Pro-choice or not(Women only)

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Pro-choice for the same reasons everyone else posted. I don't think it's murder but I wouldn't have one (unless I got raped :/).

Ok, that leads to two responses: first, do you accept abortion before 12 weeks, when the primitive heart beat begins, and second - you do realize that heart muscle tissue beats entirely on its own, without any involvement from the brain or body? You can cut a heart out of a body (young or old) and it will continue to beat on its own. For hours, if it's kept cold. That's how heart transplants are done. Do you disapprove of heart transplants, btw? Taking a perfectly good, living heart out of a living body (of a human who is brain dead) and giving it to someone else (with a functional brain) for that person's benefit - effectively killing the first body for the sake of the second?
We do that, btw, because most of us think that what makes a human a person is the ability to have a personality - which requires a functional brain. Which a zef does not have until sometime in the 3rd trimester.



A lot of PLs are.



*snort*
You must be getting your information from a PL website. The most common method of surgical abortion is dilation and curetage - known in hospitals as a D&C. It's a procedure that is also done on non-pregnant women who have abnormally heavy menstrual flows - nothing inhumane about it (or, at least, no more inhumane than any other surgical procedure).



Ok, let's say a single mom has three kids, gets sick, barfs up her daily pill without realizing it, and gets pregnant (this isn't an unheard-of scenario). She can barely afford to care for the fist three, and can't afford to take time off work for a new one. Out of love for the first three, she decides to abort the new pregnancy, but she lives in Alabama (where there is only one (IIrc) abortion provider) and has to arrange time off of work and save up travel expenses in order to get an abortion. So she ends up having a D&C at, say 13 weeks. You think she should have child abuse charges filed against her? Have her first three kids thrown into the foster care system, never to see her again except for supervised visits?

Oh, by the way - just because there's a heartbeat does not mean that the zef can feel pain. That requires a functional brain too.



Ok, so you accept that late-term abortions are ok if the life of the mother is at stake; what about her health? Take the mother of three in the same situation above: say she's diabetic, and three doctors have told her that if she continues her pregnancy she'll go blind. If she goes blind, she will be unable to work (totally aside from quality of life issues), and she and her three kids will go on the dole. Should she be able to have an abortion? This version of the scenario actually happened in Europe a couple of years ago.

And what if the fetus is severely deformed -ie, non-viable at any stage of gestation? A lot of birth defects (anencephaly, for example) only show up relatively late in gestation. What if the fetus would survive birth, but certainly die within a week of birth? Within a year? Within five years? Ten? Should a woman be able to abort a fetus that she has found has cystic fibrosis, which if born will die a horrible, choking death in its teens to early twenties?



For one thing, why induce an early birth if you don't want to keep a baby - are you saying as opposed to abortion? That's kind of stupid - which I suppose you meant it to be. Straw men are easier to knock down.



Can't really disagree that it's inconsistent. Until it's born, a zef is functionally part of the woman's body and the protections against assault and batter that cover all people, including pregnant women, should be enough. However, the leading cause of death for pregnant women in the U.S. is homicide, so extra laws have been layered on in an attempt to decrease the homicide rate by increasing the penalties. Not that it seems to work.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prenatal_development
Note the picture of a five-week-old embryo from a removed ectopic pregnancy on the right hand side. Looks a little like a sea squirt larva. Heartbeat or no, I'm not going to call that a 'person.'


That is not accurate.
http://www.ovulation-calculator.com/pre ... -tests.htm

Since ovulation occurs around midway through a cycle, a woman with regular cycles will notice a missed period at 2-3 weeks of gestation - easily within the detection range of a pregnancy test.



*snort*
"Take caution"? I'm supposed to be 'cautious' about using (or is it even discussing?) bc because someone's sky fairy told them that it's wrong for them to do so? We're supposed to change our laws so that the most restrictive philosophies are satisfied? Should we also legislate burkhas for all women because islamic extremists are offended by having to think of women as people?



You do realize that frigidity was grounds for divorce even before we had no-fault divorce laws, don't you?



...or if you're stuck in a police department giving testimony, and then the f*****g pharmacist won't fill your prescription because he's against all forms of birth control and/or thinks that Plan B is an abortificant...



Sorry, there's nothing 'mysterious' about a rapist. If I were ever so unfortunate as to become pregnant by a rapist, I'd be getting that thing out of my body whether it was legal or not.



thank you for a breath of common sense. This is the best way to decrease abortions even in conditions where they are legal.



You apparently don't realize that abstinence-only non-education is exactly as effective as no sex ed at all. The schools in the state of Texas are 95% abstinence-only, and Texas has the third-highest rate of teen pregnancy in the states.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 01003.html
http://www.apa.org/releases/sexeducation.html
http://oversight.house.gov/features/pol ... inence.htm
http://health.usnews.com/articles/healt ... edges.html

Statistically, the most effective programs in preventing teen pregnancy are pro-abstinence comprehensive sex-ed programs. They teach that abstinence is best, but also explain the necessity, effectiveness, and ways to use various bc methods.



Ask your parents.
Short answer: in humans, sex is about a hell of a lot more than reproduction or even orgasms.



Families that are willing to take in special-needs and/or non-caucasian babies are rarely turned down. Basically you have to have a sex offender record if you are going to be turned down from adopting a black baby with, say, a cleft palate.
If you want a perfect white baby, on the other hand, it gets a little harder.



huh?
You're saying that Catholic (presumably any Christian) orphanages shouldn't be forced to place children with gay couples - can you cite any cases where they are?
Can you cite any cases where children or infants are forced into Catholic or Christian care (outside of simply being placed with a C/C foster family by state family services)?



wtf?
I work at a Catholic hospital. This is the first I've heard of any such claim. There are a lot of people in my area who want to make sure that we continue have an independent hospital as well as a Catholic one, but no one is stupid enough to want the hospital simply shut down. Sounds like another straw man to me.



*snort*
You think Obama wants to shut down Catholic hospitals!? Got a source for that?
Do you also realize that FOCA merely restores the rights granted by RvW, allowing the choice to be made between a woman and her doctor?
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:S.2020:



Do you realize that sex is an intrinsic part of long-term heterosexual relationships? That refusing to have sex can cause the end of a relationship, even a marriage? That even married couples that love each other can have very real, very significant reasons for not wanting a baby in their lives?



Sad for him, but it was her right. Maybe he should have gone against his church's teachings and used a condom.



You are demonstrating your ignorance again. Abortion is not a 'short cut.' Birth control is.
Abortion is a painful surgical procedure, and the only people who 'choose' abortion over birth control are uneducated and/or lack access, or were on bc that failed. Anyone who calls abortion an 'easy way out' is a fool.



Really? PP is where I get my annual gyn physicals. I prefer them because, unlike a lot of Ob-Gyns, they don't look at me like I'm a cow just waiting to be their next pregnant patient. PP is also where I got my IUD, the most effective and user-friendly long-term bc, and PP got it for me for free because I couldn't have afforded it on my own. I'm hardly going to agree with you that they're 'evil.'

I'm not surprised that there are PL kill sites that describe PP as 'evil,' though.



I suggest you look up a little on the history of the eugenics movement in the United States. We were just as much into Eugenics as Germany before WWII, and in fact Germans were initially praised by many American scientists and social leaders for their 'scientific' approach to eugenics. It's a nasty little side of American science history that we don't discuss much, like the Tuskegee syphilis study - not something Sanger invented on her own - because we are rightly ashamed of it.

I also suggest you read a non-kill-job history of Sanger:
http://www.notablebiographies.com/Ro-Sc ... garet.html

and if you're really interested in the truth, read some of Sanger's unredacted writings for yourself.

Pro-Choice

And since everyone else has pulled out the "don't make other people's decision for them" argument, I'll bring up something else: Quality of life. Would you still bring a baby into the world if you knew it would be a complete vegetable?

For me, personally, it would depend on what the baby had and how it would affect them. The more severe the syndrome/birth defect, the more likely I would be to abort the child. But I think this is something that Pro-Life people really need to think about. Is life really worth it if you spend everyday in a bed suffering?

First, I don't personally like abortion at all. But, I was trying to place all personal feelings aside and look at it logically. The heart first beats at five weeks. If life were defined at heart beat the way I define it, then yeah, it's not murder before the fifth week.

Yes, I'm aware of how the heart works. In cases of heart transplants, most people got to make that decision to give their heart on their own by choosing to be an organ donor. And, it's not like they take aborted babies' hearts and transplant them into babies who need one. I think life is defined by heart beat because before that, it's egg and sperm doing their thing. The heart beating is the point in a pregnancy when the life actually forms. Kinda like the moment you can say, "It's alive" type thing. What are your other options? Viability? Nobody can agree on a specific moment of viability because that's different between babies. The heart beats generally around the same week for all babies. In addition, you can go extreme on the other end as an option for when life begins and consider it at contraception, which would make birth control pills and Plan B a form of abortion. So that's not too do-able in this world either. Since you seem to know so much about the science of anatomy, then when does exactly life begin for all people? What time period? Is there any better way to measure when life begins that is consistent and not based on a person's opinion (like viability?). That's why I say at heart beat we can all agree it's alive type thing because that's the one that is measurable without opinion, and it's consistent.

But your definition of a human having a personality? Now that I don't follow too well. Many people could look at an extreme autistic person and say they have no personality. I think that person is alive and well, even if they don't display personality traits.

As far as brain dead is concerned. IF you are not a person because you are brain dead, then I should be totally allowed to by law eliminate the majority of the American Population without being convicted of murder.



Yeah, but that's why. I'm more stating the distinction between life and potential of life.



From http://www.americanpregnancy.org/unplan ... tions.html


The prolife site that describes it... http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/index.html
Tell me where their information is wrong or inaccurate.

Also, according to wikipedia, D&C's are not the most common procedure in the U.S.
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilation_and_curettage





Well, as a single mom, she'd better be doing more than taking a pill to prevent pregnancy. How would her kids quality of life be if she caught an STD? Also, out of love for two of the three, would it be okay for her to kill one of the kids? In all honesty, her kids would get a better quality of life if their mom could show some signs of responsibility as she is setting the example. I'm not sure about Alabama, but the mom in many states could actually get more healthcare for free while pregnant than not, and in my state, if you work at all, you don't get medical card. Your kids, yes. You, harder to come by unless you are pregnant. So her quality of life would actually be better to keep the kid, let the welfare pay for her to get medical care for the pregnancy and anything else she needs in that time frame, give birth and give the baby up for adoption.

I also didn't say I think there should be child abuse charges against people who have abortions. I said the way the law is on child abuse, that would be child abuse to cut up your baby. In other words, it's not just about when life begins and what is murder or not. It's also about the methods we use. I personally don't like to see kids thrown into foster care unless it is really necessary. I hate that Child Protection Services take things too far sometimes, and in many cases, they don't consider the cost benefit ratio. Like many cases the mom is not perfect, but the kid is better off emotionally, physically, and so forth to be with their rightful parent than to be dumped into foster care. Either way, you can't have your cake and eat it too with the law. Either scraping your child off the wall piece by piece and sucking out the remains is child abuse or it is not. It shouldn't be okay to do it until the child is a certain age. It is or it isn't.

Oh by the way, nobody can say for sure when a baby feels pain or not. Studies and theories exist that most likely, not until the third trimester, but we'll never know for sure. Science has yet to prove it.



I don't say abortion is okay. I said it's not murder if you can build a case no different than you would if you killed anyone. Women who may die if they have the baby or suffer great health risks (even blinding) would have a self defense case. If the likelihood of the baby not surviving after birth exists, then the case would be no different than pulling a plug on life support for a grown person, which again, would be a case against it being construed as murder.



