I am pro-choice, but I think these sorts of arguments are scientifically specious.

It's not clear to me at all that a baby, born, is biologically autonomous.

And it's also not clear to me that in an age where mothers and doctors schedule births months in advance, that the date of birth, the moment of birth is in any way relevant to the question of abortion.

I think I would prefer most of McElroy's argument without the scientific technobabble and discussions of potential and hypotheticals with just an acknowledgement that it is a difficult issue but that the rights of the woman should take priority.

How about, in this day and age of nearly infalible birth control that is available to everyone, contrary to what the Democrats tried to tell us, How about people take responsibility for their getting pregnant *before* it happens. Then, in the case of rape or incest, it would be a no brainer, but people like a girl I used to know who had at least 3 abortions before she turned 18 would be dragged to their gyne and have the Depro shot whether they wanted it or not.

Birth Control is using a condom, pill, IUD, Depro, or other medically effective *Preventative* so that you do not become pregnant, Not murdering the innocent child your irresponsibility brings into being just because you were too lazy or stupid or drunk to buy a rubber.

I wish people would STOP with the BS of this being about Reproductive rights, because it isn't. It's about convenience, and selfishness. I get it, you don't want to be a mom. Cool, I certainly agree that you would be a horrible parent. That's what adoptions are for. You take responsibility for your mistake, give the baby a chance at a good life, and learn your lesson.
Before you ask, no, I've never had an abortion, but my eldest daughter was born when I was just barely 18. I had to face this issue head on. Complete with an asshole BF that left me when I was 8 mos pregnant.

It's hard to take people seriously when they say things like this:

"As a self-owner, I am the only one with jurisdiction over my own body."

I agree with her, though, per Paglia: Women are at war with the natural world, never more so that in matters of reproduction. No quarter.

Also, I agree with Jerry, and Kat some, too.

Listen, IRONY is how adulthood works.....

Get your head straight about "rights". That definition is mauled by everyone with an opinion.

If you cannot understand and exercise a right, you do not have it. Further, if that situation is not because of active denial by an oppressor, you have a guardian, who is responsible for you on the theory that you cannot be responsible for yourself.

You pay for a right by the exercise of responsibility.

And yet, a chair or tomato grown do not have individual DNA. That is where this argument and all others will fail at soemone who believes a person is a person once made. And if people ahve rights, thenm the person YOU made has them too, and that'a where your rights end. The government isn't kidnapping women in teh night and implanting fetuses. Take responsibility for your own self and don't act like babies just magically happen.

I was prochoice for a long time. In high school, a prolife classmate gave me a pamplet that graphically detailed abortion, from the POV of the baby. She asked if it had changed my mind. I said no, I knew abortion was killing someone horribly, I just didn't think you could make a woman carry it in her body. Having grown older, and realized that women should and daily DO take responsibility for things, I changed that opinion. Expecting to be able to take a mulligan for everything in life isn't doing anyone any favors.

Wow-typos. Sorry.

I am a pro-life libertarian.

There are some reasonable arguments for the pro-choice position, but "everything beneath my skin is me" is not one.

This is not an argument: it's just a restating of her conclusion in terms of an axiom. Accept that axiom and - hey, surprise! - her conclusion falls out.

> If a fetus is sustained by the food I eat and the pulsing of my blood, then I have a right to deny it sustenance and shelter.

She's just argued that she can throw a breast-feeding child out in the trash.

> It is undeniable that the fetus is in some sense alive

"In some sense"!? How generous she is! Yes, it's true that a 8 month 3 week fetus has a heart beat, muscle development, a neurologically active brain...so it is, in some sense, almost as valuable as a cockroach or an ant!

> An essential characteristic of being an individual is being a discrete entity.

First, she's again making up axioms that lead inevitable to her conclusions.

Second, even if we grant her this axiom, a fetus meets this standard: Separate DNA. Separate heart beat. Separate blood type. Separate digestive tract.

Third, her standard allows a conjoined twin to deny the humanity of his or her sibling. Thought experiment: is the first twin to reach a revolver allowed to shoot the other?

> The anti-abortion position is weak, riddled with internal contradictions

such as?

> dangerously wrong.

asserted without evidence.

> It uses the word "rights" in a self-contradictory manner

What is the contradiction?

> Self-ownership begins with your skin.

Agreed.

I'm happy to admit that - twins aside - a person should have absolute control over every human cell
that has the exact same DNA as their skin cells.

> If you cannot clearly state, "Everything beneath my skin is me; this is the line past that no one crosses without my permission," then there is no foundation for individual rights

Why "beneath"? This is a weird topological stance, designed purely to win this particular argument.

If a person steals a gold ring and swallows it, does that ring cease to belong to the original owner?

If a person has a pacemaker installed that contains copyrighted software, does the recipient now have the right to republish the software?

To get science fictional, if we have a digitized person or an AI on a chip and a person inhales that chip, does the digital being now become a slave to the engulfing individual?

tl;dr : there are plausible arguments to be made for the pro-choice position (even if I don't find them convincing). This, though, is not a plausible argument: it's just a restating - over and over and over again - of the axiom "a fetus is part of me, just like an ingrown hair, therefore I can do whatever I want. How do I know it's a part of me? Because I define it as a part of me!"

The "potential life" argument has always driven me absolutely crazy. We can tell the difference between a live fetus and a dead one; children do die in utero. When women carrying multiples are offered selective reduction, the "extra" children are killed. To see whether or not the "reduction" worked, signs of life (heartbeat and growth) are checked because obviously the mom is still pregnant---she's just intentionally carrying around a one or two dead babies along with the one or two live ones. And of course the same is true when a mom carrying multiples loses one unintentionally before it is safe to deliver the child(ren) who lived---you have the living and the dead. There is no "potential" there.

The idea of a fetus, until birth, being not a separate entity is laughable. Of course he/she is a different entity from the mother and from his twin---they have different DNA, different genitalia, different blood types, different medical conditions. A fetus has down syndrome, his mother does not. Moms can even (rarely) have allergic reactions to their fetus. The writers insistence that the fetus is simply not an individual is ridiculous to anyone who has seen a pair of twins on ultrasound.

And the idea that "under the skin" means "part of me, and mine" is sketchy. TJIC has some good points about the pacemaker and the gold ring and I would add that with surrogacy it's even becoming fairly common to carry a fetus that is definitely not you, not yours in any way. The fetus in that case simply cannot be part of the mother; he or she is undeniably individual. While I'm thinking of surrogacy, if there is such a thing as potential life, it's a frozen embryo. A fetus though, is growing and developing and undeniably living, or it is dead.

