Pro-life or pro-choice?

[Jerome Scuggs]

im pro whatever makes telcat go away, if i have to time travel and murder her fetus then fuck it roe vs wade it is

[Bioture]

im pro whatever makes telcat go away, if i have to time travel and murder her fetus then fuck it roe vs wade it is

We can place her abortion in the rape/incest statistic, thus making it ok.

[gran guerrero]

I don't know all the specifics of stem cell research, but if we are killing embryos for research, I would be against that - it comes at too high a price.

The controversy surrounding stem cell research led to an intense debate about ethics. Up until the recent years, the research method mainly focused on Embryonic Stem Cells, which involves taking tissue from an aborted embryo to get proper material to study. This is typically done just days after conception or between the 5th and 9th week.
Since then, researchers have moved on to more ethical study methods, such as Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (iPS). iPS are artificially derived from a non-pluripotent cell, such as adult somatic cells.
This is probably an important advancement in stem cell research, since it allows researchers to obtain pluripotent stem cells, which are important in research, without the controversial use of embryos.

Pros

Stem cell research can potentially help treat a range of medical problems. It could lead humanity closer to better treatment and possibly cure a number of diseases:

• Parkinson’s Disease
• Alzheimer’s Disease
• Heart Diseases, Stroke and Diabetes (Type 1)
• Birth Defects
• Spinal Cord Injuries
• Replace or Repair Damaged Organs
• Reduced Risk of Transplantation (You could possibly get a copy of your own heart in a heart-transplantation in the future
• Stem cells may play a major role in cancer

Better treatment of these diseases could also give significant social benefits for individuals and economic gains for society
Cons

• "We should not mess with human life."
• "Humans should not be trying to play God"
• Some argue that stem cell research in the far future can lead to knowledge on how to clone humans. It is hard to say whether this is true, but we have seen devastating consequences of other research-programs, even with good intentions, such as nuclear research.

http://explorable.com/stem-cell-pros-and-cons.html

[Epinephrine]

Bioture:

What all your points boil down to is that you firmly believe that a fetus is human. Thus when you talk about expanding 'human rights', you are directly implying that a fetus is human.

If you are stating that a baby exists at conception, you are directly implying that the fetus is human.

Therefore I have tried to frame my position in terms of 'even if you believe it is human, we still...'. For instance, I have pointed out a number of ways where as a modern progressive liberal-democratic society we believe that killing of humans is justified. It's not like people who die in wars give any consent to being killed either. Yet you ignore this with a magical 'well fetusus are different'.

For me there is no controversy. A fetus is 100% dependent on it's mother for absolutely everything. A baby is not. A fetus turns into a baby when it comes out of the mother. Once it's out, it either dies (because it's too early), or it lives (because outside forces keep it alive). Anyone can take care of a viable baby once it leaves the mother. Absolutely no one can take care of the fetus except for the mother.

Barring FORCING the mother to go through birth/caesearian if the fetus is above a certain age (i.e. all >24 week fetuses cannot be aborted, but must be forced to be born if the mother wants to end the pregnancy), forcing a mother to carry a fetus to term is having society tell the mother what they must do with their own body.

I believe this is a huge human rights issue. In most of human history, males have been telling females what to do with their bodies. In many places (i.e. Saudi Arabia) they still do to large degree. If we are to believe that women truly have control over their own bodies, then if we want to extent that very human right to both sexes, then we must allow abortions.

Really, the entire argument over whether a fetus is a baby or not, is religious and cultural. In the past, no one considered even a recently born baby a human (in many traditional societies they don't even bother naming children until after a certain age) in many cultures. In some cultures people do.

There will never be any scientific consensus on this because it is not an issue of science. Therefore the only argument is cultural/religious.

And the only thing I can say is that, if you are to have a truly multicultural society that respects other cultures and religions, then the state cannot impose views of one group over another. Therefore abortion is rightly a personal choice that the mother makes by law and not any other way around.

If you do not want a truly multicultural society that respects other point of views, then by all means ban abortion.

[Bioture]

Dear Epi,

I don't know how many times I've had to say it in this thread, but I've never suggested banning abortion. I've also explicitly stated that laws would not change anything. I've only tried to explain why I think it is wrong, and why we should do something about it (mostly in the educational/preventive sense) because it is a serious issue.

It is a serious issue not only because it means we have to tell a female what she can or cannot do, but because we need to justify potential murder. I have directly addressed your presentation of "Killings are allowed when..." and not ignored it. I think it would be easier if I did, but if we go with your one analogy (out of the several you've given) a bit further - in wars, people sign up to fight. Fetuses do not sign up to be aborted. Not counting the innocents that die as collateral damage, the similarity still does not hold. There will continue to be people who believe that fetuses are indeed special. I've only tried to explain to you why I consider that it is so.

I've also made no attempt to make this a religious argument. I can, but I find it easier to approach the issue on a secular level. It's funny that multiculturalism means that I must accept what is clearly (to me) an injustice. That is perhaps more disturbing to me than the argument of whether or not a fetus is actually a person.

