Should abortions performed in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy be a crime?

Great Debates
341

Looks like this thing has been kicked back into life again. Chances are it’ll grow exponentially before I get home to respond but I would like to address one “point” made by candida

Look, you’re not debating Jerry Falwell, or Pat Robertson, or any other religious fundamentalist. You’re debating me, beagledave, JThunder, Joel & Mtgman. Saying “most” pro-lifers have a misogynistic agenda in this thread is just as mischaracterising and disingenuopus as saying me, JThunder et al. personally have misogynistic agenda’s because you’re simply refusing to acknowledge our arguments, instead choosing to attack the positions of those whom we have not affiliated ourseoves with in the least. By substituting their positions for ours you are tacitly equating them.

Stop it.

342

Ben

I see no reason not to point out that the major dynamic lying behind the anti-choice movement consists of reactionary Christian sects with a social agenda that is about controlling women’s lives and fates.

You are taking a political position of dictating to women how we are to live our lives. You may, or may not, see it as that but effectively that is what you are doing. So, I also see no reason, whatever your personal agendas, not to treat you as complicit in the whole business, at the very least as fellow-travelers.

Given the all-or-nothing position that is taken by the anti-choice movement and its adherents, it’s hardly about acknowledging your arguments - if the constant reiteration of “this is how it will be” and “baby-killers” can be described as an argument - it’s that, no matter how often it is pointed out that the basis of your arguments is not accepted, all that happens is yet another iteration of “this is how it will be” and “baby-killers”.

343

Here’s what I think.

Any attempt at controlling who gets an abortion (assuming that it’s not flat-out criminalized for every woman, but I’ll discuss that in a minute) has the potential to be abused. Men with no relationship to the fetus will claim paternity to keep the matter tied up in the courts until it’s too late for an abortion.

Likewise, committing women who may be suicidal or mentally ill into institutions to “protect them” can lead to otherwise healthy women being declared suicidal or mentally ill to keep them from aborting. The Soviet government used this tactic with people who disagreed with the regime. Some of them spent years in psychiatric institutions, otherwise normal, healthy people who simply disagreed with the government.

And I don’t recall even sven ever saying that if she became pregnant, she would commit suicide. She has a mental illness, of which suicidal behavior is a feature. Presumably she also has other symptoms which are probably not all that pleasant to live through without medication. Do you really think imprisoning a woman both in an institution, and inside her own mind is humane to anyone? What becomes of the child born then? Is it immediately whisked away to foster care to be adopted? What of the child who shows signs of mental illness later, after adoption? Is it reasonable to expect an adoptive parent to be prepared for the possibility that his child will develop a severe mental illness? (And before anyone dismisses this as unlikely, this happened to my aunt. One of her adopted kids is now in a special boarding school for children with emotional disturbances. Some of his problems are very likely genetic and unknown before adoption.) This also assumes that this child will be adopted. I can’t imagine too many people willing to adopt a child knowing that s/he has a family history of mental illness and is likely to become mentally ill her/himself.

Finally, criminalizing abortion outright will lead to women taking matters into their own hands so to speak, and either go to countries where it’s legal (if they can afford to do so), or resort to backstreet abortionists. I’ve already talked about my great-grandmother, who died after an illegal abortion. There is also the case of Becky Bell, who also died of infection after an illegal abortion. There is a fact sheet with statistics here. Yes, I know it’s about mandatory parental reporting laws, but since these laws effectively criminalize abortion, I think they’re acceptable for the purposes of our discussion.

I think that there is some tunnel vision in this discussion. Abortion isn’t just about terminating a pregnancy. If that’s all it were about, the morality and ethics would be a lot simpler; a lot more black-and-white. But it’s not. A lot of thought goes into a decision to abort. I have to say I resent the use of the word “convenience” applied to the main reason women abort. It’s not because of “convenience”. It’s for a million other reasons, reasons which differ with each woman.

