# Let's amend the Constitution to ban abortion opponents! **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 17, 2010, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109 "2010-09-17T18:01:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/41 "2010-09-18T18:41:41Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > > [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > > > Of course O’Donnell has not proposed anything of substance on just about any topic much less drawing up a proposed amendment to ban abortions but guessing you knew that. Given what we know of her so far though would you be content letting her get her way? I suspect my scare tactics above would be frighteningly less hypothetical then. > > I’m pro-choice, so no, I wouldn’t support her getting “her way”, but not because I think any of your scary hypotheticals would ensue. Frankly, I think Roe was poorly decided, and that it should be left up to the states. The constitution is silent on the matter of abortion, and I think it should stay that way. There is a lack of logical consistency in the notion that women should be barred from aborting a rapist’s baby and then saying the punishment if they do is nothing and only punish any who help her. The woman has rights. O’Donnell (and her ilk) would suggest that the unborn child’s rights trump the woman’s. Why? Because it is a human life and never mind if it is only a blastocyst…that makes no difference. Conception = human life. Those opposed to abortion in all instances make exactly that case. With me so far? So, if it is a human life why does it not get all the protections born humans get? If someone shoots a 1 week old in the head, another shoots a 12 year old, another shoots a 50 year old and another shoots am 80 year old does our law distinguish among them or are they all murderers? IANAL but my sense is the law does not distinguish. In order to trump the mother’s rights to her own body and her own self determination requires a pretty substantial need on the other side. Deeming the blastocyst as human would do it. I cannot fathom anything less being able to overcome the woman’s rights here. Particularly a woman who was raped so you cannot even claim it is partly her fault (e.g. should’ve used a condom if she wanted to have sex and not get pregnant). Yet here they want to say the woman has no rights but really killing the unborn is not murder or worthy of a substantially less penalty than you’d get shooting any of the people I listed above. Make sense to you because it sure doesn’t to me. Let the woman off the hook completely if she aborts? > [@](#): > > Obama, in opposing SSM, is guided by his religious beliefs. Do you think he is morally bankrupt? Fallacy of equivalence. Obama’s stance on SSM is not a good one. O’Donnell’s stance is flat out abhorrent (not hyperbole…wish there was a stronger word for it). ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/42 "2010-09-18T19:02:42Z")
> [@Mozart1220](#): > > Actually, there IS a place where misscarriage is investigated. It’s that bastion of tolerance and social equality…UTAH. (where I lived for 16 years) > > One of the many things I got attacked and ridiculed for on the “other message board” I used to frequent, was my observation that if we make abortion “murder” misscarriage would be come “imvoulantary manslaughter”. > > Of course, those who support the idea of “abortion as murder” had many excuses why tis woiuld and could not be the case, even though siimple logic disagrees. > > After a couple years of being told how stupid, Liberal, communist, crazy, etc. I was, THIS little item popped up proving that I was right. > > [http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/blog/2010/02/20/utah-bill-criminalizes-miscarriage](http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/blog/2010/02/20/utah-bill-criminalizes-miscarriage) > After asking for apologies and admisssions that I was right, they promptly kicked me off the board. There is danger in asking conservatives to admit that they were wrong, especially if they have the power to silence you. The law signed by the governor does not make miscarriage involuntary manslaughter. It criminalizes an act intentionally intended to cause a miscarriage (“intentional” was key for the governor; he vetoed a bill that would have criminalized “reckless” behavior leading to a miscarriage). This was in reaction to a case where a 17-year-old girl paid someone $150 to beat her to the point where she’d miscarry, after her boyfriend told her he’d leave her if she didn’t terminate the pregnancy. The judge who presided over this mess sent the attacker away, but ruled that the girl’s actions were not criminal under state law. There seems to have been no dispute over the facts–the attacker pleaded guilty, for example, and advocates for the girl’s rights argued what she really needed was counseling, not jail time. Anyway, the state rep who became aware of this decided to close up this gap (as he perceived it) in the law, so that acts that were intentionally designed to cause a miscarriage would be criminalized, including for the mother. How likely this is to come up (where the mother is a conspirator in the crime) in a state where abortion is legal is anyone’s guess–mine would be, “not too often,” perhaps never again. But who knows. The point being, however wise this law is, I do not believe it supports the notion that it was intended to create the need to investigate every miscarriage, nor do I believe the citizens of Utah would stand for such a practice, nor do I think it supports the extreme position you seemed to have argued on the other board. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/43 "2010-09-18T19:02:55Z")
