A Serious Question: How is abortion anyone's business?
Over the last several months, there have been news reports of certain states trying to prohibit or severely restrict abortion rights, impose legal penalties for women seeking abortion, and even judicial interventions regarding the government's funding of health providers who also perform abortions. While such instances are not new, the current round of abortion arguments probably started with New York's Reproductive Health Act at the beginning of the year. While opinions about abortion are divided, there is one question that largely remains unanswered in all of this: How is abortion anyone else's business?
Seriously, how is a woman's choice seeking and/or obtaining an abortion anyone's business? We don't generally pry into another individual's medical health or health interventions. So why is abortion anyone's business or why does anyone think another person's abortion is their business? After all, no one cares if someone has cosmetic or other type of elective surgery. So why does someone suddenly care if a woman wants an abortion? It's simply none of their business.
Your thoughts?
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It isn't unless it hurts another human being. I'm fine with it until about 16th week. That's when the fetus can feel pain, biologically, unless the mother's health is in danger.
Sorry Perrie, but that is not quite accurate. According to Mark Rosen, an obstetrical anesthesiologist at the University of California at San Francisco ( Discover , 2005), "fetuses cannot feel pain until at least the 28th week of gestation because they haven't formed the necessary nerve pathways."
Also, according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), "The science shows that based on gestational age, the fetus is not capable of feeling pain until the third trimester (as cited in LiveScience , 2016).
I totally disagree with that doctor, as would most doctors who work in a NICU. I saw babies delivered alive and well and feeling and responding at 23 weeks. That is not a magic threshold. Put one of those babies flesh to flesh and watch them respond. This is not just autonomic responses.
We can only guestimate when this transition happens since most testing on such delicate babies would be unethical, so I don't know where that doctor got his 28-week number from.
That's why i cited 2 sources.
I'd guess from intrauterine medical procedures. I'm sure there is research articles on it somewhere out there.
I'm with Perrie on this. My daughter is a NICU nurse and I'm pretty sure she will tell you that preemies born at 24 weeks feel pain
This should be a settled issue by now: abortion is a woman's right to choose and no one else's business! Period! One might even say, "go mind your own business!"
I think it stops being your own business when it hurts another person. There has to be mitigating reasons to take such a drastic action so late in a pregnancy.
Most women have abortions early in pregnancy. But they are generally allowed up to the point of viability (23-24 weeks gestation). After that, it's considered "late," and is only allowed for medical reasons. Elective abortion up to viability seems reasonable.
So Gordy...please tell us why you are making this your business?
How am I making it my business? I'm not telling anyone what they can or cannot do. I have no say in anyone else's decisions. I have said it's no one's business. I asked how it was anyone's business. I thought that was clear.
Totally agree. Those who feel it is their right to stick their nose in other's business have waaay too much self-importance of themselves. They should pay as much attention to their own business, as it is very likely their own lives are lacking in some ways that they can't bring themselves to deal with.
And if anyone thinks that a woman having an abortion is a no-hum event for them, they are totally misguided and very heartless, as that is so very not the case. And those who have abortions have a good reason for having them, which in no way requires them to seek the opinion or approval of anyone else.
So....in other words, "Butt the H out of their business and clean up your own life before you think you have the right to condemn others".
It is NO one's business what a woman chooses to do with an unplanned pregnancy.
Exactly!
Perhaps better "planning" or taking some common sense precautions?
The question remains: how is that your business? What a person does or chooses to do is none of your business! Besides, precautions are not 100% effective either.
There is NO birth control that is 100% effective or are you that obtuse.
oral sex.
100% effective against birth
ya gotta think outside the box.
cheers
That's not birth control. That's more like foreplay.
Guess I shouldn't point out that I found 2 methods that worked both individually and in unison then as a method of BC, first one was choosing to be sterilized , and the second was abstinence , used the first for 16 years with no pregnancies resulting , and have used the second with the same results , end result has been there have been no pregnancies I caused .
Sterilization is great and should be promoted. Abstinence is just plain unrealistic.
That you are aware of. Your partner may have terminated.
well for most it would be unrealistic , me , im going on 9 years celebate , by choice.
Well , that's a given and is a matter of trust between partners in a marriage , I would add that the sterilization procedure I went through , which consisted of removal of a considerable portion of the ducts , then cauterization , and then folded over and tied back onto itself , this all made sure the ends would not grow back together and produce an oops baby. now IF , and we are talking about an EX wife here , she did terminate , I can say with almost 100% assuredness ( 99.999999>% actually) that the pregnancy wasn't mine. or caused by me. but that would lead to other trust issues ….
So you were a virgin when you were sterilized?
WOW, where did that come from?
I will get a little personal here, the ex and I married young , she went through a number of miscarriages before the birth of our first daughter , she was the one that wanted 12 kids ( yeah youthful exuberance on her part , I was just happy to have kids) well we ended up having 3 kids , and each of the births were bad on her and the complications got worse with the more we had and I would not risk loosing her in childbirth with anymore pregnancies. I talked with her and decided that due to health and risk , it was more economical and ethical if I went and got sterilized so that WE didn't risk her health, couple the fact it was an in and out same day dr visit for me vs in hospital procedure for her, the logical choice was , me getting the procedure. It is a choice I do not regret , and would do again in the same circumstances .
You said that the end result of your abstinence & sterilization is that you have not gotten anyone pregnant (unintentionally). So you have only ever slept with your spouse - I get that - Sorry if I offended. And I actually commend your decision for your wife's benefit.
No offense taken, and your right , I wasn't a virgin when I married and she was not my only sexual partner before marriage, way I see it I dodged a lot of bullets on that front to never be approached with a paternity suit at that point in my life,
and to tie it all back into the subject of the article , if a couple are in a committed relationship , though ultimately its the womans choice , inside that relationship , just as the choice I made , it wasn't solely only one persons choice , there should be discussion between the two, but no one else. not government , not religion , not society,no one else but the 2 actually involved. where it goes from there is up to them.
