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On April 29 2011 15:39 Shrewmy wrote:
Whether or not you think Abortion is morally 'correct' or not, we're facing very serious issues with overpopulation if we don't use birth control methods. Telling people to not have sex is wishful thinking, it feels good and we'll keep doing it.
If we continue at the current birth rate we're going to see a very, very serious die off in our species once we realise that we can't sustain it.
No. If Africa and Asia continue at their birth rates, THEY will have a malthusian catastrophe.
Pop growth in the developed world is due entirely to migrant intake and the birth rate among migrant groups. If Australia had maintained the white australia policy, we would be seeing birth rates at 1.5-1.8.
As an aside, people arguing that the amount of abortions due to failed birth control is negligible, need to think again. Think about how many sexually active fertile women there are. Think about how often they have sex during ovulation. And think about the failure rates of the pill/condoms (1%, 3-5% respectively). This very quickly adds up to a lot of unintentional pregnancies, especially when you consider that the two methods are not always used in tandem.
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On April 29 2011 11:12 Cloud9157 wrote:Show nested quote +On April 29 2011 09:41 Alzadar wrote:On April 29 2011 09:10 Cloud9157 wrote:
Rape is the deciding issue for me.
You're going to force a woman to have the baby of a rapist? Yeah, brilliant logic.
This 20 week law seems decent though. The baby holds no responsibility for the crimes of its father, and should not be punished for them. So the "baby" takes priority over the woman, who never wanted to have sexual relations with that man? You don't force a woman to do anything like that. Make her go through 9 months of a burden that serves as a reminder that she was raped.
No she does not. If her life was in question then you could make this statement. Until it is not this statement and all the similar ones I see people writing here are just pure bullshit.
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On April 28 2011 11:32 Wegandi wrote:Show nested quote +On April 28 2011 11:28 Imres wrote:
So you don't see the difference between an human being and an human... and you think that a women hasn't the right to control her body, congrats! Um what? Liberty is a mutual philosophy. Perhaps you should review Natural Law. No one has a right to kill another individual who is not a threat to your life or your property. Just because a woman doesn't want to be responsible, doesn't give her a right to extinguish anothers life. Sure, she has a right to evict and put the baby up for adoption, but not to kill.
Wegandi, you mention philosophy a lot, yet you missed the biggest debate relevent to the topic, the idea of self. When is a human a human, and what identifies us as being us. A fetus hasnt developed many of the "features" that we identify ourselves by, not to mention the whole idea of the conscious self, not the physical self being what we predominantly identify ourselves by. Its a very complicated issue, and Locke doesnt have an answer for it lol. I personally think late term abortions are wrong, but am completely pro choice for abortions in a timely manner.
A fetus is not a human being in its early stages, it is merely potential, just as a sperm and an egg are merely potential. Its a step on the way to an end. The reason religion leads the charge for the pro life side of the debate, is because they believe youre a person before youre a person. That you were sent into your mothers womb by a deity. From a logical or scientific standpoint, we wouldnt see it as such, and we'd see that we are actually being developed from "potential" to "reality" during the term of a pregnancy.
Also GetSome, your argument in this quote "It is SO silly to me that people are actually debating if the fetus is alive or not...People if we consider single-celled organisms, bacteria, fungus, mold, yeast, etc....hell even a fucking tree to be living, than I am pretty sure we can safely say that the little human shaped fetus with a beating heart it is also living too regardless of its complete dependency on its mother.", is completely flawed. Just because something is "alive" doesnt mean it is human, and has the rights afforded to human beings. When we get sick, its because of a virus or bacteria, it is inside our body, and is alive. Should we not be allowed to kill it because we took the risk of being alive and going into an environment that has bacteria in it, knowing it could potentially get us sick? People arent arguing that it isnt alive, theyre arguing it isnt human yet, and isnt "portected" by the law.
