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bagley wrote:

Ketara wrote:

Phryxis wrote:I find the whole "it's the woman's body" to be a fairly ridiculous argument. It's not "the woman's body" it's the baby's life.

Fundamental mistake. You're assuming the woman wants to give birth, a harrowing and painful process. What right do you have to insist the woman suffers that kind of immense pain? It IS her body.

and its the fathers baby

im guessing you dont have any children, correct?

I wasn't postulating a particular hypothetical situation here, you've just decided to throw in a variable in order to create a strawman to argue with. Nice try. Next time, try using correct grammar with the snide comment, and then I might take you seriously.

I am pro-life, and I understand where the protesters are coming from. They feel that if they can help 1 mother change their mind then they have done a good thing. I am not saying that I would do what they do, because I personally am a bit leary about protesting about abortion. Not because I think it's wrong per se..but I am just not sure how effective it really is.

As to the father in the video.. he certainly had a right to vent his anger IF those protesters heckled his wife for going in for a medical procedure whereby the mother's life was threatened or the baby was already dead. If that was truly the case then the protesters were wrong, and they did apologize for the slight. Also they shouldn't be heckling if that is what they were doing...they should be offering to help the mothers. (It's unclear in the video what they were doing before the confrontation)I do think that he went overboard with his emotional ranting. I thought those two women were quite Christlike in their tolerance of the abuse he was dishing out.

GG

Edited by Manchu. I may be sympathetic with your viewpoint and frustration but you are not allowed to express it on this website as a string of personal attacks against another user.

But seriously, all jokes aside, don't smugly correct me when you didn't bother to read my post, and you're also just wrong.

Then why don't we just take it out of the womb and pass it on for adoption?

Oh, wait, because it'd die.

Except it wouldn't.

When Roe v Wade was passed, 28 weeks was set as the point at which a fetus would be viable, and thus have a right to life. I know at least two children that were born previous to 28 weeks and are alive and well. So, clearly, they don't just die.

A baby has roughly a 50% chance to live if burn at 24 weeks.

Now, don't get me wrong, the VAST majority of abortions are done early on, before the baby is even slightly viable, but the law is the law, and we allow the abortion of viable babies.

All I'm saying is that people need to accept what they're doing, and not lie to themselves, or come up with foolish dodges like "it's the woman's body.

Ketara wrote:

Phryxis wrote:I find the whole "it's the woman's body" to be a fairly ridiculous argument. It's not "the woman's body" it's the baby's life.

Fundamental mistake. You're assuming the woman wants to give birth, a harrowing and painful process. What right do you have to insist the woman suffers that kind of immense pain? It IS her body.

I don't see his mistake. It IS her body, no doubt about it. There are cases where abortions save the mother's life. But every successful abortion kills a baby, some of which are developed to the point they can survive outside the womb.

Let me put it this way. It offends my sensibilities when a woman has an abortion. But I have no say in if she does it because it is her body. The small harm of my sensibilities is overridden by the mother's superior harm of having a pregnancy FORCED upon her.

The baby's life is to the woman's body as the woman's body is to my sensibilities.



[I do not claim to know Phryxis' thoughts on this matter. He is pro-choice btw] EDIT: ^ there they are ^

Can we talk about the video?

man with camera = jerk of simply astounding proportions

Where is his allegedly guilt-ridden, having-the-worst-day-of-her-life, in-the-midst-of-a-medical-emergency wife while he goes around with a camera yelling at middle aged ladies so that he can post the footage on the internet?

And who in the United States goes to an aborition clinic for a medical emergency? His story doesn't add up. At all.

The only argument for abortion this douche bag offers is the idea that he could possibly be someone's father.

But seriously, all jokes aside, don't smugly correct me when you didn't bother to read my post, and you're also just wrong.

Please, do what you accuse me of, and read my post.


Neighbour, you're getting far too worked up here. I disagreed with your disagreeing over the 'her body' argument'. Not only that, you're jumping the the conclusion I'm pro/anti abortion. I haven't once stated where I stand on the issue, just that saying the womans body doesn't enter into the equation is wrong, as giving birth, and being pregnant kind of are related to her body. Rude comments like that will earn you no friends.

