I'm sorry, but I just want to get the general consensus about abortion. Period. (For arguments sake, those who vote against abortion still allow it if either the mother or the child would be irreparably harmed by going forward with the pregnancy)

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Poll Results: Abortion - Yeah or Ney? (58 votes.)

Abortion - Yeah or Ney? (Choose 1)
* Yeah - 74% (43)
* Ney - 19% (11)
* I fit in neither category completely. See my intelligent and well thought out argument below. - 7% (4)

Voted nay.

Exception: when the mother is likely to die as a result of giving birth; when it's impossible for all of multiple foeti to survive and more of them will survive if some are removed.

What about when the mother is raped?

I believe that they have something called the morning after pill for just those occurances. However, if a victim does not seek out such a pill, it may be considered a decision to keep any potential children.

Of course there will be a number of perfectly good reasons that almost all people would accept to use abortion. Whether that is one or not...

I would assume that rape can be quite a traumatic expirience and I doubt that getting pregnant is the first thing a raped woman thinks about. In fact it might take quite a while for the victim to even accept that she was raped. So I would not think that not getting that pill would necessarily mean that she wants to keep the child.

I am perfectly willing to allow abortion in all circumstances as long as the pregnancy hasn't allready gone to far. Of course abortion is an unfortunate event but it's a lot better than a unwanted child which may destroy the lives of two young persons because of a one night mistake.

I voted Yay.

I once had someone explain to me that abortion is all about timing. Very few people feel that abortion is wrong if it happened seconds after copulation and very few people would feel that it is right if it happened seconds before birth. The trouble is finding the line in the middle.

My opinion also follows the 2nd basic tenet of Snookieism which can be interpreted as "I don't like it when someone tells me what to do, so what right do I have to tell someone else what to do".

I voted yay.

For me, it's a question of how to define what a human life is, and at what point does that humanity begin. Certainly, the whole process starts with conception, but you'd have a hard time convincing me that you have a human life at that point; it's more a potential human, but the same could be said of a sperm cell or an unfertilized egg.

So, like Snook, the difficulty for me is where to draw the line; 24 weeks seems a bit long to me, but 16 weeks might be OK. But these are just gut feelings, and not based on anything scientific.

I really try not to have a position on abortion. The biggest reason being that I don't have a uterus. No matter how hard I try, I will never get pregnant. I will never carry a child to term. I will never experience the pain of child birth. Hence, I will also never, ever know what a truly excruciating decision an abortion is for a woman to make. I personally feel that this issue should be left entirely up to women.

Apparantly I'm rather alone in thinking this way, as something like 70% of all anti-abortion activists are men. :heh:

If forced to give an answer, I'd say I tend to be middle of the road on this issue. I think abortion should be a last resort, but is necessary in many cases and should be legal. I am, however, totally against using abortion as a means of birth control. Any woman who engages in casual sex freely, keeping abortion handy as a "get out of jail free" card deserves what she gets. But in the case of rape, incest, of course. Even in the case of the 13 year old girl naive enough to be seduced by an older guy and had no idea what she was getting herself into, etc.

Basically, I think there are enough instances where abortion is logical, even necessary, to negate the need for a blanket denial of all abortive rights, as those on the far right would have it. A middle ground must be reached, because neither the pro-lifers or pro-choicers are being completely fair or intellectually honest about the issue. Furthermore...
So, like Snook, the difficulty for me is where to draw the line; 24 weeks seems a bit long to me, but 16 weeks might be OK. But these are just gut feelings, and not based on anything scientific. This here represents the whole problem with the issue. No one wants to logically discuss the issue long enough to set limits or guidelines. Both the pro-lifers and the pro-choicers are demanding all or nothing. Pro-lifers want absolutely all abortions to be banned, pro-choicers want absolutely all abortions to be legal. To them it's purely black and white. But there's too much gray area here for either viewpoint to logically stand. Unfortunately, neither side is willing to compromise, which is why this issue will NEVER be something we will ever agree on. At least not in American society.

[ June 02, 2004, 16:37: Message edited by: Death Rabbit ]

Well, I voted against it. I second chev.

Also, the rape question is really quite uncommon. Since I'm at the university my mother works, in the Biology computer lab at the moment, I took the liberty of asking one of the professors about this. Only a fraction of one percent (<1%) of the women who are raped become pregnant. I only have this person's word on this, but I think they're telling the truth... what reason would they have to make this up?

What about when the mother is raped?The child is not the rapist. Even though I'm normally against contraception, rapists should be infertilised irreversibly after first attempt at rape, no matter if successful. I also understand it if the victim's family wants the rapist's family to cover all costs or take the child over entirely. However, I'm not in favour of killing people for other people's crimes.

@ Chev
The child is not the rapist. True, but why should the mother be forced to have the child of the man who ruined her life?
Even though I'm normally against contraception, rapists should be infertilised irreversibly after first attempt at rape, no matter if successful. I agree totally, but I think this should be taken a step further. I think sterilizing (sp?) a rapist will only encourage his sexual drive. Removing a consequence is a bit of an anti-deterrant IMO. I personally think they should be castrated, eliminating both the sexual drive and the ability to reproduce. Punishment should fit the crime, methinks. Thoughts?

edit - Or did you mean castration when you said "infertilized?"

Abortion doesn't equal killing. By definition, a bundle of cells clustered together incapable of surviving by itself is not alive.

There is more than the right of the baby involved in any of these issues. To deny the rights of the others, which would include the mother, is to ignore basic principles of equality. When the rights of the mother are disregarded (like in the instance of rape)than the issue becomes more about politics than about natural rights. The moral high ground is lost by those who think that a woman's purpose is simply to breed for whichever male feels like sticking it to any woman he choses, (pardon the poor pun)and that the woman should be forced to "breed" for such a pig.

[ June 02, 2004, 17:50: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

Abortion doesn't equal killing. By definition, a bundle of cells clustered together incapable of surviving by itself is not alive.By this definition, nearly no one is alive :rolleyes:

It's impossible to survive without other people's help for anyone except those who have the right skills and the right equipment or really superb skills.

I don't have those skills. I don't have the equipment. Still, I tend to think I'm alive. Ergo: that definition sucks.

To deny the rights of the others, which would include the mother, is to ignore basic principles of equality.How is abortion related to any equality. Equality of whom to whom?

The moral high ground is lost by those who think that a woman's purpose is simply to breed for whichever male feels like sticking it to any woman he choses, (pardon the poor pun)and that the woman should be forced to "breed" for such a pig.Rapists deserve castration (which, unfortunately, isn't going to become the law anywhere because of tolerance people *****ing about cruelty), or at least sterilisation (which might even happen some beautiful day). However, the kid is not guilty.

If a kid uses your funds up and bugs you all the time, should you be allowed to kill it because it would be convenient for you?

Convenience doesn't make anything right.

True, but why should the mother be forced to have the child of the man who ruined her life?Why should humans be forced to die when they get old?

You're mispresenting it. The right question is: why should the mother be allowed to kill the child?

I agree totally, but I think this should be taken a step further. I think sterilizing (sp?) a rapist will only encourage his sexual drive. Removing a consequence is a bit of an anti-deterrant IMO. I personally think they should be castrated, eliminating both the sexual drive and the ability to reproduce. Punishment should fit the crime, methinks. Thoughts?It would be even better, but it won't happen. The same people who advocate the killing of children because the father was a rapist pig, those would probably have some nasty things to say about castrating the said rapist pig.

As for me, sterilise them, castrate them, unless they go to gaol for life.

How is abortion related to any equality. Equality of whom to whom?The Declaration states:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

These natural or "unalienable rights" are not only "self-evident," but God given rights, and not those of Man. They cannot be usurped by man-made laws.

Of course these are American principles, and some in other places some may not feel that these rights are valid. Some may want to follow whatever the Pope says, as an example. But here we prefer separation of Chruch and State, despite what TV evangelists with big satellite dishes have to say on the matter of natural rights. Then again, it could be that some are taking the "all men" part of the Declaration too literally, meaning only the gender.

All three rights are related - Life without Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness has little meaning, in Jefferson's, as well as the other Founders' formulation of the natural rights, which the Declaration puts forth so eloquently.

This is similiar to what Snook is arguing for in his idea of "Snookism." That the State nor the Chruch have the right to usurp the mother's right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. He must have read Jefferson's ideas on rights also.

[ June 02, 2004, 20:58: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

Yes, and i won't make an argument why :p

Of course abortion is an unfortunate event but it's a lot better than a unwanted child which may destroy the lives of two young persons because of a one night mistake.Aye, an unwanted birth may destroy the lives of those two young persons who made a "one night mistake"...but an abortion certainly will destroy the life of the youngest person, the child itself.

Incidentally, what's the suicide rate of unwanted children? The suicide rate of parents of unwanted children? Or the infanticide or child-murder rate? I'd wager it's less than 100% - less than 1%, even. Which suggests that as much misery is involved in raising unwanted kids, most judge that it isn't a problem which should be dealt with by death. Which further suggests that concerns that careless affairs may destroy lives are way overblown compared to the certainty that careful abortions always destroy lives.

I once had someone explain to me that abortion is all about timing. Very few people feel that abortion is wrong if it happened seconds after copulation and very few people would feel that it is right if it happened seconds before birth. The trouble is finding the line in the middle.Kinda like euthanasia. It becomes increasingly acceptable the older and pricer the leech gets. I guess euthanasia's line is somewhere "in the middle", too - maybe 70 or 80?

I really try not to have a position on abortion. The biggest reason being that I don't have a uterus. No matter how hard I try, I will never get pregnant. I will never carry a child to term. I will never experience the pain of child birth. Hence, I will also never, ever know what a truly excruciating decision an abortion is for a woman to make. I personally feel that this issue should be left entirely up to women.That's why I don't have a position on American slavery. I'm a white postbellum non-Southerner, so I have no right to hold a moral view on slavery by white Southerners of black men. I'll never know the pain of slavery or the cost of forgoing cheap labor. So I personally feel that slavery should be left entirely up to slaveowners and their slaves.

The beauty of objective reality is...it's objective. So you can draw moral conclusions without being personally involved. Ironically, in our judicial system, we consider it a problem of BIAS when a judge has a direct, personal interest in a case. 'Course, abortion isn't entirely blind to this judicial principle...no one consults the party with the most personal and direct interest in the case, the baby.

