class citizens?”
Straw man. And you are the one fighting gender-selection abortion restrictions. Why do you support the legality of killing females just because they are female?
“Why are you okay with a existing children growing up without a mother, even knowing that in many cases, that dooms the existing children to death from malnutrition?”
Straw man. And tell me again how much of your own time and money you donate to help them, and how many you adopt? After all, that is YOUR criterion for being able to complain about an issue.
Ah, the ever present “sluts” argument. Presumably if you eat spinach in the global south, you’re consenting to host a tapeworm or a bundle of ascarid joy. And if you go swimming, well, those schistosomes deserve a chance too.
That site is utterly bizarre. They seem to argue that, since embryos are so tiny and so unrecognizable as human, pro-choice folk somehow covering up the violence against them. You’re literally arguing that something you can’t see is more important than a sapient woman.
—-
Or when forced-birthers have successfully impeded a woman’s ability to obtain a much safer early abortion. (Count that as a win, guys!) Or when the fetus has severe deformity.
—-
And why does “being responsible” equate to attempting to carry to term?
Citation needed. Peer reviewed academic sources only, not the bullshit lies you’ve been citing thus far. Facts only.
Your ability to pull strawmen out of your ass is amazing. I think you’ve proven beyond a doubt my earlier assertion that you are just a troll.
“At best, our viewpoint is ending potential lives.”
Again, that anti-scientific sound bite would justify killing a baby outside the womb with the umbilical cord attached.
Why are pro-aborts so anti-science? http://tinyurl.com/yfje8lq
Irrational trolls aren’t worth my time. Killfile.
Previous post should read:
Irrational, lying trolls aren’t worth my time. Killfile.
“You’re literally arguing that something you can’t see is more important than a sapient woman.”
The size of a human being is irrelevant to her value. I can’t see you but I don’t think that diminishes your worth as a human.
“Ah, the ever present “sluts” argument.”
Nice dodge. I’m simply stating a fact of life: Certain behaviors come with risks. Not. That. Complicated. If you have sex you risk pregnancy. Killing the human being who was created should not be an option.
“Scientific fact: It is a “full on human being.”
Citation needed. Peer reviewed academic sources only, not the bullshit lies you’ve been citing thus far. Facts only.”
How about 10 mainstream embryology textbooks, congressional testimony and concessions from pro-abort leaders? http://tinyurl.com/yfje8lq
Better yet: You cite an embryology textbooks that disagrees with the I linked to.
This is too easy.
Why does having a unique combination of chromosomes imply a “right to life”? And more to the point why does having a unique combination of chromosomes imply a right to use someone else’s body?
What interests does an embryo that is not sapient and cannot feel pain have?
Why do you repeat this as if it hasn’t already been refuted? A neonate is not dependent on a woman’s body.
How do you decide when the probability of a woman dying are sufficient to allow an abortion? Does it have to be 100%? Do you watch her bleed out from a placental abruption until she’s lost a third of her blood volume or do you let her go to one half? Is there some sort of board meeting called? Do you let it languish in the judicial system? (Better hope one’s pregnancy doesn’t go bad on Friday evening!)
“Or when the fetus has severe deformity.”
So having a deformity is grounds for destruction? How about if they don’t find out about the deformity until after she is born? If if she — or you! — get deformed later? Still OK to kill?
“And more to the point why does having a unique combination of chromosomes imply a right to use someone else’s body?”
Just for clarity, since you are also playing the “use someone else’s body” pro-abort card then you are OK with slitting the throat of the baby and stabbing her after delivery as long as the umbilical cord hasn’t been cut? Or if the little parasite is breast-feeding? I mean, if using the body justifies death then be consistent.
Equally nice dodge. If you go swimming in the Central African Republic, does that mean that you must accept having schistosomes in your bloodstream for the rest of your life as a consequence of your actions? Why is killing the human being created not an option?
“Why do you repeat this as if it hasn’t already been refuted? A neonate is not dependent on a woman’s body.”
She is if she is breast-feeding or connected via the umbilical cord.
Why do you keep repeating this? It’s an incredibly stupid argument. Do you really believe that a neonate is absolutely dependent on one person? Once the fetus is delivered, it can be handed off to someone else; problem solved.
“‘And you are the one fighting gender-selection abortion restrictions. Why do you support the legality of killing females just because they are female?’
Your ability to pull strawmen out of your ass is amazing. I think you’ve proven beyond a doubt my earlier assertion that you are just a troll.”
What strawman? Do you think gender-selection abortions should be illegal or not? If not, then don’t tell me I’m anti-woman. If so, then why do you protect females and not males? (You lose either way).
Hey, maybe if you call me a troll a few more times you’ll convince me that your pro-abortion arguments are right.
Try this thought experiment. If I die while breastfeeding, does the neonate I’m feeding die? No? It’s not dependent on me.
If a neonate is still attached via the umbilical cord, does it die if I die? No? It’s not dependent on me.
“If you go swimming in the Central African Republic, does that mean that you must accept having schistosomes in your bloodstream for the rest of your life as a consequence of your actions?”
Bad analogy. 1. Pregnancy isn’t for the rest of your life. 2. Abortion ends a life. 3. You conceded my point that if you do certain actions then certain outcomes may occur. The question is what options you have to deal with those outcomes. Killing an innocent human being shouldn’t be one of them.
If I have a condition incompatible with life, please euthanize me. I would prefer, if I had the option, to die quickly and painlessly rather than slowly suffocate because I have no lungs. Or drown in urea because I have no kidneys.
Of course, in much of the world, people don’t have this option and are forced to die slowly in excruciating pain. Thanks pro-life!
“Try this thought experiment. If I die while breastfeeding, does the neonate I’m feeding die? No? It’s not dependent on me.”
More equivocation. All the parasite / bodily autonomy language applies to breast feeding and the attached umbilical cord. I can see why you want to shift the goal posts when your pro-abort reasoning fails, but it still fails.
The “viability” argument is flawed but I assume you oppose all abortions after the earliest possible stage of viability (otherwise you are just contradicting yourself some more).
“If I have a condition incompatible with life, please euthanize me. ”
Gladly! (Just kidding.) But a condition incompatible with life would mean you were going to die anyway. We were talking about deformities.
I hardly see how this matters. Tapeworm infections aren’t for the rest of your life either. Schistosomes probably don’t live forever either.
Taking mebendozole ends hundreds of lives.
And while we’re on the topic of “obvious things”, water is wet and kittens are adorable.
Why not? (I’m not being facetious. This is a serious question.)
“Why do you keep repeating this? It’s an incredibly stupid argument. Do you really believe that a neonate is absolutely dependent on one person? Once the fetus is delivered, it can be handed off to someone else; problem solved.”
The argument merely takes the bodily autonomy / parasite argument to its logical conclusion. It is a reductio ad absurdum argument which is designed to sound stupid — that is, the logical conclusion of your primary argument is indeed stupid. That’s the point!
We agree: Once the HUMAN fetus is delivered “it can indeed be handed off to someone else. Problem solved.” So don’t have the abortion! (You tripped yourself up there. You definite it as “just” cutting the cord. We definite it as “just” waiting a few months to deliver the baby.)
“And why does “being responsible” equate to attempting to carry to term?”
Being responsible in this case equates not to kill an human being which situation is so because ones choices.
“‘The question is what options you have to deal with those outcomes. Killing an innocent human being shouldn’t be one of them.’
Why not? (I’m not being facetious. This is a serious question.)”
I know you aren’t being facetious. I know that your conscience is so seared that you are immune to reason. I just responded earlier for the benefit of the middle ground. They aren’t so far gone. Most pro-choicers agree with pro-lifers on nearly every topic aside from first trimester abortions — http://media.hotair.com/greenroom/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/abortion-consensus-gallup.gif
No, it doesn’t. You clearly don’t listen very closely. Breastfeeding is a voluntary act, done with active and continued consent. It does not violate bodily autonomy, which is based on consent. (And yes, I’m opposed to forced breastfeeding.)
Likewise, when a neonate is still attached, it is not dependent on one person for survival. It can be handed off; no consent is required.
I’m just addressing your arguments. There are plenty of other arguments for post-viability abortions.
Gotta run — thanks for the dialog — the fallacies are getting repetitious so I’ll leave you and your fans with this link — http://www.abort73.com/ . It addresses all your pro-abortion arguments in a clear, scientific, logical manner.
I sincerely hope that you reconsider your views and how you have had to resort to personal attacks and fallacious emotional arguments to try and defend your pro-abortion position.
Then offer me some reason.
What’s this shithead’s argument that makes it okay to force women to bear children, but we can’t strap him down and suck his blood out or take his redundant organs, again?
We treat corpses with more respect than pregnant women, in terms of bodily autonomy.
All the parasite / bodily autonomy language applies to… the attached umbilical cord.
Quick biology break here: What do you think the umbilical cord attaches to? Hint: look up the third stage of labor.
1. Pregnancy isn’t for the rest of your life.
Tell it to Savitra Halappanavar. Or, rather, to her widower.
2. Abortion ends a life.
Failure to donate blood, bone marrow, and organs ends a life (or more than one life). We don’t force people to donate organs or tissue. Even a late fetus is substantially different from a baby, including in ways that make it unlikely that the fetus is conscious at any point. Certainly the earliest any legitimate science suggests that there’s even a possibility of fetal awareness is aobut 30 weeks. Abortions occurring in the third trimester are almost exclusively about fetal anomalies inconsistent with life and risk to the mother’s life. Halappanavar’s case is typical of later abortion, not atypical.
3. You conceded my point that if you do certain actions then certain outcomes may occur. The question is what options you have to deal with those outcomes. Killing an innocent human being shouldn’t be one of them
I think Halappananavar’s widower would agree. Too bad her doctors did not.
shorter eMatters: All I got is misogyny, gotta run!
abortion actually is a complicated issue
Only if you believe slavery is ever justified. Even if one concedes the extremely dubious point that a zygote from single cell stage on is a person worthy of human rights, the only way forced continuation of pregnancy can be justified is if you believe it’s ok to enslave people in certain circumstances. All anti-choice arguments come down to a claim that it’s ok to enslave women for the good of their fetuses.
Definition of slave
noun
(especially in the past) a person who is the legal property of another and is forced to obey them
The anti-choice arguments do not imply slavery.
Do you call slavist laws the anti-choice laws against one who choices to kill you?
You know, I’m hard pressed to remember the last time I debated with a forced-birther who had a coherent argument.
What term would you use to describe a situation in which someone’s physical body is used against their will by another, and their physical, mental, and emotional well-being is considered subservient to that other and this is done regardless of the physical, mental, and emotional consequences and their permanence may be?
I think slavery is accurate.
@WithinThisMind
Well, I have presented the definition of what a slave is.
What you describe is not slavery.
I don’t need to have a term to describe each situation and I don’t accept ad hoc redefinitions.
@Isu
My dictionary is bigger than your dictionary.
From the Oxford English Dictionary:
Slave
Sense 1, part d: d. Slave of the Lamp, in the story of Aladdin in the Arabian Nights: a genie summoned by rubbing a magic lamp and bound to perform the wishes of the lamp’s possessor; hence, allusively, one who performs swift miracles, or one who is under an inescapable obligation.
Sense 2, part b: fig. One who is completely under the domination of, or subject to, a specified influence.
Slavery
Sense 3, part c: A state of subjection or subordination comparable to that of a slave; also with pl., an instance of this.
@WithinThisMind #110:
@Isu #111:
Fine don’t use a term then.
Do you think it would be ethical to have a system of absolute subservience such as described above?
@Nepenthe
Please, answer my previous question related to slavery:
“Do you call slavist laws the anti-choice laws against one who choices to kill you?”
Wouldn’t be this person “under an inescapable obligation” or under “subjection or subordination” to law?
Isu, I didn’t answer your question because I didn’t understand it and I still don’t. “Choices” isn’t a verb, for example.
Wait, wait, is your question “Why don’t you consider laws against murder anti-choice?”
@Sky Captain
I don’t support that system mentioned.
By the way, most pro-abortionists support a system in which the child is absolute surservient to his mother regadless of the child well-being. Do you?
Sorry, my mistake.
“Do you call slavist laws the anti-choice laws against one who chooses to kill you?”
Isu, that seriously didn’t help.
@CompulsoryAccount7746 #113:
@Isu #116:
@dianne #108:
I don’t accept that dubious premise about zygotes.
You do. Now explain how the system you’re advocating is not what was described above.
Ok, I’m spainiard and I don’t master english language.
If anti-choice means slavery. Do you consider that law agains murder (anti-choice) are slavery?
@Sky Captain
Zygotes aren’t aborted I asked you about children.
STanding by while someone else dies isn’t murder. And that’s all abortion is, ultimately.
Children aren’t aborted either, fetuses are.
@Rutee Katreya
Forced abortion isn’t merely standing while someone else dies. It’s action to make someone else die which is killing.
Human fetuses are children.
Definition of child
noun (plural children /ˈtʃɪldr(ə)n/)
a young human being below the age of puberty or below the legal age of majority:
@Isu #121:
The dubious premise was “a zygote from single cell stage on is a person worthy of human rights”. This is what gets equivocated to ‘children’ by arguments such as yours. If you mean something different by ‘children’ be specific.
@CompulsoryAccount7746:
Not really. It’s denying the fetus access to the mother’s body. It is exactly identical to us not tying you up and drawing blood, taking organs, etc.
It’s not a child until it’s born. Although your lame attempt at using the dictionary is noted.
@Rutee Katreya.
They aren’t identical. Not tying is not action and killing an human bein is an action.
I said I don’t accept ad hoc redefinitions. According to the Oxford diccionary definition they are childen.
Show me an unbiased source where the necessity of being born is included or implied.
‘killing a human being’? Aborting a fetus isn’t that, it’s aborting a fetus.
As to action, so let’s say I tie you up and use you as a human dialysis machine for someone who will die without you. REmoving the tubes is an action; is that still wrong?
What if you’re hooked up to an actual child? Would removing that child’s lifeline from your body, that you never agreed to place there, be wrong?
I don’t accept shitty justifications that claim a fetus is supposed to be treated the same as a child to begin with, so call us even.
I don’t give two measly fucks about Oxford, and never have.
There is not a single fucking ethical justification you can make for forced birth and anti choice without at least beginning from the premise that we, as people, have a right to use other people’s blood and organs, if we legitimately need it to survive. Concede this ground or fuck off. Not a single thing you say has any credibility while you refuse to grant women the same consideration you grant to corpses.
Isu, are these children, under your thinking?
@Isu #116 + #123:
Do you see how that statement is dishonest, using the definition for “children” you provided?
@CompulsoryAccount7746:
“‘killing a human being’? Aborting a fetus isn’t that, it’s aborting a fetus.”
Are you kidding? This argument is crap.
It’s the same as saying that “killing you isn’t that, it’s killing you”.
“As to action, so let’s say I tie you up and use you as a human dialysis machine for someone who will die without you. REmoving the tubes is an action; is that still wrong?”
There are non-human dyalisis machines.
“What if you’re hooked up to an actual child? Would removing that child’s lifeline from your body, that you never agreed to place there, be wrong?”
That depends. It I make something so that an actual child were hooked up I would take his life as my responsability and would agree, otherwise not.
“I don’t accept shitty justifications that claim a fetus is supposed to be treated the same as a child to begin with, so call us even.”
I don’t mind if it is a fetus, a child, a teenager or an adult.
It must be treated as what it is: an human being.
On the other hand, according to english languaje I can call an human fetus a child.
“I don’t give two measly fucks about Oxford, and never have.”
In that case I have no fucking idea of the meaning of the words you are speaking.
“Isu, are these children, under your thinking?”
According to the meaning of the word, of course.
Accusing me of being dishonest for using a common use diccionary is an “ad hominen” fallacy.
So you won’t justify us sucking the blood out of your body, but you think *women* don’t deserve the same. We aren’t incubators, we’re people.
Accusing you of being dishonest is an insult. Saying that your dishonesty means you must, by definition, be wrong, is argumentum ad hominem.
Either that, or your common use dictionary actually is wrong, as this is a technical term.
@Sky Captain
By the way.
The definitions says “a” not “any”, as you has changed. You are the dishonest one.
Do none of you really differentiate between your own child and a stranger, as it regards obligations to their well being?
@Rutee Katreya
So you won’t justify us sucking the blood out of your body, but you think *women* don’t deserve the same. We aren’t incubators, we’re people.
That is an strawman fallacy.
I hadn’t justified me sucking the blood of your body.
Nor telling that women are incubators which is false according to what an incubator is.
@Isu #133:
I said “Do you see how that statement is dishonest” because it used a word with broad meaning (humans below the age of puberty) when you were describing human cells that have not even developed into a neonate (a considerably smaller subset of humans below the age of puberty).
Example:
A) “I don’t have a pool table in my house.”
Definition of furniture: the movable articles, as tables, chairs, desks or cabinets, required for use or ornament in a house, office, or the like.
The dictionary says a pool table is furniture.
B) “I don’t have a piece of furniture in my house.”
While technically true, it conveys a very different meaning, and would be a dishonest way of saying A).
With regard to “a vs any”, I was correcting for grammar. The arguments are not about a single ‘child’ so the singular article is inappropriate. It also helps to illustrate the problem with the statement you made. Repeating a misleading statement does not mean you are a dishonest person, if you didn’t realize it was flawed.
@CompulsoryAccount7746:
I hope you’ve never set out rat poison; I wouldn’t want you to have a crisis of faith upon discovering that you’ve, according to your lights, murdered babies.
Only in the internet sense; which is to say “An argument I don’t like”.
You justified far worse; forced pregnancy. A blood donation is quick, painless, and complication free. Pregnancy is none of those things. Yet it’s okay to force me to be an incubator, but your fool ass can’t be forced to give blood? Go fuck yourself.
Yes, I know women aren’t incubators, you fucking fool. That’s why a woman has the right to choose whether or not to carry a pregnancy to term, in short.
