UCLA caves to pro-life group re: graphic display of aborted babies
On March 11 I posted a letter from Center for Bio-Ethical Reform’s Exec. Dir. Gregg Cunningham to UCLA representative Pam Cysner.
The title of my post was, “Pro-life group plays hardball with UCLA over graphic display of aborted babies.”…
The administration at UCLA had been jerking CBR’s student co-sponsors around for a year trying to keep CBR from reserving space for a huge Genocide Awareness Project abortion photo display (example above) at Bruin Plaza.
Read Cunningham’s letter for the best example you might ever see of pro-life hardball. He promised lawsuits and mayhem if UCLA did not comply with CBR’s constitutional request to assemble for 2 consecutive days.
Well yesterday, Cysner responded to Cunningham. Read her email and smile. Click to enlarge…
So this is how it’s done, friends. The other side attempts to intimidate us, often successfully, into playing submissive, peace-love-and-understanding flower people. That’s not how it works in the secular pro-abort world.
Congrats to CBR and the truth about abortion.
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Ha! Yes! Somebody didn’t want to go to court, huh? :D
Looks like from those pictures society needs to promote the morning after pill more, and work to have abortions as early as possible instead of later in the pregnancy.
Cause later in the pregnancy its somehow more immoral to kill the baby? I didn’t know having hands and feet was a prerequisite to being a person. So if you contracted some disease that ate away your hands and feet you would then be a non-person right?
There is no other moment in pregnancy other than CONCEPTION where any momentous change occurs that you can say “aha! A new life has been created!” At the moment of conception a genetically unique human now exists…the rest of the pregnancy is just growth…slow and steady growth.
Why is that so hard for you pro-aborts to understand? Its basic biology!!!! Its not like we’re explaining something really really hard to grasp.
And as discussed on this very website, early abortions are somehow not “easier” or less dangerous. Women still die from them and suffer greatly while having them. But hey, way to be “pro-woman!”
Settle down Sydney – I’m saying, that is a great response to the graphical displays.
The anti Death Penalty crowd railed for years about how the death penalty was cruel – pulled out the pictures of a guy who had bled right through his ears during an electrocution.
So they came up with a better death penalty (the three drug cocktail).
Same thing with PETA – if being cruel is an issue, make it more humane.
That’s what I’m saying – I know this form of shock has a lot of value, but I’m more of a purist. If it is wrong, it is wrong. If the issue though is that it can get messy, well, the proper response would be to just change the methodology.
I’m settled Ex-GOP but you have missed the point entirely. The point isn’t that its “inhumane”. The point is that abortion takes a human life. What is SO HARD TO GRASP ABOUT THAT?
Certainly that is not the point – I’ve read debates on here about the “truth trucks” – the point is to shock people into changing their mind. It’s like PETA – they do the same thing.
For a purist, Ex-GOP, you’re willing to tolerate a lot of abuses in the “health care” bill. I’m under the impression that you are still in favour of Obamacare. I guess your different tolerance level there has to do with the nature of politics, right? Politics is the art of compromise.
Actually, though, I think that Sydney is correct. Everything I’ve heard from the Center for Bio-ethical Reform emphasizes that the victims of abortion are indeed human beings, people. I recall the pro-abortion commenter Less saying on another thread that he (she) couldn’t “see the issue.” The Center for Bio-ethical Reform brings the issue out into the open.
Proponents of the abolition of slavery used these methods to depict the horrors of the “middle passage” in the slave trade.
This belongs on a college campus, why exactly? I don’t think the Ku Klux Klan would be allowed to put up a big display on public university property, but this is, for some reason. The school is pathetic for folding and allowing this. If I was a UCLA student I wouldn’t be happy to know that my tuition dollars are paying a university bureaucracy that would rather avoid what would no-doubt be a short-lived legal fight, if it even came to that, than protect their campus from a monstrosity like this.
Thanks for posting that original letter, Jill. It was GREAT, and I was hoping and praying it would move some slow rears. Great example of how to get the job done when people won’t play fair.
Oregon, your KKK analogy is inverted. Think about it. The victims are the unborn. Their violent deaths are being exposed.
KKK is to lynching victims what PP and abortionists are to unborn victims. Murder to murdered.