Pregnancy and childbirth are far from painless regardless of the drugs involved to dampen pain. All I was mentioning was your seeming blind spot that you are forcing your own morality upon the body of someone else. I'll ignore the personal attack, but recommend you stop making them, or one of the mods will probably spot it and force you to take a vacation for a week or two.

I never said the baby wasn't a person. You seem to be projecting a strawman of something onto me.

Who said it wasn't a baby/living person? Again, you're projecting a whole stance onto me here I never took.

Do me a favour, neighbour. Read my post and actually comprehend it next time, and don't waste my time by setting up these ridiculous strawmen for me. I simply pointed out the uncomfortable truth that if you are against abortion, you must theoretically be in favour of forcing a woman to go through pain and pregnancy against her will. Nothing more, and nothing less. Argue with that please, and save the melodramatic statements for the local town square.

Edited by Manchu.

Manchu wrote:Can we talk about the video?

man with camera = jerk of simply astounding proportions

Where is his allegedly guilt-ridden, having-the-worst-day-of-her-life, in-the-midst-of-a-medical-emergency wife while he goes around with a camera yelling at middle aged ladies so that he can the footage on the internet?

And who in the United States goes to an aborition clinic for a medical emergency? His story doesn't add up. At all.

The only argument for abortion this douche bag offers is the idea that he could possibly be someone's father.

Indeed. If his pregnant partner was inside the clinic having the "worst day of (her) life" shouldn't he be in there with here instead of screaming at strangers on the street?

generalgrog wrote:I am pro-life, and I understand where the protesters are coming from. They feel that if they can help 1 mother change their mind then they have done a good thing. I am not saying that I would do what they do, because I personally am a bit leary about protesting about abortion. Not because I think it's wrong per se..but I am just not sure how effective it really is.

As to the father in the video.. he certainly had a right to vent his anger IF those protesters heckled his wife for going in for a medical procedure whereby the mother's life was threatened or the baby was already dead. If that was truly the case then the protesters were wrong, and they did apologize for the slight. Also they shouldn't be heckling if that is what they were doing...they should be offering to help the mothers. (It's unclear in the video what they were doing before the confrontation)I do think that he went overboard with his emotional ranting. I thought those two women were quite Christlike in their tolerance of the abuse he was dishing out.

GG

Very true @ the first part. This style of "protesting" boils down to heckling outside of clinics and is not effective.

In this case, the baby was at 16 weeks but had no chance for survival.

Though they apologized, it seems like to me that they were kind of trying to brush him off/get him out of their faces. This is after they told him and his husband that they were "killing their unborn baby." By the context, it makes perfect sense to become a bit argumentative. Personally, I think he actually was relatively restrained especially considering the circumstances. He had found out that the baby he and his wife had wanted was going to die and was insulted by people who seem to believe that most abortions boil down to someone killing a baby because they don't want it.

And "Christlike?" Really? Christlike is supposed to be loving your neighbor and so on and so forth. I believe that to be SUPPORTING not essentially PREYING UPON people who potentially have found out the worst news of their life.
(sorry for the mini ranty bit at the end)



Backstory of the video:
http://goodmenproject.com/2010/10/23/confronting-life/
This is written by the person who took the video.
Chris, when you wake up, could you shove this into the original post please?

Monster Rain wrote:

Manchu wrote:Can we talk about the video?

man with camera = jerk of simply astounding proportions

Where is his allegedly guilt-ridden, having-the-worst-day-of-her-life, in-the-midst-of-a-medical-emergency wife while he goes around with a camera yelling at middle aged ladies so that he can the footage on the internet?

And who in the United States goes to an aborition clinic for a medical emergency? His story doesn't add up. At all.

The only argument for abortion this douche bag offers is the idea that he could possibly be someone's father.

Indeed. If his pregnant partner was inside the clinic having the "worst day of (her) life" shouldn't he be in there with here instead of screaming at strangers on the street?

