Forced Abortion in China: "I could hear the baby cry"

http://www.scmp.com/news/china/poli...6/countless-tragedies-chinas-one-child-policy

excellent article

And it only supports my contention that free Abortion will only open up the door for forced Abortion in the future.

That's what happens when human life get devalued to the point where you can kill it for someone else's convenience. Whether it's the woman's choice or the policies of the State, makes no difference, the baby in the womb has still been devalued to the point that its life is completely expendable.

 

I don't give a flying fig what china does.

Anyone that is for forced gestation has no call to whine about forced abortion.

 

China for some time had government support for forced abortion, so unless you are advocating for the US to have a similar support process then you are as usual, blowing smoke out of your arse.

One only has to look to Canada to see that no legal abortion restrictions have no effect on abortion rates or people being forced to undergo one.

 

Anders wants the same power and authoritarianism he decries about the Chinese government....just in reverse.


So his hypocrisy naturally destroys any credibility he has in his criticism.

 

Overpopulation is indeed a serious concern, but forcing people to have abortions is a grievous act.

But Anders as usual has it entirely backwards. Having elective abortions would reduce the need for forced abortions(if forced abortions were something that was going to happen). Elective abortion does not open the door to it. Any government that would be willing to force people to have them is a government that has no care at all about bodily autonomy and personal rights, both of which are pretty central to the idea of a woman having control of her own body. It's a pretty far leap from a woman choosing abortion to a woman being forced to have one. I would wager that opposition to forced abortions are actually something that pro-lifers and pro-choicers can find some common ground on.

 

And it only supports my contention that FORCED GESTATION will only open up the door for forced Abortion in the future.

Force opens the door for all force.


And, of course, there is no "baby in the womb" and YES, the life in the womb is expendable.....

 

Help me to understand this. Are you claiming that all force is bad? Does prison open the door for the promotion of murder (according to your position, would this mean that forcing people like Jeffrey Dahmer to not eat people would lead to the state forcing people to become serial killing cannibals)?

This is an interesting claim. Are you saying that a fetus becomes a baby at birth? Again just for clarification, your position entails some life is expendable and some is not. What criteria are you using?

 

This makes the assumption that the fetus is "innocent" where as it is the fetus that is injuring the female without consent and her actions (abortion) are her defending herself against those non-consented injuries, just as any other person defending themselves against others is justified.

 

And in cases where there is a significant threat to the mother's life this would justify abortion. However, by phrasing it this way, it appears that you have also presented an argument against abortion as well for cases in which the mother's life is not endangered, since presumably the fetus (if a person) would have the exact same rights to self-protection as the mother (the concept of innocence here seems to trade on an conflation of different meanings of the term: 1) guilt that includes intentional acts of harm and 2) guilt which means one is merely involved in the harm- self-defense in the former seems justified, but it is not so clear in the latter - for example, if you get stuck in an elevator with a person who is wearing a perfume you are allergic to and causes you discomfort- you wouldn't be justified in killing them, even if you are stuck with them for 9 months). It would boil down to a competing interests argument - if both of are equal moral worth and granted the same rights, then 9 months of physical hardship/difficulty for the mother (that was not life threatening) would not outweigh the ending of the fetus's life (all things being equal), since the right to preservation would be sacrosanct for both. The threats would have to be weighed equally. Of course, if they aren't equal persons, then an argument explaining why would have to be established, which is what my above post was referencing.

 

Yup, the effects of pregnancy , from the immediate compromising of the woman's immune system to her heightened blood pressure, do justify use of self defense if the fetus is deemed a person. The fetus attacks first.

ALL pregnancies carry the possible risk of death.

