Abortion Question

Scratchtown

Scratchtown

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I heard Tucker Carlson interview Dawn Laguens of Planned Parenthood and he asked her the question "If you can hear a fetal heartbeat, and that becomes extinguished, what do you think about that?"

She tip toed around it and gave her rehearsed answer about every woman should have her right to decide....etc we know the rest.

My question is....(2 actually)

1.) At 5 and a half weeks you can hear a fetal heart beat. Is that a life or not and what do you think about it knowing it has been extinguished?

2.) A lot of people like to talk about being offended about various things. Do you think it's offensive to those women/couples who are unable to have children for an abortion to take place? Why or why not?

 
1) There's an extremely high chance the baby would have been born if the pregnancy wouldn't have been stopped, so it's murder.

2) It should be no more offensive to them than the average person who is anti-abortion. Some random's baby has nothing to do with them.

 
As a husband who suffered infertility with his wife, is one of the main reasons I'm pro-choice. Our story ends happy, we ended up with a healthy set of triplets because of the drugs and procedures we were lucky enough to afford.

However, there are times when "abortions" are needed to end a failed pregnancy. There are times when parents have to make choices about terminating one fetus to save the other 2 or 3. There are some instances where the mother may be in danger if she carries more than 2 fetuses. There are many "ifs" and "maybes" when dealing with infertility, really your world is made up entirely of "ifs" and "maybes" and facing the hard truth of uncertainty. When you are in that world, the only opinions you want are the doctor's, your wife's, and maybe those of clergy. In absolutely no way, shape, or form, do I care about the opinions of some 70 year old congressman and his thoughts on pre-marital sex.

 
Are these actual questions for discourse or posing "gotcha questions"?

1. What do you really expect people to say? "It's awesome." No. Nobody thinks that. It's a nuanced issue.

2. Different things offend different people. That's up to the individual.

I would ask you the same questions but substitute the 24 million the GOP are trying to kick off healthcare, gun violence victims, people killed during needless war, Syrian refugees etc, in place of 5 week old fetuses. Heartbeats inside the womb seem to mean a great deal to you. Heartbeats outside of it should too.

 
In my early 20s not wanting a kid yet, I was fine with abortion as long as it wasn't late term. In my late 20s I'm not sure anymore. I think the pill is fine. I think abortion for rape, incest, or medical issues is ok but extremely sad (as the incident leading to pregnancy obviously is).

I don't know what to consider the beginning of "life" for a human. Is it first heart beat, movement, first consciousness, first breath, first feeling? I don't think you're ever going to stop abortion, so it seems like something that should be legal to keep it safer for the women involved. If you really want to stop it purse increased awarness and understanding of contraceptive use.

To your number 2: it should be no more offensive than someone getting drunk infront of alcoholic, Or a rich person crashing their Ferrari, or a guy putting on a condom. It's just life...

 
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1) I think it is a viable life at any time after the egg has been fertilized. If left alone, it will either miscarry on its own or go full term and be born. Any outside effort to extinguish that life is as unnatural as shooting a 30 year old in the head.

2) I don't think question number 2 has any relevance to the issue. Different people are offended by different things for all sorts of reasons. It doesn't "offend" me but I'm sure there are many people who want kids, are struggling to have them and abortion probably offends them to various degrees. But there are also people who don't want kids, can't understand bringing life into this world and I'm sure many of them are offended by the procreators as well. If we worry about what might offend others, there is absolutely nothing we could do because everything offends somebody.

 
I dont like abortion, but its up to the individual if they want to be parents or not. If the child is born into a family thay doesnt want it. Into a world that doesnt care about it. Into a govt that argues about whether to help it. Its not good for that person either.

How many times have you looked at someone and said that person should never reproduce because their kids do whatever they want and you can tell the parents dont give a sh#t? Its a daily basis for me.

 
El Diaco said:
1) I think it is a viable life at any time after the egg has been fertilized.
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The "life" argument is a weak one. Both the sperm and egg were alive before fertilization. The vegetables were alive before we eat them. Same with chickens, pigs, cows, etc. We simply can't survive without taking life.

If you instead mean "living person", then that's a strong argument, but comes with the difficulty of identifying when those cells became a "person".

 
'Life' is an interesting term. Weeds are alive. Spiders are alive. Cows/pigs/chickens are alive. Trees are alive. We generally have no problem with ending those sorts of lives.

The distinction is where that life, because it's life from the start, becomes something that we arbitrarily define as more. Where it finds personhood. Where it becomes human moreso than a clump of cells. Nobody knows when or where that is. It's definitely not the moment that babies are actually birthed, and it's definitely not the second that a man ejaculates, but somewhere in between those two moments this thing that we've classified as human beings has come into existence and needs to be protected.

As far as abortions go, <.01% of the population is pro-abortion. Nobody wants to see more abortions. They are traumatic, costly, have health risks, and are usually a last resort. If we could all agree on the end goal of "we would love for there to be less abortions", we could really, actually make progress towards that ends. Even without agreeing in that spirit, the abortion rate has been steadily declining for 30 years +. That's great news.

 
Rike Miley said:
I dont like abortion, but its up to the individual if they want to be parents or not. If the child is born into a family thay doesnt want it. Into a world that doesnt care about it. Into a govt that argues about whether to help it. Its not good for that person either.

How many times have you looked at someone and said that person should never reproduce because their kids do whatever they want and you can tell the parents dont give a sh#t? Its a daily basis for me.
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Pretty much agree with this. I can see abortions in the case of rape / incest. Abortion is a terrible form of birth control. If you don't want to abort, but still don't want to care for a child, there are many childless parents who would love to raise a child.

That said, over the top opponents to abortion are pretty easy to get riled up.

 
huKSer said:
Pretty much agree with this. I can see abortions in the case of rape / incest. Abortion is a terrible form of birth control. If you don't want to abort, but still don't want to care for a child, there are many childless parents who would love to raise a child.
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There's still the possibility of massive costs to rack up just in the process of giving birth, and way too many abortions stem from lack of financial feasibility along with resources, support systems, and knowledge/education about what options exist.

 
Man. I'm not qualified to say it's a life. I'm not qualified to say it's murder.

You're committing a wrong either way.

If it's life, you're committing murder. If it isn't life, you're forcing a woman to bear a medical issue for nine months, and the emotional scars of it for the rest of her life.

If it's a life from conception, you can never end it without it being murder.

But if it isn't, and the fetus isn't viable, then what are you doing?

I used to be staunchly pro-life. But I'm not there now. I'm at a place where this may be the most confusing question facing humans today. The whole thing is a sh#t sandwich, and everyone has to take a bite, regardless of their position.

 
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