Women have a responsibility to more than themselves

What if she ends up having a change of heart and later decides she doesn't want to abort?

 

In that case she could request tests to determine if she has already seriously damaged the embryo. Then she has a difficult decision to make. Should she get an abortion and start clean and sober for her next pregnancy, or continue developing the body that she is currently gestating, knowing it will become a person with some level of disability. We all have varying levels of ability and disability in different areas, so the pregnant woman would be the best person to know if she can rise to that challenge.

But seriously, if she is that fickle would you advise her to have the baby in that situation?

 

Again her choice, what is it with pro-lifers that they feel they have the right to make decisions for other people?

 

We usually don't know if damage has been done until after the baby is born.
The baby may have long-term mental/behavioral impairments, and often this can only be diagnosed later when delayed developmental milestones are observed when the child is in the preschool stage.

Maybe she shouldn't have been drinking alcohol while pregnant in the first place.
But pro-choicers will never rise to the occasion and admit to the fact that women may have some responsibilities to their fetus while pregnant.

mmhmm... the "women know best" claim

Where have we heard that one before?
same arguments that were used to defend slavery

 

So WHO DOES "know best", Joakim?



((Watch this, folks Hint? It's a brand of automobile named for two brothers))

 

"""""But pro-choicers will never rise to the occasion and admit to the fact that women may have some responsibilities to their fetus while pregnant.""""


Another complete fail................. Pro-Choicers defend a woman's right to choose abortion or child birth......NOTHING else, there is NOTHING to "admit"...


.... It's Anti-Choicers who want and need control of, and power over, women in all aspects of their lives...



"Pro-Lifers " defend and support slavery every time they try to restrict or control women through reproduction legislation..

 

The problem is that you want to assign the legal status of individual personhood to the zygote/embryo/fetus before it has the potential to actually be an individual person. Before that point, the woman is responsible for taking care of her own body (since she is the only actual individual inhabiting it). When she discovers that the her body has sprouted a developing human organism that could potentially become a new person, then she should decide if she has already done so much damage that she should start again, or (if she never intended to construct a new person) then she may decide to get an abortion (ideally, before it develops into another person). If she waits until it becomes a new person (currently that is at birth) then she will have to do the best she can to deal with whatever damage she has done.

As I recall, many Christians used the Bible to defend slavery. God implied it was OK to have slaves as long as you treated them according to the rules in the Bible. Slavery took away the rights of persons (already-born persons) just like Christians now want to take away the rights of pregnant women (also already-born persons).

Even if some people (pro-life or pro-choice) feel a sense of responsibility to their children before they are born, that is not evidence of personhood in the child before birth. I started saving money for a house before my first child was born (even before my first child was conceived) but that does not mean my first child was a person when I felt that responsibility. If a woman decides to avoid alcohol because she is trying to have a baby, that does not mean she is already pregnant or that it is a person already. It just means she is thinking ahead. It does not qualify as evidence that the baby she might conceive months later is a person already.

The pregnant woman's primary responsibility is to her own health, although in practice we see that most women who want a baby (and even many who did not intend to have a baby) will decide to make the sacrifice.

 

This is exactly right!! Finally someone gets it. These anti-choicers are everywhere. I was in a store the other day and a mother was punishing her toddler son, after the fifth punch a man yelled for someone to call the police. Who do these people think they are?!? The man had no right to interfere. She was arrested!! Who gives them that right!?!? She was doing what she saw fit to teach her child. Yes, I admit that the boy was bleeding from the mouth and ears, but it was HER CHOICE to decide how to punish her child. She carried him, brought him to term, and he caused her pain for 9 months, SHE SHOULD BE ABLE TO HURT OR PUNISH HIM, IF SHE CHOOSES - IT'S HER CHOICE. Why don't you anti-choicers understand this - why do you want to limit her freedom? Thank you Fugazi for all that you do to stand up for women's rights. No one should interfere with a woman's choice.

 

LOL - I almost took your post seriously at first because when I lived in the South a lot of the anti-abortion folks I knew would have said "The government has no right to tell me how I can punish my kids... Spare the rod and spoil the child is what the Good Book says." It always seemed odd that they wanted to government to interfere in one area but not the other. The child you observed (or we are going to pretend you observed) has personhood and did not give informed consent to be injured like that, so the attacker was removed (aborting her attack). That all seems reasonable.

