Does life begin at conception? I think it does.

[SeanG]

Another example could be this: a state, through its legislature, could make the elective act of smoking illegal.

[Starboy]

SeanG, I understand that a state legislature may pass any dang law they want. Slavery used to be legal in many states. This doesn't make it constitutional. We started this country in order to obtain life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. If it makes someone happy to get elective surgery even if it means that they have a baseball bat installed up their ass then it is their business.

Amendment IX - Construction of Constitution. Ratified 12/15/1791. The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

The people have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. As long as they are not interfering with the life, liberty and pursuit of happiness of someone else then it should be legal. When people start interfering with the freedoms of others is when they interfere with their own freedom.

Starboy

[bishop]

So let me be clear, are you saying irresponsible sex is bad and the abortion isn’t. Or are you saying both should be lessened, through whatever means you wish; (education, contraception, in a committed relationship such as marriage… whatever you choose.

sorry you can't accept my own answers, rather than the ones you're trying to pigeon hole me into saying - answers that don't reflect my views. a person who refuses to accept another's answers (that don't conform to the limited choices they're given) isn't much of a debater i'm afraid.

but to answer your spin-off questions.. i would like to see irresponsible sex lessened - for more reasons than simply avoiding unwanted pregnancy. and, obviously incidents of abortion would likely decrease if people had sex responsibly (along with std's, aids, etc.).

[SeanG]

Starboy, you realize Dread Scott has more in common with Roe vs. Wade and Doe V. Bolton than does any point you and I were trying to make.

Bishop, I asked for those here to drop out of debating mode and have a conversation. Its not hard. I have a feeling you are one of those people that will go out with friends and every time a simple question is asked you beat around the bush and rant to and fro. I can debate very well. However, I am merely asking for a Volconversation. You obviously cannot, for whatever reason… maybe too many years in these debate rooms and you think everything is an affront to your senses? For anyone to say that they don’t care if there are more abortions or not, no matter where they stand on the issue, or for someone not to make a stand that even one of the most liberal Senators in the history of the Senate made, is, well, untruthful. Don’t say I would like to see more responsible sex, and this would drop the rates of STD’s, abortion and the like. Just come out and say you would like to see abortion decreased or increased. Would you prefer a status quo? Children die from the procedure. Middle-aged mothers die from the procedures. And very possibly, the procedure is ending a viable life (this is where we disagree, but you cannot disagree that forcefully stopping the bodies natural process isn’t deadly to some).

It is amazing to me how those who are “progressive,” “liberal,” “independent,” “secular,” whatever, cannot just come out and say that something is wrong or that they would like to see that something should at the least be reduced. This seems to be a disease of the left and of secularism.

Again, I ask the question, and let me requote Hillary and Ted, does anyone here agree or disagree with them?

Hillary Clinton: “….in reaching our goal of keeping abortion safe, legal and rare into the next century…. More has to be done to reach out to young men, and enlist them in the campaign to make abortions rare….” Ted kennedy: “Surely, we can all agree that abortion should be rare, and that we should do all we can to help women avoid the need to face that decision…”

I never thought I would be defending a concept by these two… funny shite! It should be rare because woman suffer psychological issues from that point on. It is dangerous, and it is the result of bad choices. All those things can lead any common person to flatly state that “Yes, abortion should be rare.”

However, people who could care less or are apathetic about it will soon wake up to incidents not unlike those already happening, just more routine:

CWA’s Illinois State Director (SD) Karen Hayes recently uncovered disturbing news about Christ Hospital in Oak Lawn. It routinely performs “live-birth abortions”—which it labels “therapeutic”—in which babies deemed unworthy of life are delivered and left to die. In other words, it permits infanticides. This discovery even outraged former U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop. On September 15, he wrote a letter to Advocate Health Care, Christ Hospital’s parent company, condemning this practice. Addressing spina bifida victims specifically, Dr. Koop wrote, “This is truly a barbaric outrage … Abortion for Spina Bifida is not indicated unless one is committed to a practice of eugenics.”

Maybe some here will find solice in Peter Singer’s statement that:

"If we compare a severely defective human infant with a dog or a pig ... we will often find the nonhuman to have superior capacities ... only the fact that the defective infant is a member of the species homo sapiens leads it to be treated differently from the dog or pig. But species membership alone is not relevant ... If we can put aside the obsolete and erroneous notion of the sanctity of all human life, we may start to look at human life as it really is: the quality of life that each human being has or can obtain." http://www.forerunner.com/forerunner...Evolution.html

Does any one here have the spine enough to simply state that abortion should become rare. If not it is only a commentary on the state of ethics in America.

