The only one reaching for your wallet is the baby. Your baby. Own up to it like a man and quit yer bitchin’.
Plus, my wife would cut your dick off if you put your hands on my body. 
Wow, three cross posts in a row. Hope that’s not bad luck.
I sounds fair to me. If you promise not to touch any woman’s bodies think we can get a promise from them not to touch your wallet.
You can’t set up a chain of argument (e.g. you with the face) based on the idea that childbirth is THE natural outcome of pregnancy and thus is the preferred and “good” thing to have.
Childbirth is ONE natural outcome of pregnancy. So is miscarriage. So is death of the mother. So is death of the baby, for instance if the umbilical cord gets wrapped around its neck during delivery. Natural outcome does not equal “good thing” or “preferable thing”. Doctors intervene to prevent death of mother and baby all the time. Doctors intervene to prevent miscarriage all the time. You cannot argue that one should automatically accept the “natural outcome” of an event. I won’t burden this by going into examples beyond pregnancy, but they are rife - particularly in the health care arena.
Additionally, Childbirth is not a -necessary- outcome of pregnancy in this day, age and society. The OP indicates that the question is asked with the given that abortion is legal.
So the arguments here based on the idea that childbirth is THE natural outcome of pregnancy are wrong on two bases. One, it’s simply wrong - childbirth is ONE possible outcome of pregnancy; and two, it’s wrong because of the implicit statement within the argument that a natural outcome is “good” or “better” than an outcome involving human intervention.
Pervert: good point:
I think I should revise my thinking to this: I do not disagree that “keep it in your pants” is one part of the answer/solution here. I would insist that such indications be concurrent with a “don’t spread 'em” directive to women. But I do not agree that this is THE solution. Catholic high school demonstrated amply to me the (in)effectiveness of simply and solely advocating abstinence… (i.e. lotsa knocked-up teenage girls at my high school.)
I’m scared and am hiding behind DrLizardo now.
And, why do you say my child? Did we not just argue that a women had the sole rights/responsiblities for a child while it was developing? Why should this change now that it was born?
Nor was it necessary that your irresponsible driving was going to lead to my blood on the sidewalk. Your passenger could have alerted you to the danger, but chose to let me get run over. Nevertheless, you are still morally and legally responsible for my injuries.
Your assertion is false. In fact, fathers have many legal rights and responsibilities to their unborn children. For instance, a father can be forced to share the costs of prenatal medical care, and may have a tort claim against any person who causes the wrongful death of the fetus.
I don’t think anyone has argued that childbirth is the only outcome of pregnancy. Exeryone acknowledges that many other outcomes are possible.
The question is how does this limit the man’s responsibilities?
Unless I misunderstand the OP the qustion here is wether or not we should, can, want to, etc. create an oportunity for the male to relinquish his rights and obligations for any future child AFTER the pregnancy is detected. Have I missed something?
Assuming I have characterized the question properly Then IMO the answer has to be no. Any choice to abandon the child after pregnancy creates an obligation on the woman and child. Even if that obligation is to have an abortion for the woman or stop living for the child.
I’d like to explain my train of thought a little better, if no one minds.
Man and woman have sex. This results in fertilized egg. Both are responsibile for the egg.
The egg may develop into a child. This is under the woman’s total control. Therefore, the responsibility for the outcomes of the developing egg should also be the woman’s responsiblity.
You can’t (morally) take rights away from someone, and then give them back in the form of responsiblities.
Yet another confusing metaphor: I and a woman draw the schematics for and assemble the chassis of a bomb. The woman then assembles the bomb and detonates it in such a way that I cannot prevent her from doing so. You cannot hold me responsibile for the boom because I provided blueprints, especially if I provided the blueprints as a form of intellectual stimulation.
(If it isn’t clear, blueprints = genetic material, components assembled = developing fetus, and baby = boom)
There you go again! Making up your own arguements and then defending them.
Childbirth is a natural outcome of pregnancy. No one has said it is preferred or the only one. It is however a known possible outcome.
