11 ms·

>If the fetus is a life, none of this stuff matters. This is irrelevant to my personal views on abortion because I believe that individuals have rights over th

• hatware 4y ago
  > I believe that individuals have rights over their own body Did you have rights over your own body when you had sex and started the process of conception? Why do your choices only matter depending on the result of conception?
• karencarits 4y ago
  This is very close to the violinist example https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Defense_of_Abortion https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Defense_of_Abortion
• wilsonnb3 4y ago
  I think the pro life crowd sees a significant difference between a fetus/baby/whatever and a random person. Probably something like, you are responsible for the creating of the fetus/baby/whatever so you have more of an obligation to it than you do to other people.
  • LadyCailin 4y ago
    If that were really the argument, it would look entirely different, as things like actual sex education, easily obtainable birth control, etc, would all be uncontentious. However, those are also very much subject to debate by the “pro life” crowd.
    • hackyhacky 4y ago
      • philsnow 4y ago
        This may be the case for some but the Catholic worldview is both pro-life and extremely sex-positive, in the appropriate context. If you're talking about not just "women who have sex" but "~women~ people who have sex without regard for the children whom they may conceive", then yeah I'm against that kind of sex.
        • AlexandrB 4y ago
          The Catholic Church opposes the use of condoms[1]. Even in areas of the world where AIDS is rampant. They are not sex-positive, they are procreation-positive. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_and_HIV/AIDS https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_and_HIV/AIDS Edit: I suppose the Catholic Church is sex-positive when it comes to their clergy and underage parishioners. Disclaimer: I went to Catholic school for 11 years.
          • dragonwriter 4y ago
            > Catholics oppose the use of condoms Not really. Catholic doctrine might, American Catholics, especially, do not: https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2016/09/28/poll-finds-many-us-catholics-breaking-church-over-contraception-abortion-and-lgbt https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2016/09/28/poll-finds-... > Even in areas of the world where AIDS is rampant. https://www.cnn.com/2016/02/18/health/zika-pope-francis-contraceptives/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2016/02/18/health/zika-pope-francis-cont... (Benedict XVI made somewhat similar comments in 2010 regarding AIDS in Africa.)
            • philsnow 4y ago
              > Catholic doctrine might, American Catholics, especially, do not This is unfortunately true (but unsurprisingly so, especially these days). That doesn't mean that they're somehow right; they don't speak for the Church.
  • slg 4y ago
    Which is why there is often an extra focus on situations of rape and incest when little to no active choice has been made to create life.
    • Fatnino 4y ago
      Consentual sex happens, leading to accidental pregnancy. Now the girl's family is incentivised to claim rape so she can get an abortion.
      • slg 4y ago
        To be clear, I agree with you. These exceptions are not good enough and can create perverse incentives like you suggest. I was simply citing the lack of these exceptions being universal as evidence that a large percentage of the anti-abortion crowd do not see personal responsibility as important to whether someone should have access to an abortion.
• bko 4y ago
  That's fair, but to be clear, you think someone should be allowed to terminate their pregnancy up until the moment of birth?
  • PuppyTailWags 4y ago
    This already happens when the fetus is unviable or already dead, called a D&C. If a doctor and a patient is legally obstructed from D&C, we will have cases where someone has to birth a dead baby or, if their contractions process isn't working, become septic and die.
    • ryan93 4y ago
      He was obviously asking about viable pregnancies.
      • wonnage 4y ago
        Who decides if a pregnancy is viable? If we go back to coat hanger abortions and render fetuses “unviable” that way, is everything peachy keen? If not, then are miscarriages now occasion for criminal investigations? Pro-life logic is garbage
        • entropicdrifter 4y ago
          >If not, then are miscarriages now occasion for criminal investigations? In several states, this is now true
      • PuppyTailWags 4y ago
        That's not how late-term abortion actually works. Practically all late-term abortions are wanted children who for one reason or another don't work out. They are cases of extensive tragedy. Banning very late pregnancy termination directly means that doctors will not be allowed to save lives because it will mean ending the pregnancy. When crafting law it is vitally important to understand how this would realistically affect people.
      • 4y ago
• rednerrus 4y ago
  Do you think it's acceptable for a mother who plans to carry their child to term to use drugs and alcohol or otherwise damage the fetus?
  • hackyhacky 4y ago
    From a legal standpoint? Yes, absolutely. Let me turn the question around on you: do you think that bars and restaurants should require a negative pregnancy test before they serve alcohol to customers?
