Abortion

[bryzee86]

I'm sick of some people on this thread.

1) You cannot use religion as an excuse for anything for anymore.

2) Stop caring more for a foetus which is still attached to a person for the sake of its whole life than for the person it is attached to (Just because a TINY minority of babies have survived when miscarried before 25 weeks doesn't mean that the limit should be lowered - the VAST majority would die almost instantly).
Does that person really matter less? Do you actively wish that for person to go through potentially enormous amounts of pain that can be avoided? And by this I mean both the potential back-street abortions that this person WOULD go through if the operation were not legally available, and the potential birth also.

3) Stop inferring that just because you went through a terrible experience, or because you know a person who did, that this somehow makes you a legitimate soapbox for ALL of those people. Whilst that should never have happened to you/ your friend/anyone, you are not representative. I know full well that people who I know who have been through that would have got rid of the product in an instant. A person should not be made to carry the product of a violent attack for 9 months, be forced to go through agony to give birth to it, and then to be guilt-tripped into either keeping it or adopting - whichever applies.

4) Pro-choice does not mean anti-life. It means that most care about the life of those already developed enough to realise what life and death is, what pain and pleasure are, and what misery and happiness are. That is my priority.

I couldn't live in a country which didn't allow free and easy access to this operation.

[Prawnil]

To me, a sperm is 1/2 a person, and an egg is the other 1/2. Once they join, then you have a full person. Arguments against this?

A sperm is one human cell with 1/2 the genetic material of a person, and an egg is the other 1/2 of the genetic material.
Joined, they form 1, diploid, all human'd-up, full-DNA-complement cell.
One cell. I can't imagine what kind of reasoning can equate one cell with one person.
I wonder how many billions of organisms with thousands of cells each the body'll annihilate in a lifetime, by its nature. If the 1 human cell following fertilisation is to be protected because of its potential to be human... Well, what is speciesism? The future exists when it arrives, not before. All things being equal, why is that ball of cells any more precious than its amoeboid brothers and sisters?
Would there be any thought in destroying such simple life for the sake of not changing your life for the worst like an unwanted child might, if it wasn't potentially human? The debate seems totally sensible when the fetus is developed enough to perhaps be sensorially connected with the world around it. But before it even has discernable tissues?

[Frank]

I'm sick of some people on this thread.

Why?

Whoever they are - they are expressing their thoughts.

Tell us why you don't agree with them and why - and who they are...

[Dylan Mulenburg]

I am against abortion because it isn't the unborn baby's fault if the mom doesn't want a baby--it's her fault--and the baby doesn't deserve to have his/her life taken away just because the mom is being selfish.

[missbettie]

I'm sick of some people on this thread.



For the most part everyone on this thread has had a valid point, and their opinions are just that their opinions, you don't have to agree with them.

BTW I agree with most everything you have said. Though, i'm not sick of anyone. :D

[Fuhzy]

A sperm is one human cell with 1/2 the genetic material of a person, and an egg is the other 1/2 of the genetic material.
Joined, they form 1, diploid, all human'd-up, full-DNA-complement cell.
One cell. I can't imagine what kind of reasoning can equate one cell with one person.
I wonder how many billions of organisms with thousands of cells each the body'll annihilate in a lifetime, by its nature. If the 1 human cell following fertilisation is to be protected because of its potential to be human... Well, what is speciesism? The future exists when it arrives, not before. All things being equal, why is that ball of cells any more precious than its amoeboid brothers and sisters?
Would there be any thought in destroying such simple life for the sake of not changing your life for the worst like an unwanted child might, if it wasn't potentially human? The debate seems totally sensible when the fetus is developed enough to perhaps be sensorially connected with the world around it. But before it even has discernable tissues?

(My reply is to the part of your quote I have bolded)

Ah ha, but here we are at a debate very similar to an animal rights debate. Consider, a human baby at 1 year has about the same intelligence as the average dog. But a dog isn't given the same rights as a baby. And why not? Simply because the baby, although it's at a primitive level, has the potential to become something more, while a dog is already fully developed. And so it is with a zygote when compared to the other cells in our body. The zygote will continue to develop into a human, while a skin cell will always be just a skin cell...

