Cite?
So you’re basically saying that people that are pro-choice have an agenda to declare the unborn as non-persons so that they can get rid of all unborn babies. Wow!
Scroll all the way to the bottom and click on “View methodology, full question results, and trend data”. Download the PDF and scroll down to page 6.
Oh, look. A straw man. Knock me down and color me not surprised. I direct you to post #353 (or any of the other posts where I addressed this) and then urge you to start over again from the beginning.
I don’t think you did address it in post #353. What I got from that post was that you DO think that people who are pro-choice (or who want to define fetuses as non-persons) have an agenda.
As for your other statements in that same post, you say:
Your first two examples are illegal activities and cause grievous harm to another person - of course a bystander should stop them if they can.
On the other hand if you saw someone going to commit adultery, would you stop them? That is something that is socially and morally unacceptable, yet not illegal so you would have no basis for stopping someone from taking that action. Abortion is legal so even if you don’t like it, you have no business stopping someone from having one.
I know you will never change your mind on this issue so I don’t know why I’m bothering :).
OMG do you really think a Blastocyst should have superior rights to a fully grown woman?
For your education a Blastocyst
It’s roughly 1mm across by the way.
Why don’t you quote where he said this? Pretty sure he never did. A blastocyst is not an embryo. An embryo is not a fetus.
So aborting them is OK?
There you go. Is that so hard to understand?
Legality has nothing to do with to do with anything. Harm, on the other hand, does. I’d ask for how you somehow discount the harm involved in an abortion, but I have a sneaky suspicion you’d discount it on the basis of “no one” being harmed, which goes back to the above point (defining the unborn are non-persons to meet an end).
Probably not, but that’s not proof of anything, simply because what I, you or anyone else would do has nothing to do with the act itself.
Depending on the jurisdiction, adultery is illegal though it’s rarely met with physical penalties. It does, however, has negative legal ramifications (i.e., in divorce and alimony settlements), also depending on your jurisdiction.
Aaand… There goes the eventual fall back response. You do realize what a totally crappy argument this is? Who cares if abortion is legal? That has nothing to do with whether or not it should be legal. What you’re essentially telling me that as long as something is legal, you’d show up to argue that it should remain legal and that those who don’t like it can more-or-less pound sand.
Instinctively, you should be able to recognize what is wrong with arguing the above, for it would mean that an unjust law could never be challenged or even the law itself ever changed. Your rationale would necessitate that if, say, slavery were still legal, that you come out in defense of slavery since the law allows it (and, indeed, the above rationale was applied to slavery). Of course, you’ll give me a gajillion and one reasons why “that’s different” when, in fact, it’s not.
I’m here to fight ignorance. What are you here for?
Or-- and bear with me here-- how about this? No one should have more rights than the other? Novel idea, yes?
Do some of you realize that the direct implication of your position is that no one has rights someone else doesn’t want them to have? That doesn’t seem very progressive, to me.
Yes I have seen the numbers before. But what question gets the more correct answer?
“Thinking more generally, do you think abortion should be generally legal or generally illegal during each of the following stages of pregnancy?”
or
“With respect to the abortion issue, would you consider yourself to be pro-choice or pro-life?”
Isn’t there just a little bit of bias buil in the name “pro-life”? Who is pro-death?
And if only 35% think abortion in the first trimester should be illegal but 47% call them self “pro-life” - there are actually “pro-lifers” that are not “pro-life”. Or is the name more important than the things they actually believe in?
And even if you accept that 47% are really “Pro-life” and 47% are “Pro-choice” is that enough to form a societal consensus against abortion?
And in the same Gallup-document page 2:
“Do you think abortions should be legal under any circumstances, legal only under certain circumstances, or illegal in all circumstances?”
The answer “Illegal in all [circumstances]” never gets more than 23%. Seemes to me there are al lot of pro-choicers in the closet.
