My Very Own Abortion Thread

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
61

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
It seems no one understands the distinction between positive and negative rights.

If it is permissible to force a woman to carry a fetus to term is it also permissible to force someone else to raise the child after it’s birth?[/quote]

Did that person’s actions create the child?

Negative rights require the inaction of others. What I am suggesting is that the mother did perpetrate an action. She already interfered in the natural state of the situation changing the situation. She in essence violated the right of the unborn by becoming pregnant. She took an action that effected the right of life of another.

62

[quote]tedro wrote:
orion wrote:
usmccds423 wrote:
orion wrote:
This is mainly an argument aimed at conservatives and as far as I am aware it was first made by Rothbard in the “Ethics of Liberty”:

Let us assume, for discussions sake that an embryo was a human being with all inherent rights.

What is the nature of these rights? Are they positive, i.e. must they be provided by others, or negative, i.e. only need to be respected by others?

That is important distinction, because the same conservatives who would object to the idea that they are forced at gunpoint to provide for the needs of others, expect a mother to keep a child alive.

That child however only has the right to live, not to be kept alive at someone else´s expense.

Therefore, let us separate the child from the mother and see if it lives.

If it doesn´t, the child´s right to live was never violated, it could exercise that right if it had only the power to do so, alas it hasn´t. It basically is in the same position like a person dying of diseases or of old age.

So, the real question for a conservative is, how he can be against abortion and also against welfare when forcing a woman to keep a child alive she does not want basically is welfare?

I find it funny that generally people are against murder, but to kill what is potentially a human life is okay. I always ask the same question. What did the child do to deserve to die? It is natural for men and women to want and have sex, but who suffers the repercussions of an unwanted pregnancy? The child is killed and the parties that enjoyed the baby making go about their lives usually no worse off. How is that fair? I think it send a band message to the people of the world especially our youth that says you are not responsible for your actions.

It is also funny how people talk about war being unjust, how taking someones life other then self defense is wrong, but abortion is okay. That is strange logic to me.

Read the argument again.

If an embryo is a human being, killing it is wrong.

We are not arguing about killing it, but about removing its life support system.

A right to live is respected by others by not killing you, but it does not mean that they are bound to feed you.

The embryo has a right to live, not to a cushy environment that is provided by others at gunpoint.

So, this completely consistent with an anti-aggressive war stance.

So if I lock an adult in a cellar with no food or water, then I simply removed them from their life support system, right? No killing involved.[/quote]

If you lock someone up you still deny him the property right to his own body.

Ironically, I assume that you would even want the embryo “locked up”, wouldn´t you?

No,the appropriate analogy is to simply not care whether other people live or die and as far as I know that is not illegal, nor should it be.

63

[quote]Sloth wrote:
LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
Gael wrote:
Sloth wrote:
Let me ask some novice to hike a desert with me, as a challenge. However, once deep into it’s interior, I’ll grab all the food, water, communcations, and maps in the middle of the night and leave him stranded. If he dies, he dies. If he lives, he lives.

Bumped. No one addressed this.

Stealing is unethical.

What if it was all mine? What if I, the veteran hiker, said, “I’ll bring tents, communications, first aid, food and water, and maps and compasses. You just bring a couple changes of clothes and some bug repellent.” I made no promises he’d be allowed to use my property. Or, if allowed to use my property, that he’d be able to keep using it to sustain himself if I just up and decided to leave him to his fate in the middle of the night.[/quote]

Well then at best you could be said to be guilty of fraud if you purposefully deceived the other man then that could be construed as immoral.

Now, are you obliged to stay and help this man if you change your mind and decide that you would rather be alone? Or better yet, what if the man pointed a gun at your head and told you that you had to stay against your will?

64

[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
Actually he brings up a good point about conservatives. Conservatives promote personal responsibility for your own actions. In the case of abortion that would apply to the mother. In the case of welfare that ideology would apply to the welfare recipient. So there is no inherent ideological conflict.[/quote]

Which does nothing to answer the posed question.

65

[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
Negative rights require the inaction of others.[/quote]

Wrong. Negative rights cannot be denied. This is essentially the right to your life and property.

Positive right can only be obliged. These would be considered entitlements, etc.

66

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:

The argument is so ridiculous you choose not to address it and instead offer up a red herring.[/quote]

I’m stating that it is an agreement between man and woman that their intercourse may produce a child. If it does they waive personal freedoms for the good of the child until that child is ready to take care of itself and is prepared to be a productive member of society.

Welfare isn’t even a parallel to this issues at all. One is imposed by government to give to people who are old enough to be accountable for their own actions. Imposing restrictions on abortions is not welfare in that the agreement between parents is to take care of the child. No one but the producers of the child is responsible for raising it.

67

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
It seems no one understands the distinction between positive and negative rights.

If it is permissible to force a woman to carry a fetus to term is it also permissible to force someone else to raise the child after it’s birth?[/quote]

Understanding it is irrelevant to the topic. It like taking your car to a mechanic and the mechanic complains about the state of the gutters on your house. One has nothing to do with the other.

