# Most pro-choicers have it all wrong. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 19, 2006, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118 "2006-07-19T02:50:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 21
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2006, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/401 "2006-07-25T18:29:22Z")
> [@catsix](#): > > What about a woman who has decided that zero children is enough and she does not want to have any more, ever? Personal desires are not the same as fundamental rights. I no longer want to pay taxes to the US government, but my desire is not the same as an inviolate human right. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2006, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/402 "2006-07-25T18:38:01Z")
> [@Malacandra](#): > > No, but on the whole I don’t believe the argument is founded on the desperation for babies but on the desperation not to deprive the defenceless foetus of its right to life. There’s a slight false dilemma going on there too - presupposing that misery _will_ result as a result of abortions being denied. There are other alternatives. A woman who wants an abortion would be denied what she wants, and instead be forced to remain pregnant and have a baby. I’m pretty sure this would make\*\* her \*\*miserable. So I believe misery \ ***will** \*result, yeah, but I don’t agree it’s a false dilemma. **Sarahfeena** , just to answer your question - I see that e.g. a tumour and a foetus are not the same, but don’t see what difference that makes. ---
**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:** [July 25, 2006, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/403 "2006-07-25T19:11:28Z")
If I may, I’d like offer up an illustration: A man gets on a scale and registers 180 pounds. A shipment of books is later put on the scale and registers 180 pounds. A huge bag of oranges is put on the scale and registers 180 pounds. An anvil is put on the scale and registers 180 pounds. Beyond the fact that all weigh 180 pounds, these objects have nothing in common. Four patients walk into a hospital. One has a fetus inside her (i.e. she’s pregnant). Another has a bullet inside her. A third has a diseased tooth inside him. The fourth has a tumor inside him. Beyond that fact that all of these are inside the bodies of people who don’t want them there, these four objects have nothing in common. This may be a little too obvious and elementary for this board, but I’m hoping to forestall further arguments along the lines of “you believe a tumor is the same as a baby?” ---
**Author:** ![Blanche](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a183cd/32.png) [@Blanche](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blanche)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2006, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/404 "2006-07-25T20:08:56Z")
> [@catsix](#): > > What about a woman who has decided that zero children is enough and she does not want to have any more, ever? > > To me it doesn’t matter whether you call it fetus, baby, embryo, Xenu, whatever. The point of the abortion is not killing the fetus, it’s to remove it from the uterus. I support the right of anyone to have a fetus removed from her uterus at any time she chooses, whether or not the death of the fetus is a side-effect. In early term abortions, this side-effect always exists. In later term, I suppose she could have it removed by caesarian if she so chose and that would also provide the desired result - to no longer be pregnant. I agree with what you’re saying and that example is not a position I hold or agree with, I was simply giving an example of a very conservative abortion stance that I would still consider Pro-Choice. ---
**Author:** ![Sarahfeena](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sarahfeena/32/519_2.png) [@Sarahfeena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sarahfeena)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2006, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/405 "2006-07-25T20:12:56Z")
> [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > If I may, I’d like offer up an illustration: > > A man gets on a scale and registers 180 pounds. A shipment of books is later put on the scale and registers 180 pounds. A huge bag of oranges is put on the scale and registers 180 pounds. An anvil is put on the scale and registers 180 pounds. Beyond the fact that all weigh 180 pounds, these objects have nothing in common. > > Four patients walk into a hospital. One has a fetus inside her (i.e. she’s pregnant). Another has a bullet inside her. A third has a diseased tooth inside him. The fourth has a tumor inside him. Beyond that fact that all of these are inside the bodies of people who don’t want them there, these four objects have nothing in common. > > This may be a little too obvious and elementary for this board, but I’m hoping to forestall further arguments along the lines of “you believe a tumor is the same as a baby?” I really didn’t need this “obvious and elementary” example. I only needed you to say what **MrDibble** said. Maybe you should have tried that before wasting your time typing up your rather insulting analogy. :rolleyes: My question was rather straightforward, and I am capable of understanding a straightforward answer. ---
**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:** [July 25, 2006, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/406 "2006-07-25T21:20:23Z")
> [@Sarahfeena](#): > > I really didn’t need this “obvious and elementary” example. I only needed you to say what **MrDibble** said. Maybe you should have tried that before wasting your time typing up your rather insulting analogy. :rolleyes: How is it insulting? If anything, it’s a succinct and clear response to this earlier question of yours: > [@](#): > > When pro-choicers compare an embryo to a sperm or an egg cell, or when they compare it to a tumor that is growing where it isn’t supposed to (Bryan Ekers did this earlier in the thread)…do you really not see the difference? Or do you see the difference, but it doesn’t matter to you? My answer was just an expansion on MrDibble’s comment, and since you specifically named me as the originator of the “tumor” analogy, I figured I may as well clarify it. Pro-choicers _do_ see the difference; it’s just not a particularly important difference in this context. ---