Look. I’m not sure about each of your particular lives, but I think it’s a safe bet that none of you can face an unwanted pregnancy. A woman can, and does. You’ve probably never had a girlfriend or wife who has faced an unwanted pregnancy. I have, twice. I made the decision to abort. These were not easy decisions to make. I put a lot of thought into them. I considered the fact that both men bailed because they didn’t want to take responsibility. I was young and unable to care for a child, let alone myself, and I knew that. I did consider adoption, but found the option to be unworkable for me, at least at that time.

This time around, I got very lucky. Even though Aaron wasn’t planned, I knew that Airman and I both wanted children. Between the fact that I have job skills that pay a decent wage (something I didn’t have ten years ago), and Airman is in a job with excellent pay and benefits, and the fact that I have a good support system when Airman is away, I can provide for Aaron in a way that I couldn’t before. Materially, he’s got more clothes and toys than I had when I was his age; he’s always got food in his tummy, and he’s always got diapers. Emotionally, he’s in a family that loves him and wants him and cares about him. He’s got access to medical care, outstanding day care, and, quite frankly, he’s got a future. These are things that a child could not have gotten from me ten years ago.

I don’t know if any of this makes any kind of sense to you. I’m writing this because I see a lot of tunnel vision in this thread. Abortion isn’t an act to be prevented at any cost. The need for abortion should be reduced, so women not wanting to have children should have access to reliable contraception to prevent unwanted pregnancy in the first place.

Robin

344

An allegation which, as I’m sure you realize, is a mere assertion assertion so far. That is, you have yet to substantiate that accusation. Anybody can make a claim, candida, so why don’t you provide direct evidence (NOT speculation, and NOT wild conjecture) that this is indeed their goal?
So, first you complain that the pro-life movement is rooted largely in religious organizations – an accusation which is decidedly ad hominem, as I pointed out earlier. Also, as Ben Hicks pointed out, you are NOT debating with the religous right, but with specific individuals on this forum. Hence, it does no good to rant about what the religious right does, since that is irrelevant to the objections that have been raised by indivduals on this forum.

Now your allegation is that this is part of some vast “Subjugate Women!” agenda by the religious right. Any fool can make wild accusations. Until you can substantiate that claim though with direct evidence, then I think everyone must question the process by which you arrived at that conclusion.

But for the sake of argument, let’s assume that you’re right. Let’s assume that the churches are indeed motivated by a desire to put women under their control. How does that invalidate the accuracy of the pro-life stance? Your accusation only speaks about the motives of certain elements in the pro-life movement, and does nothing to prove that their arguments are invalid.

That is one of the reasons why ad hominem argumentation is a severe fallacy. Your opponent could be the vilest, most reprehensible person on the earth, with motives most foul, but that does not automatically imply that his arguments are invalid. Attack his character if you wish, but that is a piss-poor substitute for refuting his arguments.
So, please. If you want to rant about the religious right, be my guest. We shall just casually point out that you are debating with pro-life individuals here, and NOT the religious right. Moreover, I will take pleasure in pointing out that your efforts are now focused on attacking persons and characters, instead of attempting to refute the arguments that they present.

345

Ad hominem, such as implying that women who have abortions are murderers and baby killers?

Or is that different in your mind?

You, JThunder have personally demonstrated in this thread that you lack any and all compassion for women and their lives. You care only about your own agenda of saving fetuses, regardless of the damage you have to do to them and to the women who carry them and to their families in order to achieve your goal. You’re not the only one in this thread who has demonstrated such, however I don’t recall Joel et al suggesting that someone be locked up in a mental hospital and drugged against her will despite what those drugs will do to both her and the fetus you insist must be born even if it has no eyes, no brain, and will never take a breath.

You’re the kind of person who, four years ago when I was raped, stood in front of me and called me a baby killer and a whore because I was going to one of ‘those’ clinics. People like you only added to the damage that was already done, because with all your good intentions and your self-superior attitudes, your anti-choice friends thought they knew better.