@Sky Captain
“I said “Do you see how that statement is dishonest” because it used a word with broad meaning (humans below the age of puberty) when you were describing human cells that have not even developed into a neonate (a considerably smaller subset of humans below the age of puberty).”
Using a broad meaning word isn’t dishonest to describe what something is.
For example, “human” word has a broad meaning. I’m not dishonest saying I’m an human.
Saying “I don’t have a piece of furniture in my house.” isn’t a dishonest way of saying I have “I don’t have a pool table in my house.” because the first implies the second.
“With regard to “a vs any”, I was correcting for grammar. The arguments are not about a single ‘child’ so the singular article is inappropriate.”
It’s isn’t the same to say “I can take a cup of tea” that “I can take any cup of tea”. The first doesn’t necessary mean I can take your cup of tea (:D) but other one unspecified, the second means I can take yours (any).
The same way, when I said “a child” it doesn’t have to be extended to any child.
Well, at least I think that is the difference between “a” and “any”. If I’m wrong I ask for an online reference about this issue.
@Isu #120:
Your spelling and word-choice have improved considerably in a day.
@Isu #143:
“Furniture” implies “pool table”.
Your understanding of english hasn’t.
@Rutee Katreya
“you fucking fool”
I don’t want further discussion which someone which insults me and avoids dialectic.
ISU
Feel free to pick up any dialogue at my blog, SiftingReality.com, where we don’t call names and hurl obscenities at people we disagree with.
“Your understanding of english hasn’t.”
I was refering as first and second to the sentences, not to some words in them.
I didn’t avoid dialogue, I insulted you while we dialogued. Which you would have noticed, if you weren’t a fool; I gave substantive criticism of your jackassery.
Oh, silly me, how dare I be angry at assholes like you two who think it’s okay to treat me as a baby oven!
Fuck your sanctimonious bullshit, both of you.
So in addition to being morally no different than a rapist, John B was just trolling here to get content for his blog.
@WithinThisMind:
That John B chose that moment to invite a blatantly obvious troll to support him on his blog was a nice touch too.
From the OP:
You’re right, the focus should be on the right to 100% bodily autonomy that every human being has. Unless only men have full bodily autonomy, but women do not.
John B @6:
Odd. I don’t find that argument at all loathsome. The fetus (not baby) is an organism making use of a woman’s body. If she wants to be pregnant that’s great. However, if she doesn’t want to, abortion should be 100% accessible to her. It is her body and no human being on Earth, or in the womb has the right to demand the use of her body. It doesn’t matter if the fetus has a soul, or is considered a person (which is ridiculous; personhood sets in at birth).
Those feelings you mention are *not* universal. Many women have no desire to be pregnant. Many women who get pregnant do not want to be. There is no automatic feelings of nurturing and love that come with being pregnant. It is different for each woman.
The fetus in the body of a pregnant woman *is* a parasite.
This is exactly what a fetus does.
****
embraceyourinnercrone @3:
Absolutely. Without exception.
****
eMatters @7:
It doesn’t fail. Not only does the woman *always* have the right-as a human being-to choose what to do with her body, no human being, whether outside or inside her body, has the right to demand the use of it. She can grant it, and that’s what happens when a woman chooses to carry to term. She can also deny the fetus the right to use her body and choose to seek an abortion.
Besides, according to the genocidal, woman hating, gay hating god of the bible, we’re all born into sin, so that fetus isn’t innocent. Original sin and all that.
And when did it become a right for one human to make use of another human’s body against their will? Sure, it’s a human being. It’s got the DNA right there. Doesn’t change the fact that it doesn’t have the right to take up residence in a woman’s body without her permission.
I find it so unrefreshing to find someone who doesn’t grant women full bodily autonomy. To think that a fetus, which isn’t even a person, gets to overrule the rights of the existing woman…
As long as the fetus is squatting inside the woman, taking nutrients and playing havoc with her physiology, as well as being an integral part of this painful and risky condition (i.e. pregnancy), the fetus doesn’t get any say in the matter.
Listening to this debate, you can clearly see this is a war between world views. And it hinged on how the two parse out their morality from the world views. John holds a view based on humans being made in the image of God (he does not argue this way, but I can almost guarantee it). That is why human life is all that matters for John. Justin holds to a deterministic view of life and holds to a pragmatic view of morals centered around desires. Human life is not enough for Justin because it cannot have desires. That’s why Justin holds to the term person and not human. Ultimately this debate came down to whose view of morality is correct. That’s the argument you guys need to have. If you can come to a common ground on that, then you can move forward to the abortion issue. Otherwise you will continue to shoot past each other as you did in this debate.
Isu:
Now if women only had easy to acquire and affordable contraception, this would eliminate the need for a great many abortions…
If you don’t want a child, aborting the fetus is a very responsible thing to do.
****
eMatters:
Citation needed.
Myself, I like “stress reduction” as a biological reason for sex.
Nope. If the woman finds herself pregnant and decides to abort the fetus because she doesn’t want a child, she’s being responsible.
BTW, when I have sex with a guy, I guess I’m defying the “sole biological reason for sex”, huh? Do you think I should never again have gay sex because my biological drive is of utmost importance and I can’t procreate while engaged in same sex sex?
Does a woman flunk her responsibility test if her body naturally rejects the baby through spontaneous abortion? By shirking her responsibility here, what penalty should she face?
Sef:
No, what needs to happen is for John to prove the existence of any deity. Then he needs to prove that said deity is the one he worships. Then he needs to prove that said deity actually cares what people do in their bedroom. Then he needs to establish why its necessary for anyone *other* than him to follow the rules of this deity. He needs to get to work. All this time of humans existing on this planet and no one has proven that any deities exist. He’s got his work cut out for him.
If he cannot prove the existence of his god (and he can’t), there’s no reason to blindly follow the nonsensical opinions of people from the Middle East 2000 years ago who loved them some slavery and subjugation of women.
So John B is a Pro Fetus Tone Troll?
eMatters:
Wait, are you saying that 99% of the time, a child is created through consensual sex?
Not really. Either you regard women as autonomous adult human beings or you don’t. If you do regard women as autonomous adults, then there’s no justification for using the power of the state to force them to give birth against their will. If you SAY you regard women as autonomous adults, yet think that the government should impose civil or criminal penalties on them as punishment or prevention for using their reproductive organs in a fashion you deem unacceptable, then you’ve got some cognitive dissonance going on. If you don’t like abortion, but don’t think the government should have the power to force women to endure pregnancy and labor/c-sections against their will, then you’re pro-choice.
I don’t see what’s complicated about it.
You’re a theocrat. Everything you say is worthless.
^^^^^
ACTUAL AD HOMINEM RIGHT THERE
@Tony–Queer Duck Overlord of The Bronze #155:
Image: A large version of his avatar
@eMatters
““that God loves abortion, designing, being responsible for and allowing a system whereby up to 75% of fertilised eggs are naturally spontaneously aborted:”
That’s a great argument, unless your opponent has the ability to see the difference between:
A. Human being dies of natural causes (inside or outside the womb)
B. Human being has skull crushed and limbs ripped off by a 3rd party (inside or outside the womb)”
My point was in response to people who invoke the immorality by virtue of their religion and God.
So the argument is something like:
If you are so angry with humans for aborting why are you not angry with God for DESIGNING the very system whereby MILLIONS of embryos are spontaneously aborted a year UNBEKNOWNST to humanity. That means that most theodicies cannot be invoked here.
If God is your moral benchmark, there are some serious questions that need answering (not only did he design a system of foetal death, but he continuously allows it to take place).
You need to think a bit more critically about this issue.
I was really hoping more people here would be discussing the actual debate, not just carrying it on themselves.
Though, in fairness, there seem to be much better arguments available than that were discussed.
Justin’s argument was too complicated and technical and John just didn’t understand it. Neither did I, until the rebuttal, But even then, I felt I needed time to read over it.
But John kept on raving about how the “overall movement” are shifting their ideas and changing goal posts…
It was like being on the phone to a mother-in-law.
Does he seriously think that’s an argument?
it’s like starting an argument of whether boxing should be an olympic sport by saying “those anti-boxers keep shifting their position, before the 80’s they held to X and now they all acknowledge… bla bla bla bla ”
And then, cringingly, he denied using ad hominem (thinly veiled) – this was just stunning incompetence. Justin pointed it out and explained it extremely well.
I really hope that John now understands what he said was ad hominem.
I’d really like to hear a higher standard debate. And I’m sorry, but I don’t think John’s intellect is up to the task. He simply couldn’t engage, at all.
Nah, not tolling for visits. Just pointing out there’s a place for civil discourse, not this nasty name calling hyperbolic venom. That’s all. None of you seem to be actually interested in discussion, rather just bullying dissent.
Thanks anyway, justin.
@Tony
Now if women only had easy to acquire and affordable contraception, this would eliminate the need for a great many abortions…
I don’t know why you say they hadn’t easy.
Well, lets make it easy.
If you don’t want a child, aborting the fetus is a very responsible thing to do.
The fact is that the pregnant woman already has a child.
Doing anything you want has nothing to do which responsability.
pregnant.
1(of a woman or female animal) having a child or young developing in the uterus:
@FurryFingers #161:
Don’t forget the howlers like this (31:30):
Article: Wikipedia – History of abortion
@Sky Captain
That John B chose that moment to invite a blatantly obvious troll to support him on his blog was a nice touch too.
Well, it’s clear that you are calling me a troll.
That’s one of the troll tactics.
Another one is to change what the other one says to criticise as you clearly have done chanching in my statement an “a” for an “any” to or changing my reference to a statement for a reference to a word.
It’s patent that you are trolling me.
I will have no further discussion with you.
Don’t feed the troll!
@Isu #120:
@Isu #165:
That would be nice.
There is nothing civil about the abortion debate. Anyone on the forced birther side has already demonstrated they have absolutely zero respect for me as a woman, and are already attacking some of my most basic civil rights. They are already demonstrating they do not even see me as a person.
There can be no civil discourse, because their starting position is uncivil.
Since when is being able to kill your child a civil right?
Thanks for that crystal clear misogyny, JohnB. its always nice with heartless haters out themselves.
John, when is taking away someone’s right of self defense NOT a violation of civil rights?
Okay, you win. A fetus is a person. It’s fully human. Deserving of the exact same rights as any other human.
So, one of two things must be true –
Either ALL humans must by default have the right to use a woman’s body however they see fit no matter what she feels about it
or
A woman has the right to decide what happens to her body and to defend her body with whatever degree of force necessary, including using lethal force if no other means of force is sufficient.
Which is it?
Either it’s okay to abort, or it’s okay to rape. Which is it?
You people seem to have a difficult time differentiating between a stranger and your own child. You have moral obligations to your children that you don’t have to others. Your hyperbolic rhetoric might work on an emotional level, but to someone who can think, you offer nothing. So are you being intentionally obtuse or do you really believe your own child is assaulting and raping you?
@John
So also seem to have difficult time differenciating between one who chooses to rape to one who biologically, as the mother body, is compelled to attach.
If the fetus is an attacker to defend women we must make abortion compulsory.
Okay.
So, it’s my own biological child. He’s 24 years old and hyped up on PCP. I don’t have the right to defend myself?
Either it is okay to abort, or it is okay to rape. Which is it?
The fetus is using my body against my will. Yes, if I do not want the pregnancy, I consider that the equivalent of an assault and have no problem using lethal force to rectify the situation. I do indeed consider an unwanted pregnancy to be the equivalent of rape, because it is something I did not consent to and do not want, and is violating my body.
I put a screwdriver in the kidney of the guy who tried to rape me. I am completely comfortable using lethal force to defend my body.
Wow but you are stupid and illogical. Not all sex is rape. There is this little concept called CONSENT. If the woman consents to the implantation or the sex, then it’s all fine and dandy. If she does not however, it’s rape or something she is allowed to abort.
Also, the bleating of ‘but it’s your child’ is merely an application of the special pleading fallacy.
Either ALL humans must by default have the right to use a woman’s body however they see fit no matter what she feels about it
or
A woman has the right to decide what happens to her body and to defend her body with whatever degree of force necessary, including using lethal force if no other means of force is sufficient.
Which is it?
Either it’s okay to abort, or it’s okay to rape. Which is it?
If the fetus is an attacker to defend women we must make abortion compulsory.
Isu, do you see no difference between a person who allows their body to be used by another and one who is forced to give away their body to another? Do you think that either organ donation should be compulsory or forbidden? Is it impossible to both invite people to visit your home and defend your home against uninvited intruders?
Either it is okay to abort, or it is okay to rape.
Occasionally I shock people by saying that all anti-choice men are, on some level, rapists. Many never complete the act of rape personally*, but they are all of the rapist mentality. There’s no real difference between a man who will tell a woman that she doesn’t have the right to control how her uterus is used and one who will say that she doesn’t have the right to say how her vagina is used.
*Though, of course, if they vote for “pro-life” politicians, they are effectively participating in the sexual assault of numerous women.
Which is why there’s never adoption either, even while parents live.
Okay, so I am permitted within the eyes of the law to forcibly extract blood and organs from you, if I need them to live?
Because if your body isn’t public property, neither is mine.
@dianne
Is it impossible to both invite people to visit your home and defend your home against uninvited intruders?
The analogy is invalid.
In most cases a valid analogy is that you forced people to enter your home so they aren’t intruders. If you make the fetus, you are the responsible.
Isu,
So, in your world, if I invite someone into my home and they then try to take liberties, I am not allowed to make them leave?
Either ALL humans must by default have the right to use a woman’s body however they see fit no matter what she feels about it
or
A woman has the right to decide what happens to her body and to defend her body with whatever degree of force necessary, including using lethal force if no other means of force is sufficient.
Which is it?
Either it’s okay to abort, or it’s okay to rape. Which is it?
@Sef
I tried. No one stepped up. They said “conscience is so seared that you are immune to reason” and flounced off.
My hypothesis is that there’s no rational basis to the forced-birth ethical system and “it seems icky” sounds stupid when you say it out loud. But that’s just a hypothesis.
@John B
Why, exactly? Note that “just ‘cuz” is not a complete answer.
@WithinThisMind
So, in your world, if I invite someone into my home and they then try to take liberties, I am not allowed to make them leave?
Your analogy is invalid.
If the hosts can’t not leave you are not allowed to make them leave. Furthermore, you knew that by inviting them they wouldn’t be able to leave.
One again, you are confusing free choices and compulsory acts. The fetus cannot “take liberties” because hasn’t any.
In most cases a valid analogy is that you forced people to enter your home so they aren’t intruders.
Oh, so you’re going with the “every sperm is sacred” definition of “life”? Good to know. Quite honestly, there’s as good an argument for sperm and unfertilized oocytes being people as for a just fertilized zygote, so maybe you’ve got a non-point.
Your argument also works wonderfully for illegalizing cancer treatment. You forced the cells to mutate with your evil ways (smoking, contracting virsuses, etc) and now you want to kill these unique little “people”? Horrifying!
@dianne
The analogy relates the “people”-“fetus” and “home”-“womb” terms.
You have changed the subjects and inventing what I said, making a “strawman”.
I you don’t retract, I’m justified to think that you are a rethoric liar and so I won’t want any further discussion with you.
If he has no liberties, what gives it the right to my body, or even the right to live?
That it isn’t consciously using my body is immaterial.
Isu,
Either ALL humans must by default have the right to use a woman’s body however they see fit no matter what she feels about it
or
A woman has the right to decide what happens to her body and to defend her body with whatever degree of force necessary, including using lethal force if no other means of force is sufficient.
Which is it?
Either it’s okay to abort, or it’s okay to rape. Which is it?
@WithinThisMind
You present a false dichotomy.
There are situations in which you loose your rights. As I see, if you make someone use your body in way this person can do otherwise you loose your right.
Murder: The unlawful killing of one human being by another.
Is abortion murder? No.
And I’m sorry but, despite existing all other considerations, moral or otherwise, it continues to remain the decision of the woman that is carrying. End of the debate.
Unless we get to a point in human evolution at which repopulation measures become necessary for the survival and reproduction of the species, IT IS A DISCUSSION FOR A WOMAN TO HAVE WITH HERSELF and, if she deems, the father, and her doctor. End of debate.
@babyskep
Murder: The unlawful killing of one human being by another.
Is abortion murder? No.
Sure. According to the definiton isn’t murder.
Was killing an slave murder when was legally allowed?
If you are coherent you must say, no. Which is your answer?
“The sole biological reason for sex is procreation . . .”
I am amused at how these Christian-ists apply evolutionary biology to prop up their theistic-moral arguments. Simply amused.
@Isu.
That is correct: my answer is no.
@Isu:
Nevertheless, that has NOTHING to do with slaves being deprived of their right to bodily autonomy, freedom to live their lives ON THIS EARTH as they deem. I simply answered the question of a legal term, which is a human, socially-constructed one.
Now, it still stands that the ultimate arbiter over a woman’s body is that woman. Do you disagree?
@Isu:
“The fetus cannot “take liberties” because [it] hasn’t any.”
Exactly right. End of the debate.
The analogy relates the “people”-”fetus” and “home”-”womb” terms.
But you claimed that a pregnant woman “invited” the “person” in so that the analogy doesn’t hold. That only makes sense if you’re talking about sperm, because everything else that makes up the fetus is part of the woman’s body.
But suppose, for the moment, one grants that she has invited the embryo* in. Does that mean she has no right to ever revoke that invitation? Suppose you invited me to dinner one night. Would that give me the right to live in your house forever? Or even for the next 9 months? What if I started acting obnoxious, causing you physical pain and suffering, and doing things that endangered your health or life? Would I still have the absolute right to stay since you invited me in?
You have changed the subjects and inventing what I said, making a “strawman”.
Please let me know where I misinterpreted you. I assure you it was not intentional and I will acknowledge that I can get carried away during an argument.
*Most abortions in the US occur during the embryonic phase of development.
