Some of my points have been responded to, but never disproven. I assert that conception and childbirth are two separate events; someone else asserts that they are the same event. You’ll have to do better than that before you start talking about rebutted unsubstantiated claims.
Please point out specific factual claims I’ve made that need to be substantiated. I believe these are common knowledge: Fact 1. Childbirth usually occurs about 9 months after conception. Fact 2. Pregnant women in this country are generally able to choose not to deliver a child.
I trust I don’t need a cite for those facts.
From those facts I’ve inferred the following: Conclusion 1. Since childbirth occurs much later than conception and depends on an intervening choice, they are separate events with separate causes.
I’ve also observed that generally, people are not held responsible for the actions of others, even when they made possible the situation that allowed the actions: see the examples of the co-worker and the chemical, or the car dealer and the drunk driver. From the lack of response to those examples, I assume we agree on the assessment of responsibility in those situations: the car dealer is not responsible for the DUI accident, and I (hypothetically) am not responsible for my co-worker’s failure to dispose of the chemical before it becomes unstable.
Combining that observation with Conclusion 1, I have reached the position I’ve stated in this thread: Conclusion 2. Since childbirth and conception are separate events with separate causes, the consequences of childbirth are the responsibility of the person who caused the child to be born, not the person who caused the child to be conceived.
That’s an explanation of my logic. Now could I please have an explanation of yours, which I’ve asked for but never received?
Please be specific about which of the above points you disagree with, and if your logic calls for one person to be held responsible for the actions of another, please explain why that’s appropriate in this situation but not one like the car dealer and the drunk driver.
I didnt’ assert that conception and birth are the same event - but that one results directly from the other.
You aim a loaded gun at a person, and pull the trigger. Now, they could jump out of the way, duck etc, but if the bullet hits them we don’t attempt to claim that it’s their responsability for not dodging it. By your logic, the pulling of the trigger is a different event and seperated completely from the effect of that event - ie, the bullet firing.
and that’s what’s wrong, specifically, with your analysis.
Please define “directly”. I’m very interested to see how childbirth is a direct result of conception, while at the same time a DUI accident is not a direct result of buying the car.
Unless you can provide such a definition, you are holding one person responsible for the actions of someone else.
FWIW, by my logic, the bullet firing is obviously a direct effect of pulling the trigger. There is no point between the trigger-pulling and the bullet-firing where someone else gets to decide whether the bullet will fire or lay dormant.
Looks like I may have answered the wrong question with that last paragraph; you were suggesting that I thought getting hit by the bullet is the victim’s fault.
Assuming we’re talking about regular human beings, there is no choice as to whether they will stand in the bullet’s path; dodging bullets is something we just see in movies.
There’s no time to ponder the consequences of getting shot vs. almost getting shot, no time to tell yourself “Gee, that bullet will be here in .0015 seconds, I’d better move out of the way if I don’t want to get hit.” By the time you hear the gunshot, it’s already too late to move.
Contrast that to childbirth: a pregnant woman has weeks, if not months, to weigh the consequences of delivery vs. abortion. She doesn’t just stand there with a deer-in-the-headlights look as a baby forces itself out of her at 1000 feet per second.
I understand the evolutionary process, but this conversation is about the law not about nature. Since most sex is done for a recreational reason, there is no reason anyone should assume that either person is willing to support a child. Evolution outlines a process that will function properly as long as no one ever thinks or takes actions. Since we are an intelligent species we can interrupt the natural flow of the process through the use of birth control and intentional abortion. Besides, in nature there is no reason to assume the man would be around to support the child. 9 months is a long time. He may have left or been killed by then. Women are naturally able to raise children by themselves.
Personally, I do not think men are responsible even if abortion was illegal. The parasite grows in the woman’s body and so she is responsible for making sure it does not get there to begin with. Men have no natural reason to care if they get women pregnant and I see no reason they should have a lawful reason to care either. There are moral reasons they may care, but I prefer to allow each person to define their own morality.
