I'm Speechless...Abortion Speech

Started by Rider of Wind, September 30, 2010, 03:26:26 PM

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mystictiger

#125
Quote from: Trieste on December 08, 2010, 05:33:57 PM
You're all just trying to gain power over my super-uterus. *eyetwitch*

Worst super power ever

EDIT: And yes, it is a very quiet night at the law mine, but I am required to be alert, awake, and available.
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Noelle

The woman was literally born the poster child for pro-life advocates everywhere. There's no such thing as a magical fetus (again...worst superpower ever), it had nothing to do with her "fighting" the abortion (I mean really, babies aren't exactly aware enough to keep from shitting themselves, but could magically understand what was going on inside the womb during an abortion and cling dearly to life as she implies? Say it with me now: crackpot) ...It has everything to do with a botched medical procedure. But that doesn't sound quite as touching, I guess.

DAMN YOU, COLD, INSENSITIVE SCIENCE. *shakes fist*

Serephino

The most used argument is that an abortion is nothing but the removal of tissue.  What would be so horrible about making sure it stayed that way?

What would be so horrible about making it illegal to have an abortion after maybe.. 9 weeks.. but legal up to that point?  I researched fetal development for a story I was writing, and a fetus has all organ systems in place at 8 weeks, which I think is pretty cool.  I can't remember when brain activity starts, but there has been recorded evidence that a fetus reacts to being prodded and lights and sounds at some points.  They say when a baby is fussy two things that can help are swaddling, and making a soft rhythmic shushing noise in the baby's ear.  This is because it recreates the environment in the womb.  Swaddling recreated the snugness, and the noise recreates the sound of the mother's heartbeat and stuff.  If a fetus was really so mindless and unaware up to the point of birth, then why would such things bring a newborn comfort? 

So why couldn't a fetus be considered a human life when it takes a human shape or is responsive to stimuli?  One of the characteristics of life is being able to react to stimuli.  If the woman wants to have an abortion, then she's free to decide while it's still only a cluster of cells. 

I don't see that as a bad compromise between both sides.  And in case anyone is wondering, most of my info came from ivillage.   

Trieste

Because 8 weeks or 9 weeks is a ridiculously short amount of time to find out that you're pregnant, go to the doctor, think about it, think about it some more, and make the decision. You hardly want someone to end a pregnancy because in two days they will reach the 9 week mark and they will have no other choice. It's a weighty decision, and it should not be a choice that suffers external coercion. Biological reasons for disallowing abortions aside, there should not be a deadline for that kind of decision. Women should have a choice, but they should not make that choice lightly, for chrissake.

Everything reacts to stimuli. Dust flying through the air reacts to the mere action of you walking past it. While I'm not equating living tissue of any sort to dust - unless it's a water bear, because those things are hideously adorable - 'reacting to stimuli' is not an appropriate demarcation. A heartbeat is not, either; after all, the hearts that get transplanted into whoever needs them still need to be able to beat, or they're useless. Livers need to function for transplantation, else they do nothing. Living tissue is not the same as alive.

mystictiger

The issue being that at 22-24ish weeks the foetus becomes viable with external technological support. The transition from potential to capable is of vital importance. The choice of the woman at tht point becomes secondary.
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Zakharra

Quote from: mystictiger on December 09, 2010, 01:06:05 AM
The issue being that at 22-24ish weeks the foetus becomes viable with external technological support. The transition from potential to capable is of vital importance. The choice of the woman at tht point becomes secondary.

Then at that point, let the state pay for the surgery to remove the fetus and care for it. At no cost to the mother after that. Unless you are wilwling to couigh up the money needed for that, no one, I repeat NO ONE, except the pregnant woman and maybe the possible father, should have any say in whether she keeps it or not.

The bolded part is especially troubling.

mystictiger

#131
Troubling? I agree, it's deeply troubling. It goes from removal of something that might one day be alive to killing something that is alive.

And phrase your objections to my stance in an active form. "It is troubling". Troubling to you perhaps, but not to me. Explain why you think I am wrong rather than just asserting that I am. While your at it, go and read this and you'll understand why I think the 22-24 week landmark is so important. It's a question of brain development. As a good Cartesian (most of the time) I think that what makes us human is the ability for rational thought. Guess what happens at 22-24 weeks?

The Talmud has a... unique answer to this question. Human life only begins on the 13th day -after- birth.

The woman has complete right and freedom over her body up to week 22ish. Thereafter, there are two people to think about. At that point, medical necessity (e.g. risk of harm to the mother) should be the only criteria that is acceptable for termination.

Is this unfair? Yes. I suggest you take it up with Evolution, and see if we can stop being mammals and go back to laying eggs. Or become monotremes.
Want a system game? I got system games!

Scott


Zakharra

Quote from: mystictiger on December 09, 2010, 02:11:24 AM
Troubling? I agree, it's deeply troubling. It goes from removal of something that might one day be alive to killing something that is alive.

And phrase your objections to my stance in an active form. "It is troubling". Troubling to you perhaps, but not to me. Explain why you think I am wrong rather than just asserting that I am. While your at it, go and read this and you'll understand why I think the 22-24 week landmark is so important. It's a question of brain development. As a good Cartesian (most of the time) I think that what makes us human is the ability for rational thought. Guess what happens at 22-24 weeks?

