I’m still trying to picture the whole Pat Robertson - head - exploding thing.
I certainly agree with the “not cause any unnecessary suffering” thing in general, but I’m throroughly unconvinced that I’d be causing any embryonic “suffering” by having a few drinks.
To be fair, DianaG, I don’t even kill bugs because of my policy on not inflicting harm on any living organism. I don’t care if it actually suffered or not. I don’t know what it’s like to be a bug or for that matter, a fetus. I’m not taking any chances.
ETA: I’m pro-choice. I’m talking about my own individual standard, not anything I expect anyone else to follow.
I’m not sure either, but I’m not willing to take the chance*. I won’t even fish with live bait, because I’m not sure the little bait fish isn’t capable of suffering from having a hook in him, even though people say their little brains aren’t capable of being aware of pain and suffering. 
*not that I ever have been or will be pregnant
Gee, thank you so much for this enlightening piece of information!! :rolleyes:
Well, whether a 6-week fetus is a “living organism” is a matter one’s opinion. In my case, I do not think there was a living organism inside of me. I’m like you - I don’t kill bugs either. But this was completely different. To me, it’s like having a cyst or tumor removed.
Now, it would be a whole different story for me if it were a 12-week or 20-week fetus. I think women who plan to have an abortion need to pay close attention to their bodies so that they know their pregnant early and and get it terminated as early as possible. I knew early and took action quickly.
Now picturing a chick on a bar stool somewhere: towering, shellacked coiffure, lids caked with glittering blue eyeshadow, Kool filter dangling from her rouged lip, an ash-streaked bare paunch swelling out from beneath the band of her tube top—approached by a concerned bystander who’s dismayed after watching her down several consecutive shots of Cuervo…
“Naw, it’s awright… I’m gittin’ an abortion tomorrow!”
This is IMHO-Keep it civil, or take it elsewhere.
It’s like you’ve been on my Facebook!
Ok, but does JThunder get reprimanded for bringing the pro-life debate in here?
I consider that mass of cells that is a fetus to be an organism. It is a structure of specialized cells, in the very least… and cells are alive. Tumors are made up of living organisms too. Right? We’re surrounded by life. (Yep, I’d kill a tumor. Ultimately I’m just as survival-oriented as the next organism. I’m aware that my moral code is self-constructed anyhow, so whatever. Ranked just above my ‘‘never kill’’ rule of morality is that there should be no moral imperatives besides love, and even that is strongly open to interpretation.)
I view tumors, and bugs, and my cat, and Serial Killer X, and me, as all pieces of one unified, interdependent mass of being, so regard for any of the others is basically regard for myself.
But back to pragmatics:
Obviously the issue of whether or not a fetus is a ‘‘living organism’’ is a huge question in the whole abortion debate. The answer you will get to the OP is going to depend upon how a person would personally address that point. I personally think that a fetus is life, but that abortion is the lesser of evils in some cases. When these types of decisions need to be made, I consider the capacity of each option to cause suffering. Sometimes abortion results in the least amount of suffering. So I’m going to answer, ‘‘Yes, I think it is wrong.’’ I think abortion in the first place is a kind of wrong, which is not the same as saying I think it should be banned or have anything against people who end up making that choice. I think doing something to poison the fetus before it is aborted only compounds the wrong already taking place.
Actually, another wrong part of this OP is the question of when it’s okay to abuse your body. Under what circumstances is it okay to abuse yourself? That strikes me as an odd question.
As an aside, I find it interesting that I’ve become engaged in this conversation because abortion is typically the issue that I could give a shit less about. So I hope you don’t think I’m trying to be judgmental, just stating my half-assed opinion based on my whole hour of ever thinking seriously about it.
On preview: nyctea, how could anyone post something like the OP without thinking it would start this debate? Unless she’d said, ‘‘I only want answers from people who also regard fetuses as the moral equivalent of a tumor or cyst.’’ In which case, you’d probably all agree with one another, but who knows?
Sorry for the DP – board timed out.
I was thinking nyctea had started the thread. At this point it’s not clear how the OP regards fetuses in general.
No. He, quite rightly and quite civilly, pointed out what other opinions might be based on.
It really surprises me to see that someone these days even thinks this, let alone is brave enough to admit it on a public message board. It also surprises me that I’m the first person who thought it was worth saying something about.
Do you really mean this? I was under the impression that nobody knows for sure whether or not having three glasses of wine over the course of an entire pregnancy puts the fetus at any lower a risk for FAS than drinking heavily three times a week does. Even if we did know this for sure, that three glasses of wine is still a risk, no matter how small. Personally, it strikes me as way too big of a risk to take for a stupid glass of wine.
To each their own, I guess.
It really surprises me that anyone feels that admitting to having a glass of wine while pregnant requires “bravery”. Although I suppose it shouldn’t given the number of people who feel that a pregnant woman is a public entity, who forfeits any right to accommodate her own desires, or to any sort of privacy, in that anyone and everyone should feel free to constantly remind her that she’s failing in her primary purpose as sacred vessel. :rolleyes:
Word.
Goddess only knows how most of Europe developed, whatwith all the wine and beer those women were drinking. Obviously, it’s places like North America, where alcohol was vanishingly rare before Colonial contact, that evolved the strongest stock of people that took over the world with their advanced industrial techniques. Oh, wait…
What she said.
The simple act of getting pregnant brings the risk of having a baby with some sort of physical or mental defect. You can’t, and I think shouldn’t have to, wrap yourself in cotton wool in a completely sterile environment for the entire 9 months of a pregnancy. A friend of mine who loves wine has been told by her doctor that she can have one glass of wine a week. If her doctor says it’s okay, who are we to second guess?
More than that and I might worry about suffering for the baby (as I said in my prior post, assuming the OP meant more than just a drink or two), but not one glass once in a while.
eta You know, a LOT of women probably have a few drinks or even get good and stinking drunk before they even know they’re pregnant. Not every pregnancy is planned, obviously. And I don’t hear about your normal healthy occasional drinkers having babies with FAS very often…or even ever in anyone of my acquaintance. For that matter, I’ve never know anyone who smoked while pregnant to have babies with problems, either, not that I advocate that.
How in the hell did you get any of that out of my post?
I in no way even implied any of that. Really now. I said I was surprised and expressed what I clearly stated to be my personal opinion on the matter. I didn’t at all tell her that any decision she decided to make was wrong. I didn’t suggest in ANY way that she wasn’t free to do as she pleased. I certainly didn’t attack her in any way. All in all, I think I was extremely mild.
Hell, I even threw in a “to each their own” which, to me at least, obviously means “I don’t agree with you, but you’re your own person and I’m not gonna tell you you’re wrong.” I added that line specifically because I DIDN’T want her to get the impression that I was trying to be self righteous or terribly judgemental. I added that line just to make it clear I think she’s free to do whatever the hell she wants and it’s nobody’s business.
So tell me, because I’m honestly dumbfounded here. What was it that I said that suggested I thought ANY of those things you listed?
Christ almighty.
Pretty much your entire post.