[quote]ephrem wrote:
What pat believes is that the zygote is a fullfledged human being. It isn’t. A zygote does not possess the same attributes a living, breathing human being has, …yet.
[/quote]
Sorry, your line of thinking died with the advancement of science. There’s no womb fairy swapping out organisms. It’s the same exact individual organism.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Sloth wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
America, land of the free… if you’re a white conservative male between 25 and 55 and adhere to the christian faith. Otherwise, go to hell!
[/quote]
You shouldn’t even use the word “Freedom” while being a pro-abortionist. [/quote]
Freedom, freedom, freedom? You suck at trolling slothy, but i can imagine that, in your warped little world, denying women the choice whether to abort a pregnancy or not constitutes freedom.
Will you be keeping this up, or should i ignore you too?[/quote]
Sloth’s world is very simplistic. It starts with the proposition that human life begins at the very moment of conception. As I already mentioned, I have a problem with this based on a basic understanding of neurology. Second, he assumes that all abortions are the result of unprotected, casual sex. As I also mentioned, I have some problems with this as well. I recognize that the moment of conception creates a potential for human life, and this potential deserves some protections. What is missing in the discussion is life/health of the mother, rape, and incest. As a Catholic, Sloth believes that abortion is wrong in these cases as well. As someone who believes in limited government, I have a real problem with the state telling a rape victim, “Sorry, we know it’s not your fault, but you must carry and give birth to the rapist’s child.” It’s like if someone broke into your house and the government says, “Sorry, but this poor guy obviously needs a home. You must now allow him to live in your home rent-free and provide him with food and clothing. Try to kick him out and you’ll end up in jail. That’s the law because we strongly believe that everyone is entitled to a home.”
[/quote]
It’s also a lie he maintains to disguise the fact he prefers to feel dominant over females.
Usually it’s inversely related to penis size.
[/quote]
What a weak-wristed response. Got any words for the untold number of females who never got the chance to inhale that first lungful of air? How about for one that survived what was supposed to be her death? Hey, you made it out if the womb, not your problem!
[quote]kneedragger79 wrote:
How will YOU ensure they did have protection, like a comdom?
[quote]Makavali wrote:
[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:
[quote]Cortes wrote:
And btw, if I accepted your premise that abortion was indeed merely a law regulating a distasteful act, then I would fully agree with you. But I don’t. Abortion takes a human life. That is not acceptable. And that is where the argument needs to start.
[/quote]
And this is the dispute. I don’t know when life begins but I highly doubt that it begins at the very moment of conception. Why? Because at that very moment there is no higher brain function - the brain has not even developed yet. What you have at this stage is a potential for human life. So the question becomes who should be given the right to decide when human life begins? Politicians? A majority of the people? Or should it be the individual? My vote is for the individual.
And for the record, I am not entirely opposed to some regulation on aborting healthy fetuses that do not threaten the mother’s life or health. However, in situations where the mother’s life and health are at risk, rape, and incest, the choice to abort should be left entirely to the individual.[/quote]
I would take it a step further if it wasn’t so grey in the waters I’d like to tread.
I would not offer abortion to anyone not using a form of contraception that had a lower failure rate than at least a condom.[/quote]
[/quote]
Hence I would, were the waters not so murky. It would most likely have to be something that is medically traceable.
Do you honestly believe this would work? And be cost effective? People will find ways to cheat the system, do you not realize this?
[quote]Makavali wrote:
[quote]kneedragger79 wrote:
How will YOU ensure they did have protection, like a condom?
[quote]Makavali wrote:
[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:
[quote]Cortes wrote:
And btw, if I accepted your premise that abortion was indeed merely a law regulating a distasteful act, then I would fully agree with you. But I don’t. Abortion takes a human life. That is not acceptable. And that is where the argument needs to start.
[/quote]
And this is the dispute. I don’t know when life begins but I highly doubt that it begins at the very moment of conception. Why? Because at that very moment there is no higher brain function - the brain has not even developed yet. What you have at this stage is a potential for human life. So the question becomes who should be given the right to decide when human life begins? Politicians? A majority of the people? Or should it be the individual? My vote is for the individual.
And for the record, I am not entirely opposed to some regulation on aborting healthy fetuses that do not threaten the mother’s life or health. However, in situations where the mother’s life and health are at risk, rape, and incest, the choice to abort should be left entirely to the individual.[/quote]
I would take it a step further if it wasn’t so grey in the waters I’d like to tread.
