# Abortion-clinic picketers. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 6, 2011, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935 "2011-05-06T05:57:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 30
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/581 "2011-05-11T16:37:27Z")
In order for protesters to disparge abortion, they have to present a different route for the pregnant woman who does not want a baby. Hence the adoption la-la land where mother, baby and adopting couple are all farting rainbows over the procedure. That makes me ill. And as I have stated many times, for many (most?) protesters it is only adoption to a straight Christian couple. Gay and even single-woman adoption are seen as child abuse. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/582 "2011-05-11T16:39:14Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > I contend that you could set a romantic comedy in a Nazi death camp and get away with it if you wrote it well. Hmm. Well, much as I hate to admit it, you might be right. > [@](#): > > I agree that she’s not helping. But I find that the pro-life side has a lot of incoherent arguments going for it. True. In fact, I’ll allow that of the two sides, the pro-life side has offered up MORE incoherent arguments than the pro-choice side. The pro-choice side gets incoherent only when they have to defend Roe v. Wade as legal reasoning; when they have to defend abortion rights as wise social policy or medically sound decisions, they’re generally very reasonable and cogent. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/583 "2011-05-11T16:40:32Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > In order for protesters to disparge abortion, they have to present a different route for the pregnant woman who does not want a baby. Hence the adoption la-la land where mother, baby and adopting couple are all farting rainbows over the procedure. That makes me ill. Did you miss my request for a cite for this claim? > [@](#): > > And as I have stated many times, for many (most?) protesters it is only adoption to a straight Christian couple. Gay and even single-woman adoption are seen as child abuse. Undoubtedly many feel this way. And many don’t. I don’t have any objections to same-sex couples adopting children, and my only “objection” to a single-parent adoption is to note that a two-parent household is a better choice. But a single-parent is better than no adoption at all. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/584 "2011-05-11T16:40:54Z")
> [@heatmiserfl](#): > > And what’s so special about that for anyone other than the family involved? Special enough to require government intervention on the woman’s right to her own body? Isn’t it clear that if people convince themselves that anything that will develop into a baby equals a baby then off course abortion is evil. They believe that women who get pregnant have a moral obligation to carry the child to term and doctors have a moral obligation not to preform a procedure that terminates what they’ve told themselves is a human life. They can even agree that the right to choose is also important , but the right to life supersedes it. It’s not really illogical if the axioms are accepted. It’s just that the axioms are not fact based. Not only science but recorded human history demonstrates that abortion has not been considered murder. It’s emotional and ignorant for people to present that now and use their personal feeling as a justification for imposing laws upon society. Even if you accept the premise that even potential human life deserves serious consideration we have to look at the facts of possible choices and consequences. trying to outlaw abortions is a denial of the reality of our human society IMO. They will continue. It seems much more practical and in keeping with an attitude of life being held sacred, that society seeks to provide information and alternatives and support so that women might not choose abortion. So far, there’s little sign that society as a whole holds human life that are already born in any sacred position. ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/585 "2011-05-11T16:41:56Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > … The pro-choice side gets incoherent only when they have to defend Roe v. Wade as legal reasoning.. Could you please elaborate for me? What sorts of “incoherent” arguments defending RvW have you seen? (I’m not asking you to defend them or anything.) ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/586 "2011-05-11T16:44:40Z")
> [@elbows](#): > > Your complete and utter ignorance is now showing, for all to see. > > As someone who _has_ surrendered a child to adoption, let me just tell you how very, very wrong you are. Not that it will make a dent in your beliefs, as they are not based on any actual reality. The above nugget being indisputable proof. > > Only a enormously ignorant man would suppose he ‘knows’ that adoption is ‘most certainly’ a better choice. It always comes back to you ‘know better’ what’s right for everybody, doesn’t it? > > Let us decide what’s right for us, by giving us choice. You go right ahead and decide what’s right for you and stay the hell out of everyone else’s lives and personal decisions. Your morality is not the law, if you want to live in a theocracy, move. This is an anecdotal refutation. You don’t identify why this was such a terrible choice and why abortion would have been better, nor do you demonstrate why your story should be accorded statistically significant weight. I can produce many stories about adoptions that worked very well. Why is their experience of less weight than yours? ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/587 "2011-05-11T16:48:24Z")
