Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Liberator on April 17, 2009, 03:07:40 pm
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Some weeks ago, a conservative author released a book.
She devoted a whole chapter to the subject of Unwed Mothers, and how the rise in the number of Unwed Mothers can be tracked to the rise in violent, perpetual criminals.
So here's the puddin...where do you fall on that subject.
If you need help I'll be back in about 2 hours.
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It is most certainly better for children to grow up in stable family units, and I would say that unwed single mother families have a greater tendency to be unstable than your traditional nuclear family. Which, of course, isn't to say that all nuclear families are great and that it's the only way to go, nor that single-parent families can't be stable and healthy. I would say it's also important for children to have some kind of good male role model in their lives, whether it's a father or uncle or what have you.
So I guess I tentatively agree, but I also want to see more hard data on this.
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I believe the solution to this problem is abortions.
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They are probably both symptoms rather then cause and effect
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They are probably both symptoms rather then cause and effect
This
I believe the solution to this problem is abortions.
and also this.
And some good sex education, instead of abstinence-only.
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Correct. The problem isn't so much of Mothers being unwed, it's about children being unwanted, and their mothers not being ready for them, neither in a financial nor in a psychological sense.
[rant] Social conservatives, "Pro-Life" people or whatever else one may call these people who create a climate where young women are either unaware of or unwilling to avail themselves of solutions that would not only spare their children a difficult childhood, but also allow these young people a chance to get their own life running before starting another.[/rant]
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what is this book
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Janos reminded me of something I forgot to mention.
CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION
For example, I can track the rise in unwed mothers to the drop in violence in Iraq. It is transparently obvious that unwed single mothers, seeking to provide for their children, join the military and perform heroic deeds in order to defeat the insurgency.
You need to find a new book.
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There is that, of course. Unless someone can prove a correlation like that, take any "revelation" like that with a saltmine.
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Being wed or unwed doesn't enter into it. At all. It's all about having parents, and two is better than one.
A child with loving parents hardly gives a damn whether the parents are married to each other. Marriage is just an institution.
I obviously have not read the book, but could you tell if it actually specifies parents not being married (divorced or just in cohabitation?) as the reason to violent behaviour, or does it actually mean people raised by single parent (unwed mother) and therefore lacking one parental figure? Also, what kind of statistics does it refer to?
If the former, I blow a raspberry to both the book and the author for attempting to attach the violence issue to a religious institution (marriage specifically), as if being married or not would be the deciding factor in whether or not the kid grows up to a mob hitman or a respectable member of society.
If the latter, there might be a point in it but it would be necessary to also look into such things as how the kids raised by single fathers fare in similar inspection, for example. Also a check of other common features with children raised by single mothers might reveal some things that could potentially be linked to increased violent behaviour.
In other words, violence might correlate with being raised by "unwed mother", but it doesn't necessarily mean there's a causation between the two. Or at least direct causation.
...like Battuta said.
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There is that, of course. Unless someone can prove a correlation like that, take any "revelation" like that with a saltmine.
hey you just have to make an unfalsifiable claim and then seek random data that supports it
I don't even know what this magical book is! I bet its good and revolutionizes social sciences
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hey you just have to make an unfalsifiable claim and then seek random data that supports it
I don't even know what this magical book is! I bet its good and revolutionizes social sciences
A method which, while common, does not deserve to be called science. I would hope that social science as practiced by non-idiots has more rigorous standards than that (Mathematics and Computer science are much more comfortable and less forgiving that way).
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hey you just have to make an unfalsifiable claim and then seek random data that supports it
I don't even know what this magical book is! I bet its good and revolutionizes social sciences
A method which, while common, does not deserve to be called science. I would hope that social science as practiced by non-idiots has more rigorous standards than that (Mathematics and Computer science are much more comfortable and less forgiving that way).
Yes, it does.
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hey you just have to make an unfalsifiable claim and then seek random data that supports it
I don't even know what this magical book is! I bet its good and revolutionizes social sciences
A method which, while common, does not deserve to be called science.
ding ding ding
I would hope that social science as practiced by non-idiots has more rigorous standards than that (Mathematics and Computer science are much more comfortable and less forgiving that way).
it does
But basically these kinds of books (I'm going out on a limb and I assume this is some kind of a political commentary or some **** like that) simply pick out a desirable goal ("family is GOOD"), then find some random crap and slap it on it and lazily come up with some really far-fetched allegories and use this as Science Which We Base Our Politics on.
It's ridiculous
ed: where's Liberator! I want to debate someone, I want to debate someone HARD
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I obviously have not read the book, but could you tell if it actually specifies parents not being married (divorced or just in cohabitation?) as the reason to violent behaviour, or does it actually mean people raised by single parent (unwed mother) and therefore lacking one parental figure? Also, what kind of statistics does it refer to?
I didn't mention the title simply because you'd blow me out of the water as a whacko without considering the argument, because the author makes the controversy surrounding Salman Rushte look like a mild summer shower.
The author is Ms. Ann Coulter.
http://anncoulter.com/
The book is "Guilty: Liberal "Victims" and Their Assault on America".
http://www.amazon.com/Guilty-Liberal-Victims-Assault-America/dp/030735346X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1240009136&sr=8-1
In the book she separates Single Mothers, women who have decided to bear a child for whatever reason, into a class apart from women who have lost they're husbands either through divorce or death.
Using this strict definition, you can account for something like 85% of the currently incarcerated violent offenders in America's prisons. Taking it a step further, she goes on, this accounts for the vast color differential in America's prison population, without that 85% there is almost no difference in the number of black or latino offenders vs. white offenders.
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this cannot be serious
say it isn't
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So what you're saying is that we need more abortions?
Or more social services and welfare to support single mothers and their children?
Or better public school systems to keep these kids in school?
Or more affirmative action to help them get into college?
And go back and read the earlier posts, too.
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The author is Ms. Ann Coulter.
This is how you know you should stop reading that book.
Sorry, my blood boils everytime I hear her name.
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I am not particularly partisan, but I must say that any 'research' she's done is not going to shine through all the ideological pablum she heaps on top.
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So what you're saying is that we need more abortions?
Or more social services and welfare to support single mothers and their children?
Or better public school systems to keep these kids in school?
Or more affirmative action to help them get into college?
And go back and read the earlier posts, too.
Those are treatments to the existing condition, not the causal agent.
The causal agent is a society that, while not outright sanctioning it, has begun turning a blind eye to Single Mothers.
It was not that long ago that if a girl became pregnant, she was forced to leave whatever school she was attending, moved to a different school specifically for girls in her condition and her family was scandalized. This often resulted in so called "Shotgun Weddings' where the young man would be forced into marrying the mother of his child.
Somewhere along the line, it became "ok" for a woman to have a child out of wedlock with a man. Later, a government program was created to help these women, which in turn created a culture where the children were looked upon as a form of income, more kids = more money. All the while, you have the sexual culture of these areas changing bit by bit so that promiscuity is not looked down upon as it once was. Say what you will about my "outdated" perspective, but society created the problem, and society has to fix it.
Young boys, especially as they begin to mature into biological adulthood, need a male roll model that is not a gang leader or a thug. I would love to see a generation full of Bill Cosby and Condoleezza Rice emulators instead of Tupac or Lil' Kim wannabes. You can extend that beyond race also, Mr. Cosby and Ms. Rice are worthy of emulation no matter your color or nationality.
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can i have your sisters phone number?
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So what you're saying is that we need more abortions?
Or more social services and welfare to support single mothers and their children?
Or better public school systems to keep these kids in school?
Or more affirmative action to help them get into college?
And go back and read the earlier posts, too.
Those are treatments to the existing condition, not the causal agent.
The causal agent is a society that, while not outright sanctioning it, has begun turning a blind eye to Single Mothers.
It was not that long ago that if a girl became pregnant, she was forced to leave whatever school she was attending, moved to a different school specifically for girls in her condition and her family was scandalized. This often resulted in so called "Shotgun Weddings' where the young man would be forced into marrying the mother of his child.
Somewhere along the line, it became "ok" for a woman to have a child out of wedlock with a man. Later, a government program was created to help these women, which in turn created a culture where the children were looked upon as a form of income, more kids = more money. All the while, you have the sexual culture of these areas changing bit by bit so that promiscuity is not looked down upon as it once was. Say what you will about my "outdated" perspective, but society created the problem, and society has to fix it.
Young boys, especially as they begin to mature into biological adulthood, need a male roll model that is not a gang leader or a thug. I would love to see a generation full of Bill Cosby and Condoleezza Rice emulators instead of Tupac or Lil' Kim wannabes. You can extend that beyond race also, Mr. Cosby and Ms. Rice are worthy of emulation no matter your color or nationality.
The solution is education, right?
Tell me you agree with that.
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Well, I agree with that.
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Of course I agree with that, but we have to reinject a sense of honor into the areas where they're culture has degenerated and is allowing detrimental behavior.
And I think we can all agree wild promiscuity is detrimental.
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Of course I agree with that, but we have to reinject a sense of honor into the areas where they're culture has degenerated and is allowing detrimental behavior.
And I think we can all agree wild promiscuity is detrimental.
No, we can't.
'Sense of honor' is a codeword for 'regulating people's behavior in a way I like.'
And please don't use the phrase 'their culture', since it makes it clear you're being racist.
Now, while I think many cultures in America have problems, they aren't this simplistic and they certainly aren't open to easy evaluation and resolution by one individual.
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Why is it wrong for a single woman to have a child?
I always thought it was "People who were unable or unwilling to have a child shouldn't have them"
This includes:
Married parents who can't support children.
Married parents who CAN support children, but are such poor parents they shouldn't (abuse, little time left for children)
The idea is that somehow tossing a guy (or other girl) at this equation will fix it. It won't. People don't automatically become perfect parents if there are two and people aren't automatically bad parents just because there is one.
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I believe the solution to this problem is abortions.
yes. kill moar babiez.
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Of course I agree with that, but we have to reinject a sense of honor into the areas where they're culture has degenerated and is allowing detrimental behavior.
And I think we can all agree wild promiscuity is detrimental.
no give me your phone number so i can find you and help you get a darwin award
ppl like yourself should have a really good look in the mirror before blowing your brains out , i do not know what mistakes your parents made in bringing up such an arrogant and racist idiot but they should be punished........
you in no way understand how the basic biology of living things work , the more stress and the greater the risk of death any living thing is placed under it will reproduce more to try and guarantee the survival of that species be it a plant an insect or trash like you........
i do believe you have really pissed me off !!!!!
hide your head in shame and go do some "real life" instead of judging things obviously you know jack **** about
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What if by 'restore honor' he means making it so going to prison is no longer seen as a badge of honor among certain kinds of people (and no I'm not singling out black people. We don't need to go there)? Or make it so you don't have to be in a gang to be cool? Or try and cut down on drug trade/culture (which I think could be accomplished with legalization, but that's another matter)?
I'm just saying, there's more to what he said than "OMG black people should all start acting like white people guyzzz!!"
Something's rotten. Maybe not because of unwed mothers, but there's definitely something wrong and as long as it's cool to do the things that contribute to crime and delinquency, we're going to have criminals and delinquents.
So yeah... education.
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What if by 'restore honor' he means making it so going to prison is no longer seen as a badge of honor among certain kinds of people (and no I'm not singling out black people. We don't need to go there)? Or make it so you don't have to be in a gang to be cool? Or try and cut down on drug trade/culture (which I think could be accomplished with legalization, but that's another matter)?
When has being in a gang not been "cool" or no one dealt drugs? These are not new ideas that just showed up.
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Why is it wrong for a single woman to have a child?
I always thought it was "People who were unable or unwilling to have a child shouldn't have them"
This includes:
Married parents who can't support children.
Married parents who CAN support children, but are such poor parents they shouldn't (abuse, little time left for children)
The idea is that somehow tossing a guy (or other girl) at this equation will fix it. It won't. People don't automatically become perfect parents if there are two and people aren't automatically bad parents just because there is one.
The point is that if you are mature enough to conduct the activities required to make a baby, you should be mature enough to see to the welfare of said progeny and not run like a child. Whether you like to think so or not, sex is not just a good time. There are responsibilities that go along with the fun and perpetuate beyond "the moment".
I know you're gonna come back with the whole birth control argument. I don't care, as an adult, you have certain responsibilities that you can't take a pill and make go away.
Putting it more simply, do not climb into the sack with someone you couldn't see your self married to.
By restoring honor, I mean teaching the young men and women who are fathering these children with no concern after fact to consider what they are doing and consider the consequences of they're actions. The cycle of poverty/drug abuse/fatherless children in the inner cities that people think of when they look at and inner city cannot be broken until that honor returns. Without that reasoning, they are little better than animals rutting around in heat.
Also, my comments aren't racist to any degree, you are reading your own racism into them I think. I simply use the same sample group that Ms. Coulter did, the 85% of the USA's prison population that were born to Single Mothers.
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Seriously Lib... you come back here after several years of HLP abstinence due to massive butthurt. And now you think starting a thread about the latest ramblings of the insane ***** that Ann Coulter is would be a good idea?!?
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Who said I left butthurt...I just drifted away...it happens...it's the effing internet for cripe's sake... :rolleyes:
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Of course I agree with that, but we have to reinject a sense of honor into the areas where they're culture has degenerated and is allowing detrimental behavior.
And I think we can all agree wild promiscuity is detrimental.
This is pure bull****.
What "sense of honor"?
What "degeneration of culture"?
What "promiscuity is detrimental"? I don't think so, but if you can prove this then go ahead.
You insert weasel words, subjective morality and some unfounded assertion. Are you trying to go for satire? I can't tell
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People do what they choose to do, or what they are forced to do. You can't force them to do "better" things without violating their rights (and probably your own values).
So, you need to get them to want to choose those "better" things. That need can be built from grounds up (supported by the surrounding culture), or by experimenting with the "bad" things first (so you'll know what you don't want).
If you want to see a change, put your money in building a society that supports that change, not in building a society that tries to force a change over people which are what they are.
Edit: forgot to comment this..
It was not that long ago that if a girl became pregnant, she was forced to leave whatever school she was attending, moved to a different school specifically for girls in her condition and her family was scandalized. This often resulted in so called "Shotgun Weddings' where the young man would be forced into marrying the mother of his child.
Somewhere along the line, it became "ok" for a woman to have a child out of wedlock with a man. Later, a government program was created to help these women, which in turn created a culture where the children were looked upon as a form of income, more kids = more money. All the while, you have the sexual culture of these areas changing bit by bit so that promiscuity is not looked down upon as it once was. Say what you will about my "outdated" perspective, but society created the problem, and society has to fix it.
That is just an example of a ****ed up practice that got replaced with something that doesn't work particularly well either. Nothing to long for...
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Also, my comments aren't racist to any degree
Well, actually:
I simply use the same sample group that Ms. Coulter did
Simply put, Ann Coulter is one of the last people you need to be quoting or using as a basis for your arguments. She's a partisan, racist, nationalist, insane ***** who should never have been allowed to write books, because unfortunately people do take her seriously. It perpetuates her own brand of stupidity and narrow view of everything.
Examples:
--Killing all Middle East leaders and "making them Christian"
--Blaming The Left™ for everything
--Claiming unwed mothers in the inner city (many of whom are black) are the source of the inner city's crime rate (i.e. it's the blacks' fault we have so much crime, it's those black whores' slutting it up)
--Calling for the impeachment of the single most successful president in 50 years because he got a blowjob in office
Need I go on? Do yourself a favor: put that book down right now. Burn it. And every other book by her.
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Janos,
All morality is subjective. The prevailing morality is that which the majority of the culture in question adheres to. In this case, it is generally conceived in the USA that "loose" males and females are of poor character.
This discussion is treading into an area that can't be dealt with on a scientific level. We're starting to deal with the rights and wrongs of society. I can't claim moral superiority over most anyone other than murderers, rapists and the like, but then neither can you. Your outrage over my stances and thoughts are as driven by your own moral code as mine are. If you deny this, then this discussion loses any possible common ground.
Wonderful suggestion, castor, one I would support. Except there's more money to be made exploiting the negative aspects of the current culture which leads to apathy on the thoughts of changing the society.
Nuclear1, I thought you were more open minded than that.
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Nuclear1, I thought you were more open minded than that.
I know trash when I see it, and when Ann Coulter spews partisan, ultra right wing and nationalist bull**** everytime she opens her mouth or writes a book, that's trash. She rode the wave of the 1994 election which brought the neocons into power and she has gladly been their willing spokesperson ever since.
Seriously, I don't think I can find a single redeeming quality about that woman. I'm open-minded, but I absolutely will not tolerate nonsense from people like her. If I had to make a list of the top ten people who are legitimately holding back America, she would be very high on it.
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Why is it wrong for a single woman to have a child?
I always thought it was "People who were unable or unwilling to have a child shouldn't have them"
This includes:
Married parents who can't support children.
Married parents who CAN support children, but are such poor parents they shouldn't (abuse, little time left for children)
The idea is that somehow tossing a guy (or other girl) at this equation will fix it. It won't. People don't automatically become perfect parents if there are two and people aren't automatically bad parents just because there is one.
Argument needs to step aside, let the man go through.
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The point is that if you are mature enough to conduct the activities required to make a baby, you should be mature enough to see to the welfare of said progeny and not run like a child. Whether you like to think so or not, sex is not just a good time. There are responsibilities that go along with the fun and perpetuate beyond "the moment".
Anyone who hits puberty can make a baby. Are you saying a 13 or 14 year old (maybe younger) should be capable of fully supporting themselves and the child?
I know you're gonna come back with the whole birth control argument. I don't care, as an adult, you have certain responsibilities that you can't take a pill and make go away.
I wasn't going to go there at all?
And please forgive me for any nasty stuff I am going to write. It is not to be gross.
Are you saying that I, as an adult, should not be having any sex at all unless it's to have a child? None? Zero?
Putting it more simply, do not climb into the sack with someone you couldn't see your self married to.
Why is this? I have had sex with women I have no intention of marrying. We have no intention of having a child, we used protection. She didn't mind. I didn't mind. Why do YOU mind?
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Janos,
All morality is subjective. The prevailing morality is that which the majority of the culture in question adheres to. In this case, it is generally conceived in the USA that "loose" males and females are of poor character.
Hey, you said this:
And I think we can all agree wild promiscuity is detrimental.
"I THINK WE CAN ALL AGREE" is nothing. It's absolutely nothing. It's completely null, meaningless thing. You should've said that you think that but hey, I'm not letting this pass: I do not agree with that. Your assertion is therefore disqualified unless you can find me a scientifically sound source to argue for your position. And I doubt you are going to find one. You try to pass your personal values as somehow universal, as something "we" believe in, when in truth this is an outright lie. Don't try to weasel your way out of this: your assertion of promiscuity is invalid or outright false.
But let me summarize the course of this argument
Your entire argument started as a copy of Coulter's argument. That argument was, in your original post, phrased in such a way as to sound statistically valid causation. See Using this strict definition, you can account for something like 85% of the currently incarcerated violent offenders in America's prisons. Taking it a step further, she goes on, this accounts for the vast color differential in America's prison population, without that 85% there is almost no difference in the number of black or latino offenders vs. white offenders.
That's supposed to be objectively valid science, right? I mean, you certainly showcase it as something as such.
After that you move on to claim that the causal agent was the single mothers. Like this!: Those are treatments to the existing condition, not the causal agent.
The causal agent is a society that, while not outright sanctioning it, has begun turning a blind eye to Single Mothers.
Still trying to keep that validity up there. Causal agents! This is objective, right?
Then you very blatantly propose the following cure: Of course I agree with that, but we have to reinject a sense of honor into the areas where they're culture has degenerated and is allowing detrimental behavior.
And I think we can all agree wild promiscuity is detrimental.
Now you suddenly give personalized, extremely vague terms which are just smoke and mirrors for "I think people should act like this". In your reply you refuse to even clarify what exactly you mean by these phrases!
After all, in your last post you were telling people about the causal agents.
And now, now you have the guts to tell that
This discussion is treading into an area that can't be dealt with on a scientific level. We're starting to deal with the rights and wrongs of society. I can't claim moral superiority over most anyone other than murderers, rapists and the like, but then neither can you. Your outrage over my stances and thoughts are as driven by your own moral code as mine are. If you deny this, then this discussion loses any possible common ground.
So suddenly, when driven into a corner, your supposedly valid statistical evidence completely loses it's weight and you shift your goalposts into a morality discussion. Its almost as if your arguments didn't held water before. And I just cannot resist but to take this quote from just a week ago:
Someone's hiding...
Hmm...decapitation of a living person broadcast on live tv or released via video cassette to news outlets isn't evil?
What if someone went into your home and raped your sister in front of you because she was seen in the company of a man not in her family? What if they proceeded to kill and dismember her for the same offense?
Is that not evil? [...] Yet, the people you defend meet the definition of human only biologically, otherwise they're no better than the beasts you claim we came from.
Evil was evil, but in this current argument science is secondary to subjective morality which you base on science and there is no evil.
So let's start this again because this is ridiculous and you haven't so far answered any single question I have asked you.
What are you trying to say? What degenerated culture, how is promiscuity bad?
edit: My outrage is not your position, although I find it hilariously bad. It's on you and your debate strategy which is just "talking point, talking point, denial that I ever said that, strawman, talking point, talking point" while constantly changing the subject.
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Now that I watch more news and pay attention more to these issues because of the internet, it is amazing how many people pound the same talking points on subjects.
These things flare up, everyone uses them and then they're gone when they're rebuked. Only a new one pops up.
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I think quite a lot people are aware about the issues in the society that Ann Coulter supposedly (being not American, I haven't read that book and never will) lists, the more important question is how does she propose to fix them? I would expect this as the problems should be well known among US people by now, adding one more book about the problems without mentioning her opinion of solutions is simply populism and getting herself rich at this point (which is actually a negative contribution to the problem).
While I time by time find Liberator's statements absurd, I think he is still correct in pointing out that the big problem is the rottening core values of the society. Which actually isn't something what people wouldn't know.
According to my understanding, giving money for charity happens a lot more often in US than in Europe. The money donated to charity work is supposed to fix some of the above mentioned problems. Now, do people see it affecting the surroundings? If not, why do they keep paying for it? [Answer: But but but I don't need to pay so much TAXES if I do!]
Now that I started it, let's go through some of the other problems:
If the gang violence is really that big threat, why people oppose more police funding? [Answer: Oh noes, moar TAXES!]. If the police is that corrupt bunch of people that they accept bribes, why not select them better and give better paychecks for them? [Answer: Oh noes, even MOAR TAXES!] If there is such amount of lunatics wandering on the streets, why they are not in the asylums where they could have a chance to get better? [Answer: Oh noes, we need to PAY for the private health care also?!] If people are that desperate to think stealing is worthwile, why are the morally sound jobs so lousy? [Answer: We want MOAR for less!] If unwed mothers are so dangerous to society, what causes the breakups and them becoming mothers in the first place? [Answer: I want to get laid MOAR often! Oh, by the way, abortions are also wrong, just like condoms!]
The bracketed parts are my views and my views only. Yes the last part of this post is purposefully simplistic.
Mika
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Liberator's problem is bad reasoning. He thinks that an alleged increase in single mothers is a sign of moral decay. In fact, it can be addressed by education and economic improvement, since most of these single mothers are very poor.
Maybe if institutional racism and sexism (including that which makes Liberator put all the burden of responsibility on females, condemning female sexuality) weren't keeping these people down, their kids wouldn't turn into offenders...if that does actually happen.
Liberator, and Coulter, have done nothing to link these two groups (single mothers and violent offenders) in a causal way that implicates some kind of moral panic.
Liberator, go read Freakonomics -- it suggests that there was a drop in violent crime due to easy access to abortions and birth control. Why don't you go promote those as solutions?
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Battuta,
I am absolutely laying the burden at the feet of THESE PARTICULAR females.
Consider, why are they single? Is it because none of the males are fit to be fathers? If that's the case, why bear children to them?
My general point is that children, females and particularly males as they come into adulthood, absolutely need a father to teach them what it is to be a man and a father in they're own right
I quote from this article(http://www.mrdad.com/qa/life/defining-daddy.html)
"Children are at a particular disadvantage when they are deprived of constructive experiences with their fathers," writes psychologist Henry Biller. "Infants and young children are unlikely to be provided with other opportunities to form a relationship with a caring and readily available adult male if their father is not emotionally committed to them."
In Modern America, this is seems to be more and more frequently manifesting as children taking out they're frustrations with guns on innocent or mostly innocent bystanders.
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Consider, why are they single? Is it because none of the males are fit to be fathers? If that's the case, why bear children to them?
