As usual rape comes up to imply that being anti-abortion is to be anti-female and pro-rape
I didn't say that at all. I said that if people think it's "all about responsibility" try telling that to a rape victim. No one in their right mind would be pro-rape. Don't put words into my mouth.
wow, you people are sick.
Sick in what way? I've not been the one that's been saying that people need to suffer in order to "take responsibility" for their actions.
why bother to post if you are just going to repeat the standard non-thinking 'wisdom'?
So using correct terminology, in a philosophical debate closely linked to the biological process is now classed as non-thinking? Great.
Pregnancy is not an illness. Woman body is able to nurture life of another human being
Pregnancy is personal to a woman. It is whatever she makes it. If she wants to give personhood to the potential independent life inside her then that's her prerogative. If she doesn't then that is also her prerogative. If she wants to eat organic mung beans for the duration of her pregnancy, then that is up to her too, as it is to neck a bottle of vodka week in and out.... it's not illegal, although I would doubt her capabilities as a mother.
Just because one is able to do something it doesn't mean that one HAS to do it. Ability and obligation are not mutual and do not go hand in hand, and whilst no body is forcing anybody to get pregnant there people are forcing pregnancy. See the difference?
Telling you what to do?
You told me, in your complete ignorance, that if I didn't want to get pregnant I could get the snip. Which clearly I can't, genius. I and many other women take the necessary precautions already.
Is not? It is very unusual for mothers to refer to pregnancy as "a trauma".
As I said, pregnancy is whatever a mother perceives it to be. If she wants to see it as the most wonderful thing ever, then that's up to her. If she doesn't, well I'm sorry but that up to her too, not up to you.
Well I can say that you are under the age of thirty, have no children and you haven't convinced two doctors that you are serious and mature
Erm, as Harry pointed out:
1) You can't get the snip in Poland
2) Doctors will not perform unnecessary, expensive, and painful medical operations on women of child bearing age unless there is a real necessity. It's in their code of ethics. I'm not the only person who's been turned away in the "liberal" UK. I suggest if you don't like it, you should take it up with the doctors and stop trying to find flaws in my personality in an attempt to make things personal. Is there no depths to the lows which you will not go? Also, before suggesting people in Poland "get the snip", a vague idea of the actual law might be a good idea.
Nice one IS, way to distract attention from the fact you know nothing about Polish contraception law.
Quite.
So far we've had a whole host of ill thought out and straw man arguments as well as personal attacks from the usual suspects:
1) We've had personal insults, and dehumanisation - "quasi-human", "hysterical women", and "immature" being a few.
2) The ascertation that in order for society to stay moral people need to "face the consequences" of their actions, and then U-turning when tapeworm and childhood accidents come up. It seems this "moral rule" is therefore only applicable for pregnancy, and more to the point, only for women, cos men don't get pregnant. It's do as I say, not as I do hypocrisy.
3) We've had emotive and incorrect language; "baby" and "murder" from one side, but when other incorrect and emotive terms are used such as "parasite" suddenly the tactic is no longer acceptable! Moreover, using correct terminology is now called as "non thinking". So whic is it to be? Incorrect emotive language? OR correct non-thinking language? Goalposts are constantly being shifted, but only as long as it suits the anti-abortionists.
4) We've had some people trying to say that it's all about the welfare of the child, but yet these same people actually deliver no help, physical or monetary, to unwanted children in Polish orphanages, or any struggling mothers, and actually do nothing to make the situation that they wish to implement on these vulnerable people any better for them. More do as I say, not as I do.
5) We've had people projecting their personal views of a morality, on to others, and then demanding that only their version of morality is acceptable and should be legislated. So.. totalitarianism then.
6) We've had people wanting to force dogmatic views taken from their own religion on to others. I think that called religious fanaticism.
The ONLY and I mean
ONLY reasonable response we've witnessed so far is actually this one:
As said earlier, it depends on whether you believe life begins at conception or not. I see no reason to assume it does not. I'd rather err on the safe side.
Which is fine and dandy. Should really be having a discussion about where life begins. Or more importantly where you consider
individual human life to begin and therefore at which point do you consider life to become huiman life to become "sacred".