Normal, frequent or expectable temporary side effects of pregnancy:
•exhaustion (weariness common from first weeks)
•altered appetite and senses of taste and smell
•nausea and vomiting (50% of women, first trimester)
•heartburn and indigestion
•constipation
•weight gain
•dizziness and light-headedness
•bloating, swelling, fluid retention
•hemmorhoids
•abdominal cramps
•yeast infections
•congested, bloody nose
•acne and mild skin disorders
•skin discoloration (chloasma, face and abdomen)
•mild to severe backache and strain
•increased headaches
•difficulty sleeping, and discomfort while sleeping
•increased urination and incontinence
•bleeding gums
•pica
•breast pain and discharge
•swelling of joints, leg cramps, joint pain
•difficulty sitting, standing in later pregnancy
•inability to take regular medications
•shortness of breath
•higher blood pressure
•hair loss or increased facial/body hair
•tendency to anemia
•curtailment of ability to participate in some sports and activities
•infection including from serious and potentially fatal disease
(pregnant women are immune suppressed compared with non-pregnant women, and are more susceptible to fungal and certain other diseases)
•extreme pain on delivery
•hormonal mood changes, including normal post-partum depression
•continued post-partum exhaustion and recovery period (exacerbated if a c-section -- major surgery -- is required, sometimes taking up to a full year to fully recover)


Normal, expectable, or frequent PERMANENT side effects of pregnancy:
•stretch marks (worse in younger women)
•loose skin
•permanent weight gain or redistribution
•abdominal and vaginal muscle weakness
•pelvic floor disorder (occurring in as many as 35% of middle-aged former child-bearers and 50% of elderly former child-bearers, associated with urinary and rectal incontinence, discomfort and reduced quality of life -- aka prolapsed utuerus, the malady sometimes badly fixed by the transvaginal mesh)
•changes to breasts
•increased foot size
•varicose veins
•scarring from episiotomy or c-section
•other permanent aesthetic changes to the body (all of these are downplayed by women, because the culture values youth and beauty)
•increased proclivity for hemmorhoids
•loss of dental and bone calcium (cavities and osteoporosis)
•higher lifetime risk of developing Altzheimer's
•newer research indicates microchimeric cells, other bi-directional exchanges of DNA, chromosomes, and other bodily material between fetus and mother (including with "unrelated" gestational surrogates)



Occasional complications and side effects:


•complications of episiotomy
•spousal/partner abuse
•hyperemesis gravidarum
•temporary and permanent injury to back
•severe scarring requiring later surgery
(especially after additional pregnancies)
•dropped (prolapsed) uterus (especially after additional pregnancies, and other pelvic floor weaknesses -- 11% of women, including cystocele, rectocele, and enterocele)
•pre-eclampsia (edema and hypertension, the most common complication of pregnancy, associated with eclampsia, and affecting 7 - 10% of pregnancies)
•eclampsia (convulsions, coma during pregnancy or labor, high risk of death)
•gestational diabetes
•placenta previa
•anemia (which can be life-threatening)
•thrombocytopenic purpura
•severe cramping
•embolism (blood clots)
•medical disability requiring full bed rest (frequently ordered during part of many pregnancies varying from days to months for health of either mother or baby)
•diastasis recti, also torn abdominal muscles
•mitral valve stenosis (most common cardiac complication)
•serious infection and disease (e.g. increased risk of tuberculosis)
•hormonal imbalance
•ectopic pregnancy (risk of death)
•broken bones (ribcage, "tail bone")
•hemorrhage and
•numerous other complications of delivery
•refractory gastroesophageal reflux disease
•aggravation of pre-pregnancy diseases and conditions (e.g. epilepsy is present in .5% of pregnant women, and the pregnancy alters drug metabolism and treatment prospects all the while it increases the number and frequency of seizures)
•severe post-partum depression and psychosis
•research now indicates a possible link between ovarian cancer and female fertility treatments, including "egg harvesting" from infertile women and donors
•research also now indicates correlations between lower breast cancer survival rates and proximity in time to onset of cancer of last pregnancy
•research also indicates a correlation between having six or more pregnancies and a risk of coronary and cardiovascular disease



Less common (but serious) complications:


•peripartum cardiomyopathy
•cardiopulmonary arrest
•magnesium toxicity
•severe hypoxemia/acidosis
•massive embolism
•increased intracranial pressure, brainstem infarction
•molar pregnancy, gestational trophoblastic disease
(like a pregnancy-induced cancer)
•malignant arrhythmia
•circulatory collapse
•placental abruption
•obstetric fistula



More permanent side effects:
•future infertility
•permanent disability
•death.





