For many families one more mouth to feed or several hundred dollars a month going out in child support will plunge the family into poverty. American courts have a shoddy habit of only considering the nuclear family, but family is considerably more than that to many people. We support our aged parents and grandparents. We support our relatives in other countries where conditions are much worse. Every month I send money orders to relatives, money that means the difference between eating or not eating and kids in school versus kids ending up in criminal gangs. And it has nothing to do with my particular family or culture. Virtually every immigrant I know is in the same situation.
The concept of family honor is another factor. I had a friend secure a late abortion for her daughter. The pregnancy was so advanced because the teenager was in denial of what was happening to her body. Her father and brother are very modern in their views. Her grandfather and her uncles and cousins are not. They would not hesitate to kill her for dishonoring the family with an illegitimate pregnancy.
You are aware that his response to this will be “she can put it up for adoption instead”, right? Which is an effective counter to this, assuming the father doesn’t interfere. (Which I believe is his standing assumption.)
Killing the woman alone =/= “imperil the lives of an entire family”.
Though I would be a little curious to hear Damuri Ajashi’s response to this (presumably rather rare) situation. His specific position is that abortion should be allowed if the woman’s life is at risk because of the pregnancy, I believe.
And if the father does interfere? I have seen it happen and I have seen families lose their homes and children lives amaged because their mother has to pay child support (money that could have paid for her other children’s educational, physical, or psychological need). What is Damuri alternative there? Also, some people do not consider adoption as it is practiced in the United States to be a good thing. Ethnic genocide is the term I have often heard used and I tend to agree with it.
In a situation where an illegimate pregnancy could result in an honor killing, it’s more than just the woman’s life at stack. The family member who does the act is probably going to jail (which is appropriate). It’s also possible that other family members will get harmed in the process (i.e., if one cousin wants to protect the woman, but another wants her dead, well, the potential for violence escalating is high).
Damuri Ajashi will have to present his own alternative for the case where the father interferes; I was merely (and I think, accurately) pointing out that he would believe that he already has the “we can’t afford it” situation accounted for.
And anybody who is concerned about the genocide of the ethnicity of any child they would otherwise terminate hasn’t thought this situation through very well - in either case the ethnicity would not be propogated to the fetus.
Going to jail ain’t dying.
Regardless, I am finding it just as hard to be concerned about honor feuds leaving entire households dead (in the united states) as I am about elective third-trimester abortions; neither seems likely to occur at a high enough frequency to merit consideration regarding legal abortion policy. Especially since there are various other avenues we could take to deal with the murderous family members, such as letting hostels of some sort take the women into protective custody.
And anybody who is concerned about the genocide of the ethnicity of any child they would otherwise terminate hasn’t thought this situation through very well - in either case the ethnicity would not be propogated to the fetus. QUOTE]
The mother’s ethnicity (religion, tribe, culture, however you call it) looses a chance to propogated if she chooses a late term abortion, but equally if not more important her enemies do not get the opportunity to use her child to propogate their ethnicity.
Pregnancy can make it difficult for a woman to continue at her job or trade therefore even if the expense for the child is completely removed at birth there are still many months when the family’s livelihood is reduced. She may have thought she could keep the same earning rate through pregnancy, discover she couldn’t, and need to have a late term abortion to be able to support her family.
[QUOTE=begbert2:12845200]
Going to jail ain’t dying.
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You can die very easily in jail or the life you’re forced to lead in jail may make suicide a better alternative. Also the family loses another economically contributing member.
I’m not sure I understand the distinction you are trying to make. There seems to be a missing step between what I wrote (in response to someone saying that all sorts of bad things could happen if the baby is born) and what you write about the ability of the fetus to appreciate the concept of life and death.
No, we’ve covered THAT argument before, running faster than the speed limit is a case of “just CAN’T happen” versus abortion during labor which “just DOESN’T happen”. We are talking about policy and principles. Your principle is that a woman’s right to choose is absolute and so you would allow that abortion during labor. That IS your argument isn’t it?
Yes, and are you so certain that the courts will continue to show deference to Roe? What if the politically untenable ruling is that the constitution doesn’t mention abortion or any of these “penumbra rights”
The question isn’t whether or not it is a valid concern the question is whether a meritless position should be maintained as a moat around a more meritorious position because you are afraid that the the meritless position is the first step down some slippery slope.