There can be five possibilities for this:
1)
Metabolism. - Cellular activity. Such as respiration and metabolism. This includes skin cells, and sperm cells.
2)
Genetics - A complete genome, in other words a fertilised egg. It is an independent "being" from its parent, but is still not viable. We must also think of some paradox's when talking about this. A a single ferilized egg can give rise to twins, triplets or quadruplets, in fact theoretically with infinite space, a singe fertilised egg could give rise to a million monozygotic twins. So is this fertilized egg a life, a million lives, or still just the potential to become whatever it pleases?
Here's a scientific view on some common
inaccuracies and untruths:
-
The Embryo is Safe Within the Womb. Modern research shows that 30% or fewer fertilised eggs will go on to become foetuses. Many of these early miscarriages are because of abnormal numbers of chromosomes. The view that every fertilised egg is a potential human being is wrong in around 70% of cases.
-
There is a Moment of Fertilisation when the passive egg receives the active sperm. Again recent research has shown that the previous commonly held view that the fastest sperm races towards the egg and, bingo, we're up and running is wrong on many levels. Fertilisation is a process taking up to four days. As such there is no magic moment, rather there is a process.
-
There is consensus amongst scientists that life begins at conception. There isn't even consensus amongst scientists as to whether there's consensus. However, Scott Gilbert's paper lists embryologists who support each of the major view points belying the common and oft repeated assertion that there is consensus amongst embryologists, let alone scientists.
3)
Embryology - This places the start of life at gastrulation, where the uncertainties of the genome become fixed. Twins will now be twins, viability becomes much more likely (but not certain), at this point however all embryos are female, and we still don't know for certain what it will develop into. The stem cell argument hangs in this stage.
4)
Neurology - Or brain activity. Death is usually determined by brain activity, so most people consider this to be the start of life. It's the point at which we decide to switch off the life machine. It's much a much more reliable indicator of life than a heartbeat, which is actually just involuntary muscular activity, and is not really that much different to the metabolic process described in 1).
5) Ecology/ Technology - The point where a fetus can sustain itself outside the womb and becomes viable. As technology progresses, this moment is pushed to an earlier time.
6) Self awareness - Which actually comes after birth for us humans.
Scott Gilbert (a developmental biologist) says:
The entity created by fertilization is indeed a human embryo, and it has the potential to be human adult. Whether these facts are enough to accord it personhood is a question influenced by opinion, philosophy and theology, rather than by science.
So if we're going to talk about where life begins, it's always going to be a matter of opinion, and opinion alone. It is not something anyone can say for definite. What we do know for definite is that a woman IS a living being, and an embryo "might possibly be one", so I'm of the opinion that we should be giving far more rights to "definite life" than "possible life".
Because where life begins
is a matter of opinion, can we really, in a moral sense, legislate an unprovable philosophical opinion over the real feelings, emotions, and experiences of a definite provable living being? Do your unprovable opinions on this subject, trump an actual human? If a woman, or a living being, is that an unwanted pregnancy seen to completion would be the same as torture, and wishes to do something at say, stage 3 of the process where there are still many uncertainties about what this embryo will become, would you force her through that torture, on nothing more than your opinion?
I guess the answer to those questions would be yes. We've already witnessed dehumanisation, projection and name calling, so I don't see forcing someone through torture that for from the dehumanisation process. It's very easy to ignore the feelings and wishes of someone who we no longer seem as human. It's how we get soldiers to kill the enemy, and it's how the governments win us over with propaganda. I wish to be no part of it, which is why you will never see me dehumanise anyone, no matter how much I disagree with them.
Personally, when it comes to morality I prefer to go on definite truths and leave the rest up to personal choice of a provably living human. Anything else on my part would be arrogant and cruel. Why should I be forcing my opinions on to others? Where does legislating opinion stop? Do we make heresy illegal? Do throw people in jail for eating meat, I mean, animals are sentient aren't they?? If my morals dictate I don't do something, then I don't do it. What other people do with their lives is none of my business, and neither is it yours.
You don't agree with abortion, then don't get one.
