ABORTION- Post opinions here!

Options ...

People need options to consider. Abortion is one such option. If you want less women to get abortions, you need to change the tactics that aren't working.

<b>Abstinence</b>. This form of teaching is predominantly from religious folk who preach that pre-marital fornication is best saved for marriage (i.e., committed relationships). As <b>YoungWriter</b> has said, it is very possible to exercise some self-control and abstain from having sex (as well as any kind of a social life). Just because people have the ability to have sex doesn't automatically entitle them to do so as soon as the urge arises.

Complete abstinence is not the answer, however. As has been seen in the media of late, a total denial (to oneself) of some of life's leanings can eventually lead to crimes against others (and if you're anti-abortion, then abortion can be included in this).

<b>Contraception</b>. Unfortunately, the Catholic religion spent copious amounts of time and money (and considerable political muscle) in suppressing this ultimate form of birth control. Less babies meant less members, and that was not an option. The religious right also happen to be the same people that are against homosexuality (even though the chances of conceiving a child in a true homosexual relationship--without the help of artificial insemination--are effectively zero). Instead of denouncing homosexuality, it would seem reasonable to accede that homosexuals are the true pro-rights activists, yet they are continually repressed.

Masturbation is another way for people to release pent-up feelings of desire. But, since many religious folk tend to denounce this form of self-expression (again, the chance of producing offspring by single-handedly stimulating oneself is relatively nil), masturbation is seen as sick, demented, a factor in several unrelated sex abuse cases. Considering that nearly 90% (a low figure estimate) of the world's population engages in masturbation, by the same logic above it would make sense to say that all of us house a sexually-motivated maniacal sociopath within. Joyce Elders (former US Surgeon General) received far too much media-attention when she actually went out of her way to preach masturbation as a form of sex education.

Some CNN poll recently said that 60% of kids (18 and below) have engaged in sex at least once. Seeing as how more and more kids are being told to not do drugs, wouldn't it make sense that they would find other ways to amuse themselves? Wouldn't it make more sense to redirect their desires into something, well, less productive (pregnancy).

Too many people preach "Keep it in the pants" without realizing that their lifestyle either doesn't require it now (they're married or in a relationship of some sort), don't have the drive for sex (whereas these same people have quite the hankering for alcohol or over-the-counter drugs), or believe falsely that their way of life is the true path (anything sexual is of the devil unless it's within the confines of marriage).

It's funny that the heterosexual community engage in so many sexual acts which can in no way produce children, yet those same positions (Kama-sutra ad nauseum) are not taught to others as options at the very least. If people thought they had more options/outlets--masturbation, contraception, different positions--perhaps there would be less unwanted pregnancies.

Since people grow up thinking (in the US at least) that sex is taboo except when it comes to marriage, those same people learn to associate it with behind-closed-doors scenarios. So that eventually when they do have sex (even if it's before marriage), they usually don't think to put on a condom or get themselves on the pill because that would mean that they're having sex and that can't be right. Their parents ask them if they're having sex and they reply, "No, of course not." And then they get pregnant and the parents scratch their heads. Morons. Pre-emptive medicine is not a bad thing; how much easier would it have been to assume your son or daughter was having sex and then proceeded to teach them about safe sex. You can denounce it all you want, but as long as you cover your bases so that the children won't be inclined to hide the experience from even themselves, chances are good that many more unwanted pregnancies would be caught.

I guess it would be pretty redundant to say that throughout history, the majority of abortions have been from the daughters of god-fearing parents. Having a child out of wedlock does wonders for the parents' respect in the community, so the best way to ensure that the parents retain their respect is abort the baby.

It must come as quite the surprise to see their sons and daughters engaging in such behaviour especially since they've been taught from the time when they were knee-high to a grasshopper that sex was only sanctioned within marriage.

Egod! If people were just taught openly that sex is a fact and that there were many other ways of engaging in it, perhaps the taboo of sex would lessen. Perhaps contraception would become commonplace and acceptable. Even when I'm in the store I still see some guys trying to deftly grab a pack of condoms without it looking like they're grabbing condoms (hell, I can't knock them--I was like that for a while myself). Perhaps taking the necessary precautions and realizing that your son or daughter is sexually active and sitting down with them while you still have the chance wouldn't be that foreign of an idea.