I agree, but that is not the way things are going in this country and that scares me.
Thank you for the discussion. Have a good weekend.
Unless you are a woman, or a doctor, it is not, in any way, your call to give advice to one.
Me too....put me down for 57 minutes.
Congratulations. But I'd say you're a rare exception. Or is it exceptional? Or both?
One problem is, many doctors might be unwilling to perform female sterilization, especially if a woman is young and/or with no kids, as she may "change her mind" and then bring a lawsuit against the doctor.
A past coworker was married to a man who'd had a vasectomy years before they met, so they never used any other contraceptive. His brother had a vasectomy done by the same doctor, and the brother's wife became pregnant. She must be cheating, right? Nope - they had a paternity test done, and the child was his. My coworker's husband found out by having a sperm count done that his vasectomy also hadn't been effective - he and my coworker had just been lucky, probably because she was approaching menopause.
The most responsible people still find themselves in circumstances they've done everything possible to avoid.
I also wish people would shut the hell up about contraception. Ain't none of their business if a woman wants to prevent pregnancy (traditional family values my ass)
Contraception is not the topic.
It's not, but his point still stands regardless: "Ain't none of their business...."
and what if, we are making it our business?
if women want to kill their babies that is legal and they can pay for it themselves.
when they use our taxpayer dollars? we will make it our business like it or not.
Taxpayer dollars do not go towards abortions. I thought that was well understood by now.
bs
the hundreds of millions in government dollars planned parenthood receives are fungible , acting to free up other dollars which would normally be used for salaries, facility rent, and general overhead.
It is well understood by those who have the ability to understand.
Apparently, not everyone understands. Or refuses to.
Oh...but it comes up every time the abortion subject comes up. I actually saw an NT'er say that contraception was one of the causes of the decline of traditional family values along with abortion and feminism
I dunno...I think contraception actually helps with the idea of traditional family values.
Planned Parenthood cannot use government funding towards elective abortions.
The Hyde Amendment says otherwise.
Or who are here to have an intellectually honest discussion of facts.
So just to be clear you are stating that taxes are not used to fund abortions
Wow that's a change, last time I looked that sort of thing was definitely illegal
Aren't you the one that touted better planning? Contraception plays a big part in just that. Now you say it is not the topic?
Either way, it is none of your business what a woman does with her body. Period.
Duh then why did you say taking precautions above and better planning? Duh
Psst... Trout is a gal... Split tail...
Abortions are not funded by taxes....it's illegal.
I think I knew that, lol. But my mistake.
I think I can guess whom you refer to. Lol
Ignorance for some is bliss, for others, it is just status quo. And it's not that hard to figure out which one is which.
if ya want to get all scientific about it...
"the human life cycle" starts at conception and ends with death. while everything in the middle is "human life"
at what point in that human life cycle one can end that life cycle and not go to jail for murder has always been up for debate regardless of how "settled" the issue might be at the moment.
zygote, fetus, infant, baby, rug rat, teenager, adult, old fuk. is all just semantics to hide the fact we are talking about human life.
somehow, I think the question is much bigger than, "can they feel pain"
if "pain is the only defining line? anesthesia can be the only answer required.
and the debate rages on
You put too much emphasis on "human life." Those stages might be part of the "human life" cycle, but equating a zygote (a single cell) or embryo to an actual fully developed and bornot individual is silly. But the question isn't about what the "defining line" is. It's how is one person's abortion choice anyone else's business?
The same people who rage about human life don't ever seem to have problems with waging wars
Indeed.
and you put too little emphasis on human life.
Not at all. Once you're born, you're an individual with established rights and protections. I don't get emotionally irrational over a clump of cells in various stages of gestational development.
is a person considered born if the toes on one foot are still in the birth canal?
partial birth abortion = look it up.
that is currently the line... and that line can be moved.
Wrong! Partial birth abortion is not performed unless the woman's health is at risk or there is fetal demise. Late enough into gestation, an induced birth or C-section is performed.
again. more bs.
a dead baby would not need to be killed.
a miscarriage is not called an abortion for a reason
and if the moms life is at risk, instead of removing the baby and letting it live, how does killing the baby help mom get well?
Brenda Pratt Shafer, a registered nurse from Dayton, Ohio, assisted Dr. Haskell in a Partial Birth Abortion on a 26-1/2 week (over 6 months) pre-born baby boy. She testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee (on 11/17/95) about what she witnessed.
According to nurse Shafer, the baby was alive and moving as the abortionist “delivered the baby’s body and arms – everything but the head. The doctor kept the baby’s head just inside the uterus. The baby’s little fingers were clasping and unclasping, his feet were kicking. Then the doctor stuck the scissors through the back of his head, and the baby’s arms jerked out in a flinch, a startle reaction, like a baby does when he thinks he might fall. The doctor opened up the scissors, stuck a high-powered suction tube into the opening and sucked the baby’s brains out. Now the baby was completely limp.”
She would die or be irreparably injured because of another medical condition if the pregnancy was continued to term.
Elective late-term abortion was banned by the SCOTUS in 2003.
[Removed]
Actually, it is. A spontaneous abortion.
Indeed. And there are those in the WH that prefer to engage in warfare, be it verbal or military. And they say the Dems are the War Hawks.
Where do you get the "human life cycle starts at conception" Please explain
biology 101
it is nothing new, look it up.
or find another link on your own.
Perhaps you should take you own advice and take a course in biology. Conception is merely the joining of a sperm and an egg. There is no human life at that point.