All three rights are related - Life without Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness has little meaning, in Jefferson's, as well as the other Founders' formulation of the natural rights, which the Declaration puts forth so eloquently. This is similiar to what Snook is arguing for in his idea of "Snookism." That the State nor the Chruch have the right to usurp the mother's right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. He must have read Jefferson's ideas on rights also.Aye, but...liberty limited by what, and happiness judged by what? To use the slavery example, those antebellum slaveholders were quite happy to freely own slaves. It was the North and those darn evangelists (wow! they were around then, too!) that objected that these slaveholders' happiness and liberty did not trump the life of their human slaves.

Oh, but there's the rub..."human" slaves. Is the fetus human? Or just a clump of cells which magically, mystically becomes "human" the moment it breathes fresh air? Sounds like a locational bias to me - in the womb, no rights; out of the womb, all rights. Why should a six-month-old prematurely born waif be more "human" than a seven-month-old kid still locked in the womb?

These natural or "unalienable rights" are not only "self-evident," but God given rights, and not those of Man. They cannot be usurped by man-made laws.Read the Declaration however you want, but no one has the "God-given" right to murder for their pursuit of happiness. That's exactly why so much human action is "usurped by man-made laws".

Read the Declaration however you want, but no one has the "God-given" right to murder for their pursuit of happiness. I notice that you left out the Liberty part, and of course, we had no problems shooting "redcoats" over the issue, or a tory now and then who remained loyal to King George. But the description of "baby killers" is a little harder to match up here - no?

I can't think of a single one of the major Founders who "had no problem with slavery." In fact they were tortured by the issue. Washington freed his slaves on the death of Martha (which was after his). But now that we have freed the black race from slavery perhaps it is time we did the same for women, Grey.

The description of "baby killers" is a little harder to match up here - no?...But now that we have freed the black race from slavery perhaps it is time we did the same for women, Grey.Ooh, that slavery-abortion parallel cuts two ways, non? So let's take this a li'l further and see if either of our parallels hold up under examination.

Our Declaration says that "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." Six principles:

1) human equality
2) human right to life
3) human right to liberty
4) human right to pursue happiness
5) rights are self-evident
6) rights are derived from God, not Man

Human equality clearly doesn't mean that all humans are exactly alike, like cloned cicadas. Nor does it mean that all humans merit equal treatment - we treat citizens and non-citizens differently, for example. Maybe it means that there is no inherent hierarchy, with some granted divine right to exploit fellow humans - by Jefferson's lights, that no one was born with spurs and saddle to ride his fellow man?

Oh, but wait...mothers have the RIGHT to kill their kids because they inherently have sole and complete power over the children within their bodies, by dint not of their merit or achievement, but purely as a matter of accidental birth.

The human right to life doesn't mean that we aren't allowed to kill, since Jefferson bayed for the blood of tyrants (among others). The more probable explanation is that life is a God-given right and, as such, can only be revoked by the Creator's just decision - not the whim of other men.

Oh, but wait...mothers have the RIGHT to kill their kids because they are entitled to make the final decision, regardless of what the Bible or Quran or whatever says about child sacrifice.

The human right to liberty doesn't mean that we can do whatever we want, whenever we want, however we want. If I want to go postal at work and knife my neighbors, police will block me from exercising my "liberty" to kill at will. Per Justice Holmes, my liberty to punch you ends at your face. I do not have a right to liberty if that liberty is destructive to others.

Oh, but wait...mothers have the RIGHT to kill their kids because it's part of their essential freedom. Abortionist punches don't stop at the kid's face, as it were.

The human right to pursue happiness is similarly contingent upon fellow humans. A sadist does not have the "right to pursue happiness" by kidnapping and torturing fellow humans, whose own pursuit of happiness is endangered by such.

Oh, but wait...mothers have the RIGHT to kill their kids because their lives may be "destroyed" (re: rendered desperately unhappy) if they have to carry the twenty-year burden of childraising.

That rights are self-evident is something of a leap, but it implies that humans (deep down) acknowledge the life, liberty, and right to happiness of their fellow human beings.

Oh, but wait...mothers have the RIGHT to kill their kids because, as mere clumps of cells, they self-evidently lack these Declaration rights.

That rights are derived from God, not Man means, as you say -

These natural or "unalienable rights" are not only "self-evident," but God given rights, and not those of Man. They cannot be usurped by man-made laws.But it was Man's decision that the fetus:

1) is not equal
2) has no right to life
3) has no right to liberty
4) has no right to pursue happiness
5) is not self-evidently human
6) may be overridden by the decision of men (or women), regardless of God's prior claim

So the question arises. Which is the closer parallel: the exploited slave and the executed fetus, denied their Declaration-guaranteed human rights; or the abortion supporter and the slaveholder, defending their rights to enhance their own life, liberty, and happiness at the expense of their fellow humans?

Grey Magistrate, you are my hero.

Also, it does not have to be a choice between the life of the child and the happiness of the parents... there is the option of adoption. There are hundreds of thousands of happy couples who cannot have children on their own and would do almost anything to have a healthy baby, and there are hundreds of organizations out there to provide all kinds of assistance to mothers considering adoption.

Ooh, that slavery-abortion parallel cuts two ways, non? So let's take this a li'l further and see if either of our parallels hold up under examination.
Ah, yes. By all means, let's do so. But let's try a different track rather than your holier-than-thou, ( and "you are all just a bunch of baby killers anyway") approach to this issue.

Nor does it mean that all humans merit equal treatment - we treat citizens and non-citizens differently, for example. Actually that is what it means. Remember, these are God given rights, not subject to our own whim. That we apply the law unevenly is a concern that is largely beyond our control. Jefferson believed that the "fires of revolution" would consume all the western world once American independence was achieved. He believed that France would be first, which it was, but turned out differently than he imagined. In fact, he helped Lafayette draft a document for the Franch Estates while there. Your example, from Jefferson's lofty altitude, would have been an irrelelvant detail. Jefferson believed that these were the Rights of Man. Remember that when he wrote them there wasn't even an American nation to speak of, so your notion of "citizenship" is irrelevant anyway.

by Jefferson's lights, that no one was born with spurs and saddle to ride his fellow man?Well, Jefferson borrowed that line from an Englishman from the previous century. I can't recall his name, but it was during the English revolution that the words were orginally written. Jefferson used them for his own written document for the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration, which he was too ill to attend. In fact, I believe it was his last public statement.

And that should include that "no woman should be ridden either" (sorry for the poor illustration again). Although that seems to be what some of you are arguing for. Let me explain a different way to look at this issue. The creation of a baby, from the moment of conception to the moment of birth, is a "process." It is perhaps the most miraculous of any process that we can imagine. What is wrong with abortion has nothing to do with cells, but about interrupting that process. And to carry it further, what is created is a family, hopefully a man, a woman and a child. We wrap this in an institution called marriage, which makes it highly individualistic, rather than communal. The family is harbored in the protection of ritualistic custom and Law. But the real miracle is the Love that is created out of this arrangement. It moves us that much closer to God. It makes us human in the special sense that God meant for us to be, not just a bunch of "breeders." The idea of the "woman breeder" is perhaps fine for a patriarchal society (ancient Rome maybe), where there was a "hierarchy" of rights, (and class) mostly belonging to males. Children and women were all but the property of men in that "enlightened age."

Oh, but wait...mothers have the RIGHT to kill their kids because they inherently have sole and complete power over the children within their bodies, by dint not of their merit or achievement, but purely as a matter of accidental birth.If we peal away the prejudical nonsense that women are "child killers," and look at what is powering the choice here, it becomes that of a male dominated society. That you are ranting about "child sacrifice" in the Bible, proves that you have no real illustration from the Bible to support your argument. Perhaps the Pope can help you out here. Ah, but wait, aren't women unfit to be priests also? Too bad for them. Oh, St. Paul said so? And he would be a Roman maybe? Surprise!

The more probable explanation is that life is a God-given right and, as such, can only be revoked by the Creator's just decision - not the whim of other men. Ah, yes, and you support the War in Iraq? So much for Life as a God-given right. All those dead Iraqi children I see blown up on the news must NOT fall into the catagory of "all men are created equal." Too bad for them also. You have a strange sense of how "life can only be revoked by the Creator." Or how about the death penalty? Too bad for those guys too, I guess. Maybe, people really can make life and death decisions.

The people of Iraq are dying for what? Liberty you say? As I said, all three rights are related. What good is a life without liberty? "Give me Liberty or give me Death," some American once said. Do you think it might be important to the human condition? I do. But to all humans. Not just the males.

Abortionist punches don't stop at the kid's face, as it were.Yes, but the faces of Iraqi children don't count, I guess. That's right, they are not American citizens anyway.

So the question arises. Which is the closer parallel: the exploited slave and the executed fetus, denied their Declaration-guaranteed human rights; or the abortion supporter and the slaveholder, defending their rights to enhance their own life, liberty, and happiness at the expense of their fellow humans? That women have rights may seem an alien idea to your thought process. While you may agrue for the rights of the unborn in your Declaration, I don't hear or see anythiing of the mother's situation. While you do seem to admit that the situation does make her a "slave," and that you are willing to enhance society's view (which you equate as being the same as God's) but you still would diminish a woman's Life, Liberty and pursuit of happiness. So you are left with: If it means killing an unborn child, then it is OK for another American to become a slave. It is strange to hear "one American trying to talk another American into becoming a slave."

So much for "Give me Liberty, or give me Death." But maybe it was a man who said that.

On a final note:

wow! they were around then, too!
Yes, but they did not have satellite dishes, drive Cadillacs, and have affairs with the likes of Jessica Hahn.

[ June 03, 2004, 04:50: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

But let's try a different track rather than your holier-than-thou (and "you are all just a bunch of baby killers anyway") approach to this issue...And that should include that no woman should be ridden either (sorry for the poor illustation again). Although that seems to be what some of you are arguing for...The idea of the "woman breeder" is perhaps fine for a patriarchal society (ancient Rome maybe), where there was a "hierarchy" of rights, (and class) mostly belonging to males. Children and women were all but the property of men in that "enlightened age"...That women have rights may seem an alien idea to your thought process.Hold a moment, Chandos, my friend - I think you're overreacting. We're agreed that it's never right to treat women as objects - whether sex objects or breeding machines. I defy you to find anywhere in my posts - in ANY post I've EVER written in the past year - a claim that women have no rights, or are fit only for breeding, or should be enslaved by men. Actually, I defy you to find anything I've written that's the least bit demeaning of women in a sexual context - even so much as a blonde joke! The only exception, I suppose, is abortion - which I firmly believe is the most ugly and demeaning act that can ever be done to a woman.

