Pro-life Activist in China May be Released from Prison
LifeNews.com reports that Chen Guangcheng, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee who has spent the last four years in prison for his exposure of human rights abuses against women and unborn children, may be released this week.
Chen Guangcheng received international support when he was jailed on bogus charges after revealing to the world an extensive campaign of forced abortions and sterilizations in Linyi, China that saw as many as 10,000 women and men victimized.
Now, Chen’s wife Yuan says she believes he to finally be released from prison this week after spending four years in jail in difficult conditions.
Yuan Weijing told AFP says Chen is supposed to be released this week, but she has received no confirmation from local authorities that he will be set free.
. . .
Yuan tells AFP that local police have been setting up surveillance cameras outside his home and throughout their village that she says she believes are intended to monitor his whereabouts after his release.
“From all the surveillance equipment they are installing, it looks like that after he comes home he may not be completely free,” Yuan said.
During his time in prison, Chen was reportedly denied access to medical treatment, poorly fed and at times beaten. Yuan was denied access to see her husband and not permitted to travel out of the country.
I wish the very best for Chen and his family, but I’m not holding my breath. If the Chinese government does release him, it will only be because the inhumanity of the one-child policy has already been exposed in the international media and they don’t think he can do much additional damage.
This sure puts things in perspective, doesn’t it? While it is valid to criticize American government policies, especially on abortion, we should rememeber that it could be much worse. What else can Chen Guancheng’s exceptional courage teach us?
What else can Chen Guancheng's exceptional courage teach us?
To be pro-choice, even under fire.
He's been awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award. "his irrepressible passion for justice in leading ordinary Chinese citizens to assert their legitimate rights under the law."
Every woman has a right to decide for herself how many children she should have, and when. The pro-life belief that the government should get to decide when and if a woman should have an abortion is in profound opposition to the human rights that Chen Guangcheng has suffered for.
Okay, Yonmei. If he gets out, let's ask him, after all the horror that he's seen and reported, if he believes in a "right" to abortion.
Yes: If he gets out, let's ask him, after all the horror he's seen and reported, if he believes like you that the government of the country should have the right to control women's bodies: or if he holds the pro-choice/human rights position that the pregnant woman, and she alone, should be the one who gets to decide.
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You see, that's the fundamental flaw in the pro-life position that the woman mustn't be allowed the legal right to decide for herself whether to terminate or continue her pregnancy: You have to trust that the government, which you maintain should have rights over women's bodies, will continue to be pro-life. There was a time when China was in a population drive and had pro-life laws against abortion that you would have loved. But the principle that I support is pro-choice: no government should claim the right to force a woman – whether to terminate or to continue her pregnancy.
Women must have their right to choose protected and respected. No government should have the right, either in China or in El Salvador or in the US, to use and abuse women's bodies against their will.
I don't care how many children you have or when you have it. All I'm saying is that you ought not kill your child.
We don't just trust men to not commit arson or kidnap anyone; we enact laws. The law says I cannot use my body to rape someone else. Yes, this requires that the law not command me to rape, but that's a pretty shitty reason to say rape should be legal.
I don't care how many children you have or when you have it. All I'm saying is that you ought not kill your child.
Having an abortion is not killing a child. Having an abortion is terminating a pregnancy.
The law says I cannot use my body to rape someone else.
And the law says – in a pro-choice country – that you cannot use a woman's body to make a baby against her will.
In a pro-life country, the law says that you can use her body that way.
In pro-choice countries the law requires that no one shall get to make use of a woman's body against her will.
Demanding the right to use women's bodies without regard to their consent or their will is what rapists do. I recall from an earlier thread your insistance that once a man rapes a woman, in your book she's not entitled to any control over whether she has a baby or not.
"Having an abortion is not killing a child. Having an abortion is terminating a pregnancy."
Yonmei, "terminating a pregnancy" is a meaningless term. Pregnancies are just as terminated when they end in birth or miscarriage.
Abortion IS killing a living human child by any rational, scientific definition. But don't just take my word for it: intellectually honest "pro-choice" people agree.
http://clinicquotes.com/site/story.php?id=495
Pregnancies are just as terminated when they end in birth or miscarriage.
Well, quite. So?
Abortion IS killing a living human child by any rational, scientific definition.
Abortion is terminating a pregnancy, by any rational, scientific definition: use of the word "child" to describe zygote, embryo, and fetus is mere pro-life flourishing to conceal the facts of human development: that during the first trimester, when 90% of abortions take place, the embryo/fetus is in no way the biological equivalent of a baby or a toddler.
But don't just take my word for it: intellectually honest "pro-choice" people agree.
You know, the thing I find most bizarre about pro-lifers is not that they cite pro-life sites – obviously you're going to do that! – but that you seem to think I'm going to think lying pro-life propaganda proves anything but that pro-lifers will and do lie.
