<!--QuoteBegin-ThE HeRo+Oct 14 2004, 02:13 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (ThE HeRo @ Oct 14 2004, 02:13 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> I'm pro-choice. It's the woman's responiblity, if she wants to do that, then she has to live with it. I wouldn't want to penalize a 17 year old girl, destroy her life because she had sex, and the condom broke. The rape case applies. It's her choice.
Now that I've established my opinion, no one has talked about birth defects yet.
What if your child was going to be born with a birth defect that made the child unable to interact with society normally, forever? What if you know your child is going to be born with mental retardation, and will be branded an invalid his whole life. Would YOU want to be born, your future determined already, to where you will never be able to hold any sort of job, make any sort of normal social contact?
This is only an example, and there are several worse, and less worse, examples to make.
I know I wouldn't want my child to have to go through that. I wouldn't want to either. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> my sister is mentally retarded, and unable to speak (although she can understand a few basic words and sentences). i really take offense at your suggestion that she would rather not be alive than be mentally retarded. she's one of the happiest children i've ever seen, and that's not because we spoil her (even though we sometimes do).
On topic: The terminology is all public relations. You want your group to have a name that sounds good. And you never want to be against something. You want to be FOR it. You want to be PRO life, because who could argue with someone who is pro-life? Everyone likes life, right? And on the other hand, you want to be PRO choice, because who could be against choices? Choice! Freedom! Personal responsibility! That's the only reason these terms are used. It's all just being pumped out by the PR departments.
Off the topic: I'm not going there. There are some things that arouse so much emotion in those involved that discussing them on an internet forum isn't at all productive. So I don't feel it would help to add my 2 cents, because the likelihood of anyone being swayed one way or another by my view is nonexistent. And besides, it is off the actual topic... I blame lf for yelling 'abortion' in a crowded discussion forum. Surely he knew what would happen. <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Murdering animals is one thing. Murdering humans is another thing entirely. We're not talking about killing animals. In no way have I even suggested that animals are anywhere close to fetuses.
2 interesting topics here - 1. mental/physical retardation - 2. morning after pill.
In response to 1. Understand my position here - a Bible believing Christian. Most abortion issues I can tackle without pointing out faith-based solutions. I will give the faith-based on this one first, then a "sociatal" based.
First of all, I believe that God is the author and finisher of life. Putting our human standards on his creation robs God of his right to enjoy his creatures. To say that handicapped people can not enjoy a good life - therefore they should be aborted - robs God of his enjoyment of that persons life. (This can also be applied to suicide, but that is a different matter).
Second - making a choice of life or death based on physical / mental qualities is never a good idea. You are setting up a class system based on physical characteristics. Where does it stop? Do people with glasses deserve to die because they have "inferior" genes? There must be a line of protection drawn somewhere, and I submit that the line should be drawn to include as many humans as possible - at conception.
In response to 2. My wife and I use contraceptive means to prevent pregnancy. We do not use a morning after pill. Now, I am unsure of the science involved in the morning after, but my understanding is that it causes an early menstral cycle.
My view is this - post conception humans should all be granted the same rights. If you disturb thier living environment to potentially cause death, you are doing something wrong.
<!--QuoteBegin-Hawkeye+Oct 14 2004, 09:09 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Hawkeye @ Oct 14 2004, 09:09 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Murdering animals is one thing. Murdering humans is another thing entirely. We're not talking about killing animals. In no way have I even suggested that animals are anywhere close to fetuses. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> It is my belief that humans form a continuum with other species. We are animals , probably the only self-conscious ones on this planet , but still animals. Adult chimps have about the same mental age as 2 year old human babies , yet chimps are rarely treated with the respect they deserve , as a cousin specie.
2 months foetii do <i>not</i> have the ability to think , and can barely feel anything. They do not exist as human individuals. Killing them is not a cruel course of action , especially if it prevents future suffering.
On the other hand , great apes do have elaborate emotions. They can feel sorrow for their relatives when something bad happens to them. They can feel compassion and show solidarity , to the point of actively helping retarded mates survive. Yet , no law prevents their killing or bad treatment.
Such knowledge is relatively recent. But it is my belief that morals must be updated with new knowledge.
<!--QuoteBegin-Hawkeye+Oct 14 2004, 03:09 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Hawkeye @ Oct 14 2004, 03:09 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Murdering animals is one thing. Murdering humans is another thing entirely. We're not talking about killing animals. In no way have I even suggested that animals are anywhere close to fetuses. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> Humans are animals, like it or not. One day the Nha Si'Marat might obliterate or enslave this planet. And then you all die.
FYI offt-topic: Nha culture says that all the weak are unworthy of life. Xzianthian culture tries to make each individual into the best he/she/it can be. Uniformity and genetic perfection is perhaps one of the Nha Si'Marat's greates strengths, diversity is perhaps one of the Federation of Xzianthia's greatest strengths.
~edit~
Reply to Stakhanov:
Religion and law always are trying to catchup with our method of evolution: technology.
As a scientist I believe in the objective facts, but you see here Stakhanov many of the people in this thread cannot even take that stuff into consideration because of their hardline religious beliefs. Which is fine as long as they aren't trying to force their beliefs onto others.
Stak, that's where you and I differ. You think cows and chickens shouldn't be killed for consumption, but fetuses are perfectly okay to be killed.
On the contrary, I believe the opposite. Unborn children would grow up to be doctors and lawyers and good decent people. By killing the fetus, you are killing those people. Call it whatever you want, but I'll call it murder.
<!--QuoteBegin-Stakhanov+Oct 14 2004, 03:24 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Stakhanov @ Oct 14 2004, 03:24 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> <!--QuoteBegin-Hawkeye+Oct 14 2004, 09:09 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Hawkeye @ Oct 14 2004, 09:09 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Murdering animals is one thing. Murdering humans is another thing entirely. We're not talking about killing animals. In no way have I even suggested that animals are anywhere close to fetuses. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> It is my belief that humans form a continuum with other species. We are animals , probably the only self-conscious ones on this planet , but still animals. Adult chimps have about the same mental age as 2 year old human babies , yet chimps are rarely treated with the respect they deserve , as a cousin specie.
2 months foetii do <i>not</i> have the ability to think , and can barely feel anything. They do not exist as human individuals. Killing them is not a cruel course of action , especially if it prevents future suffering.
On the other hand , great apes do have elaborate emotions. They can feel sorrow for their relatives when something bad happens to them. They can feel compassion and show solidarity , to the point of actively helping retarded mates survive. Yet , no law prevents their killing or bad treatment.
Such knowledge is relatively recent. But it is my belief that morals must be updated with new knowledge. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> 2 Months? hmm what about on day 31? 32? 33?... When is it a child?
Frankly the discussion about aborting children because they are going to be born with handicaps disgusts me. This child will be born abnormal. Therefore we will kill them? Think about what you are proposing.
Future suffering? Who are you to decide? Why not let the person decide for themself if their suffering is too great?
Every so often a neurological condition causes me to lose my vision and causes me such pain that it contorts my body to the point where I begin to thing that removing the skin from my body might not be a bad option if only it would stop the pain. I know of some people that this happens to every single day of their lives. But every now and then I look out on the countryside and think of how greatful I am to have seen it.
Whatever. It's just your body and a worthless lump of parasitic flesh living off of you for 9 months.
Pro-Life and Pro-Choice are both the simple definitions of the belief system of that group.
Pro-Life = all life in and out of the womb is sacred, and therefore abortion is murder.
Pro-Choice = a fetus, while inside a woman's body, is affecting the body of that woman, and therefore it is the woman's right to decide whether or not that fetus becomes a baby.
See how I have neatly hidden my personal opinion? The name of the sides reflect the point of view of the side.
I've got back and forth over the past couple of years. However, in the past year or so, I came to a conclusion about the danger of Pro-Choice thought processes. They do not stand alone, but instead reflect a larger viewpoint that I perceive as threatening. This is the same viewpoint that dominates things like Pro-Euthanasia (which is actually pro having the choice of suicide).
Why do I feel threatened? Well, 40 years ago, the idea of abortion would send the average American into a feeling of disgust. Today, there are advocates of parents having the right to terminate a baby after 8 days of birth. In The Netherlands, where Euthanasia is a legal and common practice, there are an increasing level of cases wherein doctors are killing terminally ill patients to free up a hospital bed.
Do you not see the trend? The average American is disgusted by these practices. What about 40 years from now....
And by the way, Stak, I love having sex outside of marriage. Sex is freakin GREAT, but I'm taking the risk of imprenating the chick I'm with. It's my decision. I know that there is only one way to insure I don't get a chick pregnant, and that is abstinence. I'm all for astinence being taught in schools, along with other birth control methods.
You need to think about the real consequences behind this trend. Read Brave New World for clarification.
<!--QuoteBegin-wizard@psu+Oct 15 2004, 08:52 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (wizard@psu @ Oct 15 2004, 08:52 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Whatever. It's just your body and a worthless lump of parasitic flesh living off of you for 9 months. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> I wont even attempt to deal with the "Animals are people too" - but this line caught my eye. That is just not true. Reproducing actually proves that you are alive, when defining life, the ability to reproduce is one of the core criteria. Please, if your high school science teacher, when explaining reproduction, told you that all mammals suffered from parasites after sex, put your hand up and much sympathy will follow.