Actually, it’s unclear that any problems result from granting a woman the right to abort at ANY time before delivery. Such rights have existed in Canada for quite some time. What problems do you think have or should have resulted?
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I think the problem that HAS resulted here in the USA is that some non-zero percentage of the third trimester abortions are elective. I’m not saying that everyone in the neighbor hood is getting a third trimester abortion but my position is that ONE elective third trimester abortion is one too many.
Show me ONE family in this country that has died because they haven’t aborted a fetus. Howe the heck do you think this would happen? the baby gets up and stabs everyone in their sleep? Or are you saying that they would all die because the baby would eat all their food?
I’m in favor of BIG GOVERNMENT And some of the things BIG GOVERNMENT provides includes WIC, SCHIP, Food Stamps, all sortsd of things to get youtr through the rough patches. Another thing that government provides is a foster care system.
I think the risk of death should be a medical risk of death. If a woman is getting an abortion because her family is going to kill her if they find out she is pregnant, then that is something else entirely. We shoudl get her the hell out of that situation (and once again I think BIG GOVERNMENT can help).
A woman who puts her child into the child care system is no longer responsible for the child in any way shape or form. If the father takes custody of the child then good for him but he’s on his own.
So the foster care system is genocide but killing fetuses is what? The indictment of the foster care system is not an argument for killing the kids before they get put in that system.
I don’t think we should let the trajectory of this debate be affected one iota by the actions of these sexually insecure asshats who feel the need to control sexual access to their daughters and sisters.
In many or maybe most cases the father doesn’t know or care! I do not think a woman would mind if the father decided to adopt, pay the expenses of incubation etc. then take the responsibility of raising the child to adulthood.
Your counterargument to that person’s point was, and I quote(d): “few things seem worse than death”.
Who do you suppose the death is bad for. If few things seem worse than it, then it must seem bad to somebody. Who is disliking the fact the fetus is dead?
I mean, we know that you are, and that hordes of other more aggressively pro-life people, but when we’re talking about a pregnancy that neither you or they are involved with, your feelings on the matter don’t really carry much weight IMHO, sorry. If the fetus minded the outcome, then as an actual participant in the situation, that would be worth at least considering.
The world record for the 100m dash is 9.58 seconds. This translates to 23.4 mph. I’ve seen speed limits of 20mph on public roads. What was your point again?
And I have several arguments regarding the subject, not being a “single issue voter” kind of guy. I take the mass of arguments for making laws against third-trimester abortion, and weigh them against the mass of arguments against making laws against third-trimester abortion. At the moment, the arguments against have come out on top; I think I’ve explained why. (Hint: the “making laws against” part is in there for a reason.)
I’m politically certain of NOTHING. I can imagine not-literally-impossible sequences of events that would result in slavery becoming legal again; turning over Roe is far from beyond my capacity to picture.
The courts throwing things completely to the pro-choice side is possible to. I hestitate to speculate which of that or losing Roe is more likely.
Long thread, you probably have already said this, but:
Would you extend the same legal courtesy to the man? Thus ending child support payments forever?
Because I could get behind that if you wanted to argue for it. I couldn’t get behind a coded-into-law gender-based not-biologically-based double standard, though: that smells unconstitutional to me.
I don’t see how the principal of self-determination gradually loses its merit as a pregnancy progresses.
And the alternative is better, is it? For the sake of getting the elective case, you’ll intrude on other cases where the situation is more dire. I’m okay with leaving these decisions up to patients and their doctors, myself.
It has happened in over a dozen families in my circle of friends and acquaintances. WIC, SCHIP, Food Stamps, etc., 1.) are not that much, 2.) they are not that easy to get (the threshold for what is not considered poverty is ridiculously low), and 3.) they cannot be sent to your family in Mexico, Russia, Central African Republic, etc. You are aware that when someone applies for government aid, they have to declare all assets. A family might have $2,500 coming in per month, but they may only have $800 or less after they send support checks back to other family members. But the government doesn’t see it that way. They only see the $2,500 which means the family isn’t going to get any aid. And do you know how much it costs to bring someone to the United States legally? How many years people to save to get their loved ones out of harms way? And illegally isn’t so cheap either. You actually expect people to choose letting other family members die just so this baby, that’s going to be another burden for years before he or she can start supporting theirself, can be born. And adoption and foster care aren’t the solution. Poor women are not the free incubators of the middle class.