I really think people should get lives... I see a lot of people protesting outside of planned parent hoods... that don't do anything with abortions.

frgsinwntr wrote:

Monster Rain wrote:

Manchu wrote:Can we talk about the video?

man with camera = jerk of simply astounding proportions

Where is his allegedly guilt-ridden, having-the-worst-day-of-her-life, in-the-midst-of-a-medical-emergency wife while he goes around with a camera yelling at middle aged ladies so that he can the footage on the internet?

And who in the United States goes to an aborition clinic for a medical emergency? His story doesn't add up. At all.

The only argument for abortion this douche bag offers is the idea that he could possibly be someone's father.

Indeed. If his pregnant partner was inside the clinic having the "worst day of (her) life" shouldn't he be in there with here instead of screaming at strangers on the street?

I really think people should get lives... I see a lot of people protesting outside of planned parent hoods... that don't do anything with abortions.

What does that have to do with my post, exactly?

Ketara wrote:

bagley wrote:

Ketara wrote:

Phryxis wrote:I find the whole "it's the woman's body" to be a fairly ridiculous argument. It's not "the woman's body" it's the baby's life.

Fundamental mistake. You're assuming the woman wants to give birth, a harrowing and painful process. What right do you have to insist the woman suffers that kind of immense pain? It IS her body.

and its the fathers baby

im guessing you dont have any children, correct?

I wasn't postulating a particular hypothetical situation here, you've just decided to throw in a variable in order to create a strawman to argue with. Nice try. Next time, try using correct grammar with the snide comment, and then I might take you seriously.

I'm not quite sure what your problem is to be honest. Phryxis stated that it is not the woman's body it's the baby's life, followed by you saying it IS the woman's body, and I simply stated that it is also the man's baby. And how is a father a variable by the way? I would consider that a constant as long as you exlude the virgin Mary. Apologies if i came across being "snide" by stating a fact and asking a simple question.

And by the way, I do find it amusing when people resort to pointing out errors in grammar when they have nothing better to say. "Fundamental mistake". You're assuming academic achievement is the only form of intelligence.

I guess my point in quoting you, is basically these people outside are trolls in real life.

The dude bought the flame bait and went off on them.

His wife may be inside in the waiting room and the only way he could "calm down" is by going outside to get its anger out.

YOU assumed she was getting the procedure right then and there at that moment... My experience with ANY medical thing... is that there is a wait time.

I Don't see this guy as a jerk at all... I see him as a frustrated person who needed to vent after having to deal with the loss of his own kid and I see anyone in his way, insulting him and his wife as a piece of crap.

Everyone participating in this discussion needs to immediately stop trading personal insults. Warnings have been handed out already. Next up are suspensions. There will be no excuses: someone flamebaiting you does not justify your flaming.

This is a very frustrating topic. I strongly urge the posters to walk away from the computer for a while before responding to posts that they do not agree with. Otherwise, take your conversations to PM and avoid disciplinary action.

I'm not quite sure what your problem is to be honest. Phryxis stated that it is not the woman's body it's the baby's life, followed by you saying it IS the woman's body, and I simply stated that it is also the man's baby. And how is a father a variable by the way? I would consider that a constant as long as you exlude the virgin Mary. Apologies if i came across being "snide" by stating a fact and asking a simple question.

The chap in question seemed to be excluding the the woman and her body altogether from the equation, hence I was responding with why I believed the woman and her body is indeed a pertinent factor.

You then responded with a comment that the child was also the fathers baby. This is correct. I would assume the baby had a father. However, I was not postulating that a father had or didn't have a say in the equation. I had not laid out any hypothetical situation for the father to be in any way relevant to my comment. My comment was solely focused upon what I believed was the other chaps mistake in completely discounting the Woman's body from the issue.

As such, stating that the baby has a father, seems to be utterly irrelevant. I would have taken it as a mere statement, and not bothered to challenge it, but you then followed that with the combatative statement, 'im guessing you dont have any children, correct?'