<!--QuoteBegin-wizard@psu+Oct 14 2004, 03:52 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (wizard@psu @ Oct 14 2004, 03:52 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> 2 Months? hmm what about on day 31? 32? 33?... When is it a child? <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> Arg. Again I don't think males can make the decisions on this debate and even then it has to determine on the individual and their culture. If you have a uterus then ok.
Do you want me to tell you what I would make as a law if I had to?
<!--QuoteBegin-x5+Oct 15 2004, 09:21 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (x5 @ Oct 15 2004, 09:21 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> <!--QuoteBegin-wizard@psu+Oct 14 2004, 03:52 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (wizard@psu @ Oct 14 2004, 03:52 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> 2 Months? hmm what about on day 31? 32? 33?... When is it a child? <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> Arg. Again I don't think males can make the decisions on this debate and even then it has to determine on the individual and their culture. If you have a uterus then ok.
Do you want me to tell you what I would make as a law if I had to? <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> Why cant males have any say on this? They helped concieve the baby, it exists because of his actions, and some males have this weird way of looking at children they helped create as somehow.... related to them.... what a crazy, crazy world we live in!
As is always brought up in abortion debates - a very famous case in Australia of a woman and her defacto partner who concieved. The father wanted her to abort the child, she wanted to keep the child. The father amubshed the mother as she was getting out of the car, knocked her to the ground and stomped on her stomach - the child in the womb died. In court, he claimed that as the baby was young enough to be legally aborted, he wasnt guilty of murder, just assault. She claimed he killed her baby. He went down for manslaughter, or unlawful killing. In other words, the court decided that it wasnt about how old the child was the determined whether it was human or not, it was about whether it was "wanted".
That's almost as whacked out as this "animals should have human rights" business.
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->2 months foetii do not have the ability to think , and can barely feel anything. They do not exist as human individuals. Killing them is not a cruel course of action , especially if it prevents future suffering.
On the other hand , great apes do have elaborate emotions. They can feel sorrow for their relatives when something bad happens to them. They can feel compassion and show solidarity , to the point of actively helping retarded mates survive. Yet , no law prevents their killing or bad treatment.
Such knowledge is relatively recent. But it is my belief that morals must be updated with new knowledge.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Ah I see, whether you are human or not depends upon whether you are thinking and feeling. Which means killing your grandma quickly while she is a asleep isnt murder, because while she is unconcious, she isnt human. Just had a car accident - think all you lost is a litre of blood and your licence? Wrong, while you're lying slumped over the wheel, you've just lost your humanity too. What's that you say - Granny will wake up, all she needs is time? That child will feel and think, all it needs is time also. What's magical about 10 minutes and 2 months till consciousness that determines whose human and whose not?
Actually, laws do exist to prevent cruel courses of actions against animals. But they are not human. If you feel comfortable drawing up arbitrary lines such as "if it sorrows, then its on our level", then I feel just as comfortable drawing lines such as "If it cant reproduce with a human female, then its not on our level"
Ok , since Legionnaired challenged me to support my questionning of abstinence with studies , here we go : <a href='http://www.plannedparenthood.org/LIBRARY/facts/AbstinenceOnly10-01.html' target='_blank'>Consequences of Abstinence-Only Sex Ed</a> <a href='http://www.siecus.org/pubs/fact/fact0001.html' target='_blank'>SIECUS Teen Abstinence Fact Sheet</a> <a href='http://ari.ucsf.edu/pdf/abstinence.pdf' target='_blank'>San Francisco Uni. Study</a>
<a href='http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/sexuality/se0074.html' target='_blank'>Uganda winning war against AIDs - abstinence style</a>
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Uganda may be on its way to wiping out AIDS by using the Biblical values of chastity and fidelity, a new Harvard University study finds. According to the study, abstinence education has shown significant effectiveness in reducing AIDS in Uganda, with the HIV infection rate dropping 50 percent between the years 1992 and 2000.
The east African nation is making a big impact with the revelation that the AIDS epidemic can be curbed. Riddled with HIV infections since the 1970s, Uganda has found miraculous success by using abstinence as its prevention strategy. Promotion of abstinence through billboards, radio programs and school sex education curricula has resulted in a slow and steady drop in HIV infection rates, as well as new attitudes about conquering AIDS in Uganda.
"Uganda is one of the countries that attach great importance on promoting abstinence among our youth," said Ahmed Ssenyomo, minister counselor at the Ugandan Embassy, in a speech to the African American Youth Conference on Abstinence.
When the program started in the late 1980s, the number of pregnant women infected with HIV was 21.2 percent. By 2001, the number was 6.2 percent. The Harvard study also reported Ugandan adults are not having as much risky sex: of women 15 and older, those reporting many sexual partners dropped from 18.4 percent in 1989 to 2.5 percent in 2000.
The emphasis on abstinence in Uganda’s program is unique. In other nations with high HIV infections, such as Zimbabwe and Botswana, condoms have been promoted as the answer to ending the AIDS crisis. In Botswana, 38 percent of pregnant women were HIV positive last year, contrasted with 6.2 percent of Ugandan women.
Much of the program’s success is due to the nation’s willingness to look beyond the sexual revolution to the past.
"What we’re seeing in parts of Africa is communities responding to the epidemic by saying, ‘Let’s see what’s in our culture — how can we deal with this with what we had in the past?’ " Susan Leclerc-Madlalas, a medical anthropologist at the University of Natal in South Africa, told the Associated Press. "What they had most of the time was a way of regulating sexuality."
Many AIDS officials reject abstinence as a potential prevention strategy despite evidence that promotion of abstinence and fidelity have significantly reduced AIDS cases in Uganda over the past decade.
"Millions and millions of young people are having sexual relations," said Paolo Teizeria, director of Brazil’s AIDS program, at the 14th International AIDS Conference. "We cannot talk about abstinence. It’s not real."
Abstinence is often dismissed as a potential prevention method. Condom promotion and "safe-sex" initiatives have long been thought to be the answer to stopping the spread of HIV: Instead of encouraging people to curb their libidos, these initiatives have tried to provide "safer" ways of exercising them. However, in many African nations condoms aren’t looked upon kindly: there are a variety of urban legends that circulate in some regions that condoms are either ethnic cleansing tools or actually spread HIV themselves. (During the Cold War, the Soviet KGB spread "disinformation" that the United States created the AIDS virus to kill off Africans.)
"Ugandans really never took to condoms," Dr. Vinand Nantulya, an infectious disease advisor to Ugandan leader Yoweri Museveni, told The New Republic.
The abstinence initiative in Uganda goes far beyond those who are already having sex — it starts with the education and promotion of an abstinence program for youth called "True Love Waits." Thirty thousand Ugandan youth are currently involved with the program. Launched in Uganda in 1994, True Love Waits focuses on abstinence until marriage as a way to prevent all sorts of adverse consequences associated with extra-marital sexual activity.
"Encouraging marriage, monogamy or abstinence, delaying the onset of sexual activity, discouraging promiscuity and casual sex, reducing the supply and demand of illegal drugs or providing treatment to drug addicts … are the absolute most effective approaches to reducing the risk of HIV," Rep. Mark Souder (R-Indiana) and six other members of the U.S. Committee on Government Reform said in a letter to the United Nations.
The United States and other countries have yet to embrace abstinence promotion as a mode of AIDS prevention. The United Nations recently predicted that AIDS will wipe out half the population in some African countries. In Uganda, the proverbial sun is starting to shine from the rain cloud of AIDS deaths — and it’s looking brighter. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
They hand out condom's too - 80M a year, plus educate people like its going out of style, but their unique suggestion of how about we all stop rooting like wild animals took off too. You understand what you are facing, and you are told the best way to avoid it is to stop humping anything that moves. Hey presto, AID's on the way down....
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Sex is also fun and done for recreation, you can't make people responsible about something that is coded into their genes for them to do as much as possible. We are designed for sex, not everyone makes a suitable parent.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It is coding in your genes to be fun to help further propigation of our species. And you are right not everyone if fit to be a parent, but that doesn't mean they dont have the right.
If I were to say people should not have recreational sex, I would be a hypocrit. I never said not to have sex. There are plenty of things that you can do to bring your chances of conception to almost zero. Im saying you should take these percautions, but be willing to take responsibility if it fails. I have always been so, even with the scare I had my freshmen year.
I think to discuss the idea of Pro-Choice or Pro-Life we must first decide on what the definition of <u>human</u> life is. By Pro-Life's definition of life all life is sacred. Therefore we shouldn't kill animals. However they somehow manage to justify killing animals while not allowing any human to be killed. Some might call it hypocrisy, but Christians have a reason for doing this. They believe that humans have something called a soul. This soul is what makes you human and its why you shouldn't be killed while still in the womb. I respect this idea, but I have a different view on what makes us human. Its called experience and it, not god or any other reason anyone can think of is the reason we are human.
This is the fundamental difference between humans and animals. Humans have experiences that they remember and more importantly they are able to pass those experiences down to other humans. This is why it is morally wrong to kill a human, because when you kill them you are not only ending their life you are ending all the knowledge and experience they they have accumulated through their life. They won't have the ability to pass down that knowledge. Society doesn't place a value judgment on ending life it places a value judgment of ending experience.
Fetuii have no experience, and even if they did they wouldn't be able to communicate that experience. By this logic fetuii aren't humans, yet. So now the question comes down to the fine details, namely whats different from a fetus and a new born baby? The answer once again comes back to communication. Fetuii have no ability to communicate with the out side world save kicking. However babies, the second they come out of the womb have the ability to cry. This is the most basic form of communication. When something cries is communicates people can respond to that communication and thats what makes us human.