And please pardon me if my tone sounds "holier-than-thou". It's not intended as such. Arrogance in any form is evil, particularly when it wears the guise of morality.

But as to your post:

Actually that is what it means. Remember, these are God given rights, not subject to our own whim. That we apply the law unevenly is a concern that is largely beyond our control.We do treat people unequally. Tall people wear longer pants than short people. Family members sleep in the house, strangers have to be invited in. Citizens are accorded some responsibilities, aliens others. We're supposed to love our spouse in a way that we're not supposed to love others. Etc., etc. This isn't unreasonable, but the very essence of rationality - rational discernment between people who are different physically, mentally, emotionally, culturally, nationally, professionally, and even (yes) sexually. But we move from that to acknowledge that despite these enormous differences, we are all equal in value as human beings, in the sight of God and the Declaration.

Hence my point: that the fetus, despite its many differences from its fellow humans, is still human. As such, like all humans under the Declaration, it merits the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Let me explain a different way to look at this issue. The creation of a baby, from the moment of conception to the moment of birth, is a "process." It is perhaps the most miraculous of any process that we can imagine. What is wrong with abortion has nothing to do with cells, but about interrupting that process. And to carry it further, what is created is a family, hopefully a man, a woman and a child. We wrap this in an institution called marriage, which makes it highly individualistic, rather than communal. The family is harbored in the protection of ritualistic custom and Law. But the real miracle is the Love that is created out of this arrangement. It moves us that much closer to God. It makes us human in the special sense that God meant for us to be, not just a bunch of "breeders."The creation of a baby is indeed a process. But so, too, is the growth from baby to toddler...to little kid...to adolescent...to teenager...to twentysomething...etc. It's all a "process", and every single day is a miracle. I mean that - tomorrow, any of us could be hit by cars, struck by illness, killed by muggers - and the world would keep turning without us. It's a wonder any of us survive to old age - and that makes it that much precious to know someone who has lived a long, full life...and lives yet.

But the beauty of the process does not negate that, at any given moment, the person within the process is still a person. The human baby does not become more human by age ten and superhuman by age sixteen (though many of us think so!). It is no more right, or wrong, to kill someone at thirty years old, thirty months old, or thirty months in the womb - except insofar as the ten-year-old has more social links, and thus more people are harmed by the death.

That has nothing to do with women as "breeders". It has everything to do with the intrinsic value of a human being.

If we peel away the prejudical nonsense that women are "child killers," and look at what is powering the choice here, it becomes that of a male dominated society. That you are ranting about "child sacrifice" in the Bible, proves that you have no real illustration from the Bible to support your argument. Perhaps the Pope can help you out here. Ah, but wait, aren't women unfit to be priests also? Too bad for them. Oh, St. Paul said so? And he would be a Roman maybe? Surprise!..."prejudicial nonsense"? Those were men that passed Roe v. Wade, men that voted for abortion protections, men that work as abortionists, men that exploit women and then callously abandon them. Arguing about whether or not women are "child killers" is like arguing whether or not Jews are "Christ killers". We're all in this together - we all have blood on our hands.

No real illustration from the Bible? Hmm, let's skim...oh, here's something. Leviticus 18:21 explicitly prohibits child sacrifice. Interestingly, this passage follows twenty verses forbidding various sexual activities outside of marriage. Note the close connection between lust and death - it ain't new. (I'd quote more but it would seem, um, "holier-than-thou".)

A recent book edited by Daniel Maguire, "Sacred Rights", makes the audacious claim that not only do world religions support abortion as a sacred right, but "...to criminalize a right that is grounded in the world's major religions is criminal itself. It is also a form of religious persecution." The book's flimsy evidence is the best argument against itself.

Aye, St. Paul was a Roman...and a Hebrew (Philippians 3:4-6), who spoke Greek and Aramaic (Acts 21:40). Four identities was about as cosmopolitan as you could get in those days, and is a sight better than many of us manage. Given that Paul argues that women should be encouraged to stay single if that's the best fit for their place and personality (I Cor. 7), he can hardly be fairly accused of treating women as mere "breeders".

And incidentally, I'm Protestant. I'll leave interpreting the Pope to chevalier.

Ah, yes, and you support the War in Iraq? So much for Life as a God-given right. All those dead Iraqi children I see blown up on the news must NOT fall into the catagory of "all men are created equal." Too bad for them also. You have a strange sense of how "life can only be revoked by the Creator." Or how about the death penalty? Too bad for those guys too, I guess. Maybe, people really can make life and death decisions. The people of Iraq are dying for what? Liberty you say? As I said, all three rights are related. What good is a life without liberty? "Give me Liberty or give me Death," some American once said. Do you think it might be important to the human condition? I do. But to all humans. Not just the males.As I said, life can only be revoked by the Creator's decision. Specific guidelines are laid out (Genesis 9:6, for instance) governing the few times when the death penalty is appropriate - always grounded not in the lack of value of the executed, but in the enormous value of the one wronged. A society may legitimately and morally execute a murderer, for instance, because the murderer's actions have transgressed the moral law in such a way as to forfeit his right to life. I'm not sure how this is a "strange sense" - to say that humans are so valuable that the wrongful death of another human is the worst crime we know.

As for the unintended killing of Iraqi children during the war and occupation - note the emphasis on "unintended", unlike voluntary abortion. Dead Iraqi children is an unfortunate byproduct of policing, just as dead innocents from police crossfire on American streets. We have as much reason to forbid war and policing because some innocents are unintentionally harmed as we do to ban planes, trains, and automobiles because they unintentionally lead to tens of thousands of innocent deaths.

That women have rights may seem an alien idea to your thought process. While you may agrue for the rights of the unborn in your Declaration, I don't hear or see anything of the mother's situation. While you do seem to admit that the situation does make her a "slave," and that you are willing to enhance society's view (which you equate as being the same as God's) but you still would diminish a woman's Life, Liberty and pursuit of happiness. So you are left with: If it means killing an unborn child, then it is OK for another American to become a slave. It is strange to hear "one American trying to talk another American into becoming a slave." So much for "Give me Liberty, or give me Death." But maybe it was a man who said that.Married moms have it tough; single moms have it tougher. There's no denying that women still have a harder life than men. But women are no more "slaves" to their children than a man is "slave" to his wife. When a man marries a woman, he commits to her for life - richer or poorer, sickness and health, etc. - forsaking all others. If he keeps that promise - and these days, few men do - then it costs him dearly. It diminishes certain aspects of his life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. But he has a moral obligation to keep that promise, and if he breaks it, then it costs the deceived woman (and their children) even more.

Same with a mom and her kid. The mom (like the dad) has a moral obligation to care for her kid. Now, the mom is "free" to deprive, abuse, neglect, abandon, or even kill the kid. But that increase to her life, liberty, and happiness comes at a steep cost.

Neither fathers nor mothers are "slaves" in the old sense of the word. But neither can they exercise total selfish liberty without brutally hurting those who are dependent on them - poisoning those other innocents' life, liberty, and happiness. Should we really be upset that restricting adults' rights to hurt the weakest members of our society "still would diminish a woman's [and man's] Life, Liberty, and pursuit of happiness"?

If this is how you define slavery - that an innocent is dependent upon another person's sacrifice - then we all are slaves. And heaven protect us from those "free men" who would pretend the right to exploit, seduce, and abuse to protect their own selfish definitions of their rights.

You mentioned the old motto, "Give me Liberty, or give me Death." But it sounds to me like the new motto is, "Give me Liberty, and give him Death."


Seriously, Chandos - I don't mean to offend you, or anyone. It just perplexes me that, after millennia of trampling women's rights, the best example of progress men can show after thousands of years is...the right of women to kill their offspring. That death should be the best we can offer women is the real disgrace.

Hold a moment, Chandos, my friend - I think you're overreacting. That is the problem with the entire issue of abortion. It is perhaps the most divisive of issues. It comes down to deciding between the process of birth, or the right of the woman to have the right to Liberty and the pursuit of her happiness, but in the INSTANCES that we are concerned with here. Remember that we are dealing with the issue of a rape. That is what set off my reaction. I am on record as being opposed to the notion of abortion on demand.

If you ask most single moms - as rough as they have it - if they would be willing to give up their babies for a better lifestyle, I think one would be hard pressed to find one who would ever even consider such a thing. We are dealing with those special circumstances here, where a woman is forced to into a situation that she would find appalling.
Look at the solution on the previous post; the one where the woman is to breed, so that another couple can have a baby. What else could one call it other than "for breeding?" At least have the honesty to call it what it is.

That has nothing to do with women as "breeders". It has everything to do with the intrinsic value of a human being.
Yes, but the mother has the same intrinsic value also. That you would ask her to carry the baby of someone who raped her, is to ignore her value as not only a human, but a victim as well. The argument has been put forth that the baby should not suffer because the sins of the father. But the mother should not bear the sins of the father her entire life also. So, how does one choose? If I am understanding you, then the mother becomes the "slave" as well as the victim. Thus, you have deprived her of Liberty and the pursuit of happiness completely. You have not resolved this issue in any way that I can see.

Aye, St. Paul was a Roman...and a Hebrew (Philippians 3:4-6), who spoke Greek and Aramaic (Acts 21:40). Four identities was about as cosmopolitan as you could get in those days, and is a sight better than many of us manage.
Yes, but he never gave up his Roman citizenship. As for women staying single: There was once a strange Christian cult - the Shakers - they believed the same thing, (perhaps they took St Paul seriously) that women should not engage with men. Guess what there aren't anymore of?

As I said, life can only be revoked by the Creator's decision. Specific guidelines are laid out (Genesis 9:6, for instance) governing the few times when the death penalty is appropriate - always grounded not in the lack of value of the executed, but in the enormous value of the one wronged. A society may legitimately and morally execute a murderer, for instance, because the murderer's actions have transgressed the moral law in such a way as to forfeit his right to life. I'm not sure how this is a "strange sense" - to say that humans are so valuable that the wrongful death of another human is the worst crime we know.

As for the unintended killing of Iraqi children during the war and occupation - note the emphasis on "unintended", unlike voluntary abortion. Dead Iraqi children is an unfortunate byproduct of policing, just as dead innocents from police crossfire on American streets. We have as much reason to forbid war and policing because some innocents are unintentionally harmed as we do to ban planes, trains, and automobiles because they unintentionally lead to tens of thousands of innocent deaths.
Rationalizing can be a helpful thing sometimes...
I notice that the unborn baby, who is caught in the crossfire between the mother's rights and a rapist father gets speical rights that others (Iraqi children for instance) don't get when they get caught in the "crossfire."

