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Abortion Debate
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Post by
Skreeran
For other purposes, including criminal acts, and death penalties, it both protects, and recognizes that a child in the womb is indeed, a child. What a person "thinks", should be carefully scrutinized, if you are weighing that as justification. Not to long ago, this country did not "think" blacks were human either.Not that long ago, as in almost two centuries ago?
Post by
Magician22773
For other purposes, including criminal acts, and death penalties, it both protects, and recognizes that a child in the womb is indeed, a child. What a person "thinks", should be carefully scrutinized, if you are weighing that as justification. Not to long ago, this country did not "think" blacks were human either.Not that long ago, as in almost two centuries ago?
Its a pretty common argument, used here quite commonly to make points about gays and women's rights. If it is acceptable for use there, is there a reason it should not apply here as well?
Post by
Skreeran
For other purposes, including criminal acts, and death penalties, it both protects, and recognizes that a child in the womb is indeed, a child. What a person "thinks", should be carefully scrutinized, if you are weighing that as justification. Not to long ago, this country did not "think" blacks were human either.Not that long ago, as in almost two centuries ago?
Its a pretty common argument, used here quite commonly to make points about gays and women's rights. If it is acceptable for use there, is there a reason it should not apply here as well?I just think you're comparing apples to oranges. Culture has moved forward a great deal since 1865, and the personhood of a fetus is a lot harder to quantify than a black person's.
Post by
ElhonnaDS
@Skreeran- I think that the statement that it is harder to quantify is more opinion than fact, and as such the analogy is appropriate.
A fetus is something that lives is going to eventually grow to the point that everyone on both sides of the argument agree it is a person. They share the exact same DNA, and their parents are definitely human. The argument is whether it starts as a person, or ends up as one at some point.
We don't have a super-specific scientific definition of what a person is, as related to having a moral responsibility to them, that then doesn't seem to get complicated when we get to abortion. Do we define a species by DNA? They share that. Do we define a person by intelligence and reason? Then many toddlers would fall outside the bounds. Do we include toddlers because they will eventually become someone who can think and reason? Then why does that exception have a developmental cutoff at all? Is the number of cells involved the crucial answer- if the number of cells is under a certain amount it doesn't count? Is there a difference between that number of cells on its way to being a fully functioning organism, and that number of cells being a part of a whole in which none of the reasoning or intelligence resides? How do you define it what a person, and why?
I imagine that back when slavery was a current event, abolitionists raised similar questions: Why are they not human? Do humans have to fall within a certain skin tone range? What about Caucasian children who tan very darkly, or children of African descent who who were lighter (either because of partial white parentage, or being from certain regions of Africa)? Is there something special about a color that makes people special, or is it about something like the soul or the mind? How can you decide anything about a soul or a mind when you're only looking at skin and hair? What do you base your assessment of what makes a person a person, and why?
From the point of view of a slave owner, facts that we see as completely obvious proof that people of all ethnicities are still people seemed much more complicated and much less cut and dry. But at the time, they thought they had solid arguments for why it was more complicated than pointing to the fact that we could produce children between the races, and they could show that other races could be just as well educated, intellectually inclined, etc. when given the opportunity. No slave owner (or very few)- the first time he saw a black man reading or heard a black man discuss trade strategies learnedly, suddenly revised his long-held opinion and released all his slaves. There was something unspoken, and unexplained, about the belief that rested in them just having been told they were not people and accepting it, even in the face of logical fallacy.
I've never heard a really good explanation for why a fetus is not a child that when applied to a non-fetus situation was something by which we would measure the value or validity of a human being. We value children and infants more, not less, despite the fact their brains and thought processes haven't developed, and they aren't finished growing, because of all they have to look forward to in the future. We don't disqualify someone as human when they stop feeling pain, we don't stop identifying people in a coma as human and pull the plug when we know for a fact that in 6 months their brains will be up and running again. There are living children, born premature, who are considered people with less cells than late term pregnancies that people want to abort, but no one claims they are not humans. We don't allow a woman to make decisions about ending a child's life based on the circumstances of their conception, economic concerns or social concerns, and we don't excuse the killing of a child a mother wants to give up on the grounds that no one was going to take the child from her for a few months, and it would have died if she hadn't cared for it in the interim, and the child didn't have more of a right for her to feed it than she had to make the choice not to.
I find it very hard to see how someone can apply a disqualification to an unborn child as to why it's not human, that is not used to disqualify children or adults who have been born from being human, and I find it very hard to see how someone can use reasons the child is better off not experiencing life to justify abortion that they would not use to justify ending that same life 6 months later, even though all of the same things will be avoided in both cases. It leaves the only indisputable difference as "They were not actually born yet," and even then, that does nothing to answer WHY that fundamentally changes them to a non-person.(##RESPBREAK##)8##DELIM##ElhonnaDS##DELIM##
Post by
Skreeran
It's things like this debate that kinda make me glad that Sapiens is the only extant species of genus Homo. Seeing that we're all the same species, race and gender are comparatively easy to debate.
Imagine if Homo neanderthalensis or Homo heidelbergensis were still around today? They'd probably have intelligence on a level similar (possibly slightly below) our own, but think about how fuzzy their rights would be.
Post by
ElhonnaDS
Oh I agree. I think that other sapien species, or the introduction of either a new subspecies of human or an intelligent but non-human species, would bring out the worst in us. I have a story I am working on that looks at a lot of these themes, but it's nothing more that kind of sketched out yet.
Post by
Lordplatypus
Simply put, once something is sentient it deserves to live.
That's my Point of view. If it has an active brain. frontal lobe most importantly, then it should live.