<!--QuoteBegin-Wheeee+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Wheeee)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--><!--QuoteBegin-ThE HeRo+Oct 14 2004, 02:13 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (ThE HeRo @ Oct 14 2004, 02:13 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> I'm pro-choice. It's the woman's responsibility, if she wants to do that, then she has to live with it. I wouldn't want to penalize a 17 year old girl, destroy her life because she had sex, and the condom broke. The rape case applies. It's her choice.
Now that I've established my opinion, no one has talked about birth defects yet.
What if your child was going to be born with a birth defect that made the child unable to interact with society normally, forever? What if you know your child is going to be born with mental retardation, and will be branded an invalid his whole life. Would YOU want to be born, your future determined already, to where you will never be able to hold any sort of job, make any sort of normal social contact?
This is only an example, and there are several worse, and less worse, examples to make.
I know I wouldn't want my child to have to go through that. I wouldn't want to either. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> my sister is mentally retarded, and unable to speak (although she can understand a few basic words and sentences). i really take offense at your suggestion that she would rather not be alive than be mentally retarded. she's one of the happiest children I've ever seen, and that's not because we spoil her (even though we sometimes do).<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This brings up a interesting question on morality. Even though you oppose killing a fetus would you be willing to change its genes to make it have a “better” life? In a since you are killing the fetus, because you are changing its genetic code and making it a different person. Is that murder or is that change?
<!--QuoteBegin-Pepe_Muffassa+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Pepe_Muffassa)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> In response to 2. My wife and I use contraceptive means to prevent pregnancy. We do not use a morning after pill. Now, I am unsure of the science involved in the morning after, but my understanding is that it causes an early menstrual cycle.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Just so you know the morning after pill is a super form of the regular pill. IIRC all it does is harden the uterun wall so the egg can't implant on it. The blood is your wife flushing out the dead egg. Please note that the only difference from the regular pill that women take every day and the morning after pill is the size of the dose. Also it is important to note that this is not an abortion.
Thanks, Nuke, for the inciteful post. It turns out I need a bit more education on the "morning after" pill before I can make a decision on its use.
As for the 1st half of your post, I totally disagree. Experience and communication are way to subjective to establish "rights" on.
Here is an interesting logical though. In 9 months, are any of you going to be more human than you are today? Are you going to be any more a person? Are you going to have more "rights" - (OK some of you may turn 18 or 21 and get more rights that way). Can we quantify your age and say that as you age 9 months, you will be more "wanted"?
That idea is absurd - yet it is an argument consistantly used to kill unborn.
I am pro-Life. I do not believe all life is sacred. Animals will always be exempt from being sacred. If I had to choose between 1 unborn child, and the last killer whale on earth - the child wins every time.
Here is the challenge for pro-Choicers. Show me a logical non-selfish reason why a 15 year olds right to have sex without concequence trumps the right of a baby to live.
ThansalThe New ScumJoin Date: 2002-08-22Member: 1215Members, Constellation
<!--QuoteBegin-Pepe_Muffassa+Oct 15 2004, 07:47 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Pepe_Muffassa @ Oct 15 2004, 07:47 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Here is the challenge for pro-Choicers. Show me a logical non-selfish reason why a 15 year olds right to have sex without concequence trumps the right of a baby to live. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> very simple actualy.
We don't condone the killing of babies.
realy the entire debate boils down to WHEN it becomes alive.
This is also key in the argument that none of us will realy change all that much in 9mo.
In 9mo it undergoes explosive growth and development. We don't change that much.
In that time it becomes a featus, eventualy it starts to develope certain characteristics that we would label as human, included in there is the brain and then thought. (one of the important points in my mind).
most people realise they are pregnant rather quickly and then take action. They don't wait untill it is fully formed and then have an abortion.
So, when does it become a life? If you say at conception then I can't help but laugh, b/c there is nothing there exept a 2 celled organisim. Yes it has the POTENTIAL to become a human life, but it is not yet. If we go with potential then I can argue that as soon as we hit puberty we need to all start screwing like rabits (hey, each sperm has the potential, and so does each egg). By the same argument we have to rule out contraceptives and things like the morning after pill (aka emergency contraceptives).
So either we accept that argument and we all start screwing and stop typing or we need a better line and, moreimportantly, a better reason.
So is it the development of eyes? features? toes? the brain? thought (brain waves)? or how about independance from the mother (I know people who argue this, and I don't agree personaly)?
As for your arguemnt of "well you are sleeping thus you can be killed" No, we still have brain waves, we still are thinking. Carcrash and coma? Most coma victims still have brain waves.
Person becomes a vegtable? Then we start getting questions. Included in there is the fact that we DO alow for the death of people (Do Not Resusitate orders are very real).
As I said, my personal line is thought. Once that point is passed, you can't go back.
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->So far I have heard: "this is the way it is, get used to it"; "she shouldn't have to wreck her life for 1 mistake"; "what about rape"; "sex is genetic, we can't be responsible for our actions" "be courageous, and deal with the grey areas".
- basically, these all have to deal with selfishness. They all put the wants of the woman/family unit ahead of that of the child. Even rape - just because you had something horible happen to you - now someone else has to die? Until we can put the value of another ahead of our own happiness, we will continue to kill the undervalued un-born. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I didn't say we aren't responsible for our actions, I'm saying that there are too many irresponsible people. People will have sex for fun... in fact some people have sex just because they have the opportunity. You can't stop them and you certainly won't stop them trying to get rid of it afterwards.
I do believe that abortion is murder, whether its the ending of life or just the possibility of life I still thinks its murder. So what?
I'm a big believer that morality <b>IS</b> black and white, I don't believe in sweeping generalisations and commandments that must be followed but I do believe that in every situation there is a 'right' way of acting. The idea of 'grey areas' is just a case of people being lazy (or ill-equipped to judge) to look at a specific situation and work out whats right so they just throw up their hands and say "there is no obvious right or wrong here".
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Males have no say on the issue I'm neither pro-choice nor anti-abortion (if anything I'm probably anti-abortion but I'm not saying my way is 100% right) It's not a black & white issue
and off-topic: One should avoid forcing others to believe in their beliefs when they disagree <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Sorry but I disagree strongly with all of those comments, it is a black and white issue (as I said earlier), males do have a say (we didn't contribute to those foetus'? We weren't given birth too?) and you've just joined a discussion on abortion to say you don't have an opinion?
One should try and convert people to your ways of belief at every opportunity but a) back off at the first sign that they aren't open to new ideas, b) don't be surprised if, even after they give you and your belief their full attention they still don't agree and c) be willing to listen to their opinions in exchange.
Back on topic: Birth defects - if I had a choice between being born with a serious mental handicap and my abortion I would prefer to be aborted. You could argue that I would disagree if I actually was born handicapped but a) once you are in a life you do tend to fight for it, that whole survival instinct thing kicks in and b) I would probably prefer abortion to my current life right now and I am a (relatively) healthy, happy individual, in fact my life is pretty damn good at the moment. Its also a lot of hassle though <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->If I were to say people should not have recreational sex, I would be a hypocrit. I never said not to have sex. There are plenty of things that you can do to bring your chances of conception to almost zero. Im saying you should take these percautions, but be willing to take responsibility if it fails. I have always been so, even with the scare I had my freshmen year. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I will be responsible, I will be the first one to admit that I am not yet ready to bring up a child and will speak to the mother about the possibility of abortion. If she wanted to keep it I'd stand by her and the child as best as I could but hopefully she would feel the same, it would be aborted, I'd breathe a massive sigh of relief and get on with my life.
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--><!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> (Pepe_Muffassa @ Oct 15 2004, 07:47 AM) Here is the challenge for pro-Choicers. Show me a logical non-selfish reason why a 15 year olds right to have sex without concequence trumps the right of a baby to live. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
very simple actualy.
We don't condone the killing of babies.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
As I believe abortion is murder I can quite happily answer that one without resorting to what 'pro-lifers' would consider pedantry.
There is no such thing as rights, we invented it because its a nice idea but they don't actually exist. I'd far prefer that 15 year old to be the person she should be without being hampered by a baby, if she is to be a mother then it will be when she is older, wiser and more responsible with more money, more time and a higher chance of a working loving relationship with a partner. 1 dead baby and 1+ living babies being brought up in a good environment with every chance of a good (and productive) life 'trumps' 1 living baby with a greatly reduced chance of a good life, a teenage mother whose own life has just ended for all practical reasons and yet more burden on the state, her family and friends etc.
In my opinion anyway. And thats not even starting on all the various permutations of rape, birth defects etc
Sorry for the long post <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
In nine months, I will not have developed an extra heart, an extra brain, more fingers, more limbs, or anything else. In nine months, a fetus undergoes a change from a single cell, comparable to an ameoba, to a complete human being, small, but with all the features of an adult. Comparing the development of a foetus to the development of a grown-up is absurd.
