[The E]

Like I said, illegalization isn't going to usher in a utopian golden age, but it sure will save a lot of lives.

No it won't. The people who are having abortions now would choose to have abortions regardless of whether or not it's illegal. All you are getting in the end is a bunch more children filtered into the adoption system, and a bunch of women who are now criminals. And on top of that, whatever method you choose to police this, it will be rather intrusive. If you are serious about this, it means you need to have pregnancy tests at every border crossing. Not just the "pee on this" kind, but the full "check the ultrasound" ones.

That is what I meant by using the legislative to force your morality on people instead of codifying the consensus. As proven by this very topic, there is no consensus on this and there likely never will be. What gives you the right to make your interpretations the law of the land? What's your mandate?

Now, I know you're going to respond with something vaguely inspiring sounding about speaking for the voiceless and advocating for those who cannot advocate for themselves. That's not enough. You already have legislation that requires counselling in cases where a woman wishes an abortion. That should be all you need. It's not your place to tell people what they should do with their bodies.

Even aside from the numerous reasons I've posted in this thread: access to legal, safe, supported abortions has the long term effect of reducing the number of abortions and reducing the number of unsafe, unsanctioned abortions at the same time.

Having children at an inopportune time in this country is nothing short of financially catastrophic.  Higher quality of life correlates significantly with reduced abortion rates.

If Roe v. Wade was supposed to reduce the number of abortions in the US, it's failed catastrophically.

And again, by all means, let's do what we can to raise quality of life! Pretty sure most people on both sides are doing what they can to accomplish that anyway.

You know what reduces abortions? Free health care. Free education. Free postnatal care. Pre-abortion counselling.
For ****'s sake, this isn't hard: If you want people to do something, give them positive incentives to do it. If you outlaw something, all you're doing is creating outlaws. You're not going to stop anything.

[InsaneBaron]

@The_E: we might be reaching the point of impasse. It's rather obvious that making abortion legal has made it far more common. Making it illegal, shutting down the business that conduct it, et cetera puts a lot more incentive into the alternatives: Adoption, to begin with.

And again, by all means, let's give mothers the health care, counseling, et cetera they need! You're right, the carrot method works too! Thing is, most people already agree to this. My focus is on resolving the problem people don't agree on.

Finally, remember that there was no consensus on Slavery a few hundred years ago. That didn't make slavery right, and it didn't make abolitionists wrong to oppose it. The hope is that in the future, people will look back on abortion the way we look back on slavery now. Not sure if it will happen in my lifetime, not sure if it's even going to happen, but it's sure worth working towards.

EDIT: come to think of it, a lot of people thought abolishing slavery was impossible and we should just live with it. History proves otherwise.

[Scotty]

@The_E: we might be reaching the point of impasse. It's rather obvious that making abortion legal has made it far more common. Making it illegal, shutting down the business that conduct it, et cetera puts a lot more incentive into the alternatives: Adoption, to begin with.

And again, by all means, let's give mothers the health care, counseling, et cetera they need! You're right, the carrot method works too! Thing is, most people already agree to this. My focus is on resolving the problem people don't agree on.

Finally, remember that there was no consensus on Slavery a few hundred years ago. That didn't make slavery right, and it didn't make abolitionists wrong to oppose it. The hope is that in the future, people will look back on abortion the way we look back on slavery now. Not sure if it will happen in my lifetime, not sure if it's even going to happen, but it's sure worth working towards.

EDIT: come to think of it, a lot of people thought abolishing slavery was impossible and we should just live with it. History proves otherwise.

I think it's hilarious and somewhat disturbing that you're using the abolition of slavery as an example for your cause, because you're pretty solidly advocating that women be slaves to their uterus.

[InsaneBaron]

@The_E: we might be reaching the point of impasse. It's rather obvious that making abortion legal has made it far more common. Making it illegal, shutting down the business that conduct it, et cetera puts a lot more incentive into the alternatives: Adoption, to begin with.

And again, by all means, let's give mothers the health care, counseling, et cetera they need! You're right, the carrot method works too! Thing is, most people already agree to this. My focus is on resolving the problem people don't agree on.

Finally, remember that there was no consensus on Slavery a few hundred years ago. That didn't make slavery right, and it didn't make abolitionists wrong to oppose it. The hope is that in the future, people will look back on abortion the way we look back on slavery now. Not sure if it will happen in my lifetime, not sure if it's even going to happen, but it's sure worth working towards.

EDIT: come to think of it, a lot of people thought abolishing slavery was impossible and we should just live with it. History proves otherwise.

I think it's hilarious and somewhat disturbing that you're using the abolition of slavery as an example for your cause, because you're pretty solidly advocating that women be slaves to their uterus.

I could just as easily claim that you're advocating considering unborn babies as property without rights. Neither accusation gets us anywhere.