Lack of education on sex? Or are you implying single females get pregnant cause it's the super cool thing to do?
Still waiting to see why me having sex without being married is bad.
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Or having children without being married.
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Still waiting to see why me having sex without being married is bad.
Because, all talk of contraception aside, preserving that particular activity to only happen within the bond of marriage is the best way to make sure a child has what it needs to grow into a healthy productive member of society.
'Course I don't expect you to understand what I'm talking about, most of you look at marriage as this out of date ritual that has no meaning.
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I spot wrongness. Being married =/= Being capable of giving a child a nurturing environment. Having both parents around certainly is a good thing, but a marriage is not required for that. Ponder this: "Without love, there can be no true marriage. With Love, there can be nothing else."
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Still waiting to see why me having sex without being married is bad.
Because, all talk of contraception aside, preserving that particular activity to only happen within the bond of marriage is the best way to make sure a child has what it needs to grow into a healthy productive member of society.
'Course I don't expect you to understand what I'm talking about, most of you look at marriage as this out of date ritual that has no meaning.
But I'm not getting married, nor do I plan on having kids.
Again, apologies all around for my language.
You're saying if I put my penis in a woman's vagina, the kid is going to be ruined, but if I masturbate it's ok?
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Liberator's arguments might have been good ones about a century ago...
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Being a parent is the ultimate responsibility, and it's down to you to be a good one, no-one else. I don't think being married has an impact on that, it's down to people, not paperwork.
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Because, all talk of contraception aside, preserving that particular activity to only happen within the bond of marriage is the best way to make sure a child has what it needs to grow into a healthy productive member of society.
Justify your claim.
On top of that, let me pose this situation to all of our members here: Assuming that you're parents are married, have you ever seen their marriage license? Did you witness their marrige? Did you verify that the priest was a certifiable priest and that the marriage is valid?
If not, then it's logically possible that you're parents are neither legally nor religiously married. Why don't you demand to see their marriage license and the certifications of the priest that wed them, just to verify that they weren't lying to you your entire life? Because you know that notion is absurd. It's absurd because it makes no difference in the way that they raised you.
Marriage is arbitrary. A genuine love between a couple is not.
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While Liberator clearly has a religious dogma behind, I don't think he is completely wrong just because of that. Some of the things he says do make sense to me at least, or at least in the way interprete his messages. I don't agree with women being always at fault when they have babies without fathers. Did young even realize what they were doing? This smacks of poor judgment, understanding and education of the sex itself and as such it is more like a typical problem of religious people.
The other side is, how many partners are enough? Where do you draw the line there? The odds are that nobody is gonna take a partner with a track record of 100s of partners.
Mika
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Marriage is arbitrary. A genuine love between a couple is not.
This is true. So why not certify it for the world to see by getting married? Show me a negative in a relationship by getting married.
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The other side is, how many partners are enough? Where do you draw the line there? The odds are that nobody is gonna take a partner with a track record of 100s of partners.
Why can't a person decide how many sexual partners they want?
I'm a crazy sex fiend who needs to have sex with 1000 women (I'm not). Is that kid over there gonna go nuts because some other guy had sex with 1000 women instead of 1 woman 1000 times? (as it would be if I were married (over time, relax)).
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Marriage is arbitrary. A genuine love between a couple is not.
This is true. So why not certify it for the world to see by getting married? Show me a negative in a relationship by getting married.
All the legal aspects that come with marriage?
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Why can't a person decide how many sexual partners they want?
I think I wrote it in a bad way. Of course they can. The question was about who actually wants to have a family with them after a track record like that. According to my understanding, there are people who are not monogamous by nature. There is no sense in trying to force them in to a marriage, nor should they be trying to achieve one by having babies.
Of course, there is notification from the history that in times when it became morally accepted to have orgies, **** as many as you could the society was about to crash. Whether these are related, I don't know, but wanted to write a note about it down here. I might have an inkling about the differences and things that lead to this kind of behavior, but I'm too tired to write it down here today.
Mika
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I think I wrote it in a bad way. Of course they can. The question was about who actually wants to have a family with them after a track record like that. According to my understanding, there are people who are not monogamous by nature. There is no sense in trying to force them in to a marriage, nor should they be trying to achieve one by having babies.
Of course, there is notification from the history that in times when it became morally accepted to have orgies, **** as many as you could the society was about to crash. Whether these are related, I don't know, but wanted to write a note about it down here. I might have an inkling about the differences and things that lead to this kind of behavior, but I'm too tired to write it down here today.
Are kids mirror images of their parents? No. Sex addict parents have monogamous kids. Monogamous parents have sex addict kids. What matters is how the parent parents.
I'm not like my parents, doesn't mean they're bad at it. They did (do) things I don't approve of. I didn't follow in their footsteps of bad behavior and I have bad behaviors they don't.
It's far more complex that this.
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I think you misunderstood my post. I don't see a connection between my post and yours post. I meant having children is seen as a way to make the dwindling marriage stronger again.
Mika
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I think you misunderstood my post. I don't see a connection between my post and yours post. I meant having children is seen as a way to make the dwindling marriage stronger again.
Mika
Unless the reason for a dwindling marriage is "we don't have kids" that's.... kinda awful.
Would you tell them that?
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You could replace "dwindling marriage" with "dwindling relationship" also.
It is not that uncommon. People are just not too honest with each other. My view is simply that quite a lot of marriages happen because two adults are afraid that they will never find the partner they love so they choose the next best option. Also, you could replace "marriage" with "love relationship" or whatever it is called elsewhere. What it comes to statistics, I have none. These are only what I have witnessed with my own eyes and not applicable everywhere.
What it comes to telling people about it, yes I have done that. I feel I'm witnessing such a relationship right in front of my eyes in the case of my little sister and her man.
Mika
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Marriage is arbitrary. A genuine love between a couple is not.
This is true. So why not certify it for the world to see by getting married? Show me a negative in a relationship by getting married.
Boy, I don't know, because it's not legal for a lot of loving couples?
Because it means commitment when a lot of people aren't ready? Because it means tying yourself legally to another individual who could betray and destroy you (on a financial and personal level)?
Given that only 15% of individuals abstain from sex until age 21, I don't think your ideals are a realistic goal.
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No I mean would you tell a kid their reason for existence was to improve your relationship?
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Me as a parent or as an outsider?
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Marriage is arbitrary. A genuine love between a couple is not.
This is true. So why not certify it for the world to see by getting married? Show me a negative in a relationship by getting married.
A) You don't need to get married. Like I said, marriage is completely arbitrary and would have little to no bearing on people's relationships if it hadn't been so thoroughly made into a paradigm by religion and law.
B) I cite all of the Hollywood marriages that go awry. And all marriages that end up in divorce. But as I said, marriage is arbitrary so it's not like this means anything other than it complicates things.
Given that marriage is arbitrary, there's really no reason for people to need to get married if they really love each other. And there are ways to profess one's love to another in ways that aren't legally and religiously binding, too.
BTW, I'm not trying to say that marriage is by any means bad, I'm just saying that it's unnecessary for a fruitful and satisfying relationship.
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As a parent Mika.
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As a parent, of course not. Yet having a surprise baby is one of the oldest tricks to catch a relatively wealthy husband. Before it was parents controlling with whom their children should be married with, nowadays the children do it automatically (including aspects of love and also wealth).
For some reason, I'm starting to think that only a few people actually know what love is.
Mika
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Seriously, Liberator. With more than half of marriages ending in failure, you want more people to get married?
People are starting to realize it may not be a really relevant social paradigm any more.
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Seriously, Liberator. With more than half of marriages ending in failure, you want more people to get married?
People are starting to realize it may not be a really relevant social paradigm any more.
You're skirting around the issue here. The problem is that people aren't being good parents, and being married has almost nothing to do with that. I don't know specific issues with today's relationships, but perhaps a common one could be that people are less sensitive or understanding with their partner, and that's what's destroying the relationships, not the marriages.
We need to change the frequency of good, healthy, stable relationships (read: relationships that won't end), not change the frequency of marriage (necessarily, at least). The relationships that have evolved into marriages would've fallen apart regardless of whether the people were married or not.
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Seriously, Liberator. With more than half of marriages ending in failure, you want more people to get married?
People are starting to realize it may not be a really relevant social paradigm any more.
You're skirting around the issue here. The problem is that people aren't being good parents, and being married has almost nothing to do with that. I don't know specific issues with today's relationships, but perhaps a common one could be that people are less sensitive or understanding with their partner, and that's what's destroying the relationships, not the marriages.
We need to change the frequency of good, healthy, stable relationships (read: relationships that won't end), not change the frequency of marriage (necessarily, at least). The relationships that have evolved into marriages would've fallen apart regardless of whether the people were married or not.
That's a valid point, but I think my comment stands as well.
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I'm going to come to Liberator's defense because someone had the gall to report a post of his to the moderator. I think we can all agree he's doing a fine job debating, even if you don't agree with his particular position.
That said I happen to agree with his position as well, or at least the more general rephrasing of it: a stable two-parent traditional household is the best way to ensure that the kids they raise are stable and well-adjusted.
General Battuta, I doubt Liberator is in favor of marriages falling apart. Obviously a marriage that stays together is better than one that ends in divorce; it shows that the married couple is mature enough to work through their differences. Nobody is ever going to be 100% satisfied with their mate; people are only human. The question is whether a person is willing to focus on the 80% that works instead of the 20% that doesn't.
In fact I would go so far as to say that a two-parent household, where a man and woman are not married but have decided to live together for the indefinite future, is almost as good as an actual marriage. They don't have the piece of paper saying they're married, but they have the stable family structure and all the other positive features that come with it.
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I know that Goober took care of this, but I'm also chiming in as someone who's not taking part in this argument. Don't report posts just because you disagree with the opinion expressed therein. Hard Light is a pretty open forum when it comes to discussing things, and even though some opinions may not jive with what you hold dear, don't report them just because you find what they say to be "wrong". If you disagree with a post, respond to it with a counter argument, don't rely on moderators to swoop in, delete the post, and scold the poster - it won't happen.
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I didn't do that, did I? No, I didn't! I'm pretty sure. I apologize if I somehow did...
And sure, Goob, I think two-parent households are generally better than one, and I have no problem considering a man and a woman (or man and man, or woman and woman, but you may disagree) living together to be on par with a marriage.
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I didn't read everyone else's posts, but I have two statistics to contribute that put planet-sized holes in Ms. Coulter's argument:
1. Violent crime rates, and the number of stable recidivist violent criminals, have been steadily dropping since the 1970s. Violent crime rates are lower now than they have ever been since they have been reliably measured.
2. Numbers of unwed mothers do not correlate to numbers of stable family units. Since the 1970s, marriage rates have steadily dropped or delayed, but the stable family unit has remained relatively intact (even in the face of divorce and separation, family unitsoften reform in blended families, which are also stable).
Coulter is a moron. She uses limited case and anecdotal evidence to make moralistic points which anyone with reasonably-competent Google skills can debunk in a matter of seconds.
Now, if an interesting discussion along these lines is how ready and legal availability of abortion services has a long-term effect of decreasing the area crime rate. Tackle that one, if you will =)
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I didn't do that, did I? No, I didn't! I'm pretty sure. I apologize if I somehow did...
I was referring to the poster who reported a certain post because he disagreed with the views expressed in it. If you did not report a post for that reason, then no reason to apologize.
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Whew! :p
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Seriously, Liberator. With more than half of marriages ending in failure, you want more people to get married?
People are starting to realize it may not be a really relevant social paradigm any more.
Firstly, Battuta, I'm not suggesting that I want more people to get married. I want more people to give some forethought into they're actions and what might happen if they do something. It's not about denying you or your partner your desires. It's about making sure those desires don't have a negative impact on your or they're life.
Secondly, thank you very much Goob, I appreciate your sentiments very much, I was beginning to feel a little alone.
Lastly, while they're may not be an earth shattering correlation between effectively fatherless children and violent crime, there is a connection. Anyone who can recognize simple patterns can see it. A little bit of inductive reasoning is all it takes. Crime is high in the inner city, the highest concentration of "fatherless" children is in the inner city, ergo at least part of the higher crime rate is created by children who would have a lower chance of committing a crime had they had a positive male influence. That's a little simple and it should include a relation to gang membership also, but it's late and I'm tired.
My big, throbbing, huge, overwhelming cry is for people to stop living in a world where the response to a negative situation is "It's not my fault!" A return of personal responsibility is what the world needs.
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My big, throbbing, huge, overwhelming cry is for people to stop living in a world where the response to a negative situation is "It's not my fault!" A return of personal responsibility is what the world needs.
This. A thousand times.
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Crime is high in the inner city, the highest concentration of "fatherless" children is in the inner city, ergo at least part of the higher crime rate is created by children who would have a lower chance of committing a crime had they had a positive male influence.
Yes, that's true, but you're missing something huge. Young women who become pregnant in the inner city, with the fathers either leaving them or being very poor role models, have no choice. I mean, really, if you don't want to have children born into a world where they're going to have a miserable existence and simply contribute to the higher crime rate, why bother having them, right? And since the child welfare department is sorely lacking in organization in funding, adoption isn't a much better option.
So, the thing you're missing is: why not abortion?
My big, throbbing, huge, overwhelming cry is for people to stop living in a world where the response to a negative situation is "It's not my fault!" A return of personal responsibility is what the world needs.
If I didn't know you believed in "sex for reproduction only" and anti-abortion, I would agree with this. However, I know given the context of this argument that this is what you mean by this. People shouldn't be having sex unless they're ready to have children and if they get pregnant, well, bugger them, they have to raise it or give it away. If abortion wasn't viewed as babykilling and made more available, I can guarantee inner city crime and violence would drop.
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While not following the whole debate, Liberator, while there I do believe that a child should have a father figure growing up, I don't believe that a child when properly raised by it's mother will be more prone to violence than one with both parents. They may have other developmental problems, but as long as the mother is actually, you know, doing her job as a parent, then I feel that in many cases the child may develop quite well, having to learn to cope with the hardship of a single parent household and making them a stronger person.
That being said, I will repeat my sentiment that a child should have a father figure in their lives, just as they should have a mother figure. One without the other is always hard for the child.
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You know who else had a single parent?
A young guy called Jesus.
Yeah. Think about that one.
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Lastly, while they're may not be an earth shattering correlation between effectively fatherless children and violent crime, there is a connection. Anyone who can recognize simple patterns can see it. A little bit of inductive reasoning is all it takes. Crime is high in the inner city, the highest concentration of "fatherless" children is in the inner city, ergo at least part of the higher crime rate is created by children who would have a lower chance of committing a crime had they had a positive male influence. That's a little simple and it should include a relation to gang membership also, but it's late and I'm tired.
No. This is not how it works. There is a connection between metros and violent crime, and Starbucks and streets, and houses and people, and probably vacuum cleaners and homicides as well! Now (after ignoring MP-Ryan's post which kinda debunks your arugment) what you do is taking facts ("crime is high in the inner city" and "highest concentration of fatherless children is in the inner city"), then somehow decide that positive MALE influence - why is this always male? It's almost as if there's a S word to be thrown somewhere. These poor ladies obviously can't raise children? Where was I? Oh! Yeah, you completely bypass all statistical tests, make an unfounded assumption and assume this argument holds water?
No it does not. Do these "fatherless" children actually commit any more crime than statistically probable? Does positive MALE MALE MALE MANLY MAN MALE influence have a reducing effect to crime? You have to prove these assumptions and not just take them for granted. Go crazy on Google! A journal access probably helps. Without proving these things this argument is not valid.
Now after all of this, I have a feeling that you still do not quite grasp one very simple thing so here's a link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation
My big, throbbing, huge, overwhelming cry is for people to stop living in a world where the response to a negative situation is "It's not my fault!" A return of personal responsibility is what the world needs.
Does personal responsibility mean copy-pasting Ann Coulter's arguments about how OTHER PEOPLE SUCK into internet discussion board?
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While not following the whole debate, Liberator, while there I do believe that a child should have a father figure growing up, I don't believe that a child when properly raised by it's mother will be more prone to violence than one with both parents. They may have other developmental problems, but as long as the mother is actually, you know, doing her job as a parent, then I feel that in many cases the child may develop quite well, having to learn to cope with the hardship of a single parent household and making them a stronger person.
That being said, I will repeat my sentiment that a child should have a father figure in their lives, just as they should have a mother figure. One without the other is always hard for the child.
I haven't been watching this one unfold either, but while I can agree the child will probably develop well, the father figure is something I want to touch on. In my experience with people in Gangs/Crews, they replace the father figure with the voice of their crew. I've been told it's more specifically the crew leader/king in America, I haven't seen such a big influence over here by the leader specifically. But regardless of the presence of a father figure, if he is present, he needs to be doing a good job. I've seen a guy in my class, his parents head the company "Credit Force", fall into basically the situation most of you guys are talking about. Except he isn't a complete asshole, at least he wasn't the last time I talked to him, but unlike most other kind people I talk to, he's been caught by cops 3 times for graffiti and every time I see him out of school, he's surrounded by the most notorious people in "my world". And the sad part is, he's actually doing the best out of his siblings, by not dropping out of school in Years 8/9. I don't know much about his parents, and for good reason too, they're hardly ever around.
I don't think the problem lies with the father figure solely, but how role models are generally presented in life. The guy I was talking about before, whom I won't name, has both parents, however his older siblings are POOR role models.
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The strongest father figure of my childhood was not my father, even though I grew up with both parents
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If abortion wasn't viewed as babykilling and made more available, I can guarantee inner city crime and violence would drop.
A study found that result exactly. You don't have to speculate anything. I mentioned this at the end of my post.
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You know who else had a single parent?
A young guy called Jesus.
Yeah. Think about that one.
Everyone forgets Joseph. They always forget about the carpenter.
Parenthood doesn't mean biology, not entirely anyway. It means being there to teach the child(ren) their gender roles within society. What is expected of a good man/woman. It's irritating when a biological donor shows up and sues for custody of "they're" teenaged child. There's no link with any meaning that would be enhanced by putting that much turmoil into the child's life.
Also, the traditional role of a mother is caretaker, a woman will choose the nurture option almost every time. The traditional role of the father is disciplinarian. This isn't to say that a mother won't swat her misbehaving child on the tush if they need it, but they'll sit there and let them get away with more before it happens. Father's not so much. You step out of line, BLAP! back into line. Conversely, a father can be nurturing as well. But the two genders aren't really wired for the other's job. They can do them, just not well, kinda like flying an Ursa on a fighter intercept mission.
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My big, throbbing, huge, overwhelming cry is for people to stop living in a world where the response to a negative situation is "It's not my fault!" A return of personal responsibility is what the world needs.
You have no evidence that personal responsibility has ever left. All you have is a political fantasy.
But the two genders aren't really wired for the other's job. They can do them, just not well, kinda like flying an Ursa on a fighter intercept mission.
Genders aren't hardwired, you idiot. Genders are social construct.
And you have no right to say anything about the biological hardwiring of the two sexes (sex =! gender)when scientists are still struggling to make headway on the issue.
But from what I'm reading here, you're conceding that marriage isn't important, only the presence of a male figure?
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But the two genders aren't really wired for the other's job. They can do them, just not well, kinda like flying an Ursa on a fighter intercept mission.
Genders aren't hardwired, you idiot. Genders are social construct.
And you have no right to say anything about the biological hardwiring of the two sexes (sex =! gender)when scientists are still struggling to make headway on the issue.
But from what I'm reading here, you're conceding that marriage isn't important, only the presence of a male figure?
Genders did not spontaneously appear one day. Gradually the social roles of the sexes were sculpted because of things that one gender was generally better at than the other. But you are correct in saying that these don't necessarily apply to modern life.
Look at breast milk for example. With domesticated animals, females don't need to breast feed children, but in prehistoric times they did. This particular facet of gender roles is now obsolete. Even still, the concept of the female being the primary caretaker of a child stuck. And there is our modern stereotype.
Bear in mind that gender roles came about based on true generalities about the different sexes, not just how people spontaneously decided that they were better than the other sex. The reason I point this out is because I think this is what Liberator was trying to point out, and I myself would like to point out to him that (like I said earlier in this post) most gender roles are obsolete given the way modern society works.
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Yes, but we have to be careful with evopsych explanations for gender roles, because they tend to become unsubstantiated and untestable just-so stories.
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If abortion wasn't viewed as babykilling and made more available, I can guarantee inner city crime and violence would drop.
A study found that result exactly. You don't have to speculate anything. I mentioned this at the end of my post.
I happen to agree with that. Abortions reduce crime and violence because those most prone to crime and violence are also those most likely to get abortions. But if abortion is wrong, then that's not an acceptable solution. It's just as immoral as killing people to alleviate food shortages.
You have no evidence that personal responsibility has ever left.
One look at the amount of credit card debt in the average family would convince me otherwise.
But the two genders aren't really wired for the other's job. They can do them, just not well, kinda like flying an Ursa on a fighter intercept mission.
Genders aren't hardwired, you idiot. Genders are social construct.
And you have no right to say anything about the biological hardwiring of the two sexes (sex =! gender)when scientists are still struggling to make headway on the issue.
No personal attacks please. And I think one could safely make a conclusion about the biological hardwiring of the sexes based on an examination of human history. "Cross-wiring" of genders is the exception, not the rule. And there hasn't been a single successful "Amazon woman" society anywhere in the world, ever.
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Genders did not spontaneously appear one day. Gradually the social roles of the sexes were sculpted because of things that one gender was generally better at than the other. But you are correct in saying that these don't necessarily apply to modern life.
Look at breast milk for example. With domesticated animals, females don't need to breast feed children, but in prehistoric times they did. This particular facet of gender roles is now obsolete. Even still, the concept of the female being the primary caretaker of a child stuck. And there is our modern stereotype.
Bear in mind that gender roles came about based on true generalities about the different sexes, not just how people spontaneously decided that they were better than the other sex. The reason I point this out is because I think this is what Liberator was trying to point out, and I myself would like to point out to him that (like I said earlier in this post) most gender roles are obsolete given the way modern society works.
No personal attacks please. And I think one could safely make a conclusion about the biological hardwiring of the sexes based on an examination of human history. "Cross-wiring" of genders is the exception, not the rule. And there hasn't been a single successful "Amazon woman" society anywhere in the world, ever.
It does not work like that! The modern social gender is not just some unfalsifiable post hoc ergo propter hoc handwaving. It changes every day, every year, and the changes are big. The social gender in question was, until Liberator probably changed the subjet again current American one. Not some ancient amazonian tales.
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Yeah, I have to agree with Janos here. The argument you're making isn't really a scientific one, Goob; it could just reflect a very enduring and deep-set power dynamic.
But I'm gonna step back from this discussion. I'm obviously getting a bit frustrated.
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I take FreeSpace-related debates far too seriously, but when it comes to RL politics, I like the drama. :D
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It changes every day, every year, and the changes are big.
Do I live under a rock, or do I just not pay attention? :confused:
Oh well, it's not like I'm an expert on this anyway. I don't think I was wrong in what I said exactly, but there's much more to it than that.
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Social conservatives hate freedom
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It changes every day, every year, and the changes are big.
Do I live under a rock, or do I just not pay attention? :confused:
Oh well, it's not like I'm an expert on this anyway. I don't think I was wrong in what I said exactly, but there's much more to it than that.
gotta go to a store to buy stuff I did not grow and also I like to dress fancily because currently it's the hot nudie jeans that give me chicks
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Social conservatives hate freedom
:eek2: :wtf:
Umm, lawl.
Seriously though...how can you say that because I favor a more responsible view on sex and relationships that I hate freedom?
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The fact that you're scared of sex, particularly of female sexuality, doesn't seem to be a good foundation for policy.
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Social conservatives hate freedom
:eek2: :wtf:
Umm, lawl.
Seriously though...how can you say that because I favor a more responsible view on sex and relationships that I hate freedom?
You want to restrict how people behave sexually?
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Social conservatives hate freedom
:eek2: :wtf:
Umm, lawl.
Seriously though...how can you say that because I favor a more responsible view on sex and relationships that I hate freedom?
It's because you don't view the ability to make such choices, say for a gay dude to marry another gay dude, as a good thing. You see the repression of their freedom as preserving the fabric of society.
Pervasive social liberalism (keeping your opinions to yourself and not legally limiting the choices of others) will work these problems out in the end. All the single mothers who would give birth to fatherless criminals can instead terminate their pregnancies (or their education in birth control methods will make that unnecessary) . The gay folks won't need to parade anymore, since there won't be any reason to. The kids in school who are different won't be bullied to the point of suicide. Non-violent pot offenders won't be wasting our resources by being in prison.
