Misconceptions about the rape exception.

Without getting into all the various moral implications, I'm interested in your thoughts as to how abortion being legal in cases of rape, but not in cases of consensual sex, would work on a practical level, considering that A) as you said, only 40 of every 100 rapes are reported to the police and B) cases that are actually prosecuted could take months or years to get through the judicial system, by which point the baby could have been born already. Do you think abortion should be legal in cases where somebody's been convicted of rape, or where there's been a rape accusation, or where there are criminal charges pending, or…?

While we still disagree about the rape exception, I love this piece because it will help people from two camps, (or slightly different positions in the same camp) understand each other better. We should be charitable, trying to understand the best arguments for the other persons position, and I think this post will help pro-lifers to do that. Well done.

I'm not being facetious, just pointing out that if the arguments don't dismantle the bodily autonomy argument, then it's a red herring (even though the argument may be compelling to those who don't argue from bodily integrity). If you want to try to convince the author against the rape exception, you have to address the points that she raises in this article.

Abortion being legal in the case of rape wouldn't really work unless the victim could prove that she was raped. And what is to stop women from lying about it to get an abortion? So basically , a rape exception would only 'benefit' a few, while punishing those whose attackers are still at large.

"So if responsibility and consent to risks are such important factors, it should be clear how cases of rape are fundamentally different even though the child’s value is the same. You would have to ignore the very nature of rape—the entire reason it’s so much worse and so controversial—to think fetal value is the only factor that could be different about a rape case." For me, absolutely nothing takes precedence over the value of human life. In my mind, the woman's bodily integrity is violated absolutely and irreversibly during abortion. The woman's body is working on making someone (that's kind its thing) and then we silence it, so to speak. And the body does react negatively even if the mind thinks everything is ok (and, sadly, in many cases, the mind eventually comes into accord with the body years later). Rape is a brazen and open attack on the mind and the body simultaneously. Abortion is a quieter and even more insidious way of accomplishing the same thing. The worst part is, the woman or girl in our "culture" may actually be more likely in a rape case to be convinced (initially) that her bodily integrity is being compromised if she keeps her own kid. pitch black irony there

Interesting piece, not sure you've convinced me one way or another – but that leads more to our worship of the concept of bodily autonomy in general (I don't disagree with the concept, at least on paper, of forced vaccinations against whooping cough for example). I remain nebulously unsure about the rape exception, erring on the side of favoring it, at the least, because it is a difficult conversation we as a nation have to have, but it isn't worth having until we first, as a nation, establish that the unborn in general have rights. So kind of the expediency argument.

That being said, I'm curious about a hypothetical situation, and how in your ideal world, this might work out. Let's say a boyfriend and girlfriend are sexually active. They have sex on Thursday, and unbeknownst at the time, conceive. That being said, the guy is really not a good person, and comes home the following night, drunk, and rapes his girlfriend. The girlfriend decides she wants an abortion. Should she be able to get one? How about the situation where ovulation was on Saturday (basically, so it is not possible to distinguish if the sperm that fertilized the egg came from Thursday's consensual sex or Friday's rape)?

No a born child is specifically NOT "just as dependent on her mother" as one at 34 weeks gestation. In fact, the child is not dependent on it's mother AT ALL. She doesn't even have to take the born child home from the hospital. Pretty much anyone can care for the child.

Next time you reply, bother to read the comment through to the end, and avoid looking dumb.

That's a really good question. I'm not sure what I think of that yet. I'm leaning toward saying she'd just have to say she was raped, not prove it (as many are unprovable), but I'm sure that would lead to a spike in false accusations, which would not only be a problem in terms of enforcing abortion law but it would also really undermine the word of any woman accusing someone of rape. So yeah, I'm not sure how that would work, it's a contentious issue.

That's a really good point, and I agree. Letting die vs killing are very different acts. I do think there are forms of abortion that are more akin to "unplugging the violinist" than others–for example, it's my understanding that RU-486 detaches the embryo from the uterine wall, which is pretty different from a suction abortion that's sheer force can tear the embryo apart as it removes the embryo. What are your thoughts on that, as far as how it would affect the morality of the situation?

That's a really good question, and no one has posed it to me before. I'm not sure what I think about that, I'd have to chew on it for awhile.

I wasnt trying to convince the author against the rape exception. In fact I do find it logically compelling (if not morally), My point was more that when making such an exception we can still maintain a "no direct abortion" stance. My point is that you can still theoretically protect the right to life of the unborn even in the case of rape (by nominally attempting to preserve their life post delivery).

Wouldn't that nominally allow anyone to abort a pregnancy, no rape exception needed?

You don't see a difference between someone dying due to kidney failure after not finding a donor, and someone dying because you shot them in the face?

I would say that's a pretty major difference. Can you help me understand where you disagree?

Yeah, Clinton, major strawman buddy. The child is dependent on adults in general–someone has to look after the child, but it doesn't have to be the mother, so the child is not dependent on the mother specifically at all. Hence safe haven laws and giving up children for adoption without even taking them home from the hospital.

I would clarify, first, that I don't think that not donating a kidney means you are "letting someone die." If they need a kidney it means that their own body is shutting down and they are dying, however tragically, of natural causes. Certainly we hope there is a chance to save that person, but you are not morally complicit in someones death under those circumstances.

As to your question regarding RU-486 vs a suction abortion, I would ask your thoughts on my killing you with a gun vs poison. The action – I have actively chosen to end your life- and the end result – your life is ended- is the same. The method, in my mind, makes very little moral difference. Now certainly we would say that someone who chooses to torture their victim before ending their life is a particularly grotesque individual, and in that way we might find the "method" to be particularly immoral. But saying "at least I killed them nicely" doesn't usually fly in a court of law. So to the question is there a moral difference in a method of abortion, I believe that the answer is no. There are merely some forms that catch our attention as particularly torturous.

It doesn't matter, does it? In either event she isn't required to birth the spawn of a rapist.

Thanks for replying. 🙂

Why did he misrepresent lady_black's comment, then?

As is usually the case in this type of conversation, I think we're misunderstanding each other. I'll try and be clear in what I think it is you're saying and hopefully you can help me understand.

I'm not sure why you think that removing a developing human being (who is functioning exactly as he or she is supposed to be functioning) in an effort to cause their death is "allowing their original condition to take over." What is there original condition that they are returning to? They were alive, and now they are dead, due to an active desire on the part of someone else for that younger human being to no longer be alive.

They are not dying from their own lack of development, they are dying because their natural development process was purposefully interrupted. It would be like saying that you didn't kill a fish by pulling it out of the water and letting it flop on the beach- it died due to its own lack of ability to breathe air. Obviously an infant is developmentally incapable of fending for themselves, but if you simply ceased feeding him or her, their death would be because you chose to starve them to death- not a result of their own lack of development.

you said: "But shooting someone in the face takes someone that is functioning perfectly fine on their own and *causes* them to be unable to function, usually killing them immediately."

On my end its entirely clear that that same action- taking someone that is functioning perfectly fine on their own(in this case a developing human being who is functioning and growing exactly like its supposed to) and *causes* them to be unable to function- is exactly the same regardless of what kind of abortion is being performed.

All of that to say, I'm not clear on what point it is you're trying to make and any clarification would be helpful.

Jesus, you two, did you ever think maybe he honestly didn't understand it? Not that he's *purposefully* misrepresenting it? Sometimes our points take more elaboration. Do you treat people like this every day — someone responds to you in a way that makes it clear they didn't get you, you accuse them of being dumb and insulting your intelligence? Grow up.

It's actually pretty easy to understand what lady_black was saying. Clinton doesn't strike me as someone with reading comprehension issues. Anyone can take care of a baby once it is born–that person doesn't necessarily have to be the biological parent.

No. I choose to believe he's smarter than that and was attempting to insult my intelligence. If he truly didn't understand my comment, he hasn't said so himself. If he does say he didn't understand, I'll happily apologize,.

The Lady doth protest, methinks she be trolling. She went to a pro-rape exception article, and a more-or-less in favor of the rape exception comment, and then proceeded to accuse people of forcing raped women to bear those children. If' that's not trolling, it's just being willfully obtuse.

"If the pro-life stance is based on the concept that "the zef's right to life supersedes the woman's bodily autonomy", then there's no logical reason for a rape exception"

Therein lies your misunderstanding! Pro-lifers do not place priority of the zef over the woman (generally speaking. I'm sure you could dig up some whacko somewhere). Pro-lifers generally submit that the rights of the zef and the woman are equal. The woman has an equal right to life as the zef (hence an overwhelming majority for life of mother exemptions).

I'm glad to have cleared this up for you.

OK so in your opinion, does the zef's "right to life" trump the woman's bodily autonomy, or not? Yes or no?

The body has no "intention".

We stop mindless biological processes all the time.

And you keep talking about surgery. I guess chemical abortion doesn't bother you? It is simply an induced miscarriage.

Of course you can. But there's no reason to. Because dropping the kid off at the fire station is easy peasy.

It's intrinsic purpose is to house humans beings while we are fetuses,
and so we may have a greater natural right to it than to other body
parts.

Vaginas evolved to fit penises. Perfectly, in fact. You might say that the penis has an intrinsic right to any vagina it wants to penetrate. Rape ftw!

What if she is pregnant by rape and plans to carry to term but still wishes to take acutane or thalidomide? Is that justified?

What if a woman is pregnant by rape and also suffers from severe depression, is bipolar or schizophrenic. Her medications will harm the fetus – should the rape victim be forced to go 9 months sans medication for the fetus?

sure. but it isn't INSIDE the parent, which is a whole different ball of wax

the thing is, the very fact that we are even discussing a rape exception shows that yes, people DO know that there is a difference between having something inside your body if you do not want it there, and changing diapers and feeding formula.

I always enjoy your articles M. You bring up interesting points, and make the debate a lot more fun:)

Because some people ARE in favour of forcing raped women to bear the children? Because that IS part of this discussion? Because it's not one giant circle jerk?

So, your argument in a nutshell is…

"women were made for pregnancy, cuz uterus, therefore they should be forced to gestate"

Right? That about sums it up?

So then why is rape a crime at all? Why is it considered a violation? The rapist using your body, penetrating your body shouldn't matter, should it? I mean, if inside your body is no different from outside, yes?

And what if the victim is male and is the one doing the penetrating? Does that count?

My argument is that children have a right to their (male and female) parent's bodies, time, and money, insofar as those things are necessary to ensure that the children get adequate food, nutrition, shelter from harm, etc.

