Gisella Perl
Earlier this month we received an email from a supporter named Sarah, who wrote in with a suggestion for a blog topic:
I don’t know if anyone’s done a piece on Gisella Perl, but I find her to be fascinating. She was a Jewish gynecologist forced to work as a doctor in Auschwitz, and one of her tasks was to report every pregnant woman in Auschwitz to Josef Mengele. Of course, we know that Mengele would use pregnant women for vivisections before killing them and disposing of them because he had a particular fascination with experimenting on pregnant females (as well as twins, people with physical abnormalities, dwarves, etc). Gisella Perl revealed that she would secretly perform abortions on Jewish women in Auschwitz in order to protect them from torture by human experimentation.
My first, immediate thought was: “Yes– this is protecting someone from cruel and unusual (as well as unwarranted) punishment, and she saved so many lives by doing so. The tragedy lies not in the fact that there were abortions necessarily (though that is a tragedy!), but in that hiding pregnancies by destroying the fetus was the only way for these women to escape vivisection and experimentation.”
I felt pretty okay about this until someone commented on the post where I learned about Gisella Perl: “I want to nail this to the forehead of every anti-abortionist who uses the word ‘Holocaust’ when talking about legal abortions.” It really got me thinking about language and Gisella Perl.
I’m in complete agreement with Sarah that Gisella Perl’s actions were not immoral. The circumstances of the Holocaust were so unimaginably twisted, and its victims’ options were so limited, that the normal framework of rights and responsibilities is utterly useless here. Survival comes first. I would go so far as to say that Gisella Perl didn’t kill those children; Mengele did.
I’m also baffled by the abortion supporter’s comment. How, exactly, does this horrible story advance the cause of “choice,” when there was no real choice to speak of, no possibility that the babies would live?
Mengele’s torture didn’t end with pregnant mothers. He also had a sick fascination with twins and performed horrific, painful, lethal experiments on them. If Mengele were about to go after a pair of school-aged twins, would it be wrong to kill the twins quickly and painlessly? That’s not an easy question.* But I know one thing for sure: the answer wouldn’t tell us a damn thing about the morality of killing twins in general.
Pro-lifers are fond of pointing out that after World War II, Joseph Mengele became an abortionist. But so did Holocaust survivor Henry Morgantaler, best known for eliminating all abortion laws in Canada. I posit that, again, this tells us next to nothing.
Ultimately, Gisella Perl’s story is worth learning about in its own right, rather than because it teaches us some great lesson about abortion (which it doesn’t). We should learn as much as we can about the Holocaust in order to honor the memories of those who perished, and for no other reason; certainly not to gain political points.
The Holocaust is sui generis. Whether you are pro-life or pro-choice, the only appropriate reaction is horror.
*I’m inclined to say no, it wouldn’t be wrong.
Thanks for telling me about her; I'll have to do some more research.
Does abortion count as a holocaust? As genocide? Or is it just hyperbolic rhetoric?
Mengele, like Hitler and many other Nazis, was an ardent occultist. Therein lies the origin of their horrific behavior against other human beings.
Arguably this would fall under "the life of the mother" situation in a more twisted regard (that is, rather than be medically at risk because of her own health, there is a sick man ready to torture and then kill them because of the pregnancy). The Holocaust was a horrific event, one that put people at the extreme, forcing people to answer moral questions they never should have had to do. There aren't enough words for "horror" in the thesaurus to cover what was done 🙁
"Arguably this would fall under "the life of the mother" situation"
I'm inclined to agree. Given that (virtually) no pro-lifers oppose the life of the mother exception, I'm amazed how many times I've seen her promoted as a "pro-choice hero" or some such thing. I mean, if both sides would support abortion in such a case, why would anyone associate her with one side or the other?
But pro lifers say that life of the mother can ONLY be justified if the woman's life is under imminent danger. Clearly, these women were not mere minutes from death, therefore, the abortions were unjust, by pro life logic.
The Catholic church in Yugoslavia cheered the genocide of Jews, and one Bishop even said that cleansing the world of Jews was godly.
A measured and humane exploration of an impossible conundrum, well argued.
Actually, I would think rather than imminent danger, the adjective best used would be "certain" or "inevitable," which would make such abortions just in the eyes of (most) pro lifers.
Maybe not! There could be a miracle! Why kill an innocent unborn baby if there is even the slightest chance that it could live?
Comparing abortion with the holocaust would require so much spinning the earth would fall off its axis. Besides, legal, safe abortions cut down on infanticide in the modern world.
The poster's comment of nailing to the forhead is dumb, but comparing abortion to the holocaust is also dumb.
Yeah, they claim that abortion = holocaust because women are genocidal maniacs who seek to kill embryos for their own selfish benefit.
I'd liken this with the thought experiment where you're hiding from the Nazis with a group of people and the youngest member of the group (an infant) starts crying. If the crying is not stopped, everyone (including the infant) will be found and killed. The only way to stop the crying is to kill the infant.
If we accept that infanticide is acceptable in this case, it doesn't follow that it's not seriously wrong in other cases. The same goes with abortion and Gisella Perl.
Isn't that an example of 'utilitarianisim' though? Pro-lifers say that utilitarianism is immoral, at least when it comes to human lives. That is my understanding, at any rate.
You're correct. All pro-lifers have exactly the same views, and none of them think the utilitarian course of action is ever the right way to go.
The majority reject utilitarianism, at least when it comes to a womans right to self determination.
I wouldn't be so sure about that. Last I checked, it's the utilitarian philosophers who tend to argue that unhooking yourself from the violinist is impermissible (thus eliminating one of the main objections to the pro-life position).
Isn't Peter Singer a proponent of utilitarianism?
Practically no prolifers support "life of the mother" exemption in practice, as you can find out by presenting prolifers with specific real life instances where a girl or a woman needed an abortion to stay alive.
Yes. He defends abortion because he argues that fetuses and infants aren't persons. He rejects bodily autonomy arguments on the grounds that it would be wrong to unhook yourself from the violinist.
I'd wager that most pro-lifers would agree with Peter Singer on at least one issue, so I'm not sure what your point is.
Really? Interesting. And most pro lifers argue against forced organ donation. The violinist can die because he is "diseased" and organ donation is "unnatural."
Perl did her part to help the Nazi cause. I cannot see how anyone could find her actions heroic.
If war could end tomorrow, her rationalization for murdering the child would be nothing else. (So much for someone's "thought experiment".)
This story (and from what I read we only have her own testimony on this) gives us insight into the twisted way the pro-abortion crowd thinks. They consider themselves Perl and us Nazis.
One thing I haven't seen referenced here is the fact that Mengele not only tortured the pregnant women, he did the same to the babies being carried by these women. Ms. Perl's actions may have saved the pregnant women, but she may also have saved the babies from a more tortuous death, at least I hope. I am as pro life as it gets, but the horrors of the Holocaust make you reassess everything.
So you consider Perl to be a Nazi?
I think you identify a very important point when you say that Gisella Perl's story–and, by extension, all the stories to come out of the Holocaust or similar atrocities–are worth learning in their own right rather than because they prove something for one side or the other in the abortion debate. Indeed, I wonder whether we need to take that same point a step further: would it be fair to say that the whole horrifying history of eugenics, "scientific" racism, and social Darwinism and how it led, in some cases, to promoting abortion is worth learning about in its own right rather than because it teaches any lessons about abortion? I ask this question simply because I am uneasy about how the ties between abortion and eugenics are often brought up by pro-lifers as if these ties somehow prove abortion is wrong. I do not think this is a sound argument–politicizing eugenics is just as problematic as the politicizing of the Holocaust you discuss in this post. Pro-lifers can do better.