The sole biological reason for sex is procreation
Actually, it’s not. Humans and other social animals use sex for social bonding and it may be more significant for that purpose than for reproduction.
Isu,
I got pregnant while on birth control. I had taken steps to prevent a pregnancy. I certainly did not force anyone to take up residence in my uterus.
Please answer the question without any further attempts to utilize special pleading or other logical fallacies.
Either ALL humans must by default have the right to use a woman’s body however they see fit no matter what she feels about it
or
A woman has the right to decide what happens to her body and to defend her body with whatever degree of force necessary, including using lethal force if no other means of force is sufficient.
Which is it?
Either it’s okay to abort, or it’s okay to rape. Which is it?
For the scientifically illiterate, the pre-rats that Isu declared to be children are embryos.
Also, Isu –
http://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/004.htm
Why are you advocating what essentially amounts to torture?
Why are you maintaining that a woman does not have the right to choose her own level of risk?
@babyskep
“Now, it still stands that the ultimate arbiter over a woman’s body is that woman. Do you disagree?”
Well. Since your are talking about legal terms, that depends on the law applied. Legally speaking, if the slavery is legal, I must disagree.
Regarding morality, I think if the woman, being her choice relevant, causes the situation (her child using her body) she has responsabilities and looses moral rights.
We must not forget the mother is the only one involved in the issue.
Nepenthe,
I once put up a bunch of various stages of development and asked the forced birthers to tell me which ones were human. They said all of them.
They were a rat, turtle, whale, chicken, and several others.
The ignorance of the forced-birther side never fails to amuse.
Isu,
It doesn’t surprise me at all to see you supporting slavery. Since that is, after all, what the forced-birther side is about – enslaving women.
I see you are also one of those people who think if a woman goes on a date with a man and he rapes her, it was her own damn fault.
@babyskep
Exactly right. End of the debate.
So, are you implying that you agree with me in the point I was discussing?
Otherwise your statement is incomprehensible.
Isu,
If you have that much trouble with English (and logic and rationality) perhaps you shouldn’t be spewing your bile here.
@dianne
But you claimed that a pregnant woman “invited” the “person” in so that the analogy doesn’t hold.
Nope.
In my analogy I said “you forced people”. Forced not invited.
And it still holds because its a variation of other analogies which were used in such way.
I still wait for retraction.
Isu,
90% of fertilized ova are simply washed away in the next period, never implanting.
Nobody is ‘forcing’ an ova to implant.
I suggest you actually study a bit of science.
@WithinThisMind
[cite]I got pregnant while on birth control. I had taken steps to prevent a pregnancy. I certainly did not force anyone to take up residence in my uterus.[/cite]
Were you raped?
If don’t you did something to force the situation that wouldn’t be if you had chosen otherwise.
Well, let have another analogy.
Suppose I have fun shooting a gun randomly. Suppose I take steps to prevent hitting somebody but there is still a chance. Wouldn’t I be responsible if I got somebody shoot down? Wouldn’t be I the agent of the situation?
If the fetus is an attacker you are responsible, because you choose a way which would force the attack.
The situation isn’t as a rape, a situation in which the rapist who is the one who chooses the action is the responsible.
Please answer the question without any further attempts to utilize special pleading or other logical fallacies.
I responded to that question without pleading and logical fallacies. By the way, tell which logical fallacies I used and in which statement so you can demonstrate your assertion.
@WithinThisMind
It doesn’t surprise me at all to see you supporting slavery.
I wasn’t supporting slavery.
That’s another strawman fallacy, seeing I have done things I haven’t.
Retract your statement or the discussion is over.
Isu,
If you wish a response, please frame an argument that contains some measure of coherence and rationality.
Please answer the question without anymore special pleading. Remember that agreeing to go on a date with does not justify rape.
Either ALL humans must by default have the right to use a woman’s body however they see fit no matter what she feels about it
or
A woman has the right to decide what happens to her body and to defend her body with whatever degree of force necessary, including using lethal force if no other means of force is sufficient.
Which is it?
Either it’s okay to abort, or it’s okay to rape. Which is it?
Yes, Isu, you are supporting slavery. You are supporting enslaving women for nine months if they happen to get pregnant and do not want to be. Yes, you are most definitely supporting slavery. No, I will not retract my very accurate claim. Yes, you are supporting slavery. Yes, you are advocating for the moral equivalent of rape. Yes, you are a misogynist. Yes, you are completely irrational and to be frank, boringly idiotic.
Yes, you are supporting slavery.
That is exactly what you are doing when you claim a woman is ‘responsible’ and thus must be forced to bear a child to term.
How, exactly, are you going to enforce this asinine notion of yours? Making abortion illegal doesn’t actually reduce the amount of abortion occurring, it just increases the maternal mortality rate.
So how do you plan to force women to carry a pregnancy to term and give birth? How do you plan to enslave women to your fucked up idea that a potential life has greater worth than an existing life?
Have you, at any point in your back-asswards existence given this matter the slightest bit of rational thought?
@WithinThisMind
So … supporting slavery, advocanting for the moral of rape, misogynist, complety irational, boringly idiotic.
Such blatant lies depicte you well.
Our discussion is over.
@Isu-198:
Now you’re being obtuse, apart from NOT answering the question. I’ll assume your answer is, you disagree that a woman is final arbiter over her own body. I’m sure women everywhere thank you for that.
@Isu-201:
No, I don’t agree. I was using your own argument to prove my point. According to your statement, pre-natals have no liberties, meaning NO RIGHTS; consequently, you cannot hold a woman accountable, morally, legally or otherwise for what she does with HER body and anything gestating within.
Along the same track (though I’ll admit I haven’t read ALL the comments thus far), I’ve yet to see you or anyone else answer WithinThisMind’s question, which, assuming her permission granted, I’m going to repost; because I’d like to see an unequivocal answer to her question:
From WithinThisMind:
“Either ALL humans must by default have the right to use a woman’s body however they see fit no matter what she feels about it
or
A woman has the right to decide what happens to her body and to defend her body with whatever degree of force necessary, including using lethal force if no other means of force is sufficient.
Which is it?
Either it’s okay to abort, or it’s okay to rape. Which is it?”
And I’m not trying to be mean-spirited, but I have little patience or tolerance for illogical, irrational, non-responsive responses. So, if you don’t mind my asking; please frame your responses around non-subjective criteria. Thanks.
@Isu:
I’ll bet you’d be patting Ash on the back for a “job well done” as that jaundiced, screaming tissue mass burst through Cain’s thoracic cavity, wouldn’t you?
In fact, that’s your new nickname: Ash. We’re all gonna start calling you Ash…
@Isu #120:
@Isu #165:
@Isu #183:
@Isu #209:
*A famous musician starts playing the world’s saddest song on the world’s smallest violin*
Great job by the teen pop sensation. Regardless of where one falls on the issue, I think it’s safe to say that Justin won the debate. I’m not saying a cogent argument couldn’t be made, but I am saying that one wasn’t made.
Just hopping on to point out the degree to which the losing side lost. In his (first) closing statement, he tried to justify the special relevance of biological humanity by comparing actions we would find immoral (or just repulsive) in humans and not in animals and in so doing, he actually settles the argument in the other direction.
He says, for example, that if an animal is raped, we do not seek justice for her. But that is not a moral issue, it is a logical issue. If I had to watch one animal rape another, I would be repulsed. I don’t seek justice not because the act is moral, but because there is no reasonable mechanism for justice. I would rather live in a world where animals don’t rape one another, but I can’t diminish the likelihood of it by imprisoning the offending animal. I can’t send a message to other badgers that if they rape, they will be punished.
Likewise, the notion that our innate disgust in seeing an aborted fetus is evidence of our intrinsic moral outrage is ridiculous for the same reason. I am also disgusted by the sight of a dead animal. All of his arguments move in the same direction. I would be repulsed if I saw a dog fornicating with a dead dog. I would be horrified if a family of pigs chopped up a deceased member of the family and kept them in the fridge. I am disgusted when my son’s hamster eats its young.
This is all incredibly relevant, as he presents these issues in such a way that being equally disgusted by an “immoral” act such as rape or necrophilia when it is perpetrated by either a human or a non-human actually DISPROVES the point he was trying to make.
I know that Justin touched on this very briefly in his closing statement, but I felt like it deserved more attention. Sorry if it was already addressed in the comments. Didn’t have time to read all of them. Who would have thought that a topic like abortion would have stirred up so much controversy… ;)
It’s nice that Isu is trying to learn English.
But they probably would have been better off learning this word:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/consent?s=t
before they entered this conversation.
@skepbabe:
Now you’re being obtuse, apart from NOT answering the question.
I’ll assume your answer is, you disagree that a woman is final arbiter over her own body. I’m sure women everywhere thank you for that.
I DO respond the question in legal and moral levels.
Your assume is right if you add “in any circumstances”, and I also explained and exception and why, which you ignore in your comment.
Exception that is also to be applied to men.
Thank you! Thank you! :D
No, I don’t agree. I was using your own argument to prove my point. According to your statement, pre-natals have no liberties, meaning NO RIGHTS; consequently, you cannot hold a woman accountable, morally, legally or otherwise for what she does with HER body and anything gestating within.
So you say: no liberties then no rights.
Are you joking?
A born human baby have no liberties also. Do you think they would pee over you freely?
Do born human baby no right to live?
you cannot hold a woman accountable, morally, legally or otherwise for what she does with HER body and anything gestating within.
It can be done legally if law is choosen so.
I have moral basis to say that it’s wrong, and the ones who say it’s ok to destroy the BODY of HER CHILD (be female or be male) because of the MOTHER will, have no basis to defend the “self bodiness ultimate arbiter” premise because of logical contradiction.
Along the same track (though I’ll admit I haven’t read ALL the comments thus far), I’ve yet to see you or anyone else answer WithinThisMind’s question, which, assuming her permission granted, I’m going to repost; because I’d like to see an unequivocal answer to her question:
As I told WithinThisMind, I had already answered.
See 186.
And I’m not trying to be mean-spirited, but I have little patience or tolerance for illogical, irrational, non-responsive responses. So, if you don’t mind my asking; please frame your responses around non-subjective criteria. Thanks.
Your asking of non-subjetive criteria on morality, when morality basis is subjective is irrational.
@babyskep
I’ll bet you’d be patting Ash on the back for a “job well done” as that jaundiced, screaming tissue mass burst through Cain’s thoracic cavity, wouldn’t you?
No idea of what are you talking about.
@DBP
Thank you.
You had better learn this one:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/responsible?s=t
That’s pretty much how I feel about much of what you say.
This is a prime example of total whatthefuckery:
They do pee all over people freely…
What do you think the word “liberty” means?
I know that one. That’s why I support birth control and abortion.
Google translate + bad arguments = rotten word salad
Isu, babyskep is referencing the movie Alien, in which a character called Ash infects a character called Cain with a parasite. You can see the results here. (This scene is apparently the subject of fierce copyright monitoring, so I could only find one with some “alternate” soundtrack. But IIRC there’s no significant dialog in the scene anyway.)
[cite]That’s pretty much how I feel about much of what you say.[/cite]
It could be. Ask about what you don’t undestand.
[cite]They do pee all over people freely[/cite]
Under the acception. (Oxford Dictionary)
[cite]2 in copious or generous amounts[/cite]
yes
But I was refering to:
[cite]1 not under the control of another; as one wishes:[/cite]
In the sense of free choice.
They pee and had no choice to do otherwise.
[cite]What do you think the word “liberty” means?[/cite]
I thought it meant “libertad”. The accurate word would be freedom.
@babyskep
I’ll bet you’d be patting Ash on the back for a “job well done” as that jaundiced, screaming tissue mass burst through Cain’s thoracic cavity, wouldn’t you?
You would loose your bet.
I’m humanist, no alienist.
So..by free you mean “they have no choice not to” and “they have the freedom to pee on people?”
Uh…….what the hell is wrong with you?
So, that’s a no on the ‘at any point in your back-asswards existence given this matter the slightest bit of rational thought?’
Killfilled, like all trolls.
Except for when those humans are women who had sex
Considering the only folks offering anything coherent were on the pro-choice side, I’m going to chalk this one up as a victory for reason.
@DBP
[cite]So..by free you mean “they have no choice not to” and “they have the freedom to pee on people?”[/cite]
Why do you ask that bizarre question?
I haven’t given the meaning of “free”, nor a basis so that you can deduce that.
[cite]Uh…….what the hell is wrong with you?[/cite]
I could ask you the same question.
Well, time to go to sleep.
See ya.
You could ask that, but the only reason there is any confusion over the topic is because you an immoral, stupid asshole. You are a terrible person and you can’t understand the actions or thoughts of good people. You come in and rant and go “YOUR ARE WRONG AND IM LIBERTY” and think that means you’ve won.
You really need to avoid debates in languages that you don’t speak fluently.
Isu
You seem to be stuck on the sex-is-only-for-procreation thing. As others have already mentioned, sex in the animal kingdom is used for a many things, not JUST procreation. That’s part of it, but not the whole part of it. Until you understand that, you aren’t going to be able to see abortion beyond your narrow view.
You also appear to be insinuating that if a woman gets pregnant, and she didn’t want to be pregnant, then she must have been irresponsible in some way. In other words, don’t have sex if you don’t want to get pregnant. Convenient man-thinking. This isn’t exactly practical or realistic advice, however. Sex is as natural to humans as breathing; people are going to do it. Nor is it realistic to suggest that married women who don’t want to get pregnant practice abstinence. Somehow I don’t see husbands around the world, especially those who believe that one of the wife’s marriage duties is to give up the pussy on demand, going along with that idea.
It’s very easy for a man to hold your point of view. After all, if a man engages in sex, he’s only risking an STD (or a stalker, psycho woman). He doesn’t have to worry about getting pregnant, of his body going through massive changes for nearly a year, dealing with mood swings and odd cravings, bearing the pain of childbirth, accruing large medical bills, suffering lost wages and lost hours at work, or being a burden on his family.
My wife and I got pregnant three times, and all three times we were on the birth control pill. After the third pregnancy, my wife got her tubes tied, because we figured we were too fertile for modern medicine. All three pregnancies were unplanned, but the first two in particular came at very bad times. We carried the first and third to term, but we terminated the second pregnancy. The second pregnancy occurred just after my wife had undergone some very serious medical procedures to remove a cancerous tumor on her thyroid, and her body, frankly, wasn’t up for a pregnancy. The doctors told us quite clearly that it would have been a very high-risk pregnancy. We decided not to risk my wife’s life, and aborted it.
Now, if anti-abortionists had their way, my wife and I could not have done that. My wife wasn’t in any immediate medical danger, but those dangers were certainly on the horizon. We hadn’t been irresponsible, we took the necessary precautions, and yet we got pregnant anyway. We’ve been criticized by some family members for getting the abortion, though, and it doesn’t make sense. It almost appears to me that they valued the potential life of the embryo more than my wife’s life, her wishes, or her future plans. My wife isn’t a baby factory; she’s a person. An embryo is not. End of story.
It is a woman’s body. She decides what happens to her body. Period. If you wish otherwise, then create the science that will allow a pregnant woman who does not want to be pregnant to transfer her fertilized egg or embryo into the body of a man or woman who does. If that sort of thing is ever created, I wonder how many anti-abortion advocates will stand up and volunteer for such a procedure.
I’m betting very few.
You would be correct.
As one of the barbarians upthread pointed out, they just oppose the act of abortion and feel no moral or legal obligation to deal with the effects of stopping it from happening.
@DBP #229:
—
@Isu #123 (two posts after “I’m spainiard”):
@Isu #145:
If a woman is obligated to provide bodily support to a fetus growing inside her, then both parents should be obligated, by law, to provide blood/organ/bone marrow/etc donations to the born child up until that born child dies.
If ‘duty to your child’ is going to be an argument, then this is the logical conclusion.
@Isu-217:
“No idea of what are you talking about.”
Of course you don’t.
@jcarr-230:
$50 your poignant tale will be completely lost on Isu. $50.
@DBF
“stupid asshole”
There is no point discussing which someone who insults you.
Our discussion is over.
@JCar
You seem to be stuck on the sex-is-only-for-procreation thing. As others have already mentioned, sex in the animal kingdom is used for a many things, not JUST procreation. That’s part of it, but not the whole part of it. Until you understand that, you aren’t going to be able to see abortion beyond your narrow view.
Since it’s your first message addressed to me I will assume you are merely wrong. I haven’t said anything like sex-is-only-for-procreation. I agree using it for fun but as I said in #46 “We know: sex is fun, but one must accept the responsabilities of our acts.”.
You also appear to be insinuating that if a woman gets pregnant, and she didn’t want to be pregnant, then she must have been irresponsible in some way.
Save exceptions such as rape, woman is responsible to become pregant (man also).
In other words, don’t have sex if you don’t want to get pregnant.
Nope, there are different ways of having sex without woman getting pregnation.
Convenient man-thinking.
Such as abortion, which removes man’s responsibilities.
This isn’t exactly practical or realistic advice, however. Sex is as natural to humans as breathing; people are going to do it. Nor is it realistic to suggest that married women who don’t want to get pregnant practice abstinence.
Ok, but I’m not suggesting not practising sex.
I’m suggesting or avoid pregnancy or take the responsibility.
Somehow I don’t see husbands around the world, especially those who believe that one of the wife’s marriage duties is to give up the pussy on demand, going along with that idea.
I don’t get the point. “abstinence” idea is quite different on man’s “pussy on demand” idea.
It’s very easy for a man to hold your point of view.
Nope. Usually a man doesn’t hold my point of view.
After all, if a man engages in sex, he’s only risking an STD (or a stalker, psycho woman).
Those are iresponsible men.
He doesn’t have to worry about getting pregnant,
That’s true.
of his body going through massive changes for nearly a year, dealing with mood swings and odd cravings, bearing the pain of childbirth, accruing large medical bills, suffering lost wages and lost hours at work, or being a burden on his family.
Nor the woman who abort.