Then there's the whole "all life is sacred" thing. I can't help but think of other animals in that case. If I believed that a couple of cells in a womb maybe not even visible to the naked eye yet have the irrefutable right to live, I could not live myself. I am a higher lifeform. I'm on top of the food chain. My entire existence is one infinite series of murders. Wherever I step, millions die at my feet. Whenever I eat, I kill, be it plants or animals. Whenever I breathe, I kill. At THIS VERY MOMENT, I am on a murderous rampage as the white blood cells in my blood do their grisly work of exterminating millions of microbes. The foetus in a woman's womb is genetically closer to me than a chimpanzee, but I can't see genes. I can't hear them, can't feel them, can't taste them, can't smell them. But I can hear, see, feel, taste (yum, apeflesh) and smell (yuck, apepoo!) the chimpanzee. I can't but admit that the ape has much more in common with me than a small foetus without a nervous system and without the ability to live independently.
Can males have a say in all this? I honestly don't know. But I think we should be allowed to discuss it, at least.
As for the morning after pill, Pepe_Muffassa, I can help you with the decision: Your belief is this: "When does it become a person, and thus gain rights? At conception." That's from your second post, on the first page. Since the morning after pill doesn't prevent fertilization of the egg, but development of the foetus, it is murder by your definition.
And finally, Off-Topic. Bob, this thread is not off-topic. I fully expected and intended it to soon become a discussion on abortion, I just chose to start it off with a little different approach than just going "Hey, do you think abortion is good, yes or no?". I recognize that this doesn't seem totally clear from my first post, but believe me, that was the intention. This thread is going exactly the way I intended it to go: People discussing the pro and contra of abortion.
Don't tell me that guys don't have say so in this issue, because I mean heck, if it is true that we're talking about murder, then it isn't that a man can't have a choice but a woman should not have "choice" to murder or not to murder.
And it isn't that we are saying "life is sacred." However, the killing of a human being is somewhat a big issue. While you may argue it isn't the killing of a human being, until a conclusion is reached, don't you think the best "default" action would be to not abort fetuses?
If it is so hard to understand the concept that a embryo could be a human being, try to imagine that embryo years later. 2 year later, that embryo will be speaking its first words. 4 years later, that embryo will be going to school for the first time. Etc. etc.
By killing the embryo, you might as well be killing that child and future adult too. It isn't so much the killing of a one-celled organism as it is killing the future person that he will be.
I'm surprised no one has brought up the people that are alive today and are alive because the abortion that their mother had done did not go correctly and left the fetus still alive.
But isn't this a kind of fatalism, a belief that our destiny is fixed?
If you ask me, there is no future. The future doesn't exist, per se. Life is not a book, where we turn over and read the next page, but where that page has always been there. When you start reading a book, the end has already been written, everything is running on a rail from start to finish. But that's not how reality works. There is no future human. There may, three years from now, be a three-year old child. Or there may be the memory of a child that died shortly after birth. The future doesn't exist yet, just like, say, a road that has been planned but not yet built doesn't exist yet. What exists is the here and now, and here and now we have a tiny foetus that you wouldn't even recognize as human if you didn't know beforehand. A foetus with no thought processes, a foetus with no BRAIN, a foetus without the ability to live on its own. Versus that, we have somebody who doesn't want a child. I think that concern weighs heavier than the concern for something that is just a growth of cells.
This issue in my opinion is one of those that will never be solved just because no one can be proven to be 'wrong' or 'right'. It's kind of like the old which came first, the chicken or the egg. People say without the chicken, an egg can't be made, and vice versa. I doubt anyone in the future will suddenly come up with a 'solution' where everyone will read it and go, "Wow, he's totally correct. I'll abandon what I use to believe in for so long and follow this new correct concept.
I personally believe that it's better to be pro-choice than pro-life, not because I'm for abortion and what not. I look at it this way, there are always people who look for ways to abort, usually the teenagers who get accidently pregnant. I'm definately for having free clinics open with the promise of aninomity(sp) because of the fact that without the clinics, the young women who are uneducated in abortion and whatnot will just try using a coat hanger or some other crude object to force an abortion. Sometimes this could become fatal for both fetus and mother. Going pro-life will just shut down those clinics, 'forcing' women to have the baby. However, as is with underaged drinking and smoking, illegal abortion will continue on with much more dire results.
<!--QuoteBegin-Marine01+Oct 14 2004, 04:19 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Marine01 @ Oct 14 2004, 04:19 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> <!--QuoteBegin-wizard@psu+Oct 15 2004, 08:52 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (wizard@psu @ Oct 15 2004, 08:52 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Whatever. It's just your body and a worthless lump of parasitic flesh living off of you for 9 months. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> I wont even attempt to deal with the "Animals are people too" - but this line caught my eye. That is just not true. Reproducing actually proves that you are alive, when defining life, the ability to reproduce is one of the core criteria. Please, if your high school science teacher, when explaining reproduction, told you that all mammals suffered from parasites after sex, put your hand up and much sympathy will follow. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> Marine01, check the content of my post and you might view my statement in a much different light.
Do you have any idea how much pain a fetus goes through when they have an abortion? I for one would not let anyone put a human being through that. Adoption is the best alternative for young women. Many parents cannot have children and WANT to raise them. Your mistake is their happiness.
<!--QuoteBegin-Stakhanov+Oct 14 2004, 05:41 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Stakhanov @ Oct 14 2004, 05:41 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Ok , since Legionnaired challenged me to support my questionning of abstinence with studies , here we go : <a href='http://www.plannedparenthood.org/LIBRARY/facts/AbstinenceOnly10-01.html' target='_blank'>Consequences of Abstinence-Only Sex Ed</a> <a href='http://www.siecus.org/pubs/fact/fact0001.html' target='_blank'>SIECUS Teen Abstinence Fact Sheet</a> <a href='http://ari.ucsf.edu/pdf/abstinence.pdf' target='_blank'>San Francisco Uni. Study</a> <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> I didn't ask for documents attacking "abstinence only" sex education, I asked for documentation of the physical and social effects of abstinence on people. I'm all for sex education, but the suggestion that "abstinence makes people sour and stuck up" is as wrong as it is narrow-minded.
<!--QuoteBegin-http://www.teen-aid.org/Abstinence_Education/Psychological_Argument_For_Abstinence_and_Commitment.htm+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (http://www.teen-aid.org/Abstinence_Education/Psychological_Argument_For_Abstinence_and_Commitment.htm)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->http://www.teen-aid.org/Abstinence_Educati..._Commitment.htm] It is clear from years of studying the psychology of human needs, that love and security are two very large components of emotional fulfillment. In today’s adolescent relationships, sex is becoming more of a temporary substitute for genuine emotional needs, although the hope of sex itself could not deliver as promised. Hajcak and Garwood (1988) feel that adolescent sexuality (including both grade school and college age), driven largely by emotional needs, can result in various dysfunctions. In summary they say:
Using sex as a coping mechanism can create depression, low self-esteem, or interpersonal problems, and often leads to hyper sexuality. It also can inhibit intimacy, prevent personal and interpersonal growth, and diminish sexual satisfaction. Unless we help adolescents become aware of these needs and how they influence sexual behavior, they will develop immature, ineffective, unsatisfying relationships and sexual habits that will carry into adulthood. (p. 755)
Shaughnessy and Shakesby (1992) explained that adolescents have a tough time with true emotional intimacy for three reasons. First, they do not have the verbal skills to effectively label or describe their feelings. Second, their hopes, dreams and aspirations are not very concrete, and third, sharing emotional intimacy does not always involve a conscious decision like having sex. Thus, sex has become a convenient symbol and method to deal with this need for emotional intimacy. However, true emotional growth may be stunted by the substitution of sex for intimacy. Hajcak and Garwood (1988) state, most teenagers have too many unresolved nonsexual needs to truly enjoy and grow through an active sex life. Indulging in sex inhibits their emotional and sexual needs and, unfortunately, many of these teenagers will never learn to separate the two. (p. 760)
It is for this very reason that Shaughnessy and Shakesby (1992) argue that sex education for adolescents needs to include discussing emotional needs, components of relationships, and the long-term consequences of sexual decisions such as pregnancy and disease. This type of education is important, especially when adolescents are being bombarded with media messages, provocative advertisements and MTV, which gloss over the complicated and emotional act of sex with adventure, glamour and excitement.
Peer pressure instigates many of the myths and desires that may encourage experimenting in sex, without full knowledge of the consequences of the sexual act. Sex is a hot topic for discussion and something that almost everyone is curious about. Many social influences, primarily aimed at emphasizing physical appearance and erotica, have added to this sexual hype. Weinstein and Rosen (1991) state that sexual activity is instigated and positively reinforced by trends and what friends think is “cool.” However, discussing real intimacy and emotional needs, along with sex, is not typically part of these discussions, especially vacant from the male point of view. Weinstein and Rosen (1991) report the following consequences for this peer induced and emotionally uninformed premature sexual behavior:
Sometimes these initial sexual experiences are fraught with anxiety and performance failure, resulting in complicated, long-term, covert sexual problems. In such cases, the adolescent male’s progress toward relational sexual intimacy is more likely to be slowed or impaired. The need for counseling may occur later, as commitment, intimacy, and long-term relationships are unsuccessfully attempted. (p. 337)
Overall, it appears that the complexity and emotional intensity of sexual behavior can cloud and confuse those who have not yet identified their emotional needs and discovered how to meet these needs through a relationship.