Married moms have it tough; single moms have it tougher. There's no denying that women still have a harder life than men. But women are no more "slaves" to their children than a man is "slave" to his wife. No, but they can become a slave to a society that has no respect for their rights as individuals. Notice that I already defended the istitution of marriage, so again, I think this is a bit of rationalizing here. I was refering to the Church or the State forcing women to have children under the worst of circumstances.

But again, I pointed out that it was a male dominated society. You quickly put forth that the judges who decided that case were all men. Thank you for proving my point so clearly. And there have been how many women justices on the Supreme Court in the last 225 years? If you guessed more than 2, you loose.

Pro choice, not necessarily pro abortion. A woman should at all times have a choice wheter or not she's ready to give birth and go through the entire process or call the whole thing off.

Pro choice, not necessarily pro abortion. A woman should at all times have a choice wheter or not she's ready to give birth and go through the entire process or call the whole thing off.A woman should first have decided if she is ready to have sex and possibly face the result, which is pregnancy.

The Declaration states:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."I know the Declaration. I've also spent some time with the bigger picture - from the point of view of American colonies (which actually inherited from Locke and Hume, anyway) that later became the United States, and from the European point of view of Lafayette's French version and its evolution in French constitutionalism.

What I understand from all it is that Life is the first and supreme right and the highest value. It's also always mentioned in the first place, before all others.

Next, the purpose of calling upon human rights (rights per se don't have a purpose, they simply are) is that the stronger can't abuse their position and power over the weaker, especially if the stronger one's interest is of lower rank than the weaker one's right. For instance, a monarch can't prosecute people who criticise his policy, a land owner can't force people into serfdom and so on.

Following from these same noble principles, a woman can't deprive her child of life in order that her life of partying, having fun and carefree sex can continue.

Having children is a natural consequence of having sex, and a natural function of a human organism. Therefore, raising children is not comparable to slavery. No more than being a child subject to parental authority is. At most it could be compared to mutual slavery, a bit like in marriage.

Consequently, it's not a violation of the right to freedom per se.

The problem comes down to a certain discomfort associated with having to pay for your own decisions or, in some fraction of a percent of cases (rape pregnancy), having ro raise a child you didn't want to have and couldn't do anything about that.

The right to life is a right of higher rank than the right to comfort and convenience.

Equality that you invoke, would necessitate the equal treating of the rights of the woman and the child. Therefore, equality would even increase the need to protect the child's right to life over a lower-ranking right of the woman to comfort.

These natural or "unalienable rights" are not only "self-evident," but God given rights, and not those of Man. They cannot be usurped by man-made laws.That is what I, as a Catholic, firmly support.

Those rights are either given from God or derived from the natural order that God has set.

Therefore, it is not up to human legislators to change them.

Therefore, it is not up to human legislators to allow the killing of the child in the name of the woman's comfort and convenience.

Some may want to follow whatever the Pope says, as an example.And what the Pope says is that life is to be protected.

This is similiar to what Snook is arguing for in his idea of "Snookism." That the State nor the Chruch have the right to usurp the mother's right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. He must have read Jefferson's ideas on rights also.The idea of state is that interests and rights of citizens collide and therefore a form of government is needed to set priorities and enforce them as needed. In this sense, the state has every right to reduce colliding rights in proportion, to forgo the lower ranking rights that collide with higher ranking ones, or to set a more specific modus operandi.

The mother has no right to violate the child's right to life. Therefore, it's the duty of the state, the society and even fellow humans to intercept and prevent the crime.

That you would ask her to carry the baby of someone who raped her, is to ignore her value as not only a human, but a victim as well.And to allow her to take the child's life is to ignore the child's basic and foremost rigt to life, ignoring him totally as a subject of human rights.

It also violates equality, as it places an elusive right of one person to comfort or convenience, more or less loosely inferred from the rights to liberty and pursue of happiness, over the explicit and highest ranking right to life of another person.

A breach of the right to life includes in itself a violation of the right to liberty as well (you can't take someone's life without taking his liberty), so the liberty of the mother is visibly ranked higher than the child's analogous right by pro-abortionists.

The argument has been put forth that the baby should not suffer because the sins of the father. But the mother should not bear the sins of the father her entire life also. So, how does one choose?Under no condition should any punitive means be taken against an innocent person. There is no justification whatsoever.

As a result, we have to put the rapist father aside and weight the interests of the mother and the child against each other. The life of the mother isn't in danger. Ergo, the life of the child is to be taken by the mother in no danger to her own life. As the right to life is superior to the right to implicit right to comfort and convenience (the explicit right to happiness isn't there to protect you from yourself and your actions), therefore the child's right must prevail. Therefore, the child is not to be killed.

Yes, but he never gave up his Roman citizenship. As for women staying single: There was once a strange Christian cult - the Shakers - they believed the same thing, (perhaps they took St Paul seriously) that women should not engage with men. Guess what there aren't anymore of?Actually, the primary addressee of Paul is the male population. He who has a wife should keep her, but he who has no wife had better not seek one. This, naturally, applies to women as well, but as women aren't the primary target but men are, Paul's teachings can't be construed as restrictive towards women in this respect.

Paul didn't try to enforce chastity and celibacy on all the faithful: Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband. Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto the husband. The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife. (1 Cor 7, 2-3)

Those who are married are under no condition to divorce and remarry, therefore a sect that dissolves marriages is in violation of Paul's command:

And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband: But and if she depart, let her remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband: and let not the husband put away his wife. But to the rest speak I, not the Lord: If any brother hath a wife that believeth not, and she be pleased to dwell with him, let him not put her away. (1 Cor 7, 10-12)

In 1 Cor 7, 27-28, Paul suggests it's better not to seek a wife if you have none: Art thou bound unto a wife? seek not to be loosed. Art thou loosed from a wife? seek not a wife. But and if thou marry, thou hast not sinned; and if a virgin marry, she hath not sinned. Nevertheless such shall have trouble in the flesh: but I spare you.

But that's not a command, as Paul mentions before in 1 Cor 7, 7-9:

For I would that all men were even as I myself. But every man hath his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that. I say therefore to the unmarried and widows, It is good for them if they abide even as I. But if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn.

As I explain it, it's better to marry than to burn, but it's better not to seek a wife or a husband actively in order just to have one, if it can be avoided.

The quotes are from King James Bible, so it's definitely not a Catholic plot of yours truly ;)

Chev, situations can drastically change. A woman could have planned to get pregnant, and due to whatever circomstances, the relationship could end out of the blue. The man walks away from his pregnant ex, so she faces a future of being a single mother. Those are situations in which a woman should have the right to reconsider. Perfectly normal imho.

And that's just one example, there are many other situations that could shed a total different light things.

This is one of the VERY few points that I agree with conservatives, as I am against abortion, except if it is incest and/or rape. You did it, you take the consequences.

There are only three reasons I could accept abortion:

1) (woman's choice) If conceived during rape.

2) (woman's choice) If pregnancy endangers the woman's life.

3) (both man and woman's choice) If conceived under circumstances that are normal, eg... Man meets woman, they get 'funky', she gets pregnant!

In this case, she should have to go through the term and the father should be, if not morally, then legally bound to be with that woman at least until delivery, and the child can be given up for adoption or any other more accepted means OTHER than abortion! (you play, you pay!!!)

Also, discussing with the father(provided he is a worthy father who is not the 'dead-beat' type) is absolutely a necessity!

As a potential father myself, if a woman is with me, does not tell me she is carrying my child, and aborts it, that would be unforgiveable to me, and have reprecussions if she will murder our child, for any reason that is not 1 or 2 above and not even give me say in the childs life.

It may be her body, but the child is also a part of the father's life as well, a part of his essence is in the child, and he should have equal say in the child's life provided he is going to take responsibility for his actions as well, otherwise, I could, reluctantly see aborting as an option in this instance too.

(This is my opinion in the matter, not intended to offend anyone ;) )

By surviving, I meant living autonomously, i.e. sustaining itself with its own metabolism and respiration. Ergo, you didn't address my point.

What about people who need artificial devices in their organisms to survive, or transplants?

Chev, situations can drastically change. A woman could have planned to get pregnant, and due to whatever circomstances, the relationship could end out of the blue. The man walks away from his pregnant ex, so she faces a future of being a single mother. Those are situations in which a woman should have the right to reconsider. Perfectly normal imho.This only shows how inconvenient for the woman the child would be. I've addressed the hierarchy of rights above, and I'm not going to repeat myself.

And that's just one example, there are many other situations that could shed a total different light things.No, those examples can only show how people are ready to commit murder and declare it morally right if it is convenient for them.

Imagine you're an heir to the throne. Is it all right to have the current king killed because you'd be a better ruler?

Or, you really, really deserve promotion. Your boss is totally useless, but knows the right people. There's no other way than to arrange "an accident", incapacitating him?

Or, there could be that old Balzac's example: an old mean man who never shares his money. Is it all right to kill him and give his money to the poor?

You can multiply examples like above in geometric progress, but it doesn't change the two basic facts: that it's calculation based on convenience and that you have to assume the role of the lord of someone's life and death to make the decision.

[ June 03, 2004, 21:35: Message edited by: chevalier ]

I'm not going to challenge you to take this conversation to the next level, although i wouldn't really mind. It's just that we already went down that road several times. I'm from the Netherlands, where something as an abortion is at least negotiable. The rest of Europe hasn't arrived at that station yet, but it shouldn't be long anymore.

If we can't even come together over simple matters like this, then by all means, let's go back to how it was 10 years ago.

I've also spent some time with the bigger picture - from the point of view of American colonies (which actually inherited from Locke and Hume, anyway) that later became the United States, and from the European point of view of Lafayette's French version and its evolution in French constitutionalism.
In the opinion of most Americans that would not be the big picture, but the dinky one. There is a good reason why the shots fired at Lexington and Concord were "heard around the world." The Revolution changed the politcial dynamics of Western Europe completely. But this is not the point of this dialogue, but the Declaration of Independence itself. To the main point it would have been helpful if you had actually bothered to read my posts on this subject.

The words: "Give me Liberty or give me Death," should have been a big tip-off that Life without Liberty has little meaning. But then perhaps this is largley an Amercian perspective. In that case, the weight of argument is on the side of Liberty anyway, since the Declaration is an American document, written by an American, for Americans. And its intention was to start a revolution, which indeed it did.

