Abortion?

[Uppercut]

All I was saying is that if you accept that the argument can be made that a foetus at any stage has any rights (accept that it's a POV that can be legitimately held, not necessarily agree with it), then you also need to accept that someone who holds that view won't accept that abortion is "the woman's choice".

I don't think so. I see a foetus the same way that you do but I'm still pro-choice. Understanding how arbitrary our judgments on what constitutes a human life are makes it hard for me to justify imposing my own gut feeling on a vague moral question on a pregnant 17 year old girl.

[benchmark00]

Definitive proof that abortion is neccessary, and in certain circumstances, should be encouraged.

[GIMH]

[Shri]

[thierry henry]

I don't think so. I see a foetus the same way that you do but I'm still pro-choice. Understanding how arbitrary our judgments on what constitutes a human life are makes it hard for me to justify imposing my own gut feeling on a vague moral question on a pregnant 17 year old girl.

????

You have to draw a line somewhere, arbitrary or not, otherwise a mother could kill her 40 year old son and argue that it's arbitrary to say that life begins at any particular point and therefore you can't say for sure that he was alive

And don't tell me that the line is when the baby comes out teh vag, because that's just too arbitrary

[silentstriker]

Why? Up until then, the fetus is a parasite on the woman, so it would make sense that the line is drawn there. Or at least, until the fetus can survive on its own outside.

[Flem274*]

DWTA.

I find it hard to believe that people are complacent enough that they'll have unsafe sex just to go through the traumatic and invasive experience of having a procedure that will cost several hundreds of dollars and stigmatise them for the rest of their life.

....

I can only speak from personal experience, but many girls who ended up pregnant in my school days had abortions, and more than one was known to not have used protection.

Never underestimate stupidity.

[silentstriker]

That's not what he was saying. He was saying people don't have sex with the expectation of getting an abortion. They don't expect to get pregnant for whatever reason, but very few women are totally flippant about surgery and its complications. I'd venture a negligible percentage.


Clearly more people ought to use protection (though from my perspective, that's more for STDs than pregnancy).

[thierry henry]

That's not what he was saying. He was saying people don't have sex with the expectation of getting an abortion. They don't expect to get pregnant for whatever reason

How on earth does this situation exist, where so many people have sex without properly realising the risk of pregnancy?

Could it possibly have something to do with the artificial separation between sex and pregnancy that post-feminist society encourages (imo)?

Clearly more people ought to use protection (though from my perspective, that's more for STDs than pregnancy).

Can you explain why you say that? I sense you are comparatively blase about unwanted pregnancy, which creeps me out pretty much (just being honest, I can't pretend I can appraise this issue in a coldly unemotional way)

[thierry henry]

Why? Up until then, the fetus is a parasite on the woman, so it would make sense that the line is drawn there.

I'm no expert on the matter, but I was born close to a month early. AFAIK an "abortion" after 7-8 months would be pretty much butchering a near-developed baby which had the misfortune to not get out quicker

Or at least, until the fetus can survive on its own outside.

This makes more sense. I mean, it's a position that chills me to the core of my already cold cold heart, but it seems justifiable

[GingerFurball]

I'm no expert on the matter, but I was born close to a month early. AFAIK an "abortion" after 7-8 months would be pretty much butchering a near-developed baby which had the misfortune to not get out quicker

It would also be illegal.

[James90]

????

You have to draw a line somewhere, arbitrary or not, otherwise a mother could kill her 40 year old son and argue that it's arbitrary to say that life begins at any particular point and therefore you can't say for sure that he was alive

And don't tell me that the line is when the baby comes out teh vag, because that's just too arbitrary

In fact it's the only time that isn't arbitrary. It's the only time when you can definitively say that the child is living independently of the mother.

Having said that, I would have serious reservations and be quite traumatised by the thought of aborting a child after the stage where it could survive if born prematurely and even more so where it could be born prematurely without severe complications. However, not being the person who has to go through the pregnancy or the one with breasts who will subsequently be the primary carer, the mother would have the ultimate decision.

I can foresee scenarios where at 32 weeks an event happens, or a realisation occurs that leads the mother to make a perfectly rational decision that the best outcome is for the pregnancy to be terminated. But I don't think anyone would make that decision on a whim and under current laws it would be illegal.

[stephen]

It is interesting that people choose the arbitrary point of "child can survive on its own" to draw the line in this debate.

Does that mean we can euthanise two year old children because they could not survive on their own if they turn out to be inconvenient?

A big problem here, and one that we're evolutionarily working to address ourselves (should only take another hundred generations or so) is that the "parenthood" hormones do not kick in until the child is nearly fully developed. Parenthood hormones are designed to protect the offspring even though it may cost the parents (they are particularly strong in women). Currently our hormones are designed around the way in which our ancestors procreated. First work on screwing and then once the child is almost there worry about the nurturing, providing and protecting.

I find that much of our modern culture is very self-centric. It is all about what is best for me, not what is best for society. We train our children through media that the goal of teenage boys should be to get into the pants of teenage girls. We train our girls to be "empowered" by using sex as both a weapon and a social lever. We teach ourselves that condoms are optional in pornography. The one thing that we never teach is that there might be people hurt by our actions. Our society has worked so hard at mitigating the need for responsibility that we have largely forgotten what responsibility even is.

We encourage cures rather than prevention because they're easier. Then we wonder why the divorce rate and single parent rates are so high and why there are no "good men" and why all the women are "bitches" who are just after us for our money. There are no "good men" because there are few masculine role models who model responsibility as well as strength and power. Most male role models (look at Charlie in two and a half men) are portrayed as "cool" because they use their power to do nothing more than take advantage of as many women as possible. Our society is the most selfish in history and the abortion rate is merely one (albeit foul) consequence of that.

[thierry henry]

In fact it's the only time that isn't arbitrary. It's the only time when you can definitively say that the child is living independently of the mother.

No no no no...it's the most arbitrary, because if you wait for the child to come out, and then kill it, suddenly you're a murderer. The child does not suddenly acquire new powers when it comes out.

As Stephen said, babies and small children would also be incapable of surviving on their own, as well as having a very low level of ability to truly comprehend their own existence....I see very little difference between a mother choosing to have her baby killed/euthanised/post-womb aborted (whatever you wanna call it) and a very late term abortion (which as GF mentioned is perhaps illegal anyway) ultimately both involve an entity that can physically survive on its own, but has a very low level of sentience. To suggest that a human being who has developed to the point where it could survive if taken from the womb and placed in the care of adults should have its right to exist determined by its mother is crazy imo.....if that's the case then the same should apply to babies who have been born.

btw, this debate has been useful for me to consider my own views on the matter, and I think that I really believe that you shouldn't be able to abort at any point after conception, although I'd be happy with certain exceptions for rape, age, health issues etc. The issue of arbitrariness for me necessitates that you go right back to the start of the process, and acknowledge that sex leads to pregnancy leads to human life, the risks are there, and two consenting adults have chosen to take them and should bear the consequences. The "isn't a sperm a baby then?" argument just doesn't really register with me- sex, the interaction of "man bits and lady bits", creates the combination of cells, or whatever, that grows in to a human. That's where it's at for me.

[thierry henry]

I can foresee scenarios where at 32 weeks an event happens, or a realisation occurs that leads the mother to make a perfectly rational decision that the best outcome is for the pregnancy to be terminated.

Assuming the 32 week old baby would be capable of being born and surviving at that point without lasting health complications- what makes this any different from a mother making a perfectly rational decision to "abort" her baby 2 days after it is born? I can certainly see scenarios where she might want to do that as well.