You’re correct that the fetus’s humanity (whatever that means) is not dependent on the mother’s options, but it’s still a moral consideration because the mother’s rights must be weighed against the fetus’s. The mother’s right not to have a parasite living inside her, IMO, outweighs any rights the fetus may conceivably have. Only when there’s a way to remove the fetus without killing it do the fetus’s rights matter.
So I suppose everyone who ever drives a car (or even crosses the street) “agrees” to be mangled or killed in a horrible accident? After all, they could have avoided the risk by staying at home. :rolleyes:
Your car is inanimate, and you had no problem using it in an analogy to explain why choosing one action means “agreeing” to all possible consequences. Address the point or concede it, pal.
BTW, this is the year 2003, and abortion isn’t a crime either.
Look, you obviously believe that a newborn is a human life, human being, or whatever, with all the rights commensurate with that status. Why does that newborn have the right to life, but the fetus five minutes before birth does not? If it is a human being or a human life, how can it not have that right? If it is not either of those, why is it not?
Only if you consider the right to be free of discomfort, pain and the like inherent rights. They aren’t - especially when brought about by one’s own actions.
Really? Why in hell does the right of the mother not to have this “parasite” living in her outweight the fetus’ right to life?
They agree to take that risk. That’s what life is all about, in case you hadn’t noticed. Prudence reduces the risks, but it does not confer the right to live free of the consequences of the act in question, as innocent as it may have been. If I loose my legs because of an indigent driver, society may grant me relief at its discretion, but it is not my right.
What point? That the analogy is imperfect? Fine, I’ll concede it.
Discomfort is one thing. A living creature inside of you that saps nutrients from your body, changes your body chemistry, and will probably become a child that you must support for 18 years, is something else entirely.
And I absolutely do consider it an inherent right to prevent creatures from living inside one’s body, no matter what they are, how they got there, or who is to “blame” for their existence. Obviously we disagree on that point.
Well, first off, you assume that the fetus has rights. Many people don’t agree.
But for the sake of argument, suppose I agree that a fetus has rights. I’d still place far more importance on the rights of a person who has been around for several years, and developed a personality, social relationships, and perhaps contributed to mankind somehow, than the rights of a potential person who has no personality or memories.
You don’t have the right to have someone else provide you treatment for free, but you certainly have the right to seek treatment on your own.
You don’t need “society’s” approval to see a doctor about healing your broken legs, even though your own actions led to the risk of breaking them. Once your legs are broken, you can either treat them or not - the choice is still yours. You didn’t automatically choose to leave them untreated when you accepted the risk by crossing the street.
Likewise, once you’re pregnant, you can either carry the fetus or not - your choice. You didn’t automatically choose to carry it when you accepted the risk of pregnancy by having sex.
Yes, that’s fine. So, the following was a meaningless semantical distinction then, correct? The nature of this entity is irrelevant, the only relevant issue is whether or not he is born, correct?
Whatever pejoratives you wish to apply to it, the condition is temporary. Abortion of a human being means sending it you know not where or for how long.
You presume facts not in evidence.
Of course, as long as that treatment doesn’t come at someone else’s expense.
Again, that’s where the analogy breaks down. A fetus is not a tumor caused by ingesting plutonium or something of that sort. It’s a human life.
That’s not what I said. What I said is that many men support abortion rights for misogynistic reasons, mainly so they can use women as sex toys without consequence.
So then I can come over to your house and torture you, and you would have no legal recourse because being free from pain is not a right which you possess?
Why shouldn’t it? I guess it all comes back to what criteria are used to assign rights.
But abortion is a consequence, so you cannot claim that having an abortion is living free of consequences. It’s just trading one set of consequences for another.
You’re killing it, not abandoning it at a bus terminal with enough money to buy a ticket to somewhere. In other words, you’re not “sending it you know not where or for how long”; You’re simply ending its existance.
If you are referring to Mr2001’s statement of “potential person who has no personality or memories”, then he is not presuming at all. We know enough about the brain to know that, prior to about the 20[sup]th[/sup] week, a fetus doesn’t have a functioning brain. It has brain tissue, but the neurons are unlinked. So this hypothetical 24 week fetus has, at the very most, 4 weeks of memories, and probably none at all.
