Bush nominates Alito to SCOTUS [Archive]

JoeChalupa

10-31-2005, 01:55 PM

Some of his decisions and writings do raise a question mark though:

Abortion:
Planned Parenthood v. Casey
947 F.2d 682 (3d Cir. 1991)
Disagreed with the majority in a ruling striking down a Pennsylvania law that required women to notify their husbands if they planned to get an abortion.

I don't think women should be required to tell their husband about an abortion just like I don't think men need to tell their wives about their mistress.

Christmas display:
ACLU v. Schundler
168 F.3d 92 (3d Cir. 1999)
Wrote the opinion in a case that said a Christmas display on city property did not violate separation of church and state doctrines because it included a large plastic Santa Claus as well as religious symbols.

I don't have a problem with this.

Asylum:
Fatin v. INS
12 F.3d 1233 (3d Cir. 1993)
Agreed with the majority that an Iranian woman seeking U.S. asylum could establish eligibility by showing that she had an abhorrence of her country's "gender-specific laws and repressive social norms," or because of a belief in feminism or membership in a feminist group.

I agree.

Harassment:
Shore Regional High School Board of Education v. P.S.
381 F.3d 194 (3d Cir. 2004)
Agreed with the majority in a ruling that held a school district failed to provide free education to a high school student because it did not protect that student from bullying and taunting from fellow students who harassed him because of his lack of athleticism and his perceived sexual orientation.

I agree.

Racism:
Williams v. Price
343 F.3d 223 (3d Cir. 2003)
Agreed with the majority granting a writ of habeas corpus to an African-American prisoner after state courts would not hear the testimony of a witness who said he heard a juror make racist remarks after the trial was over.

I strongly agree.

Due process:
Homar v. Gilbert
89 F.3d 1009 (3d Cir. 1996)
Disagreed with a majority that ruled a state university violated due process by suspending a campus police officer without pay and without a hearing after he was arrested on drug charges. The U.S. Supreme Court reversed the case on other grounds, but agreed with Alito that no hearing had been required.

I disagree. I believe a hearing was necessary for the dismissal unless University guidlines say one is not necessary.

Overall, I would vote to confirm.

RandomGuy

10-31-2005, 01:55 PM

Sound pretty sure of yourself there Governor Wallace.

Stare Decisis...

JoeChalupa

10-31-2005, 01:56 PM

Sound pretty sure of yourself there Governor Wallace.

You are correct sir!!!!

Extra Stout

10-31-2005, 01:57 PM

Overturning Roe will be tricky... it's important to have extremely intelligent justices with a healthy respect for stare decisis in order to untangle the web of legal decisions into which Roe is woven.

How would one overturn Roe without also overturning Griswold? Griswold is the one that most likely was written by space aliens, but without it what happens to the implicit right to privacy and substantive due process?

What fills the void? It will take serious legal brainpower to make it work.

RobinsontoDuncan

10-31-2005, 02:32 PM

Sound pretty sure of yourself there Governor Wallace.

you are such a dumbass, equating a bigot to someone who wants to uphold the rights of women, not deny them

Marcus Bryant

10-31-2005, 02:36 PM

The right of women to kill a perfectly healthy child? Perhaps you are the dumbass.

JoeChalupa

10-31-2005, 02:42 PM

The right of women to kill a perfectly healthy child? Perhaps you are the dumbass.

I am not a woman, therefore I will not force my values upon them for I have NO idea what it is like to carry a child but would hope that a woman sees the gift of live for what it is and will make the decision she knows how.

Being a dumbass is saying you would know exactly what to do under the circumstances.

I am pro-life, pro-choice. Of course there are those such as Yonivore who say you cannot be both but I'll be blue in the face before he or others will ever understand my position and I'll just leave it at that or else this thread will be hi-jacked and that is not my intent.

Cant_Be_Faded

10-31-2005, 02:45 PM

This is all a conspiracy to get the lower income households to have shitloads of more babies that will all end up turning to a life of crime.

Marcus Bryant

10-31-2005, 02:50 PM

I am not a woman, therefore I will not force my values upon them for I have NO idea what it is like to carry a child but would hope that a woman sees the gift of live for what it is and will make the decision she knows how.

Being a dumbass is saying you would know exactly what to do under the circumstances.

Sure, nobody knows how they will react in another's shoes, but does that preclude individuals from weighing in on a particular matter of public policy?

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 03:09 PM

I am not a woman, therefore I will not force my values upon them for I have NO idea what it is like to carry a child but would hope that a woman sees the gift of live for what it is and will make the decision she knows how.
Well, gee, Joe, I'm not a murderer either -- should I not force my values upon them for I have NO idea what it is like to have homicidal tendencies? Should I just hope that a murderer sees the gift of life for what it is and make the appropriate choice?

Of course there are those such as Yonivore who say you cannot be both but I'll be blue in the face before he or others will ever understand my position and I'll just leave it at that or else this thread will be hi-jacked and that is not my intent.
Yep.

Extra Stout

10-31-2005, 03:20 PM

Liberals: "Against abortions? Don't have one."

Well, if that makes sense, why not:

"Against domestic violence? Don't beat your wife."

JoeChalupa

10-31-2005, 03:25 PM

Sure, nobody knows how they will react in another's shoes, but does that preclude individuals from weighing in on a particular matter of public policy?

No it does not. But since abortions are not illegal in the US?

Marcus Bryant

10-31-2005, 03:25 PM

No it does not. But since abortions are not illegal in the US?

Well, that is a matter of public policy.

JoeChalupa

10-31-2005, 03:38 PM

Well, that is a matter of public policy.

That is a correct statement.

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 04:28 PM

That is a correct statement.
And, therefore, subject to change.

JoeChalupa

10-31-2005, 04:28 PM

Or not.

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 04:31 PM

Or not.
No, it is subject to change. Now, you can claim it won't change but you can't say it isn't subject to change.

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 05:12 PM

on the bright side, if roe v wade gets overturned, the clothes hanger industry is looking up, up ,up!
So, you're saying women are too stupid to find a more contemporary method to get an illegal abortion such as a black market abortion pill?

Wow! How sexist can you be?

spurster

10-31-2005, 05:16 PM

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 05:21 PM

If abortion becomes illegal (more specifically, illegal in some states, legal in others), it will simply go underground. There are already some very effective drugs for inducing abortions. DIfferent laws in different states will make it very difficult to police.
That's a very good point that continually gets forgotten in this debate (by me as well). Overturning Roe v. Wade doesn't make abortion illegal. It merely leaves that decision to the States.

Spurminator

10-31-2005, 05:25 PM

And it more than likely would not be policed.

It'd just be a moral victory for fundamentalist groups so they can sleep better at night knowing that women aren't killing feti who might, in the future, grow up to be someone those fundamentalist groups can despise.

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 05:41 PM

Spurminator

10-31-2005, 05:52 PM

I've got no problem leaving the decision up to the states, provided none of them make the decision to ban abortion.

;)

JoeChalupa

10-31-2005, 07:24 PM

Reason why I don't see Roe vs Wade being overturned is that even Alito would look at precedent and NOT change what has already been decided by the Supreme Court.

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 08:02 PM

Reason why I don't see Roe vs Wade being overturned is that even Alito would look at precedent and NOT change what has already been decided by the Supreme Court.
Kind of like Jim Crow, eh Joe?

RobinsontoDuncan

10-31-2005, 08:15 PM

Kind of like Jim Crow, eh Joe?

I can see my fellow liberals know you well enough to avoid the inevitable clash on your pigheaded statements, but I have not yet reached that point _essurectedone

A woman's right to control her body is nothing like segregation, a fucking fetus isn't alive, and just because someone is acidentally knocked up, doesnt mean that they have the obligation to carry that fetus. There are so many situations that you never have to understand in your in order to maintain your dumb ass world views, and doubtless you wont undersatnd theirs, but there is no reason why a woman isn't entitled to her own privacy, and society has no right to superimpose primitive views on her.

Ocotillo

10-31-2005, 08:27 PM

Fast Forward to sometime in the future. Lets say Roe v. Wade is overturned and the right to legalize or criminalize abortion is in the hands of the individual states.

A state, say Kansas or maybe Texas decides they will make abortion illegal. For those of you who want to criminalize abortion, who has committed a crime when an abortion is performed? Is the woman charged? Is only the "doctor" charged? What would be the sentences? Would abortion be a felony or misdemeanor? Some claim life begins at conception, would capital punishment be fitting?

RobinsontoDuncan

10-31-2005, 08:33 PM

better question, what comes next, a lot of the same fruit loops that dislike abortion dislike contraception, is that going to go too?

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 09:11 PM

...a fucking fetus isn't alive...
Just to be clear, so we don't waste each other's time, you'd be okay with terminating a pregnancy up to the moment the non-living fetus takes a breath and becomes a living baby?

Because, that's the only distinction I see between a fetus and a child...breathing.

If that's your position, let's quit now. Otherwise, tell me the exact point in the gestation of a fetus at which it is not okay to abort it and then, tell me that for every conception that occurs.

boutons

10-31-2005, 09:13 PM

The "Christian" and social conservatives have pulled on dubya' short and curlies to curtail all kinds of pre-natal/neo-natal care programs around the world, such that many now women and babies die or seriously injured for lack of care. Nicholas Kristoff has visited and document many of these countries where the US' witholding of funds has resulted in horrible sickness, injuries, deaths.

Below, the same assholes would prefer vaccine-preventable cervical cancer (but not for their daughers) while fantasizing that kids will abstain from screwing with or without a vaccine or condom or whatever.

Once these self-rightous, self-congratulating assholes decide THEY are "right", they don't give a fuck who gets hurt or who dies.

================================

Cervical Cancer Vaccine Gets Injected With a Social Issue

By Rob Stein

A new vaccine that protects against cervical cancer has set up a clash between health advocates who want to use the shots aggressively to prevent thousands of malignancies and social conservatives who say immunizing teenagers could encourage sexual activity.

Although the vaccine will not become available until next year at the earliest, activists on both sides have begun maneuvering to influence how widely the immunizations will be employed.

Groups working to reduce the toll of the cancer are eagerly awaiting the vaccine and want it to become part of the standard roster of shots that children, especially girls, receive just before puberty.

Because the vaccine protects against a sexually transmitted virus, many conservatives oppose making it mandatory, citing fears that it could send a subtle message condoning sexual activity before marriage. Several leading groups that promote abstinence are meeting this week to formulate official policies on the vaccine.

In the hopes of heading off a confrontation, officials from the companies developing the shots -- Merck & Co. and GlaxoSmithKline -- have been meeting with advocacy groups to try to assuage their concerns.

The jockeying reflects the growing influence that social conservatives, who had long felt overlooked by Washington, have gained on a broad spectrum of policy issues under the Bush administration. In this case, a former member of the conservative group Focus on the Family serves on the federal panel that is playing a pivotal role in deciding how the vaccine is used.

"What the Bush administration has done has taken this coterie of people and put them into very influential positions in Washington," said James A. Morone Jr., a professor of political science at Brown University. "And it's having an effect in debates like this."

The vaccine protects women against strains of a ubiquitous germ called the human papilloma virus. Although many strains of the virus are innocuous, some can cause cancerous lesions on the cervix (the outer end of the uterus), making them the primary cause of this cancer in the United States. Cervical cancer strikes more than 10,000 U.S. women each year, killing more than 3,700.

The vaccine appears to be virtually 100 percent effective against two of the most common cancer-causing HPV strains. Merck, whose vaccine is further along, plans to ask the Food and Drug Administration by the end of the year for approval to sell the shots.

Exactly how the vaccine is used, however, will be largely determined by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, a panel of experts assembled by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. The panel issues widely followed guidelines, including recommendations for childhood vaccines that become the basis for vaccination requirements set by public schools.

Officials of both companies noted that research indicates the best age to vaccinate would be just before puberty to make sure children are protected before they become sexually active. The vaccine would probably be targeted primarily at girls but could also be used on boys to limit the spread of the virus.

"If you really want to have cervical cancer rates fall as much as possible as quickly as possible, then you want as many people to get vaccinated as possible," said Mark Feinberg, Merck's vice president of medical affairs and policy, noting that "school mandates have been one of the most effective ways to increase immunization rates."

That is a view being pushed by cervical cancer experts and women's health advocates.

"I would like to see it that if you don't have your HPV vaccine, you can't start high school," said Juan Carlos Felix of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, who leads the National Cervical Cancer Coalition's medical advisory panel.

At the ACIP meeting last week, panel members heard presentations about the pros and cons of vaccinating girls at various ages. A survey of 294 pediatricians presented at the meeting found that more than half were worried that parents of female patients might refuse the vaccine, and 11 percent of the doctors said they themselves thought vaccinating against a sexually transmitted disease "may encourage risky sexual behavior in my adolescent patients."

Conservative groups say they welcome the vaccine as an important public health tool but oppose making it mandatory.

"Some people have raised the issue of whether this vaccine may be sending an overall message to teenagers that, 'We expect you to be sexually active,' " said Reginald Finger, a doctor trained in public health who served as a medical analyst for Focus on the Family before being appointed to the ACIP in 2003, in a telephone interview.

"There are people who sense that it could cause people to feel like sexual behaviors are safer if they are vaccinated and may lead to more sexual behavior because they feel safe," said Finger, emphasizing that he does not endorse that position and is withholding judgment until the issue comes before the vaccine policy panel for a formal recommendation.

Conservative medical groups have been fielding calls from concerned parents and organizations, officials said.

"I've talked to some who have said, 'This is going to sabotage our abstinence message,' " said Gene Rudd, associate executive director of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations. But Rudd said most people change their minds once they learn more, adding that he would probably want his children immunized. Rudd, however, draws the line at making the vaccine mandatory.

"Parents should have the choice. There are those who would say, 'We can provide a better, healthier alternative than the vaccine, and that is to teach abstinence,' " Rudd said.

In a statement, the conservative Family Research Council said it will "monitor the development of these vaccines, the FDA drug approval process, the development of recommendations for their use and the marketing of these vaccines."

"While we welcome medical advances such as an HPV vaccine, it remains clear that practicing abstinence until marriage and fidelity within marriage is the single best way of preventing the full range of sexually transmitted diseases," the group said.

The council is planning to meet on Wednesday to discuss the issue. On the same day, the Medical Institute for Sexual Health in Austin, which advises conservative groups on sexuality and health issues, is convening a one-day meeting to develop a position statement.

Both companies acknowledged the concerns and said they have been working to alleviate them by meeting with groups across the political spectrum.

"It is not our intention in any way, shape or form to promote our vaccine as a substitute for any other prevention approach, be it abstinence or screening," Merck's Feinberg said.

He added there is no evidence to suggest that vaccinating children will promote sexual activity.

"We hope when people understand more about what the disease is and how it can be prevented that their concerns will have been allayed," Feinberg said.

Alan M. Kaye, executive director of the National Cervical Cancer Coalition, likened the vaccine to wearing a seat belt.

"Just because you wear a seat belt doesn't mean you're seeking out an accident," Kaye said.

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 10:00 PM

A woman's right to control her body is nothing like segregation
And, just to be clear, my Jim Crow statement had nothing to do with comparing segregation with abortion but to point out to Joe Chalupa stare decisis isn't always followed by the Supreme Court.

Jim Crow was just one such example. Segregation had been the law of the land and, further, had appeared to have been a settled matter -- even at the Supreme Court level. I was merely pointing out that nothing is forever...not Jim Crow and not Roe v. Wade.

Otherwise, what's the point of appealing all but new arguments to the Supreme Court?

FromWayDowntown

10-31-2005, 10:06 PM

And, just to be clear, my Jim Crow statement had nothing to do with comparing segregation with abortion but to point out to Joe Chalupa stare decisis isn't always followed by the Supreme Court.

