Roe v. Wade is history

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No, because a few cells taken from a tumor is not the same thing as a new organism beginning at fertilization. If I fall off a bike and skin my knee, the piece of skin that comes off doesn't become a separate human being. If you were to somehow tease HeLa into an egg cell and implant it, THEN I’d agree that HeLa might have rights that should be protected. But HeLa is no more distinctly individual as-is than anything I might casually blow out of my nose.

I’ve been more than clear regarding what I think is entitled to rights and what does not.

I do think a HeLa allowed to become a human embryo, if that's even possible, would be fascinating. I’ve sometimes wondered if HeLa could be considered an entirely new species. Would love to see where that might go.

You should look up where the US falls when it comes to social mobility.



The US isn't a shining city on a hill for the world to look up to in this regard. The US is barely halfway up the hill pretending to be on top.

Sauce: https://worldpopulationreview.com/count ... by-country

Clear, but also inconsistent and emotionally driven. It might be a valid opinion to hold but it would be a terrible basis for law making because there's no internal logic, just your personal feelings.

Regardless, Roe and Casey have been overturned and it is now up to the “emotions” of the states as to what to do next.

However, I have read about the United States. Statistics...and the status of some neighborhoods from social media.
Americans are far richer than Chinese,in a statistical sense, of course.
But I can't believe that the state of the poorest people in the United States can be tolerated in China.

The risk of uterine prolapse of varying levels of severity is really not all that uncommon. The risk increases with each subsequent pregnancy. This is just one health concern among many.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-con ... c-20353458



https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/ ... e?amp=true

Even in the best case scenario, pregnancy is hard physically and childbirth can be painful and traumatic.

Last edited by TwilightPrincess on 23 Jul 2022, 5:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Sometimes women are embarrassed to talk about these issues, leading some to conclude that they don’t happen that often.

One thing to be mindful of (for both of us) is that emotions change and that allowing them to entirely inform laws will be likely to result in a backlash that might well leave things further in 'the wrong' direction from where things started.

That's why at some point reason needs to be applied and while emotions can power arguments on both sides, logic doesn't favour the antichoice position and attempts to argue for it from that perspective are always far less effective because the logic doesn't favour any conclusion but it does reinforce the more emotional pro-choice arguments much more than in reinforces any antichoice arguments.

Not just women, although I feel like it would be overlooked that prostate cancer isn't as widely discussed as it might deserve (for example).

Parts of our bodies we spend our whole lives being told are dirty, shameful and highly private seem likely to be neglected once proper care involves other people needing access to them.

Maybe not. I mean, IDK. You also have to understand the polarized political climate in the USA and how that leads to a lot of biased data. Not all sources are equally trustworthy, and some organizations cater to special interest groups. And both sides point fingers at the other for who’s to blame. I’m even being accused of being “emotional” when I haven't made any argument to support either political party.

No, if you are liberal, you watch pretty much everything except Fox News. If you are conservative, you watch ONLY Fox News and read Drudge. Both sides say the other is wrong. So all you can do is decide what you want to believe and pick what feels right that day. I think they are ALL idiots.

The poorest in the USA don't have it that bad, or there's a reason if they do. Homelessness owes to mental illness, drug addiction, and the foster care system. And then there are those like myself who experienced bad timing and made poor financial decisions at a young age. So when I ended up homeless with 2 kids, we at least had a car to live out of. We put together some things with what we had to at least get jobs, like a PO box for a mail address. I found a place that would let me teach piano lessons. Wife got a job. I still managed to hang onto a part time job I already had. And we were fortunate enough to buy a house in 2 months.

The difference being we knew what to do and were prepared to work through our problems and not give up. People struggling with addiction, mental illness, illiteracy/no college prep/abusive-disruptive home life don't have that advantage.

Even afterward we weren't immune to mistakes. But we’d ask why things keep happening, seek advice, and move forward because we didn't want to end up on the street again.

The reasons for homeless conditions being as bad as they are has to do with whether they have the capacity one way or another to improve things. Urban areas often enable behavior that perpetuates homelessness and horrid conditions. But if it's not a mental illness or aging out, it's usually that they aren't making the effort for some reason. Maybe they're just lazy. Or maybe they just don't know they can do better.