 

Very good reply to another who doesn't know the difference between born and unborn and what "choice" and "consent" mean....

 

Yet another pro-lifer who hasn't a clue

 

Posts like this just make you anti choicers look ridiculous. BTW, I don't believe your story for a New York Minute.

 

Are you suggesting that a child must consent to punishment? Or that a woman doesn't consent to possibility of pregnancy when engaging in sex? Why limit choice in one respect but not another? Are you saying that limiting some choices is okay? Wouldn't that make you anti-choice? And why is your definition of these terms the only ones that matters? Isn't this forcing your interpretation and belief on to others?

 

So you want to limit the woman's right to choose what punishment she gives? This makes you anti-choice. How about giving a substantive response, that actually says something - rather than just emoting feelings. Only comments that provide reasons actually say anything (like RandomObserver above - who at least gave reasons for why he disagreed - although I'm not sure how far informed consent will get him in justifying legitimate forms of punishment vs illegitimate ones).

 

Do say more. So you want to limit the choice of a woman's actions when it comes to her being a mother? Why? Didn't you say that the woman has a right to harm the child because it was harming her? Did the statue of limitations run out after birth? If the fetus is not innocent as you suggest, then retribution would be in order yes?

 

It's not. My wife had an occasion glass of wine when pregnant with both of our kids and they have no issues.

 

That's a very good point. If a woman should have the right to be able to inflict the punishment of abortion onto her fetus, what reason is there for her not being able to inflict some other form of punishment—oh, like say a female circumcision while the girl baby is still in the womb?

I use this hypothetical to demonstrate the complete absurdity of the logic behind the pro-choice position here.

If abortion is allowed it leaves the door wide open for all sorts of other kinds of fetal abuse.

 

But surely informed consent doesn't apply to cases of child punishment. 1) It would render all forms of child punishment illegitimate when the child doesn't give consent - good luck with that. 2) Informed consent by definition couldn't apply to young children since they lack the intellectual cognition to conceptualize the moral and legal dimensions. A toddler who can barely say her ABCs can't give consent precisely because she can't be informed. In this respect then (re: informed consent), the fetus and the toddler are the same. As for personhood, things get a bit trickier here. What constitutes personhood? Are you saying that if the fetus is a person then abortion would be an act of immorality? Your two criteria were personhood and informed consent - as I argue above - both toddler and fetus lack informed consent, and many here would argue that both have personhood - so to clarify, are you saying that if the fetus is a person, abortion would be an even more egregious act than that of child abuse?

 

The law, in balancing the rights of one person against the rights of the other person, requires informed consent. You cannot legally kidnap a woman and force her to gestate your offspring (the kidnap part suggests you do not have her consent). A toddler is too young to give informed consent, so the law defines the difference between discipline and abuse.

Personhood is only tricky if you are trying to assert that a tiny collection of developing cells is a person. The zef (zygote/embryo/fetus) is a developing potential person. Some pro-life members here have even pointed out that the newborn lacks the ability to be a person for some time after birth, but I think we should give them the benefit of a doubt and consider them persons by the moment of birth.

You are trying to apply a model designed for interactions between people in a scenario (pregnancy) that only involves one actual person. To apply this model you have to prove that the potential person is an actual person (which is logistically impossible). Abortion halts the development of a potential person before it becomes a person, so any action against the fetus is really an action against the pregnant woman and is judged on the basis of her informed consent.

 

So it's a non-person one moment and then the next moment, after it plops out, it's person?
That seems to be basically what you are saying.

In other words, abortion is ok when it is inside the womb, but not ok outside the womb.
Where's the logical basis for that?

 

The development of the brain is the most logical basis for identifying the start of personhood. The end of personhood is a different problem.

 

A 6-week old fetus's brain has already started developing. A 1-year-old baby's brain has not yet finished developing.

 

Again, your difficulty with words no one else has difficulty with ...born and UNborn....there is a difference even if you can't see it...


Abortion is OK inside the womb, there is no such thing as abortion outside the womb. There is no logic, fact, reasoning in saying there is...


Yes, when a fetus is still attached to the woman it is not a person. When it becomes Unattached it is a person.

 

What part of the body do you think makes a better indicator of personhood?