68

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
Sloth wrote:
LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
Gael wrote:
Sloth wrote:
Let me ask some novice to hike a desert with me, as a challenge. However, once deep into it’s interior, I’ll grab all the food, water, communcations, and maps in the middle of the night and leave him stranded. If he dies, he dies. If he lives, he lives.

Bumped. No one addressed this.

Stealing is unethical.

What if it was all mine? What if I, the veteran hiker, said, “I’ll bring tents, communications, first aid, food and water, and maps and compasses. You just bring a couple changes of clothes and some bug repellent.” I made no promises he’d be allowed to use my property. Or, if allowed to use my property, that he’d be able to keep using it to sustain himself if I just up and decided to leave him to his fate in the middle of the night.

Well then at best you could be said to be guilty of fraud if you purposefully deceived the other man then that could be construed as immoral.

Now, are you obliged to stay and help this man if you change your mind and decide that you would rather be alone? Or better yet, what if the man pointed a gun at your head and told you that you had to stay against your will?[/quote]

At the best, guilty of fraud? Sounds like a world in which the cleverest of killers are seen as nothing worse than con-men.

I would point a gun at the man’s head and tell him his academic exercise ends here. I was asked if I wanted to hike with him, the veteran, and his property or not, he will not now withdraw the means to my survival.

And, I would gladly force the property owner to stand down and allow rescuers to reach the injured man, in the other scenario.

69

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
DoubleDuce wrote:
Negative rights require the inaction of others.

Wrong. Negative rights cannot be denied. This is essentially the right to your life and property.

Positive right can only be obliged. These would be considered entitlements, etc.[/quote]

I disagree, a negative right requires that people not do anything to deny you that right. I don’t see forcing someone to do something and forcing someone not to do something as inherently different. One just narrows possible courses of action more than the other.

70

[quote]orion wrote:

That is important distinction, because the same conservatives who would object to the idea that they are forced at gunpoint to provide for the needs of others, expect a mother to keep a child alive.

That child however only has the right to live, not to be kept alive at someone else´s expense.

[/quote]

No, it’s more about responsibility. The responsibility we each have to do our part in life by raising a family correctly and with moral values. Republicans are not against all and any programs that help people either. They are against people being dependant on the government. They are not in support of people who will not try and help themselves or become a productive memeber of society…who PAYS TAXES.

Why then, would Liberal minds prefer to protect the convicted murderer with legal rights and no death penalty, yet give free reign to anyone to kill babies? Libs would rather pay 39k a year for each of these murderers and strap the taxpayer with the bill as a result.

Save the convicted killers at all costs, yet kill any of the babies if you want. Sounds moronic.

71

[quote]Cortes wrote:
orion wrote:
Cortes wrote:
orion wrote:

The embryo is cleanly separated from his Mother. It is not killed in any way. If it lives, it lives.

Umm, in what philosophical sphere is the child ever “cleanly separated from his Mother?”

So far as I know, it is sucked out limb by limb with a vaccuum hose.

Anyway your silly argument is still the same as arguing for infanticide. If the child is a human in the womb then nothing changes upon exit from the womb. So the mother can neither neglect it here nor there.

That is not even an argument.

Or if there actually is one, you are basically pro welfare and cannot really protest when your government takes your money to feed starving children in Africa.

Because that is the exact same situation you put that woman in.

See my edit. Ponder, too, the conservative stance on personal responsibility, and its bearings upon your “welfare” line of thinking.

Also, do you really believe what you are arguing, or you just like to have fun riling up the conservatives here?
[/quote]

I just bring up an inconsistency in their world view, if they believe an embryo to be a human being with all the rights of a human being.

72

[quote]Rockscar wrote:
orion wrote:

That is important distinction, because the same conservatives who would object to the idea that they are forced at gunpoint to provide for the needs of others, expect a mother to keep a child alive.

That child however only has the right to live, not to be kept alive at someone else´s expense.

No, it’s more about responsibility. The responsibility we each have to do our part in life by raising a family correctly and with moral values. Republicans are not against all and any programs that help people either. They are against people being dependant on the government. They are not in support of people who will not try and help themselves or become a productive memeber of society…who PAYS TAXES.

Why then, would Liberal minds prefer to protect the convicted murderer with legal rights and no death penalty, yet give free reign to anyone kill babies? Libs would rather pay 39k a year for each of these murderers and strap the taxpayer with the bill as a result.

Save the convicted killers at all costs, yet kill any of the babies if you want. Sounds moronic.

[/quote]

Sounds like the culture of Europe, which is part of the reason they’re going extinct and being outbred by the Muslims.

73

[quote]Sloth wrote:
Edit:

Nevermind. Sorry, but this is the dumbest arguement for murder I’ve ever read. [/quote]

First of all it is not murder, it simply cannot be.

74

Funny enough, I find pro-choice ‘libertarians’ to be false. They make tortured arguements for how killing the unborn child is not an act of aggression.

75

[quote]orion wrote:
Cortes wrote:
orion wrote:
Cortes wrote:
orion wrote:

The embryo is cleanly separated from his Mother. It is not killed in any way. If it lives, it lives.