This is important. The history of abortion, while far older than eugenics, has nothing to do with whether abortion is right or wrong. Scientific ideas, tools and procedures can be used for honorable or nefarious ends. As an extreme example, the scalpel was probably used by Josef Mengele. Doesn't mean the use of scalpels are wrong.
Abortion is NEVER safe for the unborn child.
And yes, a comparison can be made between abortion and the holocaust.
Many pro-aborts call unborn children 'parasites' in a lame attempt to justify killing them. Hitler called Jews 'parasites' for the same reason. Hitler killed millions of innocent human beings. Abortionists kill millions of human beings that have done nothing wrong either. And, NO, I'm not demeaning Jews in any way with my comments. All innocent human life is valuable – born and unborn.
You make a good point. Someone's motives for acting in a particular way do not necessarily tell us anything about the ethical status of the action.
Hi myintx
I know you are convinced what you say is true, but all your posts say roughly the same thing over and over again. Most reasonable people will say that the Holocaust was wrong (deniers will just deny it happened), most people will say slavery is wrong, most people will say the Jim Crow laws were wrong.
The fact that lots of people in the world today don't find abortion wrong should tell you the issue is more than black and white, and that there are reasonable people who have come to this conclusion through weighing various pros and cons of outlawing abortion and considering a fetus a full-fledged person. I predict a rebuttal like "a lot of good people were in favor of slavery". Sure, but I think society has matured in its evaluation of moral issues where we have a solid conception of what human rights are, and have come to value equality and fairness as a social good. Add to this the data showing that legalized abortion in many modern nations actually leads to a decrease in abortion rates should tell you that perhaps dogmatic repetition of your central point is going to fall on deaf ears.
I'm honestly curious, do you feel that repeating something over and over will lull your audience into agreement?
On a slightly peripheral subject, I'm one of those very rare women with an INTP personality (on the Briggs Meyer personality test). There was a thread on a different INTP message board once discussing whether there were any real or fictional criminals or villians who could plausibly have had an INTP personality. Being an INTP has a lot of problems, but to a large extent, it's pretty hard to be EVIL when you are an INTP. Usually, INTP's are highly moral, although their system of morality is often very eccentric and doesn't comply with that of society. At worst, INTP's are amoral. They also aren't interested in power, or very effective at using power. The ideal life situation for an INTP is to find a leader who agrees with their ideas and will direct other people to carry them out, leaving the INTP free to think of more ideas.
Anyway, there is ONE very likely candidate for an *EVIL* INTP person, and that's Dr. Joseph Mengele. He was actually in a very bad version of the 'ideal situation for an INTP' that I described above, in that he got Hitler to agree with his 'ideas' (such as they were), so that Hitler directed other people to help Mengele carry them out. The general agreement on the INTP message board with this discussion is that Mengele was probably amoral in character but *evil* in action, he got some very bad ideas and unfortunately the means to act on them, and was so interested in his own (bad) ideas that he didn't really pay any attention to the rights of the people he was vivisecting to carry out his ideas on.
Yes myintx,
You are right that abortion is never safe for the unborn child. Thanks for the reminder.
In this sad case, if I understand the accounts of it correctly, the babies were going to die either way: through abortion or vivisection. The difference was that women might escape Mengele's cruel experiments if they were not pregnant.
There is much room in this situation for the babies who were untimely ripped from their mother's wombs. There is also much room for compassion for the mothers, simply for having been in that desperate situation with all its attendant atrocities.
Because they deem other human beings as inconvenient or unwanted?
Nope.
**If we accept that infanticide is acceptable in this case, it doesn't follow that it's not seriously wrong in other cases. **
And you can show me pictures of abortions in which there is a dead *infant*? Or is it really a dead *embryo* and you are just calling it an *infant* to get sad feelies?
So… if they are not parasites, then you'd be fine with cutting off the blood supply to the uterus.
**All innocent human life is valuable – born and unborn.**
Sorry, no, you don't get to make that statement, since you've yet to provide *any* valid reason why 'human' life is more valuable than cattle or fish life.
Since you are desperately avoiding giving a valid reason why any human beings, anywhere, have any value, I see no reason why they shouldn't be killed, if they are inconvenient or unwanted. If you want to argue that they shouldn't be killed, give me something that distinguishes 'humans' from cattle and fish. And don't babble about 'potential', because then you'll just start handwaving that you get to determine when 'potential' counts. Given a billion years of evolution, a bacteria is a 'potential human being'. Going to stop breathing, because it kills bacteria?
Cutting off the blood supply to the uterus would likely harm the woman whose uterus was involved.
If I remember my biology correctly, a parasite is of a different species than its host. Human embryos and fetuses are just that: human–the same species of the woman to whom they are connected.
Lastly, myintx is free to say whatever he wants. He doesn't have to run it by you before he writes it. Also, your use of single quotation marks around "human." Why did you put the word in quotes? Do you really think the embryo or fetus is not human? If it is not human, then what is it? Cattle? Fish?
I don't think you would make your claims about cattle, fish, and bacteria in court if you were on trial for homicide. You may have some misanthropic idea that humans have no value; thankfully, the law sees the situation very differently.
Well, the Nazis were prolife: so prolife that a woman who obtained an abortion was subject to the death penalty.
Cutting off the blood supply to the uterus is the same as turning off someone's life support that still has a chance- it is KILLING them, so it's not OK.
You obviously think a born human is more valuable than cattle, right? Or are you for someone killing their newborn?
Hitler didn't want Jews around… Most women who have abortions don't want their unborn child around… yep
Many women do. Ask someone45.
Nope.
Nope…
They do want their unborn child around? oh……
yep.
Are you not able to see the shades of grey?
You think that fetuses have a right to life, and that this right to life trumps all other considerations, and that a woman must give birth regardless of whether she wants to or not. I think that is a valid standard to hold yourself up to, but its ridiculous to impose this on anybody else.
First of all, our society DOES put a value on life, and that value is not infinite. If it were infinite, we would be building all passenger cars up to the standard of Formula 1 cars with carbon fiber safety tubs, regardless of whether that would drive up costs of a Ford Focus to $5 million. We would also be outlawing trucks with bumper heights at head level of normal sedans, as they would obliterate passengers in those small cars in an accident. But we don't, because there are tradeoffs, and society deems affordability in cars, and personal freedom to drive what you want more important than saving every last life in a potential car crash.
Why aren't you incensed at this blatant carnage, the Holocaust on American highways? Some people are upset by this carnage, and there are people protesting highway speed limits being too high and lax safety standards. In fact, I am highly against trucks that are riding way too high, and want to see them outlawed, as I find those trucks pointless and just wasting fuel and putting everyone in danger because the driver is compensating for a tiny penis.
In the same way, no one doubts that fetuses are killed in an abortion. If you are willing to accept that social policies are compromises, I think your message should reflect the fact that abortion is just one of those compromises. Many people feel that there is no practical or realistic harm in killing fetuses with no sensory processing abilities, no fear and no hopes, and has never had them. Many people would put the economic realities of the woman ahead of the "right to life" of that fetus, and feel it is better for her to be able to time her pregnancy to when she is good and ready to have one.