> [@](#): > > Basis of the Roe v. Wade decision: > Roe v. Wade was decided primarily on the Ninth Amendment to the United States Constitution, a part of the Bill of Rights. The Court’s decision in this case was that the Ninth Amendment, in stating that “the enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people,” protected a person’s right to privacy. Exactly how is that an “incoherent argument”? And if _RvW_ is such a hideous law, why hasn’t it been overturned? Surely you can’t equate this with the breast cancer, psychological damage, and adoption la-la land of the anti-abortion protesters? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/588 "2011-05-11T16:55:52Z")
> [@purplehorseshoe](#): > > Could you please elaborate for me? What sorts of “incoherent” arguments defending RvW have you seen? (I’m not asking you to defend them or anything.) The incoherency of whether fetuses feel pain is resolved by medical study. Similarly, the incoherency of a legal opinion is a matter of legal analysis. Roe is grounded in successively tenuous interpretations… the state can’t substantially interfere in abortion during the first twelve weeks of pregnancy – that’s the area of pregnancy that’s constitutionally protected! How do we know? Because abortion is a private medical matter? How do we know? Because the constitution protects the right to privacy! How do we know? Because we can see some other things in the constitution that also implicate privacy, like the freedom from search and seizure and the freedom to not incriminate yourself. Which ones actually appear in the Constitution? Only the last. ---
**Author:** ![heatmiserfl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/df705f/32.png) [@heatmiserfl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/heatmiserfl)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/589 "2011-05-11T17:02:55Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > The incoherency of whether fetuses feel pain is resolved by medical study. I don’t really know what you mean here. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/590 "2011-05-11T17:04:35Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Exactly how is that an “incoherent argument”? And if _RvW_ is such a hideous law, why hasn’t it been overturned? > > Surely you can’t equate this with the breast cancer, psychological damage, and adoption la-la land of the anti-abortion protesters? Perfect example of an incoherent argument, and not knowing what you’re talking about. Roe v. Wade grounded its reasoning NOT in the Ninth Amendment, but in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment: > [@Roe v. Wade](#): > > A state criminal abortion statute of the current Texas type, that excepts from criminality only a life-saving procedure on behalf of the mother, without regard to pregnancy stage and without recognition of the other interests involved, is violative of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Roe v. Wade is a poorly-reasoned legal decision, but as a matter of social policy, it enjoys wide support. This is the reason it hasn’t been overturned: the majority of people in the country want the situation to remain as it is. And I notice you have still not responded to my request for cites. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/591 "2011-05-11T17:08:59Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > The one thing I despise the most about the protestors is the absolutely false medical information they disperse. Abortion causes breast cancer! Your two month old fetus can feel pain! Men have psychological damage from abortion! All women regret abortion! Abortion makes you sterile! Adopton is a wonderful la-la land where nobody gets hurt! Bullshit all! > > I read a very weird book that stated from the time of conception a creature can sense enough to know when it’s being rejected, and future embryos will miscarry because they will know the womb is a place of “rejection and death.” Of course, the same author claimed sexual deviance was caused by “lustful conception”; i.e. rape, unmarried intercourse, or even “too lustful intercourse within marriage.” > > I could not make this shit up, so if you con’t believe me, read [this](http://www.amazon.com/Deliver-Our-Children-Evil-One/dp/1852401087) Irrational fanatics. I’m always mystified that otherwise decent people , who claim to value the truth, will eagerly believe anything fed them. And more tragically, our elected officials who should be leading in focusing on facts , cater to ignorance. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/592 "2011-05-11T17:09:24Z")
> [@heatmiserfl](#): > > I don’t really know what you mean here. Yeah, not a model of clarity, that sentence, is it? I meant to say that whether fetuses feel pain is a question that may be resolved by medical study – it’s generally a question of fact. So if someone were to assert that 8 week old fetuses feel pain, his claim may be rebutted by citation to a peer-reviewed study. If someone were to claim 24-week-old fetuses feel pain, refutation is not so easy, because different studies exist with different conclusions. But in either event, the claim is susceptible to analysis by medical science. When discussing the wisdom of Roe as a social policy, no great expertise is needed. But if you wish to discuss how solidly grounded Roe is as a piece of legal reasoning, you need some understanding of legal reasoning. For example, you need to not confuse the Ninth Amendment with the Fourteenth. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/593 "2011-05-11T17:11:50Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Exactly how is that an “incoherent argument”? And if _RvW_ is such a hideous law, why hasn’t it been overturned? > > Surely you can’t equate this with the breast cancer, psychological damage, and adoption la-la land of the anti-abortion protesters? Not only have you still not responded to my request for cites, but you did not provide a link to the source of your quote, and the quote itself is utterly wrong as a matter of fact. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/594 "2011-05-11T17:15:46Z")