This is my business for the same reason it should have been the average German citizen's business concerning Jews. What kind of society do we want to be? The kind that is indifferent to human life?
A society that respects the rights and freedoms of its citizens.
All citizens....
The Department of Health and Human Services’ final rule protects both employers and employees. The rule protects providers, individuals, and other health care entities from having to provide, participate in, pay for, pay for coverage of, or refer for, services such as abortion, sterilization, or assisted suicide to which they might have religious objections.
The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more >>
The rule also requires applicants for federal funding from HHS to demonstrate compliance with protecting conscience rights. The rule goes into effect after 242,000 public comments were submitted.
“Finally, laws prohibiting government-funded discrimination against conscience and religious freedom will be enforced like every other civil rights law,” HHS Office of Civil Rights Director Roger Severino said in a written statement.
“This rule ensures that health care entities and professionals won’t be bullied out of the health care field because they decline to participate in actions that violate their conscience, including the taking of human life,” Severino added. “Protecting conscience and religious freedom not only fosters greater diversity in health care, it’s the law.”
Living in accordance with one’s conscience is a fundamental American principle, said Melanie Israel, a research associate with The Heritage Foundation.
“No person or entity should face discrimination or coercion for declining to participate in procedures, such as abortion or physician-assisted suicide, that violate sincere moral, ethical, or religious beliefs,” Israel said in a prepared statement. “The Trump administration’s final rule is a much-needed action to protect individual liberties and robustly enforce federal conscience statutes.”
She added:
Save your political platitudes for your own discussions! It has no value or purpose here and is off topic!
Wow KAG when you deflect you really go balls out.
No, an individual's personal medical decisions is none of your business, just as your personal decisions is no one else's business! And trying to equate one's personal choices to Nazi Germany is quite the false equivalency! This is a society that respects (or should respect) individual rights, liberty, and autonomy.
No IT'S NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS WHATSOEVER.
What a woman does with an unplanned pregnancy is NONE of your business.
So you are saying that a zygote is human life. What science gave you that
it is, every biology teacher in the world will tell ya the same thing.
ever hear of the sophist argument? lemme save ya some time...
the sophist argument is = intelligent, tricky and meant to deceive.
and always starts with a false or misleading premise.
by simply asking, when does human life begin? one attempts to escape the boundaries of actual science into a world of semantics and personal conjecture. when it feels pain, when it thinks, when it breathes air. which is all complete bs. hell, some people say life does not truly begin until we are 30 or 40yrs old. some say "life" begins at retirement. (I'm in this camp)
however, when one asks when does the human life cycle begin? ya get this...
they call that science, which is taught in every serious biology class in the world.
I am a sophists nightmare.
cheers
A biology (or embryology) teacher will say a zygote is a single, fertilized, undifferentiated cell (unlike other actual differentiated cells in the body) which marks the beginning of gestational development. In humans, it's a human zygote, just it would be a cat zygote in cats, dog zygote in dogs, ect.. But that is a far cry from calling it human as an equivalent. A zygote is less differentiated than the skin cells I scratch off my @ss when I have an itch. So to equate a zygote with an actual developed, born human is not only erroneous, it's dishonestly misleading and probably an appeal to emotion.
A broad question which can invoke many philosophical discussions, but is otherwise irrelevant to the topic of discussion.
Abortion is as much of a right as getting a haircut or shaving
OK so after reading this thread, I am very discouraged that there can be a civil discussion on this.
While I wholeheartedly support being pro-choice, and I do agree that it's a woman's right to decide whether or not to continue a pregnancy, at some point, there is another being's right involved. I feel when there is absolutism about abortion it doesn't help the cause but hurts it. People point to it being immoral and it is immoral to kill another human being, and at some point, the fetus does become a whole person and it is before birth.
I can get on board if the mother's life is in danger, but not otherwise.
Abortion will always be a hot-button issue.
I think abortion should be allowed up to the stage of viability...typically 15-20 weeks. I get really squeamish after that. However, if the life of the mother is in danger, I'm stepping back and declare none of my business
Actually Trout, viability is about 23-24 weeks. At that point, abortions are generally not allowed except for medical necessity.
Ok....but I carried 2 babies. One started kicking right around 20 weeks, the Boy started kicking right around 16 weeks
This is all just anecdotal evidence, mind you, and strictly my opinion
The threshold of viability is accepted to be 23 weeks, yet there is this case:
James Elgin Gill (born on 20 May 1987 in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada) was the earliest premature baby in the world, until that record was broken in 2014. He was 128 days premature (21 weeks and 5 days' gestation) and weighed 1 pound 6 ounces (624 g).
Which means that baby had personhood. This is a very important fact to establish.
I'd say that is an exception rather than the rule, and a very rare case too. But "personhood" is conferred to at birth. That's never been in question.
You're discouraged there's a civil discussion abut this? As opposed to uncivil?
There will never be civil discussion on this subject. When terms like "baby killers' and 'murder" are tossed in. Both are used to inflame. That does not lead to civility.
Hi Gordy,
Maybe it's my fault in the way I said that, but what I am looking for is common ground so that people who protest against choice, don't point to extremist POV from the pro-choice people.
Of course not. And that is what I am trying to avoid.
Thanks for clarifying. But I've noticed some on the pro-life side lean more towards extremism, as they become increasingly emotional and less rational on the issue. This is evident when someone calls pro-choicers "baby killers" or equate abortion as "murder," ect.
Here is your civil discussion.
Views on abortion come down to beliefs about when exactly "at some point" happens. Those beliefs differ.
Abortion opponents tend to believe that "at some point" is at conception. This is also why they object to certain kinds of contraceptive devices, which they believe disrupt a pregnancy after conception. To them, any abortion is infanticide.
"Pro-Choice" supporters believe "at some point" comes somewhere later that conception.
