He already read the comments of you and your crowd and has an extremely low opinion of you. He did not like investment banking (or the people). I can't say I blame him.
A man named John Evander Couey was sentenced to be executed for the crime of kidnapping, raping, torturing, and slowly killing a 9-year-old girl named Jessica Lunsford, by burying her alive in his yard. You people's attitude is to reach out save this man for humanitarian reasons. Yet you have no humanity to a helpless and innocent fetus trying to have a life after being conceived.
Your response to that is this must be some sort of Republican trolling right wing conspiracy. Which is a convenient cover for the fact that you people are blatant hypocrites who have no consience, no soul, and simply follow along with the rest of crowd.
I do not believe that you or I have the right to take a life unless that life is directly threatening your life.
That makes sense, and is indeed consistent. Where we disagree, and I guess this is not something that can easily be argued one way or another, is that a fetus is a life. If you don't mind me asking some further questions to react further to your position, could you tell me:
I can understand if a woman somehow finds herself carrying a fetus and finds it inconvenient to her life for whatever reason and does not want it. I have a fundamental and moral issue with treating that like an inanimate object without finding alternatives. A solution that would satisfy all would be to have the ability to remove an unwanted fetus, place it in some special incubation chamber until full term. Unfortunately that does not yet exist.
Oh, and some very popular views state that recently born children are inherently guilty... Funny paradox. Un roi sans divertissement est un homme plein de misères
How do you justify that there is life before the point where there is a nervos system? how do you justify that this is life when the fetus consists of stem cells? how do you justify that there is life before the circulatory system starts working? how do you justify the existence of life before the development of the brain?
and how do you claim that we are Hypocrites and yet you are not when you support the death penalty?
I have a concience, a soul and don't simply follow the crowd as you so patronisingly put it. Yet you would probably see me as more evil than the rest of the people who you are discussing things with here, as I have on more than one occasion taken a friend to an abortion clinic, and helped them through the mental and emotional problems that came with this. The idea that these people didn't consider what they were doing and just treated this like a casual bit of cosmetic surgery is the soryt of sick idiotic argument I normally expect from the religiously brainwashed and stupid. Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
A man named John Evander Couey was sentenced to be executed for the crime of kidnapping, raping, torturing, and slowly killing a 9-year-old girl named Jessica Lunsford, by burying her alive in his yard. You people's attitude is to reach out save this man for humanitarian reasons.
My position is that it is better for the guilty to be insufficiently punished than for an innocent to be wrongly punished. My position is that it is not because some depraved people kill in horrible ways that we should do the same. My position is that our standards should be higher.
Yet you have no humanity to a helpless and innocent fetus trying to have a life after being conceived.
A fetus is not alive, at least not for a number of months. And if anyone can be described as helpless and innocent, it's the pregnant woman. Or are you saying that unprotected sex is a crime - but only for the woman, not the man?
When you will spend as much effort demonising deadbeat fathers as you do abortions, then you will have the beginning of some moral consistency. Otherwise, as DeAnander eloquently stated above, you're just out to control women, nothing else. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
Not alive??? So a fetus by your definition is "dead" until some magical time when it leaves the womb? Do I have that right? Some how these appendages and organs magically appear at different stages. Is that right?
What you probably are trying to say is that something is not alive until it can breathe and live on its own without the support of the mother's womb. My answer to that is when a human must survive with an artificial lung or any life support machine, we should turn off that machine and consider the person dead?
And what does deadbeat parents have anything to do with the discussion of the taking of a life?
Am I out to control women? No. Anyone who knows me would find that laughable. But woman should control themselves and responsible. Today young woman are far more aware and responsible which has led to the decline of abortions.
I'll ask the question I've asked before and you appear to have ignored, why are you convinced that a fetus is a person at the point when it is just a bundle of stem cells? why are you convinced it's a living person before it has a nervous system? why are you convinced that it is alive before it has any developed organs? Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
This commenter seems to ignore most comments except the ones he can pretend to take offense to and be derisive about. Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding. -Hobbes
I'd already come to the conclusion that a subtle aplication of the clue stick was probably the only thing that would help. Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
I don't know what the scientific definition of a "person" is, so I would regard it as a living fetus. I believe that a human starts at conception because it is a rapidly developing process. No one has been able to factually state that a fetus/baby/person starts at any other point than conception.
An abortion is the termination of a living fetus and morally needs to be regarded in that way.
so I would regard it as a living fetus. I believe that a human starts at conception because it is a rapidly developing process. No one has been able to factually state that a fetus/baby/person starts at any other point than conception.