    • dahfizz 4y ago
      Requiring a negative test is a bit intrusive, but a bar that refuses to serve obviously pregnant people would be fine IMO.
      • hackyhacky 4y ago
        What is "obviously pregnant"? How does a bar accurately distinguish someone who is pregnant vs obese? Do you really want to have that conversation with your 18 year old waiter?
  • slg 4y ago
    "Acceptable" is a vague word. Do I approve of it? Obviously not. Do I think society should be okay with it? Obviously not. Do I think they should be prosecuted for it? No.
    • rednerrus 4y ago
      Should a woman be allowed to maim a fetus she plans to carry to term?
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• googlryas 4y ago
  Do you think you should have the right to have an abortion 1 day before the due date of a baby? The reasonable thing would just be to deliver the baby and put it up for adoption, but don't you have the right to, say, disconnect the placenta (it's your placenta), and also not have your abdomen cut open to help out some other individual who just happens to be stuck in there?
  • Siira 4y ago
    Yes, I think people should have that right.
    • googlryas 4y ago
      I don't say this lightly, but you're literally advocating for killing babies. Not in the sense that a first or even second trimester abortion is, but to kill a baby literally a day before it would be born, because you have the right to and not to literally save your own life, is just absolutely craven.
      • Siira 4y ago
        It’s not literally that at all. Read about Schelling fences. It’s arbitrary, but it’s not pointless.
        • googlryas 4y ago
          You can come up with any justification you want, give it any name you want, but what you advocate for is still, in the end, killing a baby which would do perfectly fine on its own in the outside world. Which is why I would be charged with murder if I go punch a heavily pregnant woman in the gut and kill her child.
          • Siira 4y ago
            I have yet to see a single baby that “would do perfectly fine on its own in the outside world.” A baby needs years of intense care and love to become a healthy person.
• jimkleiber 4y ago
  Your comment actually made me think of something I had never considered: perhaps the mother's right against the child is self-defense. The child is literally feeding off the mother until birth, taking energy, nutrients, maybe even killing the mother. I don't necessarily want to frame it this way, because I want to view the relationship as mutualistic or commensalistic, rather than parasitic, but I could see how it might be biologically a parasitic relationship. However, a quick search shows that people against abortions say that biologically it must be "an organism that attaches to a member of a different species and feeds off that organism in a manner that is physically injurious to the other organism." While it may not fit the dictionary definition of a biologically parasitic relationship, I believe it still can "feed off that organism in a manner that is physically injurious to the other organism." So I think there could be an argument for self-defense.
  • SpaceL10n 4y ago
    100%. The court took this decision away from human beings. You no longer get to choose when you procreate. At some point, the court says no longer your choice.
    • caeril 4y ago
      > The court took this decision away from human beings. No, the court remanded the lawmaking decision to the states, as it should be. There's this section of the CA-NV border known as "state line", which has a litany of casinos just right on the NV side of that border. The notion that different states have different laws is a fact we've accepted since the founding of our country. When AZ bans abortion, Arizona women will be mildly inconvenienced by a three hour drive to the CA border, as other matters of state law divergence have always been. Nobody has lost their rights. Cynically, I'd suggest that abortion rights aren't even the issue at hand - lots of people seem very angry/afraid that after a century of DC slowly arrogating all available power and authority to itself, that this power might flow back the other way.
      • jimkleiber 4y ago
        > No, the court remanded the lawmaking decision to the states, as it should be. I'm ok with this argument, as I believe that legislatures, national and state, should write laws to address these issues, not rely on court precedent. > Cynically, I'd suggest that abortion rights aren't even the issue at hand - lots of people seem very angry/afraid that after a century of DC slowly arrogating all available power and authority to itself, that this power might flow back the other way. I disagree that this is the main reason, because SCOTUS just basically said the NY state law against guns in public was unconstitutional, and Congress is passing a national gun law as we speak. So I find it hard to believe that it's just about state's rights, because it's giving states some rights in one week while also taking away other rights.
• camhart 4y ago
  > If I refuse to allow it to be used to support another life, that is my choice. You're missing the point that your choice to have sex created the fetus/life in the first place. That changes the debate and invalidates all of your examples.
  • jimkleiber 4y ago
    Depends on the law as some laws forbid abortion even in rape and incest, which I'd argue are strong examples of someone specifically not choosing to have sex.
    • camhart 4y ago
      Very true, but that accounts for less than 0.5% of abortions. For a vast majority of abortions, they made the choice.