Actually, I find the bigger and heavier the man is, the easier it is to knock him down. Either way, I was just trying to cover my basis here. It wasn't like this thread is about specific cases. If straw men were so easy to knock down, then why does everyone spit out viability? If you don't want your baby after viability, by definition of viability, then you should be able to induce early labor to get rid of the baby right? Or as many pro choicers like to sugar coat it, get rid of the pregnancy.




http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_pregnant_women

I agree we need to make measure to reduce homicides, but they are going about it all wrong. Have you ever been stalked? If you have, then you know there's nothing you can do about it until after the guy commits a crime like murder. I wonder how many other warning signs a woman sees that threatens her life can she do nothing about? Either way, the first thing that came to all the great minds for which we voted for was to consider the life inside the womb. If it's just a "zef" that feel no pain, then who cares if the woman is pregnant or not? Again, people are trying to have their cake and eat it too. When the mother is a victim, there's a life inside her. When the mother is the aggressor, then that life isn't really a life. Make up your freaking minds people. Is there a life in there or is there not?



Yeah, but what you would call a baby by appearance happens long before most people consider abortion to be murder free.

Week by week glimpse from about.com (here it is for week 9..http://pregnancy.about.com/od/pregnancy ... week9.htm; but you can click on other weeks on that page).

Week 1 - uterus sheds lining
Week 3 - Egg and sperm meets; cell division begins
Week 4 - gestational sac and yolk sac
Week 5 -- HEART BEGINS BEATING
Week 8 - Sex organs start to form
Week 9 - Baby can move
Week 10 - tiny toes, eyes open, genitalia becomes different, ears and upper lip form, tail disappears
Week 11 - Fingernails
Week 12 - Brain structure (size will get larger near birth, but structure same)
Week 13 - teeth form
Week 14 - baby pees; breathing of amniotic fluid in and out of lungs
Week 15 - sucking thumb, thin skin, and you can see blood vessels
Week 17 - Loud noises can startle baby
Week 18 - Fingerprints develop
Week 19 - Girl babies will now have primitive egg cells
Week 24 - Baby approximately weighs 1 pound and 5 ounces and is about 11.8 inches long

According to your logic, then maybe it's not a life at week 5, but it would be long before week 24. I doubt you are trying to tell me you think there's a life in there when the baby looks like a baby, otherwise, you'd be saying abortion is murder after that point. Again, cake and eat it too. It doesn't look like a baby so it's not a person. But when it does? Oh, now the argument is going to change that it doesn't matter what it looks like. I see how it is.



Yeah, that's what a pregnancy test would like to think. While they are capable of showing pregnancies that early on, they rarely do. Most women find out more often later than sooner. Also, most don't even think to pee on a stick until after their missed period, and sometimes waiting later thinking there's something wrong with their cycle. Many women do skip a period, especially when stressed, and not all women track their period close enough to know if they are late. Many women also do have a period after being pregnant, and many do have periods all throughout their pregnancy. Just because something is capable of something doesn't mean it always works that way. Every woman's body is different, and generally, they find out after week 5 for whatever reason.



No, you shouldn't have to change the law for that. Take personal caution on your soul. If you are Catholic, by definition of your religion, you should not be taking bc pills. But, many Catholic women do because they aren't aware of that, and many consider it an archaic concept. I tell them to take caution because if you are Catholic, and you do take birth control pills, then there is an issue with confession before Communion at hand that's totally between you, God, and the Priest. I'm just warning to take caution for your own personal spiritual welfare. Nothing to do with law on that statement.

And, God is not a sky fairy. And, God didn't say anything about Birth Control. People speaking on His Behalf has. I don't like when people do that for Him, but it's how it is I guess.



Yeah, and you know what was and still is a ground for annulment in my state? If you find out your spouse is an idiot. I swear it true. A marriage whose survival depends on sex alone is not a real marriage. The marriage would end no matter how good the sex was anyway. But I don't believe in abstaining from sex totally in marriage, but I also believe if I get pregnant, then we get a nursery ready.



The pharmacist was wrong. Police department does take forever. It's a full time job in of itself to find justice when raped. But it's also a full time job for people like me to get my money back from stupid companies breaking the law. If I walk into a bank and take 40 bucks, I'd go to jail. But if the bank dips into my checking and takes it for the hell of it, I have fill out a bunch of paperwork at the bank during bank hours. That's life in this country. When other people screw up or screw you over, you have to work and put in time for justice. I don't agree with it, but that's how it is.



Actually, in my case, I was active duty military. Because of my rape, I get VA Disability for post traumatic stress disorder.
It pays the rent. Would I ask to be raped for that in return? No. But hell, I don't have to worry about rent money for the rest of my life. Also, because of the rape, I think it made me fertile somehow. It gets too personal for me to explain. But lets just say my doctor was following my logic. He thought it was weird, but it made sense to him too. But we would never know for sure. Also, the rape brought me and my husband closer. It distanced us a little on intimacy. But, he was so supportive of me and so protective, it did bring us closer. Long story on it all, but I didn't report my rape until a year later because of the military. I was trying to protect myself and my husband from military BS with a shirt who hated me and was gunning for me. So, when the shirt retired, I reported the rape. And, my rape put the man away. See, he raped another girl too. The military filed two rape charges against him, and three counts of sexual harrassment in the workplace. All of us girls testified at the hearing (like a pre-trial...I'm trying to put it in civilian terms). My rape charge stuck on my testimony alone. The other girl's rape was dropped. The defense had no idea they were up against an Aspergers girl. While the other girl got caught in her NT lies, I didn't have one to get caught making. My testimony was strong. So, the dude pleaded out where they dropped my charge but gave him maximum for the harrasment charges, which in the military includes reduction of rank from E5 in his case to E1 (which is a big pay cut not to mention will bring any man to tears when they take off those stripes), and it includes jail time in military prison. After which, I'm sure he'll be looking at dishonorable discharge. I don't know and I don't care, but it was my rape that brought him down. In addition, I'm trying to use it for more good. In a study that I'm too lazy to cite right now, female military vets and female civilians were surveyed, and more than double the vets were raped in the military than the civilians raped in the civilian world. Every girl I met in the military was either raped or had a close call, or was stalked. Obviously, there's something wrong here in the military, and I'm hoping to create a packet to give to new recruits that focus on prevention. My recruiter here said he'll use it if he can (I may have to make adjustments to get around what military endorses and doesn't endorse red tape), and he said he'd submit it to the higher ups for approval to be required to give all new recruits. If they do that, then maybe it would at least increase awareness for new recruits but also bases to do something more than create a rape crisis center. I don't want to stop there. No. See, the military took away my right to defend myself. I hope to make changes with that too. But that would require more politicians, and it's a long term goal.




To be honest, a lot of ProLifers are so against birth control and abortions. That's an oxymoron if you ask me. Anyone who is responsible would make efforts to prevent unwanted pregnancies. Plus, I'm one of those who needed birth control pills for my period. I forget the diagnosis, but my period cramps were similar to labor pain. I would say when you are about 4-6 cm dialated with no pain relief after the water breaks. Yeah, that was a normal period cramp to me. Now I have normal period cramps now that I had kids. Anyway, after I gave birth to my second kid, it became very apparent to me that I don't want to have any more kids for a couple years at least. But, I don't want to relinquish all ability to have children. I may be 30, but I still may want to bring one more into this world before menopause. See, my husband separated from the military 2 weeks before I had my second baby. Tricare dropped me because they are not an insurance but a military entitlement. So, my plan out of desperation was to get home and get on welfare since no health insurance would cover my "pre existing condition." Anyway, we wouldn't have been able to afford any payments on the baby since our military separation was a very expensive one. And you don't know what kind of bill you are looking at until after the fact, and I didn't want to worry about money if things went wrong. So, I move back in the knick of time (finding out I was 4.5 cm dialated through most of the move). I get on welfare and have the baby before I get the medical card in the mail. Seriously, it was days after I moved back. Afterwards, I asked about the IUD. Welfare wouldn't cover it. But they will pay for a crack feen to bring a crack baby into this world?



I wasn't trying to say abstinence only. I assumed most states did the bc thing already. My state did. I remember sex ed a little. Too much emphasis was on bc methods and not enough on wise decisions. It's not just promoting abstinence. It's about promoting wisdom. That includes usage of bc methods, but explaining responsibilities, consequences, etc. This part is really an art because getting any teen to believe you and follow your advice is an art, not a science. I agree that bc methods need to be taught too. Abstinence only is a dreamer's wish.



Experiencing an orgasm is my way of saying "enjoying the ride." Sex hurts most girls at first. It's nothing to do with intimacy or any reason you have for ask yoru parents which I don't get. Yeah you got chemistry and all that, but in most cases, young girls who don't enjoy sex and don't want to reproduce just yet still have it because of peer pressure. Because men want to. All the other girls are doing it. In my mind, if there's nothing in it for you, then that's the difference between a lady and a ho. But you already seem to think a man's desire for sex is more important than a women's desire not to when you spit out things like frigidity being a cause for divorce. Or is this another cake and eat it too type thing?



Before I had kids, I looked into adoption as a goal. I didn't want a baby, I wanted a kid. I didn't care what color, race, or health status. And, there were so many stipulations that a military family would not be able to adopt from the agencies in that state because one stipulation was to live at the same address for at least 2 years. That doesn't always happen for military.



http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/yourvie ... rules.html
http://www.tiscali.co.uk/news/newswire. ... uters.html
http://www.the-tidings.com/2006/0407/essays.htm
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editor ... _business/
http://www.theangryfag.com/2006/03/11/c ... alifornia/

If you ask me, the kids are more important than anything. But civil rights and right to religion, now it gets hairy. What's wrong with having state adoption and church adoption agencies following two sets of rules? Kids could be placed in state adoption with the option of going to a Catholic Agency by their choice knowing that Catholics won't stick em in homosexual homes. They will probably learn a lot about God there too. Now that's a compromise. I wasn't trying to say children were forced into Catholic Care. I was saying that they should have the option in the case Catholics were exempt from the gay adoptions.



So you agree FOCA should not be signed? If it's a straw man, then I should be able to rest my case.

For someone who thinks God is a "sky fairy," are you sure you are working at the right place? It's funny how you seem to oppose everything Catholics believe in the Pro Life movement, yet where do you get your pay check?




THINK FOR ONE MINUTE HERE. FOCA would make abortion a fundamental right. All hospitals would then be required to provide those type of services in that case, unless they would stipulate that religious medical services are exempt from providing abortion services. Do you really think Catholics are going to fund abortions?




Do you realize you can still have responsible sex? And you shouldn't have to cave in to a man's desires to keep a relationship going? What about your needs? If sex is your need, then why not use a condom? Take some birth control pills? And understand if you get pregnant, you are going to have a baby?



Or he could have followed his church's teaching and picked a good woman and married her first. Either way, you seem very concerned about a man's right to screw, but not his right to have a baby.



If birth control was so easy, then why do people have abortions? If birth control, abstinence, and responsibility were so freaking easy, then everyone would be doing it and not need abortions. Which is more painful? Abortion or childbirth? Yeah, raising kids versus "getting rid of the pregnancy"...hmm it's a no brainer as to which one is easier. Don't call me a fool, and don't call me ignorant. I have kids and I'm raising them. Where's my ignorance again?

"only people who 'choose' abortion over birth control are uneducated" If abortion is so freaking painful and only uneducated people choose it over bc, then why are we having this debate? Or is this about a woman's right to do stupid things to themselves and their offspring?