The man cannot share physical consecuencies but can copay the medical bills (in my country this medical assistance is free) and support the mother economically and in other ways.
If you think it’s wrong that a man neglecting his responsabilities, you should understand why I think it’s wrong a woman neglecting hers.
Yes, the woman is the only one who has the physcical consecuencies, thus she should be the one more concerned.
My wife and I got pregnant three times, and all three times we were on the birth control pill. After the third pregnancy, my wife got her tubes tied, because we figured we were too fertile for modern medicine. All three pregnancies were unplanned, but the first two in particular came at very bad times. We carried the first and third to term, but we terminated the second pregnancy. The second pregnancy occurred just after my wife had undergone some very serious medical procedures to remove a cancerous tumor on her thyroid, and her body, frankly, wasn’t up for a pregnancy. The doctors told us quite clearly that it would have been a very high-risk pregnancy. We decided not to risk my wife’s life, and aborted it.
Well, you take care of two of them although being unnplanned. Thanks ok.
Regarding the second, I find a very high-risk pregnancy a good reason to let abortion. So nothing to complaint.
Now, if anti-abortionists had their way, my wife and I could not have done that. My wife wasn’t in any immediate medical danger, but those dangers were certainly on the horizon.
I don’t agree with those anti-abortionists.
We hadn’t been irresponsible, we took the necessary precautions, and yet we got pregnant anyway.
I you have choosen otherwise you wouldn’t got pregant.
Your choices have consecuences.
We’ve been criticized by some family members for getting the abortion, though, and it doesn’t make sense.
I don’t know how exactly are those critics to tell my full opinion about them.
It almost appears to me that they valued the potential life of the embryo more than my wife’s life, her wishes, or her future plans.
The embryo is alive. We are tallking about an human organisn with metabolism nourish and growing. He’s alive. So your statement that has “potential live” if false because he has actual live.
The value is another issue.
My wife isn’t a baby factory; she’s a person.
Agreeded.
An embryo is not. End of story.
Why not?
What makes something be a person?
I consider I was one in my earlier states of developments, and because of that and of being coherent I consider persons to those who were in my same circumstances.
It is a woman’s body. She decides what happens to her body. Period.
But the embryo is not her body.
If you wish otherwise, then create the science that will allow a pregnant woman who does not want to be pregnant to transfer her fertilized egg or embryo into the body of a man or woman who does. If that sort of thing is ever created, I wonder how many anti-abortion advocates will stand up and volunteer for such a procedure.
I’m betting very few.
I believe it will be more factible to make biological machines, but this is only a guess.
If what you say were possible if a woman doesn’t want pregancy of my child I would volunteer.
WithinThisMind says:
Either ALL humans must by default have the right to use a woman’s body however they see fit no matter what she feels about it
or
A woman has the right to decide what happens to her body and to defend her body with whatever degree of force necessary, including using lethal force if no other means of force is sufficient.
Which is it?
Either it’s okay to abort, or it’s okay to rape. Which is it?
This is obviously a false dichotomy!
A woman cannot decide for herself!
But of course she shouldn’t be raped – we respect her too much to allow it. Only her husband can use her body however he sees fit, if she is an honest woman.
And she needs laws to enforce her empowerment of following her man’s decisions!
Am I right, Isu? Is this your point of view?
ISU, you said: “Regarding the second, I find a very high-risk pregnancy a good reason to let abortion. So nothing to complaint.”
EVERY PREGNANCY CAN KILL A WOMAN AT ANY TIME
EVEN AFTER BIRTH
DO YOU UNDERSTAND
EVERY.SINGLE.PREGNANCY.HAS.THE.CHANCE.TO.KILL.OR.MAIM
Isu said: “It is a woman’s body. She decides what happens to her body. Period.
But the embryo is not her body.”
Actually ISU, the fertilized egg contains genetic *blueprints* that are used to form that embryo, to form that fetus.
But ISU, where do you think the calcium comes from to form the bones of this fetus? Hint, the fetus doesn’t magically conjure up its own calcium. IT TAKES CALCIUM FROM THE MOTHERS BODY. The building blocks ARE THE MOTHER. The fertilized egg is nothing but blueprints, directions on how to build.
It is a woman’s body. She decides what happens to her body. Period. – Me
But the embryo is not her body. – Isu
Technically, it both is and isn’t. But regardless, without the woman’s body, no embryo. So, yes, since the woman’s body is the key component of this equation, she decides what happens to her body. Period.
Unless you are still suggesting that once a woman gets pregnant, she no longer has a say in what happens to her body, because what she wants doesn’t matter anymore.
Why not?
What makes something be a person? – Isu
Consciousness, awareness, a brain, perhaps? If you are going to say that an embryo is equal to a fully grown, actual person (i.e. the mother), you have to explain why, and simply saying that it is alive isn’t good enough. Undifferentiated human cells are also alive, with development potential, but we don’t call them “persons.” When you argue that the needs of a potential human life that hasn’t even developed a brain yet are equal to (or even greater than) the needs of an actual person, you need to explain this in great detail if you want to convince people that abortion should be discontinued.
You keep saying sex has consequences. I agree. We can both hope that people are being responsible about sex. But one of those consequences is deciding whether or not to have an abortion if a pregnancy occurs. It isn’t about convenience, as John B kept mentioning; it’s about a reasonable approach to the question of whether or not the woman is ready and capable of being a decent parent, or willing to go through the pain of pregnancy and childbirth.
….and please, I know the first impulse at this point is to mention adoption. That option, of course, ignores the fact that the woman must undergo nine months of massive bodily changes, and it completely disregards the fact that our foster care system is already underfunded, overworked, and chock full of tens of thousands of kids that aren’t getting adopted. Swamping it with more babies isn’t really a smart choice.
I’m humanist, no alienist.
Interesting. Others have already covered the fact that your claim to being a humanist is extremely dubious, so I’ll take a little sci fi side trip.
Does your statement imply that if humans encountered aliens with human like intelligence and self-awareness you’d be cool with killing them because they’re not human? This sort of thinking is implied in the DNA fetishism of the forced pregnancy movement and it demonstrates what little regard the movement has for what actually makes humans special*: self awareness, thought and imagination.
*Yeah, yeah, I know. Dolphins, elephants and other great apes also pass the mirror test. I said “special” not “unique”.
I know the first impulse at this point is to mention adoption. That option, of course, ignores the fact that the woman must undergo nine months of massive bodily changes, and it completely disregards the fact that our foster care system is already underfunded, overworked, and chock full of tens of thousands of kids that aren’t getting adopted.
Not to mention the fact that giving a child up for adoption is extremely detrimental to the physical and mental health of the relinquishing mother. I know isu could care less, but at least the pro-choice side should be acknowledging the danger and damage that this choice almost inevitably causes. I favor full disclosure of the risks for any woman considering giving a child up for adoption.
In fact, any woman who is pregnant or considering getting pregnant should be informed of the risk she’s taking in continuing the pregnancy. It’s not insignificant. I’ve said this many times before, but the risk of dying in pregnancy is greater than the risk of flying-on 9/11/01. You’re more likely to die during a pregnancy than you would be if you held a random airline ticket for 9/11/01. Pregnancy is comparable in risk to donating a kidney and far riskier than donating bone marrow or peripheral blood stem cells. Blood is a near zero risk procedure. Additionally, there are health risks ranging from mild malnutrition (nearly inevitable given PIN and increased need) to permanent loss of organ function.
I’m in no way against women getting pregnant or having babies or even giving children up for adoption-as long as they know what they’re getting into. Pregnancy crisis centers that underplay the risks should be closed and their employees charged with reckless endangerment.
@JCarr
Technically, it both is and isn’t.
Technically, it isn’t.
But regardless, without the woman’s body, no embryo.
An without embryo, no woman’s body.
Don’t forget that woman’s body comes from embryos body.
So, yes, since the woman’s body is the key component of this equation, she decides what happens to her body. Period.
There are two key component in this equation, the mother and the child.
Once a woman gets pregnant, there are two bodies, two humans, two keys.
Why does she have the right to choose over the body of another human?
You may say than the embryo cannot choose. In this case, since babies cannot choose either, do we have rights over their bodies?
Unless you are still suggesting that once a woman gets pregnant, she no longer has a say in what happens to her body, because what she wants doesn’t matter anymore.
That’s misleading, I say women had no rights over other humans body on a regular basis.
Consciousness, awareness, a brain, perhaps?
If you doubt, why do you say it isn’t a person when you don’t what a person is?
Please, clear yourself.
If you are going to say that an embryo is equal to a fully grown, actual person (i.e. the mother), you have to explain why, and simply saying that it is alive isn’t good enough.
I’m not saying they are equal.
I said both of them are identical regarding being actual persons.
Undifferentiated human cells are also alive, with development potential, but we don’t call them “persons.”
I was talking about an organism, not a merely pack of cells.
And I call and “person” to a individual human organism.
Asking again. What makes a thing person? You haven’t yet answered.
When you argue that the needs of a potential human life that hasn’t even developed a brain yet are equal to (or even greater than) the needs of an actual person, you need to explain this in great detail if you want to convince people that abortion should be discontinued.
Again, it’s not a potential human life, its an actual human life and I have explained why he is alife and no doubt is human life.
The both are actual persons.
Maybe you don’t agree, ok. But I think it’s “convenient to certain parents” (avoiding annoiance) to think otherwise and to think they are the only ones to be convinced having reason by default.
You keep saying sex has consequences. I agree. We can both hope that people are being responsible about sex. But one of those consequences is deciding whether or not to have an abortion if a pregnancy occurs.
I keep hope that people would be responsible about pregancy which comes from sex (so it’s related to sexual responsability).
It isn’t about convenience, as John B kept mentioning; it’s about a reasonable approach to the question of whether or not the woman is ready and capable of being a decent parent, or willing to go through the pain of pregnancy and childbirth.
I think its the question about killing or not another human being.
….and please, I know the first impulse at this point is to mention adoption. That option, of course, ignores the fact that the woman must undergo nine months of massive bodily changes,
Worse it’s been killed.
and it completely disregards the fact that our foster care system is already underfunded, overworked, and chock full of tens of thousands of kids that aren’t getting adopted. Swamping it with more babies isn’t really a smart choice.
Well, this is not only about forbidding abortion. Let’s better the care system.
And ask those adults who weren’t aborted if they would have prefered to be have been killed.
isu said; “That’s misleading, I say women had no rights over other humans body on a regular basis.”
but isu is saying that a fertilized egg has *more* rights over a womans body than the woman, full stop
hes not a humanist, hes a ‘fetus only fuck womenist’
Does your statement imply that if humans encountered aliens with human like intelligence and self-awareness you’d be cool with killing them because they’re not human?
Nope.
I would respect them except if they choose to exterminate us then I would chose human side, so I’m HUMANist.
This sort of thinking is implied in the DNA fetishism of the forced pregnancy movement and it demonstrates what little regard the movement has for what actually makes humans special*: self awareness, thought and imagination.
If I have to choose between the life of an human baby or an irrational animal regardless an adult monkey would be more intelligent.
@dianne
I know isu could care less,
I know this knowledge is crap.
How funny of you saying pro-choice side should know the risks of pregancy (one choice) and no saying nothing about knowing the risks of abortion (the other one choice)!
Isu does not care if a woman dies or is maimed from childbirth
he does NOT care about women
isu ONLY cares about the fetus
every pregnancy, even a perfect one, can end in death for the woman
the process of birth can kill a woman
many women do not want to take that chance
the chance that a perfect pregnancy COULD kill them
isu doesnt care if women die
isu only cares about the fetus
isu wants to make women subservient to a fetus
that is the end result of isu’s ‘humanism’
isu hates women
Talking about adoption…and slavery.
I remember year’s ago talking about the issue with a female classmate. We were talking hypothetically and I suggested the adoption. Her response was:
“Si no es mio, no será de nadie más”.
“If he isn’t mine, I won’t be anyone elses”.
This really sounds as the child been property (“mine”) and thus a slave.
Sorry:
“If he isn’t mine, he won’t be anyone elses”.
@jb
bla, bla, bla, bla…
Then those who don’t want COMPULSORY ABORTION do “NOT care about women” and are women haters because they don’t care if the women dies because of continuing pregnancy.
no isu, you dont care if women die
in fact isu, you want to make pregnancy compulsory, even though you know it WILL kill women
women like me
you dont care
isu, you care more about an embryo than about my death
just admit it
I would respect them except if they choose to exterminate us
So then you do see something worth protecting other than the sacred DNA. Again, demonstrating that you’re not actually deluded enough to believe that an embryo without neural tube, much less brain, is really a person. Again, it all comes down to hurting women.
@jb
@dianne
You are cheating liars recurring once and again to a false and pathetic victimism.
No further discussion with you.
and we are pro-choice isu
none of us want compulsory abortion
stop being stupid
pro-choice means the choice to have a baby or not
it does not mean FORCING women to have babies they do not want
you want to FORCE women to gestate a fetus EVEN IF IT KILLS THEM
and more women die from pregnancy than from abortion
isu said: “You are cheating liars recurring once and again to a false and pathetic victimism.”
Dianne: notice how he does NOT want to hear, at all, how pregnancy can hurt/kill/maim a woman? he does not want to hear it. he doesnt care about women. at all. he has just proved our point.
isu does not care if pregnancy kills women
if isu cared, he would not want to force women to have babies even if it kills them
As stated by the WHO in its 2005 World Health Report “Make Every Mother and Child Count”, the major causes of maternal deaths are: severe bleeding/hemorrhage (25%), infections (13%), unsafe abortions (13%), eclampsia (12%), obstructed labour (8%), other direct causes (8%), and indirect causes (20%). Indirect causes are malaria, anaemia,[3] HIV/AIDS, and cardiovascular disease, all of which complicate pregnancy or are aggravated by it.
Forty-five percent of postpartum deaths occur within 24 hours.[4] Over 90% of maternal deaths occur in developing countries. In comparison, pregnancy-associated homicide accounts for 2 to 10 deaths per 100,000 live births, possibly substantially higher due to underreporting.
In developing countries, the most common cause of maternal death is obstetrical hemorrhage, followed by deep vein thrombosis, in contrast to developed countries, for which the most common cause is thromboembolism
Unintended pregnancy is a major cause of maternal deaths. Worldwide, unintended pregnancy resulted in almost 700,000 maternal deaths from 1995 to 2000 (approximately one-fifth of the maternal deaths during that period). The majority (64%) resulted from complications from unsafe or unsanitary abortion.
———–
Isu wants to make pregnancy compulsory so that even more women die
He wants to give a fertilized egg the *chance* to develop to the point where it can kill even MORE women
Just be honest isu
that’s all we ask
Asking again. What makes a thing person? You haven’t yet answered. – Isu
Consciousness, awareness, a brain, perhaps? – Me
I did answer your question, as you can see. I posed the answer somewhat sarcastically because I felt the answer should be self-evident. You seem to think that something that is mentally and physically equivalent to a tadpole is a person. It’s developing human life, a potential person, but not a person. Ergo, saying its rights are equal to the actual person bearing it is an equivalency that is hard to argue, logically, as you attempt to do here:
I’m not saying they are equal.
I said both of them are identical regarding being actual persons. – Isu
You say they are not equal, but then, in the very next sentence, you say they are equal. Which is it? Both are human life, but one is an actual person, the other hasn’t developed “personhood” yet.
I think its the question about killing or not another human being. – Isu
You are equating human life with human personhood. They are two very different things. A person who is brain-dead but on life-support is technically still alive, but the essential “personhood” is gone. Disconnecting life support and allowing the shell to die doesn’t alter the fact that the person is already dead and gone.
An embryo that hasn’t even developed a brain yet can hardly be called a person, no matter how many times you repeat that. Saying it over and over again doesn’t make it so.
I have a question for you, mate: would you approve of legislation that would ban abortions, except for medical emergencies, and force pregnant women to carry the pregnancy to term?
If your answer is yes, how do you suggest we deal with all the thousands of babies that would suddenly flood the foster care system? Would you lock up the woman if she gets an abortion anyway? How long a penalty? How would you suggest we, as a nation, pay for all those women that are forced to appeal to the government for aid in supporting the children they didn’t want? How would you expect our society to cope with all the psychological problems that will inevitably develop in many of these unwanted kids that we forced these women to have? How would you suggest we support all those heartbroken families that lost their wives and daughters to complications during the pregnancy or the childbirth that we forced them to have?
And, yes, we forced them to have the babies, if we ban abortions. We can hardly suggest that women stop having sex. I don’t think men will go for that.
It’s very easy and convenient to say, “It’s a baby, a human life, and we can’t kill it.” But addressing all the other issues never really seems to be a concern of anti-abortion advocates
quote: “I have a question for you, mate: would you approve of legislation that would ban abortions, except for medical emergencies”
of course, this does not address the fact that 1) women can still die, like that woman in ireland and 2) the pregnancy can go perfect and the woman can die AFTER the birth, of eclampsia, or other complications
so, in effect, Isu is basically saying that he will GLADLY sacrifice these women for a few embryos
Isu’s arguments would sound much better in the original German.
I did answer your question, as you can see.
Nope, that was a question.
I posed the answer somewhat sarcastically because I felt the answer should be self-evident.
I see know you have told that is a sascarm, but yet I have no clear. Make it a clear definition.
You seem to think that something that is mentally and physically equivalent to a tadpole is a person.
Does seem so because you are unable to distinguish them.
You can kill tapdoles freely which are no equivalent to a human.
Ergo, saying its rights are equal to the actual person bearing it is an equivalency that is hard to argue, logically, as you attempt to do here:
My logical is correct. You can object the premise that is not a person, its ok, the same way I can object the yours that it isn’t.
You say they are not equal, but then, in the very next sentence, you say they are equal. Which is it? Both are human life, but one is an actual person, the other hasn’t developed “personhood” yet.
I said both are persons. It seems that you person definition is ad hoc.
