Planned Parenthood T-Shirts

[Ben Kenobi]

The two are separate- you can have one or the other, or both.

If they are totally separate, then how can you have them together?

Physically and culturally it's a fact. Get used to it.

Physically, it depends on contraception; culturally, it depends on who you talk to.

Perhaps for you, both statements are true, but they are not for me, or for many others.

I don't recall hearing any woman express the joy of a prolapsed womb, or repeated miscarriages, or pre-eclampsia. Is that in a part of 'My Secret Garden' I missed out on reading?

Careful kid, you'll poke your eye out.

Besides, I don't need to justify the separation of reproduction from sexual pleasure

You don't have to do anything. I just don't understand why you would want to pull the two apart.

you need to explain why you will only allow pleasure for those who want to breed.

Sexual pleasure? People are going to do this regardless of what I say, or what anybody says. All I can ask is why settle for something less?

As for me not being open-minded- who's the one who wants to impose control?

Impose what? Have I ever said that contraceptives and extramarital sex ought to be banned? No. Just because I disagree with them, does not mean that I desire the state to intervene.

[Ben Kenobi]

Ben, a zygote is not even an organism. You are hard pressed to classify a cell as a human. Afterall, it takes more than a cell with human DNA to be human.

Yes, which is why both parts are there, the capacity to grow and develop, alongside the genetic code.

Quote me some of those biologists, Ben.

Who use the term, pig embryo to identify the species?

http://anatomy.med.unsw.edu.au/cbl/embryo/OtherEmb/cstages.htm#carnegiest

This is just the first hit among countless other sources.

Notice, how they categorise the different embryos according to their species, how they refer to the pig embryo as a member of the species of pigs, and so on, for all the other embryos.

They also do so for human embryos, in saying they are human.

Also, look at this:

Dulbecco also argued that such a project should be "an international undertaking, because the sequence of the human DNA is the reality of the species, and everything that happens in the world depends upon those sequences.

http://www.learner.org/channel/courses/biology/textbook/genom/genom_1.html

So clearly, I'm not far from the scientists in the field.

A human cell also share many features with, say, pig cells.

True, but the differences are found in DNA between the two species.

We do not classify something as what it may become, we classify it as what it is now.

True. Which is why I argue that the zygote possesses human DNA and the capacity to grow and develop, not possessed by other human cells. It's a very good point, UR, and needs to be clarified.

The zygote possesses everything as a human being, necessary for future growth and development.

[Ted Striker]

You guys didn't like my t-shirt?

[Kuciwalker]

Ben, a zygote is not even an organism.

Yes it is! It's one at an early stage of development. Duh!

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi

You don't have to do anything. I just don't understand why you would want to pull the two apart.


Just because I disagree with them, does not mean that I desire the state to intervene.

Nobody has pulled anything apart. Sexual reproduction and sexual pleasure can and have existed separately in human society from the beginning.

Egyptian women using crocodile dung balls as contraceptive pessaries; Roman women using natural sponges, or this:

'A twenty five hundred year old Cyrenian coin bears a puzzling image. A regal woman sits on a chair, touching a plant with one hand. Her other hand points to her genitals. To the uninitiated the meaning of the picture might range from the unfathomable to the slightly "kinky." To the ancient peoples who saw this coin and circulated it in their daily commerce, the images were crystal clear. The plant, called silphion by the Greeks and silphium by the Romans, was one of those most valuable in the ancient world and the woman's presence provides a frank, if demure, reminder of why. Silphium, was an herbal morning-after pill, readily available to our ancestors a hundred generations ago. '

http://www.islamonline.net/english/science/2003/08/article02.shtml

And in any case who says religion is the state?

Fortunately in the developed world, we don't live in theocracies.

Women get to choose when they reproduce and when they want to have sexual pleasure.

Time you caught up with the Ancients, Obi Gyn.

Oh, I 'd also suggest reading something by women who have had multiple unwanted births.

It seems to me your view of reproduction is somewhat idealistic and starry eyed, and divorced from reality.

[Ben Kenobi]

Sexual reproduction and sexual pleasure can and have existed separately in human society from the beginning.

Naturally, they exist together. So why the desire in so many human societies to pull them apart?

