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When I think about why this is a political wedge issue, I think about how righteous people feel about their chosen point of view. I think about how that feeling

by csours 4y ago

When I think about why this is a political wedge issue, I think about how righteous people feel about their chosen point of view. I think about how that feeling of righteousness can drive people to vote and donate money. I don't think that people are wrong to feel this sense of righteousness, but I do find it disgusting when politicians cynically exploit it. I was raised in a Christian faith that condemns abortion as one of the most serious sins. I understand that point of view. I still feel it to some extent. What I no longer have is the feeling of certainty that personhood begins at conception. Even saying that "life" begins at conception is tenuous. Gametes (sperm and egg cells) are "alive" in that they carry out the same cellular functions that other living cells carry out. Is a zygote more alive than the gametes that came together to form it? If your faith leads you to believe that a zygote is a person, I won't tell you that you are wrong. I would ask that you consider if another person's sincerely held beliefs may be valid when they contradict this point of view.

x3n0ph3n3 4y ago
- anon291 4y ago
  Given that the largest global pro life organization, the Catholic church, engaged in pointed efforts to outreach prisoners, immigrants, the ill, widows and orphans, this criticism falls flat. In fact, I'd venture the church spends more money on these things individually than abortion prevention.
  - the_only_law 4y ago
    Yes I'm sure a Methodist pastor was preaching that to the Pope.
    - anon291 4y ago
      I mean... he's preaching to anyone claiming to be pro-life in general.
  - x3n0ph3n3 4y ago
    This is very squarely pointed at protestants.
mistrial9 4y ago
as you know, the thinking is that it is a community of people who gather to bless the union of one man and one woman, again and again, that is the way that children are born and raised, to make the community strong. In contrast -- an unrelenting focus on one individual in the rhetoric, is so uniquely American. Isolating the qualities of the pre-born is not the point. It is a cycle of life that includes both parents and their community, that builds the community over time in a typical Christian view. I can't explain a Muslim version of that, but put together, Muslim + Christian represent a substantial portion of all humans on Earth. before you downvote, did I once say that you dear reader, have to participate in this? no, it is a choice. When it is not a choice, that is a root cause for the instant rage that is so common with this topic.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- robotresearcher 4y ago
  The Supreme Court just removed the federal guarantee of that choice, hence the current vigorous debate.
  - happyopossum 4y ago
    What the Supreme Court did was say that if there is to be a federal guarantee of that, Congress has to make it so by passing a law saying as much. That seems kinda reasonable to me?
    - robotresearcher 4y ago
      The position they overturned was that the freedom was guaranteed by the 14th amendment of the US Constitution, which was passed by Congress.
      - btilly 4y ago
        That isn't how amendments are made. They have to pass Congress and the Senate with a 2/3 majority and then be ratified by 3/4 of the states. Congress alone can't change the Consitution.
luxuryballs 4y ago
I think the “life begins” argument is overly reductive, some would argue you’re killing something by cutting off the supply of life that would otherwise be expected to play out (like plucking a seedling), that’s why they have exceptions for “danger to mother’s life”.
- hombre_fatal 4y ago
  It also seems like a distraction. The real argument seems to be around when does it make sense to end another life. For example, we don’t tend to believe that it never makes sense.
elil17 4y ago
I'll just add that many people who are pro-choice believe that the issue of whether a fetus is a person is irrelevant. You would have the legal right to back out of donating a kidney, even if you already agreed to do it and it would save someone's life. Similarly, the argument goes, you should have the legal right to have an abortion (or at least induce labor, if viability is possible) at any point during a pregnancy.
- gruez 4y ago
  >You would have the legal right to back out of donating a kidney, even if you already agreed to do it and it would save someone's life. Similarly, the argument goes, you should have the legal right to have an abortion (or at least induce labor, if viability is possible) at any point during a pregnancy. that's not really a good analogy because prior to donating the kidney, the kidney recipient isn't dependent on your kidneys, whereas at the moment of conception the zygote/fetus is dependent on the mother's body. A better analogy would be being able to take back the kidney after it's been donated, although that's also flawed because you're not really giving anything up when you're getting aborted.
  - kelseyfrog 4y ago
    Point-in-time viability isn't the idea behind the analogy. The point the poster is making is that the continued ability to live into the indefinite future is what is contingent.
- derac 4y ago
  It should be noted that this is a rare and unpopular opinion. The overwhelming majority of people are going to be disgusted by a 32 week abortion on either side of the issue.
  - micromacrofoot 4y ago
    The comment you're replying to didn't make a week-based distinction, just that the "personhood" claim of a fetus is irrelevant to whether or not an abortion is legal. Personally I'd just prefer to base it on fetal viability (which was the standard). That's roughly 25 weeks or so (some variation and debate). If a fetus were to come non-viable after that, or endanger the mother, I think that should be back on the table too.
danaris 4y ago
- worik 4y ago
  > Corpses have more bodily autonomy than women after Dobbs. They are leaving the corpses in peace. Women's bodies are a battle ground now. "Her body, the state's ovaries"
  - BlargMcLarg 4y ago
    That's bodies in general. This isn't unique to women.
    - worik 4y ago
      Men's bodies are not a battleground. There is no law against vasectomies.
- cloutchaser 4y ago
  If you neglect your 1 year old they die you are responsible. In fact, if you neglect a 17 year old and they die it can also still be your fault.
- happyopossum 4y ago
  Women don't 'give up their organs' in the course of a normal birth...
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- zajio1am 4y ago
  Well, there is draft, which (in case of a war) forces people to risk their life and health with much higher risk and for longer time than a pregnancy. And also there are bans on euthanasia, which just make people suffer for nothing.
- bdowling 4y ago
gruez 4y ago
>Even saying that "life" begins at conception is tenuous. Gametes (sperm and egg cells) are "alive" in that they carry out the same cellular functions that other living cells carry out. The standard argument here is that an implanted egg left undisturbed will eventually grow into a human, whereas sperm/egg floating around wouldn't.
- rcoveson 4y ago
  Sperm are floating around in the vicinity of eggs before fertilization. If left undisturbed, fertilization will occur. Many methods of birth control disrupt that sperm/egg interaction. It's not all that dissimilar from disrupting some intracellular interaction, or some other intercellular interaction, to prevent a fertilized embryo from replicating or implanting. Sperm+unfertilized egg mixtures in a uterus are on the path to life. For that matter, mixtures of uneducated teenagers will, if undisturbed, make a whole bunch of babies.
  - anon291 4y ago
    Sperm and eggs cannot grow or divide further, which is a fundamental requirement to being alive (the ability to grow). They can only do so on the context of fusing together at which point a diploid organism is created, which seems to be a requirement for human individuals. If you know of a case of a conscious haploid human being please inform us now