[Fuhzy]

4) Pro-choice does not mean anti-life. It means that most care about the life of those already developed enough to realise what life and death is, what pain and pleasure are, and what misery and happiness are. That is my priority.

So you are looking at it from a utilitarian perspective (similar to Peter Singer)?

[Aradia]

Well said Bryzee.


There are some people here who have a very particular and personal bee in their bonnet here and would want others to suffer because of it .. ie, carrying and bearing a child they are not interested in. What worse fate that that for a child? To be raised by somebody who never wanted them and will possibly resent them for the rest of their lives. Two lives potentially ruined.

All of use could have been aborted. I could have been. So could you have. However we were not. But if we had been, so what? We wouldn't know anything about it. We wouldn't miss our lives, because they would never have started. Why not concentrate efforts on making life better for those who are in the world, rather than focussing on those who were/are not destined to be.

[bryzee86]

I meant to add (but forgot): I'm not coming on this thread any more. I'm not expanding on my points. It's not like I'll ever be swayed, and I'm stressing out too much when I read it.

[Prawnil]

...debate very similar to an animal rights debate. Consider, a human baby at 1 year has about the same intelligence as the average dog. But a dog isn't given the same rights as a baby. And why not? Simply because the baby, although it's at a primitive level, has the potential to become something more...

Movements for animal rights have nothing to do with 'intelligence', just the validity of independent existence of living things. I don't believe the awareness a human has and that which the dog has are comparable, and intelligence is a very strange word that means very little when looked at closely.

At one year, the baby is human. I would say that the baby is raised above the dog because of its human 'superiority', that is to say that the example you gave is based on the current situation which is entirely anthropocentric and based on what the baby is, now. -The baby's higher rights status is/would be based on its potential to suffer as it exists at the time of suffering, and that status is/would be higher than dog since the majority view is that human suffering is more valid and real, somehow, than dog suffering.-
Given equality, the interests of the family of the baby would probably still give the human baby some 'rights' ground over a dog.
The baby is, though, like the dog, beyond some vague time in development, an aware, reactive, living thing, and a zygote is not. Alive, certainly, but until the cell cluster has some means of becoming reactively connected to its environment, where's awareness?

The whole problem seems to be the compartmental-ising human mind clashing with a world that it can't always be applied to. I would only accept human cells become a human once all the systems have developed to some extent in mini, at the point there is a basis for the full adult body. That's incredibly vague though, and fairly useless, but I don't believe the answer is to consider the single haploid cells part human, or the fertilised egg human.
That skin cell which is 'just' a skin cell may well go through division that will maintain that adult human. The adult human being will continue to live because of the potential for almost every cell to replicate, and become the future body of that human. Does that make every cell of the body, bar the ones that don't divide, A Human due to their potential to constitute a future adult human?

No doubt I left a multitude of my cells, with plenty of potential to divide into part of a human body, in the toilet bowl this morning. I didn't dump out a human being any more than destroying a bundle of human cells is murder- once the thing's developed its sense system, yeah it clearly becomes complicated, but before that?

My stupid rambles are pointless next to bryzee & others' real points, though. What is potential when you're levelling it with real, definite suffering of an actual, living person? Especially when that child might itself suffer its circumstances if the parent suffered against her will to allow it to be born.
Messed up.

[littlewinker]

Women already have a choice not to get pregnant - CON. TRA. CEP. TION. End of.

And if a condom and contraceptive implant are used porperly, there's only a 1/100,000,000 chance of getting pregnant every time they have sex. Yes, it's really that tiny. So almost all times you read about contraception failing, you're reading about ignorant, lazy people.

I have a lot more to say about this but don't have the time yet.

I'll be back within a few days.

I agree with Dylan Mulenburg.

[RubyDuby]

when i was 16 it seemed that simple to me too...
i'm sorry if that seems a bit ageist, but it's also realistic.

something like 30% of all pregnancies end in miscarriage, mostly before the woman knows she's pregnant. early abortions don't seem wrong to me.

[Prawnil]

Yes, it's really that tiny. So almost all times you read about contraception failing, you're reading about ignorant, lazy people.

