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You could have a kidney that can save my life and by refusing to donate it you could ensure my death. But autonomy over your own body is paramount, even if your medical decisions can cause the death of someone else. We could force you to participate in medical trials as well, that could save the lives of many many people, but again autonomy over your body is a long established legal concept

But honestly, isn't this the same thread we locked a few days ago?

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
I said accepted codes. I assure you, the Spartan's practices would NOT fly today.

Well, abortion flies today.

Killing a human being is not a generally accepted thing today. We have issues killing horrific criminals. How is it the same people are ok with killing a baby? With no more justification than "I don't want it".

The problem is that people have become ok with it because they've successfully dehumanized the baby by saying its not actually a human, when it most certainly by all objective measures is a human. Its the same pseudo-science that Hitler used to justify killing all the unwanted "sub-humans" by arguing they weren't really human at all.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 d-usa wrote:
but again autonomy over your body is a long established legal concept

Sure, but the little baby inside you isn't part of your body.

A woman has full rights to remove a parasite in her body for any reason she chooses.

 skyth wrote:
A woman has full rights to remove a parasite in her body for any reason she chooses.

More dehumanization I see.

Is a 6 month old baby a parasite too? its going to be leaching off your checkbook for the better part of 2 decades. Should you be allowed to just kill it?

 Grey Templar wrote:

 skyth wrote:
A woman has full rights to remove a parasite in her body for any reason she chooses.

More dehumanization I see.

Its the primary go to, isn't it?

My body isn't part of your body either. Which is why I'm not legally allowed to take your organs or tissues to keep myself alive. And the same reason you can stop donating blood anytime you want and the government can't take it from you no matter how rare your blood type may be and how many lives it saves. And why a police officer can't push you into your burning house to save your neighbor.

The child is one body, and it has the right to live on its own as soon as it is able to do so, hence why most reasonable people oppose late term abortion. The mother is one body, and she has the right to make medical decisions regarding her own body. She can't be forced to he an incubator the same way that you cannot be forced to donate your organs.

It's only complicated when you ignore law and inject emotions.

 d-usa wrote:
My body isn't part of your body either. Which is why I'm not legally allowed to take your organs of tissues to keep myself alive. And the same reason you can stop donating blood anytime you want and the government can't take it from you no matter how rare your blood type may be and how many lives it saves. And why a police officer can't push you into your burning house to save your neighbor.

The child is one body, and it has the right to live on its own as soon as it is able to do so, hence why most reasonable people oppose late term abortion. The mother is one body, and she has the right to make medical decisions regarding her own body. She can't be forced to he an incubator the same way that you cannot be forced to donate your organs.

It's only complicated when you ignore law and inject emotions.

Except a baby can't live on its own, even after its been naturally birthed at 9 months. It is totally helpless for a good couple years, and still can't provide for itself for at least a decade. And even then most people's children are total dependents for nearly 20 years, sometimes more.

Mentally disabled people will be completely dependent on others their entire lives. I suppose its ok just to kill them too since they're just leeches.

 skyth wrote:
A woman has full rights to remove a parasite in her body for any reason she chooses.

That is the argument. The difficult is that the parasite is a separate human being with legal rights as such.
Don't think of it like a parasite. think of it as a relative that crashed the house and just won't take the hint that its time to go.

 Grey Templar wrote:
[
Mentally disabled people will be completely dependent on others their entire lives. I suppose its ok just to kill them too since they're just leeches.

No no, the word you're looking for, I believe, is parasite.

That's right, isn't it?

Or is it Cockroach?

It's getting so muddled here.

And you cannot be forced to donate your kidney to your child the day after it is born, or when it is 6, or 45, or the grand children.

Unless somehow "feth, I have to feed my children" became "Feth, I have to cut off my own flesh to feed to my children".

Really, your argument doesn't make sense. I point out that you cannot be forced to give me your kidney even if I die without it, and your rebuttal is that a child can't feed itself and you have to buy it food?