On second thought, it's very interesting that when it comes to abortion, you have to belong to two camps of thought. Clearly if I'm against the killing of unborn babies, I must be for banning abortion. If I am pro-choice, then it must mean that I don't think fetuses are human beings. It's simply more complicated than that. Start by reading the Roe v. Wade case that people love to cite: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/script...=410&invol=113

[T3l Ca7]

In the thread quoted above you started (named “Faith in Humanity”) you stated that you had no faith in humanity and went on to say, “that human are generally design to be not very bright” and that “cockroaches would be a more successful specie if there is to be a nuclear war”. Reading that post you make it sound like humanity is doomed by its own hand.

Yet now in this thread you say you have faith in humanity and that the majority of humans have the ability to make correct choices.

Remember my pet thread: Have faith because I must ? I think you answered your own question 6 years ago in that thread.

Why do I have faith in the human race even though this faith is seemed to be so undeserving? Because I MUST. Because it is better than not having such a faith.

Mark Twain once said, “It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt”.

Mark Twain was such a smart ass, why do you think he's dead? :sweatdrop:

Just between you and me, kz, trolling makes me happy (and it doesn't seem to harm anyone else). I get this sugar rush whenever I troll.

Now jokes aside. I keep my stand, that we are doomed, unless we change for better. But there is always hope and human kind is always evolving, for the better. It is a bit like you have started to training for the upcoming marathon and the cut off time for the first 7.0km mark is 50 mins, which currently takes you an hour to finish. Do you quit now do you train harder?

[Epinephrine]

Bio, I've been very careful in my posts not to state what I believe you personally believe in so let's leave your beliefs (whatever they may be) out of this. I am only talking about generalities because if we get personal, this debate goes nowhere.

I think that the debate very much so rests on whether or not one truly believe deep down that a fetus is a human or not. If one deep down believes fetuses are humans, then that person will obviously care what happens to the fetus. If you deep down do not believe it to be true, then your level of caring is vastly less.

Now I acknowledge there are grey areas. People who believe deep down that fetuses are humans, may still allow exceptions to their thinking, so that in some cases they may believe that it is permissible to have abortion. This is akin to how as I've said, while most people believe the killing of other humans is wrong, most people believe in exceptions to the rule which I have outlined.

Similarly, even people who don't believe that a fetus is truly a human probably would not be supportive of gross and obvious flaunting of this (I dunno like for instance, killing of an almost born fetus, and then mutilating it and putting on display or something). Sort of like how even people who eat meat may prefer to only eat free-range chickens or something.

That said, if you don't believe, you're much more likely to accept all the arguments for allowing abortion without reservation, while the other way around you probably wouldn't care as much. The problem is, no matter how good those other arguments are, it probably still wouldn't change your mind that much, and the average person's final decision on this will mostly be based upon their beliefs and to what degree they believe in it.


My issue is when words like 'murder' are used. Murder indicates a very strong judgment in terms of belief. To murder someone by any definition means a premeditated killing of another out of malice, and generally has evil connotations to it. It is without question always bad to murder someone. Therefore, if you define abortion as 'murder', you are stating unambiguous that it is always wrong to kill a fetus, and that it is done with malice towards the fetus. Remember, to commit a crime, you must both do it and have the intent to do so.

In fact in a large number of abortions, the killing of the fetus has nothing to do with malice towards the fetus at all. The fetus is strictly speaking, collateral damage. That is why the war analogy is useful. Just as civilian deaths are unintended but understood to be unavoidable, war is usually justified for a 'greater good'. Similarly, abortion generally has a 'greater good' and the fetus is the 'collateral damage'.

How could this be so? Well, we look at all the reasons why someone might have an abortion. Depending on your own level of 'how much you believe a fetus is a human baby', your support of these situations will change:

1) The life of the mother will be in danger unless the fetus is terminated.
2) The life of the future baby will be guaranteed to be very short and painful, so let's save it a painful life (i.e. we can identify it has a severe untreatable congenital abnormality)
3) The pregnancy happened in a gruesome (i.e. rape) way and the mother should not have to go through bearing the child as it would be very emotionally traumatic for the mother, and she does not deserve this.
4) The life of the future baby will be long and hard, and the parents will not want to make the sacrifices to care for it (i.e. we can identify severe treatable congenital abnormality like Down's syndrome)
5) The pregnant woman for whatever reason is not at this time ready to be a mother and got pregnant by accident. Having the baby will mean great hardship to the mother and child for the foreseeable future and may even 'ruin her life' as it may.
6) Complete accidental pregnancy and the mother cannot afford to be pregnant at this time (wrong time in life, parents against it, partner against it, etc).
7) Any other reason not specified above.

Absolutists in either belief will want either none or all of the above exemptions.

Arguments for allowing abortions:
1) Saving the life of mother.

2) Making sure the child that is born is born to someone who actually WANTS this baby. This is important social policy. Sure you may say that with individual cases, unwanted babies can be adopted. But there are generally less parents willing to adopt then there are orphans, especially in a world with no abortions. Additionally, not all unwanted children are going to be put up for adoption. The mother may still raise the child, but unwillingly and may not love the child at all and this will have great social ramifications when you multiply this by millions of cases.

