# Is it possible to be Pro-Choice AND think that fetus=baby? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 6, 2011, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013 "2011-05-06T21:23:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Omg\_a\_Black\_Conservative](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/7ba0ec/32.png) [@Omg\_a\_Black\_Conservative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omg_a_Black_Conservative)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/261 "2011-05-09T19:44:22Z")
> [@DianaG](#): > > Thread winner! Who could argue with this bit of genius? Have you ever met someone who was aborted who thinks abortion is a good thing? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Quia\_Sic\_Dico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/bbce88/32.png) [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quia_Sic_Dico)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/262 "2011-05-09T19:46:37Z")
> [@Feyrat](#): > > Except the point is, at the point where abortion is legal, the foetus is NOT a baby. There’s a third option here you’re not considering. That you can believe a late-term fetus = baby, but that first-trimester fetus is NOT a baby, and so it’s fine to eject them if they are in the mother’s body against her desire or ability to bear a child. > > This whole “what’s the dividing line between a baby just before birth and just after birth” is a total smokescreen. We don’t abort babies just before birth, so that question has nothing at all to do with abortion - it’s an emotional misdirection. > > Someone in the BBQ pit gave the absolute best point to the abortion discussion I’ve ever seen: if you are saying that by engaging in sexual congress you are consenting to pregnancy, then by the same reasoning, by entering your car and traveling any distance in it, you are consenting to be in a car crash. I agree; I think you misunderstood my point. The OP asks if it is possible to be pro-choise and think of the foetus - not a viable, or third-trimester, or just before birth foetus, but _any_ foetus - as a baby. I brought up the just-before-birth-foetus-in my argument because most of us can agree on that being a baby, and I wanted to clarify that if you thought of all foetuses like that, then you would think that all foetuses are babies (I’m not defending that position, like you I find it factually erroneous), and then you would hardly sanction first-trimester abortions, unless you were alright with comitting infanticide. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/263 "2011-05-09T19:51:15Z")
> [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](#): > > The point I’m trying to make (not quite as articulately as I wish I could) is that to many people who take the “pro-life” position, a foetus isn’t just nominally equivalent to a baby, because they don’t think it makes any difference to the moral priviledges of the foetus/baby whether it has been born or not. Because they believe it is already a fully fledged human being during gestation, they accord it the same human rights within the uterus as without, and can’t tolerate that it should be killed simply because it causes inconvenience to some one else. Thus they find abortions, or foeticide, exactly as morally appalling as I imagine you find infanticide. I agree with others who say this is no great revelation, nor does it explain some unexpected aspect of the pro-life stance. In fact, it’s altogether typical of that stance in that the rights of the mother are a matter of indifference, written off as “a matter of inconvenience”. And truth be told, I don’t find infanticide _automatically_ appalling. I see, for example, a distinction between a scared teenager who delivers a baby in the bathroom during her high-school prom and a platoon of soldiers who march into a village and bayonet every infant in sight. The circumstances can mitigate the situation massively, even if the result is the same. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/264 "2011-05-09T19:51:54Z")
> [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](#): > > Ok, but what about a chimpanze or an orangutan? They appear to have emotions, a certain level of intelligence, and even a sense of personality, judging by their patterns of social interaction. Could they not be persons as well? It’s clear that mentally disabled human beings who have a mental capacity equal to a chimp are legally considered a person. If you killed one of these people, you’d be charged with murder. If you killed a chimp, you might be charged with violating the endangered species act, or various other laws, but you’d never be charged with murder. This just shows that our laws are inconsistent, because our legal traditions arose from our attempts to get along with each other in a pleasant way, rather than a formal logical exploration of a set of agreed-upon moral axioms. And this is why we can’t expect logical consistency in laws about abortion either. Laws about abortion aren’t the logical result of a set of moral axioms, they are a set of rules about what we humans have agreed to do in various circumstances, for the sake of creating the sort of society we’d like to live in. And this is why the pro-life people arguing that it is morally wrong to kill a perfectly good unborn baby are missing the point. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. I kind of agree that it’s wrong, but the important question isn’t whether I think it’s right or wrong, the important question is what I’m going to do about it. So do I advocate that a woman who had an abortion be charged with murder? This is impossible. Do I advocate that people who perform abortions for pregnant women be charged with murder? Why would I do that when I’ve already decided that it doesn’t make sense to charge the mother who decided to kill the baby with murder? The abortion wouldn’t take place without the mother’s instigation, right? And so I have to decide, well, I may be against abortion but what next? I might try to persuade people not to have abortions, but what do I do when they don’t listen? I might try to provide services to prevent unwanted pregnancies (education, birth control, etc), but what happens when an unwanted pregnancy happens anyway? I don’t want to live in a society which criminalizes abortion, even if I think abortion is morally wrong. Same as I don’t want to live in a society which criminalizes adultery, or lying, or alcoholism, or drug use, or gluttony, or gambling, or religion, or membership in the Communist Party or the Klan. Criminalizing abortion is unenforceable and counterproductive, and so I’m against it. Which means that despite being “pro-life” it turns out that I’m actually pro-choice since if someone has decided to have an abortion I’m not in favor of using force to stop them, or punishing them afterward. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/265 "2011-05-09T19:58:49Z")
> [@Omg\_a\_Black\_Conservative](#): > > Lack of abortion access doesn’t reinforce poverty. Of course it does, children are expensive and pregnant women can require both expensive medical care and have problems with their work. > [@Omg\_a\_Black\_Conservative](#): > > Yet the unborn are not afforded self-determination? Of course not; no self, no self determination. > [@Omg\_a\_Black\_Conservative](#): > > If a thread ever pops up about a Jehovah Witness denying their child a blood transfusion when it would save the child’s life, I’ll be sure to remind you that the government should stay out and let the child die, all the while accusing anyone of disagreeing to be socialists 😉 Since a child is a person while a fetus is not, your analogy doesn’t work. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/266 "2011-05-09T20:09:28Z")
Hey, OMG, you mind responding to the thought experiment I posted upthread? I’ll repost it here for your convenience. A thought experiment, and I intend this especially for \*\*classyladyhp \*\*and **OMG** : We allow babies to be given up for adoption now–that is, legally, a mother can relinquish both parental rights to a child and the duty of care for that child. In the future, don’t fight the hypothetical, we develop a uterine replicator device. For the same amount of surgical effort as an abortion, the fetus can instead be removed from the mother and placed into one of these devices, gestated, and born. Babies born from the uterine replicator have the same or lower rates of birth defects, and develop equivalently to in-womb babies. In the case where this technology exists, does the mother have a moral right to remove the fetus from her uterus and give it up for adoption while it is still unborn? ---
**Author:** ![Quia\_Sic\_Dico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/bbce88/32.png) [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quia_Sic_Dico)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/267 "2011-05-09T20:29:22Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > I agree with others who say this is no great revelation, nor does it explain some unexpected aspect of the pro-life stance. In fact, it’s altogether typical of that stance in that the rights of the mother are a matter of indifference, written off as “a matter of inconvenience”. > > And truth be told, I don’t find infanticide _automatically_ appalling. I see, for example, a distinction between a scared teenager who delivers a baby in the bathroom during her high-school prom and a platoon of soldiers who march into a village and bayonet every infant in sight. The circumstances can mitigate the situation massively, even if the result is the same. I didn’t intend it to be a great revelation. But many peoply here kept defending the pro-choice position in a way that indicated that they didn’t really understand why the pro-life people don’t agree with them. And I think that you’re being a bit hard on the poor pro-life people by accusing them of being inconsiderate towards the mother. From their point of view what they believe to be the foetus’s interest in remaining alive ranges higher simply because most pregnancies don’t kill the mother but all abortions kill the foetus (which, as I said before, they consider just as much a human being as her). If you agree that infanticide can be condoned in some instances then you don’t have to prove that foetuses aren’t infants for a pro-lifer to understand why you’re pro-choice, but if you don’t then you have to prove to them why a foetus isn’t the same as an infant. If you start doing that you’ve inherently answered no to the question posed in the OP. I know this is a completely circular argument, but I’m just trying to show that the question isn’t really that hard to answer, because it more or less contains the answer. I’m not sure I know what we’re arguing about anymore. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/268 "2011-05-09T20:34:03Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > And that is exactly what I think every pro-life person believes. That the mother did something wrong by having vaginal sex when not wanting to have a baby, and that the baby is being punished for the mother’s mistake. That once a baby is conceived, you have the obligation to keep it alive. > > I don’t understand people’s objections to other people forcing their morality. That’s what the law does. Any criminal law is about forcing one group of people to work by the morality of another. For example, child porn laws are about enforcing the morality that taking sexually suggestive pictures or enjoying looking at them is wrong. Or, to be more benign, a law about Jawalking is about forcing people not to walk across and impede traffic and to care more about their safety than the convenience of crossing the street. > > No, the idea that it’s wrong to force your morality on someone else is not going to change anything. The only thing that will resolve the situation is when transplants or machines can make it where the violinist does not need to be hooked up to you. > > And I agree with CA. I would have a moral obligation to remain connected to the guy, because my action would result in his death, while only serving to make my life more convenient. It is only the fetus not being a person that allows me not to be pro-life. But it’s also why I’m not pro-choice, either. I take [Cecil’s position](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2817/when-does-human-life-begin). > > Heck, he’s the reason I’m no longer pro-life. That article finally convinced me. His article also suggests that human life begins at some point before birth and an abortion after that prenatal point is also wrong. So he’s not exactly pro-choice either. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/269 "2011-05-09T20:36:25Z")
> [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](#): > > But many peoply here kept defending the pro-choice position in a way that indicated that they didn’t really understand why the pro-life people don’t agree with them. And I think that you’re being a bit hard on the poor pro-life people by accusing them of being inconsiderate towards the mother. OK; how about “gloatingly sadistic” instead? Quite a few are. “Indifferent” is the _nicest_ that the anti-abortion scum get towards the women they are trying to victimize; it goes downhill from there. > [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](#): > > From their point of view what they believe to be the foetus’s interest in remaining alive ranges higher simply because most pregnancies don’t kill the mother but all abortions kill the foetus (which, as I said before, they consider just as much a human being as her). Which simply shows how low a creature they consider her to be. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/270 "2011-05-09T20:43:48Z")
> [@Omg\_a\_Black\_Conservative](#): > > I never said anything about a willingness to abort that leads to poor decision making, but rather that women who abort are prone to poor decision making, which is basically me repeating what you said. Not really, no. Possibly you’re making the assumption that getting an abortion is a bad decision _in and of itself_, but I don’t agree and have never stated otherwise. If you’re _not_ making this assumption, then I don’t understand why you’re trying to changing the sequence from: 1. Woman is prone to making bad decisions 2. Bad decisions lead to unwanted pregnancies 3. Unwanted pregnancies lead to abortions …to… 1. Woman chooses to get abortion. 2. Choosing an abortion mean the woman makes bad decisions. It’s as though “A suggests B suggests C” is being converted to “C suggests A”, which doesn’t follow, much like “beagle suggests dog suggests mammal” fails to lead to “mammal suggests beagle.” Sure, a given mammal _might_ be a beagle, and a given abortion patient _might_ be prone to bad decisions, but I wouldn’t start making generalizations based on either premise. > [@](#): > > There is a rather direct correlation between unintended pregnancy rates and abortion rates. It’s not a stretch to believe that, taking what you said at face value, that if we look at who obtains the majority of abortions that women who make impulsive, short-sighted decisions would obtain more than their counterparts on the basis of them becoming unintentionally pregnant more often than their counterparts. I’m only questioning the methodology of the study you cited and explaining why I find it unconvincing. The study doesn’t address, or even try to address, “who obtains the majority of abortions” and if you want to expand the discussion in this direction, I suggest you find a cite that you respect detailing the demographics of abortion across the entire, let’s say, U.S. population, rather than the very limited scope of the study you’ve already cited, which was exclusively of 237 women who lived in mid-eighties Baltimore and who were already receiving attention from social workers and were overwhelmingly poor, under-educated and under-employed. > [@](#): > > It’s not? I’m sure you wouldn’t think that way if you were aborted. I’m just gonna let this one go. > [@](#): > > Rape accounts for less than half a percentage of all abortions. Even if you assumed double that (1%), we’d be talking about a minority of women. Even among poor women? Even, dare I say, among the 237 women profiled in your cited study, which is specifically what I was addressing? The fact is, we don’t know because that data was either not collected or not cited. > [@](#): > > Even if you times that by ten, you’d still only be talking about 5% of the women in the surver. Furthermore, I’d be interested in seeing something which shows that rape victims are more likely to abuse their children, because I highly doubt that is true. At all. Okay, feel free to doubt it, I won’t try and stop you. But if in this particular study, let’s say, three women who were impregnated by rape, aborted that fetus, and took it out on their other children, those three women alone would be enough to affect the results because the sample size is quite small. > [@](#): > > I didn’t say you said abortion makes women abusive. I said that women who have abortions might be predisposed to being abusive. They might indeed be. This study, though, does not convince me for reasons I think I’ve adequately