Well that depends on your definition of rapidly. To start with it takes about three weeks before cell types even start to differentiate beyond basic cells. up till roughly four weeks you kill more cells scratching yourself than you do if an embryo is terminated. It isn't till roughly five weeks that organs start to develop so if you want to look at an absolutely earliest point where any nervous signals can occur you're lookin at ten weeks after conception. there are roughly 200 seperate biological stages in the development from conception to birth, Developmental biologists will tell you that at least 40 of these have just as good a claim to being the beginning of life as conception.
And I would argue that that is a completely artificial assumption forming a circular argument. Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
By your argument you would have to regard the fetus as not alive until when exactly?
Neurobiologically a fetus does not become a persson till Nine months after birth (18 months after conception) Humans are unique in that their young are born without their brains being fully formed, due to the size of the head and the pelvic canal
It is arguable (and has been argued by eminent biologists) that personhood is a continuum from non personhood that exists as a pile of cells to personhood where the individual exists. the argument that Morally we must consider personhood to exist fully formed at the point of conception is incredibly simplistic. Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
if your embryo has continued through all stages of development then its an adult. So how can there be an inevitability about an adult? as for
I am not a believer in legislating people's lives and choices and prefer that they make their own and informed decisions based on all information and access to all choices.
I think one of the underlying problems with this choice is how women are viewed who do get pregnant out of wedlock. When I ws growing up they were treated as virtual pariahs of society. Today there is much more tolerance but not entirely and particularly if they are involved in a career.
The inevitability is that when an embryo is created the process of human development immediately begins and does not end until we are much older. Unless something terrible happens along this path, the embryo will inevitably become a child and an adult and have a full life. Of course there is never any guarantee of any of that.
So far I think the best option has been given by Colman: perform a Caesarean section and if the fetus survives, give it up for abortion. Before the time that premature children are known to survive with any probability (currently 22 weeks) jus perform a simple abortion. It is already considered risky to perform an abortion in the second trimester (13 to 26 weeks?) anyway. Some other arbitrary threshold (say, 1/2 or 1/3 probability of survival to 1 year - these must be tabulated) could be used.
The thing is, we know from experience that if contraceptive/abortive methods are made illegal, women will find ways to procure them anyway, often at great risk to their own lives. To think the women approach these problems frivolously or that if they take a different decision from the one you think they should they haven't thought it through properly is borderline offensive.
But, ultimately, for you an I to discuss all this is academic since we're men, we don't get pregnant and we don't get abortions, and if our partners were to get pregnant or abort they would bear the brunt of the physical and emotional stress whatever they (we?) decide to do. Which reminds me of the battle cry of the abortion-right activists in Spain in the 1980's: nosotras parimos, nosotras decidimos (we give birth, we decide), and is why I think that those who argue that ultimately reproductive health issues are about patriarchal control of women's bodies have a lot going for them. Can the last politician to go out the revolving door please turn the lights off?
"give it up for abortion" - - - - you of course meant "adoption."
No one I know or myself is advocating the making of contraceptive/abortive methods illegal. So that is not the issue I have.
"we don't get pregnant and we don't get abortions" - - - but it takes two to tango and it is equally the men's responsibility for contraception as it is the women's. I think younger generations are far more responsible and knowledgeable in this area than prior generations have been. Someone mentioned that the epidemic of HIV/AIDS is one reason for that.
The battle cry of the abortion-right activists in Spain in the 1980's: nosotras parimos, nosotras decidimos (we give birth, we decide) - - - - and my response to that is why did you get pregnant in the first place? If you feel empowered and capable of making this decision where was that same empowerment and sense of responsibility when you decided to get pregnant in the first place? I believe that we have a fundamental responsibility to all levels of life and not just some arbitrary level for political expediency or for some lifestyle convenience.
Well, this is not necessarily true, not in the US and not in Western Europe.
In many US states "readily available" means you have to go to (the much vilified by yourself) Planned Parenthood to get condoms or the day-after pill. Doctors may refuse to prescribe birth control pills. In Spain there are several regions where abortion is not available through the public health system, and one in which it is not available at all, despite being legal. Lots of pharmacists claim conscientious objection to refuse to sell contraceptives.
it takes two to tango and it is equally the men's responsibility for contraception as it is the women's. I think younger generations are far more responsible and knowledgeable in this area than prior generations have been.
"Much more responsible" does not mean "universally responsible". More often than I would have thought possible or liked I hear stories of men telling women they knocked up that it's their problem exclusively because they're the ones getting pregnant. Can the last politician to go out the revolving door please turn the lights off?
In Spain there are several regions where abortion is not available through the public health system (source)
"Lots of pharmacists claim conscientious objection to refuse to sell contraceptives." - - - while I am sure there are some religious nut pharmacists in the U.S. I have never heard of one.