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A fetus hasnt developed many of the "features" that we identify ourselves by, not to mention the whole idea of the conscious self, not the physical self being what we predominantly identify ourselves by. These criterions you consider to be necessary for someone to be subject to rights have a huge problem. and that is: they are not universal. They are arbitrary.
The premise is the concept of justifiability. In order for justice to have meaning, justice needs to be universal, otherwise it is simply arbitrary judgements. And propertarian justice is the only possible system of justice. Hence, the violation of the property rights of the fetus constitutes an unjustifiable action.
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20 weeks? That's 10 weeks in Turkey. And even 10 is totally reasonable imo.
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Sanya12364 Posts
On April 29 2011 08:29 Signet wrote:Show nested quote +On April 29 2011 07:57 TanGeng wrote:
The way I see it, it's an implicit responsibility for the woman to care for the fetus, just like it's an implicit responsibility of the parents to take care of a born baby. Likewise, it's a moral responsibility of a doctor to do no harm and whenever possible take care of an unborn child. An abortion violates both of the implicit responsibility of the mother and the moral responsibility of the doctor.
The dilemma of making abortion illegal is that the law cannot force an unwilling mother to assume responsibility and the law cannot prevent demand from finding supply. For women, if the mother is unwilling to follow through on the responsibility of bearing the baby and then taking care of a child, illegality of the abortion isn't going to change that. There needs to be someone to take responsibility for the child if it is to continue to term. I'm not busy-body enough to want the public take that responsibility through the force of law. In my mind, that is why it should not be illegal for the mother to elect.
For doctors, it is a total violate of the Hippocratic Oath, but unscrupulous doctors will cater to the demand for abortions by irresponsible mothers. In the past, I would have though that it should be illegal for doctors to perform the abortions, but that only invites black market health hazards. Today, I would suggest that abortion fall into the category of extremely morally reprehensible, but legal procedure. I would ostracize all doctors that perform abortions under all but the most extreme of circumstances and would urge others to do the same.
The ideal outcome would be that abortion is legal but socially taboo. The closer to term, the more socially taboo it becomes. I also make the distinction between dislodging the fetus from the uterus and invasive destruction of the fetus. An invasive action against the fetus is a much more serious violation of the Hippocratic Oath. I understand where you are coming from regarding doctors who perform abortions. When I interviewed for medical school (ended up choosing math grad school instead but this was before I had decided), the panel asked questions about abortion where we had to defend our position. I was politically pro life at the time. They asked challenging questions, but were probably more interested in my ability to reason and feel empathy than which side I took. One of the final questions was whether, as a future physician, I would be willing to perform an abortion under circumstances where there was not another person qualified to perform the procedure but I was. My response was that I would do it only if necessary as a matter of life or death for the woman; that if it was a matter of her elective I could not bring myself to perform the procedure and she would have to wait to find another doctor. In his response, the interviewer concluded that "people who do things that are against their conscience live tortured lives." Although it is a quite obvious statement, that particular phrase has stuck with me since then, even as I have forgotten most of the rest of that day. It would be terrible to do a job that you believe is wrong, harmful, evil, etc. I can only assume that practically all doctors who perform abortions honestly believe that life begins at birth. They probably see it as doing a service for the woman to help her improve her life, so that she can live as she wishes, possibly have a child when the time is right. Some people's job is to kill what is unquestionably a living person. An Executioner probably feels that what he does is in the interests of protecting society. It would otherwise be an impossible job to fulfill. A Soldier does not look at his job as murdering enemy soldiers who might only be trying to defend their country. He sees it as fighting for what is right, fighting for those who cannot fight for themselves, etc. A General may have to send some soldiers to their certain death to achieve a tactical objective, but he must believe that the sacrifice is worth it. How do you feel about these professions?
These professions provide plenty of opportunity to be sadistic, cynical, and devalue life, while rationalizing the inhumane behavior with good intentions. Their work also involves deep moral dilemmas and it is admirable if they arrive at a good decision. On average, I'd be inclined to not treat them favorably, but it's better to judge on individual circumstances.
