Pro-freedom vs. pro-life

[marklang500]

I agree with what you say, except for the end result. Everything you say makes perfect sence, until it ends up being "vote for the guy that will allow partial birth abortion and the removal of parental notification laws."

I'll go to war and fight anywhere in the world before I allow someone to take away parental notification laws. It's just not something I can sell out.

And since you are correct that pro-life candidates have had a dismal record of reversing abortion legislation, they have at least kept new attrocities at bay. Obama will ADVANCE those attrocities.

So I am voting for the lesser evil. (Actually, I am voting for the Constitution party, which is neither evil)

I didn't want to go all biblical here, but...

Christ rejected turning a stone into bread, because the price was to put his faith in earthly things.

Christ rejected throwing himself off a cliff for God to save him becasue the price was to put God to the test for self-validation.

Christ rejected the temptation to be the ruler of all the earthly kingdoms. The price was to bow down to Satan.

We should reject the temptation to vote for monetary prosperity. The price is the proliferation of expanded abortion allowances which WILL result in a rise in abortion rates.

If I had my choice, the abortion issue would be removed entirely from presidential influence. But that would be impossible.

[funchy]

Originally Posted by marklang500

We should reject the temptation to vote for monetary prosperity. The price is the proliferation of expanded abortion allowances which WILL result in a rise in abortion rates.

How does money tie in with abortion? It costs more a woman more money to go through gestation and birth than abort.

If I had my choice, the abortion issue would be removed entirely from presidential influence. But that would be impossible.

But you said so yourself that some of the abortion-related laws are so important you'd not only vote differently, you'd go to war. Until people are willing to not have abortion be the deciding topic when voting, it will always be something candidates discuss.

[funchy]

Abortion is a difficult issue. I don't think there is one easy answer.

Questions for those who always oppose it:

Do you also oppose fertility clinics and want them banned as well? Do you understand that one of the most common practices is IV fertilization: eggs are collected and fertilized in a lab, then implanted. Extra fertilized eggs are always created as a byproduct. If life begins at conception, aren't the fertility clinics as guilty of throwing away "babies"?

My other question is about exceptions for abortions. I learned that it's possible that sometimes something goes wrong in the fetus development and it dies in the womb. This is totally dead, not something that can be revived with machines. If you ban ALL later-term abortions, you now condemn the grieving mother to carry the corpse inside of her for months, then force her to go through labor. What are your thoughts on this? And why aren't there exceptions to address this situation?

[Elrond]

Originally Posted by marklang500

So I am voting for the lesser evil. (Actually, I am voting for the Constitution party, which is neither evil)

I didn't want to go all biblical here, but...

Christ rejected turning a stone into bread, because the price was to put his faith in earthly things.

Christ rejected throwing himself off a cliff for God to save him becasue the price was to put God to the test for self-validation.

Christ rejected the temptation to be the ruler of all the earthly kingdoms. The price was to bow down to Satan.

Christ is a good example in this context. Jesus had only two choices and he chose God, the lesser evil.

[Elrond]

When I think about it, it's hard to believe that a country with 300 million people is trying to decide a matter on a federal level in which the arguments of one of the sides are impossible to prove true or false! (i.e. religious arguments)

Soul at conception - can't be quantified or proven true or false, likely ever. You can't even quantify the good that it will bring to illegalize* abortion. In other words, you cannot make empirical statistics on the volume of souls saved and the God given Grace as a result of it.

Laws are made for the common good, to minimize suffering and maximize happiness (I think?) without inhibiting personal freedom too much. Suffering and pleasure can be measured.

”Fetuses are not capable of feeling pain at the beginning of the fetal stage, and will not be able to feel pain until the third trimester.”

Taken from wikipedia of course.

So we’ve established that fetuses can’t feel pain until late in the development, so what more is there? Hmm, let me see. Aah, the sanctity of life!

If you can dispose of your appendix you can dispose of a pre-cognition embryo. That may sound cruel but that is just my opinion looking at the cold facts of the matter. If there is any flaw in this statement, please let me know. But first let me make my own case.

Post on cognition when it comes to unborn babies.

A pre-cognition embryo (or fetus?) is, you know, human. No argument from me there. But it is not an individual human being. It is more like a part of the womans body, like any of her organs. Although it has the potential to become an individual human being, so has my sperm (yes if it can find an egg, nitpickers). Until it develops cognition, it really is nothing more than an extra organ for the mother. Like I said in the above link, one can pull the plug on a braindead* person without any moral qualms or pressure groups interfering. The body is alive, but the person is gone. Same thing with a pre-cognition fetus. It has no cognition, and cognition is a good indicator of awareness. Of course, it’s not excactly the same, cause an embryo has potential for cognition (or you might say "personality"). But then again, so has my sperm. The bottom line is that you aren’t ”killing” (republicans love to be black and white about this stuff) anything other than an organ in the first place.

To sum up, a pre-cognition fetus has no shred of individuality (not more than a liver, anyway), can’t feel pain and is likely not conscious.