Jim Crow was just one such example. Segregation had been the law of the land and, further, had appeared to have been a settled matter -- even at the Supreme Court level. I was merely pointing out that nothing is forever...not Jim Crow and not Roe v. Wade.

Otherwise, what's the point of appealing all but new arguments to the Supreme Court?

Curiously, that entire post bespeaks the need for and value of judicial activism, in the sense that judicial activism results from courts examining the constitutionality of legislative enactments in light of evolving understandings of what the Constitution means.

Yoni for judicial activism and a living Constitution? or just playing both sides?

Yonivore

10-31-2005, 10:13 PM

Curiously, that entire post bespeaks the need for and value of judicial activism, in the sense that judicial activism results from courts examining the constitutionality of legislative enactments in light of evolving understandings of what the Constitution means.

Yoni for judicial activism and a living Constitution? or just playing both sides?
No, just for correcting deviations from a strict constructionist view of the U. S. Constitution.

Overturning segregation adhered to specific tenets in the U. S. Constitution. Abortion has no basis in the U. S. Constitution. It's not addressed and, therefore, is (according to the 10th amendment) left to the states and the people.

So, how 'bout telling me at what specific point you can no longer kill a baby.

gtownspur

11-01-2005, 12:46 AM

This is all a conspiracy to get the lower income households to have shitloads of more babies that will all end up turning to a life of crime.

According to CBF. More black babies=more crimes. When in fact it was Margaret sanger, Creator of planned parenthood, who advocated abortion to stop the "negro" race from creating chaos.

Anyway, i laugh when people say that fetuses are not human. I can only imagine a pregnant woman asking a freind of hers, "Wanna get close to my tummy? You can hear my fetus! it's so adorable." :rolleyes

Or when a woman is lying on the floor in dismay crying, "my FETUS!ooh...My fetus! why God."

I can see people like CBF and other token liberals running around and colliding with a pregnant woman. THe collision is so hard that the woman has realized that the impact has killed her unborn child. CBF then apologizes and says.. "i'm sorry mam.. but it's just a fetus. Just ask your man for another one and everything will be allright.

Soon we'll have "FEtus showers" replace "baby showers" in all the blue states.
... and we'll think to ourselves."Boy oh boy,. we've come so far from Jim Crow and Plessy vs Ferguson." :lol

Cant_Be_Faded

11-01-2005, 01:23 AM

According to CBF. More black babies=more crimes. When in fact it was Margaret sanger, Creator of planned parenthood, who advocated abortion to stop the "negro" race from creating chaos.

Anyway, i laugh when people say that fetuses are not human. I can only imagine a pregnant woman asking a freind of hers, "Wanna get close to my tummy? You can hear my fetus! it's so adorable." :rolleyes

Or when a woman is lying on the floor in dismay crying, "my FETUS!ooh...My fetus! why God."

I can see people like CBF and other token liberals running around and colliding with a pregnant woman. THe collision is so hard that the woman has realized that the impact has killed her unborn child. CBF then apologizes and says.. "i'm sorry mam.. but it's just a fetus. Just ask your man for another one and everything will be allright.

Soon we'll have "FEtus showers" replace "baby showers" in all the blue states.
... and we'll think to ourselves."Boy oh boy,. we've come so far from Jim Crow and Plessy vs Ferguson." :lol

wow you are crazier than me

gtownspur

11-01-2005, 01:50 AM

^^^You just admitted to your loopiness. I never said i'm anything.

Nbadan

11-01-2005, 02:26 AM

OWNED!!!

http://us.news3.yimg.com/us.i2.yimg.com/p/nm/20051031/2005_10_31t104118_450x386_us_bush_court.jpg

The family of Judge Samuel Alito, daughter Laura (L), son Philip (C) and wife Martha (R), stand underneath a portrait of former president Bill Clinton as they watch President Bush nominate Alito to the Supreme Court in the White House, October 31, 2005.

jochhejaam

11-01-2005, 06:45 AM

Is Racism rearing it's ugly head regarding Bush's nomination of Alito to the SCOTUS? Some think so. Dubbing him "Scalito", why? (ignorance)

Hatch Follows Drudge Lead, Implies Alito Critics May Be Racist

Earlier today on Fox News, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), a member of the Judiciary Committee, followed Matt Drudge’s lead and implied that opponents of Samuel Alito’s nomination may be motivated by Alito’s ethnicity. He warned senators “to be very careful here,” because a vote against Alito would be “held against them” by Italian-Americans:

[They] think they own the Italian-American vote all up and down the East Coast. They don’t, but they think they do. If they become offensive against somebody with the qualifications of Sam Alito, Judge Alito, then I think it’s going to be held against them. They’re going to have to be very careful how they handle this, and frankly what bothers me if 22 — in other words, half of the Democrats in the Senate — could vote against John Roberts, can you imagine what this nomination is going to be like? There’s no reason they should have voted against Roberts. And I think Alito’s going to be just fine but we’re all going to have to work really hard to make sure that’s so.

Whatsa matter for you libs, Why for you don't like Alito?

JoeChalupa

11-01-2005, 07:25 AM

Kind of like Jim Crow, eh Joe?

Good point but two totally seperate issues. And, I may be wrong, but I don't believe there are any cases challenging Roe vs Wade going to the Supreme Court any time soon.

I just don't see it being over turned but that is just my "un-legal" opinion.

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 08:32 AM

From

Roe vs Wade will NOT be over-turned.

To

I just don't see it being over turned but that is just my "un-legal" opinion.

Sufficiently muted.

JoeChalupa

11-01-2005, 08:33 AM

No, not all. I still say it will NOT be over turned and that is still my opinion.

Your Jim Crow argument, while making a point, is muted.

Totally different. Totally.

RobinsontoDuncan

11-01-2005, 09:19 AM

Jim Crow was never overtunred by the courts, it was overturned by the civil rights act. Brown V. Board was only pretaining to individual school districts, unfortunatly outside of the classroom, brown v. board had no effect whatsoever. (and seeing as it took 20 years to be realized, for quite some time it had no real effect in the classroom either.)

As for the fetus, yes i think a fetus doesnt become alive until it survives the entirety of a pregnacnt but, if you need me to be completly specific, i will adhere tot he standards roe sets up and say by the thrid trimester it is no longer simply a fetus.

Spurminator

11-01-2005, 11:35 AM

Interest Groups Weigh in on Alito Nomination

Reactions to President Bush's nomination of Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. to the U.S. Supreme Court drew mixed and wide-spread reactions across the nation yesterday, including many political action groups.

Conservative groups have heaped an overwhelming amount of praise upon the nomination. Concerned Women For America released a statement saying, "Judge Alito is an outstanding choice. His qualifications are immesurable."

Other Conservative groups echoed this sentiment. A spokesperson for Americans for the Overturn of Roe v. Wade (AORW) said, "Alito will maintain the integrity of the Supreme Court in the spirit of O'Connor and Rehnquist."

The website for the Abortion is Murder Group praised Alito's record as a Circuit Court judge. "His decisions are Consitutionally sound." Hell is Full of Abortionists (HIFOA) also noted Alito's "outstanding" work as a Circuit judge. "We feel confident that Justice Alito will uphold the constitution without activism or personal bias."

Meanwhile, Liberal action groups were just as vocal in their opposition to the Alito nomination.

NARAL Pro-Choice America issued a statement saying "Alito's record indicates a clear willingness to continue dismantling our constitutional freedoms. The American public deserves a nominee who can be counted on to uphold our rights - not take them away."

Other liberal groups expressed similar concerns over Alito's record. Keep Government Out of My Uteris (KGOOMU) questioned Alito's experience. "We do not feel he is qualified to be a Justice on the highest court in the land. With the hundreds of well-qualified judges waiting to fill in for O'Connor, it is perplexing that the President would once nominate someone with so little real Constitutional Law experience."

A representative of The Abortion is Life Group said, "We are unsure where Judge Alito stands on the important issues of the day... Labor Unions, Imminent Domain, Gun Control, Religious Freedom... These are important issues which the [Supreme Court] will have a very important role in shaping."

Darlynn Kubiack of My Body: My Rights - Fuck Off (MBMRFO) agreed, saying, "I question Mr. Alito's ability to keep his personal biases out of his decisions and allow the Constitution to speak for itself."

SpursWoman

11-01-2005, 01:09 PM

My Body: My Rights - Fuck Off (MBMRFO)

:lol :tu

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 01:38 PM

:lol :tu
And at what point does a fetus have a body and rights?

RobinsontoDuncan

11-01-2005, 01:40 PM

a fetus doesn't have rights, it isn't alive, and spurminator is right ( if spurminator is a she) you have no right to tell her what she can do with her body

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 01:46 PM

a fetus doesn't have rights, it isn't alive, and spurminator is right ( if spurminator is a she) you have no right to tell her what she can do with her body
So, if you can keep it from taking that first breath, that's okay?

SpursWoman

11-01-2005, 01:48 PM

And at what point does a fetus have a body and rights?

When it's organs are developed enough to sustain it's own life..and I'm entitled to my own opinion and couldn't give a damn if anyone agrees with it or not.

And I'm not going there, I no longer choose to participate in an argument with any member of any gender that should the issue of an unwanted pregnancy arise...for all intents and purposes could just stand up and walk the fuck away.

Sorry. I just thought the name of that organization was kind of funny. :)

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 02:49 PM

When it's organs are developed enough to sustain it's own life.
So, infants born with underdeveloped lungs or non-functioning kidneys and livers aren't alive? Got it.

and I'm entitled to my own opinion and couldn't give a damn if anyone agrees with it or not.
Duly noted. After all, it's not agreement that matters here...is it?

And I'm not going there, I no longer choose to participate in an argument with any member of any gender that should the issue of an unwanted pregnancy arise...for all intents and purposes could just stand up and walk the fuck away.
D'okie dokie.

I'm still interested in knowing the precise moment during ALL pregnancies when the "life switch" is thrown and it becomes alive. There seems to be some ambiguity in that area and, jeeze, isn't this kind of an important point for there to be so much uncertainty?

Most pro-abortionists feel completely different about capital punishment. Rather 10 guilty men go free than 1 innocent man executed...right? How 'bout, Rather 10 inconvenient babies carried to term than 1 viable fetus aborted?

Seems a good analogy to me. Erring on the side of caution, no?

Sorry. I just thought the name of that organization was kind of funny. :)
Yeah...

Useruser666

11-01-2005, 02:49 PM

SpursWoman

11-01-2005, 03:02 PM

So, infants born with underdeveloped lungs or non-functioning kidneys and livers aren't alive? Got it.

Duly noted. After all, it's not agreement that matters here...is it?

D'okie dokie.

I'm still interested in knowing the precise moment during ALL pregnancies when the "life switch" is thrown and it becomes alive. There seems to be some ambiguity in that area and, jeeze, isn't this kind of an important point for there to be so much uncertainty?

Most pro-abortionists feel completely different about capital punishment. Rather 10 guilty men go free than 1 innocent man executed...right? How 'bout, Rather 10 inconvenient babies carried to term than 1 viable fetus aborted?

Seems a good analogy to me. Erring on the side of caution, no?

Don't be a patronizing asshole just because someone doesn't believe the same things you do. I would 100% support a ban on late-term abortions ... after about 16-20 weeks when a fetus, if born prematurely, would be able to survive with some sort of life support. Maybe I'm behind the times, but I'm not aware of any advancement in medical science that could sustain and nurture a < 16 week old embryo.

And I do support the death penalty.

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 03:08 PM

Don't be a patronizing asshole just because someone doesn't believe the same things you do. I would 100% support a ban on late-term abortions ... after about 16-20 weeks when a fetus, if born prematurely, would be able to survive with some sort of life support.
I'm not trying to be patronizing. In you whole answer, the biggest problem I see is where you say "...about 16-20 weeks..."

For God's sake, can't we be more precise than that when we're dealing with a human life? Why not 15 weeks 6 days?

It's not a matter of belief, it's a matter of human rights. And, you're willing to make a rough estimate on the time when a human becomes deserving of a right to life. That bothers me. In fact, I think it should bother everyone.

Maybe I'm behind the times, but I'm not aware of any advancement in medical science that could sustain and nurture a < 16 week old embryo.
I am. It's called the female body.

And I do support the death penalty.
Yeah, I know. And, if I didn't say "most" pro-abortionists, I meant to.

Extra Stout

11-01-2005, 03:22 PM

a fetus doesn't have rights, it isn't alive, and spurminator is right ( if spurminator is a she) you have no right to tell her what she can do with her bodyI think the term you want here is viable, not alive.

Because obviously a fetus is alive, but it's not necessarily viable.

Marcus Bryant

11-01-2005, 03:39 PM

I think the term you want here is viable, not alive.

Because obviously a fetus is alive, but it's not necessarily viable.

And of course this nation should avoid providing protection to a vulnerable, viable child and worry more about saving mouse embryos.

Could this society be any more decadent?

As for the "it's my body" cop out, the government already regulates our body 10 ways to Sunday.

SpursWoman

11-01-2005, 03:40 PM

It's not a matter of belief, it's a matter of human rights.

And why do feel that this little glob of DNA's rights automatically supercede my own?

xrayzebra

11-01-2005, 03:59 PM

Well old buontons is really showing his true colors when he says:

"The "Christian" and social conservatives have pulled on dubya' short and curlies to curtail all kinds of pre-natal/neo-natal care programs around the world, such that many now women and babies die or seriously injured for lack of care. Nicholas Kristoff has visited and document many of these countries where the US' witholding of funds has resulted in horrible sickness, injuries, deaths.

Below, the same assholes would prefer vaccine-preventable cervical cancer (but not for their daughers) while fantasizing that kids will abstain from screwing with or without a vaccine or condom or whatever.

Once these self-rightous, self-congratulating assholes decide THEY are "right", they don't give a fuck who gets hurt or who dies."

================================================== ============

Now it is the United State of America's, Bush and the Christians in particular fault that people are dying "all over the world". Hey aren't you the one who was hollering that the deficit was too high. Make up you mind will you. Heck, I keep forgetting you don't know what you want.

From reading this thread you would think that Roe vs Wade is the only reason conservatives want a conservative thinking judge on the court. Nothing could be further from the truth. We want someone who knows how to read the constitution and rule accordingly. We want no foreign law quoted or what society wants, we want someone who reads the constitution and understands what the founders of this country intended. It worked for many years, no reason it wont now.

FromWayDowntown

11-01-2005, 03:59 PM

And why do feel that this little glob of DNA's rights automatically supercede my own?

edit. bad.

SpursWoman

11-01-2005, 04:01 PM

edit. bad.

But it was true. :lmao

FromWayDowntown

11-01-2005, 04:03 PM

But it was true. :lmao

I'm glad you understood.

I think it's right, too.

Extra Stout

11-01-2005, 04:05 PM

And why do feel that this little glob of DNA's rights automatically supercede my own?Neither absolutist position is morally coherent, which is what makes the debate so difficult.

The woman has a right to self-determination. The fetus has a right to survive. Sometimes they come into conflict. How is it resolved?

Often I think that mainstream antipathy towards abortion is not towards the entire institution, but towards its use as birth control in support of a recklessly promiscuous lifestyle. Mind you, abortion is a terrible thing, but if it were a rare procedure conducted only after a woman is impregnated through rape, or a 12-year-old gets pregnant, or when the life or health of the mother is threatened, I don't think there would be near as much of a fight over it.

I don't so much think that abortion should be outlawed universally, but I do support restrictions, and I do think that it should have a social stigma, not so much judging the woman, but saying, hey, this is a serious and terrible thing to have to do, and only do it when it's absolutely necessary.