--------------------------------------

"As a self-owner, I am the only one with jurisdiction over my own body. If a fetus is sustained by the food I eat and the pulsing of my blood, then I have a right to deny it sustenance and shelter. I have a right to abort that fetus. To give the fetus a 'right' to consume another person's bodily functions is to establish two rights claims over one body. The word that describes a system in which one man has property rights in another is slavery, and it is the antithesis of libertarianism."

Children, under a certain age, are always entitled to their parents' bodies in that their parents (blood in the arteries included) must work to support them, must use their bodies-full-of-blood to do the manual labor of changing diapers and such. This paragraph essentially means that the writer thinks all parenting is slavery which is of course nonsense. Having a legal obligation to a child you created is not slavery. And, of course, you can transfer many of these obligations to another willing party (adoption) but the child still does have a right to be cared for by someone until the transfer can take place. If you bring home a baby and then decide that you would like to arrange an adoption for that child, you have to take care of him/her, with food and diaper changes and all the rest until you can physically place him/her in the arms of someone else who will do it. Same with pregnancy---you have to take care of the kid until it's safe to hand him or her to someone who will take over.

Children have a right to sustenance and shelter from their parents, period. A pregnant mom with a biological child is the parent. A pregnant woman carrying someone else's baby is babysitting, as arranged by the parents. Any child who is being cared for is depending on his/her caretakers' bodies; pregnancy is just one way in which that happens.

"This is not an argument: it's just a restating of her conclusion in terms of an axiom. Accept that axiom and - hey, surprise! - her conclusion falls out."

Exactly.

And I like Wendy, but I think she is wrong on this one.

"tl;dr : there are plausible arguments to be made for the pro-choice position (even if I don't find them convincing). This, though, is not a plausible argument: it's just a restating - over and over and over again - of the axiom "a fetus is part of me, just like an ingrown hair, therefore I can do whatever I want. How do I know it's a part of me? Because I define it as a part of me!"

Exactly....again.

A born baby is highly dependent, but anyone can meet those needs. It breathes on its own and has its own circulatory system, and anyone with a credit card and access to a supermarket can feed it and keep it clean. With a fetus, only the biological mother can provide these things. My fetus is part of me because it is exists inside my uterus and is connected to a placenta that my body created. It uses the nutrients that I eat and the blood I create to survive. If I died today, it would stop circulating waste, breathing and eating, and would die soon after.

If I swallow a ring that isn't mine, it doesn't become mine, but no one has the right to cut me open to get it. Same goes for the pacemaker (the physical item, not the patented plans for it, which is a whole other issue). But dragging clearly non-living things into an argument about living things is a common tactic people use when they are trying to make the whole argument sound ridiculous. Nobody is confused about a pacemaker's individual rights.

Despite Kat's confidence in the matter, birth control fails frequently. People who use it don't always use it perfectly. Even when they do, condoms break, medicines interfere with birth control, etc. But that's a tangent. How well people use birth control has little to do with whether a fetus has rights independent of a mother.

We have exactly the rights we decide to give each other. If we're going to be consistent, then we either support a woman's right to abortion in all circumstances or in none. If a fetus is a separate individual, then being the product of a rape or incest or the potential cause of a mother's death doesn't make that less true.

Pro-choice. My body, NOT yours. You DON'T OWN ME. I don't get tell you what you can or can't do with your body; you do NOT get to tell me what I can or cannot do with mine. End of story.

I think Flynne has it right.

If I swallow a ring that isn't mine, it doesn't become mine, but no one has the right to cut me open to get it.

---------------------------------------

Right. And if a fetus attaches to your uterus, it doesn't mean that fetus now owns your uterus...but he or she does have a right to not be torn limb from limb so that you can have your uterus back the way it was. The owner of the gold ring can do what he/she wants with the ring when it is safe to separate the ring and the other person's body, and the owner of the uterus can do what he/she wants with it when it's safe to separate the uterus and the baby's body.

And remember, here, the fetus is not a thief who intentionally took over someone else's property. This particular swallowed-ring analogy works best if we assume that the person who swallowed the ring did so by either the owner's negligence or honest-injun accident (not using birth control or having it fail would be like dropping the ring into a casserole you served to the other person) or by some third party's crime (a rape in this analogy would be like if someone stole my ring and then hid it in a casserole that my neighbor ate).

------------------------------

If we're going to be consistent, then we either support a woman's right to abortion in all circumstances or in none. If a fetus is a separate individual, then being the product of a rape or incest or the potential cause of a mother's death doesn't make that less true.

Posted by: MonicaP at July 31, 2012 7:52 AM

Now this much I agree on. The people who insist on no abortion except in cases of rape or incest baffle me. I do get where their heart is; I'm horrified by the prospect of a woman carrying her rapist's baby, but I can't imagine legally defining a person as not having human rights because of the circumstances of his conception.

Thanks, Feebie. And I get where Monica and Jenny are coming from too, but the bottom line is, IT IS NO ONE ELSE'S BUSINESS. What I do with MY body is not YOUR business, it's not my MOM'S business, it's certainly not my CONGRESSMAN'S business, it's not ANYone else's business but MINE and my DOCTOR'S. PERIOD. And the baby's father if he's in the picture, maybe. It just is NOT anyone else's business! So keep YOUR nose out of my body, thank you, and I will return the courtesy. Because it is, you know, common courtesy to NOT BUTT IN to OTHER people's business. Especially something so personal.

I see the pro-choics pro-life in libertarian terms but from a different perspective. The fetus is in the far majority of cases an un wanted but previously semi-invited guest. Barring cases of rape (estimated less than .1% of abortins have to do with rape) one willlingly had sex which as we all know has a good chance of producing pregnancy (semi- invitation).

What do you do with an invited guest on your property if you decide you now want them out? Moreover what do you do if they realistically can't leave, say they fell and slipped a disk.
You want them gone and are tresspassing, violating your rights. Your first choice is not to kill them. Otherwise I could invite my enemies over, load the gun and say you have 5 seconds to leave then start shooting them. Why allow the same with pregnancy.
With modern medical technology, babies are viable an earlier and earlier age of pregnancy, what is the moral question in aborting a baby which could be viable at that age. You have the right to have the fetus leave, but not to kill.
Also as stated by others, we say children have rights to parents support, why deny that to earlier children.

I'm very, very, very, VERY reluctantly pro-choice. I think abortion is very, very wrong and I am appalled that women feel the need to get one for whatever reason. The only reason I'm pro-choice at all is that abortions *will* happen, whether legal or not. They always have throughout history. I'd much rather have them happen in a medical environment with sterile equipment. And frankly I'd rather have them done in an environment where the doctors and lawmakers can say "A fetus at 24 weeks has a 50% chance of living. No abortions after 23 weeks."

And I totally agree with TJIC. (well, aside from the whole pro-life/ pro-choice thing).