    - tomrod 4y ago
      Parthenogenesis is uncommon but not impossible in eggs. We might have record of it happening once for humans in some holy writ, though the baby was considered male, which if genetically male would be impossible for parthenogenesis but not necessarily if the case were simply phenotypically male (like a female hyena). Certainly that story is more common in the US than other similarly derived folklore and myths, like Athena (female, so parthenogenesis is a potential).
      - anon291 4y ago
rayiner 4y ago
There are complicated moral issues at the "zygote" stage, as you mention. But the article clearly shows that the vast majority of the developed world--most of those countries being far less religious than the U.S.--has achieved a moral consensus around the beginning of the second trimester, 12-14 weeks. (Incidentally, that's also around the point that much of the Islamic world believes that a baby gains a soul.) The immediate political debate in the U.S. isn't about zygotes, but rather fetuses. The Dobbs case involved Mississippi's 15-week ban. Under Roe, states cannot ban elective abortions even at 15 weeks. At 15 weeks, the baby is a fetus, it has hands, feet, a face, and thumbs that it can suck. https://visitantlit.com/2012/11/19/pregnancy-week-15 https://visitantlit.com/2012/11/19/pregnancy-week-15. Most of the developed world has deemed that a human life at that stage warrants a certain level of protection. Most of the developed world acknowledges that society has a right to intervene after that point. Even if they recognize exceptions to that rule, they simultaneously recognize that society has a right to protect those lives and a good reason is required to extinguish them. For example in liberal and non-religious Denmark, abortions after 12 weeks require unanimous approval of a special committee, with an appeals process that kicks the decision up to the Ministry of Justice: https://abortion-clinics.eu/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Denmark_Pub_AbortionlegislationinEuropeIPPFEN_Feb2009.pdf https://abortion-clinics.eu/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Denma...
- czzr 4y ago
  This is true, but omits the fact that several states have or are contemplating even more extreme measures - such as 6 weeks or earlier, or total bans.
  - zaphar 4y ago
    In a sense, the refusal of most of American media to even give airtime to the discussion of when a fetus should gain rights/protections is why such extreme measures are being on the table. They painted this as a binary issue with no nuance or even discussion as regards the status of an unborn fetus so the reaction has been similarly binary with total lack of nuance.
    - 4y ago
zzzeek 4y ago
with all due respect your religious beliefs are irrelevant to the discussion and have no place in a discussion about people's rights to health care being revoked by an unelected minority.
- csours 4y ago
  People vote based on their beliefs. It's not common for people to separate their beliefs based on how they came to believe them. That is: I got my morals and beliefs and political leanings from the people I'm around, and there's not a clear demarcation in my mind between them.
- gruez 4y ago
  >in a discussion about people's rights to health care being revoked by an unelected minority. I don't know, this seems like a "live by the sword, die by the sword" situation to me. Either you recognize the authority of the "unelected minority", or you don't. You can't support their legitimacy when it suits you, and oppose their legitimacy when it doesn't.
  - zzzeek 4y ago
    and that's why most of the Republican party tried to overthrow the election in 2020, including the wife of Clarence Thomas who continued to rule on cases relevant to the overthrow attempt. Spare me the lecturing. not to mention Mitch McConnell stole a supreme court seat.
    - gruez 4y ago
      >and that's why most of the Republican party tried to overthrow the election in 2020 including the wife of Clarence Thomas who continued to rule on cases relevant to the overthrow attempt 1. Can you link to some cases where you believe that the court has ruled inappropriately? 2. even if we somehow accept that Thomas should be disqualified from serving, the ruling would still be 5-3 in support of overturning it. >not to mention Mitch McConnell stole a supreme court seat. explain.
kansface 4y ago
> Is a zygote more alive than the gametes that came together to form it? Uh, life sure, but human life? If human life doesn't start at conception, when?
- soperj 4y ago
  at conception it's just a cell. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zygote#/media/File:Zygote1.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zygote#/media/File:Zygote1.jpg I don't think anyone would mistake that for a human life.
  - Dove 4y ago
    I would call a zygote a human life. A zygote has a critical feature that no other cell has: if you don't kill it, it will someday love and suffer and have opinions and work and play and seek the meaning of life. Humans are rarely fully human at any given moment. They sleep, during which they lose the critical characteristic of consciousness. They go insane, during which they lose the critical characteristic of intelligence or reason. They suffer the frailties of youth, during which they are dumber and weaker than many animals. They suffer the frailties of age, during which the same is true. They suffer injury and disability. They suffer under privation and oppression and abuse and fail to develop as they should. None of these things prevent them from being human. The eugenecists of the early 20th century were scientists. They didn't say the negro was subhuman out of sheer bigotry; they tested the hypothesis. They gave IQ tests and the results were clear -- but they were testing victims of abuse and privation. Were they right to look at the man as he was, at that moment? They were not. The true understanding of the value of a human being transcends the current circumstance and looks at the whole of life and the whole of potential. It respects what happened in the past and what will happen tomorrow. It respects what could happen with healing, or in a generation. Sperm are cells. They do cell things. But that zygote - if you protect it - is a creature that will some day write essays. That's why it's human. That's the difference.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
cloutchaser 4y ago
In my country no politician will bring up the issue because it's so toxic, for all sides. You can't win and you will lose votes. We have abortions up to 12 weeks. Honestly, I think this is a good situation. It's a super divisive issue and there is no need to argue about it. Christians here accept that most abortions would take place illegally and endanger the mother if it was banned. It's swept under the rug. Pro abortion people think 12 weeks is ok, I mean you probably know youre pregnant by then. It works. Everyone stays the fuck away from the issue. I look at the US and think its fucking insane how this issue is being used politically by everyone. It's a terrible issue to make political. And frankly it is the supreme courts fault, as Ruth Ginsberg herself said. The court allowing abortions full stop meant one side won. No questions, no discussion. That is not how a normal society works. You can't ignore all pro life people and say abortions allowed up to birth. It's ridiculous and undemocratic.
- worik 4y ago
  > It works. Everyone stays the fuck away from the issue. Until they do not. Legality is a big help for women. In a nod and wink, illegal but permitted regime women's health care is in danger of the political whims of law enforcement disrupting it. Legality is not perfect protection against the misogynist brigade, but it is definitely a help.
- MikeTheGreat 4y ago