What the courts did, and unintentionally, mind you*, was hold up abortion as this fundamental right to be revered and cherished. That's twisted. We shouldn't be celebrating that a woman has the freedom to go the doctor and have him chop up her fetus into little pieces and pull them out, or jab a sharp probe into the base of its skull and vacuum out its brains. We should be mourning that in our society it ever comes to that, and keeping it as rare as possible.

*Blackmun never intended for his decision to mandate abortion-on-demand. He simply wasn't a good enough justice to comprehend the ramifications of what he wrote. That's a big reason why I was so opposed to the Miers nomination, and why I thought that the defense "being a Supreme Court justice is easy" was so contemptible.

xrayzebra

11-01-2005, 04:14 PM

Neither absolutist position is morally coherent, which is what makes the debate so difficult.

The woman has a right to self-determination. The fetus has a right to survive. Sometimes they come into conflict. How is it resolved?

Often I think that mainstream antipathy towards abortion is not towards the entire institution, but towards its use as birth control in support of a recklessly promiscuous lifestyle. Mind you, abortion is a terrible thing, but if it were a rare procedure conducted only after a woman is impregnated through rape, or a 12-year-old gets pregnant, or when the life or health of the mother is threatened, I don't think there would be near as much of a fight over it.

I don't so much think that abortion should be outlawed universally, but I do support restrictions, and I do think that it should have a social stigma, not so much judging the woman, but saying, hey, this is a serious and terrible thing to have to do, and only do it when it's absolutely necessary.

What the courts did, and unintentionally, mind you*, was hold up abortion as this fundamental right to be revered and cherished. That's twisted. We shouldn't be celebrating that a woman has the freedom to go the doctor and have him chop up her fetus into little pieces and pull them out, or jab a sharp probe into the base of its skull and vacuum out its brains. We should be mourning that in our society it ever comes to that, and keeping it as rare as possible.

*Blackmun never intended for his decision to mandate abortion-on-demand. He simply wasn't a good enough justice to comprehend the ramifications of what he wrote. That's a big reason why I was so opposed to the Miers nomination, and why I thought that the defense "being a Supreme Court justice is easy" was so contemptible.

I tend to agree with you. I know before it became legal the old coat hangar trick was quite often cited as a reason for a so called mis-carriage. But I also believe that many family doctors took matters into their own hands after talking with the family. Of course many young ladies moved in with relatives in other states to finish some school. And many a young man was convinced that he really did love her and wanted to be part of the family by a means commonly known as a shotgun. There was those that married to make an honest woman and went on to raise a family of which they were rightly proud. And knowing some of families, I sometimes wonder if it wasn't used as a means to marry someone who the family opposed. But to use it as some have, a means of birth control seems really, really wrong. Someone, sometime has to think of the life being destroyed.

FromWayDowntown

11-01-2005, 04:15 PM

The problem I have with the abolish Roe side of the argument (taken to its logical end result, which would be a ban on all abortions, I suspect) is that a limitation on abortion would be the ONLY way in which the conflict between the woman and the fetus is resolved against the woman. If this were truly about protecting the rights of a fetus (whether viable or not), the restrictions on pregnant women should be much, much more stringent. For crissakes, if our society was truly worried about the health and welfare of fetuses, you'd expect that there would be a hue and cry for mandatory pre-natal care, too. Interesting to me that there isn't; in fact those who oppose abortion also generally oppose the idea of standardized or mandatory healthcare -- positions (at least with respect to pregnancies) that seem to be at odds.

In fact, about the only protection for a fetus that has been written into law is the difficult-to-prove crime of injury to a fetus, which (to my knowledge) does not criminalize negligent acts that result in harm. In most instances, the law doesn't treat a fetus as a person and social policies only pay lip service (at best) to protecting the miniscule interests a fetus might have. Why should that be different in the realm of abortion?

To me, this isn't about developing a culture that reverently protects the rights of the fetus; it's about mandating the manner in which women deal with nature and its consequences by imposing a standard rooted entirely from a relativistic morality. The arguments to the contrary of that stem entirely from Judeo-Christian norms and mores that may or may not be the standards by which some individuals in our society live.

SpursWoman

11-01-2005, 04:18 PM

In fact, about the only protection for a fetus that has been written into law is the difficult-to-prove crime of injury to a fetus, which (to my knowledge) does not criminalize negligent acts that result in harm. In most instances, the law doesn't treat a fetus as a person and social policies only pay lip service (at best) to protecting the miniscule interests a fetus might have. Why should that be different in the realm of abortion?

Like smoking, drinking and drug use while pregnant?

Or a nine-month diet of doritos & chocolate milk? ... :oops

FromWayDowntown

11-01-2005, 04:23 PM

Like smoking, drinking and drug use while pregnant?

That, or any other reckless behaviors that a pregnant woman might engage in that might incidentally have an effect on the life she's carrying. I mean, if we're really worried about protecting a fetus, why not write a law that compels all pregnant women to avoid any possible means by which the fetus might be injured or killed?

Marcus Bryant

11-01-2005, 04:24 PM

The problem I have with the abolish Roe side of the argument (taken to its logical end result, which would be a ban on all abortions, I suspect) is that a limitation on abortion would be the ONLY way in which the conflict between the woman and the fetus is resolved against the woman. If this were truly about protecting the rights of a fetus (whether viable or not), the restrictions on pregnant women should be much, much more stringent. For crissakes, if our society was truly worried about the health and welfare of fetuses, you'd expect that there would be a hue and cry for mandatory pre-natal care, too. Interesting to me that there isn't; in fact those who oppose abortion also generally oppose the idea of standardized or mandatory healthcare -- positions (at least with respect to pregnancies) that seem to be at odds.

I think real exceptions for those instances in which the life/health of the mother is threatened should be established. But otherwise, legalized abortion on demand because you simply don't want the child is not a good proposition.

In fact, about the only protection for a fetus that has been written into law is the difficult-to-prove crime of injury to a fetus, which (to my knowledge) does not criminalize negligent acts that result in harm. In most instances, the law doesn't treat a fetus as a person and social policies only pay lip service (at best) to protecting the miniscule interests a fetus might have. Why should that be different in the realm of abortion?

Sounds like other areas of the law would need to be fleshed out.

To me, this isn't about developing a culture that reverently protects the rights of the fetus; it's about mandating the manner in which women deal with nature and its consequences by imposing a standard rooted entirely from a relativistic morality. The arguments to the contrary of that stem entirely from Judeo-Christian norms and mores that may or may not be the standards by which some individuals in our society live.

Why stop with abortion?

RobinsontoDuncan

11-01-2005, 04:32 PM

well done from way down town, that was exceptional verbalization of a very complex argument, I applaud your post.

Spurminator

11-01-2005, 04:32 PM

and spurminator is right ( if spurminator is a she)

I'm not, but I'm still right. ;)

FromWayDowntown

11-01-2005, 05:02 PM

Why stop with abortion?

I'll ask you: why abortion? With other prohibited activities, generally crimes, there is a victim who is identified by law to possess rights that are invaded by the criminal perpetrator.

To be consistent, your argument necessarily means that laws will have to come into existence that either: (1) define a fetus as a person for all purposes; or (2) concoct some bizarre architecture to define when a fetus does or does not have rights. Either result is problematic, I think.

If you define a fetus as a person for all purposes, you open the door to all sorts of interesting possibilities. If a fetus is a person, can a mother who miscarries be prosecuted for manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide if there is some proof that the miscarriage was provoked by the mother's behavior? I mean, if the idea here is to protect the interests of the fetus, it seems to me that some State resources would have to be devoted to investigating miscarriages to determine if there was misfeasance by the mother that may have caused the result.

Say a pregnant woman is injured in a car accident caused by the negligence of an employee of Holt Cat. She goes to Wayne Wright or Jim Adler -- or better yet, goes to a plaintiff's lawyer who isn't afraid of a courtroom -- and sues Holt Cat. Should the fetus be able to recover damages from Holt Cat in that action? If not, why not? I mean, if there is some injury, why shouldn't the fetus be entitled to a recovery?

Here's another situation, the pregnant woman is married and her husband is killed by the negligence of a Holt Cat employee. The woman is entitled to damages for wrongful death, and likely can recover for things like emotional distress and loss of consortium. Why shouldn't the fetus be entitled to similar damages?

The list of absurd results just grows from there if you define a fetus as a person in the law. If you don't define a fetus as a person for all purposes, you're simply drawing the very same arbitrary line that Yonivore despises with respect to defining viability.

Marcus Bryant

11-01-2005, 05:21 PM

I'll ask you: why abortion? With other prohibited activities, generally crimes, there is a victim who is identified by law to possess rights that are invaded by the criminal perpetrator.

Well, we're in this purgatory, with something that isn't fully a separate human but by the same token is something more than a tumor.

To be consistent, your argument necessarily means that laws will have to come into existence that either: (1) define a fetus as a person for all purposes; or (2) concoct some bizarre architecture to define when a fetus does or does not have rights. Either result is problematic, I think.

Sure, but the situation itself is problematic. Does one need to define a fetus as a person in order to provide it legal protection?

If you define a fetus as a person for all purposes, you open the door to all sorts of interesting possibilities. If a fetus is a person, can a mother who miscarries be prosecuted for manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide if there is some proof that the miscarriage was provoked by the mother's behavior? I mean, if the idea here is to protect the interests of the fetus, it seems to me that some State resources would have to be devoted to investigating miscarriages to determine if there was misfeasance by the mother that may have caused the result.

Sure.

Say a pregnant woman is injured in a car accident caused by the negligence of an employee of Holt Cat.

Guilty, but I digress.

She goes to Wayne Wright or Jim Adler -- or better yet, goes to a plaintiff's lawyer who isn't afraid of a courtroom -- and sues Holt Cat. Should the fetus be able to recover damages from Holt Cat in that action? If not, why not? I mean, if there is some injury, why shouldn't the fetus be entitled to a recovery?

Let the mother have standing initially and then once the child is a full person he/she can have standing as well.

Here's another situation, the pregnant woman is married and her husband is killed by the negligence of a Holt Cat employee. The woman is entitled to damages for wrongful death, and likely can recover for things like emotional distress and loss of consortium. Why shouldn't the fetus be entitled to similar damages?

The list of absurd results just grows from there if you define a fetus as a person in the law. If you don't define a fetus as a person for all purposes, you're simply drawing the very same arbitrary line that Yonivore despises with respect to defining viability.

Then don't define the fetus as having that status, but don't allow the wanton destruction of it.

Spurminator

11-01-2005, 05:31 PM

I still don't see how the status of a fetus as a living human matters in the abortion debate. The primary issue is whether or not a woman should be punished for choosing to forego a pregnancy.

My opinion on this issue would be the same whether we're talking about a fetus, or a 6 year old kid that somehow got planted into a woman's uterus and the only two options were to kill it or to allow it to inhabit the woman's womb for a year.

Someday, maybe we'll be able to remove embryos/feti after conception and keep them alive but for now, given the choices, I side with the woman... however selfish or morally reprehensible her motives may be. Because I cannot justify imprisoning someone for avoiding a 9 month pregnancy.

BronxCowboy

11-01-2005, 05:39 PM

I still don't see how the status of a fetus as a living human matters in the abortion debate. . . . My opinion on this issue would be the same whether we're talking about a fetus, or a 6 year old kid that somehow got planted into a woman's uterus and the only two options were to kill it or to allow it to inhabit the woman's womb for a year.

Scary.

boutons

11-01-2005, 05:54 PM

Fringe right dictates to the dickless, brainless faux-macho dubya.

http://images.ucomics.com/comics/wpnan/2005/wpnan051101.gif

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/opinion/ssi/images/Toles/c_11012005_520.gif

Marcus Bryant

11-01-2005, 05:56 PM

boutons has posted some pics. Time to shut down the thread.

FromWayDowntown

11-01-2005, 06:00 PM

Sure, but the situation itself is problematic. Does one need to define a fetus as a person in order to provide it legal protection?

Well, things have legal protection only to the extent that the law creates rights and rights exist only with respect to people, property, and chattel. It would be an odd result to say that a fetus is either property or chattel, so I would say yes to your question. It would be necessary to either define the fetus as a person, particularly since the anti-Roe crowd is so insistent in defining a fetus as a person; it would be an odd result to cite that proposition as the basis for decades of argument, only to relent after the fact.

As my previous post explains, there are significant legal problems associated with defining a fetus as a person (either fully or on a limited basis).

Guilty, but I digress.

So I presumed.

Let the mother have standing initially and then once the child is a full person he/she can have standing as well.

I can't see that as being an answer. For one thing, you'd have protracted litigation while waiting for the fetus to obtain "personhood" -- which again, is problematic to the anti-Roe argument; it's either a person or its not. Another is that it would create a large inconsistency in the law. The law generally assigns the date of the accident as the date of accrual for damages. If you're hurt in an auto accident, you can obtain future damages based on injuries you sustained in the accident. But if you weren't legally injured in the accident, you have no basis to recover in tort. If you define a fetus to be a person, then you have to say that it was injured at the time of the accident to afford it the recoveries that would be available to any other person injured by the accident. But if you say that it was a person at the time of the accident, liability in tort will grow again, which is contrary to present day conservative dogma. You can't have it both ways: if the fetus is a person, it has legal rights, including things like the right to sue for damages.

Then don't define the fetus as having that status, but don't allow the wanton destruction of it.

Would that be based on the "Because Christian teachings says its wrong" theory of the law? or would that be the "Because we're too willy-nilly to deal with the ramifications of a consistent articulation of legal rights since doing so might adversely affect other things that we stand for, but damnit we think it's wrong" theory?

FromWayDowntown

11-01-2005, 06:07 PM

I still don't see how the status of a fetus as a living human matters in the abortion debate. The primary issue is whether or not a woman should be punished for choosing to forego a pregnancy.

I think it's terribly important to the anti-abortion argument. If the fetus is a living human -- a person -- then terminating a pregnancy (killing the fetus) would be an infringement on the rights of another living person. The anti-abortion argument depends largely on the notion that the rights of the mother cannot or should not outweigh the rights of her unborn child because that child has equal rights under the law -- hence, the push to define life as beginning at conception. In other words, any rights the mother might possess are limited by the rights of the fetus. Otherwise, the mother's rights are the only rights at stake in the decision and her right to self-determination is difficult to overcome, legally.

It's why they absolutely must have the law define the child as a person to accomplish the goal of ending abortion altogether.

Mr. Peabody

11-01-2005, 06:07 PM

Because I cannot justify imprisoning someone for avoiding a 9 month pregnancy.

I agree. Government keeps taking an inch here and an inch there when it comes to invading our privacies and dictating what we can do with our bodies and we keep letting them. Forcing women to be living incubators for nine months against their will is not a power that the government should have.
________
Nexium settlement update (http://www.classactionsettlements.org/lawsuit/nexium/)

Marcus Bryant

11-01-2005, 06:27 PM

Well, things have legal protection only to the extent that the law creates rights and rights exist only with respect to people, property, and chattel. It would be an odd result to say that a fetus is either property or chattel, so I would say yes to your question. It would be necessary to either define the fetus as a person, particularly since the anti-Roe crowd is so insistent in defining a fetus as a person; it would be an odd result to cite that proposition as the basis for decades of argument, only to relent after the fact.

So there is a way to deal with the issue in the law.

I can't see that as being an answer. For one thing, you'd have protracted litigation while waiting for the fetus to obtain "personhood" -- which again, is problematic to the anti-Roe argument; it's either a person or its not. Another is that it would create a large inconsistency in the law. The law generally assigns the date of the accident as the date of accrual for damages. If you're hurt in an auto accident, you can obtain future damages based on injuries you sustained in the accident. But if you weren't legally injured in the accident, you have no basis to recover in tort. If you define a fetus to be a person, then you have to say that it was injured at the time of the accident to afford it the recoveries that would be available to any other person injured by the accident. But if you say that it was a person at the time of the accident, liability in tort will grow again, which is contrary to present day conservative dogma. You can't have it both ways: if the fetus is a person, it has legal rights, including things like the right to sue for damages.