I would not offer abortion to anyone not using a form of contraception that had a lower failure rate than at least a condom.[/quote]
[/quote]
Hence I would, were the waters not so murky. It would most likely have to be something that is medically traceable.[/quote]
This is exactly right! So you want to give the government more control and power? History is full of examples of how that works. Chocked FULL of how tumultuous those stellar examples ALWAYS end.
I still fail to grasp how giving our respective governments more power is ever going to work.
Do you honestly expect a power hungry bureaucracy to limit themselves? You know this answer without question. In the history of the world it has never ended even close to peacefully.
If it quacks like a duck, walks like a duck and looks like a duck. It must be a fucking duck.
I will try a different route. Do you honestly believe people sleeping with everyone and anyone will never self destruct? Pregnancy is a gift but tell me which STD can be thought of the same way?
Human life is sacred. But is human life simply the act of an organism not dying, or does quality and experience play a part?
[quote]kneedragger79 wrote:
This is exactly right! So you want to give the government more control and power? History is full of examples of how that works. Chocked FULL of how tumultuous those stellar examples ALWAYS end.[/quote]
Your distrust of the government is a matter of its own thread. Suffice to say, if a bill were passed allowing limited access to abortion dependent on contraceptive use (with the necessary sub clauses addressing rape etc) at a Doctors discretion it would be enough. The main part of what I’m suggesting is education and access to contraception. You want to (unrealistically) ban abortion. I’m offering a solution that would reduce it while not taking choice away.
You accept that 100% control is impossible, yet in the same breath you are willing to try to do the same thing by banning abortion. I’m not offering 100% control. I’m offering something that is more palatable to a wider range of people. Again I ask, what is truly better?
Stubbornly arguing for an absolute and producing no change, or moving up a soft hill and gradually getting closer to an end game?
This is not an argument.
People will always self destruct, but larger access to contraception helps to keep children out of the line of fire.
STDs are a different game altogether, and not part of what I was addressing. Having casual sex without a condom is idiotic, and if you catch an STD due to such stupidity, then you deserve to have your genitals shrivel up and fall off.
[quote]kneedragger79 wrote:
Do you honestly believe this would work? And be cost effective? People will find ways to cheat the system, do you not realize this?[/quote]
Do you not understand the cost of raising a child on welfare? Do you think free or subsidized access to contraception will outweigh the cost of a child?
[quote]Sloth wrote:
Because it is, and because it does…that organism isn’t a fruit fly. And you know it. For all the arguments you guys make, you honestly know you’re killing an individual human life. Life isn’t defined by neurology, just look no further than bio 101.[/quote]
“Life,” as in something that’s an organism, is not defined by neurology - you’re right there. But I most certainly define human life based on higher brain function. I don’t see it otherwise. Consciousness and self-awareness are the qualities that make us human. I think these qualities are so important, in fact, that if a computer with artificial intelligence developed consciousness and self-awareness I would consider it immoral to simply pull the plug on such a machine even though it is still a machine and not a biological organism and thus, technical, it is not “alive.” However, the fact that artificial intelligence software might someday gain consciousness is not enough of a reason to keep the computer on all the time.
Is the MikeTheBear that exists today the same MikeTheBear that existed in the womb? Well, we shared the same DNA. But the MikeTheBear in the womb was not aware of his existence. I would say that at the in utero MikeTheBear was a biological precursor to today’s MikeTheBear.
[quote]Makavali wrote:
[quote]kneedragger79 wrote:
This is exactly right! So you want to give the government more control and power? History is full of examples of how that works. Chocked FULL of how tumultuous those stellar examples ALWAYS end.[/quote]
Your distrust of the government is a matter of its own thread. Suffice to say, if a bill were passed allowing limited access to abortion dependent on contraceptive use (with the necessary sub clauses addressing rape etc) at a Doctors discretion it would be enough. The main part of what I’m suggesting is education and access to contraception. You want to (unrealistically) ban abortion. I’m offering a solution that would reduce it while not taking choice away.
You accept that 100% control is impossible, yet in the same breath you are willing to try to do the same thing by banning abortion. I’m not offering 100% control. I’m offering something that is more palatable to a wider range of people. Again I ask, what is truly better?
[/quote]
Mak, this is an interesting proposal. Like you said - people will always have sex, and some people will always have casual sex. This is human nature that cannot be changed. You can ban abortion, contraception, and porn. You can preach, require mandatory church attendance, and show nothing but reruns of “Leave it to Beaver.” People will still have causal sex that will result in STDs and pregnancy. I think focusing on preventing STDs and pregnancy is smart.