Any politician who votes for Obamacare has blood on his/her hands. A vote for Obamacare is a vote to provide taxpayer funding of 11 billion dollars to murder babies. Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. How many political cheerleaders for Satan will betray the unborn for 30 pieces of silver? We are now fighting to maintain a civilized society.
John –
Oh yes, I forget, as long as we don’t have to pay for it, then we can all feel good about ourselves.
Maybe any politician who votes for wars is like Judas. Maybe any politician who votes against people having health care is like Judas. Maybe any politician who supports the death penalty is like judas.
Oh wait, maybe it is just Judas who is like Judas.
The rest of us have all sorts of things that we are like Judas on – heck, all of us pay for internet connection to talk like this – how many lives could we save if we just donated that amount to Compassion International each month?
John – we’ve all subsidized abortion for years. At least this is a step towards compassion for people here in the country. I’m thinking if this thing passes, I might have to drop calling the pro-life movement the pro-birth movement…though they sure have been fighting the bill tooth and nail.
Sorry for multiple posts. I don’t know why it posted 3 times.
Mary Ann, this stuff doesn’t belong on a college campus period, no matter how bad you think abortion is. This is propaganda and the group that is doing it is trying to brainwash impressionable college kids.
I think if anywhere, college campuses are the places for this. I was more upset at the guy on this board who was going to put it outside of a church, which I guess had Sunday school rooms on that side of the church. I also take exception even to the “truth trucks” driving down the road – I saw one once, and glad neither of my small girls were with me.
I think the bigger question is, is this just bone-head type logic? What I mean is, as I stated earlier, I think the “shock and awe” type argument is near-sighted and not quite up to the intellectual level a college should be at. Look, if abortion is wrong, then argue abortion is wrong. If abortion is messy though, then a proper response is, let’s build a cleaner abortion.
If anyone should have to look at this ugliness, it should be the churchies. They’re the ones who think abortion is such a big evil immoral deal, let them look at the abortion pictures. College students shouldn’t be forced to see this stuff on their campuses.
O-R:
What? Can’t handle the truth?
You might be an Oregonian but you’re no Republican.
Chi hair straighteners are becoming increasingly popular in terms of its usage and performance. The ease of use of these straighteners makes it an excellent buy. Pink is the most preferred color among many women. And that is one of the reasons, which led to the increase in the sale of the limited edition Pink Chi Straighteners. More information at http://www.chistraightener.us.
Well, with all due respect OR, you typically show somebody something shocking to get them to change their mind about it. For instance, if I want to convince people to pass health care reform, I might pull out some shocking, worst case scenario story. On the flipside, folks against it bring out something shocking regarding Canada or rationing or something.
Now, arguments made through shock value typically aren’t very good arguments in my mind.
I agree in regards to not having pictures like this on campus in a big display – but I very much think in the right setting, pictures from both sides and strong debate are nice to see – and college campuses are the place to do it.
Who are you to tell me I’m not a Republican? The true Conservative way of looking at abortion is that it’s a free market issue. Abortion providers are selling a service on the market and they should be able to do that without federal government interference. A lot of you people think the government should ban abortion because you think it’s immoral. That’s just statism, it’s no better than a lot of what the Democrats do.
That logic seems to be one a slave trader would use as well.
The question really is, when is it a baby. At that point, there’s certain rights that are granted.
By the way, is it an insult to be told “you aren’t really a Republican?” I would think that would be a deep sigh relief type moment, like finding out you don’t have HIV.
Is it an insult? I don’t know, but he obviously meant it as an insult. I’m not ashamed to identify as a Republican. I don’t always agree with the party (social “conservatism” I consider to be disguised progressivism and incompatible with basic fiscal conservative values), but I think it’s right more often than it’s wrong.
Slave trading? That has nothing to do with what we’re discussing and is totally irrelevant. When is a baby a baby? That question answers itself: it’s a baby when it is a baby… not when it’s a fetus. Is a tomato seed the same as a tomato plant? Obviously not. It’s the same thing here.
So 5 minutes before birth, would you be okay with an abortion?
I used to identify as GOP. Now I lean left – but with the Dems getting in their usual circular firing squad regarding health care (I’m young – I’d like things like social security and medicare to get reformed so that I don’t have to pay half my wages in taxes down the road) – who knows, maybe next election I’ll be voting some Independent party.