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 Frazzled wrote:

 skyth wrote:
A woman has full rights to remove a parasite in her body for any reason she chooses.

That is the argument. The difficult is that the parasite is a separate human being with legal rights as such.
Don't think of it like a parasite. think of it as a relative that crashed the house and just won't take the hint that its time to go.

It's not a separate human body yet though, which is probably the reason I didn't get to claim her on my tax return the year my wife started to be pregnant...

 d-usa wrote:
And you cannot be forced to donate your kidney to your child the day after it is born, or when it is 6, or 45, or the grand children.

Unless somehow "feth, I have to feed my children" became "Feth, I have to cut off my own flesh to feed to my children".

Really, your argument doesn't make sense. I point out that you cannot be forced to give me your kidney even if I die without it, and your rebuttal is that a child can't feed itself and you have to buy it food?

Except you are providing that unborn child with is food, shelter, and protection, via your bloodstream and consuming more nutrients than normal. Something parents are sort of required to provide their currently born children, otherwise we wouldn't have laws regarding child neglect.

You aren't cutting off your own flesh. You are simply eating more.

 Frazzled wrote:

 skyth wrote:
A woman has full rights to remove a parasite in her body for any reason she chooses.

That is the argument. The difficult is that the parasite is a separate human being with legal rights as such.
Don't think of it like a parasite. think of it as a relative that crashed the house and just won't take the hint that its time to go.

Human or not i cant un think of it as a parasite now..

That analogy is bad and you should feel bad for typing it.

If you refuse to understand such a simple legal concept and realize that having to feed someone is different than loosing autonomy over your own body then there is really no point to continue this.

A court can order you to pay child support, they cannot order you to donate your kidney to your child. Simple stuff really.

 d-usa wrote:
That analogy is bad and you should feel bad for typing it.

If you refuse to understand such a simple legal concept and realize that having to feed someone is different than loosing autonomy over your own body then there is really no point to continue this.

A court can order you to pay child support, they cannot order you to donate your kidney to your child. Simple stuff really.

Nobody is donating or losing organs. You are simply feeding a child. Slightly differently than if the child was outside your body, but its still just feeding it and providing shelter.

You gave away your right to not have your womb occupied when you didn't use a condom or any of the other numerous and cheap/free methods of preventing conception. But there is an out. You can wait for the child to be born and then you can give it up for adoption.

You can even arrange the adoption ahead of time. Thats how I got adopted.

@GreyTemplar, what is your position regarding the so-called 'morning after' pill?

 d-usa wrote:
That analogy is bad and you should feel bad for typing it.

If you refuse to understand such a simple legal concept and realize that having to feed someone is different than loosing autonomy over your own body then there is really no point to continue this.

A court can order you to pay child support, they cannot order you to donate your kidney to your child. Simple stuff really.

It's maps like this (I think this may be out of date) really highlights the major problem we have with it:



There's an utter lack of consistency within the law. Viability is so utterly ambiguous. And the timing is all over the place.

It's an issue that makes me waffle, TBH. Personally, I wouldn't ever do it. We didn't get any of the early stage tests for our daughter because it never entered the equation. I judge people that have them, for sure. But at the same time, I don't want a bunch of unfit, unwilling people to have children. Adoption is an option, obviously, but we already have such a large pool of children in foster care and in group homes that I hate seeing that number rise.

At the same time, I hate how much of a disposable society we are, and it kills me that so many are that cavalier with the life of these unborn children.

 d-usa wrote:
That analogy is bad and you should feel bad for typing it.

If you refuse to understand such a simple legal concept and realize that having to feed someone is different than loosing autonomy over your own body then there is really no point to continue this.

At some point, you're the problem

 Desubot wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 skyth wrote:
A woman has full rights to remove a parasite in her body for any reason she chooses.

That is the argument. The difficult is that the parasite is a separate human being with legal rights as such.
Don't think of it like a parasite. think of it as a relative that crashed the house and just won't take the hint that its time to go.