You will never comprehend the kind of suffering you want to put on someone else’s shoulders because it’s not possible for that to be put on you. Have the humility to realize that these are choices you’re not capable of making for anyone else and stay out of it. When you’re the one who’s pregnant, you’re qualified to decide. Until then, there’s no way in the world you could possibly tell me with any degree of confidence that aborting is worse than what I’d go through if I didn’t. You can’t tell any woman that, because you cannot fully comprehend what it is to be that woman.

And you must realize this is a losing battle for you. The most you could possibly gain in making abortion illegal is to push it underground. There were sympathetic OBGYNs 40 years ago. There are sympathetic OBGYNs now. There will always be sympathetic OBGYNs. You could, at the very most, turn it into an ostrich situation where you can sit there with your head buried in the sand of believing it doesn’t happen because it’s illegal while women obtain abortions anyway. It’d be easier than in the time before Roe v. Wade, considering the availability of RU-486. Like any other drug or combination of drugs, do you really think making it illegal would make it unavailable?

If you were truly interested in helping people, you’d be promoting sex education in schools, including birth control and the failure rates and risks of, getting birth control to those who need it in an affordable manner, and supporting the right of any adult to opt for surgical sterlization. Nobody here is going to tell you they like abortion, but most of us are realistic enough to know that making it illegal will only be putting a blindfold on to the real problems.

Work on making it unnecessary if you want to help.

346

Yes, it is different. Ad hominem argumentation is attacking the person in place of addressing their arguments. Abortion is the killing of innocent of human lives, and this is critical in determining whether such an act is morally justified or not.

347

That’s an interesting accusation, considering that I’ve been volunteering for women’s charities for eleven years now. This included three years of serving as board chairman for one such organization, and working for six months on an unpaid basis for another. The services we provided included counseling, food, shelter and even education.

Gee. Must have been my imagination.

Have I, at any point in this discussion, referrred to such people as “whores”? Most certainly not. I have, however, emphatically pointed out that while these women often face difficult situations, this does NOT excuse the killing of an innocent human being. Now you may think that cruel, but I do not think we should condone the shedding of innocent blood for the sake of looking “merciful.” That would ultimately be cruel to both the infant and the mother.

348

Non sequitur alert! [insert sound of head exploding]

So, let me make sure I understand what you’re saying. It’s not okay for anyone to attack you personally, but it’s okay for you to attack women personally?

Robin

349

The problem there is that it’s only your personal belief* that allows you to call it an ‘innocent human being’ or that someone is ‘killing a baby’ or ‘shedding innocent blood’.

None of those things are medical facts. They are only emotionally charged ploys to disparage any woman who doesn’t believe the same things you do.

As for your contributions to charity, they are far outweighed by the fact that you would do anything including imprison someone in a mental hospital to get what you want. That’s not compassion. That’s selfish and cruel.

350

Thunder

If I said “you are wrong because you are a woman-hating monster”, that would be ad-hominem.

However, if I say, “you are wrong, I don’t accept the basis of your argument” and “oh, by the way, you are a woman-hating monster” it wouldn’t be.

I raised the question of ‘control’ in the context of what you have been doing throughout this thread, arguing in favor of taking control over women’s bodies. Whatever your motivation, Thunder, that’s what you have been doing. I linked that to the whole question of control that is a feature of the groups that provide the main dynamic for the movement of which you are a part.

Do you deny that your position implies control over women’s bodies?

It’s not a matter of refuting your position, Thunder, I don’t accept terms in which you set up the argument in the first place - women here have said that, time after time but you never listen, you’re too busy posturing and reveling in your pomposity.

It’s the reason why abortion debates go nowhere, neither side accepts the basis of the other’s position.

351

If such a motivation could be shown then the bastard should be tossed in jail and/or fined enough money to pay for medical costs to deliver the baby and support it until it can get into the adoption system.