Somehow it seems to me that your opinion is that women happily avoid birth control and tra-la-la hop of to the clinic for an abortion whenever they feel like it, with no thought, no heartbreak, no gutwrenching fear. Of course there is harm done.
It’s not an easy thing to go through but I do not believe that the cells that are removed from a woman’s uterus should have any more rights than a sperm or an egg do. Until that fetus is viable outside the womb, that is all that it is, a set of cells that, given the right circumstances could turn into a living baby.
I have a lot more experience than you when it comes to this subject. When you have actually had to have an abortion, let me know ok, because I think then you will be able to argue that you are fighting ignorance.
And when I say there is harm done, I’m talking about to the mother. I have only ever met one woman (who was a heartless bitch) who had an abortion without any emotional scars.
I don’t define the unborn as non-persons to meet an end, I define the unborn as non-persons because they aren’t persons. It’s a lump of tissue with human DNA. I didn’t come up with that belief to support my abortion-rights position- I believe in abortion rights because of that position. I don’t believe a fertilized egg is a person. I don’t believe an implanted egg is a person. I don’t believe a 6 week old fetus is a person. To be honest, I don’t know exactly when a fetus becomes a person; based on the conflicting information I’ve read, viability seems like a reasonable line to me (not that that necessarily changes my opinion on the legality, but I believe that a post-viability fetus is different than a pre-viability fetus).
What’s your position on abortion? Should it be illegal in all cases? Some cases? Should the pill be legal? Should the morning-after pill be legal? How about abortion in the cases of rape/incest? Would you allow any health or life-in-danger exceptions?
Very well put. Would like to know OMG’s position on the above too.
All? No. More than some people are willing to admit. Most definitely. The internet is rife with with examples women who are said to be pro-life myths (you know, the “tralalala I’ll-just-not-use-contraceptives-and-happily-skip-to-the-abortion-clinic-if-get-pregnant” women). But that’s just the internet. Never mind the fact that this actually happens in real life. As some will note, I’ve already shown that legalized abortion lowers contraceptive use, precisely because it lowers the risk associated with unsafe, whereas when abortion cannot be readily or easily accessed, contraceptive use goes up.
I’ll elaborate on this more a little later on, but what you believe is irrelevant; especially when you can’t even justify those beliefs beyond “well, that’s what I believe”. I mean, the inevitable response is “Yeah, so what?”
I’ll just point out that this isn’t anything close to an actual argument, especially since whether or not one has had an abortion or a hundred abortions, or even whether or not they’re a male or a female or anything like that, doesn’t exactly strengthen one’s argument.
:smack:
What the hell? There’s a rather well-known logical fallacy known as petitio principii, otherwise known as begging the question. The above is a classic case of it. How do you know they’re not non-persons? In fact, this requires you to first know what the thing they are not, are. You just don’t get to state “Oh, I define them as non-persons because they are non-persons”. But moving on.
Maybe a page or two back, ZPG Zealot lamented the fact that the educational system in the U.S. is going to hell in a handbasket. The above quoted is pretty good evidence of this (or of the educational system in the country which you live). Pray tell, what kind of tissue is/are the unborn? Obviously, my nice, shiny (and pretty much useless except for showing off :p) biology related degree and educated totally failed me.
I feel supremely confidence in saying it’s the other way around, especially since the issue of being a non-person is only invoked when looking to act in a manner detrimental to the one labeled as a non-person.
Sucks for you.
Sucks for you.
Sucks for you.
What you believe is irrelevant. I understand the want to hide behind “your beliefs”, but that’s nothing more than a cheap out-- especially since you definitely will not afford the same luxury to someone whose beliefs might contradict yours or to someone whose beliefs you find repugnant (i.e., the individual who doesn’t believe that you’re a person until, say, the third or so month after you’re born). You see, at the end of the day, you can (1) provide no valid justification as to why one should accept your beliefs as de facto correct over anyone else’s or (2) why some humans are not entitled to the same basic rights as another human. Because you believe you are correct and because you believe they do not based on whatever you’ve told yourself is a-- frankly put-- shitty reason.