Also, as a bonus, we get to keep calling the USA the Land of the Free
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:yes:
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Social conservatives hate freedom
:eek2: :wtf:
Umm, lawl.
Seriously though...how can you say that because I favor a more responsible view on sex and relationships that I hate freedom?
It's because you don't view the ability to make such choices, say for a gay dude to marry another gay dude, as a good thing. You see the repression of their freedom as preserving the fabric of society.
Pervasive social liberalism (keeping your opinions to yourself and not legally limiting the choices of others) will work these problems out in the end. All the single mothers who would give birth to fatherless criminals can instead terminate their pregnancies (or their education in birth control methods will make that unnecessary) . The gay folks won't need to parade anymore, since there won't be any reason to. The kids in school who are different won't be bullied to the point of suicide. Non-violent pot offenders won't be wasting our resources by being in prison.
Also, as a bonus, we get to keep calling the USA the Land of the Free
You are out of your ever loving mind if you think that.
Non-violent offenders should get the hint that what they're doing is illegal after they're first arrest and have the sense to not do it again.
I don't care what gay people do in the privacy of they're own bedrooms/houses/whatever, I'm not gonna restrict what you can do for a living or how much you can make or who you can live with based on that. But the covenant of marriage was a holy religious covenant between a man, woman and God long before the current homosexual Left decided to use it as a political issue.
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Stop using 'they're' when you mean 'their'! I can understand doing it once or twice accidentally, but you are doing it consistently! You are using the language wrong! I can't begin to take you seriously if you can't even follow basic rules of grammar and spelling especially when they change the meaning of your words!
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But the covenant of marriage was a holy religious covenant between a man, woman and God long before the current homosexual Left decided to use it as a political issue.
this is reality, quit bringing your fairy tales into it.
Non-violent offenders should get the hint that what they're doing is illegal after they're first arrest and have the sense to not do it again.
it shouldn't be illegal, and the only people that are harmed by anyone's consumption of marijuana are harmed only because of the government's position on it.
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I don't care what gay people do in the privacy of they're own bedrooms/houses/whatever, I'm not gonna restrict what you can do for a living or how much you can make or who you can live with based on that. But the covenant of marriage was a holy religious covenant between a man, woman and God long before the current homosexual Left decided to use it as a political issue.
But the Earth was the center of the universe for a long time before astronomers decided to change it.
Answer me this: What is wrong about the following statement:"Without love, there can be no true marriage. With Love, there can be nothing else."?
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Seriously though...how can you say that because I favor a more responsible view on sex and relationships that I hate freedom?
As you are against contraceptives and abortion, I cannot in good conscience consider you to favor a more responsible view.
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You are out of your ever loving mind if you think that.
Non-violent offenders should get the hint that what they're doing is illegal after they're first arrest and have the sense to not do it again.
You are muddying the waters
The point is that not all things that are currently illegal should actually be so. The issue is not whether breaking the law is illegal (...) but whether should the same
I don't care what gay people do in the privacy of they're own bedrooms/houses/whatever, I'm not gonna restrict what you can do for a living or how much you can make or who you can live with based on that. But the covenant of marriage was a holy religious covenant between a man, woman and God long before the current homosexual Left decided to use it as a political issue.
THE HOMOSEXUAL LEFT why do we even bother to argue with someone like... this
You should probably go around India, Arabian peninsula and Japan parading your well-thought position of marriage. And tell atheists that they cannot marry either.
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Non-violent offenders should get the hint that what they're doing is illegal after they're first arrest and have the sense to not do it again.
Amazingly enough, they don't often times.
I don't care what gay people do in the privacy of they're own bedrooms/houses/whatever, I'm not gonna restrict what you can do for a living or how much you can make or who you can live with based on that. But the covenant of marriage was a holy religious covenant between a man, woman and God long before the current homosexual Left decided to use it as a political issue.
Shouldn't that be in the bounds of the churches then? Shouldn't they be the ones to decide who gets to "marry" and who doesn't?
If a church says "Hey, let's let gays marry" who are you to say they can't?
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You are out of your ever loving mind if you think that.
Hey, watch the personal attacks--you do know there are a lot of people who are dying to say the same thing to you, but don't.
Non-violent offenders should get the hint that what they're doing is illegal after they're first arrest and have the sense to not do it again.
Yes, but they don't. And government resources continued to be piled into a losing war when we could be spending it on something else.
But the covenant of marriage was a holy religious covenant between a man, woman and God long before the current homosexual Left decided to use it as a political issue.
Oh damn them for demanding the same legal rights as heterosexual couples.
They're not human beings like us, they don't need them! God said so!
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Hey Liberator you still haven't proved your assertions about male figures and crime rate
or about how the personal responsibility vanished
or about how the promiscuity is bad
and the single mothers being the source of all evil
And the degenerated culture! That was a direct question I asked you at page 3 and I've still yet to see a good answer!
Just answer these questions already - your continuous shifting of goalposts and evading the argument is irritating as ****. I will ask these questions for all eternity until I get an answer in this thread because now people are for some reason letting this crap go through. Your argument lies squarely on unfounded assertions and what's even funnier, when asked to specify them you don't do that. It's almost as if you completely ignore any and all arguments to contrary. If you are right then proving it shouldn't be difficult.
So answer the questions and explain your arguments, thanks!
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Yeah, you keep giving ground every time we crush one of your points. Why not admit you're wrong?
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Didn't Pat Robertson or someone say they lost the culture war in the US and that were "awash in sin"?
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Hey Liberator you still haven't proved your assertions about male figures and crime rate
or about how the personal responsibility vanished
or about how the promiscuity is bad
and the single mothers being the source of all evil
And the degenerated culture! That was a direct question I asked you at page 3 and I've still yet to see a good answer!
Just answer these questions already - your continuous shifting of goalposts and evading the argument is irritating as ****. I will ask these questions for all eternity until I get an answer in this thread because now people are for some reason letting this crap go through. Your argument lies squarely on unfounded assertions and what's even funnier, when asked to specify them you don't do that. It's almost as if you completely ignore any and all arguments to contrary. If you are right then proving it shouldn't be difficult.
So answer the questions and explain your arguments, thanks!
Yeah, you keep giving ground every time we crush one of your points. Why not admit you're wrong?
Intimidation: It wins debates.
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And I think one could safely make a conclusion about the biological hardwiring of the sexes based on an examination of human history. "Cross-wiring" of genders is the exception, not the rule. And there hasn't been a single successful "Amazon woman" society anywhere in the world, ever.
You'd think wrong. While sexual organ development is typically a dichotomy, sexual identity and preference (along with gender identity, which is the social construct) are determined primarily by two factors: hormonal dosage during embryonic development, and gender roles during upbringing.
People get this sex versus gender thing mixed up all the time, so here's the fast and dirty breakdown:
-Sex is biological identity, determined in humans by dosage concentrations of X and Y chromosomes (actually, two particular genes on the Y chromosome). Usually sex is considered dichotomous, both in reality it's more of a gradient. As we're genetically wired to function best with either XX or XY it's the most common, but dosage mix-ups are reasonably common, and so the biological difference between the sexes is better looked at as a gradient than two biological absolutes.
-Sexual identity does NOT correlate to sexual organ development. Sexual identity is determined in the brain, and the most popular and best support theory at the moment has reasonably conclusive evidence that it is the result of testosterone concentrations in the brain during early development. This is how transsexual phenotypes come about. Again, there is no dichotomy - it's a threshold based gradient. 1-10% of the population have transsexual characteristics, including variance in brain structure (there is a little known study published in Nature or Science [can't remember offhand] in the early 2000s that compared anatomical features of the brain in deceased persons and found that brain physiology differs for males and females, but that it doesn't always correlate to genetic sexual identity - in short, they could tell if a person was transsexual simply by examining part of their brain).
-Gender identity is a result of learned social stereotypes about gender, which again doesn't always correlate with the biological factors. Thus, it is possible to get a genetically male individual with a biologically female brain whose behaviour correlates most closely with learned male gender patterns.
So there are at least three different major contributors to the determination of which sexual characteristics (biological and behaviour) that we exhibit. Therefore, saying humans with male primary sexual characteristics should fit a certain pattern and humans with female primary sexual characteristics should fit a different pattern is ludicrous. It's all down to individual behavioural types.
That said, there are common behavioural genettic patterns which are wired into hormone balances that make it more likely for particular sexes to exhibit particular behaviours, but it certainly isn't absolute.
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But the covenant of marriage was a holy religious covenant between a man, woman and God long before the current homosexual Left decided to use it as a political issue.
FACT: Marriage existed long before Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, to name but a few of the major religions claiming to control marriage.
Evidence of marriage ceremonies dates back well into the era of the Mesopotamian city-states (and prior to that - just in case you don't know the history, that's nearly 4000 BCE). And guess what - it hasn't always been between just one man and one woman. And it usually had more to do with politics and trade than any religious conventions.
If I can put another large hole in your argument, child-rearing wasn't traditionally done by a nuclear family. Up until recently (maybe the last 300 years) children were usually raised by a large extended family and community. The nuclear family, as often harped upon by Christian conservatives, is a relatively recent social construct used more as a political tool than it ever actually existed.
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FACT: Marriage existed long before Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, to name but a few of the major religions claiming to control marriage.
Evidence of marriage ceremonies dates back well into the era of the Mesopotamian city-states (and prior to that - just in case you don't know the history, that's nearly 4000 BCE). And guess what - it hasn't always been between just one man and one woman. And it usually had more to do with politics and trade than any religious conventions.
If I can put another large hole in your argument, child-rearing wasn't traditionally done by a nuclear family. Up until recently (maybe the last 300 years) children were usually raised by a large extended family and community. The nuclear family, as often harped upon by Christian conservatives, is a relatively recent social construct used more as a political tool than it ever actually existed.
Is there a web source that you got this info from? I'd like to show it to some people that I know.
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FACT: Marriage existed long before Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, to name but a few of the major religions claiming to control marriage.
Evidence of marriage ceremonies dates back well into the era of the Mesopotamian city-states (and prior to that - just in case you don't know the history, that's nearly 4000 BCE). And guess what - it hasn't always been between just one man and one woman. And it usually had more to do with politics and trade than any religious conventions.
If I can put another large hole in your argument, child-rearing wasn't traditionally done by a nuclear family. Up until recently (maybe the last 300 years) children were usually raised by a large extended family and community. The nuclear family, as often harped upon by Christian conservatives, is a relatively recent social construct used more as a political tool than it ever actually existed.
Is there a web source that you got this info from? I'd like to show it to some people that I know.
There probably is, but that's constructed from a combination of my history and psychology background. Marriage rituals from Mesopotamia should be a fairly easy find - try looking up information on the Sumerians. A variety of neolithic peoples before them practiced marriage (there is evidence in cave sites found all over Europe, and a couple settlements were uncovered in the Shetlands, in Britain). Really, your best source is probably Art History textbooks or sources as they cover ceremonial artifacts from the daily life of these peoples (thank you, Art History 101). I'm trying to remember the name of the city-state in Iraq and it presently escapes me, but they practiced marriage ceremonies overseen by priest-clerics who ran the city and were the common person's only link to the local gods.
As for child-rearing, your best example is the Inuit peoples of northern North America or the customs of First Nations peoples across the continent. While evidence of communal child-rearing from Europe does abound, you'll have to hunt through a lot more material to find what you're looking for.
The construct of the nuclear family actually began with the nobility sometime after 1600 CE, as noble children were socially constructed as nothing more than "small adults" rather than a distinct phase of human development. Evidence is best found in the writings of individuals like Hobbes and Swift, or in family portraits (where children are depicted bearing adult visual characteristics rather than child-like features).
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Thank you, MP-Ryan. That was a quality contribution (and I hope I'd have said as much even if it didn't agree with my viewpoint.)
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Social conservatives hate freedom
:eek2: :wtf:
Umm, lawl.
Seriously though...how can you say that because I favor a more responsible view on sex and relationships that I hate freedom?
It's because you don't view the ability to make such choices, say for a gay dude to marry another gay dude, as a good thing. You see the repression of their freedom as preserving the fabric of society.
Pervasive social liberalism (keeping your opinions to yourself and not legally limiting the choices of others) will work these problems out in the end. All the single mothers who would give birth to fatherless criminals can instead terminate their pregnancies (or their education in birth control methods will make that unnecessary) . The gay folks won't need to parade anymore, since there won't be any reason to. The kids in school who are different won't be bullied to the point of suicide. Non-violent pot offenders won't be wasting our resources by being in prison.
Also, as a bonus, we get to keep calling the USA the Land of the Free
You are out of your ever loving mind if you think that.
Non-violent offenders should get the hint that what they're doing is illegal after they're first arrest and have the sense to not do it again.
I don't care what gay people do in the privacy of they're own bedrooms/houses/whatever, I'm not gonna restrict what you can do for a living or how much you can make or who you can live with based on that. But the covenant of marriage was a holy religious covenant between a man, woman and God long before the current homosexual Left decided to use it as a political issue.
SOMEONE ALERT THE INTERNET, GAY PEOPLES' HAPPINESS IS GOING TO DESTROY SOCIETY.
Not to jump on you like everyone else is man, but this is simply wrong. Honestly, I think Christians have much bigger fish to fry in this world than people who find true love in someone of the same gender.
Denying basic rights to a specific group of people is discrimination. Just like racism was practiced (In America) against Catholics, Italians, Irish, Chinese, Hispanics and Blacks, its now also being practiced against Gays. Why its happening now probably has to do with the interesting social crossroads created with the LGBT movement meeting the Christian Right at the same time and place in history.
What really gets me is why the Christian institution gets involved in it at all. The Old Testament might have a footnote regarding marriage being between guys and gals somewhere, but the Christian church doesn't own marriage. Saying Gays can't be wed because the Old Testament doesn't want them to is like saying non-Christians can't get married because they aren't Christian. I say Old Testament, because Jesus supposedly led a sinless life, sacrificed himself for all of Humanity's sins, and then was resurrected as a testament to God's will. His ministry and sacrifice wiped the slate clean for Humanity. Does this mean we can go nuts and do whatever we want? Of course not. But it does mean we can progress past the old ways. Just like we aren't required to sacrifice our livestock or first born children to God anymore to make penance for when we **** up, we aren't required to pretend we're something we're not. Through Christ, our sins are forgiven.
Gays and gay relationships might be strange and uncomfortable to straights, but so is meatloaf. Pretending they don't exist, or worse, antagonizing and persecuting them, isn't going to make them stop existing. It's simply persecuting a group of people because they are different.
So to come back to my original argument, the denial of basic rights and respects to Gays (or any group of people) under Christian pretenses is wrong. Not only is it wrong, but its directly contrary to God's will, and the lessons we learned from Christ. And if you or anyone else is going to tell me that its God's will that everyone in the world is entitled to the same equality, basic rights, and eternal salvation through faith, except for Gays, then we clearly don't share faith in the same God.
And please don't even get me started on why denying them the right to marry is wrong legally.
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I would be satisfied with getting the law out of marriage altogether; it has no business being there in the first place. If two people want to get married in a mainline Christian church, then that's their business. If a man and a man want to get married in the Church of Adam & Steve, then that's their business as well. And neither church should have the authority to force a pastor of the other church to officiate for them.
But once the government gets involved in deciding who is can get a marriage license and who can't, it no longer remains a personal covenant between two people and becomes a covenant between two people and everyone else. And you may not like what everyone else has to say about it, regardless of which position you hold.
Marriage licenses were originally established (in the USA at least) to prevent interracial marriages. That should have raised a red flag right at the beginning.
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I would be OK with this.
The removal of the legal portion from marriage and the establishment of a civic union of some kind that carries the current legal weight of marriage would be fine. Then you've got all the major arguments from both sides nixxed.
See? I can be reasonable.
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Yes, that's agreeable, as long as it's open to everybody.
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I would be satisfied with getting the law out of marriage altogether; it has no business being there in the first place. If two people want to get married in a mainline Christian church, then that's their business. If a man and a man want to get married in the Church of Adam & Steve, then that's their business as well. And neither church should have the authority to force a pastor of the other church to officiate for them.
But once the government gets involved in deciding who is can get a marriage license and who can't, it no longer remains a personal covenant between two people and becomes a covenant between two people and everyone else. And you may not like what everyone else has to say about it, regardless of which position you hold.
Marriage licenses were originally established (in the USA at least) to prevent interracial marriages. That should have raised a red flag right at the beginning.
I would be OK with this.
The removal of the legal portion from marriage and the establishment of a civic union of some kind that carries the current legal weight of marriage would be fine. Then you've got all the major arguments from both sides nixxed.
See? I can be reasonable.
holy ****, did that just happen?
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Umm, yeah it did, I never said I was against civil unions. Just not Reverend/Pastor/Priest performed marriages.
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Umm, yeah it did, I never said I was against civil unions. Just not Reverend/Pastor/Priest performed marriages.
Are religious institutions forced to marry people?
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Umm, yeah it did, I never said I was against civil unions. Just not Reverend/Pastor/Priest performed marriages.
Are religious institutions forced to marry people?
On the flip side, playing Devil's Advocate for minute - Imagine a world where society has progressed far enough to demand complete equality in regards to respect and human rights for citizens of all colors, races, genders, etc.
You have two absurdly attractive lesbians who under this shining new society, get married. They love each other. They live happily ever after up until they have an argument in a bar after work, over whether their beer should have better taste, or less calories. It quickly becomes heated, because they are ****ing hot lesbians, and one of them slaps the other, while in reaction, lesbian #2 pulls the others' hair, while the first one rips off #2's clothes in response.
Yet, keeping in mind our progressive society, what would be a gloriously arousing catfight, is now legally domestic violence. The cops are called, break up the fight, and haul both the chicks off to jail. :blah:
You see, either way, Satan is the only winner here, and we're all losers.
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Hey Liberator you still haven't proved your assertions about male figures and crime rate
or about how the personal responsibility vanished
or about how the promiscuity is bad
and the single mothers being the source of all evil
And the degenerated culture! That was a direct question I asked you at page 3 and I've still yet to see a good answer!
Just answer these questions already - your continuous shifting of goalposts and evading the argument is irritating as ****. I will ask these questions for all eternity until I get an answer in this thread because now people are for some reason letting this crap go through. Your argument lies squarely on unfounded assertions and what's even funnier, when asked to specify them you don't do that. It's almost as if you completely ignore any and all arguments to contrary. If you are right then proving it shouldn't be difficult.
I mean, you have already posted at least twice in this thread after my original questionpost so you probably should have time to justify your original starting positions!
Thank you in advance! Eagerly waiting your repy
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Yet, keeping in mind our progressive society, what would be a gloriously arousing catfight, is now legally domestic violence. The cops are called, break up the fight, and haul both the chicks off to jail. :blah:
Having seen something very much like this happen, it's not as sexy as it sounds. :(
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Just answer these questions already - your continuous shifting of goalposts and evading the argument is irritating as ****. I will ask these questions for all eternity until I get an answer in this thread because now people are for some reason letting this crap go through. Your argument lies squarely on unfounded assertions and what's even funnier, when asked to specify them you don't do that. It's almost as if you completely ignore any and all arguments to contrary. If you are right then proving it shouldn't be difficult.
Calm down dude, it's only the internet. There are going to be people who are wrong, or at the least, you disagree with, for the rest of your life. You can't defeat them all.
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I would be satisfied with getting the law out of marriage altogether; it has no business being there in the first place. If two people want to get married in a mainline Christian church, then that's their business. If a man and a man want to get married in the Church of Adam & Steve, then that's their business as well.
The legal parts of marriage are important though. Big example is this one: when a gay man is in the hospital only allowed "family" visitors, his partner of potentially decades won't be allowed in. There are thousands of legal benefits to being married as opposed to just living with somebody.
As it is, no church is forced to marry anybody they don't want to. In fact, you don't even need a religious officiate. A magistrate can marry people. No religion involved in that at all.
I think marriage, as it pertains to government, should revolve around things like property rights, next of kin status, etc, as those things will likely be important to two people who are romantically involved for a very long time.
EDIT: Actually, "romantically involved" is too specific. Best friends of decades and decades could be allowed to marry, in that sense.
Marriage wasn't invented to bind people who love each other. It was just an easy way to keep track of the legalities of selling off your daughters.
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Just answer these questions already - your continuous shifting of goalposts and evading the argument is irritating as ****. I will ask these questions for all eternity until I get an answer in this thread because now people are for some reason letting this crap go through. Your argument lies squarely on unfounded assertions and what's even funnier, when asked to specify them you don't do that. It's almost as if you completely ignore any and all arguments to contrary. If you are right then proving it shouldn't be difficult.
Calm down dude, it's only the internet. There are going to be people who are wrong, or at the least, you disagree with, for the rest of your life. You can't defeat them all.
then why will he post
or why do you
edit: Seriously though, I can deal with stances I do not like and so on, but if someone's seriousposting and everyone else is replying to him and it's serious I don't just know why bad argumentation skills should slide and people should accept crap like this at face value.
It's poor discussion thats doing more than enough damage in politics, and this is a political thread. Giving your discussion opponent a chance to throw line after line of unsubstantiated arguments into the discussion does nothing at all, except maybe give him a false sense of success. People look at the discussion and go "hey, he hasn't been demolished or disproved, maybe he is on to something" when in reality the entire strategy is just "post post post post and back away as soon as challenged". This is extremely pitiful discussion tactic and should be questioned wherever encountered, especially if in guise of serious debate.
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Geez, just separate the religious aspect from the advantages of a legally registered relationship and you're all set. The religious organizations can deal with the things however they like, while controversial pairs can still register their relationship in the legal sense.
Legally, a civil union should be exactly the same thing as a marriage by some religious authority.
If it isn't, then the separation of church and state is a sham (not news really*, but whatever).
And if civil unions aren't available for same sex couples, then the system discriminates against certain group of people and the supposedly free society is a sham (again, not exactly a new thing).
*considering how religious organizations are tax exempt regardless of what their economical balance is...
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I have nothing against gay marriage myself (legal one) ....as long as you don't call it marriage. We need to invent a new word for it (since marriage by definition is the union between a man and a woman). Let's call it kazoo or something.
note that "gay marriage" is two words. We need something shorter. Garrige?
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I have nothing against gay marriage myself (legal one) ....as long as you don't call it marriage. We need to invent a new word for it (since marriage by definition is the union between a man and a woman). Let's call it kazoo or something.
note that "gay marriage" is two words. We need something shorter. Garrige?
Wait... what? 1) I'm pretty sure you're Croatian or something. I'm also reasonably sure that English is not Croatia's first language. Why do you care? 2) That's why it's called GAY Marriage, because its homo.
How about we start calling you Gayshman, because well, by definition, you're pretty gaysh most the time. C wut i did there???
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Whoa, calm down there. He was just saying we need a new word for it because, by definition, marriage is the union between a man and a woman.
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Whoa, calm down there. He was just saying we need a new word for it because, by definition, marriage is the union between a man and a woman.
That's why it's called GAY Marriage, because its homo.
Adjectives are amaaaaaazing.
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Whoa, calm down there. He was just saying we need a new word for it because, by definition, marriage is the union between a man and a woman.
Actually, marriage has all kinds of definitions. The most COMMON is between one man and one woman, but that doesn't mean it's absolutely correct and not subject to change.
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Marriage is a union of souls, according to most priests, do souls have gender?
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Adjectives are amaaaaaazing.
note that "gay marriage" is two words. We need something shorter. Garrige?
So is reading...
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So you're perfectly cool with a man marrying a woman, even if the woman has a penis?
Or does it have to be the union between a male and a female?
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I think by definition that if a woman has a penis, she is technically 'male,' as such as 'male' is the term for the gender that houses small, mobile gametes.
Personally, I think of marriage as union between a man and a woman, biologically and any other trappings that such entails. I think that a union between two members of the same sex is not "marriage" but just a "union." Opinion, not fact.
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No, if it has a penis it's either a male or an intersex individual. That doesn't make it a man. Man is a gender and therefore a social construct, and female individuals may be men (or identify themselves as 'queer' or transgender, alternatively, but not equivalently.)
Whoops, misread your remark.
What you want to say there is that you think of marriage as a union between a 'male' and a 'female'. Those are biological terms.
So is it genetic-level sex that matters? Does it have to be an XX and an XY? What about an XX and an XXY individual? What about a man and a hermaphrodite? What about a man marrying a genetic male who's undergone gender assignment surgery and now identifies as a woman and has the equipment of a female?
None of these are marriage in your book, right?
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I think by definition that if a woman has a penis, she is technically 'male,' as such as 'male' is the term for the gender that houses small, mobile gametes.