It also is quite apparent many relationships use sex as the primary way to fulfill intimacy and closeness. One study (Peplan, Rubin, & Hill, 1977) demonstrated that sexual involvement often preceded forming emotional intimacy in heterosexual couples. They found that the major difference between couples who engaged in sex early or later in the relationship was based on the emotional component. For couples who waited, emotional intimacy was established; for those who had sex early in the relationship, emotional intimacy was not a prerequisite. Without direct research comparing these two groups for relational success, longevity and satisfaction, I can only hypothesize that establishing emotional intimacy before sex, will improve the satisfaction, self-esteem, and longevity of a relationship<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
@lolfighter, so because we cannot see that the zygote genetically has the same structure as us, and because we can't see that it will grow up to be like us, it's ok to kill it? Is ignorance a liscence for murder? I can't see much more of you than your handle and IP, is it ok for me to kill you, as long as I don't look at you while I do it?
Yeah as others have pointed out, pro-life does not mean the oppisite is anti-life, the oppisite of it would be:
pro-life > pro-murder
pro-choice > pro-responsibility
Either way you look it, it always slanders over to the pro-life side. Anyhow, abortion is okay for those who are raped, or if it's threatening the mothers' life, in extreme cases like that, but otherwise it should be prohibited.
Abortion is a stain on society that should try to be removed or limited.
No, Legionnaired, I meant it quite the other way around: If a foetus has legal rights, then every living being should have the same rights. If I show a layperson a picture of a just-fertilized egg and a picture of an amoeba, then ask him to tell which is which, chances are he can only guess. And the amoeba has the POTENTIAL to develop into a sentient being too, it'll just take it several billion years instead of nine months, and the potential is substantially smaller. But the potential is there. But a society where every living being has the same rights is impossible to live in. Imagine if killing an ant was murder, punishable by years of inprisonment. It'd be absurd. You can't avoid stepping on ants. Or spiders. Or accidentally swallowing a fly with your drink (which is in the process of drowning, yet not dead). You can't give every living being the same concern. If I can place my desire for a tasty steak over the life of a young cow, it'd be hypocritical of me to place the well-being of a grown-up human over the life of a small foetus.
<!--QuoteBegin-lolfighter+Oct 16 2004, 07:49 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (lolfighter @ Oct 16 2004, 07:49 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> No, Legionnaired, I meant it quite the other way around: If a foetus has legal rights, then every living being should have the same rights. If I show a layperson a picture of a just-fertilized egg and a picture of an amoeba, then ask him to tell which is which, chances are he can only guess. And the amoeba has the POTENTIAL to develop into a sentient being too, it'll just take it several billion years instead of nine months, and the potential is substantially smaller. But the potential is there. But a society where every living being has the same rights is impossible to live in. Imagine if killing an ant was murder, punishable by years of inprisonment. It'd be absurd. You can't avoid stepping on ants. Or spiders. Or accidentally swallowing a fly with your drink (which is in the process of drowning, yet not dead). You can't give every living being the same concern. If I can place my desire for a tasty steak over the life of a young cow, it'd be hypocritical of me to place the well-being of a grown-up human over the life of a small foetus. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> That is a very flawed and ridiculous comparison.
A fetus if not aborted and no complications arise <b>will</b> mature into a human. An amoeba, even if the conditions are right, has a very very very slim <b>chance</b> of ever becoming anything close to a human. That said we do not police other species and our laws are meant for the protectton and propigation of our own species. You don't see us arresting eagles for killing a fish to eat, that would be stupid.
You know plants are living things, you are hurting them to when you eat them. Better start eating air.
Comments
Now that I've established my opinion, no one has talked about birth defects yet.
What if your child was going to be born with a birth defect that made the child unable to interact with society normally, forever? What if you know your child is going to be born with mental retardation, and will be branded an invalid his whole life. Would YOU want to be born, your future determined already, to where you will never be able to hold any sort of job, make any sort of normal social contact?
This is only an example, and there are several worse, and less worse, examples to make.
I know I wouldn't want my child to have to go through that. I wouldn't want to either. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
my sister is mentally retarded, and unable to speak (although she can understand a few basic words and sentences). i really take offense at your suggestion that she would rather not be alive than be mentally retarded. she's one of the happiest children i've ever seen, and that's not because we spoil her (even though we sometimes do).
Off the topic: I'm not going there. There are some things that arouse so much emotion in those involved that discussing them on an internet forum isn't at all productive. So I don't feel it would help to add my 2 cents, because the likelihood of anyone being swayed one way or another by my view is nonexistent. And besides, it is off the actual topic... I blame lf for yelling 'abortion' in a crowded discussion forum. Surely he knew what would happen. <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Not like we're eating soylent green or anything.
*edit* "IT'S PEEEEOOPPPLE!!!!" */edit*
In response to 1. Understand my position here - a Bible believing Christian. Most abortion issues I can tackle without pointing out faith-based solutions. I will give the faith-based on this one first, then a "sociatal" based.
First of all, I believe that God is the author and finisher of life. Putting our human standards on his creation robs God of his right to enjoy his creatures. To say that handicapped people can not enjoy a good life - therefore they should be aborted - robs God of his enjoyment of that persons life. (This can also be applied to suicide, but that is a different matter).
Second - making a choice of life or death based on physical / mental qualities is never a good idea. You are setting up a class system based on physical characteristics. Where does it stop? Do people with glasses deserve to die because they have "inferior" genes? There must be a line of protection drawn somewhere, and I submit that the line should be drawn to include as many humans as possible - at conception.
In response to 2. My wife and I use contraceptive means to prevent pregnancy. We do not use a morning after pill. Now, I am unsure of the science involved in the morning after, but my understanding is that it causes an early menstral cycle.
My view is this - post conception humans should all be granted the same rights. If you disturb thier living environment to potentially cause death, you are doing something wrong.
Thats it for now.
It is my belief that humans form a continuum with other species. We are animals , probably the only self-conscious ones on this planet , but still animals. Adult chimps have about the same mental age as 2 year old human babies , yet chimps are rarely treated with the respect they deserve , as a cousin specie.
2 months foetii do <i>not</i> have the ability to think , and can barely feel anything. They do not exist as human individuals. Killing them is not a cruel course of action , especially if it prevents future suffering.
On the other hand , great apes do have elaborate emotions. They can feel sorrow for their relatives when something bad happens to them. They can feel compassion and show solidarity , to the point of actively helping retarded mates survive. Yet , no law prevents their killing or bad treatment.
Such knowledge is relatively recent. But it is my belief that morals must be updated with new knowledge.
<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Humans are animals, like it or not. One day the Nha Si'Marat might obliterate or enslave this planet. And then you all die.
FYI offt-topic: Nha culture says that all the weak are unworthy of life. Xzianthian culture tries to make each individual into the best he/she/it can be. Uniformity and genetic perfection is perhaps one of the Nha Si'Marat's greates strengths, diversity is perhaps one of the Federation of Xzianthia's greatest strengths.
~edit~
Reply to Stakhanov:
Religion and law always are trying to catchup with our method of evolution: technology.
As a scientist I believe in the objective facts, but you see here Stakhanov many of the people in this thread cannot even take that stuff into consideration because of their hardline religious beliefs. Which is fine as long as they aren't trying to force their beliefs onto others.
On the contrary, I believe the opposite. Unborn children would grow up to be doctors and lawyers and good decent people. By killing the fetus, you are killing those people. Call it whatever you want, but I'll call it murder.
It is my belief that humans form a continuum with other species. We are animals , probably the only self-conscious ones on this planet , but still animals. Adult chimps have about the same mental age as 2 year old human babies , yet chimps are rarely treated with the respect they deserve , as a cousin specie.
2 months foetii do <i>not</i> have the ability to think , and can barely feel anything. They do not exist as human individuals. Killing them is not a cruel course of action , especially if it prevents future suffering.
On the other hand , great apes do have elaborate emotions. They can feel sorrow for their relatives when something bad happens to them. They can feel compassion and show solidarity , to the point of actively helping retarded mates survive. Yet , no law prevents their killing or bad treatment.
Such knowledge is relatively recent. But it is my belief that morals must be updated with new knowledge. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
2 Months? hmm what about on day 31? 32? 33?... When is it a child?
Frankly the discussion about aborting children because they are going to be born with handicaps disgusts me. This child will be born abnormal. Therefore we will kill them? Think about what you are proposing.
Future suffering? Who are you to decide? Why not let the person decide for themself if their suffering is too great?
Every so often a neurological condition causes me to lose my vision and causes me such pain that it contorts my body to the point where I begin to thing that removing the skin from my body might not be a bad option if only it would stop the pain. I know of some people that this happens to every single day of their lives. But every now and then I look out on the countryside and think of how greatful I am to have seen it.
Whatever. It's just your body and a worthless lump of parasitic flesh living off of you for 9 months.
Pro-Life = all life in and out of the womb is sacred, and therefore abortion is murder.
Pro-Choice = a fetus, while inside a woman's body, is affecting the body of that woman, and therefore it is the woman's right to decide whether or not that fetus becomes a baby.
See how I have neatly hidden my personal opinion? The name of the sides reflect the point of view of the side.
I've got back and forth over the past couple of years. However, in the past year or so, I came to a conclusion about the danger of Pro-Choice thought processes. They do not stand alone, but instead reflect a larger viewpoint that I perceive as threatening. This is the same viewpoint that dominates things like Pro-Euthanasia (which is actually pro having the choice of suicide).
Why do I feel threatened? Well, 40 years ago, the idea of abortion would send the average American into a feeling of disgust. Today, there are advocates of parents having the right to terminate a baby after 8 days of birth. In The Netherlands, where Euthanasia is a legal and common practice, there are an increasing level of cases wherein doctors are killing terminally ill patients to free up a hospital bed.