Out of sight, out of mind is the mentality that too many hold. Just don't think about it, they say. It's like a local saying around here, "Whoever said genealogy was fun has either never done genealogy or has never had fun." Meaning that just because it's a cinch for you to keep yourself pure before marriage doesn't mean it's that easy for others. As long as they had options, wouldn't it be better and more acceptable for people to have sex instead of having kids?

Wow, that soapbox was creaking long before I got off of it.

Thanks!

prag
 
Here are some things to throw in the mix.

Young folks, becoming aware of sex, have hormones speaking louder than good sense. Most, upon losing their viriginity will not return to abstinance. Fact of life.

I lightly touched upon this in the previous post. That a young lady considers that she may be abandoned by her boyfriend unless she conceeds to sex. Also peer pressure asserts another force to push them to comply. If ladies felt that everytime they had sex they would get pregnant there would most likely be considerably less. However nature plays a dice game. Sometimes the dice are load for, sometimes against. Good sense doesn't play well in the heat of passion. That is natures design.

Who are we to tell some one that they made a mistake and now must suffer for it the rest of their life? Who are we to condemn a woman who has yet to discover life in its most real sense to a life of poverty because she was not ready when nature made plain reality? Till that point, being young leads one to believe they are bullet proof and what has happened to millions of others will not happen to them. I am not saying that everyone must have an abortion. I am saying the choice is and should always, in the end, rest with the mother. No more, no less.

Funny, I am not female. Yet I take a stance for the mother. I will never become pregnant within this life. I will say this. I am responcible. I believe that the one who must bear the burden is the one who in the end must always make a choice.
 
Like some of the others, I have no horse in this race, but find the arguments interesting.

Tyler - you've twice said that you don't think the government should legislate morality, but that's just what governments DO. Laws against killing people are "legislating morality". I assume you aren't against such laws as that, so I think you need to refine your thoughts on this matter.

Defining the argument in terms of "choice" may be a winning debating tactic, but intellectually it's weak. If a human fetus is a human, then killing it would seem to be murder. So, we CAN (and some have) engage in a debate over biology, but that leaves the decision in the hands of scientists, and even then it isn't clear. But there are good arguments for killing fetuses even if they are human -- and I haven't heard them here yet.

Clockwood's ideas about sentience are very much along the same lines as mine.
 
"Tyler - you've twice said that you don't think the government should legislate morality, but that's just what governments DO. Laws against killing people are "legislating morality". I assume you aren't against such laws as that, so I think you need to refine your thoughts on this matter."

Actually, you seem to have totally missed what I also stated twice. Murder is NOT illegal because it is immoral. Laws are based on what is beneficial or detrimental to a society. Murder being legal would be highly detrimental to a society. Therefore, it should be illegal.

Name any law you think is based on morality (and probably wasat some point) and I guarantee you I either think it is for the benefit of society to be illegal or shouldn't be a law.
 
Tyler -- your philosophy as stated presents a lot of questions. WHO decides what is beneficial? The Germans under Hitler thought getting rid of the Jews would be beneficial --- and they may have been right. Very often what's beneficial for some hurts others. How do you balance these effects?

I suggest that laws are made more on the basis of what we WANT. We all put our wants into a big bag, count them up, and that's what we make into law.
 
"Tyler -- your philosophy as stated presents a lot of questions. WHO decides what is beneficial? The Germans under Hitler thought getting rid of the Jews would be beneficial --- and they may have been right. Very often what's beneficial for some hurts others. How do you balance these effects?"

What it raises is debate. And my system would only truly work if the majority of citizens took an interest in politics and logic.

Who decides what is beneficial? The citizens. They elect members of parliament who represent their feelings on what is beneficial.

The Germans under Hitler thought....? And they were damn right. It did benefit them. However, if they had forsight (which people in the midst of depression rarely do) they would have seen the problems which would inevitably be raised by genocide. Here's where it becomes a matter of debate. Some politicians would say the benefits of killing Jews outweigh the detrimints. Some would say otherwise. They should be allowed to argue their sides and then the citizens make an informed decision.

How do you balance these effects? You take into consideration all ends and means and you decide which is of more objective value. It's difficult. I causes much debate. But it is a fuck load better than "my morals are RIGHT!"
 
