Would this Change your Position on Abortion?

[sayak83]

Because medical abortion (ie through drugs) may be preferred by the woman, and it's her body, her choice, and she's a legal person.

Along with the previous argument here is a thought experiment to demonstrate that a person does not always possess the right to do wahtever with what he owns.
"I am a billionaire in draught ridden LA. I legally buy 70,000 gallons of drinking water and plan to pour it down the drain as a personal preference. Does the state, whose citizens value drinking water highly, have the right to violate my property right and put a legal injunction against me doing this?"

 

[ADigitalArtist]

Are the late term abortions that you support medically necessary or they can be for birth control reasons?

Are you asking my personal values or how I would approach them on a legal basis? Because the two aren't necessarily the same.
I wouldn't legislate against late-term abortions because tying the hands of doctors as they wait until there's no chance of liability has lead to tragically avoidable deaths. But personally I wouldn't get one unless I had to.

What is often forgotten in this debate about quality over quantity is the quality of people who are alive and are making reproductive choices. We need a society where people learn to make better choices. Where people have a good understanding of self-control, planning, patience hard-work, perseverance etc. Those are the values which I think our society would benefit most from developing. Yes sex education is good and necessary; yes birth control is good and necessary. But if these things become an excuse for not developing those other virtues I have mentioned, then they become more a vice than a virtue.

And as I keep mentioning, these virtues will not just help us (as individuals and as a society) on the reproductive and birth control arena, it will assist us with many other social challenges we are currently facing.

I completely agree with you. I just don't believe banning on-demand abortions is the way to encourage those values. And regardless of how I value those same concepts, I'm not willing to violate body autonomy to do it.

Incidentally my husband and I regularly communicate on our feelings and thoughts about having a child. And while we both are in agreement that we don't want one at this time, we use three birth control methods. (Granted one is for treating the symptoms of PCOS). And if all three somehow failed, we are both on the same page that I would terminate as soon as I knew. Which means abortion is part of our planning, but we are taking reasonable precautions against unwanted pregnancy. I'm not interested in nor expect universal approval for it. But it is the way it will be.

 

[Thanda]

Cite?

Gladly

• Birth control (contraceptive) failure. Over half of all women who have an abortion used a contraceptive method during the month they became pregnant.2
• Inability to support or care for a child.
• To end an unwanted pregnancy.
• To prevent the birth of a child with birth defects or severe medical problems. Such defects are often unknown until routine second-trimester tests are done.
• Pregnancy resulting from rape or incest.
• Physical or mental conditions that endanger the woman's health if the pregnancy is continued.

 

[Curious George]

Gladly

• Birth control (contraceptive) failure. Over half of all women who have an abortion used a contraceptive method during the month they became pregnant.2
• Inability to support or care for a child.
• To end an unwanted pregnancy.
• To prevent the birth of a child with birth defects or severe medical problems. Such defects are often unknown until routine second-trimester tests are done.
• Pregnancy resulting from rape or incest.
• Physical or mental conditions that endanger the woman's health if the pregnancy is continued.

It appears this is the list of reasons why women can have abortions. I am failing to see how this supports your claim which I asked you to cite. How many women get abortions to elude financial responsibility for a child and what portion does this play in the woman's decision making process?

 

[Nous]

As we "progressive" humans consider human life to be worth cost, it should not be an issue.

Do you have the extra $40-$80 billion? I don't.

How many unwanted children have you provided for and raised so far?

I have heard people use the argument of cost of keeping inmates as an argument for the death penalty.

That would be an argument based on an erroneous premise. It much more expensive to apply the death penalty than to incarcerate a person for life.

Or alternatively let's scrap the moral relativism and begin to teach values that will help people make better choices and prevent not only having 500 000 children without homes or families but also the 1.2 million children aborted every year.

(1) I haven't even vaguely espoused moral relativism. (2) How do you plan to "teach values that will help people make better choices and prevent" the births of nearly 2 million unwanted children in the US alone?

BTW, why do you consider abortion of a non-viable fetus worse than birth control?

 

[averageJOE]

I've been thinking: if I understand correctly the main argument behind abortion is the bodily autonomy of a woman. Basically the thought process is that a woman shouldn't be forced to house another human being in her body.

In line with this thinking is the belief that if a child relies on a woman's body to live then they are not actually fully human yet and she should be allowed to cease supporting the child's existence by having an abortion.
Now as technology develops it may become possible for fetuses to be transferred from the earliest stages (a few weeks) to some machine that can help the fetuses develop into a fully viable baby.

Should such a system become available would you, if you currently support abortions, cease to support them as the baby is now no longer solely dependent on the mother's body for survival but the baby now has an option to develop independently from the mother through science?

Would we then create a law stating all married couples must be required to adopt and raise at least 3 children? And at least one for single unmarried people?