I use:
person
a human being regarded as an individual
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/person?q=person
That has nothing to do with conciussness, awareness or a brain.
It’s developing human life, a potential person, but not a person.
It’a a human life which develops. An actual person.
You are equating human life with human personhood.
Yes.
A person who is brain-dead but on life-support is technically still alive, but the essential “personhood” is gone.
Its still a person.
Disconnecting life support and allowing the shell to die doesn’t alter the fact that the person is already dead and gone.
No, it’s also killing a person.
An embryo that hasn’t even developed a brain yet can hardly be called a person, no matter how many times you repeat that. Saying it over and over again doesn’t make it so.
So donkeys which develop a brain are persons?
I have a question for you, mate: would you approve of legislation that would ban abortions, except for medical emergencies, and force pregnant women to carry the pregnancy to term?
When you mean “force pregnant women” “women pregant by rape” yes.
If your answer is yes, how do you suggest we deal with all the thousands of babies that would suddenly flood the foster care system? Would you lock up the woman if she gets an abortion anyway? How long a penalty? How would you suggest we, as a nation, pay for all those women that are forced to appeal to the government for aid in supporting the children they didn’t want? How would you expect our society to cope with all the psychological problems that will inevitably develop in many of these unwanted kids that we forced these women to have? How would you suggest we support all those heartbroken families that lost their wives and daughters to complications during the pregnancy or the childbirth that we forced them to have?
You have many questions to ask and I don’t want further dicussion on other issues.
And, yes, we forced them to have the babies, if we ban abortions. We can hardly suggest that women stop having sex. I don’t think men will go for that.
Yes, and we don’t stop serial killers by muder ban.
It’s very easy and convenient to say, “It’s a baby, a human life, and we can’t kill it.” But addressing all the other issues never really seems to be a concern of anti-abortion advocates
It’s not a baby, it’s an human life and we shouldn’t kill in a it’s annoyance basis.
Well, I’m getting weary of this discussion.
Add what you consider need to add.
Lets agree you have your opinion and I have mine. Ok?
quote: “It’s not a baby, it’s an human life and we shouldn’t kill in a it’s annoyance basis.”
but its ok if the embryo kills the woman carrying it
isu is in favour of that
John B:
Why do you place more importance on the tone of a conversation rather than the content? If you wanted to discuss the abortion debate, it seems like the *content* would be more important. However, by bowing out, you make it clear that the tone of the conversation takes precedence.
Many people feel strongly about this issue, and utilizing a tone that they choose in addition to making their arguments can be an effective tactic. Though if you’re concerned about harsh words more than an argument I guess I can see how ineffective it would be.
****
Isu @163:
In the United States, contraception is not easy for many women (especially poor women) to acquire. It can also be costly depending upon personal income. Access to affordable contraception is essential for women’s health.
As a side note, more men should take the responsibility of acquiring condoms. In my subjective experiences, many of the heterosexual men I’ve encountered say they don’t wear condoms and that it’s the woman’s job to protect against pregnancy.
@186:
Like when a woman gets pregnant, according to you.
She loses the right to bodily autonomy.
The fetus inside her has (in your world) rights that override hers.
That the presence of the fetus creates physiological changes-some of which are deadly-matters not. What matters is that the fetus has the right to make use of the mother’s body. If she doesn’t want the fetus to use her body, tough luck. She is required by you to carry that fetus to term.
Interesting that a clump of cells possesses more rights that an already existing woman. Even more, that clump of cells overrides one of the basic human rights possessed by all: bodily autonomy. If the woman no longer has one of her basic human rights, she is in effect not considered fully human (if she were, she would possess full bodily autonomy). When she gives birth and the forcible use of her body is over, she regains her bodily autonomy.
Odd that there’s no situation where men lose their bodily autonomy (and certainly not one where another human being uses your body-without your consent-for nutrients, protection and sustenance for 9 months).
I did answer your question, as you can see. – Me
Nope, that was a question. – Isu
I posed the answer somewhat sarcastically because I felt the answer should be self-evident. – Me
I see know you have told that is a sascarm, but yet I have no clear. Make it a clear definition. – Isu
Um….what? Not only are you insisting my answer is a question, simply because you are confused about the question mark, but then you ask for a clear definition,…which is exactly what I provided.
If you can’t comprehend what I’m saying, we might as well discontinue this until you get a better grasp of English. I don’t mean that as an insult, I’m referencing your previous comment about being Spanish.
You have many questions to ask and I don’t want further dicussion on other issues. – Isu
In other words, force the woman to carry the pregnancy to term, and then you don’t care or worry about what happens next. That comment speaks volumes about you, ol’ boy.
Lets agree you have your opinion and I have mine. Ok?
Yep. That doesn’t mean they are equally valid or supported, however, any more than a creationist’s opinion is equal to a biologist’s opinion on the subject of evolution.
Your opinion is, to paraphrase, it’s a human life, we can’t kill it, if women don’t want to get pregnant they shouldn’t have sex, and you really don’t care to discuss any other issue that may arise as a result of forcing women to have babies.
My opinion actually has foundational support in law and science, neither of which define a developing embryo as a “person.” Nor does my opinion force women to do anything they don’t want to do, or limit their ability to enjoy sex if they wish, or risk their lives,…nor burden our society with all the detrimental effects of a massive wave of unwanted children.
I am certainly glad that my opinion is the law of the land rather than yours.
Isu @188:
Why do you equate an existing human being that is not dependent upon another for nutrients and protection with a human being who lives inside another and is dependent upon that person for nutrients and protection?
That’s not remotely a valid comparison.
By the way, I see that you treat a fetus as a person. I feel you’re wrong. There’s far more to determining the status of a person that our genetic makeup.
[emphasis mine]
While it can be debated whether or not these 5 are the most effective critieria for determining personhood, it is clear that a fetus has *none* of these qualities.
You feel fetuses have rights, like any other person. Do you feel they have all the basic rights accorded to us all as humans? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Declaration_of_Human_Rights
Please see the list of rights accorded all humans in this declaration. There are 30 articles. Do you feel all fetuses should have those rights?
quote: “Your opinion is, to paraphrase, it’s a human life, we can’t kill it, if women don’t want to get pregnant they shouldn’t have sex, and you really don’t care to discuss any other issue that may arise as a result of forcing women to have babies.”
He will not discuss the real world fallout of his policies because that would mean admitting that women and children will die and he has to maintain his veneer of ‘humanist’
John B @171:
You keep bringing up the “responsibility” mother’s have to a fetus (though you treat the fetus as a child). That’s a strong appeal to emotion, yet you’re calling others out for emotionally appealing rhetoric?
@Tony
I’m getting very very weary of discussion the issue.
Among other things, such as others idiocy putting words in my mouth, because of repeating things I have already commented.
For example you said: “clump of cells” as persons such you and me weren’t a “clump of cells”. Being a “clump of cells” doesn’t deny personhood.
Isu @172
Why?
If the woman wants to carry the fetus to term, there’s no need for an abortion. Why would you force a woman to have an abortion?
Pro choice advocates would be fighting against that too. It’s about recognizing that women are full human beings with the right to choose whether or not they want to carry a fetus to term.
@205:
1-This is dangerously close to the mindset of rape apologetics.
“If a rapist attacks you, you are responsible, because you choose a way which would force the attack.”
Yup, it does sound that bad (and it’s punishment for women who don’t want to have a child).
2- Contraception isn’t 100% reliable. If a couple has sex and he uses a condom, but it breaks, and the woman later becomes pregnant, is she responsible for keeping the fetus, even though she chose a way to NOT become pregnant.
3- If a fetus has developed inside the body of a woman, is she *obligated* to leave it there and carry it to term (or it could be aborted naturally through a miscarriage; hopefully she doesn’t get blamed for that) whether she wants to or not? Why are her desires superceded by a fetus?
Isu:
No one is forcing you to respond.
DId you miss my post @264, where some of the defining traits of personhood are listed? Fetuses have *none* of those traits. They are not persons. They’re human beings, yes; which owes to their genetic makeup. They lack the characteristics that define a person.
And yes, at some point you and I were both a clump of cells.
You apparently know very little about human anatomy and physiology.
Silly Tony, none of your so-called reasonable criterion for personhood matter. Isu has the final arbiter of philosophy, morality, and legal theory on his side: some dictionary.
Isu:
You may refer to yourself as one, but by denying women their autonomy you’re not living up to the ideals of humanism.
If we take the definition of humanism as:
you do not value the agency of pregnant women.
I also question if you’ve arrived at your anti-choice opinions based on rationalism or scientific evidence.
Also, since you are so attached to the notion of women being responsible for carrying a fetus to term if they have sex, I guess they’re not allowed to put the child up for adoption when it’s born. The responsibility of the mother surely doesn’t end when she gives birth. Doesn’t she also have a responsibility to retain custody of the child and care for hir? If not, then why does a woman have more responsibility for a fetus than an autonomous child?
So pregnant women are all required to carry fetuses to term, regardless of their desires.
They cannot put children up for adoption because that would be a violation of their responsibilities.
@267 – Isu
When people repeat things it usually means that you have not provided a satisfactory, evidenced response. Continuing on without meeting that base level of charitable behaviour tends to get one classified either as a troll or ignorant (or some pleasant mixture of the two).
Do women have bodily autonomy? Yes or no? It’s okay to say no, but realize that women won’t be doing handsprings of joy in your defense when you think they are less than human.
Isu:
BTW, if you intend to continue posting here, you may want to get over your issue with profanity. Some of your opinions are particularly vile and offensive to people (particularly women), and they have every right to express themselves. If you don’t like it, this may not be the place for you. I’ve avoided insulting you because I’m unfamiliar with the comments policy here, but I have wanted to because I find your views to be disgusting and your “arguments” to be grade school.
Also, this is incredibly mild.
Neither you nor John B could handle the Thunderdome.
Nepenthe: notice how the women on this thread are now being ignored? Isu does NOT have time for us, you know, all our claims of ‘false victimhood’
Isu, you keep throwing around the words “human” and “person”. What do you mean by them? What defines life and death medically?
Arbourist @272:
I’m not certain how much importance Isu places on bodily autonomy. Certainly, he doesn’t recognize it as a fundamental human right.
quote: “I’m not certain how much importance Isu places on bodily autonomy. Certainly, he doesn’t recognize it as a fundamental human right.”
some people don’t its weird. do they not just understand the reality of what they are saying?
a guy over here http://freethoughtblogs.com/crommunist/2012/11/15/because-abortion-needs-to-be-explained-apparently/#comments even went so far as to say that he believes forced organ donation should be mandatory because, after all, a life is more important than mere bodily autonomy
I suspect that the question of bodily autonomy is merely theoretical to these people.
Incidentally, for anyone curious to blockquote-
[blockquote] copy/paste the text you’re quoting [/blockquote]
in place of the above brackets, use the greater than/less than angle brackets. Don’t forget the forward slash before you close the tag.
thanks tony!!!
jb:
There’s a lot to wade through in that thread. Do you have the comment handy (you can copy/paste a link for the datetime so I can click right to the comment)?
jb:
You’re welcome.
It took me a few tries before I got it right.
yeah, I will grab it for you
the guy never came back, but here it is:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/crommunist/2012/11/15/because-abortion-needs-to-be-explained-apparently/#comment-96857
http://freethoughtblogs.com/crommunist/2012/11/15/because-abortion-needs-to-be-explained-apparently/#comment-96880
jb:
Ugh.
That guy is yet another person (like John B and Isu) that doesn’t understand bodily autonomy and how essential it is.
@Arbourist
When people repeat things it usually means that you have not provided a satisfactory, evidenced response. Continuing on without meeting that base level of charitable behaviour tends to get one classified either as a troll or ignorant (or some pleasant mixture of the two).
So repeating things to fundamentist creationist means you have not provided a satisfactory, evidenced response?
Nope, in my experience when people repeat things means is that people behave dogmatically.
Have you readed Isaac Asimov’s “Reason”? There is one point in which reason is flawed and those are the principles.
Isu:
Well in my experience, that’s not always the reason people repeat themselves. In fact, I would say that people choose to repeat themselves for different reasons. One should be wary of treating their subjective experiences as the norm.
i think everyone here deserves a medal for ‘debating’ isu
not only is there a language problem, but he’s none too bright, is he?
Dang jb you were mean to Isu.
/snark
I guess he’s done debating you too. Doesn’t leave many people for him to chat with. Perhaps his sensitivity to tone is proving an obstacle to discourse.
I miss John B
He was so sensitive. He so dearly wanted to force all women to WANT to be mommies. I mean, how endearing is that?
Well, I will do the same as Gregory Powell’s in “Reason”. I’m going to bed.
Probably a good idea Isu. Sleeping is a better idea than continuing to spew your nonsense.
This is probably way late, but:
eMatters:
And you claim you’re “too pro-science to be pro-abortion”?
Is it possible to be that much of a fucking idiot?
Sil: someone on Pandagon said that the reason born babies have a sinful nature is that when they pass through the vagina they get ‘sin-cooties’:P
you know, vaginas = bad, and all that!
@jb #274:
dianne was even ignored twice.
@Isu #253:
@Isu #183:
#293 it’s happening on another FTB thread too. Women are basically being told that our outrage is NOT welcome and that we should be more understanding of the nice moderate pro-lifers. We are being told this by someone who is supposedly on the same side.
jb @292:
Please tell me you were joking about that Pandagon comment… otherwise my faith in humanity will be shattered (actually just torn to even smaller pieces than it already was).
I see many have enjoyed some back and forth on this topic. My comment is for the Reasonable doubts guys. This discussion always gets me. I know you are very thoughtful on women’s issues so please forgive my rage. My head may explode if i hear another set of men discussing abortion. This political season has been rife with men weighing in on what I should and should not be able to do if I get pregnant. I agree that a human body and living cells with genetic code are present at conception, but that is irrelevant. That shit is sucking my body dry. I have a kid and was all but forced to place her for adoption after 16 months of doing my best to parent. I know what it’s like to be pregnant and what it’s like to try to the odds of society only to get a big fuck you when you need help. No one and especially no man can tell me I have to carry a child just to give it away. No one can tell me I shouldn’t be able to remove something inside of my body if it requires my body to live. The only reason this is a topic of discussion while hair and nails are not, is because other people keep bringing it back up, not because of its innate morality clash. Can we get some women to debate? No offence to you guys. Love the show and have been listening for years. I just want to hear the voices of the sex that knows what it means to be pregnant.
The US constitution states:
“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”
Why should a woman be forced into involuntary servitude to anyone, let alone a fetus? Is having sex now somehow a crime for which only women can be convicted?
295 tony:
I was not clear, sorry. The denizens of pandagon were trying to explain, ‘fundy’ style, why the religious consider embryos to be sin free, and babies are sinful. One person came up with the sin-cooties theory:P It fits perfectly after all, vaginas are the ultimate evil, no?
297 “Why should a woman be forced into involuntary servitude to anyone, let alone a fetus? Is having sex now somehow a crime for which only women can be convicted?”
THIS!!
THIS is what I have been trying to put into words for a while now
THANK YOU
Of course, assholes like to plead ‘well, guys have to like, buy diapers, and thats tough man:(((‘
patterndrafter:
I would *love* to hear a debate between women on this issue. Having men speak about this issue and having men debate this issue feels too much like mansplaining. Women are the ones who are directly affected by the abortion issue and they’ve been kept quiet for too long.
Perhaps even between a pro-choice and anti-choice woman who have both had abortions.
****
WithinThisMind:
I see it this way.
You see it this way.
The forced birth advocates do not.
I wish there was a way to bridge that gap and get them to understand that it is forcing a woman to give birth against her will, in effect making her a slave to the needs of the fetus.
****
jb:
I love this game of “make it up as we go along” played by fundies.
Is there anywhere in the bible that mentions when we get our non-existent souls? Is there anywhere in that horrible holy book that explains that fetuses have no sin?
#300
Actually tony, the ’embryos are sin free’ – ‘babies are sin’ idea just goes to show that fundies *know* there is a dividing line between fetus-hood and actual birth. They KNOW that the embryo/fetus is POTENTIAL and that birth = ACTUAL. And this, imo, proves it.
Well, God breathes life into Adam and only then does he become alive (Genesis 2:7). This is consistent with the normal legal standard of live birth.
@jb #298:
Sin-cooties may be beneficial…
Article: ScienceNews – Baby’s first bacteria depend on birth route
I try to get at this by asking them to name which specific measures they want to take to prevent women from getting abortions, or to punish them if they manage to get abortions.
They have a great deal of difficulty with this, because as soon as you start talking prison sentences or house arrest, it quickly becomes apparent that there is no way to give their ideas the force of law without enslaving women directly. Locking them up and tying them down to force them to give birth if it is discovered that they want to terminate their pregnancies, or locking them up after the fact.
Sometimes they claim that the doctors, not the women, should be prosecuted, in which case it becomes apparent that they regard women as more like children than adults. These people won’t treat women as autonomous persons who are fully responsible for the decisions they make.
Most often they refuse to answer. Every once in a while you find one who is perfectly clear that abortion is murder, therefore women should go to prison for a very long time or even be executed for killing an embryo.
Where do you stand, Isu, if you’re still reading? Should the prison sentence for an elective abortion (no urgent medical emergency aside from the fact of pregnancy, no rape) be long or short? Five years? Ten? Should a woman’s sentence be mitigated if she already has children? Should women be locked up and forcibly compelled to give birth if the state discovers that she’s trying to terminate her pregnancy?
Never mind, I forgot for a minute that you refuse to deal with the real world consequences of your views. How very unhelpful. Everyone’s philosophy would work perfectly if we could all live in a fantasy world of our own inventing.
usufruct
noun
[mass noun] Roman Law
the right to enjoy the use and advantages of another’s property short of the destruction or waste of its substance.
The law in my country (Spain) has roman law basis.
I have some property usufructed by my mother.
I didn’t know this concept would be alien to you.