Why are you so concerned about what I do? What has it got to do with you? How does it affect your life, if I decide to do something you disagree with? My best guess is that it DOESN'T, but you want to stick you nose in my personal business anyway. Sorry, you DON'T GET TO. Just as you wouldn't want me sticking my nose in YOUR personal business.

And Joe, your argument is ridiculous. An invited guest ON my property is NOT the same thing as a fetus INSIDE MY BODY. Why is it that all these people insist on comparing oranges to apples?

And for the record, I could have aborted. Twice. I CHOSE NOT TO, not because of WHAT ANYONE ELSE had to say about it, but because it was MY decision. Hence, pro-CHOICE. But if there was something wrong with either of my children that would have made their lives a living hell, DAMN RIGHT I want the OPTION to abort, if that makes more sense than bringing a deformed or severely handicapped child into the world that I would not be equipped to take care of. And THAT ALSO would be MY decision, NOT ANYONE ELSE'S. NOR SHOULD IT BE. Because it would be MY life, NOT yours, that would be affected.

@Flynne:

> Why are you so concerned about what I do? What has it got to do with you? How does it affect your life, if I decide to do something you disagree with?

Well, that's a fine argument for whipping your slaves when they fall behind on cotton harvesting goals. They are your property after all - ah, wait. This is about what you do with your son or daughter, not your field slave?

Anyway, yes, yes - your property, your choice. Well argued.

That was pretty STUPID, TJIC, I wouldn't have expected that argument from you. How is being pregnant even remotely the same as owning slaves?? Stupidly argued on your part. Try again, maybe? And this time, try to explain to me how my life even remotely affects yours.

"Why are you so concerned about what I do?"

Why am I concerned when your drunken friend murders you at a bar?

Because for many of us, it's pretty clear that the fetus is alive. The question isn't really one of is it alive or not, the hard questions come after that. Eliminating the question of if it is alive or a human or autonomous seems to be more a way of badgering the argument than holding a discussion.

----

There are some interesting comments at Wendy's column....

I think (one of?) the problem(s) I have with the biologically autonomous argument is this:

As medicine progresses, fetuses will become viable at earlier and earlier ages. Already now, there are 22 - 26 week old premies that go on to live and succeed. Perhaps we should not consider them any less biologically autonomous than a newborn, or someone paralyzed from the neck down, or someone very elderly all of whom used to be dead dead dead until culture and medicine and technology evolved.

So the very first choice prior to abortion at or beyond 22 weeks is to make mom (and dad) pay for an early delivery and neonatal care.

I think that's the logical endpoint of the biologically autonomous argument.

Hey, maybe this is all a transitory phenomena because as medicine advances all kids will be extracted at 4 weeks and placed in (Matrix-like) pod incubators so that mom can go back to her career. (Not really joking, that might be a good thing...)

Regarding incest and rape abortions, I understand the point of view that says there should be no exceptions due to incest and rape if the kid is really an individual.

That may be right.

My response is to make sure contraception is widely available and cheap beforehand (including the pill), and also to ensure that pregnancy tests, Plan B and RU-486 are also widely available as well. And to insist that ERs and Pharmacies are well stocked in all.

That won't cover all cases, but I bet it covers most of them.

Hey, maybe public toilets should automatically test for pregnancy....

Right. And if a fetus attaches to your uterus, it doesn't mean that fetus now owns your uterus...but he or she does have a right to not be torn limb from limb so that you can have your uterus back the way it was.

First cause. My body created the fetus. I can live just fine without the fetus. The fetus can't say the same. If my fetus died, I would be very sad, but I would live, barring extreme medical complications. I am clearly the life support for my fetus, not the other way around. And the fetus has no such "right" to not be torn limb from limb. Many people want it to, but it doesn't, since we legally allow people to have abortions. Rights are given by man, not nature.

Flynne is right, but I do understand why people feel the need to get involved. If you see abortion as murder, then you can't just stand aside and be silent.

The whole abortion argument seems to invite comparisons that don't make any sense.

"The word that describes a system in which one man has property rights in another is slavery, and it is the antithesis of libertarianism."

This may not be intended for Amy's readers, but it will probably be relevant for many who might consider be forced to have a baby to be like slavery. And they will disagree vehemently...

I am divorced. I pay child support. That child support is based on my income. Child support is not based on the current economy, the current unemployment rate, where I live and the availability of jobs, my happiness at my current job, or even my happiness or satisfaction in my current field. Child support is not based on the poverty rate, or the mean income of others in the neighborhood.

If I change jobs and my wages go down, child support does not necessarily go down. In fact, the parent paid child support can ask the court to "impute wages" at the old rate which means that if I am laid off, or change jobs, or change fields, I may still have to pay child support at the old much higher rate. And that is common and not the exception.

In California I paid $2300 per month. When my ex moved to Arizona and I followed, support should have decreased to $1500 per month, but there was no guarantee. When I was laid off, support should have decreased to ____ what? You fill in the blanks, but still my ex and lawyers all thought support should stay at what I was paying prior to the layoff.

I would like to go back to school and/or change fields and careers. I think I would be much happier in a different field, even if that means earning less. I would still be able to pay my ex far more than an unemployment or poverty level. I would probably be able to pay my ex at the mean income of those in the neighborhood, but it would be less than what I was paying when I was in a job I hated.

But I can't do that without the permission of my ex and the permission of the courts.

If I fail to pay enough child support I can and will be thrown in jail, AND still be liable for the child support I didn't pay. And in jail, I will still be liable for child support I am not paying those months I am in jail.

So.... Well, I think the being forced to carry a baby is slavery argument has its flaws in today's society.

Why am I concerned when your drunken friend murders you at a bar?

Again, apples and oranges. If I'm out at a bar, and my "drunken friend murders [me]", again, how is it any of your business? Two adult, autonomous people do NOT = pregnant woman. If you never met me before, how and why on earth would you be affected by my death? Answer: you WOULDN'T. Still NOT YOUR BUSINESS.

"Again, apples and oranges. If I'm out at a bar, and my "drunken friend murders [me]", again, how is it any of your business? Two adult, autonomous people do NOT = pregnant woman. If you never met me before, how and why on earth would you be affected by my death? Answer: you WOULDN'T. Still NOT YOUR BUSINESS."

But I've already said I don't believe the autonomous biological entity argument makes any sense. And I've already said I think that fetuses past some quickly changing and shrinking point of viability are clearly living and shouldn't be killed if there is an alternative.

And so it seems a pregnant woman and that viable fetus are indeed similar to two people at a bar, one of whom kills the other.

But if you're saying I shouldn't care about murders of people I don't know, uh, well, wat?

If you see abortion as murder, then you can't just stand aside and be silent.

Well, yes I can, and should, because that STILL doesn't make it my business, what someone else does with their own body.