    • tzs 4y ago
      I don't understand why it is almost always "rape and incest", both on the part of people considering exceptions when they ban abortion or people trying to get exceptions into someone else's abortion ban. Incest can be nonconsensual, in which it was also rape and so would be covered under a rape exception. Incest can also be consensual, in which case what is the logic to treating conception by incest any different than any other circumstances of conception?
      • jimkleiber 4y ago
        Fair point, I meant more for the nonconsensual aspect, although I'm unsure if incest is illegal even if consensual, I guess it might depend on the jurisdiction, at which point eve if it were two people consenting, it may not legally be considered consensual, similar to how people under a certain age have no legal ability to consent.
      • AlexandrB 4y ago
        I think there are a few problems. First, as with statutory rape, I think incest is often treated as de-facto coercive - e.g. could you say "no" to your dad if you depend on him for food/shelter/clothing? Second, rape often requires the victim to accuse the rapist of such - which is probably less likely when family is involved. Finally, incest carries increased risks of abnormalities in the child, which makes the case for aborting to prevent suffering of the child stronger.
• scarmig 4y ago
  How far does this extend? To riff off the classic example, what happens if there were a hypothetical medical condition where a violinist needed to be attached to your bloodstream for nine months and would die if removed beforehand, and you sign a contract agreeing to it before deciding at month seven that you've had enough and cut her off, killing her? Have you committed a moral crime there? And if so, should you face legal punishment for it (a separate question)?
  • dariusj18 4y ago
    This is a contrived example, but a pretty obvious answer given PC's stance. You can enter into the contact and would need be prepared for civil liability upon breach, or criminal if you entered into the contract under false pretenses. Intent would be a major part of deciding the criminal action. If you could be shown to have the intent of someone's death, then that would be murder, otherwise no.
    • Levitz 4y ago
      It is a contrived example, but it has a reason for it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Defense_of_Abortion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Defense_of_Abortion
      • dariusj18 4y ago
        Seems pretty heavily modified from the source, but even the source isn't super relevant because it is trying to use though experiments to determine the morality of the act, however Roe and this subsequent decision (tenuously) are based on legal justification.
        • scarmig 4y ago
          Thought experiments are useful as intuition pumps, and very widely used in philosophy. And the particular argument I was responding to was about a moral argument for complete bodily autonomy.
      • 4y ago
• brodouevencode 4y ago
  > I believe that individuals have rights over their own body which supersede anyone else's rights to their body You do understand how this can be twisted for __very__ bad things, right?
  • viksit 4y ago
    actually no, can you elaborate?
    • Levitz 4y ago
      If your bodily rights supersede anyone else's rights to their body, then someone with lung cancer can go ahead and murder someone to obtain a new pair of lungs.
      • bettysdiagnose 4y ago
        I think you misunderstood who the word "their" is referring to here.
      • tzs 4y ago
        There was a pretty nifty short story called "Dibs" by Brian Plante in the April 2004 issues of Analog that was sort of along those lines. Whenever someone would die soon if they did not get an organ transplant the government would check the records to identify all people who would be good donors. Those donors would all receive a notification that someone has dibs on that organ. If one of those donors died while the person with dibs was still alive their organ would be used to save the life of the person with dibs. When that happened, or when the person with dibs dies before getting a transplant, all the people who had been potential donors were notified that no one had dibs on their organ any more. Most of the time for most people they would occasionally get notified someone had dibs on some organ of theirs and then in a week or two they'd get a notice that it was resolved and their organ was no longer under dibs. Rarely, someone who had an organ under dibs would get a notification that a second organ was under dibs. Most of the time that would end like the single dibs case. Two or three weeks later they would be back to normal with no organs under dibs. Very rarely someone with two organs under dibs would get a notification that a third organ was under dibs. In that case they were required to give up their three organs to save the lives of the three people under dibs.
• dukeofdoom 4y ago
  I know someone that just had a baby two weeks earlier. Other than a c-section, the baby required no incubation or anything special, or anything different than what a full term baby would require. It was fully formed and is totally able to survive outside the womb. Maybe a little a lower weight. Just seems wrong that you think that the mother could kill it up to the last moment of birth, for even the most absurd reasons.
  • corrral 4y ago
    There's a reason access to 3rd trimester abortions enjoys far less support from the public than abortion rights in the abstract—and, in fact, IIRC, Roe and subsequent decisions do not guarantee any kind of right to 3rd-trimester abortions, which is why states have been able to restrict abortion access for late-term pregnancies, despite Roe.
• logifail 4y ago
  > rights over their own body When does the offspring gain rights over its body?