Read, please: http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,62416.msg1232957.html#msg1232957
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Marriage means union. To marry is to bring together as one. There is no gender specification beyond connotations.
After all, didn't marriage used to be between two people of the same race? And before that, a man and his wives?
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Didn't read all 8 pages of this but why can't the 2 be separated just like church and state are supposed to? The state gives civil union licenses which are basically partnerships just like in business. Marriage is a religious thing and should not be recognized at all by the government. You want to get married go to your church. You want to form a partnership go get a license. You want you marriage to be seen by the government do both.
Solves the whole damn problem. Separation of church and state are there for a reason.
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I couldn't care less what it is called, as long as it is called one thing (and one thing ONLY) by the government.
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What about a man marrying a genetic male who's undergone gender assignment surgery and now identifies as a woman and has the equipment of a female?
None of these are marriage in your book, right?
I classify transvestites as an "it".
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What about a man marrying a genetic male who's undergone gender assignment surgery and now identifies as a woman and has the equipment of a female?
None of these are marriage in your book, right?
I classify transvestites as an "it".
First of all, he wasn't referring to transvestites. He was referring to transsexuals. There's a huge difference.
Second of all, aren't you all Christian and ****? Isn't against your all-loving, all-humans-are-better-than-other-animals policies to dehumanize and devalue a human life like that?
You, sir, are an ignorant, bigoted hypocrite.
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Dehumanize and devalue? Who's dehumanizing them? They are very much human.
It's just that I believe that humans are in general morons and not really better than animals in the first place. And some are bigger morons than others. Yet I still love humanity.
O, and you considering me ignorant, bigot and hypocrite...*sniff*. You wound me Sir. You really do. I must now play a sad tune on the worlds smallest violin. Surely your flawed opinions on my character have destroyed my fragile psyche! Oh, the AGONY!
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O, and you considering me ignorant, bigot and hypocrite...*sniff*. You wound me Sir. You really do. I must now play a sad tune on the worlds smallest violin. Surely your flawed opinions on my character have destroyed my fragile psyche! Oh, the AGONY!
I don't know if that's cute, funny, annoying or just downright stupid.
EDIT:
I'm settling on a combination of the last two.
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Okay, calm down guys. Let's avoid the name calling.
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iamzack, it's generally safer to just disregard Trashman's contributions to GenDisc threads.
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You wound me Sir.
That's Ma'am, trashhole.
iamzack, it's generally safer to just disregard Trashman's contributions to GenDisc threads.
She will keep this in mind in the future.
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iamzack, it's generally safer to just disregard Trashman's contributions to GenDisc threads.
In general, it's wise thing to just ignore pretty much everyone, not just me. You included.
Forum debates are very rarely intelectual or literary highhlights of anyones day.
That's Ma'am, trashhole.
You sure? Better doublecheck.
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iamzack, it's generally safer to just disregard Trashman's contributions to GenDisc threads.
In general, it's wise thing to just ignore pretty much everyone, not just me. You included.
Forum debates are very rarely intelectual or literary highhlights of anyones day.
That's Ma'am, trashhole.
You sure? Better doublecheck.
that was iamzack typing btw. she is here right now. and naked. definitely a girl.
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In general, it's wise thing to just ignore pretty much everyone, not just me. You included.
Forum debates are very rarely intelectual or literary highhlights of anyones day.
Obviously you don't read what Battuta usually posts.
that was iamzack typing btw. she is here right now. and naked. definitely a girl.
You see, Turey, (may I call you Turey? It's the dimunitive form of Turambar :p), things like that are inherently unbelieveable. Understatement works much better. The people who it's worth letting know will get it. The people who it's not, won't.
Unless of course those people are now frantically going back to reevaluate every post I've made in GenDisc in the last three years. In which case they might find something after all.
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Unless of course those people are now frantically going back to reevaluate every post I've made in GenDisc in the last three years. In which case they might find something after all.
So... you're a girl? :p
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So... you're a girl? :p
Or they're just going to pull the wrong conclusion anyways, I suppose. Anything not expressly forbidden by physical law is still possible...
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I believe the solution to this problem is abortions.
I'm against abortions.
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I believe the solution to this problem is abortions.
I'm against abortions.
so don't get one
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iamzack, it's generally safer to just disregard Trashman's contributions to GenDisc threads.
In general, it's wise thing to just ignore pretty much everyone, not just me. You included.
Forum debates are very rarely intelectual or literary highhlights of anyones day.
I have no particular problem with you as a person, Trash, but there's a higher-than-usual risk of flame!
In general, it's wise thing to just ignore pretty much everyone, not just me. You included.
Forum debates are very rarely intelectual or literary highhlights of anyones day.
Obviously you don't read what Battuta usually posts.
Aw, thanks. I might deserve that more if I could actually find a source for that battleship-mines thing.
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Abortions, or more acurately they're recipients, are rampant with complications post procedure, such as depression and a sense of loss. Not saying they should be illegal, but then again, they weren't pre-1976 either.
My feeling is this, by the time an abortion is practical as a way of terminating a pregnancy you are killing a baby, end of story.
Termination of a pregnancy, to me, is only viable using the so-called "abortion pill", outside of that window, no go unless the health of the mother is directly threatened by the pregnancy. "I don't want to be pregnant!" is not a sufficient reason to kill a baby.
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Abortions, or more acurately they're recipients, are rampant with complications post procedure, such as depression and a sense of loss. Not saying they should be illegal, but then again, they weren't pre-1976 either.
Same's true of pregnancy.
My feeling is this, by the time an abortion is practical as a way of terminating a pregnancy you are killing a baby, end of story.
Termination of a pregnancy, to me, is only viable using the so-called "abortion pill", outside of that window, no go unless the health of the mother is directly threatened by the pregnancy. "I don't want to be pregnant!" is not a sufficient reason to kill a baby.
Oh God please let's not get into this we just had an epic flamewar on this last year.
This is the rule: you don't have to have an abortion, okay? And you can let everybody else decide for themselves too.
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This tread is an abortion
Seriously are there any other hot button issues we need to add to General Discussion?
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Abortions, or more acurately they're recipients, are rampant with complications post procedure, such as depression and a sense of loss. Not saying they should be illegal, but then again, they weren't pre-1976 either.
My feeling is this, by the time an abortion is practical as a way of terminating a pregnancy you are killing a baby, end of story.
Termination of a pregnancy, to me, is only viable using the so-called "abortion pill", outside of that window, no go unless the health of the mother is directly threatened by the pregnancy. "I don't want to be pregnant!" is not a sufficient reason to kill a baby.
Post-abortion syndrome is a complete lie.
"I don't want to be pregnant" is a perfectly good reason to kill a baby. See, I do believe that fetuses count as "human life." However, I also believe that no human has the right to live inside another human against their will, feeding off of them like a parasite, even if it's necessary to their survival.
That's like me stealing your kidney because I need one to survive. It's not a completely essential organ, and you'll survive if I take it for a while, say, nine months, and then give it back when I don't need it anymore.
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My feeling is this, by the time an abortion is practical as a way of terminating a pregnancy you are killing a baby, end of story.
Termination of a pregnancy, to me, is only viable using the so-called "abortion pill", outside of that window, no go unless the health of the mother is directly threatened by the pregnancy. "I don't want to be pregnant!" is not a sufficient reason to kill a baby.
You realize the majority of abortions that are performed are medical abortions during the first 7-8 weeks following the woman's last period, using one of either (depending on the country) methotrexate and misoprostol OR mifepristone (RU 486) and misoprostol, right?
Even then, surgical abortions are generally only performed in the third trimester if there is immediate risk to the health and safety of the mother. Most abortions fall well before the 20-weeks (five months) viability period.
Just sayin'.
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Shall I mention the rhythm method again? Considering that system relies on a fertilized egg being ejected because it is too late in the cycle for it to attack to the wall of the womb? ;) Or the 'morning after pill', which does the same thing.
Abortion isn't just going under the knife, and Roman Catholicism has been practising church-sanctioned 'abortions' for hundreds of years via the said rhythm method.
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Shall I mention the rhythm method again? Considering that system relies on a fertilized egg being ejected because it is too late in the cycle for it to attack to the wall of the womb? ;) Or the 'morning after pill', which does the same thing.
Abortion isn't just going under the knife, and Roman Catholicism has been practising church-sanctioned 'abortions' for hundreds of years via the said rhythm method.
(Skipping to the last page)
It's not an abortion because a pregnancy could not have been achieved under those circumstances. An abortion is the termination of a pregnancy. The rhythm method simply is a manner of knowing when a woman is fertile or not.
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Shall I mention the rhythm method again? Considering that system relies on a fertilized egg being ejected because it is too late in the cycle for it to attack to the wall of the womb? ;) Or the 'morning after pill', which does the same thing.
Abortion isn't just going under the knife, and Roman Catholicism has been practising church-sanctioned 'abortions' for hundreds of years via the said rhythm method.
(Skipping to the last page)
It's not an abortion because a pregnancy could not have been achieved under those circumstances. An abortion is the termination of a pregnancy. The rhythm method simply is a manner of knowing when a woman is fertile or not.
RIF.
Allow me to show you:
Considering that system relies on a fertilized egg being ejected because it is too late in the cycle for it to attack to the wall of the womb?
A fertilized egg is what most anti-abortionists claim to be a human being. The rhythm method tricks a woman's body into preventing the implantation of a fertilized egg. if you're against abortion at any stage because it's the termination of a human life, then you're a class-A hypocrite if you use or condone the rhythm method.
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(Skipping to the last page)
It's not an abortion because a pregnancy could not have been achieved under those circumstances. An abortion is the termination of a pregnancy. The rhythm method simply is a manner of knowing when a woman is fertile or not.
I've made this argument before but you obviously weren't around for it. Most pro-lifers argue that life begins at conception. However the rhythm method isn't designed around preventing conception. It's designed around making sure that the fertilised cell doesn't implant.
In other words if you believe that life begins at conception you are killing more people using the rhythm method than you would be by using barrier or chemical forms of contraception as those methods prevent conception from occurring in the first place.
Pregnancy may have not occurred but that's a rather moot point since we're going from the assumption that life begins at conception. Which makes using the rhythm method a senseless waste of life compared with condoms.
See, I do believe that fetuses count as "human life." However, I also believe that no human has the right to live inside another human against their will, feeding off of them like a parasite, even if it's necessary to their survival.
That's like me stealing your kidney because I need one to survive. It's not a completely essential organ, and you'll survive if I take it for a while, say, nine months, and then give it back when I don't need it anymore.
Now that's an interesting take on it actually. It does open up some rather interesting arguments.
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My apologies. See if I do an off-the-cuff argument in the future. (Hint: I won't)
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Wow, IronBeer, that was actually impressively mature.
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My apologies. See if I do an off-the-cuff argument in the future. (Hint: I won't)
Feel free to do so. It's better to make a mistake and learn something new (or see a new way of thinking about things) than to keep quiet and remain ignorant. :)
As I said, you weren't around last time this came up.
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Don't worry about it Ironbeer, being here is a learning experience, and this argument has been going on in this forum for at least 5 years, probably longer ;)
Besides if no-one ever made an off the cuff argument, the entire Internet would be a wasteland ;)
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Obviously you don't read what Battuta usually posts.
I read everything everyone posts. And none of us usually have anything particulary deep to say.
I have no particular problem with you as a person, Trash, but there's a higher-than-usual risk of flame!
Why? For stating the obvious? I don't know about you, but I don't live in a dellusion that I'm so absolutely brilliant that everyone will love to hear what I have to say.
I doubt I'm that interesting or smart. No one is.
If I wanted a mental workout or something really intelectual, I'd go read a good book - not debate on various forums. These forums do have a somewhat higher standard tough.
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Why? For stating the obvious?
There is this thing called tact, and it generally helps keep discussions from becoming heated.
Personal take: I think that life begins, technically, at conception. I am against abortions unless the pregnancy directly threatens the life of the mother. "I don't want a baby" is not, to me, an acceptable reason. If you don't want a baby, use contraceptives, or don't do it at all. That seems to me like deciding to kill your kids just because you don't want to have to support them anymore. "I don't want to support them anymore" is most definately not a good enough reason for a jury. Now let's all agree to disagree.
(That's my opinion, deal with it. It won't change, don't even try to do so, it will lead to Bad Things, as such things usually do.)
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If you don't want a baby, use contraceptives, or don't do it at all. That seems to me like deciding to kill your kids just because you don't want to have to support them anymore. "I don't want to support them anymore" is most definately not a good enough reason for a jury. Now let's all agree to disagree.
(That's my opinion, deal with it. It won't change, don't even try to do so, it will lead to Bad Things, as such things usually do.)
That's not a very good analogy. Kids that are already born aren't living inside of you causing you all kinds of physical discomfort, health problems, etc. I'm a bit sensitive to this issue, seeing as I do have a uterus and would be extremely opposed to having another person living in it.
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Why? For stating the obvious?
There is this thing called tact, and it generally helps keep discussions from becoming heated.
Personal take: I think that life begins, technically, at conception. I am against abortions unless the pregnancy directly threatens the life of the mother. "I don't want a baby" is not, to me, an acceptable reason. If you don't want a baby, use contraceptives, or don't do it at all. That seems to me like deciding to kill your kids just because you don't want to have to support them anymore. "I don't want to support them anymore" is most definately not a good enough reason for a jury. Now let's all agree to disagree.
(That's my opinion, deal with it. It won't change, don't even try to do so, it will lead to Bad Things, as such things usually do.)
Relevant part bolded and color changed.
(Wow, I just quoted myself :blah:)
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That's not a very good analogy. Kids that are already born aren't living inside of you causing you all kinds of physical discomfort, health problems, etc. I'm a bit sensitive to this issue, seeing as I do have a uterus and would be extremely opposed to having another person living in it.
No, but they can cause you physical discomfort, stress, exhaustion and health problems even outside.
So being inconvenient for a person is pretty much irrelevant.
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Relevant part bolded and color changed.
What happens in the small chance contraceptives fail? What if I'm raped? What if I know the baby will be defective?
Hell, what if I just made a mistake and don't want to shove an 8lb parasite out of my ladybits?
That's not a very good analogy. Kids that are already born aren't living inside of you causing you all kinds of physical discomfort, health problems, etc. I'm a bit sensitive to this issue, seeing as I do have a uterus and would be extremely opposed to having another person living in it.
No, but they can cause you physical discomfort, stress, exhaustion and health problems even outside.
So being inconvenient for a person is pretty much irrelevant.
But they are not destroying your bodily autonomy. They are not inside your body, leeching nutrients. A person can annoy me all they want, until they steal my kidney.
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Post-abortion syndrome is a complete lie.
"I don't want to be pregnant" is a perfectly good reason to kill a baby. See, I do believe that fetuses count as "human life." However, I also believe that no human has the right to live inside another human against their will, feeding off of them like a parasite, even if it's necessary to their survival.
That's like me stealing your kidney because I need one to survive. It's not a completely essential organ, and you'll survive if I take it for a while, say, nine months, and then give it back when I don't need it anymore.
Post-abortion syndrome is a lie? Uhh... no?
Also, "I changed my mind" is a terrible reason for abortion. There are a lot of good reasons to get an abortion. That doesn't mean it's appropriate to ****-n-flush repeatedly. I think there's a pretty solid underlying argument in that you really shouldn't be ****ing around if you're not prepared for the possibility of being a parent.
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Yeah, so I **** around and do what I can to not get pregnant. People make mistakes. Are you saying if I make a habit of jumping off rooves, and then break my leg one day, I'm not entitled to have it fixed?
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Yeah, so I **** around and do what I can to not get pregnant. People make mistakes. Are you saying if I make a habit of jumping off rooves, and then break my leg one day, I'm not entitled to have it fixed?
please don't start jumping off of roofs, i worry about you enough as it is.
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That's so irrelevant.
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Post-abortion syndrome is a complete lie.
"I don't want to be pregnant" is a perfectly good reason to kill a baby. See, I do believe that fetuses count as "human life." However, I also believe that no human has the right to live inside another human against their will, feeding off of them like a parasite, even if it's necessary to their survival.
That's like me stealing your kidney because I need one to survive. It's not a completely essential organ, and you'll survive if I take it for a while, say, nine months, and then give it back when I don't need it anymore.
Yeah, so I **** around and do what I can to not get pregnant. People make mistakes. Are you saying if I make a habit of jumping off rooves, and then break my leg one day, I'm not entitled to have it fixed?
... some stuff..
.... counter point... some stuff... punctuation... There are a lot of good reasons to get an abortion... witty joke... more words... you really shouldn't be ****ing around if you're not prepared for the possibility of being a parent.
There were some irrelevant things inbetween, so I shortened it for you. Hope it helps.
Note: the two ideas aren't contradicting.
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So I should only have sex if I want a kid? Why, because I'm a chick and that's all that sex can possibly be for me? Uh.. no.
Besides, if I can't afford an abortion, I'd just punch myself in the gut until I miscarried. Problem solved.
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So I should only have sex if I want a kid? Why, because I'm a chick and that's all that sex can possibly be for me? Uh.. no.
Besides, if I can't afford an abortion, I'd just punch myself in the gut until I miscarried. Problem solved.
You're still reading into things that aren't there. I don't know how much bigger I can make my text. I can't remember typing "want" anywhere. I do remember typing "being prepared" though.
Also, way to try to pull feminism into it. Don't really care if you're a guy, girl, tranny, or a turtle. If you're boning down, be ready for the possibility of having to change diapers. If you're not ready, don't bone down.
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.. damn you s--
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I wouldn't call it irrelevant. You can dump the kid in a gutter once he's born, but before, you're stuck with him unless you get an abortion.
EDIT: But that's not to say that the inconvenience constitutes an abortion if the person is not prepared for it, just so you know that's not what I'm saying.
wtf happened here? GHOST POST!
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:shaking:
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Â
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So I should only have sex if I want a kid? Why, because I'm a chick and that's all that sex can possibly be for me? Uh.. no.
Besides, if I can't afford an abortion, I'd just punch myself in the gut until I miscarried. Problem solved.
You're still reading into things that aren't there. I don't know how much bigger I can make my text. I can't remember typing "want" anywhere. I do remember typing "being prepared" though.
Also, way to try to pull feminism into it. Don't really care if you're a guy, girl, tranny, or a turtle. If you're boning down, be ready for the possibility of having to change diapers. If you're not ready, don't bone down.
So having sex and subsequently getting pregnant means I have to change around my entire life? No thanks. I'll just take the abortions.
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Why? For stating the obvious?
There is this thing called tact, and it generally helps keep discussions from becoming heated.
Personal take: I think that life begins, technically, at conception. I am against abortions unless the pregnancy directly threatens the life of the mother. "I don't want a baby" is not, to me, an acceptable reason. If you don't want a baby, use contraceptives, or don't do it at all. That seems to me like deciding to kill your kids just because you don't want to have to support them anymore. "I don't want to support them anymore" is most definately not a good enough reason for a jury. Now let's all agree to disagree.
(That's my opinion, deal with it. It won't change, don't even try to do so, it will lead to Bad Things, as such things usually do.)
It sounds like you're pretty much in favor of abortion in all the cases I am: medical necessity, contraceptive failure, or sudden relationship change (i.e. father deserts.)
Or am I incorrect?
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I don't see the relevance of the debate over which circumstances justify abortion. Either you believe a woman has the right to an abortion or you don't. You can be as disgusted as you want by her reasons-- that's not the question. Supporting her right to make the choice means you acknowledge that why she wants one is really none of your business. Only if you want to argue that she doesn't have that right is there a basis for a discussion with immediate, practical implications.
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I don't see the relevance of the debate over which circumstances justify abortion. Either you believe a woman has the right to an abortion or you don't. You can be as disgusted as you want by her reasons-- that's not the question. Supporting her right to make the choice means you acknowledge that why she wants one is really none of your business. Only if you want to argue that she doesn't have that right is there a basis for a discussion with immediate, practical implications.
yes
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I don't see the relevance of the debate over which circumstances justify abortion. Either you believe a woman has the right to an abortion or you don't. You can be as disgusted as you want by her reasons-- that's not the question. Supporting her right to make the choice means you acknowledge that why she wants one is really none of your business. Only if you want to argue that she doesn't have that right is there a basis for a discussion with immediate, practical implications.
Seeing things in black and white is fun.
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Well, it's true. Murder's a black and white thing, innit?
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I don't see the relevance of the debate over which circumstances justify abortion. Either you believe a woman has the right to an abortion or you don't. You can be as disgusted as you want by her reasons-- that's not the question. Supporting her right to make the choice means you acknowledge that why she wants one is really none of your business. Only if you want to argue that she doesn't have that right is there a basis for a discussion with immediate, practical implications.
yes
Y'know, I think I may need to adjust my stated stance, since this argument makes sense to me.
I might frown upon abortion in some cases, just as I frown upon some other decisions, but in all cases I will support the woman's right to make her own decision.
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I don't see the relevance of the debate over which circumstances justify abortion. Either you believe a woman has the right to an abortion or you don't. You can be as disgusted as you want by her reasons-- that's not the question. Supporting her right to make the choice means you acknowledge that why she wants one is really none of your business. Only if you want to argue that she doesn't have that right is there a basis for a discussion with immediate, practical implications.
yes
Y'know, I think I may need to adjust my stated stance, since this argument makes sense to me.
I might frown upon abortion in some cases, just as I frown upon some other decisions, but in all cases I will support the woman's right to make her own decision.
Yeah, well said. After all, it's their child and not ours.
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Yeah, well said. After all, it's their child and not ours.
Was that sarcasm?
While I tend to support abortion rights, I frequently find the absolute lack of legal standing the father has to arrest it frustrating...if necessary.
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That is a somewhat overlooked area of parents rights alas, problem is, it the debate never gets to that point because no-one can get past item 1.
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Tch. If the father wants it that bad, he can have it. But it's not staying in my body.
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Tch. If the father wants it that bad, he can have it. But it's not staying in my body.
That's the reason it's necessary.
Also the one it's frustrating, since that kills it.
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If the father wants the kid and can't convince the mother to keep it using words and persuasion, then the couple has more problems than a kid, and really shouldn't be throwing any new humans into whatever their ****ty situation is.
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Seeing things in black and white is fun.
It's far from black and white, but my contention is that the gray area is irrelevant to the practical question of how to proceed. If this discussion is a purely academic foray into ethical philosophy, then by all means, let's discuss the imperatives and ramifications surrounding a woman's reasons for wanting an abortion. But if this is a debate over whether abortion is or is not a right, then your answer is either yes or no, and if you argue that a woman should only be permitted an abortion after her motivations have been officially ascertained, then your answer is no.
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Uh, who was that? Seriously, something's wrong with the board? :P
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Well, it's true. Murder's a black and white thing, innit?
Exactly.
This is why we have soldiers who go to war for their countries, but aren't prosecuted when they return home. Also why we have 1st, 2nd, and Manslaughter degrees of murder in criminal law.
Oh wait...
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I'd also like to add that I don't feel that even if women have the right to choose to have an abortion, that their choice will necessarily be a morally correct thing to do. This is the point where I think most of the issues in politics come up with abortion. I personally don't feel the government has the right to dictate whether abortion is always morally incorrect, and in turn make abortion illegal. I also feel that the neo-conservative voters that are anti-abortion have even less of a right to tell people what to do about it because they're not even elected by the people, assuming that has anything to do with it.
I don't really get what you're saying. Are you trying to say that the government has no right to decide people's morals for them, or are you saying that government has no right to decide whether they have a right to do this or not?
I guess I'd agree with the first possible case, but the second possible case is a bit funny, so I'm just not gonna touch it and hope that's not what you mean.
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Seeing things in black and white is fun.
It's far from black and white, but my contention is that the gray area is irrelevant to the practical question of how to proceed. If this discussion is a purely academic foray into ethical philosophy, then by all means, let's discuss the imperatives and ramifications surrounding a woman's reasons for wanting an abortion. But if this is a debate over whether abortion is or is not a right, then your answer is either yes or no, and if you argue that a woman should only be permitted an abortion after her motivations have been officially ascertained, then your answer is no.
Really? Cause I can say that murder is bad, but I will view killing in self-defense as justifiable. See the connection here?
I can say the same thing about abortion - bad, but there are specific circumstances in which I would find it justifiable.
If you create life than take responsiblity for it. But maybe it's better for that child to never be born - trying to escape the consequences and responsibility is a sure sign of a immature nad bad parent.
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You can come up with weird scenarios on either side, that doesn't mean that a person has to agree with every one of them to take that side.
