[Conor Friedersdorf]
An orthodox Catholic I know cares more about abortion than any other political issue. He votes for candidates based largely on his expectations about the kinds of judges they'll appoint or confirm, behavior I completely understand given the certainty he feels that every abortion is a murder. At the other extreme are pro-choice voters whose number one issue is protecting Roe vs. Wade from being overturned, preventing any restrictions on abortion, etc.
These are by their nature long term political struggles, or so you might think: the composition of the Supreme Court is always going to change, legislatures can be influenced to hue closer to one side or the other, etc.
But I predict that what we now think of as the abortion debate is going to radically change within our lifetime in a way that makes many of the strategic gambits employed by both sides irrelevant, or at least beside the point.
Specifically, I think that technology is going to make fetuses viable outside the womb earlier and earlier. In fact that is already happening. And eventually there will be artificial wombs, enabling doctors to extract a fetus from a pregnant woman during the first trimester with a procedure no more invasive or dangerous than abortion, and to keep that baby alive in an incubator.
Today we are used to thinking about a woman's right to end a pregnancy as the functional equivalent of ending the fetuses' life. In the future, however, that need not be so. A woman could be afforded the right to end her pregnancy, but be denied the right to end the life of the fetus. Although I am not an expert in abortion jurisprudence, it is at least conceivable that this could happen without any need to overturn Roe vs. Wade.
It is conceivable that adoptive parents would step in to raise children who would've been aborted prior to artificial womb technology, though it is unlikely that enough adoptive parents could be found to raise all the children now aborted. It is possible that society's views about killing fetuses would change in the pro-life direction once that change didn't entail forcing women to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term, and that the government would be in the business of funding large scale orphanages.
It is even conceivable that women would find themselves in the same position that some men find themselves in now: forced to pay for the upbringing of a child they'd rather have aborted. Were I a strategist at a pro-life or pro-choice advocacy group I'd be spending a lot of time and effort figuring out when changes like these are going to happen, what I thought about them, and how I could shape them to advantage my side.
UPDATE: This paper considers similar arguments in far greater detail.
And, of course, advancing technology will also make birth control more reliable, more accessible, less invasive, and cheaper than it is today. Such that, eventually, abortion will be seen as an inefficient alternative to other methods of preventing/dealing with unwanted pregnancy. In short, it will be obsolete.
As it stands now the decision whether to have the child is ultimately the woman's, while the financial costs of raising the child are in part (often in great part) the man's. If this mix changes, abortions might well increase.
Were I a strategist at a pro-life or pro-choice advocacy group I'd be spending a lot of time and effort figuring out when changes like these are going to happen
Well then, I guess we can safely rule that out as a career option.
And, of course, advancing technology will also make birth control more reliable, more accessible, less invasive, and cheaper than it is today.
Not, apparently, if opponents of abortion have their way.
That is, of course, the most alarming paradox of the entire debate: the technologies that would obviate the need to perform abortions - contraception, education about it, access to it - are precisely what the pro-life movement so vociferously opposes. While it's true that artificial womb technology might obviate abortion for, oh, I don't know, the ten women who will be able to afford access to it, invariably that technology will be opposed by the pro-life movement as well.
I guess it's a paradox only if you take the pro-life movement at face value. If you presume the goal of the movement is rigid, lockstep control over women's bodies, their public, well-known opposition to contraception and education makes a lot more sense.
"artificial wombs" are a trope of science fiction. The idea has been around for a few decades. Along with the alternate meaning they provide for "bottle babies". I know Pournelle and Niven have worked them into their stories as major plot points.
Heinlein probably did too. Arthur Clarke certainly did, as far back as the middle of the last century.
There is more than adequate adoption potential in the US to consume adoptable children resulting from contraceptive failure (not including failure to use contraceptives), rape and incest. However, the potential is likely not large enough to consume adoptable children resulting from fecklessness, stupidity and cupidity.
I understand that we live in a post personal responsibility society, so it is highly likely that, regardless of technology, the death of the innocents will continue.
On the contrary, the developments you describe will make judicial selection more and not less important.
I am a Catholic who thinks that abortion is murder. I would like it very much if I put the question (is abortion murder?) to a popular vote and won. I could live with the result if I lost. But so long as Roe v. Wade stands, I won't get to put the question to a popular vote: the Supreme Court says that if I do, the results won't matter. That's why the abortion issue is so intractable: it can't be resolved via vote.
The developments you anticipate will require legislative treatment. But Roe v. Wade will profoundly affect that treatment: either by tying the hands of the legislature (if it stands) or by freeing them to make law as they deem fit (if it falls).
The pro-choice movement has already made it very clear that they don't consider ending the pregnancy enough; the baby has to die. Their opposition to the born-alive infant protection bills has been huge and public.
And this technology will be so cheap that it will be available to any woman, regardless of her income and insurance status. And the state will gladly take responsibility for these infants, financing their upbringing by simply cutting taxes until the necessary revenue is available.
And this technology will be so cheap that it will be available to any woman, regardless of her income and insurance status. And the state will gladly take responsibility for these infants, financing their upbringing by simply cutting taxes until the necessary revenue is available.
Not everyone on the "pro-life" side is against the use of contraceptives. Personally I do think that abortion is the taking of a human life - a tragedy that ought to be prevented whenever possible. Preventing unwanted pregnancies from occurring in the first place would go a long way towards the goal of reducing the number of abortions. Terribly sorry, but I think the Pope is wrong on this one - there's less evil in extramarital sex with condoms, than in extramarital sex without condoms.
