ARTICLE: Thank God I'm Not a Woman!!!

[chequita guevara]

Are you always this obtuse?

[Drogue]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
So why not throw a costly and difficult toddler in the trash for these same reasons?

When it can survive on it's own, it can be taken over by someone else. The mother can severe ties with a toddler, buy giving them up. If the mother could do the same witha foetus, I'd have no problem.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
And none of these are medical benefits. This is like saying a placebo has demonstrable medical effects because people feel better after taking them.

Yes, and? Placebo's have been used to treat some conditions, as the psychological effect can help the patient get better. However I would say it's not the same, as removing a baby is an action, a placebo is all psychological.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
So why is the solution to this problem to kill the child? There are many other ways to solve the problem.

Not the same way there aren't. If the problem is with the pregnancy, there is no other way. Moreover, there isn't a child to kill. I still don't believe, and evidently neither does the patient, that the foetus is a child, with the rights that entails.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi

https://www.princeton.edu/ec/ecpnyou.html

About 50% of women experience nausea and 20% vomit. A far more serious side effect is the increased risk of ectopic pregnancy. The Princeton University website promoting ECPs also warns: "It is possible ... that a woman using ECPs could have one of the dangerous or even fatal complications that have been reported in very rare cases with normal, prolonged use of birth control pills. These include: thrombophlebitis (blood clots in the legs), lung clots, heart attack, stroke, liver damage, liver tumor, gallbladder disease, and high blood pressure"

Yep, no less than almost any over the counter medicine. Side effects. To some people the medication is still worth it.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Biologically, you cannot have a parasite of the same species as the host.

Definition?

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Then most children also have no right to depend on their parents, and we do not have the right to depend on each other.

Remember your praise of my point that no man is an Island?

Yes, but still you have no right to life at someone's expense. As a living child, the state can take you in and care for you. As a foetus, you cannot survive without that mother. The mother should be able to withdraw support in both cases. You have no right to depend on your parents, since they can decide to give you up for adoption if they feel they can't cope. If you could give up a foetus without killing it, I'd be perfectly happy with banning abortion. But you can't.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Okay. But what are the medical benefits that justify the use of ecp?

To some women, terminating a pregnancy is enough of a benefit. Like curing a headache is enough to justify the use of codine, or other such substances with side effects.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
So if I said that I intended to remove all the air from someone I would not be charged with murder?

That's not right, Drogue. Of course I would be charged with murder even if I said I only intended to remove the air, because I know that to remove the air from someone will result in his death.

Yes, because with murder, you are charged even if it is a secondary effect, with the exception of removing your support. If you remove support from an elderly relative, who dies, you aren't prosecuted. If you remove support from a man on life support, in a coma, you aren't held responsible. The latter is possible life too, and has a chance of recovery, but at times support is still removed. Why should the mother be held to different standards than the doctor?

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
The same here. To remove the support from the child, is like suffocating him. One should be just as responsible as in the first case.

No, it's your support to remove. No-one should be able to force you to support something that is feeding of your body, without your consent.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
That's dumb. The medical authorities should get to decide what gets stocked and what does not. The very fact that the politicians get involved tells me that pharmacy supplies are more about politics than about medicine.

It's called democracy, where the poeple decide. If you want to change law, you have to convince the people. Law wouldn't have to get involved if you didn't want to ban things. If you can change medical practice by getting the medical authorities to change policy, then that's fine too. However I think you'd have more luck with the legislators.

It seems the main parts of our argument comes down to the child's right to life vs the mother's right to her own support. I believe the mother should be able to remove her support at any time, and if that necessitates the death of the foetus, then so be it. You seem to believe that the child's right to live at the mother's expense trumps the mother's right to her body. This seems to be partly based on your belief that the child is a person, that I do not share, but even without that, I still believe the mother has a right to her own body, and her own support. If she chooses to remove support, either the foetus/child is taken into care of the state, or it dies. Since the first option isn't possible with a foetus, the second happens. I believe a mother's right to her own body trumps any rights of the foetus.

[Drogue]

Originally posted by Patroklos
Man, the Nazi's could have used you at Nuremborg. I will remember this comment if ever ordered to slaughter civilians.

So when I bring my perscription for arsnic should my pharmacist think twice?

The executioner doesn't have to kill, he can give up his job. What he cannot do, is keep his job and choose not to kill that person. If the Nazi soldiers had an option not to kill, to quit the army, then I'd hold them responsible for their actions too. If you have a legitimate prescription for arsnic, then yes, the pharmacist should give it to you. I doubt you have, somehow though.