> [@Mozart1220](#): > > So here’s the question that got me in so much trouble before (I never learn do I?) > > If abortion is considered “murder” can misscarriage be considered "invoulantary manslaughter? > > If not…WHY? Here’s my logic, boiled down to the simplest form possible. > Murder = The intentional killing of a human being (abortion) > > Invoulantary manslaughter = the accidental killing of a human being. (misscarriage) Not correct. Involuntary manslaughter is not simply the accidental killing of a human being. You must have been doing some sort of conduct that rises to the level of reckless, or criminally negligent, and thereby cause the death. A simple accident that causes the death, without that reckless conduct, is not manslaughter. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/44 "2010-09-18T19:07:41Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > …is O’Donnell scary enough, morally bankrupt enough, to oppose her for office. I say unequivocally yes. Shocker. Still, it’s a prefctly valid point of view. I can hardly fault you for attaching such grave importance to the issue that it outweighs all other issues in guiding your judgement. My only gripe was your claim that this constitutes an objective standard; that we’d be perfectly correct if we had a law that literally disqualified someone with those views from running for office. Since you have repudiated that claim, I’m happy to simply agree to disagree on your current point. That said, I don’t believe I can come down on the side of supporting her bid for office either. But it’s not her stance on abortion that drives me to this conclusion. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/45 "2010-09-18T19:09:36Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > > [@John\_Mace](#): > > > > I’m pro-choice, so no, I wouldn’t support her getting “her way”, but not because I think any of your scary hypotheticals would ensue. Frankly, I think Roe was poorly decided, and that it should be left up to the states. The constitution is silent on the matter of abortion, and I think it should stay that way. > > There is a lack of logical consistency in the notion that women should be barred from aborting a rapist’s baby and then saying the punishment if they do is nothing and only punish any who help her. It’s a political strategy. It’s not intended to be logically consistent, it’s intended to create a law that’s palatable to the public that will criminalize abortions. Period. Abortion providers will be in violation of the law if they continue to provide abortions (if such a law were passed). But pro-life lobbyists understand that the public has no stomach for sending women to jail for deciding to procure an abortion; frankly, the American public is pretty schizophrenic in its positions on abortion. So, whether or not the pro-life tribe believes it’s appropriate to criminalize the mother’s actions, it’s a non-starter. If one’s objective is to pursue the path that best ensures the criminalization of abortions, one had best abandon criminalizing the mother’s role in this. It’s that simple. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/46 "2010-09-18T19:16:49Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > There is a lack of logical consistency in the notion that women should be barred from aborting a rapist’s baby and then saying the punishment if they do is nothing and only punish any who help her. > > The woman has rights. O’Donnell (and her ilk) would suggest that the unborn child’s rights trump the woman’s. Why? Because it is a human life and never mind if it is only a blastocyst…that makes no difference. Conception = human life. Those opposed to abortion in all instances make exactly that case. > > With me so far? > > So, if it is a human life why does it not get all the protections born humans get? If someone shoots a 1 week old in the head, another shoots a 12 year old, another shoots a 50 year old and another shoots am 80 year old does our law distinguish among them or are they all murderers? > > IANAL but my sense is the law does not distinguish. In order to trump the mother’s rights to her own body and her own self determination requires a pretty substantial need on the other side. Deeming the blastocyst as human would do it. I cannot fathom anything less being able to overcome the woman’s rights here. Particularly a woman who was raped so you cannot even claim it is partly her fault (e.g. should’ve used a condom if she wanted to have sex and not get pregnant). > > Yet here they want to say the woman has no rights but really killing the unborn is not murder or worthy of a substantially less penalty than you’d get shooting any of the people I listed above. > > Make sense to you because it sure doesn’t to me. Let the woman off the hook completely if she aborts? I never said it was logically consistent. > [@](#): > > Fallacy of equivalence. > > Obama’s stance on SSM is not a good one. > > O’Donnell’s stance is flat out abhorrent (not hyperbole…wish there was a stronger word for it). No, the two are quite similar. Whom we are allowed to marry and whether we are allowed to abort are significant, serious life choices. O’Donnell’s stance is abhorrent to you. It is not objectively abhorrent, if there is even such a thing. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/47 "2010-09-18T19:41:08Z")