I get where you're coming from, though, and I understand why some people think it's necessary to protest abortion, and to try and assert themselves into some stranger's life, but it's really best not to do that, lest some stranger try to assert themselves into YOUR life, in a way you wouldn't want them to.

"As long as the fetus is physically within the woman's body and dependent upon her circulatory and respiratory system, it cannot claim individual rights because it is not an individual. At birth, the fetus is biologically autonomous and becomes a self-owner with full individual rights. Although it cannot survive without assistance, this does not affect those rights."

All this seems like a good argument for being able to have the fetus surgically removed or induce an early birth. It doesn't particularly seem like a good argument to allow killing at ages where medical technology now allows premature births to survive routinely. You absolutely have a right to evict someone from your property, and you don't have to save the life of someone on the sidewalk, but that doesn't extend to automatically being able to shoot someone.

On a side note, I don't know about being pregnant, but having kids is quite a bit like owning slaves, just as being a kid is quite a bit like being someone's slave, with some obvious differences in how one got in that situation and the promise of eventually getting out.

Determining that independent life starts at viability doesn't resolve the issue that the fetus currently occupies a space in a woman's uterus, but it does open up a whole other set of problems.

No reputable doctor would induce at 24 weeks unless there were a very good medical reason to do so, so ultimately she is still required to be a life support system for a fetus. Even if induction were an option, babies born that early often have serious medical problems. Who pays for that medical care? Women seeking abortions often do so because they can't care for their babies. Asking them to them pay for extensive neonatal care (and beyond) may very well be like getting blood from a stone. If she decides to abandon the child to the state, how many people are going to be chipper about paying tax money for medical and foster care expenses?

Full-term babies are a different matter. There aren't enough of them to go around to couples who want them, so it's unlikely that a healthy, full-term baby is going to be a burden on the state.

Why are you so concerned about what I do?

I don't.

I care about the small person you may have inside you. I fear the consequences of living in a society where millions of babies are murdered every year.

I also care a whole lot about personal liberty, property rights, and the notion that nobody should tell anybody else what to do.

So it's all just a bit more complicated and fraught with peril than 'MY BODY MY CHOICE'.

"Well, yes I can, and should, because that STILL doesn't make it my business, what someone else does with their own body."

The disagreement is that people don't agree with the "their own body" part. Your uterus is your own body; the fetus is a parasite, but that doesn't mean that it's part of your body. You're free to remove it from your body and cease providing it support.

Your complaints about strangers sound a lot like people I know who defend beating their wives or children, some of the former arguments being based on (absurd and silly) arguments about marriage making two people "one person."

Well, yes I can, and should, because that STILL doesn't make it my business, what someone else does with their own body.

I agree with you in that I don't see abortion as murder, so I think people should just stay out of it. But on a greater scale, if we do define something as murder, leaving that sort of thing up to individuals to work out is a bad idea. Society works because we all agree to more or less follow the same laws. I want someone prosecuted for murder because I don't want it to be essentially legal to murder me or the people I love. And I don't want my only option to be be vigilante justice.

And that oft-repeated phrase "and HER DOCTOR" seems to me to be incompatible with libertarianism. I realize that, for some bizarre reason, courts found it easier to justify rights on the basis of the rights of doctors to prescribe. Yet it seems silly to me. Surely if it's a right, it's a right of the person whose body it is, not the doctor's right, of all things.

No reputable doctor would induce at 24 weeks unless there were a very good medical reason to do so, so ultimately she is still required to be a life support system for a fetus. Even if induction were an option, babies born that early often have serious medical problems. Who pays for that medical care?

----------------------------------------

The adoptive parents would pay for the medical care. I suppose that it should probably be lawful to induce labor or perform a c-section early if

1.)The patient understands and accepts the very real risks to her that are associated with c-section and with the drugs used to induce labor, which are significant.

2.)There are adoptive parents ready willing and able to accept the child and his/her medical bills immediately AND they know and accept that this early birth is done by choice and they understand all the risks associated with raising a child born so early

3.)The birth mother and the adoptive parents can find an OB, pediatrician/neonatalogist and hospital with an appropriate neonatal unit willing to go along with it all, with the full understanding that there was no medical reason for this. Which would be nigh on impossible at 24 weeks, but probable at 34 or even 30. In 2020 it might be possible sooner; who knows?

It *is* unfortunate and unfair that women have to be life support for their children more often and in a more dangerous and burdensome way than men. But this is just one of those hard things about biology: It isn't fair.

The adoptive parents would pay for the medical care.

If the state/mother can find adoptive parents for a child who might have extensive medical issues. There are adoptive parents willing to take this risk, but not many, and if we start having more and more babies with extreme problems, there won't be enough. IVF and surrogacy have given people far more options than they had before. These babies will be the state (i.e., taxpapers') problem until they are well enough for a couple to feel confident their new baby won't die.

At 34 weeks it's a completely different story. Despite many pro-life fears, near-term women aren't lining up for late-term abortions for trivial reasons. Most abortions are done very early in the pregnancy. I don't think we need to create laws for extreme outliers.

Wanted to add: I'm not sure it's kinder to introduce a child to potentially a lifetime of suffering caused by premature birth issues than it is to abort.

"It *is* unfortunate and unfair that women have to be life support for their children more often and in a more dangerous and burdensome way than men. But this is just one of those hard things about biology: It isn't fair."

I'm not disagreeing, just want to add that as men are constantly being told, it's also a benefit and source of joy, wonder, insight and wisdom that men can never understand.

You guys are seriously into this. It's almost certain that one of you is wrong about something, and it will be fun to come home after work and read carefully and find out who and ridicule the living shit out of 'em.

Until then, here's one of my favorite links on the internet, offered here several times before, deployed anytime people start getting sanctimonious about feminine/motherly nature. Enjoy!

Wanted to add: I'm not sure it's kinder to introduce a child to potentially a lifetime of suffering caused by premature birth issues than it is to abort.

Posted by: MonicaP at July 31, 2012 10:20 A

---------------------------------------

I don't think it's particularly kind, but there's a chance at life vs. outright destruction of life. To be clear, this is not a decision I think is morally right and I'd be disgusted with a doctor who would (given 24-weekers current rates of survival) participate unless the mother was suicidal or addicted or some such thing where the baby was reasonably safer out than in. But, in that scenario no one would be setting out to end the baby's life, so it would fall under private medical decision, I think. I don't think it would happen often, though, as it would be hard to find doctors and hospitals who would agree to participate---I don't think finding adoptive parents (which would be the job of the pregnant woman and whatever agency she uses, not the state) would be as hard as you might think.

Basically, I'm trying to think of a way in which the rights of the woman are compromised as little as possible while still respecting the baby's right to continue living. It's hard, but I think it's worth it to try and respect both rights as much as possible.

I'm not disagreeing, just want to add that as men are constantly being told, it's also a benefit and source of joy, wonder, insight and wisdom that men can never understand.