I don’t draw any distinctions between abortions based on what time of the pregnancy they occur in, no. Abortion is abortion. And it should be left up to the free market to decide whether it exists or not. If the demand goes away and it’s no longer profitable for private businesses to provide, then the product will go away too and the free market system doesn’t get trampled by statist progressive “social conservatives” in the process.
OR Republican, you’re in the wrong party. Those are Libertarian arguments, not Republican ones, not conservative ones.
The proper question is not “when is it a baby”? The proper question is “when is it human”? It is ALWAYS human, from the moment of conception it is a unique human being with unique DNA.
And, as we know, this country was founded on this: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Well, I’m not going to insult you – though plenty others from this board will surely come soon.
Having kids of my own, I believe (and glad that courts and the law agree) that there’s certain rights at a certain point (generally viability). I’ve seen your viewpoint before – and while I suppose in some logical world it makes sense, the thought that somebody a week before birth wants to have an abortion – well, again, I’m glad that the law and courts see that even in a pro-choice country, that shouldn’t happen.
You’re right, Elisabeth, they are Libertarian arguments too, but they were Conservative arguments before they were Libertarian. The progressive social “conservatives” worked very hard to suppress these ideals and were fairly successful in doing so, pushing out what had once been a mainstream Conservative position into the margins of Conservative ideology. Today, we’re bringing it back where it belongs: a central tenet of Conservatism. I have been active with the local Tea Party movement and it’s obvious to me that a bad economy really reminds people what’s important… and what isn’t. There have been a few anti-abortion types, but they are by far part of the minority.
Ex-GOP: Be realistic. What are the chances that someone is going to wait until one week before they’re due to give birth to have an abortion? This just doesn’t, and wouldn’t, happen: again, the free market, when left alone to do its job, works just fine.
The question really is, when is it a baby. At that point, there’s certain rights that are granted.
Posted by: Ex-GOP Voter at March 18, 2010 8:24 PM
—-
A better question is – when is it a human which is “being”?
Do you understand the end stage of fertilization called amphimixis?
Because after that point, the only difference between you and the zygote is only a matter of time.
And if you deny a human such living time, you’re denying them their life.
BTW – you’re begging the question in two ways:
1. You’re attempting to establish a criteria for a “baby” rather than using the actual biological timeline, and existence of a rapidly growing human being. 21 days after amphimixis you have a beating heart, blood vessels etc.
2. You’re falsely assuming that some entity, besides the Creator, grants rights. The US does not grant inalienable rights – it exists to secure those rights.
50+ million US citizens have been discriminated against due to their age, size, development, gender and the environment they lived in. Every single one of them was orphaned first, then killed. So much for security.
Any comment on the Catholic Health Association (representing 600 Catholic hospitals) and the coalition of nuns’ decision to support the health care bill? Their representative was on NPR yesterday stating they were convinced abortion with federal $$ would not be expanded and that improved health care coverage is the pro life position. I would think the Catholic Health Association’s commitment and experience providing health care to the poor would make their position worthy of consideration.
I’ve read multiple other analysis that agree that the abortion coverage is not included in the bill.
I also asked multiple times on this board for reasoning regarding how a community health center loophole equals abortion funding, and received no response.
I don’t know – I think there certainly could be some funds that go towards abortion, but I believe there are now, at least the government doesn’t tax the money, which is pretty much the same thing.
“If anyone should have to look at this ugliness, it should be the churchies. They’re the ones who think abortion is such a big evil immoral deal, let them look at the abortion pictures. College students shouldn’t be forced to see this stuff on their campuses.”
Posted by: Oregon_Republican at March 18, 2010 8:06 PM
What is with your whole “college kids are fragile butterflies” deal? If they’re old enough to be going to college, they’re old enough to have their views on abortion challenged. Graphically. Shockingly. In-their-face-ly.
“Slave trading? That has nothing to do with what we’re discussing and is totally irrelevant. When is a baby a baby? That question answers itself: it’s a baby when it is a baby… not when it’s a fetus. Is a tomato seed the same as a tomato plant? Obviously not. It’s the same thing here.”