As for my experience, I think I was just happy to have a place to live at all. I stayed around thinking if I just worked hard long enough, eventually, things would dramatically turn around and we’d do well, maybe even get rich. And then it became about how I was killing myself for people who didn't value me or the same things I loved. When COVID hit, we had the perfect opening to leave the area. I’m under a contract now that will more than double our combined salary provide. And that's just MY job. There are two other adults in the house, and one of them will also have a job after we move.

It doesn't always work out for everyone. I have two college degrees, a professional license, and credentials for days. I know MBA's who went straight back to mama’s basement because they couldn't get 6 figures in upper management, and then they got turned down for other jobs for being overqualified. My worst mistake was giving up after things didn't work out. But on the other hand, I believe in myself a little more, I sacrifice for others a lot less, and I travel light. I’m a lot more mature and take things in stride much better.

I can't explain why other people don't have an easy time of it, but I am VERY sure that the majority of people are unreasonable and lack a realistic perspective. Realistically, the world is full of possibilities and it is possible for anyone to achieve the things they want. So just by starting with the belief that I can do anything and then do whatever it took to get there, I think sometimes I’ve surprised myself with what I’ve gotten done. The cool thing about the USA is you're allowed to make of your life whatever you want and whatever you can. It confuses me that so many people prefer a darker existence. But in the end, I can't really be bothered by it.

Rampant victim blaming. You can’t know other people’s situation or circumstances.



More victim blaming and empty assumptions.

Maybe you would be less confused if you tried learning about other people.

It’s great that you were able to find success, but what worked for you will not work for everyone, whether they are in the US or elsewhere.

The “American Dream” is often just that - a dream.

That's going to come down to your presuppositions, though, as to whether logic is going to favor one position over another. You presuppose that killing babies is always justifiable at the whim of the mother. The only assumption I make is that life is the ultimate value and highest standard by which all else is measured. From there, it follows logically that the protection of the unborn is as important as the born. The greatest moral failing is the destruction of life. Anything that directly threatens life forfeits its right to exist, and this includes the unborn as well as the born. Abortion must be allowed only as long as it can be justified, same as self defense, same as the death penalty. If you cannot justify killing someone for the reason you don't want a baby, then you cannot justify killing your baby. You have cancer and cannot survive to both have a baby and beat cancer. You are a single mother with 4 kids with a complicated pregnancy, and being dead means your kids are orphaned. You are an 11-year old rape victim and can't reasonably expect to carry a baby to term. You are a newlywed trying for your first baby and find out it’s ectopic. You chose your life, your children’s lives, over the life of a deadly pregnancy...or not. Same as if you face a home intruder, you have no obligation to kill him. But you are justified if you do.

But causing pain or trauma by itself isn't enough to justify killing someone. I have a pretty long list of post-birth abortions I would have performed back when I was a much more bitter person. But, if I’m being honest, at worst all they deserve is to lose their own jobs. In a logical, objective justice system, you are only called to punish another person equivalent to the crime or injury they committed. And since a healthy, normal pregnancy only costs a woman 40 weeks plus recovery, there is no justification for killing the baby, without which no person is ever allowed to kill anyone.

Emotions? Emotions are why we even have logic. Logic is a servant to emotion because our values and desires are bound up in our emotions. Emotions give us “why.” Logic gives us the means to achieve the “why.” Life is the ultimate objective standard. Our emotional desire to preserve and protect it is the why. Logic gives us the means to conclude by preserving life and enjoying all the good things that come with life. Logic helps shape your values along with how you go about achieving them. For example, I choose to live because I discovered I am naturally predisposed to making music. I choose to live because I’m a good father and husband. To lose music, to lose my family, to lose my wife would mean having to exist in a void without everything that makes life worth living. I would choose life because life is all that’s left, and I would make decisions about achieving things within my ability to support life for as long as I can.

I am amused by Star Trek’s Vulcan’s claim to live an emotion-free life. It's the ultimate in hypocrisy. The decision to deny emotion is itself an emotional product. Denying emotion is perhaps the most unreasonable of all choices, the most illogical. All logic stems from pursuing value. If life is the measure of value, pursuing one’s own rational self interest is the highest moral aim. Romantic love isn't about sacrificing self for the sake of some nice guy who claims to love you. Romantic love is about finding the ideal man with whom you share the most values. It becomes more about being lead from the head rather than the heart. You discover your man is a narcissist? Walk away. Emotion tells us we love him and he’s worth it because of that. Logic tells us that by loving ourselves FIRST and knowing our own intrinsic value, it is far better to die free than live a slave. Since life is the highest value and standard against which all other values are measured, on logically conclude the slave is never alive in any sense that matters. And the narcissist who coerces through force forfeits his own rights to freedom.