That's the entirety of the argument. It's really very simple.
But people tend to be irrational and emotional (consider most of the comments on NT). Frequently, those feelings that cause the irrational/emotional vitriol are rooted in some entirely unrelated issue that they themselves cannot address and confront, much less share...so they go a bit batshit on other topics.
Beliefs themselves tend to be emotional and irrational. And yes, it does cause some people to go batshit. But they only apply to the individual who has them. It doesn't answer the question at the heart of this discussion: how is abortion anyone else's business?
I agree.
If our society allowed mothers to kill their children up to age 3, would you consider that a problem? Age 10? BTW, the fathers would have no say in this, nor any way to protect their children.
In the minds of those who believe life begins at conception, that's how they see abortion. The murder of a child not even old enough to dirty a diaper and with zero consideration for what that child's father may want or feel.
That's how it becomes "everyone's" business.
Legally life begins when the fetus becomes a baby living independently of the mother's body at birth. Your own bible in Genesis 2:7 says that life begins when we breathe air at birth.
Your idea would open up a perilous legal quandary at the end of life as well, so I doubt that you would want to cross that line.
That is a conservative religious belief that is unsupported by medical science so like other religious beliefs it only applies to the person holding it to be true. Your religious beliefs do not apply to the bodies and lives of other people because they have their own equal religious.
The concept of the separation of church and state prevents the government from ending one religious belief above others or from endorsing religious belief over not belief.
Hence the Pro Life objection to the current law.
If they were sacrificing trans virgins...and it was legal.... I suspect you would feel just like they do.
It's not my idea, and I'm not sure I even support it. It's been explained to me by sane, rational people, so I thought I'd offer that insight per Perrie's request.
I didn't ask you to believe it, don't care if you believe it, and would be positively gobsmacked if you did.
The fact is that other people believe differently than you do, and your normal practice of continually re-stating your beliefs while telling them they're ignorant isn't actually going to change their minds.
Keep your religious beliefs out of the bodies of others and I don't care what you believe in. If you don't like abortion then didn't have one, unless you also want me to legislate my religious beliefs on your body.
They're not actually my beliefs.
But you don't care what I believe in anyway. You clearly have very limited interest in understanding any views but your own.
Are your feelings hurt that I don't concern myself with your religious beliefs?
Try me. Would you like to discuss them or do you just want to complain that I don't think that I understand them?
Utterly indifferent.
I've explained them, and explained that they're not actually my views. You responded with a standardized angry liberal bumper sticker.
These people disagree with you on when life begins. They're not going to agree with you, and you're unlikely to agree with them. Given their initial assumption, the rest of their beliefs follow as logically as an algebraic proof. Given your initial assumption, your beliefs follow as logically as an algebraic proof. What doesn't follow is each side's intolerance for each other.
You do like personal attacks.
What exactly are your religious beliefs? I have laid mine out for all to see and to criticize many times.
I am tolerant of their religious beliefs, until the point where they try to use them to trample the equal religious beliefs and secular rights of others. If defending different beliefs of others from being trampled by one group makes me intolerant, then yes I am intolerant of the religious beliefs of others.
They can believe whatever they want to but they cannot force me to obey their religious beliefs as secular law. We cannot have equal religious rights for all people if any one group has the power to legislate their religious beliefs and force other religions to follow them, despite the latter groups differing religious beliefs.
I never said that they cannot believe that abortion is wrong, but their belief that abortion is wrong only applies to members of that church/religion as they choose to do so. Other religions and the non-religious have equally valid beliefs on abortion and in the eyes of the state, all are equal because the separation of church and state that keeps the actions of the government neutral on social and political issues that stem from religious belief. I have no doubt that you also have a very different interpretation of what the separation of church and state idea means and where that line is drawn by the federal courts
I treat people how they treat me.
I am a Christian. I am also very much a moderate.
The ones you have already attempted to argue in this seed?
You mean your beliefs. If they were trying to trample child marriages or human sacrifice, I doubt you'd mind. You start to voice objections when their beliefs differ with yours.
They would argue that you are attempting to force them to do exactly that.
Interesting. Today's liberalism has all the hallmarks of a religion, and liberals have no reservations at all about making everyone else do what they want.
Liberals frequently attempt to outlaw the practices of other religions. There are bills in several states to raise the minimum marriage age to prevent various religious sects from marrying their daughters off at 15.
Not as different as you might imagine.
When have I addressed you with an ad hominem attack ?
What Protestant Christian sect are you a member of because I doubt that you are either Catholic or Eastern Orthodox, unless you are you Mormon?
They have the guaranteed right to worship and believe as they wish, as long as they do not try top legislate their religious beliefs as secular law. I have the right to disagree with them and to live as I wish because I have free speech rights as well as equal religious and secular right even if my views are drastically different from yours or theirs.
This is a very strange statement from you . Neither of these actions is a religious or secular right. Children are not adults and they have limited rights until they turn 18. I doubt that the person being sacrificed was doing so willingly or in their right mind, if they claimed to be doing it willingly.
How am I forcing them to do anything because I am denying them the right to trample the equal rights of others. This is neither moderate or reasonable.
Do you see yourself as part of an interconnected and interdependent society? The idea that we must solve common problems in a way that benefits the greatest common good is not in any way a religious idea.
Can you give me an example of religious practices that are being outlawed by liberals?
Do you support arranged marriages between adults and minors? A minor is not an adult and they must be protected until they reach 18 and can make that decision themselves instead of having it forced on them.
Considering some of the views that you have expressed in this response, I think that our views are very different.
Has this been suggested?
I'm not really interested in ludicrous "what if" scenarios.
That's their own belief and their own problem. That view doesn't apply to everyone, nor does it mean another person's view and decision is any of their business!
There is no murder in an abortion.
