I just read this post, and I applaude all the well thought out opinions everyone holds. I do, however, want to make mine for whatever it's worth.
First, I believe that abortion is a medical issue between a woman and her doctor. When a government entity tries to restrict abortion, the govenment entity enters the treatment room with me and my doctor and dictates the conversation I can have with my physician. This does not happen to people who are uanble to get pregnant, and as long as some men, their religious counterparts, and right wing zealots make up the majority of governing bodies, then their will can be imposed on me in the most private of settings - that between me and my doctor. That is a privacy right that gets overlooked in this situation.
Second, I would like to recomend Sam Harris'(the author, not the singer though I enjoy him, too) book, Letter to a Christian Nation, for an excellent discussion of this issue.
Third, this nation can only prosper when all of its citzens have the freedom to control their reproductive rights. I believe Mr. Harris makes this point eloquently, and I would add that to understand the importance of choice for women, one should study the life and work of Margaret Sanger. She fought for basic birth control rights at the beginning of the 20th cenury, and her battle is primarily the same going on today with the threat to choice.
Fourth, I believe when the right to choose is threatened, it threatens everything I am as a thinking, intelligent person. Without the right to choose, I become less than a full citizen of this country. I become the puppet of others who know nothing about me, my life circumstances, and my experience. I will be less, and quite frankly, I think this is the goal of some folks.
Finally, there is no equivalent issue that faces men. I refer to the argument that abortion shoud not be used as birth control, and that it should be illegal for any woman who has had more than three. Should a man be sterilized if he has contributed to three unwanted pregnancies? What should a man have to do if he is faced with an unwanted pregnancy, and there is no choice? Yes, many men will support this child, but many will also just walk away with no physical health issues involved, no social ramifications, and no spiritual condemnation. So, for me, this is an question of equality for women, and social, financial, and political equality is a serious moral issue for me.
This whole issue annoys me. If I was to discover I was pregnant one day (god forbid) I would have to think about it for a good long time, but it wouldn't be easy. The issue isn't easy. You can't say across the board that it's always right or wrong in any case, at any stage of pregnancy.
It should really just be up to the woman (or the couple, rather) involved. It just annoys me that people try to force their beliefs on someone else's choice. A difficult choice. Just because you think that a blob of cells is a living, breathing, thinking, feeling human being doesn't mean you have the right to force someone else to see it that way too and to act as you would act.
"But I can tell you that Raoul, who was so handsome in "The Phantom," is now a drunken wreck."
Thanks, guys. This remained a respectful, intellectual debate. After researching the issue more carefully and looking at other abortion issues, I want to make my beliefs clearer:
Intact dilation and extraction abortion (sometimes incorrectly called "partial-birth" abortion) should always be legal. The Netherlands has the best abortion law in the world, because abortion is always legal until the fetus is viable. Also, some people say that abortion shouldn't be used as a form of birth control. Well, I think that you should use birth control if you don't want to get pregnant, but if it doesn't work, you can have an abortion. Also, IF you didn't use birth control, it's okay to have an abortion but not every time. In other words, don't make a habit out of it. For example, after maybe 2 abortions that were results of not using birth control, you should start using birth control. However, there should never be a law against using abortion as birth control, nor should there be an abortion limit for any woman.
"Well, I think that you should use birth control if you don't want to get pregnant, but if it doesn't work, you can have an abortion. Also, IF you didn't use birth control, it's okay to have an abortion but not every time. In other words, don't make a habit out of it. For example, after maybe 2 abortions that were results of not using birth control, you should start using birth control. However, there should never be a law against using abortion as birth control, nor should there be an abortion limit for any woman."
Are you effing crapping me with that last paragraph?
Damn you, Kringas! I was just going to say the same thing. XD Abortion *IS* birth control. It's... far from ideal in place of contraception, but it's very silly to suggest it's not birth control. XD
I am strongly pro-Choice, because I feel like it a very personal decision... one that the Gov't should not dictate. I personally don't think I would ever get an abortion... but it is not my place, and I feel that it is not the Gov't place, to tell other woman what to do with their bodies.
"If we don't live happily ever after at least we survive until the end of the week!"
-Kermit the frog"I need the money... it costs a lot to look this cheap!" -Dolly P."Oh please, Over at 'Gypsy' Patti LuPone hasn't even alienated her first daughter yet!" Mary Testa in "Xanadu""...Like a drunk Chita Rivera!" Robin de Jesus in "In the Heights"
"B*tch, I don't know your life." -Xanadu
After that if he still doesn't understand why you were uncomfortable and are now infuriated, kick him again but this time with Jazz Hands!!! -KillerTofu
there should not be a pro-choice or pro-life camp. Everyone should be pro-choice in that you have a choice; a decision that's solely yours to make. Against abortion - that's your CHOICE. For abortion - that is also your choice. Everyone is pro-choice.
enough with all the sanctimonious waffle. And yeah all the harassment at abortion clinics sure speaks volumes about cherishing lives, doesnt it?
But Fleur: everyone *isn't* pro-choice. The whole point of pro-choice is that you are able to choose for yourself what is right for you, whether you want that parasite cut out of you NOW, or whether you know that, having conceived a child, you wouldn't dream of doing anything other than bearing it and raising it with love. Some people - the members of the pro-life brigade who are most outspoken and opinionated and scary - think that NO ONE should have an abortion EVER, which means they are NOT pro-choice. They may have chosen to believe what they believe, but they do not believe people should be allowed to choose for themselves.
I really like how abortion is addressed here in New Zealand. Yes it's legal and yes any woman can have one but it's not super easy. You need to visit a gynecologist and a psychiatrist before and after your abortion, or termination as they call it here. These visits have costs included and I appreciate that it forces the woman to really consider what she is doing. And if she goes through the process and decides that abortion is best for her I support that. I forget where I saw it but the statistics in the US show that if a woman has one abortion she is extremely likely to have another. That I find a bit unacceptable. Wouldn't you learn?
We've come to realize that the OP is a sock puppet, crack-pot...
"TheatreDiva90016 - another good reason to frequent these boards less."<<>>
“I hesitate to give this line of discussion the validation it so desperately craves by perpetuating it, but the light from logic is getting further and further away with your every successive post.” <<>>
-whatever2
I'm saying again that it shoud be, and was for me, a very easy decision to make. Either you do want a baby or you don't. If you're not sure, well...maybe it is a difficult decision for you.
And-I would never want to be examined by a psychiatrist before or after an abortion. What sense does that ;make anyway? If the psychiatrist decides that you're too crazy to have an abortion, what do they make you do, have the baby? LOLOLOL!
FlyingMonkey dug it out, I'll assume because he hasn't been able to have any race wank for a while. And MTF3 may be a sockpuppet, but this is still quite a good thread despite its inauspicious beginnings.
And 'viability' is determined how? It's capable of surviving outside the uterus when removed. That's around 25 weeks, and as Kringas has said, late term abortions are very rare, so a statement like that will affect very few situations.
Like a firework unexploded
Wanting life but never
knowing how
