Let’s say you have a couple who are in a committed relationship (either living together or married) and the woman gets pregnant. She decides she doesn’t want the baby, but the man does.
Does/should the man have any say in the matter?
Whenever I’ve heard abortion being discussed, I don’t recall hearing this subject come up.
I’ve seen it come up plenty. The obvious answer is that, since abortion rights are predicated on the idea that a woman has a right to control of her own body, then her husband/boyfriend/whatever has no say in the matter. As far as I understand the legal side of things, that’s what the law says, too.
I’d say if they haven’t worked things like that out beforehand their “committed relationship” status is suspect.
Be that as it may, legally, the situation is: You get a woman knocked up, and she wants to keep it, you’re responsible for that child’s welfare. If she doesn’t want to keep it, you have no say in the matter.
It’s every man’s responsibility to get those conditions through his thick skull before he gets a woman knocked up, because that’s the way it is. Don’t like it? Don’t fuck. Simple as that. I have little sympathy for men who somehow find themselves in a reproductive predicament not to their liking and feel the need to protest. Be a man and accept the fact that the woman is in charge of her body, and YOU are responsible for your offspring once that person has left her body. Disagree? Tough.
I believe the man SHOULD have a say in the matter…but I understand why he doesn’t.
As a slight hijack, when medical technology advances to the point when an embryo/fetus can be developed outside the mother’s womb, we’re going to see some major changes of the rights of a male and responsibilities of a female. Imagine a situation where the female wishes to end the pregnancy and does so, but the male wishes to keep the child and also does so! The issue of child support would completely shift sides as well.
It’s interesting to contemplate.
That’s a pretty stupid comment, considering that even if the man thinks they have that issue worked out, the woman can still do what she wants and change her mind.
Unfortunately, that is the current legal situation.
Funny, that is pretty much the argument the pro-lifers have. If you have the chutzpa to say that it’s not too much of a burden on a man to control his sexual desires then by any stretch of the imagination you can legally put that burden on a woman. So the only undo burden would be in cases of rape.
Actually, the law can be changed. There is already a pretty big movement to do just that. Or better yet, 5 people can very easily decide to put that burden on both parents.
If you’re fucking a woman who would do that to you, then you’re the stupid one.
A debatable value judgement.
Chutzpah has nothing to do with it. Woman’s body, woman’s decision. Period. Don’t like it, don’t fuck.
It’s none of those 5 persons’ business, nor should it be their right to impose their Neanderthal morals on a woman’s reproductive and sexual autonomy.
So much for “equal” rights.
Reproductive and sexual autonomy = “I get to have a baby and make someone else pay for it.”
And it is those 5 (actually 9) persons’ business to find the best way to protect everybody’s rights, not just half of everybody. Oh yeah, men don’t have rights. Because you say so.
That’s idiotic. A man has a right to be in a consensual sexual relationship. He also has explicit responsibilities and potential liabilities that come with that right. If he isn’t ready to bear the burden that comes with the right, then he should keep his dick in his pants. Why anyone else should be involved in the consequences of the decisions of two adults in a consensual relationship is not at all clear. No one’s rights are being violated if other people butt the fuck out. Quite the contrary, in fact. You sound like one of those conservatives who bitches about big govt. impinging on your own freedoms, yet wants to play Big Brother when it comes to what other people do with their own genitals.
I agree entirely. Men are getting the short end of the stick as it works, but its a situation where someone is going to get the short end no matter what, and this does the least harm than any other solution. The only way to make it all fair relies on technology that just doesn’t exsist, yet. As soon as someone find a way to make an artificial womb and a reliable way to transplant a fetus, the political landscape of this country is going to change overnight.
Nothing idiotic about it. You want sexual and reproductive autonomy, but only for one of the people involved. You state that it’s the man’s right to “keep his dick in his pants”. It generaly takes two people to make a baby, but it falls upon the man to excercise restraint? You’re inner sexist is shining through.