Posted by: jerry at July 31, 2012 10:22 AM

-------------------------------------------

That's also true. Also unfair. Ho-hum.

And, it's true that for some women, it's more burden than joy and sometimes it's those women whose boyfriends' condom breaks. It's true that for some women it's more joy than burden and sometimes they can't have as many babies as they'd like. Just as true, just as unfair. Damn biology.

Both sides agree that the fetus is alive. Both sides agree that the fetus has unique human (homo sapiens) dna. Abortion ends a human life. Just sayin...

I don't think finding adoptive parents (which would be the job of the pregnant woman and whatever agency she uses, not the state) would be as hard as you might think.

Perhaps not. We can only agree to to disagree on that. But I also don't think there's anything compelling women to find adoptive homes for babies they were just has fine aborting. There's certainly no way to force them to.

And the fetus has no such "right" to not be torn limb from limb. Many people want it to, but it doesn't, since we legally allow people to have abortions.

-----------------------------------

Okay, I just saw this. Ridiculous. By this logic---that rights are determined by the government and not inherent in humans and then either respected or disrespected by the government---you could just as easily say "Black people don't have a right not to be enslaved. Many people want them to, but they don't since we legally allow people to own them." Deplorable.

"Women and teenage girls don't have the right to not be forced into marriage. Many people want them to, but they don't since we legally allow their fathers to arrange their marriages." Disgusting.

"Atheists don't have the right to skip church. Many people want them to, but we legally allow the pastors to round them up and lock them in the church til they pay their tithes." Horrifying.

"Men don't have the right to have sex with other men. Many people want them to, but they don't because we legally allow people to stone them if they are caught." Awful.

> men are constantly being told, it's also a
> benefit and source of joy, wonder, insight
> and wisdom that men can never understand.

This is absolutely true. (A favorite variant.)

Please read the link at July 31, 2012 10:26 AM, OK? I'm begging you people. Motherhood is a very precious, very special thing.

"Black people don't have a right not to be enslaved. Many people want them to, but they don't since we legally allow people to own them." Deplorable.

Black people DON'T have a natural right to not be enslaved. Deplorable, yes, but there is no God. We don't enslave black people because we have decided that enslaving people is a terrible thing to do.

Men have the right to have sex with other men because the people around them give them that right. Fine, it's awful, but that's life. As a woman, I have the right to not be beaten by my husband because our laws are structured that way. This isn't a moral call. It's a legal one. And rights are legal in nature.

> This isn't a moral call. It's a legal one.

That's a really weird thing to say.

What do you do with an invited guest on your property if you decide you now want them out? ... Your first choice is not to kill them. Otherwise I could invite my enemies over, load the gun and say you have 5 seconds to leave then start shooting them. Why allow the same with pregnancy.

Flynne already pointed this out. But I'd like to go over this again for the "Oh, but the pregnant woman could *just* have the baby be adopted! Easy-peasy!" crowd. And the "Abortion is selfish!" crowd.

Pregnancy is some serious stuff. Simply put, pregnancy does some stuff that unwanted house guests don't -- and, for the same reasons, the argument that a woman could *just* opt for adoption doesn't hold water.

1) Pregnancy could affect a woman's health to the point where she cannot work and is in danger of losing her job. Required bed rest. It's a thing.

2) Pregnancy requires a woman to take on certain health care expenses that aren't cheap without insurance, which many people don't have. Yes, she could find prospective adopters who are willing to foot the bill. But what if the fetus has a severe genetic disorder, and nobody wants it?

3) Pregnancy complications can make it impossible for a woman to take care of children she already has.

I'm willing to meet some people half way and agree that responsible use of birth control is the responsibility of every female adult. But pregnancy can cause a woman to lose the very things that make her a self-sufficient adult. And to the people who say "Well, she messed up on birth control! Her fault," well...that just sounds like pregnancy is a punishment, and that doesn't sit well with me.

Flynne, because like it or not, plenty of us don't think it's your body. We think it's a person YOU made. Your rights end where another person begins. You may not agree, and most who think that way will never be persuaded otherwise by you. And that is why abortion will always be so divisive. For people that think a 3rd person is involved, your rights on your body don't matter once the 3rd person is made. For people who don't think it's a person, I'm with those who think the only logical position is to allow any abortion at any time for any reason.

You REALLY want people out of your business. If you are robbed, shall we not care? It's society's job to be in your business to a certain extent. The legal debate currently is how much-not if at all. You and I fall on different sides of this area. Doesn't mean you are right and others are wrong no matter how much you use your caps.

There are years-long waitlists of people wanting babies. Even drug-addicted ones. To say finding other parents is hard is absurd. For a 8 year old yes. A newborn? No. No matter the race.

Rights aren't given by the government and they aren't votable. They are inherent. All people are born with them. The things we vote for and Congress allows us? Those aren't rights. Rights exist no matter what Congress says.

If abortion is outlawed, will those of you saying it's ok because it's legal decide it's actually bad?What's with letting Congress decide your morals?

In "Utne Reader," Jan-Feb 1992, there was a letter from a woman born in 1951 who said she'd unwillingingly given up a baby for adoption (in 1970 or 1971) and now, whenever she was driving and saw a bumper sticker saying "Adoption Not Abortion," it was all she could do to keep from ramming the car.

That's a really weird thing to say.

So you think legality and morality are the same thing?

Rights exist no matter what Congress says.

If you have a right that no one acknowledges, is it really a right, or is it a wish?

@Flynne:

> That was pretty STUPID, TJIC, I wouldn't have expected that argument from you. How is being pregnant even remotely the same as owning slaves?? Stupidly argued on your part. Try again, maybe? And this time, try to explain to me how my life even remotely affects yours.

I see that you failed to understand the point I was making.

Let me try again:

1) I support your right to do whatever you want with your property and your body

2) I support the right of others to do whatever THEY want with their property and their bodies.

3) Thus, I support some random person's right to NOT be whipped for failing to gather enough cotton.

4) Thus, I support some random person who is 4 lbs and 8 inches long to not have a vacuum tube poked into his brain, his skull crushed with forceps, and his limbs hacked off with sharpened surgical tools.

If you are ever on a cotton farm owned by another, I will support YOUR right not to be whipped.

If you are (or were) ever inside a uterus, I will (or did) support YOUR right not to have your skull crushed with forceps.

On the other hand, if you ever OWN a cotton farm, I will defend others against your desire to whip them...and if you are ever pregnant, I will defend your child's right to not have it's brain suctioned out and its skull crushed.

Flynne:

> > If you see abortion as murder, then you can't just stand aside and be silent.

> Well, yes I can, and should, because that STILL doesn't make it my business, what someone else does with their own body.