The role of consent to the action which created the child is what's being discussed.

I'm pointing out that, if we have a natural right to our bodies because they are ours and our body parts were designed to promote our own survival and health rather than the interests of others, the uterus is only described by the first of those reasons. It's the only organ in the woman's body which is not biologically specified for her own use and survival. Rather it's sole biological purpose and intention is to provide for us when we are unborn babies. So, discussions on consent momentarily aside, it can be argued that the child has a greater natural right to the uterus than to other body parts, as it's sole purpose in existing is to keep her safe and alive.

You can disagree if you want, but if you're going to strawman and imply misogyny where none exists, this discussion isn't really going to go anywhere.

Because biology is not destiny. Certain intestinal parasites evolved to live inside our guts. They co-evolved with humans, they depend upon us for survival. It could be argued that those worms have a right to our intestines, since nature designed it that way!

Rape is especially horrific because our sexuality is something very personal that we keep safe.

Rape is just use of a body part though. Without consent.

Why should it matter?

Actually, recent studies have shown that intestinal worms can be pretty damn helpful:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/helminthic-therapy-mucus/

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2396220/

And my point still stands, you can't make the claim 'but this was 'designed' for the baby, therefore it has a right to it' because, not only is it a glaring appeal to nature/naturalistic fallacy, but, in as a general principle, having a body part that can be used for something does not automatically mean that it MUST be used for that something.

No, it isn't relevant. As per my other example. Something being 'designed' or having 'co-evolved' to use something else does not give it a 'natural right' to anything.

Biology is not destiny. Period.

Yes, but respectfully your other example was invalid because it concerned an organism which by nature was not morally on par with the woman…We're discussing two organisms which, for the purposes of discussion at least, have equal moral value.

Morally on par or not, no thing – human or non-human, has a *claim* on the body of another, simply because 'evolution/god designed it that way'.

Rape is an unjust violation of bodily integrity. We can all probably agree that some infringements on bodily integrity are justified, and the right to life does not always trump the right to bodily integrity, and that the right to bodily integrity does not always trump the right to life. The question at hand is whether bodily integrity justifiably permits aborting a child conceived non-consensualy.

Interesting bait and switch. If the woman and the prenate have equal rights, then her right bodily autonomy means the prenate's right to life gives it no claim on the woman's body. To deny this is to say the prenate's right to life supersedes the woman's bodily autonomy. The life of mother exemption does not make up for the fact that you are nullifying her other rights.

Does bodily integrity justifiably permit aborting a fetus conceived consensually? I say yes, but all your prior posts indicate you disagree.

Just as an fyi, some fetuses are sentient, depending on their age.

But consider a newborn and an animal that has comparable mental capabilities. I'm not any kind of expert on animal psychology, but let's just go with….I don't know, a raccoon. Not self-aware, not capable of rational thought. And concerning physical abilities, a raccoon is far more capable and independent than a newborn.

Why aren't they morally on par with each other? Should someone who kills a newborn and someone who kills a raccoon be charged with similar crimes?

What about a 1 month old? I suspect a well-trained and socialized Border Collie can solve puzzles, follow commands, and maybe empathize just as well as a one year old. (Maybe better.)

Do you believe that they are morally on par? Why or why not?

"The uterus is not needed by the mother for survival or even for health, but it is needed absolutely by the child."

And the vagina is not needed by the woman for her health. So. What? Why in the world would you think that an organ's primary function somehow dictates the moral use of that organ? This is classic appeal to nature. It's a logical fallacy.

Because a right to your own body and a right to the body of another are two entirely different things.

And there really is no such thing as 'natural rights'. It's an invention, so humans can get along without having to worry about getting stabbed in the back .

And, I might add, the uterus is also the place where fertilized ovum go to die. So, as far as 'nature' is concerned, the prenate has no right to 'life' where the uterus is concerned. There is something known as “Rh-factor rejection”, an incompatibility
between the mother’s immune system and the prenate, that almost
always causes a miscarriage, unless modern medical technology is
employed to intervene. Such a thing would never happen if that argument
was completely valid.

Mensturation is actually rare among placental mammals. It has evolved
independently in different species (but not in a large total number of
mammalian species). And scientists studying why menstruation evolved find no support for the notion that the human womb is actually a “welcoming” environment for the unborn.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3528014/

Also, there exists a completely different mechanism by which a mother’s body might kill an unborn human, “fetal resorption”. This phenomenon is fairly common in kangaroos; when the environment is poor in food, a pregnant kangaroo will literally suck out the life –and body– of its womb-inhabitant, until nothing remains. Other mammals can accomplish fetal resorption as well, including humans.

https://www.google.ca/search?q=fetal+resorption&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&channel=sb&gfe_rd=cr&ei=uiLYU6aQJY_EoATo_oHgCQ

It is perfectly natural for the unborn to be killed if conditions aren’t adequate for supporting it.

Just as an fyi, some fetuses are sentient, depending on their age

The capacity for sentience does not exist until at least 25 weeks along, a point long past which most abortions occur.

Agreed.

I'm not sure I agree that natural rights even exist, or that I'd support them. In your mind what's the difference between a natural right and "this is what happens in nature therefore it's good and we should support it?" I'm not seeing a distinction, hence Appeal to Nature Fallacy.

Why can't I just say, "Hey the vagina is made to fit the penis. Therefore the man's penis has a NATURAL RIGHT to the vagina!"

You'd probably say, "But the man's penis doesn't need the vagina to live! The embryo needs the uterus to live, thus it has a natural right to use it."

Then I'd say, "Yeah but what about all the people that need my blood donations to live? Why don't they have a natural right to use it? What's the difference here?"

You might say, "Because your blood is not naturally made for another person's use, it's made for your use."

So your claim seems to come down to (1) life-sustaining use and (2) NATURAL use.

But I'm not seeing why something being natural gives it moral weight or rights of any kind. Why does the fact that I was born with a uterus somehow entitle an embryo to go in and use it against my very consent? "That's the way of nature" doesn't really cut it.

Thank you for allowing me to smoke during my pregnancy.

Blueberry, your conclusion about the fetus and the womb is right, just not the reasoning you are using to get there.

Society holds the common belief that no one has the right to deliberately deny any other innocent human person the necessities of life (nutrition, hydration, oxygen, etc.)

When human beings are in their feral stage of existence, the womb is a necessity of life – and therefore, the argument is that deliberately denying a fetus access to a womb is an act which denies an innocent human being their right to the necessities of life.

Clearly this means that a fetus can lay a certain claim to the womb (according to this argument), and this claim isn't lessened by the manner of its conception – so rape changes nothing.

Also, this argument would NOT justify rape, because the penetration of a vagina by a penis is clearly not an essential for the existence of an individual human being.

Blueberry, your conclusion about the fetus and the womb is right, just not the reasoning you are using to get there.

Society holds the common belief that no one has the right to deliberately deny any other innocent human person the necessities of life (nutrition, hydration, oxygen, etc.)

When human beings are in their fetal stage of existence, the womb is a necessity of life – and therefore, the argument is that deliberately denying a fetus access to a womb is an act which denies an innocent human being their right to the necessities of life.

Clearly this means that a fetus can lay a certain claim to the womb (according to this argument), and this claim isn't lessened by the manner of its conception – so rape wouldn't mean that you are less entitled to the necessities of life.

Also, this argument would NOT justify rape (as others have mentioned in this thread), because the penetration of a vagina by a penis, even though a natural complimentarity exists between these two organs, is clearly not an act or thing that is an essential for the existence of an individual human being.

Not at all, because it can be clearly shown that the intention of such an action was still to either end the life of the prenate/deny them the necessities of life.

The only time things would be different is if the removal of the uterus was carried out as a life-saving treatment on the mother, and the unintended and secondary effect was the loss of the prenate in utero.

You're confusing the argument here.

This argument has NOTHING to do with design, or teleology, this argument is about the biological reality of the fundamental necessities of human existence (whether those fundamentals are designed or not, or end-direted or not, is irrelevant to this argument).

Also, if a uterus is removed, it no longer functions, and so removing it is still an act of denying the necessities of life to an innocent human being.

This would be like denying someone clean water, and instead providing them with only toxic, undrinkable disease-ridden water, while saying 'hey, I'm still providing you your right to the necessities for life'

Now why the hell would anyone do that when every state has safe harbor laws and they can legally abandon them anywhere there would be 24 hour personnel available, such as hospitals, fire stations, etc. Unresponsive to my comment. A born child is no longer in NEED of it's mother, PERIOD.

RIGHT ON! Appeal to nature fallacy.

Raccoons are pretty freaking intelligent. I wouldn't disparage the intelligence of animals.

NOBODY (without exception!) has any right, natural or otherwise, to ANY part of my body. And for your information, the woman's ENTIRE BODY is used by a developing zef. Not merely the uterus.

I am not confused about anything. You are just trying to dress up a shitty appeal to nature argument.

Society operates on the premise that we do not subject individuals to *unjust killing*. Abortion is not unjust killing – the prenate does NOT have a right to lay claim to the woman's body simply because it's natural environment is the uterus.

a uterus wouldn't actually be able to fulfil that function and instead the prenate would die.

The uterus just holds the prenate, the actual job of keeping it alive is up to the rest of the woman's organs. Keep the uterus as healthy as possible, but impair the functioning of the woman's kidneys, liver and other organs, and you'll have a dead prenate. The women breathes for it, eats for it, and processes wastes for it.

I never said they were removed for trivial reasons – and if you read what I have actually said here then you'd observe that I have stated that the loss of an unborn human being could be an unintended secondary effect of a removal of a uterus, which is not unethical.

The issue here is not really whether anyone has a 'right to a uterus', it's actually about whether or not anyone has the right to deliberately terminate and expel an innocent human being from a uterus – that's a very different proposition altogether.

No one has the right to be in the middle of the road jaywalking either – but just because they don't a right to be in the middle of the road, that doesn't then mean that I have the right to run them down and kill them with my car if I drive around a corner and find them in the middle of the road while jaywalking.

Yeah, and you two seem to be leading the charge on the fallacies here.

Then demonstrate which fallacies, philosophy boy.

Why the obsession with 'innocent human being'

Please elaborate.

And no one has the right to be inside your body without consent, and if the ONLY way you can escape results in their death, too bad.

So if am being raped by someone who doesn't comprehend that rape is wrong, I can't use force to stop it? Just watch me!