Umm, in what philosophical sphere is the child ever “cleanly separated from his Mother?”

So far as I know, it is sucked out limb by limb with a vaccuum hose.

Anyway your silly argument is still the same as arguing for infanticide. If the child is a human in the womb then nothing changes upon exit from the womb. So the mother can neither neglect it here nor there.

That is not even an argument.

Or if there actually is one, you are basically pro welfare and cannot really protest when your government takes your money to feed starving children in Africa.

Because that is the exact same situation you put that woman in.

See my edit. Ponder, too, the conservative stance on personal responsibility, and its bearings upon your “welfare” line of thinking.

Also, do you really believe what you are arguing, or you just like to have fun riling up the conservatives here?

I just bring up an inconsistency in their world view, if they believe an embryo to be a human being with all the rights of a human being.

[/quote]

What inconsistency? Saying that abortion is the taking of a human life and taking a human life is wrong? If that inconsistent, then I don’t know what consistency is…Is it “Murder is wrong unless that persons life is a problem for you then it’s ok?”

76

[quote]pat wrote:
orion wrote:
This is mainly an argument aimed at conservatives and as far as I am aware it was first made by Rothbard in the “Ethics of Liberty”:

Let us assume, for discussions sake that an embryo was a human being with all inherent rights.

What is the nature of these rights? Are they positive, i.e. must they be provided by others, or negative, i.e. only need to be respected by others?

That is important distinction, because the same conservatives who would object to the idea that they are forced at gunpoint to provide for the needs of others, expect a mother to keep a child alive.

That child however only has the right to live, not to be kept alive at someone else´s expense.

Therefore, let us separate the child from the mother and see if it lives.

If it doesn´t, the child´s right to live was never violated, it could exercise that right if it had only the power to do so, alas it hasn´t. It basically is in the same position like a person dying of diseases or of old age.

So, the real question for a conservative is, how he can be against abortion and also against welfare when forcing a woman to keep a child alive she does not want basically is welfare?

You are over complicating a very simple issue to make yourself feel good. The nice thing about abortion topic is that is really it is not about liberal vs. conservative, atheist vs. religios. The argumment centers around two fundamental points. Is the taking of a human life acceptable at any point and is the abortion the taking of a human life…

Your assigning a value on the human life based of what it is dependent on is utter stupidity. We are all dependent on each other as well as basic fundamental things. Take those away, you will die too.
So is taking a human life the right thing to do?[/quote]

I have the right to find another person to do business with, so does the embryo.

Plus, there is no taking of human life.

What there is is the non-supporting of human life.

Very big difference that one of the core conservative values,

77

[quote]orion wrote:
Cortes wrote:
orion wrote:
Cortes wrote:
orion wrote:

The embryo is cleanly separated from his Mother. It is not killed in any way. If it lives, it lives.

Umm, in what philosophical sphere is the child ever “cleanly separated from his Mother?”

So far as I know, it is sucked out limb by limb with a vaccuum hose.

Anyway your silly argument is still the same as arguing for infanticide. If the child is a human in the womb then nothing changes upon exit from the womb. So the mother can neither neglect it here nor there.

That is not even an argument.

Or if there actually is one, you are basically pro welfare and cannot really protest when your government takes your money to feed starving children in Africa.

Because that is the exact same situation you put that woman in.

See my edit. Ponder, too, the conservative stance on personal responsibility, and its bearings upon your “welfare” line of thinking.

Also, do you really believe what you are arguing, or you just like to have fun riling up the conservatives here?

I just bring up an inconsistency in their world view, if they believe an embryo to be a human being with all the rights of a human being.

[/quote]

Embryos aren’t what get aborted as previously stated.

Are you pro welfare and pro abortion? That is the only hypocritical view brought up. Unless your ideology is that a knowing adult should be void of personal responsibility. That’s the ideology that makes those two beliefs sync up.

78

[quote]orion wrote:
Sloth wrote:
Edit:

Nevermind. Sorry, but this is the dumbest arguement for murder I’ve ever read.

First of all it is not murder, it simply cannot be.

[/quote]

Then by make that statement you must explained when, exactly, does human life begin and state why you think so…It’s be helpful to be sure if you are going to start taking it.

79

[quote]Sloth wrote:
Let me ask some novice to hike a desert with me, as a challenge. However, once deep into it’s interior, I’ll grab all the food, water, communcations, and maps in the middle of the night and leave him stranded. If he dies, he dies. If he lives, he lives.[/quote]

The you lied to him and stole from him.

Both very wrong.

If you find someone in the desert and chose not to help him, that would be the equivalent.

80

[quote]pat wrote:
LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
It seems no one understands the distinction between positive and negative rights.

If it is permissible to force a woman to carry a fetus to term is it also permissible to force someone else to raise the child after it’s birth?

Understanding it is irrelevant to the topic. It like taking your car to a mechanic and the mechanic complains about the state of the gutters on your house. One has nothing to do with the other.[/quote]

So in this case it’s Orion’s car and you are the mechanic talking about the gutters on his house. We need to be clear where each of us stands.