I think most anti-abortion advocates would take a ban on abortion on demand over their dogma on the legal status of the fetus.

As for damages, move up the DCF on the damages to accrue to the child to his/her birth date. Prior to that, let the mother collect on the medical expenses related to whatever injuries were sustained. The child then will have the standing to collect the loss in lifetime earnings as well as the projected cost of medical care that will be required during his/her life if the accident was that serious. I don't think it would take much to enable an individual to make a tort claim for injuries sustained while in the womb.

Would that be based on the "Because Christian teachings says its wrong" theory of the law? or would that be the "Because we're too willy-nilly to deal with the ramifications of a consistent articulation of legal rights since doing so might adversely affect other things that we stand for, but damnit we think it's wrong" theory?

Better than the 'it's too hard to make this work theoretically so let's just embrace the status quo' theory.

Spurminator

11-01-2005, 06:29 PM

The anti-abortion argument depends largely on the notion that the rights of the mother cannot or should not outweigh the rights of her unborn child because that child has equal rights under the law -- hence, the push to define life as beginning at conception.

But they don't have equal rights, regardless of its humanity, because the unborn child is completely dependent on the mother. Kind of cold, but until we can incubate unborn children some other way, that's the way it has to be... Otherwise the unborn child's rights, by definition, supercede the mother's rights.

Extra Stout

11-01-2005, 06:34 PM

But they don't have equal rights, regardless of its humanity, because the unborn child is completely dependent on the mother. Kind of cold, but until we can incubate unborn children some other way, that's the way it has to be... Otherwise the unborn child's rights, by definition, supercede the mother's rights.
That's why there's the "viability" standard. If a child can be kept alive outside the womb with contemporary technology, then abortion should no longer be an option unless the life or health of the mother is in jeopardy.

Right now, that's somewhere around 16 weeks.

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 06:35 PM

Spurminator

11-01-2005, 06:44 PM

That's why there's the "viability" standard. If a child can be kept alive outside the womb with contemporary technology, then abortion should no longer be an option unless the life or health of the mother is in jeopardy.

Right now, that's somewhere around 16 weeks.

I agree, and if advances enable us to keep an unborn child alive outside of a womb, I would align myself with the anti-abortion side.

Spurminator

11-01-2005, 06:47 PM

That's only if the life of the mother is being traded for the life of the baby.

It may be, it may not be. More than likely not, but a woman should not be forced to take that risk, or endure the 9 months of physical reprocussions leading up to it.

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 07:31 PM

It may be, it may not be. More than likely not, but a woman should not be forced to take that risk, or endure the 9 months of physical reprocussions leading up to it.
Over 99% of pregnancies are a choice -- not forced upon the mother.

jochhejaam

11-01-2005, 08:28 PM

a fetus doesn't have rights, it isn't alive, and spurminator is right ( if spurminator is a she) you have no right to tell her what she can do with her body
Since when does her body have two heads, two beating hearts, four arms and four legs? :wtf

jochhejaam

11-01-2005, 08:56 PM

better question, what comes next, a lot of the same fruit loops that dislike abortion dislike contraception, is that going to go too?
If contraception had been used the termination of the unborn baby wouldn't have been necessary.
You were a "fucking fetus" at one time.

JoeChalupa

11-01-2005, 09:12 PM

Over 99% of pregnancies are a choice -- not forced upon the mother.

link please.

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 09:45 PM

link please.
Jeeze, Joe...MILLIONS of abortions a year. Subtract those due to rape and incest and do the math yourself.

JoeChalupa

11-01-2005, 09:58 PM

Jeeze, Joe...MILLIONS of abortions a year. Subtract those due to rape and incest and do the math yourself.

So what are you saying? That everytime a woman has sex other than rape and incest she intended to get pregnant? Or that you pulled stat out of thin air?

Jeeze Yonivore, I didn't know you had such insight into a woman's thoughts.

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 10:19 PM

So what are you saying? That everytime a woman has sex other than rape and incest she intended to get pregnant? Or that you pulled stat out of thin air?

Jeeze Yonivore, I didn't know you had such insight into a woman's thoughts.
No, that she makes a CHOICE that could lead to pregnancy.

JoeChalupa

11-01-2005, 10:24 PM

So you agree. Then should it not be her CHOICE whether to have the child or not?

I think she should but I cannot force her to do so.

Yonivore

11-01-2005, 10:51 PM

So you agree. Then should it not be her CHOICE whether to have the child or not?

I think she should but I cannot force her to do so.
Once created, life is deserving of the right to continue.

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 07:34 AM

[QUOTE=JoeChalupa]So you agree. Then should it not be her CHOICE whether to have the child or not?
With few exceptions, slaughtering the innocent unborn should never have been a choice in the first place and I'll never figure out the "pro-death to babies" crowd. :wtf
And everyone who reads this post was at one time a "fetus" so don't feed me your absurd and tiresome arguements about viability!

I think she should but I cannot force her to do so.

That's the position pro-lifers are in, The USSC made a horrific and unconscionable decision and we are obligated to abide by it.

There is one whose opinion matters far more than a handful of Justices. His love for all of His creation, including those whose lives were senselessly and inhumanely torn from the womb of those who didn't want to be inconvenienced by their life, remains steadfast and his judgement upon those that actively fight for the mindless execution of his Creation will be brought to fruition.

"Beautifully you were created in your Mothers womb". Psalms

But Jesus said, "Let the little ones come to me, and do not keep them away: for of such is the kingdom of heaven". Luke
They were never given the chance, I'm sure He understands that is would have been inconvenient...<sarcasm>

JoeChalupa

11-02-2005, 08:42 AM

[QUOTE]
With few exceptions, slaughtering the innocent unborn should never have been a choice in the first place and I'll never figure out the "pro-death to babies" crowd. :wtf
And everyone who reads this post was at one time a "fetus" so don't feed me your absurd and tiresome arguements about viability!

That's the position pro-lifers are in, The USSC made a horrific and unconscionable decision and we are obligated to abide by it.

There is one whose opinion matters far more than a handful of Justices. His love for all of His creation, including those whose lives were senselessly and inhumanely torn from the womb of those who didn't want to be inconvenienced by their life, remains steadfast and his judgement upon those that actively fight for the mindless execution of his Creation will be brought to fruition.

"Beautifully you were created in your Mothers womb". Psalms

But Jesus said, "Let the little ones come to me, and do not keep them away: for of such is the kingdom of heaven". Luke
They were never given the chance, I'm sure He understands that is would have been inconvenient...<sarcasm>

Again, what most don't get is that, at least for me, I am NOT pro-death to babies. I am a Catholic just like Judge Roberts and Alito and I am against abortion but I will not legislate from the bench and force my religious beliefs on others. I will ALWAYS choose life over death and have never approved of abortion. I have a pro-life Rose on the dash of my car.

Some just don't get it I guess.

Just like I sometimes don't get the pro-lifers who support war and the death penalty but that is just me.

FromWayDowntown

11-02-2005, 10:10 AM

With few exceptions, slaughtering the innocent unborn should never have been a choice in the first place and I'll never figure out the "pro-death to babies" crowd. :wtf
And everyone who reads this post was at one time a "fetus" so don't feed me your absurd and tiresome arguements about viability!

Fine, then it's a person. It should have all the legal rights that all other persons enjoy. The mother should be held criminally liable if she miscarries because of negligence on her part or if she engages in any sort of reckless activity. Let's legislate female morality to the point that women who become pregnant have no choices whatsoever, other than to serve as a simbioate for the child.

Let's require mothers to undergo mandatory prenatal care, subsidized at least in part by the State.

Those who injure the mother (whether intentionally or unintentionally) should have their crimes compounded. They should also face civil liability to the person in the womb. Forget tort reform, because we have to protect the person in gestation.

Until you're willing to agree to all of those conditions and others similar to them -- to truly defining a fetus as a person for all purposes -- you're engaging in the same sort of arbitrary line-drawing that the anti-Roe crowd so readily decries.

Again, you can't have it both ways.

SpursWoman

11-02-2005, 10:48 AM

Wow, apparently I'm nothing but a walking, talking incubator!

I think I should be re-stripped of my right to vote while we're all at it. I mean, if I'm insignificant enough as an individual to not have any control over my own body...why should I be able to have that kind of impact in the world of MUCH more significant men!?!

And WTF am I doing at work?? Shouldn't I be at home cooking and making babies 'n stuff?

Uncle Donnie

11-02-2005, 10:50 AM

Fine, then it's a person. It should have all the legal rights that all other persons enjoy. The mother should be held criminally liable if she miscarries because of negligence on her part or if she engages in any sort of reckless activity. Let's legislate female morality to the point that women who become pregnant have no choices whatsoever, other than to serve as a simbioate for the child.

Let's require mothers to undergo mandatory prenatal care, subsidized at least in part by the State.

Those who injure the mother (whether intentionally or unintentionally) should have their crimes compounded. They should also face civil liability to the person in the womb. Forget tort reform, because we have to protect the person in gestation.

I don't have a problem with any of that.

SpursWoman

11-02-2005, 11:11 AM

I wonder if health insurance would start covering voluntary tubal ligation and hysterectomies?

SpursWoman

11-02-2005, 11:33 AM

That or it will get virtually impossible for single guys to get laid. :lol

Marcus Bryant

11-02-2005, 11:34 AM

FromWayDowntown

11-02-2005, 11:59 AM

Yeah, shame on the "anti-Roe crowd" for even insinuating that a mother shouldn't be able to smoke crack (hell cigs probably do a ton of damage to prenatal development), drink heavily and otherwise fuck up the development of that child in her womb, provided she doesn't opt to kill it first.

In a sense, that's the point. If a mother chooses to smoke crack or cigs, why should she be required to bring that fetus with her in those choices. If you're going to compel women to carry every pregnancy to term, you'd better start imposing stronger laws about what pregnant women can or can't do. Otherwise, the concern for the child is a pretty hollow one.

Who cares about having a perfect theorectical structure to abortion law? It's not like Roe was grounded in anything close to perfection in constitutional law.

Who on Earth could possibly want predictability in the law? Such a silly notion, predictability.

Look, I've acknowledged throughout that if you want to define a fetus as a person from the time of conception, I can understand that. But what I don't think many on your side of the argument have considered is how that characterization can have some very long-reaching effects that run contrary to many of the things that that side has fought so staunchly against.

If the law is to provide that the fetus is a person, you have to be willing to accept all of the consequences that come with it, including, in essence, subserviating the rights of pregnant women to those of a dependent fetus that she may or may not wish to carry.

Logically, the anti-abortion argument falls apart, I think, if you aren't willing to impose different legal standards upon pregnant women than those that exist with respect to any other group in our society. From a Constitutional standpoint, there would be a fairly significant Equal Protection problem there, and perhaps even a Due Process problem, because you'd be singling out a group for disparate treatment based solely on status (in that case, pregnancy).

From the way it sounds, perhaps someone should sue God (or whoever you think created the reality we are in) for making the female of our race the childbearer (just don't give that fetus standing).

Why is it that the choice to keep or abort a pregnancy can't simply be a choice between a woman and her God?

Such decadence.

Such hypocrisy.

Marcus Bryant

11-02-2005, 12:08 PM

In a sense, that's the point. If a mother chooses to smoke crack or cigs, why should she be required to bring that fetus with her in those choices. If you're going to compel women to carry every pregnancy to term, you'd better start imposing stronger laws about what pregnant women can or can't do. Otherwise, the concern for the child is a pretty hollow one.

So what's wrong with that?

Who on Earth could possibly want predictability in the law. Such a silly notion, predictability.

Roe was not predictable. Laws change all the time. I don't think the argument that predictability supplants all concerns is a convincing one.

Look, I've acknowledged throughout that if you want to define a fetus as a person from the time of conception, I can understand that. But what I don't think many on your side of the argument have considered is how that characterization can have some very long-reaching effects that run contrary to many of the things that that side has fought so staunchly against. If the law is to provide that the fetus is a person, you have to be willing to accept all of the consequences that come with it, including, in essence, subserviating the rights of pregnant women to those of a dependent fetus that she may or may not wish to carry. Logically, the anti-abortion argument falls apart, I think, if you aren't willing to impose different legal standards upon pregnant women than those that exist with respect to any other group in our society. From a Constitutional standpoint, there would be a fairly significant Equal Protection problem there, and perhaps even a Due Process problem, because you'd be singling out a group for disparate treatment based solely on status (in that case, pregnancy).

I don't understand why you have to go back to what others 'on my side' are claiming about this issue. Seriously. I don't care whether some seek perfection in regards to the classification of a fetus as a person and I certainly do not care if they are evangelical Christians, Catholics, Buddhists or Dead Heads.

Why is it that the choice to keep or abort a pregnancy can't simply be a choice between a woman and her God?

How about because it isn't hard nowadays for a child to be cared for outside of the womb, and hey, maybe it's wrong, legal complexities notwithstanding?

Such hypocrisy.

Well, since we are into lumping everyone into two camps, congrats on the hypocrisy of claiming to be interested in seeing society take care of its less fortunate, its unwanted. Seems like you are as full of shit as you believe the other side to be.

Marcus Bryant

11-02-2005, 12:23 PM

Logically, the anti-abortion argument falls apart, I think, if you aren't willing to impose different legal standards upon pregnant women than those that exist with respect to any other group in our society. From a Constitutional standpoint, there would be a fairly significant Equal Protection problem there, and perhaps even a Due Process problem, because you'd be singling out a group for disparate treatment based solely on status (in that case, pregnancy).

Men are singled out for child support payments that would seem to impose a different standard on them than on the womens.

I say you give men the right to give up all rights as a parent in exchange for no liability to provide child support. May seem a bit excessive, but hey, at least they don't want the option to kill the kid.

SpursWoman

11-02-2005, 12:28 PM

Men are singled out for child support payments that would seem to impose a different standard on them than on the womens.

Having to give up your entire life and body as you know it = 20% of net and dependant health insurance.

Marcus Bryant

11-02-2005, 12:30 PM

Hey, we're only talking about legal equivalence here. It's just like how you can turn what would otherwise be a healthy kid into nothing more than a tumor.

FromWayDowntown

11-02-2005, 12:38 PM

So what's wrong with that?

A woman gets pregnant and is instantaneously faced with laws aimed only at her that are far more restrictive than those levied against men and non-pregnant women. You don't see any problem with that?

Why not just declare pregnant women chattel while we're at it? It would be much easier to take care of the incubating babies if society deemed the fetus to be a person but severely limited what the mother could or couldn't do. Do you seriously not see a problem with that?

And if your answer is "I've never said that," then don't you see that the argument is vapid -- you'd be arguing for the primacy of the fetus, but against any laws that would protect the person en gestae. I can't see how those two ideas can be squared.

Roe was not predictable. Laws change all the time. I don't think the argument that predictability supplants all concerns is a convincing one.

I think we're talking about different types of predictability. Perhaps the better word from my end is consistent. The law would become a mess (and logically untenable) if a fetus was deemed a person for some purposes but not a person for other purposes. You have to call it one thing or another, I think.

I don't understand why you have to go back to what others 'on my side' are claiming about this issue. Seriously. I don't care whether some seek perfection in regards to the classification of a fetus as a person and I certainly do not care if they are evangelical Christians, Catholics, Buddhists or Dead Heads.

While you and I are engaged in this discussion and I'm referring to your statements as the bases for subsequent posts, I'm not talking only to you. Hence my generalizations. If you would prefer that I discuss this only with you, perhaps we can arrange a time to grab a beer, or PM each other.