Do you not see the trend? The average American is disgusted by these practices. What about 40 years from now....
And by the way, Stak, I love having sex outside of marriage. Sex is freakin GREAT, but I'm taking the risk of imprenating the chick I'm with. It's my decision. I know that there is only one way to insure I don't get a chick pregnant, and that is abstinence. I'm all for astinence being taught in schools, along with other birth control methods.
You need to think about the real consequences behind this trend. Read Brave New World for clarification.
I wont even attempt to deal with the "Animals are people too" - but this line caught my eye. That is just not true. Reproducing actually proves that you are alive, when defining life, the ability to reproduce is one of the core criteria. Please, if your high school science teacher, when explaining reproduction, told you that all mammals suffered from parasites after sex, put your hand up and much sympathy will follow.
Arg. Again I don't think males can make the decisions on this debate and even then it has to determine on the individual and their culture. If you have a uterus then ok.
Do you want me to tell you what I would make as a law if I had to?
Arg. Again I don't think males can make the decisions on this debate and even then it has to determine on the individual and their culture. If you have a uterus then ok.
Do you want me to tell you what I would make as a law if I had to? <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Why cant males have any say on this? They helped concieve the baby, it exists because of his actions, and some males have this weird way of looking at children they helped create as somehow.... related to them.... what a crazy, crazy world we live in!
As is always brought up in abortion debates - a very famous case in Australia of a woman and her defacto partner who concieved. The father wanted her to abort the child, she wanted to keep the child. The father amubshed the mother as she was getting out of the car, knocked her to the ground and stomped on her stomach - the child in the womb died. In court, he claimed that as the baby was young enough to be legally aborted, he wasnt guilty of murder, just assault. She claimed he killed her baby. He went down for manslaughter, or unlawful killing. In other words, the court decided that it wasnt about how old the child was the determined whether it was human or not, it was about whether it was "wanted".
That's almost as whacked out as this "animals should have human rights" business.
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->2 months foetii do not have the ability to think , and can barely feel anything. They do not exist as human individuals. Killing them is not a cruel course of action , especially if it prevents future suffering.
On the other hand , great apes do have elaborate emotions. They can feel sorrow for their relatives when something bad happens to them. They can feel compassion and show solidarity , to the point of actively helping retarded mates survive. Yet , no law prevents their killing or bad treatment.
Such knowledge is relatively recent. But it is my belief that morals must be updated with new knowledge.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Ah I see, whether you are human or not depends upon whether you are thinking and feeling. Which means killing your grandma quickly while she is a asleep isnt murder, because while she is unconcious, she isnt human. Just had a car accident - think all you lost is a litre of blood and your licence? Wrong, while you're lying slumped over the wheel, you've just lost your humanity too. What's that you say - Granny will wake up, all she needs is time? That child will feel and think, all it needs is time also. What's magical about 10 minutes and 2 months till consciousness that determines whose human and whose not?
Actually, laws do exist to prevent cruel courses of actions against animals. But they are not human. If you feel comfortable drawing up arbitrary lines such as "if it sorrows, then its on our level", then I feel just as comfortable drawing lines such as "If it cant reproduce with a human female, then its not on our level"
<a href='http://www.plannedparenthood.org/LIBRARY/facts/AbstinenceOnly10-01.html' target='_blank'>Consequences of Abstinence-Only Sex Ed</a>
<a href='http://www.siecus.org/pubs/fact/fact0001.html' target='_blank'>SIECUS Teen Abstinence Fact Sheet</a>
<a href='http://ari.ucsf.edu/pdf/abstinence.pdf' target='_blank'>San Francisco Uni. Study</a>
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Uganda may be on its way to wiping out AIDS by using the Biblical values of chastity and fidelity, a new Harvard University study finds. According to the study, abstinence education has shown significant effectiveness in reducing AIDS in Uganda, with the HIV infection rate dropping 50 percent between the years 1992 and 2000.
The east African nation is making a big impact with the revelation that the AIDS epidemic can be curbed. Riddled with HIV infections since the 1970s, Uganda has found miraculous success by using abstinence as its prevention strategy. Promotion of abstinence through billboards, radio programs and school sex education curricula has resulted in a slow and steady drop in HIV infection rates, as well as new attitudes about conquering AIDS in Uganda.
"Uganda is one of the countries that attach great importance on promoting abstinence among our youth," said Ahmed Ssenyomo, minister counselor at the Ugandan Embassy, in a speech to the African American Youth Conference on Abstinence.
When the program started in the late 1980s, the number of pregnant women infected with HIV was 21.2 percent. By 2001, the number was 6.2 percent. The Harvard study also reported Ugandan adults are not having as much risky sex: of women 15 and older, those reporting many sexual partners dropped from 18.4 percent in 1989 to 2.5 percent in 2000.
The emphasis on abstinence in Uganda’s program is unique. In other nations with high HIV infections, such as Zimbabwe and Botswana, condoms have been promoted as the answer to ending the AIDS crisis. In Botswana, 38 percent of pregnant women were HIV positive last year, contrasted with 6.2 percent of Ugandan women.
Much of the program’s success is due to the nation’s willingness to look beyond the sexual revolution to the past.
"What we’re seeing in parts of Africa is communities responding to the epidemic by saying, ‘Let’s see what’s in our culture — how can we deal with this with what we had in the past?’ " Susan Leclerc-Madlalas, a medical anthropologist at the University of Natal in South Africa, told the Associated Press. "What they had most of the time was a way of regulating sexuality."
Many AIDS officials reject abstinence as a potential prevention strategy despite evidence that promotion of abstinence and fidelity have significantly reduced AIDS cases in Uganda over the past decade.
"Millions and millions of young people are having sexual relations," said Paolo Teizeria, director of Brazil’s AIDS program, at the 14th International AIDS Conference. "We cannot talk about abstinence. It’s not real."
Abstinence is often dismissed as a potential prevention method. Condom promotion and "safe-sex" initiatives have long been thought to be the answer to stopping the spread of HIV: Instead of encouraging people to curb their libidos, these initiatives have tried to provide "safer" ways of exercising them. However, in many African nations condoms aren’t looked upon kindly: there are a variety of urban legends that circulate in some regions that condoms are either ethnic cleansing tools or actually spread HIV themselves. (During the Cold War, the Soviet KGB spread "disinformation" that the United States created the AIDS virus to kill off Africans.)
"Ugandans really never took to condoms," Dr. Vinand Nantulya, an infectious disease advisor to Ugandan leader Yoweri Museveni, told The New Republic.
The abstinence initiative in Uganda goes far beyond those who are already having sex — it starts with the education and promotion of an abstinence program for youth called "True Love Waits." Thirty thousand Ugandan youth are currently involved with the program. Launched in Uganda in 1994, True Love Waits focuses on abstinence until marriage as a way to prevent all sorts of adverse consequences associated with extra-marital sexual activity.
"Encouraging marriage, monogamy or abstinence, delaying the onset of sexual activity, discouraging promiscuity and casual sex, reducing the supply and demand of illegal drugs or providing treatment to drug addicts … are the absolute most effective approaches to reducing the risk of HIV," Rep. Mark Souder (R-Indiana) and six other members of the U.S. Committee on Government Reform said in a letter to the United Nations.
The United States and other countries have yet to embrace abstinence promotion as a mode of AIDS prevention. The United Nations recently predicted that AIDS will wipe out half the population in some African countries. In Uganda, the proverbial sun is starting to shine from the rain cloud of AIDS deaths — and it’s looking brighter. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
They hand out condom's too - 80M a year, plus educate people like its going out of style, but their unique suggestion of how about we all stop rooting like wild animals took off too. You understand what you are facing, and you are told the best way to avoid it is to stop humping anything that moves. Hey presto, AID's on the way down....
Sex is also fun and done for recreation, you can't make people responsible about something that is coded into their genes for them to do as much as possible. We are designed for sex, not everyone makes a suitable parent.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It is coding in your genes to be fun to help further propigation of our species. And you are right not everyone if fit to be a parent, but that doesn't mean they dont have the right.
If I were to say people should not have recreational sex, I would be a hypocrit. I never said not to have sex. There are plenty of things that you can do to bring your chances of conception to almost zero. Im saying you should take these percautions, but be willing to take responsibility if it fails. I have always been so, even with the scare I had my freshmen year.
This is the fundamental difference between humans and animals. Humans have experiences that they remember and more importantly they are able to pass those experiences down to other humans. This is why it is morally wrong to kill a human, because when you kill them you are not only ending their life you are ending all the knowledge and experience they they have accumulated through their life. They won't have the ability to pass down that knowledge. Society doesn't place a value judgment on ending life it places a value judgment of ending experience.
Fetuii have no experience, and even if they did they wouldn't be able to communicate that experience. By this logic fetuii aren't humans, yet. So now the question comes down to the fine details, namely whats different from a fetus and a new born baby? The answer once again comes back to communication. Fetuii have no ability to communicate with the out side world save kicking. However babies, the second they come out of the womb have the ability to cry. This is the most basic form of communication. When something cries is communicates people can respond to that communication and thats what makes us human.
<!--QuoteBegin-Wheeee+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Wheeee)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--><!--QuoteBegin-ThE HeRo+Oct 14 2004, 02:13 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (ThE HeRo @ Oct 14 2004, 02:13 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> I'm pro-choice. It's the woman's responsibility, if she wants to do that, then she has to live with it. I wouldn't want to penalize a 17 year old girl, destroy her life because she had sex, and the condom broke. The rape case applies. It's her choice.
