If there were no fetal rights there would be no discussion. Since there is, your assumption is incorrect.
"Women are Hosts"
- Thread starter ElectricFetus
- Start date
DaveC426913
Valued Senior Member
Is that not exactly what I have been saying?
(I think you may have read my post without reading the previous ones, where I point out that the ascension to personhood must lie somewhere between conception and birth. It is just a matter of where.)
Lifers/Choicers all agree a collection of cells has no rights.
Lifers/Choicers all agree that a newborn has rights as a person.
They only disagree in the middle bit.
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As a midwife Australia we were given a very short talk about the law covering births
A born fetus becomes a person at the cutting of the umbilical cord
Stillborn require burial formalities
Miscarriage is generally left to the wishes of the family
Medical and social issues should govern termination
If non judgmental laws could be drafted as guidelines with suitable funded programs for ANY decision reached that would be ideal
Just keep religion out of it if possible
I understand this not always possible as the mother herself may bring Religion into the situation
Perhaps better expressed as keep religion out of other mothers business
DaveC426913
Valued Senior Member
That was decided as a practical marker, yes, but it is by no means a given. That point is what is in contention.
I seriously doubt it would protect a (hypothetical) parent who decided that that was the time they wanted to abort the fetus. See?
Another issue that is in contention.
Agree
But that's the marker we have
If your senerio occurs the law would be called in for a ruling
If the law was at 38 weeks gestation that would be a even more questionable marker
Bells
Staff member
And I am personally pro-life, but would never ever assume that my personal beliefs should apply to other women's bodies. I also recognise that this is a decision that should be left to the individual woman for herself and her body. Would I have an abortion? No. If my life were at extreme risk, then I should be free to make that decision for myself. In other words, it is not up to others to determine what I do with the contents of my uterus.
Do I see validity in the pro-life argument? No. The reason I do not, even though I am personally pro-life, is that they are determined to control the bodies of women and take that decision away from them. As a woman who has been pregnant and had one problematic pregnancy and was advised to terminate, but chose to persist and was supported for my choice, that should be my choice and no-one else's.
The pro-life brigade demand that what they say about women's bodies goes. Women are being denied the right to choose for themselves and their bodies.
And I absolutely object to having people refer to my body as a host and removing my rights as a result of it. It should always be a personal and private matter that should remain between the woman and her doctor, not one where the State gets to sanction what women do with their bodies.
The pro-life movement seeks to remove any right to the woman's body. Even when she is brain dead, they seek to continue to use her body as a "host", despite the wishes of her next of kin and what would have been her wishes. It is still her body and thus, her right and her choice. To demand that a potential for life that exists inside her body somehow or other has equal rights to her is the extremes that I find troubling and offensive. What we see from the pro-life movement is that that potential for life has more right to life than she does.
And it is putting the lives of women at risk. Women who are miscarrying are being denied treatment because there is still a foetal heartbeat and we have seen one woman die in Ireland as a result of pro-life laws, and women in the US, for example, being allowed to go septic because of a miscarriage, with doctors in some hospitals refusing to treat them and do a D & C or induce labor, because there is a foetal heartbeat. Why? Because the so called life she is miscarrying has equal and/or more right to life to her.
The notion of referring to women as hosts, is in a way, objectifying her as an incubator. It is deeply offensive and controlling.
Most importantly, it has dangerous consequences and it is only a matter of time before more women die.
Bells
Staff member
Lifer's demand that personhood be granted at the point of conception.
Which is why some areas in the US, for example, are trying to pass laws that would result in miscarriages being subjected to criminal investigations.
http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2011/02/miscarriage-death-penalty-georgia
http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/bl...nes-some-miscarriages-as-qcriminal-homicideq-
That's an interesting one, actually. Ask conservative pro-lifer's what they think about dropping bombs on hospitals in Muslim countries.. Or gun rights that endanger the life of newborns in domestic violence households where the newborn is at risk of being shot, or gun owners who leave guns out for children to play with, resulting in deaths of children and whether gun restrictions should be put in place to protect said newborns..