 

[Thanda]

Are you asking my personal values or how I would approach them on a legal basis? Because the two aren't necessarily the same.
I wouldn't legislate against late-term abortions because tying the hands of doctors as they wait until there's no chance of liability has lead to tragically avoidable deaths. But personally I wouldn't get one unless I had to.

I'm merely asking whether your allowance for late terms abortion is unconditional - i.e. for any reason a woman can come up with - or whether it is conditional on medically necessary reasons.

I completely agree with you. I just don't believe banning on-demand abortions is the way to encourage those values. And regardless of how I value those same concepts, I'm not willing to violate body autonomy to do it.

Incidentally my husband and I regularly communicate on our feelings and thoughts about having a child. And while we both are in agreement that we don't want one at this time, we use three birth control methods. (Granted one is for treating the symptoms of PCOS). And if all three somehow failed, we are both on the same page that I would terminate as soon as I knew. Which means abortion is part of our planning, but we are taking reasonable precautions against unwanted pregnancy. I'm not interested in nor expect universal approval for it. But it is the way it will be.

Perhaps it isn't but certainly having it freely available does not encourage people to learn those values either. While I'm against lifestyle abortions altogether I can stomach it if at least at the same time we are encouraging those type of values that will eventually reduce our reliance on them.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

I'm merely asking whether your allowance for late terms abortion is unconditional - i.e. for any reason a woman can come up with - or whether it is conditional on medically necessary reasons.

My personal values make late term abortion conditional. I would prefer they choose a live extraction if the risk were small. But legally a woman should be able to stop a pregnancy at any time for any reason. So I wouldn't vote against LTA.

Perhaps it isn't but certainly having it freely available does not encourage people to learn those values either. While I'm against lifestyle abortions altogether I can stomach it if at least at the same time we are encouraging those type of values that will eventually reduce our reliance on them.

By all means, I encourage contraceptive use and artificial womb or live extractiom availability.

But my belief in the unassailability of body autonomy means I wouldn't prevent abortion by even the most POS irresponsible ******* with twenty abortions under her belt.

But those technologies would, at least, allow people like me the option to choose them.

 

[Thanda]

Do you have the extra $40-$80 billion? I don't.

How many unwanted children have you provided for and raised so far?

Of course I don't have that money. Yet we (collective) have it.

None - the money wouldn't come from one person individually. It would be pooled together and used to assist in the cause.

That would be an argument based on an erroneous premise. It much more expensive to apply the death penalty than to incarcerate a person for life.

Source?

(1) I haven't even vaguely espoused moral relativism. (2) How do you plan to "teach values that will help people make better choices and prevent" the births of nearly 2 million unwanted children in the US alone?

BTW, why do you consider abortion of a non-viable fetus worse than birth control?

1) It is just a commentary on how we pretend there are multiple equally valid truths and yet the consequences of people's actions are always felt and borne by society
2) The same way we teach sex education - through schools, supporting civic organisations that would teach that, developing programming on TV, Radio, the net and in other mediums that promotes these messages.

3) Because the life has already starting developing - but let's not go too far into this as it would need a thread of it's own to properly go into this discussion.

 

[Thanda]

Would we then create a law stating all married couples must be required to adopt and raise at least 3 children? And at least one for single unmarried people?

Preferrably those children would be required to live with their parents - and the necessary support that they would need would be provided.

 

[Thanda]

It appears this is the list of reasons why women can have abortions. I am failing to see how this supports your claim which I asked you to cite. How many women get abortions to elude financial responsibility for a child and what portion does this play in the woman's decision making process?

The very first reason cited claims that more than 50% are from people who hadn't wanted to be pregnant in the first place. Therefore this indicates that the majority of abortions are not for medical reasons.

Here's another more straight forward source.

https://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/journals/3711005.pdf

From the study:

RESULTS: The reasons most frequently cited were that having a child would interfere with a woman’s education, work or ability to care for dependents (74%); that she could not afford a baby now (73%); and that she did not want to be a single mother or was having relationship problems (48%). Nearly four in 10 women said they had completed their childbearing, and almost one-third were not ready to have a child. Fewer than 1% said their parents’ or partners’ desire for them to have an abortion was the most important reason. Younger women often reported that they were unprepared for the transition to motherhood, while older women regularly cited their responsibility to dependents.​

 

[Curious George]

The very first reason cited claims that more than 50% are from people who hadn't wanted to be pregnant in the first place. Therefore this indicates that the majority of abortions are not for medical reasons.

Here's another more straight forward source.

https://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/journals/3711005.pdf

From the study:

RESULTS: The reasons most frequently cited were that having a child would interfere with a woman’s education, work or ability to care for dependents (74%); that she could not afford a baby now (73%); and that she did not want to be a single mother or was having relationship problems (48%). Nearly four in 10 women said they had completed their childbearing, and almost one-third were not ready to have a child. Fewer than 1% said their parents’ or partners’ desire for them to have an abortion was the most important reason. Younger women often reported that they were unprepared for the transition to motherhood, while older women regularly cited their responsibility to dependents.​

So in essence these women did not want to go through pregnancy? Sure. That is a medical decision. If I want to get a vasectomy it is a medical decision. My medical decision. An abortion is the choice to modify one's body to not undergo a pregnancy. That is a medical reason. That some women choose not to undergo pregnancy for myriad reasons does not change the fact that the decision to do so is a medical decision.