How about because it isn't hard nowadays for a child to be cared for outside of the womb, and hey, maybe it's wrong, legal complexities notwithstanding?

But it's wrong because you say so. It may not be wrong to Mary Jane Rottencrotch who lives down the street. Why is it that your sense of morality should dictate what she does?

Well, since we are into lumping everyone into two camps, congrats on the hypocrisy of claiming to be interested in seeing society take care of its less fortunate, its unwanted. Seems like you are as full of shit as you believe the other side to be.

Frankly, I regretted the choice of hypocrisy. It wasn't the right word.

And I've explained the basis for my generalizations.

Nevertheless, I see no inconsistency in my position (just as, apparently, you see none in yours). Your criticism of my position would require that I define a fetus as a person at the time of conception, a characterization that I'm not ready to make, since the viability standard strikes a reasonable balance to me. My interest, politically, is that people's personal freedoms be respected and not subjugated to the whims of some presumed majority morality. Would I ever want my girlfriend or wife to have an abortion? No. But should I decide for her whether that is an available option? I don't think so.

spurster

11-02-2005, 01:05 PM

I think it's a false dichotomy that a fetus would have to legally either be a person with full rights or a nonentity. Children do not have full rights and gain them when they become of age (e.g., 18 for voting, 21 for drinking). Probably a similar approach could be attempted for a fetus with many of the same difficulties that FWD is talking about.

And Spurswomen, do not worry. No doubt any laws restricting women will only be for your good.

FromWayDowntown

11-02-2005, 01:24 PM

I think it's a false dichotomy that a fetus would have to legally either be a person with full rights or a nonentity. Children do not have full rights and gain them when they become of age (e.g., 18 for voting, 21 for drinking).

That's true, but I don't think it resolves the issue. I'm not talking about extending the franchise to a fetus or allowing it to drink. I'm talking about rights that are, in a sense, more fundamental than those. I'm talking about legal recognition as a person. If a fetus is a person, then any actions taken by or against the mother, and which result in injury to that person, are cognizable at law, whether it be through criminal prosecution or civil suit. As another example, if a mother smokes, drinks, or take drugs during her pregnancy, she could certainly be held liable in a civil case filed by the child for any damage that might ensue.

My bigger problem, though, is that the policy justifications are inconsistent if the law isn't severely revamped to criminalize (as assault, battery, homicide, etc) anything the mother does that might adversely effect the person, whether intentional or not. Again, if the mother's negligence results in a miscarriage, how is that not manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide? Are we just going to say that an abortion is murder, but a miscarriage brought about my the mother's misfeasance is insignificant? I don't see where you draw the line if you don't make each of them a crime. To do otherwise is to say that we're interested in protecting that person, but only up to an arbitrarily-determined limit.

It all strikes me as quite, um, misogynistic.

SpursWoman

11-02-2005, 02:41 PM

What I've been trying to figure out is if with the logic that an embryo (not yet classified as a fetus) is granted all the rights of an individual under the law at the moment of conception ... and a woman could potentially be guilty of manslaughter (or even murder) is she miscarries ... if that little glob of DNA implanted itself in my fallopian tube, ruptured, causing major hemorrhaging, and I survived, can I charge it with attempted murder?

Would little glob be incubated, then sent to a juvenile holding facility until it turned 18 and could be tried as an adult? :spin

Marcus Bryant

11-02-2005, 02:52 PM

A woman gets pregnant and is instantaneously faced with laws aimed only at her that are far more restrictive than those levied against men and non-pregnant women. You don't see any problem with that?

"Life is unfair", to quote a great conservative thinker.

Why not just declare pregnant women chattel while we're at it? It would be much easier to take care of the incubating babies if society deemed the fetus to be a person but severely limited what the mother could or couldn't do. Do you seriously not see a problem with that?

Parents already face different legal status than Joe Schmoe at large.

And if your answer is "I've never said that," then don't you see that the argument is vapid -- you'd be arguing for the primacy of the fetus, but against any laws that would protect the person en gestae. I can't see how those two ideas can be squared.

I'm arguing for some protection for the fetus. Sure, it restricts the ability of the mother to execute it.

I think we're talking about different types of predictability. Perhaps the better word from my end is consistent. The law would become a mess (and logically untenable) if a fetus was deemed a person for some purposes but not a person for other purposes. You have to call it one thing or another, I think.

The law is already a mess, in general. Complexity or a change in direction doesn't strike me as a compelling argument. The law is constantly evolving.

While you and I are engaged in this discussion and I'm referring to your statements as the bases for subsequent posts, I'm not talking only to you. Hence my generalizations. If you would prefer that I discuss this only with you, perhaps we can arrange a time to grab a beer, or PM each other.

Well, I'm here to represent my POV in this forum.

But it's wrong because you say so. It may not be wrong to Mary Jane Rottencrotch who lives down the street. Why is it that your sense of morality should dictate what she does?

The law today is based on a certain set of values, a morality.

Frankly, I regretted the choice of hypocrisy. It wasn't the right word.

And I've explained the basis for my generalizations.

Nevertheless, I see no inconsistency in my position (just as, apparently, you see none in yours). Your criticism of my position would require that I define a fetus as a person at the time of conception, a characterization that I'm not ready to make, since the viability standard strikes a reasonable balance to me. My interest, politically, is that people's personal freedoms be respected and not subjugated to the whims of some presumed majority morality. Would I ever want my girlfriend or wife to have an abortion? No. But should I decide for her whether that is an available option? I don't think so.

The law can restrict action without having to give the fetus full legal status as a person. Does the law restrict a person from seeking damages for actions experienced as a child?

Marcus Bryant

11-02-2005, 02:55 PM

Once upon a time there was a certain class of people who were regarded as something less than a full person (3/5ths, I believe was the ratio). That was held up due to a desire for legal consistency and private interest.

To me there is not a conflict between mother and fetus unless the fetus ended up there as a matter of something other than the mother's willing participation or if the fetus threatens the life of the mother.

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 05:20 PM

Again, what most don't get is that, at least for me, I am NOT pro-death to babies. I am a Catholic just like Judge Roberts and Alito and I am against abortion but I will not legislate from the bench and force my religious beliefs on others. I will ALWAYS choose life over death and have never approved of abortion. I have a pro-life Rose on the dash of my car.

Some just don't get it I guess.

Just like I sometimes don't get the pro-lifers who support war and the death penalty but that is just me.
I understood your position Joe, I wasn't implying that you were for abortion.

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 05:39 PM

[QUOTE=FromWayDowntown]Fine, then it's a person. It should have all the legal rights that all other persons enjoy. The mother should be held criminally liable if she miscarries because of negligence on her part or if she engages in any sort of reckless activity. Let's legislate female morality to the point that women who become pregnant have no choices whatsoever, other than to serve as a simbioate for the child.
No need to go off on a tangent FWD the problem is that you have the rights of more than one person to consider. How about people look at te from the standpoint that a human life hangs in the balance instead of just considering the opinions of those that want to abort this life?
1. Do we choose to allow the child to live?
2. Do we allow the woman (or man as some, perhaps many pressure the woman to abort) to abort his or her life because it's "inconvenient"?

Those who injure the mother (whether intentionally or unintentionally) should have their crimes compounded. They should also face civil liability to the person in the womb. Forget tort reform, because we have to protect the person in gestation.
There are already cases where multiple murders have been charged to those that have taken the life of a woman who's pregnant.
An accident is just that so there's no crime committed

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 05:46 PM

[QUOTE=SpursWoman]

I think I should be re-stripped of my right to vote while we're all at it. I mean, if I'm insignificant enough as an individual to not have any control over my own body...why should I be able to have that kind of impact in the world of MUCH more significant men!?!
We'll take up the womans right to vote in another thread. :lol

And WTF am I doing at work?? Shouldn't I be at home cooking and making babies 'n stuff?
I assume you're doing the same thing my wife is, earning a living.

The issue is abortion so save the straw(wo)man distractions.

I thought you weren't going to get into this discussion? :lol

p.s.I do 95% of the grocery shopping at my house and 90% of the cooking.
I have 3 pounds of thawed chicken breasts, any of the guys in here have suggestions as to what to do with it?
If not I"m gonna do the usual egg/flour/vegatable oil thing. :lol

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 05:49 PM

I wonder if health insurance would start covering voluntary tubal ligation and hysterectomies?

Sorry, I wouldn't know, mine definitely covers a vasectomy though. :depressed :lol

SpursWoman

11-02-2005, 06:14 PM

No need to go off on a tangent FWD the problem is that you have the rights of more than one person to consider. How about people look at te from the standpoint that a human life hangs in the balance instead of just considering the opinions of those that want to abort this life?
1. Do we choose to allow the child to live?
2. Do we allow the woman (or man as some, perhaps many pressure the woman to abort) to abort his or her life because it's "inconvenient"?

There are already cases where multiple murders have been charged to those that have taken the life of a woman who's pregnant.
An accident is just that so there's no crime committed

Why are "we" using the word "convenient" like having a child is about as bothersome as having to take a different route in the morning to work because of construction or an accident?

"Inconvenient" is not even in the same universe as the magnitude of the impact of having a child has.

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 06:21 PM

Why are "we" using the word "convenient" like having a child is about as bothersome as having to take a different route in the morning to work because of construction or an accident?

"Inconvenient" is not even in the same universe as the magnitude of the impact of having a child has.
It doesn't reach the magnitude where it warrants taking a life.

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 07:41 PM

[QUOTE=FromWayDowntown]In a sense, that's the point. If a mother chooses to smoke crack or cigs, why should she be required to bring that fetus with her in those choices. If you're going to compel women to carry every pregnancy to term, you'd better start imposing stronger laws about what pregnant women can or can't do. Otherwise, the concern for the child is a pretty hollow one.
Why does the baby always come up on the short end of whatever hangup the woman might have?
Inconvenient to carry it to term? Eliminate the baby.
Mother can't provide for the baby? Eliminate the baby.
Mother's on drugs? Eliminate the baby.
Boy/Husband doesn't want a kid around? Eliminate the baby.
:wtf

If the law is to provide that the fetus is a person, you have to be willing to accept all of the consequences that come with it, including, in essence, subserviating the rights of pregnant women to those of a dependent fetus that she may or may not wish to carry.
If the law stated that abortion were illegal other than vs the life of the mother, rape, and incest I bet the pregnancies that lead to abortion would drop dramatically...I'd say maybe about 75% in this Country.
As the law is right now they have an easy out so for many it's no more than a minor inconvenience, a temporary problem that can be taken care of at the drop of a hat.

Why is it that the choice to keep or abort a pregnancy can't simply be a choice between a woman and her God?
Such hypocrisy.
Uhm, Because someone is left out of the equation?
Again the baby is forgotten.

Actually as of right now it is the womans choice.

ChumpDumper

11-02-2005, 07:44 PM

If the law stated that abortion were illegal other than vs the life of the mother, rape, and incest I bet the pregnancies that lead to abortion would drop dramatically...I'd say maybe about 75% in this Country.I doubt it, but it might be prudent to buy stock in coathanger companies.

SpursWoman

11-02-2005, 08:16 PM

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 08:53 PM

Just like there was a dramatic drop in drug use?

Did you make up a list of ideas on how to trivialize abortion?

http://www.europeannationalfront.org/abortion.jpg

Hey, :cry what about us^^^, we want a say! (Sorry babies, it doesn't do any good, they just don't care)

http://www.sfist.com/attachments/sfist_jackson/newborn.jpg

Thanks for making the right choice mommy!

Spurminator

11-02-2005, 09:31 PM

Did you save a bunch of pictures to avoid the question?

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 10:21 PM

Did you save a bunch of pictures to avoid the question?
What was there to answer?
When was drug use legal? There was nothing to compare.
Look a little deeper next time and you may be able to answer your own question.

But if not I'm here for ya bro. :lol

SpursWoman

11-02-2005, 10:32 PM

The issue is abortion so save the straw(wo)man distractions.

No, the issue is you trying to impose your own beliefs on me. I do NOT believe that life begins at conception. PERIOD.

What makes you feel that you have the right to tell ME what I should believe? And that I should be punished because of what YOU believe if my actions don't quite measure up to what YOU feel is morally correct?

Yonivore

11-02-2005, 10:41 PM

No, the issue is you trying to impose your own beliefs on me. I do NOT believe that life begins at conception. PERIOD.
So, when does it begin and, after you answer that, how do we reconcile the 150 million different answers to that question from all the women of the United States?

My response is that life begins somewhere and since there is an entire range of beliefs -- just among child-bearing age women -- from life begins at conception to life doesn't begin until sometime after birth, society should err on the side of caution and life and prohibit the practice of abortion until we have a definitive answer.

What makes you feel that you have the right to tell ME what I should believe? And that I should be punished because of what YOU believe if my actions don't quite measure up to what YOU feel is morally correct?
It has nothing to do with you or your personal morality. It has to do with defining human life and when that life deserves to be afforded its own rights to life, liberty, and property -- as guaranteed in the U. S. Constitution.

JoeChalupa

11-02-2005, 10:54 PM

Men's pursuit of happiness sometimes leads to unwanted pregnancies.

Yonivore

11-02-2005, 10:56 PM

Men's pursuit of happiness sometimes leads to unwanted pregnancies.
Not unless there's a willing woman.

JoeChalupa

11-02-2005, 10:57 PM

Not unless there's a willing woman.

Where there is a will..there is a way.

Yonivore

11-02-2005, 10:58 PM

Where there is a will..there is a way.
That doesn't mean society has to provide it.

JoeChalupa

11-02-2005, 11:03 PM

That doesn't mean society has to provide it.

Provide what? sex?

jochhejaam

11-02-2005, 11:04 PM

[QUOTE=SpursWoman]No, the issue is you trying to impose your own beliefs on me. I do NOT believe that life begins at conception. PERIOD.
I've listened to the opinions of everyone that's posted in the thread and I don't feel anyone is trying to "impose" on me. I'm stating how I feel and others are stating how they feel and the only way someone should feel imposed upon is if their insecure in their position on abortion.

Perhaps the confrontation you're having is with your conscience?

What makes you feel that you have the right to tell ME what I should believe? And that I should be punished because of what YOU believe if my actions don't quite measure up to what YOU feel is morally correct?
Why does my opinion matter that much to you and where did I tell you what you should believe? I'm stating what I believe, feel free to personalize it if you wish but you certainly have the option to disregard it.

Yonivore

11-02-2005, 11:06 PM

Provide what? sex?
Anything to satisfy the object of will.

SpursWoman

11-03-2005, 12:30 AM

Why does my opinion matter that much to you and where did I tell you what you should believe? I'm stating what I believe, feel free to personalize it if you wish but you certainly have the option to disregard it.

Do I seriously need to point out the generic use of "YOU" to you?

gtownspur

11-03-2005, 12:47 AM

^no, with all due respect,just point out the generic use of imposition of JJ's morals to yours for starters.

SpursWoman

11-03-2005, 07:06 AM

Why does my opinion matter that much to you and where did I tell you what you should believe?

Do you vote in line with that opinion?

^no, with all due respect,just point out the generic use of imposition of JJ's morals to yours for starters.

Do you vote in line with that opinion?

Extra Stout

11-03-2005, 09:24 AM

Why does the compulsive power of the state have to be the only thing society uses with regard to these kinds of issues?

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 02:42 PM

Why does the compulsive power of the state have to be the only thing society uses with regard to these kinds of issues?
Well, in this case, I believe it is because the unborn child has no other remedy -- particularly when it is the person most likely to be its protector that is trying to terminate its life. After all, aren't individual human rights kind of the whole purpose of the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution?