> [@Shaw's Caesar and Cleopatra](#): > > Pardon him. Theodotus: he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature. **Whack-a-Mole** would no doubt have been just as outraged about Ptolemy and Cleopatra’s marriage as Britannus was. He honestly seems to believe that as long as he feels it deeply enough, it’s a truth for everyone. No one can harbor a good-faith difference of opinion. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/48 "2010-09-18T19:58:58Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Still, it’s a prefctly valid point of view. I can hardly fault you for attaching such grave importance to the issue that it outweighs all other issues in guiding your judgement. My only gripe was your claim that this constitutes an objective standard; that we’d be perfectly correct if we had a law that literally disqualified someone with those views from running for office. Since you have repudiated that claim, I’m happy to simply agree to disagree on your current point. I did. See Post #11. I copped to a bad choice of words. Nor am I a single issue voter. I noted a slew of issues in the other thread you linked to in the OP and spawned this one. I cannot understand how or why you would suggest otherwise since you actively defended her on my other assertions against me. You may be able to remember how you did on your last 18 holes of golf but your memory on this seems remarkably short or you are being intentionally misleading. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/49 "2010-09-18T20:02:00Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > No, the two are quite similar. Whom we are allowed to marry and whether we are allowed to abort are significant, serious life choices. O’Donnell’s stance is abhorrent to you. It is not objectively abhorrent, if there is even such a thing. No, they are not similar. Important sure. Similar no. In SSM the state is preventing marriage but you can still live with the person which while not ideal is not wholly stomping on them either. In this abortion issue you are forcing someone to do something (bear the rapist’s baby) against their will. You see no distinction there? Really? ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/50 "2010-09-18T20:03:04Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > > [@Shaw's Caesar and Cleopatra](#): > > > > Pardon him. Theodotus: he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature. > > **Whack-a-Mole** would no doubt have been just as outraged about Ptolemy and Cleopatra’s marriage as Britannus was. He honestly seems to believe that as long as he feels it deeply enough, it’s a truth for everyone. No one can harbor a good-faith difference of opinion. Bullshit and you know it. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/51 "2010-09-18T20:15:00Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > > [@John\_Mace](#): > > > > No, the two are quite similar. Whom we are allowed to marry and whether we are allowed to abort are significant, serious life choices. O’Donnell’s stance is abhorrent to you. It is not objectively abhorrent, if there is even such a thing. > > No, they are not similar. Important sure. Similar no. > > In SSM the state is preventing marriage but you can still live with the person which while not ideal is not wholly stomping on them either. > > In this abortion issue you are forcing someone to do something (bear the rapist’s baby) against their will. > > You see no distinction there? Really? There are no two issues that don’t have some “distinction”. But they are similar because they force religious beliefs on others, denying them a key choice to make their lives happier. Marriage and childbirth are very similar issues, often closely linked together. You can hand wave away the desire of gays to not be treated in a “separate but equal” way, but I can just as easily say that the pregnant woman’s ordeal need not last longer than 9 months, while the gay couple’s ordeal lasts a lifetime. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/52 "2010-09-18T20:15:36Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > > [@John\_Mace](#): > > > > No, the two are quite similar. Whom we are allowed to marry and whether we are allowed to abort are significant, serious life choices. O’Donnell’s stance is abhorrent to you. It is not objectively abhorrent, if there is even such a thing. > > No, they are not similar. Important sure. Similar no. > > In SSM the state is preventing marriage but you can still live with the person which while not ideal is not wholly stomping on them either. > > In this abortion issue you are forcing someone to do something (bear the rapist’s baby) against their will. > > You see no distinction there? Really? This exchange started in reaction to your notion that the state had no business imposing one group’s beliefs on another group. The fact that these analogies may differ in nature and severity (depending on one’s perspective) doesn’t change the fact that you overstated your objection to anti-abortion laws. The state often imposes a particular moral perspective–that’s the counter to your statement. You’re shifting the argument to something you’d rather argue. “Yeah, but those impositions aren’t as bad” isn’t a rebuttal to your initial unambiguous (and wrong) assertion. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/53 "2010-09-18T20:17:02Z")