Post by
588688
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Magician22773
Simply put, once something is sentient it deserves to live.
That's my Point of view. If it has an active brain. frontal lobe most importantly, then it should live.
Well, that is somewhere around week 3. (4 if you want the brain to have developed into lobes).
This is a good 20 weeks or so before most abortions become illegal.
BTW...a couple that I know, had a baby girl about 3 months ago. She was only 23 weeks along, and had pre eclampsia. Their baby was about 1.5 lbs, and only 14 inches long. The baby is now about 3.5 lbs, and is maybe month away from leaving the hospital.
This child would have been legal to abort.
Post by
Lordplatypus
And exactly the problem.
A sentient being is a sentient being.
That's what separates use from cows or fish, we have a unique "Sentience" each one. It means each person is valuable, and should be valued.
Then there's the left-wing that just wants to get more votes at the cost of making a dystopia.
Post by
Magician22773
Glad they cleared things up
.
Post by
Skreeran
What?
I read all the words in that comic, and they failed to form a coherent message in my brain.
Just...
What?
Post by
Magician22773
What?
I read all the words in that comic, and they failed to form a coherent message in my brain.
Just...
What?
Incandescent is the only big word in there, and you can Google that if necessary.
Are there any others in particular that you are struggling with?
Post by
Skreeran
What?
I read all the words in that comic, and they failed to form a coherent message in my brain.
Just...
What?
Incandescent is the only big word in there, and you can Google that if necessary.
Are there any others in particular that you are struggling with?Okay, how about the fact that I can and have smoked, owned a gun, used incandescent bulbs, drank soda, used electricity generated by coal, and am faced with people honoring God on a daily basis, but abortion is 100% illegal in all cases in 30 states?
Post by
Magician22773
What?
I read all the words in that comic, and they failed to form a coherent message in my brain.
Just...
What?
Incandescent is the only big word in there, and you can Google that if necessary.
Are there any others in particular that you are struggling with?Okay, how about the fact that I can and have smoked, owned a gun, used incandescent bulbs, drank soda, used electricity generated by coal, and am faced with people honoring God on a daily basis, but abortion is 100% illegal in all cases in 30 states?
Hmmm...
Smoking is being banned by government all over the place.
Gun Ownership would be banned if it weren't for that pesky Constitution, but you gotta give 'em an E for effort.
Incandescent bulbs are being phased out, by law, for the much more,
mercury filled
, energy efficient, (and significantly more costly) CFL bulbs.
Soda size has been regulated by the Governor of New York, and sugar has been called a "poison", and some lawmakers have suggested that it should be controlled by the ATF, even requiring a person to be ID's when buying a soda.
Obama campaigned against coal power plants, saying that if someone wants to build a coal plant, they can, but he will bankrupt them with his policies.
And, you seem to be quite
offended
by those honoring God, unless of course when you said,
you'd probably take
offense
to it too.
I misunderstood something.
So, yeah...I think the cartoon explains it quite well. You can be pro-choice, as long as you don't choose any of those other things.
Post by
Skreeran
But, um, I can, and, uh, do?
I started smoking while I was in the Army, which is part of the government. I own a gun, my dad owns a gun, my mom owns a gun, and thanks to the Second Amendment, that's probably not going to change. I still use incandescent bulbs most of the time, but I prefer florescent bulbs because they don't have to be replaced as often and produce less waste. I don't live in New York, so I drink soda way more than I should and my teeth are paying for it. I'm opposed to putting too much reliance on non-renewable energy because it's bound for failure when it runs out and it's
literally killing our planet
. And yes, I am offended when people drag their religion into my own business uninvited, but I certainly believe in the right to hold beliefs different from my own.
So, yeah...I still think your comic is dumb. I am pro-choice and I fit almost none of your stereotypes.
Post by
Magician22773
No, I don't get what you mean either magician.
Unless the comic is making fun of left-wing people or something, since pro-choice is usually a left view?
Otherwise I don't understand.
I am not sure what I could post that would help you understand.
There are lots of things in the cartoon that government thinks are bad, so they reduce or remove our right to choose them
There is one thing there that I think is bad, and many people, including the government, think it should be a choice.
I find that ironic, and I believe the creator of the cartoon does as well.
And that, is all the troll food I have for today...sorry.
Post by
Lordplatypus
I'm opposed to putting too much reliance on non-renewable energy because it's bound for failure when it runs out and it's literally killing our planet.
I'd rather use something we can rely on rather than rely on weather.
We need something that won't shut down if the sky is cloudy or the wind dies down.
Post by
Skreeran
I'm opposed to putting too much reliance on non-renewable energy because it's bound for failure when it runs out and it's literally killing our planet.
I'd rather use something we can rely on rather than rely on weather.
We need something that won't shut down if the sky is cloudy or the wind dies down.Sure, solar and wind both have their problems. Nuclear, geothermal, and hydroelectric are other options.
But my point is, we have to get some kind of fuel that not going to run out in the next hundred years. If we're still so heavily dependent on fossil fuels when they run out, it's going to be chaos everywhere.
It's just a bonus that we're currently causing the planets sixth mass extinction event.
Post by
Adamsm
We need something that won't shut down if the sky is cloudy or the wind dies down.
..../sigh Solar energy continues whether the sun is shining or not; obviously it doesn't work at night, but there are lots of locations all across the world that you can build panel farms. Hell, if they can figure out a way to keep them from freezing and easy transportation, could set up massive fields in the arctic and antarctic for the 6 months of light that both of them go through. Wind turbines are hundreds of feet high so they will get as much wind as possible.
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