Conflicting evidence of what? A meaningless term which isn’t even defined beyond what personal definition and criteria you want to give to it? That?
The latter.
Forgot this (thought I submitted it already…).
(1) It says “generally speaking”, not as an absolute standard.
(2) You were the one who mentioned the pro-life/pro-choice numerical breakdown.
(3) Yes. Just make abortions illegal where <50% of the population says they should be legal. I’d bet you pro-lifers would agree with that proposition loooong before pro-choicers do, though.
I don’t know how else I could define it- should I just take your word for it? Should I take a priest’s word? A doctor’s, or a scientist’s? How do you know they are human? Is a sperm human? An egg? A fertilized egg? A fetus? Why is your line/definition any more accurate then mine?
Of course- you obviously know my mind better than I do. It couldn’t possibly be that I thought about the question and tried to form an honest, informed opinion.
Why should we accept your beliefs as de facto correct over anyone else’s? “Because you believe you are correct and because you believe they do not based on whatever you’ve told yourself is a-- frankly put-- shitty reason.” Why couldn’t I say the exact same thing about you? What about someone who thinks a sperm is a person? Or that a fertility specialist who damages or destroys a fertilized egg for medical reasons is a murderer?
What does this mean? What is your position on abortion?
So you are happy that 47% of the Americans are pro-life even if, generally speaking, only 35% are against legal-abortion. Actually “35%” is a high number. Other polls say its more like 20%.
Yes because you made the argument that laws should be made by what the majority thinks is moral. And if the majority thinks abortion is immoral there should be a law against it. And I tried to show you that the majority does not think abortion should be illegal. Sorry that I thought facts could stand in your way.
You actually don’t think societal consensus is necessary to make laws based on immorality. It’s the minority that shouts the loudest that should make the laws. Good to get that in the open.
Sorry I have missed the post where you did that.
But let me repeat something I posted earlier.
That means:
1,2 abortions per 1000 Germans.
3,9 abortions per 1000 Americans.
0,4 teenagers that give birth per 1000 Germans.
1,6 teenagers that give birth per 1000 Americans.
In Germany abortion is legal and cheap. We have mandatory sex-ed-classes in school. Anyone who tries to preach abstinence to German kids gets laughed at. German teenagers are doing it. A lot.
And you really think the problem in the US is legal abortion?
Omg- you act as if the statement “a fertilized egg is a human person” is a clearly and self-evidently true statement.
Well it’s not clear or self-evident to me. Please enlighten me- you have said that you like to educate the ignorant; please educate me. Why should I believe that, say, a fertilized egg (for example) or a 6 week old fetus are human persons with the same rights as a just-born baby?
A lot of the issues some people have with problems like this have to do with an inability to reason outside the literal meaning of various popular ideas that become equivocations when you put them in any number of contexts while using the popular English language of our time.
A popular syllogism example:
Something must be done.
This is something.
Therefore, this must be done.
They are literally becoming inflamed by the way words sound when you put them in certain combinations: “To kill a defenseless human being is evil and wrong. A fertilized egg is a human being. To kill a fertilized egg is evil and wrong.”
The beauty for the simple minded is that they can use fewer mental resources to deal with a variety of situations. Instead of the uncomfortable feeling that being open minded and prepared to evaluate each context on it’s individual merits creates one can just apply the black and white rule.
This is something the human mind wants to do because it makes decision making faster and requiring less resources. This is where stereotyping comes from. “The only Asian man I ever met was an immigrant and made very bad business decisions. Asian men are all immigrants and make bad business decisions.” Often we are able to overcome this when it’s use is self evidently absurd. What is more difficult is when a popular religion encourages the use of illogical thinking patterns. If the environmental pressures are strong enough even a smart person can compartmentalize their higher reasoning to maintain them when they have the natural capacity not to.