  Just to be clear - the elil17's statement that "Similarly, the argument goes, you should have the legal right to have an abortion (or at least induce labor, if viability is possible) at any point during a pregnancy." is not the normal/typical pro-choice position (at least here in the US). In fact, that statement is so far from the normal/typical pro-choice position that I seriously wonder if elil17 is trying to troll us (it's possible they're not, and I can never know what they're really thinking, but if I was trying to divide a group of people using a hot-button issue here in 2022 the way I'd do it is to post something that's like 80% reasonable sounding and then ends with something that'll get "the other side" riled up). It's worth pointing out that this isn't accurate either: "You can't ignore all pro life people and say abortions allowed up to birth". Wikipedia even says that here in the United States "The [Supreme] Court also held that the right to abortion is not absolute and must be balanced against the government's interests in protecting women's health and prenatal life" (from the 'Roe v. Wade' article) Wikipedia has two citations to support that. I can't decipher the citations myself - I think they might be court cases: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roe_v._Wade#cite_note-FOOTNOTENowakRotunda2012%C2%A7 18.29(a)(i)-5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roe_v._Wade#cite_note-FOOTNOTE...
lettergram 4y ago
I tend to err on the side of libertarianism. Everyone can govern hyper locally, why impose your view on others. That avoids much of the conflict. I think in this particular issue, the challenge is both sides view it as a global issue and they aren discussing on the same terms. On the one hand life does begin at conception, it’s a scientific fact. The question is whether or not it’s worthy of societies protection. One view is that creation and life should be protected at high cost. The other world view believes either their life matters above others OR society is better without certain life. Listen to the arguments, that’s what it boils down to. Quality of life, career, mental fitness, problems with the fetus, removing genes from the pool — it’s eugenics. I personally pass no moral judgement, to your point, I see both world views. However, it’s painful to watch people not recognize what it is. The discussions aren’t even framed properly; everyone just talks past one another.
- dwallin 4y ago
  It's seems like absolute bodily autonomy would be an extremely libertarian position. You can't get more hyper local than that.
  - lettergram 4y ago
    Interesting you should say that, what about the other body? Are we okay killing dependents? I don’t think it’s as cut and dry.
    - WaxProlix 4y ago
      From a libertarian perspective, if someone is dependent on you for food and shelter, what compels you to continue to provide those? There's no moral burden to help someone else, as they have no claim over your resources. Choosing not to supply a fetus with your nutrients and hormones - the result of hard work, fruits of your labour - is totally in line with my understanding of libertarianism.
      - lettergram 4y ago
jliptzin 4y ago
The way I see it, the issue of abortion is obviously one of the most controversial things out there, some people think it’s baby murder, other people think it’s no big deal. With something so controversial, why not just let the person who is carrying the baby decide for themselves? You might think a mom is killing her baby, but she might not. Just let her decide for herself. Forcing people one way or another is a terrible solution. Pretty ironic for a party that loves to claim they’re all about personal freedoms and small government.
- BitwiseFool 4y ago
  >"Pretty ironic for a party that loves to claim they’re all about personal freedoms and small government." This kind of sentiment is overly reductive and misses the point. No proponent of small government wants a government so ineffective that it cannot have laws against murder. I personally don't believe abortion is murder, but many people do, and they're not so libertarian as to "live and let live" on such a topic. I wanted to chime in because I really dislike the fallacy of 'you claim to like personal freedom and small government, but you want the government to enforce laws you support? Curious...'
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - jliptzin 4y ago
    Most of them don’t actually believe abortion is murder though. They give their hand away pretty easily. If they thought abortion were murder, why are they also against contraceptive use? Over a quarter of all pregnancies end in miscarriage - far more than the number of voluntary abortions - why are they doing nothing to reduce that number? Maybe there could be mandatory pregnancy testing once a month to check if a woman is pregnant, and then intervene with drugs or behavioral guidance to maybe help avoid a miscarriage. Maybe more research is needed there, which they are not doing. And if abortion is murder, why make an exception for rape or incest? It’s not the baby’s fault it is the product of rape or incest - how does murdering a baby make a rape any better? Two wrongs don’t make a right.
it_citizen 4y ago
I am bit puzzled by how much focus we put on where life begins. The reasoning seems to be: 1) Ending a human being life is wrong 2) A foetus is a human being 3) Therefore abortion is wrong. It seems much more interesting to me to wonder: Is ending a life always morally wrong? Not saying I have the answer, I just find the question interesting.
- Buttons840 4y ago
  And also, to what extent do we want to enforce our morals on others. If 20% of the population believe in a moral principle, should it be enforced on all? How about 50%, 80%, or 99%?
- setuids 4y ago
  I feel like that has sort of been asked already, in the context of abortions for women who have been raped/ are in danger. There's quite a few places that allow abortion only in those circumstances, and the reasoning behind that is usually that "fetuses are human, but in these cases the fetus can be killed because it threatens the women/ the women did not consent". While an interesting avenue to explore, for the general debate it is less useful that discussing when life begins.
COGlory 4y ago
You have missed the essential argument: The claim is that "someone ELSE's life begins at conception". Obviously all cells are alive, but they are your own until they become a new human being. Once that new human being is created, it's no longer your decision to make. At least, that's the moral argument being proposed.
diob 4y ago
Isn't abortion mentioned in the bible as okay though?
- fknorangesite 4y ago
  People sometimes interpret Numbers 5:11-31 as, among other things, instructions on conducting an abortion. Though that's admittedly unclear. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordeal_of_the_bitter_water https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordeal_of_the_bitter_water
  - ars 4y ago
    Yes, it's not about an abortion, it's done before she's pregnant, not after. It's about adultery, and the penalty is death for the participants.
- judah 4y ago
  No. In the Hebrew Bible, Exodus 21, a man who inadvertently causes either a miscarriage or premature birth (the wording is uncertain) is liable for punishment by fine. How much more so someone who deliberately kills an unborn child? The early Christian communities also forbade abortion based on the Biblical idea of preservation of life. The Didache, an early Christian writing circa 70-100 AD, forbids abortion[0]: > "Do no murder children through abortion nor kill them after they have been born." And this should not be surprising, as Christianity was birthed from Judaism, and Judaism forbids abortion in all but extreme cases.[1] [0]: https://blog.judahgabriel.com/2022/07/what-did-early-christian-communities.html https://blog.judahgabriel.com/2022/07/what-did-early-christi... [1]: https://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/39015/is-a-jew-permitted-to-have-an-abortion https://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/39015/is-a-jew-p...
  - ars 4y ago
    The Bible makes it clear that killing an unborn child is not the same as killing someone after they are born - the penalty is monetary vs capital. That doesn't in the slightest mean the Bible permits abortion, but it does mean the Bible views abortion different than murder.