Certainly she does. It's HER uterus. She can do anything she wants with it. She can rent it out if she wants. See surrogacy.

Once again, no this is NOT an appeal to nature.

I really can't believe you're still trying to insist of this fallacious claim when I've explained several times that this is not the case at all.

Secondly, a functioning uterus would still act to provide nutrients, expel waste, etc, even if it was separate from a woman's body (obviously this technology does exist as of yet) – the key point is that you referred to a 'functioning' uterus in relation to pregnancy, but then suggested that a healthy human being in utero would still die even if a uterus was functioning.

This is precisely why I had to challenge your definition of 'functioning', because clearly what you have described is a uterus that is NOT actually functioning any longer, thus the death of the human being in utero.

As I explained, innocent people have a right not to have forced used against them – but this is not true if the person being talked about is an unjust aggressor, in that situation you do have the right to use force against them.

It's also why I am careful to use the word 'deliberate' a lot as well – because there is clearly a different level of moral culpability between deliberately doing something and accidentally doing it, or doing something else that causes that outcome as a secondary and unintended consequence of your actions.

As you see above, I am not trying to argue that a fetus has a right to be inside someone's body – instead I am arguing that they have the right to necessities for life (and a womb is one of these when you are a human being in your fetal stage of development), and also, I am arguing that even if someone doesn't have a right to be in your body, that does not then mean that you have an automatic right to kill them and expel them from your body.

For example, if a doctor was to open you up and operate on you, without consent – because you arrived at the hospital unconscious after a car accident, and he was trying to save you – that doesn't mean that you have the right to kill him if you awake during the surgery and find him inside your body, even if that was the only way to get him out of your body.

I think when it comes to bodily integrity, there can be a clear distinction drawn between a requirement to violate your bodily integrity to preserve the life of someone who is otherwise dying as the result of bodily malfunction, and a requirement to violate your bodily integrity in order to refrain from terminating the life of someone who will otherwise physiologically survive. It's not about the nature of the violation so much, but more about a difference in the burden required to prove that your action/inaction is justified; the former situation requiring a lesser burden than the latter.

It's also about the relative rights in balance. Not having to donate a kidney = right to bodily integrity trumps right to health. Having to provide a blood or breath sample for drink driving = right to life (for others on the road) trumps right to bodily autonomy. Being quarantined for disease = right to life (for others) trumps right to liberty. Involuntary treatment for mental illness = right to life (others and/or your own) trumps right to bodily integrity. And then abortion = right to bodily integrity trumps right to life.

It's pretty clear that bodily integrity can be justifiably violated. What needs to be argued in abortion is whether or not the life and rights of the prenate provide sufficient weight for that justification to exist.

(If anyone replies, I'm in the middle of studying for exams and don't have much time for debate. So you may have to be quite patient if you want a response.)

The problem is that abortion is NOT like refusing to donate blood or bone marrow. In the latter case, you're simply failing to save the person's life, and the person dies from a pre-existing illness; you're no more responsible for the death than someone who drives past an accident victim and fails to stop and help.

Let's say we have two girls, Alex and Bethany. Alex and Bethany are conjoined twins with a shared circulatory system. However, one day Bethany suffers from liver failure. She'll still be able to live, however, because her blood will still be filtered by Alice's functioning liver. However, Alice doesn't like that her liver function has essentially been halved, meaning she sometimes feels queasy and can't drink as much alcohol. If Alice could find a doctor to separate their circulatory systems, should she be allowed to do so?

You mentioned the De Facto Guardian article, but didn't address it. Do you think that the woman in the cabin should be allowed to starve the baby to death, rather than breastfeed?

I think I can explain the "Punish the rapist, not the child!" line. It isn't meant to imply that those who support a rape exception don't want to punish rapists; it's meant as more of an attempt to establish common ground. Many people seem to be of the thought process that if you *don't* support a rape exception, that means you don't think rape is that bad, or that you don't care about rape victims. The line is an attempt to say, in a soundbite, "Look, I understand that rape is a terrible crime, and a traumatic experience to go through. I agree that more needs to be done to prevent rape and bring rapists to justice. We don't disagree on anything about rape; I'm only contending that the child conceived in rape should not die for his father's crime.

My problem with a rape exception is the ability to enforce it. How exactly would that work? Does a woman need to simply say "I was raped"? Because that would mean that any woman could still get an abortion if they are willing to lie to get one. Which makes it not an exception at all.
Or does a woman have to PROVE she was raped? As your stats said before, only 40% of rapes even get reported. Lets assume a woman is raped and becomes pregnant.Let's also assume that they find the rapist, arrest him, take him to trial, and finally convict. By the time all of this happens, the woman would have given birth to the child anyways.
So my question to those out there who believe in a rape exception, is there something I'm missing? How would this possibly be enforced? In what way could this possibly work?

I know this wasn't your point, but I really object to phrases like "spawn of the rapist." I agree that rapists are the scum of the earth, but that doesn't mean their children are bad or "spawn." Many rape survivors choose to carry their pregnancies and it's really hurtful to them and their children to see society use phrases like this. Just something to consider.

I understand at least half of them do, and my opinion is my own. To those who choose to do so, that is their private decision and no justification is needed. I meant of course, that to ME it would be the spawn of a rapist. Not a "child" but a hateful parasite that I would in no way consider giving birth too. That may be done, but it's only inviting trouble.

Thanks for that perspective. That makes a lot more sense to me, although (speaking purely anecdotally/subjectively) that's not the impression I usually get from the attitudes of the people saying the soundbite.

There is no such thing as "non-penetrative rape."

""You should be allowed to unplug" is a moral intuition in most people.
Since unplugging is somewhat analogous to abortion (in case of rape), we
may conclude "you should be allowed to abort." But what do we learn
from the fact that the thought experiment works in that way? We learn
the primacy of intuition. Now that we have understood that intuition is
what counts, why not see what our intuition is about abortion itself?
The outcome might be different. If so, the analogy has broken down
somewhere. We may not logically understand exactly where, but that does
not mean that we should abandon our moral intuition."

Were going to have a fuller discussion on this topic, so I won't go into much detail here. It isn't just the pinpointing of our intuition that matters in this thought experiment. Thomson also went on to explain why that intuitions work out that way despite the fact we would all acknowledge that a) the violinist is undoubtedly a person who b) undoubtedly has a right to life. Without that explanation, our reaction to the experiment could just be dismissed as an anomaly.

"An unborn human being is not an unjust aggressor because they have no
intent to cause harm to another person – intent is required on the part
of the aggressor."

Nonsense. Imagine, if you will, a person suffering from PTSD. That person attacks you, thinking for whatever reason that you are "the enemy." That person has no intent to harm you, but even without that intent, that person is an unjust aggressor that can be dealt accordingly.

"LOL – if you have consensual sex with another person, and you create a dependant human being from that act, it is absolute nonsense to try and claim that nature created the human being – as opposed to you creating it as a direct result of your actions."

I find it interesting how you insist on intent in one case but disavow it in this one. Just because you have consensual sex, it does not mean you intend to get pregnant–hence the term *unintended* pregnancy. dudebro is correct–the woman didn't purposely create the prenate.

"The doctor analogy was used to show that your claim about it being
ethically permissible to kill someone just because they are inside your
body without consent is clearly not true, otherwise it would be okay to
kill the doctor in that situation where you gave no consent to having
doing things to your body."

If you awake during the surgery and attacked the doctor in the honest belief it was necessary to use deadly force, a self-defense claim may or may not hold up, depending on the jurisdiction. However, in jurisdictions that recognize the imperfect self-defense doctrine, you could avail yourself of that and it would reduce the charge and/or sentence.

1. Comparing a person with PSTD to an unborn human being is simply nonsensical.

The person suffering from PTSD still has intent – even if their intent is fuelled by mental instability due to the PTSD.

Their actions are intentionally directed at their victim.

This is nothing like an innocent fetus which takes no action and directs nothing against the mother at all.

2. The primary end of the act of sexual intercourse is the reproduction of our species (i.e. creation of new human lives).

It is the most effective of creating a new human being, and the two bodies of the male and female sexual partners are working to try and achieve this outcome right from the very start of the act – regardless of whether you personally intend that or not.

Consenting to sexual intercourse is consenting to the very act which has the sole biological aim of bring new human lives into existence.

It is simply ludicrous to engage in the act that is designed to create new vulnerable human beings, and then try and claim that you are nor morally culpable for the new vulnerable human beings that you happen to create as a result.

This is precisely why courts rule that wayward fathers have to pay child support to support their biological offspring regardless of whether they intended their sexual acts to produce the child or not – the very fact that their actions led to the existence of that human being makes them accountable for the wellbeing of that human being.

3. I would suggest to you that no sane person would consider it ethically acceptable to kill that doctor and claim that you were just exercising your right to bodily autonomy, and that your actions were perfectly justified.

1. I wasn't necessarily comparing someone with PTSD to a prenate. I was simply responding to your assertion that intent is required on the part of an aggressor before one could respond to the aggression.

2. Who says "the primary end of the act of sexual intercourse is the reproduction of our species" or that sexual intercourse "has the sole biological aim of bring new human lives into existence"? Or for that matter that sexual intercourse was designed at all? Or that forcing fathers to pay child support for children they didn't want is any more just than prohibiting abortion?

3. I'm not saying that any sane person would. I am saying a sane person would not necessarily convict the patient given the circumstances.

1. I NEVER said that intent was required (on the part of the aggressor) before one can respond, instead I said that a fetus is innocent of unjust aggression because THEY don't have intent. I was explaining why a fetus is innocent, and why they can't be treated with force in the same way that someone who intends to do you harm does (which a PTSD person does – putting them in a different category to a fetus).

2. Who says? Mother nature does. Biology textbooks do. This is science and reality 101. Sex might be pleasurable for us, but it doesn't exist as a pleasure outlet for human beings, but biologically/evolutionarily speaking it exists as a vehicle to achieve human reproduction.

3. I disagree. Unless the patient could prove insanity, I don't think any sane person would consider their killing of the doctor to be an ethically acceptable act.

Your would still fail because you are demonstrably wrong. A prenate doesn't just need a functioning uterus. It also needs the mother's lungs, digestive system, kidneys and circulatory system (at a minimum). This is what dudebro was getting by suggesting the prenate can have the uterus so long as it left the rest of the woman's body alone.

It is one thing to say one should be provided with clean water. It is another to say that the clean water must come directly from my body.