explained. > [@](#): > > I dare say, at least in the U.S., abortion attitudes have returned to their pre-1973 levels, so it’s not much of an argument to the contrary. Have they? I’d find that to be a tad surprising, to say the least. I know there are backlashes in various states, and vocal opponents, and federal-level pro-life politicians (though how much of this is mere lip service is anyone’s guess). Frankly, I’d be quite bemused if _Roe_ and similar decisions were discarded anytime in the next decade and the U.S. returned to pre-1973 standards. If anything, I’d expect a significant increase in Canadian gynecological clinics set up along our southern border and near our major airports, to tend to your medical refugees. > [@](#): > > Lack of abortion access doesn’t reinforce poverty. Excess numbers of babies, though… You can continue claiming the two aren’t linked, if you like. I won’t stop you. > [@](#): > > Yet the unborn are not afforded self-determination? Whether they are or not, I’m okay with their hypothetical wishes being overruled by another person in the specific circumstances of pregnancy. It’s unclear to me why the state is better suited to make that determination. > [@](#): > > If a thread ever pops up about a Jehovah Witness denying their child a blood transfusion when it would save the child’s life, I’ll be sure to remind you that the government should stay out and let the child die, all the while accusing anyone of disagreeing to be socialists 😉 In that case, the parents’ best interests are _not_ being served in any tangible way by denying the transfusion because their concern (that their child’s soul will be endangered) is not something that be evaluated in any meaningful way. It’s only analogous to pregnancy if a pregnant woman is considered “possessed” by an intangible “child-spirit” that she wants “exorcised”, when the blunt reality is she has a growing organism inside her that will over a period of several months increase her personal discomfort significantly and even afterward impose an emotional and financial burden that I’m not comfortable forcing on her when alternatives exist to remedy the situation. In any case, if a pro-choice stance can be likened to infanticide, I see no reason a pro-life stance can’t be likened to totalitarian government-mandated reproduction: “So, comrade, you have failed to fulfil your duty to the Party. That is double-plus ungood, as the state needs soldiers to wage our war with Eurasia (with whom we’ve _always_ been at war, incidentally)…” That is, if I wanted to play that pointless game. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/271 "2011-05-09T20:53:01Z")
> [@Omg\_a\_Black\_Conservative](#): > > Are the mentally disabled afforded less moral status than your Nobel prize winning and member of MENSA astro-physicist? Are comatose patients afforded less moral status than you or I? You know, it’s a good thing individuals aren’t afforded moral status on the basis of having minds. It would turn conservatives into second class citizens. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/272 "2011-05-09T20:55:24Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > I think it still applies, even if the subject initially volunteered. I don’t see how generosity in the past requires someone to continue to be generous into the future. Its not generosity in the past. You have put the violinist in the condition in which he finds himself. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/273 "2011-05-09T20:58:51Z")
> [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](#): > > I didn’t intend it to be a great revelation. But many peoply here kept defending the pro-choice position in a way that indicated that they didn’t really understand why the pro-life people don’t agree with them. Well, possibly.. I can’t speak for all the pro-choice people in this thread, of course. Personally, I think I have an adequate understanding of the pro-life stance, and those who hold such a stance are perfectly free to continue doing so, but I’ll continue challenging any argument that their beliefs should influence law, because I find their arguments to be idealistic and short-sighted and apt to do a fair amount of harm in exchange for a questionable, possibly nonexistent, amount of good. > [@](#): > > And I think that you’re being a bit hard on the poor pro-life people by accusing them of being inconsiderate towards the mother. From their point of view what they believe to be the foetus’s interest in remaining alive ranges higher simply because most pregnancies don’t kill the mother but all abortions kill the foetus (which, as I said before, they consider just as much a human being as her). Well, I just don’t see why their interpretation of the fetus’s interest should take priority of the mother’s interpretation of her own. And given my own direct observations of a westernized democracy that has no real barriers to abortion and yet has suffered no ill-effects, I have to wonder what purpose is served by another westernized democracy trying to impose or re-impose such barriers. > [@](#): > > If you agree that infanticide can be condoned in some instances then you don’t have to prove that foetuses aren’t infants for a pro-lifer to understand why you’re pro-choice, but if you don’t then you have to prove to them why a foetus isn’t the same as an infant. If you start doing that you’ve inherently answered no to the question posed in the OP. I know this is a completely circular argument, but I’m just trying to show that the question isn’t really that hard to answer, because it more or less contains the answer. I’m not sure I know what we’re arguing about anymore. I dunno, but the arguments are fun, anyway. Ths one isn’t _as much_ fun as that “spaceship” version a while back, but it’s okay. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/274 "2011-05-09T20:59:00Z")