So, you will have to do better. You will need to find stats that explain how much financial etc. reasons play into the decision while explaining why these women didn't choose adoption etc.

 

[Thanda]

So in essence these women did not want to go through pregnancy? Sure. That is a medical decision. If I want to get a vasectomy it is a medical decision. My medical decision. An abortion is the choice to modify one's body to not undergo a pregnancy. That is a medical reason. That some women choose not to undergo pregnancy for myriad reasons does not change the fact that the decision to do so is a medical decision.

They didn't want to have the child. That is if you had offered them a child without pregnancy they would have refused it.

That said you appear to be clutching at straws by calling everything a "medical reason". Lol! We know abortion is a medical procedure. It is the reason for the medical procedure that we are interested in.

 

[Curious George]

They didn't want to have the child. That is if you had offered them a child without pregnancy they would have refused it.

That said you appear to be clutching at straws by calling everything a "medical reason". Lol! We know abortion is a medical procedure. It is the reason for the medical procedure that we are interested in.

And you seem to be stuck on the fact that women are given some unfair advantage by making a medical decision for their own body. Your implication is that women are saying, "I can't afford a baby, so abortion." When in reality that may be a factor in such a decision, but the ultimate decision is to choose one thing for their body and not another. Men needn't choose one thing for their body. Either way their body will be the same. Only their finances change. Thus, you are speculating about motives. Put it in another context. When a surrogate is hired and all expenses are paid, and there is even a financial gain, we still advocate for the surrogates right to choose abortion. It is not some financial scheme where the woman is given control over everyone's finances. It is about a medical decision.

 

[Thanda]

And you seem to be stuck on the fact that women are given some unfair advantage by making a medical decision for their own body. Your implication is that women are saying, "I can't afford a baby, so abortion." When in reality that may be a factor in such a decision, but the ultimate decision is to choose one thing for their body and not another. Men needn't choose one thing for their body. Either way their body will be the same. Only their finances change. Thus, you are speculating about motives. Put it in another context. When a surrogate is hired and all expenses are paid, and there is even a financial gain, we still advocate for the surrogates right to choose abortion. It is not some financial scheme where the woman is given control over everyone's finances. It is about a medical decision.

I will not let up on this point - I am not speculating. There are multiple studies showing why women are having abortions - unless you believe women are liars and they say their are having abortions for financial reasons while they are actually having it for medical reasons.

No one is arguing that the choice they make does not involve their body - but their reasons for making the choice has nothing to do with their bodies in most cases. They are choosing something for their body but their reason for the choice is not their body.

 

[Jumi]

There used to be a system before abortions in Swedish and Finnish law(outlawed in 1918 and stopped in 1940s respectively) where kids that parents could not afford were auctioned to bidders.

 

[Jumi]

I am willing to pay more but more importantly I am willing to pay more for programs that teach taking responsibility and how to handle challenges. I believe that is what the world needs most. In other words I believe in solving the cause not just treating the symptom.

If said invention worked, wouldn't forcing kids on the unprepared and unwilling be the worst idea? It's been seen that it's not a good idea almost ever.

Again, better education is the solution to these problems - not killing babies. The same people who have such bad attitudes also express those same attitudes in other areas of their lives and as a result often have multiple challenges in their lives. So rather than just acceding to and accepting a don't care and irresponsible attitude in our societies we are better served working to change attitudes.

First fix the attitudes so the born are taken care of that we have now. If we can't even do that, why make things even harder? Now that we are ruining nature as is, how do we support more irresponsible folks having larger families? Because it's not free.

Sure

I have no idea what you mean by reproductive spaces is why I asked.

Sure - and they could use the same excuse with personal information they are taught in school. As a society we can only do so much to assist someone. At some point they have to make the determination to act responsibly. We should not however incentivise irresponsible behaviors.

Indeed, but the kids would be the ones to pay for their parents mistakes. Especially when society, with this invention, would force them to take them. They would develop more negative attitudes towards them than they do now.

 

[averageJOE]

Preferrably those children would be required to live with their parents - and the necessary support that they would need would be provided.

I don't understand.

You're suggesting that instead of getting an abortion that a fetus gets surgically removed, placed in a machine that brings it to full term, then give it back to the woman?

 

[Thanda]

I don't understand.

You're suggesting that instead of getting an abortion that a fetus gets surgically removed, placed in a machine that brings it to full term, then give it back to the woman?

Precisely - or the dad.

 

[averageJOE]

Precisely - or the dad.

So what's the point of that machine at all? Seems like a waste of money?