Posted by: Oregon_Republican at March 18, 2010 8:37 PM
Ah, so you want to play the semantics game. Okay, that’s cool. Do you know what “fetus” means? It’s the Latin word for “offspring.” In other words, it’s a fancy-schmancy name for “baby.” Regardless of what you call it, it still comes to the same thing. You’re killing a human being whether you do it in the embryo, fetus, newborn, infant, toddler, child, teenager, young adult, adult, senior, or elderly stage of life. They’re all different stages of the same thing: a human being.
“I don’t draw any distinctions between abortions based on what time of the pregnancy they occur in, no. Abortion is abortion. And it should be left up to the free market to decide whether it exists or not. If the demand goes away and it’s no longer profitable for private businesses to provide, then the product will go away too and the free market system doesn’t get trampled by statist progressive ‘social conservatives’ in the process.”
Posted by: Oregon_Republican at March 18, 2010 8:47 PM
Thank goodness the law does not take that position on other services you can sell–like murder for hire. Or theft. Or even government censorship. Your system would be a highly convoluted and roundabout way of selling the police forces straight to organized crime. Sheesh.
The animal rights activist says that “animals are people too and deserve human rights!” The statist “social conservative” says “fetuses are people too and deserve human rights!” And the rest of us just roll our eyes at the nonsense that some people believe. The nicest thing I can say to you is that I simply don’t share your personal beliefs and while you have a right to them, you don’t have a right to insist I agree with them. But if I’m being blunt, I must say that you’re no better than the social engineering progressives on the Left–in fact, you’re their exact mirror image, but with a different cause du jour.
GTFO of my party. We have no room for those who advocate the killing of human life in the womb. I’m sick of people picking and choosing which planks in the platform they’re going to support.
The animal rights activist says that “animals are people too and deserve human rights!” The statist “social conservative” says “fetuses are people too and deserve human rights!”
The difference being a human fetus actually is human. But there’s nothing wrong with being concerned for animal rights and welfare. Granted, a dog is not a human (like some of the more extreme groups would like to argue), but that doesn’t mean that it’s morally okay to abuse your pet puppy. In my view, a responsible awareness of and concern for the suffering or well-being of animals is part of a consistent pro-life view. So, if you’re trying to insult me here, your doing it wrong.
And the rest of us just roll our eyes at the nonsense that some people believe.
LOL. “I am the majority because I say so.” Sorry, Charlie. Haven’t you heard? Most Americans are pro-life now. Honestly, you can roll your eyes all you like. The busier you are doing that, the more you’ll be out of our way. Roll away.
The nicest thing I can say to you is that I simply don’t share your personal beliefs and while you have a right to them, you don’t have a right to insist I agree with them.
You know, if you actually held this view, you would be pro-life. “Your right to swing your fist stops at the other guy’s nose” is the popular phrase. To turn this around, the kindest thing I can say to you is that you have the right to believe whatever you like about other human beings. You have no right to kill them based on those beliefs.
But if I’m being blunt, I must say that you’re no better than the social engineering progressives on the Left–in fact, you’re their exact mirror image, but with a different cause du jour.
I stopped calling myself a Republican a few years ago, and right now, I don’t care what side of the political aisle I’m standing on so long as that side is protecting fundamental rights. Like life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Notice how they build on one another? Meaning you can’t have any of them if you don’t have the right to life. So calling me a liberal or a progressive or a leftist is just words. I know I’m not, but if you see me that way, I don’t really care. And if the only sympathy you can muster up for creatures aside from yourself is a concern for how they impact your wallet…then you’re kind of a sociopath. How’s that for blunt?
Oregon Republican…people like you are the reason I am a Constitutionalist and not a Republican.
Look. I get it. I don’t want the state interfering in people’s lives either. I don’t want the state telling us what occupation to have, or forcing us to give Guardasil to our daughters, or taking our land from us, or all that stuff.
I support a woman’s right to do anything she wants to HER body. Thats why even though I think breast implants are unsafe and incredibly stupid and I would never get them…I fully support the right of any other woman to get them if she so desires.
But we aren’t talking about the state meddling in our affairs just for the heck of it. We are talking about whether the state has the right to forbid you from taking another human being’s life. YES. The state has the right to forbid that. The state has the RESPONSIBILITY to protect the innocent the defenseless.