It's a lot more serious than breathing perfume.......but Anti-Choicers do have a tendency to minimize what women go through...

 

Nope, nice try though. My argument was not show that pregnancy and breathing perfume are equated. But to show that difficulties associated with non-intentional acts don't justify self-defense claims. By the way, allergies can be serious (surely you don't want me to post all of the serious complications of an allergy right?). But all that is needed at this point, is to show that if these complications/problems are less than death (which I'm assuming you agree with) then the right to life argument would cut both ways (if both are granted the same personhood status) - it's really not that difficult to comprehend.

 

You are certainly confused on self defense laws. A person can use self defense even if death isn't imminent or obvious. Would you agree to have somone slap you for 9 months without stopping them? YOU have a right to stop them why don't you want women to have the same right? If you can stop them without killing them fine but

A woman has no way to stop the assault by a fetus except to abort.

 

Let me make this plain and simple concerning morals.

They do not make laws.

I believe in protecting the right of women to decide to have a abortion or not and they can base it on their own morals if they choose to. Their own morals, not yours, not mine, or some stranger's.

Taking away their right to their bodies is taking away their right to decide if an abortion is moral for them.

NO one else should decide what other's morals should be.

Morals are not absolute.

 

This is an equivocation. Self-defense that justifies the death of the other person would require that one's life is reasonably threatened. Yes there are stand your ground laws in certain states, but the justification of these go all the way back to John Locke's Second Treatise of Government - that one just don't know the intent of an attacker, so one can't take the chance. Of course whether or not the laws are justified in these cases is certainly up for dispute. But unintentional acts are different than intentional acts. If a mother is marooned on an uninhabited island with her 2 year old child (no one else around) and it starts inconveniencing her, even to the point of physical hardship, can she justifiably kill it? Or walk away from it and let it die? After all it is attacking her, making demands on her, complicating her life, etc. Should she have the right to choose to kill it? It's her life after all...

 

You don't know the difference between born and unborn?
Born people have rights, a fetus doesn't.
The desert island scenario has nothing to do with abortion.

A fetus causes the woman it's in harm. She has the right to stop that harm just like you and I have the right to stop someone from harming us.
The woman though, only has one way to stop the harm.

<MOD EDIT- REMOVED FLAMEBAIT>

 

Let me be clear. You are making a moral claim about what ought to be. This is your moral position. Period. End of story. Finis. Why is this so difficult? You are talking about what laws ought to be. THIS IS A MORAL CLAIM. YOU ARE MAKING A CLAIM ABOUT WHAT PEOPLE SHOULD BE ABLE TO DO. Law prescribes certain behaviors. Laws against murder for example. How do you know good laws from bad ones? So I'm assuming then you are against laws that prohibit slavery? Since that would mean "taking away the right to ownership which would be taking away slave owners' right to decide if owning people is moral for them" - I mean after all you just said that "NO one else should decide what other's morals should be" - which includes slavery right? As you say "Morals are not absolute" - so no critique of Stalin's Gulag? or Hitler's Holocaust? - what's funny is that this applies to your own position - according to you, it's wrong for you to criticize anti-abortion laws, since this is you telling others they shouldn't do something - namely pass laws that restrict choice. How can you not see this?

 

Why? This is what I asked several posts ago - but you refuse to answer it. The law in and of itself isn't justification - for example consider federal law in 1800 concerning those of African descent. Some people had rights, some didn't. Doesn't make it right.

Actually it does. Try harder. See your next thought below.

Now go back to the island example.

MOD EDIT - REMOVED REPLY TO FLAMEBAIT

 

This is the era of Mao Zedong who committed a genocide against his own people. But the current government now allows Chinese couples to have more babies until a male heir is born.