[The E]

@The_E: we might be reaching the point of impasse. It's rather obvious that making abortion legal has made it far more common. Making it illegal, shutting down the business that conduct it, et cetera puts a lot more incentive into the alternatives: Adoption, to begin with.

You do not know that! You do not have enough data to confirm this! Very few people were ever convicted of having or performing abortions, so the vast majority never made it into any form of statistic you could use to prove your point.

Look at this chart. Abortion rates have been on a slow and steady decline since the 80s. That's the success story here, and what you're doing now amounts to little more than whining that things are not going as fast as you want them to, despite the absolute knowledge that the end goal you seek is absolutely unattainable.

EDIT: I forgot to read the notes. It seems that abortion rates have been more or less steady since the 1990s. So by criminalizing abortions, it would seem that you would make somewhere between a fourth and a third of all women that become pregnant criminals. Good Job!

Finally, remember that there was no consensus on Slavery a few hundred years ago. That didn't make slavery right, and it didn't make abolitionists wrong to oppose it. The hope is that in the future, people will look back on abortion the way we look back on slavery now. Not sure if it will happen in my lifetime, not sure if it's even going to happen, but it's sure worth working towards.

EDIT: come to think of it, a lot of people thought abolishing slavery was impossible and we should just live with it. History proves otherwise.

History also proves that slavery still persists (even if we call it different things now) and that abortions have always happened.

Morality is built on consensus. There was a time when the consensus was that slavery was a good and necessary thing. The consensus changed, but that does not mean that our consensus now is absolutely correct now, has been correct retroactively, and will remain correct in the future.

[Phantom Hoover]

@InsaneBaron: the vast majority of human pregnancies end in miscarriage, usually before the pregnancy is even noticed. Where are the pro-lifers rallying to devote all our medical resources to ending this holocaust?

[InsaneBaron]

@The_E: we might be reaching the point of impasse. It's rather obvious that making abortion legal has made it far more common. Making it illegal, shutting down the business that conduct it, et cetera puts a lot more incentive into the alternatives: Adoption, to begin with.

You do not know that! You do not have enough data to confirm this! Very few people were ever convicted of having or performing abortions, so the vast majority never made it into any form of statistic you could use to prove your point.

Look at this chart. Abortion rates have been on a slow and steady decline since the 80s. That's the success story here, and what you're doing now amounts to little more than whining that things are not going as fast as you want them to, despite the absolute knowledge that the end goal you seek is absolutely unattainable.

Awesome! Why do you think the rates are going down? Perhaps because the Pro-Life movement is having an impact?
Like I said, whether or not the end goal is attainable, it's worth trying.

EDIT: and no, we don't know that the end goal is unattainable. After all, it was illegal for most of American history.

Finally, remember that there was no consensus on Slavery a few hundred years ago. That didn't make slavery right, and it didn't make abolitionists wrong to oppose it. The hope is that in the future, people will look back on abortion the way we look back on slavery now. Not sure if it will happen in my lifetime, not sure if it's even going to happen, but it's sure worth working towards.

EDIT: come to think of it, a lot of people thought abolishing slavery was impossible and we should just live with it. History proves otherwise.

History also proves that slavery still persists (even if we call it different things now) and that abortions have always happened.

Morality is built on consensus. There was a time when the consensus was that slavery was a good and necessary thing. The consensus changed, but that does not mean that our consensus now is absolutely correct now, has been correct retroactively, and will remain correct in the future.

Morality is not determined by consensus. Whether or not an action is wrong is not determined by how the people of a place and time feel about the matter. Slavery was wrong then and is wrong now. Yes, we still have some forms of slavery, yes, we would likely have illegal abortions, but in both cases the problem is much less widespread.

[GhylTarvoke]

Morality is built on consensus.

Part of me agrees with this, but most of me recoils.

@InsaneBaron: the vast majority of human pregnancies end in miscarriage, usually before the pregnancy is even noticed. Where are the pro-lifers rallying to devote all our medical resources to ending this holocaust?

That's a question for medical science, like other deaths by natural causes. Though you have a point.

[Scotty]

I'd also like to hear the pro-life reaction to in-vitro fertilization clinics, because they're emphatically and without ambiguity at all little better than mass murder factories based on some of the definitions thrown around in this thread.

EDIT: But I forgot no one actually cares about those, because they don't offend our tender sensibilities like abortion does.

[InsaneBaron]

Morality is built on consensus.

Part of me agrees with this, but most of me recoils.

All of me recoils on this. If we build morality on consensus, we have to justify Aztec human sacrifice, the holocaust, and most of the atrocities of history on the grounds that the consensus of society permitted them.

[Scotty]

I really wonder what you're basing your morality on, then, if not consensus?