**Author:** ![Sarahfeena](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sarahfeena/32/519_2.png) [@Sarahfeena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sarahfeena)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2006, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/407 "2006-07-25T21:50:33Z")
> [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > How is it insulting? If anything, it’s a succinct and clear response to this earlier question of yours: > My answer was just an expansion on MrDibble’s comment, and since you specifically named me as the originator of the “tumor” analogy, I figured I may as well clarify it. Pro-choicers _do_ see the difference; it’s just not a particularly important difference in this context. Succinct it was not. **MrDibble’s** answer was succinct…and this one you have given was succinct. Thank you for answering…just wanted to clarify your position. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2006, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/408 "2006-07-25T22:30:44Z")
> [@tim314](#): > > I’m pro-choice, and I partially agree with the OP here. > > **_If_ aborting a fetus is morally equivalent to killing a baby** , then you can’t justify aborting a fetus to spare a woman an unwanted pregnancy. If abortion involved actually killing a baby (i.e., not a fetus but an infant who’s already been born), then hardly anyone would say it was justified to spare a woman an unwanted pregnancy. If we accept that, then the first sentence of this paragraph is practically a tautology. > > That said, I don’t think aborting a fetus _is_ equivalent to killing a baby. But the _question_ is obviously relevant. Anyone who says that it’s just about a woman’s right to choose is _presupposing_ that abortion isn’t equivalent to baby killing. I think this is a succinct way of putting it. The real crux of the matter, in my opinion, is the ability to recognize the validity of the other side’s position with relation to their actions. I understand the position that a fetus is human, and I understand that a person with that position would never want to have an abortion, which is fine. However that side doesn’t seem to understand that some people truly do not believe that a fetus and a baby are equivalent. I’ve offered as examples that we as a culture do not react the same to a miscarriage as to a baby’s death, and we certainly don’t equate a failure to implant and a baby’s death. Many cultures have naming and adulthood ceremonies that are based on high infant death rates, so that an infant who doesn’t make it six days isn’t quite human yet. We’ve turned that around, but in a world where half the babies died at under one week you might not be so fast to paint the spare bedroom. I think pro-choice really means pro letting the most involved party make the moral choice in a situation where there are no scientifically proveable absolutes. Thus someone who believes that abortion is wrong, and would never, ever have one, is pro-choice if she accepts that other moral actors come to different conclusions. I can imagine a hypocrite who believes that abortions are okay for rich people, but should be off limits for riff-raff. That person is anti-choice even if she’s had a dozen abortions. That example is no doubt far fetched, but if you consider the moralist who rants about premarital sex while practicining it (or worse, adultery) you have a similar example. That’s why the set of people who would do everything in their power, through access to birth control and sex education, to make abortion practically disappear are still pro-choice, if anti-abortion in a very real sense. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 8:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/409 "2006-07-26T08:21:28Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > I can imagine a hypocrite who believes that abortions are okay for rich people, but should be off limits for riff-raff. That person is anti-choice even if she’s had a dozen abortions. > That example is no doubt far fetched[…] Not so far-fetched - I’ve read examples (on this board, possibly even in this thread), of women who come into abortion clinics, but don’t want to be in the same room as “those people”. And I seem to recall (can’t find where, though) an anti-abortion activist, head of an organisation, who had an abortion while still with that org. Does that ring a bell with anyone? It’s always easy to prescribe for other people, but often, we find ways to make exceptions for ourselves. I think that’s why I’m pro-choice, ultimately - I don’t presume to tell others what their moral choices should be. ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 9:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/410 "2006-07-26T09:30:16Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > A woman who wants an abortion would be denied what she wants, and instead be forced to remain pregnant and have a baby. I’m pretty sure this would make\*\* her \*\*miserable. So I believe misery \ ***will** \*result, yeah, but I don’t agree it’s a false dilemma. Oh well, if “misery” means “not getting what you want” then I agree, but on those terms I’m made miserable a good many times a week. I guess I’m also “poverty-stricken” because I can’t afford a private plane. I think it is perfectly possible to become pregnant unintentionally, to become reconciled to the fact, to give birth to the unwanted infant and either for the reconciliation to extend to caring for it, or at least to allowing someone else to care for it - which is why I don’t agree that “misery will result”. Indeed, I’ve seen someone on the Dope make an argument that basically amounted to “I want the right to abort, because otherwise, after the baby was born I might want it”. > [@MrDibble](#): > > **Sarahfeena** , just to answer your question - I see that e.g. a tumour and a foetus are not the same, but don’t see what difference that makes. How? How is it not possible to see that it makes a huge difference to how it is proper to treat it? > [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > Four patients walk into a hospital. One has a fetus inside her (i.e. she’s pregnant). Another has a bullet inside her. A third has a diseased tooth inside him. The fourth has a tumor inside him. Beyond that fact that all of these are inside the bodies of people who don’t want them there, these four objects have nothing in common. Too right they have nothing in common. The bullet is to be removed with all expedition, except in the unusual case where it is doing less harm where it is than it would do to remove it (which was why my grandad carried a piece of German lead in his ankle for sixty-seven years). The tumour is to be irradiated, zapped with drugs, or excised, as a matter of some urgency. The tooth - shouldn’t you be going to a dentist? Over here you’d either be paying someone in private practice to remove it a.s.a.p. or waiting for your turn at an NHS dentist. It’s not life-threatening and it’s certainly not causing you to bleed to death even as we argue about it. The foetus…? These four things are not identical. To get from any discussion of them to the conclusion “It being in my body against my wishes, I have the right to its removal” requires that you first establish that it has no claim on your body. Clear-cut in the case of the tumour, tooth or bullet; in the case of the foetus, the very crux of the argument, and you must not beg the question. > [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > When the U.S. (for example) has a sufficiently large social net that cycles of poverty are broken and/or a sufficiently streamlined adoption process that can absorb a million or so babies every year, then you can say alternatives exist. Currently, they don’t. A million or so a year? Somebody needs to explain this “safe, legal and rare” thing to me again. > [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > > [@Malacandra](#): > > > > You may not agree that a foetus has any rights, but you surely need not regard as demented anyone who says that it has. > > Who said I regarded anyone as “demented”? Example, please. I think the worst I’ve said is “short-sighted” (post #382) and I stand by it. Please support your claim or withdraw it. Sorry. The rhetorical “you”, not “you” personally. I did not and do not claim that you called anyone demented. > [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > Give the fetus huge rights, if you want. Give it drinking and voting rights, if that helps. I won’t argue against it. My turn to ask you for a cite that I was arguing for anything of the sort. :dubious: > [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > But no matter how many rights you give it, none of them should trump those of the mother. That is the crux of the pro-choice argument, regardless of the “alive or not, person or not, human or not” definitional sideshow suggested by the OP, which in my opinion only hurts the pro-choice cause. _None_ of them? The right of the mother to wear a flattering swimsuit on vacation should outweigh the right of the foetus to _live_? Then you have surely made up your mind as to whether the foetus is alive or not, person or not, human or not - and your refusal to consider any further discussion of the question (since it only hurts the “cause”) smacks of sophistry. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/411 "2006-07-26T11:12:41Z")
> [@](#): > > **Mr. Dibble** said: > And I seem to recall (can’t find where, though) an anti-abortion activist, head of an organisation, who had an abortion while still with that org. Does that ring a bell with anyone? You must be thinking of [_The Only Moral Abortion Is My Abortion_](http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/anti-tales.html), in which a doctor recounts that story. Second one down, from the physician in Texas. > [@](#): > > **Malacandra** said: > To get from any discussion of them to the conclusion “It being in my body against my wishes, I have the right to its removal” requires that you first establish that it has no claim on your body. No other person can force me to use any part of my body for their survival. Why should a fetus be any different? > [@](#): > > None of them? The right of the mother to wear a flattering swimsuit on vacation should outweigh the right of the foetus to live? The right of a fetus to live does not in any way entitle that fetus to be inside an unwilling host. We wouldn’t let an adult siphon off your blood to survive, whether you caused that adult to need your blood or not, so I see no reason why a fetus should be different. As I’ve already said, the death of the fetus in an abortion is, most of the time, a side-effect. In my mind, the real point of the issue is whether or not a woman has the right to decide she does not want her body used to host a fetus. Abortion is a cure for _pregnancy_, not a deliberate move to kill fetuses. The fact that abortions today cannot be performed without the fetus dying is nothing more than an irrelevant and unfortunate side-effect. ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/412 "2006-07-26T11:39:17Z")