**Whack** : No, I don’t think he does know it. This is a guy, after all, who himself thinks that “life begins at conception” is an objective fact. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2010, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/54 "2010-09-18T20:19:32Z")
That _is_ an objective fact. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2010, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/55 "2010-09-19T00:37:48Z")
Just to be clear, “life” is not a meaningful term in the abortion debate. Every cell in my body is alive, and there is nothing inherently human in “life”. The relevant term is “personhood”, and there is no objectively way to determine when personhood begins. Assigning personhood to a fertilized egg is arbitrary, and is based on a religious belief. ---
**Author:** ![Mozart1220](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@Mozart1220](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mozart1220)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2010, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/56 "2010-09-19T02:45:12Z")
> [@Stratocaster](#): > > > [@Mozart1220](#): > > > > Actually, there IS a place where misscarriage is investigated. It’s that bastion of tolerance and social equality…UTAH. (where I lived for 16 years) > > > > One of the many things I got attacked and ridiculed for on the “other message board” I used to frequent, was my observation that if we make abortion “murder” misscarriage would be come “imvoulantary manslaughter”. > > > > Of course, those who support the idea of “abortion as murder” had many excuses why tis woiuld and could not be the case, even though siimple logic disagrees. > > > > After a couple years of being told how stupid, Liberal, communist, crazy, etc. I was, THIS little item popped up proving that I was right. > > > > [http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/blog/2010/02/20/utah-bill-criminalizes-miscarriage](http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/blog/2010/02/20/utah-bill-criminalizes-miscarriage) > > After asking for apologies and admisssions that I was right, they promptly kicked me off the board. There is danger in asking conservatives to admit that they were wrong, especially if they have the power to silence you. > > The law signed by the governor does not make miscarriage involuntary manslaughter. It criminalizes an act intentionally intended to cause a miscarriage (“intentional” was key for the governor; he vetoed a bill that would have criminalized “reckless” behavior leading to a miscarriage). > > This was in reaction to a case where a 17-year-old girl paid someone $150 to beat her to the point where she’d miscarry, after her boyfriend told her he’d leave her if she didn’t terminate the pregnancy. The judge who presided over this mess sent the attacker away, but ruled that the girl’s actions were not criminal under state law. There seems to have been no dispute over the facts–the attacker pleaded guilty, for example, and advocates for the girl’s rights argued what she really needed was counseling, not jail time. Anyway, the state rep who became aware of this decided to close up this gap (as he perceived it) in the law, so that acts that were intentionally designed to cause a miscarriage would be criminalized, including for the mother. How likely this is to come up (where the mother is a conspirator in the crime) in a state where abortion is legal is anyone’s guess–mine would be, “not too often,” perhaps never again. But who knows. > > The point being, however wise this law is, I do not believe it supports the notion that it was intended to create the need to investigate every miscarriage, nor do I believe the citizens of Utah would stand for such a practice, nor do I think it supports the extreme position you seemed to have argued on the other board. Extreme position? Hmmm… How is it extreme? Like the other board you have disregarded the logic and just assume that they are not the same. So how do we KNOW a misscarriage is just that UNLESS we investigate? This girl was not very good at making it look like an “accident”. Push people far enough, as they do in Utah and you’ll see people “get away” with what she attempted. In fact, I’m certain others have already. I know someone personally. Do you have any idea the depth of harrassment women suffer in Utah when it’s discovered they are even THINKING about an abortion? Do you know what the “moral” people of that state have stooped to AFTER the abortion has taken place? I do. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2010, 9:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/57 "2010-09-19T09:22:28Z")
> [@Mozart1220](#): > > Extreme position? Hmmm… How is it extreme? Like the other board you have disregarded the logic and just assume that they are not the same. Miscarriages have not become “involuntary manslaughter,” which is what you asserted. Your cite does not support that assertion, so I’m not surprised you didn’t receive a lot of apologies. > [@](#): > > So how do we KNOW a misscarriage is just that UNLESS we investigate? This girl was not very good at making it look like an “accident”. Push people far enough, as they do in Utah and you’ll see people “get away” with what she attempted. In fact, I’m certain others have already. I know someone personally. Nonetheless, I’ll bet you a cup of coffee that it will NOT be the standard practice in Utah to investigate every miscarriage, just as I assume it is not to investigate the death of every 80-year old. The citizens will not stand for it, and it ain’t gonna happen. It’s a pro-choice bogeyman. An extreme position, one might describe it. ---
