Except of course consenting to sex does not mean consenting to pregnancy, especially if as pro-lifers insist that there is a person from the moment of conception. Consent is non-transferable factor unless the person who gave the consent agrees to that transfer ergo consenting to one person (the man) for one action (sexual intercourse) can not be seen or used as proxy consent for another person (the fetus) for another action (pregnancy). It could be said that consenting to sexual intercourse is implied or informed consent to pregnancy .. however, implied or informed consent only applies to the point the person by word or action, explicitly says no, from that second onwards implied or informed consent is moot. True, however if the person starts to injury you then you have every right to defend yourself up to and including deadly force if required, as the fetus injures a woman from the moment of conception until birth she is well within her rights to defend herself if those injuries are not consented to, and before you try to assert that pregnancy is not an injury it is already seen as such in rape cases, and in "wrongful pregnancy" cases, oh and by the way in some states you would have the right to kill a trespasser on your property regardless of whether you left the door open or not. Regardless of the circumstances that caused pregnancy, a person does not lose the right to be free of interference from a third party .. remember it is pro-lifers who want the unborn to be seen as persons (the third party) and as such the unborn must gain consent to impose themselves onto another person. You are confused between socially dependent and biologically dependent, a one year old is socially dependent meaning that any person can take care of it, where as the unborn are biologically dependent meaning that only the female it resides within can take care of it, and you are wrong about the number of people waiting or wanting to adopt, there are nearly 22,000 children each year that age out before being adopted. The problem is that by far those wanting to adopt want to adopt the perfect little white baby. Wrong, abortion has been morally and culturally acceptable for far longer than it has not, even in the relative short existence of the US abortion has been legally, morally and culturally acceptable for far longer than it has not, as to laws prohibiting it, why should you have the right to decide who, what, where and when your body is used by another but not a pregnant woman . .to remove that right from her is a direct violation of the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. The state CANNOT give or remove a right that it does not give or remove from ALL other people.
There are plenty here willing to engage on a real debate, let us know when you want to start, and in case you are a little confused how a real debate should progress here is a little help - http://courses.csail.mit.edu/6.141/spring2013/pub/lectures/Forum-7_Debate101.pdf
To FoxHastings, Okgrannie, Fugazi, I appreciate the effort you put into your posts in response to mine, but I don't respond to chopped up posts like that. It destroys context and makes having a discussion tedious both to participate in and for those having to try to follow it. Every one of you have offered the same rationale in the same words we have been seeing for years from pro-choicers-on-demand for why women should be allowed to kill their developing children on demand. But I will stick with my argument that I believe is reasonable and sound in case somebody would like to seriously discuss it within its full context. Everybody have a great day.
Three posters did seriously discuss it. It sounds like you need an excuse to not respond. The points are separated to address each claim. Many posters do this. It is NOT reasonable nor sound to claim that women kill children on demand. The "full context" can be found in this forum . You: """ Every one of you have offered the same rationale in the same words we have been seeing for years from pro-choicers..."" Yes, that's because we provide facts....facts don't change. BTW, it's considered polite to use the quote function when addressing other posters so they receive notice that there is a response.
This is true, but the woman doesn't actively have to do any nurturing, it's a natural biological process. If she just leaves it alone, her body will do most of the work itself. But it is not an inanimate object either. It is somewhere in the twilight zone between a mindless clump of living tissue and being a person. Yeah, I think there is an old thread about this: mercy killing the retarded/feeble-minded Why is that evil? Two rights don't make a wrong. Why do you think fetuses conceived by rape would have less rights than other fetuses? Ok, this is a legitimate issue. I would imagine that 90% of all pro-lifers, even though they may still oppose abortion at any stage, would rather have the abortion done sooner rather than later, if the woman is going to get one. I had the idea for a loan the woman would have to pay back. At least that way she could get the abortion sooner and then worry about paying it later. (and she wouldn't be allowed to get another abortion if she didn't pay back the first loan)
Too many points within one post does indeed make the post tedious both to the replying poster and the reader. The same words that have been used for years still apply since the rationales are the same. The same semantic emotional ploys have remained the same, i.e. calling a zef "children" and referring to abortion as "on demand" when "on request" would be more accurate. Whatever you believe is reasonable and sound works for your decisions regarding your own body, but your reasoning does not and cannot apply to others who are equally entitled to their own reasoning.