This implies that you do have children, and I do not, therefore granting you some sort of exclusive knowledge unavailable to those uninitiated in fatherhood. Not only that, it transforms what previously appeared to be an irrelevant statement on what I had previously said, into some kind of bizare counter-argument that makes no sense.

frgsinwntr wrote:I Don't see this guy as a jerk at all... I see him as a frustrated person who needed to vent after having to deal with the loss of his own kid and I see anyone in his way, insulting him and his wife as a piece of crap.

I don't know how those ladies exercising free speech got in this alleged father's way. In fact, despite their best efforts they have not been able to get in the way of anyone seeking an abortion for the last thirty seven years. Even if I were to accept his story, I'd still say he was a total jerk: if he just needed to go outside to calm down, why yell at some strangers? You don't get to calm down by yelling at strangers. You don't get to vent your anger at strangers. And who brings a camera along? The answer is "jerks bring their cameras along."

I agree with GG. Those ladies showed patience with his abuse.

Fyi, I was the person who linked Chris to this (indirectly) and this is context (if you hadn't already seen it).
http://goodmenproject.com/2010/10/23/confronting-life/

In terms of the video, this clears up some of the arguments/rhetoric thrown around in here, specifically about this incident.

Manchu wrote:Everyone participating in this discussion needs to immediately stop trading personal insults. Warnings have been handed out already. Next up are suspensions. There will be no excuses: someone flamebaiting you does not justify your flaming.

This is a very frustrating topic. I strongly urge the posters to walk away from the computer for a while before responding to posts that they do not agree with. Otherwise, take your conversations to PM and avoid disciplinary action.

Just as a point out however, DakkaDakka also has rules for PMing:

Threats, insults, racial slurs, spamming, etc, via PM will not be tolerated.

As it is...abortion is a very touchy subject...some see it as sacred to women's rights for their ability to choose what to do with their own body; others see life as sacrosanct and will not tolerate the termination of any life, no matter the situation.

http://civilliberty.about.com/od/abortion/tp/Pro-Life-vs-Pro-Choice.htm

Wall of Text™ deleted by Manchu. The link immediately above this text will do fine.

Ree wrote:In terms of the video, this clears up some of the arguments/rhetoric thrown around in here, specifically about this incident.

I cannot seem to get this website to load. Could you please succinctly tell us about its content? Nevermind, it's up now.

frgsinwntr wrote:I guess my point in quoting you, is basically these people outside are trolls in real life.

The dude bought the flame bait and went off on them.

His wife may be inside in the waiting room and the only way he could "calm down" is by going outside to get its anger out.

YOU assumed she was getting the procedure right then and there at that moment... My experience with ANY medical thing... is that there is a wait time.

I Don't see this guy as a jerk at all... I see him as a frustrated person who needed to vent after having to deal with the loss of his own kid and I see anyone in his way, insulting him and his wife as a piece of crap.

I assumed no such thing.

I'm going off of what he said in the video, and whether or not his wife was getting the procedure done right then has no bearing on it whatsoever. I know that if my wife and I were in a similar situation, I'd be in the waiting room with her whether it was for a consult or a procedure or whatever was happening.

PS

The link isn't loading for me either.

Running on pure adrenaline, and without even a hint of a plan, I grabbed my cell phone and crossed the street. I didn’t know what to say or how to say it, I just knew I wanted to make public the cowardice of these protesters.

Paraphrased: "I am a jerk. One day I was angry and sad and decided to be a jerk. I didn't even need to plan it."

She wanted to call the police because I was peacefully expressing my opinion on a public sidewalk and exercising my First Amendment rights, which is exactly what she was doing. But I’m not on “God’s side,” am I.

More evidence of him being a presumptuous jerk.

What is immediately apparent to me from watching these videos (and seeing with my own eyes protestors in front of Planned Parenthood locations) is that they weren't screaming at anyone. Actually, I have met a few of the sidewalk counselors who participate in these protests and found out that their message explicitly avoids judgment in favor of emphasizing alternatives to abortion.

Did anyone happen to notice the sign that the woman actually had? Well, it wasn't a picture of chopped up babies. It was a picture of Jesus, specifically the Divine Mercy devotion.

Here's a quick link on that:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_Mercy

Nevermind, I got it to load.