Blatantly stating a fetus is killed will get you no sympathy from people who consider multiple facets of an issue. You will only sound dogmatic and crazy if you are not capable of accepting the tradeoffs most people consider in this debate.
Myintx would force her 9yo daughter to give birth (if raped) even if it permanently disabled the girl. Watch, she won't deny it. (Yes, she has a kid, but the kid is no longer 9. The point still stands though).
If anybody is remotely like Mengele or Hitler, it is people for whom dogma is most important. One issue is SO important that everything else is of no import. Mengele was SO into his weird theories and proving them, that he was willing to do any experiment regardless of the resultant human suffering.
The problem is that life is full of unexpected surprises and non-idealities. Most issues don't have a one-size-fits-all solution. For me, there are cases when I believe the life of the fetus IS more important the non-life threatening wants of the mother (late-term abortion), but otherwise, I believe that the living, sentient mother's will trumps that of the non-sensory fetus. I think this debate would be far more productive if we could delve into the nature of the compromises made, and when we should prioritize the fetus or the woman, and why.
Yes, and it is something that must be taken very seriously, because forced gestation and birth violates the basic rights of women, and treats them unequally before the law.
And if the value of human life is absolute, as myintx claims, and every embryo is entitled to a future, then why can't the same be done for dying 5 year olds? Giving up your bone marrow, a pint of blood, even a kidney, is a small price to pay so that someone may live, no?
From a biologist:
There is intraspecific and interspecific parasitism. It is not necessary that the host and parasite be separate species, but this is usually the concept of parasitism most people are familiar with and the kind gone over in public school. I know they don't go over that in the high school science curricula, but in college zoology courses we learn all the different types of parasitism, symbiosis, mutualism, and differing theories regarding nomenclature. Remember, your high school science books is aimed at teenager, so they only learn the basic, broad, concepts.
Mammalia n pregnancy is absolutely an example of intraspecific parasitism. Other examples include anglerfish, in which the male becomes a parasite that lives on the female, and intraspecific brood parasitism that you see in ostriches.
There is also fetus in fetu, aka parasitic twin, that is a very interesting anomaly that can occur in humans (and likely other animals as well). One sibling absorbs the other in utero, and the absorbed fetus parasitizes the other one. The parasite fetus often has to be removed later on lest the host sibling dies from lack of nutrition.
What is the source of this information?
I find the arguments presented on the following pages to be far more persuasive than your un-cited claims from a supposed "biologist":
http://l4l.org/library/notparas.html
http://bioethicstoday.wordpress.com/2013/02/26/the-fetus-is-not-a-parasite-debunking-an-ethical-fallacy/
http://shardoins.blogspot.com/2009/06/is-fetus-parasite.html
The zygote actually overpowers the woman's immune system in the same way a parasite does. Isn't that interesting!?
Here are some scientific findings:
Further investigation revealed that placental NKB contained the molecule phosphocholine, which is used by the parasitic nematode worm to avoid attack by the immune system of the host in which it lives.
During implantation, fetally derived cells (trophoblast) invade the maternal endometrium and remodel the endometrial spiral arteries into low-resistance vessels that are unable to constrict. This invasion has three consequences. First, the fetus gains direct access to its mother's arterial blood. Therefore, a mother cannot reduce the nutrient content of blood reaching the placenta without reducing the nutrient supply to
her own tissues. Second, the volume of blood reaching the placenta becomes largely independent of control by the local maternal vasculature. Third, the placenta is able to release hormones and other substances directly into the maternal circulation. Placental hormones, including human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) and human placental
lactogen (hPL), are predicted to manipulate maternal physiology for fetal benefit.
The host-parasite relationship during pregnancy is a fascinating interaction and research in this area will improve understanding of disease pathogenesis and the various consequences of the host immune response, being host-protective, parasite protective and contributing to disease pathology. Pregnancy poses an interesting problem for the immune system of the dam as she is essentially carrying a semi-allogeneic tissue graft (the foetus) without immunological rejection taking place.
Another role for foetal transferrin receptors on trophoblasts could be to bind maternal transferrin at the materno-foetal interface, thus frustrating maternal immunosurveillance. This is similar to a mechahism used by schistosomes in the host-parasite relation where host proteins are bound by the parasite to escape immunological recognition.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7081298.stm
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8115596?dopt=Citation
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17958926
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37515
1. **Cutting off the blood supply to the uterus would likely harm the woman whose uterus was involved.** Irrelevent, and you're avoiding the issue. If the fetus isn't a parasite, it doesn't need the mother's blood supply.
2.**If I remember my biology correctly, a parasite is of a different species than its host.** Google 'parasitical male'. Then get your money back from whatever school you learned biology from.
**Lastly, myintx is free to say whatever he wants. He doesn't have to run it by you before he writes it.**
So, you're claiming that myintx is allowed to tell lies, and no-one should call widdle bitsy her out on it? Because why? Being a rapist and extortionist makes her some sort of special snowflake?
**Why did you put the word in quotes?** Google 'equivocation fallacy'. The forced gestationers want to take the rights that are granted to 'humans' under one definition of that word, then sneakily switch to a *different* definition of the word 'human' in order to sneak the zef in as 'human' under the SECOND definition of that word, and claim that this therefore entitles the zef to the rights granted under the FIRST definition of that word.
**Do you really think the embryo or fetus is not human? If it is not human, then what is it? Cattle? Fish?** It really doesn't matter, does it, since the forced gestationers refuse to explain why 'humans' should have rights, but cattle and fish should not.
The fact that you find those arguments to be 'far more persuasive' is not evidence that they are correct. It only proves that you prefer to believe them. Given that you feel that people should be allowed to tell lies and not get called on it, your estimation of such things is highly questionable, at best.
**You may have some misanthropic idea that humans have no value;** No, as a matter of fact, I do NOT have that idea, and you are playing the deliberately obtuse game in order to avoid the issue.
This issue is this (and no doubt you will handwave, in order to avoid it again like all forced gestationers):
The definition of 'human' as given by forced gestationers does not contain any valid reasons for granting 'humans' rights that are better or different from rights given to cattle, fish, or bacteria. The forced gestationers use this very broad and very low definition of 'human' in order to sneak the zef in as a 'human'. Strictly speaking, they can validly do that.
What they CAN'T do, and are desperately trying to do – without saying that they are doing it, is sneaking the zef in as a 'human' under a definition of the word 'human' that does not justify any rights, but THEN trying to give the zef rights under a DIFFERENT definition of the word 'human' which the zef would not qualify for.
This is what is known as an 'equivocation fallacy'. I'm not going to fall for it, no matter how much you insult me, so grow up and deal with it.
I don't want the dust under my bed around. Is there a point to your post, or is it just your usual sad feelies?
Care to explain why your attempted extortion of babydaddy wasn't 'selfish', myintx? Why are you the only one who is a special snowflake, and gets to be 'selfish'?
*Abortion is NEVER safe for the unborn child.*
Eating hamburgers is never safe for the cow. Is there a point to your post? If so, tell me why 'humans' should have more rights than cattle. I notice you are desperately avoiding doing that, because any definition of the word 'human' that would justify more rights than animals have, would sadly exclude the brainless zef.
**Cutting off the blood supply to the uterus is the same as turning off someone's life support that still has a chance- it is KILLING them, so it's not OK.**
So is not donating all your money to buy food for a starving child that still has a 'chance'. So is not allowing homeless people into your house so they don't freeze to death. So is not wanting to donate a kidney to dialysis patients.