tsimionescu 4y ago
It's important to note that whether this is sinful or not completely irrelevant to whether it should be illegal. The fact that so many Christians don't see this obvious fact is frankly disturbing - as is the fact that organizations like the Catholic Church are engaged in trying to push such theocratic ideas. There are many huge sins that are perfectly legal. For example, eating pork, killing cows, and working on the Sabbath are much worse sins according to their respective religions, and yet they are perfectly legal activities. For legal matters, the only thing that matters is balancing the rights of one individual with the rights of everyone else, and with the good of society of large. From all of these points of view, allowing access to early term abortion is a clear net win, even if it infringes on the rights of a kinda sorta potential person (the fetus). As the fetus gets closer to being an actual person, the equation changes.
- FranchuFranchu 4y ago
  > whether this is sinful or not completely irrelevant to whether it should be illegal Unless your country has an official religion. Making the sins of that specific religion illegal would not not make sense there.
- nostromo 4y ago
  I hear this a lot, but even as an atheist I think you're making a bad argument. Murder is a sin in most (all?) religions. It's also against the law. It's not against the law because it's a sin. It's against the law because it violates another person's rights. Some people view abortion in the same light. They think you're killing a person and they think that should be illegal. And, yes, even lots of atheists like me get increasingly uncomfortable with abortions after the first trimester. And it's not because of any religious doctrine. I think your argument was much better suited for an issue like gay marriage where -- no matter how you look at it -- nobody's rights were being violated, and it was entirely based on religious doctrine and tradition.
  - whatshisface 4y ago
    There are plenty of people who think that sin should be illegal. They just don't post on HN.
NikolaNovak 4y ago
I'm 44 years old; and found a article recently that completely transformed my perspective: FORGET when life begins. It's a red herring. A distraction causing us to diverge rather than agree. Right now, today, there are countless people needing blood transfusions; but I'm not legally forced to donate my blood to them (I should; it would be great; it would be the right thing to do; but I'm not legally forced to do so). Right now, today, there are people needing bone marrow or organs; or would like eggs or sperm so they can have a child; or long hair for wigs for cancer-struck; but I'm not legally forced to donate them to these clearly worthy causes. Lest somebody tries to muddle the issue, I'm also not required to donate blood or organs to my two children, or my sibling, or my spouse; I should, and I likely would, but I'm not legally forced. .... So even IF we grant that a gamete or zygote or 4 cells or 6 weeks old fetus or whatever are live beings based on whatever definition we agree or fail to agree on; what rational differentiator would cause us to force a woman to donate blood and organs, sacrifice and risk their health for them? I may have come to this point late, this may be an old perspective to others, but it helped me shortcut a tremendous number of complex and relative arguments, and go back to - "it's a woman's body; where do we get off forcing her to donate it to anybody else?" At the same time, I must admit I now find it harder to understand and condone the opposing perspective; I see it as forced organ donation for a select subgroup of humanity, and while I'm a moral relativist, that doesn't mean that I don't find some things morally wrong :-/
- rayiner 4y ago
  > .... So even IF we grant that a gamete or zygote or 4 cells or 6 weeks old fetus or whatever are live beings based on whatever definition we agree or fail to agree on; what rational differentiator would cause us to force a woman to donate blood and organs, sacrifice and risk their health for them? Because the moral obligations of mothers (and parents generally) to their children are different than the moral obligations surrounding blood donations or anything else. If you said that fathers have a moral obligation to sacrifice their bodies and lives for their kids, either in providing for them or in war, most of the people who oppose abortions would agree with you.
  - NikolaNovak 4y ago
thepasswordis 4y ago
It is absolutely frustrating to me that people are trying to say that pro life people are coming to the conclusion due to their religion. I'm sure some people are, but the idea that the only way you can derive ideas like "human life has worth" is from religion feels like a huge step backwards.
- corrral 4y ago
  I'm pro-choice but every time I read an online thread on the topic I spend the whole time face-palming over "my side's" bad arguments and total failure to understand pro-lifers' positions. It's actually not the only topic on which I think it'd be a lot easier to work as a conservative operative or pundit crafting or delivering arguments against what I believe, than as a liberal operative doing the same in favor of what I believe. I'm not sure if that's true for a lot of people regardless of their beliefs—that is, that it's just way easier to argue something you don't actually believe, in general, so there are also some conservatives on the other side going "man, it'd be so much easier to argue for liberal positions"—or something about the level of nuance or whatever required to vigorously defend current liberal positions versus the difficulty of defending current conservative positions. Hard to judge which is the case, for me at least.
nus07 4y ago
One of the best things I read recently was how a woman in Texas drove on the HOV lane arguing that because she was 2 months pregnant it was more than one person in the car by how Texas law defines a fetus as a person. And further how this will have implications on health insurance companies because suddenly a pregnant woman is not one person but two people and so what can insurance cover and what it cannot . It’s both fascinating and a disaster. .
- ars 4y ago
  For health insurance benefits a pregnant woman already counts as two people, so it changes nothing at all. There's no disaster here, just a funny story.
  - corrral 4y ago
    I'm... pretty sure that's not true. For one thing, I can't ever recall having to enroll a child with insurance or having them on any of our insurance cards before they were born. They are, in a sense, covered, but not in the same sense they are after they're born.
- bongoman37 4y ago
tablespoon 4y ago
> Even saying that "life" begins at conception is tenuous. Gametes (sperm and egg cells) are "alive" in that they carry out the same cellular functions that other living cells carry out. Is a zygote more alive than the gametes that came together to form it? I don't know what they actually think, but it seems "life" in that sense might actually be a bit too fuzzy. Gametes are alive, but, for lack of a better term, they're not exactly human. Fertilization is the discrete event that creates an identifiable individual human life. Before that, you have cells that are created and die as a matter of course. After that, you have a more-or-less continuous process of development of an identifiable human organism. > I would ask that you consider if another person's sincerely held beliefs may be valid when they contradict this point of view. I think this goes for all sides. One of the major societal breakdowns regarding this that many people seem to think that they don't need to do that, and prefer instead to consider strawmen that reinforce their personal sense of righteousness.
norwalkbear 4y ago
You actually don't have the empathy you think you do. If Christians think abortion is child murder, then of course they SHOULD do everything in their power to stop it. Honestly the article shows even Europe wouldn't approve of American Abortion. So it's clear this is more than a religious issue and more of an existential one.