And when did you want the Supreme Court to butt the fuck out? Prior to Roe v Wade, or only after? Would you want people to butt the fuck out if men were forcing women to have abortions, or not have them? That’s the way it used to be.
So after 3 sentences you can already tell all about my politics. I’m embarrassed to say that you and I probably agree on more than we disagree on, especially regarding abortion. But I do not, and will never, agree that the last time a man should have rights regarding the birth or abortion of his child is when he pulls his pants back on.
That’s naive. Surely you can’t be more than 25 with such an ignorant remark.
And why should a man have to control his desires when a woman doesn’t have such a burden? You do realize that absent rape a woman has decided “to fuck” in order to get pregnant. Thy both made equal “value judgments” yet the man is more responsible and at the mercy of the females decision. That, son, is crap. Fine, it’s her body. He can’t make her have an abortion, and he can’t make her carry to term. But he should not be more responsible for her decision. If she wants the baby, then she can take care of it. If she didn’t want the baby, then in your little world, she should not have spread her legs. Since her conscious decision to bring the child in this world then she is responsible.
Yet again more ignorance. They have imposed their morals on her body. There are limits when a woman can have an abortion. And if you do not think a justice has a right to interpret the Constitution when something like “right to criminalize abortion” is not in there anywhere, then you should be demanding Roe be overturned too.
And you should check that haughty 'tude you got there. Anyone who has an inkling of what is going on in this country WRT abortion rights knows that that right is very tenuous. 5 people made it so. And they did it with very specious arguments with very little merit when it comes to Constitutional Law. And your imaginary reproductive and sexual autonomy right is baseless but for that one decision those 5 people made. A woman has no more rights than a man when it comes to reproductive and sexual autonomy accepting for abortion, period.
Wait a minute, when were we forcing women to have abortions in this country?
That’s not an abortion argument, that’s a custody argument. And the reasoning is that, if we let the man shirk all responsibility for a pregnancy, it will eventually harm a child. Women get to shirk responsibility for a pregnancy by only hurting a fetus. It’s an unfair solution, but it’s also the most fair we can get at this point.
“We” didn’t force anybody to do anything.
My point is that it was not always the woman’s choice. Due to economic, religious, or social pressure, 60, 80, 100 years ago she pretty much had to do as whe was told. Loopydude wants people to butt out of peoples relationships, it is my contention that women are much better off for people having butt in.
The two are not mutually exclusive. Especially when Loopydude insists that custody for a man begins when he decides to have sex, and for a woman when she decides not to abort. And insists that is the right thing to do. The woman’s unequal right is there only because of the abortion argument.
Loopydude cannot say that it’s ok to burden the man not to have sex, but no one has a right to burden a woman with the exact same. That’s sexist crap.
I do agree that the child’s safety trumps the rights of the parents to shirk responsibility. That is why I am against abortion in most cases. I wad responding more to his snide comments than the OP necessarily.
If you’re male and don’t want a baby, and you have reason to believe the woman you are sleeping with is not on birth control, or is lying to you about being on birth control, wear a condom.
I have always disliked women who get pregnant (married or not) without the knowledge/consent of the male partner. I think it is dishonest, but unfortunately there are women who do just that.
“Has” = nope.
“Should have” = he should be able to specify that the embryo is to be removed from her body without killing it, if he so chooses, assuming the existence of the medical technology necessary to do that without increasing risk to her. Then he can have it implanted in his own abdominal cavity, to feast off his blood supply, until the time comes for his Caesarian.
Seriously, her right is the right to not be pregnant. It’s not the right to kill the embryo. It’s an important distinction. The man’s involvement and interests with regards to the fate of the latter, which is what you’re bringing up, have no meaningful bearing on the former, only on the latter.
You’re full of it. It’s not sexist crap. Women and men have different roles in the reproductive process. Maybe it’s not “fair” but life never was. Women carry the child. Her body, her say in the matter. When it comes to the woman’s body, the man has no ultimate authority. When the child is born, he has equal responsibility. If he doesn’t like those conditions, he should stay away from female bodies. Period. Get over it. You want more prerogative, get reborn as a woman.