JohnnyMarzetti

11-03-2005, 03:23 PM

Well, in this case, I believe it is because the unborn child has no other remedy -- particularly when it is the person most likely to be its protector that is trying to terminate its life. After all, aren't individual human rights kind of the whole purpose of the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution?

Sure..when it suits you. Bush spouts his beliefs about the sanctity of human life and human rights but has no problems going to war and killing innocent victims or allowing torture of "suspects" in the so called "black prison" in foreign countries.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 03:55 PM

Sure..when it suits you. Bush spouts his beliefs about the sanctity of human life and human rights but has no problems going to war and killing innocent victims or allowing torture of "suspects" in the so called "black prison" in foreign countries.
Focus man -- the topic is abortion.

Extra Stout

11-03-2005, 04:29 PM

Well, in this case, I believe it is because the unborn child has no other remedy -- particularly when it is the person most likely to be its protector that is trying to terminate its life. After all, aren't individual human rights kind of the whole purpose of the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution?
So, if this is a human rights issue, then you would say that abortion should be illegal under all circumstances, including rape, incest, health of the mother, etc.?

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 04:33 PM

So, if this is a human rights issue, then you would say that abortion should be illegal under all circumstances, including rape, incest, health of the mother, etc.?
That's an absolutist position that some have. But, if we could restrict our debate to just those type of "duress" pregnancies that'd be a nice change.

However, if pressed I'd say yeah -- except for the legitimate health of the mother argument when it truly becomes the rights of one individual weighed against the rights of another.

I think it would go a long way if we could just end the practice of "convenience" abortions and focus on those that are truly sought as a result of circumstances beyond the control of the mother.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 04:34 PM

That's my thought too.

If abortion is illegal because of the child's rights, it should always be illegal. I mean, it's not the baby's fault that the mother was raped...

This whole debate all goes back to punishing a woman for having sex.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 04:36 PM

I think it would go a long way if we could just end the practice of "convenience" abortions and focus on those that are truly sought as a result of circumstances beyond the control of the mother.

How will you police that? What happens when rape reports suddenly increase by 10x?

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 04:39 PM

That's my thought too.

If abortion is illegal because of the child's rights, it should always be illegal. I mean, it's not the baby's fault that the mother was raped...
I think I just stipulated that I agreed with this point. If it is a pure human rights issue, only abortions that are undertaken to save the life of the mother should be considered.

This whole debate all goes back to punishing a woman for having sex.
No, it actually speaks to protecting the rights of a living human being. Do women not know that sexual intercourse can result in pregnancy?

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 04:40 PM

Do women not know that sexual intercourse can result in pregnancy?

This whole debate all goes back to punishing a woman for having sex.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 04:41 PM

How will you police that? What happens when rape reports suddenly increase by 10x?
That's a specious argument. And, the answer is, you investigate the crime and prosecute the offenders -- whether it be a rapist or a woman falsely accusing someone of rape.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 04:43 PM

No, it goes back to holding individuals accountable for their actions -- in deference to the life of an innocent child who had no say in whether or not the woman should drop trou and create him.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 05:04 PM

And, the answer is, you investigate the crime and prosecute the offenders -- whether it be a rapist or a woman falsely accusing someone of rape.

Unrealistic. Rape accusations will increase insurmountably. You'd have to double your investigation team.

No, it goes back to holding individuals accountable for their actions

Like having sex.

Requiring a woman to go through with a pregnancy when she does not wish to be pregnant is punishment. I'm not even talking about the imprisonment after an illegal abortion.

Extra Stout

11-03-2005, 05:10 PM

I think I just stipulated that I agreed with this point. If it is a pure human rights issue, only abortions that are undertaken to save the life of the mother should be considered.But using the human rights argument when you're only interested in ending the "convenience" abortions, as you put it, is inconsistent.

I, too, am most concerned with the use of abortion as primary birth control. However...

No, it actually speaks to protecting the rights of a living human being. Do women not know that sexual intercourse can result in pregnancy?

...I disagree that the primary problem is slutty women who need to be punished.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 05:13 PM

Unrealistic. Rape accusations will increase insurmountably. You'd have to double your investigation team.
By the way, why, exactly, would rape reports go up? I've already stated I'd be opposed to abortions of pregnancies that resulted from rape and incest.

Like having sex.
Like engaging in a practice that has consequences.

Requiring a woman to go through with a pregnancy when she does not wish to be pregnant is punishment. I'm not even talking about the imprisonment after an illegal abortion.
Abortion is, arguably, the taking of a human life. (<< Al Gore's words, not mine). Which is worse? "Punishment," if that's what you wish to call it, for having to live with the consequences of a choice or killing an innocent child?

Me? I pick being killed over being "punished" as the worst of the two. But, that's just me.

Extra Stout

11-03-2005, 05:14 PM

No, it goes back to holding individuals accountable for their actions -- in deference to the life of an innocent child who had no say in whether or not the woman should drop trou and create him.

The majority of abortions are had by impoverished minority women.

Their choices with regards to sex may be a lot more complex than just being sluts who drop trau at the blink of an eye.

For example, they may have to choose between having sex or getting beaten, or have to choose between having sex or being abandoned. Safe sex isn't necessarily an option.

Don't be so quick to judge.

Extra Stout

11-03-2005, 05:14 PM

By the way, why, exactly, would rape reports go up? I've already stated I'd be opposed to abortions of pregnancies that resulted from rape and incest.

Because if claiming rape was the only way to get an abortion, then more women would claim to have been raped.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 05:15 PM

But using the human rights argument when you're only interested in ending the "convenience" abortions, as you put it, is inconsistent.
That may be, but -- damn -- if we could end that practice first, wouldn't it be a good thing?

I, too, am most concerned with the use of abortion as primary birth control. However, I disagree that the primary problem is slutty women who need to be punished.
I never said it was. The primary problem is that no one recognizes that human life is being extinguished for reasons of convenience.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 05:17 PM

Me? I pick being killed over being "punished" as the worst of the two.

You may have a point. Perhaps we should also force adoption of starving African orphans on people who are caught speeding.

Or at least raise taxes until we end world hunger altogether.

Extra Stout

11-03-2005, 05:19 PM

That may be, but -- damn -- if we could end that practice first, wouldn't it be a good thing?Yes. Here's a couple points:

1) An outright ban on abortions isn't necessarily the best way to get there.

2) If we're focusing on a drastic reduction in the number of abortions used as primary birth control rather than an outright ban, then the politicians actually can get something done, because I think everybody but the fringe groups agrees on that.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 05:19 PM

Because if claiming rape was the only way to get an abortion, then more women would claim to have been raped.
I merely stipulated that "duress" abortions were a legitimate starting place over which to disagree. I'm not in favor of abortions for rape or incest. The only abortions I'd even consider would be those where you are choosing between the life of the mother and the life of the child.

But, you're right, if I believed abortion was okay for rape and incest victims and not sluts -- that would be inconsistent. However, that's not what I believe. I just wish the argument was over those few people so afflicted.

And, focusing on that point, only draws attention from the elephant in the living room...the millions that seek abortions annually simply because they can't keep their pants on.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 05:20 PM

I believe it is better to work harder to prevent pregnancies than to try to stop abortions after pregnancy occurs.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 05:22 PM

Yes. Here's a couple points:

1) An outright ban on abortions isn't necessarily the best way to get there.
That's like saying an outright ban on murder isn't necessarily the best way to stop the crime. And, that may be a true statement -- however -- decency should dictate that you not concede that point merely because it won't work. Why not use it in conjunction with whatever you feel is the best way to "get there?"

2) If we're focusing on a drastic reduction in the number of abortions used as primary birth control rather than an outright ban, then the politicians actually can get something done, because I think everybody but the fringe groups agrees on that.
Unfortunately, the fringe groups are the ones providing most abortions -- Planned Parenthood being chief among them.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 05:24 PM

I believe it is better to work harder to prevent pregnancies than to try to stop abortions after pregnancy occurs.
Duh! How could I be so blind?

How 'bout both?

But, even having said that, attempts to prevent pregnancy are thwarted at every turn. Abstinence information and morality instruction is eschewed in schools in favor of condom dispensers and over-the-top sex education classes.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 05:27 PM

There's simply no positive end to the issue.

If you continue to allow abortions, innocent lives are being destroyed, sometimes for no good reason.

If you ban abortions altogether, you would still have illegal abortions and forced miscarriages, and the added bonus of further government intervention into your private life if you expect to investigate women whose pregnancies end suspiciously.

If you distribute free birth control and condoms, not everyone will use them and some side effects may occur. You'd still have to decide on abortion being legal or illegal... But that would lend itself to REQUIRED birth control.

All told, I believe #3 is the best option.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 05:33 PM

And I believe you stand on the principles embodied in the Constitution and quit trying to contemplate and navigate every possible outcome that could be chosen -- wrongly or rightly -- by individual people.

If abortion is wrong don't make it legal just to prevent people from making bad choices when they get pregnant.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 05:37 PM

The principles embodied by the Constitution would not include imprisoning women for choosing not to go through with a 9 month pregnancy... Yes, it was irresponsible sex that led to that pregnancy, but it was irresponsible of the man as well, and for the man to get off scott free while the woman serves a jail term is sexism... also not embodied by the Constitution.

I find abortion to be reprehensible, but I also find it to be the lesser of two evils when compared to the ensuing fascism required to police the banning of abortion, and all other factors related to it.

FromWayDowntown

11-03-2005, 05:43 PM

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 05:55 PM

The principles embodied by the Constitution would not include imprisoning women for choosing not to go through with a 9 month pregnancy...
Unless it was murder.

Yes, it was irresponsible sex that led to that pregnancy, but it was irresponsible of the man as well, and for the man to get off scott free while the woman serves a jail term is sexism...
No, it's a matter of natural selection. If a man were capable of being pregnant, I'd feel the same way. And, if the man causes the abortion, he's just as guilty.

...also not embodied by the Constitution.
I don't follow.

I find abortion to be reprehensible,
I find it criminal.

but I also find it to be the lesser of two evils when compared to the ensuing fascism required to police the banning of abortion, and all other factors related to it.
Apparently, I place a higher value on the life of an innocent child.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 05:58 PM

I just see the "only to save the mother's life" as a form of the same type of arbitrary line drawing that Yonivore despises with the viability standard. Who will decide whether the pregnancy threatens the mother's life? Does she have to go through some sort of bureaucracy to have that finding substantiated and her abortion approved?

And even then, aren't you forsaking the rights of the fetus anyway? Isn't that inconsistent with a policy that forbids abortion for the purpose of effectuating the rights of the fetus?

Well, you're splitting hairs but, for the sake of argument -- let's follow this out.

Certain medical conditions that occur during pregnancy are known to be fatal or permanently disabling to the mother. If the medical condition can be resolved by abortion, I'd say that'd qualify.

If the claimed condition cannot be resolved by abortion, I'd say not.

There is a wealth of medical research and obstetrical history on which to base such decisions.

But, if you have a problem with that one...fine, outlaw it too and just let the chips fall where they may.

If you're going to create an exception, why not extend it to cases of rape or incest? Isn't that an arbitrary line, too?
That'd be great...think we can eliminate all the other abortions and have this argument?

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 05:59 PM

SpursWoman

11-03-2005, 06:02 PM

why not extend it to cases of rape or incest?

No, apparently it's okay to put a raped woman through the unimaginable torture not just from the act of rape itself, but to physically and emotionally prolong her abuse by making her carry the result of something that was not consentual and will very likely damage her for the rest of her life.

And that's not even considering if that woman was married, and what that would very likely do to her relationship.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 06:02 PM

Unless it was murder.

Not all killing is murder.

No, it's a matter of natural selection. If a man were capable of being pregnant, I'd feel the same way. And, if the man causes the abortion, he's just as guilty.

The man helped cause the pregnancy, which the woman must live with for 9 months. Should he be required to care for her for the duration of the pregnancy? Help compensate for any work missed?

I don't follow.

Equality.

Apparently, I place a higher value on the life of an innocent child.

Not really, I just have more realistic expectations about the feasibility of preventing the deaths of those children.

Banning abortion does not achieve the desired end, and creates many more problems along the way.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 06:05 PM

Not really, I just have more realistic expectations about the feasibility of preventing the deaths of those children.

Banning abortion does not achieve the desired end, and creates many more problems along the way.
Really?

How many abortions were there before Roe v. Wade? After?

What was the mortality rate of mother's receiving abortions (legal or illegal) prior to Roe v. Wade? After?

I think you'd be surprised at the exponential increase in abortions and the relatively stable mortality rate. I'll dig those numbers up again -- unless you find them first.

But, compared to so-called back alley abortions which, I concede, resulted in a higher mortality rate for the mother than do "professional" abortions, the exponential increase in the procedure conducted in clinics has resulted in an exponential rise in complications resulting in death in numbers that rival those that occurred due to unsafe abortion procedures.

All medical procedures have a mortality rate. And, one that is used millions of times per year has a pretty significant one.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 06:07 PM

Not all killing is murder.
And that's what we're arguing about, isn't it?

The man helped cause the pregnancy, which the woman must live with for 9 months. Should he be required to care for her for the duration of the pregnancy? Help compensate for any work missed?

Equality.
Sure, why not.

Not really, I just have more realistic expectations about the feasibility of preventing the deaths of those children.

Banning abortion does not achieve the desired end, and creates many more problems along the way.
I disagree.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 06:07 PM

How many abortions were there before Roe v. Wade? After?

Impossible to measure, given that most illegal abortions were not reported or recorded.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 06:09 PM

Impossible to measure, given that most illegal abortions were not reported or recorded.
But, the numbers of women that died due to the illegal procedures is known...

I'll find the statistics.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 06:09 PM

What is the difference between a nation allowing abortions to occur and a nation allowing starvation to occur?

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 06:10 PM

But, the numbers of women that died due to the illegal procedures is known...

That is, in all likelihood, a small fraction of the total number of "back alley" abortions.

Not every woman stuck a rusty coat hanger up her snatch.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 06:13 PM

What is the difference between a nation allowing abortions to occur and a nation allowing starvation to occur?
You may need to make your point because, I'm not sure I follow, but I'd say

Abortion are acts that are either legitimized or delegitimized by government while starvations is a condition that is either responded to or not by a government.

Both are preventable but one is an overt act while the other is a sympomatic condition of other problems.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 06:16 PM

That is, in all likelihood, a small fraction of the total number of "back alley" abortions.

Not every woman stuck a rusty coat hanger up her snatch.
I agree but, the more illegal abortions there were only reduces the mortality rate when compared to current legal abortions.

It's a catch 22 for pro-abortionists. Either illegal abortions had a lower mortality rate than legal ones do or we've so increased the number of abortions by legalizing them that it's not longer a safe alternative for mothers because we're killing more of them now than we did when they were illegal.

Noodle that one out and I'll get back to you later.

Spurminator

11-03-2005, 06:25 PM

Abortion are acts that are either legitimized or delegitimized by government while starvations is a condition that is either responded to or not by a government.

I disagree. Abortion is not legitimized by the government's choice not to interfere. The government is not sanctioning abortion as they would, say, gay marriage. They are simply allowing it to happen, because it's going to happen and trying to police or prevent it would create more problems.

It's a catch 22 for pro-abortionists. Either illegal abortions had a lower mortality rate than legal ones do or we've so increased the number of abortions by legalizing them that it's not longer a safe alternative for mothers because we're killing more of them now than we did when they were illegal.

That sounds like a great reason to picket abortion clinics or mail out pamphlets, but I don't see what it has to do with whether or not the government should step in and enforce a no-abortions policy.

If the woman chooses to risk her life for an abortion, that's her choice. Of course, she probably has a better chance of being killed in a wreck on her way to the clinic...

JoeChalupa

11-03-2005, 06:30 PM

Stop saying "pro-abortion". I am pro-choice..NOT pro-abortion.