If this technology were in fact come to pass, would/should any woman be able to use it to avoid the discomfort of carrying a child, or the permanent physical changes (stretch marks, wider hips, a saggier belly) that inevitably occur?
In other words, not as an alternative to abortion, but one to natural gestation and birth?
Abortion has been obsolete since birth control became reliable; but it still occurs because we are a feckless lot. I doubt if that attribute of humanity will change.
I am one of those who regard legal abortion as preferable to illegal. The Catholic church - and others - have taken the opposite line. That stance is based upon the absolute view that it is wrong to take a life even to save another. I see that view as choosing the deaths of those who would die in illgal abotions over the deaths of those who die in legal abortions.
One effect of the development of artificial wombs - which for many years will be doubtfully reliable for at least some classes of fetus - will be to force a choice on the theologians in terms of which group of deaths are the lesser evil: those who just might have survived in the natural womb but die in an artificial one, or those who will die in an abortion - legal or illegal - if not transferred legally to an artificial womb. As a thought experiment, does this not mean that the present absolute view of the church is untenable?
I would like it very much if I put the question (is abortion murder?) to a popular vote and won. I could live with the result if I lost. But so long as Roe v. Wade stands, I won't get to put the question to a popular vote: the Supreme Court says that if I do, the results won't matter. That's why the abortion issue is so intractable: it can't be resolved via vote.
Life should be up to popular vote? If anything, the Court should have opposed abortion even if popular will was in favor of it because their job is to seek justice and protect the rights and freedoms of all, despite the whims of the majority.
If abortion is taking human life, then people like Tel and Joe _have_ to think the mothers are accessories to premeditated murder. So I'm guessing they think that good stiff jail sentences are what is needed for any woman who has an abortion.
I'd also note that the public is enormously 'pro-abortion', so that unless the votes are somehow jinked, the outcomes are already predetermined. Finally - and this is what cheeses me off about these jokers - Roe vs. Wade was a compromise. But abortion opponents want to keep redrawing the lines. Not exactly honorable behavior.
My problem with the pro-life movement is that it essentially imposes religious and personal believes on people who do not necessarily share them. If they were really interested in limiting the number of abortions, they wouldn't be so adamently against mesures like comprehensive sex ed and the morning after pill. However, because these measure interfere with their personal believes, they go out of their way to obstruct these measures in order to impose their strictly interpreted ideologies.
Roman,
It is important to give the benefit of doubt to those one disagrees with. The reason many pro-lifers are against many forms of contraception is that these forms are contraception don't really stop conception, but instead stop a fertilized egg from implanting in the womb. To them, a life is still being created and active steps are being taken to make that life end. The pill does both (stops most ovulations, thus preventing conception, and makes conceptions which occur from "breakout" ovulations less likely to implant). The morning after pill doesn't stop fertilization at all if it occurs before the next morning.
So again, you may not agree with the pro-lifers, but many have a consistent position which starts with a fertilized egg being a human life worthy of protection by the state against those who would take active measures to end its life.
Now, of course, I'm sure there are pro-lifers who also think condoms should be illegal. But I will bet they even they will tell you that that is a separate issue from their being pro-life.
If you were to put a gun to my head and ask whether I'd consider myself pro-life or pro-choice, I'd probably say pro-life - but smart enough to know how cut and dried this issue isn't.
I think it might be more constructive to stop asking whether abortion is murder. Clearly this is being employed as that gun to the head. The pro-lifer is trying to equate women who choose abortion with some sort of non-existent serial thrill-seeker movement, actively having sex as much as possible, relying on an abortion safety net to enable their hedonistic urges. The pro-choicer, on the other hand, seems to want to equate every choice of abortion with a noble, teary-eyed act of moral triage, in the worst light being merely a desperation killing.
Neither is true, and only serves to distract the mind into a vortex of moral absolutism. There will be no absolute with the science we currently have. There might never be. In the meantime, encourage reason - move the debate forward - and openness - stop trying to cause more abortions or birth control bans in order to re-frame the issue.
That last part is based on my personal hunch, granted. Many on each side feel birth control bans and safely conducted abortion procedures to be either morally reprehensible or sound, depending on your side in the holy war. My hunch is that most Americans are pretty damn uncomfortable with killing an otherwise healthy baby seconds before birth, and meanwhile have a hard time getting worked up over an egg that was just fertilized (many of which fail to implant and die anyway from natural causes).
In that sense, Roe v. Wade strikes me as a squandered opportunity. It was a compromise that used respect for the Court to keep both sides from eating each other alive. If it had been viewed as a delay tactic until science and religion could work to fill the cultural divide, it would have saved the culture. (There may still be hope.) Instead, it's being treated as the marker on a tug-of-war rope. It needs to stop being that. It has weakened respect for the authority of the Court, which could in turn harm a lot more institutions.
ScentOfViolets - "If abortion is taking human life, then people like Tel and Joe _have_ to think the mothers are accessories to premeditated murder. So I'm guessing they think that good stiff jail sentences are what is needed for any woman who has an abortion."