We are guaranteed the right to LIFE, liberty and the pursuit of happiness (we are not guaranteed happiness liberals…just the right to pursue it).
A new Coach bag would make me very happy. I have the right to pursue that but not by trampling someone else’s rights. So I can’t steal one.
Same with a woman has the right to control her body. But not if it tramples someone else’s rights. Is this really that confusing for you all? Its not rocket science. Really.
I lived in a college town near Philly. Trust me. These aren’t little kids. The college kids in my town spent so much time at the 21 bars with four blocks and were so busy peeing in the street and having sex in the parking lot that I wondered why their parents wasted their life savings trying to “educate” these morons.
But let these college kids be “brainwashed.” They are by their liberal professors…trust me.
The fact that they might be “brainwashed” by these abortion posters to respect life…GASP! The horrors!
Seriously. you’re worried about that? Idiotic.
Oh, and I don’t go to church, either. There are plenty of atheist/agnostic/non-christian conservative/Republican pro-lifers. Their abortion stance is one of the only reasons I haven’t registered as a Libertarian. You should.
xalisaex: yeah, me too. I’m sick of the progressive infiltrators who have had their hooks in the party program for decades and have steered it leftwards in an attempt to subvert true Conservative principles of economic and social freedom in order to further their own statist religious agenda. Goldwater saw right through your progressive agenda.
Keli Hu: oh, there is a right to life, I agree… it just doesn’t extend to fetuses, animals, house plants, and other things that are not people. I never said anything about impacting my wallet. It’s called the free market. It’s an ideal. A bedrock, fundamental principle of a free society. That’s more than just money. And do I care about the results of some flawed, meaningless Gallup poll? No, I don’t, thank you very much. If most Americans suddenly decided Communism is awesome, would you advocate for a Marxist revolution?
“…Conservative principles of economic and social freedom…”
Then get to advocating for the right to live, because ALL freedom begins and ends with that one.
per·son
? ?/?p?rs?n/ Show Spelled[pur-suhn] Show IPA
–noun
1.
a human being, whether man, woman, or child: The table seats four persons.
2.
a human being as distinguished from an animal or a thing.
A living human in utero fits that criteria. I guess just like you’re going to choose to willingly ignore Gallup data, you’re going to stick your head in the sand about this basic scientific fact as well? Even Dr. Ron Paul is pro-life, partner, and he’s got the market cornered when it comes to sticking one’s head in the sand.
Oregon Republican…
Unborn children are clearly human. We live in the age of technology now. Didn’t you know (how old ARE you?) We have ultrasound technology. unborn baby is clearly a baby. We can even do surgery on the unborn! Ain’t that sumptin?
There is no need to be an ignoramus any longer. You obviously can work the internet. You can google “human fetus” and google images will show all sorts of scientifically accurate pictures of unborn people! WOW. Yes I am being snarky. I can’t believe in this day and age I still hear people try to claim unborn children aren’t human. wha? But then again, some people held to the flat earth theory for years and years. sigh.
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2006/03/14/science/14preg.1.184.jpg
Sydney M: You’re drawing a completely arbitrary line in the sand. You’re sticking your fingers in your ears and yelling out “fetuses are people and deserve rights!” over and over as if repeating this mantra makes it hard fact. You’re right, this isn’t a discussion about “the state meddling in our affairs just for the heck of it.” This is a discussion about the state meddling in our affairs because some statist-minded people are just damned sure that their way is the only way and personal freedom be damned. There’s no difference between you and someone who wants meat banned because they consider it the byproduct of animal murder.
xalisaex: Register as a Libertarian? Why would I do that? My ideals are fundamental Republican ideals, whether the progressive busy-bodies who have hijacked the party like it or not. The Libertarian Party is redundant: Libertarians are Republicans who were pushed out for being true to the party’s Conservative foundation.
“…completely arbitrary line in the sand…”
…
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
1.) Is it alive?
2.) Is it a human organism/unique member of the human race?
That’s pretty cut-and-dry. Why is birth so great? Birth IS arbitrary. It can be induced at any time in the 3rd trimester and produce a living baby, pretty much. If that isn’t the definition of arbitrary, I don’t know what is. Abortion involves inducing labor and birth. Is the result what you would consider “a dead baby”? YOU said it was a baby after it was born, right?