My personal opinion is that with proper sex education and access to birth control, the odds of unwanted pregnancies would drop dramatically.
AFTER that, a woman should have the right to determine whether or not to keep something she physically has to bear for a time. Since women who didn't want a child to begin with almost would never get pregnant, this would exceedingly low and rare.
However those cases would have to be looked at as well.
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Lol, it's in the bible.
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Really? Cause I can say that murder is bad, but I will view killing in self-defense as justifiable. See the connection here?
I can say the same thing about abortion - bad, but there are specific circumstances in which I would find it justifiable.
That's precisely the argument I was responding to. You've entirely missed my point.
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I haven't. I just refused to be railroaded by you and that faulty logic.
But if this is a debate over whether abortion is or is not a right, then your answer is either yes or no, and if you argue that a woman should only be permitted an abortion after her motivations have been officially ascertained, then your answer is no.
I quite simply don't buy that.
Since it's not a matter of motivation in the first place, but rather circumstances. And, since we're talking about a human life here, which the mother DOES NOT own, and therefore, has no right to extinguish, especially since it's the product of her willing actions.
The need of the child to live overrules the womans "right" to be free of physical discomfort for 9 months.
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The need of the child to live overrules the womans "right" to be free of physical discomfort for 9 months.
Did you just call pregnancy a "discomfort"?
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especially since it's the product of her willing actions.
Unless it's not.
The need of the child to live overrules the womans "right" to be free of physical discomfort for 9 months.
What if she's going to die?
And in any case, it's her choice as to whether it's right or not, not yours.
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From what I understand, the pro-lifers seem to believe that even if you've taken every sensible precaution to prevent pregnancy and still have sex but they fail and you end up pregnant you have to keep the baby because it's still your fault for having sex.
Now let's give an analogy to that.
Suppose you're out driving to the cinema. Not speeding, taking care. You have an accident. It's your fault even though you didn't do anything wrong. A pedestrian gets hit by your car and taken to hospital. He suffers renal failure due to his injuries. He'll die without a transplant but you happen to match.
The pro-life argument is similar to saying "You didn't have to drive. You knew that if you went out for a drive you could have an accident. So since you have caused one the government have the right to take one of your kidneys and give it to him. And if you don't want to do that, you're a murderer"
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Unwed mothers, unstable families... Who stands to gain from such things?
Child protection services, military.. pharmaceutical industry.. childporn rings (sometimes/often affiliated with CPS) and several others. (http://ryleepagebliss.wordpress.com/2008/07/24/stop-cps-kidnapping/ as an example of what CPS is responsible for)
Which often cause the problems one way or another, as well. Pills that mess up the dad's, war that kills fathers, etc.
Result for them, $$$$$$$ and a feeling of power.
The pursuit of riches seems to inevitably mean the loss of good and the gaining of evil. the more money you have, the more evil you can become.
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I'm an excellent example of what happens when people who don't want kids get pregnant and decide to keep it because abortion is wrong.
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What if she's going to die?
Since it's not a matter of motivation in the first place, but rather circumstances
I believe I already covered that. Exceptions prove the rule.
And in any case, it's her choice as to whether it's right or not, not yours.
Then it's also my choice on weather or not if it's alright to kill YOU (since you cause me discomfort), not anyone elses.
From what I understand, the pro-lifers seem to believe that even if you've taken every sensible precaution to prevent pregnancy and still have sex but they fail and you end up pregnant you have to keep the baby because it's still your fault for having sex.
No. You have to keep her because it's the only right thing to do. It's a matter of life and death of a human being.
Some people are treating the child like it's a STD. A child. That I find appauling.
Treating it like a freak accident and looking at it only from the blame and want angle.... their own flesh and blood. It sickens me.
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I'm an excellent example of what happens when people who don't want kids get pregnant and decide to keep it because abortion is wrong.
What are you saying? That you are a mistake and should be removed from the human populations? That having kids is a bad idea? That you ended up as a bad human being?
Or just that your parents weren't good parents?
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Let's also not forget that ****ing, while good, bad and ugly, exists for the reason of, SURPRISE, making children. The fact that it happens to feel oh so good is perhaps nature's incentive for you to pump out more of the little tykes.
And bonus, prego sex!
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Actually no. Sex being purely for reproduction ended as soon as women stopped having clear indications of estrus.
From what I understand, the pro-lifers seem to believe that even if you've taken every sensible precaution to prevent pregnancy and still have sex but they fail and you end up pregnant you have to keep the baby because it's still your fault for having sex.
No. You have to keep her because it's the only right thing to do. It's a matter of life and death of a human being.
Except that I question your assertion that it is a human being at that point. I've already pointed out the hypocrisy of Roman Catholics when it comes to the whole life begins at conception argument.
And notice you avoided saying anything about the rest of my post.
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Except that I question your assertion that it is a human being at that point. I've already pointed out the hypocrisy of Roman Catholics when it comes to the whole life begins at conception argument.
And notice you avoided saying anything about the rest of my post.
Everything can be questioned. Question away.
I for one don't have to consider you worthy of living either. That doesn't make it right for me to kill you, now does it?
I didn't comment on your comparison because it doesn't fit, and the whole "who's to blame" approach is wrong from the beginning.
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But as you continually claim, it's not about blame. It's about responsibility. You are responsible for the guy's death after all.
Okay then, question. Where you stand on the issue Catholics using the rhythm method then?
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Who cares about Catholics?
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Trashman should, because according to him they are god-damned babykillers, since zygotes are babies and all...
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Who cares about Catholics?
The Varsity. Protestant is still only JV, after all.
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I quite simply don't buy that.
Since it's not a matter of motivation in the first place, but rather circumstances. And, since we're talking about a human life here, which the mother DOES NOT own, and therefore, has no right to extinguish, especially since it's the product of her willing actions.
The need of the child to live overrules the womans "right" to be free of physical discomfort for 9 months.
But you're not even disagreeing with my point here. You don't believe a woman has the right to an abortion; you believe, I gather, that she has the right not to die if the pregnancy is causing medical complications. You say it's a matter of circumstances and not motivation, but her motivations necessarily follow from her circumstances. If you argue that a woman asking for an abortion must be under a certain set of circumstances, the law you're effectively proposing is a law that will restrict her access to the procedure on the basis of why she would presumably want it. Again, let me be clear: I am not trying to argue with anyone about whether abortion should or should not be considered a right. I'm simply maintaining that if you claim abortion is protected by a woman's right to privacy, then you can't advocate that the procedure be granted on the basis who you believe deserves it. Since you obviously don't subscribe to this premise to begin with, you and I don't even have a quarrel.
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Trashman, sorry, no, a human being does NOT have the right to hijack my body, even if it needs to do so to survive. I don't care any more about a human child than I do about the fish I caused to die for food last night. Life is life, and if I don't want that life inside my body, then it's not staying there.
I don't care if I'm responsible for it existing in the first place. If it can't survive outside of me, then that's its problem, NOT mine.
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But as you continually claim, it's not about blame. It's about responsibility. You are responsible for the guy's death after all.
Am I? Like I said, your analogy doesn't work.
Okay then, question. Where you stand on the issue Catholics using the rhythm method then?
Never heard any priest I know even mention that method. Ever.
It's outdated and was used in the time when people didn't know better or had no better way.
They did say abstinence. If not abstinance, condoms or some other form of contraception.
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Trashman, sorry, no, a human being does NOT have the right to hijack my body, even if it needs to do so to survive. I don't care any more about a human child than I do about the fish I caused to die for food last night. Life is life, and if I don't want that life inside my body, then it's not staying there.
I don't care if I'm responsible for it existing in the first place. If it can't survive outside of me, then that's its problem, NOT mine.
I weep for humanity in the light of such disregard for life.
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See, the problem here is that it isn't hijacking. You opened the door, and let it walk right on it.
I don't care any more about a human child than I do about the fish I caused to die for food last night.
Holy S***, you are seriously f***ed up.
I still think that by becoming pregnant, the woman accepts responsibility for the child. Certain instances not withstanding, of course. Such instances consist of rape and the father walking out, provided that the woman or her family cannot care for the child. "But I don't want it" and "it's uncomfortable" are not good reasons. You wouldn't kill a toddler just because "you don't want it anymore," nor could you go next door and kill Annoying Jimmy who plays his stereo too loud, and causes you discomfort. Both of those would be considered murder.
As for the life argument: If you can kill it, it is alive. Abortions kill fetuses, therefore, fetuses are alive.
EDIT: the wording makes it seem a little odd, I consider ALL rape to be grounds, the bolded part does not pertain to that.
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So... if you didn't voluntarily become pregnant, it's okay to kill the thing? I'm not buying it.
Look, I'm not a life support machine here. I don't care if I let it walk in. Just because I don't clean a wound properly doesn't mean I can't kill the bacteria if it gets infected. My point is this: I will NOT allow ANYTHING inside my body if I don't want it there. It is not my problem if the damn thing can't survive on its own. I am not obligated to save its little life.
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As for the life argument: If you can kill it, it is alive. Abortions kill fetuses, therefore, fetuses are alive.
This argument crops up many times during these kinds of debate and I'm always annoyed at it.
When people say that the embryo/fetuses/whatever is or isn't alive (whichever it is, I'm not here to argue), they mean in the context of a human life. Otherwise, the argument wouldn't make sense any way you took it.
First there is the part that, yes it is alive, as in a biological organism.
Second, there are other things that are alive that we are allowed to kill without any sort of social stigma.
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It is not my problem if the damn thing can't survive on its own.
Then don't give it the damn life in the first place!
So... if you didn't voluntarily become pregnant, it's okay to kill the thing? I'm not buying it.
As opposed to what?
I don't care if I let it walk in.
"Hey neighbor Bob, come on in. Oh, whoops times up. *Boom*"
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As for the life argument: If you can kill it, it is alive. Abortions kill fetuses, therefore, fetuses are alive.
That's weasel wording right there, you're saying that abortion kills fetuses therefore making them alive. That makes no sense. Let me clarify. "Accidents kill cars, therefore cars are alive.". That assertion has no leg to stand on, you can slap a word onto anything, that doesn't associate that word with the object in a logical sense, it just means that they've been used in conjunction.
A fetus does not begin to think and have cognitive thought until well into the pregnancy, at the very least. This is recorded fact, while all you stated was a messed up comment that doesn't make any sense.
I can't find the right words to explain what I mean, but I think you get my point.
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There's just no really good analogy for this. The closest I can think of to being forced to house a fetus against your will would be rape.
I don't want to just say I'll disregard everything you all say because you're guys, but it's difficult not to. None of you will ever or have ever been faced with anything like it, and in that context "but it's a human life" is an understandable argument.
However, I just don't think that's really relevant. Is this thing's life more important than my right not to be forced to house it? No. Like I said, I wouldn't mind not killing it if that were possible. I just don't want it living IN me. That freaks me out to the highest order.
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"Accidents kill cars, therefore cars are alive.".
Accidents destroy cars. Semantics maybe, but I take "kill" to mean it has to have been alive to be killed.
while all you stated was a messed up comment that doesn't make any sense.
Perhaps. It makes sense to me, but I see how that may not make the leap to other people.
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their argument is based on emotional responses and religious texts.
i don't think that they will see things our way, or that we will see things their way.
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Huh? What religious texts? I don't recall bringing anything like that up (or seeing anyone else do so), at least for this section of the argument.
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their argument is based on emotional responses and religious texts.
i don't think that they will see things our way, or that we will see things their way.
Shut up if you don't know what you're talking about.
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what? it all comes down to what's alive, what's human, and what's ok to kill.
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Hrm. After some good argument on iamzack's part, I now find myself convinced of her point of view.
I now support abortion rights on the basis of a woman's right to control her own body. (Previously I would have considered this important, but not alone sufficient.) Nothing else seems necessary, though some addditional arguments are valid and strong as well.
I'm not sure I would support third trimester abortions except in the case of health issues, but I'm not sure it's my place to decide or dictate.
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i cant imagine babby bein carried to 3rdmester and then aborte for any reason but health
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But as you continually claim, it's not about blame. It's about responsibility. You are responsible for the guy's death after all.
Am I? Like I said, your analogy doesn't work.
Why? You keep claiming that but you fail to explain why.
Why if you cause an accident are you not responsible for a person's death but if you accidentally get pregnant are you responsible for the new life?
Remember that you can't blame the woman and say it's her fault for getting pregnant in the first place as you've already rejected that argument.
Never heard any priest I know even mention that method. Ever.
It's outdated and was used in the time when people didn't know better or had no better way.
They did say abstinence. If not abstinance, condoms or some other form of contraception.
So we're back to you telling the pope he's wrong again? Cause that is the method of family planning that is still being pushed by the Catholic church. Roman Catholics are not allowed to use condoms.
As for abstinence. Since only married people are supposed to be screwing, the rhythm method is mostly aimed at married couples. Are you seriously telling me that married Roman Catholic couples should abstain from sex except when they want to have children? And that once they've had all the children they want to have they should abstain completely?
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i cant imagine babby bein carried to 3rdmester and then aborte for any reason but health
How is babby formed? (http://tinyurl.com/cgd2r6)
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i cant imagine babby bein carried to 3rdmester and then aborte for any reason but health
How is babby formed?
By combining "baby" and an alcoholic iamzack :p
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i cant imagine babby bein carried to 3rdmester and then aborte for any reason but health
How is babby formed?
By combining anyone and an alcoholic iamzack :p
Fixed. Sorry Zack, couldn't help it ;)
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Why if you cause an accident are you not responsible for a person's death but if you accidentally get pregnant are you responsible for the new life?
Because it's a death, regardless of who was responsible or suffered because of it, it's an end of something.
Pregnancy, accidental or not, is not an ending, it's the beginning of a new life that will suffer if it's creators don't do everything in they're power to prevent that suffering, even if it means they'll never see that life after it's delivered into this world.
Contrary to what a lot of you think, I'm not some heartless creep who spouts homilies and truisms, my concern over the abortion issue is that abortion wouldn't be an issue if people, all people, were well educated about reproductive health. A well designed comprehensive health course would include both abstinence and more secular methods of birth control, as well as educate the students as to the reasoning behind BOTH. However most parents in the USA are very uncomfortable with the idea of they're child as a sexual being. My dad, who walked my sister down the aisle to the man she sleeps with I would assume frequently, refuses to accept that she's an adult, she will always be his baby girl. The main problem with Sex Health, is that you can't say we'll have it for them when they're all 13 years old. Some people mature early, some later. I went to school with a girl that looked like she was 9 or 10 until sophomore year, she came back from that summer and no one recognized her.
My point is that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to this issue. It's a touchy subject when a large portion of the populace won't even admit in public that a marriage is as much a sexual relationship as it is spiritual.
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Contrary to what a lot of you think, I'm not some heartless creep who spouts homilies and truisms, my concern over the abortion issue is that abortion wouldn't be an issue if people, all people, were well educated about reproductive health. A well designed comprehensive health course would include both abstinence and more secular methods of birth control, as well as educate the students as to the reasoning behind BOTH.
WTF? Freudian slip?
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No, it actually makes sense when you read it in context and don't get stuck in the supposed established person of the writer.
It's ad hominem even if you don't say it so.
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It doesn't really make sense though.
It assumes that contraception is a secular form of birth control and abstinence is the only religious form. Which forgets that married religious people need some form of birth control too.
But then everybody seems to forget that fact anyway so it's not something I can specifically have a go at liberator over.
I'll respond to the rest of his argument later though.
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I don't really agree on the wording either, but considering the argument itself it's the most sensible one I've read from Liberator yet.
Abstinence really is an effective "contraceptive method" if someone wants to go by it, although including it along with "more secular contraceptive methods" on sex ed is kinda... self-explanatory (otherwise I don't know what would be the point of sex ed).
I wouldn't even call it contraceptive method, it's just preventing any and all chances of fertilization, not stopping it once the deed is done. Sex ed should by default make it clear that unless you have sex, getting pregnant is once-in-a-religion (or quite a few more times in combined mythology of world) kind of thing.
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Yeah I agree that the rest is pretty good but one of the forgotten failures of abstinence only sex ed is that even if it succeeds in preventing sex before marriage, it's piss poor at preventing unwanted pregnancies after marriage.
The result of which is a rise in abortions amongst married women.
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Why? You keep claiming that but you fail to explain why.
Because it just doesn't. It' an interesting comparison, but flawed, since it's not the same. In any way.
And in case you wondering, if I was involved in an accident and the man needed by blood or something - yes, I would help. It's the only right thing to do. Not only because I was involved, but also because if not me - who else? If it's a matter of someones life or death, then it's a no-brainer for me.
So we're back to you telling the pope he's wrong again? Cause that is the method of family planning that is still being pushed by the Catholic church. Roman Catholics are not allowed to use condoms.
I'm Roman Cahtolic and I NEVER heard that. The only line I have been getting is "we'd prefer you not you, but if you are going to, then use condoms".
And quite frankly, even if what you say was the case - what difference does it make? Two wrongs don't make a right.
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Read this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benedict_XVI#Birth_control_and_HIV.2FAIDS). Granted, these statements are about AIDS in Africa primarily, but the Church's position applies to all catholics anywhere, at least in principle. Your local priest may be a bit more pragmatic about the matter.
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I will NOT allow ANYTHING inside my body if I don't want it there. It is not my problem if the damn thing can't survive on its own. I am not obligated to save its little life.
Well, if I lock you up in a empty room, you'll die from starvation after a while. It's not my problem you can't survive without food. After all, I'm not obligated to feed you.
Your local priest may be a bit more pragmatic about the matter.
Priest(s). Plural. Not just local either. From all over.
Methinks the Church is weary of giving an all-out blessing to the condoms for other side effects. Mainly, increase in sex. A sense of security and increasing open stance towards sexuality in the west can only increase the number of sexual encounters (and reduce the starting age)...thus also increasing the chances of pregnancy or STD's
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Come on T-Man, how does that first one have any relevance? The Baby is there via a direct action/decision of it's parents, whether or not they were aware of it. Assuming the womb is equivalent to your Empty Room, you wouldn't have let iamzack in there following her logic
I will NOT allow ANYTHING inside my body/room if I don't want it there
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No, it actually makes sense when you read it in context and don't get stuck in the supposed established person of the writer.
It's ad hominem even if you don't say it so.
Explain to me how a birth control method can be secular or not if it's got nothing to do with religion.
It's like saying the right-hand rule (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-hand_rule) is religious or secular, it's nonsensical.
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Come on T-Man, how does that first one have any relevance? The Baby is there via a direct action/decision of it's parents, whether or not they were aware of it. Assuming the womb is equivalent to your Empty Room, you wouldn't have let iamzack in there following her logic
She fell in by accident. I locked the door not knowing.
I know she's inside now, but I can't open it for another 9 months. Let her starve, it's not my fault she was stupid enough to get trapped inside.
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Well.... while iamzack's morals may not be "sound/acceptable" by you or I, the fact behind it is true. While society's moral values say that she SHOULD look after the baby, many mothers lack any kind of morals, though I doubt many are as extreme as iamzack, but even smoking during pregnancy shows some kind of disrespect for the child.
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Methinks the Church is weary of giving an all-out blessing to the condoms for other side effects. Mainly, increase in sex. A sense of security and increasing open stance towards sexuality in the west can only increase the number of sexual encounters (and reduce the starting age)...thus also increasing the chances of pregnancy or STD's
You're gonna need data to support that, because in the US, current trends suggest that abstinence-only sex ed leads to greater chances of pregnancy and STDs.
So, in other words, you're scientifically wrong.
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Priest(s). Plural. Not just local either. From all over.
Methinks the Church is weary of giving an all-out blessing to the condoms for other side effects. Mainly, increase in sex. A sense of security and increasing open stance towards sexuality in the west can only increase the number of sexual encounters (and reduce the starting age)...thus also increasing the chances of pregnancy or STD's
Sorry but that's utter bollocks. The church is against the very idea of contraception because it interferes with God's plan for humanity and not because of the pragmatic reasons you claim.
Simply fact is that the pragmatism is misplaced but that's irrelevant to the discussion. The Roman Catholic church considers the use of contraception a sin.
In 1997, the Vatican's Pontifical Council for the Family (http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/family/documents/rc_pc_family_doc_12021997_vademecum_en.html) stated:
"The Church has always taught the intrinsic evil of contraception, that is, of every marital act intentionally rendered unfruitful. This teaching is to be held as definitive and irreformable. Contraception is gravely opposed to marital chastity; it is contrary to the good of the transmission of life (the procreative aspect of matrimony), and to the reciprocal self-giving of the spouses (the unitive aspect of matrimony); it harms true love and denies the sovereign role of God in the transmission of human life."
Furthermore
"When couples, by means of recourse to contraception, separate these two meanings that God the Creator has inscribed in the being of man and woman and in the dynamism of their sexual communion, they act as 'arbiters' of the divine plan and they 'manipulate' and degrade human sexuality—and with it themselves and their married partner—by altering its value of 'total' self-giving.
Why do I have to explain your own faith to you yet again? We've had this discussion before and I pointed out the exact same thing back then. I strongly suggest you go back to those priests and ask how their position on the use of contraception within married couples can be so different to the official Vatican line. Ask them about the rhythm method while you're there.
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Why do I have to explain your own faith to you yet again?
You can't. Cause you don't know what I believe in in the first place.
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Obviously it's not the Roman Catholic faith though.
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Let's just say I'm not a very good catholic, shall we? ;)
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For now.
Don't expect this not to come up in the future though. :p
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No, it actually makes sense when you read it in context and don't get stuck in the supposed established person of the writer.
Explain to me how a birth control method can be secular or not if it's got nothing to do with religion.
It's because religions like to make it an issue and take a stand on it, after which those methods not endorsed by that particular religious point of view can be considered secular by comparison.
It's like saying the right-hand rule (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-hand_rule) is religious or secular, it's nonsensical.
If some church had decided to indoctrinate the right-hand-rule as the only correct co-ordinate system and endorsed it's use over other co-ordinate systems... then it could be argued that left-handed co-ordinates could be considered secular by comparison.
Don't ask me if any of this makes sense, I have no answers - just my own opinions and they say churches don't make much sense in any sense, why should they start now? I'm just saying that even though churches/religions by and large don't have much in the books of well-balanced arguments for their stories and claims, their members can still be nice people who can even disagree with their organized faith as arranged by the church. Assuming that all of them are just drones for their denomination is without basis (although disturbingly often accurate).
I should know, I live with several students of theology and majority of them are perfectly nice bunch of people. I find their religious tendencies odd, but that hasn't prevented me from having many an actual discussion about things that go much deeper than the superficial issues that I have with religions (such as definitions of divine, universe, their separation and it's necessity).
So there, booyah. Then again they are actual students of theology so the terminology and level of discussion (and if necessary, argumentation) is likely better than even this forum (despite it's reasonably high standards by internet spectrum) by degrees of several magnitudes.
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No, it actually makes sense when you read it in context and don't get stuck in the supposed established person of the writer.
Explain to me how a birth control method can be secular or not if it's got nothing to do with religion.
It's because religions like to make it an issue and take a stand on it, after which those methods not endorsed by that particular religious point of view can be considered secular by comparison.
It's like saying the right-hand rule (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-hand_rule) is religious or secular, it's nonsensical.
If some church had decided to indoctrinate the right-hand-rule as the only correct co-ordinate system and endorsed it's use over other co-ordinate systems... then it could be argued that left-handed co-ordinates could be considered secular by comparison.
Don't ask me if any of this makes sense, I have no answers - just my own opinions and they say churches don't make much sense in any sense, why should they start now? I'm just saying that even though churches/religions by and large don't have much in the books of well-balanced arguments for their stories and claims, their members can still be nice people who can even disagree with their organized faith as arranged by the church. Assuming that all of them are just drones for their denomination is without basis (although disturbingly often accurate).
I should know, I live with several students of theology and majority of them are perfectly nice bunch of people. I find their religious tendencies odd, but that hasn't prevented me from having many an actual discussion about things that go much deeper than the superficial issues that I have with religions (such as definitions of divine, universe, their separation and it's necessity).
So there, booyah. Then again they are actual students of theology so the terminology and level of discussion (and if necessary, argumentation) is likely better than even this forum (despite it's reasonably high standards by internet spectrum) by degrees of several magnitudes.
I can see from where you're coming with this, but I still can't find any sense in it. Just because a religion endorses it, doesn't make something religious.
For example, is evolution secular? (just making the question makes me puke, but...)
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Aren't we kinda....moving off topic?...wasn't this about abortion...or whatever. I don't even know how this thread started. Carry on.
