The law does not permit you to place your body in my living room in the middle of the night if I have not permitted this. Does your general rule believe this law is another needless restriction of choice? And if not, do you concede that just because someone is restricted as to what he can do with his body, that fact ALONE is not enough to conclude the restriction is wrong?
**Right. That’s why I added the phrase “to the extent any right can be inviolable” which you apparently overlooked in your zeal to grab the dictionary.
But that does not mean that there is not a hierarchy of rights, that certain rights do not subjugate other undeniably real rights. And I would suggest that the right of an innocent to live is the mother of all rights. Without it, all other rights are illusions.
You feel that the right of a woman to decide whether or not to “host” a fetus is a critical right. Just as an example, say a given woman pulls into my driveway to ask for directions, and I shoot her between the eyes for intruding upon my property. It’s my property. I will not suffer any intrusion, and who are you to say that my rights must be subjugated to another person whom I have no desire to interact with?
Whatever other right you supposed she was entitled to, I have rendered it moot by not respecting her most basic right. She cannot exercise any right now. Her right to live must be the most fundamental right she possesses, or else all other rights are mirages.
And if she possesses the right, as an innocent, to avoid being killed in a profligate manner, why wouldn’t a fetus? Why wouldn’t the unborns’ right to live be as fundamental and inviolable (to the extent any right can be)?
In responding, please keep in mind that I am not saying that my anology is similar to an abortion in any regard other than the fact that rights are in conflict. Suppose, for argument’s sake, that in my analogy I consider my property rights to be sacred, that any intrusion is tantemount to assault as far as I am concerned.
And if you respond with something along the lines of, “But what you’re suggesting is illegal,” I will smile a wry smile and consider this particular exchange over, since an abortion debate that relies on “But what’s legal is what matters” is not a debate. We are not discussing what is legal, we are discussing what ought to be legal.
I also await your response to Dave. I agree wholeheartedly with Dave (what a shock!) that someone who cannot extend this simple courtesy says more about himself than about anything else. There are others on the board who also refuse, and their work speaks for itself.