The first sentence is correct, in my case; the second is not. I believe that abortion is murder, but that it would be impossible to enforce any law that might be passed against it. There have been natural, easily-obtainable (and often-dangerous) methods of inducing miscarriage for hundreds of years. We can't legislate pennyroyal out of existence. As another thought experiment, imagine if the ~30% of pregnancies that end in natural miscarriage were treated as suspected homicides. Not exactly a loving direction for society to go. If a law doesn't do what it's intended to do, and would just create more pain and cruelty in its application, then that law should not exist. So yes, I'm in the minority position - I believe that abortion is a horrible evil that legally has to exist. (I also think our society's drug laws are foolish, for similar reasons).
Given that, I think that the best use of the Pro-Life side's resources would be to move towards prevention and amelioration of the situation. Arrange things so that a woman doesn't have to choose between financial/social ruin and having the baby. Make contraception freely available. Work with men to improve their feelings of responsibility in the situation. Basically, work on everything else that leads up to the choice. Don't spend time tilting at windmills like the abortion law.
And eventually there will be artificial wombs, enabling doctors to extract a fetus from a pregnant woman during the first trimester with a procedure no more invasive or dangerous than abortion, and to keep that baby alive in an incubator.
Taking this to its logical conclusion, you could eliminate women from the reproductive process entirely. I predict a split in the Movement between those who regard this as the ultimate liberation for women, and those who regard this as a plot by the patriarchies male scientists to abolish women entirely.
The religous view may also afford interest.
Before anyone has an abortion, it should be mandatory for them to watch a video of one, mutilated fetus and all. That would at least lead to a more informed "choice."
What of cases where the mother wishes to abort -- via the artificial womb -- because of severe fetal abnormalities? Will many adoptive parents take on that emotionally and financially back-breaking role? If not, then who will raise the child?
Babies aren't made by accident; people know what happens when they have sex (leaving rape and incest aside). Why are we so quick to protect them from their decisions? When people buy a stock, they know (or should know) it's can go down. Likewise, having sex can be risky - one can get pregnant or get a disease. They can even occur if precautions are taken. I would never in the world impose a morality on others that mandates no sex before they want kids (I didn't follow that), but I can't excuse people who take risks and expect others to pay for them. This still applies given the fact that if abortions weren't legally available, people would search them out illegally, which would have the potential to do harm to the mother. People put their lives in danger, long- or short-term, every day (driving without a seatbelt, eating trans fats, smoking). I know a lot of those who are opposed to regulation prohibiting this kind of behavior are also in favor of abortions. I, for one, am opposed to the idea of protecting people from their choices. Pregnancy is a consequence of sex and we ultimately choose our consequences through the actions that lead to them. Sex is the choice – possible pregnancy, which, of course, is the creation of another human, is the consequence. Give people choices until the exercise of their choice impedes on the ability of another to choose. Just because a fetus can’t express a choice doesn’t give someone the right to take it away.
Before anyone has an abortion, it should be mandatory for them to watch a video of one, mutilated fetus and all.
If you're talking about "mutilated fetuses", Nelson, then you're talking about a form of abortion used in less than 1% of cases.
So you're advocating a mandate to essentially lie to women; that is, to tell them "this is what your abortion will be like" when, in all likelihood, their abortion won't be anything like that.
I think that exemplifies the dishonesty at the heart of abortion opposition.
As I said above, both sides are trying to make these arguments to raw emotion, not just pro-life. It won't work. There's emotional appeals on both sides, and anyone who makes it for one side is going to have to deal the existence of the other. One can't just ignore or discredit the other side. Making the appeal as loud as possible in hopes of drowning out opposition isn't going to work, either. Even disregarding the crime against reason that this would be, there isn't enough marketing dollars in the world to make it happen.
At the end of the day, both sides are going to have to stop flinging poo and go back to the table, and be willing to listen.
You're totally right, hutch. And we should stop sending ambulances around to car accidents; people who drive knew the risks, or should have, right?
Why should they be insulated from the lethal consequences of their choices?
ScentofViolets wrote: I'd also note that the public is enormously 'pro-abortion', so that unless the votes are somehow jinked, the outcomes are already predetermined.
That's quite a thing to say without a citation. Fortunately, I've got one (reconstruct manually it since the spam filter is feeling mean today):
triple-double-u dot pollingreport dot com, slash abortion dot htm
The results shown there pretty much correspond with the results of a large Gallup survey taken a few years ago, but which has long since disappeared behind the pay-wall. The eyeball summary is:
* 25% of Americans support it under any circumstances.
* 60% of Americans support it under only some circumstances (including a very wide range of opinions on issues ranging from parental notification to thir trimester).
* 15% oppose it under any circumstances.
This is not the same thing as being "enormously pro-abortion", unless you mean that 85% of American support it under at least some circumstances, which could also be rephrased to claim that 75% of Americans oppose it under at least some circumstances. Either one cites an overwhelming majority without telling us where people draw lines and how they relate to the current state of law.
Finally - and this is what cheeses me off about these jokers - Roe vs. Wade was a compromise.
If you mean that that the legal decision allowed abortion under certain health exceptions, then technically, it was a compromise. However, since a few subsequent cases resulting from Roe quickly expanded the scope of decision to unrestricted convenience abortions, then no, there was no compromise. The resultant state of affairs does not reflect how a majority of Americans understand the abortion question.
But abortion opponents want to keep redrawing the lines. Not exactly honorable behavior.
"And this little piggy cried 'Ow, I've been shot!' "
-- Excerpted from 'The New Mother Goose for Rhetorical Gunslingers'
You're totally right, hutch. And we should stop sending ambulances around to car accidents; people who drive knew the risks, or should have, right? Why should they be insulated from the lethal consequences of their choices?