What I understand from all it is that Life is the first and supreme right and the highest value That may be your opinion but it was not the opinion of the Founders, and those of the Revolutionary generation; many of whom went to their deaths for the right to have Liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Following from these same noble principles, a woman can't deprive her child of life in order that her life of partying, having fun and carefree sex can continue. A woman should first have decided if she is ready to have sex and possibly face the result, which is pregnancy.
I find it odd that you keep thinking of "the woman" as the one doing the "partying" here. As if she is "partying" by herself. I notice that your rants never include a male partner. How odd.

But I'm not sure if that's what the Founding Brothers had in mind anyway. I'm sure their thoughts were largely political rather than the "right to party." You may want to consider the Beasty Boys on the "right to party" thing. But again, I thought this was supposed to be a serious dialogue.

Having children is a natural consequence of having sex, and a natural function of a human organism. Thank you for stating the obvious.
But here's the punch line:

At most it could be compared to mutual slavery, a bit like in marriage.Have you been watching "Married with Children?" Somehow we have gone from Jefferson's view of the Rights of Man, to Al Bundy's view of marriage and its lack of "freedom."

Consequently, it's not a violation of the right to freedom per se.Do you mean having sex? or being married? Or maybe both.

in some fraction of a percent of cases (rape pregnancy), having ro raise a child you didn't want to have and couldn't do anything about that.
Or being the victim of a crime.

The right to life is a right of higher rank than the right to comfort and convenience.
Did you mean to say the right to Liberty and the pursuit of happiness?

The idea of state is that interests and rights of citizens collide and therefore a form of government is needed to set priorities and enforce them as needed. In this sense, the state has every right to reduce colliding rights in proportion, to forgo the lower ranking rights that collide with higher ranking ones, or to set a more specific modus operandi.Not in the case of abortion. Perhaps in Poland, but not here. In 40 years since Roe v. Wade, the State has not done any such thing. Probably because of the Declartion. Some of our government leaders have acutally read it, and as importantly, believe it.

The mother has no right to violate the child's right to life. Therefore, it's the duty of the state, the society and even fellow humans to intercept and prevent the crime.
Did you mean the rape? since abortion is not a "crime" here.

And to allow her to take the child's life is to ignore the child's basic and foremost rigt to life, ignoring him totally as a subject of human rights.Perhaps you missed the "all men are created equal" part of this dialogue. See Patrick Henry or Thomas Jefferson for a fuller definition of "rights." Ah, but you may thought they meant only "men."

Under no condition should any punitive means be taken against an innocent person. There is no justification whatsoever.Except the woman of course. Her lack of innocence appears to be her gender in your world.

so the liberty of the mother is visibly ranked higher than the child's analogous right by pro-abortionists So the rapist and baby's liberty is ranked higher than that of woman's by anti-abortionists?

Actually, the primary addressee of Paul is the male population. Surprise!

but he who has no wife had better not seek one. This, naturally, applies to women as well,Have you been spending time with Arnold?

Paul didn't try to enforce chastity and celibacy on all the faithful: Yes, there would not have been anymore "faithful" after a generation or two.

The life of the mother isn't in danger.No, now she only has a constant reminder of the dishonor and crime committed against her. And now not only has she been brutally raped, but now she gets to raise the child and create a family with the rapist. Not only that, but she may already have a family and husband. So now the entire family, including the mother's babies, which she actually chose to have, is now poisioned by the criminal. How noble of you.

and she be pleased to dwell with him, let him not put her away. Does he mean like a box of Lego blocks?

but it's better not to seek a wife or a husband actively in order just to have one, if it can be avoided.
I was wondering where DR. Phil got that from.

Why should I establish a household at the age of 20? And how, in the first place? Marry a random woman, invite her to my parents' house, make babies, leave my studies and sweep streets for a living?
No, I don't want to have fun "and such" for as long as I can. I want my studies finished and job secured, because I want a house for my children and a considerable steady income to pay for it and keep it going.
Who said that? Everyone wants that, even some women. Hard to believe I guess - that women may want to actually make their own decisions about their own lives. Could it be about the pursuit of happiness? Or Liberty? Or about the right to Life? A life of one's own choosing, we all hope. Anything else is called Tyranny.

[ June 04, 2004, 06:52: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

I just wanted to say that I agree with Moxy here. Grey Magistrate, you are my hero.

Chandos the Red, your post disappoints me. You used to apply more logic in the framing of the previous ones. And far less emotion as well as far more objectivism.

In the opinion of most Americans that would not be the big picture, but the dinky one. There is a good reason why the shots fired at Lexington and Concord were "heard around the world." The Revolution changed the politcial dynamics of Western Europe completely. But this is not the point of this dialogue, but the Declaration of Independence itself. To the main point it would have been helpful if you had actually bothered to read my posts on this subject.I do not actually bother to trace your posting history. No offence, but you're not important enough for me to bother this much about your writing. If you ever become a celebrated political writer, drop me a line and I'll buy a book or two. Until then, let's hold back on it.

The words: "Give me Liberty or give me Death," should have been a big tip-off that Life without Liberty has little meaning. But then perhaps this is largley an Amercian perspective. In that case, the weight of argument is on the side of Liberty anyway, since the Declaration is an American document, written by an American, for Americans. And its intention was to start a revolution, which indeed it did.I am not sure if you're aware of this, but there's a place known as "the rest of the world" and the abortion issue isn't limited to America. Neither is "the rest of the world" really feeling bound by American documents.

You're also twisting the intentions of the Founding Fathers to suit your current agenda. I'm surprised that you haven't made them devout pro-abortionists as of yet.

That may be your opinion but it was not the opinion of the Founders, and those of the Revolutionary generation; many of whom went to their deaths for the right to have Liberty and the pursuit of happiness.The Founding Fathers, first of all, were not the guys who faced English bayonets. Next, those guys who actually did, weren't doing it with your pro-abortionist agenda in mind, as it were.

I find it odd that you keep thinking of "the woman" as the one doing the "partying" here. As if she is "partying" by herself. I notice that your rants never include a male partner. How odd.Your persistence in swaying the subject impresses me. However, what seems to escape you is that a male is physically unable to have an abortion on the basis of the fact that males aren't supposed to become pregnant.

Therefore, I could technically add "the same would apply to males if males were able to get pregnant", but I think the majority of people is smart enough to understand this without a special notice.

But I'm not sure if that's what the Founding Brothers had in mind anyway. I'm sure their thoughts were largely political rather than the "right to party." You may want to consider the Beasty Boys on the "right to party" thing. But again, I thought this was supposed to be a serious dialogue.I am dead serious when it comes to life.

The right to party, feel comfortable and have the consequences of your actions removed from your life is some vaguely implicit right that you seem to infer from the right to liberty and pursue of happiness, at which point I move in to stop that.

Have you been watching "Married with Children?" Somehow we have gone from Jefferson's view of the Rights of Man, to Al Bundy's view of marriage and its lack of "freedom."I don't know if Paul was a fan of Al Bundy, but he said in 1 Cor 7, 3:

"The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife."

Having power of someone's body is the core of owning, as you own a slave. In this sense, spouses belong to each other and serve each other.

If you prefer some Contract for Exclusive Sex and Shared Tax Breaks, have it your way.

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Consequently, it's not a violation of the right to freedom per se.
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Do you mean having sex? or being married? Or maybe both.Surprising as it may be to you, I mean that having children as a result of having sex is not a violation of someone's civil rights. It's nature. (Naturally, if men were able to get pregnant, this would apply to men as well.)

Are you also going to sue nature for infringing on your right to liberty if you fall ill and can't leave your house?

Or being the victim of a crime."Or being victim of a crime" is included in "having ro raise a child you didn't want to have and couldn't do anything about that"

If a woman becomes pregnant (which would also apply to a man if men were able to become pregnant) as a result of rape, we can safely assume that she doesn't want to have that child. By definition of rape, she couldn't do anything about being raped. Ergo: being victim of rape and becoming pregnant is, basically, "having ro raise a child you didn't want to have and couldn't do anything about that".

Please apply some logical thinking next time. It will cut a paragraph or ten off my posts making everyone happy.

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The right to life is a right of higher rank than the right to comfort and convenience.

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Did you mean to say the right to Liberty and the pursuit of happiness?No, I meant a generic right to feeling comfortable and having things arranged in a way convenient for you, removing the results of your actions from your way. That's the vaguely implicit right that you infer from the right to liberty and pursuit of happiness.

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The idea of state is that interests and rights of citizens collide and therefore a form of government is needed to set priorities and enforce them as needed. In this sense, the state has every right to reduce colliding rights in proportion, to forgo the lower ranking rights that collide with higher ranking ones, or to set a more specific modus operandi.
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Not in the case of abortion. Perhaps in Poland, but not here. In 40 years since Roe v. Wade, the State has not done any such thing. Probably because of the Declartion. Some of our government leaders have acutally read it, and as importantly, believe it.Essentially, what I wrote there is the very base of law doctrine regarding conflicts of rights.

If there are two incompatible rights, one must be given precedence. The other way is to reduce both rights to such a level as to make them compatible with one another.

Let's take John and Frank. John feels bad about his neighbour Frank living yonder and arrives at the conclusion that the very existence of Frank violates his (John's) right to pursue of happiness. Therefore, he grabs his shotgun and shoots Frank's head off in order to secure his happiness.

The court, however, will probably give precedence to Frank's right to Life over John's pursue of happiness.

If the state were not to intervene in this case of colliding rights, the court would have to pat John on his shoulder and say "yeah, bro, you were in your right, hope your right to pursue of happiness won't be violated like this".

Next, you could have a divorced couple, let's say... Jake and Elsie, who have a son. They won't live with one another, but they both have a right to have children!

So what does the state do? Allow them to fist-fight for the custody or something? No. The court chooses the custodian and gives the other parent the right to visit the kid (precedence of rights). Or both get custody but the kid spends half the year with one and the other half with the other parent (proportional reduction of rights).

So far as I know, the US courts aren't an exception here and thus the US state, as well as any other state, reduces people's conflicting rights in proportion and gives some rights precedence over other rights instead of letting the citizens solve it on their own. Like duel or something.

If you prefer the state to allow the citizens to solve conflicts on their own, perhaps you should move to a clan society, or some no-man's land? Don't forget to sharpen your duelling axe.