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I thought we were talking about unwed single mothers but what do I know? Nothing, that's what.
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Why do I have to explain your own faith to you yet again?
Question: Why are you assuming that everyone arguing such is of the Catholic faith? Personally, I am a Southern Baptist, and I have yet to find anywhere that my own faith calls contraception a sin. You need to stop blanket assuming that just because the Catholic church thinks this, that means that other denominations do too. (At least, that's what I'm getting from your statements).
I re-iterate my standpoint: abortion = bad unless rape/health threatened. Zack, if you don't want a f*cking baby, don't have one, but stop saying "but I don't want one, so your entire premise is wrong."
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Why do I have to explain your own faith to you yet again?
Question: Why are you assuming that everyone arguing such is of the Catholic faith?
Question: Why are you assuming I'm even talking to you when my response was quite clearly directed at Trashman?
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Scotty, you do have a bit of a habit of responding to people who aren't talking to you -- ease up a bit!
If you were pregnant, and it looked like the baby would be fine (born healthy and all), would you have an abortion?
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Scotty, you do have a bit of a habit of responding to people who aren't talking to you -- ease up a bit!
If you were pregnant, would you have an abortion?
Sorry, I butt in to a lot of things non online too. It's not just here.
No.
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I think I would. That was what convinced me of iamzack's argument: I'd see it as an unwanted parasite and a violation of my body.
The fact that I'm male contributes to that, but I don't see any reason for a woman to feel differently. And if you're using contraceptives, and they fail...well, then, you've got every right to feel that it's an unwanted parasite.
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I think I would. That was what convinced me of iamzack's argument: I'd see it as an unwanted parasite and a violation of my body.
The fact that I'm male contributes to that, but I don't see any reason for a woman to feel differently. And if you're using contraceptives, and they fail...well, then, you've got every right to feel that it's an unwanted parasite.
it's always the same
powerful men arguing that women shouldn't be "loose" or "bad" which means opposing abortion while the same patriarchy is aggressively cutting down social programs and arguing hypocritically about some "values of life" which they don't give two ****s about
they don't want to give up anything but other people have to live up to their ridiculous standards
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I honestly don't know if I would get rid of it. It would depend on whether the father planned to stick around if I had the baby. If he did, then I'd abort it. I'm not into commitment, and I don't want to be tied to somebody forever.
If I could think of no way to care for it myself, without help, then I would abort in that case also. I'm much more sickened by the thought of putting a child up for adoption than I am by killing it or having it.
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I honestly don't know if I would get rid of it. It would depend on whether the father planned to stick around if I had the baby. If he did, then I'd abort it. I'm not into commitment, and I don't want to be tied to somebody forever.
If I could think of no way to care for it myself, without help, then I would abort in that case also. I'm much more sickened by the thought of putting a child up for adoption than I am by killing it or having it.
This makes much more sense to me than: "I'll kill it because it's a parasite."
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Well, yeah, but I'm talking about in the future as well. If I found out right now I was pregnant, I would think of it as a parasite and be extremely grossed/freaked out until it was removed.
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No biologist in the world would agree with your definition of a baby as a parasite.
It's offspring, pure and simple.
Calling it a parasite is an insult to humanity and everything that is good and pure.
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Read: nothing on this site, so we're good.
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Blah blah blah.
parasite: an animal or plant that lives in or on a host; it obtains nourishment from the host without benefiting the host
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Benefit: You pass on your genes to the next generation.
EDIT: Whoa, forgot who I was talking to.
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No biologist in the world would agree with your definition of a baby as a parasite.
It's offspring, pure and simple.
Calling it a parasite is an insult to humanity and everything that is good and pure.
That's opinion, pure and simple. In biological terms, a parasite is, as zack said, something which feeds off of the host body giving no returns. This makes fetuses, in biological terms, parasites.
lrn2science
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Blah blah blah.
parasite: an animal or plant that lives in or on a host; it obtains nourishment from the host without benefiting the host
Also happens to be of a different species and not native to the bilogical workings of the host. And parasites also tend to live off the host pretty much indefinately.
A baby could be considered more of a symbiont. It carries your genes further and takes care of you when you're older...unless it puts you in the old folks home that is...
Why the hell am I even debating this with you? It's so wrong there isn't a even a word to describe how wrong it is. It's not been invented yet.
It can't be invented because it would be too big and too long and too complex, since it would have to portray the amount of your wrongmess within itself, which is infinite.
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Great, I've potentially passed on bipolar, schizophrenia, diabetes, cancer, and endometriosis. Anti-benefit: I feel guilty about it.
I mean, if the woman is suicidal and she dies in childbirth, I guess that could be a benefit. *rolls eyes*
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A fetus is not really a true parasite, but it's relation to the mother is definitely parasitic.
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Benefit: You pass on your genes to the next generation.
And how is that a benefit to you?
It's a benefit to the genes of course but how it that at all a benefit to you personally?
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They're trying to say it benefits the person emotionally, but that's really not relevant. What happens AFTER the baby is born is not the issue. It's what is happening while it is in the womb.
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You ever lose a kidney?
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Blah blah blah.
parasite: an animal or plant that lives in or on a host; it obtains nourishment from the host without benefiting the host
Also happens to be of a different species and not native to the bilogical workings of the host. And parasites also tend to live off the host pretty much indefinately.
A baby could be considered more of a symbiont. It carries your genes further and takes care of you when you're older...unless it puts you in the old folks home that is...
Why the hell am I even debating this with you? It's so wrong there isn't a even a word to describe how wrong it is. It's not been invented yet.
It can't be invented because it would be too big and too long and too complex, since it would have to portray the amount of your wrongmess within itself, which is infinite.
More weasel wording, it changes nothing of what I said, it still feeds off of you without your consent. I do not see sex as consent, yes it's possible to become pregnant, but accidents do happen, and one mistake shouldn't ruin a year or more of your life.
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Much more than a year. Women are judged primarily by their appearance no matter what they are trying to achieve. Babies do not leave your body in very good condition. :[
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So if you got pregnant, TrashMan, you'd carry it to term?
Before you answer, read this. (http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/anti-tales.html)
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I suppose my final take on the matter is that Abortion is not contraception, it shouldn't be used instead of contraception, it's potentially dangerous if done too often, and a great deal needs to be done to stop it being viewed as a form of contraception.
That said, a lot of the reason that it is used as contraception is because of poor Sex Education, difficulty in obtaining proper contraceptives etc. It's there that the problem needs to be attacked, to deal with this crazy Dogma over the use of contraceptives, the acceptance of such preventatives would do so much good around the world as far as dealing with STD's abandoned/murdered babies, overpopulation etc and if it were not for the ridiculous taboos put in place by certain religious establishments, simply because they want the Church to grow, the situation, I feel, would be markedly better in places like Africa.
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Right, that I can agree on: abortion isn't contraception!
But if contraception fails, it seems a perfectly valid decision.
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I suppose my final take on the matter is that Abortion is not contraception, it shouldn't be used instead of contraception
*Scotty agrees
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Ehhh... "abortion is being used as contraception!" is a bad argument, I think.
If you think of it like a form of contraception, it's like "well, I could use a $3 condom or get a $300 abortion. hmmmmm."
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Yeah, I think the common use of abortion as contraception is a myth akin to that of the welfare mom.
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Yes, the choice should be available, accidents, and crimes, happen and Abortion should be a decision that is made by the parents, no-one else.
Ehhh... "abortion is being used as contraception!" is a bad argument, I think.
If you think of it like a form of contraception, it's like "well, I could use a $3 condom or get a $300 abortion. hmmmmm."
Well, I'm not confining things to the US to be honest, and the real problem is that, as you yourself said, sometimes getting a hold of contraceptives can be difficult, so people decide to 'risk it'. That's why the UK has to be very careful about Abortions, because they are funded by the NHS, but the US still has, iirc, one of the highest abortion counts per 1000 in the world, 1.3 million in 2000. That's a pretty high number really, and I'm sure it could be bought down with better sex-ed and more freely available contraception.
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Holy crap! 1.3 million abortions per 1000 people?
Damn!
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:eek2:
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Holy crap! 1.3 million abortions per 1000 people?
Damn!
:p 1.3 million in total, couldn't find the per 1000 listing.
http://www.abortiontv.com/Misc/AbortionStatistics.htm#United%20States%C2%A0%C2%A0%C2%A0%C2%A0%C2%A0%C2%A0%C2%A0
* The overwhelming majority of all abortions, (95%), are done as a means of birth control.
* Only 1% are performed because of rape or incest;
* 1% because of fetal abnormalities;
* 3% due to the mother's health problems.
Source: Central Illinois Right To Life
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As much as I agree with you, we need to see some figures, as well as for more than just Illinois (am I reading that right?).
EDIT: Yay! I'm an idiot.
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That's for the entire United states up to 2004, courtesy of some group who don't know how to write a website so the title is visible in Firefox...
Edit: Heh, don't worry, I had to check to make sure :nervous:
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Given 500 women per 1000 people, that's 2600 abortions per woman every year...a bit more than seven abortions every day!
Man, that's a lot of abortions :p
And those stats don't mean abortion is being used as a contraceptive (though even if it was, that's just evidence of the need for better education on contraception.)
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I have a feeling "as a form of birth control" applies to people whose contraceptive method failed for some reason.
Also, the 1% due to rape or incest is typically not adjusted for unreported instances. Very few rapes are reported.
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So if you got pregnant, TrashMan, you'd carry it to term?
Yes. I'd do a lot worse things without ever looking back.
That's the problem with the way the culture is going today..it's all "MY rights" , "My decisions"...ME ME ME.. Egoistical and self centered culture.
If you really don't want a baby, and are not ready or prepared for the eventuality that it could happen, then don't have sex. It's not impossible, quite a lot of people manage to do it. If all else fails, use a vibrator. But yea....that's a harder path. Why would we ever take that path, hmmm?
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Because that path sucks. Sex is way better than any damned vibrator.
It's not like I don't drive a car because I might kill somebody.
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Well, once again, statistics are what statistics do, no doubt those figures are inaccurate to a certain degree, and, I said before, accidents happen, but, let's face it, even if it were 50%, roughly 650,000 abortions from split condoms? Still seem a bit high to me, even erring on the side of caution.
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It's not like I don't drive a car because I might kill somebody.
Yep. We are back to blaming the mother for getting pregnant again. Despite Trashman claiming that's not the case.
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So if you got pregnant, TrashMan, you'd carry it to term?
Yes. I'd do a lot worse things without ever looking back.
That's the problem with the way the culture is going today..it's all "MY rights" , "My decisions"...ME ME ME.. Egoistical and self centered culture.
If you really don't want a baby, and are not ready or prepared for the eventuality that it could happen, then don't have sex. It's not impossible, quite a lot of people manage to do it. If all else fails, use a vibrator. But yea....that's a harder path. Why would we ever take that path, hmmm?
Everyone should be aware of how to use vibrators; they're by no means a last resort.
However, sex is a basic human need and right, along with food, shelter, belonging, and psychological well-being. It shouldn't be denied. Contraception allows people to access this need without fear of pregnancy (as well as finally bringing some much-needed gender equality.) If contraceptives fail, then abortion should be available.
There are plenty of people who don't have sex. Statistically, however, they suffer reduced lifespan and happiness compared to those who do -- in no small part due to the physical benefits of sex.
Unsafe sex, on the other hand, carries a tremendous number of risks.
Well, once again, statistics are what statistics do, no doubt those figures are inaccurate to a certain degree, and, I said before, accidents happen, but, let's face it, even if it were 50%, roughly 650,000 abortions from split condoms? Still seem a bit high to me, even erring on the side of caution.
Perhaps so. However, abortion is probably not used as a regular contraceptive measure simply due to expense. Even if it is, it's a decision best left to the individual. These are their bodies, not ours.
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Because that path sucks. Sex is way better than any damned vibrator.
It's not like I don't drive a car because I might kill somebody.
sex != driving.
And you don't purposefully kill someone when you go out driving. An abortion is purposeful.
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Perhaps so. However, abortion is probably not used as a regular contraceptive measure simply due to expense. Even if it is, it's a decision best left to the individual. These are their bodies, not ours.
Certainly, the final choice is with the parent/s of the child, but, the whole point of my argument is that probably the best way to bring down the number of abortions taking place would be to improve sex education and ensure the availability of contraception.
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Because that path sucks. Sex is way better than any damned vibrator.
It's not like I don't drive a car because I might kill somebody.
sex != driving.
And you don't purposefully kill someone when you go out driving. An abortion is purposeful.
I was comparing killing to conceiving, not to killing.
Sex is a choice, driving is a choice. They can have consequences. The difference is that I can unconceive a baby. I can't unkill a person.
Saying "don't have sex if you don't want a baby" is inherently misogynistic.
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Imagine an extra 1.3m babies every year in this country.
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Saying "don't have sex if you don't want a baby" is inherently misogynistic.
Hey, there are men who don't like that either and women who do.
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Men disapproving/women approving doesn't make it less misogynistic.
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Imagine an extra 1.3m babies every year in this country.
That's 445 octomoms every day for a year. O.o
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Men disapproving/women approving doesn't make it less misogynistic.
You're right, I confused the term.
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She has a really important point: most menwho say 'don't have sex if you don't want to have a baby' are speaking only to women.
Then they go out, complain about how they can't get laid, and look for somebody to have sex with. They're targeting female sexuality. Inherently misogynistic.
Some, however, do genuinely mean that nobody should have sex...but that still doesn't get around the fact that the woman has to deal with the consequences and the man doesn't.
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Of course, men's rights activists say "women have babies on purpose so they can leech money off you for the rest of your life!!!11"
*sigh*
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Men's Rights activists fail at biology...
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They fail at life, and I wish they would all ****ing die.
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:(
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Well. I wouldn't go that far :p Next thing you know, people will be saying that about Women's lib as well, both sides have valid issues, but it's always drowned out by hysterical shrieking from the extremes.
Edit: Scotty, any way you can trim down that siggy a bit? It's 3 times larger than the post :p Just removing the blank lines should do it, but Admin have a habit of performing plastic surgery on siggies that get too long, so it's best to prune it yourself once in a while ;)
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Because that path sucks. Sex is way better than any damned vibrator.
It's not like I don't drive a car because I might kill somebody.
No, but if you do drive a car then you accept the responsibility if something should happen...like if you run over somebody. It doesn't matter if it's not you, but actually the breaks were wrong. Your car.
You can't just leave a bleeding man on the street and drive away, just cause you haven't planned it. "It's the fault of the damned breaks" you might say. Wouldn't matter to the court much or to the bleeding man.
Yep. We are back to blaming the mother for getting pregnant again. Despite Trashman claiming that's not the case.
Blaming? You're acting like getting pregnant is a horrible crime that no one wasn't to be associated with. Blame is the wrong word.
Responsible. And not just the mother. The father is responsible too and should get quatered publicly if he tries to dump the mother.
However, sex is a basic human need and right, along with food, shelter, belonging, and psychological well-being. It shouldn't be denied. Contraception allows people to access this need without fear of pregnancy (as well as finally bringing some much-needed gender equality.) If contraceptives fail, then abortion should be available.
What about the right to life? Doesn't any human have that?
There are plenty of people who don't have sex. Statistically, however, they suffer reduced lifespan and happiness compared to those who do -- in no small part due to the physical benefits of sex.
Bollocks. Reduced lifespan and happiness my ass.
Wait, are you counting self-plesuring under sex (as in - any sexual activity at all)? I want to see those statistics. And I doubt they would be very reliable..Since people tend to lie a lot when it comes to sex.
I was comparing killing to conceiving, not to killing.
Sex is a choice, driving is a choice. They can have consequences. The difference is that I can unconceive a baby. I can't unkill a person.
Saying "don't have sex if you don't want a baby" is inherently misogynistic.
You can't "unconcieve" in that sense...since unconcieve means to kill.
She has a really important point: most menwho say 'don't have sex if you don't want to have a baby' are speaking only to women.
Then they go out, complain about how they can't get laid, and look for somebody to have sex with. They're targeting female sexuality. Inherently misogynistic.
Let me put it this way:
If I, a man (who is more instinct and hormone driven than a woman) can keep my pants on, then so can a woman.
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Abortion is taking responsibility for your actions. The procedure isn't cheap or fun. NOT taking responsibility would be to pretend to not be pregnant, drink, smoke, etc, and then dump the baby in a dumpster when it comes out.
Humans have the right to life, but they do NOT have the right to live parasitically off of another person. Don't bring up social issues here. I'm talking biologically.
And finally, I don't WANT to keep my pants on. I want to have consequence-free sex, and that's my prerogative. If my contraceptive methods fail, and I choose not to have a baby, I will terminate the pregnancy. It's just that simple.
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For once I agree with iamzack.
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Admin have a habit of performing plastic surgery on siggies that get too long, so it's best to prune it yourself once in a while
It's been that way for at least a month, and nobody had noticed :p
Abortion is taking responsibility for your actions.
Abortion is ducking out of the responsibility of parenting. (hoo boy, I'm gonna feel the heat for that one.)
EDIT: I changed the sig a bit anyway.
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Heh, trying to parent would be the irresponsible thing to do in many cases. Example: my parents.
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It was only irresponsible to society, and I think we all agree that society can go f*** itself.
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It was also irresponsible to me, my siblings, and themselves.
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Men can, if they are so inclined, run away from the repercussions of sex, women cannot, to my mind, men have no place judging what a woman chooses to do unless he is the other half of the pregnancy, and even then, I have no idea how to sort out a situation where the father wants the child but the mother does not, you simply cannot force a women to carry a baby to term against her wishes, the mere thought of doing that sends shivers down my spine at the possible social consequences.
When Sharon had her abortion, it was because of deformities in the foetus, which meant the child only stood a limited chance of surviving full-term, it wasn't an easy decision to make, but it was the only decision we could make, but at the end of the day, I left the final decision to her, either let go now, or risk the high chances of a miscarriage, or a severely disabled baby. In truth we had little choice, but the final choice can only realistically be the mothers.
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And finally, I don't WANT to keep my pants on. I want to have consequence-free sex, and that's my prerogative.
Everything has consequences. That's just a fact of life.
There's no such thing as "consequence-free sex" (or consequence-free anything for that matter).
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And finally, I don't WANT to keep my pants on. I want to have consequence-free sex, and that's my prerogative.
Just cause you want something doesn't make it your right or your prerogative.
Heh, trying to parent would be the irresponsible thing to do in many cases. Example: my parents.
It's very hard, almost impossible actually, to tell if someone is going to be a good or a bad parent. Becoming a parent changes things...dramaticely. It changes people...usually for the better.
Men can, if they are so inclined, run away from the repercussions of sex
If they try, they should be shot like the filthy pigs they are.
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Any man who runs from a responsibility like that, even if all he can do is get a job a McDonalds, should be punched in the face...repeatedly.
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Agreed, but regardless, it does happen, once you've totally removed a man's ability to avoid the responsibility of getting a woman pregnant, then you have an even playing field to start from.
Edit: Of course, by then no-one would be worrying about Abortion because of the drastic rise in Domestic arguments/violence from incompatible couples being jammed together.
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And finally, I don't WANT to keep my pants on. I want to have consequence-free sex, and that's my prerogative.
Everything has consequences. That's just a fact of life.
There's no such thing as "consequence-free sex" (or consequence-free anything for that matter).
You can't deny someone a means of avoiding an unfortunate consequence and then tell them it's just a fact of life. If a woman wants an abortion but she can't get one because it's illegal, the "fact of life" at play here is not some metaphysical principle of action and consequence; it's the intervention of law. The people who made the law are the ones who decided which consequences are inescapable.
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Making abortion illegal opens the door for a number of other things... Can you charge a woman with homicide if she starves herself until she miscarries?
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Bollocks. Reduced lifespan and happiness my ass.
Wait, are you counting self-plesuring under sex (as in - any sexual activity at all)? I want to see those statistics. And I doubt they would be very reliable..Since people tend to lie a lot when it comes to sex.
The evidence here comes from two sources: correlative links between sex and fitness, and experiments (much better!) in which one group was assigned to have a certain amount of sex, then tested for happiness and fitness. They were better off than control groups, including control groups given comparable non-sexual exercises.
Let me put it this way:
If I, a man (who is more instinct and hormone driven than a woman) can keep my pants on, then so can a woman.
You have no data to support that remark, and, in fact, it's not scientifically valid at all.
Second, you're generalizing your own behavior to a large group.
Unfortunately you're doing nothing to shake my view of you as an established misogynist. However, I will not debate further with you as it will probably lead you into another ban.
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Everything has consequences. That's just a fact of life.
There's no such thing as "consequence-free sex" (or consequence-free anything for that matter).
Of course.
However labeling pregnancy a necessary consequence of sex is bull****. It's neither necessary nor certain even without the use of contraceptives or abortificants.
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the point of it being guaranteed or not is moot. Pregnancy is a consequence of sex without contraceptives, and should not be simply disregarded because "they can just get an abortion later."
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Don't have sex without contraceptives. But if you do, you still have the freedom to get an abortion. The market should discourage that behavior by making it more costly, right?
And it's not a consequence for sex without contraceptives for you, mister. Why do you get any input?
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the point of it being guaranteed or not is moot. Pregnancy is a consequence of sex without contraceptives, and should not be simply disregarded because "they can just get an abortion later."
No.
It's not.
And you're spouting bull**** as I just explained.
Not every instance of sex will automatically end in pregnancy despite not using contraceptives. It is not a necessary or natural consequence of pregnancy. It never was.
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the point of it being guaranteed or not is moot. Pregnancy is a consequence of sex without contraceptives, and should not be simply disregarded because "they can just get an abortion later."
No.
It's not.
And you're spouting bull**** as I just explained.
Not every instance of sex will automatically end in pregnancy despite not using contraceptives. It is not a necessary or natural consequence of pregnancy. It never was.
Where do I say necessary? It is, however, a consequence (read: it can happen directly becuase of sex, therefore, it is a consequence). Sex exists as a reproductive method. That would be why our particular form of reproduction is called sexual reproduction. I believe that somewhere earlier in this thread someone said something about that (I'll look it up later).
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And finally, I don't WANT to keep my pants on. I want to have consequence-free sex, and that's my prerogative.
Just cause you want something doesn't make it your right or your prerogative.
WHAT THE ****! SHE CAN DO WHATEVER THE **** SHE WANTS! WHO THE HELL ARE YOU TO JUDGE HER, AND TELL HER WHAT SHE CAN AND CAN'T DO. YOU ARE CROSSING THE LINE FROM IGNORANT TO ASSHOLE!
(Sorry admins, but that goes a bit over. I can't stand self-righteous holier-than-though **** like that.)
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the point of it being guaranteed or not is moot. Pregnancy is a consequence of sex without contraceptives, and should not be simply disregarded because "they can just get an abortion later."
No.
It's not.
And you're spouting bull**** as I just explained.
Not every instance of sex will automatically end in pregnancy despite not using contraceptives. It is not a necessary or natural consequence of pregnancy. It never was.
Where do I say necessary? It is, however, a consequence (read: it can happen directly becuase of sex, therefore, it is a consequence). Sex exists as a reproductive method. That would be why our particular form of reproduction is called sexual reproduction. I believe that somewhere earlier in this thread someone said something about that (I'll look it up later).
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAhahahahahahaha no.
'Sexual reproduction' is practiced by organisms down to the unicellular mechanism. It has nothing to do with socially valuable, mutually enjoyable, highly pleasurable sex. In many species these traits are completely absent. It remains a scientific mystery, for example, why women can experience orgasm.
Our sex isn't called sex because it's sexual reproduction. Very few species seem to enjoy casual sex -- which suggests our sex is special, in that it is a social and bonding mechanism not necessarily related to reproduction.
Also, colecampbell, I empathize with your feeling.
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Actually, female orgasm involves muscle contractions which increase the amount of sperm brought up to the cervixy area.
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Where do I say necessary? It is, however, a consequence (read: it can happen directly becuase of sex, therefore, it is a consequence). Sex exists as a reproductive method. That would be why our particular form of reproduction is called sexual reproduction. I believe that somewhere earlier in this thread someone said something about that (I'll look it up later).
I could, of course, present this a binary set: if it's not necessary, then it must be unnecessary, and therefore safe to dispense with.
However rather than do that...it is a very poor reproductive method. Numerous species are much better adapted (dogs for example) to ensure sex is effective at reproduction. We are not. Consider the reason.
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But it's a greater than zero chance that it will end in pregnancy. Actually, it's about 1 in 4 that it will end in pregnancy.
Killing babies isn't a solution for anything, I don't care if it cured cancer, parkinson's and AIDS all in one swipe just by the act of killing, it's not worth the cost ethically, morally, or spiritually.
