Abortion Debate (As Scheduled)

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

This seems to be a very interesting statistic. Though the vast majority of Americans approve of abortion in certain circumstances, it would appear that Americans are moving more to the cautious edge of defining certain circumstances.

I approve.

[Kadagar_AV]

Uh...

You should not be allowed to even control your own body, or what? You are not entitled to decide when you want offspring or not?

Interesting perspective.

If not for abortions I'd be a dad. Thank GOD I am not.

[Marshal Murat]

EMFM - I'd like to point out that while many Americans are now pro-life, they haven't all come around to the whole "let's ban abortions" thing yet. Which is a nice moderation from my point of view.

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

EMFM - I'd like to point out that while many Americans are now pro-life, they haven't all come around to the whole "let's ban abortions" thing yet. Which is a nice moderation from my point of view.

Exactly what the poll says. Most Americans are pro-life, and yet most Americans are also in favour of abortions in some circumstances. This coincides rather nicely with my position (secular pro-life with abortions legal only in certain cases).

You should not be allowed to even control your own body, or what?

A fundamental opinion behind the pro-life movement is that a fetus isn't your own body.

You are not entitled to decide when you want offspring or not?

Yes. You should have made that decision earlier though.

[Kadagar_AV]

Yes. You should have made that decision earlier though.

Ok... so condom bursting, vomiting when on birth control pills.. Those are not valid reasons?

basicly what you are saying is that one should wait having sex untill married to avoid complications? Welcome to the year 2000.


I'll use myself as an example...

Scenario 1: I make a girl pregnant, she gives birth. We are not right for each other, we try a couple of years but it fails. Child is left fatherless/motherless or perhaps has to grow up with two parents hating each other. Alternatively has to spend every other week/year/whatever in Austria and England.

Scenario 2: I make a girl pregnant, she does NOt give birth. We split up, she now has a child and is married, I have a new girlfriend.

Now, explain why scenario 1 is better than scenario 2?

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

Ok... so condom bursting, vomiting when on birth control pills.. Those are not valid reasons?

basicly what you are saying is that one should wait having sex untill married to avoid complications?

No, I'm saying one should assume the potential responsibility of sex. I'm willing to consider first trimester abortions for birth control purposes (on the condition that you pay for them yourself), but that's all.

Now, explain why scenario 1 is better than scenario 2?

The child is alive and has a shot at life?

[Kadagar_AV]

The child is alive and has a shot at life?

Well, now she got another child who got a shot at life... And THAT one will probably grow up with two loving parents.

You mean this child has less value of life? Or do you mean this child would have happened if she would have got the first one too?

Oh, and we kill some millions of babies each time we , right?

Just urinating will kill quite a LOT of potential life.

Touched your balls anytime this week? The sudden impact against your balls will have killed thousands of potential humans.

*yawn*

Yeah abortion is bad. bad, bad abortion.

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

You mean this child has less value of life? Or do you mean this child would have happened if she would have got the first one too?

Can I kill you if it means that your parents will end up with another [presumably better]* child?

*No insult intended with that, I'm playing on your analogy/example.

Oh, and we kill some millions of babies each time we , right?

Just urinating will kill quite a LOT of potential life.

Touched your balls anytime this week? The sudden impact against your balls will have killed thousands of potential humans.

*yawn*

Yeah abortion is bad. bad, bad abortion.

The argument that killing millions of unfertilized cells, or even an embryo, means that all abortion should be legal is a laughable example of hyperbole and completely unrelated to that of a violent abortion of a fetus.

[KarlXII]

Scenario 1: I make a girl pregnant, she gives birth. We are not right for each other, we try a couple of years but it fails. Child is left fatherless/motherless or perhaps has to grow up with two parents hating each other. Alternatively has to spend every other week/year/whatever in Austria and England.

Scenario 2: I make a girl pregnant, she does NOt give birth. We split up, she now has a child and is married, I have a new girlfriend.

This isn't the 70s. We know the risks of sex, both in pregnancy and diseases, and therefore must act more resonsibly about the consequences. If you don't want to be a father and decide to go have sex with a girl without taking the proper prevention, then you KNOW the risks, and if you get her pregnant, it is YOUR responsibility.

[HoreTore]

(on the condition that you pay for them yourself)

So....

What you're saying, is that rich people shouldn't have kids, but we should get more dirt poor kids...?

[Samurai Waki]

I'm all for it, my girls were a conscientious decision between two people who agreed the alternative wasn't agreeable, but that it didn't mean people shouldn't be able to decide. I'm truly sorry for those who weren't ready to be received into the world without proper guidance and instruction.

[Fragony]

You buy what you break, if you make a mistake you should live with it. Abortion should only be possible only under extreme circumstances, might not look like a human being, yet, but it is one if you allow it to live. I wouldn't be able to live with knowing that, abortion is so very wrong on so many levels.