• “Everything I have said and done in these last years is relativism by intuition…. If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and men who claim to be bearers of an objective, immortal truth… then there is nothing more relativistic than fascistic attitudes and activity…. From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own ideology and to attempt to enforce it with all the energy of which he is capable”
  ~ Mussolini ~

Moral relativists are shocked to hear, I’m sure that there ideology, or lack thereof, is more fascistic than any other philosophy.

Can anyone answer the original question?

[LogicaLunatic]

Quote by: dotcoma Can a baby retain it's viability outside of the womb without a mother? A separate life still needs to be nurtured similarly to the way a mother's body takes care of it internally.

Quote by: dotcoma No, I will disagree with you. The abortions we see are not clusters of cells that could have been for anything. They are indeed humans in the process of development.

Wait stop, I didn't specify whether it HAD a mother or not, only that it was separate from the mother, as in, outside the womb. Before that crucial point (which keeps getting pushed closer and closer to conception by new discoveries) it is no more a baby than a clump of cells. If it can't survive outside of the mother even given our best medical science, it is then not a separate being. Even if the potential is there, it's only potential.

Hell, even tumors can grow teeth and hair! (See: teratoma)

As soon as abortion is made illegal I'm claiming my sperm as dependants on my w4 form.

[Gorgo]

What is your point, SeanG? How is any of this relevant?

[Gorgo]

Let me put it another way. I don't care if abortions are increased or decreased. If someone started giving out pills for free that ended pregnancies in the first trimester that was completely safe I would think that was wonderful. If it was safer and cheaper than other methods of contraception (and pregnancy itself wasn't a risk), I would think that that was the way to go for a lot of people. How's that?

[Starboy]

Quote by: SeanG Starboy, you realize Dread Scott has more in common with Roe vs. Wade and Doe V. Bolton than does any point you and I were trying to make.

SeanG, you are the one directing this discussion. I am just responding to your posts. If you don't like it then stay on topic.

Starboy

[SeanG]

Gorgo, you said

If someone started giving out pills for free that ended pregnancies in the first trimester that was completely safe…

You will never be able to find a safe way to drastically stop a natural occurrence in a woman’s body that either evolution or creation made to be the natural order. For instance, the pill can cause lots of problems (an old response I did many years ago):

Now women were reporting a number of minor side effects, like: migraine headaches, depression, nausea, fatigue, skin rashes, inflammation of the gums, weight gain, breast tenderness, and irregular menstruation – (The Boston Women’s Health Collective, The New Our Bodies, Ourselves [New York: Simon Shuster, 1984], pp.242-44). Or how a number of medical studies began pouring in that the complications didn’t end there – for example: World Health Organization, Oral Contraceptives: Technical and Safety Aspects (New York: United Nations Book Shop), p. 20; Boston Collaborative Drug Surveillance Program, “[Oral Contraceptives and Venous Thrombo-Embolic Disease, Surgically Confirmed Gall Bladder Disease, and Breast Tumors,” Lancet, January 1973, pp. 1399-1404; O. P. Heinonen, et al., “Cardiovascular Birth Defects and Antenatal Exposure to Female Sex Hormones,” New England Journal of Medicine 296:2 (January 1977), pp. 67-70. These studies, and others, showed that women who use the Pill are susceptible to hypertension – abnormally high blood pressure. They have an increased risk of heart attacks, thromboembolism [the blockage of a blood vessel by a thrombus carried through the bloodstream from its site of formation.], and strokes. They are more significantly susceptible to various kinds of growths, cysts, and malignancies including ovarian cancer, liver cancer, and skin cancer. In addition, it appears that the Pill can make women more susceptible to diabetes, urinary tract infections, epilepsy, asthma, pleurisy, arthritis, eczema, urticaria, chloasma, and ulcers. – (The New Our Bodies, Ourselves, pp. 241-244. [from Grand Illusions : The Legacy of Planned Parenthood, by George Grant].) Did you need to know about the IUD, RU486, Spermicidal Jelly, Etc. How about other forms of birth control: Menstraul Extraction, Suction-Apsiration, Dialation and Curettage (D&C), Dialation and Evacuation (D&E), Saline Amnocentesis, Prostaglandin?

The FDA warned a company that makes Depo-Proverb (a new birth-control) that the commercial misleads consumers by excluding information making the birth control pill seem safer. The warning came in a letter to the company released by the FDA on Dec. 29, 04. In addition to the bleeding problems the pill's label warns that other side effects can include blood clots, heart attack and stroke.

You see, the woman’s body is a hormonal machine that when conception begins, it changes drastically. To stop this normal/natural process, one has to drastically attack this process. This is, and always will be, dangerous to the woman’s body and health. With this in mind, do you think that abortions, which are also equally as risky, should be reduced or increased? Do you disagree or agree with the Senators?

[Gorgo]

I cannot disagree that chemicals and invasive operations are, for a long time, going to carry some risks. That was not my point. My point was to attempt to answer the questions that you posed for some reason. The reason you asked the question cannot be because you want someone else's answer, as you don't seem to care about our answers. So, you tell us what you want us to know and we'll shut up.