Why do you get to decide what possessions and body parts which people should have to give up, and which 'needs' and 'very lives' magically create a 'right' to other people's bodies and money?
It's your side that uses 'sad feelies' as an excuse to kill. A woman might feel (cue drama) 'enslaved' by a pregnancy. That's a good excuse to seek mental help, but a horrible excuse to kill a human being that has done nothing wrong.
If you cannot see the difference between dust under your bed and a human being, you're just making your cause look even worse than it is.
"shades of grey". I'm sure many people would be more sympathetic towards women having abortions if we heard about hundreds of thousands of women being turned away from adoption agencies or pregnancy resource centers because those places were too busy to help. But the fact is that many women don't even TRY to get help. They are either like some of the women on this forum who have said they would go straight to the clinic at the first sign of pregnancy or they are fooled by pro-aborts into thinking they are just getting rid of a clump of cells or that their convenience is more important that 'clump of cells'. And, no, your side has not admitted that abortion kills anything. They use words like 'terminate' or compare it to organ donation.
"tradeoff" – no human being that has done nothing wrong should be killed to make someone elses life more convenient.You wouldn't justify killing a newborn using your lame formula 1 analogy. Can't be used to justify killing an unborn child either. Yes, it's sad when someone dies in a car accident – it does NOT justify killing a child – born or unborn – just because someone doesn't want to take care of him or her.
Are you ranting because of your mental disorder? I'm trying to have sympathy for you…
So we should be able to kill any human being that isn't smarter than a cow?
Hi OrdinaryGuy1
You're arguing over the definition of a "parasite". A biological arrangement where 1 organism is taking nutrients is generally considered parasitic, and just by that definition, a fetus is a parasite. Not all parasites are necessarily harmful, as some organisms form symbiotic relationships with its host. E. coli in your gut is such an example. Without this parasite in your gut, you will die. We need their ability
As for the 3rd link, um this guy is a young earth creationist. While some highly reputable scientists sometimes espouse crazy ideas unrelated to their field, ie. Linus Pauling and his vitamin C crusade, this guy writing this blog is not a respected scientist in the first place, and is merely someone espousing a crazy idea.
Here are some of his writings
——–
"What over population problem"
"Theistic Evolution"
Ultimately, the Christian must understand that our walk is one of faith. We must believe in order to be saved.
——–
Basically, he is saying screw the evidence. In the end, it is faith. He believes what he wants to believe.
So basically, the guy in the 3rd link is an idiot. A raving lunatic. I would take anything he says with a very tiny grain of salt. As for the other 2 links, they're just opinion pieces from nobodies.
The law should get to decide Ann. The law gets to decide after viability. The law should get to decide before viability (based on what the people of the state want).
Also, your links already assume that parasites are necessarily harmful. My previous E. coli in the gut is an example counter to this. Here is another fascinating example of what scientists consider a parasite.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cymothoa_exigua
A crustacean that functionally replaces the tongue in fish, but does not otherwise seem to harm the fish whatsoever.
And as night porter says, the intraspecific parasitism of the angler fish is a well known example. Parasites do not have to be of a different species.
I'm not an embryologist, and what we're arguing about is a definition, a classification, but it would seem that a fetus actually does fit the definition of a parasite. Notice that this word alone doesn't say whether a fetus is harmful to the host or not – there are parasites that aren't harmful to the host, and in some instances can be vital to the survival of the host.
Is she not the one who also said that whenever she delivered a baby after the war she told God that he owed her for all the babies she had to kill during the war? I've always found her story to be so sad.
Of course, I can't even go to see an X-Men movie (X-Men: First Class in specific) without crying my eyes outs out over Nazi atrocities, so what do I know?
**It's your side that uses 'sad feelies' as an excuse to kill.**
Sorry, no. Unless you first explain why human beings should have a 'right to life' while cattle should not, and why the zef should have special rights to do things that other humans don't, 'killing' it is not immoral. And, as I've told you before, you've overused the word 'killing' to the point of making it meaningless.
**If you cannot see the difference between dust under your bed and a human being, you're just making your cause look even worse than it is.**
In other words, you're playing the usual forced gestationer game of insulting me and pretending to be obtuse in order to avoid having to answer my actual point, which is that you are trying to pretend that since most abortions are, in fact, performed because the embryo is 'unwanted', the term 'unwanted' always means merely that it is *slightly* inconvenient, like the dust under my bed, and never that it is 'unwanted' in a more disastrous sense, the way being tortured is 'unwanted'.
Do you honestly think anyone with an IQ over 90 is going to fall for your pretense of stupidity? You make your cause look worse than it is by constantly pretending to be obtuse in order to avoid answering the hard questions.
Your estimation of anything on this thread is highly questionable.
That's a pretty obvious strawman about the links being correct.
Hello.
I am well aware of what the articles I cited say and what their authors assume. Here's the thing:
I have yet to see any pro-choice use of the term "parasite" to refer to a pre-birth human in a manner that is anything other than negative.
(Of course, I don't claim to have seen all instances of a pro-choice person calling a human zygote, human embryo, or human fetus a "parasite" in any way that was not negative–i.e., claiming that the human "ZEF" was harmful to the human ZEF's mother.)
Therefore, the articles I cite respond to those negative uses of the term "parasite." Do they dispose of the issue? No, but they do offer a variety of perspectives about why the human ZEF is not a parasite.
What would be useful would be a verifiable reference to a published book or peer-reviewed journal wherein a practicing scientist with real credentials calls the human ZEF an intraspecific parasite.
Assuming, for the sake of discussion, that a human ZEF is a parasite vis-a-vis his or her relationship to its "host," does that "parasitic" arrangement offer any beneficial aspects for the "host"?
Thanks for your reply.
Save your pretend logic lessons for someone who will fall for them. Some jurisdictions have laws against so-called fetal homicide. Those jurisdictions do not have comparable crimes for killing cattle, fish, or bacteria. They have crimes against conversion or destruction of private property, or perhaps protecting endangered species, but those laws are different than fetal homicide laws. If you don't like those laws, you can work to change them.
I am also not going to play your little game of claiming everyone here is "avoiding the issue."
Sorry, no. It doesn't prove anything one way or the other about the links being correct, and your 'strawman' insult is an obvious distraction from the real issue that the mere fact that you find some links to be 'far more persuasive' is also not evidence of which links are actually correct.
You also haven't explained why Myintx is a precious little special snowflake who should be allowed to post lies and not have them questioned or corrected.
**The law should get to decide Ann. The law gets to decide after viability.**
Well, that's an interesting thought, myintx. The problem with that thought, is that it contradicts other statements of yours, wherein you attempt to compare embryos to blacks or jews, and try to make the assertion that since blacks and/or jews were unwanted or regarded as subhuman, and consequently killed or enslaved, and this was morally incorrect, this is therefore somehow 'proof' that embryos are not less than human and should not be killed.
If you want to adopt the position 'the law should decide', then you are entirely giving up your ability to complain about the poor treatment of blacks and jews being morally improper, since their treatment in the pre-civil war South, and Nazi Germany was, in fact, allowed by the law.
In fact, if you are giving up trying to have consistent moral principles, in favor of 'the law', in order so that you can handwave 'rights' around and apply them only in those situations where it would be personally convenient to you, such as giving the 'right' to someone else's organs for a 'very life' only to embryos, but not to dialysis patients, the 'law' will certainly let you do that. 'Laws' can be tweaked and gerrymandered any way you (or a majority) want them to be. But don't try to claim that such gerrymandered 'laws' are synonymous with morality.