That won't work. As far as I know, nobody here, or at least very few, are proposing that medical benefits be denied if somebody undergoes a life-threatening condition as a result of sexual stimulation. ("Oopsy! You had a weak heart? Too bad. But at least you know this will make for a fantastic story down at the coroner's office...") In particular, the case of a life-threatening condition resulting from a pregnancy is a possibility, but that possibility is an exception, not a rule, and becomes more exceptional as medical technology advances. As such, it is reasonable to claim that it should not be handled as a representative case.
Re: It is even conceivable that women would find themselves in the same position that some men find themselves in now: forced to pay for the upbringing of a child they'd rather have aborted.
A woman always has the option of placing an unwanted child for adoption.
Way I see it, the debate is over and has been over for some time. You do what you want and I'll do what I want. Its my body, not yours. The basis for fetus as equivalent to living human is based on your religion, not mine. Church and state are separate for many reasons, my body as my own to do with as I please is one of these. I see it as my body, you see it as a baby in my body (and in particular, a baby that you don't care about after its born, in my body). Oh well. Good thing we don't have to agree.
And I also disagree with the illegality of drugs and suicide, though your religion has lots to say about that too I'm sure. I say government has no place in these personal issues, and neither does anyone else because they're personal.
A fetus doesn't have the ability to express its desire for life because its an unaware ball of goo -- that's what my religion says. What about late-term abortions you say -- and I say, fine, so limit them to only cases where the mother may be harmed/killed birthing the baby, which decision is up to a doctor treating the woman, not some government/religion stooge.
Oh, and regardless of whether a fetus is viable outside the natural womb in some future utopia is irrelevant, though I'm sure anti-choice types won't see it that way. A fetus is part of the body its inside of, and if you think you have the right to take my body and remove parts of it without my permission, you're a sick crazy mofo. Of course if I want you to, that's again my choice, and there is no problem.
I have to say I dislike how these discussions frequently misconstrue a lot of pro-life opposition not only to abortion but also contraception and sex education. As a devout Roman Catholic, I firmly believe that contraception is immoral and abortion is wrong. As a citizen of a secular society, I think people should have access to accurate information about sex and they should be free to exercise whatever behavior they think is appropriate to prevent pregnancy. After a pregnancy has occured, I think it is wrong, from a legal outlook, to enforce a complete ban on abortion, though I think there should be tough restrictions. But a lot of pro-life opposition to things like birth control, sex education, and abortion aren't about the legality of those things, it's about the fact that we who oppose them are forced to subsidize the behaviors. For example, laws are passed that say a pharmacist cannot withhold the morning after pill from a woman who wants it. But a pharmacist may have a conscience, too; where is the justice in forcing someone to provide a service to someone else which they find morally reprehensible? Similarly, I have a friend, a young woman, who frequently complains that her birth control pill costs are going up, because she used to get them at a greatly reduced price through some government agency. I don't feel like my tax money should be spent to pay for her not to get pregnant. I don't care if she uses the pill, but I don't want to pay for it either. My opposition to these things isn't because I think people shouldn't have access to them; my opposition is that the government forces me to be a part of them.
Sigh. Would you try harder?
Since in the context of the thread, abortion is equated with murder, I think it's safe to say the split is between those who don't want it legal under any (or very very narrow) circumstances, I think you just kind of proved my point.
And let's just check another factoid, shall we?
"Polls find that two-thirds of Americans say abortion should be legal during the first trimester, but that drops to 8 percent in the third trimester. When the woman's health or life is endangered, or when the pregnancy was caused by rape or incest, more than three-quarters of the public favors the option of abortion."
And since
"
52% of all abortions occur before the 9th week of pregnancy, 25% happen between the 9th & 10th week, 12% happen between the 11th and 12th week, 6% happen between the 13th & 15th week, 4% happen between the 16th & 20th week, and 1% of all abortions (16,450/yr.) happen after the 20th week of pregnancy."
i.e., 89% of all abortions happen in the first trimester, I think it's pretty safe to say that what I said was dead accurate.
Further, from the wiki:
"The central holding of Roe v. Wade was that abortions are permissible for any reason a woman chooses, up until the "point at which the fetus becomes ‘viable,’ that is, potentially able to live outside the mother's womb, albeit with artificial aid. Viability is usually placed at about seven months (28 weeks) but may occur earlier, even at 24 weeks."[1] The Court also held that abortion after viability must be available when needed to protect a woman's health, which the Court defined broadly in the companion case of Doe v. Bolton. These court rulings affected laws in 46 states.[3".
That is, your characterization that it was not initially a compromise is false.
Finally, this is, at best, stupid, at worst, malicious misinterpretation:
Stipulate that the injuries in the accident aren't life threatening; you're proposing that the victims be denied medical care. No, recognizing an increased risk and proceeding anyway is in no way shape or form an implied consent to passively accepting any outcome. That's as silly as saying someone who gets mugged while walking outside after dark has no business complaining, that someone who breaks a leg skiing should be denied medical treatment, or that no attempts should be made to resuscitate a drowned swimmer.
Yeah. Get back to us when you come across a story about an organization that is determinedly promoting the passage of bills making abortion easier to get, and at later and later dates. Instead of the opposite. Feh.
Don't let the doorknob hitcha where the dog shoulda bitcha on the way out looking for those stories.