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The mother has no right to violate the child's right to life. Therefore, it's the duty of the state, the society and even fellow humans to intercept and prevent the crime.

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Did you mean the rape? since abortion is not a "crime" here.Maybe not in the legal sense as the law is interpreted as of now. However, crime has a broader sense than a type of criminal offence under law.

Murder is crime, legal or not. Abortion is murder. Therefore, abortion is crime. You may disagree with me, but you can't deny my views some inherent sense :rolleyes:

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And to allow her to take the child's life is to ignore the child's basic and foremost rigt to life, ignoring him totally as a subject of human rights.
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Perhaps you missed the "all men are created equal" part of this dialogue. See Patrick Henry or Thomas Jefferson for a fuller definition of "rights." Ah, but you may thought they meant only "men."If all men are created equal, is the mother more equal than the child?

I don't understand why and how you can claim that equality means that the mother's rights (which would also apply to fathers if fathers wee able to get pregnant) are more important than the baby's rights. I would rather think that equality means that the mother's rights are as good as the child's rights. But I'm not American, and I don't even live there, so what do I know a damn about equality.

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Under no condition should any punitive means be taken against an innocent person. There is no justification whatsoever.
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Except the woman of course. Her lack of innocence appears to be her gender in your world.Now that was heavy. I understand your eagerness to win in this debate and prove me wrong, but making me look retarded and mentally living in the stone age isn't really the way. Plus, it's not like you're going to succeed in it, anyway.

Having a child as a result of having sex is no more punitive than aging and dying when you get old enough. Is God inflicting undeserved capital penalty on you when you get 95 years old and die in your bed?

However, aborting the child BECAUSE his father raped the mother is punishing the child in place of the father. Your reasoning looks like this:

The child was conceived during rape, AND rape is a crime. A crime deserves punishment, THEREFORE the child should pay for it with his life.

No matter who has actually done it, someone has to pay for the crime :rolleyes:

In civilised countries, beginning with ancient republican Rome, there's a rule that says nullum crimen sine lege, no crime without a law, "a law" meaning a parliament bill or corresponding act. Soon it was followed by nulla poena sine lege, ie no punishment without a law. Therefore, no punishment to someone who hasn't broken any law.

What law has the rapist's child broken? Yeah, tell me. What crime did the baby commit?

As for your accusation that I hold women responsible for rapes committed on them etc etc, disregarding the fact that it's completely illogical rubbish intended to present me as a troglodite, I remind you that I've already devoted a paragraph to rapists who in my oh so humble opinion deserve castration.

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so the liberty of the mother is visibly ranked higher than the child's analogous right by pro-abortionists
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So the rapist and baby's liberty is ranked higher than that of woman's by anti-abortionists?The rapist's liberty is of no consequence here. You only mention it to create an opposition of an innocent and unjustly oppressed rape victim and an evil rapist and use it to support your argument.

However, whether to abort a rapist's child or not is between the mother (or the father, should he be able to get pregnant) and the child. I have already said that the rapist (or his family) should cover all costs and even take the child completely on himself (themselves) should the victim demand this.

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but he who has no wife had better not seek one. This, naturally, applies to women as well,
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Have you been spending time with Arnold?No, but I have been spending time with people who don't understand that if a sentence about seeking a wife if you had none is applied "to women as well", it means seeking a husband if a woman has none.

Why you have made the effort of searching through the archives for my other posts on seeking a spouse is beyond me. Are you really so huge a fan of my writing? I feel honoured.

And yes, I believe seeking a spouse for the sake of having one is a very bad idea and leads to problems. It's better to marry the right candidate if and when you meet one.

But if you prefer to get married ASAP with no matter whom, have it your way.

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The life of the mother isn't in danger.
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No, now she only has a constant reminder of the dishonor and crime committed against her. And now not only has she been brutally raped, but now she gets to raise the child and create a family with the rapist.I have already said that the rapist and/or his family should cover all costs and even take the child over completely if the rape victim demands this.

So now the entire family, including the mother's babies, which she actually chose to have, is now poisioned by the criminal.And the criminal is the baby, right?

Or criminal offspring or some such? Thus deserving only death?

No, now she only has a constant reminder of the dishonorAs my father used to say, undeserved harm doesn't make dishonour. What makes dishonour is compromising your honour by acting against it. Like killing innocents. Or inflicting revenge on the offender's family.

And now not only has she been brutally rapedEven though rape requires brutality to enaact, there's a difference between rape and brutal rape and not all rape counts as brutal rape. Don't add more emotions than it's needed. Cool and calm deliberation better serves debate and arguments than a boiling brain.

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and she be pleased to dwell with him, let him not put her away.
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Does he mean like a box of Lego blocks?Paul surely had Lego blocks on his mind. Paul also owned a jet plane, drank Guinness and played on Antiochian stock market. Rumour has it, he worked for the CIA as well. Or was it Al-Quaeda.

How noble of you.Yeah, that reassures me I'm doing my job well.

Would you rather see the woman give birth to an unwanted child ? You know how that story goes, don't you ? Aren't there enough orphanages already ? If a phoetus has loving parents to look forward to, he'll have a pretty good life and a safe environment to grow up in. If that's not the case, it's better off not being born at all. There's way too many of those unwanted kids outthere as it is. I know a few, and they all have a bitter view on life as a whole, have no optimistic feelings about the future, and develop criminal behaviour faster than "normal" kids. If i were to grow up under such circumstances, i'd rather would have seen my mother go with an abortion 38 years ago.

How the hell can you think a rapist would make a suitable parent? Or his family, for that matter. "Here, take this kid your family member conceived when he had his fun and care for him/her well".

As for "God-given rights", the rights we have are given by society. Our laws and values aren't dictated by what a fictitious spook in the sky said.

Children orphaned by living parents are a sad occurence. So is poverty. Even more so is a raped woman - a sight that makes the blood of every real man boil. However, such sad circumstances don't give us the right to kill a human being. Neither can we judge the value of a person basing on circumstances of his conception (rape, incest, adultery, one night stand, you name it), economic status or innate disability. We don't have any right to deem a person unworthy of living. Our own hardship doesn't give us the right to do harm to other humans in order to alleviate our suffering, either.

Not inflicting my judgement on mothers who for various reasons decide to abort their children, I can't in clear conscience stand still while the act is taking place. As a Christian, I believe God will judge them, as He will judge fathers who participated in creating the situation, among those rapists, adulterers, men who abandon the mothers of their children. Each of those bears a level of guilt according to his awareness and the harm done. As a moral person, having a specific philosophy, I believe that those person's conscience will mete out a punishment even in this life; they will be the judges of themselves, as will be mothers who abort their children.

Even given that actions will be judged and justice will be served, harmful acts can't be let happen; they must be prevented in so far as it is possible. There are various levels of guilt and association and non-action belong to those. In clear conscience, a moral being can neither allow nor ignore evil if anything can be done. Despite trials of life, despite hardship.

Therefore, the men (males) involved in the conception should face the consequences of their actions, the society should render aid to the mothers in difficult circumstances as well, the families and local communities should provide support. The killing of the unborn child can't be let happen, though.

As for "God-given rights", the rights we have are given by society. Our laws and values aren't dictated by what a fictitious spook in the sky said. I should like to point out that 53% of the world's population worships the "fictitious spook in the sky," (in one form or another) and that the US. Constitution (And quite a few others) is based upon things that he is quoted as saying. Even the money we pay in our shopping centers and at our grocers has "in God we trust" stamped on it. Our entire society was founded on religious principles.

Oh, by the way, abortion is mean. Don't do it.

Suppose we take a step back and consider a different analogy.

I think we're all agreed that:

1) Abortion kills a human being.
2) Access to abortion increases women's liberty and happiness.
3) Some births are wanted, others unwanted; free abortion is an excellent means to end an unwanted pregnancy.

The first is scientifically undeniable; the second and third are sociologically demonstrable. The pro-life position incurs serious costs on women's freedom to live their lives as they wish. (Not that this is necessarily a bad thing - marriage, for instance, incurs serious costs on men's freedom to sleep around - but it IS a cost.)

So let's consider two scenarios.

First scenario: a civil war breaks out in Canada. (Hey, it could happen!) Canada bombs Montreal into the ground, and sends thousands of infantry soldiers into the rebellious province to kill, loot, extort, and more to intimidate the population into submission. Terrified, hundreds of thousands of Quebecois refugees flee to the American border.

The US Border Patrol, in response, sets up machine guns at the border and mows them down.

Did the US ask for war refugees? No. (Though one tactless commentator notes that, "Hey, America looks so darn attractive, it was ASKING to be fled to!") Is the US responsible for the evil that created the refugees? No. Would accepting these refugees cost the US enormous sums that could have been spent on American education, health care, and deficit reduction? Oh yeah. Would accepting a flood of impoverished refugees distort the identity of the border states struggling to absorb them? Most certainly.

But do these staggering costs, and the US' innocence regarding the refugees' status, justify the (extremely effective) solution of executing the refugees?

Second scenario: you come back from vacation to discover that some idiot has left a stray puppy on your doorstep. Your family has a history of accepting strays, as do many of the families in the neighborhood. It's both accepted and expected. However, you don't want a dog, and can't spare the time and money to care for it. It's not the puppy's fault it was abandoned, but taking in the dog imposes serious costs on your freedom and ambitions.

So, after fruitlessly checking around for other possible owners, you have the puppy put to sleep.

Is this wrong? No. It's unfortunate for the puppy, and it's unpleasant to be put in such a situation. You may get some nasty looks from others in the neighborhood. But you are fully within your moral rights to have the dog killed.

What's the main difference between the two scenarios? Humanity. Animals may be loved, but they are expendable; humans may be unloved, but they are never expendable.

We don't have to argue about the huge costs that nature imposes on women because we ALREADY AGREE that women are burdened by childbearing. Raising just one kid to adulthood saps two decades from a woman's life. Two decades! - and those are the decades when the woman is youngest and strongest, and when male competitors are scaling the corporate ladder. And it doesn't help when the majority of men are faithless, deceptive drifters who think of themselves as "breeders" rather than "fathers".

Granted, some people - religious types, mostly - argue that motherhood is honorable, that having children is a good thing, and that women may be truly fulfilled in raising children, even in a difficult environment. Most would counter, however, that although they're grateful for their OWN mothers' sacrifices, our generation has finally realized (after thousands of unenlightened years) that Dr. Henry Higgins was right: The best way to be a woman is to act like a man. That requires giving women the same right to betray their kids as men have "enjoyed" for millennia.