Do you think a newborn with brain damage that makes him or her as equal in 'intelligence' as a cow should be able to be killed because he or she is not as smart as a cow?
Hard to say. Do you have a reason why cattle can be killed, but not humans?
Unless she was non-Aryan. In which case the Nazis condoned and sometimes forced abortions, which is something pro-lifers would never support – ergo the Nazis were not pro-life.
Yes, the most common pro-life response to the bodily rights argument is to show that pregnancy is not analogous to the forced organ donation scenario (the natural-artificial distinction is one of many dis-parallels). But the argument would also be defeated if one could successfully argue that you are obligated to stay attached to the violinist.
Well, the victims of late-term abortions aren't too different from infants and you can easily find pictures of those online.
Aside from that though, I was making an analogy to demonstrate that the Gisella Perl story doesn't prove that abortion is morally permissible in most cases. I'm aware that pro-choice people don't think infanticide and abortion are moral equivalents, you don't need to point it out.
You are avoiding the issue, which anyone over the age of 9 can tell. Babbling about how certain places have 'laws' regarding fetal homicide but not laws for killing cattle, fish, or bacteria simply tells me about the laws of certain jurisdictions. Not impressed. There are jurisdictions with laws about not carrying an icecream cone in your pocket, or riding in a car with a duck perched on your head on Sundays.
Your babble about the 'laws' is simply another desperate attempt on your part to give me a REASON why human beings, but not cattle, fish, or bacteria should have a 'right to life. Babble about the 'laws' without giving me a REASON tells me nothing, for all I know, the law makers were as eccentric when they passed such laws as they were when they passed the laws about ice cream cones and ducks.
And, btw, a mentally retarded infant's 'need' for it's 'very life' does not create a 'right' for it to be cared for. If you, myintx, wish to personally spend the money and time to care for such infants, then and only then, are you in any sort of position to demand that parents carry them to term.
They were anti choice, meaning, women should have zero say in their repoductive lives. Sound familiar?
Well, there are differences between fetuses, even late term ones, and infants:
1. The fetus is using the mother's body, which it does not have a 'right' to.
2. The fetus has not been born, and the birth process will cause at least some injury to the mother, which the fetus does not have a 'right' to do.
3. Almost all late term abortions are performed for specific medical reasons. There is either something seriously wrong with the fetus, or with the mother.
In regards to your other point, I'd say that you are correct in that an extreme case does not prove that an action acceptable in an extreme case is acceptable in all cases. However, it also doesn't necessarily prove that such an action is *unnacceptable*, either. Case in point, there were probably prisoners in concentration camps who bit their fingernails. The fact that it occured in a concentration camp doesn't prove, in and of itself, that biting one's nails is completely morally unacceptable.
Since you are in the mood to discuss morality, I will point out that if you want to claim something to be a 'human right', then it should be a right almost ALL the time, and the exceptions should be very rare. You are holding that this is the case with abortion, and that the right to be gestated should be the case almost all the time, and that the exceptions, such as the Gisella Perl situation, should be very rare. If you assume that being gestated is a right, then this would be consistent.
However, there is a problem, which is that the 'right to be gestated' is based on what pro-lifers claim is a 'right to another person's organs, if you need it for your VERY LIFE'.
Now, if you hold that there is such a thing as a 'right to another person's organs if you need it for your very life', then this right should exist almost all the time, for all people. If this is an actual, real, 'human right' as the pro-lifers claim, then it should be the usual case, and exceptions should be unusual and rare.
But instead, pro-lifers claim the opposite is true. They engage in continual handwaving and gerrymandering and exception making, so that the MAJORITY whose 'very life' depends on the organs of others (ranging from their blood to their kidneys), are somehow always exceptions to this claimed 'right to the organs of others for your very life', and only a small minority of exceptional cases, only the precious zef and embryo, somehow sneaks through, and is actually really entitled to this great 'right' they claim exists.
Do you see why I find myself skeptical of this?
I think we're agreed (I thought we were, see OP) that what the Nazis did to women who were "non-Aryan" falls outside the realm of "are you prolife or prochoice". As the OP noted: "The Holocaust is sui generis. Whether you are pro-life or pro-choice, the only appropriate reaction is horror."
But with regard to Aryan women, outside the realm of the Holocaust, the Nazis were prolife. All abortion was banned, all contraception was illegal. Germany retained stringent Nazi laws against safe legal access to abortion until 1972 (East Germany) / 1974 (West Germany).
They did drop the death penalty, which was the final prolife touch for the Nazi government against women who thought they had a right to control their own bodies and decide how many children to have and when, but the Nazis were, in the government of Germany, very, very prolife.
so, it's OK for a woman to kill her mentally retarded newborn?
Not particularly. I'm fine with women making decisions about their reproductive lives so long as it doesn't destroy another human being. Most people on this blog support contraception as well.
In other words, you are anti choice. Reproduction does not complete the moment sperm meets egg. It takes 9 months to make a baby. By forcing women to remain pregnant against their will you are forcing them to reproduce, and denying their right to reproductive freedom. That is anti choice.
Okay, so we'll just ignore the fact that the Nazis performed and condoned lots and lots of abortions because it doesn't fit your narrative that they were pro-life.
Though even if the Nazis were pro-life, that doesn't really prove anything. The Nazis got it right on several things (tobacco, animal cruelty, and motorways to name a few).
Call it what you like. I don't think "women should have zero say in their reproductive lives".
Keep telling yourself that.
Always fun talking to you 🙂
Hi purr I'm back from My "Vacaction" of playing with the NRO trolls. They are completely freaked out that I busted them for trolling liberal sites on Halloween. They talked about it at the NRO thread "Obama's veto pen." They are all wondering how I busted them. They are sooooo stupid. It was great fun. Anyway had to share this with you. I know you will get it. Anything new with the moderation at RH? I haven't been there for a while. Hope all is good with you.
Well, anonGuest, you really have to accept that the Nazis were prolife: they passed laws making abortion illegal. Just as you have to accept that slaveowners were prolife: just as their modern ideological descendants today argue that a black woman shouldn't have the right to choose abortion,. so white slaveowners argued that a woman they owned having an abortion was robbing them of their property.
Wubbies. Glad you had fun. They are dumb.
As a pro-lifer, I suspect I know a lot more pro-lifers than you do. You, sir or madam, are wrong! Pro-life fully supports saving the life of the mother when only her life can be saved.
We do oppose post-viability abortions because in those cases, the baby has a chance at life with an emergency delivery, which is actually faster and safer for the mother than a late-term abortion.
"Well, the victims of late-term abortions aren't too different from infants and you can easily find pictures of those online."
NO, you can't. They are fakes.
You cannot defeat a right NOT to have one's organs used by another by claiming the method of use is "natural." Natural or artificial, there is no such "right."
You continue vacillating back and forth, myintx. I don't specifically want to "kill" any human that isn't smarter than a cow, as I don't want to be forced into gestating one either. You yourself compared abortion to cutting off "life support" with which I agree. That doesn't constitute killing someone. The person dies because they are incapable of sustaining their own life functions. That's the natural state in pregnancy for a very long time. The difference is that women aren't utilitarian objects whose only purpose is to breathe for embryos and fetuses. A respirator is a utilitarian object that does exist only to breathe for someone. That's the difference.
NOPE. The law forbids involuntary servitude. Your nonsense about laws deciding after viability is just more 'who-shot-John' nonsense out of you, since nobody is forced to stay pregnant before or after viability.