  • entropicdrifter 4y ago
    Under Roe v. Wade, once the fetus is viable, so at about the 24-week mark
  • divided 4y ago
    …the entire time? I think you’re trying to ask a poignant question, but it misses the point. The fetus’ body is not the mother’s body, and bodily autonomy dictates one isn’t obligated to give their body for another’s survival. Removing the fetus from the womb results in termination of the fetus if done prior to viability, but at no point does any violation of the fetus’ body need to occur for this outcome to happen.
    • logifail 4y ago
      > …the entire time? Umm ... well, maybe. My views on this are definitely coloured by having three kids, but watching the process of creating new humans starting off with a discussion about "shall we try and start a family", the next bit <cough>, a result on a test kit, the highs and lows of pregnancy, feeling your unborn first child kicking along to music in my wife's almost comically round tummy while we sat in a concert hall a few weeks before the big day .. .. through to revising algebra and geometry at the breakfast table with my eldest this morning prior to an end of term maths test. > The fetus’ body is not the mother’s body Indeed, although the fetus survives due to the cord that connects them. I've personally been in the room for all our three kids' births, cut the cord for two of them. #1 needed the doctors in a hurry after his birth, I just sat out of the way, watching in awed and stunned silence. Life is wonderful, and complicated, and at times messy and confusing. Sometimes just downright awful. Pregnancy is some or indeed all of those. Like everything we do there are edge cases and I don't think we should design our societies to leave anyone feeling they are left with no choices. "Look after those who can't look after themselves" is something that goes beyond the technical discussion of when is a fetus viable, I've spent enough time feeding and changing babies to know that just because they can breathe unaided it doesn't mean they can survive unaided. TL;DR: I would be just as uncomfortable with a complete ban on abortion as I would be with unlimited easy access to it without any time limits.
• wyager 4y ago
  There is definitely an autistically propertarian argument in favor of abortion, which I personally consider fairly compelling, but 99.9% of people are not nearly as propertarian as I am, and I'm not willing to give people a pass to use this kind of reasoning selectively. If you support abortion rights on these grounds and you're not also 100% on board with laws that let you e.g. shoot burglars, you're not being consistent. A lot of people using this argument were also pro-vaccine-mandate, which is similarly inconsistent. (Not calling out you personally, just using "you" to refer to the hypothetical flip-flop.)
  • AlexandrB 4y ago
    If the vaccine has side effects similar to that of an average pregnancy it would not only not be mandatory, but would have failed FDA trials and would be illegal to administer. There's a line somewhere between total bodily autonomy and being compelled by the state to experience: nausea, swelling, muscle and back pain, weight gain, incontinence, depression, and laceration to you genitals.
    • wyager 4y ago
      You're failing the "consistent propertarian" test hard
      • AlexandrB 4y ago
        Thanks, I think? I'm not sure why it's necessary to consider one's body "property" to advocate for having some semblance of control over what happens to it. And it's pretty obvious this right is not absolute since parents are still allowed to circumcise their children and sign off on medical procedures done to them.
        • wyager 4y ago
          My original comment is not addressed at people like you; sorry if that was not clear. You don't appear to be claiming to have a property ethic, and are instead using various ad-hoc lines of reasoning (e.g. what strikes you as qualitatively more or less onerous). > parents are still allowed to circumcise their children Indeed, propertarianism where parents do not own their children would also proscribe surgically mutilating them, for example. However, parents would not necessarily be obligated to take care of their children; this is also the basis by which abortion would be permitted. Propertarianism where parents do own their children (which strikes me as unreasonable) would a fortiori also allow abortion, as well as other more universally reviled practices such as post-birth infanticide.
• kokanator 4y ago
  Actually this is not true. The US government can compel you to sacrifice your entire body ( organs and all ) for the greater good of other citizens should they wish. [0] https://www.sss.gov/ https://www.sss.gov/
  • bogwog 4y ago
    I think you picked the worst counter argument here, since women specifically are not required to register for the selective service. ...I'm not saying I agree or disagree with anything in this thread, I just think this particular chain of comments is funny.
• imchillyb 4y ago
  The rights of the body /ended/ when a penis was inserted into a vagina. The ONLY KNOWN METHOD OF HAVING CHILDREN IS: ::drumroll:: Sexual Intercourse. There is no other natural method of having children; intercourse is it. The choice lies in choosing NOT TO HAVE SEXUAL INTERCOURSE. That is the proper framing. If the choice /not/ to have sex was followed there would be no pregnancy, and no cause to terminate a life. The choice was prior to conception, not after.