Wrong! It's certainly not my business. Neither is it yours or anyone else's.
I've lost count of the number of times you've told me I "cannot comprehend" something or "refuse to educate myself", simply because I disagree with you. For the record, my previous comment was not a personal attack.
I am a Baptist, but not a Southern Baptist. I don't agree with most of their social positions.
Child marriage actually is still legal in many states. The point is that many laws in the US are passed based on religious objection or endorsement. But liberals don't mind those because the restrictions are consistent with liberal ideology.
In their eyes, there is no distinction between abortion and infanticide. In their view, you are forcing them to accept the murder of innocent children.
I agree. However it frequently doesn't stop there. For many liberals, adherence to liberal ideology is how they define right from wrong and good people from bad. In their minds, one cannot be a good person if they oppose abortion or higher tax rates or if they refuse to bake a cake. The devout of their sect fixate brainlessly on the preferred "solution" of their religious leader and refuse to question anything that person says.
There are bills in the process right now in many states to eliminate child marriages, which are still practiced among certain Muslim fundamentalists. We've already been through the drama of the ACA requiring Catholics to pay for birth control and fundamentalist Protestants to pay for "abortifacients".
Conservative Christians also point to the aggressive persecution of the Colorado Baker by liberal officials within the Colorado State government culminating in a widely misconstrued SCOTUS decision, California clinics being forced to advertise low cost abortions, and the Obama executive order on LGBT employment.
And before you ask another idiotic and offensive question, I hire gay people, we have gay clients, our gay clients refer us to other gay clients, and we get paid handsomely to help our other clients create inclusive workplaces.
I don't, but not for the reasons you imagine. The vast majority of these marriages are "barely adults" marrying "almost adults", like an 18-year-old boy marrying his 17-year-old high school sweetheart. That's a stupid decision, and the chances of that marriage lasting a lifetime are exceedingly small, so I don't have a problem raising the minimum age.
Be honest. You're clearly not really interested in considering views on this that disagree with your own.
I'm open to any view. But If such "views" are clearly way out there or illogical or irrational, then why should they be considered? And let's keep views on track with the topic, and not on "what ifs."
Being open to considering different views does not mean one must agree to false equivalences.
Well opposition to abortion has been the prevailing view in western civilization for most of its history, so I think we can rule out "way out there".
Many people with strong feelings on the subject refuse to acknowledge any logic in the other side of the argument... which is really silly.
Anti-abortion arguments are based on a religious belief and emotion, which is the lack of logic or fact. You have the right to believe that but you cannot claim that those view is founded on logic or science.
They can claim that abortion and infanticide are the same, but logic and the law says otherwise. Why is it that they feel that they must force their own religious beliefs on others who also have their own views on science, the law, and religion? Do they not feel that others are able to hold opposing religious beliefs? I am not asking for their approval because I don't care but they must keep their religious beliefs off of the bodies of others. They certainly have the right to their beliefs but their beliefs end at the end of their nose where the equal beliefs of others begin. Nobody is saying they they must have an abortion or that they must agree with others who do or who do support the right of women to make their own choice but somehow they seem to believe that their religious beliefs supersede the religious beliefs and the secular rights of others.
It's a bit more nuanced than that.
According to whom? Good article with facts about the history of abortion in the US at link below...
I was referring more to your aforementioned what-if scenario. But abortion has been more or less accepted and practiced in the past.
I haven't seen much logic from the pro-life side of the argument. Mostly just religious based tripe or appeals to emotion.
They are absolutely as logical as you are. That's quite obvious to the objective observer.
Logic says no such thing. The law currently says otherwise, but that hasn't always been the case. The illogical people are those who attempt exceptions, like John McCain's opposition to abortion except for rape or incest. Now....if this man believes life begins at conception, then these exceptions make no sense. We would not condone the killing of a child once it's born under those circumstances, so it's incredibly bizarre that McCain would condone it on a pre-natal basis. Either the fetus is a child or it's not. If it's a child, it has all the rights before it is born that it has after.
I'm not sure how many times and ways I need to explain that they see abortion as murder before you actually start to respond like you comprehend what that means.
Correct. Nobody is saying you must murder a child. So do you then accept that murdering children is OK and you should mind your own business and not try to shove your morals down everybody else's throat?
I doubt very much that you do. Yet you attempt to make the exact same point to them.
It's not a what-if scenario. It's an illustration of how abortion opponents view the subject.
They believe life begins at conception. Therefore they believe a fetus in the second trimester has as much right to life as a child in the second year.
You haven't seen much logic from either side of the argument. It was abandoned long ago in favor of emotion and vilification. There are more votes in emotion and vilification than there ever will be in logic.
The reality is it's all subjective which is why it's so hard for us to agree on what is and isn't murder. If you shoot someone in the head, we assume "Murder", but if that person was holding a gun threatening to shoot a room full of children, the sniper's not a murderer, they're a hero. If you put a plastic bag over someones head till they suffocate, that's "Murder", right? But what if it was a terminally ill loved one who lived in excruciating constant pain and begged their spouse or best friend to help them end their suffering? And if a gunman was holding a woman hostage, gun to her head, we wouldn't call killing him "murder", so what if its a fetus threatening a woman's life? Late term abortion to save the life of the mother is nothing other than self defense.
I understand very well how many religious Americans have been taught to believe a magical "soul" is created at conception, but not only is their zero evidence of a soul existing at all, there certainly is no evidence one is created at conception. For all anyone knows, if there is one it started with the woman's egg or the mans sperm so virtually every young boy going through puberty might be a mass murderer if you believe in souls.
My point is, anyone can have whatever religious beliefs they want, that should be immaterial to our civil laws. At the moment the law draws the line at viability with exceptions for rape, incest or the life of the mother, and no one is being forced to get abortions, so no one has to violate their faith in allowing other women to have a choice.