I understand what you mean about writing when you are at the point of exhaustion. I once had to go back and edit a number of posts I wrote when exhausted. For most of them, it was necessary to make clarifications for something that would otherwise be misleading. But in one case I had to come out and say ignore everything after a certain point and admit I didn't know what the hell I was thinking when I wrote it. You've done quite well here, especially given the length of the post.

When it comes to rights, there are no yes-buts. Either you have them or you don't. In saying this, I am not saying rights are completely inviolate or that you can use your rights to infringe upon those of others. But if there limits, those limits need to be consistently applied.

With that in mind, let us move to the heart of the matter. You state, "To answer that question we have to address the point of when human
rights begin. Are they magically assigned at the moment of birth?
Earlier? At the point that they start existing as a unique individual?"

The answer is that, no, we don't have to address the point of when human rights begin. It is irrelevant. Sure, if the prenate doesn't have any human rights, then having an abortion is of no more consequence than pulling a louse from your body.

But if bodily rights mean anything, they mean that no one has the right to use your body for their purposes. You said it yourself–it would be absurd to justify rape on the ground that your body wanted to be on someone else. It also means that no one has the right to your organs, even to keep themselves alive. And "no one" includes prenates, even if they have human rights.

You want to make a distinction on two grounds. First, the difference between letting die and the fact that a third party is involved. Okay, let's run with it then. Here are some questions for you:

1) If a woman could simply consciously expel the fetus from her body under her own power, would it be acceptable if she did so? If not, then how can you justify fighting a rapist trying to use your body?

2) If I happened upon someone raping an unconscious person, am I permitted to intervene? If so, on what grounds do you forbid a third person to remove a prenate from a woman's body?

I'm opposed to it, but forced organ donation is NOTHING like abortion.

Abortion is intentional direct killing of an innocent human being, but if I decline to donate my organs to someone and they die, that is an unintentional secondary effect of my actions – which is obviously totally different to abortion.

The person requiring an organ transplant is not killed, they die, and they don't die because I intend it, and they don't die at my hand – their lethal ailment is the thing that ends their life, not another human being.

Blueberry wrote:

**If the baby is viable, and the mother no longer wants to be pregnant (maybe she can feel the baby kicking now, or she just discovered her pregnancy), should she be obligated to undergo a c-section or to induce labor rather than have an abortion?**

The problem with inducing labor is the elephant in the living room that anti-abortionists want to desperately ignore, which is that you are forcing a very large object (a head) through a very small hole (the birth canal). It's far more painful and dangerous than an abortion. Ditto for a C section, cutting a large hole in the abdomen is much more painful and dangerous to the mother than an abortion.

If you can find a way to remove the baby intact that is not more painful, dangerous, time consuming, or expensive than an abortion, and are willing to pay for the costs of keeping it alive, then you have grounds to talk.

**An unborn human being is not an unjust aggressor because they have no intent to cause harm to another person – intent is required on the part of the aggressor.**

Sorry, no. If someone is falling (by accident) from a building, and they are headed towards me, and the situation is such that they will die unless I allow them to fall on my body, I am not under an obligation to let them fall on me to save their lives (thus risking harm myself) simply because they didn't 'intend' to fall from the building.

**Innocence is important is because innocence is a qualifier in human ethics.**

Crap argument. A man who visits prostitutes isn't 'innocent', but I don't have the right to go shoot him. And contrawise, if a man doesn't visit prostitutes, but is starving to death, or falling towards my body from a building, I don't have an obligation to feed him or let him fall on me, merely because he is 'innocent' or 'didn't intend' to be in his situation.

This is not a moment when I can get back to Thomson. I will do that when we discuss this on the blog. But at this point, I'm very skeptical that I will find her explanation to be applicable to all situations other than the violinist situation, in such a way that it certifiably overrides our direct intuitions about those situations. I don't remember seeing in Thomson or ever seeing elsewhere an explanation of an intuition that accomplished that.

Agree but if you put another moral person in a state of situational dependency needing the water you have from your body; you have a right of refusal but not from moral obligation causing them to need it from you. If I get time maybe I'll write up our discussions so others can argue over it as well.

Unfortunately, not everyone aware of safe harbor laws… But, I thought you knew?

I don't recognize 'obligations' and 'responsibilities' that I have not voluntarily and explicitly agreed to. Especially to something without sufficient brain to either desire or enforce such a thing, which is therefore being used as a false flag to disguise slavery to YOU.

**(living, growing, has its own unique DNA, etc.)**

So does cancer. And HELA cells. And my ears.

**it also has all of the exclusively human potentials (potential for rational thought, freewill, etc.)

So does an ova or sperm. By the use of the word 'potential' you admit it does not have those properties NOW. On what basis do you enslave an actual person to a 'potential' one, other than your sad feelies?

**If you want to claim that it is not a person, then you need to provide compelling evidence that it is not a person.**

It doesn't have a functioning brain. There. Proven.

**A born child at 1 week postpartum is just as dependent on her mother as the same child at 34 weeks gestation.**

So, I'm sure you can show me the pictures in medical textbooks of week old infants still obtaining their supply of oxygen and nutrition through umbilical cords. Otherwise, you're just handwaving.

Yeah, my explanation still stands. Attacking the person as your argument, with no other argument = ad hom fallacy.

Example: "you are wrong because you're an atheist"

But if you make a personal attack whilst also providing other, valid arguments, it is not an AF hom .

I have found that people are fond of accusing their opponent of using the ad hominem fallacy *any* time an insult is used. "You insulted me! Your entire argument is invalid now! Ad hominem fallacy!"

If people aren't aware of them, that is the fault of the government.

Sure, i can. i do not want to be pregnant. No other reason needed.

Sex also exists for social bonding. Which is why humans don't fuck like dogs or cows. If sex amongst humans existed ONLY for procreation, humans would enter heat, have sex, and then forget about it.

In humans, sex exists for social bonding in order to facilitate stronger group ties, and keep people together to raise a resource intensive child.

http://media.uoregon.edu/channel/2013/02/15/darwin-days-whats-love-got-to-do-with-it-sex-for-social-bonding-in-bonobos/

Bingo.

Nowadays, sex offenders are very rampant. Everyday there's a news about sex offenders. Here's a good service that will surely help you whenever you encounter any troubles. You just need to install the application to your phone. By the time you press the panic button it will automatically connect to the response center and the call can be routed to the nearest 911 if badly needed. Just visit Safekidzone.com.

No, but nor have I survived an attempt on my life where I have killed the attacker with no evidence to show I was the innocent party. Nonetheless I would be obliged to come forward and say what happened.

Another way to frame it is if I was raped and a mob took an innocent man and was going to kill him even if it was traumatic I should come forward.

Or if it was a serial rapist that had killed his other victims and is continuing to rape if you survived the rape and had any evidence at all you should come forward in the hope of stopping future rapes.

Yes rape is traumatic nonetheless it ca still palce moral obligations on the victim to come forward.

&if you want to use it to kill another innocent human being, the onus is on you to justify the right to do so and avoid legal repercussions.

From his number 2, it depends what one means by ''distinguished'' if by mental abilities, then a human wouldn't be considered a person until about 3 years of age since theory of mind seems to exist only in most members of the human species. If a pro choicer wants to use that to make the person/non person distinction, then ET and AI's can qualify and some humans like those with profound mental retardation and those with autism wouldn't and some other humans as well.

There is some testing of theory of mind being done on Chimpanzees and dolphins since for theory of mind to be possible, a entity would need to have the capacity for self awareness which is in some other higher order species as well.

A fetus is not a human being or a legal person by definition. Words have meaning.

The only reason I need for an abortion is = I do not want to be pregnant.

I knew from your attitude you have never been raped. Best thing you could do about rape is shut your mouth. You know what Thumper's Mother said, right?

Yes but by the same token things could change like definitions have changed in the past.

BTW I wouldn't stop a rape victim from having an abortion as she isn't morally responsible.

& no I won't shut my mouth. if you just want to come here and troll just P'Off.

I agree the science indicates the unborn are humans just like the rest of us and that abortion does indeed kill a human so pro choicers have some options.
1. Bodily rights argument
2. Make that distinction between being a person and just being a human with bringing ET and AI's into the picture to put pressure on pro lifers since they like to focus intensively on species membership.

You need to shut your mouth about rape for your own benefit. You come across to someone who has been raped as an unfeeling emotionally disconnected sadistic dolt. Suit yourself. A word to the wise is sufficient.

You can stop no woman from having an abortion. Women abort. That is what we do. And we do not have to whisper about it in the kitchen anymore.

Let us now discuss the morality of abortion:

Anthropologically speaking, Homo sapiens has three strategies
for dealing with unwanted reproduction (births): contraception, abortion and infanticide. All three are practiced in every culture worldwide historically and currently.

Those who restrict contraception and abortion make infanticide, child abandonment/abuse and maternal mortality inevitable. We have many in vitro examples of this but the one that troubles me the most at the moment is this example:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…

There is nothing moral about your position if your position is controlling women's reproductive choices by law or by shaming/blaming. Illegal abortion and sepsis and hemorrhage in childbirth are the three leading causes of maternal death worldwide. Women have blood in the game. YOU do not. Abortion and contraception are human rights. You do not occupy the moral high ground.

Some religious PL's have a problem with it but I tend to think secular PL's wouldn't; and would easily extend it to great apes etc.

"I do not want to be pregnant. No other reason needed."

Whatever relief and other benefits you will obtain from the abortion lie at least somewhat in your future. No sane woman is motivated to become unpregnant by the pleasure of the immediate abortion experience, or by going to the clinic, filling out forms, and paying $350 (sometimes much more), is she? So when you say becoming unpregnant is a justifiable reason for you to abort, you mean that the abortion is justified by your future, your potential.

And yet you and Ann Morgan say, "On what basis do you enslave an actual person to a 'potential' one . . . ?"

Essentially, you are saying:

1. the potential of a woman should be taken into account, and therefore she has a right to kill her unborn child

2. it's okay to kill an unborn child, because its potential should not be taken into account.

Any reason that might be given for abortion always gives weight to the woman's future, her potential

Another point: since you say that the only-potential status of the fetus "goes right to the point," do I understand correctly that your "I do not want to be pregnant. No other reason needed" is based on that only-potential status, and that if you conceded for the sake of argument that the fetus is a person now, some further reason would be needed before aborting?

Nice ad hom but since you have no idea what my stance is you are just shooting out your ass.

I maintain a moral right for any woman to have an abortion and even more so for rape victims.

