(May 22, 2013 at 2:08 pm)Tiberius Wrote:

(May 22, 2013 at 12:20 pm)Just Chilling Wrote: First of all imagine being an woman and you get pregnant with an unwanted child.

It depends how she got pregnant. If she was raped, then sure, I'd probably support abortion in that instance. If she had sex willingly, then sorry, but pregnancy is a possible result of that sex. It doesn't matter if she used protection; no protection is 100% effective, and it has never claimed to be.

If you participate in an action that has possible consequences, then you are responsible for your actions and any consequences that come from it. This holds true for everything in life, but not abortion, even though abortion deals with one of things that humans hold most precious: life.

Another potential consequence of sexual intercourse is catching an STI. Are you opposed to people getting treated for those as well?

How about potential consequences of other actions? What if you get a sky diving injury and break a leg, should we deny them medical care?

Here's something that annoys me: pregnancy generally lasts about 40 weeks (give or take 2 weeks, 40 falls on the peak of a nice bell curve). There are 4 weeks each month. A pregnancy lasts 10 months, not 9.
Most pregnancies are uneventful, if uncomfortable the last few weeks. Around 90% of women have completely problem free pregnancies. The births are a different matter entirely.
I'll get off my soap box now.

(May 22, 2013 at 3:34 pm)festive1 Wrote: Here's something that annoys me: pregnancy generally lasts about 40 weeks (give or take 2 weeks, 40 falls on the peak of a nice bell curve). There are 4 weeks each month. A pregnancy lasts 10 months, not 9.
Most pregnancies are uneventful, if uncomfortable the last few weeks. Around 90% of women have completely problem free pregnancies. The births are a different matter entirely.
I'll get off my soap box now.

It's closer to 4 1/2 weeks a month.

I, and I'd guess most people, would count 2 days as negligible. Half a week is 3 days or more. Medical professionals and their literature typically state pregnancy lasts 10 months. It gets knocked down to 9 because the first month it's virtually impossible to detect the pregnancy. Unless the woman is having daily blood tests screening her HgC levels.
ETA: I bring this up because the abortion debate often comes down to key points of fetal development. Which often occur sooner than the pro-choice camp wants to admit, and aren't as significant as the pro-life camp chooses to believe. Speaking in generalities of course

(May 22, 2013 at 2:34 pm)pocaracas Wrote: You know Tib, sometimes the babies are really unwanted and remain unwanted after birth... sometimes, having a child can mean losing a job and any way of supporting both the mother and child.... sometimes, having a child means that the grandparents have to take monetary care of both the mother and the child, and sometimes, they're not very willing to do so.
Sometimes, the mother's life just becomes unbearable, if she haves that child.

I never denied that sometimes babies are unwanted and remain unwanted. All I did was argue against the apparent assumption that all of them fall into that group. I asked for evidence! Even if this happens "sometimes", it is not grounds for allowing abortion. Sometimes, children grow up into murderers, but we don't go around locking up children because they might kill someone else. That isn't fair on the child, and it isn't fair on the child in this situation either. Yes, maybe they will grow up having a hard life, but we have no way of knowing that before the fact.

Quote:And I think anyone should be allowed to judge their own lives and deal with the consequences of sex in their own way... within a reasonable time-frame.

The problem is, there are (at least) two lives involved in abortion, and one of them doesn't get a say.

(May 22, 2013 at 2:44 pm)Rev. Rye Wrote: Here's one. Here's another one.

The first seems to deal with child abuse in general, and states that keeping unwanted children is one possible reason. It also states that 40% of child abuse cases relate to substance abuse. My point is, it doesn't conclude that the majority of unwanted children that are kept end up being abused. The second link was a book, so unless you have a specific excerpt from the book (and the source the book takes the info from), it isn't really what I was after.

Quote:And you seem to assume that adoption is necessarily a better option. Counter-Example: David "Son of Sam" Berkowitz' final tipping point was his finding out that he was adopted.

No I didn't. I never assumed anything of the sort. It's all very well to use counter-examples to adoption after the fact, but we can't know from the start whether an adoption is going to go well. Unless you have evidence that the majority of adoptions end with the kid being mistreated, or having a terrible life because of it, then I'm not sure what point this even proves. Adoption is a possibility for unwanted pregnancies; one which gives the child at least a chance at having a life. Abortion does not.

Quote:And yet, abortion remains legal. Your talk about feelings cannot work.

Abortion is not legal because women "feel" they should have control over their own bodies. Abortion is legal because people argued about it in government / court and came to a decision. That could change one day; it's changed in the past.

(May 22, 2013 at 2:45 pm)NoraBrimstone Wrote: Another potential consequence of sexual intercourse is catching an STI. Are you opposed to people getting treated for those as well?

No, but then an STI isn't a human...

Also, abortion isn't a "treatment" for a pregnancy...it's the termination of a pregnancy. Are you seriously comparing an STI to a child?

Quote:How about potential consequences of other actions? What if you get a sky diving injury and break a leg, should we deny them medical care?

Seriously? You're really asking me that? It affects one person; one person's body. No human is killed in the mending of a broken leg. If a person has insurance, and the insurance covers the care, then of course they should get it.

(May 22, 2013 at 3:48 pm)Tiberius Wrote: No, but then an STI isn't a human...

Also, abortion isn't a "treatment" for a pregnancy...it's the termination of a pregnancy. Are you seriously comparing an STI to a child?

No. I'm comparing an STI to an unwanted, parasitic foetus. STIs are living things, too you know. Most STIs aren't fatal, so why should we kill them just because they're unwanted? Hmm?

(May 22, 2013 at 3:48 pm)Tiberius Wrote: Seriously? You're really asking me that? It affects one person; one person's body. No human is killed in the mending of a broken leg. If a person has insurance, and the insurance covers the care, then of course they should get it.

The only person involved in an abortion is a pregnant woman. A foetus isn't a person, it can't do anything a person can do. Why can a person be treated for a broken leg they knew was a risk when they jumped out of a plane, but a woman has to have her whole life ruined because of a risk she took, or an accident she had?


This is not a human in any sense of the word.

I think rape should be legal when the mother is raped or where the mother's life is in danger, AND for any reason. I'm not the biggest abortion fan in the world, and it should be discouraged, but I think a mother should do what she wants with her FETUS, who is NOT A PERSON YET.

*cue catfish to talk about fish*

LOL, nice typo!

(May 22, 2013 at 4:13 pm)NoraBrimstone Wrote:
This is not a human in any sense of the word.

Only in the sense that this is a moth:

[/quote]

I assume you posted a picture of a caterpillar, the pic isn't showing up
But quite different actually. A caterpillar can eat, breathe, crawl around, etc. which is much more than a 12 week gestational fetus can do.