Fair is when the law treats all parties equally (no one expects nature to be fair but many of us do expect the law to be fair). Women have an opportunity to bail out (abortion) so men should have one as well (male abortion - which I admit is child abandonment).
Of course sex is associated with having babies. I said that most sex does not lead to children and thus no one should assume that either person is willing to take care of a baby should one result. A fetus may indeed come into being but there is no reason for the man to think that the woman will give birth to it nor for the woman to think that the man will help pay for it. When people consent to sex they consent to sex, not parenthood.
Only if you spell female abortion “hysterectomy”. There is a big difference between choosing not to have one particular kid and choosing not to have kids ever. Men can have their sperm frozen first, but then women can have several eggs frozen before their hysterectomy. In either case, neither will ever be able to have children the natural way ever again.
The point is, there is no real comparison between child abandonment and abortion. There is a closer similarity to abortion and vasectomy, since they both are elective surgeries. We’ve already gone over this, though.
There is NO similarity between child abandonment and abortion. One is just skipping out—no consequences, no nothing. Just going home and eating a cheeseburger. By comparison, abortion is a surgery that some consider murder. It’s surgery that may put the woman’s future childbearing at risk; or at the very least, it’s physically uncomfortable. It’s surgery so controversial that the doctors who perform it have been murdered. And this has any similarity to skipping out and doing—what? Nothing? Not bloody likely.
And actually, vasectomy isn’t as difficult or as controversial as abortion, as it is missing the “may be murder/you may be murdered” element. But, it is a surgical procedure, so it does bear more similarity to abortion. More similarity than sitting at home eating a cheeseburger.
But, oh wait. I remember why bringing up vasectomy isn’t “fair”. It’s because it involves surgery to the man. That’s why it’s “unfair”! I get it! :rolleyes:
It’s so easy for some of you to wave your hand and say, “Let her get an abortion. Let her raise it herself. Let the taxpayers pay for it. Anything other than expecting him to pay for it!” It’s the abortion thing that most rankles—why is it so easy for you to expect an abortion from her, when the thought of a vasectomy seems so off-limits to you? Why should the man not be held responsible for what his sperm do? Why should the expectation be that a woman have surgery to remove what he helped start? Especially when he had a choice of a vasectomy?
I mean, these things work both ways. And we’ve already gone over this, over and over. We will continue to have an impasse, I suppose. Since some of you seem to think that having an abortion is as easy as falling off of a log… And since some of you seem to think that it is unreasonable to anticipate that a pregnancy and then a child may result from sex. Since some of you think that, “but I didn’t want that!” is all the reason needed to not be held accountable for what you have done and have helped create. (Ah, if only the world worked like that—but it never has…)
There’s really no where else to go in this discussion. Other than for me to say that I rejoice that your viewpoints will never become public policy.
The fact that a vasectomy is surgery is not the problem. The fact that it is frequently permanent is the problem. If there were surgery that made men sterile for a year and then they went back to being as fertile as they were before the surgery I would not be as a against it. Your suggestion that any man that does not want to have kids at the age of 12 should have himself sterilized so that he will never have kids is silly. Vasectomies are quite common. I know several men that have had them, but all of them were in their late-30’s to early 40’s when they had it done and all of them were already married with all the children that they ever intended to have.
Yes it is true that abortion is murder, but I personally feel that leaving a child with only its crack addict mother to take care of it is worse than killing it. It all depends on how you define your own moral code. Some people feel abortion is amoral. Some people feel child abandonment is amoral. Some find them both amoral and some find neither amoral. But they have the right to make that choice for themselves. If we decide that both abortion and child abandonment are amoral and we make a law banning both then it doesn’t even matter what anyone else thinks because we are ruling their lives whether they like it or not. Each person should be free to make their own moral choices whether it is killing a fetus or abandoning it. Why do you feel that your moral choices should be forced on everyone else?