You make absolutely no sense. But…thanks for your vote anyway, I guess.
xalisaex: I am advocating for the right to live. Part of that right of living is being able to start a business and respond to the market demand for a product by providing it at a profit, even if some progressive busybodies who want to stick their fingers in every pie have a problem with it. Abortion has been as wrongly demonized as any industry I’ve ever seen and the worst part is that this demonization is coming from the purported right rather than the left.
Sydney M: “Unborn children”? I’m not going to debate things on your terms here. We are talking about fetuses in the womb. And when does a fetus become a person? When it graduates from the birth canal. So it is, so it’s always been.
“Part of that right of living is being able to start a business and respond to the market demand for a product by providing it at a profit…”
Yeah, but the biggest part is being allowed to continue your life cycle without someone coming along and f’ing KILLING YOU. Your wallet doesn’t matter that much if you’re f’ing DEAD, ya dolt.
We’re talking about abortion, not someone being killed. You can bring up this canard over and over again but it changes nothing.
You wrote “Sydney M: “Unborn children”? I’m not going to debate things on your terms here. We are talking about fetuses in the womb. And when does a fetus become a person? When it graduates from the birth canal. So it is, so it’s always been.”
Hmmm…what is it about the birth canal that makes the fetus suddenly a person? Boy, those vaginas are magical aren’t they? My friend’s daughter was born c-section. Guess my friend can kill her daughter any time she chooses since she didn’t descend through the birth control and magically become a baby.And the state better not interfere!
In fact, the state should never interfere. Sorry X, if you go out tonight and happen to get raped. State can’t interfere ya know so I guess the rapist will go on his merry way. Sorry Oregon republican..hope no one breaks into your house. State can’t interfere. You’re on your own with the prosecution of the burglar. Sorry Jill Stanek…hope no one drives drunk and crashes into your car. State can’t interfere. You’re just gonna have to live with it…if you live. But oh well…state can’t interfere!
Do you see how ridiculous that statement is? Like I said before…we live in the day and age of technology. The unborn person is clearly a PERSON. Not a blob. Not an animal but clearly a tiny fragile human being. And the state CAN interfere when your intent is to do harm to another human being.
Who is sticking their fingers in their ear and singing “la la la” when I showed you photographic PROOF of the humanity of the unborn child and you still play stupid?
Answer my questions, Oregon.
1.) Is the fetal human alive?
2.) Is the organism a member of the human species?
If it is not alive, how do you come to this conclusion?
“I dare say any thinking sensitive individual can’t not realize that he is ending life or potential life.” (3)
Abortionist Dr. Charles Bender
Yeah…ugh, even abortionist GET IT. They KNOW they are murdering. Wow…you’re extremely dense I guess.
Where did I say the state should never interfere with anything whatsoever? My view of the purpose of the government is the same as John Locke’s: its job is to protect life, liberty, and property. That clearly excludes promoting the progressive “pro-life” agenda at the expense of the rights of women to procure abortions and doctors to provide those services.
xalisaex: Your questions are irrelevant. There is exactly one process by which a fetus becomes a legal person: birth. Anything that happens to the fetus prior to that point is completely beyond the auspices of the state.
Sydney M: Do you even understand the concept of “murder”? Murder is unlawful killing. Even if abortion is killing, it is not murder, because it is legal.
So when the white slave owners beat their black slaves to death…that wasn’t murder correct? Cause it was legal.
So if Obama makes it legal to kill Republicans and someone comes and shoots you in the head…well, hey its not murder, it was LEGAL.
Legality doesn’t make it RIGHT. As my three year old son would say, you are a barnacle head. I’m done for the night…
night all.
Answer my questions, Oregon.
1.) Is the fetal human alive?
2.) Is the organism a member of the human species?
If it is not alive, how do you come to this conclusion?
“its job is to protect life, liberty, and property.”
You’re forgetting that first one. LIFE. Preborn humans are ALIVE, mister. How many times have you been pregnant? If I thought fetal humans weren’t living humans, I’d sure be freaked out when my doctor let me listen to my baby’s heartbeat…
yeah. “…legal person…”, because bad laws shouldn’t ever get fixed once science figures out they’re bad…
Dur-hur
Final thoughts for tonight. Sydney: correct in both cases. The term murder refers exclusively to unlawful killing. xalisaex: blades of grass are alive too. The line has been drawn here: the class of living things that enjoy government rights and protections are human beings from birth until death. Saying “fetuses are alive!” is no more relevant to this discussion than saying “chickens are alive!”