3) Understanding that being pregnant is a huge responsibility for someone for 9 months, and that no one should be able to force a woman to go through this. For instance, if you got raped either by your partner or a stranger, why should you be forced to go through months of morning sickness, months of diet limitations, gaining a lot of weight, getting stretch marks, and potentially having problems during childbirth (including dying) when you yourself do not want to nor was it really your fault?
Basically this is the woman's rights argument. Since this is something the woman has complete responsibility for (the man can literally run away and just not pay child support, especially if it's a random rape or the kind of rape that the woman is scared to report because it's from a family member), she should be able to decide what happens to her own body and no one else.

4) Understanding that in general, people who have babies with serious disabilities will treat these children badly. Many of them will end up as wards of the state, costing millions to care for and will result in people who will probably not contribute much if anything to society ever (a lot may even die before they leave childhood). I have seen many of these cases myself, and so I know for sure 100% it happens a lot. Even parents who do end up taking care of severely disabled children will end up directing huge amounts of their own resources towards this and thus will likely end up living vastly less fulfilling lives because of this. I have no problem if someone WANTS a Down's baby, but not many actually do, not even super religious ones (this is from my work experience and ancedotal experience of Ob/Gyns)

5) Many modern medical advances actually may result in the 'death' of many fetuses. For instance IVF requires the fertilization of many eggs which are all implanted at once into a woman with the understanding that most will die. Some forms of birth control may inadvertently kill a live very recently impregnated fetus, and if we follow the "Catholic church" way of thinking of it, this would make many forms of birth control (including the birth control pill which unlike condoms is a birth control method that the woman has control over) illegal. Once again this completely destroys a lot of the power that women have over their own bodies. And considering in some cases the pill can be used to treat actual disorders like heavy periods, this means that any woman who uses pills for that reason cannot ever have sex or else they might be breaking the law.

BTW I'm aware that the birth control pill prevents ovulation, but I'm also aware that theoretically if you don't use them perfectly (who does), you can still ovulate and get pregnant, but that if you then later double up a missed pill that actually acts as a 'morning after pill' effect, thus it will terminate the pregnancy.

6) Knowing that whenever there are limitations to abortions, people will find ways around it because there's lots of people who want them. This means unsafe underground abortions, the kind that killed many mothers before abortion was made legal. By having safe and legal methods, this is prevented. Also prevents any idea of underground providers blackmailing their clients and so on.

7) An argument for not having any limitations is that some people truly are not aware that they are pregnant. Every year we'll see a patient at our hospital who has a baby and never knew that they were pregnant. It happens, and thus having limits will just continue to still have all the bad effects of the other points. In Canada we do not have any limits for abortion in terms of fetus age.

8) Understanding that in the extreme, if we banned all abortions then we create a lot of other legal headaches. If someone kills a pregnant mother, is that a double murder? How about a car accident, is that double manslaughter? If it is truly murder (malicious CRIME) to kill a fetus, then logically does this mean that the fetus is awarded all the rights of an alive person? How would they fit under the legal framework of the state? Do they start to have other rights as well? This can easily go on forever once the 'right' is extended.

----
That's all I can think of at the moment.

How about reasons against abortions:
1) The fetus is a human being, so it must be treated the same as a human being

2) The fetus will one day be a human being, so we should treat it with respect (i.e. the free-range chicken argument, and really this is the only reason why I believe most countries have gestational age requirements into their abortion laws)

3) The mother may one day feel bad about it (although this is a bad reason, because who cares if they feel bad about it if it's their choice to do so, we as a society generally don't care about how people feel bad after making any other legal decision in their lives)

----

See how severely unbalanced the two sides are? A completely independent observer with no stake in this, would probably agree that the position of allowing abortions based on the arguments, with maybe allowances of gestational age because you can probably still have all the 'good' of abortions with some limitations.

Therefore, I firmly believe that if someone were to believe that there should be SERIOUS limitations to abortions, then their beliefs are so strong as to completely negate all the very good arguments on allowing abortions because they honestly don't care about any other reason except that 'abortion is murder'.

[T3l Ca7]

Well written epi, but you seem to have forgotten one of the most powerful argument, that women actually want their babies to survive if they can help it.

Motherly instinct is as strongly inbuilt as hunger or desire for love, without which most mammals would extinct.

The only reason why women chose to have abortions is that they don't think there any other way. How many women you know of want to kill their own child (insane people are the exceptions)?

[Bioture]

Bio, I've been very careful in my posts not to state what I believe you personally believe in so let's leave your beliefs (whatever they may be) out of this. I am only talking about generalities because if we get personal, this debate goes nowhere.

I think that the debate very much so rests on whether or not one truly believe deep down that a fetus is a human or not. If one deep down believes fetuses are humans, then that person will obviously care what happens to the fetus. If you deep down do not believe it to be true, then your level of caring is vastly less.

Now I acknowledge there are grey areas. People who believe deep down that fetuses are humans, may still allow exceptions to their thinking, so that in some cases they may believe that it is permissible to have abortion. This is akin to how as I've said, while most people believe the killing of other humans is wrong, most people believe in exceptions to the rule which I have outlined.