Now that I've established my opinion, no one has talked about birth defects yet.
What if your child was going to be born with a birth defect that made the child unable to interact with society normally, forever? What if you know your child is going to be born with mental retardation, and will be branded an invalid his whole life. Would YOU want to be born, your future determined already, to where you will never be able to hold any sort of job, make any sort of normal social contact?
This is only an example, and there are several worse, and less worse, examples to make.
I know I wouldn't want my child to have to go through that. I wouldn't want to either. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
my sister is mentally retarded, and unable to speak (although she can understand a few basic words and sentences). i really take offense at your suggestion that she would rather not be alive than be mentally retarded. she's one of the happiest children I've ever seen, and that's not because we spoil her (even though we sometimes do).<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This brings up a interesting question on morality. Even though you oppose killing a fetus would you be willing to change its genes to make it have a “better” life? In a since you are killing the fetus, because you are changing its genetic code and making it a different person. Is that murder or is that change?
<!--QuoteBegin-Pepe_Muffassa+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Pepe_Muffassa)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> In response to 2. My wife and I use contraceptive means to prevent pregnancy. We do not use a morning after pill. Now, I am unsure of the science involved in the morning after, but my understanding is that it causes an early menstrual cycle.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Just so you know the morning after pill is a super form of the regular pill. IIRC all it does is harden the uterun wall so the egg can't implant on it. The blood is your wife flushing out the dead egg. Please note that the only difference from the regular pill that women take every day and the morning after pill is the size of the dose. Also it is important to note that this is not an abortion.
As for the 1st half of your post, I totally disagree. Experience and communication are way to subjective to establish "rights" on.
Here is an interesting logical though. In 9 months, are any of you going to be more human than you are today? Are you going to be any more a person? Are you going to have more "rights" - (OK some of you may turn 18 or 21 and get more rights that way). Can we quantify your age and say that as you age 9 months, you will be more "wanted"?
That idea is absurd - yet it is an argument consistantly used to kill unborn.
I am pro-Life. I do not believe all life is sacred. Animals will always be exempt from being sacred. If I had to choose between 1 unborn child, and the last killer whale on earth - the child wins every time.
Here is the challenge for pro-Choicers. Show me a logical non-selfish reason why a 15 year olds right to have sex without concequence trumps the right of a baby to live.
very simple actualy.
We don't condone the killing of babies.
realy the entire debate boils down to WHEN it becomes alive.
This is also key in the argument that none of us will realy change all that much in 9mo.
In 9mo it undergoes explosive growth and development. We don't change that much.
In that time it becomes a featus, eventualy it starts to develope certain characteristics that we would label as human, included in there is the brain and then thought. (one of the important points in my mind).
most people realise they are pregnant rather quickly and then take action. They don't wait untill it is fully formed and then have an abortion.
So, when does it become a life?
If you say at conception then I can't help but laugh, b/c there is nothing there exept a 2 celled organisim. Yes it has the POTENTIAL to become a human life, but it is not yet. If we go with potential then I can argue that as soon as we hit puberty we need to all start screwing like rabits (hey, each sperm has the potential, and so does each egg). By the same argument we have to rule out contraceptives and things like the morning after pill (aka emergency contraceptives).
So either we accept that argument and we all start screwing and stop typing or we need a better line and, moreimportantly, a better reason.
So is it the development of eyes? features? toes? the brain? thought (brain waves)? or how about independance from the mother (I know people who argue this, and I don't agree personaly)?
As for your arguemnt of "well you are sleeping thus you can be killed"
No, we still have brain waves, we still are thinking.
Carcrash and coma? Most coma victims still have brain waves.
Person becomes a vegtable? Then we start getting questions. Included in there is the fact that we DO alow for the death of people (Do Not Resusitate orders are very real).
As I said, my personal line is thought. Once that point is passed, you can't go back.
"this is the way it is, get used to it";
"she shouldn't have to wreck her life for 1 mistake";
"what about rape";
"sex is genetic, we can't be responsible for our actions"
"be courageous, and deal with the grey areas".
- basically, these all have to deal with selfishness. They all put the wants of the woman/family unit ahead of that of the child. Even rape - just because you had something horible happen to you - now someone else has to die?
Until we can put the value of another ahead of our own happiness, we will continue to kill the undervalued un-born. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I didn't say we aren't responsible for our actions, I'm saying that there are too many irresponsible people. People will have sex for fun... in fact some people have sex just because they have the opportunity. You can't stop them and you certainly won't stop them trying to get rid of it afterwards.
I do believe that abortion is murder, whether its the ending of life or just the possibility of life I still thinks its murder. So what?
I'm a big believer that morality <b>IS</b> black and white, I don't believe in sweeping generalisations and commandments that must be followed but I do believe that in every situation there is a 'right' way of acting. The idea of 'grey areas' is just a case of people being lazy (or ill-equipped to judge) to look at a specific situation and work out whats right so they just throw up their hands and say "there is no obvious right or wrong here".
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Males have no say on the issue
I'm neither pro-choice nor anti-abortion (if anything I'm probably anti-abortion but I'm not saying my way is 100% right)
It's not a black & white issue
and off-topic:
One should avoid forcing others to believe in their beliefs when they disagree <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Sorry but I disagree strongly with all of those comments, it is a black and white issue (as I said earlier), males do have a say (we didn't contribute to those foetus'? We weren't given birth too?) and you've just joined a discussion on abortion to say you don't have an opinion?
One should try and convert people to your ways of belief at every opportunity but a) back off at the first sign that they aren't open to new ideas, b) don't be surprised if, even after they give you and your belief their full attention they still don't agree and c) be willing to listen to their opinions in exchange.
Back on topic: Birth defects - if I had a choice between being born with a serious mental handicap and my abortion I would prefer to be aborted. You could argue that I would disagree if I actually was born handicapped but a) once you are in a life you do tend to fight for it, that whole survival instinct thing kicks in and b) I would probably prefer abortion to my current life right now and I am a (relatively) healthy, happy individual, in fact my life is pretty damn good at the moment. Its also a lot of hassle though <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->If I were to say people should not have recreational sex, I would be a hypocrit. I never said not to have sex. There are plenty of things that you can do to bring your chances of conception to almost zero. Im saying you should take these percautions, but be willing to take responsibility if it fails. I have always been so, even with the scare I had my freshmen year. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I will be responsible, I will be the first one to admit that I am not yet ready to bring up a child and will speak to the mother about the possibility of abortion. If she wanted to keep it I'd stand by her and the child as best as I could but hopefully she would feel the same, it would be aborted, I'd breathe a massive sigh of relief and get on with my life.
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--><!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> (Pepe_Muffassa @ Oct 15 2004, 07:47 AM)
Here is the challenge for pro-Choicers. Show me a logical non-selfish reason why a 15 year olds right to have sex without concequence trumps the right of a baby to live. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
very simple actualy.
We don't condone the killing of babies.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
As I believe abortion is murder I can quite happily answer that one without resorting to what 'pro-lifers' would consider pedantry.
There is no such thing as rights, we invented it because its a nice idea but they don't actually exist. I'd far prefer that 15 year old to be the person she should be without being hampered by a baby, if she is to be a mother then it will be when she is older, wiser and more responsible with more money, more time and a higher chance of a working loving relationship with a partner.
1 dead baby and 1+ living babies being brought up in a good environment with every chance of a good (and productive) life 'trumps' 1 living baby with a greatly reduced chance of a good life, a teenage mother whose own life has just ended for all practical reasons and yet more burden on the state, her family and friends etc.
In my opinion anyway. And thats not even starting on all the various permutations of rape, birth defects etc
Sorry for the long post <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Then there's the whole "all life is sacred" thing. I can't help but think of other animals in that case. If I believed that a couple of cells in a womb maybe not even visible to the naked eye yet have the irrefutable right to live, I could not live myself. I am a higher lifeform. I'm on top of the food chain. My entire existence is one infinite series of murders. Wherever I step, millions die at my feet. Whenever I eat, I kill, be it plants or animals. Whenever I breathe, I kill. At THIS VERY MOMENT, I am on a murderous rampage as the white blood cells in my blood do their grisly work of exterminating millions of microbes. The foetus in a woman's womb is genetically closer to me than a chimpanzee, but I can't see genes. I can't hear them, can't feel them, can't taste them, can't smell them. But I can hear, see, feel, taste (yum, apeflesh) and smell (yuck, apepoo!) the chimpanzee. I can't but admit that the ape has much more in common with me than a small foetus without a nervous system and without the ability to live independently.
Can males have a say in all this? I honestly don't know. But I think we should be allowed to discuss it, at least.
As for the morning after pill, Pepe_Muffassa, I can help you with the decision: Your belief is this: "When does it become a person, and thus gain rights? At conception."
That's from your second post, on the first page. Since the morning after pill doesn't prevent fertilization of the egg, but development of the foetus, it is murder by your definition.
And finally, Off-Topic. Bob, this thread is not off-topic. I fully expected and intended it to soon become a discussion on abortion, I just chose to start it off with a little different approach than just going "Hey, do you think abortion is good, yes or no?". I recognize that this doesn't seem totally clear from my first post, but believe me, that was the intention. This thread is going exactly the way I intended it to go: People discussing the pro and contra of abortion.