"keep your religion off of my body" writes
Way I see it, the debate is over and has been over for some time. You do what you want and I'll do what I want. Its my body, not yours. The basis for fetus as equivalent to living human is based on your religion, not mine.
Yes, yes. "If you don't like abortion, don't have one."
I wish they had cars with bumpers in the mid 1800's. How about the bumper sticker "If you don't like slavery, don't own one."
Right, Chris, because as we all know, whether or not people whose immediate ancestors were mostly from Africa are human is just a bit of religious dogma. And the fact that those scientist guys say that the entire concept of race has no basis in fact is of no more or less consequence than what some holy writ has to say.
Oh, and btw, if my daughter should happen to get pregnant at some later date, I would hope that she not get an abortion. So you can take your phony outrage elsewhere.
keep your religion off of my body wrote:
"A fetus is part of the body its inside of, and if you think you have the right to take my body and remove parts of it without my permission, you're a sick crazy mofo."
Um, no. Not at all. Not one little bit. A body doesn't have "parts" with a completely different genetic makeup from the rest of the body. The genes and chromosomes found in your liver cells are the same as those found in your bone cells and your white blood cells and your skin cells and your brain cells. But not the same as those found in a fetus residing inside of your body. The fetus is not a "part" of the woman's body - it is a different body.
Now, you can still argue that the law cannot compel a woman to support a fetus inside of her body, and that thus the woman has a right to an abortion if she wants one. I generally disagree, but at least this is an issue on which there can be honest and reasonable disagreement - the two sides simply place different weights on different interests.
But once the fetus is removed from her body, the woman ceases to have any defensible right to determine what is done with it. If, as the original post postulated, it were technically possible to preserve the fetus throughout the completion of its development, then society would have every right to ensure that the fetus would indeed reach maturity.
"For example, laws are passed that say a pharmacist cannot withhold the morning after pill from a woman who wants it. But a pharmacist may have a conscience, too; where is the justice in forcing someone to provide a service to someone else which they find morally reprehensible?" - Seth
I'm not very sympathetic to this particular argument. Yes, a pharmacist has a conscience. But surely a person looking to go into the pharmacy business has to know that there are medications that they may find morally problematic to fill. Filling all of the prescriptions is a bona fide job requirement of the pharmacist. If someone knows that at the outset, and freely chooses to enter that career anyway, then it's perfectly fair to expect them to provide that service.
They also freely chose to go to work for a store that offers the drug which they refuse to provide. Look, I consider it morally reprehensible to give anyone a book by Ann Coulter. But if I'm working as a bookstore clerk, I don't imagine that I have a moral right to refuse to sell a customer a book for ideological reasons.
"Re: It is even conceivable that women would find themselves in the same position that some men find themselves in now: forced to pay for the upbringing of a child they'd rather have aborted."
A woman always has the option of placing an unwanted child for adoption.
This is going to be fun.
But if I'm working as a bookstore clerk, I don't imagine that I have a moral right to refuse to sell a customer a book [by Ann Coulter] for ideological reasons.
Agreed. But if you owned the bookstore, do you have a right not to stock Ann Coulter books? Does an owner-operated pharmacy (do they exist) have the right not to stock morning-after pills?
ScentofViolets wrote: Sigh. Would you try harder?
Thanks, but pass.
Since in the context of the thread, abortion is equated with murder,
When did that become the "context of the thread"? It may have been the context of your response, but then you made an untenably broad claim. I can not, and would not even if I could, read your mind; it's wild in there. If you intended any other limitations on your statement than those given, I knew nothing of them.
i.e., 89% of all abortions happen in the first trimester, I think it's pretty safe to say that what I said was dead accurate.
Whether they do or not is irrelevant to whether they can occur at other times for any reason, and the present broad state of judicial opinion on the matter hinders legislation that would bring access more in line to what a majority of Americans believe it should be (i.e., 75% do NOT support the present state of unlimited convenience abortion).
That is, your characterization that it was not initially a compromise is false.
Wrong. First, that's not what I said. Second, whatever compromise existed the very second Roe was handed down is not helpful in your efforts to characterize and critize abortion opponents now, because the precedent of Roe enabled subsequent cases where the definition of legality was very quickly broadened to unlimited convenience. Roe's foundational reasoning is the basis by which itself and all subsequent cases have been unasailable through legislative process.
Finally, this is, at best, stupid, at worst, malicious misinterpretation:
No, that is. Please refrain from doing it, and consider that if taken at face value, the party to whom I responded was directly equating pregnancy to a car accident. Anyone who believes sophistic bunk like that -- hopefully not him, and presumably not you -- is unlikely to be fit for rational debate. So I assumed the most favorable definition of his argument, i.e., the case where sexual relations lead to a severe and entirely unexpected medical condition (which could include a direct risk to the life of the mother).
Also, I assume your Wikipedia research on Roe turned up the fact that a life-of-mother medical exception was available prior to that decision?
Don't let the doorknob hitcha where the dog shoulda bitcha on the way out looking for those stories.
Mice aren't that tall, and we prefer neatly vertical entrances with a circular-arched top. (Very early gothic.) And the dogs are on my side, being as they are very eager to please and readily bribed.
Chris, because as we all know, whether or not people whose immediate ancestors were mostly from Africa are human is just a bit of religious dogma.