by csours 4y ago

x3n0ph3n3 4y ago

anon291 4y ago
Given that the largest global pro life organization, the Catholic church, engaged in pointed efforts to outreach prisoners, immigrants, the ill, widows and orphans, this criticism falls flat. In fact, I'd venture the church spends more money on these things individually than abortion prevention.
- the_only_law 4y ago
  Yes I'm sure a Methodist pastor was preaching that to the Pope.
  - anon291 4y ago
    I mean... he's preaching to anyone claiming to be pro-life in general.
- x3n0ph3n3 4y ago
  This is very squarely pointed at protestants.

mistrial9 4y ago

as you know, the thinking is that it is a community of people who gather to bless the union of one man and one woman, again and again, that is the way that children are born and raised, to make the community strong. In contrast -- an unrelenting focus on one individual in the rhetoric, is so uniquely American. Isolating the qualities of the pre-born is not the point. It is a cycle of life that includes both parents and their community, that builds the community over time in a typical Christian view. I can't explain a Muslim version of that, but put together, Muslim + Christian represent a substantial portion of all humans on Earth. before you downvote, did I once say that you dear reader, have to participate in this? no, it is a choice. When it is not a choice, that is a root cause for the instant rage that is so common with this topic.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
robotresearcher 4y ago
The Supreme Court just removed the federal guarantee of that choice, hence the current vigorous debate.
- happyopossum 4y ago
  What the Supreme Court did was say that if there is to be a federal guarantee of that, Congress has to make it so by passing a law saying as much. That seems kinda reasonable to me?
  - robotresearcher 4y ago
    The position they overturned was that the freedom was guaranteed by the 14th amendment of the US Constitution, which was passed by Congress.
    - btilly 4y ago
      That isn't how amendments are made. They have to pass Congress and the Senate with a 2/3 majority and then be ratified by 3/4 of the states. Congress alone can't change the Consitution.

luxuryballs 4y ago

I think the “life begins” argument is overly reductive, some would argue you’re killing something by cutting off the supply of life that would otherwise be expected to play out (like plucking a seedling), that’s why they have exceptions for “danger to mother’s life”.

hombre_fatal 4y ago
It also seems like a distraction. The real argument seems to be around when does it make sense to end another life. For example, we don’t tend to believe that it never makes sense.

elil17 4y ago

I'll just add that many people who are pro-choice believe that the issue of whether a fetus is a person is irrelevant. You would have the legal right to back out of donating a kidney, even if you already agreed to do it and it would save someone's life. Similarly, the argument goes, you should have the legal right to have an abortion (or at least induce labor, if viability is possible) at any point during a pregnancy.

gruez 4y ago
>You would have the legal right to back out of donating a kidney, even if you already agreed to do it and it would save someone's life. Similarly, the argument goes, you should have the legal right to have an abortion (or at least induce labor, if viability is possible) at any point during a pregnancy. that's not really a good analogy because prior to donating the kidney, the kidney recipient isn't dependent on your kidneys, whereas at the moment of conception the zygote/fetus is dependent on the mother's body. A better analogy would be being able to take back the kidney after it's been donated, although that's also flawed because you're not really giving anything up when you're getting aborted.
- kelseyfrog 4y ago
  Point-in-time viability isn't the idea behind the analogy. The point the poster is making is that the continued ability to live into the indefinite future is what is contingent.
derac 4y ago
It should be noted that this is a rare and unpopular opinion. The overwhelming majority of people are going to be disgusted by a 32 week abortion on either side of the issue.
- micromacrofoot 4y ago
  The comment you're replying to didn't make a week-based distinction, just that the "personhood" claim of a fetus is irrelevant to whether or not an abortion is legal. Personally I'd just prefer to base it on fetal viability (which was the standard). That's roughly 25 weeks or so (some variation and debate). If a fetus were to come non-viable after that, or endanger the mother, I think that should be back on the table too.

danaris 4y ago

worik 4y ago
> Corpses have more bodily autonomy than women after Dobbs. They are leaving the corpses in peace. Women's bodies are a battle ground now. "Her body, the state's ovaries"
- BlargMcLarg 4y ago
  That's bodies in general. This isn't unique to women.
  - worik 4y ago
    Men's bodies are not a battleground. There is no law against vasectomies.
cloutchaser 4y ago
If you neglect your 1 year old they die you are responsible. In fact, if you neglect a 17 year old and they die it can also still be your fault.
happyopossum 4y ago
Women don't 'give up their organs' in the course of a normal birth...
deleted 4y ago
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zajio1am 4y ago
Well, there is draft, which (in case of a war) forces people to risk their life and health with much higher risk and for longer time than a pregnancy. And also there are bans on euthanasia, which just make people suffer for nothing.
bdowling 4y ago

gruez 4y ago

>Even saying that "life" begins at conception is tenuous. Gametes (sperm and egg cells) are "alive" in that they carry out the same cellular functions that other living cells carry out. The standard argument here is that an implanted egg left undisturbed will eventually grow into a human, whereas sperm/egg floating around wouldn't.