Men do not have to pay child support for a pregnancy. They pay child support for a child.
In, the child is the woman’s fault, though.
OK, (not that I want to create any more agreement) But I concur inence is not THE solution either. I was trying to limit my argument to the male opt-out idea proposed by your original post. If the problem we are discussing is enlarged to unwanted pregnancy in general then we may need more space. Also, I agree that a “don’t spread em” attitude must be adopted as well.
If I may, could your original question be expanded to somethine like this:
How do we handle conflicts between male and females AFTER pregnancy? What rights/obligations should the male have?
As we discuss the possiblity of male opt-out, I have not heard many people propose that males should be allowed to opt-in. That is if the female commits an act which terminates the pregnancy does she owe nothing to the male?
I leave it to you DrLizardo. Are we talking about the male’s rights generally during pregnancy or simply the proposition of males relinquishing obligations.
I’m not using “good” or “bad” judgments at all about childbirth. All I’m saying is that it is stupid for a man to complain that a woman has given birth to his child, after accepting the risks inherent to sex.
It seems to me you are treating abortion and childbirth as equal choices, and they are not, not necessarily. Telling a woman (who is pro-life) that she has a choice to either abort or have a baby, wrongly presents those two options as ethical equals. The woman is left with two unpleasant options: to do something that she feels is immoral or to give birth to a fatherless child. The man, on the other hand, doesn’t have to do anything except worry about finances. Big whoopty do!
Regardless, abortion is still an elective procedure. It is not life-sustaining. If anything it’s the opposite. And you’re coercing her to undergo a dangerous elective procedure whether she wants it or not, that is not to her benefit or to the fetus’s, but for your benefit.
No, I’m responding to other people’s postulations. Specifically
you with the face:
specifically looking at the phrase “THE natural consequence of pregnancy” [my emphasis]… And if you want to claim the answer ‘face’ is getting at isn’t entirely implicit, be my guest, but I will snicker at you for being silly.
And you should give credit to Ronald Reagan for lifting his signature “there you go again…” line that he used to such effect when he didn’t have a good argument to put forth…
Perv: I’m open to expanding the discussion.
If it is clear that you never thought she would use the bomb for harm then you are blamless.
OK, not really. The test is one of reasonableness. That is if a resonable person in your shoes would have believed that no chance of harm existed then you can’t be held liable. However, if you provided material assistnece that could reasonably have been forseen to be used for harm… you’re it. Admittedly you’re not solely responsible.
Think of it this way. If you knew for sure, or even encouraged, the woman to use the bomb for harm I think you would agree you have some responsibility for the outcome. Somewhere between you actively encouraging and you having no knowledge of the potential harm is the truth. A jury would be allowed to use some sort of reasonable test to find where you were.
If we apply you analogy to the OP again, we may find that it is quite impossible to believe that no reasonable man could have forseen the possibility of pregnancy. The link between sex and children was extablished many thousands of years ago.
You with the face: I am treating childbirth and abortion as equally LEGAL choices, which they quite simply are (at the moment).
I also think, and have said, that I’m not seeking to minimize the fact that abortion is a medical procedure with possible unitended/unwanted outcomes. But it’s also a medical procedure the right to which is DEMANDED (and exercised) by an AWFUL lot of women each year… I can’t be quite that horrific, now can it?
I have said the “opt out” option should involve some obligation or consequence by the father that is deemed relatively similar in impact on his life. I recall postulating vasectomy or community service akin to low-level criminals as possibilities.
Finally, I disagree with the oft-stated sentiment that the “opt out” would “coerce” the woman into having an abortion. It would continue, as it is now, to be her SOLE and EXCLUSIVE choice whether to do so or not. Unless, of course, you care to indicate that the poor little weak helpless women of this country are utterly dependent upon men. At which point we’ll buy y’all burkas and keep ya’ locked up in the harem with our other wives… But I personally don’t have that condescending a view of women.
But it is you who has no good arguements.
He said that child birth was the natural consequence of pregnancy…okay. But he did not say that it was good/bad what is what you were placing on him. You added the “thus”.