And it isn't that we are saying "life is sacred." However, the killing of a human being is somewhat a big issue. While you may argue it isn't the killing of a human being, until a conclusion is reached, don't you think the best "default" action would be to not abort fetuses?
If it is so hard to understand the concept that a embryo could be a human being, try to imagine that embryo years later. 2 year later, that embryo will be speaking its first words. 4 years later, that embryo will be going to school for the first time. Etc. etc.
By killing the embryo, you might as well be killing that child and future adult too. It isn't so much the killing of a one-celled organism as it is killing the future person that he will be.
If you ask me, there is no future. The future doesn't exist, per se. Life is not a book, where we turn over and read the next page, but where that page has always been there. When you start reading a book, the end has already been written, everything is running on a rail from start to finish. But that's not how reality works. There is no future human. There may, three years from now, be a three-year old child. Or there may be the memory of a child that died shortly after birth. The future doesn't exist yet, just like, say, a road that has been planned but not yet built doesn't exist yet. What exists is the here and now, and here and now we have a tiny foetus that you wouldn't even recognize as human if you didn't know beforehand. A foetus with no thought processes, a foetus with no BRAIN, a foetus without the ability to live on its own. Versus that, we have somebody who doesn't want a child. I think that concern weighs heavier than the concern for something that is just a growth of cells.
I personally believe that it's better to be pro-choice than pro-life, not because I'm for abortion and what not. I look at it this way, there are always people who look for ways to abort, usually the teenagers who get accidently pregnant. I'm definately for having free clinics open with the promise of aninomity(sp) because of the fact that without the clinics, the young women who are uneducated in abortion and whatnot will just try using a coat hanger or some other crude object to force an abortion. Sometimes this could become fatal for both fetus and mother. Going pro-life will just shut down those clinics, 'forcing' women to have the baby. However, as is with underaged drinking and smoking, illegal abortion will continue on with much more dire results.
I wont even attempt to deal with the "Animals are people too" - but this line caught my eye. That is just not true. Reproducing actually proves that you are alive, when defining life, the ability to reproduce is one of the core criteria. Please, if your high school science teacher, when explaining reproduction, told you that all mammals suffered from parasites after sex, put your hand up and much sympathy will follow. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Marine01, check the content of my post and you might view my statement in a much different light.
(sarcasm is easily lost on the internet)
Then again it's all my view on the subject...
<a href='http://www.plannedparenthood.org/LIBRARY/facts/AbstinenceOnly10-01.html' target='_blank'>Consequences of Abstinence-Only Sex Ed</a>
<a href='http://www.siecus.org/pubs/fact/fact0001.html' target='_blank'>SIECUS Teen Abstinence Fact Sheet</a>
<a href='http://ari.ucsf.edu/pdf/abstinence.pdf' target='_blank'>San Francisco Uni. Study</a> <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I didn't ask for documents attacking "abstinence only" sex education, I asked for documentation of the physical and social effects of abstinence on people. I'm all for sex education, but the suggestion that "abstinence makes people sour and stuck up" is as wrong as it is narrow-minded.
<!--QuoteBegin-http://www.teen-aid.org/Abstinence_Education/Psychological_Argument_For_Abstinence_and_Commitment.htm+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (http://www.teen-aid.org/Abstinence_Education/Psychological_Argument_For_Abstinence_and_Commitment.htm)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->http://www.teen-aid.org/Abstinence_Educati..._Commitment.htm] It is clear from years of studying the psychology of human needs, that love and security are two very large components of emotional fulfillment. In today’s adolescent relationships, sex is becoming more of a temporary substitute for genuine emotional needs, although the hope of sex itself could not deliver as promised. Hajcak and Garwood (1988) feel that adolescent sexuality (including both grade school and college age), driven largely by emotional needs, can result in various dysfunctions. In summary they say:
Using sex as a coping mechanism can create depression, low self-esteem, or interpersonal problems, and often leads to hyper sexuality. It also can inhibit intimacy, prevent personal and interpersonal growth, and diminish sexual satisfaction. Unless we help adolescents become aware of these needs and how they influence sexual behavior, they will develop immature, ineffective, unsatisfying relationships and sexual habits that will carry into adulthood. (p. 755)
Shaughnessy and Shakesby (1992) explained that adolescents have a tough time with true emotional intimacy for three reasons. First, they do not have the verbal skills to effectively label or describe their feelings. Second, their hopes, dreams and aspirations are not very concrete, and third, sharing emotional intimacy does not always involve a conscious decision like having sex. Thus, sex has become a convenient symbol and method to deal with this need for emotional intimacy. However, true emotional growth may be stunted by the substitution of sex for intimacy. Hajcak and Garwood (1988) state, most teenagers have too many unresolved nonsexual needs to truly enjoy and grow through an active sex life. Indulging in sex inhibits their emotional and sexual needs and, unfortunately, many of these teenagers will never learn to separate the two. (p. 760)
It is for this very reason that Shaughnessy and Shakesby (1992) argue that sex education for adolescents needs to include discussing emotional needs, components of relationships, and the long-term consequences of sexual decisions such as pregnancy and disease. This type of education is important, especially when adolescents are being bombarded with media messages, provocative advertisements and MTV, which gloss over the complicated and emotional act of sex with adventure, glamour and excitement.
Peer pressure instigates many of the myths and desires that may encourage experimenting in sex, without full knowledge of the consequences of the sexual act. Sex is a hot topic for discussion and something that almost everyone is curious about. Many social influences, primarily aimed at emphasizing physical appearance and erotica, have added to this sexual hype. Weinstein and Rosen (1991) state that sexual activity is instigated and positively reinforced by trends and what friends think is “cool.” However, discussing real intimacy and emotional needs, along with sex, is not typically part of these discussions, especially vacant from the male point of view. Weinstein and Rosen (1991) report the following consequences for this peer induced and emotionally uninformed premature sexual behavior:
Sometimes these initial sexual experiences are fraught with anxiety and performance failure, resulting in complicated, long-term, covert sexual problems. In such cases, the adolescent male’s progress toward relational sexual intimacy is more likely to be slowed or impaired. The need for counseling may occur later, as commitment, intimacy, and long-term relationships are unsuccessfully attempted. (p. 337)
Overall, it appears that the complexity and emotional intensity of sexual behavior can cloud and confuse those who have not yet identified their emotional needs and discovered how to meet these needs through a relationship.
It also is quite apparent many relationships use sex as the primary way to fulfill intimacy and closeness. One study (Peplan, Rubin, & Hill, 1977) demonstrated that sexual involvement often preceded forming emotional intimacy in heterosexual couples. They found that the major difference between couples who engaged in sex early or later in the relationship was based on the emotional component. For couples who waited, emotional intimacy was established; for those who had sex early in the relationship, emotional intimacy was not a prerequisite. Without direct research comparing these two groups for relational success, longevity and satisfaction, I can only hypothesize that establishing emotional intimacy before sex, will improve the satisfaction, self-esteem, and longevity of a relationship<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
@lolfighter, so because we cannot see that the zygote genetically has the same structure as us, and because we can't see that it will grow up to be like us, it's ok to kill it? Is ignorance a liscence for murder? I can't see much more of you than your handle and IP, is it ok for me to kill you, as long as I don't look at you while I do it?
pro-life > pro-murder
pro-choice > pro-responsibility
Either way you look it, it always slanders over to the pro-life side. Anyhow, abortion is okay for those who are raped, or if it's threatening the mothers' life, in extreme cases like that, but otherwise it should be prohibited.
Abortion is a stain on society that should try to be removed or limited.
If I show a layperson a picture of a just-fertilized egg and a picture of an amoeba, then ask him to tell which is which, chances are he can only guess. And the amoeba has the POTENTIAL to develop into a sentient being too, it'll just take it several billion years instead of nine months, and the potential is substantially smaller. But the potential is there. But a society where every living being has the same rights is impossible to live in. Imagine if killing an ant was murder, punishable by years of inprisonment. It'd be absurd. You can't avoid stepping on ants. Or spiders. Or accidentally swallowing a fly with your drink (which is in the process of drowning, yet not dead). You can't give every living being the same concern. If I can place my desire for a tasty steak over the life of a young cow, it'd be hypocritical of me to place the well-being of a grown-up human over the life of a small foetus.
If I show a layperson a picture of a just-fertilized egg and a picture of an amoeba, then ask him to tell which is which, chances are he can only guess. And the amoeba has the POTENTIAL to develop into a sentient being too, it'll just take it several billion years instead of nine months, and the potential is substantially smaller. But the potential is there. But a society where every living being has the same rights is impossible to live in. Imagine if killing an ant was murder, punishable by years of inprisonment. It'd be absurd. You can't avoid stepping on ants. Or spiders. Or accidentally swallowing a fly with your drink (which is in the process of drowning, yet not dead). You can't give every living being the same concern. If I can place my desire for a tasty steak over the life of a young cow, it'd be hypocritical of me to place the well-being of a grown-up human over the life of a small foetus. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
That is a very flawed and ridiculous comparison.
A fetus if not aborted and no complications arise <b>will</b> mature into a human. An amoeba, even if the conditions are right, has a very very very slim <b>chance</b> of ever becoming anything close to a human. That said we do not police other species and our laws are meant for the protectton and propigation of our own species. You don't see us arresting eagles for killing a fish to eat, that would be stupid.
You know plants are living things, you are hurting them to when you eat them. Better start eating air.