[QUOTE] I can produce many stories about adoptions that worked very well. [QUOTE] followed by… > [@](#): > > This is an anecdotal refutation. You’re a real thinker, aren’t you? > [@](#): > > Why is their experience of less weight than yours? Because I’ve actually lived through it, that’s why my ‘experience’ has more bearing than your ‘opinion’. I am also in regular contact with 300 -400 women, who survived it, on a private, international board dedicated solely to helping each other recover from the emotional trauma adoption caused in their lives. But hey, don’t let reality interfere with what you believe now. If you have not experienced it, you cannot possibly understand the breadth and depth of the lifelong shattering nature of the adoption experience for the birth mother. Just like you can’t know what it’s like to be women, or a twin. Anyone who paints a rosy picture of adoption, to a confused and pregnant woman deserves to be slapped across the face, in my opinion. Sometimes ignorance _should_ hurt. ---
**Author:** ![heatmiserfl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/df705f/32.png) [@heatmiserfl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/heatmiserfl)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/595 "2011-05-11T17:18:22Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > Isn’t it clear that if people convince themselves that anything that will develop into a baby equals a baby then off course abortion is evil. > … > It’s not really illogical if the axioms are accepted. It’s just that the axioms are not fact based. Not only science but recorded human history demonstrates that abortion has not been considered murder. Great post. The above is especially important because this is what I was trying to get to before. My second-guesses were actually a way to get the poster to think about where the axioms come from. The classylady, for example, appears to be basing her axioms on a prior trauma. People like her can’t be swayed by facts. Hell, they don’t appear to be swayed by traumas experienced by victims of anti-choice forces. Pretty much unreachable. There’s also something you’re missing which is going to be un-PC but I’m putting it out there. People of below average intelligence have a really hard time processing facts and come to a logical conclusion. I think people forget this. ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/596 "2011-05-11T17:20:13Z")
Ok, I’ll bite. **Bricker** , how would _you_ have preferred to see Roe v. Wade played out? Let’s say you could magically make yourself a SCOTUS judge at that point in time - hell, let’s say you could uber-magically make yourself the entire effing panel. How would you have written the argument? Bonus points if you can take into account that “the majority of people in the country want the situation to” [… work out so abortion is/remains/becomes legal]. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/597 "2011-05-11T17:24:28Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally Posted by **Annie-Xmas** > In order for protesters to disparge abortion, they have to present a different route for the pregnant woman who does not want a baby. Hence the adoption la-la land where mother, baby and adopting couple are all farting rainbows over the procedure. That makes me ill. > [@Bricker](#): > > Did you miss my request for a cite for this claim? Just to clarify: Are you looking for a cite that says Pro-life groups think that “adoption is la-la land where mother, baby and adopting couple are all farting rainbows over the procedure”? Do you want those exact words in the cite? If a Pro-life group does not use the exact wording “farting rainbows”, will that make the cite invalid? Or do you simply want a cite from a Pro-life group that says that adoption is a wonderful thing for mother, baby and adopting couple and it is a good alternative to abortion? That would seem to be easy to provide. I’m confused about what exactly you’re looking for here. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/598 "2011-05-11T17:28:17Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > In fact, the most significant interaction I’m aware of from personal experience was a woman who stopped to tell one of our number that he was an idiot – who would care for this kid if she had it? Him? > > He replied, “Let me call my wife and ask her.” > > And that woman, once she realized he was serious, ended up having her baby and my friend and his wife adopted the child. And they kept the birth mother involved in her daughter’s life to the extent she wanted to be; all three attended her daughter’s high school graduation and the young woman just got married. > > Since we’re trading anecdotes, and all. > . That’s the kind of action I can respect. IMO, offering support systems for pregnant women and care for their potential offspring is real courage and compassion, and the only real solution. Hateful condemnation , not so much. ---
**Author:** ![classyladyhp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b5ac83/32.png) [@classyladyhp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/classyladyhp)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/599 "2011-05-11T17:33:34Z")
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > But.. She’s so classy!\* > > And a lady!\*\* > > - demonstrably not, judging from the evidence of her posts > \*\* likely not even female, and if so, probably under the age of 16. Ok. let’s play at your level.I’ll dumb down my response so you get it. You username sucks Euphononious. It should bid uraphony. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2011, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935/600 "2011-05-11T17:34:44Z")
I have yet to hear a protester say one bad word about adoption. Even when it leads to the death of the child. Randy Alcorn, mentioned above states (paraphrased): Adoption is not cruel. It is a God (sic) given solution to the dilemna of a difficult pregnancy. What is cruel is the alternative of killing a baby. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935.md?page=29) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abortion-clinic-picketers/580935.md?page=31)