I would like everyone to have as much or as little safe sex as they want to have. Since sex itself is risky, I think it would be wise to abstain from sex, or masturbate, but should people decide to have sex with others, I think it should be done as safely, and respectfully, as possible with reliable birth control methods. Should the preceding fail, I think abortion should be an option. I think abortions should be made as safe as possible.

Sex is risky. Pregnancy is risky. Birth control is risky. Abortion is risky. I think everyone should embark on any of these things with that knowledge.

Should someone work towards making any of these things less risky? Yes. Should abortion be made rare by educating the public and making contraception better and less risky and less expensive? Sure. That would be great. It already is relatively rare. It is expensive. It is hard to get an abortion for most people.

[bishop]

you make a whole lot of assumptions based on the comments you've read in one whole thread here seanyboo. can't have the conversation you want, since i don't respond to the limited options you want to force me into. like i said, i gave my honest answer. i guess you can't accept that.

Again, I ask the question, and let me requote Hillary and Ted, does anyone here agree or disagree with them?

unwanted pregnancies should be decreased. since that is my pov, let's just say for argument's sake that i disagree with them. but since i sense that you're the type of person to goad people into your own characterizations, let me also say this... in previous posts in this thread, i've also said that i'm completely opposed to partial-birth and all late-term abortions. (i don't think you bothered to read that before making your half-baked assumptions)

[fushigi]

Quote by: SeanG Fushigi, you said something that is quite the opposite of what the founders clearly pointed to as a truth of what does and what does not come from the state... our rights to life come from a higher source than man, government is only there to secure [not to say what] our rights [are]. At least according to those who signed our founding and other documents.

Okay, so if I understand you correctly, you're saying that the government's job is to determine and secure the rights that "a higher source than man" gives us. And you're accusing me of being out of touch with what our founders wanted in a state?

[dotcoma]

Quote by: LogicaLunatic Quote by: dotcoma Can a baby retain it's viability outside of the womb without a mother? A separate life still needs to be nurtured similarly to the way a mother's body takes care of it internally. Wait stop, I didn't specify whether it HAD a mother or not, only that it was separate from the mother, as in, outside the womb. Before that crucial point (which keeps getting pushed closer and closer to conception by new discoveries) it is no more a baby than a clump of cells. If it can't survive outside of the mother even given our best medical science, it is then not a separate being. Even if the potential is there, it's only potential. Hell, even tumors can grow teeth and hair! (See: teratoma) As soon as abortion is made illegal I'm claiming my sperm as dependants on my w4 form.

My point was that we know that the clump of cells is a baby. It is not sperm or a tumor lol. You can understand what it is. You are being way too technical IMO.

Bishop, why do you think women should not have babies they do not want? What sort of message does that send society? Responsibility is important.

[Matt W]

Responsibility is important - and so is the welfare of the mother. We've been through this ad nauseam, but what about the age-old conundrum - the baby of a rapist? Why are you for forcing a woman to go through a painful process to have a baby she may well despise?

[LogicaLunatic]

Quote by: dotcoma My point was that we know that the clump of cells is a baby. It is not sperm or a tumor lol. You can understand what it is. You are being way too technical IMO.

Right, that was your point. My point was that this clump of cells shouldn't be considered more than a simple clump of cells (legally speaking) until it can be removed from the womb and still retain it's viability.

Yes, I can understand what that clump of cells is and what it 'could' become. It has quite a bit of potential. But, until that potential can be realized WITHOUT the mother's special biological capabilities, it is just another clump of cells.

Can the clump of cells be removed from the womb and survive to become a full term baby? If so, then it shouldn't be aborted.

[Gorgo]

If it's murder, then it is murder. It is murder if it's rape, it is murder if the life of the mother is in danger, it is murder. There can be no extenuating circumstances.

Quote by: Matt W Responsibility is important - and so is the welfare of the mother. We've been through this ad nauseam, but what about the age-old conundrum - the baby of a rapist? Why are you for forcing a woman to go through a painful process to have a baby she may well despise?

[dirishb]

When a Cell divides........."There is LIFE"......Folks, it does not get any simpler than that.
Yours Truly, dirishb

[tman_ndsu08]

The cell alone could be called life, if you want.

[Chris the Chees]

Quote by: Gorgo If it's murder, then it is murder. It is murder if it's rape, it is murder if the life of the mother is in danger, it is murder. There can be no extenuating circumstances.

However, is it not the case that a person has the right to self protection? By that standard a mother in serious danger has the right to the termination of her pregnancy.

[Gorgo]

Self-protection involves injuring an attacker. Is the baby seen as an attacker here? No. Then what we have is doing what causes the least amount of damage or risk.

That's what abortion is.