Human or not i cant un think of it as a parasite now..

You have no idea. Wait until they are teenagers. They eat all your food, suck all the money out of your wallet, wreck your car, and leave all the lights on!

You cannot be forced to use your body for something against your will. A father doesn't loose the right not to have to donate a kidney just because he could have used birth control and then he wouldn't have a kid that needs a kidney.

Your body cannot be used for medical trials against your will just because you have AIDS, even if you could have prevented it by wearing a condom. Your body cannot be used for medical trials against your will just because you have cancer and you could have prevented it by not smoking.

Your body is yours, it doesn't matter if you have no kids, a kid inside of you, or a kid outside of you. Simple stuff really.


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Ouze wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
That analogy is bad and you should feel bad for typing it.

If you refuse to understand such a simple legal concept and realize that having to feed someone is different than loosing autonomy over your own body then there is really no point to continue this.

At some point, you're the problem

How right you are. Speaking of which, I need to feed my two year old before she starts biting me...

 d-usa wrote:
You cannot be forced to use your body for something against your will.

Correct, and refusal to use a contraceptive indicates you consent at the time. You can't retroactively decide against it.

@GreyTemplar, what is your position regarding the so-called 'morning after' pill?

I think any contraceptive which terminates an already fertilized embryo is wrong to use or have available.

Fortunately, there are many many other options which don't terminate fertilized embryos, instead preventing fertilization from occurring. So really there is no excuse.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
You cannot be forced to use your body for something against your will.

Correct, and refusal to use a contraceptive indicates you consent at the time. You can't retroactively decide against it.

@GreyTemplar, what is your position regarding the so-called 'morning after' pill?

I think any contraceptive which terminates an already fertilized embryo is wrong to use or have available.

Fortunately, there are many many other options which don't terminate fertilized embryos. So really there is no excuse.

Right I've sat here and read this tripe you keep on spewing about not using contraceptives and then being forced to have a child. Have you even considered that maybe it isn't as black and white as she just didn't use any? What if she was raped? What if she was abused and talked into performing acts she didn't want to? What if she had passed out at a party and got passed around the guys there? In the last she wouldn't necessarily know till it was too late. In the abuse example she'd probably have been cut off as soon as the guy found out she was pregnant and as such was of little use to him. Should she still be forced to carry the child, go through all the pain and suffering involved, just so you can get a warm fuzzy feeling that you saved a child?

 cincydooley wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
That analogy is bad and you should feel bad for typing it.

If you refuse to understand such a simple legal concept and realize that having to feed someone is different than loosing autonomy over your own body then there is really no point to continue this.

A court can order you to pay child support, they cannot order you to donate your kidney to your child. Simple stuff really.

It's maps like this (I think this may be out of date) really highlights the major problem we have with it:



There's an utter lack of consistency within the law. Viability is so utterly ambiguous. And the timing is all over the place.

It's an issue that makes me waffle, TBH. Personally, I wouldn't ever do it. We didn't get any of the early stage tests for our daughter because it never entered the equation. I judge people that have them, for sure. But at the same time, I don't want a bunch of unfit, unwilling people to have children. Adoption is an option, obviously, but we already have such a large pool of children in foster care and in group homes that I hate seeing that number rise.

At the same time, I hate how much of a disposable society we are, and it kills me that so many are that cavalier with the life of these unborn children.

We were the same and didn't do any testing because we didn't even want to be faced with the choice. I want to be the bigger person and pretend that we obviously would never have aborted, but I didnt even want to be put in that spot.

I am pro-choice, but I wish more people would choose life. I think we probably would save more unborn children if we took all the resources spend on abortion laws and defending them over and over again only to have them struck down and simply spend that money on helping people choose life (through improved welfare, improved adoption laws, etc). Let the gays adopt, stop with the binary "they are using abortion as birth control, they are only having kids for welfare" talk, stop treating women like ignorant breeding machines who are too stupid to use a conform and stop acting like women aren't making difficult decisions that will haunt many of them for the rest of their lives. If society as a whole was more pro-life instead of simply pro-birth we might make more of an impact.