If a woman doesn't want to be pregnant, there is no "getting help" that makes her want to be pregnant. The question is under what authority do you force her to remain pregnant? The constitution forbids involuntary servitude. That includes to fetuses.
**I'm sure many people would be more sympathetic towards women having abortions if we heard about hundreds of thousands of women being turned away from adoption agencies or pregnancy resource centers because those places were too busy to help.**
And I'm sure people would be more sympathetic to the forced gestationers if we DIDN'T hear about hundreds and thousands of dark skinned, older, and/or handicapped children being left to rot in institutions while hundreds and thousands of adoptive parents hold out for that elusive, perfect, healthy, white newborn infant.
Did you have a point, other than your sad feelies?
I fail to see how your rape and attempted extortion of babydaddy has anything to do with what my mental state may or may not be. Other than that I'm apparently rude enough to actually give you an honest assessment of your actions.
I know. She's awesome. Who are you "guest?"
She's a broken record. We've heard this before? Right?
MamaBear, fine: you try asking your prolife friends if they think Savita Halappanvar should have had a life-saving abortion the day after she went into hospital suffering a miscarriage at 17 weeks,
There was no question that the foetus could survive – 17 weeks is far below viability.
But Savita herself could have lived, if she had had an abortion when she asked for one.
If prolifers genuinely do support life-saving abortions, prolifers would have been hugely supportive of Savita's right to have an abortion and hugely condemnatory of the legal and medical system that condemned her instead to die of sepsis caused by a prolonged untreated miscarriage.
Instead, prolifers made up a whole mythology for themselves claiming that Savita would have died anyway so it didn't matter that she didn't have an abortion when she asked for one.
And there are still other examples of real life situations where a woman needs a life-saving abortion, and if she gets the abortion and lives prolifers claim she killed her baby and would have lived anyway: if she doesn't get her abortion and dies, prolifers claim she would have died anyway.
There is no real life situation I can think of where a woman was in danger of death, got a life-saving abortion, and prolifers cheered that abortion had saved her life. If you can link me to one, I'll read it.
Savita and her baby both died of sepsis, what used to be called blood poisoning. It is treated by high dose IV antibiotics which they failed to start soon enough. It was malpractice, but not because of not getting an abortion.
A few years ago a woman in France developed sepsis due to an abortion (it can develop after surgeries or due to other infections). The French hospital also delayed treating it. She didn't die, she just lost body parts, multiple amputations due to tissue death from sepsis.
See? As you conveniently demonstrate yourself, prolifers just don't support life-saving abortions, even when there was a clear need and no possibility of a live baby.
Too bad you can't read. She died of SEPSIS, of not getting antibiotics. An abortion (originally baby was still alive) would have risked spreading the infection.
I recently had cellulitis, which will develop into sepsis if not caught in time. I do not know what caused Savita's sepsis, but it can develop out of a number of other infections. Pregnancy is not a cause.
Her membranes were ruptured – that is what let the infection in. The only treatment for that is an abortion plus antibiotics.
Too bad you are so uninterested in Savita's untimely death that you don't care to know what killed her, and so determined not to support life-saving abortions that you don't want to admit an abortion – plus antibiotics – would have saved her life.
This treatment for a prolonged miscarriage is so standard that Savita's family were stunned to find that in a Western country like Ireland, their daughter had been left to die untreated and in agony in a hospital bed.
What struck Savita's family was that in prolife Ireland, their daughter had died just as if she had miscarried in an Indian village a hundred miles from the nearest hospital where she could have had a life-saving abortion to close her cervix (thus stopping the route by which the infection was getting in) followed by antibiotics.
But prolifers don't want to support life-saving abortions, so they just invent stuff to pretend Savita didn't need one.
Myintx is severely lacking in intelligence and morality. She thinks her sad feelies about the 'tiny innocent defenseless vulnerable' embryo somehow grant it a whole slew of special rights for it's 'very life' that no other human being has. Never mind that it doesn't even have a functioning brain. Never mind that the mere fact of being 'tiny innocent defenseless vulnerable' does not create rights or Christmas tree ornaments would have rights. The widdle embwyo is sooo cute, and that's about all that matters to her. The rest of the human race, being considerably less cute, has no rights, in Myintx's view of the world. Anyway, lacking in the intelligence to create her own arguments, Myintx keeps repeating the same material from pro-life pamphlets over and over, thus sounding like a broken record, and simply making herself and her side sound stupid.
A woman's rights aren't violated after viability… Since viability isn't mentioned in the constitution it wouldn't be violating a woman's rights for pro-life laws to PROTECT unborn children before viability either. PARENTS have a responsibility to ensure the safety of their offspring. They shouldn't be able to KILL them just because they don't want them – before or after birth.
Post viability abortion laws prohibit abortions after viability (unless the woman meets one of the exceptions).
I guess lying is part of your disorder too?
Nope, that is incorrect. Fetuses don't have ANY rights.
There is no such thing as an abortion after viability. That's called a delivery.
Then what does late term abortions look like? They're just a clump of cells or what?
She's a CPC broken record. I think I finally quit responding to her because if that.
What is a "late term abortion?" A 20 week fetus is about 6 inches long. Does that sound like an infant to you?
that's b s. If that were the case, Susan Robinson would be out of business. She KILLS unborn children after viability – she doesn't give them a chance to be born alive.
Shame we need to have laws to tell people how to behave. People should CARE for their offspring, not kill them – before or after birth.
The fact that you don't like a truthful assessment of your rape and extortion schemes does not mean that my assessment of them is a 'lie'. And since you have openly admitted to lying and using the continuum fallacy knowingly and deliberately to 'humanize' the zef, you are hardly in a position to make such comments anyways.
Exactly. For some women the only 'help' they're seeking is an abortion. None of the other alternatives apply to them.
Yeah, unless I am missing something here, I agree with you that, in Gisella Perl's case, performing these abortions was morally justifiable. In addition, I would think that if one was in a Nazi concentration camp and one of the officials or whomever there told this individual that this individual can either personally shoot and kill all of his or her (already born) children and be allowed to remain alive himself/herself or refuse to do this and have both him/her and all of his or her children get killed by the Nazis, then it is certainly morally justifiable for this individual to kill all of his/her own children in such a circumstance. As in Gisella Perl's case, I would think that, in this scenario of mine, the Nazis would be responsible for the deaths of killings of these (already born) children rather than this individual himself/herself. However, as with Gisella Perl's case and abortion, this position of mine certainly does *not* mean that it is okay for a parent to kill his or her (already born) children.
What about an exception for ectopic pregnancies?
"While it is true that parasitism is defined by differing species,"
So parastic twins are not parasites?
"The constitution forbids involuntary servitude."
It probably depends on how exactly one interprets this part of the U.S. Constitution, though.
Also, in regards to involuntary servitude, using your definition of this, wouldn't the European countries which prohibit elective abortion at certain points before viability as well (such as, starting from 12 weeks or from 14 weeks) be committing involuntary servitude?
"I know you are convinced what you say is true, but all your posts say roughly the same thing over and over again. Most reasonable people will say that the Holocaust was wrong (deniers will just deny it happened), most people will say slavery is wrong, most people will say the Jim Crow laws were wrong.