When slavery was legal in the United States, no thinking person really doubted whether or not Africans were human. But there was a lot of debate about whether or not Africans were some kind of lesser human, whose lives, by definition, were less valuable than those of Europeans. In short, to people at the time, it wasn't at all obvious that slavery was morally impermissible (the institution, was, after all, as old as civilization itself). It may well be that in a century and a half's time, artificial womb-equipped Americans will recoil at the moral obtuseness of their fetus-slaughtering ancestors just as today we recoil at the thought of ancestors who owned slaves.
If anything, the Court should have opposed abortion even if popular will was in favor of it because their job is to seek justice and protect the rights and freedoms of all, despite the whims of the majority.
Er, no, it is the job of the court to interpret the law. "The rights and freedoms of all" can indeed be curbed by the majority, if the particular curb in question doesn't violate the constitution.
I don't think children should be punishment, and I don't think I'd want to be raised by someone who was punished for unprotected sex by having me.
As for aritificial wombs, I doubt you could legally require women who want abortions to deposit their unwanted fetuses in them (medical procedure against her will and all). If you did, we'd see a return to the coat hangers. I think they just don't want the kids and think of adoption as somehow shameful.
I'd love to one tenth of the efforts to restrict abortion used to encourage women to give up the children for adoption instead or encourage people to adopt children from the foster system.
In answer to SG: pharmacies are regulated and have to stock whatever drugs state regulators decide are the minimum to be worthy of calling an institution a pharmacy. It's not every drug, but, for instance, many pharmacies would like not to have to stock certain drugs, like Oxycodone, because they are considered to be addict (and break in) magnets. Many states do not allow pharmacies to engage in such selective discrimination, reasonable though it may seem to be. The idea is that you should be able to get most drugs at most pharmacies, and particularly drugs like pain killers, antibiotics, emergency respiratory medications (Xopenex) and perhaps, Plan B, that you would need in short order and might not be able to travel elsewhere to find in the time that you need them. It varies by state, but states definitely have the authority to do this.
Medical abortions were available for more than just the life of the mother prior to Roe v. Wade. My mother was offered one in the 1960s after contracting rubella (which has a greater than 50% risk of severe birth defects for the baby.) She refused and got lucky— my sister's fine.
A lot of couples want to adopt from the foster system but I will submit that it is hard, even when there is direct proof that the original family means the child harm. I've known many foster parents who try their best to adopt only to have the child returned to the family— sometimes that's good, but sometimes you have to wonder.
What surprised me was finding out that there is a waiting list to adopt special needs children— Down's syndrome, cystic fibrosis, and the like. Some couples obviously feel they have a lot of love to give.
Don't fool yourself. Artificial wombs may change how the public perceives abortion, but they won't change the agenda, because the agenda is dead babies.
If the agenda was merely the emptying of the unwilling womb, there would be no third-trimester abortions. Yet they persist, and the abortion lobby is going to the mat to defend them. If the agenda were merely the emptying of the unwilling womb, there would be no opposition to the Born Alive Infants Protection Act. Yet there is.
And the clincher -- whose side does the abortion lobby take in EVERY SINGLE CASE of custody dispute with IVF embryos, who are in NOBODY'S womb? The unilaterally take the side of whoever wants the embryos dead, even if that means going against the woman -- and this stand is taken by alleged advocates of "women's choices".
It's about dead babies. Pure and simple. All artifical wombs will do is make that crystal clear.
This will make concepts such as "pro-life" and "pro-choice" pretty much obsolete. In might hurt the pro-life movement more, however, since the anti-abortion position is often a cover for opposition to birth control and sex educations(and personal freedom in general) Without abortion, the underlying extreme social conservatism at the heart of the pro-life movement will turn off many people.
Chet, let's step away from abortion for a moment and talk about motorcycles.
Let's say you were dismayed at the number of fatal motorcycle accidents. You want to eliminate them.
What would you think of a group that said the best way to eliminate fatal motorcycle crashes was to give everybody a motorcycle who wanted one, regardless of their age, as long as they also took a free helmet and took a safety course. What do you think would happen to the number of fatal motorcyle crashes?
It'd go up, of course, because though any given motorcyclist might be less likely to have a fatal crash (because of the helmet and safety course), there would be so many more motorcyclists on the road (because of all the free motorcycles) that the total number of fatalities would skyrocket.
THAT"S WHAT THE CONTRACEPTIVE MINDSET DOES. It tells people that all they have to do is take a pill or wear a condom, and they can have sex as often as they want and they will NEVER NEVER NEVER end up creating a baby they aren't planning on.
Which is no more realistic than handing out helmets and telling bikers they will never be in a crash.
This will make concepts such as "pro-life" and "pro-choice" pretty much obsolete. In might hurt the pro-life movement more, however, since the anti-abortion position is often a cover for opposition to birth control, sex educations and personal freedom in general
The absolutist's on both the pro-life and the pro-choice sides make me sick. You people base your positions on dogma and emotion, not science.
For instance, if you believe life begins at conception why then do 1/2 to 2/3 of all fertilize eggs die within 8 weeks of pregnancy? Considering a large percentage of these miscarriages go unnoticed by the women due to occurring in the first 1-3 weeks, how can you consider an Abortion during this period to be murder when one does not consider it a loss of a life when all those fertilized eggs die?
For the pro-choice people, the first measurable signs of EKG activity occur in the 12th week indicating sensory feelings. Is it really ethical to kill something that can feel? Of course if the child has a disease or is deformed in some way then I understand the abortion is for the best. But if the child is healthy how can you say having the abortion at this point is a good idea? This is the borderline area where the child might be able to feel in some form or another but could not survive outside. In these cases I would still leave it up to the women seeing as though it is her body and her child. Of course if we built an artificial womb well then that would, in my opinion, change things.
