Nonsense. What, do you think they should travel back in time and tell Mom to get an abortion ? They had no choice in the matter of being born.
I completely destroyed your bogus point about chickens/people, and this is your rejoinder? “I give a shit”? Deep, diogenes, deep.
Especially as it seems that pro-life struggle in itself has done very very little to bring about a change either in national opinion, or practical results. If there is a scale of being pro-life, I am well on the pro-life side, but as a pragmatist, I look at prominent pro-life politicians and say, you are doing zero about this problem. You’re preserving it as an ideological blunt instrument. This shows less respect for life than any good-faith attempt to reduce the necessity for abortion.
I think there is a closeted fear on the part of strategists on the right that if we reduce the number of and necessity for abortions, it will become less resonant as a vote-getter. This is precisely why it makes sense for them to oppose abortion and at the same time oppose birth control and sex education- it keeps the incidence of abortion high so that the wind will fill their sails come election time.
Of course, you can say the same for Obama’s desire to reduce abortions- to take away a club of the right- and you know what it certainly would not surprise me if it were, the man is a consummate politican. The difference is, I think that reducing unplanned pregnancies and encouraging mothers to carry children to term if they can is an objectively good result, regardless of the political calculation behind it.
I didn’t say EVERY pregnancy should be aborted. I’m saying there are a lot that should be that aren’t. My criteria is also not arbitrary. I’ve said, for instance, that I wish that crack addicted women would terminate. That means there is no hypocrisy in me being born to a non-crackhead (or having three children of my own) – not that simply being born can ever be a hypocritical act anyway.
How the fuck do you think you did that? Do you think you proved that chicken are people? What exactly do you think you proved?
Uh huh. Well, that chart you linked to is alreasy out of date - recent news reports now place the date for reserve depletion as 2037 - four years earlier than previously expected.
Considering that I’ll be of roughly retirement age then, I do regard this as worrisome.
Don’t worry, we’ll get around to imposing a means test eventually.
Hell exists only if God is a monster. In which case it would be sin to worship him.
Tolerance. Fail.
Ah, the tolerance of intolerance argument. How clever.
Oh, I think it’s been demonstrated that your views are abhorrent. Unless you don’t really believe what you post…
No.
An anesthetized person cannot suffer. Neither can someone who was medically induced to temporarily flat-line their brain activity. They’re still human beings. As is a fetus. And, Dio, how about a late-term fetus, one who can feel pain. Do you restrict abortions in those instances? Or does capacity to suffer only matter for some?
Sure they can. They can also be sentient.
I don’t get your point with this one. A dead human being is no longer a person.
3rd trimester abortions are already illegal, except in extemely extingent circumstances (usually the fetus is already dead), and comprise something like 1/16 of 1% of all abortions. Completely elective abortion of healthy fetuses by healthy women does not occur in the US, so it’s irrelevant to the discussion, but I have said several times in the past on this board that while (I still think the woman has the right to have the fetus removed from her body, I have no objection to removing it intact and alive if possible. If the government wants to induce some kind of live birth and remove the fetus to an incubator or something, and become that fetus’s guardian at taxpayer expense, that’s fine with me. I think it would virtually never happen, though.
Obviously, it needs to be acknowledged by both sides that a fetus is not exactly the same at every stage of development. An baby is clearly a baby an hour before birth, but clearly is NOT a baby an hour after conception. There is no bright line of development for when it becomes a person, but clearly there is a time when it isn’t and a time when it is (barring religious beliefs which carry no legal weight). 90% of all abortions are performed in the 1st trimester, virtually all the rest in the 2nd. Can a fetus suffer in the 3rd trimester? I don’t know, probably in the very late stages, but they aren’t aborted anyway. I do know that crack babies suffer tremendously after they’re born, and get sent home to hideous households, and I’d just as soon prevent those pregnancies before the end product can suffer.
Do you think that a fertilized egg is exactly the same as a living baby? Because while a claim that a 9 month fetus isn’t a baby is tough to really sell, the claim that a zygote or a week old embryo is a baby is pretty ridiculous too. There has to be a compromise between those two extreme positions.
Congrats. This is total crap.Do you ever listen to somebody besides Rush? SS is in good zzshape for 26 more years. But minor fixes can keep it solvent for generations. It is a very well run program. Try again when you have a clue.
I rather doubt that listens to anyone by Limbaugh and the rest of the right wing echo chamber; he had the dittohead feel of someone used to tossing out insults and lies exclusively to people who nod their heads and agree. And he won’t try again due to being banned.
I just quoted the above so you would know I asking you the question because you seem to be the most knowledgeable. I don’t have strong feelings on abortion so I’m not trying to debate anything; I don’t even know if I’m pro-choice or pro-life.
The time I have pondered it though, I never took abortion as causing any suffering or anything. I always just thought of it as ending a high chance of birth. What are the odds that a just fertilized egg will come to full term? (not rhetorical, I’m asking). I assume high, but don’t know why I think that.
So, it’s like you take the egg from the chicken and go eat it. fine, I don’t think you killed anyone or hurt anything, but you did stop any chance that egg had from being born.
Am I pro-life or pro-choice?
Carol Stream, it is prohibited to call other posters trolls outside the BBQ Pit. (And while the word “troll” is explicitly named, all name-calling in Great Debates is forbidden.)
Thing Fish, direct insults to other posters even when a “name calling” formula is not employed, is also forbidden.
Knock it off, both of you.
[ /Moderating ]
Just a question, Carol. Suppose you were raped and impregnated. Abortion, yes or no?I’m assuming you will raise the baby.
I’ll rephrase it to “grant absolution” ( desperation?)
Is there an official church position on Obama? On Obama’s visit?
You continue this “spokesperson” thing and are wrong. The Pope is the head of the church on Earth not a spokesman (By the way, do you always go for the if-the-spokesman-says-it-is-right thing? ).
The Pope speaking as the top guy in the church expressed his (extremely important and non-trivial) opinion but didn’t issue a rule, get the difference? If he had THEN I would accept it. Of course the Pope can be wrong, not even Pope himslef or the most ultra-mega-traditionalist-conservsative catholic believes otherwise.
If Obama, for example, says he doesn’t like something it doesn’t have a legal effect. When he signs it into law NOW we have to pay attention.
Well, something like 20-30% of all pregnancies end in miscarriages. The number is hard to measure because many women miscarry without ever knowing they were pregnant (in the very early stages it can just look like a heavy period).
“Pro-choice” describes a legal position, not a philosophical one, so if you think it should be legal, you’re pro-choice, even if you personally think it’s unethical.