[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:
“Life,” as in something that’s an organism…[/quote]
You just gave away any argument you had. There’s no switcheroo in the womb. None. That organism? It’s the same organism 26 years later, having it’s own child. Human.
I am pro-choice mainly because it has always been up to the woman, why pretend otherwise? And an abortion is safer when performed by a doctor. Luckily I have never been in this position. Although I am pro-choice I don’t think that I could get rid of an unexpected pregnancy. For me the choice is which one can you live with not which is easier. As a pro-choicer I would have no problem with sex ed including what the emotional ramifications could be for a couple that goes through an abortion. I don’t remember the emotional side of sex being covered in sex ed classes.
Sad song about abortion from the boys pov
[quote]Makavali wrote:
Pregnancy rates for Contraception:
So lets run some numbers with these figures.
Are they independent probabilities? Yes, they don’t have an effect on one another. Note they are also rates for couples having sex regularly throughout the year.
So that means if you use both (and use them correctly) you have a 0.00006 (0.003 * 0.02) probability of becoming pregnant.
The US has ~310 million people, of which ~155 million are female (half).
Lets also assume every single one of these women is having regular sex. I.e. even the 5 year olds and the 80 year olds were having regular sex. Lets assume they are all taking the pill and their partners are all using condoms correctly. And lets further assume that NONE of them want to become pregnant.
Then ~9300 (0.00006 * 155,000,000) women in the US each year would become pregnant accidentally.
Of course there are only around 100 million females aged 15-64 (aka ones that are likely to be having sex). Again it is likely 5% of these are lesbian, and another 5-10% will not be having sex in the year. So the actual number would likely be closer to 85 million females having sex. This would mean only 5100 (0.00006 * 85,000,000) women would get pregnant each year accidentally.
Yet how many abortions are there in the US each year? From what I could find it is ~1 million. Lets assume 1%, or 10,000, of these abortions are rape cases (which wikipedia data seems to suggest is about right).
Lets assume that ALL of these women want to get an abortion (i.e. all pregnant women want an abortion). Then if people used protection properly there would only be 15100 - 19300 abortions each year in the United States.
So why the FUCK are there 1 million? No wonder pro-lifers get worked up about it. It must be because most women who get abortions don’t bother to use protection properly when they have sex.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
It’s not hypocritical. Leaving the decision up to the woman is not hypocritical. To take it away from her is.
[/quote]
So the man that gave half the baby it’s substance had no ‘choice’ in making the child.
I maybe wrong, but I’m sure naturally and biologically speaking we’re hard wired to protect society and the innocent. Or, maybe that is just bygone chauvinism and chivalry? I don’t know, why do you think men are not protectors of society?
[quote]MikeTheBear wrote:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
You’re right that the unborn has a brain that has less development. And it is not thinking or self-aware until much later. But how does level of development deteremine our value? Aren’t there many humans outside the womb who can’t feel pain or have worse thinking skills than others or have more self-awareness than others? If those things give us value, don’t those of us with more thinking skills have more value than those of us with less?[/quote]
Well, let’s look at this objectively. Look at how society treats different individuals. Can a severely retarded person ever earn a salary comparable to that of a more intelligent person who becomes a doctor, lawyer, or engineer? And no, before you even get there, I am NOT arguing that developmentally disabled people should be killed. I am simply pointing out the reality here: based on earning potential, our society does, in fact, place a higher value on those who have more intelligence and better thinking skills. Like it or not, that is a cold hard fact.[/quote]
I maybe wrong, but I think I was looking at it every objectively.
Yes, people in society are treated differently because they are individuals but like you said no one is denying human dignity to a severely retarded person even though they are not necessarily materially more productive than a doctor. However, (again I maybe wrong) you brought up that the value of an unborn child is on the basis of its development. Hypothetically let’s take a one-year-old, now most one-year-olds are less developed than you or I, would it be okay for us to kill the one-year-old?
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
A potential of life.[/quote]
How is it a potential life, and not a life?[/quote]
What pat believes is that the zygote is a fullfledged human being. It isn’t. A zygote does not possess the same attributes a living, breathing human being has, …yet.
[/quote]
Well, we have some common beliefs! We both see that a zygote does not possess the same attributes as living-breathing human beings (it doesn’t even have lungs yet!), I am glad we could agree on something before we continue with this dialog, good friend.