[MrFun]

Its opening posts like this one, that gives me a chilling reminder that in some ways, the United States is similar to the fanatical, religious governments of some of the more extreme Muslim states.

[Whaleboy]

Maybe he just wants to look pale?

No, it's your support to remove. No-one should be able to force you to support something that is feeding of your body, without your consent.

I'll interject to show a big flaw in your reasoning.

BK would counter by saying that the fact you have the child there is a consequence of consenting sex. However, I would make the argument to counter you that where you have a conscious being dependent entirely upon you as a direct result or intent of your own consenting actions, then you have responsibility over that being, whereupon it can be called a being. As a result, to kill it in while it is in such care, is murder. That just applies to beings however.

[Drogue]

Originally posted by Whaleboy
BK would counter by saying that the fact you have the child there is a consequence of consenting sex. However, I would make the argument to counter you that where you have a conscious being dependent entirely upon you as a direct result or intent of your own consenting actions, then you have responsibility over that being, whereupon it can be called a being. As a result, to kill it in while it is in such care, is murder. That just applies to beings however.

However I wouldn't agree. I don't believe you have a responsibility for it in terms of keeping it alive. I believe you have a responsibility to give it up for adoption rather than letting it die, but since that isn't possible for abortion, it has no option other than to die or to be living off the support of the mother, then the mother can choose. Moreover, I don't think sex is explicitly consenting to parenthood, even though it is a possibility.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi

Of course there are many woman who believe they will be better off without abortion.

If they believe they're better off without the option of abortion, I submit they're idiots.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by General Ludd

That's why there aren't any vegan fast food plces.

What planet do you live on?

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


Argument from lesser to greater. If guns, which have purposes other than killing another person, should be less restricted than a pill with no other purpose.

I really shouldn't need point out that killing people unintentionally is one of the chief arguments for banning guns.

Only very rarely is anyone accidentally killed by abortion.

[Whaleboy]

However I wouldn't agree. I don't believe you have a responsibility for it in terms of keeping it alive. I believe you have a responsibility to give it up for adoption rather than letting it die, but since that isn't possible for abortion, it has no option other than to die or to be living off the support of the mother, then the mother can choose. Moreover, I don't think sex is explicitly consenting to parenthood, even though it is a possibility.

I never said it was explicit consent, what I wrote was "direct result or intent of your own consenting actions", whereby explicit consent is only given to the act itself, you are still responsible for the direct consequences.

Upon its being, you have a responsibility not to terminate the child while it is in your care and there are no other options. A mother cannot simply withdraw her services. To kill the child directly would be murder if it is a being, and her responsibility if she does so because it is in her care, thus she is obliged not to kill it. For the most part, maturnal instinct makes this whole question irrelevant anyway with a well-developed foetus, though of course this is a conceptual debate.

If, as a direct result of my actions, a person is attached, say, externally to me and is wholly dependent upon me. That person cannot be removed and would die if I did so, then I am still responsible for it. If it is a being, it is like a helpless baby, still a being, a person unto itself, in the care of its mother, or a prisoner utterly dependent upon his captors to keep him alive. Since both the prisoner, the child, and the person attached to me is my responsibility, and yet is also sentient, then to kill it would be murder and not the removal of a parasite.

The whole thing rests upon whether or not one is responsible, and when the transition from lifeform to being occurs.

[St Leo]

Humanity is transmitted both genetically -- via genes -- and memetically -- via ideas. You aren't fully human until the age of majority.

Where do we draw the line? Well, personally, I'd say birth. Infanticide has a lot going against it. People avail of it for all the wrong reasons -- "wrong" sex, physical deformity, mental disability, too many mouths to feed (should have figured that one out during physical gestation, dumb****).

Also, though we know of the baroque beauty of the adult mind, we only know of it abstractly. Physically, killing a newborn is not much different from killing an adult. It desensitizes. It turns people into potential murderers.

Birth is a very good dividing line. Whether conventional or caesarean, there is very little argument about when it occurs. The procedure for pre-empting a birth is very different from one for killing an adult human.

So, abortion yes:thumbsup:, infanticide no:thumbsdown:.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Drogue

The executioner doesn't have to kill, he can give up his job. What he cannot do, is keep his job and choose not to kill that person. If the Nazi soldiers had an option not to kill, to quit the army, then I'd hold them responsible for their actions too.