If you say anything relating to religion or God, I'm going to laugh at you.

[The E]

The Aztecs believed they were serving their religion. The Germans believed they were serving their country. What do you believe?

[GhylTarvoke]

I'd also like to hear the pro-life reaction to in-vitro fertilization clinics, because they're emphatically and without ambiguity at all little better than mass murder factories based on some of the definitions thrown around in this thread.

Sounds about right. For whatever reason, abortion draws more attention.

All of me recoils on this. If we build morality on consensus, we have to justify Aztec human sacrifice, the holocaust, and most of the atrocities of history on the grounds that the consensus of society permitted them.

I agree with it from a practical perspective. I mean, what else can we do? At the same time, consensus has zero impact on my own morality. (Your signature is remarkably appropriate here.)

Scotty: I base my morality on my beliefs (not meant religiously). Consensus is irrelevant.

[InsaneBaron]

I really wonder what you're basing your morality on, then, if not consensus?

If you say anything relating to religion or God, I'm going to laugh at you.

The Aztecs believed they were serving their religion. The Germans believed they were serving their country. What do you believe?

I'm using human reason, which is pretty much what either of you do when you argue that a human being has rights. The fact that every human person has intrinsic value is as self-evident as 2+2=4, and when the Aztecs or Nazis neglected it, they as a nation had no excuse (individual members might have been more or less culpable, if culpable at all, due to coercion or brainwashing, much like how I avoid judging a mother's culpability due to the amount of propaganda she's exposed to. Love the sinner, hate the sin)

EDIT: again, look at Pro-Life Humanists. They draw their conclusion by applying reason to the self-evident postulates of morality. That's why I love these guys; they're some of the best apologists I've ever met.

EDIT: A question for you guys, then. If morality is built on consensus, why on earth do we have the right to condemn the holocaust?

[Scotty]

The fact that every human person has intrinsic value is as self-evident as 2+2=4

Why?  What makes people valuable?  What makes a fetus a person?  What makes a fetus's rights equivalent to the woman's rights?  What makes a woman's rights less important than a fetus's rights?  What distinguishes people from any other intelligent animal?  Do pets have intrinsic value?  Why is that value less than a person?

People don't have intrinsic value.  People have the value they make for themselves.  An ambulatory lump of complex meat does not suddenly become more valuable (to you, to me, or to society) just because it looks like you and I.  Some people are utterly worthless scum and the world is better off without them.

[The E]

I'm using human reason, which is pretty much what either of you do when you argue that a human being has rights. The fact that every human person has intrinsic value is as self-evident as 2+2=4, and when the Aztecs or Nazis neglected it, they as a nation had no excuse (individual members might have been more or less culpable, if culpable at all, due to coercion or brainwashing, much like how I avoid judging a mother's culpability due to the amount of propaganda she's exposed to. Love the sinner, hate the sin)

You're applying your morality as if it is the only morality that is, has been, and will be the correct one. Doing so is intellectually dishonest, as it precludes understanding of what actually happened back when and why it happened. Using your morality to judge whether or not to support something happening today is one thing. Condemning the past for something you see as sin that the people at the time thought was the good and proper way to behave is silly.

[GhylTarvoke]

Oh, wow. Okay, we've identified a major divide here. (And I thought the only one worth mentioning was the definition of "person".)

Do I think my morality is the only correct one? No. Do I think the morality of, say, Nazi Germany was incorrect? Absolutely.

[InsaneBaron]

The fact that every human person has intrinsic value is as self-evident as 2+2=4

Why?  What makes people valuable?  What makes a fetus a person?  What makes a fetus's rights equivalent to the woman's rights?  What makes a woman's rights less important than a fetus's rights?  What distinguishes people from any other intelligent animal?  Do pets have intrinsic value?  Why is that value less than a person?

People don't have intrinsic value.  People have the value they make for themselves.  An ambulatory lump of complex meat does not suddenly become more valuable (to you, to me, or to society) just because it looks like you and I.  Some people are utterly worthless scum and the world is better off without them.

You just made a bunch a judgements regarding moral value. On what grounds?

@The_E: So according to you, we don't have a right to condemn to holocaust? I mean, what, then, makes our morality better then that of the Nazis, or your morality better than mine, if there's no objective standard to measure them against?

EDIT: And before we get into a God debate, said moral standard can be found by reason, just like the multiplication table can. Doesn't mean it's neccessarily easy to find, or that we already have solved all of it any more than we've exhausted mathematics.

[GhylTarvoke]

Seriously, this whole "consensus morality" thing is very illuminating. Now I understand why we've been at loggerheads.

[The E]

There's a difference between saying "What the Nazis did was bad and we need to do our best to stop it from happening again" and "I have no idea how they did these things when it was clearly wrong".