"I suggest that laws are made more on the basis of what we WANT. We all put our wants into a big bag, count them up, and that's what we make into law"

The majority of Germans wanted Jews gone.
The majority of Americans wanted Communists kicked out.
 
not entirely true
it is whoever speaks the loudest, has an influential lobby doing their bidding and of course oodles of cash
 
Yes, and that's what happened isn't it? You are stating what you believe SHOULD be the case and I'm stating what I believe IS the case.

How do we determine what is beneficial and how do we decide what all to take into account? You make it sound as if intelligent, informed people could determine whether the result of any proposed law would be beneficial. Aside from the difficulty of ascertaining matters of fact (is global warming caused by human activity?) though, we have to answer questions regarding minority rights and how much weight (if any) to assign to psychological happiness.
 
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It IS possible to grant human status to a fetus and yet be in favor of killing it:

Two arguments:

1) Women have a right to sex. Sometimes, pregnancies occur even though reasonable precautions are taken. Therefore, you wind up with women pregnant through no fault (note that I didn't say "action") of their own. Now, along comes the fetus (another human being and in effect, it says. "You must support my life until others can." It would not at all be unreasonable for the woman to say "Why?"

2) Clockwood's sentience argument. We value human life above all other NOT because it is human but because of its sentience. A human fetus has NO sentience (or at least no more sentience than individual cells do) until the 8th week of life. Even at birth, it has less than, say, a dog. (In fact, I've read reports that the smartest breed of dog, the border collie, has the sentience of a 2 1/2 year old child.) So, a fetus, SHOULD have less protection than a dog or many other animals which we kill -- and even eat. Of course this argument brings up questions about infanticide. But infanticide is something that I also could support.
 
Roe v Wade was a ridiculous decision. The supremes just sort of waved there hands over the constitution and then came out with 50 pages or so of mumbo jumbo. The decision on whether or not abortion should be legal or illegal, and all the details, should be left to the people, via their representatives (or even directly, by initiative), IMO. I fail to see why Supreme Court members have any more moral authority than any other citizen.

spookz -- it is true that the people who oppose abortion usually feel much more strongly about it than most of those who favor it. If the issue were returned to the legislatures, they would do everything they could to make their wishes weigh more than their opponents. This is an issue with democracies and democratic republics that cuts across many issues. I don't call it a "problem" because I don't know that it's a bad thing for people who feel strongly about an issue to be able to count more than people who don't.
 
Ridiculous or not, Roe vs Wade is now the law of the land. I think it was a good call. It elimanated the fly-by-night abortions. No longer are women found dumped, bleeding, and dead or near dead from inadequate training and shysters. True medical help is available from professionals. Much like drugs, this a practice that will not stop because it is illegal. The past has shown us that just like drinking alcohol and doing drugs being illegal will not stop either those who wish it or those who will preform the service. Far better that it be legal.

As far as going out and shooting somebody because I do not agree with the law of the land, it ain't going to happen. While I believe that it should be available to women I have no axe to sharpen against folks who think different. I just think them wrong. What is not taken into account is the silent majority. Those you don't hear from. They speak at the polls at voting time.
 
wet1 -- it is ridiculous that Roe v. Wade IS the law of the land for the reasons I sited.

You and I hold opposite positions: you care strongly about abortion and don't care how/what it takes to get your position codified as law, I, don't care one way or the other about abortion, but care strongly that the people's will be heard on this issue, not the will of 9 supreme court members.

You say the silent majority is heard at the polls. I say too often the silent majority doesn't bother to vote, and that's why strong-caring minorities are often able to get laws enacted that reflect the anti-majoritarian beliefs.

I think it is a pretty well known fact that before abortion was legal, it was far less common than now. Also, I think when alcohol was prohibited, consumption of it was way down. Laws do often work, to an extent. This seems a side issue to me, though.
 
Roe vs. Wade is not the law of the land, it is the ruling of the Supreme Court. My biggest beef on Roe vs. Wade was the way it came about, and what it did.

Roe vs. Wade, for those who don't realize it, was a court ruling by 9 individual judges over a legal case. It was NOT passed by represenetives in the house of the senate. It was NOT voted upon by elected represenetives. It overturned anti-abortion laws in states which were very pro-life. It affirmed pro-abortion laws in states which already had abortion.

When Roe vs. Wade came into effect, it struck down dozens upon dozens of laws in multiple states at once, which were passed by duly elected officials, and citizens engaging in the democratic process of law.