Sixteen years is a considerable length of time, and though your experience is as valid as anyone elses, when your're making comments like that to a group of people, some of whom have more than three times the life experience you do, you're going to piss people off.
Maybe take into account that you should be careful since, relative to what you might've read, to someone with first hand, difficult experience, you're going to sound like an inconsiderate brat who has no idea what you're talking about.

Consider the number of those round here who, unlike you, don't have to 'read about contraceptive failing'.

[snivelingchild]

So almost all times you read about contraception failing, you're reading about ignorant, lazy people.

No, you are reading about people who live in areas where there is poor sex education, usually in poverty stricken areas. So....al we have to do to prevent 99.9% of unwanted pregnancies is simply cure poverty and education probems then? There is also rape, where victims do not choose whether or not to use contraception.

Actually, you are thinking of condoms that are 100% (or nearly close) if used properly all the time. Chemical methods such as spermicide or morning after are not nearly that effective. Only condoms and the pill.

[matt35mm]

There's a tremendous documentary called Lake of Fire that tackles this issue with as much wisdom and humanity as I've ever seen. It is specifically about the last 15 years (it took 15 years to make) of both sides of the abortion debate in the United States.

I say it's wise because the filmmakers simply listen. Most of the film is dedicated to extremists on either side, and as a result there are moments such as an interview with a doctor who was later murdered, or interviews with "Roe" from Roe v. Wade as she later became religious and strongly pro-life. I think the film is smart enough not to argue for one point of view, but rather acknowledge the complexity of the issue, and show how deadlocked the whole matter has become (nothing has really changed in the past 15 years; there is no clear argument to reach a consensus).

For those who can find this documentary, I strongly recommend viewing it. Because the film is about extremists, there are bound to be ideas that the interviewees say that you'll think are crazy or scary, but I think that the way to get the most out of this film is to listen to everyone without balking, and instead try to grasp the people and the mentality involved that has produced this mind-bogglingly complex problem. No matter how simple the issue is in your mind, this film does a fantastic job of representing the complexity of the issue as it exists in the United States.

It'd probably be fair to say that it's not about what decisions you should make regarding the issue of abortion, but rather it is about the people who have made these decisions one way or the other. It is a very powerful piece of work, and I think it reflects all that it sees with astonishing and unrelenting clarity. If you have the belief that we must see how things really are before we can begin making useful moves forward, then check out Lake of Fire.

[cobweb]

Women already have a choice not to get pregnant - CON. TRA. CEP. TION. End of.

And if a condom and contraceptive implant are used porperly, there's only a 1/100,000,000 chance of getting pregnant every time they have sex. Yes, it's really that tiny. So almost all times you read about contraception failing, you're reading about ignorant, lazy people.

I have a lot more to say about this but don't have the time yet.

I'll be back within a few days.

I agree with Dylan Mulenburg.


well thanks for clearing that up for all of us then :rollseyes_ani:

[littlewinker]

when i was 16 it seemed that simple to me too...
i'm sorry if that seems a bit ageist, but it's also realistic.

something like 30% of all pregnancies end in miscarriage, mostly before the woman knows she's pregnant. early abortions don't seem wrong to me.

You don't know me, because you were immature at 16 does NOT mean everyone else is.

I know it's a complicated issue, I apologize for being clever enough to have deveoped my own opinion at what you consider a young age :rolleyes:

[Klytemnest]

Sorry but this is just speculating. How do you know the baby feels nothing.

The same way you know a carrot doesn't feel anything, dreama. It does not have a brain capable of interpreting stimuli as pain.

[QUOTE]
Abortions are legal up to 24 months by which case the baby does feel. It may feel a long time before then. You don't know. This claim that pro abortionists that babies feel nothing, compairing them to cancer etc... its just sick.

Cancer kills, having a baby doesn't.


I think you mean 24 weeks...

In order for a being to feel pain it needs to have a brain that is developed enough, that has the capacity for feeling pain. A fertilized egg does not have this capacity - it has no brain! In the early stages of fetal development the brain does not yet have the ability to perceive pleasure or pain. And that is when most abortions are performed.

And let's not introduce emotionalism into this discussion. No one is being callous here. No one is equating fetuses with cancer tissue. No one is anti-baby here.