The process doesn’t have to be perfectly abuse-proof. Nothing ever is. What matters is we’ve taken steps to prevent or remedy the abuses. Still this sounds more like a red herring or at least hyperbole. The same few fanatics can’t claim paternity on dozens of pregnancy cases without being caught and I just don’t see a large enough subset of men who would be willing to perjure themselves and risk fines/imprisonment to keep below the authorities radar.**

This is part of the downward spiral of desperation on the part of both parties, those trying to protect the unborn and those who would not willingly extend such protection. Each side gets more and more desperate and it just spirals out of control. Better birth control and medical advances to help babies survive outside the womb earlier(thereby reducing the amount of time a woman would have to carry an unwanted pregnancy) would help. The spiral needs to be broken and I don’t have a good answer right now. I can’t re-work the human reproductive process. If a woman and man engage in sex and the woman gets pregnant what would you have me do? I’ve said life begins at conception, once that mix of the 46 chromosomes comes together in a new and unique way. If you believe I’m mistaken, argue that point, but if you don’t contest that point, how can you ask me to ignore the human being who would be destroyed by an abortion?

I can’t stop men and women from having sex, nor can I stop unexpected/unwanted pregnancies. If a person insists on engaging in behavior with potential consequences, the consequences occur and the remedy they seek would destroy an innocent life… What can I do? Ignore the life of the innocent?**

You would lose that bet.

Enjoy,
Steven

352

No, I am attacking the arguments and values being presented. This is not the same as attacking the person.

Abortion IS the ending of an innocent human life, and contrary to catsix’s claim, this IS a medical fact. In fact, this is consistently reported by medical textbooks. This fact is absolutely central to the abortion debate, so emphasizing it is NOT ad hominem argumentation.

353

Granted, but I was not referring to that. I was referring to the continued claims that the pro-life movement is identified with the religious right, which (allegedly!) has the motive of subjugating women.

Again, that is attacking the persons, not their arguments. Even if your claims are correct, and they are acting with that motive, that does not invalidate the arguments they are presenting. Attacking the persons is not the same as refuting their arguments.

354

Sorry, Thunder, I’m too careful and too used to the rush to claims of ‘ad hominem’ from emotional blackmailers to have fallen into the trap. Read what I’ve said and you’ll see.

Meanwhile, you still demand that the argument has to take place within the context formed by your assumptions. I reject that, just as I reject your assumptions.

Meanwhile, the time has come to leave you to it, my weekend is coming up and, as a wife and mother, I have family things to do.

355

More importantly though, that scenario fails to accurately present the pro-life argument. Pro-lifers don’t believe that suicidal women should specifically be prevented from aborting. Rather, they believe that abortion in general should not be allowed (except, as stated earlier, where it is the only way to save the mother’s life).

Besides, the potential for abuse does not invalidate the need for action. It does mean that checks and balances will be necessary (for example, the common practice of medical reviews to verify the honesty of a diagnosis), and it does mean that errors may occasionally be made. No system is perfect though, and such highly hypothetical situations are insufficient grounds to avoid enforcing the fundamental right to life.

356

Here’s the real problem: there are only two ways to look at this issue:

Dogmatically: Human life begins at conception, and thus NO abortion at any time for any reason is acceptable. There is NO wiggle room here. It’s murder (except perhaps health of mother, i.e. self-defense).

Practically: Human life does NOT begin at conception, therefore abortion should be addressed in terms of health, safety, convenience and other factors ONLY. There is no moral aspect or concern with it, and it’s strictly a medical decision between a woman and her doctor. Society should butt out.

The problem is, surveys seem to indicate that most folks in this country want to fall somewhere in between… The law of the land already leans that way. I definitely find myself torn between the two viewpoints, neither of which I can 100% embrace, neither of which I can 100% discount.

We all smack of hypocrisy (and I include myself in this). I’m definitely more comfortable with the idea of first rather than late-term abortions. BUT, To my mind, if a first-trimester abortion is okay, but a third-trimester partial birth abortion of a fetus that is definitely viable isn’t… why? What’s the rationale? Either it’s a life or it’s not.