Now, look what's happened in 20 years. With the Government legalizing abortion as a whole, and it being part of most public sex education courses, it's changed the legal (and thus moral) standards of a whole generation. For the record, I am not touching the moral issue here with my own opinion of what is moral or not, I am talking about the effects of Roe Vs. Wade.

In 1992, the US Supreme Court nearly did strike down Roe vs. Wade in the court case "Planned Parenthood vs. Casey". However, in the end it affirmed it, basically because that between the mid 1970's and now, a whole generation of young people were brought up free of the moral constraint of pregnancy in sex.

The point I'm comming to is that NO ONE who says that Pro-Lifers are trying to impose morals has much ground to stand on in view of how Pro-Choice came to be legalized.
 
Actually Xevious, it is the function of the Supreme Court to interpret the law of the land - i.e the Constitution. Whether you buy the 14th amendment argument or not.
 
I know that. My quesiton is WHY did it have to be a court ruling? The answer is rather obvious. If this battle occured in the Senate and in the House of Represenetives, it would be a national battle on all fronts. Even today, Planned Parenthood, NOW, and other groups do not introduce their own legeslation or laws for approval by the senate, in favor of court action.

The only reason to not introduce a law into the senate or house which legalized Abortion is because it quite likely would not pass in Congress. Think about it: It's been over 20 years since Roe vs. Wade and morals in the country have changed as a result of it. A federal law which made Abortion legal would be MUCH stronger than a court ruling in terms of legal applicability. Yet, none has been introduced.

Then again, the last time morals were imposed on several states at once via the Federal Law, a whole civil war broke out. I wonder if that is the real fear. With radical pro-choice people already attacking and violently maiming pro-life protesters, and framing some of them, and extreme pro-lifers killing abortion doctors and blowing up abortion clinics, I think that statement EASILY stands on it's own merits.
 
And, ah, so?

Xevious:

Then again, the last time morals were imposed on several states at once via the Federal Law, a whole civil war broke out. I wonder if that is the real fear.
Click to expand...

Ummm, have I slipped into a parallel dimension where the US has a wildly different history?

I don't seem to remember ANY of this from my history books.

In any case, your point remains, well, pointless.
 
Slavery is a matter of morals isn't it, and morals are purely subjective aren't they? In fact, Aristotle supported slavery as a natural state for some human beings.

Last time I read US History, the issue of slavery was a good part of why the War Between the States broke out. That would mean that militarily, AND by legeslation, the Federal Government imposed morals. By my point of view, Roe vs. Wade was an imposement of morals. Then again, the states which outlawed Abortion were also imposing morals.

The point I am trying to make is two-fold. ONE is that it doesn't matter if the Pro-Life OR the Pro-Choice position is the one the Government adopts. In either case, SOMEONE's morals are being used, be it the moral "It's a woman's choice" or the moral "It's a human being." The idea that outlawing abortion is imposing morals is true. The idea of allowing abortion to anyone who wants one is ALSO an imposing of morals. You can argue "I think women choose for themselves" but that is in itself, a moral argument. Namely, the moral is that women have the right to decide if they choose to carry a child or not.

It is also my point that these two morals go far beyond the subject of if a fetus is a child or not. We are dancing around a VERY old issue of mankind, just in new ways. The issue is: What is the criteria for establishing who is human and who is not? Is this based on age and development? Do those who can take care of themselves have a moral obligation to take care of those who cannot? Is person interests as the primary rule the way society should be, or should society require compassion of everyone to help those who cannot help themselves? These are all OLD questions.

Abortion is just another verse in an old song and dance. It's a song and dance that has been related to the same disputed values which come into play when wars break out.
 
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"What can the white man say to the black woman?

For four hundred years he ruled over the black woman’s womb.

Let us be clear. In the barracoons and along the slave shipping coasts of Africa, for more than twenty generations, it was he who dashed our babies brains out against the rocks.

What can the white man say to the black woman?

For four hundred years he determined which black woman’s children would live or die.

Let it be remembered. It was he who placed our children on the auction block in cities all across the eastern half of what is now the United States, and listened to and watched them beg for their mothers’ arms, before being sold to the highest bidder and dragged away.

What can the white man say to the black woman?

We remember that Fannie Lou Hamer, a poor sharecropper on a Mississippi plantation, was one of twenty-one children; and that on plantations across the South black women often had twelve, fifteen, twenty children. Like their enslaved mothers and grandmothers before them, these black women were sacrificed to the profit the white man could make from harnessing their bodies and their children’s bodies to the cotton gin.