Today we hear of stories in which 1 pound babies are born at 23 weeks then placed in incubators. Whats wrong with inducing a birth and then placing the child in an incubator instead of killing the child outright? If the child dies in the incubator then no charges are brought against the doctor or the mother—just give the life a chance! The child can then be placed up for adoption, the mother and father never have to pay a cent. This way we respect the mothers body while also respecting the life inside.
If we have the technology to save a healthy baby that is born prematurely we should use that same technology to save the fetus that is aborted. Its the same thing, the only difference is that the mother does not want the child in one case, and in the other the mother does.
What I find most amazing though is that England as well as several other left leaning European nations have laws that state a fetus cannot be aborted after week 24. Not hear in the U.S.
Of course I shouldn't be surprised, this is the nation that abandoned its founders principles of non-interventionism to launch a preemptive war in Iraq that has cost so many innocent lives. So when Republicans/neocons say they are pro-life I just laugh, then I loose a little more faith in humanity ...
Diversity, how about "None of the above"? Why do so many supporters of legal abortion make the totally baseless presumption that *prolifers* favor illegal abortion? We oppose ALL abortion. It's the prochoice who performed abortions when it was illegal, who perform it now, and would continue to perpetrate abortions were the practice again criminalized.
One side favors abortion, the other side favors live children. Since illegal abortions are just as effective at killing the children in question as legal abortions, we're just as opposed.
I have to get out of here. I can not believe that the "prochoicers" in here are as clueless or evil as the things they say.
Freedom = dead babies
We're back to the old question, "Liberals -- Evil or stupid?"
Are you too stupid to see the babies, or too evil to care?
Christina, we'll take out all the zygotes and dump them into YOUR belly, so YOU can raise them to term!
Anyone who thinks that a two-celled organism is "a baby"--well, sheesh, learn some biology. As long as that bloody little organism is living off MY bloodstream I call it a parasite.
The science stated in this post and the linked article are severely flawed. Note that the articled said that births at 24 weeks have been surviving since 1989. While the survival rate at that age has increased, the 24 week limit has been virtually unchanged for the last two decades. This is the point when the lungs develop enough to allow breathing air. Anything earlier would required these artificial wombs which are still very much in the realm of science fiction. It is also worth nothing that virtually every 24 week baby has serious developmental issues. In the best cases it merely noticeable learning and behavior deficits.
Putting a 12 week fetus in an artificial womb to guarantee a life of problems is not a win-win situation for everyone. Also, who is responsible for these artificial wombs. If there is a miscarriage (very likely just like with fetuses in mothers), is it malpractice?
This might be an interesting thought experiment, but it has no relation to reality and won't for a very long time.
Iow, Mousy, you were - at best - trolling. And at worst, stalking. Grow up.
Actually, the argument was that the slaves were the sons of Ham:
And from the wiki:
So, no sporting a buggy-sticker saying "Against Slavery? Don't own any." is a wildly inappropriate analogy.
Finally, sex ed that teaches birth control methods do not result in increased numbers of pregnancies, contrary to what was claimed above(and with some rather bizarre justification at that.) No, that statistic is owned by the 'abstinence only' crowd.
I suspect that birth control technology is only going to get better - much more reliable, and much less obtrusive - so that by the time the middle of the century rolls around, the anti-abortion crowd's antics will only be a footnote. I can see where the straw that broke the camel's back will be something that prevents a fertilized egg from ever forming . . . and these people will still be against it, and on grounds so spurious that the general public will just throw up its hands and say enough is enough.
SD, you're funny --
"Um, no. Not at all. Not one little bit. A body doesn't have "parts" with a completely different genetic makeup from the rest of the body."
--actually, "completely different" is gross misstatement; and give me an example of where the state or external parties try to control something that resides inside my body without my permission and I'll show you an unjust and immoral act.
"The fetus is not a "part" of the woman's body - it is a different body."
-- a non-part that just happens to be entirely inside the woman's body. You can have your precious word, as the particular word we use is irrelevant. A fetus is a parasitic organism. Just because a tool may be developed that can host such a parasite outside a woman's body during its development into a human being, doesn't make it not a parasite.
"Now, you can still argue that the law cannot compel a woman to support a fetus inside of her body"
--damn right. Oh, and its not up to you to determine what I can or can't argue.
" and that thus the woman has a right to an abortion if she wants one. I generally disagree but at least this is an issue on which there can be honest and reasonable disagreement - the two sides simply place different weights on different interests."
--for sure. And you can place the weight where you want, and I'll place it where I want. I'm not making you get an abortion.
"But once the fetus is removed from her body, the woman ceases to have any defensible right to determine what is done with it."
-- really? Removed how? You really need to be more specific on this. Can you tell me why you think you have the right to determine what happens to the parasite created by and inside another person's body?
" If, as the original post postulated, it were technically possible to preserve the fetus throughout the completion of its development, then society would have every right to ensure that the fetus would indeed reach maturity. "
-- and then what? What's your grand plan for raising the child? Are you going to start a baby ranch? That's where your anti-choice moralizing really falls apart. You all care terribly, until the thing is born. Then its not your problem anymore.