By definition anyone who sees abortion as murder (murder: the killing of ANOTHER person) does not see the unborn child as part of the mother's body.

Encased within?

Yes.

Part of?

No.

But pregnancy can cause a woman to lose the very things that make her a self-sufficient adult.

At which point, by McElroy's logic and as argued by some in this thread, we can abort the mother as well!

By definition anyone who sees abortion as murder (murder: the killing of ANOTHER person) does not see the unborn child as part of the mother's body.

That's what makes the whole thing a sticky mess. A fetus is both another person AND part of the mother's body. The entire debate revolves around which one takes precedence.

> So you think legality and morality are the
> same thing?

Did I say I did?

Are you that wound up? Do you think these topics are clumpy like that?

Did I say I did?

Just looking for clarification on why it was weird.

I know the NBC Olympics thing is a pain in the ass, but it'll all work out.

Well Monica, having 2 8 year olds that were very prematurely born, I've gotta say-abortion is NOT better. You abort, the baby's dead. Period. Premature babies are overwhelmingly okay, even micropreemies. Seems a pretty clear choice to me-certainly dead vs almost certainly okay. Maybe I'm better educated on prematurity knowing SO many preemies through multiples groups, but ti seems pretty black and white to me.

"If you have a right that no one acknowledges, is it really a right, or is it a wish?"

I would argue a right, that's why we call offenses against rights to be rights violations and not just crime X. No matter what Congress says, I have to right to life. I don't have the right to fly. See the difference?

> Just looking for clarification on why it was weird.

No, you immediately responded with

> So you think legality and morality are the
> same thing?

Which is, y'know, twitchy. Sometimes people see what they wanna see, and sometimes what they wanna see is weird, and is a desperate, melodramatic cry for help.

I care about the small person you may have inside you. I fear the consequences of living in a society where millions of babies are murdered every year.

Why? You don't know me, I don't know you. What an utterly stupid thing to say. "Millions of babies" aren't "murdered" every year. What horseshit. Prove it.

I also care a whole lot about personal liberty, property rights, and the notion that nobody should tell anybody else what to do.

Wow. You're just a walking contradiction, aren't you?

Prove that you care a whole lot about personal liberty. Start by staying OUT OF MY PERSONAL BUSINESS. Okaythankyou.

Flynne, because like it or not, plenty of us don't think it's your body. We think it's a person YOU made. Your rights end where another person begins. You may not agree, and most who think that way will never be persuaded otherwise by you. And that is why abortion will always be so divisive. For people that think a 3rd person is involved, your rights on your body don't matter once the 3rd person is made. For people who don't think it's a person, I'm with those who think the only logical position is to allow any abortion at any time for any reason.

BULLSHIT. Pure bullshit. It is NO ONE ELSE'S BUSINESS. BUTT OUT. Yes, it's a person I made. NOT YOU. Me. Stay out of it. MIND YOUR OWN. YOUR RIGHTS END WHERE MY BEGIN, AS DOES MY CHILD'S. YOU HAVE NO RIGHTS TO MY CHILD, BORN OR UNBORN. Savvy?

You REALLY want people out of your business. If you are robbed, shall we not care? It's society's job to be in your business to a certain extent. The legal debate currently is how much-not if at all. You and I fall on different sides of this area. Doesn't mean you are right and others are wrong no matter how much you use your caps.

Once again, apples and oranges. And you say "to a certain extent", well, that extent does NOT include my body. Okaythankyou.

and if you are ever pregnant, I will defend your child's right to not have it's brain suctioned out and its skull crushed.

Been there. Twice. And it's still none of your damned business. My girls are gorgeous. Keep your hands and yourself AWAY from them. Okaythankyou.

By definition anyone who sees abortion as murder (murder: the killing of ANOTHER person) does not see the unborn child as part of the mother's body.

Encased within?

Yes.

Part of?

No.

STILL not their damned business.

That's what makes the whole thing a sticky mess. A fetus is both another person AND part of the mother's body. The entire debate revolves around which one takes precedence.

In my eyes, it's the mother, who is already a FUNCTIONING human being. The fetus? Not so much. But when all is said and done, it is up to the MOTHER, and her DOCTOR, and NO ONE ELSE.

It's going to be fun to come back to this one later tonight.

Meanwhile, everyone watch the Olympics on NBC/CNBC/MSNBC! Tonight, all those little flippy-floppy girls from the gymnastics squad race to achieve menarche! It a new "medal" sport for London '12, and it's going to be great television! (The North Africans did well when it was just an "exhibition" sport in Beijing, but the Pacific Rim is expected to kick ass now that it's for real!) Don't forget to start your VHS!

Pro-choice. My body, NOT yours. You DON'T OWN ME. I don't get tell you what you can or can't do with your body; you do NOT get to tell me what I can or cannot do with mine. End of story.

Posted by: Flynne at July 31, 2012 8:09 AM
-----------

Might I ask Flynne, what are your feelings on mandated government run/single payer healthcare? Free birth control mandates for insurance? The drug war?

Thanks for the downer there Crid, I'd read that blog before, didnt really need the reminder though.

Never forget.

"Then, in the case of rape or incest, it would be a no brainer..."

Except not really. This argument is flawed for several reasons:

1) If you truly believe that abortion is murder, then you're punishing unborn babies for being the product of rape.

2) If you're saying that exceptions should be made for rape victims because it wasn't their fault, then shouldn't the same exception be made for people whose birth control failed, whose hysterectomy/vascetomy didn't work, whose doctors told them they were infertile/sterile but proved wrong? Suddenly you're getting into a whole lot of gray area. And more disturbingly you're implying that a child is a fitting punishment for irresponsibility--it's a human being, not a punishment.

3) How exactly would you prove that someone was raped? Proving rape in a court of law is a lengthy, difficult, and often futile process and in many cases would drag beyond the safe/window window for abortion, yet if we just take the woman's word for it then everyone would claim rape, and we're back to square one. If this rule was instituted I guarantee we'd see an enormous increase in false rape accusations; probably even the baby's father going along with it in many cases. "Yes judge, I got drunk and raped my girlfriend; I'm very sorry and I'll serve my six months of probation; now can we please go get that abortion?" It's just totally impractical.

Might I ask Flynne, what are your feelings on mandated government run/single payer healthcare? Free birth control mandates for insurance? The drug war?

The drug war is and always was a farce. The only major contributions to American culture as a result of the drug war are drive-by shootings and better-armed thugs. Nothankyouverymuch.

Mandated government run/single payer healthcare is a disaster waiting to happen. Nothing good will come of it. Free birth control mandates for insurance will only work if people use it.

"AS DOES MY CHILD'S. YOU HAVE NO RIGHTS TO MY CHILD, BORN OR UNBORN"

Yell a little more, that will surely convince people you are right.