But this not entirely true. And furthermore the fetus is not the woman's body. Society restricts people's rights all the time, when those actions affect other people. Society sometimes restricts people's bodily autonomy even when it is not affecting other people. I agree with you on this point though. I wish people could try to keep their OP to a more singular subject.
And pray tell what is the difference between the law saying a woman should get an abortion 'on request' or 'on demand?' I think the law would be more likely to consider the request a demand would it not? The pro abortion people would certainly consider it as such. And if I believe a human being is a human being at ALL stages of development, I just can't see that anybody can rationally, morally, or honestly argue with that. None of us become functioning independent humans beings without first going through that critical stage of development. To abort a zygote or zef as you call it or an embryo or any other stage of human development is to end a human life that might have been. There may or may not be justification for that. But I refuse to see it as anything other than what it is. And certainly my belief in the sanctity of life and the importance of human development at all stages is no more emotionally driven than is the person who insists that those of us who are pro life want to invade the wombs of woman and/or deprive them of their liberties.
But "Pro-Lifers" do want to deprive others of their rights and liberty based on their continued attack on those rights. Pro-Choice has facts, science and law on their side, Anti-Choicers have only their feelings and emotions....... IF a fetus is A human being it would have all the rights of A human being but it would also have the same restrictions, it couldn't use another person's body to sustain it's life anymore than you or I could.
That is absurd as saying all pro choicers want to abort every baby conceived or murder every baby on the planet. When you believe the unborn baby is a human being and we are obligated to give it every chance to fulfill its best destiny, that is not at all the same thing as wanting to take away anybody's rights.
To "request" is to ask while to "demand" is to insist. "On demand" conjures up visions of women stamping their feet in a temper tantrum insisting that resistant doctors perform their requirements, while "on request" conjures of visions of women politely asking for service for which they are willing to pay. No one is "pro-abortion", as that conjures up visions of people insisting women abort a pregnancy. Yes, you can possibly make the argument that "a human being" is "a human being at all stages of development, but "A human being" has a workable brain, and until that is acquired, the human tissue is NOT "a human being." Using birth control undoubtedly ends human lives that might have been. No one cries because of those lost lives. You just cannot require women by law to fulfill the possibilities of "might have been." As to your "seeing it as anything other than what it is", that is what you wish to believe, you are seeing only your views colored by your experiences which nearly always fails to provide empathy or understanding of other women's circumstances. Nearly all those professing a view on abortion have an emotional component in their reasoning. All should try to put that aside and make decisions on their own lives based on reason, and that reason should guide them to stay out of others' decisions.
Did you just fall off a turnip truck? I ask because your so-called points have been addressed many times. But, just for you, one more time.....first, do not refer to a zef as a "baby", babies are born, typically babies are called "babies" from birth to one year of age. Secondly, unwanted pregnancies occur frequently when people DO take precautions, did you know that half of all women choosing abortion had been using birth control? Third, people not taking precautions may have other reasons than being "lazy." - - - Updated - - - Did you just fall off a turnip truck? I ask because your so-called points have been addressed many times. But, just for you, one more time.....first, do not refer to a zef as a "baby", babies are born, typically babies are called "babies" from birth to one year of age. Secondly, unwanted pregnancies occur frequently when people DO take precautions, did you know that half of all women choosing abortion had been using birth control? Third, people not taking precautions may have other reasons than being "lazy."
I've never fell off any truck, nor have I ever murdered a baby. All of ours ours grew up. Addressed, and then ignored for convenience. I wonder if the fetus can scream when they kill it?
I'm sorry but if abortion is legal just because the woman doesn't want to be pregnant, that is legally abortion on demand. But as for how anybody wants to structure it so that it is PC or define it in emotional terms or insist that the beginning of the baby is nowhere near as important as the finished product, I don't play those games and I won't bother with arguments similar to whose is blackest or whose mother wears the crappiest army boots. My personal rationale is that there is no point from the moment of conception to the time the infant leaves the womb that is more or less important to a human being than any other time. None of us live without going through every single bit of it. For that reason I cannot set a specific point that the developing human is not a human being and is therefore disposable from the living, breathing, creative, full of potential that person may become. And my views on abortion on based on that simple truth.