rcoveson 4y ago
Sperm are floating around in the vicinity of eggs before fertilization. If left undisturbed, fertilization will occur. Many methods of birth control disrupt that sperm/egg interaction. It's not all that dissimilar from disrupting some intracellular interaction, or some other intercellular interaction, to prevent a fertilized embryo from replicating or implanting. Sperm+unfertilized egg mixtures in a uterus are on the path to life. For that matter, mixtures of uneducated teenagers will, if undisturbed, make a whole bunch of babies.
- anon291 4y ago
  Sperm and eggs cannot grow or divide further, which is a fundamental requirement to being alive (the ability to grow). They can only do so on the context of fusing together at which point a diploid organism is created, which seems to be a requirement for human individuals. If you know of a case of a conscious haploid human being please inform us now
  - tomrod 4y ago
    Parthenogenesis is uncommon but not impossible in eggs. We might have record of it happening once for humans in some holy writ, though the baby was considered male, which if genetically male would be impossible for parthenogenesis but not necessarily if the case were simply phenotypically male (like a female hyena). Certainly that story is more common in the US than other similarly derived folklore and myths, like Athena (female, so parthenogenesis is a potential).
    - anon291 4y ago

rayiner 4y ago

There are complicated moral issues at the "zygote" stage, as you mention. But the article clearly shows that the vast majority of the developed world--most of those countries being far less religious than the U.S.--has achieved a moral consensus around the beginning of the second trimester, 12-14 weeks. (Incidentally, that's also around the point that much of the Islamic world believes that a baby gains a soul.) The immediate political debate in the U.S. isn't about zygotes, but rather fetuses. The Dobbs case involved Mississippi's 15-week ban. Under Roe, states cannot ban elective abortions even at 15 weeks. At 15 weeks, the baby is a fetus, it has hands, feet, a face, and thumbs that it can suck. https://visitantlit.com/2012/11/19/pregnancy-week-15 https://visitantlit.com/2012/11/19/pregnancy-week-15. Most of the developed world has deemed that a human life at that stage warrants a certain level of protection. Most of the developed world acknowledges that society has a right to intervene after that point. Even if they recognize exceptions to that rule, they simultaneously recognize that society has a right to protect those lives and a good reason is required to extinguish them. For example in liberal and non-religious Denmark, abortions after 12 weeks require unanimous approval of a special committee, with an appeals process that kicks the decision up to the Ministry of Justice: https://abortion-clinics.eu/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Denmark_Pub_AbortionlegislationinEuropeIPPFEN_Feb2009.pdf https://abortion-clinics.eu/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Denma...

czzr 4y ago
This is true, but omits the fact that several states have or are contemplating even more extreme measures - such as 6 weeks or earlier, or total bans.
- zaphar 4y ago
  In a sense, the refusal of most of American media to even give airtime to the discussion of when a fetus should gain rights/protections is why such extreme measures are being on the table. They painted this as a binary issue with no nuance or even discussion as regards the status of an unborn fetus so the reaction has been similarly binary with total lack of nuance.
  - 4y ago

zzzeek 4y ago

with all due respect your religious beliefs are irrelevant to the discussion and have no place in a discussion about people's rights to health care being revoked by an unelected minority.

csours 4y ago
People vote based on their beliefs. It's not common for people to separate their beliefs based on how they came to believe them. That is: I got my morals and beliefs and political leanings from the people I'm around, and there's not a clear demarcation in my mind between them.
gruez 4y ago
>in a discussion about people's rights to health care being revoked by an unelected minority. I don't know, this seems like a "live by the sword, die by the sword" situation to me. Either you recognize the authority of the "unelected minority", or you don't. You can't support their legitimacy when it suits you, and oppose their legitimacy when it doesn't.
- zzzeek 4y ago
  and that's why most of the Republican party tried to overthrow the election in 2020, including the wife of Clarence Thomas who continued to rule on cases relevant to the overthrow attempt. Spare me the lecturing. not to mention Mitch McConnell stole a supreme court seat.
  - gruez 4y ago
    >and that's why most of the Republican party tried to overthrow the election in 2020 including the wife of Clarence Thomas who continued to rule on cases relevant to the overthrow attempt 1. Can you link to some cases where you believe that the court has ruled inappropriately? 2. even if we somehow accept that Thomas should be disqualified from serving, the ruling would still be 5-3 in support of overturning it. >not to mention Mitch McConnell stole a supreme court seat. explain.

kansface 4y ago

> Is a zygote more alive than the gametes that came together to form it? Uh, life sure, but human life? If human life doesn't start at conception, when?

soperj 4y ago
at conception it's just a cell. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zygote#/media/File:Zygote1.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zygote#/media/File:Zygote1.jpg I don't think anyone would mistake that for a human life.
- Dove 4y ago
  I would call a zygote a human life. A zygote has a critical feature that no other cell has: if you don't kill it, it will someday love and suffer and have opinions and work and play and seek the meaning of life. Humans are rarely fully human at any given moment. They sleep, during which they lose the critical characteristic of consciousness. They go insane, during which they lose the critical characteristic of intelligence or reason. They suffer the frailties of youth, during which they are dumber and weaker than many animals. They suffer the frailties of age, during which the same is true. They suffer injury and disability. They suffer under privation and oppression and abuse and fail to develop as they should. None of these things prevent them from being human. The eugenecists of the early 20th century were scientists. They didn't say the negro was subhuman out of sheer bigotry; they tested the hypothesis. They gave IQ tests and the results were clear -- but they were testing victims of abuse and privation. Were they right to look at the man as he was, at that moment? They were not. The true understanding of the value of a human being transcends the current circumstance and looks at the whole of life and the whole of potential. It respects what happened in the past and what will happen tomorrow. It respects what could happen with healing, or in a generation. Sperm are cells. They do cell things. But that zygote - if you protect it - is a creature that will some day write essays. That's why it's human. That's the difference.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]

cloutchaser 4y ago

In my country no politician will bring up the issue because it's so toxic, for all sides. You can't win and you will lose votes. We have abortions up to 12 weeks. Honestly, I think this is a good situation. It's a super divisive issue and there is no need to argue about it. Christians here accept that most abortions would take place illegally and endanger the mother if it was banned. It's swept under the rug. Pro abortion people think 12 weeks is ok, I mean you probably know youre pregnant by then. It works. Everyone stays the fuck away from the issue. I look at the US and think its fucking insane how this issue is being used politically by everyone. It's a terrible issue to make political. And frankly it is the supreme courts fault, as Ruth Ginsberg herself said. The court allowing abortions full stop meant one side won. No questions, no discussion. That is not how a normal society works. You can't ignore all pro life people and say abortions allowed up to birth. It's ridiculous and undemocratic.