You have a bad habit of attempting to turn reality on its head. You declare belief and emotion to be logic and then try to say that logic is their equal and somehow expect us not to notice what you continue to do. Calling your arguments a strawman just doesn't accurately describe your actions. Your bombastic proclamations are very predictable but they are far from convincing.
A fetus is not a child but it has the potential to become a child after 40 weeks of gestation when it is living independently of the mother's body. You don't seem to accept that a woman does not surrender her constitutional rights to your church, to conservative politicians or to the fetus when we get pregnant. We are still people with all of our same rights when we are pregnant. We are not and do not become simply ambulatory vessels to gestate a zygote and then a fetus to term and that surrender our constitutional rights because a instant pregnancy test had positive result. We are much more than a vagina, uterus and ovaries.
You are now trying to declare that abortion is murder, despite facts to the contrary. Is the demand that others have the right to make the best decision for themselves instead of having it forced on them by religious people like yourself or conservative politicians having others morals forced down your throat? Do yo think that you have the right or the power to determine what secular rights others enjoy because of your beliefs as a man or as a baptist?
Agreed.
Saving the life of the mother would be the only McCain exception that makes sense.
They argue that the DNA of a child is established at conception. Personally, I don't know enough about that to support or refute it.
I understand that is your belief, and I understand how you arrive at it. Do you understand (not agree...simply understand) how they arrive at theirs?
I do. My family are hardline evangelicals as I myself once was, staunch anti-choicer's, and I've had many debates about this. It wasn't until my second marriage and our first pregnancy that I was really invested in the debate as the doctors believed it to be a cluster pregnancy that might not have turned viable and may have been just a mass of deformed dead cells that would have to be removed or my wife's life could be at risk. Thankfully, we had a good doctor and we discussed our options, chose to wait and see a little longer because we were only at about 6 weeks and we had time to terminate if it wasn't viable. Fortunately, we waited and had a healthy baby girl who just turned 10.
But without that option, without that choice, it could have gone very wrong and I might have lost my wife to religious zealots demanding their right to strip my wife and I and every other Americans of our choices forcing us to obey their faith.
That is something that should never EVER happen in a secular society, where the religious extremists can force their faith, force compliance on others just because in their minds they've already decided who God is and what God wants regardless of anyone else's beliefs.
So while I fully understand and respect how they arrive at their conclusions, and would never try to keep them from applying it in their own lives, where I disagree is where they think their conclusions should be universally applied to others who vehemently reject their unproven faith and everything associated with it.
Your version of reality, possibly. Maybe you need to examine it more closely.
Cite me. Which means you'll need to read it again. Which will hopefully help you recognize what I actually said.
We all understand that you believe that. Do you understand that other people don't?
No matter how many times you go on these bizarre batshit rants where you presume to know what I believe....often despite my direct statements to the contrary... I never quite get used to it. I am used to your consistent practice of angrily vilifying everyone who holds views differing to yours.
Do I just need to stop using metaphors or hypothetical situations with you? Serious question. You seem to take everything very literally.
But to the point.... you know how you absolutely hate the idea that religious people might be able to force you to conform to their beliefs? They think the same thing about you. They see this issue as you forcing them to accept legal infantacide without objection. That's their view. You don't have to agree with it, I don't expect you to agree with it, I'm not even defending it. I'm simply explaining how they see things.
So I want you to imagine a terrible thing that one person might do to another and use that hypothetical as a way to understand (not agree with...just understand) their position.
If we lived in a country where things like slavery or rape were legal, you would not accept the very statements you offer. You telling them "if you oppose abortion, don't have one" would be the equivalent in that scenario to them telling you "if you oppose slavery, don't own one" or "if you oppose rape, don't rape people...but don't force the rest of us to abide by your values". You would never accept such an argument and would work night and day to abolish rape and slavery. That's how they feel about abortion and the defense of it.
Now, do you understand the concept of hypothetical examples well enough to process the fact that they don't actually want to own slaves or rape people?? Does that require some sort of further clarification?
So a statement like "If our society allowed mothers to kill their children up to age 3, would you consider that a problem? Age 10? BTW, the fathers would have no say in this, nor any way to protect their children," is not a what if? People are actually advocating for that?
Then their views is quite warped I'd say.
They can believe whatever they want. But their beliefs apply only to them, and no one else. Nor should their beliefs be forced on anyone else. Besides, belief does not equal fact. If they believe abortion is so bad and life begins at conception, ect., then they are free not to have an abortion if they do not want to. They don't get to make that determination for anyone else! Neither is anyone else's decision in such maters any of their business!
I see that far more from the pro-life side.
Not even a little. Belief and emotion is not logical! Calling abortion "evil," "sinful, " murder," and declaring abortion to be murder or describe those who provide and obtain abortion as "baby killers/murderers," as the pro-life side so often does, is the very definition of emotional response. There's no logic in it, especially when such declarations is factually and legally incorrect!
The law says abortion is a legal medical procedure. Logically, it is therefore a private matter with an individual and their care provider and no one else's business.
I tend to agree.
A fetus is not a child and has no rights pre-birth, and certainly none which trumps the woman's rights.
I know they see abortion as murder. But they are clearly wrong in that view. Not to mention such views is emotionally driven itself.
A false equivalency. Murder is illegal and children are recognized as individuals. Abortion is not murder and neither is an embryo/fetus considered a child (regardless of one's own personal feelings about it).
That's all I'm looking for.
The more we understand how people arrive at their conclusions, the more tolerant and intelligent a society we become.
It boils down to it's the womans' choice and no one else.
So you favor abortion up to the moment of delivery?
Says a lot about your values.
Do not make this personal!