[Vuk]

Anyway, back to the subject on hand. You guys just ain't gonna let me concentrate on my finals, are you? :P I personally do not think that abortion should ever be legal, and here is why. I used to think that it should be legal for rape cases or times when the mother's life was on the line, and then it should be the mother's choice. Here is why I changed my mind.
In the case of rape, someone viciously assaulted someone else, and committed a crime against a human being. Does that mean that we should retaliate and commit another crime against a human being? Sure, she did not ask to be raped and bear the child, but the rapist forced it on her, and has to be punished for his crime. The baby should not be the one punished for the rapists crime. Abort the rapist, not the innocent kid! O wait, I forgot. All the people who are for killing innocent children are the ones against killing evil murderers and rapists. That makes a lot of sense. The rapist committed the crime, not the baby. Let the baby be born, then she can put it up for adoption if she does not want it. It is not right that the woman has to carry the baby, it is a wrong the rapist did to her. That does not mean that the baby should pay for the wrong though. It is innocent and did not maliciously put itself into her womb.
As far as when the mother's life is on the line, that just seems too much like playing God to me. By natural selection one person is gonna die and another is not, what right do we have to come in and kill the hope of the survivor? What I mean is that the kid is innocent, and isn't trying to kill the mother, so why does it deserve to die? Likewise if it was a case of the mother would live but the baby was gonna die, and they could cut the mother up in a way that would save the baby's life but kill the mother, I would say no. The mother is innocent and does not deserve to die. It was natural selection that selected her to live.
When you think of it a little deeper, that is like a husband knowing his wife will die if she does not get a healthy organ transplant and there are no doners with the right type, so he takes a chainsaw and murders his daughter to get her organ so that he can save his wife. You can't kill your children to save yourself, it is just not right.

All that said, the only time that I am not sure of is incest. I unfortunately have not made my mind up on that one. There are communities where the population is the result of inbred relationships, and most of them are just normal people. On the other hand very close incest esp can really make an unatural mess of a kid with extreme physical and mental disorders. I don't know, it seems so wrong, yet killing it seems so wrong. I guess I will have to wait until I find more out about it.

[HoreTore]

I'm all for giving fetuses full human rights.

But the mother still has full human rights. So, what is the situation we have then? The fetus has the right to live and become a human, check. But where does it say that since I'm a human being, I'm entitled to live where I want, including inside another human? If I want to live on another persons property(or body, in this case), I would have to ask their permission first, of course. So, the fetus has every right to live, but the woman has the right to evict the fetus from her body, since the fetus has no right to live on another persons property.

If abortion is banned, I'm going to live inside Angelina Jolie. Or just outside of her. And then inside her. And then just outside again.....

[Pannonian]

If abortion is banned, I'm going to live inside Angelina Jolie. Or just outside of her. And then inside her. And then just outside again.....

Make up your bloody mind for goodness sake.

[Tristuskhan]

If you don't want to be a father and decide to go have sex with a girl without taking the proper prevention, then you KNOW the risks, and if you get her pregnant, it is YOUR responsibility.

So your punishment must be a child? Looks like you love children.... can I remind you it's the unwanted child who pays for your mistake? I wish abortion was legal when my father was born (june 1945, nine month after Liberation of France, bless those wild liberation parties), he won't be struggling everyday to find reasons not to practice self-destruction.

[Vuk]

So your punishment must be a child? Looks like you love children.... can I remind you it's the unwanted child who pays for your mistake? I wish abortion was legal when my father was born (june 1945, nine month after Liberation of France, bless those wild liberation parties), he won't be struggling everyday to find reasons not to practice self-destruction.

He didn't say it was a punishment, he said it was a responsibility. It is abortionists (such as Obama) who say that children are punishments. If you do not want the responsibility of a child, then yes, having sex is a 'risk' in that sense, but that does not mean that a child is a punishment. Children are responsibilities, and abortion is just a cheap way to get out of that responsibility by murdering a child.

[PBI]

This generalisation has been edited out in the original post. BG

Not only is this an incredibly lazy (not to mention offensive and inaccurate) generalization, it is also completely irrelevant.

[Tristuskhan]

He didn't say it was a punishment, he said it was a responsibility. It is abortionists (such as Obama) who say that children are punishments. If you do not want the responsibility of a child, then yes, having sex is a 'risk' in that sense, but that does not mean that a child is a punishment. Children are responsibilities, and abortion is just a cheap way to get out of that responsibility by murdering a child.

Right. I can understand the point. I'd just say that it's "responsibilities" for people around, but actually a punishment for the parents in most cases.

To keep on a ground I know, life is still a punishment for my father 64 years after his birth for being an unwanted child. Something he was not responsible of but definitely was the victim.
You all anti-abortionnists always think about the parents responsibilities and never about the child's future feelings, likely to be really unbalanced, and the way he or she will pass it to his own children.

[Vuk]

Not only is this an incredibly lazy (not to mention offensive and inaccurate) generalization, it is also completely irrelevant.