I see others have addressed these issues already, but I would like to offer a few comments. I disagree with your assertion that permission for intercourse means permission for pregnancy. By your definition, if I allow anybody into my house (whether it is by leaving the door open or inviting them in) I have given up my right to decide what they can do when they get here. Any time a man enters my house he could have a gun (unless I install a metal detector) so by your logic, I could not object to him pulling out his gun and shooting me because I gave him permission to enter my home, knowing it was POSSIBLE for him to bring in a gun and shoot me. Besides that, wouldn't you agree that anybody using any birth control method is demonstrating an intent NOT to get pregnant? I agree with you that killing a fully developed newborn is wrong, but I think you misinterpret what people mean when they talk about the capacity to live on its own. I agree that the embryo has human tissue, but it is not yet capable of meaningful thought, so I see no justification for giving it the same rights as a human being that has COMPLETED the developmental process. Do you believe that every fertilized egg (including all those zygotes at the fertility clinic) are inhabited by some kind of sentience (or spirit, or soul) that we must preserve as if they were completed human beings? I agree that the federal government has no authority to regulate abortion, but I would go farther and say state and local governments have no right to interfere with a woman's right to decide how long the fetus may (or may not) use her body.
Consent to sex is in no way, shape or form agreeing to gestate and give birth should a pregnancy ensue. Thankfully, laws aren't made according to *your* viewpoint, and abortion is legal at any stage in my country - where *doctors* practice medicine, NOT the govt.
I didn't say that permission for intercourse is permission for pregnancy. I have no problem with taking whatever measures to avoid pregnancy. But intercourse assumes the risk of pregnancy. Just as driving a car assumes the risk of an accident. You don't plan it. You don't want it. But if it happens, you accept what responsibility you had for it happening. At no time in my discussion have I discussed 'rights' of anybody. I have simply argued that the development of a human being begins at conception and there is no point that can be skipped in the process of that human reaching his/her full potential; therefore no one stage is more important than another. I am arguing for recognition of the sanctity of life, the potential that exists in all human beings, and a human life is not disposable simply because it is inconvenient to the mother. There are many reasons that an abortion might be the only sensible and humane choice. But I am arguing that we must always be aware that when the baby is aborted, it ends a human life.
Maybe the more logical term is "unrestricted abortion." I would argue there is a clear point (late in the third trimester) when the brain is developed enough to sustain meaningful, sentient, thought. At that point you could argue that it may be inhabited by a "sentient human being" or a "spirit" or a "soul" (depending on your philosophy). What justification do you have for treating it the same (i.e. allowing it the same rights) as a completed human being?
Yes, there is a risk of pregnancy (even if you use birth control). If I am driving my car there is the risk of an accident. If I am in an unfamiliar area, I might take the wrong turn and find myself traveling north in the southbound lanes. Should I give up and say "Oh well I will take responsibility for whatever happens when I hit that cluster of cars ahead" or should I take action to PREVENT the unwanted accident? Based on your response, you would argue that a woman who takes action to PREVENT the birth is affecting a developing human being and the government has a responsibility to stop that because it is alive (because of the sanctity of life). I assume, unless you are a vegan, that non-human life does not count as much as human life (but I don't want to put words in your mouth). Do you believe in the sanctity of life for ALL life, or just for life with human DNA?
People say this all the time, they must not be thinking of the effects the fetus has on the woman's body. When the fetus is attached to the woman, for all practical purposes it is a part of her body, in fact her own body thinks the fetus is a part of it, otherwise it would reject the fetus as a foreign substance. When you can deal with the fetus without affecting the woman's body, you can give it rights. Please give an example of society restricting bodily autonomy when it is not affecting other people or harming the person himself.
Just because abortion is legal, doesn't mean a woman can compel a doctor to perform one, as "demand" suggests. You've just been reading the right-wing propaganda where they like to portray women as "demanding". I believe in CHOICE, so your personal rationale is great for your own choices. I and many others have our own personal rationales though, and we prefer to make our own choices based on the truth as we see it. My personal rationale is that my ending a pregnancy or completing a pregnancy is none of the government's business since society as a whole is not affected by either result.