Simply? You do not have any rights over what I or anyone does to their body. It makes not one bit of difference if the fetus is viable outside of the womb. Under the law it is the woman's choice. What I bolded removes that choice from the woman. Unless you are the one carrying it, you should have no authority to stop or prevent an abortion of another woman's  pregnancy.

If you want it so badly, you pay for the cost and care for the potential child.

QuoteThe woman has complete right and freedom over her body up to week 22ish. Thereafter, there are two people to think about. At that point, medical necessity (e.g. risk of harm to the mother) should be the only criteria that is acceptable for termination.

Is this unfair? Yes. I suggest you take it up with Evolution, and see if we can stop being mammals and go back to laying eggs. Or become monotremes.

Get your goddess damned hands off of other people's  reproductive systems.

I'm not meaning to be snarky or personal, but  people who say things like that would likely try to establish control over a woman, or someone else's, body under the catch all phrase, 'It's for your own good', irritate me  Shut the fel up and keep your damned hands OFF of me.

Caeli

Locked.

'Shut up' is not an appropriate response during a civil discussion.
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mystictiger

QuoteGet your goddess damned hands off of other people's  reproductive systems.

I'm not meaning to be snarky or personal, but  people who say things like that would likely try to establish control over a woman, or someone else's, body under the catch all phrase, 'It's for your own good', irritate me  Shut the fel up and keep your damned hands OFF of me.

Tell me when human life starts? Tell me when I can end it without being called a murderer?
Want a system game? I got system games!

Noelle

#136
Quote from: Zakharra on December 09, 2010, 08:23:11 AM
Simply? You do not have any rights over what I or anyone does to their body.

Make no mistake, I support the option to have an abortion, but reasoning like this has already been discussed here as to why it's not necessarily the most accurate point in favor of abortion when, in fact, under the same law where it's a woman's choice, it's also illegal to do other things to your body such as drugs, selling your organs, suicide, and euthanasia. It's illegal in many states to get a tattoo or piercing under a certain age. It's illegal to drink under a certain age, and in the US, you become a legal adult a whole three years before you can consume alcohol. Your body has restrictions under the law whether or not you actively think of them.

Granted, I think that a fair number of those have good reason, be it maturity, societal well-being, or what-have-you, and I also think that the alternative to a fair few of them are nothing nearly as drastic as being forced to gestate and give birth -- being drug-free, tattoo/piercing-free, having all your organs, and living are all generally unobtrusive things -- minor annoyances in some cases compared to being forced to bear a child. At any rate, I'm off on a tangent now.

QuoteIt makes not one bit of difference if the fetus is viable outside of the womb. Under the law it is the woman's choice. What I bolded removes that choice from the woman. Unless you are the one carrying it, you should have no authority to stop or prevent an abortion of another woman's  pregnancy.

I don't know if that first statement is entirely true; by that logic, taking a medical-grade Hoover to your kid the minute before it drops out of your womb would be A-okay with no moral or legal repercussions. If that's what you believe, then I guess we're on different standards of acceptable abortions, but I just can't agree with that, and if you can't either, then it brings us right around to the questions that Mystictiger has presented to us -- when is a life a life, and where is the line?

QuotePeople who say things like that would likely try to establish control over a woman, or someone else's, body under the catch all phrase, 'It's for your own good', irritate me  Shut the fel up and keep your damned hands OFF of me.

I think that's a bit of an exaggeration. Most people who lobby against abortion aren't misogynistic uber control freaks, they tend to be people who truly, morally believe that what you're doing is equatable to a full-blown murder -- the kind of thing that gets the average man locked up in prison. If you believed that legal murder was happening every day, you'd probably be outraged, too. For a lot of pro-lifers, the dilemma isn't about whether or not the woman should have the choice -- the dilemma is about making it okay to commit murder.

It's unfair because, as Mystic says, biology has made it unfair. Men and women are not biological equals and the unfortunate consequence is that only one half of the pair it takes to even make a child has to bear the greater share of the burden, both physically and socially. Science has taken steps to try and make sexual freedom more equal between the two sexes through various methods of birth control, but the thing is, if/until they find a way to either gestate the embryo outside the womb (be it in an artificial womb setting or somehow implanting it into a man), women will always be at the biological disadvantage. But if you think about it, under the present law, that same party also has the power to choose whether or not to have the child regardless of the man's wishes. The choice is more than just "my body, my rules" -- the things you choose to do with it can and do affect other people.

Serephino

I'm definitely not out to take away women's rights.  However, I do believe that aborting a fetus that animated and viable is harming another living thing, and that I'm not okay with.  If you let the pregnancy continue to the point where the baby could possibly live outside the womb, what's the point in getting rid of it then?  You've already gone most of the way.  What reason, other than your life being in danger, is there to get an abortion that far along? 

In my state the abortion of a viable fetus is actually illegal unless two doctors both think it's medically necessary.  I thought it was 12 weeks, but I just looked it up.  And even then, it looks like they just remove it and try to keep it alive.  That's not so bad in my opinion.   

http://law.findlaw.com/state-laws/abortion/pennsylvania/