Isu:
You’re one of the most regressive individuals I’ve ever ‘encountered’. That you actually feel that one human being has the right to make use of another’s body without their consent is abominable. You don’t belong in the 21st century. The Middle Ages seems the best time for you. Or even further, since you seem to believe in slavery, go live with the uneducated goat herders that crafted the BS in the bible.
People are not slaves to one another.
Slavery, despite what the bible says, is immoral and unconscionable.
Women have full bodily autonomy and are not beholden to a fetus just because you (or any one of a thousand imaginary gods-up to and including Yahweh) say so. No woman should be enslaved to a fetus against her wishes.
SallyStrange:
I wonder what their responses are to miscarriage. Or how-if abortion is murder-you prove that a woman intentionally aborted a fetus vs. miscarriage. Moreover, since miscarriage is natural abortion, shouldn’t GOD be put on trial? Or is abortion ok when GOD does it, but not when humans do it? He gets to hide behind “mysterious plans”, women are thrown in jail?
Now that I think about it, to fully police women to make sure they don’t have abortions, men would need to keep women under constant surveillance after any sexual activity to monitor for any potential pregnancy. If a woman is pregnant, she must constantly be inspected to watch the development of the fetus.
Another direction this could take: If sex is “about” procreation, then every human needs to have a physical examination prior to having sex to determine whether or not they are sterile. If you are, you’re unable to have sex.
I find all none of the above scenarios acceptable. I find them repugnant.
I can only assume then that Isu would not object if someone were to kidnap him and take his kidney to save a life?
I think this may be the origin of the well-known political trope, IOKIYAR: It’s OK If You’re A Republican.
It certainly fits with the rest of Biblical morality. Murdering children–I mean born children, several years old–is bad, unless God does it. Genocide is bad, unless God does it. Rape is bad–wait, the Bible doesn’t even go that far.
tony: I have listened to some podcasts on the issue (dogma debate has a good one, the subject of abortion vs a preacher) and have literally (for shits and giggles) argued with dozens of idiots on yahoo comments.
Basically, if God does it, its ok. If anything is classified as ‘natural’ good or bad, its ok. If God kills embryos, well, that is God’s will and its not up to us to intervene.
However, they tend to contradict themselves when they say 1) pregnancy is natural, it is not our job to interfere, its what a HEALTHY BODY does but 2) it is our job to stop the NATURAL occurrence of cancer and aging b/c an UNHEALTHY BODY is not good, and God gives us his permission to combat disease.
So in the end, they are making it up as they go along!
The preacher in that dogma debate episode even went so far as to say that we should not stop pregnancy, that would be unnatural, but however, we should not force fathers to give blood or organs to a sick child, b/c a sick child is ‘gods will’.
Yet, this same preacher felt that the ‘gods will’ of a baby dying mid-childbirth is something that should be combatted, by forcing a woman to have a c-section (or symphysotimy no doubt) against her will.
Don’t you just love God logic?
That you actually feel that one human being has the right to make use of another’s body without their consent is abominable.
I don’t find it is abominable if you make him to do so and he couldn’t refuse. The mother and the father were the ones who forced the situation (mother don’t in case of being raped). They who make this happen are the guilty ones. He is innocent and thus I think he has the right to live by usufruct.
I find abominable the parents choice to kill their own innocent children.
Yes, Isu, we’re aware that you’re all for forcing women to do what you want with regards to pregnancy.
We’re also familiar now, with the notion that you think slavery is okie dokie.
You’re a horrible person if you support the idea of people owning other people OR anyone having the right to use anyone else’s body.
Of course, I’m sure you’d be the first person to object to someone taking your kidney to save their life without your consent, so you must have immunity from someone using your body for their needs.
I have an idea.
Since sex results in it being okay to punish women by making them give up their bodily autonomy, let’s hit both genders the same.
From now on, every time a man has sex, he has to give blood. It’s mandatory. If he is caught having a sexual encounter without being able to prove he gave blood that day, nine months in prison.
Isu wants women to die.
Isu@311
(Bolding mine.)
This is a really important point, Isu. If a fetus is innocent, why should abortion be permitted even if the gravida did not consent to being impregnated? If you genuinely believe the fetus is “innocent and … has the right to live”, then for consistency’s sake you should oppose all abortion under all circumstances, regardless of whether the gravida consented.
The only way of reconciling the apparent contradiction is if you somehow believe that women do consent to becoming pregnant any time they have sex (even if they are using contraceptives), and that consent is both implicit and irrevocable.
Is this a fair representation of your position?
I have explained the usufruct idea which doesn’t involve slavism. So accusing me of supporting slavery is a blatant lie and diffamation.
The “the kidney stealer” analogy is a deviant one.
If somebody steals a kidney, it’s a result of STEALER’S CHOICES on a regular basis.
If a woman gets pregnat, it’s a result of PARENT’S CHOICES on a regular basis.
The ones who make the CHOICEs are the RESPONSIBLE ones. If consecuences are wrong, they are the ones to blame, the ones who are guilty.
I find clear that I have the moral right to defend myself from somebody if he chooses to atack me and that I don’t have the moral right to defend myself if I make him atack me.
If I make him steal my kidney I had no right to refuse, he needs not my consentment and I have no right to autodefense, but that is not the usual.
It’s interesting you use terms like “blame” and “guilty”. What, precisely, is a woman who becomes pregnant guilty of? What should she be blamed for?
So you agree with my representation of your position as, “If a woman chooses to have sex, even if she uses contraception, she implicitly and irrevocably consents to being impregnated,” then?
Isu:
your definition of usufruct:
-No one has the *right* to use another human being. Unless one is a master, and the other is a slave. I reject slavery because it’s immoral and inhumane.
Great*. Then you should be first in line to defend abortion, since the fetus is attacking the body of the woman. If she doesn’t want to be attacked, then she has the option of aborting the fetus so it is no longer a threat to her.
Glad we got that all cleared up.
By the way, you fail to understand the kidney argument.
IF we make the [incorrect] assumption that a fetus is a person, then over the course of the pregnancy, one person is using the body of another person-the pregnant woman. IF the pregnant woman consents to being used in such a manner, she carries the fetus to term.
IF she does not consent to her body being used by another person-if she does not give her consent to being used, that person does not have the right to use her body.
If you give permission for me to use your kidney, then because of your consent, there is no conflict.
If, however, you do not desire for me to use your kidney, I have no right to the use of it, because it is *your* body and you have bodily autonomy.
I cannot make use of your body without your permission.
A fetus cannot make use of a pregnant woman’s body without her permission.
All of that is dependent upon the fetus even being a person, which it is not. Fetuses meet *none* of the criteria for determining personhood. They’re humans, sure. That’s from their DNA. They are *not* persons.
As a result of not being persons, fetuses do not possess the same rights as the mother and they certainly do not possess rights greater than the mother’s. The body of the woman is hers. Since we’ve established that no one has the right to use the body of another without their consent, she has every right to abort the fetus.
End of story.
I suppose this is probably pointless to continue any further. You’re an ignorant idiot who supports enslaving women and you’re not interested in educating yourself about human rights or human anatomy and physiology. Your views are disgusting and I’ve already wasted too much time trying to awaken any decency and compassion that you used to have.
You may kindly screw yourself now.
*Not really. You can choose to not defend yourself. You can choose TO defend yourself. You can also change your mind if you’ve made either choice initially. If you made someone attack you, you do have the right to defend yourself.
@Snoof
It’s interesting you use terms like “blame” and “guilty”. What, precisely, is a woman who becomes pregnant guilty of? What should she be blamed for?
Is guilty of and blamed for the so called atack.
So you agree with my representation of your position as, “If a woman chooses to have sex, even if she uses contraception, she implicitly and irrevocably consents to being impregnated,” then?
I say that in that situation, consentment is not need.
Did you read the analogy what I had written?
“If I make him steal my kidney I had no right to refuse, HE NEEDS NOT MY CONSENTMENT and I have no right to autodefense, but that is not the usual.”?
Well, I have checked and I have found that “consentment” is an spanglish word. I meant “consent”.
I hope you won’t fall on deaf ears as Tony blatantly does.
Interesting. So if you hit me with your car, and I need a blood transfusion, I can take yours? After all, you’re responsible for the “attack”, so consent isn’t needed. What about your liver? Kidneys? Bone marrow?
Interesting. So if you hit me with your car, and I need a blood transfusion, I can take yours? After all, you’re responsible for the “attack”, so consent isn’t needed. What about your liver? Kidneys? Bone marrow?
That’s a different question. That would involve your CHOICE.
Go on then. How is it different? I’m just walking down the street, minding my own business, then *wham*. I need organs. You hit me, why can’t I have yours?
Go on then. How is it different? I’m just walking down the street, minding my own business, then *wham*. I need organs. You hit me, why can’t I have yours?
Can’t you see the difference between an accident and an attack?
Wow!
Let’s be not that I hit you by accident (even a painless hit) and you kill me by your “HOLY” right to defense.
@Snoof
Once again I repeat 316 message:
I have explained the usufruct idea which doesn’t involve slavism. So accusing me of supporting slavery is a blatant lie and diffamation.
The “the kidney stealer” analogy is a deviant one.
If somebody steals a kidney, it’s a result of STEALER’S CHOICES on a regular basis.
If a woman gets pregnat, it’s a result of PARENT’S CHOICES on a regular basis.
The ones who make the CHOICEs are the RESPONSIBLE ones. If consecuences are wrong, they are the ones to blame, the ones who are guilty.
I find clear that I have the moral right to defend myself from somebody if he chooses to atack me and that I don’t have the moral right to defend myself if I make him atack me.
If I make him steal my kidney I had no right to refuse, he needs not my consentment and I have no right to autodefense, but that is not the usual.
Your case is clearly the STEALER’S CHOICES case, not PARENT’S CHOICES one. And I only said consentment isn’t needed in the PARENT’S CHOICES one.
From now on, every time a man has sex, he has to give blood.
Not a fair comparison. The risk of giving blood is minimal. Admittedly, it does limit the amount of sex the guy can safely have…about once every 6 weeks, four weeks if he’s really lucky. But where’s his risk of death?
If somebody steals a kidney, it’s a result of STEALER’S CHOICES on a regular basis.
If a woman gets pregnat, it’s a result of PARENT’S CHOICES on a regular basis.
This is a pretty definitive statement: It’s not about saving lives, but about punishing women for having sex. The person dying of kidney failure doesn’t have a right to life using someone else’s organs, but the fetus does because the pregnant woman made a choice to have sex.
Fine so far as it goes, if definitively not pro-life, but what about bone marrow donation? Bone marrow is trickier than organs because it contains the immune cells. You have to have the right marrow or the person receiving it will die. Messily. So no kidnapping random strangers. The only way someone is ever called on to donate marrow is if they are known to have a similar tissue type to the person who is in need of a transplant.
The only way that someone’s tissue type would be known is if they have been typed. This involves that person giving blood or cheek cells to be typed and registered. Voluntarily. Much moreso than sex. No one gets drunk and accidentally registers as a donor. No one is dragged into a marrow donation center against their will and forced to give their tissue up for typing.
So, if you are registered as a marrow donor, are you required to give marrow if and when someone types as a match and needs marrow? No. In the US, at least, there is a precedent stating that the potential donor’s right to bodily integrity trumps the potential recipient’s need. If a truly living, breathing, thinking person can not force another to undergo a procedure which is much less dangerous and painful than pregnancy–another person who has given preliminary evidence of willingness, why should an embryo have the right to force a woman to undergo pregnancy in its interest?
I know it isn’t fair Dianne. I was pointing out that inconveniencing a man’s ability to have sex in any way is horrific to consider, but it’s okay to punish a woman for being the ‘recipient’ of sex.
Concluding
“It’s not about saving lives, but about punishing women for having sex”
from
“If somebody steals a kidney, it’s a result of STEALER’S CHOICES on a regular basis.
If a woman gets pregnat, it’s a result of PARENT’S CHOICES on a regular basis.”
is a clear evidence of idiocy.
And any man seeking a Viagra prescription needs to be “counseled” on the possible side effects, shown a video of a needle aspiration treatment for priapism, get a biopsy to test for prostate problems (even if it’s not medically indicated), then undergo a 24-72 hour waiting period before he can get his pills.
Oh, and we’ll only allow these counseling sessions to take place at a handful clinics. If he’s not able to travel for several hours to get to a clinic for the counseling session, or able to make a second trip to get his prescription, then I guess he just can’t afford to have sex.
Isu, there’s a truism in law that if the law isn’t on your side, argue the facts. If the facts aren’t on your side, argue the law. If neither the law nor the facts are on your side, then attack the other lawyer.
The facts aren’t on your side. You said, in so many words, that you were ok with allowing people to die in order to protect one’s bodily integrity, i.e. to stop someone from stealing your kidney, even if they needed that kidney to live. With one exception-pregnancy. You argued that pregnancy should be an exception because the pregnant woman made a choice to have sex. In short, you argue that it’s ok to force someone to donate their body to the use of another if they are at risk of doing so because they had sex. Exactly as I said. This is not a “pro-life” argument because you allow for the death of the CRI patient. It is all about not allowing women who have sex to “escape the consequences”.
And the law is not on your side, as the McFall versus Shimp case makes clear.
So I believe calling me an idiot is the correct approach for you to take. And I am correct in pointing out to the lurkers that that’s what you’re doing.
ButchKitties: I agree, but would like to point out that a man seeking a prescription for Viagra really SHOULD have counseling about the side effects and probably some testing to ensure that his heart function is adequate and his GU health is reasonable. Men, don’t let anyone tell you PDE5 selective inhibitors are completely benign and always safe. It’s not true and you can kill yourself if you don’t pay attention to the risks properly.
This concludes the “drugs are risky: use responsibly” digression. Back to your regularly scheduled debate.
it is clear to me that Isu does not care about life
Isu is only interested in punishing women for having sex
why can’t Isu just be honest with us?
Facts:
I’m not a lawyer.
This is not a court case.
http://articles.nydailynews.com/2011-06-20/news/29704439_1_cops-fatal-blows-murder
[Sarcasm mode on]Yeaaa, I want Kim Crawford be punished for having sex.[Sarcasm mode off]
Isu no longer has a leg to stand on, as it were.
He has proven, without a doubt, that the ONLY time he thinks a person should be forced to give up their bodily autonomy is when that person is a pregnant woman. Specificaly, a pregnant woman who CHOSE to have sex.
He does not even care about ‘life’ enough to force the perpetrator of a crime to donate blood/organs to save the victim.
Clearly, Isu thinks that women who consent to sex are guilty of a worse crime than criminals
How messed up is this?
Isu, you disgust me
And your misogynistic attitude has been laid bare for all to see
Stop trying to weasel your way out of it. We all know your true motives buddy!
@bobo
Isu, you disgust me
The only truth in what you said. I know my mind thus I know its false.
Now, beacause you have said so, I do know you hate me.
How many misandrist want to confess?
aww, Isu is pretending to be a martyr
let’s all shed a tear for Isu, poor, persecuted Isu!
he’s indifferent to women’s bodily autonomy, he wants everyone to have bodily rights except women – but please, don’t point this out to him, the little crybaby will whine about how he is being unfairly persecuted
waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!
:P
Isu sez:
You’re male? I did not know that. Doesn’t change my impression of you though. You’re still an asscake.
@silomowbray
Insulting me after getting into account that I’m a male gives me a right impression of what you are.
You can keep your impression for you and those of your herd.
@isu
oh the irony
isu put all of the *women* on ignore, after accusing them of ‘false victimization’
now isu realises that he has been revealed for what he is, a hater of women, he is trying to convince everyone that mean evil women are out to victimize *him*
all I can say is
lololololol
lollolollol
isu funny!
Hey Justin and RD crew,
Love the show. While I’m pro-choice, I have to admit I find a little inner conflict with my own position, precisely because of the idea of what, and of what moral status, we find in the womb. So thanks for the well-centered debate.
While I understand the moral line you’ve drawn for creatures that have, at the least, a background ideal desire for self-preservation, I didn’t really hear an argument for why that category of creatures is the category of moral significance. I could, for example, classify as morally significant creatures that:
– Have at least background self-preservation instict (but not idealized). This would morally distinguish someone sleeping, but not someone drunk or depressed. Why shouldn’t we hold to this?
– Have at least a background and/or idealized desire for self-preservation. This is your position. Why?
– Have at least a background, idealized, passive-potential desire for self preservation. By “passive potential,” I mean a state of affairs for a biological specimen that would theb go on to develop a minimum of background, idealized self-preservation desires if an active agent (such as an abortionist) doesn’t intercede. While this isn’t a position taken by anyone in this debate, it is a position an anti-abortion advocate could take if they wanted to include creatures like embryos. Why not this position.
In short, although I’m on “your team”, I unfortunately have level on you the same criticism you level on your opponent, namely, failing to justify your category of creature as deserving of moral significance in the case of killing.
Thanks for your thoughts, ~Chris
Abortion is self-defense, pure and simple. Men are invariably permitted the right of self-defense. Women deserve the same rights as men.
@Chris W. 341:
Drugged?
Sounds like, as your default, it’s growing in a passive incubator that wouldn’t make decisions that’d affect a predetermined outcome; constant supply of high-grade nutritive juices and such.
I assume this hypothetical is set in a future where women aren’t needed anymore (you only mention the presence of an ‘abortionist’ in passing). Otherwise this is irrelevant so long as there’s a real female adult involved that vastly overshadows the moral importance of tissue in any metric you could possibly use to compare them.
@Laurie Mann
is self-defense, pure and simple. Men are invariably permitted the right of self-defense. Women deserve the same rights as men.
I find that if one (be woman, be man) force an attack so that the otherone can’t do otherwise, there is no right to self-defense.