Given your contemptible position, the day you start speaking for the Supreme Court is the only day I ought to have the slightest concern about your oppinions regarding human reproduction and sexual politics. People like you don’t want to take proper responsibility, and spout off about the Supreme Court like a moral individual ought to give a fuck. That only 5/9 of the Supremes aren’t slaves to religious depravity is bad enough without the nation crawling with the disease.
We’ve had this debate before. Quite obviously it’s not the man’s body and that’s the end of it. If a kid is born, he’s responsible for it. If not, not. That’s the way it goes. He relinquishes all say in the matter as soon as he ejaculates in the woman’s body. If he doesn’t want her to exercise her right to terminate any ensuing pregnancy then he needs to wear a condom or keep it in his pants.
There are greater problems with this as well if you’re talking about legal rights. For one thing, you’re talking about giving one person the absolutely say over another person’s body. A woman who decides to abort is not affecting the sperm source’s body. If you say she can’t abot without the sperm source’s permission, then you’re saying the sperm source has 100% of the say. This is vile in itself, but even more so when you think about the potential for abusive or controlling men using this as a means to hurt women.
The biggest problem, though, is when it comes to establishing paternity. What if she says he’s not the father? What then? How do you prove anything? What’s to stop any guy off the street from claiming to be the father? What’s to stop a woman from lying and getting some other dude to say he’s the father just so she can get the abortion? Until you have a way to actually prove who the sperm came from, any talk of legal rights for that person is moot.
That’s the way it goes, at present. And that is what the law currently says. I doubt it will change. But it sure does eliminate any options for the man. A woman can terminate her pregnancy for any reason. Want to pursue a career? No problem. Not quite ready for a baby? No problem. Want to travel the world? No problem But the man is a bystander to this process. His life is out out of his control. Not ready for a baby? Tough shit. Want to travel? Tough shit. If there were a way, early in the pregnancy, for the man to “opt out”, I wouldn’t have a problem with it. The woman still has the option to choose, but she now must choose based on the fact that she will be raising the baby alone. After all, abortion is still safe, and legal.
Does this make the biological father that "opts out"a selfish loser? Yep. Will more babies be raised by single moms? Maybe.
I don’t think, and would hope, that nobody is advocating a man have any legal authority over whether a woman has an abortion or not.
From an analytical perspective, the man has only one point on the spectrum at which he chooses whether or not to have a child, while the woman has two points. Both the man and the woman choose whether or not to risk pregnancy before having sex. If either one decides that the risk of pregnancy is unacceptable, then no sex, so no pregnancy. On the other hand, if a man chooses to have sex anyway, and a woman gets pregnant, that ends his ability to force a decision (he still can influence the decision, obviously, and it’s naive to think otherwise). The woman has one more chance to decide whether to carry the pregnancy.
So it seems that the debate is over whether it is equitable that a woman has one more decision point than a man when it comes to pregnancy. Abortion has been a reasonable option for a woman in the US for only a short period of time (twenty, thirty years), but during that time, both society and the law have determined that the decision to abort must remain the woman’s. The man can attempt to influence the decision through persuasion or other legal means, but ultimately the decision remains the woman. This is fair, says the law and society, because any other alternative is to support a form of slavery: the woman’s body is enslaved for the length of the pregnancy. (This, I think, is why a number of people in this thread have posited that when technology reaches the point that the woman no longer needs to be enslaved, a man can choose to carry his child to term even if a woman decides against it. It doesn’t answer the question on the other side, of course.)
Because that option, forced enslavement, is untenable for most people, we are left with the somewhat inequitable situation that a man must make his decision about whether to father a child before a woman makes hers. Ultimately, of course, it is as much the man’s decision as it is the woman’s, unless someone forced him to have sex. Mr. Rio, the reason that society doesn’t permit a man to “opt out” after he fathers a child is that it is in both the child’s and society’s best interest for the man to support his child. If he “opts out” it puts the burden of his decision on society.