Pregnancies do sometimes cause the death of the mother. This is one of the reasons the decision regarding what happens to the mother's body should remain solely with the mother - not the father, not the government, not the church. It is her body. You don't have the right to dictate how she is to treat it.

I believe that a woman should always keep the baby because the alternative is depriving the baby of any choice at all. If you don't like my views that's your problem not mine.

You are welcome to your opinion. But there is a difference between "I think she should" and "I am going to make it so that she must." You may think it would be a more admirable or noble choice for the woman to carry the baby to term - and I may well agree with you. But it is quite another thing to argue that the law should force every woman to do with her body what she does not wish to.

Should you take your shirt off and give it to a homeless person? Perhaps. Should you be forced to? No. Should you donate one of your kidneys to your mother, if her life depended on it? Perhaps yes. Should the government force you to donate it? No. It should be your choice. Because, even though her life depends on it, it is YOUR body and you are the only one who should be entitled to a vote regarding what is done to it.

Regarding the childish comment at the end of your post... Yes... Your view is becoming my problem. When you are arguing that one's right to sovereignty over one's body must be suspended, you are making it my problem. This is why it is important for us to talk about this and see if we can become better informed in an effort to find a resolution to this issue. Saying "if you don't like my view, that's your problem" does not advance the conversation. It stops it.

[cobweb]

You don't know me, because you were immature at 16 does NOT mean everyone else is.

I know it's a complicated issue, I apologize for being clever enough to have deveoped my own opinion at what you consider a young age :rolleyes:


littlewinker why worry about people here disliking you and then say something like that? :confused:

no, we don't know you in person but it's a very fair assumption that ANYONE might know more about life as they increase in age.

it really was extremely offensive of you to make assumptions about people who have unplanned pregnancies and it was immature of you to not realise that your comments were ill placed.

[littlewinker]

Prawnil: "Sixteen years is a considerable length of time, and though your experience is as valid as anyone elses, when your're making comments like that to a group of people, some of whom have more than three times the life experience you do, you're going to piss people off.
Maybe take into account that you should be careful since, relative to what you might've read, to someone with first hand, difficult experience, you're going to sound like an inconsiderate brat who has no idea what you're talking about.

Consider the number of those round here who, unlike you, don't have to 'read about contraceptive failing'."

Don't patronize me. I find it completely infuriating that you're all comparing me to how naive you were as a teenagers. You do not know me or my life experiences. I will not say my experiences because I have nothing to prove and I'm too proud to say something just to make you look stupid.

I can't even believe I'm justifying myself to you, but why do YOU not see yourself as inconsiderate just for having an opinion? If I were pro-choice you wouldn't say I had no idea of what I was talking about. You just see me as inconsiderate because you don't bloody agree with me. You need to shut your ignorant mouth and open your ignorant mind and don't jump to conclusions.

Like I said, if it's a 1/100,000,000 every time you have sex using a condom and an implant (hormone chip in your arm, for those of you who seem to be ignorant about it) then hardly anyone would get pregnant due to failed contraception. All the statistics don't add up. Admit it, it's laziness or ignorance.

And finally, don't fucking make out like all you pro aborts have "The Knowledge" that makes your opinion more important than anyone else, because you don't. The reason you all feel so open minded and modern is because you have to be bloody open minded to agree with something the goes against the grain and is so obviously wrong. Or extremely narrow minded because you're blinding yourselves and enveloping your minds just to agree with something because it's convenient. Because lets face it, abortion is the easy way out. Don't tell me "ohh it's traumatic" because they chose it over carrying th baby to term. Why didn't they carry it to term? Because "I couldn't face bringing an unwanted child into the world blah blah" no it's because they knew that once they had the baby, they would feel the rush of love, want to keep it, and their life would change. It's a fear of the unknown. If they don't want the baby so much, they can get it adopted. And don't try and say "it's pergory being an unwanted child" or anything - would you honestly rather be dead than adopted? Even those in care are usually happy, and if they aren't at least they had a chance in life. Life is what you make it. Are you saying that every child in care and adult bought up in care, should be dead? And some pro-abort once told me that 1/5 children in care in the USA attempts suicide - even if that is true 4/5 don't. They deserve that chance. They didn't ask to be put in the womb of someone so selfish. Yes, it IS selfish, it's not for the unborn's benefit. I haven't even touched on the brutal methods used to take the lives.