In my mind, the executioner comes out best the because the profession is the conducting of justice for crimes deemed serious enough to merit death. The act should be grim and swift. Glee in torturing the criminal with pain would be poor in character. However, a justice system that employs an executioner has a major problem in how to handle false convictions when it can mete out punishment with the finality of death. Executioners may have to deal with the guilt of killing an innocent man or the doubt of having killed a man that was possibly innocent.
The general has a good chance of being a cynical character with a huge ego. Much of the question of morality has to deal with the nature of the war the general is fighting and how willing the general is to fight a battle of attrition. Respect for civilians and reduction of collateral damage are virtues that generals on the offensive often lack. For example, General Sherman of the US Civil War committed a string of atrocities by engaging in total war.
Soldiers are tragic figures. Most army train their soldiers to be robots and pawns - robots to take orders well, pawns to sacrifice themselves for objectives. In battle, soldiers are conditioned to have low inhibition for killing and soldiers often drive themselves into a frenzy. Right now, I can't think of the right way to describe what I think of soldiers, but hopefully that gives you a bit of an idea.
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On April 29 2011 14:37 GetSome wrote:Show nested quote +On April 29 2011 14:28 Essentia wrote:
Every civilization from the beginning has performed some kind of child sacrifice, this is just the modern form of it and how we do it in our society. sorry but I consider this the stupidest thing I have read in a long time...was this a joke? Is there a REASON for this "child sacrifice"? Is it necessary? Because some hooting superstitious clan of ignorants decides to knife a child 1000 years ago, that suddenly that makes it okay to do it now? From this perspective our race is pretty shallow and disgusting...
you don't need perspective to see that our race IS shallow and disgusting, don't you think? i mean we stack waste in the ground, remove decomposing fossil liquid to burn it in open air, destroy entire ecosystems daily to catch some fish; i mean, how can you think we are NOT shallow and disgusting?
As for my opinion, is that my opinion should not be forced upon anyone, thus if the pregnant women should be allowed here own choice and opinion, which shouldn't take 20 weeks to form anyways. Person who doesn't want/can't have a child should know this prior anyways and if its accident, well it should be dealt with earliest possible. The timeline is not against one persons will or 'opinion' its matter of common sense.
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This one guy I knew years ago got his girlfriend pregnant. He was excited to be a dad, about 5 months down the road they broke up ( She ended up cheating on him I believe ). He was pissed, but still excited about being a dad. He called her to see when the next ultrasound was so he could go, but she decided she didn't want the kid anymore and got a abortion and didn't even say anything to him. He didn't take this well at all, lost his job because he started doing lots of drugs. What would you do if that happened to you? I for one believe there has to be a time where the doctors say "Are you stupid? Why didn't you come and get an abortion like 2 months ago? Give the kid up for adoption!".
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On April 29 2011 18:08 Focuspants wrote:Show nested quote +On April 28 2011 11:32 Wegandi wrote:On April 28 2011 11:28 Imres wrote:
So you don't see the difference between an human being and an human... and you think that a women hasn't the right to control her body, congrats! Um what? Liberty is a mutual philosophy. Perhaps you should review Natural Law. No one has a right to kill another individual who is not a threat to your life or your property. Just because a woman doesn't want to be responsible, doesn't give her a right to extinguish anothers life. Sure, she has a right to evict and put the baby up for adoption, but not to kill. Wegandi, you mention philosophy a lot, yet you missed the biggest debate relevent to the topic, the idea of self. When is a human a human, and what identifies us as being us. A fetus hasnt developed many of the "features" that we identify ourselves by, not to mention the whole idea of the conscious self, not the physical self being what we predominantly identify ourselves by. Its a very complicated issue, and Locke doesnt have an answer for it lol. I personally think late term abortions are wrong, but am completely pro choice for abortions in a timely manner. A fetus is not a human being in its early stages, it is merely potential, just as a sperm and an egg are merely potential. Its a step on the way to an end. The reason religion leads the charge for the pro life side of the debate, is because they believe youre a person before youre a person. That you were sent into your mothers womb by a deity. From a logical or scientific standpoint, we wouldnt see it as such, and we'd see that we are actually being developed from "potential" to "reality" during the term of a pregnancy. Also GetSome, your argument in this quote "It is SO silly to me that people are actually debating if the fetus is alive or not...People if we consider single-celled organisms, bacteria, fungus, mold, yeast, etc....hell even a fucking tree to be living, than I am pretty sure we can safely say that the little human shaped fetus with a beating heart it is also living too regardless of its complete dependency on its mother.", is completely flawed. Just because something is "alive" doesnt mean it is human, and has the rights afforded to human beings. When we get sick, its because of a virus or bacteria, it is inside our body, and is alive. Should we not be allowed to kill it because we took the risk of being alive and going into an environment that has bacteria in it, knowing it could potentially get us sick? People arent arguing that it isnt alive, theyre arguing it isnt human yet, and isnt "portected" by the law.