But bodily sovereignty is a right not to have your body used against our will.

It isn't a right to avoid responsibility from creating moral persons and then have them killed to maintain that bodily sovereignty.

& unlike many PL's I support increased financial support so and keep real health exceptions.

& I have a somewhat more sophisticated con conception of ethics than you. Something can still be wrong even if it doesn't impact on me and especially so when it impact another moral person.

& the reason I do maintain the high moral ground on this subject compared to both sides as I'm far more consistent than either PL or PC.

Some birds have passed the mirror test as well. I actually lean more towards a secular Jainist position myself.

Corvids pass knowledge of tool use age and other skills to their offspring.

Animals are not different from us in kind, only in degree.

Nice ad hom but since you have no idea what my stance is you are just shooting out your ass.

…………..

I read what you had to say.

I maintain a moral right for any woman to have an abortion and even more so for rape victims.
……………

So what. You have no standing in my moral or physical life.

But bodily sovereignty is a right not to have your body used against our will.
It isn't a right to avoid responsibility from creating moral persons and then have them killed to maintain that bodily sovereignty.
……….

Abortion is a responsible choice when confronted with an unwanted pregnancy. A fetus is not a person, legally or otherwise.

& unlike many PL's I support increased financial support so and keep real health exceptions.

………..

So what. You have no standing as chooser in my life.

& I have a somewhat more sophisticated conception of ethics than you. Something can still be wrong even if it doesn't impact on me and especially so when it impact another moral person.
& the reason I do maintain the high moral ground on this subject compared to both sides as I'm far more consistent than either PL or PC.

……….

This does not address my response about the morality of abortion. Here it is again.

Anthropologically Homo sapiens has three strategies for dealing with unwanted reproduction (births): contraception, abortion and
infanticide. All three are practiced in every culture worldwide historically and currently.

Those who restrict contraception and abortion make
infanticide, child abandonment/abuse and maternal mortality inevitable. We have many in vitro examples of this but the one that troubles me the most at the moment is this example:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…

There is nothing moral about your position if your position is controlling women's reproductive choices by law or by
shaming/blaming. Illegal abortion and sepsis and hemorrhage in childbirth are the three leading causes of maternal death worldwide. Women have blood in the game. YOU do not. Abortion and contraception are human rights. You do not occupy the moral high ground.

Your link is dead.

& it is actually your stance that makes infanticide the logical,/b> final step for reproductive 'choice' something some PC's already accept.

& I don't restrict most contraception actually the reverse. I would mandate a global effort at 100% safe male contraception. Also I could I would make it a legal requirement for all reproductive males have to use it or would be held as criminally responsible as the female who then has an abortion from consensual sex.

A fetus is human, it is alive, it may be wanted or unwanted.

I fixed the link. But just in case, here it is again.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4078859

"& it is actually your stance that makes infanticide the logical, final step for reproductive 'choice' something some PC's already accept."

Citation needed for this. Speak to what I actually wrote not what you think I wrote. Your responses are narcissistic. Your idea of what abortion is and what reproductive activists think and value is childish and self referent.

It really is quite simple and something the infanticide PC readily see and agree with.

If part of the reason that abortion is justified is that the fetus isn't a psychological person -which is argued the basis or moral personhood -then it doesn't really where a immature non person is it doesn't have a full right to life.

Therefore as pointed out in the Post Birth Abortion paper – and by others- many of the burden arguments justifying abortion, also apply to babies.

& you last points show you have little understanding of the philosophy underpinning abortion.

These are standard arguing points very much seen as valid even by informed individuals on both sides. They might think they are wrong but relevant arguments nonetheless.

Well I find that strange, differentiating between biological persons /Homo sapiens, psychological persons and legal persons are such basic introductory information that it is listed in lecture notes and in essays without reference.

Something like mentioned here.

http://psychology.wikia.com/wiki/Person

Take Peter Singer's work those differences are so interwoven into his work it would be taken for granted a reader understood the differences.

Next while true that the majority of philosophers in the Personal Identity debate think we are ontologically speaking psychological persons the debate is far from over.

It is so common either in ethics or the personal identity debate I just don't understand how you haven't come across it.

http://www.iep.utm.edu/person-i/

"Another intuitively appealing view, championed by John Locke, holds that personal identity is a matter of psychological continuity.
According to this view, in order for a person X to survive a particular
adventure, it is necessary and sufficient that there exists, at a time
after the adventure, a person Y who psychologically evolved out of X.
This idea is typically cashed out in terms of overlapping chains of
direct psychological connections, as those causal and cognitive
connections between beliefs, desires, intentions, experiential memories,
character traits, and so forth. This Lockean view is well suited for
thought experiments conducted from first-person points of view, such as
body swaps or tele-transportation, but it, too, faces obstacles. For
example, on this view, it appears to be possible for two future persons
to be psychologically continuous with a presently existing person. Can
one really become two? In response to this problem, some commentators
have suggested that, although our beliefs, memories, and intentions are
of utmost importance to us, they are not necessary for our identity, our
persistence through time.

A third criterion of personal identity is that we are our bodies,
that is to say, that personal identity is constituted by some brute
physical relation between, for example, different bodies or different
life-sustaining systems at different times. Although this view is still
somewhat unpopular, developments about personal identity theory in the
1990s promise an ideological change, as versions of the so-called
somatic criterion, associated with Eric Olson and Paul Snowdon, attract a
continuously growing number of adherents."

"I'm actually saying that you *can't* use your rights to infringe
upon the rights of others

Basically, what I'm trying to say is that rights are a base
standard, a line that one cannot normally cross. They are not necessarily
absolutely inviolable. But if they are going to be violated, there had better
be a really damned good reason for doing so.

Not at all. All I am doing is applying a generally
recognized rules to specific situations. If an adult can be denied my body
parts to keep itself alive, then a prenate can also be so denied. There is no
yes-but here. Both can be denied. I am not discriminating based on stage of
development; that is what pro-lifers are doing.

Should the right to bodily autonomy allow you to
actively kill another human being? Personally, if such a thing were possible I
don't believe it would be morally right, but there would be no way to legislate
it. While I would encourage mothers to not do that and seek to support them in
their pregnancy and motherhood, it's not analogous to an issue like abortion
which is a legal procedure designed to kill a human being."

Very nice can I join in here?

Super_Red can I join in? I've been messaging Timothy over these topics and another perspective would be great.

Actually while some people do think ontology -what we fundamentally are- is irrelevant to the debate if you raise personhood you put this on the table.

And you misunderstand what you've read if you don't think a fetus isn't a biological person.

BTW I don't have a clitoris so does that mean I cannot criticize women who do Female genital mutilation (FGM) on their daughters?

Look sure if you think killing offspring is ok sure, but so do people who think infanticide is ok. Neither Zef's or babies are psychological persons. & like other sentient beings they don't have a right to life as opposed to moral persons so a parent who decides they wish to humanely kill their non person offspring should be able to for similar reason to abortions.

What does this have to do with not wanting to be pregnant?

My clitoris is none of your business. I am not interested in you in any way, shape of form. You skeeve me.

Look if the fetus isn't morally relevant than this whole argument doesn't matter.

But there are strong philosophical and physiological reasons to think it does have grounds for moral personhood.

So for arguments sake lets say it is a moral person.

What obligations does creating a moral person entail?

Could you push a button with a baby making artificial -womb machine create health Zef but then just walk away and let it die?

No? Why not? Maybe because you created a moral person who is existential dependent on you and that creates moral obligations in the same way a baby does and especially so if no other care giver can be found.

Again I think you have the right to say who uses your body including a right to remove them. But just because you have that right that doesn't abrogate the obligations you arguably owe that moral person you created.

Excuse me I will bow out for someone who went to university you ability to understand even simple arguments is lacking.

You need to bow out. Your arguments are trash.

Citation needed.

Isn't it both? What is both consistent legally and morally?
But I will go back to that other thread.

Citation needed, you fooking liar.

Let us get real. There are no 'rights.' Hold up a 'right' so I can see and touch it.
'Rights' is a concept we created. A 'right' by definition cannot be forfeited.

Sorry I'm not sure whether you are addressing what I've asked.

Are agreeing that NO, there cannot be a FUNDAMENTAL moral principle/right that could be invoked that would allow you to intentionally kill someone -that you put in that situation- and avoid any moral responsibility for that killing?

In other words could it be possible to invoke a fundamental right that would allow you to MURDER another moral person but get away with it because you can effectively hide behind that moral right?

I am being real. Certain rights can indeed be forfeited. As another example, take the right to freedom of movement. Yet we take duly convicted criminals and lock them up in a prison. If rights by definition cannot be forfeited, then on what basis do we do this?

If adoptive parents change their minds, they can pass the child on to someone else, or the state. Even speaking solely as a matter of moral obligations, situational factors will still apply to the stranger who gets trapped in a house with a random baby.

P.Z. Myers is one google him and infanticide.

http://socraticgadfly.blogspot.com.au/2011/01/pharyngula-gets-dr-gosnell-all-wrong.html

and

http://freethoughtblogs.com/zinniajones/2014/03/there-is-also-a-secular-argument-for-infanticide/

I think she is trying to get at the argument that rights were invented by man so that we could co-operate without having to worry about getting randomly stabbed in the back.

However, there does appear to be *some* evidence that a form of morality evolved, and is even present in animals today:

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-nature-nurture-nietzsche-blog/201005/did-morality-evolve

On a related note I recorded an interesting show on stress – and how it kills us. Researchers were studying baboons, and dominant baboon males tend to be highly aggressive bullies. They routinely beat up the females and weaker males. Anyway, the alpha males, being in the habit of hogging all the food, got a hold of some rotten meat and died. The troop was then left with nothing but females and non-dominant males. The surprising thing is that none of the beta males stepped in to become alphas. The troop then settled down, shared food more equally, and everyone got along. Levels of violence plummeted, to near non-existent levels.

Funny, isn't it, how similar human society is to the baboons – the sociopathic alphas make life hell for the rest of the world.

You tell me.

Shitweasel.

Look at Peter Singer, Michael Tooley, the authors of the after-birth abortion paper, two of my real-life pro-choice friends, et cetera.

Also, for the record, *if* I become pro-choice, then I might open the door to supporting legalizing elective painless infanticide in certain cases.

As an agnostic, I don't particularly care much about what religions say about/on various issues, including on this issue.

Infanticide is murder in most cases.
Singer is not saying infanticide is no big deal and generally okay. Assisted suicide is legal and should be. I support parents ending the life of their suffering children as well.
I have not read Tooley.