> [@Sarahfeena](#): > > Seems that way. I’m all for personal responsibility too, but give me a break. This argument is ridiculous. Kanicbird thinks a few cells are a human being and calls it murder,there is not yet a human being, so if it is life he is talking about each ejaculation he has is a form of murder even if a child is conceived( as many human lives that were in the sperms that didn’t make it died). War (even a ‘just’ one could be called murder (even )self defense,as another human life has been ended. In biology a chicken egg is not a chicken because it is fertile,it has chicken life, a human is no different, a fertile human egg is not yet a person. Monavis ---
**Author:** ![DianaG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7ab992/32.png) [@DianaG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DianaG)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/413 "2006-07-26T11:44:30Z")
> [@Malacandra](#): > > Oh well, if “misery” means “not getting what you want” then I agree, but on those terms I’m made miserable a good many times a week. Yes, being pregnant when you don’t want to be is exactly like ordering a mocha latte, and getting a caramel. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 11:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/414 "2006-07-26T11:50:08Z")
> [@catsix](#): > > No other person can force me to use any part of my body for their survival. Why should a fetus be any different? Because your action created it? Generalisations to other human beings don’t really work to address the unique status of a foetus. It’s not a vampire. It’s not a tapeworm. It’s not a burglar. It’s your unborn offspring. > [@catsix](#): > > The right of a fetus to live does not in any way entitle that fetus to be inside an unwilling host. We wouldn’t let an adult siphon off your blood to survive, whether you caused that adult to need your blood or not, so I see no reason why a fetus should be different. That’s how foeti live. It doesn’t have an alternative. There is no other way to grant it the right to live. It’s an inescapable part of its natural life-cycle. It’s not as though the foetus costs you an enormous amount - women can go through pregnancy and be largely unaware of it until the last few weeks (there was a case in the paper only today). That’s hardly to be compared with an adult siphoning off your blood. > [@catsix](#): > > As I’ve already said, the death of the fetus in an abortion is, most of the time, a side-effect. In my mind, the real point of the issue is whether or not a woman has the right to decide she does not want her body used to host a fetus. Abortion is a cure for _pregnancy_, not a deliberate move to kill fetuses. The fact that abortions today cannot be performed without the fetus dying is nothing more than an irrelevant and unfortunate side-effect. I don’t care whether or how many times you’ve already said it, I say “Side-effect my hairy ass”. The whole point is to get rid of an annoying dependent-to-be, so let’s not kid ourselves it’s anything else. Otherwise there would be a lot less noise being made in this thread about poverty and deprivation. You know perfectly well that pregnancy is a self-correcting condition, and no doctor in the world would approve of surgery, concomitantly and inescapably fatal to a third party, in order to correct a condition that would go away of its own accord in a matter of months. So let’s kick out that canard right away. ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/415 "2006-07-26T12:16:47Z")
> [@Sarahfeena](#): > > I want to ask a question, in all honesty, I am wondering this. When pro-choicers compare an embryo to a sperm or an egg cell, or when they compare it to a tumor that is growing where it isn’t supposed to ( **Bryan Ekers** did this earlier in the thread)…do you really not see the difference? Or do you see the difference, but it doesn’t matter to you? Humans(even if we do not want to think as such are biological beings) are no different than other egg bearing species. Of course we value ourselves more because we are interested in saving the species. But the egg analogy is a fact in Biology. If for religious reasons people do not want an abortion no one is making them get one. That is the difference,to call abortion Murder is no different than saying war, and self defense, are murder. In war or self defense the already born are killed. A woman in the later trimesters are allowed to have an abortion even by the pro-birth people if it endangers her life. So they accept the choice under those circumstances. How can they determine how or why a womans decision is made. Monavis ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/416 "2006-07-26T12:17:06Z")
> [@DianaG](#): > > Yes, being pregnant when you don’t want to be is exactly like ordering a mocha latte, and getting a caramel. :rolleyes: Local charity store got a jacket for that strawman? _I’m_ not the one who was arguing for a definition of “misery” that translated as “not getting what you want”. (Mocha latte? Caramel? ::barf:: Just a _cup of coffee_, fcryinoutloud.) ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/417 "2006-07-26T12:30:28Z")