In a nutshell, this is logic vs emotion. There is no point for one without the other.

Yours is the precisely the attitude of a failure. If that is all you choose to see, that is all you will ever have.

And yes, I do blame victims. I blame victims all day long. Someone who makes the choice not to assert his own will over his circumstances only has himself to blame for his failure.

You know what happens when people taken control over their own lives? They stop being victims. Any person who says because I’m gay, because I’m black, because I’m trans, because I’m Christian, because I’m a woman--and what does playing the victim card accomplish? I know someone who grew up in a single parent household and became a single parent herself. She put herself through community college, and moved her son to a drafty house with bullet holes in the walls with only an electric oven for heat. Got a job working for a bank. Her family ostracized her for “acting white” and refusing to play the victim card. She wanted better for her son, and for that, her family completely cut her off. Eventually she was able to live much more safely and comfortably. It turns out betraying a culture of failure, bitterness, and resentment pays.

There are victim cards for all kinds of victim classes in this country with everyone claiming some kind of special identity that entitles them to special treatment. That special treatment has a lot of political support thrown behind it, the promise that if you just stay poor and keep voting for the right politicians, you can have a roof to keep the rain out and plenty of food to feed your kids. You don't have to lift a finger. And don't you dare lift a finger--those white racist people owe it to you anyway. Remember, once you start working, you won't get all the free stuff or the programs. It's all a lie, of course, because you have access to better things when you either work to buy what you want or you own the resources to make everything you want yourself. Playing the victim card LITERALLY does not work.

I don’t believe in karma, but it would probably be good for you to experience the struggles of other people first hand. It would remove the narrow lens that you are seeing the world through.

There is a difference between being a victim and “playing the victim card.” People do struggle and do need support for many different reasons. Making judgment calls and proudly asserting that you blame victims is not something to boast about. It would cause me deep shame and embarrassment if I engaged in such behavior.

Just because a person hasn’t succeeded doesn’t mean they didn’t try. You can’t know them or their situation well enough to make a judgment call like that.

You speak of babies when no babies are involved, baby is typically reserved for people who've been born. The initial premise is flawed so of course the conclusions reached from it will also be.

You speak of killing when no obligation to sustain exists. If one wishes to remove something from their flesh the fact that it will die as a result is irrelevant.

It's hard to really talk about the sanctity of life and sound like you mean it when you've reduced all of us to only meaning as much as a just implanted zygote which you somehow are able to distinguish as more 'sanctified' than an equally human, equally living collection of human cells.

You call it logic but I'd say your "logic" debunks itself the more you're pressed.

All I can say is that I value the rights of people over those of potential people and that potential people have no inherent right to life because that will inevitably conflict with inalienable rights possessed by all people. Real people always beat hypothetical people.

You are ASSUMING they aren't real people. You haven't proven that they aren't.

For the moment allowing abortion bans only means banning a quasi-medical procedure. It doesn't imply or establish personhood. Some believe personhood is the logical next step. Arizona is attempting this, I understand, and their law is currently making its way through the courts. The assertion you make regarding personhood seems to be in doubt, at least in Arizona.

You are also making a false assumption that science and medicine are fixed, set in stone. The now-defunct Casey ruling held viability as the standard by which the states were allowed to regulate abortion. This had the unintentional consequence of raising the question of what viability even means. Since Casey established viability at n-weeks, it stands to reason that personhood is established before birth. Dobbs raised the question of whether viability could possibly be achieved earlier, and theoretically it is a possibility.

Your concept of personhood as exclusively outside the womb is antiquated and not well supported, especially given the concessions of Casey and court acknowledgment of future scientific and medical discoveries that might challenge present notions of personhood. In at least one instance, a state already legally asserts personhood as beginning with fertilization.

I don't agree with Arizona’s definition myself, but I do think it is interesting that a state legislature views a human being as such at the earliest possible moment to do so.