Call me unenlightened, but women deserve better than that.

Well, against my better judgement, I'm going to jump in here again.
I think we're all agreed that:

1) Abortion kills a human being.
Nope, I have to disagree with you there. From my original post:
For me, it's a question of how to define what a human life is, and at what point does that humanity begin. Certainly, the whole process starts with conception, but you'd have a hard time convincing me that you have a human life at that point; it's more a potential human, but the same could be said of a sperm cell or an unfertilized egg. Now, where to draw the line is another matter, but to me, if an abortion is done "early enough" (whatever that means), you aren't taking a human life. Whether "early enough" is 8 weeks, 12 weeks, 16 weeks, or something else, doesn't change the basic premise in my opinion.

Edit: Wow! 3 posts basically at the same time saying basically the same thing.
But I was first. :p

Grey - I don't like abortion and am not in favor of it generally or specifically with certain limited exceptions not at issue in the grand scheme of things (for example, I don't believe that anyone here truly believes that a woman should carry a child to term when the process will kill her).

One thing that you take for granted, though, that others may not, is your first assumption -- i.e., that abortion kills a human being.

I'm sure you believe that, but I would hazard a guess that anyone who is pro-choice does not agree. (If they did agree, I have no idea how they could possibly sleep at night.)

Some people don't believe that it's a human being until its born. Others believe that it's a human when, if born prematurely, it stood a reasonable chance of surviving to live a "normal" life (even with heroic medical measures required for the beginning of that life). Still others believe that, if there's any chance it could survive if born, no matter how slim and no matter how wretched that life, then it's human. Finally, there are those who believe it's human at the moment of conception. I assume that you fit into the latter category.

However, the definition of when human life starts is neither scientific nor exact, as it relies on a certain subjective element.

My two cents and somewhat off-topic.

I think we're all agreed that:

1) Abortion kills a human being.
2) Access to abortion increases women's liberty and happiness.
3) Some births are wanted, others unwanted; free abortion is an excellent means to end an unwanted pregnancy. Somehow, I don't think we're all united in our agreement on point number 1...

I should like to point out that 53% of the world's population worships the "fictitious spook in the sky," (in one form or another) and that the US. Constitution (And quite a few others) is based upon things that he is quoted as saying. Even the money we pay in our shopping centers and at our grocers has "in God we trust" stamped on it. Our entire society was founded on religious principles. Doesn't mean that it still should be regulated by those teachings, based on personal belief. It's no coincidence that religion's influence diminished with the Age of Enlightenment. Religion is (or should be) a private matter; something that people who use the argument "because God said so" apparently haven't grasped.

Doesn't mean that it still should be regulated by those teachings, based on personal belief.This sounds much better than "our laws and values aren't dictated by what a fictitious spook in the sky said.".

As for: "Religion is (or should be) a private matter; something that people who use the argument "because God said so" apparently haven't grasped."

Religion is (or should be) a private matter;That's a matter of opinion and you present yours here. However, any and all individual has the right to his religious views and expression thereof, in public as well.

something that people who use the argument "because God said so" apparently haven't graspedThose people disagree with your opinion and "grasping" anything has nothing to do with this.

People who disagree with you aren't necessarily any less aware than you are.

Slith's point when he mentioned the 53% worshipping God was not that the minority should give in, but that you carelessly offended the feelings of some half of the Earth's population.

However, the definition of when human life starts is neither scientific nor exact, as it relies on a certain subjective element.Not true. By purely scientific standards, the fetus is "human" right from conception. It has entirely human DNA, distinct from chickens, dogs, apes, whatever. To say otherwise would require that there be two different species of "human" with the same DNA code - distinguished only locationally by whether the critter happens to be inside or outside the womb. We don't do that for any other species, and it would be arbitrary (though politically useful) to do such for the human species. The "scientific" argument against the fetus' humanity is very poor.

But if we move beyond science into philosophy...

Some people don't believe that it's a human being until its born. Others believe that it's a human when, if born prematurely, it stood a reasonable chance of surviving to live a "normal" life (even with heroic medical measures required for the beginning of that life). Still others believe that, if there's any chance it could survive if born, no matter how slim and no matter how wretched that life, then it's human. Finally, there are those who believe it's human at the moment of conception. I assume that you fit into the latter category.I think what you mean is that although a fetus may be "human", it doesn't acquire human rights until a certain point. Many people (with a less scientific bent) conflate the two and assume that if someone lacks human rights, of course they ain't human. The better argument is that a fetus is undeniably human, but it lacks the same rights, value, and protection that we afford to born humans.

There are indeed cogent arguments to be made for such positions - and these coherent positions, as you imply, let their holders "sleep at night". I don't agree with 'em, but they are defensible. Let's go through them one by one:

Some people don't believe that it's a human being until its born.

This is locational bias - the baby's position (inside or outside the womb) dictates its value - but that's not necessarily a bad thing. We use locational bias all the time. If someone is born inside America's borders, they automatically get American citizenship; if they're born outside, they have to jump through all sorts of hoops to win entry. That's a form of locational bias, but it's a useful form. The awkward bit about this argument is that it means that a six-month-old prematurely-born baby is somehow "more" human than a fetus aborted at seven months.

Others believe that it's a human when, if born prematurely, it stood a reasonable chance of surviving to live a "normal" life (even with heroic medical measures required for the beginning of that life).

This makes humanity contextually dependent on scientific advance. Again, not necessarily a problem. But suppose one fetus is born prematurely in a state-of-the-art New York hospital, and another fetus (same age) is born prematurely in an African slum. Is the one baby "more" human because doctors were available to save it?

Still others believe that, if there's any chance it could survive if born, no matter how slim and no matter how wretched that life, then it's human.

This is connected to the above argument, but neatly solves the New York-Africa dilemma by supposing that the kid is human based not on the immediately available medical attention, but on the medical quality ANYWHERE in the world. So since the African fetus could survive if born in New York (but couldn't possibly survive if born in Africa), it's still worthy of being assigned human value. 'Course, this still makes humanity contextually dependent on scientific advance...it just broadens the parameters globally.

Finally, there are those who believe it's human at the moment of conception.

Scientifically this is true. Philosophically...maybe. I think it is, but I can't prove it. But then, I tend to defer to science and rationality anyway.

To my mind, there are really only two worthy philosophical arguments in favor of abortion, and Chandos has touched on both (if unintentionally). The first is that the fetus is indeed human, but its rights must be balanced against the mother's rights. Even though the fetus has human rights, its right to life is ultimately trumped by the mother's own right to liberty (and happiness, if you want the whole Declaration set). So while abortion is a tragedy - even a murderous one - it is still a legitimate and moral action.

The second is that the fetus is human, but human rights gradually mature as a human grows older and wiser. Life is a process, and what matters is the quality of the humanity. So a well-educated twenty-something is "more" human than an unborn kid, by dint of having richer experiences and social connections. If given a choice between a young woman who has a fresh life ahead of herself, versus a human just beginning in the womb, the choice is obvious - sacrifice the lesser human for the greater. It certainly wouldn't make sense to sacrifice the woman's greater humanity for the kid's mere potential, unless you suppose that humans are equal in value.

'Course, if you buy either of these two arguments, you'll have a hard time figuring out why we arbitrarily stop at birth...and THAT'S when you'll have trouble sleeping at night.

No offence, but you're not important enough for me to bother this much about your writing. Don't bother to patronize me when it was clearly your intention to be offensive.

Neither is "the rest of the world" really feeling bound by American documents.
Actually most Americans are not "bound" by the documents of the Founders, but are the reverse, freed by them. The rest of the world I leave to your concern.

The Founding Fathers, first of all, were not the guys who faced English bayonets. Two things here: One, Hamilton, Washington and John Marshall served in the Continental Army. Your knowledge of American history is really rather shallow, since you don't know that at least George Washington had not only fought in the Revolution, but often led his troops from the "front of the pack." Two, my post stated "those of the Revolutionary generation," which was meant to include more than just the Founding Brothers of the generation, but the larger population as well.

However, what seems to escape you is that a male is physically unable to have an abortion on the basis of the fact that males aren't supposed to become pregnant.
No they can only cause it to happen. That would only make them "accessories" to the "crime."

The right to party, feel comfortable and have the consequences of your actions removed from your life is some vaguely implicit right that you seem to infer from the right to liberty and pursue of happiness, at which point I move in to stop that.
No, you brought the dialogue down to the level of "partying." That is something I never would have considered in a real debate about serious issues. So much for being "dead serious about life."

I don't know if Paul was a fan of Al Bundy, but he said in 1 Cor 7, 3:
You were the one who implied that marriage was "like slavery." That was one of the statements that I took to mean that this was no longer a serious deabte of the issues.


Even though rape requires brutality to enaact, there's a difference between rape and brutal rape and not all rape counts as brutal rape. Well, what can be said for such a statement? You rant on about how important life is; yet, you don't even understand the diminsions of a crime such as rape. I think most women who are raped would consider themselves to have been brutalized. In fact, that is probably one of the most offensive lines I have ever seen posted on these boards. My feeling is that there is nothing more to gained from this "debate."

But:

I understand your eagerness to win in this debate and prove me wrong, but making me look retarded and mentally living in the stone age isn't really the way. Plus, it's not like you're going to succeed in it, anyway.
I don't need to, since you are doing such a good job of it on your own.

[ June 05, 2004, 07:52: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

Not true. By purely scientific standards, the fetus is "human" right from conception. It has entirely human DNA, distinct from chickens, dogs, apes, whatever. To say otherwise would require that there be two different species of "human" with the same DNA code - distinguished only locationally by whether the critter happens to be inside or outside the womb. We don't do that for any other species, and it would be arbitrary (though politically useful) to do such for the human species. The "scientific" argument against the fetus' humanity is very poor.

But if we move beyond science into philosophy...

You are correct in assuming that I was not measuring humanity in scientific terms (if I had intended to do so, I would have used homo sapiens rather than "human being.")

As for the philosophical issue, I personally believe that it's a human being from the get-go, but those people I know who are pro-choice tend to not view it that way. To them, it's not a human being with a lesser bag of rights, it's more like a human being in waiting. (I think that the lesser bag of rights issue raises a whole moral conundrum equivalent to the rationale that underlied slavery.)

In any event, to them, it ain't a human until it has a decent chance of living outside the womb. Can't say I agree, but they don't agree with your weighing the rights of two humans against each other -- it's a human vs. a wanna-be. Otherwise, you could argue that the moment of birth is irrelevant to the continuity of rights, which would open an entirely new can of worms.