Oh I would not say my argument is flawed. I was arguing a point against somebody saying it is okay to abort the fetus cause it is not "alive" for one reason or another...taking that into account my argument is dead on! Yours is a different point all together and deserves its own response. I believe that a fetus inside its mother is human and deserves all the rights and protections extended to the rest of us.
So at what point do fetuses become human? I am going to guess that nobody knows and that is why the debate is centered around when the fetus can be aborted as apposed to IF it should be aborted at all. I can say that I understand your point of view even though I do not agree with it. I would argue that a fetus is and always has been human. I guess this is going to lead us to discuss and define what it is to be human where there are dozens of different definitions...
In the end it is going to come down to opinion sadly. There is no real proof one way or the other that suggests on point of view is more right than another. I guess that is why this issue is so sticky. No hard feelings though...I do understand that we don't all view things the same.
In the end I will error on the side of caution. I will never support or engage in something so serious and potentially could be considered the murdering of babies...
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On April 29 2011 20:52 xarthaz wrote:Show nested quote +A fetus hasnt developed many of the "features" that we identify ourselves by, not to mention the whole idea of the conscious self, not the physical self being what we predominantly identify ourselves by. These criterions you consider to be necessary for someone to be subject to rights have a huge problem. and that is: they are not universal. They are arbitrary. The premise is the concept of justifiability. In order for justice to have meaning, justice needs to be universal, otherwise it is simply arbitrary judgements. And propertarian justice is the only possible system of justice. Hence, the violation of the property rights of the fetus constitutes an unjustifiable action.
They arent arbitrary at all. Are animals protected by propetarian justice? Are any lifeform that isnt a human being protected by these laws? No. If a fetus before a certain point, is ruled to not yet be a human (Which they have been, since abortion is legal in many places) then its not arbitrary at all. The reason late term abortions arent allowed in most places, is because the baby's brain is functioning, it has the ability to think, to dream, and to hear and recognize its mothers voice for example. Its nervous system functions, and at this point, it is deemed to be a "living human". Some places dont afford it rights until its born, other places think its deserving of rights at the point of conception. Everywhere, the rules are dictated by the majorities belief systems. That is the only arbitrary factor at play.
Edit* Thats spot on GetSome. As I stated above, the decision is arbitrary in the sense that the ruling on the issue is different depending on the concensus of the majorit in any given area. Its not cut and dry like murder for example. I respect some peoples pro life stances, especially those only against late term abortion, because banning it totally only leads to bad things (people will still get an abortion if they want one, and it will be under much less safe conditions). Not only that but things happen and sometimes its a better solution. I am prsonally 23, getting engaged this month, and me and my gf have no plans on having kids until were about 30. We want to travel for a couple years, settle in and get a solid footing before having kids. If a kid were to accidentally be made, even though it would hinder our plans, I personally couldnt go through with it, I just dont think that because I wouldnt want to go through that (or want my gf to for that matter) should dictate whether someone else can or cannot.