On the point of social sex, sex is a pleasureable(or so I've been told), bonding event because it helps a mated pair maintain the relationship in a positive way. Despite what you think, until very very recently, casual sex resulted in the spread of some rather horrific diseases so there was a definate social downside to leading a loose lifestyle.
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Well now we can prevent that. Isn't it great?
Sex is awesome.
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Actually, female orgasm involves muscle contractions which increase the amount of sperm brought up to the cervixy area.
No no no no -- that's one very likely theory, but there's still debate on the topic.
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I read a study about how that's the case. Not a definitive reason for it existing, of course.
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Actually, female orgasm involves muscle contractions which increase the amount of sperm brought up to the cervixy area.
No no no no -- that's one very likely theory, but there's still debate on the topic.
Yet, you can't just dismiss it because there is still debate.
The point is, sex is a form of reproduction. It also functions as a social tool to keep couples together, as brought up earlier.
However, being a form of reproduction, there is the chance of pregnancy as a result.
Damn, now I can't remember what we were originally arguing about.
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Ann Coulter.
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No, not that, last page :lol:. Who cares about Ann Coulter?
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And finally, I don't WANT to keep my pants on. I want to have consequence-free sex, and that's my prerogative.
Just cause you want something doesn't make it your right or your prerogative.
Is that so?
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Dude, I already told him. Do you think it'll listen anyways? (watch him ***** at me for being juvenile)
NO MORE SEX IT MAKES BABBYS AND BAD ZAKC KILLS THEM SHE DOESN'T LIKE BABBY SHE R MONSTR ROOOOORRR ROOOOOORRRR!
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Damn right I will. Keep it civilized.
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You are being juvenile. Both of you. For ****'s sake.
(for clarification: not scotty)
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Yeah, I guess so.
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Actually, female orgasm involves muscle contractions which increase the amount of sperm brought up to the cervixy area.
No no no no -- that's one very likely theory, but there's still debate on the topic.
Yet, you can't just dismiss it because there is still debate.
No, but because I'm a scientist, I can avoid leaping to conclusions to support my ideological bias because there was one study about the topic!
The point is, sex is a form of reproduction. It also functions as a social tool to keep couples together, as brought up earlier.
However, being a form of reproduction, there is the chance of pregnancy as a result.
Damn, now I can't remember what we were originally arguing about.
And nowadays it's a method of recreation as well.
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Sex isn't "for" anything, reproduction or otherwise. Reproduction happens to be a result of sex. The argument that sex should be for procreation is predicated on a quasi-religious mischaracterization of the evolutionary process; evolution isn't a set of laws that must be obeyed, just a series of interrelated processes like everything else. It doesn't make sense to appeal to natural law as a basis for our social understanding of sex, because there is no "natural law," there's just nature, and nature isn't a thing; it's everything. Have sex if you want to reproduce, or have sex because it rules-- "nature" doesn't give a ****.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to a party to get drunk and hopefully have sex.
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The evidence here comes from two sources: correlative links between sex and fitness, and experiments (much better!) in which one group was assigned to have a certain amount of sex, then tested for happiness and fitness. They were better off than control groups, including control groups given comparable non-sexual exercises.
And I say again - bollcoks. I can excercise and be fit without any sex. And happines is not something you can mesure objectively anyway.
In addition, any marriage based on sex is doom to failure sooner or later.
You have no data to support that remark, and, in fact, it's not scientifically valid at all.
What? That men are more hormon and instict driven than woman?
But we are. We produce more hormones in general and, unfortunately, act more "primitive" then women in general.
Unfortunately you're doing nothing to shake my view of you as an established misogynist.
Your view of me doesn't interest me at all. I'm not even trying to mold your view of me in any way. Think what you will - I couldn't care less if I tried.
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Just cause you want something doesn't make it your right or your prerogative.
WHAT THE ****! SHE CAN DO WHATEVER THE **** SHE WANTS! WHO THE HELL ARE YOU TO JUDGE HER, AND TELL HER WHAT SHE CAN AND CAN'T DO. YOU ARE CROSSING THE LINE FROM IGNORANT TO ASSHOLE!
(Sorry admins, but that goes a bit over. I can't stand self-righteous holier-than-though **** like that.)
ERm...yeah...keep it down sourpuss.
The point is you can't do whatever you want. You're not free to do whatever you want. You're not entitled to do whatever you want. You're not entilted to do anything without consequences. Actions always have consequences.
Attempting to run from the consequences or hide behind a fog of supposed "rights", "wants" and blame castings is ...is...well, I really lack the words to describe it....foolish? egoistical? Self-decieving? Take your pick.
Dude, I already told him. Do you think it'll listen anyways? (watch him ***** at me for being juvenile)
NO MORE SEX IT MAKES BABBYS AND BAD ZAKC KILLS THEM SHE DOESN'T LIKE BABBY SHE R MONSTR ROOOOORRR ROOOOOORRRR!
Now you really are being juvenile...
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The evidence here comes from two sources: correlative links between sex and fitness, and experiments (much better!) in which one group was assigned to have a certain amount of sex, then tested for happiness and fitness. They were better off than control groups, including control groups given comparable non-sexual exercises.
And I say again - bollcoks. I can excercise and be fit without any sex. And happines is not something you can mesure objectively anyway.
In addition, any marriage based on sex is doom to failure sooner or later.
You have no data to support that remark, and, in fact, it's not scientifically valid at all.
What? That men are more hormon and instict driven than woman?
But we are. We produce more hormones in general and, unfortunately, act more "primitive" then women in general.
Unfortunately you're doing nothing to shake my view of you as an established misogynist.
Your view of me doesn't interest me at all. I'm not even trying to mold your view of me in any way. Think what you will - I couldn't care less if I tried.
You're a lump.
a) You can be fit without sex. I never said you couldn't be. But people who have more sex tend to be more fit and happy than those who don't. And this may be a causative, rather than correlative, link.
I didn't say anything about a marriage based only on sex.
b) You are simply making **** up. You have no evidence. Men do not produce any more hormones than women do. Your ignorance staggers me.
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And I say again - bollcoks. I can excercise and be fit without any sex. And happines is not something you can mesure objectively anyway.
hahahaha this cannot be true, this is just too good
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Just cause you want something doesn't make it your right or your prerogative.
WHAT THE ****! SHE CAN DO WHATEVER THE **** SHE WANTS! WHO THE HELL ARE YOU TO JUDGE HER, AND TELL HER WHAT SHE CAN AND CAN'T DO. YOU ARE CROSSING THE LINE FROM IGNORANT TO ASSHOLE!
(Sorry admins, but that goes a bit over. I can't stand self-righteous holier-than-though **** like that.)
ERm...yeah...keep it down sourpuss.
The point is you can't do whatever you want. You're not free to do whatever you want. You're not entitled to do whatever you want. You're not entilted to do anything without consequences. Actions always have consequences.
Attempting to run from the consequences or hide behind a fog of supposed "rights", "wants" and blame castings is ...is...well, I really lack the words to describe it....foolish? egoistical? Self-decieving? Take your pick.
Dude, I already told him. Do you think it'll listen anyways? (watch him ***** at me for being juvenile)
NO MORE SEX IT MAKES BABBYS AND BAD ZAKC KILLS THEM SHE DOESN'T LIKE BABBY SHE R MONSTR ROOOOORRR ROOOOOORRRR!
Now you really are being juvenile...
I notice that you responded to everything but the fact that you don't get to tell someone what their prergoative is. Zack is a human, that makes it her right to do whatever the **** she wants with her body.
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I'm telling you that you aren't free to just decide "X is my perogatoive" like that. Just cause you want it, or say it, doesn't make it so.
I can say "It' my perogative to fling poo/grenades/knives at the president without consequences. Freedom of speech! Attacaaaa!" or crap like that. What I won't I don't automaticly get.
People aren't completely free to do what they want. Total freedom doesn't exist, especially if your freedom intereferes with someone elses (or national security..or other things).
**
That said, I can understand how people can be afraid of having a child.
It's a big responsilbiltiy and definately can turn your life completley upside down.
They might be afraid that they wont' make good parents, they might fear they don't have the resources to raise it properly (or at all), or might be afraid of sicknesses that run trough the family. They might fear such a sudden change in lifestyle (and boy, once the baby gets there it a friggin big change. No time for sex and parties)
All of that, I can understand.
What I cannot ever understand is calling a child a parasite, coldly and without any remorse. To me, that shows a cold, empty heart.
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What I cannot ever understand is calling a child a parasite, coldly and without any remorse. To me, that shows a cold, empty heart.
One little nitpick here, the heart only pumps blood, it has nothing to do with feelings or whether someone is a good person or a bad person.
When you think about it, a child is a parasite. While it matures, it leeches off of the parent's resources, whether it's in the uterus or outside of the uterus.
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Just 'cause I couldn't resist putting my finger in this nice soup again, let's have a pick at the fundamental core problem that many people have with abortion.
Claim: Abortion is child murder.
My answer: To be murder, as in homicide, the target of abortion should be a person and alive. It is only the latter. Therefore abortion is not homicide. However, it could be defined as feticide (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feticide) (which has different meanings in legal and medical contexts), which is by definition a different matter (and you shouldn't confuse the term "legal person" with the normal definition of person).
Obviously same applies to "child". Zygote isn't a child. Embryo isn't a child either. Neither of these have the prerequisites of human being in any other sense than their genome and the subsequent ability to grow and develope into a human child. They are not persons just because they might be.
You do not normally (I hope) treat people or things based on what they could potentially become. So claiming that the zygote or embryo are "children" or human beings is a flawed argument, because they quite obviously aren't. Embryo is a cluster of cells doesn't have the nervous system crucial for bringing up a personality until much later in the course of pregnancy. Abortion of the pregnancy at these stages is from biological and materialistic point of view not ending a life of human being. It is terminating a pregnancy and that's all there is to it on any reality-based argumentation that usually comes up in these arguments.
If you want to go the route that says the zygote is a human being and terminating it shouldn't be allowed, then why not declare all animal zygotes human beings? After all, they are very much identical in appearance, functions and size - heck, embryos and fetuses look, act and work very much alike in mammals (up to certain point of course)!
The argument that cow zygote or pig embryo should be considered to be human being is obviously absurd, but why? Because we know they won't become humans, but human embryo does have potential to that. However the potential is just that - it means the embryo can become a human being, but is not human at that point.
So, I said that terminating a pregnancy is just that and that's all there is to it in biological and materialistic sense. Hormonally and emotionally it's a whole different thing obviously. Female body reacts in certain ways to pregnancy, unwanted or wanted, and it's termination usually causes some kind of adverse reactions (which is not to say pregnancy wouldn't...), either physically and mentally and usually both. So no, it isn't a matter to be taken lightly, but it MOST CERTAINLY is every female's choice up to certain point whether to do it or not.
Now, aborting a relatively developed fetus... that's a different story (as is drawing the line between embryo and a fetus). At some point, the developing organism starts to have enough nerve systems that it starts to get increasingly difficult to say it isn't killing a baby, but like I said drawing the line is very very hard. The textbook definitions say that developing human is an embryo until 8th week of pregnancy, whereafter it is named fetus, however these are just definitions of the words, obviously.
Different legislations draw the line at different point. One good point of reference could be somewhere before the fetus has the ability to (theoretically) survive a pre-term birth with intensive care. That would place the line at somewhere around... 20th week I think?
/me cheks the wiki
...yeah, the youngest prematurely born child was 21/23 weeks old depending of the method of calculation. Which actually coincides with the legislations in many countries I believe.
Personally I would put the limit at somewhere closer to ten weeks for elective abortions and about twenty weeks or so for clinical abortions. Ten weeks should be ample time to find out about the pregnancy and decide whether the mother wants to carry the baby or not. After that point, there should better be some damn good reason to the abortion; best I can think of is immediate medical risk for the mother, although there are other reasons I would consider valid as well.
...Just looked it up and this actually coincides surprisingly well with the legislation in Finland:
Availability: Under certain conditions
Gestational limit: 24 weeks
Conditions: Abortions permitted up to 12 weeks to save the woman's life, to preserve her mental health, for economic or social reasons or in the cases of rape or incest.
Available up to 20 weeks if there is a risk to the physical health of woman or if she is younger than 17. The procedure can be performed up to 24 weeks if the woman's life is at risk or there is a risk of foetal malformation.
An abortion must be authorised by one or two doctors up to 12 weeks, or by the State Medical Board up to 20 weeks. Abortion is free of charge under national health insurance but women must pay hospital fees.
The International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) says that in practice a woman can get an abortion on demand, but illegal abortion is rare.
TrashMan, for the aforementioned reasons comparing woman's prerogative to abortion to prerogative to "fling poo/grenades/knives at the president without consequences". Often used analogy between murder and abortion works even worse, since murder is ending a person's life.
Oh, and religious views of zygote, embryo or fetus being a human being "just because" or because it "has a soul" aren't valid argumentative material. They are non-falsifiable statements with just opinion value in this matter, like in all matters that affect other people than those with the same convictions. You can think so or believe so, but don't try to force your opinions on others after stating them.
It's not your business to decide whether those who end up with unwanted pregnancy should have the right to terminate it or not. Within reasonable time limit of course. Aborting a fetus that could possibly live a premature birth with intensive care is actually tantamount to child murder in my personal logic circuits, but an abortion done soon enough after finding out the pregnancy... I have no problem with that at all.
Also it's meaningless to talk about developing child as "parasite" "symbiote" or any other biological terms that describe the coexistence of some species. It's called viviparous gestation and other terminology isn't quite meant for dealing with it. It's a process in a class of it's own, so to speak.
Now, placenta, there's an interesting lump of tissue, if you consider the biological structure. It basically acts as an interface between the mother and the fetus, and as such it can't be clearly defined to be belonging to either.
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I'm telling you that you aren't free to just decide "X is my perogatoive" like that. Just cause you want it, or say it, doesn't make it so.
When it's your body in question, then, yes, actually, you are free to decide what your prerogative is. There are very few times (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandatory_vaccination) when the government or society can force you to make a decision about your personal health, but that usually is when the greater good and the well-being of the community are at risk.
A fetus developing inside a woman's uterus, on the other hand, causes no physical harm or effect on the general well-being of the community, as, say, a bacteria outbreak would. Instead, the mother, whose nutrients the fetus is siphoning off, is the only party directly physically affected by a pregnancy. It directly affects her health and her well-being, which is something necessary to be taken into consideration.
Therefore, it is her decision on whether to carry the fetus to full maturity and give birth to the child, or to terminate it.
I can say "It' my perogative to fling poo/grenades/knives at the president without consequences. Freedom of speech! Attacaaaa!" or crap like that.
Apples to aircraft carriers.
Find a better analogy.
People aren't completely free to do what they want. Total freedom doesn't exist, especially if your freedom intereferes with someone elses (or national security..or other things).
And does a woman's decision with regards to her own body and the maturing fetus inside it, affect any other party other than herself?
What I cannot ever understand is calling a child a parasite, coldly and without any remorse. To me, that shows a cold, empty heart.
What's funny is abortion isn't as black and white as you'd like to picture it. Women who terminate children aren't just selfish, cold-blooded murderers without feeling or emotion who simply want to get rid of the child so they can have free time party and go on without any responsibility.
If you'd read (http://www.afterabortion.org/hope/arti17.htm) some sources (http://www.cirtl.org/syndrome.htm) relating to the matter (http://www.americanpregnancy.org/unplannedpregnancy/abortionemotionaleffects.html) instead of just appealing to people's emotions completely without basis, then you'd realize a fair number of women who undergo abortions suffer extreme emotional distress afterwards, and some even attempt suicide. It's not an easy decision, not by a long shot.
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But in order to give the woman that freedom, you are ignoring the inherent humanity of the baby. What about his/her rights? Who speaks for them?
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You're ignoring that a collection of 8 cells isn't a human.
But even if we say it is, you're basically saying that because the woman is the only person who can save the baby's life is the mother, she should be forced to do so. Right? Any other argument blames the mother for getting pregnant and Trashman at least has claimed that he doesn't.
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But in order to give the woman that freedom, you are ignoring the inherent humanity of the baby. What about his/her rights? Who speaks for them?
What Karajorma said. Potential to become human does not make the embryo one.
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You are right, 8 cells doesn't qualify as human, too bad by the time you can tell if a woman is pregnant or not, it's a helluva lot more than 8 cells.
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But it's still hijacking her endocrine system and siphoning nutrients off of her.
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And most women will find out within about 8 weeks give or take, at which point the baby is still embryonic.
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You are right, 8 cells doesn't qualify as human, too bad by the time you can tell if a woman is pregnant or not, it's a helluva lot more than 8 cells.
So... what constitutes as a human being? (my opinion in parenthesis)
Tzygote of Homo sapiens? (no)
8 weeks old embryo of Homo sapiens? (no)
12 weeks old fetus? (no. I don't think there's enough strucural ability to be human being here yet.)
24 weeks old? (getting on the limits here. This is the fuzzy ground, because technically a child born at this time could still survive and when it's born it automatically becomes a person, though physically it's the same when it's in utero. At the risk of ruining my own argument I say that yes, at this point it is possible that the fetus could be considered human being already.
A recently born Rattus norvegicus? (no, for obvious reasons)
A recently born Homo sapiens? (yes, newborn babies have a personality and some level of sapience, and they gain these abilities at some point during the last trimester of the pregnancy (my estimation). Empathy too, as they react to the feelings of people around them - maybe instinctively, but then what couldn't be called instinctual.)
Three years old Homo sapiens? (yes...)
Adult Pan troglodytes? (yes, as they have much the same mental, emotional and cognitive capabilities as a three-year old child.)
Adult Gorilla gorilla? (yes, same as above.)
By the way, yes, I do know that defining humanity with abilities can become a slippery slope. However, I do consider ability to sentience, personality and empathy pretty much the defining features of being a human being. Many (most mammals and birds at least) animals have personality (pet owners or wild life researchers would be quick to agree), but their sentience is questionable, as is their ability to empathy in most cases. Pack animal behaviour can perhaps be explained by instincts in cases like canines or bovines, or horses or lambs or such critters.
However, with species like great apes, their behaviour leads me to conclude that yes, they are "human beings" in the sense that they are sentient, have personality and ability to feel empathy (among other similar abilities like communication, using tools, abstract thought etc. etc.). Same applies to some cetacean species. I would consider shooting a chimpanzee a crime comparative to killing a two or three-year-old child. On a hand-to-hand fight though, chimpanzee would win... so it's just manslaughter. You couldn't, though. A grown healthy chimpanzee would probably rip right through Alexandr Karelin, Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris if it wanted to.
An embryo, and a fetus up to certain level, has none of these abilities. It's only ability for quite long is just to grow; then it starts to gain motoric functions, and at some point it obviously crosses a certain threshold where it's nervous system is capable of generating personality and some level of sentience. But like said, drawing an arbitrary line where the fetus can be considered human being is difficult and I would hate to be in a position of making such decisions, because whatever you decide you're always wrong.
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I believe the earliest possible detection is five days after conception... or maybe it was five days after the missed period.
If I were pregnant, I would suspect so within a month.
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Four days short of a month is earliest.
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The whole argument collides on the topic of when the fetus becomes a baby.
One side says conception, one side says birth. And yet neither side has truly good reasons as to they're stance.
One side says it's murder, the other says it's parasite removal.
All I can say is I'm glad I'm not the child of the parasite side...I'd probably get left at a bus stop somewhere....
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The whole argument collides on the topic of when the fetus becomes a baby.
One side says conception, one side says birth. And yet neither side has truly good reasons as to they're stance.
One side says it's murder, the other says it's parasite removal.
All I can say is I'm glad I'm not the child of the parasite side...I'd probably get left at a bus stop somewhere....
Would you really want to be the child of someone who doesn't want you?
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Exactly, the child's just going to have all sorts of psychological issues when he/she grows up if they aren't taken proper care of. If the mother thinks she can't care/doesn't want to care and has an abortion, then really she's just saving the system from another felon/mental patient.
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The whole argument collides on the topic of when the fetus becomes a baby.
I completely agree with you on this. Which is why I posted my views concentrating pretty much on this topic...
One side says conception, one side says birth. And yet neither side has truly good reasons as to they're stance.
There are no good argumentations for either of these extremities, and I don't think many people who actually give the matter any thought at all fall into either camp. The answer lies somewhere in between, and there are many good reasons for views that range from the eight-week mark of switch from embryonic developement to foetal developement, to late third trimester. However, there is no true answer for the question either because each pregnancy is different and each fetus developes slightly differently, which means no fixed date for the awakening of humanity/personality/sentience or whatever can reliably be given.
This is why I personally play it safe with my opinion and say that first trimester abortions are ok as elective, second trimester kinda so-so and third trimester... deeply questionable.
One side says it's murder, the other says it's parasite removal.
Again, I don't think many people think of it as parasite removal even if they advocate freedom of choice for women regarding abortion. It's termination of unwanted or dangerous pregnancy.
All I can say is I'm glad I'm not the child of the parasite side...I'd probably get left at a bus stop somewhere....
What are you talking about??
This is a deeply flawed argument, and it appalls me that you even bothered to make it. Think about it:
If you were born to a mother who thinks it is the woman's right to choose whether to keep the child or not, wouldn't it kinda imply that she chose to carry you, give birth to you and raise you as opposed to not caring about you at all? It means she wanted to have a child. It means she wanted to have a child and it wasn't an unwanted pregnancy.
As opposed to a situation where a woman gets pregnant, has no way of terminating it or believes it's wrong to do and thus has to bear the child, give birth to it and raise it even if she didn't want to?
Wtf man. :shaking:
Curses, too slow. :blah:
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The trouble is that there is an alternative to raising the child, even an unwilling mother can make a difficult, but sometimes beneficial choice to give up the child for adoption.
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Of course.
That's not implicitely a better option than termination of an unwanted pregnancy though.
It's not "taking responsibility" either. It's getting rid of the child that was born simply because there was no way to prevent it after getting knocked up.
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Here's my question: Why is this thread still going?
The abortion debate is as old as time itself. Women (and men) have been aborting pregnancies since we gained the knowledge to do so... in other words, throughout recorded history and likely well beyond that. Meanwhile, other women and men have been interfering with the decision for a variety of reasons. You're not going to solve it.
Abortion is legal in democratic nations which value the rights of individuals. If you like it, great, keep fighting to keep it that way. If you don't, suck it up or move to a fundamentalist nation that views the issue the same way you do. Either way, arguing about it on an Internet forum is BEYOND pointless.
Just sayin' :p
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Here:
(http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty_calls.png) (http://xkcd.com/386/)
Because as much as anyone can respect other opinions... they would still prefer others change their opinion and agree with them.
And it feels so GOOD to be RIGHTeous in the internet. ;)
EDIT: miscellaneous
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I lol'd
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You are right, 8 cells doesn't qualify as human, too bad by the time you can tell if a woman is pregnant or not, it's a helluva lot more than 8 cells.
So when does it qualify as human then in your opinion?
/me is surprised no one else asked since that's a major difference from Trashman's and presumably Scotty's points of view.
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I haven't figured that out. Honestly, it's above my pay grade(which is nonexistent amt :sigh: ).
But for myself, I would like it just fine if things went back to way they were before this procedure and abominable offspring(particularly the variant used in late term abortion, I hear tales of babies surviving the initial attempt, being partially delivered and murdered afterward) were developed. At least so far as this procedure goes. Everyone seems so set on the health of the mother, but how healthy is it to drill into some of the most resilient tissue in her body? I mean, the female body is designed specifically to keep a unborn child safe from harm and damage from external sources barring heavy violence and accidents.
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I haven't figured that out. Honestly, it's above my pay grade(which is nonexistent amt :sigh: ).
Okay but if you haven't figured out when it is, on what basis are you unwilling to accept the argument of those who have?
The 24 week limit we have in the UK is the opinion of people who have studied the subject. If you're going to disagree with that, I'd like to hear something a bit more concrete as the reason than just a gut feeling.
But for myself, I would like it just fine if things went back to way they were before this procedure
And when is that? Methods for forcing a miscarriage have been known since ancient times. The Hippocratic Oath even includes a line about abortion. Abortion is not a modern thing by any means.
I hear tales of babies surviving the initial attempt, being partially delivered and murdered afterward
I'd be very careful about listening to those tales. I've heard all kinds of nonsense from the anti-abortion groups. I certainly wouldn't put it past them to spread such stories.
Everyone seems so set on the health of the mother, but how healthy is it to drill into some of the most resilient tissue in her body? I mean, the female body is designed specifically to keep a unborn child safe from harm and damage from external sources barring heavy violence and accidents.
