I was shocked by your highly ignorant column on “when life begins”.
You have a very conservative approach, and a misogynistic one at that.
I appreciate your attempt at explaining brain waves. But what your article lacked was a woman’s right to her body, and you had an even more disturbing view on rape. Apparently, you need to take a woman’s course or ethics course.
You included research on a boy’s soul being 40 days, and a girl’s 80 days, but you failed to acknowledge how sexist that view is. Furthermore, you genderized your ‘child’ at the end as a ‘he’. True ‘he’ is one of us, but are you responsible for raising him?
A woman’s body is her own. Having to carry a child for 9 months and raising that child for as many years as one is obliged to do so is a large responsibility. Most women prefer to wait until they are able to provide for that child.
Man has been known to impregnate a woman when she is not ready - as a surprise to himself or on purpose. A woman who is raped must live with the trauma and possible severe psychological issues, would you force her to endure that child as well?
Men die in war, from disease, from cancer, from car accidents, etc. People are abused, tortured, murdered, raped, etc. People are unable to eat, get health care, forced to live in poverty, etc. Life is not perfect. Why do we hold the unborn in such high esteem when we fail to do the same for the living?
If the child was a mistake (no planning involved) it is up to the woman to decide if she wants to keep him/her. Men have used that power of impregnation over women for too long. There are far too many single mothers in poverty because of irresponsible and dead beat fathers. Too many men do not understand how much work and money it takes to raise children (the same goes for some women). A woman’s right to choose is her ticket to sexual freedom. A man’s version of when ‘life’ supposedly begins is HIS DEFINITION OF POWER OVER HER. A man does not know and will never be able to understand what having a child is like.
Silly male monkey, tricks are for kids.
Welcome to the Straight Dope. It’s customary to post a link to the column to which you’re referring, in this case When Does Human Life Begin?
Now – everybody here already agrees that a woman, being a human being, has certain rights. That has nothing to do with the question asked in the column. Or at least, you haven’t demonstrated its relevance.
Ah; do you understand that Cecil was talking about 13th century Catholic doctrine, not “research”? The fact that Catholic doctrine regarding pregnancy is sexist is pretty much a given.
Wow, have you misjudged Cecil! I suspect you had an axe to grind before you read the article, and found what you wanted to find. By the way, it is considered bad form to fling personal insults in this forum; we have a special little corner of Hell reserved for such ranting.
would you say that a woman, pregnant by rape, has the right to bear the child and then kill it in order not to bear the burden of raising raising it? If not, when does the childs’ rights trump the mothers? this is a question thoughful people who are not conservative, misogynist or religious have disagreed on.
Before it is born it needs my body to survive, after it is born it doesn’t need my body to survive. Forget the burden of raising it, I shouldn’t have to put my body through the birthing process if I don’t want to.
If I want it removed from body, that’s my right. If you don’t like that, let them take it from me and you can give it a whirl… it’s all yours.
If a man uses a woman’s reproductive organs without her permission, it’s called rape.
If a fetus does it, it’s called “pro-life.”
Nobody, including a fetus, should have the right to use another person’s body without permission.
I am not by any means “pro-life” having been the male partner in several terminations, for a variety of reasons, however equating the presence of a fetus to an invasive sexual assault is one of the dumbest things I have ever read on these boards.
Before it is viable it needs your body. It becomes viable at about 24 weeks.
With respect to the OP’s anti-male outlook, please don’t put all the anti-abortion sentiment on men. From a CBS News Poll from 2003:
Well…don’t you mean most of them prefer to wait until they marry a man who is able to provide for them?
Abortion is illegal at that point, so your point is?
This sounds more like a Great Debate than a comment. I’m just saying.
The question is not whether women have rights to their body. The question is what rights, if any, belong to the unfertilized egg and sperm, the blastocyst, the embryo, the fetus, and the newborn. Where in that chain of being do “Human Rights” get applied? Where is the line that distinguishes between getting rid of an unwanted mass of tissue and murdering a human being?
I would phrase it that the question is not the beginning of life, but the beginning of personhood.
**outlierrn ** said:
Exactly the point. Many moral dilemmas are the product of weighing the rights of one individual or group against the rights of another individual or group. Sensible people can disagree over where to draw those lines, whose rights trump whose. The issue that makes this situation more complicated is that the exact status of one of the parties is one of the issues being debated. Thus the first level of muddiness comes from whether you think one of the parties should have rights or not. (No, I don’t think sperm should have human rights. YMMV.)
One of the big problems with the Abortion Debate is that people seem to be unable to see that the issue begins first with agreeing on *that * point. If you don’t agree on where to draw the line of “person” status, then you cannot reach agreement on which party’s rights are more prime.
Fetal viability allows some leeway around that argument. If you could transplant the embryo or fetus at any stage of pregnancy to another uterus (assuming a volunteer could be found) or some medical “artificial womb”, then there would still be debate over the choice to terminate or to transfer. Do the prospective parents have the option to terminate a pregnancy, even if there is a donor womb and a fully viable transfer at, say, 12 weeks? Why or why not? Back to the original question - when is it a person.
From that same link, some 300 to 600 abortion per year in the US are performed after 26 weeks. So I’m not really sure what your point is.
My point is that in your first post, you were glossing over the distinction between birth and viability.