Similarly, even people who don't believe that a fetus is truly a human probably would not be supportive of gross and obvious flaunting of this (I dunno like for instance, killing of an almost born fetus, and then mutilating it and putting on display or something). Sort of like how even people who eat meat may prefer to only eat free-range chickens or something.

That said, if you don't believe, you're much more likely to accept all the arguments for allowing abortion without reservation, while the other way around you probably wouldn't care as much. The problem is, no matter how good those other arguments are, it probably still wouldn't change your mind that much, and the average person's final decision on this will mostly be based upon their beliefs and to what degree they believe in it.

Thank you for keeping the conversation impersonal. In this case we're at an impasse, since I do believe that human life starts at conception. However, there is common ground we can go on and I'll address that below.

My issue is when words like 'murder' are used. Murder indicates a very strong judgment in terms of belief. To murder someone by any definition means a premeditated killing of another out of malice, and generally has evil connotations to it. It is without question always bad to murder someone. Therefore, if you define abortion as 'murder', you are stating unambiguous that it is always wrong to kill a fetus, and that it is done with malice towards the fetus. Remember, to commit a crime, you must both do it and have the intent to do so.

In fact in a large number of abortions, the killing of the fetus has nothing to do with malice towards the fetus at all. The fetus is strictly speaking, collateral damage. That is why the war analogy is useful. Just as civilian deaths are unintended but understood to be unavoidable, war is usually justified for a 'greater good'. Similarly, abortion generally has a 'greater good' and the fetus is the 'collateral damage'.

I understand the bit about malice. In this case, perhaps it isn't malice, but it is premeditated. It is out of selfishness - the majority of abortions happen not because of medical complications, or rape/incest. It happens because people get pregnant - both guy and girl - then decide to respond to an act of irresponsibility with another act of irresponsibility. We can't make people be responsible, but we can at least educate them, and make other options more readily available. Since you say that the fetus is "collateral damage" for "the greater good," I imagine a person must also wonder if there is a way to not have collateral damage, or at least attempt to lessen it.

How could this be so? Well, we look at all the reasons why someone might have an abortion. Depending on your own level of 'how much you believe a fetus is a human baby', your support of these situations will change:

1) The life of the mother will be in danger unless the fetus is terminated.
2) The life of the future baby will be guaranteed to be very short and painful, so let's save it a painful life (i.e. we can identify it has a severe untreatable congenital abnormality)
3) The pregnancy happened in a gruesome (i.e. rape) way and the mother should not have to go through bearing the child as it would be very emotionally traumatic for the mother, and she does not deserve this.

These three I actually agree with. Abortion would be appropriate in this case. I would also add cases of rape and incest.

4) The life of the future baby will be long and hard, and the parents will not want to make the sacrifices to care for it (i.e. we can identify severe treatable congenital abnormality like Down's syndrome)
5) The pregnant woman for whatever reason is not at this time ready to be a mother and got pregnant by accident. Having the baby will mean great hardship to the mother and child for the foreseeable future and may even 'ruin her life' as it may.
6) Complete accidental pregnancy and the mother cannot afford to be pregnant at this time (wrong time in life, parents against it, partner against it, etc).
7) Any other reason not specified above.

Absolutists in either belief will want either none or all of the above exemptions.

Not being an absolutist, this is where it breaks down for me. Are you an absolutist and belong to a particular political frame wholeheartedly? Because essentially what you're asking is for me, someone who believes life at conception, to accept that murder (or maybe manslaughter, is that a better term?) because of personal, selfish reasons. In the link I've posted before, over 90% of abortions happen because couples are not ready for children or got pregnant by accident. Essentially, people use abortion not as a medical reason or some other extreme circumstance, but as a way to get out of being responsible for their actions. The price being paid, as much as a pro-choicer may not be so attached to, is manslaughter.

Arguments for allowing abortions:

3) Understanding that being pregnant is a huge responsibility for someone for 9 months, and that no one should be able to force a woman to go through this. For instance, if you got raped either by your partner or a stranger, why should you be forced to go through months of morning sickness, months of diet limitations, gaining a lot of weight, getting stretch marks, and potentially having problems during childbirth (including dying) when you yourself do not want to nor was it really your fault?

Basically this is the woman's rights argument. Since this is something the woman has complete responsibility for (the man can literally run away and just not pay child support, especially if it's a random rape or the kind of rape that the woman is scared to report because it's from a family member), she should be able to decide what happens to her own body and no one else.

8) Understanding that in the extreme, if we banned all abortions then we create a lot of other legal headaches. If someone kills a pregnant mother, is that a double murder? How about a car accident, is that double manslaughter? If it is truly murder (malicious CRIME) to kill a fetus, then logically does this mean that the fetus is awarded all the rights of an alive person? How would they fit under the legal framework of the state? Do they start to have other rights as well? This can easily go on forever once the 'right' is extended.

I will address the women's rights issue, and 8). The rest is where our impasse happens, and I believe there are workarounds to the given situations, given the severity that I place on abortion. My counterarguments I have are not new any more than the reasons for abortions are new.