Bear in mind that most abortions are carried out using techniques that don't involve cutting at all.
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Most abortions use medication, no physical aspect.
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Seems we hit the crux of the matter.. semantics and worth of a humans life.
When does a human life start to have some worth? Whatever answer you pick, I can argue something different. And thereby justify any subsequent killing action by the simple virtue that it's not human/person at that point.
After all, what makes a human, human? Just bilogy? in that case, a humans' life if worth from day 1.
Brain power? What's so special about that? Heck, every animal has a brain. And when does a brain become big enough and complex enough for the human life to have worth?
Personality?Newborns don't have a personality yet. They are blank slates yet to written upon. No worth whatsoever then.
Inherent empathy? Some humans are cold as blocks of ice.
Usefulness to the species? Chuck the old and impotent into the fire then.
You can start applying labels and categories, but there's really no difference in saying a fetus isn't a person, and therefore can be killed, and saying that mass murdered isn't a person, and then frying him on a electric chair. It's all down to the criteria and semantics and applying worth.
Frankly, this now dwells deep into the philosphical aspect, and whole books could be written on any of those questions.
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Here's a much better question: Why is a human life inherently worth more than the life of any other animal, plant, bacterium, etc?
Hint: It's not.
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It is to us because we're human.
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Here's a much better question: Why is a human life inherently worth more than the life of any other animal, plant, bacterium, etc?
Hint: It's not.
wat
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at the end of the day no religous group should have the power to force its believes on an individual , at what point a feotus becomes a living entity , the bible talks about blood being part of life so thats about te 14 week period as i understand (with my limited biology) personaly i have no religous doctorine that i subscribe too, i do hate ppl that have a doctorine that makes them believe that they have the right to be "correct" and to force there opinions on others....
if its your belief that there is a higher power ... excelent .. well done now go and meditate and ask these questions of your god and the answers that come to you are right....for you and no other
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Seems we hit the crux of the matter.. semantics and worth of a humans life.
When does a human life start to have some worth? Whatever answer you pick, I can argue something different. And thereby justify any subsequent killing action by the simple virtue that it's not human/person at that point.
I'm sure you can. Just remember that a contradiction is not an argument, it is just the automatic gainsaying of any statement the other person makes. ;)
After all, what makes a human, human? Just bilogy? in that case, a humans' life if worth from day 1.
This is essentially the "value by potential" aspect and if you go by it, logically you should also use it for other purposes or define what makes human worth a special case so it may be used.
Why not use it to establish a value of your car by saying it'll one day be an antique?
Or selling real estates on the premise of surely becoming worth more one day?
Or selling stock of a nonexistant company on the premise than when you actually get the firm up and running it'll be like a goose giving golden eggs? (normally it's called a hoax)
Or saying that once your pants are on, you make gold records?
So why would worth of a human being be defined just by the genotype? Because that's essentially the only thing the embryo and early fetus really have linking them to the developed form of a child; it's the same organism as far as genotype is concerned, but the change is vast yet not clearly defined, as the change occurs gradually.
Which is really what makes the whole issue really difficult.
Brain power? What's so special about that? Heck, every animal has a brain.
Technically no, not every animal has a brain. Actually, not all animals even have nerve cells to begin with. Single-cell animals are of course pretty much given, but there are also multicellular organisms like that - sponges come to mind for example. Then there are animals that have nerve cells but no brain; jellyfish, starfish, hydra, sea anemones and the like. They have a decentralized nervous system instead.
All vertebrates do have brains though, and most invertebrates that most people think of as animals (insects, crustaceans, arachnids, cephalopods etc.) so while it is incorrect to say every animal has a brain, it's usually a valid statement in everyday speech... but incorrect it is nevertheless.
And when does a brain become big enough and complex enough for the human life to have worth?
While size of the brain typically doesn't correlate to mental capacity, it still needs all it's parts functional to some degree to be able to function normally (yeah, the brain can compensate for damaged regions relatively well, but you still need a functional brain cortex for consciousness and voluntary movement). And of all the organs of the fetus, the brain developement doesn't stop during the pregnancy, while other organs are pretty much ready after the second trimester (if I recall my biology lessons correctly). Lungs only start working properly when the baby is big and strong enough to use them physically, though.
I don't know at which point the brain cortex reaches a point where the fetus becomes aware of sensory input, or when it becomes more aware of itself, if at all.
Personality?Newborns don't have a personality yet. They are blank slates yet to written upon. No worth whatsoever then.
Eh?
Why would they suddenly start to develope personality only after birth? They do have all their mental and cognitive abilities for quite a while before they are born, it's not like they magically start from nothingness after birth. They have a lot of sensory input and, while their motoric range is kinda limited, there's no reason to assume they do nothing while in utero. They have periods of sleeping and activity much like after birth. The only things that are introduced in birth as a transition are:
-individual digestion
-individual breathing
-exposure to elements (temperature is no longer constant, the immune system needs to start working out etc. etc.)
-direct contact to and interaction with people and external world
I'm sure you agree that for the developement of the child's psyche, the last one is the most important change that occurs in birth, but does it mean that the child can have no personality without it, even in utero?
I don't think so. Besides, ask any nurses or mothers if newborns have a personality or not... and most would answer that they definitely do.
Inherent empathy? Some humans are cold as blocks of ice.
Are you referring to sociopaths? Because that's a mental/personality disorder (although some would just disregard the psychiatric diagnosis and call them arseholes or something less flattering) or a few of them at the same time. It's an illness of the mind, and even if it might be genetic, I don't think they are incapable of knowing empathy, it just doesn't make sense to them. Many of these people can act like normal people if they so choose, but to them, other people don't have any value. That doesn't mean other people should think of them as worthless, obviously.
Aside from these individuals that are quite obviously an exception of normal human behaviour (yet somehow evolution has not deemed fit to remove them from the gene pool; clearly these personality types are beneficial in some situations), empathy is a core feature of typical human behaviour, but you're right - it can not exclusively be used to define human behaviour, much less human value.
Usefulness to the species? Chuck the old and impotent into the fire then.
Blarrg, it seems you really slipped on that surface. Or are you just throwing out straw men? Of course that's not a valid criterion for human value.
You can start applying labels and categories, but there's really no difference in saying a fetus isn't a person, and therefore can be killed, and saying that mass murdered isn't a person, and then frying him on a electric chair. It's all down to the criteria and semantics and applying worth.
It is not the same thing because the mass murderer quite obviously is a person. He walks and talks and does stuff, while the existence of a fetus (without the movements) would, up to certain point, much comparable to someone in persistent vegetative state.
Frankly, this now dwells deep into the philosphical aspect, and whole books could be written on any of those questions.
True.
If it weren't difficult and ambiguous matter, this kind of debates wouldn't be going on.
I don't like the concept of late abortions either. Aborting a pregnancy at 24th week when the fetus could potentially live after birth at week 21 or 22 (albeit with low chances of survival) creeps me out.
Which is why it's a good thing that the vast majority of abortions occur in the first trimester, as far as I know.
But, like I said "human value" is not clearly defined in itself, and I would personally grant it to the other great ape species (chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutangs) with no question. Cetaceans likely as well, though they are a bit more difficult to deal with.
By the way, how does using a chimpanzee as a test subject for a lethal procedure compare with early abortion in your opinion? Worse, less aggravating or equal?
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*Scotty has to skim through three pages of new arguments
how does using a chimpanzee as a test subject for a lethal procedure compare with early abortion in your opinion? Worse, less aggravating or equal?
Equal. You are still killing something that doesn't deserve it. Maybe test it on the aforementioned mass murderer.
*Not even going to bother reading the rest of that post. Suffice it, post = good points, but I don't necessarily agree.*
Why is a human life inherently worth more than the life of any other animal, plant, bacterium, etc?
Because we think, feel, and all sorts of other things that are actually more useful to humanity than some plant, bacterium, animal, etc. You really kind of scare me with your total indifference to human life.
So when does it qualify as human then in your opinion?
This statement itself can be kind of touchy. The difference that is the crux of the matter is between when life starts, and when it qualifies as human. I believe that life starts somewhere close to conception. The humanity starts somewhere later. Regardless of where it starts, I still do not agree with abortion *sigh* unless the mother was raped and/or is threatened physically by the child.
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This statement itself can be kind of touchy. The difference that is the crux of the matter is between when life starts, and when it qualifies as human. I believe that life starts somewhere close to conception. The humanity starts somewhere later. Regardless of where it starts, I still do not agree with abortion *sigh* unless the mother was raped and/or is threatened physically by the child.
so although you are against abortion it is ok to murder an unborn child because of the actions of someone else ?
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Cases of rape are the exception.
because of the actions of someone else
That applies to every pregnancy ever, because you need two people. Except for Jesus.
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Cases of rape are the exception.
because of the actions of someone else
That applies to every pregnancy ever, because you need two people. Except for Jesus.
But in the case of rape, it's one person.
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Cases of rape are the exception.
Why?
Seriously, why. If you really believe it to be murder you are suggesting killing a child for a crime committed by its father.
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This is essentially the "value by potential" aspect and if you go by it, logically you should also use it for other purposes or define what makes human worth a special case so it may be used.
It's not. It's a matter of semantics and opinnion.
Why would they suddenly start to develope personality only after birth? They do have all their mental and cognitive abilities for quite a while before they are born, it's not like they magically start from nothingness after birth. They have a lot of sensory input and, while their motoric range is kinda limited, there's no reason to assume they do nothing while in utero. They have periods of sleeping and activity much like after birth.
What is personality and how is it formed? It's a mix of experiences, reactions and opinnions.
Babies have no personality to speak off (unless you count those that cry a lot and those that don't as important, distinct personalities), and you'll be hard pressed to prove me otherwise
Besides, ask any nurses or mothers if newborns have a personality or not... and most would answer that they definitely do.
And most mothers will say that their baby is the most beautiful in the world too. Which is not. A moot point.
Blarrg, it seems you really slipped on that surface. Or are you just throwing out straw men? Of course that's not a valid criterion for human value.[/qutoe]
You don't have the monopoly on determining what the valid criteria are. That's just my whole point.
Things either have an inherent value, or have value that we give to them.
If it's the latter than whatever value any human assigns to something is just as equally valid as yours - regardless of the criteria used.
It is not the same thing because the mass murderer quite obviously is a person. He walks and talks and does stuff, while the existence of a fetus (without the movements) would, up to certain point, much comparable to someone in persistent vegetative state.
Again, completely a matter of how you define and person.
By the way, how does using a chimpanzee as a test subject for a lethal procedure compare with early abortion in your opinion? Worse, less aggravating or equal?
I don't like using ANY animal as test subjects. Frankly, people should value all life as much and possible. I personally, even avoid stepping on ants (literally).
Any loss of life is tragic IMHO. Innocent life - doubly so.
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i have an experiment i would like to try lets shoot trashman if he lives there is a god if he dies im happy
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Babies do have personality; there's been a lot of psychological research on it. Reactivity to stimuli, attachment behavior, stuff like that.
Trashman is objectively, scientifically wrong on that count.
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i have an experiment i would like to try lets shoot trashman if he lives there is a god if he dies im happy
Yes. YES! I relish in your hate. It feeds me. It sustains me!
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i have an experiment i would like to try lets shoot trashman if he lives there is a god if he dies im happy
Yes. YES! I relish in your hate. It feeds me. It sustains me!
i dont hate you i just think it would be the humain thing todo
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Let's avoid the death threats. There's been entirely too much of that kind of nonsense recently.
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Yes. YES! I relish in your hate. It feeds me. It sustains me!
(http://staff.hard-light.net/goober5000/images/wrong.jpg)
I'm going to go Philemon 1:8 on you and say GTFO General Discussion before I have to monkey you. :rolleyes:
Now as long as I'm here, let me state my position before I disappear back into hammerspace...
1) Murder is the willful killing of an innocent person.
2) An unborn child qualifies as a) innocent; and b) a person.
2a) Corollary to 2) -- As long as there is any doubt of the precise moment of time as to when an unborn child achieves personhood, it is wise to err on the side of caution and assume it as the onset of pregnancy.
3) Abortion is "willful termination of pregnancy". Miscarriages are not willful; implantation failure due to rhythm or whatever is not willful.
4) Ergo, abortion is murder, and one who opposes one should oppose the other. The governing moral principle here is the defense of the rights of a person.
5) In the interests of triage, it is acceptable to pursue intermediate milestones such as "only opposing partial-birth abortion", or "opposing abortion except in the cases of rape or incest", etc. This is done with the understanding that, while the ultimate goal is the abolition of all abortion, a stepwise approach may be more productive than an "all or nothing" approach.
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You failed to address the uterus-hijacking issue.
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2) An unborn child qualifies as a) innocent; and b) a person.
This is debatable. While technically human, the fetus is not necessarily sentient. I don't know whether they can count as people like you or me or not, and I do not think anyone else can either. The notion saying that "the first heartbeat is when it gets a soul" is pretty unscientific and thoroughly unverifiable (as with much else when dealing with this topic), but it's pretty ridiculous in itself if you understand what the heart actually does in the slightest sense. Even in the brain's earliest form, when the notochord is developing, it's hardly a mass of cells more differentiated than muscles and skin. A nice article (http://brainmind.com/FetalBrainDevelopment.html)
Saying that they are potential people and as such should not be killed makes about as much sense as me saying that since I'm a potential 21 year old and that I should be allowed to go out buy a few hookers, some smokes, some alcohol, and a few guns right this instant albeit the fact that I'm 17.
Though I really must say, the entire case of abortion being acceptable (in some form) or not really lies in whether the fetus is sentient at time of death.
TL;DR - You are right in saying that we don't know exactly when sentience begins in human development, but the developing human sure as heck aren't conceived with it. Good luck with early detection, though.
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You failed to address the uterus-hijacking issue.
I thought that was implicit. But fair enough:
1) If the life of the mother is threatened by her pregnancy, the question becomes, "is it acceptable to end one life for the sake of another". Some people may decide in favor of the mother; some may decide in favor of the child. It becomes a moral dilemma that falls outside the scope of this argument. Regardless, it only happens in the minority of cases.
2) If the life of the mother is not at risk, it becomes a matter of convenience. You and I may disagree on the level of inconvenience caused by a pregnancy, but the fact remains that if it is not a threat to life or limb, it is merely a threat to convenience.
3) I hold that one person's desire for convenience does not supersede another person's right to life. In other words, the convenience of a person is not a legitimate justification for murder.
2) An unborn child qualifies as a) innocent; and b) a person.
This is debatable.
Hence 2a.
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What about my desire to not have someone living inside of my body?
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It's not a person, it's not innocent, it's a clump of cells that until quite a good bit in looks the same as a lizard embryo
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2) An unborn child qualifies as a) innocent; and b) a person.
This is debatable.
Hence 2a.
That's part of my point, we have a good month of solid leeway. Course, you did post a good 10 minutes before I finished editing my post. :D
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I don't see why everyone's ripping on Zack, she has more to worry about this than any of you. She isn't inhuman, and if I'm interpreting her views right, she has a very big-picture view.
Many of these unwanted children that could've/would've been aborted will become criminal or at least less-savory due to the lack of a stable mother/father/family/role-model. They will drain on the funding of the state due to prison/police/legal funding, as well as the hospitals with more dangerous behavior. If all of this were to disappear, there would be more money and less people, more money per-person and better quality of life. Higher overall education and standards of living, more money to health care and other services, and less (fewer?) unwanted, unhappy people.
Think of another point. "One death is a tragedy; one million is a statistic. " - Good Ol' Joe Stalin.
These (anti-abortion) organizations, much like the organizations against African poverty (noble causes), PETA (debatable, not big-picture IMO) and others, try to appeal to your empathy and compassion rather than your judgment. They show you these shocking images and personalized tragedies, all the while subversively convincing you not to think. You don't look at the big picture such as I outlined above, you think of the poor little Afghani/Indian/whatever girl with no meat on her bones. The big picture is that people need to die. Call me cruel, call me inhuman, call me heartless; death is a part of life. In today's world (and most likely well into the future) many people will die, many at an "unfairly" young age. If it saves them from a probable life of hardship and goes towards the greater good, I deem it an acceptable loss. It wouldn't be unfair to them as one can't miss what one has never had, and if they go to "heaven" and meet "god", will he not welcome them the same? Are babies (and by extension fetuses) not sinless?
2) An unborn child qualifies as a) innocent; and b) a person.
This is debatable.
Hence 2a.
That's part of my point, we have a good month of solid leeway. Course, you did post a good 10 minutes before I finished editing my post. :D
There is a doubt, true, but as Herra stated, scans and testing have solidly indicated that at about week 20 there is a chance of survival, being very conservative. Before this, terminating a pregnancy is not ending a "life" as the life never had a chance to occur in the first place.
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Think of another point. "One death is a tragedy; one million is a statistic. " - Good Ol' Joe Stalin.
These (anti-abortion) organizations, much like the organizations against African poverty (noble causes), PETA (debatable, not big-picture IMO) and others, try to appeal to your empathy and compassion rather than your judgment. They show you these shocking images and personalized tragedies, all the while subversively convincing you not to think. You don't look at the big picture such as I outlined above, you think of the poor little Afghani/Indian/whatever girl with no meat on her bones.
These organizations exist because someone somewhere thinks that they serve a good purpose. No one in their right mind would create and maintain an NGO just for the hell of it.
The big picture is that people need to die. Call me cruel, call me inhuman, call me heartless; death is a part of life.
And that's where you differ from most people. Most people actually try and change that, hence the NGOs you just mentioned.
In today's world (and most likely well into the future) many people will die, many at an "unfairly" young age. If it saves them from a probable life of hardship and goes towards the greater good, I deem it an acceptable loss. It wouldn't be unfair to them as one can't miss what one has never had, and if they go to "heaven" and meet "god", will he not welcome them the same? Are babies (and by extension fetuses) not sinless?
There's another thing that people try and change. The hardship doesn't have to be a part of their life, but it will be as long as there are people that want to just kill them instead of fixing the problems. You're side stepping the issue and rationalizing it by saying "I don't think they would've wanted to live anyway..."
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Oh, btw, I'm pregnant.
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Oh, btw, I'm pregnant.
<Turambar> time for some falcon punches
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Oh, btw, I'm pregnant.
Oh ho really?
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Think of another point. "One death is a tragedy; one million is a statistic. " - Good Ol' Joe Stalin.
These (anti-abortion) organizations, much like the organizations against African poverty (noble causes), PETA (debatable, not big-picture IMO) and others, try to appeal to your empathy and compassion rather than your judgment. They show you these shocking images and personalized tragedies, all the while subversively convincing you not to think. You don't look at the big picture such as I outlined above, you think of the poor little Afghani/Indian/whatever girl with no meat on her bones.
These organizations exist because someone somewhere thinks that they serve a good purpose. No one in their right mind would create and maintain an NGO just for the hell of it.
And I never said they didn't, I just stated which tactics they use/how they operate.
The big picture is that people need to die. Call me cruel, call me inhuman, call me heartless; death is a part of life.
And that's where you differ from most people. Most people actually try and change that, hence the NGOs you just mentioned.
I myself am for changing that, I'm behind the principles 100%. The truth still stands, in today's world, it's not feasible nor possible to save everyone. Improving quality of life and education for the living is the first step towards this.
In today's world (and most likely well into the future) many people will die, many at an "unfairly" young age. If it saves them from a probable life of hardship and goes towards the greater good, I deem it an acceptable loss. It wouldn't be unfair to them as one can't miss what one has never had, and if they go to "heaven" and meet "god", will he not welcome them the same? Are babies (and by extension fetuses) not sinless?
There's another thing that people try and change. The hardship doesn't have to be a part of their life, but it will be as long as there are people that want to just kill them instead of fixing the problems. You're side stepping the issue and rationalizing it by saying "I don't think they would've wanted to live anyway..."
A. I never said that they wouldn't have wanted to live, I said that they wouldn't know life and so wouldn't miss it. B. Refer to response #2.
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(http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/attachment.php?attachmentid=23446&%3Bstc=1&%3Bd=1168484923)
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Turambar: I dare you.
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1) Murder is the willful killing of an innocent person.
2) An unborn child qualifies as a) innocent; and b) a person.
2a) Corollary to 2) -- As long as there is any doubt of the precise moment of time as to when an unborn child achieves personhood, it is wise to err on the side of caution and assume it as the onset of pregnancy.
Except that there is no scientific doubt. Of course that's never stopped religious organisations in the past from claiming that there is. A collection of 8 cells is not a person. You want to claim that it is which makes the rest of your argument dubious.
3) Abortion is "willful termination of pregnancy". Miscarriages are not willful; implantation failure due to rhythm or whatever is not willful.
Nice try but if you're claiming that abortion is murder then the rhythm method is negligent homicide. You seem to want to imply that it doesn't count because this is all going on in the mother's body without her knowledge. But that still doesn't change what is actually happening in there. If you honestly believe that abortion is murder you would save a lot more lives killing off the use of the rhythm method in favour of other forms of birth control. It would probably be easier too as you're already dealing with people who believe that conception is when life starts. If you're really after triage you should go after the largest wound first.
And if you don't want to, then I question whether you're really doing this to save lives.
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Except that there is no scientific doubt. Of course that's never stopped religious organisations in the past from claiming that there is. A collection of 8 cells is not a person. You want to claim that it is which makes the rest of your argument dubious.
Must we restrict this to scientific doubt? The vast majority of people believe that human beings possess a soul; it's what separates man from animal. If adult humans have souls, then there's a good chance unborn humans have souls as well. And if they do, and if we as a society have decided to value souls, then we have a vested interest in preserving them, whatever their age.
You may think that's side-stepping the question, but you could just as easily apply that to murder of adults as well. Why have we as a society decided that murder is morally wrong? Not just legally wrong, or wrong from a practical point of view or a sustainability point of view, but wrong from a moral point of view?
Nice try but if you're claiming that abortion is murder then the rhythm method is negligent homicide. You seem to want to imply that it doesn't count because this is all going on in the mother's body without her knowledge. But that still doesn't change what is actually happening in there. If you honestly believe that abortion is murder you would save a lot more lives killing off the use of the rhythm method in favour of other forms of birth control. It would probably be easier too as you're already dealing with people who believe that conception is when life starts. If you're really after triage you should go after the largest wound first.
K. There are some churches which discourage all forms of contraception, including the rhythm method. I shall research this more.
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Must we restrict this to scientific doubt?
Yes. Any other view forces people who don't have the same belief system you have to live under yours.
If adult humans have souls, then there's a good chance unborn humans have souls as well. And if they do, and if we as a society have decided to value souls, then we have a vested interest in preserving them, whatever their age.
Protecting them from what? The soul is indestructible (at least as far as man is concerned). Even if abortion is murder it's not doing anything to the souls of the unborn.
Furthermore that view is very Abrahimocentric. Why would a Buddhist care? Or a Hindu? Or a Sikh? All three believe that the soul will simply be reincarnated elsewhere IIRC. Again this is about forcing everyone to live with your beliefs.
You may think that's side-stepping the question, but you could just as easily apply that to murder of adults as well. Why have we as a society decided that murder is morally wrong? Not just legally wrong, or wrong from a practical point of view or a sustainability point of view, but wrong from a moral point of view?
It's wrong from a moral point of view because morals are simply practicalities that have lasted long enough to become ingrained in the culture. Most societies simply wouldn't work if murder wasn't illegal. We make a moral distinction between murder and killing all the time based on that.
K. There are some churches which discourage all forms of contraception, including the rhythm method. I shall research this more.
Yes but the Roman Catholic church pushes for the use of natural birth control methods. With around one billion of them the number of "deaths" due to the rhythm method is probably much higher than anything from abortion.
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...not to mention the deaths and human suffering caused by AIDS, hepatitis C, human papillomavirus (HPV infection in women has causative link to cervical cancer) and to lesser degree by less lethal STD's that would be trivial to prevent with the use of condom, yet the Catholic church insisting on evilness of condoms makes it socially unacceptable for millions of people to use them.
But that is a matter for different conversation mayhaps. :nervous:
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The vast majority of people believe that human beings possess a soul
Just because many believe something does not make it true.
kara covered all the rest of the topics I was going to rant about.
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Furthermore that view is very Abrahimocentric. Why would a Buddhist care? Or a Hindu? Or a Sikh? All three believe that the soul will simply be reincarnated elsewhere IIRC. Again this is about forcing everyone to live with your beliefs.
Technical point: Buddhists do not believe in a soul. Really just reinforces your point, but just in the interest of nitpicking.