From that same link, some 300 to 600 abortion per year in the US are performed after 26 weeks. So I’m not really sure what your point is.
My point is that in your first post, you were glossing over the distinction between birth and viability.
That link doesn’t state why those 300-600 are done. Since it wouldn’t be legal to have them done for CHOICE reasons after that time, they may have been done for reasons relating to the mother’s health or for medical reasons for the fetus. So my point is that it’s a bit less than honest of you to throw that statistic out there as if they are abortions of choice.
I will refer you back to my first post and make you the same offer that I made outlierrn, if you don’t like it then I’d gladly have it removed from me and given to you.
It would be a mistake to think that the question I asked suggested a certain view or opinion on my part. Irishman expanded on it well.
Having said that, Sleeps with butterflies, on whose dime? Show your work

Having said that, Sleeps with butterflies, on whose dime? Show your work
Oh believe it, I’d pay for my own abortion. What you choose to do with the extracted tissue would be on you.

If a man uses a woman’s reproductive organs without her permission, it’s called rape.
If a fetus does it, it’s called “pro-life.”
Nobody, including a fetus, should have the right to use another person’s body without permission.
Hmm. Perhaps by allowing herself to become pregnant, the woman has given tacit permission to the fetus? Of course, pregnancy by rape is a different thing, but abortion as birth control is pretty stupid. My wife and I aren’t ready to have kids, but if our bc fails, well, we’re adults and can abide the consequences of our actions.
Don’t get me wrong, I am pro-choice. But, if we are going to make abortion safe, legal, and rare (as it should be), I think we need not only to have proper sex-ed and birth control, but also be able to deal with unwanted pregnancies.

You included research on a boy’s soul being 40 days, and a girl’s 80 days, but you failed to acknowledge how sexist that view is.
Call me crazy, but as a reader I felt that went without saying. Cecil certainly didn’t advocate that view.
Furthermore, you genderized your ‘child’ at the end as a ‘he’.
Blame the English language, not Cecil. We don’t have a neutral case in this language. Calling an individual child “them” is technically incorrect - granted that people care about this less and less as time goes on, so it’s evolving - and I’m sure you wouldn’t ask Cecil to deliberately make a grammatical error.
A woman who is raped must live with the trauma and possible severe psychological issues, would you force her to endure that child as well?
In context I think it’s pretty clear Cecil doesn’t think she should be forced to do anything. That’s the “so what” part, which comes up twice.
It doesn’t necessarily follow that abortion is always wrong
Why do we hold the unborn in such high esteem when we fail to do the same for the living?
That’s subject not broached in the column.
If the child was a mistake (no planning involved) it is up to the woman to decide if she wants to keep him/her.
I don’t think Cecil contradicts that view anywhere in the column.
Silly male monkey, tricks are for kids.
Thank you for introducing sexism of your own, it really aids your case.

But, if we are going to make abortion safe, legal, and rare (as it should be)…
I think using the hoped-for condition “rare” is granting the pro-life side part of the argument that they don’t deserve. A very reasonable pro-choice position is that protected personhood cannot begin before you have a functioning central nervous system which is beginning to have some self-awareness. Since most abortions are done rather early, I see no reason to want them to be rare, other than avoidance of yet another medical procedure.
**Great Dave ** said:
But, if we are going to make abortion safe, legal, and rare (as it should be), …
Why should it be rare? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not advocating everyone has to have one, or that 8 month and 3 week abortions make sense, but what is wrong with abortions at, say, 3 weeks (other than most don’t know they are pregnant then)? That goes back to the original question as rephrased, when is the beginning of personhood?