worik 4y ago
> It works. Everyone stays the fuck away from the issue. Until they do not. Legality is a big help for women. In a nod and wink, illegal but permitted regime women's health care is in danger of the political whims of law enforcement disrupting it. Legality is not perfect protection against the misogynist brigade, but it is definitely a help.
MikeTheGreat 4y ago
Just to be clear - the elil17's statement that "Similarly, the argument goes, you should have the legal right to have an abortion (or at least induce labor, if viability is possible) at any point during a pregnancy." is not the normal/typical pro-choice position (at least here in the US). In fact, that statement is so far from the normal/typical pro-choice position that I seriously wonder if elil17 is trying to troll us (it's possible they're not, and I can never know what they're really thinking, but if I was trying to divide a group of people using a hot-button issue here in 2022 the way I'd do it is to post something that's like 80% reasonable sounding and then ends with something that'll get "the other side" riled up). It's worth pointing out that this isn't accurate either: "You can't ignore all pro life people and say abortions allowed up to birth". Wikipedia even says that here in the United States "The [Supreme] Court also held that the right to abortion is not absolute and must be balanced against the government's interests in protecting women's health and prenatal life" (from the 'Roe v. Wade' article) Wikipedia has two citations to support that. I can't decipher the citations myself - I think they might be court cases: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roe_v._Wade#cite_note-FOOTNOTENowakRotunda2012%C2%A7 18.29(a)(i)-5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roe_v._Wade#cite_note-FOOTNOTE...

lettergram 4y ago

I tend to err on the side of libertarianism. Everyone can govern hyper locally, why impose your view on others. That avoids much of the conflict. I think in this particular issue, the challenge is both sides view it as a global issue and they aren discussing on the same terms. On the one hand life does begin at conception, it’s a scientific fact. The question is whether or not it’s worthy of societies protection. One view is that creation and life should be protected at high cost. The other world view believes either their life matters above others OR society is better without certain life. Listen to the arguments, that’s what it boils down to. Quality of life, career, mental fitness, problems with the fetus, removing genes from the pool — it’s eugenics. I personally pass no moral judgement, to your point, I see both world views. However, it’s painful to watch people not recognize what it is. The discussions aren’t even framed properly; everyone just talks past one another.

dwallin 4y ago
It's seems like absolute bodily autonomy would be an extremely libertarian position. You can't get more hyper local than that.
- lettergram 4y ago
  Interesting you should say that, what about the other body? Are we okay killing dependents? I don’t think it’s as cut and dry.
  - WaxProlix 4y ago
    From a libertarian perspective, if someone is dependent on you for food and shelter, what compels you to continue to provide those? There's no moral burden to help someone else, as they have no claim over your resources. Choosing not to supply a fetus with your nutrients and hormones - the result of hard work, fruits of your labour - is totally in line with my understanding of libertarianism.
    - lettergram 4y ago

jliptzin 4y ago

The way I see it, the issue of abortion is obviously one of the most controversial things out there, some people think it’s baby murder, other people think it’s no big deal. With something so controversial, why not just let the person who is carrying the baby decide for themselves? You might think a mom is killing her baby, but she might not. Just let her decide for herself. Forcing people one way or another is a terrible solution. Pretty ironic for a party that loves to claim they’re all about personal freedoms and small government.

BitwiseFool 4y ago
>"Pretty ironic for a party that loves to claim they’re all about personal freedoms and small government." This kind of sentiment is overly reductive and misses the point. No proponent of small government wants a government so ineffective that it cannot have laws against murder. I personally don't believe abortion is murder, but many people do, and they're not so libertarian as to "live and let live" on such a topic. I wanted to chime in because I really dislike the fallacy of 'you claim to like personal freedom and small government, but you want the government to enforce laws you support? Curious...'
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- jliptzin 4y ago
  Most of them don’t actually believe abortion is murder though. They give their hand away pretty easily. If they thought abortion were murder, why are they also against contraceptive use? Over a quarter of all pregnancies end in miscarriage - far more than the number of voluntary abortions - why are they doing nothing to reduce that number? Maybe there could be mandatory pregnancy testing once a month to check if a woman is pregnant, and then intervene with drugs or behavioral guidance to maybe help avoid a miscarriage. Maybe more research is needed there, which they are not doing. And if abortion is murder, why make an exception for rape or incest? It’s not the baby’s fault it is the product of rape or incest - how does murdering a baby make a rape any better? Two wrongs don’t make a right.

it_citizen 4y ago

I am bit puzzled by how much focus we put on where life begins. The reasoning seems to be: 1) Ending a human being life is wrong 2) A foetus is a human being 3) Therefore abortion is wrong. It seems much more interesting to me to wonder: Is ending a life always morally wrong? Not saying I have the answer, I just find the question interesting.

Buttons840 4y ago
And also, to what extent do we want to enforce our morals on others. If 20% of the population believe in a moral principle, should it be enforced on all? How about 50%, 80%, or 99%?
setuids 4y ago
I feel like that has sort of been asked already, in the context of abortions for women who have been raped/ are in danger. There's quite a few places that allow abortion only in those circumstances, and the reasoning behind that is usually that "fetuses are human, but in these cases the fetus can be killed because it threatens the women/ the women did not consent". While an interesting avenue to explore, for the general debate it is less useful that discussing when life begins.

COGlory 4y ago

You have missed the essential argument: The claim is that "someone ELSE's life begins at conception". Obviously all cells are alive, but they are your own until they become a new human being. Once that new human being is created, it's no longer your decision to make. At least, that's the moral argument being proposed.

diob 4y ago

Isn't abortion mentioned in the bible as okay though?

fknorangesite 4y ago
People sometimes interpret Numbers 5:11-31 as, among other things, instructions on conducting an abortion. Though that's admittedly unclear. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordeal_of_the_bitter_water https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordeal_of_the_bitter_water
- ars 4y ago
  Yes, it's not about an abortion, it's done before she's pregnant, not after. It's about adultery, and the penalty is death for the participants.
judah 4y ago
No. In the Hebrew Bible, Exodus 21, a man who inadvertently causes either a miscarriage or premature birth (the wording is uncertain) is liable for punishment by fine. How much more so someone who deliberately kills an unborn child? The early Christian communities also forbade abortion based on the Biblical idea of preservation of life. The Didache, an early Christian writing circa 70-100 AD, forbids abortion[0]: > "Do no murder children through abortion nor kill them after they have been born." And this should not be surprising, as Christianity was birthed from Judaism, and Judaism forbids abortion in all but extreme cases.[1] [0]: https://blog.judahgabriel.com/2022/07/what-did-early-christian-communities.html https://blog.judahgabriel.com/2022/07/what-did-early-christi... [1]: https://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/39015/is-a-jew-permitted-to-have-an-abortion https://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/39015/is-a-jew-p...
- ars 4y ago
  The Bible makes it clear that killing an unborn child is not the same as killing someone after they are born - the penalty is monetary vs capital. That doesn't in the slightest mean the Bible permits abortion, but it does mean the Bible views abortion different than murder.

tsimionescu 4y ago

It's important to note that whether this is sinful or not completely irrelevant to whether it should be illegal. The fact that so many Christians don't see this obvious fact is frankly disturbing - as is the fact that organizations like the Catholic Church are engaged in trying to push such theocratic ideas. There are many huge sins that are perfectly legal. For example, eating pork, killing cows, and working on the Sabbath are much worse sins according to their respective religions, and yet they are perfectly legal activities. For legal matters, the only thing that matters is balancing the rights of one individual with the rights of everyone else, and with the good of society of large. From all of these points of view, allowing access to early term abortion is a clear net win, even if it infringes on the rights of a kinda sorta potential person (the fetus). As the fetus gets closer to being an actual person, the equation changes.