Before I start, I should reiterate again for the millionth time that I believe abortions should be available in extreme circumstances such as rape, and health issues. But these extreme examples make up for a very small percentage of abortions in the U.S. This is not a new belief for most moderate conservatives. For women's rights: I believe in them. I think you're still arguing from the standpoint that I'm very conservative when it comes to abortion, when the reality is that most conservatives are not. In my experience, most pro-choicers are similarly not very liberal, and find fault in late-term pregnancies when a fetus is more fully formed.

The breakdown is actually very simple - we have a stigma in American culture that because something is permissible, that it becomes a necessity, and subsequently a right. The women's rights argument is that they would have ACCESS to abortions. Not sure how many times I have to say that I believe it should be available in extreme circumstances, but I'll say it ad nauseum because it doesn't seem to stick. If you want to argue this point with someone with a more rigid conservative political frame, you'll have to look elsewhere.

Here is the gallup polls: http://www.gallup.com/poll/147734/Am...ife-Lines.aspx

The split is pretty even. Even among women.

Access to abortions are not a right any more than healthcare is a right. There are examples of doctors being forced to perform abortions, and examples of women being forced to perform abortions. Both are equally bad. Can we force a woman to keep a baby? Of course not - that is probably the definition of political framing. In trying to explain why abortions involve killing a human being, it has now become an issue of taking away someone else's freedom to choose. Both are bad.

Instead of harping on the idea that somehow I wish to take away a woman's right, which I don't, how about educating people about pregnancy? How about making adoptions easier in the U.S.? I know several friends looking to adopt, but because of the procedure/fees involved stateside, they'll adopt someone overseas. There are many solutions to an unwanted pregnancy, including not getting pregnant in the first place. Or you can choose to believe that people honestly have accidental pregnancies, and that the success rate of current contraceptives are causing them.

See how severely unbalanced the two sides are? A completely independent observer with no stake in this, would probably agree that the position of allowing abortions based on the arguments, with maybe allowances of gestational age because you can probably still have all the 'good' of abortions with some limitations.

Therefore, I firmly believe that if someone were to believe that there should be SERIOUS limitations to abortions, then their beliefs are so strong as to completely negate all the very good arguments on allowing abortions because they honestly don't care about any other reason except that 'abortion is murder'.

I think there is less stake for the pro-choicer and here's why: to you, the grey area of whether or not abortions are morally wrong has no consequence. Since most conservatives, in my experience and according to the poll, believe in limited abortion, there is more common ground than most people think. The trouble is that the responsible route involves work. Building awareness, promoting the use of contraception, etc. All require significant effort by our teachers, parents, etc. And since not all conservatives are on board with contraception, it has been exceedingly difficult to gather behind a particular political or ideological leader that can organize an effort. In the meantime, my biggest personal beef is that those who believe in the liberal political frame very heartily believes that the overall rise in abortions across the board is completely acceptable and justifiable.


Edit: Personal side note: as someone who would like to become a father one day, I'm actually disgusted by how pregnancies and children have become an inconvenience in society. We have "men" who are very willing to make babies, but not to take care of them. We have women who become promiscuous solely for the reason of not wanting to be alone, and even worse, women who use children as a means of leverage. Shows like Maury, even though they're staged, makes me sick to the core. I don't want a child to go into a household unwanted, any more than I want them to be aborted as a fetus. I don't think this is an unreasonable view.

[Epinephrine]

I understand the bit about malice. In this case, perhaps it isn't malice, but it is premeditated. It is out of selfishness - the majority of abortions happen not because of medical complications, or rape/incest. It happens because people get pregnant - both guy and girl - then decide to respond to an act of irresponsibility with another act of irresponsibility. We can't make people be responsible, but we can at least educate them, and make other options more readily available. Since you say that the fetus is "collateral damage" for "the greater good," I imagine a person must also wonder if there is a way to not have collateral damage, or at least attempt to lessen it.

My point is that the word murder should never be used in terms of abortion. If there is no malice, it is not murder any more then the person who presses the switch while performing a capital punishment is a murderer, or someone shooting a person threatening their life a murderer. While there may be sporadic cases of people who actually want to kill the fetus for the sake of killing fetuses, the vast, vast majority 99.999% have nothing personally against the fetus. For that reason, it is definitely NOT murder and will never be murder. So if that term is ever used, it is highly judgmental, and causes the 'other side' to react strongly. Strong enough for the 'other side' to believe that those who are against abortion are insane religious fundamentalists stuck in the 16th century, true or not. And thus it goes nowhere. Wording is very important, and when you casually use words like that, you are setting yourself up for endless strife.

Not being an absolutist, this is where it breaks down for me. Are you an absolutist and belong to a particular political frame wholeheartedly? Because essentially what you're asking is for me, someone who believes life at conception, to accept that murder (or maybe manslaughter, is that a better term?) because of personal, selfish reasons. In the link I've posted before, over 90% of abortions happen because couples are not ready for children or got pregnant by accident. Essentially, people use abortion not as a medical reason or some other extreme circumstance, but as a way to get out of being responsible for their actions. The price being paid, as much as a pro-choicer may not be so attached to, is manslaughter.