Citing pro-life lies about what you want to believe "intellectually honest pro-choicers" think is not honest in any degree – intellectual or otherwise.
Isn't it interesting how fast pro-lifers in this dicussion thread ran away from supporting women against the government to arguing the standard pro-life justifications why a government has every right to force women?
The site just compiles pro-choice quotes from their own books and interviews. The original sources are there for you to check.
"Isn't it interesting how fast pro-lifers in this dicussion thread ran away from supporting women against the government to arguing the standard pro-life justifications why a government has every right to force women?"
What, did you expect us to agree with you that governments don't have the right to stop people from killing? Nulono tried to reason with you, and you responded by comparing pro-lifers and fetuses to rapists. A conversation is not going to last very long after that.
I've got to go now. You can have the last word.
The site just compiles pro-choice quotes from their own books and interviews.
In the same way as pro-life sites routinely quote Margaret Sanger out of context in an attempt to trash Planned Parenthood? Hm?
What, did you expect us to agree with you that governments don't have the right to stop people from killing?
But pro-lifers argue that governments have the right to kill women by denying women access to healthcare and by enforcing laws against abortion.
Nulono tried to reason with you, and you responded by comparing pro-lifers and fetuses to rapists.
Nulano argued in an earlier thread that rapists have the right to force pregnancy as well as sex on an unwilling woman.
The essence of your argument as a pro-lifer is that you believe you have the right to force the intimate use of women'against their will. The parallel with rape is pretty clear, even before you take into account that pro-life countries enforce laws against abortion by allowing the police to examine the crime scene – a woman's vagina. It's not just metaphorical rape: it's literal.
Yonmei, I looked up the word "child", and one of the definitions was, quite simply, an offspring "a son or daughter". Oh yeah, another was "a human fetus".
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/child
Nobody is arguing a woman should be forced to "make a baby".
http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/2006/11/stith-arguing-with-pro-choicer
I also do not believe a rapist has a right to rape. I am arguing that a woman does not have the right to kill the resultant offspring.
I am not against an abortion if it is actually the only way to save the mother's life.
Nobody is arguing a woman should be forced to "make a baby".
Creepy lies.
What is the whole pro-life movement but arguing that a woman who is pregnant and doesn't want to be, ought to be forced against her will to make a baby?
Aren't you the one who was arguing that a raped woman ought not to be allowed to have an abortion? You are directly arguing for force there, yet you hypocriticaly claim that "no one" argues that – it's far from an unusual view in the pro-life movement.
Oh, god, that FirstThings article, using a Polaroid camera as an analogy,
Pro-lifers want to take the camera away from the person who owns it, take their photographs with it, but insist that she pay the bill for the film. They won't allow a woman to decide for herself when she wants to take a photograph, if she wants to develop it, and how she wants to store it.
I've read a lot of stupid pro-life analogies comparing women's bodies to inanimate objects, but this one is one of the worst.
I also do not believe a rapist has a right to rape. I am arguing that a woman does not have the right to kill the resultant offspring.
You think a rapist has a right to force a woman to have his baby against her will. You're just trying to claim you don't actually support the initial act of violence – merely the ongoing violence and force to ensure the woman isn't allowed to do as she wishes with her own body. Is this because you see rape as an act of sex, and you hate sex enough to dislike rape, while loving the force and violence against women so much you crave the idea she could be forced through pregnancy as a result of rape?
I am not against an abortion if it is actually the only way to save the mother's life.
Yet you loathe and repeat lies about Doctor Tiller, who performed thousands of abortions for decades to save women's lives. So that falls down, too.
I mean seriously, what but naked hatred of women could motivate a pro-lifer to think, once she's been raped she can be forced to make a baby against her will? Aren't you even against providing rape victims with emergency contraception to try to prevent pregnancy? You just love that rapist sperm?
Pregnancy is not "making a baby"! To paraphrase Morbo, PRENATAL DEVELOPMENT DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY!
I am against all violence, INCLUDING the killing of an innocent unborn child.
The camera analogy is not comparing the camera to the mother's body. It is comparing the development of the photo to the development of the child. The camera doesn't even factor into the analogy; it's merely meant to demonstrate self-directed development.
I'm cool with sex, I'm all for contraception, and, if it's true emergency contraception does not cause embryonic death, I'm all for providing rape victims with emergency contraception to try to prevent pregnancy.
Pregnancy is not "making a baby"! To paraphrase Morbo, PRENATAL DEVELOPMENT DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY!
Really? What do you pro-lifers thimk pregnancy makes – a football? Study up on prenatal development sometime.
It is comparing the development of the photo to the development of the child.
Yeah, because fertilized eggs are just like undeveloped photos.
I'm cool with sex, I'm all for contraception, and, if it's true emergency contraception does not cause embryonic death I'm all for providing rape victims with emergency contraception to try to prevent pregnancy.