I maybe wrong here, but let’s look at the facts. The unborn have far less attributes that would be recognized as something related to you and I, but I wonder how does the value of a person depend on the level of attributes or appearance to humans; would we say a toddler is less of a person because he does not possess the appearance of an adult human?
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
It’s not hypocritical. Leaving the decision up to the woman is not hypocritical. To take it away from her is.
[/quote]
So the man that gave half the baby it’s substance had no ‘choice’ in making the child.
I maybe wrong, but I’m sure naturally and biologically speaking we’re hard wired to protect society and the innocent. Or, maybe that is just bygone chauvinism and chivalry? I don’t know, why do you think men are not protectors of society?[/quote]
If the pregnancy is unwanted by both man and woman the choice is clear. If the pregnancy is unwanted by the woman and not the man, the man can’t force the woman to continue the pregnancy. If the pregnancy is unwanted by the man and not the woman, it happens that the man forces the woman to have an abortion, but still it’s up to the woman to decide what happens.
Not you. Not me. Not anyone but the woman in question.
Men are not the protectors of society, and are not hardwired to do so. Men will protect their family, but it’s presumptuous and arrogant of you to assume that you know what’s good for society. Protect your genes and loved ones, and leave it at that.
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
A potential of life.[/quote]
How is it a potential life, and not a life?[/quote]
What pat believes is that the zygote is a fullfledged human being. It isn’t. A zygote does not possess the same attributes a living, breathing human being has, …yet.
[/quote]
Well, we have some common beliefs! We both see that a zygote does not possess the same attributes as living-breathing human beings (it doesn’t even have lungs yet!), I am glad we could agree on something before we continue with this dialog, good friend.
I maybe wrong here, but let’s look at the facts. The unborn have far less attributes that would be recognized as something related to you and I, but I wonder how does the value of a person depend on the level of attributes or appearance to humans; would we say a toddler is less of a person because he does not possess the appearance of an adult human?[/quote]
Look, i’ve been here before with this discussion. I really don’t feel like rehashing the same arguements again. If you want to argue that a toddler is equal to a zygote, i’m not going to respond to that. It’s almost insulting.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
It’s not hypocritical. Leaving the decision up to the woman is not hypocritical. To take it away from her is.
[/quote]
So the man that gave half the baby it’s substance had no ‘choice’ in making the child.
I maybe wrong, but I’m sure naturally and biologically speaking we’re hard wired to protect society and the innocent. Or, maybe that is just bygone chauvinism and chivalry? I don’t know, why do you think men are not protectors of society?[/quote]
If the pregnancy is unwanted by both man and woman the choice is clear. If the pregnancy is unwanted by the woman and not the man, the man can’t force the woman to continue the pregnancy. If the pregnancy is unwanted by the man and not the woman, it happens that the man forces the woman to have an abortion, but still it’s up to the woman to decide what happens.
Not you. Not me. Not anyone but the woman in question.
Men are not the protectors of society, and are not hardwired to do so. Men will protect their family, but it’s presumptuous and arrogant of you to assume that you know what’s good for society. Protect your genes and loved ones, and leave it at that.
[/quote]
Sure, sure. Men will and usually do protect their families. When I said protect, I mean in the case of preventing someone from being killed. I was thinking that if you saw a homeless man, and he was being beaten to death, you’d try to prevent it?
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
A potential of life.[/quote]
How is it a potential life, and not a life?[/quote]
What pat believes is that the zygote is a fullfledged human being. It isn’t. A zygote does not possess the same attributes a living, breathing human being has, …yet.
[/quote]
Well, we have some common beliefs! We both see that a zygote does not possess the same attributes as living-breathing human beings (it doesn’t even have lungs yet!), I am glad we could agree on something before we continue with this dialog, good friend.
I maybe wrong here, but let’s look at the facts. The unborn have far less attributes that would be recognized as something related to you and I, but I wonder how does the value of a person depend on the level of attributes or appearance to humans; would we say a toddler is less of a person because he does not possess the appearance of an adult human?[/quote]
Look, i’ve been here before with this discussion. I really don’t feel like rehashing the same arguements again. If you want to argue that a toddler is equal to a zygote, i’m not going to respond to that. It’s almost insulting.
[/quote]
Yes, I am sorry. I did not mean to insult you. I am merely a fool for comparing a toddler to a zygote! What was I thinking? My mind must be slipping!