To be fair, if you accept a fertilised egg as a human being, the fact it resulted from rape is irrelevant. It still has human rights.

 d-usa wrote:


I am pro-choice, but I wish more people would choose life. I think we probably would save more unborn children if we took all the resources spend on abortion laws and defending them over and over again only to have them struck down and simply spend that money on helping people choose life (through improved welfare, improved adoption laws, etc).

It should definitely be cheaper to adopt a child in the US than to adopt one from another country. That part has never, ever made sense to me.

Sadly, I think we could pump as much money as we wanted to into more education programs, but I don't think its ever going to result in more accountability or break the young mother cycle that we see for large portions of the poor, lower-literacy population. Maybe (hopefully) I'm wrong, but I just don't see it.

Not having a kid is literally the easiest thing to do. My wife and I had regular sex for 7 years before we decided we were ready to have a kid. She was pregnant two months later.

stop acting like women aren't making difficult decisions that will haunt many of them for the rest of their lives.

The guardian just came out with this study: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/womens-blog/2015/jul/14/women-rarely-regret-abortions-us-study-uk-reproductive-rights

Seems to indicate the opposite, which, I have to be honest, blows my mind a bit. It's obviously not nearly concrete, but it is an example.

I think abortion is a special case where the woman's self determination over her body is the most important thing. What we have now, is the best fit for balancing the rights to terminate a pregnancy and with destroying living matter. The mother is in the unique position of carrying the child in her body. Only she is allowed the choice to terminate, it's not murder because it's not a person. But it still has value as life or potential for life, which is why it's wrong for other people to terminate it, you can't force an abortion on someone, the government can't and neither can a disagreeable partner or family member, and it's specifically a crime to kill the foetus (say by an action that injures the woman). The right to abort lies in the hands of the woman whose body carries the child places her in a special position to make such a decision. It'll never be easy for those either side of the debate but I feel the balance of where we hold a foetus as 'life' in law is probably the best it can be for reflecting the rights of all involved. I think pro-life attempts to remove the right to abort infringes too far upon the right of a woman to determine the future of her own body. And in the other direction men cannot ever be allowed to demand an abortion to be undertaken a woman because he doesn't wish to support the child.

 Grey Templar wrote:

You gave away your right to not have your womb occupied when you didn't use a condom or any of the other numerous and cheap/free methods of preventing conception.

So if you forget to lock your apartment once, you have no right to throw out a burglar?

You can even arrange the adoption ahead of time. Thats how I got adopted.

I suppose that explains a lot.

 Grey Templar wrote:

You gave away your right to not have your womb occupied when you didn't use a condom or any of the other numerous and cheap/free methods of preventing conception.

You do know that life is a bit more complicated than that right? Contraception does fail for many reasons. Unwanted pregnancies do not always result from refusal to use contraception.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
A fetus is not a baby.

BINGO!

 Xenomancers wrote:

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
A fetus is not a baby.

BINGO!

not BINGO. If you're going to man up and be protabortion, face what you're doing like a man.

Is it a baby? Maybe. (That even rhymes).

What's the trimester? How far through the development process is it? Is it capable of sustaining its own vital signs out of the womb?

Most importantly, do I give a feth?

No, not really. If the child is as-yet unborn and the mother (and father, if present and applicable, depending on circumstances) don't want to keep it? Then terminate it or give it up for adoption. Do what you like, it's not a decision for me to make, because I'm not involved, it's none of my business.

Now, if you want to claim that you're "pro-life" but oppose social welfare services, funding public education, reform of laws unfairly targeting minorities and the poor, oppose free and easily-available birth control, oppose realistic sex ed and sexual health classes in schools, etc etc... then you're not really pro-life, you're just a control-freak and can't stand to not be all up in someone else's business.