In actuality, they did have the option to not to kill and remain in the army; apparently, no-one was ever punished for refusing to participitate in killings of civilians or POWs.

OTOH, if they quit the army before the expiry of their contracts, they risked being executed as deserteurs.

[Drogue]

Originally posted by Whaleboy
I never said it was explicit consent, what I wrote was "direct result or intent of your own consenting actions", whereby explicit consent is only given to the act itself, you are still responsible for the direct consequences.

IMHO, you are perfectly at rights to put things to exactly the situation they were before your action. Ie. without the baby. If I go for a drive in my car, I might crash it. If I crash it, I can get it fixed back to how it was. If I have sex, I might create a child. If I do, I can put it back to how it was (from a women's point of view). You are responsible, but not to keep the child alive.

Originally posted by Whaleboy
Upon its being, you have a responsibility not to terminate the child while it is in your care and there are no other options. A mother cannot simply withdraw her services.

Yes she can. She can get it adopted.

Originally posted by Whaleboy
To kill the child directly would be murder if it is a being, and her responsibility if she does so because it is in her care, thus she is obliged not to kill it.

No, it is illegal because she has another option, that of adoption. She has the right to withdraw her services, she does not have the right to kill it.

Originally posted by Whaleboy
If, as a direct result of my actions, a person is attached, say, externally to me and is wholly dependent upon me. That person cannot be removed and would die if I did so, then I am still responsible for it.

No. if you don't want it there, it is a living at your expense, and thus has no claim to life.

Originally posted by Whaleboy
If it is a being, it is like a helpless baby, still a being, a person unto itself, in the care of its mother, or a prisoner utterly dependent upon his captors to keep him alive. Since both the prisoner, the child, and the person attached to me is my responsibility, and yet is also sentient, then to kill it would be murder and not the removal of a parasite.

The baby can be adopted, the prisoner can be released. You can withdraw your support without killing them. If they then die, it is not your responsibility. With a foetus there is no other way to remove your support, so it comes down to the mother's right to remove her support vs the foetus' right to life. IMHO, the mother's right to her remove her support wins.

[Drogue]

Originally posted by Last Conformist
In actuality, they did have the option to not to kill and remain in the army; apparently, no-one was ever punished for refusing to participitate in killings of civilians or POWs.

Did they know that at the time? Did they believe they would be punished? has it been covered up in the destruction of records?

[Whaleboy]

IMHO, you are perfectly at rights to put things to exactly the situation they were before your action. Ie. without the baby. If I go for a drive in my car, I might crash it. If I crash it, I can get it fixed back to how it was. If I have sex, I might create a child. If I do, I can put it back to how it was (from a women's point of view). You are responsible, but not to keep the child alive.

That does not refute my argument, you have merely restated yours with an "IMHO" and an example. I am explaining how that is not the case if there is another being involved in that situation and it is ones responsibility for that. Of course after childbirth, other options present themselves, but only where they are available. If not, it is your responsibility to keep your helpless child alive after birth to the best of ability (i.e. if foster/adoption isn't available to you).

Yes she can. She can get it adopted.

This issue is one of abortion. As I said above, if after birth there is that option she is free to take it, if not same thing applies. Before childbirth that is not the case, though if the opportunity does present itself in the future obviously that's fine.

No, it is illegal because she has another option, that of adoption. She has the right to withdraw her services, she does not have the right to kill it.

That does not answer my question or address my argument, you have merely reiterated your proposition.

No. if you don't want it there, it is a living at your expense, and thus has no claim to life.

And again.

If they then die, it is not your responsibility.

Only because they are not in your care.

[quote]
With a foetus there is no other way to remove your support, so it comes down to the mother's right to remove her support vs the foetus' right to life. IMHO, the mother's right to her remove her support wins.
[/qutoe]

You talk as though it is a natural right. Nonetheless, I shall repeat my argument in the hope that you will address it... the issue of responsibility for ones own actions causes consequences whereupon a being has been created. If you consider there to be a window in pregnancy where the embryo is a mere lifeform, then develops into a being, then you can abort in that time, afterwards, the fact that a child is a being complicates the simplistic scenario, and thus we are forced to conclude that abortion after that point is murder.

Did they know that at the time? Did they believe they would be punished? has it been covered up in the destruction of records?

LC is correct. The guards at various concentration camps were able to opt out of serving there and still remain in the SS.