  • swearwolf 4y ago
    Are you honestly of the opinion that all intercourse involves the affirmative choice of both parties? Because if you are, you are gravely mistaken.
  • colinmhayes 4y ago
    The ONLY KNOWN METHOD OF HAVING A CAR CRASH IS ::drumroll:: driving a car. If you don't want to be forced to save someone as a result of crashing into them, whether on accident or on purpose, you shouldn't have gotten in your car. The choice was prior to the crash, not after.
• tablespoon 4y ago
  >> If the fetus is a life, none of this stuff matters. > This is irrelevant to my personal views on abortion because I believe that individuals have rights over their own body which supersede anyone else's rights to their body. It absolutely is relevant, because you view collapses into nonsense unless you believe a fetus is a not an individual and that it has no rights. If the fetus is a person, then you're in a situation where their rights to their own body are getting superseded by another's right. > We hold this as true in all other facets of bodily autonomy. No, not all. You totally have the legal obligation to provide for your children, if you have them, and that almost always involves using your body in some way.
  • PuppyTailWags 4y ago
    > You totally have the legal obligation to provide for your children, if you have them, and that almost always involves using your body in some way You are not legally obligated to donate your organs to your children, fwiw. I think the discussion of ethical and legal obligation cannot possible be given broad swath of "no one is obligated to anyone" nor "you are entirely obligated to someone in every way". This isn't how reality works. Parents are considered obligated to their children, unless they choose not to parent their children and withdraw their parental responsibilities under existent legal frameworks. At the same time, parents are not entirely obligated to their children, as parents are not fined or jailed for not donating their blood or organs.
    • deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  • jyounker 4y ago
    You don't have a legal obligation to feed your children from your own flesh.
    • tablespoon 4y ago
      > You don't have a legal obligation to feed your children from your own flesh. What a bizarre and morbid misunderstanding. You have the legal obligation to use that "flesh" to acquire food to feed your children. Also, it's not like a fetus eats its mother's flesh from the inside (until I suppose it emerges from the husk like a xenomorph?).
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• fallingknife 4y ago
  We don't have the legal right to bodily autonomy. If we did, prostitution and recreational drugs would be legal. I think we should but we just don't. But this still doesn't get to the heart of the matter on abortion. A fetus isn't quite your body.
  • AlexandrB 4y ago
    But your body is feeding it and keeping it alive, often at the expense of itself. That's the bodily autonomy part - a woman should not be compelled to keep a fetus alive at the risk to her own health and well-being.
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• Thorentis 4y ago
  > individuals have rights over their own body The argument is that at some point the fetus is no longer the same body. Arguing for "bodily autonomy" ignores the crux of the debate. A mother cannot kill their 1 year old, and parents have obligations to their young children, otherwise social services will intervene if those obligations aren't met. What obligations does a mother have to their unborn child? That is the debate that needs having.
  • feet 4y ago
    The fetus is no more than a growth
    • Thorentis 4y ago
      At what point does it become human?
      • feet 4y ago
        I'll quote someone else's response as I think it explains things well. """ > I also don't really agree with this definition either. This train of logic leads to the justification of euthanizing less intelligent humans. How so? less intelligent humans have cognitive ability so they have rights. > It also doesn't adequately address why a human with microcephaly or no frontal lobe has rights, but a dolphin or octopus or killer whale does not. The question is not why the law is the way it is but the way that it should be. As it is now, It has rights because it is a human, we make our laws for ourselves and sometimes for other species, and I would definitely say that animals should have protections/rights (and they do). A law is also a custom or an enforced custom and certainly animals have customs. At least in america, many families take the toll of taking care of their family members with many deformities. the state should not enforce termination of these, but it should be optional for those that do take this unfortunate toll in their hands. (criminalization != decriminalization) > It also allows for the justification of cruelty against animals who can feel pain but aren't intelligent enough to pass some arbitrary test of intelligence. On the contrary, as a cognitive animal capable of pain. it indicates that you should not do so, I would say the capability of pain is the most important aspect to life. given that it is usually an indicator of the will to live. > To be clear, I don't know the answer, I am hesitant to label anything as "innately valuable". I think that there is however a sliding scale of what is "ethical". Neither do I. Abortion is euthanasia, and it certainly has merit. both economically speaking and in the sense of well being for humans. Given that human childbirth is probably one of the worst around on the animal kingdom. It would be nice if we just relegated pregnancies to artificial wombs, but until the technology is there. I guess we'll be having this abortion "debate" forever. """