On the other hand, as I am not completely anti-abortion, my own personal moral dilemma is broken down to "When is it OK?"

As alluded to in an earlier post, if the baby's gonna kill the mama, I'm for the mama. If the baby's gonna die after a "life" of less than three years, all spent in intolerable pain (Tay Sachs anyone?), I'm for the mercy-killing.

There aren't many other circumstances in which I agree with abortion, although I have a tough time with the rape question due to the fact that the baby is a constant reminder of the rape act and that, at least as explained to me by a psychiatrist I respect, the healing process after a rape that results in conception is often delayed and exacerbated by the pregnancy to a far greater extent than a "normal" rape.

Abortion as contraception, heck no! (I haven't really considered day-after pills yet, and wonder how quickly after sex conception occurs.) If two people are going to have sex, they must recognize that there is a chance of pregnancy. Yes, the chance is greatly reduced by using contraception, but it's still there. They must recognize and understand the risk they take and be prepared to deal with the consequences, including spending the dough on the pre-natal care and ensuring that their unwanted child is placed in a home where he or she is greatly wanted. This is just another example of the "it's not my problem attitude" that is so prevalent today. Wake up people, it is your problem, unless that wasn't you the night before under the sheets.

Yes, I'm a guy and, who knows, my attitude might be completely different if I had XX chromosomes instead of XY. It may change if my daughter gets pregnant, but I doubt it. Hope never to find out (I've got about 10 years before I start worrying, and there will be a lot of family propaganda in those 10 years).

I'm going to quote verbatim a post I made recently in another thread because it is equally applicable here.

Mingled at various points within very long posts in this thread are prime examples of things that should have been kept to PMs instead of posted on the boards.

Whenever a post is made, the arguments themselves are always fair game for response. Directing personalized comments at an individual poster, however, typically crosses a line. Enough.

OK

You guys woke me up for THIS!

I have to confess that I've not been able to read every post in this thread, although I've tried to at least keep abreast of it...but what disturbs me most is to see two friends, chevalier and Chandos, developing hard feelings over this issue.

Fellas, let me make a virtual headlock on each of you and draw you to the table for a drink...

Chandos here is a great fan of the Democratic process, and as such, has a huge passion for personal liberties and self determination. I used to argue with him, until I realized that his love of truth and Justice really made him a friend and an ally. Even though the "American" principles that he speaks of are distinctly American...we are still a melting pot of every culture and "ism" in the world, and it is that fusion that is our greatest strength and weakness. Chev, some of the things that you have said to Chandos are rather insulting, particularly when dealing with an issue as volatile as abortion. Chandos the Red (as well as Death Rabbit ;) ) are great Americans...try to see them as they stand in defense of the ideals they support, apart from the beliefs that you and I hold.

Now, about chevalier...I love chev (NO, not in that way, you Godless homos ;) ). His theology mirrors mine, yet he has the gift to apply logical proofs to matters of Faith. chev and I both hold to a system of beliefs that tells us that a life begins at conception...and is able to provide us with backup (based on the Faith we hold) that that is indeed the case. When you speak of an issue that seems to you to be the matter of preference of the rights of a woman over the rights of a fetus...it is to us a matter of murder. Clear and simple. There are no "rights" involved when what we see is the murder of innocence to atone for the errors of another (didn't we get away from that with the "New Covenant" :confused: )

There it is in a nutshell. The reason why this issue is so polarizing. The Pro-Choice advocates lump the so-called "birth rights" issue along with other matters as mundane as Affirmative Action and Civil Rights.

The "Pro-Life" forces see that every abortion committed is an act of murder against innocence (and what does the Bible say is the greatest sin, short of blaspheming the Holy Spirit?...)

I completely agree with chev, and have envied the calm rationale used by GM in every post he's made, while at the same time admiring the love of Liberty shown by Chandos, and others who support "Choice". Let's take this opportunity to learn a little more from each other, and to look past what we say and try to focus on why we say it. Regardless of where you stand...there are lives at stake...whether the life of an in-eutero fetus, a teenage girl, or a young man who's in way over his head. Try to remember EVERY life involved in such a situation...and not focus just on one.

There you have it...my attempt at pulling both sides into a more fruitful discussion. If for some reason I've broken forum rules and get in trouble for this...oh well, I need some sleep anyway.

There’s been a lot of discussion and assumptions as to pro-choicers’ beliefs as to when a fetus becomes human, and they all seem to revolve around the ability to survive outside the womb. I’m not going to speak for everyone else, but IMO that’s irrelevant; after all, a newborn can’t survive on its own without outside help (feeding, for example).

To me, the issue centres around when does a fetus begin to demonstrate those characteristics, behaviors, emotions, etc. that set humans apart from other animals. I’m not talking about fully-developed abilities here, but rather the first signs of those abilities. I don’t accept that simple DNA of a newly-fertilized egg fits the bill.

Central to being human is the brain. The basic structure of the human brain is formed at about 8 weeks, so that would be the earliest that I could accept as the cut-off point for when abortions could be performed. However, at that point, it’s not really doing anything that a non-human brain does. I couldn’t find any definitive information as to when a brain starts to exhibit human processes, so I’m open at this point to further discussion. However, for the sake of argument, let’s say that it occurs after 13 weeks (the end of the first trimester). So to me, it would be up to that point that abortions would be OK.

Now, I realize there are arguments as to why it’s not appropriate to look at brain development as the basis for determining humanity, but I haven’t seen any so far that have convinced me that I’m wrong.

Then does an adult human, who is in a "vegetative" state due to an accident or other means, cease to be human?

What about a baby who is born full term, yet has severe neurological defects, such as Holoprosencephali (sp), Normal brain functions are not present, at least not to sustain life, and they will die...whether it's minutes, hours, days...

What about a very old person with advanced Alzheimers? I've seen it, and it ain't pretty...there certainly are no normal brain functions there.

The inherent problem with defining "human" using any kind of man-made measure...is that the measurement can change. It is open to a myriad of interpretations that can vary depending on who is holding the yardstick, and introduces an entire realm of ethics that are derived to fit each different situation...instead of the same ethical code applied to each situation.

"Physical" (or perhaps we should say "Scientific") definition of Humanity is a great trap that starts with something that seems as rational as first trimester abortions (or the use of artificial birth control ;) ), and happily leads to Executions, Euthanasia, Genocide, Ethnic Cleansing...

That last comment will probably get me in hot water, as some will think that I'm calling the Abortionists "Genocidal Maniacs" ***hmmmmm***, but I am only trying to illustrate the slippery slope that is inevitable when mankind attempts to define human life, using only the skills and abilities of mankind.

Human life begins at conception, when the union of sperm and ovum creates the new organism that is then imbued with a soul. That's the defining element...the soul. It's what makes us a little higher than the animals, and why the life of EVERY human should be preserved to the greatest extent possible.

A spiritual view of "Human" is so much cleaner, unwavering and effective.

Human life begins at conception, when the union of sperm and ovum creates the new organism that is then imbued with a soul. That's the defining element...the soul. It's what makes us a little higher than the animals, and why the life of EVERY human should be preserved to the greatest extent possible.

Well, I agree. But until a soul is recognised as a legal definition it seems that there is no choice but to ignore that worthy argument when discussing the legality of abortion...

Human life begins at conception, when the union of sperm and ovum creates the new organism that is then imbued with a soul. That's the defining element...the soul. Please define "soul", and explain how it defines, in a non-circular way, "being human". And since I am not religious, please refrain from defining it in religious terms.

Wow!

Quoted twice in a row by two esteemed members...I feel special :p .

@Vukodlak...I understand the logic you employ when you say Well, I agree. But until a soul is recognised as a legal definition it seems that there is no choice but to ignore that worthy argument when discussing the legality of abortion... ...but that is also part of the slippery slope. It is another example of reliance of human skill in the determination of morality...imagine if today a panel of the most esteemed doctors and scientists were able to agree, that based on the best measurements available, that human indicative brain activity began at 56 days after conception. Laws are enacted based on these findings, and abortions are performed only prior to that point.

One year later, due to the invention of a new gizmo, the panel again meets and determines that human indicative brain activity can be measured as early as 42 days after conception, and the laws are changed accordingly.

The change of law does not change the fact that thousands of newly defined humans (between 42 and 55 days old) were murdered over the last year, and although you couldn't necessarily prove any premeditation...human lives were lost due to the decision of another human...and ethically someone is responsible...someone is now guilty of a crime.

Of course, the doctors who performed the procedures won't be charged, they are just doing their job...the women who chose the abortion won't be charged, they just did what the law allowed them to do...the men who impregnated the women won't be charged, they were just looking for a place to put their dick...and the panel of experts won't be charged, because they are "top men".

So, we arrive at a point where an ethical standard, even proven by the limited ability of mankind, is ignored. The door is now open to ignore the murder or displacement of anyone else who fails to meet a human derived standard.

You see where this is going?


@Splunge...I will try, my friend...although I think that GM or chev might be better educated and equipped to deal with your question. I am confident that a soul can be discussed in non-religious terms...although a certain spirtual sense may be required. Being that you are primarily agnostic...that shouldn't be a problem ;) .

To me, the issue centres around when does a fetus begin to demonstrate those characteristics, behaviors, emotions, etc. that set humans apart from other animals. I’m not talking about fully-developed abilities here, but rather the first signs of those abilities. I don’t accept that simple DNA of a newly-fertilized egg fits the bill.Humanity isn't measured by human characteristics. How many of us indulge in anthropormorphism - assigning human characteristics to animals - with our pets? But though our dogs and cats may exhibit certain human-like qualities, that doesn't make them the least bit human. Similarly, if a human goes crazy and imagines that he's a cat - or takes the role in a bad Broadway musical - that doesn't make the person any less human. Characteristics are indicators of substance, not the substance itself.

Besides - if a fetus doesn't become human 'til it exhibits a certain level of brain activity, then what is it beforehand? It's clearly alive. Is it a separate species? We don't make this distinction with any other species - giraffe fetuses are considered giraffes right from the get-go. Science usually does "accept that simple DNA of a newly fertilized egg fits the bill" - largely because dogs don't give birth to cats and vice-versa.

Please define "soul", and explain how it defines, in a non-circular way, "being human". And since I am not religious, please refrain from defining it in religious terms.Actually, the pro-choice position is the one benefited by the idea of a "