As for rape, the tiny minority of abortions are performed for that, but it's still not a good enough reason to take away a life. Even if it's an early abortion, it's still a life and has all the DNA it will ever need to be a full human. Once that life has gone, it will never come back. It's not the woman's fault in this case but still not the child's.

I can understand the pro-abort p.o.v completely (I just don't agree with it) but the one thing I cannot bare is when they pretend it's good for the unborn children.

One more thing, any woman who has had an abortion doesn;t deserve to be a mother. For a start, she cherry picked when her children could survive when it's convenient, and more inportantly, the more abortions you have the more chance you have of miscarrying or having handicapped children. Case in point: Katie Price - mother of the year my arse.

For the record, by "read" I meant all the stories you see in every magazine thse days about the women who've had 7 abortions and that, & the reason I've never been pregnant is because I don't want a baby. If I ever do get pregnant unplanned, which I have just shown the chance is miniscule, I will accept it. As soon as a woman has sex, she has "chosen" to accept that however tiny the chance, she could possibly get pregnant.

Sniveling Child - *sighs* Americans really don't believe in a world outside their own do they?...

Over here abortion occurs across the board.

Sex education needs to let people know how high the chance is of getting pregnant if you do it unprotected once - I was told 85% - I don't know if that's true but either way it worked for us all.

Anyway, will you stop bloody talking down to me? You're the same woman who has never met me who tried to tell ME about MY puberty and when I deveoped physical feelings - and got it wrong and mde yourself look a condescending twat.

And you've done it again - if you're going to argue you need to know the facts.

Condoms are 99% effective - over a whole year, 1% of women using them will get pregnant. IMPLANTS - heard of them, no? - are OVER 99% effective.

Stop telling me what I'm thinking, it will always backfire on you.

Imo to take a life is murder and murder is murder is murder, whether animal, unborn, or capital punishment and that's why I'm pro-life.

[cobweb]

ok, littlewinker, try and place yourself in the position of the ONE woman in 100 who got pregnant when the condom split - you're only just old enough to legally have sex (like yourself!) and your boyfriend won't support you. You're frightened and you know that if you tell your parents they'll disown you. Try to think about it.

And i have reported your last post - i'm telling you this because i know you don't like to be 'patronised' so i thought i'd be upfront with you :cool:.

Of course you are allowed an opinion but your wording is just offensive and you state your opinions like they are 'facts' :dizzy:.

[Poison Ivy]

Imo to take a life is murder and murder is murder is murder,

and rudeness, arrogance and offensiveness are still rudeness, arrogance and offensiveness...if you would like people to converse with you in a reasonable, more welcoming/friendly manner then lose the hostility towards everyone else whether they're disagreeing with you or offering advice:rolleyes:

[cobweb]

and, by the way, i don't think there is any evidence that having terminations 'increases the chances of having handicapped children' littlewinker, but even if there is, what you said about Katie Price is slanderous and deeply offensive to her and every other parent of children with a disability.

[littlewinker]

littlewinker why worry about people here disliking you and then say something like that? :confused:

no, we don't know you in person but it's a very fair assumption that ANYONE might know more about life as they increase in age.

it really was extremely offensive of you to make assumptions about people who have unplanned pregnancies and it was immature of you to not realise that your comments were ill placed.

If I worried that much I wouldn't be on hre any more!

Can you not see people patronizing me??

Everyone will know more as they get older but it's all relative - some people grow wise a lot younger than otyhers.

If your last paragraph was true then it's offensive to be pro-life immature to comment on women who have abortions in an abortion thread. It was immature of you to make assumptions about me because I'm anti abortion.

(From now I'll call it pro and anti abortion to avoid the stupid "you're anti choice no you're anti choice"argument)

[cobweb]

no, it's not offensice to have or to post opinions, but it is offensive to make sweeping statements and far reaching assumptions about every single case of abortion.

i'm beginning to think you're a troll.