> [@JThunder](#): > > Can we at least agree that the ultrasound footage that you saw did NOT depict a mere cell? > > As far as saying that the baby was not yet formed, that’s a rather silly claim to make. [Just take a look at this.](http://www.unborn.com/window/womb3.htm) Yes, later on in a pregnancy one can detect a being that looks like a tad pole but I know that when I misscarried it looked more like a blood clot as no human form was there. It indeed wasn’t one cell but it takes time to form as a human being. Did you also notice the people killed in wars, from starvation in African countries were fully developed human beings? When the already born are taken care of then lets worry about the ones who may become a human being. Monavis ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/418 "2006-07-26T12:44:50Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > Humans(even if we do not want to think as such are biological beings) are no different than other egg bearing species. Of course we value ourselves more because we are interested in saving the species. But the egg analogy is a fact in Biology. Okay, another Biological fact: Explain the difference between what happens when an unfertilised egg enters the uterus, and what happens when a fertilised one enters. Explain what processes a foetus goes through that an unfertilised egg does not. Explain why, if you can, a foetus is nevertheless the same as an egg cell. > [@monavis](#): > > If for religious reasons people do not want an abortion no one is making them get one. Quite. And if you don’t want to beat your wife/husband/significant other, no-one is forcing you to do so. Don’t interfere with my right to beat mine. > [@monavis](#): > > That is the difference,to call abortion Murder is no different than saying war, and self defense, are murder. In war or self defense the already born are killed. A woman in the later trimesters are allowed to have an abortion even by the pro-birth people if it endangers her life. So they accept the choice under those circumstances. How can they determine how or why a womans decision is made. > > Monavis Actually there are major differences between calling abortion murder, and calling war murder, and calling self-defence murder. I encourage you to spend some time thinking why these things are not all the same. > [@monavis](#): > > How can they determine how or why a womans decision is made. Well, the how and why of an abortion done to save the woman’s life can usually be established by requiring the opinion of one or more medically-qualified personnel to verify that the woman’s life is indeed in peril. In other words, it tends to be an objective judgment backed up by observable facts. ---
**Author:** ![Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e480ec/32.png) [@Least\_Original\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Least_Original_User_Name_Ever)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/419 "2006-07-26T13:52:05Z")
This is an 8 page response to the pro choice discussion. There have been many others on these boards. So thinking, reasoned people have come up with different conclusions. The distinction that is not being addressed ,is that pro choicers are not telling reasoned anti abortionists that they should have an abortion. Only that the option exist incase difficult circumstances might warrent it. I dont know any one who sees abortion as a form of birth control . It is too traumatic and important for that. But ,the anti choicers, believe their reasoned results should become law of the land, and punishments should be meted out to those who do it anyway. Somewhere a piece of doubt should creep in. History showed us that back alley abortions will be performed. A procedure in those circumstances that used to result ,sometimes, in death, disfigurement and dangerous circumstances. is now a relatively safe one. The wealthy however, and it was well known, were able to obtain them safely. ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2006, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118/420 "2006-07-26T13:54:12Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > Yes, later on in a pregnancy one can detect a being that looks like a tad pole but I know that when I misscarried it looked more like a blood clot as no human form was there. It indeed wasn’t one cell but it takes time to form as a human being. In which case, your comment that “the cells are not human ‘beings’” is simply irrelevant. Moreover, you’re describing a _miscarriage_, not a normal pregnancy. It should come as no surprise that the miscarried unborn might not closely resemble a human infant. In addition, if the miscarriage occured very early on, the fetus might simply not have been visible yet. Making judgments on its appearance using the naked eye would be absolutely reckless–especially when it’s mixed in with the messy detritus of a miscarriage. In addition, the unborn is already visibly human [even at early stages of development](http://www.caringpregnancycenter.net/baby.html). Personally, I think that carefully take laboratory photos tell the story much better than merely looking at the aftermath of a miscarriage. Furthermore, even if we grant that the unborn does not look human at all, its mere _physical appearance_ of the unborn is a poor standard by which to deny its humanity. You mentioned tadpoles earlier. Tadpoles bear no resemblance to frogs, and yet that’s exactly what they are. They don’t look like adult frogs, but that’s simply because they’re at an earlier stage of development. By the same token, we should not expect unborn human beings to look just like adults, or even little children. They’re at an earlier stage of development, after all. And finally, even if we were to grant _every single one of your claims_, this would not justify abortion in general. Rather, it would only justify abortion in the absolute earliest stages of pregnancy–not abortion on demand. > [@](#): > > Did you also notice the people killed in wars, from starvation in African countries were fully developed human beings? When the already born are taken care of then lets worry about the ones who may become a human being. Your argument assumes that they are NOT human beings. In other words, it is circular reasoning. Moreover, your argument is tantamount to saying, “You should take care of all the wars and starving African children before you complain about the way I treat my own kids.” It’s a false dilemma, and a rather childish one at that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118.md?page=20) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-pro-choicers-have-it-all-wrong/365118.md?page=22)