**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:** [September 19, 2010, 10:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/58 "2010-09-19T10:25:48Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > > [@Shaw's Caesar and Cleopatra](#): > > > > Pardon him. Theodotus: he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature. > > **Whack-a-Mole** would no doubt have been just as outraged about Ptolemy and Cleopatra’s marriage as Britannus was. I fail to see even a remote similarity. In one case we have two people doing something they apparently had no problem with; in another case we have a movement to force other people to follow their standards. You are in fact inverting who has the intolerance problem. > [@John\_Mace](#): > > > [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > > > No, they are not similar. Important sure. Similar no. > > > > In SSM the state is preventing marriage but you can still live with the person which while not ideal is not wholly stomping on them either. > > > > In this abortion issue you are forcing someone to do something (bear the rapist’s baby) against their will. > > > > You see no distinction there? Really? > > There are no two issues that don’t have some “distinction”. But they are similar because they force religious beliefs on others, denying them a key choice to make their lives happier. Marriage and childbirth are very similar issues, often closely linked together. You can hand wave away the desire of gays to not be treated in a “separate but equal” way, but I can just as easily say that the pregnant woman’s ordeal need not last longer than 9 months, while the gay couple’s ordeal lasts a lifetime. No, they are not even close in severity. A much closer in degree example of the persecution of homosexuals would be the practice of raping lesbians in the attempt to convert them to heterosexuality, or the forced hormone therapy of gay men. As disgusting as forbidding same sex couples to marry is, it isn’t in the same class as a violation of the body, which forcing a woman to bear a child is. Forbidding women abortion is the moral equivalent of a war crime; no different than gang raping the women of a conquered city to get them pregnant. And pregnancy has lifelong effects, and can be seriously injurious or fatal. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2010, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/59 "2010-09-19T15:50:15Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > > [@Bricker](#): > > > > **Whack-a-Mole** would no doubt have been just as outraged about Ptolemy and Cleopatra’s marriage as Britannus was. > > I fail to see even a remote similarity. In one case we have two people doing something they apparently had no problem with; in another case we have a movement to force other people to follow their standards. You are in fact inverting who has the intolerance problem. Am I? I don’t think you remember your classics. Aren’t all liberals supposed to have a liberal arts education, or something? In Shaw’s play, Ptolemy, the firstborn son of Auletes the Flute Blower, is ten years old. Cleopatra is older, but still “a child, whipped by her nurse.” Brittannus’ objection is that two young children are considered marriageable and married – and, indeed, this is not something “they have no problem with.” Cleopatra unceremoniously upends her younger brother so she may sit on the throne; he chokes back tears at how she refuses to treat him like a king. When Brittanus is rebuked, he insists that they, not he, are the scandal. It is, in other words, precisely what’s in play here: Brittanus’ view is that the Egyptian scheme is wrong, no matter what the Egyptians say. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2010, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109/60 "2010-09-19T17:42:02Z")
> [@Stratocaster](#): > > That _is_ an objective fact. It is a belief. One held so fervently by many that they are no longer aware that it is not an objective fact, though, and that makes it impossible for them to accept that anyone who does not share that belief can be rational or moral or even sincere about it. That is why abortion is such a matter of contention. **John** ’s point that a fertilized egg has “life” is correct but does not get to the point. The egg and sperm individually have just as much “life”, and just as much potential to become human, before they join as after. He’s right, though, to point out that it is a matter of social convention and/or religious doctrine as to where personhood commences. It is hardly an objective fact, testable and falsifiable, that it not only begins but becomes complete at the point of cell wall penetration. To insist that only that view is consistent with any code of morality is commonplace but mistaken. **Bricker** s refusal/inability to see that makes it pointless to proceed as if he did. It does account for his insistence that we all follow the Vatican’s preaching on the point, and for his belief that he can find the right Gotcha if he can only find the right strawman to present it with. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-amend-the-constitution-to-ban-abortion-opponents/554109.md?page=4)