Woo, big of you, Mr Rapist Lover.
I am against all violence, INCLUDING the killing of an innocent unborn child.
How's that? You just admitted in the People thread that you're totally in favor of cutting up a fetus inside the women's uterus, rather than allowing IDX. If you're AGAINST all violence, how does that fit with your desire to have fetuses cut up inside uteruses, instead of aborted almost intact using IDX?
If you're AGAINST all violence, how else do you plan on forcing women through pregnancy and childbirth against their will? Violence against women or against healthcare providers is, in a free country with even a half-decent healthcare system, the only way to stop a woman choosing abortion.
You pro-actively support murdering doctors and acts of terrorism against clinics and their staff by your perverse claim that doctors who perform abortions are "killing babies"! Try to weasle out of your fond association with killers and terrorists by washing your hands and pretending you don't notice the pro-life violence…
1. Pregnancy does not "make" ANYTHING. It is not a constructive process.
2. As I've explained 3.5 billion times, I hate rapists.
3. I'm against abortion regardless of the method.
4. How do we stop people from committing any violent crime?
5. Every group has its extremists. I am in no way in favor of killing abortionists. But that they kill babies is an easily verifiable fact.
Pregnancy does not "make" ANYTHING. It is not a constructive process.
What a medieval idea. You think that the sperm consists of little tiny babies which get deposited in the woman's uterus and she grows them like a field?
As I've explained 3.5 billion times, I hate rapists.
As you've explained even more times, you love forcing women through pregnancy after rape. You may or may not "hate rapists", but you surely do love supporting and enabling their violence against women.
I'm against abortion regardless of the method.
So you're in favour of letting women die as a result of pregnancies gone wrong. Hate women so much you're willing to have them used by rapists and die in pregnancy.
How do we stop people from committing any violent crime?
Well, for one thing, we stop letting people like you who support, defend, and enable violent crime get away with your pro-violence, pro-crime narrative that lets you pretend your desired end, of treating women like machines, justifies the violent means.
Every group has its extremists.
Yes, and you're one of them. Only extremists talk about forcing women through pregnancy after rape, and denying women abortion even when needed for health reasons.
But that they kill babies is an easily verifiable fact.
It's a lie. It's a disgusting, pro-crime lie.
I am in no way in favor of killing abortionists.
You justify it with a belief culled from medieval times that women are merely beds in which the man plants the baby. You justify the murder of doctors and violence against clinic workers by pretending in your mind that when a doctor performs an abortion they are "killing a baby". You are a pro-life extremist, dehumanising women, in exactly the same way the Catholic Church does: as this is supposedly a "secular" blog, I guess it just demonstrates that the desire to dehumanise and use women is profoundly misogynist, having nothing much to do with religion.
Interestingly, too, though I suspect many people who read this blog and identify as "pro-life" wouldn't agree with your extremist, anti-woman position, Nulano, I don't expect that many of them would argue with you. Pro-lifers are not a movement much given to arguing with their extremists.
1. Your view is the medieval one. An offspring is present from fertilization, and said offspring grows and develops from then until death. The "making" occurs by the fusion of gametes, and, as I've already said, I'm all for contraception.
2. I said regardless of the method, not regardless of the motive.
3. I'm going to ignore the lies about what I do and do not support and just point out that you've completely missed the point. You seem to be under the impression that it's impossible to prevent abortion without violence, and I was pointing out the flaw in your logic.
4. Tell me what happens to the unborn baby in an abortion. Because even the dictionary acknowledges said baby is killed.
There is nothing extreme about respecting the right to live of every human being regardless of age or parentage.
An offspring is present from fertilization, and said offspring grows and develops from then until death. The "making" occurs by the fusion of gametes
Okay. So we just remove the embryo from the uterus – intact, which is what happens in early abortions >8 weeks – and as far as you're concerned, the "offspring" just grows and develops, "made" by gametes. Let me know how that works for you, will you?
And then we can move on to the known modern facts: a woman makes a baby from fertilized egg to childbirth. She uses the whole resources of her body in doing so.
Pro-lifers want to force her. Pro-choice, human rights supporters, believe it's wrong to force the use of any human's body.
and, as I've already said, I'm all for contraception.
As you've repeatedly said: You're hostile to Planned Parenthood, a major provider of contraception in the US: and you were opposed to women using the Pill which you claimed to believe to be an "abortifacient". Changed your mind about that? Prepared to oppose the pro-life pharmacists and pro-life hospitals that want the right to deny women contraception? Going to spend your Saturday mornings picketing pro-life pharmacists or pro-life hospitals instead of bullying women who've decided to get an abortion?
I doubt it, which makes your facile claim to be "all for contraception" another piece of pro-life hypocrisy.
