Reply To: Abortion Ftw.

[Vicelin]

Oki. Let me try this again.

tarheel91 said: This argument only works if you feel the fetus isn’t a living human (and thus has no rights). However, if you think the fetus is a living human, then saying WOMEN SHOULD HAVE THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE ignores the fundamental right to life the fetus has (trumps right to choose, sorry).”

No matter where we begin the sentence, and no matter how well you try to explain it, I can’t help but read the bolded/underlined and perceive it as an opinion. I keep picking that up no matter how many times I read it and no matter how many angles I read it from, even all these months later after I have come back to the thread with a fresh view. I think that what really makes it that way is the “sorry” at the end. Perhaps the issue isn’t so much my misinterpretation as it is poor choice of wording.

tarheel91 said: This argument only works if you feel the fetus isn’t a living human (and thus has no rights). However, if you think the fetus is a living human, then saying WOMEN SHOULD HAVE THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE ignores the fundamental right to life the fetus has (which would trump right to choose).”

This wording is something I would have percieved as objective.

I’m glad you recognize that defining when a fetus becomes a human being is very difficult, and not black and white, but I hope you don’t honestly think the government not recognizing anyone/thing unborn as a human is significant in this discussion. You pointed out various issues with recognizing them. However, that makes it clear that that recognition is based on convenience, and has nothing to do with what really constitutes a human being.

Well, I do think that the opinion of the government is pretty significant. Even though sometimes I really don’t like them, it is their job to look at the issues of the country objectively and come to a decision that best fits with our laws, our constitution and rights. I agree with the decision made in Roe Vs. Wade and Justice Blackmun’s statement: “The states are not free, under the guise of protecting maternal health or potential life, to intimidate women into continuing pregnancies”.

but don’t try to pretend it’s not taking the life of another human being.

Well, since my opinion is that a fetus is not a human being until it has developed the nervous system, no, I don’t consider anything before that to be the taking of the life of another human being.

But my opinion aside, making abortion against the law does not solve the root of the problem, at all. There will always be women pregnant who do not want to be pregnant, and there will always be people willing to provide those women with abortions, whether they be back-door or in a safe clinic, if it’s for the right price. If both sides of the abortion debate would focus on the root of the problem (unwanted pregnancy) instead of the solution (abortion), this issue might have been solved by now. Both sides of the abortion debate can agree on one point: less abortions = good. So how to we lower the rate of abortion? There are many answers to that. I posted links to two articles in my previous post that explain some of those answers.

I know of no circumstances outside of another person trying to kill you that justify killing that person, and I certainly don’t think it’s a necessary evil. It’s an evil that’s not to be tolerated.

Well, I think that desperate, fear-driven women seeking out unsafe, unclean back-door abortions performed often times by unproffesional surgeons is also an evil that’s not to be tolerated