Yo yo Sky Captain,
2 things:
First, I was not considerig a tube or other theoretical environment, just a standard womb. Your criticism holds some considerable merit. One may rightly hold that the state of affairs in the womb is not passive but active. To take this position, you would have to hold that the womb is a series of active choices on the part of the mother. This is something I could buy, but it doesn’t go without explanation. When the would be mother is asleep, eating, going to work, and doing many other things, she isn’t actively involved in growing the would-be baby so much as passively allowing it to continue doing so. The passive/active distinction here seems frequently in favor being the latter.
Secondly, and more to my central point, even if after consideration we find the womb to be an active environment, thus permitting abortion in moral scenario number #3, this does nothing to answer my original question to Justin, which is why should we hold any of these scenarios as the moral rules to guide permissable killing. I gave 3 hypothetical moral lines in the sand, to examplify that we could draw it in multiple ways. That avoids the really important question of why we should hold a given set of rules, be them 1, 2, 3 or number 146, as correct.
I find that if one (be woman, be man) force an attack so that the otherone can’t do otherwise, there is no right to self-defense.
So we’re in agreement, then. A pregnant woman is under attack by her pregnancy and has the right to defend herself.
(It’s no weaker than your logicical atrocity)
The woman didn’t force the fetus to be there. Neither did the man. It was an accident, just like the car accident where you denied that the car driver has any moral or legal obligation to donate organs to the person she injured. The sex was deliberate, but the pregnancy was an accident. Voila. You have no more possible objections to abortion.
The woman didn’t force the fetus to be there.
She did. She took an action with this possible conclusion. The fetus doesn’t choose, he is forced.
It was an accident, just like the car accident.
That involves a different frame. The accident was caused because many people’s choices, including the injuried one.
What if the injuried one had crossed the street with red light? It’s far more difficult to set responsibilities.
where you denied that the car driver has any moral or legal obligation to donate organs to the person she injured.
I denied his choosing my organs, which is far different.
If it was my fault, I would find my moral duty to help as possible. Anyway, organ compatibility is a tricky question and in the pregnant case they do NOT DONATE ORGANS to the fetus.
In my country a driver insurance for car accidents is compulsory and we have social health care.
The sex was deliberate, but the pregnancy was an accident. Voila. You have no more possible objections to abortion.
There are also responsabilities in the accidents.
I set the random shooter analogy. Someone might have fun shooting ramdomly, but if he shoots someone down is responsible.
Isu is truly obsessed with punishing women for the crime of having sex, isn’t he?
And it is clear, here, that he considers pregnancy to be nothing more than a ‘minor inconvenience’ and that he has no understanding of how the fetus uses the pregnant womans body to build itself.
Oh, and if I invite someone into my house
And they try to injure me,
And I kill them in the process, I am *still* defending myself
Isu, your logic is flawed
She did. She took an action with this possible conclusion. The fetus doesn’t choose, he is forced.
Now Isu, you wouldn’t be smuggling in any presuppositions, would you?
the presupposition is that sex is a crime for which only women should be punished and convicted!
@loodfasword
Now Isu, you wouldn’t be smuggling in any presuppositions, would you?
I don’t know what you mean with that. Could you explain it more clearly?
If you force someone to enter your house and chain him to a machine which moves his arm to stab you. Do you have the right to self defense and the right to kill him?
Om my!
Let’s hope I don’t get that job in Nevada!
I don’t know what you mean with that. Could you explain it more clearly?
All of your “self defense” examples, and your entire argument that having sex automatically binds a woman to any and all consequences arising from that act, along with your unsupported position that unique human DNA and “potential” personhood equate to full personhood are presuppositions.
You’ve smuggled them in by simply assuming them to be true and you’re expecting the people that you’re arguing with to treat them as true.
But we don’t.
I don’t agree with you that a cluster of cells, or even a fetus with the first glimmers of brain activity has the equivalent rights and entitlements as the woman in whose body it resides.
You’ve been trying to argue a consistent position (I’ll give you that), and I’m suspecting you want your argument to be persuasive. But you need to back waaaay up because you’re just talking past most of the people you’re trading insults with.
Until you can persuade your opponents, instead of merely asserting, that an unborn potential person should be privileged above the rights of the woman whose body it’s inhabiting, then you’ve got no traction whatsoever.
And it starts with your presuppositions.
With which most of us probably disagree.
I know I do.
If you force someone to enter your house and chain him to a machine which moves his arm to stab you. Do you have the right to self defense and the right to kill him?
One indication that you’re arguing from smuggled presuppositions is that your opponents can easily muster up real, actual examples of the acute risks that women can face during pregnancy and childbirth.
And you have to resort to ridiculous hypotheticals to try to demonstrate your point.
#356 loofasword
I have on my desktop, a list of approximately 40 horrific side effects of pregnancy. I could paste them but, would isu care? The answer I am guessing is, no! :P
bobo:
My sister probably lived through about 29 of those side effects. Yes she managed to survive 2 1/2 months of bed rest, carried to term and now loves her daughter dearly. That she is rich, has a strong support network, has access to world-class socialized medicine and was at a point in her life where she could afford to step back from her career were all important factors in her ability to choose to endure a truly horrific pregnancy and very risky birth.
Not every woman is as lucky, and even she knows it.
Fetuses are incapable of choosing anything. Therefore it impossible to “force” a fetus to do anything. To use the word “force” implies that the fetus has a will, which can be contravened. It implies that the fetus has desires, and aborting the fetus is against the fetus’ desires. This is one of your presuppositions that people are talking about.
Indeed, what if the injured person crossed against the light? Under your reasoning, the way to hold this person responsible for their bad decision is to deny them appropriate medical care. Didn’t want that piece of metal in your kidney? Well, you should have thought of that before you crossed the street, you immoral
slutjaywalker!You assert that it is different, but you cannot explain your reasoning for thinking it is different. Your argument fails to convince.
Factually false. Women donate the use of their UTERUS to the fetus! Not to mention their entire bloodstream, calcium from their bones, the use of their immune system, and a certain percentage of all the nutrients they consume while pregnant.
Hey, how unsurprising–another anti-choicer who thinks that pregnancy is like a lovely stroll in the park. It’s almost as if their positions run contrary to reality itself, and they are forced to pretend that pregnancy is far different than the reality of pregnancy in order to continue supporting an unsupportable position.
Insurance for pregnancy would include both abortion and prenatal medical care. What you said here has no bearing on any other part of this discussion, since we’re not comparing health care systems.
Once again: getting an abortion IS the responsible thing to do in the case of unwanted pregnancy. Forcing women to have children against their will results in more women and children living in poverty, living in abusive home situations, and results in women dying. YOU are the one who is endorsing the irresponsible course of action here.
…and OF COURSE the fetus is male!
@loofasword
All of your “self defense” examples,
Well, self defense argument comes from abortitionists.
and your entire argument that having sex automatically binds a woman to any and all consequences arising from that act,
All are bind to the consequences of our choices. Cause-efect bind.
along with your unsupported position that unique human DNA and “potential” personhood equate to full personhood are presuppositions.
Definition of person
noun (plural people or persons)
1a human being regarded as an individual:
Its an organism, DNA states it is human and we can tell him apart from the mother.
My position is fully supported.
Your state that my position is unsupported is an unsupported position.
I don’t agree with you that a cluster of cells,
The woman is also a cluster of cells.
or even a fetus with the first glimmers of brain activity has the equivalent rights and entitlements as the woman in whose body it resides.
An human has equivalent rights to an other human.
You’ve been trying to argue a consistent position (I’ll give you that)
Nope, I haven’t tried: my position is consistent and argumented.
and I’m suspecting you want your argument to be persuasive.
It is imposible if the others make another pressumptions.
But you need to back waaaay up because you’re just talking past most of the people you’re trading insults with.
I’m have no clear what the phrasal verbs you are using mean (back way up and talk past).
Until you can persuade your opponents, instead of merely asserting, that an unborn potential person should be privileged above the rights of the woman whose body it’s inhabiting, then you’ve got no traction whatsoever.
First I’m not saying that is a potential person but an actual person.
Second, it’s not about privilege but rights confrontation.
And it starts with your presuppositions.
I’m not the only one who uses presuppositions, so you don’t have the right to put the blame only on me.
With which most of us probably disagree.
As I disagree with your presuppositions.
I know I do.
No problem with that.
Have you read my previous messages?
I recomended someone to read Isaac Asimov’s “Reason”. There one can see the root trouble of discussion.
On the other hand, it would be interesting to know if you are using double-thinking in the abortion issu. (See “1984” book).
quote: “and your entire argument that having sex automatically binds a woman to any and all consequences arising from that act,
All are bind to the consequences of our choices. Cause-efect bind.”
Then I guess people should be denied treatment for STDS. If you have sex, and there is a risk of getting an STd, you asked for it, and should have to live with it. Living with the STD is the ‘responsible’ thing to do:P
@Chris W. #345:
Dietary decisions aren’t active involvement?
Vitamins, malnutrition, fasting, ethanol… even if they were routine before, they’re still choices that affect the outcome.
To clarify, which of the following are you asking?
A) why should we hold moral rules?
B) why should we hold any of these scenarios as the moral rules?
If B, it’s closely related to A, but if Justin has special merits in mind for his argument it may be a while before he notices your question.
…and OF COURSE the fetus is male!
Fetus is either male or female.
Your sarcasm out of contest makes clear you are trolling me.
#364 Isu
Try to actually respond to arguments, instead of pretending to be a victim of trolling so that you can get out of answering the rebuttals.
#314
[Sarcasm on]Ohhhhh! This message has sooo many arguments and all of them correct, that I couldn’t do anything againt that perfec logic and rationalism.[Sarcasm off]
You are getting on my nerves. Good job, trolls.
Definition of person
noun (plural people or persons)
1a human being regarded as an individual:
That’s your support? A dictionary definition? You do realize that dictionaries track the common usage of words, but do not create the meaning of those words, right?
What if I don’t agree with your dictionary? What if your dictionary meaning doesn’t automatically extend to the larger context of the argument that we’re having?
That you have taken a dictionary definition as your starting point does not mean that your argument is philosophically or logically valid.
In fact, demanding that your opponent accept a dictionary definition as the foundation of an ethical argument is pretty much the definition of smuggled presuppositions (see what I did there?).
Nope, I haven’t tried: my position is consistent and argumented.
Nope. It’s based on an entire raft of smuggled presuppositions. You should consult the dictionary definitions of “argue” and “assert”. You’ve got the two confused.
All are bind to the consequences of our choices. Cause-efect bind.
No we’re not. Because all consequences are not discrete and identifiable. In all human societies we have concepts of “fairness” and proportionality. In other words, we have an innate moral sense that people shouldn’t receive considerably more than they give and they also shouldn’t suffer more than necessary. Of course every society draws those lines differently but the basic premise is the same.
In western legal and ethical systems we have procedures to help us determine not only who is responsible, but also how much they are responsible. We differentiate between negligence and culpability, between action and intent.
So, for example, flicking my cigarette butt into your driveway may make me in some way responsible for the fact that your house burned down. But not completely responsible, because the fire was “caused” by a natural gas leak that you knew about last week but hadn’t gotten around to fixing. I’m not going to go to jail for 20 years, because I didn’t extinguish my cigarette properly. Were you to bring a tort against me, any damages awarded would be lessened by the extent to which you contributed your own loss by not maintaining your property.
But according to you, in all circumstances, a woman is completely and fully responsible for every consequence of even a single act of procreative sex. Whether contraception was or was not used, whether the protection failed, if the woman was drunk or high when she “decided” to have sex, whether or not she was misled by her partner… In all possible circumstances, the woman, and only the woman, bears full responsibility, and all the risks of carrying a pregnancy to term.
Far from being coherent and well-supported, your position is contrary to some 2,500 years of western ethical and legal reasoning.
People react to your incredible myopia with disdain and you can only accuse them of trolling because you don’t even know what a presupposition is.
#366
do you deny that you are indifferent to the suffering that women will go through if abortion is illegal in all cases?
you think that a fertilized egg has the right to injure maim and kill a woman
thus, you want women to die
you want abortion to be illegal, it follows that you want women to die :P
isu: care for a list of the 40 horrific side effects of pregnancy? do you want to actually learn what pregnancy can do to a woman? someone who is genuinely interested in debate would love to learn, you, I am not so sure. So which is it?
1a human being regarded as an individual:
I’ve highlighted the problem in your “definition”. This is your presupposition at work. We have not agreed on how to regard a human being as an individual, but you skate right past that, demanding that we accept your position as the correct one.
You need to start with “regard” not with “human being” or with “person”.
I put this phrase into google translator, and look what it gave me:
Waaaaahhhh! I am a big baby and I can’t rebut your arguments so I’m going to whine.
Who knew google translate could be so accurate?
And, of course, it’s patently obvious that getting an abortion is just another of the consequences that follows from getting pregnant.
Bobo:
I’d like to read that list of pregnancy side effects if you don’t mind
#375 tony, rather than flood the comments section with a messy cut and paste, I am just going to direct you to the original link
This is one of the BEST pro-choice manifestos that I have ever come across:
http://idwarrior.wordpress.com/2012/04/22/no-compromise-no-surrender/
RE: usufruct (from way upthread)
Usufruct is a law about property. In the Roman system, property included slaves. Slaves, but not free Romans.
Isu: think really really hard about the ethical foundations of your position if you want to assert that a civil law right of enjoyment extends to the bodies of modern women.
One other thing: usufruct allows for the use as long as the property is not damaged or destroyed. Every woman who endures a pregnancy is damaged in some way shape or form. Her body is never the same, and sometimes the effects are serious and lasting.
If you serious propose that usufruct legally estops a woman’s right to abortion, who exactly can she sue for the damage to her body? Her child?
You cannot hold out that you respect the autonomy of women in any way, shape or form if you seriously use usufruct as your backstop. You explicitly support the enslavement of women. You explicitly invalidate your argument that the abortion issue can be reduced to a conflict of rights which the unborn child deserves to win.
If you really thought about this, you might even get a glimpse of why some people think your position is despicable.
@loofasword
That’s your support? A dictionary definition? You do realize that dictionaries track the common usage of words, but do not create the meaning of those words, right?
Dictionaries doesn’t create the meaning of those words, but they do DESCRIBE THE MEANING of those words.
You say correctly about “common usage”. It’s so common that I use it and you are using the word “person” in an uncommon way if you don’t agree.
What’s is your support to say the human person is non-person? Your ad hoc definition?
What if I don’t agree with your dictionary?
What if a racist don’t agree either and feels justificated to kill you because you are non-person according to his definition?
What if your dictionary meaning doesn’t automatically extend to the larger context of the argument that we’re having?
The word extends to my arguments when I use the word “person”.
That you have taken a dictionary definition as your starting point does not mean that your argument is philosophically or logically valid.
Doesn’t mean that it is invalid either.
To talk about something there must be an idea of that something and I have used the common one.
In fact, demanding that your opponent accept a dictionary definition as the foundation of an ethical argument is pretty much the definition of smuggled presuppositions (see what I did there?).
Your wannabe undefined person concept to say the human fetus is not a person is “smuggling presuppositions”. I have shown the concept I’m using while you are hidding yours as a smuggler does.
I had my doubts when you started the smuggling presuppositions issue. I know now that by your complaining about my use of the common sense of the word that you are using rhetorics.
I have experience with rhetorical ones. They always end up “winning” the discussion. So to save time, I give up. Put yourself any “medals” you want and be greeted by your “team”.
Time to follow Gregory Powell’s advice in “Reason”.
bobo:
Thank you for the link.
I knew only a fraction of those side effects.
I’m glad I read that, but I’m genuinely horrified. I knew pregnancy was very difficult for women, but I had no idea how horrific and life changing it can frequently be.
It makes me all the more determined to support a woman’s right to choose. Full stop.
(I’m also filled with more disgust towards those humans like Isu who are utter scum)
#379 yeah tony, after reading that list I felt sick. forced pregnancy is nothing short of institutionalized torture!
makes me so sad for the women of the world who are forced, on a daily basis, to carry children, sometimes a new one every 12 months, until they drop dead form exhaustion
it is truly horrifying:((
No one has to lend their body to the life support of another person, so why do you ask it of unwillingly pregnant women? It doesn’t matter if it is a person or if it were conscious–which it doesn’t have the brain structures for.
I came across some interesting while looking for the news story of a girl who was killed by her father due to mandatory abortion notification laws. Sociological research finds that where U.S. states make minors have to get parental consent for an abortion or put in place strategies to delay abortions, the number of children under five killed by their parents rises 13%. When states put in mandatory parental notification laws, the number rises 7%. They suggest that barriers to abortion cause more children to be born into high-risk situations. Link:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22497846
bobo:
(from your link)
I found this quite interesting (actually, everything I read was interesting, but in a thread discussing the “responsibilities”* women have when having sex, I thought this might be a little relevant).
*The use of scare quotes is because I do not believe women have responsibilities to anyone other than themselves and their partner(s) when having sex. Certainly not to any potential side effects like pregnancy.
@Isu #378:
For the curious, Reason was a short story by Asimov.
Robots invent a religion, worshipping the orbital power station they’re on. They ignore all further instruction and obsessively do the things they imagine their god commands of them, wholly disregarding how their actions will affect people on earth.
Two humans onboard try to argue, but the head robot responds like Ray Comfort. On a bad day.
Powell says the robot’s being logical, but is forgoing empiricism to only use postulates, Descartes-style rationalism. This reduces the robot’s arguments to unshakeable faith-based assertions and excuses.
Hi again Sky Captain,
You’re absolutely right, nutrition choices would almost certainly affect the child’s life, so eating’s a bad example. And in any case, this isn’t the relevent point for me to harp on.
I did indeed mean your option B, not A. Justin laid out an argument for option 2 in the above three moral lines in the sand. I spit out the two others from the top of my head, and I bet we could find a dozen other ways to create the morally distinct group of entities privileged with being classified as ‘murdered’ when killed. Justin accused his opponent of defining a biological category without arguing for it as a moral distinction. Unfortunately I believe Justin is guilty of the same critique.
You’re probably right, Sky Captain. A lot of bitter arguing running down this thread. He’ll likely miss this small piece. Maybe I’ll email the RD team with it.