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On April 30 2011 01:00 Focuspants wrote:Show nested quote +On April 29 2011 20:52 xarthaz wrote:A fetus hasnt developed many of the "features" that we identify ourselves by, not to mention the whole idea of the conscious self, not the physical self being what we predominantly identify ourselves by. These criterions you consider to be necessary for someone to be subject to rights have a huge problem. and that is: they are not universal. They are arbitrary. The premise is the concept of justifiability. In order for justice to have meaning, justice needs to be universal, otherwise it is simply arbitrary judgements. And propertarian justice is the only possible system of justice. Hence, the violation of the property rights of the fetus constitutes an unjustifiable action. .Everywhere, the rules are dictated by the majorities belief systems. That is the only arbitrary factor at play. ..
That is a MAJOR arbitrary factor, because that is the only thing determining most legal systems. ie Slavery, Infanticide, Genocide... all were justified by the majority belief system at the time in a Lot of areas.
"Who"/"what" qualifies as "human", and how we should treat those qualified as "human" are supported by absolutely Nothing but belief systems. (although some belief systems are more widely believed than others that says little about the truth of such things).
The laws will work towards expressing the beliefs of the people (statement of fact as opposed to 'they should')... However, people Should work towards changing beliefs of their own or others that are wrong. (and therefore reasonable people will work towards changing the beliefs of others that they believe are wrong)
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Sanya12364 Posts
On April 30 2011 00:18 gold_ wrote:
This one guy I knew years ago got his girlfriend pregnant. He was excited to be a dad, about 5 months down the road they broke up ( She ended up cheating on him I believe ). He was pissed, but still excited about being a dad. He called her to see when the next ultrasound was so he could go, but she decided she didn't want the kid anymore and got a abortion and didn't even say anything to him. He didn't take this well at all, lost his job because he started doing lots of drugs. What would you do if that happened to you? I for one believe there has to be a time where the doctors say "Are you stupid? Why didn't you come and get an abortion like 2 months ago? Give the kid up for adoption!".
I, for one, wished more doctors would do that and refuse to perform the abortion.
But that's one disgustingly irresponsible and untrustworthy girl. What an awful human being.
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I support the right of a woman to expel the fetus at any stage of pregnancy; because the baby lives inside the woman its right to life is forfeit.
The woman gave up the right to expel the fetus when she had sex.
Where do rights come from? Why does the woman have rights but the fetus doesn't?
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Well, yes there is no pissing around. It's one or the other, no in between. Knowing this, I am against abortion because I feel it is murder. However, there is a point where the parents must decide, or insent/rape takes factor.
Therefore, I am turned. It is up to the mother, but I strongly advise against it for everyday circumstances such as social issues.
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On April 28 2011 11:31 Echo515 wrote:Google image search 20 week fetus. Here I did it for you. How can anyone think it's ok to throw something like that in the garbage? Just as a side note I'm not religious at all but that just seems wrong to me.
Where's the treshold? One cell? Two cells? 1000 Cells? As soon as it starts looking human?
For me, human life is defined by the abilities of active sensitivity, thinking, feeling. Imagine we would transplant the cognitive abilities of a fly into a -before lifeless- human body. Would it suddenly be wrong smashing that fly? Yeah, it would feel damn wrong, but actually not making a moral difference (much of a difference to possible observers though, because they'ld feel empathy with the fly just because it looks human. It would be pretty cruel for any observers.)
Still it's true that there has to be a treshhold. I think 20 weeks is still "kinda okay" for women beeing in a possibly serious situation, although I'm not sure. Obviously the treshold should be noticably below 8 months though.
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On April 29 2011 13:41 Godzilla wrote:Show nested quote +On April 29 2011 11:57 Stratos_speAr wrote:
20 weeks is legit and the precedent around most of the country anyway. It's somewhere between week 20 and 24 that the fetus develops even the slightest chance of surviving outside of the womb, so this law makes sense. However, requiring doctors to say those things to patients is absolutely ridiculous. This country just sickens me with the bullshit that goes on in politics. Requiring a doctor to say what is the truth is ridiculous? Would you rather your doctor not to tell you what is true about any conditions you have, maybe they'll lie to you about your cancer or heart condition to make you feel better.