I personally do not believe that a fetus is fully 'human'. People become people through their actions, and since a fetus has never done anything, nor can it possibly do anything, it is not strictly speaking a person. Therefore, as 'irresponsible' as some couples are, I would rather not compound that irresponsibility. If someone got pregnant and truly doesn't want the baby, it is never a light decision. And if they absolutely truly don't want to be pregnant, I see no reason to stop them. There's a good chance they will be a bad parent, the child will have a horrible life, and society will on average (I'm sure every so often an unwanted child will do something amazing, the the vast majority will not) lose out thanks to this. Therefore, I actually find it refreshing that a lot of people who are too irresponsible to have a child choose to terminate that child instead of 'seeing it through'.

I've seen enough 'welfare families' at work where you have parents on welfare, and children who are 18 on welfare (how the hell you can get on welfare at 18 is beyond me). People who basically contribute absolutely nothing to society, and probably drain resources from the rest of us. I could only imagine if millions more of these people existed because abortion was outlawed (except in extreme cases which we both agree are a small percentage anyway). The rights of society not to have this burden is huge.

Secondly, let's assume a perfect world, where men and women are equally culpable for the woman getting pregnant (which is never true because it's very easy for a man to force himself onto a woman, whether it is a random rapist, or a stronger boyfriend). This means that 50% of the time it's "the woman's fault", and 50% of the time it's "the man's fault". If it's the man's fault, the man doesn't have to deal with any potential problems for 9 months of pregnancy. More often then not, will not stick around to take care of the child, and even with child support laws assuming the guy even pays, the level of responsibility is staggeringly different (there's a huge number of single mothers, not that many single fathers). This means that 50% of the time, the woman's life may be ruined because of a man being irresponsible and if abortion were outlawed for these cases, then the child's life will probably not be so great either without a father, and with a mother completely unprepared to be a mother.

You might say that, well if the woman were more 'responsible' and never dated, or never got drunk, or used birth control pills completely 100% perfectly, or anything else then they would be fine. Or perhaps married couples should just get vasectomies/tubal ligations before they ever want to have sex and not have kids. But I can only counter that even in Saudi Arabia where they keep women in burkas, there's a lot of unwanted and unintended pregnancies. And besides, do we want to turn our society back 200 years like that anyway? I don't think anyone but the most die-hard would support this.


Of course we can say that 'well if the man forced himself on the woman, it will be rape'. That is technically speaking, true. But will the woman report the guy as a rapist? There is a huge stigma against these kinds of things, especially if the guy is the boyfriend of the woman who forced himself on her, who's going to believe it? Will she even want to report this?

Instead of setting artificial limits, the only person who can decide is the woman, and thus that is how laws are set.

I think there is less stake for the pro-choicer and here's why: to you, the grey area of whether or not abortions are morally wrong has no consequence. Since most conservatives, in my experience and according to the poll, believe in limited abortion, there is more common ground than most people think. The trouble is that the responsible route involves work. Building awareness, promoting the use of contraception, etc. All require significant effort by our teachers, parents, etc. And since not all conservatives are on board with contraception, it has been exceedingly difficult to gather behind a particular political or ideological leader that can organize an effort. In the meantime, my biggest personal beef is that those who believe in the liberal political frame very heartily believes that the overall rise in abortions across the board is completely acceptable and justifiable.


Edit: Personal side note: as someone who would like to become a father one day, I'm actually disgusted by how pregnancies and children have become an inconvenience in society. We have "men" who are very willing to make babies, but not to take care of them. We have women who become promiscuous solely for the reason of not wanting to be alone, and even worse, women who use children as a means of leverage. Shows like Maury, even though they're staged, makes me sick to the core. I don't want a child to go into a household unwanted, any more than I want them to be aborted as a fetus. I don't think this is an unreasonable view.

Again, this is you moralizing against other people by putting your own beliefs onto others. While I may say that some people may not contribute to society, these can be measured monetarily. When you say that you are disgusted by how certain people choose to act, you are imposing your views onto those people. Perhaps just as similar, they can be completely disgusted by things that you may do in your life, whatever it may be. If you support laws which impose your own morality on others, then it basically just completely proves my point that the entire 'debate' rests on cultural and religious beliefs, which supposedly should not have any place in a country founded on the separation of church and state.

Once we start making laws based on punishing people for their free actions, then pretty soon you'll be Saudi Arabia.

=========

Finally, you talk about making it easier to adopt. Allowing for more sex education and so on. I don't disagree with these facts, these are all things that virtually anyone would accept. As much as I don't personally believe that a fetus is a fully formed human, I am of the 'free-range chicken' camp, when I say that I would not mind it if there were less accidental pregnancies, and that babies who do end up being born find a loving home. That said, much like how I'll go out to a restaurant and eat chicken without really questioning where it came from even if I buy free-range at the supermarket, I strongly don't believe that these things should be legislated as 'you must do this or else, unless it was one of these 3 exceptions' because in the end I think that we can only do the arguments for abortion justice if there are as few limits as possible.

[Epinephrine]

One last thing.

Bio, you state that:

Access to abortions are not a right any more than healthcare is a right.

I find this disturbing to say the least. While you argue that except for very extreme cases, abortion should not be allowed, you also state that health care is not a right. So basically we can force someone to have an unwanted pregnancy and give birth, but yet we have no obligation to make sure that person has a safe delivery, and the baby gets adequate healthcare when it comes out?