Anthropologically speaking, Homo sapiens has three strategies
for dealing with unwanted reproduction (births): contraception, abortion and infanticide. All three are practiced in every culture worldwide historically and currently.

Those who restrict contraception and abortion make
infanticide, child abandonment/abuse and maternal mortality inevitable. We have many in vitro examples of this but the one that troubles me the most at the moment is this example:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…

There is nothing moral about your position if your position is controlling women's reproductive choices by law or by shaming/blaming. Illegal abortion and sepsis and hemorrhage in childbirth are the three leading causes of maternal death worldwide. Women have blood in the
game. YOU do not. Abortion and contraception are human rights.

Obviously I have thought a great deal more about this than you have. YOU do not occupy the moral high ground.

Maybe you should go to his site and tell him and his supporters that. 😉

Yes, this is what I meant by "in theory". As you said, this might be different in practice (though I wonder if there is anything that a "baby daddy" can do to try determining whether his female sexual partner gave birth and then utilized safe-haven laws without his consent; for instance, is there any way to do paternity tests on all infants at safe haven locations to see if one of them is yours?).

Yes like the European magpie. You yourself would have no problem with leaving that word open into ET and AI's currect? Because I am not welling to take the view pro lifers want to me take that only humans can be persons when we have for example 180 billion galaxies in our observable universe must likely then not containing other civilizations out there. Carl Segan estimated we may have about 100 million technological civilizations in our milky way. If he is correct, then species membership is a poor indicater of personhood. It surprising to see that the pro lifer movement can walk away from watching avatar still thinking they are synonyms still.

It's very rare to talk to someone who takes a Jainist position since they are pretty consistent on mostly everything just about.

I really wouldn't know where to start looking. Don't worry, if you made a similar argument in another thread, you would have received a similar response.

You have raised niggling to high art. I am impressed.

Can you provide the link where that quote appears?

Then you originally quoted me, also, without sourcing from any link. You relied on your memory for what you represented as an exact quote. If you will admit that was a bit irresponsible, I will provide the exact quote.

And your point is …?

Sure is; so you should cut it out.

Prison serves, in theory, to keep felons from hurting others. What is served by executing the felon?

While I nominally agree that her explanation will be applicable to "all" other situations, I will submit that you have missed the point. The point was to test what you would call your intuition against what I would call your intuition. If your "gut reaction" (akin to what I mean by intuition) does not match the stated principle (akin to what you mean by intuition), then the principle does not really stand as stated. The thought experiment itself is just a paradigm case of the stated principle.

How is any of that relevant? You said "it is a violation of their fundamental rights to deliberately deny them an essential for life." These are YOUR WORDS. I didn't put them in your mouth, and I am taking them at face value.

Now, you said that denying the prenate the use of the mother's womb denies them an essential for life and is therefore a violation of their fundamental rights. Denying someone an organ when they need it to live is deliberately denying them an essential for life. If it is a violation of the prenate's fundamental rights in one case, it is a violation of a nonprenate's fundamental rights in another.

So, do you really believe denying something that is an essential for life constitutes a violation of their fundamental rights or not? Based on your response, I conclude you really don't believe it is a violation of fundamental rights to deny someone something that is essential for life. So what is your real reason for denying women the right to an abortion?

1. In an unwanted pregancy, the prenate becomes an unjust aggressor because it lacks consent to be in the woman's body. Intent is irrelevant.

2. The very fact that humans engage in sex for purposes other than reproduction itself suggests that sex that reproduction is not the primary end of sex. The biological fact is that sex serves a number of different purposes for the human species. To take any one of those purposes and call it the "primary end" goes far beyond what the facts tell us.

3. I never said a sane person would consider it an ethically acceptable act. What I said is that a sane person might not convict the patient given the circumstances.

"How about this if I can think of a situation whereby I can intentionally kill someone but invoke another moral or legal right so I’m not morally responsible, doesn’t that at least question or make doubtful whether an absolute claim to that right in all situations is ethically permissible?

"Call it the Murder Test."

I think I found the post you wanted me to copy a answer to another post to. Since my answer to this question is substantially the same, I will go ahead and copy that answer here:

I would say that no, it would be impossible to murder another person and get away with it by hiding behind another moral right. Murder by definition is the unjust killing of another person. If the assertion of one's moral rights leads to the death of another, assuming the other's own moral rights are not violated, then that death is simply not murder.

To that, I would add that I have never said that rights are absolute in all situations.

"A right to bodily sovereignty isn’t a moral right not to be held morally responsible for wrongs done to moral person innocent aggressors who are themselves impinging on the offenders bodily sovereignty because of the actions of that person."

Granted. Heck, your right to free speech even allows you to express your moral indignation about it. Beyond that, you may even have a right to hold the person morally responsible for such a moral outrage, depending on how you do it. What you cannot do is hold them legally responsible for exercising their right to bodily autonomy.

No he isn't. He is the polar opposite of that.

You can take a test.
http://members.shaw.ca/jeanaltemeyer/drbob/TheAuthoritarians.pdf

I am not reading it. I find C.S. Lewis painful to read. The test is in the beginning of the paper. I think it is in the table of contents.

I not remember how it was scored. 66 is well below the average for what?
I wonder what you deserve? A crappy way to evaluate crime and punishment IMO.

Same penalty as in the case of a rape victim killing her newborn the second it was born if she didnt realize she was pregnant.

Most medical risks come well after viability. In that case, a DELIVERY can be done – e.g. C section – to save the life of the woman and the unborn child.

And, what if the rape victim was an a human extermination center at 23 weeks 5 days, the abortion was botched and the baby born alive. Could she still have the doctor KILL the baby? That's her wish… you wouldn't want to deny a woman her 'wish' now would you?

Already answered some of your questions. Yet you answer none of mine…Typical pro-abort tactic.

Don't talk about yourself like that. Go get some counselling.

And, what if the baby is born alive and the umbilical cord is still attached – it's still 'using her body'… still her choice?

And, are you OK with a woman aborting at 32 weeks just because the unborn child is inconvenient or unwanted?

"And, what if the baby is born alive and the umbilical cord is still attached – it's still 'using her body'… still her choice?"

Yes, it is still her choice. However, in this case, the proportionate response is to cut the umbilical cord and/or detach the placenta.

"And, are you OK with a woman aborting at 32 weeks just because the unborn child is inconvenient or unwanted?"

Okay with it? No, but my feelings about the matter are irrelevant because it is still HER body.

No, it is not 'her choice' to kill if a baby is born still attached via an umbilical cord. There are laws against that.

And, your feelings on abortion after viability DO matter. (It's not 'her body' killed in an abortion anyway). Post viability abortion restrictions are based on what the people of that state want. If you live in a state that does not restrict abortion after viability, you have the right to ask your leadership to make laws to protect unborn children after viability.

To tell you the truth I don't think we are even persons rather a form of Highly Autonomous Cognitively Sophisticated Complex Adaptive System that is part of even larger Super Organism species/system.

I believe if you take a systems perspective all life are differing variations of organic Complex Adaptive System replicators, and as I think you would appreciate one could also have CAS synthetic replicators as well.

My line is if we are prepared to consider wel-being interests as rights grounding, all autonomous CAS's whether, cognitively sophisticated or non cognitively sophisticated, biological or synthetic could have basic interests as well.

& yes we can still be seen as a variation type of CAD but because we are strongly self developing/assembling 'persons' we are persons at all stages of our development. Philosophy just hasn't caught up with complex dual purpose machines.

I have a question for those who support the rape exception in the name of bodily integrity. What about a situation in which a woman has been trying to conceive with her partner, but is raped and becomes pregnant by the rapist? Does her predetermined willingness to share her body with a foetus alter the permissability of abortion, given that she would not have aborted a foetus fathered by her partner? Because it seems to me that if you are working purely from bodily integrity, that abortion would not be allowable in this case, given that it would have to be based on the identity of the foetus rather than the woman's willingness to be pregnant. Perhaps there are aspects I haven't considered. I'm open to hearing them if so.

I am uncertain what you mean. It does seem to me that "pro-lifers" have always been arguing that the life and rights of the prenate provide sufficient justification to override the woman's right to bodily autonomy. And it seems to me they have always been failing.

I've been pro-choice ever since I've been aware there was a such thing as abortion and that there was a debate surrounding it. Before I read Thomson, however, I could have swung into the "pro-life" camp fairly easily. Before reading Thomson, I did feel there was a genuine conflict of rights. All it would have taken was one good convincing argument to flip me into the anti-choice column.

But even during the years I was an Evangelical, when I held all sorts of other crazy beliefs, I still resisted the pressure to turn "pro-life." At least, not on the political level. On things like creationism and biblical inerrancy, they made convincing arguments (which is more of a testament of how ignorant I was back then), but they couldn't convince me that the "baby's" right to life outweighed the mother's right to decide what happens with her own body. All they had was emotionalism and the Bible (and despite being an Evangelical, I still believed in freedom of religion).

Reading Thomson solidified my pro-choice position, mainly by resolving what I felt was a genuine conflict of rights. But it wasn't just reading Thomson. If that were the case, I could be accused of confirmation bias. What I also did was see if there were any convincing objections to Thomson's argument. If there were, most likely it would have only had the effect of continuing to recognize a genuine conflict of rights with the benefit of the doubt going to the mother (IOW, all the counterargument would have had to do is "muddy the waters" again). Be it as it may, I found *nothing.* As far as counterarguments go, it doesn't really get any better than Beckwith. And he couldn't even make a dent in Thomson's arguments.

So, from my experience, the abortion debate has always been about whether the prenate's rights outweighed the rights of the mother. And they've always been failing in making their case.

Clearly I wasn't specific enough. What I meant was; are you saying that pro-lifers have failed to make their case to you personally, have failed to personally convince you; or do you think that pro-lifers have failed to make their case in the general arena, convincing the general public?

So the original author says,

"The child conceived in rape is worth just as much as any other, but a rape survivor is not responsible for the fact that the child is growing inside her. By definition, she did not consent to that risk. So if responsibility and consent to risks are such important factors, it should be clear how cases of rape are fundamentally different even though the child’s value is the same."

Hopefully I'm not misunderstanding them, but they seem to be putting the emphasis on the circumstances of conception, rather than the identity of the individual embryo or foetus that results from that conception – in much the same manner as we would look at an adult who was conceived in rape and not suppose that their genetics allow us to treat them any differently from anyone else.