That's got to be one of the dumbest comments ever. How do you perform an abortion up to the moment of delivery? Do you understand anything about labor and delivery? Once labor starts, that's it a baby is on its way and doctors aren't going to perform an "abortion".
Indeed. That's the type of comment made by those who have no rational argument and try to appeal to emotion instead.
Well, to be honest, I got emotional in my response because ignorance makes me angry
Who has suggested this>?
I understand how you feel. Dealing with ignorance can get frustrating.
The Insult Troll
The insult troll is a pure hater, plain and simple. And they don't even really have to have a reason to hate or insult someone. These types of trolls will often pick on everyone and anyone – calling them names, accusing them of certain things, doing anything they can to get a negative emotional response from them – just because they can. In many cases, this type of trolling can become so severe that it can lead to or be considered a serious form of cyberbullying .
The Mango Messiah made a claim the other day that it happens.
The most asinine statements and obvious appeals to emotion and the ignorant and/or gullible just eat it up. Go figure.
Or the dishonest - those who know better, but pretend he's telling the truth, because it suits their agenda.
Yes, that too.
The turd in chief has been spreading those lies everywhere. His rabid base eats it up.
My daughter is a middle school teach want to guess at the number of pregnant 12/13 year old girls there are in her school yet people feel they should get an abortion? My wife screamed for 43 hours of labor with our first kid and she was in great physical condition, think about that 12 year old girl trying to birth a child
Only idiots would condone that.
"How is abortion anyone's business?"
It's really not …… until.....UNTIL ……... (Did you get the UNTIL Part ?) ...…. you want TAX PAYER FUNDING to support YOUR PERSONAL CHOICE .
Then it's EVERYONES DAMN BUSINESS !
Tada !
That was an easy question to answer.
Taxpayer funding generally does not go towards abortions. So no, it's none of your business! Yes, that was easy.
Generally does not ?
Generally ?
Usually ?
I want to hear ….. Definitively DOES NOT !
I don't really care what you want to hear. Talk to yourself if you want to hear what you want.
Out of the approximately 879,000 abortions that took place in the United States in 2017, what is the General number that "Wasn't Funded" by Tax payers ?
I'm sure you have the "General" answer.
Any abortion that is performed due to rape, incest, or the woman's health can be funded. Those are the exceptions. Elective abortions are paid out of pocket. You can do your own research to see how many were elective or not. Either way, it's still not your nor anyone else's business !
This 11-year-old will now be forced to carry her rapist's child to term because the new abortion law doesn't have an exemption for rape.
Which is utterly disgusting on all levels to say the least.
Can't answer my question ?
" Any abortion that is performed due to rape, incest, or the woman's health can be funded"
I hear there is a company one can pay into with their own money, that covers things like that.
I think they call it "HEALTH INSURANCE" .
This is what pro-life means, even if the mother's life is irreparably harmed.
I doubt that this abortion bill will survive judicial review because it effectively bans abortion. Her only hope is to either leave the state or to convince a doctor that her life would be in jeopardy if she is forced to carry this fetus to term. The emotional trauma of being forced to continue this pregnancy is heinous.
Not all insurances cover the same thing and not everyone has insurance. That still doesn't make it your business anyway.
Medicaid is public health insurance.
The Approximately 879,000 Abortions in 2017, were paid for by Medicaid ?
Guess who pays for Medicaid recipients.
I guess It really is …. STILL MY BUSINESS huh !
Hopefully it doesn't survive challenge or review.
I did answer your question. And my answer remains the same. Just like it's still none of your business!
You have no proof that those abortions were paid by Medicaid. The facts that they occurred isn't proof that they were paid for by public insurance. Medicaid only pays when the life or health of the mother is at risk or when the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest.
The facts disagree with you.
You answered with NOTHING.
If you take from others to fund your own choice....It's STILL everyone's business that funded your choice, even if you don't want it to be.
Life's a Bitch !
Then you clearly didn't comprehend my answer, or you simply want to hear what you want to hear. Your problem, not mine. And still not your business!
I comprehended very well. You're all for "Paid For by others" Choice, and those that contributed should just butt out.
"Your own personal health is your own personal choice, all the way down the line."
Melissa Etheridge
Clearly you haven't , especially since you keep going on about it at this point. Or make idiotic and erroneous assertions like that.
In Your mind.
"Or make idiotic and erroneous assertions like that."
Like "not your business" ?
I never said any such thing.
I'd rather pay for an abortion than to pay for 18+ years of social services for a child that isn't wanted and cannot be supported by the parents. Conservatives don't care about the child once it is born so they are not pro-life, but instead, they are forced birth because they believe that their opinions overrule the equal rights of the mother.
The fact that the Earth is already overpopulated should be enough of a reason to support publically funded elective abortion. It is both fiscally and biologically sound policy.
You insinuated such in 10.1.11.
Which makes it all about control. Those family values they keep touting is all about control of women. Nothing more, nothing less. They want to go back to the time when a husband or father could beat his wife & sell his daughters.
" Medicare has spent $172 million on penis pumps in the last five years"
I think abortion is as much the tax payers business as Medicare recipients erections, which is to say, none at all. It's between the patient and the doctor. Not every older man on Medicare wants or needs a penis pump, but I'm not going to deny them one just because I may think gross older men shouldn't be getting erections anyway. It's not my business, and neither is what a woman and her doctor decide is best for her life and body.
That appears to be what is meant by traditional family values. Slavery, bigotry, genocide, and rape.
Any person that has spent any time at all keeping themselves afloat from working income, and has any salts at all, would damn sure want to know where their earned money that is taken from them is going and for what. If one doesn't, they deserve the pain they inflict on themselves by not wanting to know and just handing it over, no questions asked.
They call that being "STUPID".
Also....Willfully "IGNORANT" !
Tax Payers don't pay for Medicaid recipients ?