FranchuFranchu 4y ago
> whether this is sinful or not completely irrelevant to whether it should be illegal Unless your country has an official religion. Making the sins of that specific religion illegal would not not make sense there.
nostromo 4y ago
I hear this a lot, but even as an atheist I think you're making a bad argument. Murder is a sin in most (all?) religions. It's also against the law. It's not against the law because it's a sin. It's against the law because it violates another person's rights. Some people view abortion in the same light. They think you're killing a person and they think that should be illegal. And, yes, even lots of atheists like me get increasingly uncomfortable with abortions after the first trimester. And it's not because of any religious doctrine. I think your argument was much better suited for an issue like gay marriage where -- no matter how you look at it -- nobody's rights were being violated, and it was entirely based on religious doctrine and tradition.
- whatshisface 4y ago
  There are plenty of people who think that sin should be illegal. They just don't post on HN.

NikolaNovak 4y ago

I'm 44 years old; and found a article recently that completely transformed my perspective: FORGET when life begins. It's a red herring. A distraction causing us to diverge rather than agree. Right now, today, there are countless people needing blood transfusions; but I'm not legally forced to donate my blood to them (I should; it would be great; it would be the right thing to do; but I'm not legally forced to do so). Right now, today, there are people needing bone marrow or organs; or would like eggs or sperm so they can have a child; or long hair for wigs for cancer-struck; but I'm not legally forced to donate them to these clearly worthy causes. Lest somebody tries to muddle the issue, I'm also not required to donate blood or organs to my two children, or my sibling, or my spouse; I should, and I likely would, but I'm not legally forced. .... So even IF we grant that a gamete or zygote or 4 cells or 6 weeks old fetus or whatever are live beings based on whatever definition we agree or fail to agree on; what rational differentiator would cause us to force a woman to donate blood and organs, sacrifice and risk their health for them? I may have come to this point late, this may be an old perspective to others, but it helped me shortcut a tremendous number of complex and relative arguments, and go back to - "it's a woman's body; where do we get off forcing her to donate it to anybody else?" At the same time, I must admit I now find it harder to understand and condone the opposing perspective; I see it as forced organ donation for a select subgroup of humanity, and while I'm a moral relativist, that doesn't mean that I don't find some things morally wrong :-/

rayiner 4y ago
> .... So even IF we grant that a gamete or zygote or 4 cells or 6 weeks old fetus or whatever are live beings based on whatever definition we agree or fail to agree on; what rational differentiator would cause us to force a woman to donate blood and organs, sacrifice and risk their health for them? Because the moral obligations of mothers (and parents generally) to their children are different than the moral obligations surrounding blood donations or anything else. If you said that fathers have a moral obligation to sacrifice their bodies and lives for their kids, either in providing for them or in war, most of the people who oppose abortions would agree with you.
- NikolaNovak 4y ago

thepasswordis 4y ago

It is absolutely frustrating to me that people are trying to say that pro life people are coming to the conclusion due to their religion. I'm sure some people are, but the idea that the only way you can derive ideas like "human life has worth" is from religion feels like a huge step backwards.

corrral 4y ago
I'm pro-choice but every time I read an online thread on the topic I spend the whole time face-palming over "my side's" bad arguments and total failure to understand pro-lifers' positions. It's actually not the only topic on which I think it'd be a lot easier to work as a conservative operative or pundit crafting or delivering arguments against what I believe, than as a liberal operative doing the same in favor of what I believe. I'm not sure if that's true for a lot of people regardless of their beliefs—that is, that it's just way easier to argue something you don't actually believe, in general, so there are also some conservatives on the other side going "man, it'd be so much easier to argue for liberal positions"—or something about the level of nuance or whatever required to vigorously defend current liberal positions versus the difficulty of defending current conservative positions. Hard to judge which is the case, for me at least.

nus07 4y ago

One of the best things I read recently was how a woman in Texas drove on the HOV lane arguing that because she was 2 months pregnant it was more than one person in the car by how Texas law defines a fetus as a person. And further how this will have implications on health insurance companies because suddenly a pregnant woman is not one person but two people and so what can insurance cover and what it cannot . It’s both fascinating and a disaster. .

ars 4y ago
For health insurance benefits a pregnant woman already counts as two people, so it changes nothing at all. There's no disaster here, just a funny story.
- corrral 4y ago
  I'm... pretty sure that's not true. For one thing, I can't ever recall having to enroll a child with insurance or having them on any of our insurance cards before they were born. They are, in a sense, covered, but not in the same sense they are after they're born.
bongoman37 4y ago

tablespoon 4y ago

> Even saying that "life" begins at conception is tenuous. Gametes (sperm and egg cells) are "alive" in that they carry out the same cellular functions that other living cells carry out. Is a zygote more alive than the gametes that came together to form it? I don't know what they actually think, but it seems "life" in that sense might actually be a bit too fuzzy. Gametes are alive, but, for lack of a better term, they're not exactly human. Fertilization is the discrete event that creates an identifiable individual human life. Before that, you have cells that are created and die as a matter of course. After that, you have a more-or-less continuous process of development of an identifiable human organism. > I would ask that you consider if another person's sincerely held beliefs may be valid when they contradict this point of view. I think this goes for all sides. One of the major societal breakdowns regarding this that many people seem to think that they don't need to do that, and prefer instead to consider strawmen that reinforce their personal sense of righteousness.

norwalkbear 4y ago

You actually don't have the empathy you think you do. If Christians think abortion is child murder, then of course they SHOULD do everything in their power to stop it. Honestly the article shows even Europe wouldn't approve of American Abortion. So it's clear this is more than a religious issue and more of an existential one.