Perhaps a further question might help me clarify your stance on abortion, although it would be most clear if you could explicitly state it yourself. If a woman has consensual sex with someone and conceives, but than later discovers that this person is a total jerk and she'd rather not have their child, is it acceptable for her to abort?

Then, without any intention of offending or minimising your opinion, my original question was not directed at you. It was directed towards those who are pro-life, but hold a rape exception. This is clearly not you, as your general belief in the acceptability of abortion does not require exceptions to be made.

"Surely rape as a violation of bodily autonomy and pregnancy as a violation of bodily autonomy are two separate issues."

Certainly there are differences. Nevertheless, the essence is still the same. Both the rapist and the unwanted fetus are using another's body for their own purposes without their consent. Other examples would include slavery, nonconsensual scientific or medical experimentation, and China's practice of executing political prisoners to harvest organs.

I actually think that in this, the devil is in the details. But it's a complex topic which I intend to explore on my blog – which I believe is a better forum than this comment thread. Keep an eye out for it, as I'm hoping to crank it and another out in my holidays.

Personhood bills keep failing. Even in Mississippi, which is an extreme pro-life state.

I think Timothy is referring to measures that are directly voted upon by the public – I imagine similar to an Australian referendum.

Okay, so I found some information on the Albuquerque one:

"According to the city clerk’s office, about 87,000 votes were cast in the election, or 25 percent of Albuquerque’s registered voters. The final tally was 55 percent of votes against and 45 percent of votes for the abortion ban."

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/20/us/albuquerque-voters-defeat-anti-abortion-referendum.html?_r=0

Two comments:

1. 45% to 55% is pretty darn close, and actually reflects fairly well the numbers in the Gallup poll.

2. 75% of voters didn't bother to show up. So there's no way of knowing which way they would have gone.

It's handy in Australia that voting is compulsary, so we get a better overview of general opinion.

The one I can find from Mississippi (http://edition.cnn.com/2011/11/09/politics/mississippi-election/ and http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mississippi-anti-abortion-personhood-amendment-fails-at-ballot-box/2011/11/09/gIQAzQl95M_story.html) was very broad, and I imagine that people may have been scared of by the possible ramifications for IVF and birth control – but it still had 41% vote yes.

Colorado and North Dakota haven't voted yet (November this year). Can you point me towards any others?

"1. 45% to 55% is pretty darn close, and actually reflects fairly well the numbers in the Gallup poll."

55% to 45% is practically a landslide in the American context. Consider that, since 1824, only thirteen presidential elections were won with 55%+ of the vote. An 8700 vote margin in an election where 87000 voted is hardly a razor thin margin.

"2. 75% of voters didn't bother to show up. So there's no way of knowing which way they would have gone."

That is actually pretty typical in American city elections. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the initiative's backers were counting on the low turnout. If so, the 55% to 45% margin just becomes all the more crushing.

"Colorado and North Dakota haven't voted yet (November this year). Can you point me towards any others?"

I can talk about two cases, one in Arizona and one in South Dakota. I was present in those states during the time. I voted in the Arizona election, but did not vote in the South Dakota election.

In 1992, for the first, and so far only time, an Arizona initiative banning abortion was placed on the ballot. It was a pretty straightforward ban, and included exceptions for rape, incest, and to save the life of the mother. In an election that saw Bush get Arizona's electoral votes and sent reelected Senator John McCain with 55% of the vote, initiative lost 69% to 31%. Since then, anti-abortion initiatives have yet to gain enough signatures to even get on the ballot.

In 2008, South Dakota had an initiative on the ballot criminalizing abortion except in cases of rape, incest, and the health of the mother. In 2006, a law passed by the legislature was overturned by voters 56% to 44%. This initiative's backers wrote their new law based on exit polls of voters, who said they wanted those exceptions. The 2008 initiative also lost 55% to 45%. (BTW, Colorado also defeated a fetal personhood law that year.)

A couple features need to be noted here. The 2008 initiative backers had the information taken from exit polls, which said that though South Dakotan voters didn't like abortion being used as "birth control," they didn't want a ban that didn't have exceptions for rape, incest, and the health of the mother. Moreover, because we're talking about exit polls, we are talking about likely voters the next time around. The new initiative was written precisely with those concerns in mind. And yet, when it came time to vote, the anti-choicers could only shift the column in their favor by only 1%.

BTW, Senator McCain won South Dakota with 53% of the vote. This means more people voted against the abortion ban than voted for the "pro-life" candidate.

So, if America had compulsory voting, would anti-abortion measures pass more often? That's hard to say. The 2008 South Dakota initiative does suggest that people will tell pollsters one thing while voting another, at least when it comes to abortion. We should also consider that the "pro-life" side very, very good at "get out the vote" efforts. When there is an anti-abortion initiative on the ballot, the anti-choicers are extremely motivated. And yet they still haven't drummed up enough voters to win their own ballot initiatives.

So, I will stand my original statements that the anti-abortion advocates have failed to make their case in the general arena.

"Which doesn't disprove that the case is being made on an individual level, or that momentum is not increasing to gamer those votes."

You were asking me if I thought "that pro-lifers have failed to make their case in the general arena, convincing the general public," remember?

"I do vaguely recall reading of one measure that didn't gain enough votes, but I can't remember any details. In order to use these as positive proof, I think you would have to examine each measure individually and the environment in which it was presented. If you have a link to information on any of them, I'd be interested to read more."

How many variations on the theme do we need to try before you stop making excuses? Abortions bans without exceptions, abortion bans with exceptions, fetal personhood have all failed. California voted down parental notification laws–three times! (Yes, it's California, but still ….) Maine voted down a "partial-birth" abortion ban in 1999. Parental notification and "partial-birth" abortion bans have about as much support in the polls as the combined two answers of "legal only in certain circumstances" and "illegal in all cases." But only two states (out of four; in both cases, the vote was carried by 55%, again far short of what the polls would lead one to believe) managed to pass a parental notification law, and none have passed a "partial-birth" abortion ban. These should be slam dunks, for Pete's sake! At least, if we listened to the polls.

Anyway, if you want to do research on how well abortion measures fare on the ballot, go to http://ballotpedia.org/Abortion_on_the_ballot#tab=By_state. I doubt the list you'll find catches everything, but it is a good place to start.

It wasn't a strawman, it was following her argument to its logical conclusion. She said the child is not just as dependent, and I showed that he/she is.

Also, I've never understood the argument that if you're dependent on one, they can kill you, but if you're dependent on many (and therefore a greater burden), we have to protect you.

Suppose you're the last person out of a public pool, or so you thought. Before you leave, you hear a splash at the far end of the pool. A toddler has fallen in and is drowning. You look around and there's no one there. The child is completely dependent on you for his/her survival. Do you have an obligation to jump in and save the child (assuming you can swim) or are you morally justified in walking away and letting the child drown because he/she is only dependent on you for his/her survival?

People give up their right to freedom by impinging on the freedoms of others.

Similarly, anyone who invades another person's body gives up their right to life (if they had such a right to begin with).

A zef is a parasite regardless of whether the woman was raped or not.

Some women choose to accommodate the parasite at the expense of her body, while others don't.

That decision should be entirely upto the woman, not to you, me, or the government.

We're not promoting human suffering. Pro-life organizations do a lot of good in helping single parents and pregnant women. That's just pro-choice propaganda. Besides, why not just round up all women and children who are suffering and kill them now? If you can't justify doing then, then you can't justify doing that when they're still in the womb. The answer is to try to end or ease their suffering, not to kill them.

I'm talking about ballot measures, not what legislatures do whether we want them to or not.

Enjoy, because I will not respond to you again. You are a pompous liar.

J Med Ethics. 1985 Dec;11(4):198-204.

The brain-life theory: towards a consistent biological definition of humanness.
Goldenring JM.
Abstract

This paper suggests that medically the term a 'human being' should be defined by the presence of an active human brain. The brain is the only unique and irreplaceable organ in the human body, as the orchestrator of all organ systems and the seat of personality. Thus, the presence or absence of brain life truly defines the presence or absence of human life in the medical sense. When viewed in this way, human life may be seen as a continuous spectrum between the onset of brain life in utero (eight weeks gestation), until the occurrence of brain death. At any point human tissue or organ systems may be present, but without the presence of a functional human brain, these do not constitute a 'human being', at least in a medical sense. The implications of this theory for various ethical concerns such as in vitro fertilisation and abortion are discussed. This theory is the most consistent possible for the definition of a human being with no contradictions inherent. However, having a good theory of definition of a 'human being' does not necessarily solve the ethical problems discussed herein.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4078859

Then you must be pretty thick, if you believe your question has not been answered. Eager to be pregnant by my husband does NOT equal eager to be pregnant by a rapist. The genetic identity of the fetus IS a sufficient reason to abort.

Um, NO. What requires a rape exemption to be made is the fact that the RAPE survivor might not want to carry the pregnancy resulting from rape to term. I am pro-choice in all circumstances. I personally (as myself) would only choose abortion in certain narrow circumstances, and rape is one of them. It doesn't matter what I think about anyone else's pregnancy. If the woman pregnant from rape chooses to gestate, fine. If she chooses not to gestate, fine again. Pro tip: It doesn't matter what YOU think either, nor does it matter what anyone else on this forum thinks. The only person's opinion that matters is the person who is pregnant.

Simply because there is an umbilical cord present doesn't mean it's being used, myintx. For your scenario to be valid, the cord would have to be in use, and it NEVER IS …immediately upon birth. That's why the first thing done is to clamp the cord and cut it. At the moment of birth, the cord becomes dead tissue.

If you kill someone, yes you are required to come forward. Killing someone is generally a crime, with certain exceptions (one of them being self-defense, as you mentioned). However, here is where your argument falls apart. Being raped is NEVER a crime. The rape victim has nothing to prove, and wouldn't be under any scrutiny for having been raped. Just as the victim of a mugging or armed robbery, she hasn't done anything wrong. She may decide to seek treatment on her own, and not to report the crime. She may be unable to report the crime if she is young and the rapist is a family member. HOWEVER, rape and pregnancy from rape do not occur simultaneously. She won't know until much later. That doesn't negate her right to treatment for an injury that wasn't found until weeks, maybe months after the assault. You're attempting to conflate victim and perpetrator here, and it just doesn't work.

Not 'the moment' of exiting the womb…. http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/should-doctors-wait-a-little-longer-to-cut-umbilical-cords-19310867/?no-ist

So, if the baby is still utilizing the woman's resources, can she kill it?