Funny, my "bias" source cites Sanger herself. What did your source cite? Nothing. It did give reference to further reading, non of which included Sanger. Where's the credibility in that? In addition, my source showed a lot about the history of Eugenics in the US, including Sanger's influence. Why did the Birth Control League change the name to Planned Parenthood? To not sound like a nazi. Its a front. Just like the argument for abortions. A front. A mask. A fake. A pathetic attempt to justify what is obviously wrong.

IN ADDITION:

I love how people who are too poor to take care of their kids couldn't survive without their cell phone, dvd player, xbox 360. Give me a break. My grandparents were poor. They had 7 kids while poor. You know what? All the ones that wanted to go to college went to college. My husband's from Puerto Rico. You think they were rich? His parents have 4 kids. They live in an area where the cost of a small three bedroom home would be at least 300,000, and the most his dad made until very recent was like 12 bucks an hour. Yeah, and all the kids go/will go/or have gone to college. They didn't get XBoxes and computers and internet. No they are not spoiled. Yes, they are great people. But if luxury of worldy goods is more important to you than life, then Satan can keep your soul. Hope it was worth it. No I don't mean after death. I mean here why you are alive. People who sell out have no substance, no character, and when you strip them of their worldy goods, what's left? Nothing. It better be worth it for quality of life purposes.

And all those arguments about reasons for abortions?
http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/psrh/full/3711005.pdf
Compare the 1% due to rape and 12% due to health problems to 74% that it would dramatically change my life.

People are abusing this right already, and it isn't even a right yet. And people want to promote it's misuse more because?

Technically, the ovum and sperm were alive; the zygote was alive; the blastocyst was alive. There's no 'unalive' or dead space between the parents and the zef. A far more important question to ask is, 'when is it a person?'
The point wrt organ donation was not that zefs should be used for organs, or about consent, but that humans are considered 'dead' by society when there is no functional brain. Even if there is a heart beat, that person is legally dead if they are brain dead; even if they are not organ donors, the family can pull the plug and kill the leftover body because there is no person in either the legal or the moral sense.

btw- I was wrong that the heartbeat starts at 12 weeks, but you aren't exactly right either; the heart starts beating when it is still just an s-shaped tube, not really resembling an adult human (or even adult vertebrate) heart at all. It finishes up ~ week 8.
http://www.meddean.luc.edu/lumen/MedEd/ ... ndex1.html

I'm so glad you asked!
http://8e.devbio.com/article.php?id=162



I prefer the neurological view (see above).



Oh, autistics absolutely have personality. Have you ever met any LFAs? There are people posting on WP who are considered LFAs by the external world because they don't talk, but they are perfectly able to type and communicate over the internet.



I appreciate the snark, but the reality is that we can and do kill bodies which are brain dead regularly. We kill them just to kill them - just to end their lives, and stop having to think about them and paying for their hospital bills - and we kill them to harvest their organs and give them to living people. We do this legally and without censure, unless non-custodial, uber-religious relatives go on crusades and enlist the national legislature to raise a hue and cry over it (a la Teri Schaivo).



For one thing, your use of the inaccurate misnomer "suck-cut." For another, the emphasis on dismembering the embryo and on the sharpness of the tools used. At the stage most abortions are done, there isn't much to dismember; the embryo is three inches long, or less, and barely resembles a human. There's more placenta to remove than embryo. The PL site makes it sound like some thinking, feeling baby is being sawn limb from limb, and they emphasize that sharp tools can cause uterine perforation; they don't mention that when a perforation occurs, it is the dull edge of the loop that does it and takes considerable force to occur.
here's a site with links to pictures of the actual tools:
http://abortioninfo.blogspot.com/2005/0 ... there.html



Ok, I stand corrected. D&As are a more common form of abortion than D&Cs. I suspect that D&Cs are still a more common procedure, since they are done fairly commonly for hypermenorrhea.



Ok, here we start out by demonizing the mother as irresponsible...



...followed by equating abortion with infanticide.



for one thing, quality of life takes a hell of a lot more than free medical care. For another, poor women are not cows to produce kids for rich infertile couples. She's still going to miss time off of work - weeks if everything goes well, or months if it doesn't (assuming she's not fired), when she was already living paycheck to paycheck to keep her extant kids fed. Having an early-term abortion has fewer complications and a lower fatality rate than carrying a fetus to term.

Finally, there's the psychological element of closure; a lot of women simply are not capable of carrying a fetus to term and then giving it up, and it's better for them if they realize this about themselves from the beginning.



Yes, you quite clearly did. QUOTE:
If you have an abortion after that heart starts beating, by law the way it is defined right now, you should face child abuse charges because that's what it is. UNQUOTE.



You do understand that an embryo does not have enough of a nervous system to experience pain, don't you...?



more often, the embryo is small enough to come off all at once; it's the placenta that comes piece by piece.



It's not a child, therefore not child abuse. It's neither sentient nor sapient, therefore unable to be abused, therefore not child abuse. A zef is not the same as a baby. A zygote is not the same as an embryo. An embryo is not the same as a fetus. A 12-week-old fetus is not the same as an 8-month old fetus. It is foolish to treat these things as the same, because they are fundamentally different.



*snort*
Pain is a neurological function. No brain = no pain. It's as simple as that. Even a fish on a line feels more pain than an embryo being aborted in the first trimester.



By "OK," I meant 'you would allow it.'
But please answer the question completely: How much postnatal survival would you require before aborting the fetus is no longer ok? A week? A year? Five years? Fifteen?



Or 'get rid of the fetus.' Because it's not a baby. Not legally, not biologically.
You do know, don't you, that almost all of the states in the U.S, and most western countries, severly limit third-trimester abortions already? That there legally has to be a threat to the life or health of the mother, or severe fetal abnormality, for a woman to legally have a late-term abortion?



No disagreement on the first part, and no: I have never been stalked. However, I disagree on the latter part: I am the pro-active type and would be more likely to get a gun and a concealed-carry permit than to rely solely on the police - and I am psychologically capable of killing someone if I feel threatened.



Oh, it's definitely alive, I never contested that. The question wrt abortion is whether or not it's a person. Even if it's not quite a person, it can still have value to the owner (the mother), especially as it approaches the personhood line closer and closer as it nears full term. It has value to the mother as a future child, and it has value to society as a future child. Sometimes, however, one good outweighs another; the needs and autonomy of the living, breathing person (the mother) are more important than the value of the potential child. In the third trimester, assuming normal development, the fetus *can* feel emotions and pain, so there's that to consider as well.



No, I was adding 'worm-like appearance' to a long list of reasons (including viability, neurology, etc.) why a 5-week-old embryo should not be granted personhood. The most important to me is neurological, but talking about a worm like its a sentient child is just silly.



Honey, I work at in hospital laboratory. Believe me, our quantitative tests can detect HCG that early - and our qualitative test is essentially the same thing as what a woman can buy in the store (that being a compliment to the store-bought kits, not a denigration of ours).



Notice what I said above: with a three-week old embryo, the woman is already one week past due for her period. However, you are correct that even so many women do not find out until later. However, 'many women'...



...is not 'most.'

I don't know what the actual average 'gestational age upon discovery by mother' is, but of the people who come into the hospital it's usually quite early.



Ohhh, you are presuming to lecture me on Catholic dogma, assuming that (if I'm Catholic) you know more about said dogma than I do.
I assure you, the Catholic women who take bc are WELL aware of church dogma on the subject, it being discussed ad nauseum in church on a regular basis. They simply think it's BS and that the celibate priesthood, while maybe being in close touch with god because they spend so much of their time praying, don't know a whole hell of a lot about raising a family in real life.



Call it whatever you want - it has as much demonstrable reality as a sky fairy or an invisible, immaterial dragon in the garage.



Yeeessss... but I think that even you will agree that a marriage with no sex at all is a far different thing from a marriage with bad sex. Sex is not the only factor in marriage, but it is an important part of it.



Good for you. Not everyone has that option.



No s**t. Unfortunately, the 'wrongness' of the pharmacist does not bring back those hours.



Due respect to the trauma of filling out forms in a bank, but that's a hell of a lot less significant that being pregnant for nine months with a zef that you don't want. Fortunately for American women, we have options that decrease some of the unpleasantness of life. Just because 'Life isn't fair,' and it patently isn't, doesn't mean that we shouldn't work for justice. Just because the world isn't perfect does not mean that we shouldn't work to make it better.

{snip rape story}

I grieve with thee for thy trauma. I'm glad that you were able to overcome it, and that you are strong enough to work on preventing other women from going through similar trauma.

Personally, I tend to 'lose it' when people touch me, especially forcibly, without my permission; I'd either kill a rapist or force him to kill or disable me, probably without a whole lot of conscious thought on my part.



Tell me about it:
http://www.guttmacher.org/media/nr/2009 ... index.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cristina- ... 69489.html



Some states will cover it; California does. Even if you don't like PP, you could call them and ask; it's their business to make bc as available as possible. I asked about food stamps once when I was a starving college student, though, and was told that I would only get assistance 'if I was pregnant or had a child.' Gee, thanks - no help unless I deliberately get knocked up?!



Mine did too, when I was in high school, and I think that they tried to promote commons sense as much as they could in a classroom full of teens - but the Bush II admin changed the rules so that only abstinence-only programs would get federal funding. A lot of these programs teach really regressive sex roles and outright fabrications about bc (claiming that condoms don't do anything at all to prevent HIV, for example).



This gets back to the frigid marriage question. In humans, sex is for pair-bonding as much as it is for reproduction, if not more. It's not just peer pressure. Girls (and some boys, too) have sex as a way of showing their partner that they love them - it's just part of life that teens generally think that their first crush is the love of their life.



Part 1: There absolutely is something in it for the whore - cash to keep the heat on at home.
Part 2: Talk to a few prostitutes before assuming that they have no value as a person. A lot of them have had sadder, harder lives than you can imagine, and hooking is the best way for them to make money because they have no skills. A man can make $10 -$15 an hour at unskilled labor; the only unskilled labor that pays that well for a woman is sex.



Huh? who said anything about a man's desire being more important than a woman's? Not me. Women want sex sometimes too, you know.




Maybe your state was different.
http://www.childsworld.ca.gov/PG1302.htm



Ahh, the U.K. No wonder I hadn't heard of it. But you're right: I don't think that any agency with a plethora of unhomed children and a shortage of loving homes should be allowed to quibble based on prejudice.



Gotta love the church (not..).

I just realized that it's 2:48 am PST (I have my light programed to go out so that I don't stay up too late). I'll respond to the rest later.

Last edited by LKL on 28 Feb 2009, 7:55 pm, edited 2 times in total.

This is getting ridicululous on the quoting of piece by piece plays, so i'm just responding here in the same order.


The problem with determining life at a brain development is that nobody can agree when that happens. For instance, all throughout your argument, you assume the baby feels no pain until the third trimester, and that just isn't proven yet. Nobody knows for sure. They can only assume. Even in your source, with your method, they debate between week 8, week 20, and week 25. The heart beat on the other hand is easy to determine if there is one, and it's consistent as to when it occurs. Why would that be important? Right now, FOCA says it's okay to have an abortion before viability, and that viability is determined by the caring (I mean the guy taking care of the patient, not that he may care) doctor's opinion. There is no consistency with that, and it's bias. There's no machine that can measure viability.

I believe autistic people have a personality, but there are many people who would believe otherwise. The same goes for many neurological disorders. A person is a person when there's a personality is not an argument you really want to promote because it would just open up a new can of worms with all the brain dead people in this country.