Oh, I 'd also suggest reading something by women who have had multiple unwanted births.

I've affirmed that it should be a decision taken together between the man and the woman. If the woman takes this approach, then why would the children she has be unwanted? They would be open to the children when the come, since that is one of the consequences of forsaking contraceptives.

It seems to me your view of reproduction is somewhat idealistic and starry eyed, and divorced from reality.

I've never been faulted for being overly realistic.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi

Naturally, they exist together. So why the desire in so many human societies to pull them apart?


I've affirmed that it should be a decision taken together between the man and the woman. If the woman takes this approach, then why would the children she has be unwanted? They would be open to the children when the come, since that is one of the consequences of forsaking contraceptives.

Who pulled them apart?

You can't pull things apart which are separate. Sexual pleasure does not depend on reproduction.

We're going round in circles here- you can have sexual pleasure, you can reproduce, you can have both simultaneously, but if you have just the first, it is no better or worse than if you have it in conjunction with the second.

Depending on the experience, naturally.

And as for the second, oh drag yourself into the real world, where plenty of women don't get to choose, and certainly didn't get to choose, thanks to religious indoctrination, societal/cultural edicts, or family pressure.

[Ben Kenobi]

And as for the second, oh drag yourself into the real world, where plenty of women don't get to choose, and certainly didn't get to choose, thanks to religious indoctrination, societal/cultural edicts, or family pressure.

Real world?

What societal edicts exist today, or at least in the West to prevent the use of contraceptives? As for religion, women still have the choice whether or not they will obey the teachings of their church.

Women are hardly pressured by society to forsake contraceptives. In fact, all the pressure is on the opposite end.

As for family pressure, it's your family, and not your parents. If you can support 5 children, then that's your decision.

Do you admit that naturally, the two are connected, procreation and pleasure in sex?

[Alexander's Horse]

A lot this stuff from Ben and others is sooo male centric.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


...or at least in the West to prevent the use of contraceptives? As for religion, women still have the choice whether or not they will obey the teachings of their church.

Do you admit that naturally, the two are connected, procreation and pleasure in sex?

Which West is this- the nice middle class West, or the West that you aren't thinking about?

In any case, I didn't restrict myself to the developed world, so I fail to see why I'd let you do that either.

As for the second, I'll admit what many women have told me- it's entirely possible to have sex and not enjoy it, either as a sexual act, or for procreation.

Is there a connection between sexual pleasure and reproduction?

Not for me.

Can one reproduce without having had any pleasure in the act?

Gee, that's a difficult one.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker

Ben, a zygote is not even an organism.

Yes it is! It's one at an early stage of development. Duh!

Clearly, you don't know what an organism is.

An amoeba is an organism. A zygote is not.

Do notice the word "is."

That indicates present tense.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker


To be precise, one would say that it is the corpse of a horse. The dead body is not, precisely, a member of (what is the taxonomical name for a horse?).

Equus caballus.

Point is, we're not being precise, cause there's no need for it.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi

Then what is the unborn child, if he is not a human being? Is he a dog, or a cat, or some other unnamed species?

I've repeatedly stated that a zygote, embryo, or foetus is human. Whether it is a "human being" depends on what a "being" is, which the participitants in this debate stubbornly refuse to define.

(I might add that where I come from, "unborn child" is a legal term, refering to a foetus in the 28th week or later. Interestingly, abortion becomes illegal before the foetus reaches "unborn child" status, except in cases where the mother's life is at risk, which however is also ground for aborting an "unborn child".)

Secondly, biologists would not consider their definitions of what constitutes a species to be 'arbitrary' but rather, have real bearing on the real world. Whereas the relationship between species may be less certain, the existing boundaries would be much more concrete.

Any honest biologist will tell you that species membership is an abstraction, and that borders get fuzzy and arbitrary at the edges.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Last Conformist:

There's plenty of stuff I'd call human that do not contain any DNA, human or otherwise.

Like what?

Pretty much everything in the human body not made up of cells.

[Last Conformist]

You are hard pressed to classify a cell as a human. Afterall, it takes more than a cell with human DNA to be human.

It takes more than a cell to be a human. It does not to be simply "human", which you recognize by your use fo the phrase "human DNA".