So when a poor single mother with no money doesn't have any money to go to the hospital, get their children vaccinated, society has no obligation to help out, even if society forced them to have this unwanted child, because healthcare is not a right?

[Bioture]

One last thing.

Bio, you state that:



I find this disturbing to say the least. While you argue that except for very extreme cases, abortion should not be allowed, you also state that health care is not a right. So basically we can force someone to have an unwanted pregnancy and give birth, but yet we have no obligation to make sure that person has a safe delivery, and the baby gets adequate healthcare when it comes out?

So when a poor single mother with no money doesn't have any money to go to the hospital, get their children vaccinated, society has no obligation to help out, even if society forced them to have this unwanted child, because healthcare is not a right?

I think once we go over the same topic three times, we're at an impasse. We've put our cards on the table. The definition of what is a right (http://www.tep-online.info/laku/usa/rights.htm) is another conversation altogether. You find it disturbing because it's hard for you to understand that people need to be responsible. It might also be because the word "right" mean something different to you. A single poor mother (out of all of them that choose to get abortions) does not invalidate the possibility that a fetus could be a human being. On the contrary, society has given TREMENDOUS support to single parents. So much so that that is another topic of its own - entitlements.

And as much as you like to say "forced," I can only repeat ad nauseum that they must have the right to their liberty, and access to abortions. That simply does not make it a non-issue ethically. As a doctor, you swear to do no harm. I'll leave you and your colleagues to determine what harm is, because as much as people want to demonstrate outside of my office, what's clear is that this is a polarizing topic across the board.

[Bioture]

My point is that the word murder should never be used in terms of abortion. If there is no malice, it is not murder any more then the person who presses the switch while performing a capital punishment is a murderer, or someone shooting a person threatening their life a murderer. While there may be sporadic cases of people who actually want to kill the fetus for the sake of killing fetuses, the vast, vast majority 99.999% have nothing personally against the fetus. For that reason, it is definitely NOT murder and will never be murder. So if that term is ever used, it is highly judgmental, and causes the 'other side' to react strongly. Strong enough for the 'other side' to believe that those who are against abortion are insane religious fundamentalists stuck in the 16th century, true or not. And thus it goes nowhere. Wording is very important, and when you casually use words like that, you are setting yourself up for endless strife.

When I want to kill something because it inconveniences me, I would say that it is personal. And with that, you can conjure up whatever proves your point that it is acceptable. To me it is not. We're done making that point, right?

I personally do not believe that a fetus is fully 'human'. People become people through their actions, and since a fetus has never done anything, nor can it possibly do anything, it is not strictly speaking a person. Therefore, as 'irresponsible' as some couples are, I would rather not compound that irresponsibility. If someone got pregnant and truly doesn't want the baby, it is never a light decision. And if they absolutely truly don't want to be pregnant, I see no reason to stop them. There's a good chance they will be a bad parent, the child will have a horrible life, and society will on average (I'm sure every so often an unwanted child will do something amazing, the the vast majority will not) lose out thanks to this. Therefore, I actually find it refreshing that a lot of people who are too irresponsible to have a child choose to terminate that child instead of 'seeing it through'.

I've seen enough 'welfare families' at work where you have parents on welfare, and children who are 18 on welfare (how the hell you can get on welfare at 18 is beyond me). People who basically contribute absolutely nothing to society, and probably drain resources from the rest of us. I could only imagine if millions more of these people existed because abortion was outlawed (except in extreme cases which we both agree are a small percentage anyway). The rights of society not to have this burden is huge.

And yet a fetus turns into a baby? And a baby doesn't contribute to society either. They don't do anything. But you believe that killing one of those is murder, right? Like I said, back in roman times children are considered property, and you can destroy them as you wish. We're sounding like broken records here. I understand where you are. I respect it, but you're wrong.

Secondly, let's assume a perfect world, where men and women are equally culpable for the woman getting pregnant (which is never true because it's very easy for a man to force himself onto a woman, whether it is a random rapist, or a stronger boyfriend). This means that 50% of the time it's "the woman's fault", and 50% of the time it's "the man's fault". If it's the man's fault, the man doesn't have to deal with any potential problems for 9 months of pregnancy. More often then not, will not stick around to take care of the child, and even with child support laws assuming the guy even pays, the level of responsibility is staggeringly different (there's a huge number of single mothers, not that many single fathers). This means that 50% of the time, the woman's life may be ruined because of a man being irresponsible and if abortion were outlawed for these cases, then the child's life will probably not be so great either without a father, and with a mother completely unprepared to be a mother.

You might say that, well if the woman were more 'responsible' and never dated, or never got drunk, or used birth control pills completely 100% perfectly, or anything else then they would be fine. Or perhaps married couples should just get vasectomies/tubal ligations before they ever want to have sex and not have kids. But I can only counter that even in Saudi Arabia where they keep women in burkas, there's a lot of unwanted and unintended pregnancies. And besides, do we want to turn our society back 200 years like that anyway? I don't think anyone but the most die-hard would support this.