I have some wacky LoA beliefs, but I trust science.



It's ironic that in a country where most people don't want a big federal government (and with good reason - there are 300 million of you), you want to legislate something that you never manage to come close to an agreement on whether it is right or wrong in the first place.


* To make most or all abortions illegal. I am against abortion after a certain period of time in the fetuses development.

* 2: I made another post on that too. Therein I asked among other things at what point of decomposition the soul leaves the body. Noone replied.

[crescive]

Here are my reasons for being pro-choice:

1. I think the life and well-being of the mother is more important than the life of the unborn child. The mother is here on earth, I would not force her to carry the baby in her body for 9 months and then force her to take care of it for 18 years because I have no right to do that.

2. I cannot make any couple a good mother and father. I think it would be far more cruel to subject a child to parents who don't want it, who might abuse or neglect it and subject the child to a life of possible suffering.

3. I don't think that foster care and adoption agencies are such wonderful places certain idealists who constantly say, "Just put the child up for adoption!" make them out to be. Not all kids who grow up in the system get out of it and many are exposed to drugs, abuse, and neglect. "Nearly half of foster kids in the U.S. become homeless when they turn 18" (Saving foster kids from the streets / As the nation faces a new wave of homeless children, Larkin youth center helps provide a transition to adulthood).
"According to liftingtheveil.org, 28% of children in state care were abused in Baltimore. 21% of abuse or neglect cases involved foster homes In Louisiana. 57% of those in Missouri placed in foster care settings in 1981 were at a high risk of abuse or neglect. 25% of children in Kansas City foster care were the subject of abuse or inappropriate punishment. In Arizona, over 500 of an estimated 4,000 foster children, a figure representing at least 12.5 percent of the state's foster care population, have been sexually abused while in state care" (Foster care - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia).

4. Making abortions illegal will cause many more women and babies to die due to unsafe abortions. "What is most striking about these recent studies of abortion around the world is that whether it is legal or not, women are just as likely to get an abortion. The World Health Organization, with AGI, found in 2007 that abortion rates are "virtually" equal in rich and poor countries. Looking at abortion trends from 1995 to 2003, researchers concluded that regardless of restrictive abortion laws, women sought abortions. In other words, restricting access to abortion does not make it go away; it only makes it clandestine and unsafe. The worldwide unsafe abortion rate was essentially unchanged between 1995 and 2003. Because the overall abortion rate declined during this period, the proportion of all abortions that are unsafe increased from 44 percent to 47 percent" (Abortion Around the World - Overview).

[Michael Chui]

Rejecting an offer of sex is murder, because the sex could produce a human child and if you say no, that child will never be born to grow and live and change the world for the better.

More seriously, though, I think a better solution would be to mandate pro-life, but take the infant away from the mother if she cannot show that she is fit to raise it. Put it in any government-funded program; make it an extension of public schooling. That way, in twenty years or so, you'll have an army of crack soldiers and retire the silly enlist thing. Of course, you'll have to figure out what to do with them when they grow old... send them to space and colonize Mars or something.

Or, you know, go pro-choice. Short-term fix while we fix everything else that's wrong with the country.

[Gaz]

Personally, I think abortion is great.

Let me explain what I mean before you all go and get out the torches and pitchforks. Abortion as an action is debatable. Abortion as a topic for debate is fantastic. It contains ethical, religious, legal, emotional, and scientific isues all in one neat little package and people try to polarise a grey issue.

Strictly speaking, Pro-life means no abortions, ever, and pro-choice means abortions are fine at any time, but people always like to qualify their statement. I'm pro-life, unless the baby is a result of rape. I'm pro-choice, but not in the third trimester, things like that, when what the real debate is about is at what point are you willing to force your opinion onto other people.

Personally, I'm pro-choice. My opinion on abortion is complicated and there are lots of qualifiers as to when I feel it's justified, and when I feel it's a cop out, but ultimately, I don't feel it's right to force somebody else to make the decision I would.

Let's look at something completely ridiculous as an example to illustrate the point. Must you use Pen or Pencil. Hopefully, this should have none of the religious, moral etc implications. I use pencil out of choice, but there are certain situations where I feel it is necessary to use pen. Sounds like my reasoning on abortion. But, is it right for me to force you (if you use a pen by choice) to use pencil, because that is what I feel is right, or, by forcing you to adhere to my decision, am I impacting on your freedoms.

Now before you use the above argument to say that I am condoning absolute freedom, I'm not, anarchy is not a good thing. What I am saying is that as long as your choice has no impact on my freedom, or anyone else's freedom, then I have no right to dictate, even if I disagree with what you decide.

And that, is the problem with the abortion debate. At what point does a foetus become a human with the right to it's own freedom. And that is where all the issues start. For pro-lifers it's at conception, for everyone else it's at some point in the gestation period, or birth (a nice clear line), and until agreement is reached on that point there is never going to be a right answer.