Okay, suck cut was bad. IT's more of a scrape suck. The tool isn't sharp, but it's purpose is to scrape. That tool is hardly capable of scraping 3 inches of matter leaving it all in tact. And Pro LIfers believe it is a thinking feeling baby. See, it does take considerable force to use? What's humane about this at all? When you are talking a dusting and cleaning as my mom puts it, that's one thing. But when you are talking abortion, that's another. As stated previously, we can't determine when the baby feels pain, and we can't determine when there is a life. You are basing much of your argument on something science has yet to prove.

A mother who gets knocked up when she doesn't want to have more kids obviously didn't protect hersefl from STDs either, unless she took her man down to the clinic and had him checked before they went into it because that happens all the time.

I did not equate abortions with infanticide. You said in your story that the mom was going to have an abortion for the benefit of the existing children. So, if that's a good reason to get rid of one kid, why can't it be the same good reason to get rid of another? No it shouldn't be. It's your straw man here. Again, science has not proven the pain aspect or when life begins. Obviously, if the mom had to save up and wait and travel and all that jive, then she was probably well past week 8 which by your definition from your link holds a high possibility of human life and would be murder. Any abortions by your same definition passed week 24 at the least would be murder.

I hate the fired thing. I got fired for being pregnant. I wasn't stupid enough to blame my pregnancy. I blamed the right person, the guy that fired me. Where the EEOC when you really need them? Maybe we need a woman's version of the NAACP, someone to safe guard our civil rights.

A woman who can get an abortion because it's too hard to give their baby up for adoption after the baby is born probably shouldn't have an abortion anyway. Why? They would be more apt to have nightmares and depression and many other side effects of abortion that health professionals are not warning patients about. A woman who can give birth and place her baby up for adoption is doing what's right for them. If they are capable of doing that, then it's probably the best thing in that case. If they are not capable of that, then it may not be in their best interest. But then again, we are talking about uneducated people here, according to you, who pick abortion over birth control.

I did NOT say child abuse charges should be against people who have abortions. Requoting myself like you did thinking it was going to prove your point, "If you have an abortion after that heart starts beating, by law the way it is defined right now, you should face child abuse charges because that's what it is. " English class 101 here. If you abort, by law, you should face child abuse charges. Not by my opinion should you face it, but by law, you should face it. Even if that tool isn't sharp, if I started scraping my children with it with the force you said is necessary for an abortion, do you really think that will fly with CPS? It doesn't matter when there is life in there. It is your child at the moment of conception. It may not be alive, but it's your kid. You may differentiate between zygote, embryo, fetus, etc.

From the dictionary:
Main Entry: child
Pronunciation: \ˈchī(-ə)ld\
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural chil·dren \ˈchil-drən, -dərn\
Usage: often attributive
Etymology: Middle English, from Old English cild; akin to Gothic kilthei womb, and perhaps to Sanskrit jaṭhara belly
Date: before 12th century
1 a: an unborn or recently born person bdialect : a female infant
2 a: a young person especially between infancy and youth b: a childlike or childish person c: a person not yet of age
3usually childe \ˈchī(-ə)ld\ archaic : a youth of noble birth
4 a: a son or daughter of human parents b: descendant
5: one strongly influenced by another or by a place or state of affairs
6: product , result <barbed wire…is truly a child of the plains — W. P. Webb>
— child·less \ˈchī(-ə)l(d)-ləs\ adjective
— child·less·ness noun
— with child : pregnant

Again you make an argument about when pain is felt, and I squashed that because it's only theory right now.

Obviously, I allow abortions to take place regularly cause it's not like i go picketing or aggressively try to stop abortions. As far as would I consider it murder, the timing doesn't matter as much as whatever case you present for each case scenario. Where I stand personally, only in extreme cases would I consider abortion for myself (such as being raped by some monster, literally and non human monster like if the mothman came down and raped me) or possibly for my survival even though I've told my husband if he has to choose for me to pick the baby over me. I know my kids would love to have me around longer, but death is natural, and I'm actually in the process of planning for my death with the will and life insurance and all. I can't assume I'm going to live forever, and my child will bring more to this world than I have left to offer. For me personally, one day of fetus survival is enough for me to try to have the baby and keep my child alive as long as I humanly can. I don't give up on my kids.

I know what states feel about third trimester abortions. Did you know that FOCA would severely increase these third trimester abortions because it is written so vague? You'd be looking at mental distress as a health reason for it the way this country is. Don't believe me? When abortion was first introduced to this country, it was for reasons such as rape, incest, and severe impairment on the mother. You saw the statistics of how many abortions are done for those purposes. Even then, look at McCain. He's prolife. But he thinks abortions are okay for those reasons. So back in the day, he'd be pro choice. But he's considered pro life in this day and age because people have misused abortion so much. And did you know that Obama promised to sign FOCA in his campaign? So yes, it's a major issue now. It's not law yet, but because it's on the verge of becoming law, it is a big issue.

On the stalking thing, I'm glad you are so confident in yourself. Have you ever shot a weapon before? Do you know what it takes to get a concealed weapons permit? And, you will probably lose that right as Obama has ideas on that issue too including taxing the crap out of all of it, and I promise you, even if you were a Resident Supervisor or something at the hospital you work at, you still couldn't afford much with guns and ammo and practice if Obama taxes it at 500%. Anyone who thinks they are ready to kill someone when feeling threatened are usually not. Even as a sharp shooter with a third degree black belt, do you think you could defend yourself if your stalker was a trained sniper specialist and stalked you from miles away on some mountain through his rifle scope? If you can't depend on your police, then again, we need more law enforcement reform. We need better laws to protect you. That would reduce homicides better than increasing the charges placed against you if you commit an act of homicide. But we are not just talking about you. We're talking about decreasing homicides in general.

Seriously give up arguing the concept that if I beat up a pregnant woman, I get charged for assault against the woman and her unborn child but she can turn around and have an abortion the next day. You can't argue that. It's stupid. It's a cake and eat it too concept. It's murder if it's alive? Or is it murder when it's a person? Is it murder if it has value to the owner? Value to society? Oh, it's murder if someone else kills the unborn baby except the mom because the mom is exempt because she is more important than the child. C'mon now. Either it's murder or it's not. It can't be murder for one person but not for another, otherwise, any mom should have the right to kill her children at any point in her child's life. That's just stupid. If it's murder for another person to kill the unborn child, then it's murder for the mom to do it as well. Sugar coat it all you want, but I was in the military, and I know what Bull Scrap looks like. If you really don't think it's murder for the mom to get an abortion, than it's not murder to the unborn child if someone kills the pregnant mother. It would only then be a one count of murder and not two. Otherwise, you do believe it's murder for the mom to kill the unborn child as well. There's no way you can have both.

Talking about a worm like it's a child is just silly? Hmmm, even with viability, neurology theory, and all, the child would be a person when it looks still quite like an alien. Scientifically, it shouldn't matter what it looks like. What matters is when the life is there, and heartbeat is so far the easiest way to determine life because there's not theory to when the heart beats if it beats or anything like that. It's one of the only things we can scientifically measure to scientifically measure life. Unless you go with DNA, which is at conception. Or human soul which Catholics believe to be at conception. Or brain waves which we can only theorize about when it comes to babies in the womb. Face it, science doesn't know enough to be more exact than heart beat. Theoretically, brain waves may make more sense depending on other factors such as nervous system and so forth. However, we don't know enough about the human body to determine when this happens.

I know that pregnancy tests are capable of picking up pregnancies pretty early. I know that. Like I said capability doesn't mean it always works out that way. Many women don't discover until around the 5th week. No I don't know if there's a study that proves that. It's just a generalization. The point isn't when as much as that many or most women don't find out until a certain time in their pregnancy. This is an important issue for abortion purposes. How many women know they are pregnant at their 3rd week in comparison to those who find out later on? And people who come into the hospital quite early, are they doing it for prenatal care or for pregnancy testing?

I was trying to avoid lecturing anyone on Catholic Dogma. The original post was written to more people than just yourself, and I was just telling people to look into their religion for where their religion stands on the issue, assuming they are religious and care about their religion...hence take caution part. If you do know more on the dogma than I, am I wrong? Catholic dogma was the example that I was thinking of as I don't know where Protestants stand on the issue because they never discussed it in my churches, and they don't have bishops, cardinals, and popes writing articles or making public statements on where there religion stands. I know where the Catholic religion stands because it's available, and easily available. I assure you that you cannot speak for all Catholic women in the world. I can't either. All I can do is paraphrase all I read on the church's stand, but that doesn't speak for all Catholics individually. If a Catholic thinks his/her religion is BS, then maybe they should consider going Baptist. If Catholics don't know a lot about raising families, then why are you working in a Catholic Hospital?

I'm not going to get into a religious debate on God's existance. That's totally off subject. If you had any amount of respect for other people and their beliefs, you wouldn't disrespect any concept or entity that many people hold dear and consider sacred.

The only bad sex out there is for people who don't know what they are doing. Good sex is when you know what you are doing. Better sex is when both of you know what you are doing. If a marriage needs sex to survive, then it's not a good marriage. No sex is not healthy for a marriage, but a good marriage can survive through it. Yes it is important to a marriage. Abortion can destroy a marriage too. So if your argument is that abortion has to be okay to save marriages because married people require sex, and married people don't always want anymore babies, then that's not going to fly because in most cases, abortions are not healthy psychologically for a marriage anyway.

Yes everyone has the option of getting a nursery ready. It may be a small part of their bedroom or living room, and the crib may be a pack n play, but everybody has that option.

As for the pharmacist and Plan B, yeah he was wrong. His "wrongness" didn't lose all those hours. Did you know there are other pharmacies out there? They compete against each other. Some even match the price of others. And many Walgreens are open 24/7.

I do believe in making the world better. But abortions are not going to make the world better. Lazier and more irresponsible, but not better. If a woman really doesn't want to have kids, then I'm all for having the government pay with my tax dollars for her to get an IUD or tie her tubes. That would make the world better than abortions. I'm also for fighting rape. That would also make the world better than abortions. But then again, the percentage of women who have abortions as a result of rape is pretty small. Like I said, I'm kinda hazy on where I stand on that one in a national arena.

In my rape, I wanted to defend myself. I even had a plan in my head. I could have taken him down. But the military tied my hands down for him. I chose at that moment that I would rather be raped than kicked out with a dishonorable discharge for an alcohol related incident. Yeah, I drank the night I was raped, and yeah, that's my fault for not being responsible. I wasn't drunk, but I would be able to blow enough to fail a breathalizer. I still wouldn't change my mind on it. Rape versus dishonorable discharge...I'll take rape any day over that. I'd also choose death over dishonor.

On the IUD. I can't remember where I read it or heard about it, but when I heard that there was a potential side effect of it or something...well anyway, I was happy that I didn't get one when I heard it. But to hear someone like you who seems to be doing fine with it, well maybe I might talk to my doctor about it. I have health insurance now, and I think it may cover it.

Yeah I hate that about welfare when they only give services to pregnant women or single moms. They promote pregnancy with that. Even the unwanted ones. People who could really use the help without abusing the system are often turned down. That's so wrong.

I didn't know about Bush admin changing the rules on abstinence only programs. Typical for Bush I guess. I'm sure Obama will be changing that.