Okay, you can walk the fence and claim that life begins at “viability”… but that’s a dead end. Viability has been pushed further and further forward. I have little doubt that in the not-too-distant future we’ll have technology that could take a newly-conceived fetus of only a few cells and bring it to fruition outside the mother’s body. Ergo, viability and conception become largely one and the same.

How about my cousin who just gave birth to a baby that had only a partly-developed brain (stem, no lobes)… who will never have any ability to move, who will never have any ability to feed himself, who will never (we’re told) have any level of “consciousness” like what we think of as the human experience? He breathes, he eats (via tube), he excretes. They don’t even have any sure way of knowing if he “feels,” “hears” or “sees” in any meaningful way. That’s about it. If they had known of this before birth, would an abortion have been okay? Merciful perhaps?

These are the issues I struggle with in my own viewpoint. I tend toward an “life is precious and begins at conception, thus all abortion is wrong” stance myself, but I CAN NOT be honest and say that IF I had been in my cousin’s place and IF I had known about the problem, I’d not have supported my wife in choosing an abortion (as she’s indicated she likely would have done)…

So… All you all that say you are 100% FOR choice or 100% FOR life, or whatever the terminology du jour is; I DON’T BELIEVE YOU. I think if you pro-choicers had to stand there and watch – really watch – what abortion entails you’d probably have some real gut-churning going on (Yes, I have). At the same time, if you pro-lifers had to confront the human face of a tormented mother, alone, poor, caring for a profoundly damaged child with no hope of anything resembling a life, you might find that you couldn’t call her a murderer and consign her to hell for pondering abortion.

Let’s also be honest and drop the hysteria. Let’s remember that that while these things do happen, the VAST majority of all abortions are NOT performed on victims of rape or incest. They’re not performed on terribly young girls who made a mistake. They’re not performed on women who’s health is in danger due to the pregnancy. The vast majority are simply women who don’t want to be pregnant right now for various reasons, financial, social, lifestyle and otherwise.

So, to take the bull by the horns and answer the original query: I DON’T KNOW. I definitely DO think 2nd/3rd term abortion should be illegal. MUCH of my doubt is erased when we have viability getting firmer and firmer… First trimester… In my heart, in my gut, especially now that I’m a parent, I feel that it SHOULD be illegal, but my head won’t let it be that simple I fear.

Emilio

357

Thanks for the post, Emilio. There are parts of your post that I agree with, and parts I don’t (obviously)…but you bring some honest reflection to a hard discussion, and for that I say thank you :slight_smile:

BTW, welcomes to the boards!

358

Thanks beagledave… Though of course what I actually wanted was the abject submission of all to my absolutely correct and omniscient viewpoint :slight_smile:

Actually, I’ve been on the boards for years, just not around for a while… But it IS good to be back!

359

I’ve seen it. There was no ‘gut-churning’ involved. It, IMO, resembled every other surgery I had to watch.

Law can’t be based on what someone’s gut reaction ‘as a parent’ says, because there’d be no way to ensure that all citizens got just treatment. Moral and personal beliefs are fine to live your own life by, but are not OK to force me to live my life by.

As far as my position on late term abortion, I have already stated that post-viability I would support a ban as long as an exemption from the ban was allowed for things like toxemia, ecclampsia, anencephaly, or hydrocephaly. I would throw all my chips in on a ban like that if the other side would be willing to stop there, and leave first trimester abortion alone.

However, I have learned to fear that further restriction on late term abortion would only drive the anti-choice crowd to clamor for a total ban, and I’m not interested in giving up my right to choose.

360

Ok, you’re bound and determined to believe that, no matter what I say, I, and those on my side, want to control women’s bodies. Well then, since you know what’s in my heart and mind, since you know what I’m “really” about and my “real” motives are, then complete the following sentence for me.
I want to control women’s bodies because (insert your answer here)
Please tell me what I’m thinking because, I obviously don’t know myself, and need to you tell me.