Are conservatives "pro-war" thus "pro-death"?

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 06:54 PM

Stop saying "pro-abortion". I am pro-choice..NOT pro-abortion.
If you're not against it, you're for it. But -- since I wasn't talking directly to you -- let me say, there are pro-abortion people out there.

Are conservatives "pro-war" thus "pro-death"?
Nah, just pro-security.

jochhejaam

11-03-2005, 07:07 PM

Stop saying "pro-abortion". I am pro-choice..NOT pro-abortion.

So you're all for the woman having the right to have an abortion but when they exercise that right you're against it? :wtf

Are conservatives "pro-war" thus "pro-death"?
That's not the greatest analogy Joe.
Many involved in war are able to defend themselves and therefore leave the war alive, the baby facing abortion has no capacity to defend himself or herself and therefore there are no survivors.

That should break the hardest of hearts but it doesn't.

FromWayDowntown

11-03-2005, 07:21 PM

Well, you're splitting hairs but, for the sake of argument -- let's follow this out.

Certain medical conditions that occur during pregnancy are known to be fatal or permanently disabling to the mother. If the medical condition can be resolved by abortion, I'd say that'd qualify.

If the claimed condition cannot be resolved by abortion, I'd say not.

There is a wealth of medical research and obstetrical history on which to base such decisions.

But, if you have a problem with that one...fine, outlaw it too and just let the chips fall where they may.

I have a problem with it because your standard is no more reasonably or any less arbitrary than the viability standard that you so readily decry. There's ample medical research on which to base a determination that a fetus has become viable. You reject that as too arbitrary, so why is your standard any different.

Certainly there is medical research and obstetrical history to allow some determinations to be made in objective terms. But that all assumes proper diagnoses and the existence of only known conditions as the causative factor in all maternal mortality cases. Neither assumption is valid.

And what is the government to do if a particular doctor finds that his or her patients are suffering from problems that threaten the mother's life? Should there be an investigation if the findings are out of kilter from some sort of national average -- I mean, surely you'd have to develop some means to prohibit doctors from readily concluding that the lives of certain unhappy patients were in danger as a result of their pregnancies and giving them the medical go-ahead to have an abortion. Are we now going to investigate each and every clinic to insure that the dire consequences diagnoses are founded in fact and not in a willingness to aid a patient to obtain the abortion that you outlawed?

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 07:29 PM

I have a problem with it because your standard is no more reasonably or any less arbitrary than the viability standard that you so readily decry. There's ample medical research on which to base a determination that a fetus has become viable. You reject that as too arbitrary, so why is your standard any different.
It is based on individual cases and not arbitrary benchmarks of gestational age. The viability date of a fetus has yet to be fixed definitively, has it?

Certainly there is medical research and obstetrical history to allow some determinations to be made in objective terms. But that all assumes proper diagnoses and the existence of only known conditions as the causative factor in all maternal mortality cases. Neither assumption is valid.
But, it is based on the facts known about a particular case and for which individuals can be held accountable and not an arbitrary standard based on the "medical consensus" du jour.

And what is the government to do if a particular doctor finds that his or her patients are suffering from problems that threaten the mother's life? Should there be an investigation if the findings are out of kilter from some sort of national average -- I mean, surely you'd have to develop some means to prohibit doctors from readily concluding that the lives of certain unhappy patients were in danger as a result of their pregnancies and giving them the medical go-ahead to have an abortion. Are we now going to investigate each and every clinic to insure that the dire consequences diagnoses are founded in fact and not in a willingness to aid a patient to obtain the abortion that you outlawed?
Do we demand any less for a person going to the executioners chamber?

FromWayDowntown

11-03-2005, 07:42 PM

It is based on individual cases and not arbitrary benchmarks of gestational age. The viability date of a fetus has yet to be fixed definitively, has it?

Viability can be fixed as definitively as the likelihood that a pregnancy will threaten a mother's life. Both are complex issues that involve any number of uncontrollable variables. We do know that there are some instances in which a pregnancy will threaten a mother's life, but it's hubris to think that we've identified each of them. In the same sense, it is my understanding that we know that there is a point after which a fetus is viable, though not all become viable at the same time. In any event, if it's arbitrary to conclude that there is a particular viability date, it's equally arbitrary to conclude that a mother's life is or is not endangered by her pregnancy.

And again, any exceptions to the rule that you espouse would seem to defeat the policy justifications you advance for the rule itself. If abortion is a violation of the rights of the fetus, then an abortion is an abortion is an abortion. There can't be an exception without undermining, to some extent, your policy.

But, it is based on the facts known about a particular case and for which individuals can be held accountable and not an arbitrary standard based on the "medical consensus" du jour.

How are you going to hold them accountable, though? Are we going to institute the Abortion police and create a whole new bureaucracy to ensure that no women are having abortions when they shouldn't be? Can Joe Friday walking the beat assess whether an abortion was properly permitted without a medical degree? Do we have to have governmental panels review the determinations of individual doctors on these issues? Who decides what the panels standards are and do those panels apply national or local standards?

If the right was so vehemently against subsidized health care because of the bureaucratic largesse it would require, why is this problem any different in kind?

Do we demand any less for a person going to the executioners chamber?

So you'd be in favor of some sort of investigation into every case in which a doctor concludes that a woman is eligible to have an abortion? and would that investigation have to precede the procedure or would it be a post hoc review to ensure that transgressing women can be thrown in prison as frequently as possible?

SpursWoman

11-03-2005, 08:43 PM

it is my understanding that we know that there is a point after which a fetus is viable

There is...it's roughly 16 weeks. If you've ever been pregnant and been to regular doctor visits during the first 3-4 months they advise you to be very cautious because a pregnancy is very volatile during that time.

Not coincidentally, after which, any pregnancy that is terminated is considered a late-term abortion and is banned in most states unless critically, medically necessary. In Texas it is illegal to have/perform an abortion after 16 weeks.

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 10:08 PM

There is...it's roughly 16 weeks. If you've ever been pregnant and been to regular doctor visits during the first 3-4 months they advise you to be very cautious because a pregnancy is very volatile during that time.

Not coincidentally, after which, any pregnancy that is terminated is considered a late-term abortion and is banned in most states unless critically, medically necessary. In Texas it is illegal to have/perform an abortion after 16 weeks.

Define "roughly" and then help me to understand how to reconcile those that unfortunately fall just on the wrong side of the "roughly" line.

Thanks.

SpursWoman

11-03-2005, 10:29 PM

Yonivore

11-03-2005, 10:36 PM

Right. Then go look into the eyes of a woman who has been brutally raped, impregnated by the rape, and then tell her that she can go fuck herself if she thinks she's morally justified getting the remains of a monster out of her body...that she has no rights and she's nothing but a fucking incubator for a criminal and to just deal with it. Because that's what YOU believe so that's THE ONLY answer. And I'd I like her reaction on video tape.

Thanks.
Okay, way to concentrate on less than .5% of abortions in order to justify the over 99% of others.

First of all, the baby isn't a monster and isn't to blame for the rape. Further, I find it reprehensible that you would exploit a rape victims dilemma in order to justify a convenience abortion.

So, back to that definition of "roughly."

jochhejaam

11-04-2005, 12:12 AM

Spurswoman:
In Texas it is <legal> to have/perform an abortion <up to> 16 weeks...she's morally justified getting the remains of a monster out of her body...A baby's heart begins beating 18-25 days after conception

Sixteen weeks old. The baby can grasp with his/her hands, kick, or even somersault. Baby now has a sucking reflex. If a bitter solution is introduced into the amniotic fluid, all swallowing stops, however, if a sugary solution is introduced, the baby swallows twice as fast as before! The baby can also get the hiccups just about now.

http://www.mccaugheyseptuplets.com/pregnancy/fetus/16weeks.jpg
16 weeks old ^^^

Texas abortion law sparks protests

Jamie Wilson in Washington
Tuesday June 7, 2005

The bill also restricts doctors from performing abortions on women who have carried a child for more than 26 weeks unless the woman's life is jeopardised or the baby has serious brain damage. More than 30 US states have implemented similar legislation.
http://www.shortnews.com/shownews.cfm?id=48516

http://www.mccaugheyseptuplets.com/pregnancy/fetus/25weeks.jpg

^^^25 weeks
10" now, Skin now becomes opaque instead of transparent. The heartbeat can be heard by someone outside the body now by placing an ear on the belly. If you talk or sing, he can hear you.

25 weeks - 79% of babies survive premature birth.

Doesn't sound like "her body" to me!

SpursWoman

11-04-2005, 06:54 AM

Further, I find it reprehensible that you would exploit a rape victims dilemma in order to justify a convenience abortion.

:lol :rollin

Uh, okay.

SpursWoman

11-04-2005, 07:12 AM

Doesn't sound like "her body" to me!

Thanks for the pictures, I've seen several sonograms of my own kids....it's pretty awesome. Of couse, that'd be my own opinion.

Which, btw, is that that is something I could never choose for myself..but I'm not naive enough to think that the circumstances surrounding all pregnancies are all teddy bears, pink wallpaper, and baby showers...and it's not my place to make those kinds of decisions for people I don't know based on my own feelings.

And "roughly" = a subjective POV that if were able to be clearly defined, would pretty much make this argument moot. And I understand "erring on the side of caution," but *you* need to realize not everyone feels the same way you do, and until *they* do, what your opinion is is just that...your opinion.

Dos

11-04-2005, 07:50 AM

wasn't casey vs. pennsylvania a case against a law that was brought forth by a pro-life democrat Bob Casey... ? Just wondering heard something about that the other day..

SpursWoman

11-04-2005, 08:14 AM

Sixteen weeks old. The baby can grasp with his/her hands, kick, or even somersault. Baby now has a sucking reflex. If a bitter solution is introduced into the amniotic fluid, all swallowing stops, however, if a sugary solution is introduced, the baby swallows twice as fast as before! The baby can also get the hiccups just about now.

And btw, about 16 weeks is the time you can actually start *feeling* the baby move inside of you...up until then all you really feel is nauseous. I'm for a ban on late-term abortions, too.

Maybe, if by naked eye an 8 week old embryo looked like something other than a blood clot it'd make a bigger emotional impact in the initial term, too, and greatly decrease a woman's inclination to terminate it.

SpursWoman

11-04-2005, 08:54 AM

25 weeks - 79% of babies survive premature birth.

That would pretty much define it absolutely as viable at that point, wouldn't it? I don't think anyone is arguing that. None would survive a premature birth at 8 weeks.

JoeChalupa

11-04-2005, 09:05 AM

If you're not against it, you're for it. But -- since I wasn't talking directly to you -- let me say, there are pro-abortion people out there.

No, you are wrong. I am against it, just not willing to force a woman to do what I feel is right.

Nah, just pro-security.

Nice spin. But if I use you way of thinking..If you are for war you are FOR death. Pro-security?...sounds like pro-choice to me. Pretty hypocritical to me.

Yonivore

11-04-2005, 10:14 AM

No, you are wrong. I am against it, just not willing to force a woman to do what I feel is right.
How 'bout this not being about "feelings" and about the rights of a human being?

Nice spin. But if I use you way of thinking..If you are for war you are FOR death. Pro-security?...sounds like pro-choice to me. Pretty hypocritical to me.
I accept that death is an unfortunate result of war -- both legitimate and illegitimate campaigns. But, death shouldn't be the litmus over which wars are engaged.

In the case of abortion -- Death is the object of the discussion. The object of the practice. It's the direct result and aim of receiving an abortion.

I see a difference.

jochhejaam

11-04-2005, 05:54 PM

That would pretty much define it absolutely as viable at that point, wouldn't it? I don't think anyone is arguing that. None would survive a premature birth at 8 weeks.
Crap, if someone took away your life sustaining necessities you'd die too so if that's all you've got you have failed to make a point.

The baby's heart starts beating between 18 and 25 days that means there's life, any aborting after that heart starts beating qualifies as taking a life.
Blowing it off as a glob doesn't change that fact, it only helps to soothe the conscience (I wonder how many have one) of the person playing God with the baby's life.

xrayzebra

11-04-2005, 05:55 PM

Just a quick comment on a headline on the news: Accident kills woman and "unborn" child. Is the media changing their stance?

SpursWoman

11-04-2005, 06:01 PM

Just a quick comment on a headline on the news: Accident kills woman and "unborn" child. Is the media changing their stance?

She may have been in an advanced state ... didn't it kill a 2 year old, too? :( :(

xrayzebra

11-04-2005, 06:02 PM

She may have been in an advanced state ... didn't it kill a 2 year old, too? :( :(

Yes, believe it did. I was just taken aback by the "unborn child" part.

SpursWoman

11-04-2005, 06:13 PM

Crap, if someone took away your life sustaining necessities you'd die too so if that's all you've got you have failed to make a point.

No, it was just a statement of fact. Since your apparent view of women is that basically they should have no rights at all regarding their own bodies, any argument that I might make that would include something like, "who are you to tell her she has to be the support system ... especially if she's having trouble with supporting her OWN life" would fall on deaf ears...or no ears whatsoever, which would seem to be the case.

I'm also a believer in DNR's, war, and the dealth penalty, too. But at least, unlike some of you, I'm consistent.

jochhejaam

11-04-2005, 06:14 PM

Jimmy Carter weighs in on the abortion issue and he's made as hell! :wow

Carter condemns abortion culture
By Ralph Z. Hallow
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
November 4, 2005

Former President Jimmy Carter yesterday condemned all abortions and chastised his party for its intolerance of candidates and nominees who oppose abortion.
"I never have felt that any abortion should be committed -- I think each abortion is the result of a series of errors," he told reporters over breakfast at the Ritz-CarltonHotel, while across town Senate Democrats deliberated whether to filibuster the nomination of Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. because he may share President Bush and Mr. Carter's abhorrence of abortion.
"These things impact other issues on which [Mr. Bush] and I basically agree," the Georgia Democrat said. "I've never been convinced, if you let me inject my Christianity into it, that Jesus Christ would approve abortion."
Mr. Carter said his party's congressional leadership only hurts Democrats by making a rigid pro-abortion rights stand the criterion for assessing judicial nominees.
"I have always thought it was not in the mainstream of the American public to be extremely liberal on many issues," Mr. Carter said. "I think our party's leaders -- some of them -- are overemphasizing the abortion issue."
While Mr. Carter has previously expressed ambivalence about abortion, his statements yesterday were "astonishing," said Robert Knight, director of the Culture and Family Institute at Concerned Women for America.
"He has long professed to be an evangelical Christian and yet he had embraced virtually all the liberal political agenda," said Mr. Knight. "Maybe with Jimmy Carter saying things he never uttered before, more liberals will rethink their worship of abortion as the high holy sacrament of liberalism."
Running for president in 1976 -- just three years after the Supreme Court's landmark Roe v. Wade decision -- Mr. Carter took a moderate stance.
"I think abortion is wrong and that the government ought never do anything to encourage abortion," he said during that campaign. "But I do not favor a constitutional amendment which would prohibit all abortions, nor one that would give states [a] local option to ban abortions."
In Washington to promote his latest book, "Our Enduring Values," Mr. Carter acknowledged he made mistakes in office.
"I can't deny I'm a better ex-president than I was a president," said Mr. Carter, who in recent years has traveled the globe with his wife Rosalyn, "trying to help hold 61 elections" in developing countries.
He has been outspoken in condemning Mr. Bush's policy toward Iraq. "I think all Christians -- and certainly all Baptists -- are different," Mr. Carter said yesterday. "I have a commitment to worship the Prince of Peace, not the Prince of Preemptive War."
But he praised Mr. Bush's policy toward war-torn Sudan, and declared that the best treatment he has received since leaving the Oval Office was from the first President Bush, and the second-best treatment he got was during the Reagan administration, especially from Secretary of State George P. Shultz. The worst treatment he's received, the former president said, was from President Clinton.
Mr. Carter said his party lost the 2004 presidential elections and lost House and Senate seats because Democratic leaders failed "to demonstrate a compatibility with the deeply religious people in this country. I think that absence hurt a lot."
Democrats must "let the deeply religious people and the moderates on social issues like abortion feel that the Democratic party cares about them and understands them," he said, adding that many Democrats, like him, "have some concern about, say, late-term abortions, where you kill a baby as it's emerging from its mother's womb."