I said regardless of the method, not regardless of the motive.
Performing an abortion safely is a technically skilled operation.
If you're against doctors learning the methods of how to perform abortion, it's just another piece of pro-life hypocrisy to say you don't object to their using the information they were not taught if you think their motives are sufficiently pure. Doctors who train in pro-life hospitals don't learn how to perform abortions: fortunately for women in need, pro-life teaching hospitals are not yet a majority in the US (at least, I don't think so… and I hope never are.)
You seem to be under the impression that it's impossible to prevent abortion without violence
It is impossible to prevent abortion without violence. Your claim that you think you could force all the women of childbearing age in whatever country you want to be King of, to not have abortions, would entail multiple major human rights violations and yes, violence, when the women resisted – and violence by the state against their person if they didn't. For example, in your imaginary pro-life state which forcibly prevents all abortions, you'd need to ensure that every girl above puberty had an involuntary urine test every cycle, to check for pregnancy: if the test showed positive, and yet she wasn't pregnant, you'd have to have a corps of medical police who performed an examination of the suspected crime scene, her vagina, to ensure she hadn't had an abortion. You enjoy rape, you've probably already fantasised about these involuntary examinations of terrified women… and yes: that's violence. That's the pro-life state.
Tell me what happens to the unborn baby in an abortion. Because even the dictionary acknowledges said baby is killed.
Depends which dictionary. I'm sure yours specifically mentions "killing the unborn baby", because you wouldn't have it in the house if it didn't!
It's your assertion that the pregnant woman doesn't matter – you've claimed, in your medieval misogynist monkish way, that she's not "making a baby" when she's pregnant. So, why would it matter if the football she's not making is removed from her uterus?
But a good medical dictionary will tell you that prior to 8 weeks, embryo; 8 weeks to delivery, fetus; after delivery, baby. (There are stages of development prior to embryo, but even spontaneous abortions at this stage do not generally register as such – there's no way to test for pre-embryonic pregnancy.)
But, it depends what stage of development the abortion happens at, and it depends what method of abortion is used. Some early methods remove the embryo intact. Once the fetal skull is sufficiently developed, there are different means of getting the skull out past the cervix without damaging the cervix.
Of course your objection to IDX probably includes your idea that if a woman decides to have an abortion, you don't care if her cervix is damaged – you'd rather have her punished as much as possible, than let her have her fertility intact to try again.
I am against abortions not done for the purpose of saving the mother's life.
I'm against Planned Parenthood because they perform abortions. If you can demonstrate hormonal contraception does not cause embryonic death, yes, I would support it. I don't picket anywhere; it's just not my thing.
Your "pro-life dystopia" scenario is absurd.
http://www.l4l.org/library/fetalrts.html
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/baby
http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=baby
I'd rather a woman not get an abortion at all if it's elective. If it's life-saving, and there is no way to save the life of both the mother and the child, I'd prefer whatever way is safest for the mother.
I'd rather a woman not get an abortion at all if it's elective.
Because you think you have the right to enslave and force women to make them produce babies, yadda yadda yadda.
If it's life-saving, and there is no way to save the life of both the mother and the child, I'd prefer whatever way is safest for the mother.
So you actually oppose the ban on IDX? Wow. Switcheroo. Going to see comments to that effect from you whenever the "partial birth abortion ban" is mooted? Or are you just going to rejoin the pro-life majority when you're not actually being challenged on why you support abortion methods dangerous to women?
Your "pro-life dystopia" scenario is absurd.
Of course it's absurd. Glad you see it. Going to stop being pro-life now you see the brutal absurdity of your beliefs carried to their logical conclusion in the dystopic pro-life country of your dreams?
If you can demonstrate hormonal contraception does not cause embryonic death, yes, I would support it.
I can't personally, lacking a lab: any of the actual science websites (as opposed to the prolife propaganda websites that fed you this ignorant crap) can inform you that hormonal contraception works by preventing the follicles on the ovaries from releasing an egg. It also may prevent sperm from entering the uterus by thickening the mucus at the mouth of the cervix. If there's no egg, there's no fertilisation, there's no need for abortion: if there's no sperm through the cervix, there's no fertilisation, there's no need for abortion.
You can check this on any neutral science website. You could have at any time. You don't because you prefer to suck down propaganda without checking the facts at source. Pro-lifers don't like facts, I've noticed.
I don't picket anywhere; it's just not my thing
So your fantasies about what pavement bullies do were real fantasies, not based on any personal experience? Figures.
Interestingly, the longer comment in which I explain to Nulono how hormonal contraception works to prevent abortions – which is presumably exactly why pro-lifers who love high abortion rates hate it – has gone to the spam queue.
But if you're really interested in the facts, Nulono, you can check them out on any neutral, scientific website about contraception. I daresay you'd regard any website not pro-life as dangerous to your mind, though….