It’s all about control over my own body and about having the fundamental right of deciding whether or not I want to reproduce.
What about men, you ask. Don’t they have a say in this?! NO, THEY DON’T.
If women have to take the risk of getting pregnant, then men have to take the risk that we don’t want the child. If that thought bothers you that much, get a vasectomy, and then you won’t have to worry about it.
Amen!
Sure, it would be an asshole move for her to wait until the last moment legally allowed, letting him drive her to appointments, massage her feet and all that, and either all the while knowing she was going to terminate or change her mind on a whim.
But it would still be her right, and it would be his to consider her to be quite rude for doing so.
OTOH, if she finds out at 8 weeks, and schedules the termination promptly, and he only ever knows from the time she knows to the time it is aborted, then so what?
I don’t think that she even has to tell her partner about it, especially if they are in a more casual relationship.
Sure do. But just as I don’t think that it should be illegal to euthanize a dog solely for the sin of being unwanted, and I don’t think it should be illegal to kill a cow or pig solely because they are tasty, I don’t think it should be illegal to terminate a non-cognizant bit of living tissue solely because the woman doesn’t want to incubate it.
I am unsure whether a cow is a fully sentient being with a soul, so out of an abundance of caution shouldn’t we ban the consumption of meat? I am also unsure whether whatever it is that makes a fetus a human might not exist in whole as part of the ovum, therefore out of an abundance of caution shouldn’t we require all girls to get pregnant with every ovulation?
The solution to the problem is practical, not theoretical. The practical minimum between Choice and Life is Birth.
Choice should be free to parents during conception and embryonic development. At birth the organism begins the process of perceiving the world and developing consciousness. Birth bestows Life in the social sense.
We make a legal distinction between child and adult. Embryo, child and adult are each legally unique.
Genesis 9:3
Every creature that lives shall be yours to eat; as with the green grasses, I give you all these.
~Max
So what? A sentence from a Bronze Age tribal scripture doesn’t determine anything about “the moral condition” of a cow, or a fetus, or an ovum, except for people who’ve already chosen to accept that Bronze Age tribal scripture as authoritative by virtue of its alleged supernatural status.
The rest of us are still on the hook for forming our own opinions about “the moral condition” of a cow, or a fetus, or an ovum, etc.
All one in four of Americans who don’t believe the Bible is the word of God? Most people get their morals from religion, specifically the Bible.
And I am one of those who doesn’t.
~Max
You say that 75% of Americans are Christian fundamentalists?
Nah, they got them from their parents, along with the religion that they pay lip service to.
No, I said 75% of Americans believe the Bible is the word of God. That is not the definition of Christian fundamentalism, under which not only is the Bible the word of God, but it is also historically accurate / interpreted literally.
I’d hazard about half of those that believe the Bible is the word of God are fundamentalist.
~Max
But as you note, many of those believe merely that it’s divinely inspired and not necessarily to be taken literally in all its statements. So even for believers in Abrahamic faiths that accept divine inspiration of the Bible, a particular biblical prohibition doesn’t necessarily carry any moral authority.
And, of course, there are no prohibitions or any statements at all about abortion in the Bible. The closest thing to a reference to legal personhood of the fetus is Exodus 21:22-25, decreeing that if someone attacks a pregnant woman and causes her to miscarry, he must pay her husband a fine to compensate for the loss.
In other words, the fetus does not have legal personhood: according to Mosaic law, if you kill a person then you get the death penalty, but if you kill a fetus you pay a monetary fine.
I think you have it backwards. The fact that it is divinely inspired is a point in favor of it carrying moral authority, even if the story didn’t literally take place in history.
Correct! But there are statements about eating meat.
~Max
But how is this relevant? Paul_was_in_Saudi’s point was that since whether or not a fetus is a person is not a settled question, we should err on the side of caution and therefore assume that it is and outlaw abortion. My point was that whether a cow is a sentient being is also unsettled and so by his logic we should outlaw meat.
The fact that some people believe that its ok to eat a cow, is irrelevant to whether or not its settled so as there is no clear proof that cow’s aren’t sentient.
But it doesn’t necessarily carry moral authority, even for believers in the Bible’s divine inspiration. Which is what I said.
There are scads of prescriptive statements in the Bible that scads of self-professed Christians don’t consider themselves morally bound to follow.
And it was a good point, irrespective of the tangential discussion it engendered (sorry about that, back on topic).
My point is that it is a category mistake to assume ‘sentience’ of a creature has any factor in whether it is moral to eat meat. Namely that creatures are a separate class than people (by definition, a creature is not a person): the moral analysis used for people is (or, may be) different from the analysis used for creatures.
~Max
So, if it is not to be interpreted literally, why do you spout out a bible verse as though it should be taken literally?
What percentage of Christians do you think would even be able to tell you what Genesis 9:3 is? Let’s say you even give them multiple choice?
I wonder what percentage of Christians incorrectly think that the bible has a prohibition on abortion? Do you think that they get their morals from the bible, or from what they were told the bible says?
If you say that people get their morals from the bible, where do they get their objection to abortion?
Perhaps from what they are told is in the Bible.
and I believe that bundles of cells are a separate class from people by definition and so the moral analysis used for human tissue without anything even resembling a brain is (or may be) different from the analysis used for people.
The point is that Paul’s reasoning is flawed when he argues as a blanket statement that when making moral judgements we should always assume the most generous definition of person to be on the safe side.
Definitely the latter, who ostensibly gets it from the Bible. Although as indicated by another member in this very thread, some people actually read & interpret the Bible themselves.
~Max