I personally have no rights to you or your child. Society does, though. Otherwise kids could be worked like slaves with no schooling and beaten at will by their parents, or whored out for money.

I really hate the "what if the baby is horribly what-evered and in for a miserable existence and the product of an incestful rape..." arguments. Basing policy-any policy-on the most extreme unlikely horrible scenario you can imagine is never a good idea. Fact is-most abortions are convenience. By far most. So let's work on that.

Flynne, Miss out-of-my-business-why would it be your Drs business if you want an abortion? You don't need a Drs note to visit a clinic.

Re: The "between a woman and a doctor" I think it's a silly nitpick. Most abortions are done by a doctor, and if he/she doesn't approve, then he/she doesn't have to do it. And it wouldn't have to be your *regular* doctor to be "your doctor"---he's "your doctor" while you're getting the procedure. Presumably when women do abortions themselves via knitting needle or whatever other implement, it's then between the woman and, well, (if you buy the argument that a fetus is not a rights-bearing individual) nobody. Except the father and whoever might find her if it goes horribly wrong, I guess. But the push for legalizing abortion was supposedly to prevent these disastrous abortions that were between a woman and nobody, or a woman and her sister who heard from a friend-of-friend how to do this, and so on. So they added the "between a woman and her doctor" bit, which made sense.

But, yeah. It bears repeating that if it were true that a fetus isn't human or isn't "being" it really would be none of our business and abortion would be okay for any reason at any point. Like pulling a healthy tooth or getting rid of a mole or any other elective procedure. If Jane Roe wanted to get all her healthy teeth pulled, that actually would be between her and her dentist (or whatever dentist was in the business of pulling perfectly good teeth). If she wanted to pull all her teeth at home in her bathroom, that would be between her and nobody else. But a fetus is not a tooth, and he/she is a human being. And societies band together to protect human beings from being killed, so it *is* our business, no matter how many capital letters are used.

@Flynn
In my eyes, it's the mother, who is already a FUNCTIONING human being. The fetus? Not so much. But when all is said and done, it is up to the MOTHER, and her DOCTOR, and NO ONE ELSE.

Presumably, then, you would not be opposed to a ban on abortion of any viable fetuses? After all, they are functioning, they just need to be removed.

Think carefully before you posit a scheme where human rights vary by how "functioning" a person is. Plenty of disabled folks may not like that.

No energy for the fight here.. Society certainly has interest in what happens to dem fetuses, but in the end, Flynne's right. Women have always been at war with their bodies, and it's not just a metaphor... Throughout history, pregnancy was a great way for a woman to be maimed or killed. They're baby, their call. You don't want her to have the choice, don't stick yer dick in her.

Dammit, I keep getting sucked in....

> That is where this argument and all others
> will fail at soemone who believes a person
> is a person once made.

If the "persons" were fully "made," they'd be much better at resisting these terminations than they actually are. Yeah... They're defenseless... And it's ugly... But they're not whole, and they'll need much more from their mothers before they are.

Last time: IF any fetus can live OUTSIDE its mother for any lenghth of time and FUNCTION on its own, it would be wrong to abort. Unless and until that fetus can determine for itself what is best, IT'S THE MOTHER'S CALL. No one else's. That all you high-and-mighty self-righteous-holier-than-thou people think YOU have a right to make a determination in a situation you know nothing about is WRONG. NOT YOUR BUSINESS. Neither you nor the government has ANY business telling ANY individual what they can or cannot do with their body. And Jenny, comparing pulling teeth to an abortion??? Geeezloueeez, way off base!

And societies band together to protect human beings from being killed, so it *is* our business, no matter how many capital letters are used.

NO it isn't. Yes, if you actually see someone being killed in front of your face (how many wars have been fought? I forget), it would behoove you to maybe do something. But something as PRIVATE as a decision to abort something that isn't even outside of someone's body, and that no one else in society would walk off the street to observe just out of curiosity, has absolutely NO bearing on society as a whole. NUNYA beeswax.

@Flynne:

> Last time: IF any fetus can live OUTSIDE its mother for any lenghth of time and FUNCTION on its own, it would be wrong to abort. Unless and until that fetus can determine for itself what is best, IT'S THE MOTHER'S CALL

I agree.

If Flynne can feed herself and drink on her own and doesn't need dialysis or an external pacemaker, it would be wrong to kill her.

...but as soon as she needs an external life support system she is no longer a human being and her mom gets to decide to vacuum out her brain and cut off her limbs with surgical instruments.

Am I missing any nuance of your position?

Am I missing any nuance of your position?

Of course you are, in addition to misconstruing it.

Which people do when they can't accept logic and reason. Let me explain it better so you'll understand (although I doubt you'll admit you do):

I AM ALREADY out of my mother's womb, and have been for more than a few decades. So she would NOT be making any decisions on my behalf.

A fetus that is still INSIDE the mother's womb does not have the luxury of even comprehending its existence yet, and so cannot make informed decisions for itself. That's the MOTHER'S job. NOT YOURS, not mine, NOT anyone else's. NONE. OF. YOUR. BUSINESS.

And just so you know, right now my dad is in the hospital, on life support. It is not YOUR decisions to decide whether or not the plug gets pulled. Fortunately for my mom, my brothers, and myself, he made the decision, and it is stipulated in his will, if/when the plug gets pulled. Again, NONE. OF. YOUR. BUSINESS. Not yours, not mine, not the government's. NUNYA.

(PS) Thanks for the back-up, Crid. Much appreciated.

I care about the small person you may have inside you. I fear the consequences of living in a society where millions of babies are murdered every year.

Why? You don't know me, I don't know you. What an utterly stupid thing to say. "Millions of babies" aren't "murdered" every year. What horseshit. Prove it.

I believe human life starts at conception.

It's a religious thing - you wouldn't understand.

Call it a fetus, call him a baby, call her a rose by any other name. It's murder.

I get that you don't care. But it is what I believe to be true.

I also care a whole lot about personal liberty, property rights, and the notion that nobody should tell anybody else what to do.

Wow. You're just a walking contradiction, aren't you?

Everyone is, babe.

I see less contradiction here than you might think.

Were I king for a day, I would not coerce you by law.

Rather I would have a culture where people do the right thing because it is ethically, morally, socially, the obviously right thing to do.

Prove that you care a whole lot about personal liberty. Start by staying OUT OF MY PERSONAL BUSINESS. Okaythankyou.

You really don't see where the intersection of your personal business and the culture we share intersect, do you?

It's a religious thing - you wouldn't understand.

Like I said, you don't know me. You don't know ANYthing about me.

I see less contradiction here than you might think.

Uh, yeah, because I think YOUR thinking is quite clouded.

Were I king for a day, I would not coerce you by law.

Rather I would have a culture where people do the right thing because it is ethically, morally, socially, the obviously right thing to do.