As it turns out, frgsinwntr, she was having the procedure done right then.

While he may have a point about people having to terminate pregnancies for medical reasons, it doesn't change the fact that he was behaving like an insufferable ball-bag.

Ketara wrote:

I'm not quite sure what your problem is to be honest. Phryxis stated that it is not the woman's body it's the baby's life, followed by you saying it IS the woman's body, and I simply stated that it is also the man's baby. And how is a father a variable by the way? I would consider that a constant as long as you exlude the virgin Mary. Apologies if i came across being "snide" by stating a fact and asking a simple question.

The chap in question seemed to be excluding the the woman and her body altogether from the equation, hence I was responding with why I believed the woman and her body is indeed a pertinent factor.

the chap in question was adhering to standards deeply rooted in society, where children are prioritised above all else. i doubt you actually believe for a second he though the woman's body is entirely irrelevant. do you take everything so literally? i just thought you were being the typical femenist he was complaining about when you said "it IS the womans body".

apologies for coming across at all aggressive

Hello all. Just popped back in to Dakka after several months of extreme business. I see Manchu's been made a mod, good choice.

Um...

Yup. Let's keep it civil folks, and remember that it's not just the woman's body, it's another body too, and possibly another person. I'd play it safe in case it is a person, but that's just me. And some other people.

I didn't watch the video, but from your text I think I got the idea.

Monster Rain wrote:While he may have a point about people having to terminate pregnancies for medical reasons, it doesn't change the fact that he was behaving like an insufferable ball-bag.

As the lady in the video pointed out to him, they are not protesting the kind of procedure he claims his wife had.

Manchu wrote:
Did anyone happen to notice the sign that the woman actually had? Well, it wasn't a picture of chopped up babies. It was a picture of Jesus, specifically the Divine Mercy devotion.

Here's a quick link on that:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_Mercy

On that note, it could be he was referring to the 2nd woman protesting. We never get a good look at the sign she's holding, so it could be that the pictures he was referring to was just not captured in the video, as he was focusing on the woman holding the Divine Mercy picture.

And yet he never mentioned it. Or wondered about it. Or in any other way seemed curious about their viewpoint or their actual motivations, as opposed to the ones he presumed they had.

Manchu wrote:

Monster Rain wrote:While he may have a point about people having to terminate pregnancies for medical reasons, it doesn't change the fact that he was behaving like an insufferable ball-bag.

As the lady in the video pointed out to him, they are not protesting the kind of procedure he claims his wife had.

Nah, couldn't be. She was a Christian Hate-Monger.

And he's not on "God's side," is he? Herpty derpty derp.

Manchu wrote:And yet he never mentioned it. Or wondered about it. Or in any other way seemed curious about their viewpoint or their actual motivations, as opposed to the ones he presumed they had.

I will admit that when I first saw that video my first reaction was 'Oh yeah! Take 'em on!' but with hindsight I have to admit, I may have been influenced by my own experience of extremely zealous, Evangelical Christians. Looking deeper into it though, I guess you have a point in that he does just go on a rant....but I've been in situations where my temper just blows up, and I act in an insane manner. I'd have to say that this guy could have been in a position of stress, and something made him snap. The backstory does imply that was what happened.

Chris, you'll have to excuse me for being rather skeptical of the backstory provided by this man. On the bare face of the video, we have a man going up to two ladies and getting extremely morally indignant and self-righteous over them allegedly being morally indignant and self-righteous. I think he even calls them hypocrites. Seriously. Whatever valid points he may have been able to make are completely undercut by his own adoption of the method and posture he claims to be opposing.

In his blog entry, he encourages others to take up "non-violent" means in imitation of him. But I will tell you this as a lawyer: going up to people on the street and venting your fury at them is not non-violent. In fact, you might be charged with assault. (The police car he saw was almost certainly there for him. The protesters had likely been told to go home for their own safety.) Think hard about why the term non-violence has so much moral weight--because it actually is an alternative to the method it critques. This man may be right to be angry over people like those protesting ladies (if what he claims about them is true)--and if that's the case, he should be pretty furious with himself. Because he's one of them.