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20051103-111740-7148r.htm

jochhejaam

11-04-2005, 06:18 PM

No, it was just a statement of fact. Since your apparent view of women is that basically they should have no rights at all regarding their own bodies,

:spin Do whatever the heck you want with "your" body, just quit destroying the baby's body that God has entrusted you with!

jochhejaam

11-05-2005, 08:02 AM

No, it was just a statement of fact. Since your apparent view of women is that basically they should have no rights at all regarding their own bodies,

:spin Do whatever you want with "your" body:
You can ehnance it,
you can pierce it,
you can reduce it,
you can tan it,
you can de-wrinkle it,
you can tatoo it,
you can botox it,
you can de-hair it,
you can nip and tuck it but
quit destroying the baby's body that God has entrusted you with!
He created it, his/her heart starts beating within 18 days and people decide they have the right to stop that heart from beating...who's God here?

SpursWoman

11-05-2005, 08:27 AM

:spin Do whatever the heck you want with "your" body, just quit destroying the baby's body that God has entrusted you with!

I'm not particularly religious...who is this God you're speaking of and why should I GAF what he thinks? Do you think this God person can babysit for me tonight? I have a mandatory work fuction tonight and am having a hard time finding someone to help out. :lol

There is *you*, trying to live *my* life by what *you* believe again. :rolleyes

SpursWoman

11-05-2005, 08:28 AM

...

SpursWoman

11-05-2005, 08:34 AM

Jimmy Carter weighs in on the abortion issue and he's made as hell! :wow

:lmao

WGAF what Jimmy Carter says besides his wife? Seriously?

JoeChalupa

11-05-2005, 08:55 AM

I agree...WGAF what Bush says beside his wife? Seriously? :)

SpursWoman

11-05-2005, 08:58 AM

Well, Carter's been out of office for quite some time now ... but I'd answer: those that hang on every word, and those that can't wait to hear what comes next so they can bitch about it? :lol

JoeChalupa

11-05-2005, 09:00 AM

Yeah..like all the so called "political experts" who sit around a table and talk smack on the news channels. :)

jochhejaam

11-05-2005, 09:11 AM

[QUOTE]I'm not particularly religious...who is this God you're speaking of and why should I GAF what he thinks?
I believe you stated that you're 32 years old (you look much younger from the side :) ) so if you don't know who "this God" is by now chances are you never will.
I think the Percentage of people who give their life to Christ (find out who "this God" is) after the age of 18 is around 5%.

There is *you*, trying to live *my* life by what *you* believe again. :rolleyes
And this is you :spin spinning to the point of absurdity again. :lol

jochhejaam

11-05-2005, 09:13 AM

:lmao

WGAF what Jimmy Carter says besides his wife? Seriously?
Well since he's speaking about the damning effects and aspects of abortion and the sanctity of human life I knew it wouldn't be you.

SpursWoman

11-05-2005, 09:18 AM

And this is you :spin spinning to the point of absurdity again. :lol

You with your firm, unwaivering belief that everyone believes in God to the extent you do is the only thing absurd about this argument.

Well that and the fact that there are too many clinical variables involved in pregnancies that make it impossible to make finite legislation.

Do you know when or how to pin-point the precise moment of conception?

RandomGuy

11-05-2005, 09:20 AM

When god says so...

SpursWoman

11-05-2005, 09:32 AM

A girl's gotta be able to define when her liabilty begins.

jochhejaam

11-05-2005, 09:37 AM

You with your firm, unwaivering belief that everyone believes in God to the extent you do is the only thing absurd about this argument.

:wtf Where did that come from? I'm quite certain that you can't back up that charge with anything resembling fact. Show me the money (facts)!
I can only surmise that you feel that way because of the strength of the arguements by those that are against abortion.

SpursWoman

11-05-2005, 09:58 AM

No ... I actually don't like abortion, it makes me very sad and disheartend. But I've been a single mom for a very long time under the worst circumstances and I know it's not all peaches and cream and takes a very strong constitution and a good support system to be able to handle it. Not everyone has that. And it's not like getting stuck with a bad haircut or color that will grow out eventually, it's yours until the day you die. And I don't mean using it as a form of birth control to a certain extent ... ask any woman who has been in that situation and I guarantee you rarely you will find one that took her situation that lightly. I just feel very strongly that the decision should be between the affected person/people in their unique situation. They are the only ones that have to live with what the consequences of their choice may be. And I don't know anyone having had one who has "forgotten all about it."

Having had 2 (live, healthy children) of my own, and known several very loving people who were not able to have kids of their own, I hold young woman who are able to give their children up for adoption right up there with people who work in ICU's ... which is somewhere near Saint territory.

I'm actually with Spurminator for the most part on this one ... prevention is worth a ton of cure. Education is everything. If unwanted pregnancies were prevented in the first place...this wouldn't be as huge an issue and everyone could just mind their own business and live their own lives.

For example, I wonder how many women (and men) know that a woman can get pregnant from having intercourse during her period? That that is by no means a "safe" time? Or the innumerable amount of pregnancies that spontaneously abort during the first 4 weeks that a woman didn't even know about...that mistook a miscarriage for a normal cycle? The "did you knows?" are limit-less.

Shelly

11-05-2005, 10:05 AM

I love SW!

Yonivore

11-05-2005, 10:16 AM

I love SW!
I do too.

SpursWoman

11-05-2005, 10:33 AM

:makeout :makeout

Yonivore

11-05-2005, 10:46 AM

:makeout :makeout
Okay, I've got to say it...why are you kissing K. D. Lang in your Avatar?

ChumpDumper

11-05-2005, 10:55 AM

Well, all I have to say on the abortion issue is that if Roe is overturned, the Democrats will have their agenda set for years to come and probably will make gains in which their current disorganized state they cannot.

How much hay will be made out of Alito's going back on his word to recuse himself from any cases involving a company in which he had roughly half a million dollars invested?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/31/AR2005103101686.html

Yonivore

11-05-2005, 11:33 AM

Well, all I have to say on the abortion issue is that if Roe is overturned, the Democrats will have their agenda set for years to come and probably will make gains in which their current disorganized state they cannot.

That would depend on if you're talking about Jimmy Carter Democrats or Michael Moore Democrats. Because, there's a whole buttload of one (those that also opppose abortion) who could probably care less about Roe v. Wade and, in fact, may like to see it overturned; and very few of the other (those that promote abortion). Bottom line, Abortion is becoming a marginalized Democrat issue with no mainstream support and little extreme (albeit loud) support.

How much hay will be made out of Alito's going back on his word to recuse himself from any cases involving a company in which he had roughly half a million dollars invested?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/31/AR2005103101686.html

Not much, I imagine.

JoeChalupa

11-05-2005, 11:33 AM

ChumpDumper

11-05-2005, 11:45 AM

Bottom line, Abortion is becoming a marginalized Democrat issue with no mainstream support and little extreme (albeit loud) support.It's marginalized now because nothing much is ever really done about it. Little window-dressing parental consent or late-term regualtions aren't much for either side to give much of a shit about. Overturn Roe and you'll defintely de-marginalize the issue and change many votes in the process.

Yonivore

11-05-2005, 11:48 AM

...it makes me very sad and disheartend.
Why is that?

ask any woman who has been in that situation and I guarantee you rarely you will find one that took her situation that lightly.
And, why is that?

They are the only ones that have to live with what the consequences of their choice may be.
And, just what are the consequences if it's just tissue, like a wart or mole or benign cyst?

And I don't know anyone having had one who has "forgotten all about it."
And, why is that?

For example, I wonder how many women (and men) know that a woman can get pregnant from having intercourse during her period? That that is by no means a "safe" time? Or the innumerable amount of pregnancies that spontaneously abort during the first 4 weeks that a woman didn't even know about...that mistook a miscarriage for a normal cycle? The "did you knows?" are limit-less.
What do I win? I know all these things.

I also know abstinence has never resulted in pregnancy. Well, there was that one immaculate conception.

Yonivore

11-05-2005, 11:49 AM

It's marginalized now because nothing much is ever really done about it. Little window-dressing parental consent or late-term regualtions aren't much for either side to give much of a shit about. Overturn Roe and you'll defintely de-marginalize the issue and change many votes in the process.
I'm willing to take that chance...

ChumpDumper

11-05-2005, 11:52 AM

Invest in coathangers.

scott

11-05-2005, 11:58 AM

So now people care what Jimmy Carter thinks?

Dos

11-05-2005, 11:58 AM

seems like it's none issue .. roe v wade I don't believe will ever be overturned.. it's like the right crying about gun rights... sheeesh

JoeChalupa

11-05-2005, 12:03 PM

seems like it's none issue .. roe v wade I don't believe will ever be overturned.. it's like the right crying about gun rights... sheeesh

I concur.

ChumpDumper

11-05-2005, 12:05 PM

I'd believe that if the litmus tests didn't exist on both sides.

jochhejaam

11-05-2005, 02:02 PM

Why is that?

And, why is that?

And, just what are the consequences if it's just tissue, like a wart or mole or benign cyst?

And, why is that?
Good questioning, cuts right to the heart of the serious problem posed by abortion.

If I were her attorney I'd advise her to take the Fifth on this one.

SpursWoman

11-05-2005, 05:02 PM

What do I win? I know all these things.

For every one of you there's five little Alverez's of the forum that makes their 15 year old girlfriends take a pill before they have sex. A Pill? I didn't realize there was "A" pill you could take for birth control. Usually it's a pill EVERYDAY. It's scary. I know WOMEN who think you can't get pregnant during her period. Very scary indeed. Congratulations to you though, for being smarter than the average teenagers who don't have parents that teach them...because they will never get the whole story from their buddies at school.

I also know abstinence has never resulted in pregnancy. Well, there was that one immaculate conception.

Well, in the real world, in 2005, people are getting laid just for fun. Go figure. :fro

Yonivore

11-05-2005, 05:12 PM

Well, in the real world, in 2005, people are getting laid just for fun. Go figure. :fro

And that has consequences. Go figure.

No reason a baby should suffer them just because of the irresponsibility of the fun-seeker.

jochhejaam

11-06-2005, 09:48 AM

seems like it's non issue .. roe v wade I don't believe will ever be overturned.. it's like the right crying about gun rights... sheeesh
sheesh interj.
Used to express mild annoyance, surprise, or disgust

Sheesh? I think 55,000,000 babies being denied the right to exist each year, with well over 2,000,000 million being denied that most basic of human rights here in the United States, deserves more than a sheesh.

Is your philosophy one of 'if I see little hope of correcting a gross injustice it becomes a non-issue so I'll just forget about it and look the other way'?

Fortunately there is a vast multitude of people that don't share that philosophy.

The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in time of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.
-Dante Alighieri- The Inferno

FromWayDowntown

11-06-2005, 11:38 AM

:wtf Where did that come from? I'm quite certain that you can't back up that charge with anything resembling fact. Show me the money (facts)!
I can only surmise that you feel that way because of the strength of the arguements by those that are against abortion.

Your entire argument is premised on the notion that everyone either does or should believe in your God. You posit that a baby is a gift from God (as opposed, I guess, to the result of certain biological processes in the human body) -- that is, created by God. But if someone doesn't believe in God, they don't agree with you on that. The point/counterpoint on this "morality play" is that while you see abortion as an abomination, some (particularly those who aren't religious) do not.

Again, why is it that your view is superior?

SpursWoman

11-06-2005, 12:10 PM

And that has consequences. Go figure.

No reason a baby should suffer them just because of the irresponsibility of the fun-seeker.

Educate the people and there wouldn't be near as many unwanted "consequences."

Now The Greatest Gift From God is reduced to "consequence" status?

Why do you appear to be so against putting more effort into educating young people about how babies are made than trying to prevent the problem in the first place? A pre-emptive strike, so to speak. You realize that there are a shitload of parents out there that either don't care or are too embarrassed to teach their kids anything, right?

Simply throwing a bible at them and telling them "Don't Do It Because I Said So" isn't good enough.

jochhejaam

11-06-2005, 03:40 PM

Your entire argument is premised on the notion that everyone either does or should believe in your God. You posit that a baby is a gift from God (as opposed, I guess, to the result of certain biological processes in the human body) -- that is, created by God. But if someone doesn't believe in God, they don't agree with you on that. The point/counterpoint on this "morality play" is that while you see abortion as an abomination, some (particularly those who aren't religious) do not.

Again, why is it that your view is superior?
You misunderstand my premise because a baby's creative origin is irrevelant in regards to the value of his or her life.

My entire arguement is based upon the premise that human life has great value, my belief that this is God's creation interjects possible eternal ramifications for those that believe a baby's beating heart is of less value than a woman's prerogitave.

SpursWoman

11-06-2005, 04:07 PM

Your entire argument is based on what you learned in Bible school, apparently. Not everyone has been or cares to go. So what about them? Or are you just *talking* to hear yourself *talk*?

Don't get me wrong...there's nothing wrong with that at all if that's what you choose to do. But you can't assume everyone lives with that belief system. Enacting laws based on theological beliefs will start touching ground on infringing on the freedom of religion of others.

In order to make a point that will be cause for consideration to those that don't, you're going to have to get a little more specific & scientific....and not use word's like "eternal" and "God's whatever" ... a lot of people really don't give a damn, and as soon as you start preaching they are going to tune you right out.

jochhejaam

11-06-2005, 06:26 PM

[QUOTE=SpursWoman]Your entire argument is based on what you learned in Bible school, apparently. Not everyone has been or cares to go. So what about them? Or are you just *talking* to hear yourself *talk*? Don't get me wrong...there's nothing wrong with that at all if that's what you choose to do.
^^^Strawman arguement #1 a blatant attempt to draw attention away from your position which is one that shows total disregard for the sanctity of human life.
I've never been to Bible School and never stated that I had but a baby's heart starts beating at 18 days even if I had attended one.
As I just clearly stated in reply to FWD, the fact that human life is sacred does not hinge on divine creation a point you chose to ignore in order to justify an arguement which was made made obsolete by that point. :wtf

But you can't assume everyone lives with that belief system. Enacting laws based on theological beliefs will start touching ground on infringing on the freedom of religion of others.
^^^Strawman arguement #2 Without theology human life is less valuable than a woman's social issues?
Time and again you insert false assumptions and frivilous hypebole into your arguements.
I'm acutely aware of the fact that there are many belief/nonbelief systems and therefore are differing views on issues and I've never assumed or insinuated anything different than that. [/B]

In order to make a point that will be cause for consideration to those that don't, you're going to have to get a little more specific & scientific....and not use word's like "eternal" and "God's whatever" ... a lot of people really don't give a damn, and as soon as you start preaching they are going to tune you right out.
Strawman arguement #3 ^^^ I have been specific and that is readily evident to anyone that has followed this thread. You seem to think that someone's belief in God lessens the strength of their arguement. Do you believe in God? Most people on either side of the abortion debate do.
\
Of my 25 or so posts many are supported by scientific fact, only 4 or 5 had any mention of God and the fact that he's mentioned certainly doesn't weaken the merit of the arguement.
You're seeing shadows where there are none.

I'm will give you credit for one thing in this thread Spurswoman as the leading the way in sidestepping the main issue and as the top submitter of strawman arguements. :king