I rest my case. You can't legislate morality. Nice try, though. Because a king makes the laws in his country. But you can't make laws telling people what to think. You can't make a law telling people they have to do what YOU think is right. Not even God did that. He gave us FREE WILL. He set down some laws as examples of how he would HOPE we act, but yet still endowed us with free will. Ain't no laws you can make enforcing someone to have the SAME thoughts as you.

You really don't see where the intersection of your personal business and the culture we share intersect, do you?

No. Because it doesn't. I have an obligation to behave a certain way in public, yes. And I do. I practice random acts of kindness all the time. But behind my closed doors, what goes on is NONE. OF. YOUR. BUSINESS. Period.

You don't know ANYthing about me.

I know you are a serial abuser of 'Caps Lock'.

I get it: you're committed. Passionate. Bitchy, even. You can ease up on the all caps thing, now.

But you can't make laws telling people what to think. You can't make a law telling people they have to do what YOU think is right.

If you will re-read what I wrote, you will find that I do not want to legislate morality.

Whatever. This is fun but I've got things to do.

Have a nice day.

If you will re-read what I wrote, you will find that I do not want to legislate morality.

No, you would have a culture where people do the right thing because it is ethically, morally, socially, the obviously right thing to do.

By order of the King, I guess.

You have a nice day, too.

So. What demands should a mother be able to make on technical means?

Because, to be consistent, if Jane Doe can call for a doctor to remove a fetus, she can call one to preserve it.

It's a religious thing - you wouldn't understand.

You know Brian, if you think abortion is murder and life begins at conception then by extention your must beilve that god is a bloody monster

Most fertalized eggs self abort, which means god has aborted more humans then every abortion doctor and back alley coat hanger jockey combined

So Mr. Dunbar thinks all the women who've had abortions belong in prison, right?

I mean, he likes the word "murder"...

So....

"Expecting to be able to take a mulligan for everything in life isn't doing anyone any favors."

Exactly. The sluts must be punished. Forcing them to care for a child will turn them into loving, responsible adults. Or frustrated child murderers. Whatever.

Once it's out of the womb it doesn't count.

So....

No.

If you want to know how I think about this, ask.

Your rhetorical tricks are real impressive for the rest of the scouts around the fire, but shoddy tactics when talking to adults.

Have a nice day.

> If you want to know how I think about this, ask.

No, we're cool:

> Call it a fetus, call him a baby, call her
> rose by any other name. It's murder.

Or were you were being facetious? It's important to be clear when doing facetiousness in text.

No, we're cool:

Ah - you're not serious. I am shocked.

The conversation here - if there was any - seems to have died.

The link in my name takes you to my blog. There you will find my email. Write if you want, or don't.

You put your opinion out there as best you could, and it was judged accordingly; such judgment doesn't portend an endlessly renewable curiosity. But if you were misunderstood, you're welcome to say so. Amy buys her disk space by the terabyte nowadays... It's crazy-inexpensive.

Brian, you said life begins at conception, Most fetalized aggs do not implant in the utirne wall due to the poor design of the human reproductive system. Most of the eggs that do implant still self abort for a varitey of reasons.

Therefore due to gods influence more fertalized eggs have been lost than all abortions combined. So either you think god is a moster or you are a moron who doesnt bother to think out his postions very clearly

So which are you?

I'm always amazed by the descriptions of abortions. Do you realize that most of the pictures on the pro-life posters are of miscarriages? In any case there is a period of time when the pregnancy is just that, a bunch of cells that might one day turn into a baby if all goes well. Are you honestly telling me that this is a baby?

www.babycenter.com/fetal-development-images-4-weeks

Most abortions happen before 6 weeks, when the embryo looks like this:

www.babycenter.com/fetal-development-images-6-weeks

This idea of a homunculus being implanted at day 1 are just silly.

I took the stats from here:

www.abort73.com/abortion_facts/us_abortion_statistics/

To express this in less theoretical terms: everything beneath my skin is me. It is mine in the most basic and existential sense possible. If my body is not mine, then nothing else on earth can belong to me.

I think the pro-life position is that the fetus is NOT the woman's body. That's the point. This may be wrong, it may even be crazy, but to begin by asserting (without argument) the position you wish to defend is not a convincing strategy.

Certainly the relationship between the fetus and the mother is a unique one -- the only thing that seems remotely comparable to it is conjoined twins -- but this doesn't mean that "everything beneath my skin is me".

luj, when a fetus is lost early, it's just a natural death like any other. You're basically arguing that because some people are killed "by God" it's okay to kill others. The fact that some infants die of heart abnormalities in the first year of life doesn't mean that it's okay to kill infants, and the fact that fetus die of abnormalities (most miscarriages are caused by fetal abnormalities) doesn't mean it's okay to kill them. Everybody dies. Some people die in utero, some people die in adolescence, most people die in old age. It's still not right to kill someone at any stage of life.

There are arguments for abortion that are hard to answer, but that's not one of them.

luj, when a fetus is lost early, it's just a natural death like any other.

NO NO NO NO. If you subscribe to life begins at conception, than any losses are a direct result of an all powerful god all knowing.
You dont get to side step the debate one you realire your train of thought is taking you somewhere you never wanted to go

Luj, Christians already do subscribe to the notion that the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Thus, when He takes a child while the child is in utero, that doesn't give us the right to kill a different child in utero. We see every life as beginning at conception and as being God's choice to end, not ours. That's why it's wrong to kill any human at any point after conception---their life is between him/her and God, even in the earliest stages. Christians believe that God does a lot of things we can't do, because...hang on, now...we're not God. God takes some children in infancy...we don't know why He does everything He does, but we do know that we aren't entitled to do that.

You seem to be saying "God kills fetuses so we can too, or else Christians are just being crazy" and that's as silly as saying "Nature kills fetuses and therefore we can too", because obviously nature kills adolescents, infants and elderly people too and it's not okay to kill them.

Leaving aside Christianity, you have the argument that most people don't survive gestation. And it's true---most people don't. But that doesn't make it alright to a Christian or to most anyone else to kill a person who looks like they might survive gestation. Likewise, the fact that most people don't survive their 90's is not an argument for killing a 90-year-old or a 99-year-old.

Basically a fetus is a person or not. Modern Catholics consider the fetus a person with the same rights as any other child and thus find it abhorrent to kill him or her.

Sorry. Jenny, was outside and didnt see it as yours, thouth it was Brian responding

I dont give a fuck what chritians belive as to when life begins, accroding to their book life doesnt begin until the baby is born as evidenced by the fact that killing a baby is punishable by fine while killing a man, even accidentally via livestock, is punishable by death.

I am sick and tired of a la carte religiosity, picking and choosing which part to selectivly ignore and which parts to create out of absolutly nothing