So kids have sex for bonding. I believe it was even Planned Parenthood that years ago had a pamplet called 100 things you can do to be close to your boyfriend without having sex. Anyway, sex being natural isn't a good argument. If it were, then there wouldn't be such thing as cheating on your spouse. If it's a way to show someone how much you love them, then you would also show how much you love them by being proud and excited to be bringing their child into this world and raising their child. If the love is true, the parenting would be a team effort. Otherwise, it's not love and they have no need to show it.

Difference between a lady and a ho is that a ho doesn't get anything out of sex for herself, i.e., little girls who go to parties and give 5 guys a blow job back to back. The difference between a ho and a whore is that the prostitute, the whore, gets paid. I wouldn't suggest prostitution as a career for anyone, but I wouldn't judge a woman who slept around for money to take care of her children as long as her children weren't a part of her lifestyle and she was drug free.

"A man can make $10 -$15 an hour at unskilled labor; the only unskilled labor that pays that well for a woman is sex. " Are you serious? Let's see the options. A homeless person can get a job at a telemarketing office making over 10 bucks an hour plus commission. Any woman can join the union or an apprentice program starting at 15 an hour in many cases (sometimes more) as a first year apprentice. A good stripper makes more than 10 bucks an hour. Same with bartending and serving. A woman is free to join the armed forces, in which case, getting a hell of a lot more than 10 bucks an hour in addition to free housing, free food, free college, free attorneys, free gym memberships, etc. If she can't be accepted by the armed forces for any reason outside of a criminal background including failing the drug test, then she should be eligible for SSI.

You have made some arguments that sound like sex is necessary for a woman to keep her man, so yes, it sure sounds like to me that a man's desire is more important than a woman's.

See, you prove my point with my state being different about adoption procedures. My original point was that it needed to be a federal thing, not a state thing.

Not just the UK did Catholic Orphanages shut down, but also Boston for sure and possibly California. What goes for the Roman Catholic Religion in the UK also spreads itself here. The Catholic Church in the UK made a public stand that they will close down adoption agencies before placing children in same sex households. That public stand has a direct influence on Catholic Stands here in the states as Boston is proof.

Pro life, unless the baby's or mother's life is at risk in the pregnancy.
I feel that life starts at conception, because it is still a living cell even if it doesn't look like much.
I'm not religious btw

I'm pro-choice with reservations. I mean, if we're not sure if we're killing a living being, should we do it? Granted, it's usually just a bunch of cells when it's aborted, since most abortions occur in the first 2 mos.

Abortion should be available because of situations like rape and incest. It should also be available because in nature, if there is not enough food or resources to support an offspring, a natural abortion will usually occur. This is in animals and people. Often, we don't have the resources to support a child and yet our body doesn't recognize this.

I do not want a baby. Luckily, my BF is infertile. But, it would be totally unfair for me to raise a child when taking care of myself is a full time job. I'd have to go off my bipolar meds, get even moodier with pregnancy hormones and then deal with my selfishness and try to mother at the same time, the way my AS mother did with me. No thank you!

I don't think I should be deprived of sex the rest of my life because my choice is not to have children, either. Also, I've only been pregnant once and I had a miscarriage. I've never had an abortion. I'm sure it's traumatic, but giving a baby up for adoption is equally traumatic, if not more.

I respect women who do give their babies up for adoption though. I respect them a lot. It's just that I couldn't do it. I'd rather take the chance that aborting a group of cells is not murder.

Responding to the second half before reading the response to the first half:

The problem is that one method is likely to have factually better outcomes for the children in question; it's not legit to deny a child a loving home based on dogma. It harms us all.



I read FOCA. There's nothing in there about forcing private (Catholic) hospitals to do abortions; it's about overturning the limits on intact D&Cs established by the BushII regime.
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:S.2020:

It is about prohibiting Government interference in medical abortions, nothing else.



I was concerned about that when I signed on, but it was made quite clear to me and everyone else that one does not need to toe the Church line nor even to be Catholic in order to work in a Catholic hospital. I agree with quite a lot of the philosophical underpinnings of this hospital; it's meant to be a caring, compassionate environment, and the fact that it's not-for-profit means that the patient comes before the bottom line to a far greater degree than in a for-profit hospital (which I have also worked at).



That's not an accurate statement. FOCA prohibits government interference, nothing else. I've posted the link to the actual text twice now; please give it an unbiased read.



For one thing, people DO get pregnant despite using bc. For another, sometimes the bc is sabbotaged:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 173421.htm
Please don't get on that rant that 'she should leave him, then.' Yes, she should - but not every woman (especially every young woman) knows how, or is in a position to do so.
There's also the fact that a lot of the BushII federally funded abstinence-only classes teach that bc doesn't work anyway; essentially, it does nothing to prevent kids from having sex, but makes them less likely to use protection when they do have sex because they've been told that 'it doesn't work anyway.'
Those kids shouldn't be punished for the rest of their lives because the state and federal governments failed to provide them with adequate education.



For the second time, I have never singled out men as having some special right to have sex that women do not have. Both men and women like sex - I'm really sad if that's a surprise for you.
Men do not have a 'right' to have a baby. Sorry, but that's a biological fact (unless you think that it's ok for a man to force a woman to have his child, whether by rape or not). Even women do not have a 'right' to have a baby. Both sexes either have to find cooperative partners that *grant* them the needed genetic material, or they have to buy it (a la sperm banks or surrogate mothers).



Because people lack both education and access, and because people are sometimes stupid. Just because someone is stupid one time, though (perhaps, socially, less so!), does not mean that they should be forced to donate their entire body and nine months of their lives (at least) to producing an offspring that they didn't want.



Perhaps I was in error as to your point. PLs often degenerate into rants about women who 'use abortion as birth control;' you didn't quite say that, but I jumped to the conclusion that you were headed in that direction.
Abortion is certainly less dangerous than childbirth; never having experienced either, I can't say one way or the other about the pain.
So I take your point that, once a pregnancy has occured, abortion is easier than carrying a fetus to term. Honestly, though, I don't see why that should count as a negative against abortion. Giving birth with an epidural is 'easier' than giving birth without one, and if and when I ever have kids I'm going to demand every drug available. That's one more thing I disagree with the church on: I don't see suffering as morally valuable.
However, the argument




Because uneducated people shouldn't have to suffer for their lack of education, and because bc sometimes fails.



Stupidity may be punished quite harshly by the world, but humans can and do try to mitigate that punishment.



Ever heard the term "quote mining"? I've seen really quite nasty-looking quotes pulled out of Sanger's writing before, but when the entire page or essay from which the quote was pulled is read, and the quote is put into context, it looks quite different.



You don't like my source? Fine. It was either second or third down on the google list of 'Margaret Sanger Biography.' Here are some from 'Margaret Sanger Writings.'
http://womenshistory.about.com/od/quote ... sanger.htm
http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/we ... 01879-1966




'Fer cryin' out loud. We no longer say 'janitor,' either; we say 'environmental management.' We put 'In God We Trust' on our currency to make us sound less like communists. Corporations and Businesses and not-for-profits change their names all the time to sound better; there's nothing nefarious about it, just good business practice. There are advertising corporations whose main specialty is in making up good-sounding names for this or that business or product.



Given that the majority of voters in the U.S. disagree with you, I would say that it's not so "obvious."



Have you never met a truly poor person? You remind me of the conservatives in the Regan and Bush I eras ranting about 'welfare mothers' living high on the hog. Maybe you live in a rich area and have simply never seen real poor people. There are a lot of people around here who are happy to have enough money to put gas in their car so that they can get to their third job, much less buying video games.
A cell phone, btw, is no longer a luxury item. Many rental units no longer have land lines, and in a rural area having a cell can literally be a life-saver.



And mine had four on one side, five on the other. One set of granparents bought an enormous house with a valley view for less than 56K, and both grandmas never worked outside the home. Things are different now. They have been for a while. Very few women can *afford* to stay home and take care of 4-7 kids.



...and now we have progressed to damning me to hell. Very convincing argument.

The first house I can remember was literally right next to the train tracks. The furnace explodes once and coated the entire interior of the house with black soot. A hobo broke in once and stole a pound of cheese from the refrigerator. I was afraid to learn how to use the bathroom because my mom got a book from the library that said that black widow spiders sometimes hide under the seat in outhouses, and I thought that our bathroom probably qualified. There was a urinal (with no plumbing) bolted to the outside of the house. The house itself was swarming with mice. My brother and I used to race the trains that would come by, and apparently we nearly gave more than one conductor a heart attack because a man came walking down the tracks one day and told us not to do it any more. My mom worked in a fabric store full time, for minimum wage. My father (parents were married until around the time I was born) brought by some cheese or eggs once in a while, and then moved across the country when I was about 4 and left no forwarding address.

If my mother had gotten pregnant for whatever reason, we would probably never have gotten out of that dump. I hope she did have a lover, though; joy was rare enough in her life during that time period.



Oh, so now I'm a sell-out because I happen to disagree with you (and back my disagreement with evidence)? I'll admit that I'm about as happy with my life as an aspie can be - but you're wrong if you think that I'm rolling in worldly goods and wealth. My most expensive posession is my car, and it's Honda Fit. It's about the smallest car one can get these days, and one of the cheapest. I share a rented house with a student at the local U.
Not that any of that matters, except for the pleasure of proving you wrong even on a topic



What, you don't think that's a good enough reason?



Nobody promotes abortion, dear. People want abortion *access,* and PC women's groups do a hell of a lot more to reduce the actual need for abortions (therefore abortions themselves) than any PL group.

An abortion is a failure, just like a divorce is a failure. It means that something has gone horribly wrong. Sometimes, though, both abortion and divorce are the best options one has open, and making either illegal would result in huge amounts of suffering.

Did you not read the article I submitted? I'll quote the relevant section for you:
quote:
If life and death are based upon the same standard of measurement, then the beginning of human life should be recognized as the time when a fetus acquires a recognizable EEG pattern. This acquisition occurs approximately 24- 27 weeks after the conception of the fetus and is the basis for the neurological view of the beginning of human life.
...there is a strong argument that the unique and highly recognizable EEG pattern produced by a mature brain is a defining characteristic of humanity (Morowitz and Trefil 1992). Therefore, the moment that a developing fetus first exhibits an EEG pattern consistent with that of a mature brain is indicative of the beginning of human life. It is from this point and onward during development that the fetus is capable of the type of mental activity associated with humanity (Morowitz and Trefil 1992).




No, I'm sorry; it's not an 'assumption' to say that there cannot be pain without an active brain.



From my source:
Observations to date have led to the conclusion that 25 weeks of gestation is required for the formation of synapses needed for recognizable neural activity. At this point in development, the recognizable signals exist only as intermittent bursts that interrupt periods of random activity (Morowitz and Trefil 1992). This conclusion is summarized by Donald Scott who in his book Understanding the EEG wrote, "Attempts have been made to record cerebral activity of premature infants and they have succeeded (only) if the gestational age was 25 weeks or more (Morowitz and Trefil 1992)."
...neural connections in the cerebral cortex have yet to develop in a 12-week-old fetus. Lacking these basic neural networks, the developing fetus is incapable of feeling the emotions recognized as fear or pain (Morowitz and Trefil 1992). ...a 12-week-old fetus is not yet capable to take direct actions in response to a thought. The developing fetus is therefore incapable of recognizing potential danger and unable to either be fearful of it or actively evade it through movement or any other willful activity (Morowitz and Trefil 1992).

Taken together, that's hardly an ambiguous argument.



And I'll say it again: a heart beat is meaningless both with respect to determining life and with respect to determining humanness. You could as easily take some other unambiguous landmark - say, the development of fingernails (week 11) or implantation in the uterus (first week). They are both unambiguous, and the latter has a heck of a lot more significance than a heartbeat in terms of the potential viability of the zef.