Comprehension isn't your strong suite huh.
I would rather not pay for any bit of someone else's Fuck Up !
Reduce "Adoption" costs, and the other half of you comment would fix itself too.
"The fact that the Earth is already overpopulated "
It is ?
On the first part, like the commercial says …. "YOU PICKED THE WRONG INSURANCE" !
On the second part ……. If you don't have insurance, NOT MY PROBLEM, and DON'T MAKE IT MY PROBLEM IF YOU WANT ME TO STAY OUT OF YOUR FUCKED UP CHOICE !
So shouldn't your petition or complaint be that Medicaid stop paying anything for erections or abortions and not that somehow because Medicaid helps pay for a tiny fraction of terminated pregnancies that all abortions should be banned?
The article asks how abortion is anyone else's business. You claim it's "Everyone's Business" because a small fraction of abortions get some Medicaid funding. Under the Hyde Amendment, federal Medicaid funds cannot be used for abortion except in cases of rape, incest or life endangerment. Medicaid paid for only 1.5% of abortions in 2014 so with the estimated 652,000 abortions in 2014 that would be just 9,789 that received partial funding through Medicaid. So while Medicare spent $172 million of our tax dollars on penis pumps, Medicaid spent under $9 million to help women who had been impregnated by a rapist, relative or had their life threatened by the pregnancy. I'd say that's money far better spent helping those women survive than the money spent keeping old men stiff. Those who don't think it through and simply react on emotion or try to force their personal faith on others are the ones I'd consider truly "STUPID" and both willfully and woefully "IGNORANT".
No where in any of my comments, did I say that Abortions should be banned.
You did say that abortion is " EVERYONES DAMN BUSINESS !" implying that those who want to ban abortion have every right to do so simply because about 1.5% of abortions get some Medicaid funding. I apologize if I wrongly assumed you were one of those in the "Let's make up ridiculously stupid excuses for why we should be allowed to force our religious beliefs on others" camp.
If that isn't your position, then maybe you can answer the question with one small caveat.
"Why should 98.5% of abortions that received ZERO federal funding or tax dollars be anyone else's business?"
That's a damned good question DP.
No, in reality.
Your tax dollars pay for trumps golf trips.... But a womans health choices is a bit too far? Really? LOL
In case you missed it ….. The article is about Abortions and whom should be left out.
Your "Reality" is different than MOST.
Then "most" just don't get it, including you!
I spend a lot of time trying to understand the motivations behind controlling others and denying them the right to exercise their "free will".....or is "FREE will" actually another lie that we tell ourselves?
How does anti-choice and "free will" co-exist in a person's mind?
and
Are you saying "Minority Rules" is the ONLY Thing that makes sense ?
No, that us not what I said. Try again!
Sure you did. YOU just didn't see it !
None so Blind as those that will NOT, or cannot...… SEE !
Nope. You're still wrong!
I would rather hear definably does pay for abortions, cost effective use of tax money
Nothing Tax Payers are on the hook for, is "Cost Effective" !
WE....Make the money for government. They just "SPEND" it. They don't care if it's "Cost Effective" or not !
I want access to your mail. I help pay to deliver that mail; therefore what arrives in your mailbox is my business.
I also want access to your house. I help pay for police and fire protection for your house; therefore, your house is my business, and I should be able to enter it at will.
I should be afforded a say in your healthcare decisions. In all likelihood, any hospital to which you present receives taxpayer funding of some sort, so your healthcare should be in my hands.
Just keeping things consistent here.
YOU ….. have NO HAND in anything of mine !
My REQUIRED Allotted portions are ALWAYS paid for in FULL …. by ME !
I'm "GOLD", possibly even "Platinum" on my insurance. Have you made it to "Copper" yet ?
If I'm a taxpayer (and I am), then, by your own rules, I should have access to anything you have that is in any way supported by taxes. Unless you consider yourself to be exempt from your own rules? But that would be hypocritical, so I'm sure that couldn't be the case.
Also, anybody who is on the same insurance plan (homeowner's, health, car, etc.) should also have a say in your healthcare decisions, and access to your home and car. Thanks for reminding me. What kind of car do you drive, and what company insures it? Is it one I'd like to take for a spin? I'm a good driver, I promise.
Nothing you pay taxes on, That I already have contributed my allotted amount towards in FULL, makes you privy to anything of mine that I pay "Privately" for ?
Do you request other tax payers to fund your health care ?
If so, your taking away from those under privileged folks, for your own gain, which you already had (since you pay for yourself that is
).
Are you saying the folks that have to go to the Freebie Planned Parenthood, or have this need for "Government funding" to pay their way for their fuck up, paid their "Full" share, and don't deserve to be looked at ?
So, your town has no law enforcement? No fire department? The materials to deliver your house were delivered over open fields, without the use of roads? Or do you support all of those in full, with no contribution from other taxpayers?
I'm not buying that.
All you've done is list what actual "Tax Payers" fund, like me. A very bad response. Tells me you haven't read a friggin thing !
You're STILL avoiding what I've been saying since I started on this Article/ Seed …..about the Ones that DON'T FUCKING PAY anything, but get anyway !
And?
Do you think women who get abortions don't pay taxes?
They do.
Even the ones on Medicaid.
Really ?
Then I should have free access to all your records to see if you are a felon on the run, to see how behind you are in your payments, if you use drugs. All those require taxes being used.
Go for it.
How is abortion anyone's business?
Unless you happen to be the individual involved, it is not. Kind of falls into my MYOB category along with sexuality, religion and finances, personal things best left that way in my opinion.
Exactly! Well said.
abortion will always be all about control - either controlling women and their health decisions, or letting women have control over their own bodies... apparently some people feel that it's their "business" to control women and their health decisions concerning abortions