If Prolife people were prolife so that women could suffer, do you think that that would be important? I think that motivatin matters a lot.

Right. I can understand the point. I'd just say that it's "responsibilities" for people around, but actually a punishment for the parents in most cases.

To keep on a ground I know, life is still a punishment for my father 64 years after his birth for being an unwanted child. Something he was not responsible of but definitely was the victim.
You all anti-abortionnists always think about the parents responsibilities and never about the child's future feelings, likely to be really unbalanced, and the way he or she will pass it to his own children.

Trist, do you know how many people I have met whose parents loved them and wanted them who turned out a bunch of emos? It can happen both ways. While I certainly do not have proof that it is representative, it just so happens that every 'unwanted child' I know is pretty darned happy with life and getting along darned well. The problem is with the way parents raise kids, not with parents having kids. The answer is not to teach people to murder their kids so that they will not be bad parents, but to teach them to be good, responsible parents. As I said, children are a responsibility, not baggage. They need love, and they need to be raised responsibly. People need to be made to take responsibility, not allowed to dodge it by murdering an innocent child so that they can have pleasure.

[Fragony]

To keep on a ground I know, life is still a punishment for my father 64 years after his birth for being an unwanted child. Something he was not responsible of but definitely was the victim.
You all anti-abortionnists always think about the parents responsibilities and never about the child's future feelings, likely to be really unbalanced, and the way he or she will pass it to his own children.

I am going to be really careful here. If he had a choice, would he rather not exist? I very good friend of mine is a rape-child, and he was devastated when learned that and he is totally out of control sometimes and things aren't going very well. But when given the choice, well having the choice.

[Vuk]

I am going to be really careful here. If he had a choice, would he rather not exist? I very good friend of mine is a rape-child, and he was devastated when learned that and he is totally out of control sometimes and things aren't going very well. But when given the choice, well having the choice.

Truth be told, I think that most would rather have the chance at life. And you know what? A lot of children whose parents wanted to have them end up regretting life. My parents did not intend on having children at first, but then my sister 'happened' so they had her. 2 children later I was born, and my ma ended up having 6 altogether. :P My parents were very poor and afraid of what would happen if they had kids and didn't want the responsibility. Tell you what, I am drrned glad that they didn't take the easy way out and murder me and my 5 siblings. I love life, and so does everyone of my brothers and sisters. The answer is not to tell the parents to murder their babies, but rather tell them to take responsibilty and be good parents. My parents did not want kids, but they were good parents and loved their kids.

[HoreTore]

Tell you what, I am drrned glad that they didn't take the easy way out and murder me and my 5 siblings.

Murder is what happens after birth, ie. when we're talking about an actual human being.

A fetus is removed by a medical procedure, and is not a human being.

[Fixiwee]

Murder is what happens after birth, ie. when we're talking about an actual human being.

A fetus is removed by a medical procedure, and is not a human being.

That's not entierly true and pretty much a matter of definition.

[PBI]

If Prolife people were prolife so that women could suffer, do you think that that would be important? I think that motivatin matters a lot.

Your attempted line of reasoning was "all men in favour of abortion are man-whores who just want abortion to be legal so they can screw around without consequence, therefore any argument they may present in favour of abortion is just a pretext and may be assumed to be fatuous." I would argue it is quite irrelevant since I take the view that the arguments for and against abortion should be considered on their own merits rather than the perceived moral authority or depravity of those presenting them. Otherwise why bother to debate them at all? Far better to just spend the time slinging mud at our political opponents to discredit them.

[Fragony]

Murder is what happens after birth, ie. when we're talking about an actual human being.

That's what you think you feel like, but when somebody kicks a pregnant woman in the belly you are just that tiny little bit more disgusted.

[Vuk]

Murder is what happens after birth, ie. when we're talking about an actual human being.

A fetus is removed by a medical procedure, and is not a human being.

Fine, then I will have your brain removed via medical procedure and I will not be commiting murder. You are not a human being, you are just an adult. See what I mean? 'Fetus', just like adult, is simply a stage in human development, but both are still humans.

EDIT: and BTW, 'medical procedure' does not make something not murder. A lot of the most henius acts in history, including those committed under both Hitler and Stalin were 'medical procedures'. Murder by another name is still murder.

[Tristuskhan]

Hitler and Stalin

Here they come.... Bye-bye, debate.

[Vuk]

Here they come....

They are the best examples of medical procedures being used to the detriment of humanity. What is up with the Hitler fetish on this board?

EDIT: bye bye debate? Why, because I pointed out that medical procedures do not necessarily have to used for good? Why do you and Lemur go crazy at the mention of the name?

[Tristuskhan]

They are the best examples of medical procedures being used to the detriment of humanity. What is up with the Hitler fetish on this board?

Do I really have to tell you? Fifteen years ago my girlfriend aborted, hence I used a medical procedure to the detriment of humanity, hence it looks like I can be put more or less on par with Hitler and Stalin, hence no more debate.