The "child" conceived in rape is not "dying for his father's crime." He is being aborted because the mother doesn't want to be pregnant with him. She is not obligated to do that.

"And, by waiting a few minutes the baby gets more blood!" Big hairy deal. The blood in the cord is the baby's blood, not the mother's blood. And if you actually read the article, that extra blood is not always a good thing. The extra blood also results in hemolysis and jaundice. The supposed "benefit" is higher levels of iron. As I have said (THREE TIMES SO FAR) at the moment of birth, the baby is no longer using the mother's resources. It begins to breathe and the placenta begins to die. The medical community may some day realize enough of a benefit to wait several minutes before cutting the umbilical cord. Thus far they have not. And it STILL doesn't imply that the neonate is still using the mother's resources. At the moment of birth (YES, the moment of birth) the neonate is using it's OWN resources. Here's the proof. Some parents choose to extract the cord blood and preserve it for possible future use by the baby. NOT BY THE PARENT. The blood in the cord at birth is the baby's blood. It is in no way a part of the mother.

total b s… if the doctor is doing a c-section, when he has made the final incision and is reaching for the baby, the cord is still working. and you know it.

If the chord is still attached he or she could still be getting resources from her… can a woman have the baby killed in either case – a c-section where the doctor hasn't yet pulled the baby out? or he is pulling the baby out and the chord is still pulsing?

Eh well, Myintx also made the argument that the pregnant woman voluntarily *gives* her bodies nutrients to the prenate. Yes, she gives it away! In fact, the woman FORCES implantation on the poor innocent blastocyst that is just wandering by, kind of like the magical toddler.

Uh, I thought you knew…LB approves of killing all life on earth because she is actually HItler.

Fuck me but you're ridiculous.

You win a toddler for dinner. Actual dinner. It will attach itself to your leg momentarily.

Anyone who approves of a full term unborn child dying in his or her mother's womb because the woman refuses a life-saving c-section for the unborn child is pretty close to Hitler. Don't you agree?

Let's do a deal. I won't use the term 'pro-aborts' and you don't use the word 'anti-choicers'.

Thank you for the informative post. I think we can both agree (not that I was ever denying this) that the pro-life movement in the USA is not yet strong enough to result in a majority of public votes on legislative measures. Though I pointed out in another post that the non-compulsory nature of American voting means that these results have the credibility of a survey with an extremely strong selection bias, and a far bigger difference in results would be needed to assert that one view or the other predominates. And I would hold to that even if it was 55-45 in favour of the pro-life side.

I think the difference in the way we're seeing things it saying 'anti-abortion advocates have failed to make their case' comes across as very final – as if the chance to make the case has come and gone. Whereas it is instead an ongoing issue.

So if we said that we'll measure that truth of that statement by considering the majority viewpoint, as expressed through polls and public votes, then pro-lifers are failing to make their case.

But if we said (along the lines of what I was originally thinking) that we'll measure the truth of that statement by considering how viewpoints have changed over time (which I feel is better reflective of people changing their minds over abortion, i.e. having the case made to them), then pro-lifers are indeed succeeding in making their case, even if not yet to a majority of people.

In other words, 'failing' or 'succeeding' as an ongoing process should be considered in terms of change over time – because it has to start somewhere. If polls suddenly showed a shift in viewpoint to, say, 30% pro-life and 70% pro-choice, then I would definitely agree that the pro-life movement is failing.

I'll have to leave it there – study calls.

48% consider themselves pro-life, compared to 45% pro-choice.

The problem with this of course, is that someone can consider themselves pro-life and still choose NOT to oppose abortion when it comes to lawmaking.

Pro-life for themselves, pro-choice for others.

Also, people tend to be dishonest.

http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/anti-tales.html

Depends, if you are then going to use that situation to kill another moral person many would say yes.

I've read that piece before. It makes me angry and sad.

Agreed that someone can consider themselves pro-life and still not support anti-abortion legislation. It's far from a simple viewpoint.

Exactly. Matters of "legislating morality" is actually twofold question: Is it immoral? and Should it be illegal? The answer to one question does not necessarily follow from the other. That may also explain the discrepancies between poll answers and voting patterns, especially on the issue of abortion.

Should abortion be illegal with a prison sentence for any woman who aborts? Say life in prison for murder?

So if a woman hires a hitman to kill her toddler, he should go to jail, but she should not, because its a complex issue?

So? Ignorance and social norms are not a defense.

In some societies genocide is perfectly acceptable. As is child rape. I guess these people can't be prosecuted for their crimes because their genocidal actions etc are not considered immoral in their society?

Well of course I was talking about *after* abortion is illegal. It would make sense that it should be considered a capital crime, especially if embryos have the same moral worth as all born persons.

And I will check out that article once I have time.

It isn't so much "killing" a person as it is refusing to gestate. YOU are a 'moral person.' If your mother chose to breathe for you for 40 weeks, you may consider that a gift that you accepted. You may NOT consider it a "duty" that you were "owed."

Okay. Caveats duly noted. But surely you have some ideal sentence. Would it be closer to involuntary manslaughter or capital murder?

With the caveats in place, I imagine that the gradual process of increasing severity in penalties would eventually culminate in a murder charge. What type of murder charge, I don't know – because I'm not that familiar with the current law and distinctions on murder charges. But in essence, it would be treated no differently than we currently treat the murder of a born person, i.e. extenuating circumstances, intent, forseeability etc. would be brought into play when deciding on the appropriate charge.

And I say all this with another caveat – for the time being I am content to work on education, public awareness and incremental legislative change regarding abortion. The need for murder charges is very very far away, if it ever does eventuate.

Curious – assuming you regarded abortion the same way I do, what would your answer be?

Effective in doing what? How many women were getting nontherapeutic abortions twenty-eight weeks and after before it was criminalized? What kind of legal and practical hurdles does a woman have to jump through to get an abortion before the twenty-eight week mark?

When I say that criminalizing abortion will not work, I am working with data that shows that it doesn't. See http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/rate-of-abortion-is-highest-in-countries-where-practice-is-banned-6292070.html. And mind you, in some of those countries, abortion is treated as a murder charge. I think dudebro will have a link handy for you in that regard.

I had to look up what a Zion society is, and I'm still not really sure exactly what you mean by it. Is what you're getting at is that it would be appropriate to criminalise abortion only when there is no perceived need for abortion?

Your link's author says, "Dr Sedgh said there was a link between higher abortion rates and regions with more restrictive legislation, such as in Latin America and Africa." Perhaps she wanted to give readers the IMPRESSION that Sedgh had demonstrated a causal link, "more restrictive legislation causes higher abortion rates," but she knew better than to actually SAY something she could not back up. She said there was a link between rates and REGIONS, not rates and LEGISLATION.

So now it starts to become clear how the counterintuitive idea "where there is more restrictive legislation, there are higher abortion rates" might possibly be valid. As the author said at the outset, "good access to birth control in those countries [which happen to be countries with more liberal abortion laws] resulted in fewer unwanted pregnancies" (hence, naturally, fewer abortions). What countries need is not liberal laws, but good birth control. Common sense would dictate that the lowest abortion rates would be achieved by combining good birth control with restrictive laws.

Whatever your link's author wished people to think, Dr. Sedgh's study itself did not even attempt to examine causality between legislation and abortion rates. If you're interested, I could provide links to an Ireland study, a Chile study and a US study that did attempt to do that and all concluded, to differing degrees, that anti-abortion legislation is, as Elizabeth Doecke originally said, effective. Here —

http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/a_ground_breaking_abortion_study_from_chile

— the main author of the Chile study said in an interview:

"Third, from the perspective of protecting human life from the very beginning, obviously, abortion restriction saves many lives, in contrast to countries where elective — on demand — abortion is allowed, because in these countries all the unborn [involved in abortions] lose their lives."

I've come across that Lancet article before:

http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(11)61786-8/abstract

Problems with their methodology are discussed here:

http://c-fam.org/docLib/20090514_Removing_the_Roadblocksfinal.pdf

and here:

http://www.nrlc.org/archive/news/2003/NRL02/laura.html

(The second one is only Part 1 of 7, but the rest are easily discovered through a search engine).

And perhaps most tellingly, here, where pre-legalisation estimates and post-legalisation data for Mexico is compared:

http://femecog.org.mx/docs/IJWH.pdf

Some of the salient points:

– The study conflated 'illegal' with 'unsafe' rather than using a medical definition.

– The study methods allowed room for erroneous inclusion of spontaneous miscarriages and ectopic pregnancies.

– The estimates gained were further adjusted according to the researchers expectations, which may have lacked reasonable validation.

It's actually very easy to get an abortion prior to 28 weeks here, as personal communication with doctors has shown me. If someone was being charged or prosecuted for getting an abortion, it would make national news (as it has done before). The lack of any such event suggests that it does not happen – hence my comment about it being effective.

"Irish women have their abortions in England."

The study took that factor into account and nevertheless came to its conclusions about effectiveness. In other words, the study concluded that some women do, but some don't.

Some women are too poor to travel. The criminalization of abortion only hurts the poor. Women of means can *always* travel.

Should women who can afford to travel to procure an abortion be prevented from traveling during their fertile years should they attempt to seek an abortion out of country?

Now you have introduced a new topic: when an abortion-minded woman is denied an abortion, what happens?

First of all, of course, the child lives.

Regarding what happens to the woman, your assumption that if she is temporarily frustrated in her design she is necessarily "hurt," seems like a huge leap. A more scientific approach was taken in a study called the "Turnaway Study," described here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/16/magazine/study-women-denied-abortions.html

The study found that such women suffer somewhat economically. But in overall terms, only 5% of such women end up wishing they had gone through with the abortion.

Perhaps the 95% eventually realize that money would not have compensated them for what would have been lost.

The article focuses on a woman named S. "S. now says that [the baby she had wanted to kill] is the best thing that ever happened to her. 'She is more than my best friend, more than the love of my life,' S. told me, glowingly. . . . 'She is just my whole world.'”

It might help to look at it this way. MIscarriage is the natural death of the prenate. People die natural deaths all the time. Sometimes natural deaths have to be examined in case they were actually caused by something unnatural, e.g. murder, accidental poisoning, trauma. Sometimes, this does very unfortunately have the result that people are accused, charged, prosecuted and even jailed for crimes that they did not commit. However, it's not reasonable to suggest that we treat murder any differently because of the possibility that innocent people might be wrongly accused.