Cheers, ~Chris
Sky Captain:
Ah!
This explains why *someone* is so obsessed with this story. Unshakeable faith-based assertions.
Was his advice to shriek “YOUR KILLING A BABY!” in a klaxon like voice ad nauseum?
Is it to remove bodily autonomy from women?
Is it to pretend to have some moral high ground when you can’t honestly claim the nadir?
Greagory Powell talks about reason.
He says everyone who uses reason also uses postulates which are taken by assumption and reinforced by faith.
postulates
1 suggest or assume the existence, fact, or truth of (something) as a basis for reasoning, discussion, or belief:
Reasoning uses postulates. They are the base (the lowest part or edge of something, especially the part on which it rests or is supported), the principle (a fundamental truth or proposition that serves as the foundation for a system of belief or behaviour or for a chain of reasoning).
He says clearly that he also has unshakeable faith-based assertions (“We have ours and Cutie has his”).
He also realises that it is impossible to convince someone who has different postulates than yours, thus he give up arguing to convince.
Well, this is my final message in this thread. I have shown my postulates and my conclusions derived from reasoning with them. You can take them or leave them.
One last thought for those who “support” that the human embryo or fetus is non-human.
Maybe it will be the day that you lost one you want and to consolate you someone would say something like “Don’t worry, you have lost a cluster of cells!” “Don’t worry, you have lost a clump of cells!” “Don’t worry, you have lost a thing not a person!”. This would be poetic justice.
Thank goodness.
The idiotic fuckwit is gone.
There’s the lesson Isu gleaned.
When people say you’re wrong about something, call it a postulate.
Then you can handwave disagreement as incompatible worldviews.
And everyone else must have been incapable of listening all along.
I know now that by your complaining about my use of the common sense of the word that you are using rhetorics.
Un-fucking-believable. I’m calling him out on his selective use of one meaning of a pivotal word, but I’m the one using rhetoric.
Goodbye and good riddance.
This would be poetic justice.
This is a person who has never experienced any of what he’s lecturing other people about. And because he’s male, he’ll never have to.
@Isu 387 This would be poetic justice.
As someone who has actually had several first trimester miscarriages of wanted pregnancies , one of which required a D/C as it was incomplete, I have to tell you from my point of view that:
a) None of my health care providers said anything like that because they understood what I lost was a “potential” person, that would have ,if the pregnancy went full term be a new member of my family. It was a loss but not the same as the loss of my actual born daughter would be, not even close.
b) I am just as pro-choice as I was before, pregnancy was not easy for me and if I had not been close to good medical care could have been disastrous.
Its the pregnant persons decision whether they want to continue a pregnancy or not. The bodily autonomy, needs, wants and health of the actual person who is carrying the pregnancy come before anything else. So please don’t use what is an actual lived experience for some of us as some sob story: But how would you feel if you lost a baby/miscarried!???!
What you are trying to do in saying that pisses me off just as much as the idea that pregnant people who want abortions should have the baby and give it up to some “deserving” couple who can’t have children…just NO. Women are not incubators. Women are people.
What a coward Isu is.
Isu does not care about life. Isu cares about proving that he is morally superior to everyone, especially those pesky women!
I wonder about the educational system in his country since he thinks he actually accomplished anything being here. I think he believes he won the argument.
Tony, since you seem to be interested in how women suffer from pregnancy – I dug up this video for you:
http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/video/2012/09/19/every-congressman-had-to-take-this-test-birth-control-would-be-100-free-all-tomorro
The fact that some women can spend 2-3 days in labour is just…wow.
I am a woman and I am absolutely terrified of childbirth. Ever since I was a little girl, I have just been scared shitless of ever having to go through that. So, the fact that some ignorant misogynist asshole politician (or someone like isu) thinks that I should be FORCED to do something against my will without ANY regard for how it will affect me physiologically/mentaly just makes my blood boil
Fuck those assholes.
p.s. oh, and after reading a radfem site, I learned that throughout history, in many cultures, women have been forbidden from complaining or even making a sound while suffering the intense pain of pregnancy and childbirth. no, these female slaves were just supposed to take it, like good little minions.
What is the purpose of having two men debate an issue that they have no stake in, while by definition excluding the only voices that actually count for anything on the issue?
^^^ Spambot commenter detected (Podcast RSS Feeds).
One last thought for those who “support” that the human embryo or fetus is non-human. – Isu
For the record, Isu, if you ever come back…
The fact that you make this erroneous statement illustrates quite clearly that you simply weren’t listening. No one said it wasn’t human life; we made the entirely correct point that it was a non-person, a potential person.
Science makes the distiction between human life and personhood. The law makes the distinction between human life and separate, independently-existing personhood.
You make no such distinction. You equate human life with personhood, entitled to the same human rights as actual persons. That’s where this entire debate has been stymied, because you simply ignored this point.
The fact that neither science nor law support your definition of personhood is apparently irrelevant to you.
I am so pleased that I work in the NHS and not in the American health care system. I am a gynaecologist, I care for women who are distraught because they can’t get pregnant, because they have become pregnant or because they have lost their pregnancy; and all deserve sympathy and respect. In the UK, and in the US, at least 20% of pregnancies miscarry and 25% of the remainder are terminated. Terminations occur in all social and religious groups and at all ages. It strikes me that a fair proportion of bible bashing evangelists are being hypocritical, either on their own, or their family’s behalf.
WTF are you smoking Ghylly? Noone here is criticizing women who cannot get pregnant or have miscarried????
The primary abortion rights argument is: Who owns my body? It has to be me, or I’m not free. Otherwise I am a slave (or potential slave) of the state. If I decline to allow my body to be used by another, the result cannot be murder, because murder requires removing a life support system that isn’t my body and doesn’t belong to me. A real life scenario would be conjoined twins, where there are two individuals but only one complete body. The incomplete twin is dependant on the life function of the full-bodied twin. This situation can create any number of problem scenarios for both twins. Every court would allow either of the twins (as adults) to to demand a separation surgery, regardless of of the wishes of or results to the second twin. No one can be forced to be a life support system! (Therefore: not murder.) The life of the zygote or fetus or twin is secondary to the choice of the person whose body is being used, no matter the consequences of that choice or the history of past allowed useage. I own my body. You own your body. That is what freedom is.
The Pro-lifers have taken great liberties by calling abortion murder; homicidal. When abortions, on the whole, are mercy killings where a woman doesn’t feel capable to carry or raise a child, and terminates as an act of compassion. Yet this, as we know, goes right over the Pro-lifers’ heads.
So it’s best to agree with them that fetuses shouldn’t be aborted for other than health reasons. Then, while everyone’s on the same page, you expound how this is exactly why it’s imperative to provide early termination, before quickening, preferably by the sixth week. When the umbilical and embryo have not yet differentiated, making the biological mass nonhuman: a miss-carriage instead of feticide.
#405 if only that would work peterfan. idiots like ‘isu’ upthread believe that an egg, at the very moment of fertilization, is a person, worthy of citizenship…etc
I was amused by one of John B’s rebuttals that Justin was using an argument that was impossible for him to counter, and that this was “unfair”.
Was Justin to say “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to confront you with an argument you couldn’t handle. How ungentlemanly of me”?
Of course, it’s possible that Justin’s argument was invalid, but John should have addressed its validity in a means other than whining “but that’s too haaaard”.
I also was amazed by John B’s contention that the existence of the debate proved him right. Yes, a debate occurs because people disagree – that people disagree doesn’t automatically make one side correct.
Finally, it was sad to hear someone plead for arguments based on logic appeal so blatantly to emotion: “Chopped up flesh grosses you out, so I’m right!” Sad.
I am prochoice. I do not condone abortion, but I believe every child deserves a chance to have a good life and many times that just isn’t possible. The world is overpopulated. Women are impregnated via rape on a daily basis all over the world. Women are denied birth control and abortions. I think it is more ethical to have an abortion than it is to have a child you cannot properly take care of.
I am not against people who are prolife, but I do think many of them are realistic about the realities of the limited choices women have in underdeveloped countries where rape, poverty, starvation, and many other factors make it humane to have abortions.
In the west we are privileged, there is welfare, child support, tons of social support for single moms, and they are still the poorest of the poor. Think about how much worse it is for parents, and I’m not limiting this to single moms, to provide a decent life for their kids.
This kind of debate on vague boundaries is utterly pointless.
The only defensible position in the abortion debate is this one: Any person has total sovereignty of their own body.
You may not like it when someone has an abortion but as it is not your body it is not your business.
Why do you want to debate whether abortion is murder or not? What difference does it make? There are lots of examples of acceptable cases of murder in our society. Capital punishment and self-defense, for example. Putting a term-limit such as 3 months on the abortion limits does much to ease the conscience because before abortion was legalized- there was no such control- and illegal abortionists were aborting babies god-knows-how-far-along-they-were, and god knows what medical procedures or lack thereof was being used on our women. That was much worse murder by society perpertrated on women and babies than we have ever seen since women have been allowed to make their own decisions regarding their own reproductive rights and health-care.
John B., a fetus is in fact frequently a parasite. Some of them kill their hosts, and more of them severely maim their hosts: look up fetal-maternal competition, which is a well-understood biological phenomenon.
The fact that a fetus is a parasite is one you were unable to dispute. You merely complain that it creates emotional reactions which you don’t like. Well, tough luck, face facts man.
If the pregnant woman decides that the fetus is worth it, fine. People have the right to retain parasites, and sometimes parasites are actually commensal. If she doesn’t want it, if it’s hurting her, it’s certainly her right to remove it, and if it’s non-viable, that means killing it. We kill things all the time. Even vegetarians do.
I doubt John B. believes that we have the right to force him to suffer or die for the sake of an embryo (and I could contrive bizarre situations involving organ transplants where I might be able to make that happen).
Forced-birth is a really immoral attitude because it fundamentally denies the human rights of women, while elevating a fetus to levels of importance we don’t even give to Nobel Peace Prize winners. (We don’t believe that Nobel Prize winners have the right to use random women as their life support systems without those women’s consent — well, at least I don’t believe that!)
Hi Justin,
I just listened to your debate on iTunes and thought to contribute a few comments since you asked for feedback, although after 400+ of them I doubt you’re even reading them anymore.
Your conclusion of the debate was that your opponent failed to address your opening argument about desires and murder. I personally do not follow your line of logic here. Assuming that your definition of murder as the killing of desires (even if background desires) is correct, how did you make the leap from consciousness to desires?
You stated that a fetus is not capable of conscious thought until after 20 weeks or so, but does that automatically make them capable of desires? Take even a newborn baby crying to be fed; is that because of an inner desire to hold on to existence or simply a hunger instinct making the baby uncomfortable without which the baby would be perfectly content to starve to death?
Your “background desires” argument does not seem to apply here, since, unlike the comatose person or the distraught wife, the newborn or the fetus, although conscious, never had the chance to form those desires initially. The same argument could be applied to severely mentally disabled adults and by this logic a case could well be made that it would be morally worse to kill a healthy dog than a 25 week fetus, a newborn or a disabled adult.
So in essence, your opening argument needs considerably more work, in my opinion.
As far as the rest of the debate, you came out stronger in part 2 from a debate technique perspective, but your argument was somewhat “under the belt” in that it took advantage of inherent flaws in the nature of the debate itself. You mention that a claim to biological humanity is not sufficient to prove moral worth without additional justification; without showing that there is something about being a member of a particular primate family that also entails a right to life. And this justification your opponent never provided. But this is a problem with how the debate was framed to begin with in that it ignored the presuppositions each of you would obviously bring to the discussion, presuppositions which really should have been addressed first for the current debate to have value and bring additional clarity to the topic.
Your opponent approaches the discussion from the premise that human beings were brought into existence by an intelligent entity with purpose and intentionality; mainly in order to interact intelligently with them. This sets them apart as of higher moral worth than other primates or other organism who were meant to fulfill a mainly supportive role.
You, on the other hand, consider (I assume) human beings as the result of an undirected and unintentional step by step, continuous process and therefore nothing more than slightly further developed primates.
Each of these presuppositions leads naturally to different conclusions and debating the conclusions without addressing the presuppositions is like having a tug-of-war with each party pulling on different ropes. Instead, you might have chosen one of three other options:
1) Have a prerequisite debate on the presuppositions.
2) Accept the presuppositions of your opponent for the duration of the debate and attempt to prove your point even within those presuppositions.
3) Ask your opponent to make his case on your turf.
Needless to say all three of these approaches are less than ideal. The first could become all time consuming so that one never gets to the actual topic at hand while the second and third options put one of the participants at a significant disadvantage. But at least with such debates there is the potential for progress. With the current format, the opponents invariably talk past each other and no progress is possible. Yet sadly, most debates I come across these days tend to be framed this way, to deal with the fruit rather than the root of the problem.
And let me just add one more point before I close. If we were to accept your opponent’s presuppositions about the nature of man, it is fairly easy to see how he would come to his conclusions in regards to the morality of abortion even without a clear explanation on his part. If however we accept your presuppositions about the nature of reality it isn’t necessarily clear how you arrive at your conclusions in regards to those cases where you consider killing to be clearly immoral. Are you temporarily borrowing the moral standard of your opponent to make your argument?
If human beings are the product of natural causes and just a step above other organisms, what is your basis for any type of morality or for differentiating between humans and other organisms at all? I am not saying that such a basis cannot exist, but it is not something obvious and definitely needs a thorough explanation; an explanation of how this view of morality emerges naturally from your perspective on the nature of reality. So in my opinion, a case for naturalistic morality is necessary before you can present the arguments in your opening statement.
The extrapolation from Desirism is an interesting angle I’ve never considered. As alluded to above, though, the implications of this argument run the same risks as identified in the critiques of desirism, such as the qualifications and implications of varying desires (though I am somewhat sympathetic to it- Alonzso and Luke @ Conversations ft Pale Blue Dot did a nice podcast series on it).
There are some uniquely proper challenges in this context as well, such as WHEN, exactly, the desires are functional. We could say, as philosophers have said, that teleology is present in a latent form in all things, on a continuum. Does the unconscious growth of an embryo have some form of purpose (to grow) and isn’t purpose some form of desire? I wouldn’t say that they have inherent rights for this reason though, but the continuum argument could afford it some consideration. Personally, I don’t buy that argument. I actually think there’s more weight in the notion that there is no victim until there is. I have yet to hear a thought experiment against that that considers the difference between a being *that has had memories at some point* (or we could say, desires) and one that hasn’t.
It was annoying to hear John B. rephrase his ad hominem as ANOTHER ad hominem. Saying that pro-choice people have been doing something disingenuous for some reason IS AD HOMINEM. Period. And it was interesting for him to disparage ‘outside standard’ ‘personhood lists’ that we actually use and then go on to use an intuitive thought experiment to distinguish human nature. The lab fire/petri-dish thought experiment clearly shows we have other intuitions concerning human value and/or human nature. He must concede that moral intuitions in thought experiments are problematic and can only be taken with a grain of salt, because they are not veridical anyway. Along the same lines, perhaps even closer, are the examples of when we extend privileges to humans based upon intelligence and capability. These are both examples of standard qualities and examples of privileges. I would anticipate a rejoinder against priviledges as not being rights, but I would argue that they are just a watered down version of rights on the continuum of actions that we allow members of society to perform. This is intuitive enough to be in practice in law, though it’s another thing to go beyond thought experiments. In any case, the continuum is there and ‘outside standards’ affect it.
And as Justin pointed out, the examples of disgust are not examples of unethical behavior. Why? Because there was no victim in each case. Disgust, as psychologists will tell you, is highly vulnerable to cultural influence too, not something that is likely to line up veridically with absolute values.
Even when disgust has a physiological basis, it’s a non-sequitur. I LITERALLY GAG at the taste of canned beets, yet not at a picture of an aborted embryo. Is this my intuition telling me that it’s more immoral to can beets than it is to abort an embryo… and that it is therefore true ontologically (to a moral realist)? Ironically, apologists (like JP Holding) call this the “argument from outrage” and it is considered a no-no.
I also wanted to agree with a poster above who noticed, as I did, that he kept framing the embryo as innocent… when so many theists believe in original sin. Problematic? You bet, because now they have start making distinctions of their own, based on… WHAT EXACTLY? Abilities? Can’t use the bible. From what I understand, even young children aren’t counted in the OT censuses and we know they’re not innocent in the womb or Yahweh wouldn’t have intentionally killed them in the Flood. As far as I’m concerned, any rational god worth its salt would not kill a “person” that is “innocent.” If it truly is an “innocent person” from conception, no one told Yahweh. And to allow Him to kill them, in the Flood or other genocides in the OT, and then call Him “THE ULTIMATE GOOD,” makes ‘goodness’ incomprehensible.
Last, he fails to understand all the way up to the end, in the final suicide analogy, that it is the presence of background desires and not necessarily particular conscious desires that Justin is arguing are what make the defense tenable. Unless I understand it wrong. That’s entirely possible.
I (like a few others on here) wasn’t completely satisfied with Justin’s performance on this one.
A few things I would have liked to see him mention:
1. A sperm and an egg are a potential human adult as well, so is it murder to use contraception?
2. If aborting a fetus to protect the life of the mother is permissible (which I think John agreed to) then we have ALREADY made the moral judgement. Suppose the survival choice was between a 2 month old child and a mother. Humans will almost 100% of the time chose the child, no matter the circumstances.
3. A fertilized embryo’s chances of being born and making it to 2 years old is remarkably low. Abortions occur frequently in humans naturally. If the pro-lifers want to be consistent, they really need to spearhead some sort of research program to help prevent these natural abortions, since natural abortions would then be analogous to some sort of plague of epic proportions.
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Someone just referred to a baby as a “parasite”…….
That completely removed all support of abortion I might have had.
Abortion is murder, simple as that. You wouldn’t kill your 10 year old if he/she were taking up too much time/money. Why would you murder an unborn child to prevent that?