There will come a time when people look back in horror that there was a time when a woman didn't have absolute right to her body and the parasites she has created and hosts. God doesn't create a parasitic fetus, a woman and a man do. Hence they get to decide what happens to it. End of story.
I think its fun to have these debates because guess what -- you're never going to get your way, and you will never never ever again have the right to impose your ridiculous religious "beliefs" on womankind. I hope that ruins your day.
The world is saying goodbye to your religion because it is an archaic anachronistic vestige of a superstitious past that has long ceased to have justification for its existence. Spirituality will never die, but your religion that asserts your rights over others is dead. And you know it.
You clearly ave no background whatsoever in science.
This. Will. Never. Happen.
It sounds like the kind of thing that Womyns Studies majors make up to scare eachother.
Shouldn't the future of the abortion debate include the next President's views on abortion?
http://www.2008electionprocon.org/abortionlegaloption.htm
I believe that these "extracorporeal" life support systems were intended to help women who REALLY want the babies that their body can't carry: women whose water breaks at 19 weeks gestation; women who develop infections that require expulsion of an otherwise healthy fetus; women whose cervix is unable to stay closed long enough to allow the birth of a viable fetus; women whose own health is jeopardized by the continuation of a pregnancy; women who need to undergo treatment for a life threatening condition (such as cancer), which might threaten the health or life of the fetus.
Just a thought experiment: At the current rate of abortion, we would need one million of these machines, each to be monitored by an incredibly sophisticated medical team. Has anyone here ever been to a NICU? One of the saddest sights is to see babies who are there day after day with no one to visit (not always because the mother doesn't want to, but because transportation, work and other children make it really difficult). This isn't just a "technology" issue.
"Babies aren't made by accident; people know what happens when they have sex (leaving rape and incest aside)."
I never understand this part of the Pro-Life argument. It's illogical. If you claim to oppose abortion to protect human life, why does it matter whether that human life came from a rape or incest? It's still a human life.
Seems to me that judging HOW a woman got pregnant has a lot to do with this. If she was forced to have sex, well then she can abort the baby. If she wasn't, it's murder. (???) Can we stop pretending that the Pro-Life movement is ONLY about protecting babies? It is somewhat about that. It's also about controlling women, or you wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the babies created by force. They are just as human as the ones created freely.
Just one last comment: the "in utero" experience includes a lot of "outside the uterus" stimulation -- through light, sound, taste, and even touch. So what are the sounds and tastes that a fetus in a machine will experience? As someone whose child was in a NICU, you really have to be there to understand how difficult it is to truly recreate a healthy uterine environment, particularly when the needs of medical personnel overwhelm the desire to provide a more humane (or human) environment. This would be such a last ditch kind of solution that it's hard to imagine anyone pushing it as a "routine" solution to abortion. That's what contraception is for.
How about taking the artificial womb all the way. We can use sperm and egg to make a blastocyst in vitro. Why can't we just place that blastocyst in an artificial womb? Thus millions of extra embryos from in vitro fertilization could become children. In addition, since a single sperm and a single egg has the same ability to become a person as an embryo, then why not regulate those and penalize all women who don't let their eggs get fertilized each month?
Sure I'm being ridiculous, but no more ridiculous as people who say artifical wombs will end the abortion debate or that an 8 cell embryo is morally equivalent to a living and breathing child.
What would you think of a group that said the best way to eliminate fatal motorcycle crashes was to give everybody a motorcycle who wanted one, regardless of their age...THAT'S WHAT THE CONTRACEPTIVE MINDSET DOES.
Guess what, Christina? Teenagers already have everything they need to have sex. That equipment comes standard with every model. Advocates of access to contraceptives are better analogized to people who want to give everyone A MOTORCYCLE HELMET. Which seems like a pretty good idea.
I have enjoyed reading this thread. Thanks.
I am not now nor have I ever been a "fertilized egg". We are not chickens we are human beings and at fertilization, we are a distinct, living, and unique human beings. Believe me, this "fertilized egg" stuff is not even good biology. However, biology cannot tell us how to treat this distinct, living and unique human being that is traveling to and will implant into the mother's womb. We have to turn to philosophy for that. Notice, I did not say religion. People can have a philosophy of life that might or might not take into account a God.
One more thing about the science. If someone can prove to me scientifically that the embryo and subsequently, the fetus is not human (that someone we humans defy the Law of Biogenesis) then, by all means, have all the abortions that you want. However, if the embryo and fetus are human, then there is no justification for killing them. We just do not kill other human beings on a whim or for convenience, no matter where they are or what stage of development that they are.
There are only 4 main philosophical differences between the embryo we all were once and the person we are now: size, level of development, degree of dependency, and environment.
I want someone to make a case for abortion that is scientific and philosophic. This old tired talking point about a woman's body and her choice is just that: tired.
A few BTWs: Sweden just came out with a study that showed abortions have increased since Plan B was made OTC. The increased use of contraception leads to more, not less abortions, because women use abortion for contraceptive failure and they have a singular sense of protection that is not really there even with regular and conscientious use. Finally, why can't we define the beginning of life by the end of it? Let me explain: Death is defined in all 50 US States as when the cells of the body are no longer communicating with each other in a coordinated way.(it is said a little more scientific than that--but this is what it means.) For instance, there will be live cells on a dead body for quite a while, however, they are no longer TALKING to each other. So, what if life was defined as beginning when the cells start communicating with each other? That would be at fertilization, folks.
Gotta go. Thanks for the afternoon of entertainment.