"Much more responsible" does not mean "universally responsible". More often than I would have thought possible or liked I hear stories of men telling women they knocked up that it's their problem exclusively because they're the ones getting pregnant." - - - I used to hear that 20 or more years ago. Young people today in the U.S. have been brought up with serious sex education, more open dialogue with parents and doctors, and are making better choices. The only situation I have heard of recently was a young man of 24 and a girl he dated who was a year older. She got pregnant through him. They decided they wanted to child but were not in love to get married. She had the baby and I am sure they have figured out how to manage the situation. I think one major difference was 30 years ago women were not of equal status with men and today they are (and then some).
What you find when you make something illegal (alcohol, abortions, etc.) is as you said people will find a way to do it but it will be in a dangerous way.
You are grossly uninformed. You should do some actual research on the topic (besides reading right-wing propaganda) before having further discussion on the topic.
btw, if you're not pushing for legislation or change in the law, then what is your point, exactly, in discussing this on a political forum? Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding. -Hobbes
"if you're not pushing for legislation or change in the law, then what is your point, exactly, in discussing this on a political forum?" - - - - You speak of human right issues and I believe if progressives are humanitarians then it should not begin at birth.
And do yourself a favor and try coming up with an original idea of your own if you don't agree with something other than "besides reading right wing propaganda."
Honestly, try doing some reading. And I don't know what else to call it when you repeat right-wing propaganda that has no basis in fact. I'd say the same if you were pushing creationism -- it's simply made up. If you choose to believe it on faith, fine, but don't expect a good reception among people who value informed opinions and reasoned debate. Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding. -Hobbes
The school of fish political commentary simply shows you are uninformed and like I said have no original ideas of your own.
I just get upset when people resort to political labels of any kind. It is worth replacing "republican propaganda" with what you actually mean. Particularly since I have never been a member of the Republican Party now or in any prior lifetimes (to my knowledge).
frankly that's fairly insulting, I've attended abortions, I've spent several months studying the morals and ethics of abortion during my degree, and you're more informed on the grounds of one half baked anecdote? Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
Heh. Don't flatter yourself by thinking you've done any more than repeat stale talking points poorly. At most, you've mildly annoyed some, and greatly amused me, for which I'll give you credit.
What I'm glad about is you've revealed yourself and I'll know in the future to take your assertions with a grain of salt.
I think one major difference was 30 years ago women were not of equal status with men and today they are (and then some).
Now theres a telling Misogynistic phrase and a half. Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
in developed western countries that is an outdated idea. Contraception is readily available nowadays and easily accessible to men and women - young and old.
I think you need to recognise that your ascribing life to the point of conception is as arbitary as any of ours. Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
As to the failure rate, like any product it does happen. We all know someone who had a defective contraceptive and suddenly he's a daddy.
"I think you need to recognise that your ascribing life to the point of conception is as arbitary as any of ours." - - - - Actually I do recognize that but would like other to recognize that as well, think more about it, as not just dismiss abortion as something just to be disposed of. Progressives are supposed to be humanitarians and that should not begin at birth.
The one incredible thing about medical science is how rapidly it has progressed particularly in the issue you raised about premature babies. I would imagine that there would be a time soon where they will have the ability to extract an embryo or fetus and have the means to incubate them to full term.
Do you believe in abortion for any reason? Rape, incest, or to save to save a woman's life?
Also, quit being so rude and personally insulting. It makes you look like an asshole and detracts from any point you may have. Are you trying to discuss opposing points of view? or merely pick fights? Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding. -Hobbes
Expelling a fetus as you described it cannot be murder since it is lawful and for any reason. I do believe in extacting the fetus in those extreme cases such as rape, incest, and definately when it threatens the life of the mother.
The fundamental problem I have is how one regards that early life form. Proponents of a abortion do not regard that life form until it is at an advanced stage and close to full term and able to function if born premature. I would argue that the life form may not be fully formed but it is alive and rapidly developing. It does depend on the birth mother for life and could not survive if extracted too early.
Then how do you seperate an early fetus that is dependent on the birth mother for survivial and an adult who through some unfortunate accident requires life support systems to survive?
The rudeness is only there to answer rude and defamatory remarks.
Personally, I trust women to make their own medical decisions. Circumstantial legislation such as you seem to be advocating does nothing but ensure that women suffer and die needlessly. It doesn't work.
Everything you've been saying about abortion being in "vogue" and women going around having them "without remorse" is simply malicious propaganda that is completely beside the point and highly offensive, which is one of the reasons you've gotten the sort of response you have. Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding. -Hobbes
"Circumstantial legislation such as you seem to be advocating" - - - actually I am not advocating any legal changes - only personal responsibility, better education, and better options.