What can the white man say to the black woman?

We see him lined up on Saturday nights, century after century, to make the black mother, who must sell her body to feed her children, go down on her knees to him.

Let us take note:

He has not cared for a single one of the dark children in his midst, over hundreds of years.

Where are the children of the Cherokee, my great grandmother’s people?

Gone.

Where are the children of the Blackfoot?

Gone.

Where are the children of the Lakota?

Gone.

Of the Cheyenne?

Of the Chippewa?

Of the Iroquois?

Of the Sioux?

Of the Mandinka?

Of the Ibo?

Of the Ashanti?

Where are the children of the Slave Coast and Wounded Knee?

We do not forget the forced sterilizations and forced starvations on the reservations, here as in South Africa. Nor do we forget the smallpox-infested blankets Indian children were given by the Great White Fathers of the United States government.

What has the white man to say to the black woman?

When we have children you do everything in your power to make them feel unwanted from the moment they are born. You send them to fight and kill other dark mothers’ children around the world. You shove them onto public highways in the path of oncoming cars. You shove their heads through plate glass windows. You string them up and you string them out.

What has the white man to say to the black woman?

From the beginning, you have treated all dark children with absolute hatred.

Thirty million African children died on the way to the Americas, where nothing awaited them but endless toil and the crack of a bullwhip. They died of a lack of food, of lack of movement in the holds of ships. Of lack of friends and relatives. They died of depression, bewilderment and fear.

What has the white man to say to the black woman?

Let us look around us: Let us look at the world the white man has made for the black woman and her children.

It is a world in which the black woman is still forced to provide cheap labor, in the form of children, for the factories and on the assembly lines of the white man.

It is a world into which the white man dumps every foul, person-annulling drug he smuggles into creation.

It is a world where many of our babies die at birth, or later of malnutrition, and where many more grow up to live lives of such misery they are forced to choose death by their own hands.

What has the white man to say to the black woman, and to all women and children everywhere?

Let us consider the depletion of the ozone; let us consider homelessness and the nuclear peril; let us consider the destruction of the rain forests in the name of the almighty hamburger. Let us consider the poisoned apples and the poisoned water and the poisoned air and the poisoned earth.

And that all of our children, because of the white man’s assault on the planet, have a possibility of death by cancer in their almost immediate future.

What has the white, male lawgiver to say to any of us? To those of us who love life too much to willingly bring more children into a world saturated with death?

Abortion, for many women, is more than an experience of suffering beyond anything most men will ever know; it is an act of mercy, and an act of self-defense.

To make abortion illegal again is to sentence millions of women and children to miserable lives and even more miserable deaths.

Given his history, in relation to us, I think the white man should be ashamed to attempt to speak for the unborn children of the black woman. To force us to have children for him to ridicule, drug and turn into killers and homeless wanderers is a testament to his hypocrisy.

What can the white man say to the black woman?

Only one thing that the black woman might hear.

Yes, indeed, the white man can say, Your children have the right to life. Therefore I will call back from the dead those 30 million who were tossed overboard during the centuries of the slave trade. And the other millions who died in my cotton fields and hanging from trees.

I will recall all those who died of broken hearts and broken spirits, under the insult of segregation.

I will raise up all the mothers who died exhausted after birthing twenty-one children to work sunup to sundown on my plantation. I will restore to full health all those who perished for lack of food, shelter, sunlight, and love; and from my inability to see them as human beings.

But I will go even further:

I will tell you, black woman, that I wish to be forgiven the sins I commit daily against you and your children. For I know that until I treat your chil dren with love, I can never be trusted by my own. Nor can I respect myself.

And I will free your children from insultingly high infant mortality rates, short life spans, horrible housing, lack of food, rampant ill health. I will liberate them from the ghetto. I will open wide the doors of all the schools and hospitals and businesses of society to your children. I will look at your children and see not a threat but a joy.

I will remove myself as an obstacle in the path that your children, against all odds, are making toward the light. I will not assassinate them for dreaming dreams and offering new visions of how to live. I will cease trying to lead your children, for I can see I have never understood where I was going. I will agree to sit quietly for a century or so, and meditate on this.

This is what the white man can say to the black woman.

We are listening. "

-Alice Walker
 
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