> [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](#): > > No, I think that is a good point. And there’s another problem with that argument as well: the violinist is already brilliant and well loved by the time he is hooked up to the unfortunate surrogate, and he’s an adult who can probably fend for himself once he wakes up and is unhooked (if he can’t the society of music lovers have already proven that they’ll do almost anything to ensure his welfare). As such the surrogate’s responsibilities to the violinist do not extend beyond the period when they are physically connected. Conversely, a mother’s responsibilities to her baby doesn’t end at the moment of birth. A child needs care and stimulation, and can’t usually depend on having a society of baby lovers standing ready to provide those things if the mother should happen to be unwilling, or unable, to do so. You know that you can put a baby up for adoption right? They can take the baby from you in the delivery room if you want. you never even have to see it. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/275 "2011-05-09T21:08:14Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Well, that’s nice for you, but the point is why should anyone else give a shit about your personal moral code? Because people like her are electing presidents that are appointing supreme court justices that will overturn Roe v Wade. You really think Roberts, Alito, Thomas and Scalia wouldn’t overturn Roe v. Wade if they could? You really think that a Tea Party President won’t nominate even more radical right judges? This is a war of ideas and “I don’t care what you say, I’m right” is a good way to stimulating the back alley abortion industry. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/276 "2011-05-09T21:10:28Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > That’s easy, since I already have done so repeatedly. Organ donation. We can disassemble a mindless human for parts. Please cite to where we can harvest conservatives for organs while they are still alive? ---
**Author:** ![Quia\_Sic\_Dico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/bbce88/32.png) [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quia_Sic_Dico)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/277 "2011-05-09T21:10:57Z")
> [@DianaG](#): > > Well, I’d have to imagine it, since that doesn’t actually happen. And apparently you have to imagine pregnancy, or you’d never have typed up any of the rest of that silly drivel. I must say, I don’t think you’re being entirely fair. Just because my argument is hypothetical it is not automatically invalid. I haven’t any children, nor have I ever been pregnant. If you have, then obviously you have the benefit of an experience which I haven’t, and you can’t really blame me, in my ignorance, for believing that looking after an infant would be more taxing than being pregnant. In my defence, an infant requires near constant attention, and often deprives you of sleep to a degree that most pregnancies do not (at least not for their full duration), and most of the women I have known who have had children have seemed a lot more exhausted one month after giving birth than one month before. Anyway, I still think the hi-jacking argument is a bit off: Surely women have abortions because they don’t want to end up with a baby, not because they object to being hi-jacked. ---
**Author:** ![DianaG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7ab992/32.png) [@DianaG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DianaG)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/278 "2011-05-09T21:15:47Z")
I don’t blame you for not knowing what it’s like to be pregnant, I’m just pointing out how silly it is, in that case, for you to make assertions about what it’s like to be pregnant. Women have abortions for all sorts of reasons. I don’t want babies, AND I object to the hijacking. Being pregnant sucked, even when it was with a baby I wanted, but I lived with it because I wanted that baby. I certainly would not live with that again for a baby that I don’t want, and I shouldn’t have to, because my organs are mine, and I don’t owe the use of them to anyone, not even my own children. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/279 "2011-05-09T21:26:24Z")
> [@kevlaw](#): > > We allow doctors and patients to make all kinds of difficult moral decisions. Any reason to think that they could not handle this choice too? In other words, do you think there is a massive pent-up demand for late-term abortions that would turn into a flood if we allowed doctors and mothers the choice? Yopu’re not relying on the relatively small number of post-viability abortions (1% or about 10-20K abortions/year) as a reason to ignore them are you? I don’t think there is a pent up demand for infanticide either but I still think it should be illegal. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013/280 "2011-05-09T21:43:25Z")
> [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](#): > > Then imagine if someone handed you a newborn baby and said you had to take care of it, or it would die. That would put even greater demands on you and your body than just being pregnant. I’m not even female and this strikes me as blatantly, patently absurd. Even if someone is handed a newborn and responsibility for it (and for some reason cannot just refuse on the spot), an infant’s care can be temporarily and perfectly legally passed off to a nanny or babysitter. It’s somewhat harder to do so with an unwanted guest in your uterus. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-to-be-pro-choice-and-think-that-fetus-baby/581013.md?page=15)