Of course we can say that 'well if the man forced himself on the woman, it will be rape'. That is technically speaking, true. But will the woman report the guy as a rapist? There is a huge stigma against these kinds of things, especially if the guy is the boyfriend of the woman who forced himself on her, who's going to believe it? Will she even want to report this?

Instead of setting artificial limits, the only person who can decide is the woman, and thus that is how laws are set.

Find me something I've said that says women shouldn't have the right to decide. You can either talk to me like an adult, or force me into a political platform that you're used to arguing against.

Again, this is you moralizing against other people by putting your own beliefs onto others. While I may say that some people may not contribute to society, these can be measured monetarily. When you say that you are disgusted by how certain people choose to act, you are imposing your views onto those people. Perhaps just as similar, they can be completely disgusted by things that you may do in your life, whatever it may be. If you support laws which impose your own morality on others, then it basically just completely proves my point that the entire 'debate' rests on cultural and religious beliefs, which supposedly should not have any place in a country founded on the separation of church and state.

Once we start making laws based on punishing people for their free actions, then pretty soon you'll be Saudi Arabia.

Absolutely, but then again in a conversation about ethics, do you not moralize? You have no problem saying that it is not murder and that somehow I'm stuck in the 16th century for believing that it is. I think defining a baby as a human until it is born is just as extreme and "disgusting" as forcing all women to give birth. I also don't think you understand separation of church and state. If you really want to go into that can of worms, technically the country was founded on christian ideals. But since I am making a secular argument, I will not tote my bible here. But in case you were wondering what separation of church and state means in the context of enforcing morality, here's a good one: http://www.allabouthistory.org/separ...-and-state.htm

Finally, you talk about making it easier to adopt. Allowing for more sex education and so on. I don't disagree with these facts, these are all things that virtually anyone would accept. As much as I don't personally believe that a fetus is a fully formed human, I am of the 'free-range chicken' camp, when I say that I would not mind it if there were less accidental pregnancies, and that babies who do end up being born find a loving home. That said, much like how I'll go out to a restaurant and eat chicken without really questioning where it came from even if I buy free-range at the supermarket, I strongly don't believe that these things should be legislated as 'you must do this or else, unless it was one of these 3 exceptions' because in the end I think that we can only do the arguments for abortion justice if there are as few limits as possible.

You don't disagree, but how can we do it? You recognize the choice is solely up to the woman, but how do we inform them of the consequences? You can give me hypotheticals all you want, but the reality is that it takes work, which is why we don't do it. It requires that we change our culture of irresponsibility.

[Bioture]

As something different, there was a tremendous IAmA on reddit 8 days ago, during the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comment...ion_in_the_us/


One story stood out: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comment...the_us/c81bvr6

Which is why I am both pro-life and pro-choice.

[Epinephrine]

Find me something I've said that says women shouldn't have the right to decide. You can either talk to me like an adult, or force me into a political platform that you're used to arguing against.

While you've not specifically said it, you state that you basically only support a limited application of abortion. These are the oft quoted 'saving the mother's life, in cases of incest and rape'.

This logically means that you do not support any other reason why someone may have an abortion. Which means that if someone wants an abortion because it's their choice to have one (for whatever reason) it means that you do not support it.

But you aside, we must look into the logical consequences of any particular stance. If the stance that society adopts is that abortion is only allowed in "extraordinary cases", in a democracy this would be adopted as law, then in practice what will happen is that we will be:
1) Forcing women to stretch the truth so that they can still get legal abortions
2) Forcing women to go underground
3) Limiting women's choices for those who don't want to stretch the truth, or even admit that they were raped, taken advantage of by a partner eager for sex or were victims of incest publicly in order to get this done legally.

Any time there is limits to something, someone's freedom to do something is curtailed. And I firmly because that these freedoms (unlike say the freedom to drink a drive) should not be curtailed because no human is being harmed (which I very much understand that you are against this point of view and I respect that).


Like I said, I have absolutely no problems with better adoption laws, more education and so on. But I think if the conversation turns to any of the following two things we will go to a dead end.

1) The stance that "Abortion is murder".

Once you believe this, there is very little to argue. Either it is murder or it is not. If it is murder, absolutely nothing else matters nearly as much because everyone generally agrees that 'murder' is one of the worst crimes you could do. This is a pure argument on beliefs and beliefs no matter what they may be are irrational and are very hard to change.

2)The stance that 'people need to be more responsible'.

I think that this is a dead end if it just a proclamation. Very often, the idea that 'people should be more responsible' is twisted as a statement of fact to be used to justify whatever it is you are arguing about. If it is about gun control, then gun-activists will say that individuals are the most responsible. If it is about abortion, abortion activists will say that people are not responsible when they make decisions about their own body and thus need better 'education' and are 'not informed of the consequences' (a very paternalistic view I may add).

It is very easy for someone to turn that argument around and say "religious people should be made more responsible. We should actually have them learn science so that they know the consequences of wasting a day a week praying and going to religious services". See, when I put it like that, it sounds a bit silly doesn't it?

Just as silly as saying that if only women were better educated and better behaved they wouldn't get themselves into positions where they would even want an abortion because it's really a lack of education that makes this happen.