Depends on how you define “someone else”. I don’t consider a fetus with no memories, no personality, and no sense of self to be a person, and so it cannot be “someone else”.
So? Whether or not it’s a human life is not important (to me, at least). What’s important is whether or not it’s a person. To my mind, there is a vast difference between the two.
Maybe you don’t know where it goes or for how long, but that can only be because you’ve never asked. I believe it goes the same place as tumors, blood, and any other medical waste.
If you mean “sending it” somewhere in a metaphysical sense, well, that’s between the mother and her god(s).
The time at which brain function develops isn’t exactly a mystery. If you have some new evidence that fetuses have personalities, then let’s see it.
Do you have a cite, or are we just supposed to take your word for that?
A tumor is human life. That’s why the terms you use are so important and you can’t just throw one in in place of another at whim. A tumor is not a human being, nor is it a person, but it’s human life. It’s certainly not feline life or canine life.
Human life doesn’t automatically convey any rights, and certainly doesn’t convey personhood.
You may want to examine the whole sex/misogyny thing, as well. If you determine the value of the fetus’s life based on the actions of the mother, and treat a baby as punishment for sex, then yes, you may be falling into the realm of misongyny. This is a big problem with the “no abortion except in the case of rape or incest” position. The mother’s moral worth should not have any bearing on the worth of the unborn life, if you think that it’s really an unborn person with the same rights as fully formed, born people. “Punishing sluts” isn’t a justifiable reason to outlaw abortion, in my opinion. Protecting what you consider to be babies is, though there’s still lots of debate over when an unborn life becomes a person with full rights that outweigh those of it’s mother.
Ask the woman with diabetes caused by pregnancy how temporary it is. Heck, ask my mom who has had to deal with hemmroids since she had me. Pregnancy causes permanent and irreversable changes to the human body. Archeologists can tell by looking at bones if someone has given birth or not. Let’s not even mention the mental issues behind the fact that if you have a kid, your always gonnna have a kid.
Fine. Since you evidently believe a fetus doesn’t meet your criteria, just what are those criteria?
So is killing my wife for the insurance money to avoid going bankrupt.
Again, this presumes a knowledge of human consciousness and its existence after physical death not possessed by modern science.
Probably? Swell. I guess that means it’s probably not a human being.
Beyond that, what living human beings all have is some level of consciousness, or an awareness of itself and its environment, which, in the case of the fetus, is the womb. There is no evidence that a functioning brain is necessary for any of that in an embryo. You presume that because EEG’s and the like constitute evidence of consciousness, the absence of such evidence means there is no consciousness. All it means is that we cannot detect it.
Again, you assume that a fetus has no sense of self. There is no scientific basis for such a belief. On the contrary, evidence of prenatal memories suggests the opposite.
And the relevant difference within the context of the discussion is…?
I don’t assign the same rights to it based solely on its being a human life. A human life that has been born has more rights than one that has not, in my view. This is because one that has not been born is part of a woman’s body, and her rights supersede its.
In a case where the pregnancy endangers the mother’s life, that would make sense. Barring that, how on earth can a mother’s right not to be pregnant supercede the right of a human being to life?
What does it being a part of her body have to do with it? If she has the right to sovereignty over her own body, why doesn’t the fetus have the same right?
Sorry, but since when is that the qualifier for human life? A tumor has human DNA. It can even have hair and teeth. It’s made up of mostly living cells ( which are, in and of themselves, human life). Human +life = Human life.
If my cells are not human, what are they? What about my foot? Not human either? It’s not going to grow into a person any time soon. Heck, -I’m- not going to grow into a person. I already did. What am I?
Just because a tumor, a fetus, and a baby are all technically human life, does not mean I’m claiming they have any moral equivilancy. I’m just asking you to use the right terms, because otherwise your argument gets lost, and you miss what the other side is saying. The term " person" is very important in many pro-choice arguments. If you refuse to acknowledge what it means, and what it does not mean, you’re not very well equipped to deal with those arguments.
Swell. Assuming you believe that only persons have a right to life such as infants have, what’s your definition of a person, and why does a fetus five minutes before birth not fit the definition, but does after birth?