The fact that such consensus doesn't exist for abortion should tell you the issue is more than black and white, and that there are reasonable people who have come to the pro-choice conclusion through weighing various pros and cons of outlawing abortion and considering a fetus a full-fledged person. I predict a rebuttal like "a lot of good people were in favor of slavery". Sure, but I think society has matured in its evaluation of moral issues where we have a solid conception of what human rights are, and have come to value equality and fairness as a social good."
This appears to be a case of the argumentum ad populum fallacy. I agree with you that the abortion issue does appear to have some gray in it (which is why I myself am currently politically ambivalent on it), but using public opinion to make your point here appears to be fallacious.
Hi Coyote
I don't think I'm using public opinion to say one side is right or one side is wrong. Rather that there is a clear polarization down the middle to point out that there are many reasonable people who don't accept myintx's premise, and therefore the premise is rather murky and not necessarily obvious to everybody.
Some prolifers argue that if a woman needs an abortion for an ectopic or molar pregnancy this isn't "really" an abortion because the foetus could never develop into a baby.
Other prolifers argue that it's still an abortion if the foetus is removed directly either by inducing a medical miscarriage or surgery – either of which leave the Fallopian tube intact – but it's not an abortion if the tube is removed completely, mutilating the woman. Prolife: the morality that prefers mutilation to abortion.
Alll prolifers agree that if the Fallopian tube has ruptured, so that the foetus is about to die anyway, it's OK to try to save the woman's life by an immediate operation. The woman is quite likely to die if doctors wait til the tube ruptures, but women's lives are not important to prolifers.
Well, they didn’t look like alien monsters or parasites to me. I saw his legs, arms, head, and etc. They were still developing and small, sure. But they look like babies to me. It's not some kind of "disease" or weird "goos" or whatever. So, yes, I know what they look like. Thanks.
So I was just asked you, what does late term abortions look like? That's something should show how it kills a human life…
"Some prolifers argue that if a woman needs an abortion for an ectopic or molar pregnancy this isn't "really" an abortion because the foetus could never develop into a baby."
But then they appear to be redefining the meaning of the word "abortion," correct?
"Other prolifers argue that it's still an abortion if the foetus is removed directly either by inducing a medical miscarriage or surgery – either of which leave the Fallopian tube intact – but it's not an abortion if the tube is removed completely, mutilating the woman. Prolife: the morality that prefers mutilation to abortion."
I am sorry, but I am a little confused to what exactly their rationale for this is.
"Alll prolifers agree that if the Fallopian tube has ruptured, so that the foetus is about to die anyway, it's OK to try to save the woman's life by an immediate operation. The woman is quite likely to die if doctors wait til the tube ruptures, but women's lives are not important to prolifers."
Thank you very much for this information; also, Yes, personally, regardless of whether I look at this from a pro-choice or pro-life perspective, it seems pointless to wait until the Fallopian tube ruptures.
I am sorry, but I am a little confused to what exactly their rationale for this is.
Religious, AFAIK. If you remove the Fallopian tube in whole or in part, you're ensuring the woman doesn't die of a ruptured tube: some Catholic ethicists say this is OK.
If you remove the embryo and leave the Fallopian tube intact, you are killing the embryo: no Catholic ethicists say this is OK.
It doesn't matter, apparently, that the embryo in an ectopic pregnancy has zero chance of survival: it's still more valuable that allowing the woman to preserve her Fallopian tubes intact.
The reason they do not consider removing the entire fallopian tube to be 'direct killing' is because they blame the tube for the ectopic pregnancy, not the embryo. The tube is 'diseased' and so must be removed – it's like the idea that it's acceptable to treat a woman for cancer even if the embryo dies as an indirect result of the chemotherapy…
Of course, this isn't always true in practise, and a few years ago in the Dominican Republic, an 17 year old girl was allowed to die from cancer because the doctors were afraid to treat her because she was pregnant with an 8 week old embryo. So they let her die.
Add this one to your 'pro-lifers would prefer to let women die' files:
http://www.cnn.com/2012/08/18/world/americas/dominican-republic-abortion/
Well, Cougar… what would you expect a late term fetus to look like? An elephant or a whitetail deer? But I'll bet you would have a hard time telling a human fetus from a fetus of other primates. And at the embryonic stage? All vertebrates look pretty much alike. You couldn't tell a human embryo from a skink embryo or a dog embryo. You have yet to say why it matters that the fetus is human. Is the woman NOT human? Does she have no rights not to have her body used without consent? A six inch fetus, no matter how human it looks, is not fit to live as a human outside the body of another. And it's not entitled to the body of another.
http://www.exploratorium.edu/exhibits/embryo/embryoflash.html
Which embryo is human?
Please pardon my extremely ignorance in regards to this.
That said, wouldn't both of these actions be saving the pregnant woman's life, though?
"If you remove the embryo and leave the Fallopian tube intact, you are killing the embryo: no Catholic ethicists say this is OK."
Is the embryo removed in one piece? If so, then wouldn't this be more of a case of letting the embryo die as opposed to killing it? Anyway, though, it would be great if God (if he/she/it even exists) showed up and somehow saved both of their lives, but we live in the real world but if it is a choice between one death and two deaths, then even looking at this from a politically anti-abortion perspective, it appears obvious that one should prefer the situation with one death (that of the embryo/fetus).
"It doesn't matter, apparently, that the embryo in an ectopic pregnancy has zero chance of survival:"
Isn't it more like 0.1% or 1%, though?
"it's still more valuable that allowing the woman to preserve her Fallopian tubes intact."
Out of curiosity: will removing a woman's Fallopian tubes make her infertile? Also, do such pro-lifers support removing a pregnant woman's Fallopian tubes *before* these tubes burst?
Finally, as a side note, I *don't* think that individuals should support changing the law based on their religious beliefs. After all, we have and should have separation of religion and state.
Thanks for this info; however, though, I fail to see why exactly there is a relevant difference in regards to these two cases; after all, both of these things result in someone's death in order to protect someone else's life and the only reason that there is an intentional death in one of these cases is because there is (likely) no other way to save the pregnant woman's life (if God hypothetically showed up and created such a way which didn't involve intentional death, then it would be a "whole different ballgame").
Does what I wrote here make sense (to you)?
Fallopian tube removal mutilates the woman and is unnecessary.
Yes, what you wrote makes sense, but RCC = mental gymnastics.
"Fallopian tube removal mutilates the woman and is unnecessary."
Does it also make her infertile?
"Yes, what you wrote makes sense,"
Good.
"but RCC = mental gymnastics."
Well, we have (and should have) separation of religion and state in the U.S.; thus, people shouldn't try to implement laws here (and ideally, everywhere else as well) which are purely based on their religious beliefs. In regards to religious beliefs, religious people should simply let God (if he/she/it exists) judge people in the afterlife (if an afterlife exists, that is) rather than try implementing religious-based laws here, in this life.
It can affect her fertility, yes.
Major surgery should be avoided when possible
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/proxy/dwG_pVjw2qV73vt10M_DlnAGJV8qE1EtffMX7d5NEJX4uuI2p40XCObE7bw_-h4rrw64uXFwQrloSrG5kfowJtmCu9Gt8tcJddB6BPR09TUAaWKojsYuLIXL5TqRqMV8Nu5xbqkb3Zmx1Ug=w400-h320-nc
"It can affect her fertility, yes."
It's not guaranteed to make her infertile, though–correct?
"Major surgery should be avoided when possible"
Agreed.
An unborn child IS a human being.
You are a habitual LIAR.