I'm talking about the question of "what is a right?" that is a whole other topic
Question: do animals have rights? If so why is person-hood important? We can give specific rights to a fetus, irrelevant if it is a person or not. We can even say that it is a person, but it is parasitizing off another person who has the right to cut it off.
Oh it has rights, it is just that its right to live is inferior to the mother's right to not have it feeding off her.
Apparently the "women are host" guy believes otherwise
And I agree that is what most of the pro-lifers believe, but not this "women are host" guy, his argument is that even the father has a rights over that fetus (He should have rights once it is born, but not while it is inside her) that she is purely a host(ess).
http://www.ncsl.org/research/health/fetal-homicide-state-laws.aspx
That's because they're trying to catch up with the least enlightened banana republics
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...e-crime-of-having-a-miscarriage-a7053501.html
It's nothing to do with concern for the "baby". They prove, both in South America and in Darkest USA, that they don't give a damn about child welfare: these are the same states that refuse women adequate perinatal care, contraception, sex education, or protection from sexual predators; the same ones that don't care whether their children have decent food, shelter, education or protection from abuse.
The whole fuss about "rights" to life is a sales-pitch to the ignorant, who keep chanting it without a second's reflection as to the quality of life they're forcing on people.
It's all about putting women back in biblical serfdom. And that's all it's about.
Oh, sorry, I forgot. It's about putting poor women down. The rich ones, and those with rich and influential patrons, can always terminate embarrassing pregnancies elsewhere, safely, in comfort and in secret. Conservatives want the good ol' days back, when the peasants were prolific, expendable and on the edge of starvation, so they could be made to do anything for their overlords.
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Why differentiate between a sperm one nanosecond before penetration and a sperm one nanosecond after penetration?
And what about clones?
Because you have to draw the line somewhere.
Funny that
There is no line to be drawn
Except if you want to divide
LIFE before on the PAST side of the LINE
and LIFE after on the FUTURE side of the LINE
LIFE does not STOP and START
It is a CONTINUUM
From the time LIFE arose it has not stopped being LIFE
It has diversified into many successful franchises with a common core of being LIFE
Funny that
There is no line to be drawn
Except if you want to divide
LIFE before on the PAST side of the LINE
and LIFE after on the FUTURE side of the LINE
LIFE does not STOP and START
It is a CONTINUUM
From the time LIFE arose it has not stopped being LIFE
It has diversified into many successful franchises with a common core of being LIFE
DaveC426913
Valued Senior Member
Right, but you see that the woman's right to her body isn't necessarily the only rights involved here. There is (potentially) a competing set of rights - those of the unborn child.
If that is actually what they want, then that's a big problem. I don't actually know their stated or implicit ulterior motive.
Cynically though, it certainly sounds like Pro-choicers would want people to think that...
Again, I plead ignorance of the facts agenda-wise. I feel the principle needs to be addressed before the practical can be effectively resolved.
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DaveC426913
Valued Senior Member
A sperm is not a complete set of blueprints for a person. It is merely a list of as-yet unchosen options (the person on-order could get blue eyes. Not sure yet).
There is no entity until both sets of chromosome define who it is.
Obviously, it's a continuum. But the point of genetic combination that finally defines a complete genetic makeup is a pretty good 'earliest possible' point.
DaveC426913
Valued Senior Member
Clones still need two sets of chromosomes.
Dispite what the American Constitution states we are not born with unalienable rights
The rights you are born into are determined by where you are born and they are far from unalienable
Most of the rights confered are a generalagreement from society
Although not necessarily true most of the pro lifers have a religious bent
Being a religious bent it assumes a superiority over mere mortals rights to pursuit of life and liberty and happiness
Again get religion out of it
Also the political bent who are only pandering to the religious bent for votes
Concentrate on the overall health of the society
Hard but not impossible
DaveC426913
Valued Senior Member
I was thinking more of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
I know of the Document
Not that familiar with the contents
However whatever rights it contains are given by mortals for mortals and I hope realistic