No, requiring a doctor to spout pro-life propaganda is ridiculous. Of course the doctor should inform the patient of the procedure and the possibly risks of it, but this information is completely unnecessary for the procedure itself and shouldn't be forced to be given. It should be available if asked for. Hell, this information has zero immediate bearing on the person whatsoever. If they are worried about it, they should be free to ask for it and the information should be given, but you shouldn't guilt-trip a patient like this. It's fucking ridiculous.
Oh, and lets not forget how biased and potentially wrong some of these "facts" are.
At what point am is anyone telling a women what to do with her body when it comes to abortion? Let me guess, endure 9 months of being pregnant and then birth the baby? Does that pretty much sum it up? I don't know about you but where I come from its called taking responsibility for your actions. Now I am not talking about rape or insest. That is where the issue gets gray for me. I am talking about a women who doesn't take the necessary precautions to prevent getting pregnant and then gets upset when she does get pregnant...
Take responsibility for your actions people. And don't bring up breaking condoms and non-effective birth control either...those are to be considered as part of the risks of sex IMO...besides they, along with rape and insest, make up a small percentage of the abortions taking place and I am referring to the majority.
And another thing...It is SO silly to me that people are actually debating if the fetus is alive or not...People if we consider single-celled organisms, bacteria, fungus, mold, yeast, etc....hell even a fucking tree to be living, than I am pretty sure we can safely say that the little human shaped fetus with a beating heart it is also living too regardless of its complete dependency on its mother. Is it any less dependent after it is born? Nope, it is still 100% dependent on mom after it is born too and nobody would be willing to kill it then...
Sorry people but it IS alive and it IS human so to me it IS murder.
The human species is designed by evolution to survive and grow in a social context. The human fetus is not designed by evolution to survive at all outside of the womb in any natural capacity or with any possible chance of survival before ~week 20. Furthermore, simply being considered alive doesn't qualify something as having the right to human liberties, being a human does, and that's a significantly harder thing to categorize.
Where do rights come from? Why does the woman have rights but the fetus doesn't?
A fetus only gets rights that can contend with the mother's rights once it's considered human. I'm not about to give random animals, plants, fungi, etc. rights that supersede a human's rights, so why would a fetus get it if it isn't considered human? That's the line in question - when do you consider it human?
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I'm pro-abortion, but I think this is a good change, its currently 24 weeks in Britain and at that is just too late. Currently you have babies being born prematurely and surviving at 24 weeks and then you have foetuses of the same age being aborted.
The article seems to make it sound like doctors are basically forced to give a biased pro life account. I'm fine with them giving a fair account, but that means putting numbers to their statements.
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Stratos_spear - I would agree that being human qualifies you for the rights and liberties extended to the rest of us...not simply being alive. However we have already discussed this too about 8-9 post above this one.! Glad we are on the same page here.
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I find it hard to understand how people can argue against abortion, but find it ok to live in air conditioned houses, browse the web, and just go about a daily life as when if you look at the things required for a daily life in developed countries its simply appalling. The sheer amount of wildlife, animals, and ecosystems destroyed along with other humans taken advantage of to produce simple goods to give you electricity, comfort and basic non-animal food stuffs and the sheer amount of of animals slaughtered to provide you with meat at the market/restaurants. Its really unfathomable how ignorant people are when they look at human life as something special and think "I would never harm anything, let alone an human infant" when they are part of the group destroying the entire planet and killing an unknown amount of "life".
I recognize I'm a part of the group that lives a daily life and thus ends "life" on a regular basis, but I also recognize that its pretty "bleeping" horrible if you really think about it. Luckily I can just put that behind me and go on with my life of not caring since I will hopefully die of old age before any of the horrible habits currently used matter.
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