That's why I prefer a non-technological measure. Which neurology is.



I'm not afraid to go there. No brain = no personality = no person.



That's still a deliberate misnomer. You know what it's called; why not use the proper words?
...Oh, for the same reason that you insist on calling the zef a 'baby' when it clearly isn't one: because the proper words aren't emotionally loaded enough for you to make a good argument with.



Pro-Lifers are entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts. No brain = no thought and no feeling.



No. Science is quite clear on this. We know quite a lot more about neurology than you seem to think we do. There are still thousands of questions, but that is not one of them.



Or maybe she was in love and believed him when he said he was clean (and if she has decent taste in men, he'll have been honest about that), and believed herself protected from the non-STD risks of sex because she was on the pill.



Yes, you quite clearly did.
QUOTE:out of love for two of the three, would it be okay for her to kill one of the kids?

This in response to a discussion about a woman having an abortion out of love and concern for the existing three children. I asked why it wouldn't be ok to abort a zef for the existing children, and you responded by asking why it wouldn't be ok to kill a child for the other children, clearly equating the two actions.



Not at all. Please read the cited passage.



Murder, no. Extremely serious, and legally limited to life/health concerns for the mother, and/or fetal abnormality, yes.



What, like a National Organization for Women?!
http://www.now.org/issues/mothers/index.html



After birth, the mother is flooded with hormones that help her to bond with the baby. Before birth, especially early in the pregnancy, any bonding that occurs is largely mental rather than hormonal. Heck, even I might bond with a bond with a baby after it was born!



*snort*
Rule #1:
If you want to get out of a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.



No, it is not a child. It is not a baby. It is not a separate being from the mother until it is born.


Which dictionary, please?



Ok, so we can outlaw abortions of female zefs because one dictionary defines child as an unborn female.

there's a problem, though: there's more than one dictionary.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child
quote:
A child (plural: children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty. The legal definition of "child" generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger than the age of majority.



No, it's not. No matter how many times you deny it, the fact is that one cannot feel pain without a brain to process the sensation.



Given that no one knows the details of each scenario as well as the woman considering an abortion, no one can make the decision as well as that individual woman herself. Not you, not a bunch of old male politicians.

I know what states feel about third trimester abortions.



I sincerely doubt that. FOCA would restore Roe v Wade (it explicitely states this), and RvW allowed states to place significant restrictions on 3rd trimester abortions. State laws that limit 3rd-trimester abortions, as they currently stand, are compliant with RvW.



Severe mental distress is currently a legit reason to get an abortion, even in states that restrict 3rd trimester abortions to life/health of the mother. Mental distress is real - just because the problem was 'all in her head' doesn't make both mother and fetus any less dead when she offs herself rather than go full term.



Yeah, and back in the day the KKK would have been abolitionists rather than the evil racists that they're considered today, because they advocate Jim Crow laws rather than out-and-out slavery.
We've come a long way, and that's not a bad thing.



No, I didn't know that - but it makes me like him even more.



yes, and yes.



IIrc the President's ideas on guns include limiting assault weapons, but not smaller semi-automatics. It doesn't take a very big bullet to kill someone.
http://thinkonthesethings.wordpress.com ... -position/



Then I'd borrow one of my Grandpas'. One Grandpa has a case of rifles and a handgun or two; the other Grandpa collects revolvers. They may be antique, but they work well enough.



I've trained in Aikido for almost nine years. One learns quite a bit about one's reactions to threats in that much martial arts training time. There's also my tendency to get violent when touched against my will:
http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt92463.html



Well, I'm not exactlya crack shot, and have only a first degree black belt. I guess I'll just have to train more.



Of course not. There's not much I could do, for that matter, against someone from one block away with a gun - unless they miss their first shot. We were, however, talking about stalkers - my guess is that most of them are not trained snipers (and, btw, they won't have any easier a time getting a gun than I will), and most are emotionally involved enough that they want to be up close and personal with their victims.



Or just more police.



Laws don't do a whole lot to prevent 'immoral' but emotion-based behavior. They're essentially about punishing the perpetrator after the fact, not preventing the crime. What does change violence rates is social approval - for example, societies that value women as human beings with individuality and personal purpose have less violence against women than societies that only value women as 'mothers' and/or 'wife;' a woman who doesn't measure up to a man's standard of mother or wife can be seen as defective or bad, and therefore deserving of punishment for not fulfilling her role in society. A woman who is recognized as her own being can fail to measuer up to the standard for a good person, but that's a lot harder to miss than the standards for a perfect wife/mother.



You misunderstand, or perhaps I spoke unclearly; I agree. It's stupid. The law should be based on harming a woman and destroying a part of her that she values, not on 'murdering' a fetus. Destroying a fetus without the mother's permission, yes. Murder, no.




No, its body is pretty well human by the time its brain develops.



And it doesn't matter a great deal what it *looks* like, but the fact is that it pretty much *functions* like a worm at that stage too. Primitive tube-like heart, virtually no central nervous system, not even reflex action to stimulus @ 5 weeks, IIrc.



except that heartbeat is meaningless in terms of both humanity and life.



No, an EEG is pretty unambiguous.



Technically, DNA is there before conception. It's even in unique combinations before conception. Heck, even the mutations are there before conception! For that matter, cancer cells have unique DNA.



So Catholics believe that identical twins share one soul between the two of them? Ouch.
Actually, Catholics have believed, when it was convenient, that ensoulment happened at 'quickening,' when the mother could feel the zef moving around.
http://www.religioustolerance.org/abo_hist_c.htm



We know from premature infants that normal EEGs don't appear until 25 weeks. Unless you can demonstrate any case where the brain suddenly changes in maturity with birth, that's pretty difficult to refute.



The fact that YOU don't know enough to be more exact than a heart beat does not mean that nobody knows. Embryology and neurology are growing in leaps and bounds, but you are claiming as 'unknown' things that have been doccumented for decades.



Yes, we do.



I don't know. It would be interesting to look into that.



Sometimes they are women who are trying to get pregnant, and are being checked every week (sometimes even several times a week) to see if they've succeeded. Other times they are women who come into the hospital for abdominal pain or cramping or 'discomfort' or 'feeling wierd.'



I come from a Catholic family, and no: you are not wrong. However, your idea that Catholics (any of them, anywhere) might be unaware of the teachings was...
... ? umm...
It's just really difficult to imagine that anyone who has gone to a single Catholic mass would be unaware of the Church's position. They harp on it constantly.



Of course not. Just a mother, three aunts, two grandmothers, and numerous friends, co-workers, and family contacts.



Firstly, it's not the whole religion, just the stance on birth control (and, for some, on the celibacy of priests). There's a heck of a lot more to Catholicism than that.
Seconly - Baptist!? Horrors! LOL
I assure you that that's not where a lapsed Catholic is likely to head. Maybe some do, but the first church of refuge would be Episcopalian. And many Catholics do make that switch.



There are a couple of problems with that statement.
First, raising families and running hospitals are two different things.
Second, it's not Catholics in general that don't know about raising families, just the celibate priests.
Third, I've already told you why I like working in a Catholic hospital: it's compassionate, it's non-profit, and they treat their employees well.



Religion consists of testable statements about the world and how it works. I'm not being any harsher about religious ideas than I would be about, say, global warming denial. Religion is just another form of idea, and ideas - even (especially!) important ones, can be debated. How about, for example, the Islamic idea that killing lots of innocent people along with yourself will send you directly to heaven, where you'll have a harem of virgins to have sex with for eternity, will-they or nill-they?
Pretty stupid, eh? Maybe even objectively evil? And yet that idea is sacred to many people.



...Through it? assuming that there's an end? Assuming that there will be sex again someday? Like maybe when the woman goes through menopause (and isn't interested in sex anymore)?

It may be a 'bad' marriage that can't survive with out sex, but it's also a marriage in line with the vast majority of marriages extant today. Probably the vast majority extant in the past, as well, given the divorce laws.



Sure, but if the couple discusses the issue and agrees on it together, it's a lot less likely to destroy a marriage than having no sex.



Got any data that an abortion that a married couple agrees on is going to doom their marriage?



Not everyone has the resources for a 'nursery.' Unless by 'nursery' you can mean a baby-sized cardboard box with an old blanket.



None of which will do any good if the pharmacist refuses to release the scrip for Plan B. Which they do.



They already have. Women have far more equality today than they used to have, and I for one am very grateful. I have never had an abortion, never need to even consider having one - but I am very grateful that the option would be there for me if I needed it. I am grateful that the option is there for other women. I only wish that bc was more readily available for more people.



Yay! something we agree on.



somewhere between 1-2%, IIrc. As far as laws go, though, it wouldn't change much; I would have an abortion if I became pregnant by rape whether it was legal or not, and I've spoken to other women who feel the same way.



I've heard about the situation in the military before; it's pretty disgusting. Is it true that you get a dishonorable discharge if you admit that you're pregnant (basically making women choose between getting an abortion off base or getting kicked out dishonorably)?! And the father gets no punishment?!



BS. Rape is not the Universe's punishment for having dared to imbibe alcohol, nor does it somehow give a rapist a 'right' to have sex with a woman without her permission. It was the rapist's decision, and the rapist's fault. NOT YOURS.
(that "BS" is in reference to the social attitudes that say that rape is somehow ok if the woman has had the audacity to want to have a casual drink in a social setting, not to your telling of the story).



As long as you were neither on duty nor planning on operating heavy machinery or weapons, there's nothing wrong with that.



Any form of birth control either has side effects or too high of a failure rate for me to be comfortable with. IUDs come in two forms: copper and hormonal. The copper one has no chemicals, but many women are allergic to copper and it also causes heavier menstrual periods. Since I already had heavy periods, my clinician recommended me away from that. The other one is hormonal, and works esentially like birth control pills; the difference is that it's releasing the hormone right in your gonads, so it doesn't take as much hormone and the hormonal side effects are smaller. It also basically stops your periods (yes! I love that part). The down-side is sort of like the down-side of being on bipolar medication for someone who's bipolar: no downs, but no ups either. None of the super-libido/ ovulating days. And it did hurt to put it in.



That wasn't the argument. Picking one's nose is 'natural,' but it has no emotional component so it's easy to learn not to do it.



It's entirely possible to love someone without wanting their children (or any children at all).



Mmmm don't know what to say about that, except that girl has some serious emotional issues.



Ok, those are options I didn't know about. I never saw jobs like that advertised when I was untrained and looking for work (luckily I wasn't desperate enough to need more than minimum wage). I have heard that hooking pays relatively well, but I don't know what the actual figures are. Maybe part of the allure is that it's inherently tax-free?



...and, as you've already mentioned, serious risk of rape by the men who should be her brothers.



It's not that it's necessary for 'a woman to keep her man,' but for the man and woman to keep each other. I don't know how many times I have to say that. Honestly, I have non-sexual but very rewarding relationships with some men, but none that I would call my boyfriend. Part of romantic love is sexual attraction, for women as well as men. If I'm not attracted to a man (ie, intersted in sex at least on a theoretical level), I'm not going to start dating him in the first place. He has to smell right. He has to have a modicum of personal grooming. He has to be reasonably intelligent. He has to be interested in me as well. And once I'm in a relationship, 'Honey, I love you but let's not have sex any more,' would be equivalent to 'I'm not attracted enough to you to have sex, and/or I've decided to become a celibate monk and earthly matters are only a distraction.' I would definately see it as a sign of disinterest and/or disrespect by the man if he didn't want sex within an established relationship.