To any practical person (and even in Ireland, the country tgat really is set up to let women die if pregnancy goes wrong), the only ethical thing to do with molar or ectopic pregnancy is to perform an abortion ASAP. There's no possibility that anything but a dead pregnant woman will be the resultt of letting either ectopic or molar pregnancy continue: abortions in these cases are clearly life-saving.
In the Republic of Ireland, they resolve this problem by just not calling ectopic/molar abortions "abortions" – thus redefining abortion. In other prolife countries, they h ave other 'solutions'. Including, of course, the pre-eminently prolife solution of waiting til the tube ruptures and both embryo and woman are near enough dead for it to be OK to try to save the woman's life.r
Sorry, no.
1. First of all, there is no 'unborn child'. It is an embryo or fetus, NOT a child, so you are the liar.
2. I have never denied that the embryo has human DNA. So you are lying about that as well.
3. I have repeatedly asked you to explain exactly what you mean by the term 'human', and what aspect of that definition justifies the granting of ANY rights, that cattle do not have. The fact that you are unable to find a definition of the term 'human' that grants rights while simultaneously allowed the zef to sneak through that definition is your tough shit. I won't play your game and let you sneak the zef through under one definition of human while filling in the blanks for you with sacred 'rights' that are granted by an entirely different definition? Boo fucking hoo, my failure to play along with your attempted equivocation game does not make me a 'liar'.
4. You have admitted to deliberately and knowingly using the continuum fallacy to 'humanize' the zef, This also makes you a liar.
Thank you very much for all of this info, and Yes, I am tempted to agree with everything which you wrote here.
Also, off-topic, but out of curiosity–are you a Scottish female?
"Unborn child" is a valid synonym for fetus. Look it up. Many examples of the word "unborn" in reputable dictionaries use "unborn child" or "unborn baby" in their examples. It's a VALID TERM.
An embryo does have human DNA. It is a human being. There is no need to try to humanize an unborn child because it is human.
We don't kill born children that happen to be less intelligent than cattle. We shouldn't be killing unborn children either. No innocent human being should be killed because he or she is inconvenient or unwanted.
… That's not in late term pregnancy I talked about. I was talked about later pregnancy.
Yeah? how late?
BTW, anencephalic babies look human. Arms, legs, heads eyes. Does that make them people too?
Whatever. Keep pretending that I "believe" women are nonhumans/nonpersons then.
You know, I was not talked about early abortions…
Funny. You guys keep saying that those abortion photos are fake, yet you guys still won't show me actual late term abortions…
But okay…
Do you believe that a zygote is equal in value to a newborn?
You realize you are both undercutting the author's argument that the Holocaust was sui generis, meaning the normal rules don't apply?
I think you're missing the poster's point. It seems to me that the poster was taking issue with "pro-lifers" using the Holocaust to score political points in the abortion debate, not that he or she was attempting to use Perl's story to advance the pro-choice cause.
1. If 'unborn child' is a valid synonym for fetus, then why not simply use the word fetus? I think it's because you know they are not the same thing, and are trying to pull your usual sad feelie by taking advantage of the ambiguity that exists in the English language. And, btw, no matter how many times you pretend it does, the ambiguity in the English language does not somehow create developemental and biological reality. Case in point, there is a bird in North America and a bird in England, both of which will be found under the term 'robin' in the dictionary. This fact does not turn them into the same species, any more than it turns a fetus into a child. Grow up and deal with it.
2. "It is a human being". And this is about the 22nd time I have asked you to tell me exactly what your particular definition of the term 'human being' is, such that it both justifies the granting of rights, and allows the zef to sneak through. Your repeated refusal to do so, indicates that you're trying to pull an equivocation fallacy.
3. 'There is no need to try and humanize and unborn child, because it is human'. And yet you've admitted to another poster here that you are deliberately and specifically engagining in the coninuum fallacy, for the specific purpose of humanizing the zef. Why do that, if there is 'no need'?
4. "We don't kill children that are less intelligent than cattle". Neither does low intelligence, or high intelligence, or any sort of intelligence grant a right to be cared for.
5. "No innocent human being should be killed". See above. The 'right to life' is not a right to the resources of others. If you can figure out a way to keep the zef alive without using the mother's body without her consent, great. If not? Guess what? The zef is not (sob) 'innocent'. It's violating the rights of the mother, and the mother DOES have a right to kill it, to defend her own rights. That's the nature of rights, you have a right to kill someone, if you choose, to defend them. Grow up and deal with it.
Oh, and I'm still waiting for you to tell me where all these free condoms are available, that you claim are all over the place. Been to several stores today. Haven't seen any free ones. Or is that just another one of your sad-feelie fairy tales?
OK; thank you for clarifying this part.
"Add to this the data showing that legalized abortion in many modern nations actually leads to a decrease in abortion rates and infanticide should tell you that perhaps abortion solves some real social problems and contributes to the health of a society."
Frankly, I am *extremely* skeptical that the legalization of abortion will reduce the abortion rate *if all other factors (correct contraception usage, the frequency of comprehensive sex ed, et cetera) remain equal before and after abortion is banned.* As for abortion reducing the rate of infanticide, this might very well be accurate, but I have a question for you: Would you support legalizing painless infanticide in a hypothetical scenario where doing this will mean that less children will be abused and/or painfully killed later on in their lives? If not, then I *wouldn't* view the fact that legalized abortion reduces the rate of infanticide as a good argument in favor of legalized abortion.
"Without some recognition of these facts, dogmatic repetition of your central point is going to fall on deaf ears."
Yes, I certainly agree with you that individuals should study all of the facts which pertain to banning abortion.
>> Frankly, I am *extremely* skeptical that the legalization of abortion
will reduce the abortion rate *if all other factors (correct
contraception usage, the frequency of comprehensive sex ed, et cetera)
remain equal before and after abortion is banned.*
Hey, I agree. I'm pointing out that abortion rate is strongly correlated with economic stability of a society. My contention is that women have been trying to control their reproductive destiny, be it through BC, infanticide or abortion because they instinctively know how many kids is too many kids to safely bring up.
Would I support painless euthenasia of infants? No. If abortion reduces infanticide, I see this as a good thing because I prefer abortion to infanticide. I don't quite get the point of your hypothetical.
I once had a conversation with a catholic who stated that he preferred a little bit of infanticide over a whole lot of abortion. We were discussing China, and female infants being smothered or starved to death didn't bother him. He was really concerned about the embryos, though.
"Isn't it enough that parents who would otherwise have committed infanticide would just abort them earlier instead?"
Not if some women's circumstances change in this hypothetical scenario. For instance, a woman could hypothetically give birth to a child only to unexpectedly experience massive financial problems afterwards which will cause her to change her mind in regards to raising this child.
Also, as a side note, interestingly enough, legalized abortion has *not* completely stopped infanticide and child abandonment, which is why safe-haven laws were previously passed in many areas.
Also, in regards to birth contraception/contraception, my ideal hope (and I think that you'll agree with me here) is that 100% effective/efficient contraception (other than castration and ovary removal, obviously) will eventually be available to every male and female who wants it. If this occurs, and if artificial wombs are developed and commercialized to such an extent that any or almost any female can afford to utilize them, then I think that the debate over abortion law will become much less important, especially if there are less religious idiots by that point in time. (And please don't dismiss my hopes here as being unrealistic, considering that technology and social attitudes can and sometimes do progress a lot over several centuries; for instance, I think that someone from, say, 1500 would have been *extremely* surprised at the technological and social advancements that have been made over the last several centuries.)