[CoffeeSaint]

Quote by: webjedi Pregnancy is an accident? Your viewpoint is so fundamentalist that you are now denying the basic facts of biology.

What a bizarre thing to say. Are you disagreeing with me about the factors that lead to pregnancy? Do I need to prove that one can have sex without creating a child? Do I need to prove that there is no way to control all of the factors that result in pregnancy?

No birth control is 100% effective. Prove that statement wrong, and we can talk about the choice to become pregnant or not as being a corollary to the choice to have sex. But until you prove that there is a 100% effective method of birth control, there are factors involved in pregnancy that are outside of one's control, which means that the choice to have sex is not the choice to become pregnant.

Quote by: webjedi Having a vacuum hose shoved up your vagina and getting the contents of your womb sucked out is not an ideal resolution, I would say:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, abortion is gross. So is pregnancy and birth. What's your point?

Quote by: webjedi That I wouldn't classify that as irresponsibility, I would classify that as insanity.

And you are welcome to your opinion.

Quote by: webjedi See above for the definition of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. If you hold these God-given rights so dear then how can you say it is right for you to deny that for somebody else? What right do you have to decide who should live or die?

What right do you have to decide what a woman does with her body? Who made you the master and all women your slaves?
Please note that I have never argued that women should get abortions, nor that they should bear children; what a woman does with her body is entirely her choice, not mine. You are the only one in this argument that wants to remove the rights of others, not I. I have never fathered a child, I have never caused a pregnancy, and I never will: I am personally blameless in this in every way. I will never decide who gets to live and who gets to die.
But I will continue to argue that women deserve the right to decide that for the fetus inside of them.

Quote by: webjedi I realize it is inconvenient to have to adhere to rules, but that is why we don't practice cannibalism or enslave people or settle disputes by bashing each other's heads in with dinosaur bones.

The banning of abortion is slavery of women. Not inconvenience. By removing their ability to control their own bodies, their own lives, you take away their most basic, fundamental right.
I agree that abortion removes the inherent rights that a fetus has. I simply believe that this is a necessary sacrifice. I have always advocated the proper road to a solution here: an artificial womb and the ability to transfer a fertilized zygote. Once the child can be separated from the mother without dying, then the woman would have no right to kill it, and I would happily agree to ban abortion except in life-threatening emergencies. But until that is possible, a woman's right to control her body is more important than a fetus's right to life.

Quote by: webjedi The argument that women have no control over their reproductive system before they get pregnant, but suddenly gain control over it after they get pregnant is completely illogical; I don't buy it.

It isn't illogical at all. Women always have control over their reproductive systems to the extent that that is medically possible. If we could not perform abortions, I would not argue that they should be an option; since we cannot absolutely control conception, I do not argue that the control of conception should be legally mandated. When we have control, it should become a factor in this issue.

Quote by: webjedi Unfortunately, both pro-chociers and pro-lifers stand in the way of any sane approach to the problem. On the one hand the pro-lifers want to sweep the problem away by stopping people from having sex, which is not going to happen. One the other hand the pro-choicers pretend there is nothing wrong with abortion and it is unharmful, which is untrue. Neither want to face the reality of life, and neither are interested in any reasonable solution - they are both extremist camps intent on proving their opinion is superior to the other. The only solution that I can see is to face the fact that women have been irresponsible with their use of the abortion option, and re-establish social consequences for it.

That isn't a solution, and it also isn't possible. But I wish you the best of luck.


And by the way, I see the value of life: but I will not mandate for others the value of life. I also believe in assisted suicide, euthanasia, and DNR/living will rights. If someone wants to die because they believe their life is worthless, I might try to talk them out of it, but I wouldn't try to pass a law to stop them. If a pregnant woman believes that her fetus is a valuable life, then good for her, and I would try to protect that fetus if I could. But if a pregnant woman does not believe that life inside her has any value, who am I to tell her differently?