Ok. Maybe a federal beauro could have prevented that whole thing with the FLDS raids last year.



In other words, that their dogma was more important to them than the welfare of children. I can't feel sorry for the church over that, though I do feel sorry for the kids.

Roaches have heartbeats too and that doesn't make them intelligent organisms.

Sorry if I'm pissing anyone off. Really.

Just so you know, I got a friend that's bi-polar, and she's far from a mild version of it. She is also adopted. She is also a great mom. She had two boys and a little girl. They discovered the little girl had a brain tumor when she was 6 months old, and my friend raised two boys, dealt with a lousy husband, and took care of her special needs daughter with very little to know income. When her daughter was two, her daughter passed away due to Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome, ARDS. During the autopsy, they discovered the brain tumor was completely gone. My friend stopped taking her medication for bipolar many years ago because at times she couldn't afford it, and other times, she decided it was too hard on her sleeping patterns and work schedule. Without medication, she took care of her boys who were very difficult in their time of grieving as well as grieved over her daughter's death, came up with the money to bury her daughter and coordinated a funeral, and now, she has found a good job with in home care and is divorcing her husband. For someone who is bipolar, my friend is the most emotionally strong person I know. Don't get me wrong. She isn't perfect. But she proves it's not impossible to raise kids while bipolar, and proves that you don't have to be like your parents. BTW, she was probably 19 years old when she got pregnant with her oldest son. And no, she wasn't living with mom and dad when that happened.

And forcing religions to follow laws against their dogma is a violation to their Freedom of Religion. Even in the article about Boston's shutting down of adoption services, adoptions to the same sex households accounted for like 4% of all their adoptions. It's not harming anyone to allow Catholics to run their charities the way they want to.

FOCA is an aggressive attempt to offset some of the Pro Life agenda, and it would make abortion a fundamental right no different than the right to religion or free speech. Yes, I've read the way it's written probably more than you have. I've also read many articles by many different types of people (PL and PC). Anyone who thinks they won't require Catholic hospitals to perform abortions is naive. You even proved it with your argument as to why Catholic Adoption Services should be placing kids in same sex homes. It harms us all if they don't. And that was up against a civil rights law. Try seeing it up against a fundamental right. People like you will then be saying if Catholic hospitals don't perform abortions, then it harms us more than helps us. Unless it's written they are exempt, then they will be forced into shutting down. The fact that Washington isn't jumping on the Catholic's concern (you don't think The Church is taking this quietly do you?) proves how much they really don't care if these hospitals are going stay open or not. The same people that "care so much" about your healthcare who don't care what the Catholics do are hypocrites.

First of all, children are not a punishment. Second, if the problem is sex ed, then that needs to be fixed long before pushing more irresponsible actions onto people. Where's your choice then? Oh, I got pregnant because my school's sex ed sucks, so I got pregnant because of my school, not because it was my choice. Then, I got an abortion because the school's sex ed sucks. Where's the accountability? Are we teaching kids to blame other people? Is that what you want?

Both men and women like sex, but I promise you at the age of 14 or 15, boys like it much more. Why is that age the one I target, because they are too young to deal with the responsibility associated with sex. Now if you are talking 30 year olds like you and I, well that's a different story. Hopefully with our age comes a little maturity to make responsible decisions with sex. Hopefully, people our age are mature enough to handle any outcomes of our sexual decisions, like taking care of the baby.

I'm not saying men should have rights on the matter since they can't get pregnant. I'm just saying that we can't forget about them in our decisions. If I had it my way in the case of my brother in law, I'd rather keep the kids and abort the mom. By your definition, she's pretty brain dead so it wouldn't be murder. Ha. But I'm not going to worry about it too much. A woman like that in Puerto Rico isn't going to have an easy life.

"Just because someone is stupid one time, though (perhaps, socially, less so!), does not mean that they should be forced to donate their entire body and nine months of their lives (at least) to producing an offspring that they didn't want." So you are saying if I went to Puerto Rico and killed the woman who aborted my niece and nephew, because I'm stupid with my lack of education to the Pro Choice, I shouldn't have to go to jail for murder? Forget murder. What if I beat her to an oblivion? Should I face assault charges?

No I don't think abortion is birth control. People may use it as such according to the statistics, but to actually say people use it as birth control is an insult to the concept of birth control. But my point was that abortion is the easy way out as opposed to growing up and taking care of baby, and it is. To compare it to whether or not to get the epidural are two totally different things.

Suffering is not morally valuable. Growing up and taking responsibility for your actions is very morally valuable.

Uneducated people do suffer for their lack of education. Or everyone who dropped out of high school would be doctors and lawyers. Information on birth control is widely available. Anyone with any common sense would know the doctor will know more about bc methods than their phys ed teacher.

We can try to mitigate punishment or try to reduce unwanted consequences for our actions. There's a big difference between that and blowing off responsibility.

It's about credibility of the source. My source came from a bias site, but that site didn't write my source. It was a research paper by a graduate student who is now a historian.

No I think the majority of the US perceive it wrong somewhere inside them, and they too easily dismiss that feeling. Why do I think this? Words like, Nobody is pro abortion. Well if it's that safe, and it's not murder, and there's nothing wrong with it, then you would be pro abortion, you'd want to see more of it.

Actually I do see very poor people without cell phones and dvd players, but I've never seen them in the states in modern day. If they are that poor, then they obviously didn't make their way down to the welfare office.

A cell phone is not a luxury item, when you are talking about a 20 dollar phone. But most people don't have a phone like that. No their phones have bells and whistles like MP3 Players, cameras, etc. If you are poor, then phone in of itself whether it's a cell phone or vonage should be a luxury. You don't need a phone to survive. It's nice in case of emergency, but it's not necessary for everyday survival. Many people survive fine without a phone.

As far as time difference back then and now...the Puerto Rico example is now.

On satan keeping your soul, I wasn't damning you to hell. I don't do that. I wrote on to mean for the now. It was figurative, not literal. But, you are selling out to worldy goods when you say that abortion is necessary because you could afford more worldy goods if you didn't have the baby. It's not because you disagree with me. I could care less if you ever agree with me. Anyone who thinks it's okay to kill their offspring to have a better life (or abort their child) is a sell out. No you didn't prove me wrong. That's a very hard thing to do, and if you ever do prove me wrong, I'm also the type of person to give you your props on it. Also, don't respond to this until you read further or you will be taking me out of context.

There is nothing wrong with desiring worldly goods. You don't think I don't have that xbox 360? No, the point is that I didn't give up any of my children or the possibility of children to get or keep my worldly goods. And I wasn't trying to say you were a sell out more than trying to point out maybe you aren't the type to sell out and maybe, as a result, your argument needs some revision.

Rape, incest, and health problems are the reasons Pro Choicers say "we need to have the option of abortion." Dramatically change my life was not one of the reasons once upon a time. Now it is because people abuse it, people allowed that abuse, and now, people are standing up for that abuse. No it's not a good reason. You are not talking about, oh I colored my hair blonde and I didn't like it so I changed it back. No this is a big deal. And it should not be treated like, oops, well lets have an abortion.

Nobody promotes abortion? You are. Planned Parenthood is. Access is saying, abortion should be available for cases like incest, rape, and health problems. Promoting is saying, it's also available if you are stupid, uneducated, lied to by Bush, or think it will dramatically change your life. And saying that it's okay to get an abortion no different than coloring your hair is doing a lot more to increase it than reduce it. Why else are abortion rates rising in the Pro Choicer's hands?

Abortion is not like a divorce. I know for a fact beyond a shadow of doubt if I divorce my husband, I am not killing a living being. Nobody can agree or define when life begins, and until that day, nobody knows for sure if abortion is killing a baby or just removing some unwanted cells.

you really cannot honestly make a statement like that until you have been in that situation yourself....it is impossible to imagine beforehand how you would feel if you were the one with the little pee-stick from a pregnancy test in your hand praying that the animal who assaulted you didn't get you with something.....you think you know what you would do, but you can't know until you're there exactly just what you can tolerate and what you cannot--like having the child of a monster growing inside of your body.

for those of you who are pro-life except for a few extreme circumstances like risk to the mother's life or the pregnancy being the result of rape, i have a question for you:

if it were up to you i imagine you would wish to make abortion illegal except in the above mentioned circumstances, so let's say that has happened. now you suddenly have droves of women claiming rape as the reason for their pregnancy and asking for abortion. obviously some of these women have other reasons but are applying under the rape clause b/c it is still legal....now here's the question--how do you determine who gets the abortion? does each woman need to somehow prove she was raped? what if she can't prove it and has no physical evidence other than the pregnancy itself? would she be denied then? and if she were denied, how many women would find themselves in the same position, where legally they should be able to abort if they choose to because they have been raped, but because they can't prove the assault they cannot have the procedure and are forced to carry the baby to term? does anyone else see the huge logistics problem here with making abortion only legal in particular circumstances? the moral consequences as well?

the woman has already been traumatised by a horrible violation--only to have another horrible violation (that of being forced to have a child inside her body for 9 months and the subsequent birth) imposed on her by her own government's legislature because she could not prove her assault occurred.

remember, you are asking the woman to carry to term a baby that is 50% made up of her rapist inside of her body, followed by the experience of having to push that child out of their body through the way the rapist got in....really think about the psychological consequences of what you are asking here when you say she should just carry to term and put it up for adoption, as if that would be an easy option to choose. it is our body. it is our choice. no government on earth has the right to take that choice from us.

Did you read the article you submitted?

Not to mention:



and



Does not sound like they are in total agreement, nor does it sound like they can measure EEG in the womb.

http://www.abortionfacts.com/fetal_deve ... l_pain.asp
The fact that people are debating over this shows clearly that we can't prove whether or not there is pain or not.

If the brain = pain, and nobody can agree when there is a brain, then nobody can agree or know when there is pain.

Your source is ambiguous when there are other proponents arguing when. All you cited was one proponent's argument. The other things you have to consider is pain an emotion? What defines pain? No, it's not all science or otherwise, when I walk into a doctor's office, they wouldn't ask me what my pain scale is on a 1-10 scale, but instead, they'd hook me up to a machine to accurately measure my pain.

So since you prefer a neurology over viability, then are you against FOCA?

So, since no brain = no personality = no person. That would also mean brain = personality = person. http://kidshealth.org/parent/pregnancy_ ... week6.html
So, then by week 6, the brain is growing rapidly, meaning there is a brain, meaning personality, meaning person.
Or do you mean a complete brain? Because the brain is still developing after birth.

Isn't that what a D&C is? It scrapes and then sucks? Or are you playing with the terminology to suit your interests no different than a pro life website calling the zef a baby or a pro choice website calling the zef a pregnancy. Just because I give something emotional interest doesn't make it wrong just as you can decide to remove the emotion interest. To me, there's a baby. To you, a zef. I could just as easily knock you for removing emotion from the term to make it easier for you accept abortion in your life.

You are not entitled to your own facts either. A brain starts forming pretty early on, so then there would be thought and feeling. Like I said before, nobody knows for sure. It's a debate. All you do is the same thing the Pro Lifers do, showing your side of the debate and calling it fact. At least I'm capable of acknowledging real fact by admitting that it's still in debate.

Science is not clear on the subject or nobody would be debating it. Nobody debates the earth is round because we finally proved that. Nobody debates that HIV is sexually transmitted because we proved that.

Even in love, even when asked, even when he seems credible, she is still taking a risk. How many people know they have STD's, especially men?

No I wasn't equating abortion with infanticide (although you took me out of context to make it sound like I did, thank you). No, I was using the logic in your example against your argument. So it was YOU who equated the two when you set forth said lousy logic and then again by pointing out that your logic was equated with infanticide.

yes it would be murder passed week 24 by your definition because that's when you said it's a person. To abort a person is murder.

Maybe the NOW needs to work on some things. Since if I were black, and I was discriminated against, I know to call the NAACP. They will help me with my particular case. But the NOW seems more of a liberal group focusing on women rather than being about women. It sounds like they are more about talking on my behalf in Washington about things I disagree with than helping me personally. Abortion is not a civil right.

So my mother's love is all hormones? No the difference is when a woman is pregnant early on, it's easier for her to to not recognize the life inside her because then, she can call it a zef, but when it's a baby in her arms, she realizes that she is holding her child and doesn't want to give that away. And all the sudden, all those things that she was afraid of about being a mom doesn't carry much weight with her child in her arms. Oh but the hormones make her decide that whatever reason she might think was reason enough to have an abortion is no longer a reason to not give a baby up for adoption.

Snort, if you can't argue it, then come up with a stupid cliche like straw man, or stop digging to get out of your hole. At least then you don't FEEL stupid.

It's not a separate being until it's born, but it's a person past week 26? Would please make up your mind? I'm sick of you switching definitions at the convenience of your argument.

Mirriam Websters Dictionary, the only real dictionary written first by Noah Webster. We weren't talking about whether to have abortions or not in this situation, but whether or not an abortion, by law the way it is defined now, would be child abuse. Child is also the unborn. Read the etymology of the word, something you didn't provide in your wikipedia definition which isn't anywhere as near credible as the Webster's dictionary. Scraping the child off the wall and sucking it out is abuse. The D&C abortion method would be child abuse unless someone wants to change the law on it. If the law wants to redefine a word, as it does all the time.. they are welcome to it. The law usually defines a child by "anyone who is under the age of 18" sometimes stating exceptions such as if they are married and so forth.

Again, you keep thinking about the pain thing because you fail to realize there are people debating against your opinion. Then you state your opinion as fact because it agrees with some, not all, scientists. Then you go on to condemn people who make up their own facts.

Since nobody knows what Dahmer was thinking, we'll leave all his decisions to himself instead of a bunch of old male politicians.

Mental distress is a normal treatable symptom of pregnancy. A third trimester abortion should not be an option for that.

No, see you miss the point. Abortion was about having it available in extreme cases. Now women are using it for other reasons too that are far from extreme. I'm starting to think you are arguing just to argue.

Me personally, I don't need a gun to kill someone. I just need God's grace and legal right of way. But speaking of guns, I'll be honest, I suck at aim with hand guns. I got left and right accurate, but the up and down gets me. With a rifle, I'm not great, but better than average (average when I'm about to pee myself as I learned in basic training). For whatever reason, on the hand gun, I do better with a 45 than a 22. I think because it's heavier with a bigger kick, I'm less apt to vear up and down so much some how. But, I'm so bad with a hand gun that it would be easier for me to break a neck than hit my target. I don't think I'm good at breaking necks either.

Antique revolvers jam easy. And if you are a trained fighter, then you know it's will that wins not training. I've taken down a few guys with lots of training, one even dumped me because he thought I was possessed by Satan. I have no real training. I win only because I'm freaking stubborn. I sometimes prefer the word strong-willed. But I will give you props. You're pretty strong willed too, so I'm probably guessing your abilities to defend yourself aren't empty ones.

I just once knew a girl who was stalked by a guy like that. I hated it when he'd call her cell when I was with her just to tell us where we were and an approximation as to where he was. I don't know why he stopped stalking her, but I figured who cares. He finally stopped stalking her. Now he wouldn't stand a chance on it because her last man who she can't get rid of bugs her phones and sets up cameras and such. He's like a CIA stalker type. I don't think he'll ever hurt her. He does it for control. They have a kid together, and he usually uses the info he gets against her in the custody battles, which all the more makes him a different threat.

Good point on the stalkers, especially the up close and personal thing.

I think we need better police and also more better police. It really depends on the area. Some areas police better than others. But I personally would rather see my tax dollars go to the police before seeing them go to gun control methods.

Snap, I wasn't too clear. I was thinking something without communicating it. When I say better laws to protect you, I mean removing the red tape that stops police from doing their job and protects the defense too much. I don't mean removing all privacy laws nor removing all rights to defend ourselves. But aren't you sick of seeing that drug dealer get out over an illegal search or something like that? There also has to be some law against stalking. Even threats. In Wyoming, I saw this kid being threatened by 5 boys a little older than him at a gas station. The clerk called the cops, and the cop said, it's only illegal to threaten the President.

I do agree about social standards.

Sorry I misunderstood you. I hate when I do that because I hate when it happens to me.

At 26 weeks, it looks human, but disfigured a bit at least by the 3D machine like the ultrasound. Maybe that's the machine more than anything.

Heartbeat is not totally meaningless to life. We have so many abstract figurative comparisons to it. We couldn't survive without the heartbeat. I agree, it may not be the most accurate definition to when life begins, but it is a measurable method which is what we need in law. Something measurable without bias. Until science can do better, we go with what we got. Don't even spit out the EEG thing again because again, it is useless to the womb. All the studies were done on premature births. Even then, the EEG pattern outside of the womb prematurely could possibly be different than inside the womb. Again, I repeat, POSSIBLY.

See, you just helped me prove DNA isn't a good option. I brought up Catholic definition because I knew you wouldn't think it was a good option either. Again the brainwaves, I stated my argument on that already.

Again, I've stated my case on how science doesn't know enough which has nothing to do with what I know personally. I'll admit, I don't know a whole hell of a lot about EEG's, but based on the information you provided me, there is a debate on when and what. There is a debate on definition of things and how things go. And EEG's can't be done inside the womb.

Thank you on it would be interesting to look into that. Irregardless of abortions, women need to find out sooner than later. They say the best time to increase folic acid intake is early in the pregnancy. And I hate the fact that I drank with my first child before I knew I was pregnant.

And your source of info on when women come in would be bias because women trying to have a baby to get tested weekly would know pretty early on. Women who are married and thinking, well if I get pregnant so be it, if not, so be it aren't going to be there that early. Women who aren't trying to get pregnant at all will wait even later. It's a very important issue to women who want to keep their babies for proper prenatal care.

I know the church harps on birth control constantly, but every Catholic Church has small differences. I promise you in Puerto Rico, it is very different than here in the states. In addition, every Catholic Church has their share of Catholics who go Christmas and Easter only. And I'm sure you are right that many women do think it's bull s**t. I'm not Catholic, but I think it's bull s**t. But if I were Catholic, and I thought it was bull s**t, and I took birth control, before Communion, I would go to Confession explaining that I am in sin for I disagree with the church for I take Birth Control.

Sorry about my snide remark about going Baptist. I'm a former Baptist, and I detest the Baptist religion. It was more a comment like my one about killing brain dead people. I was just being facetious.

On your job thing, I wrote that before I read what you said as to why. But those celibate priests play a major role in the Catholic Religion and Hospitals and Funding. But priests are more there for spiritual consultation rather than details on raising a family. The idea of a soul and spirit and birth control interfering with that would be their business.

You are more than welcome to debate religious ideas, but I try to respect things people hold sacred. It's about respecting other people. God is someone I hold sacred. And while I'm against some of the things extreme Muslims do in practice, I would never disrespect Allah. Now, if I were on a plane and I killed the terrorist, I might publicly wish them to get the Catholic treatment for their sins and request God judge them instead of reincarnation as I wish them judgement in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, but that would be the purpose of that. And I am no terrorist. But thank you for comparing my respect for God to a bunch of terrorists.

Through it. Well, marriage ends at death. So would no sex. I never said it was healthy for a marriage. I just said it shouldn't be a requirement for a good marriage. To be honest, it's quite personal. I have been raped.

As far as abortion destroying the marriage, the man has no right to the baby, so the couple doesn't have to discuss it right?

I don't know about a bunch of data, but here's an example. I'm sure it does not stand alone. My example isn't quite a marriage, but you can see how it would be no different in a marriage. My friend had a fiance, and they were together for years, and they got pregnant. She also had an abortion quite late into the term for when abortions go. Anyway, it did destroy their relationship. She did talk to him about it first. It was his decision equally. But he felt guilt, she got nightmares, and they broke up. They were perfect for each other with no problems until the abortion. She will tell you it was the abortion that destroyed her life because she still to this day wishes she was with him. After him, she got with the CIA stalker type.

I'm sure most of the abortions that have taken place would have been able to have a nursery far bigger than a cardboard box and an old blanket. Especially in the US where you can get on HUD, welfare, foodstamps, and go to places that sell used or gives away old cribs, pack n plays, etc.

If the pharmacists holds your script hostage, you call the police. That's what I would have done.

Abortions do not give women equality. That's a load.

I never said I thought there should be a ban on abortions. The fact that I know women will try to find abortions illegally is one of the reasons why. I also feel the same way about gun control.

No you won't get a dishonorable discharge if you are pregnant unless it's between an officer and enlisted because they had sex, not because they were pregnant. Even then, that's at worse case scenario as that happens and they don't all get dishonorable over it. Also, if they did, they would also have the option of having it overturned so many months out. If you are in basic training or tech school and get pregnant, you'd get a general discharge. They won't deploy you while you are pregnant, which is also why I don't want to tie my tubes. If they call me back in, I don't want to leave my children to blow up some things in Afghanistan. My plan of action is sex, sex, sex, and get pregnant. One of my female officers was pregnant more than not when I was in, and she did PT and all that pregnant. They even have maternity uniforms. But, the UCMJ has rules about sex. I can't remember all of them, and they aren't often enforced. I know oral sex is illegal in the military, and you have to have sex in the missionary position. So when I say they got enough rules to tell you how to wipe your ass, I'm not joking. That's what makes it harder because all those rules, they can find something from even the best of the best to kick them out over. But generally, they don't freak out over pregnancy. They also do offer paid maternity leave.

I don't think my irresponsibility should justify the rapist, but I think it was my fault on the count of common sense on my part. I was very stupid about things that night. I didn't deserve rape, no. But i try to learn from it. I dont' think it's fair that I can't get drunk and people mess with me while I"m that way, but such is life right?

I agree nothing wrong on the drinking thing, but in the military, it's moer like there's nothign wrong with drinking as long as you are of age and you aren't on standby as long as you don't get into trouble, because then that's an alcohol related incident. But my base was harsher on things than all bases.

"Picking one's nose is 'natural,' but it has no emotional component so it's easy to learn not to do it" LOL

It's also entirely possible to show someone your love without sex.

They do exist. I hate the fact that I used to always make fun of them because they probably needed a friend more than another enemy.

Combat pay is tax free too. And you increase your risk to rape by going to college, but that shouldn't be reason not to go.

Well, you were Catholic, you know in their mind, it's not that their dogma is more important than kids, but that kids are more important and should not be raised by sin to the extreme of homosexual homes. I personally know two women raising two girls, and their girls are two of the best behaved children I know. I also know that due to their lifestyle of choice, sometimes their children get some of the hell raised their way too. I think that's totally wrong, and most of that comes from your hidy tidy religious fanatics. So, yes, dogma is more important than welfare of children, but you see how their mentality is too. Either way, I think children are more important than a principle, and if we can increase adoption services all together, then that's what we do. Supplement state services with Catholic Services, and do it on the Catholic's terms if that's the only way it can get done.