I’m with Xalisae (as usual!),
It doesn’t matter whether you call it a fetus, a baby, a zygote, whatever… the point is, that it is human.
Animals don’t deserve human rights because they are not human. They deserve to be treated humanely because we ARE human and should act in humane manners towards other species…
But a fetus is NOT another species. It is human from the moment of conception on.
What about that do you fail to understand? (I’m betting a this point it is not that you fail to understand, it is that you actively choose NOT to understand.)
We’re not arguing about whether it is “alive”. We’re stating that it is HUMAN life… as opposed to plant life, such as that blade of grass you speak of.
Because it is HUMAN life from the moment of conception, it deserves the same rights as all other humans at all other stages of development.
It is not suddenly made human during birth but was some other species prior to that…
Even 5 year olds know that… we did a science unit with my daughter in Kindergarten… mama ducks have baby ducks…. which were ducks (not chickens or geese) from the moment the egg was laid. Mama cats have baby cats… which were cats from the moment of conception (not dogs or mice) And mama humans have baby humans… which were human from the moment of conception.
Hey Oregon,
Start a new social club and call it ROTFL… Republicans Other Than For Life
OR:
You know what’s insulting? It’s sticking a needle in an unborn baby’s head and sucking out its brains. You can call yourself a fiscal conservative and a social liberal which means you couldn’t give two sh*ts about anybody else but yourself and your wallet.
The Republican platform is pro-life in case you haven’t noticed.
It’s people like you that corrupt any chance that we pro-lifers have of making abortion 100% illegal so please go away now.
You’re out of touch, irrelevant, uninformed, theologically ignorant, a dinosaur and meaningless to the Party. We do not need you.
I also asked multiple times on this board for reasoning regarding how a community health center loophole equals abortion funding, and received no response.
Posted by: Ex-GOP Voter at March 18, 2010 9:07 PM
Ex-GOP – I never saw you post that question before but the answer to your question is “Planned Parenthood”, the largest abortuary chain in the US.
truth – how? I’ve worked with CHC’s – PP isn’t one, and they have no relationship with them.
“Keli Hu: oh, there is a right to life, I agree… it just doesn’t extend to fetuses, animals, house plants, and other things that are not people. I never said anything about impacting my wallet. It’s called the free market. It’s an ideal. A bedrock, fundamental principle of a free society. That’s more than just money. And do I care about the results of some flawed, meaningless Gallup poll? No, I don’t, thank you very much. If most Americans suddenly decided Communism is awesome, would you advocate for a Marxist revolution?”
Posted by: Oregon_Republican at March 18, 2010 10:09 PM
Assuming that you are not a troll (which, given that you are taking on all the worst caricatures of the liberals about apathetic right-wingers who care nothing about anyone, I’m not entirely sure you aren’t), clearly you are an apathetic, sociopathic, greedy idiot. What you’re saying essentially comes down to “the unborn aren’t people because I don’t want them to be!” Never mind what science, common sense, an actual regard for basic liberties, or a functioning moral center have to say on the matter. You have decided, therefore you must be right. And having decided that it’s okay to deprive other human beings of life without due process of law, your only concern is how much money can be made off selling the service, thus greasing the wheels of the free market, which you hold up as the be-all, end-all of Good Things in The World.
As to the poll, your position was that “the rest of us” were not pro-life. The truth of the matter is that pro-lifers are “the rest of us.” It’s pro-choicers that are a shrinking minority. And again, since Communisim is a system that has always been about stripping humans of rights, your whole “fetuses aren’t people” schtick rings far truer of a Marxist revolution than anything the pro-life movement says. (PROTIP: Glenn Beck fanboying – you’re doing it wrong.)
So, yes. Going off what you’ve posted here, the only concern you have for other human beings is how they impact your personal bank account. You are a greedy sociopath. The free market is god, and heaven forfend anything ever interfere with that. The fact that this is exactly the same kind of argument used by slavery apologists to justify their horrible trade makes no never mind to you. You’re not a conservative. You’re practically an anarchist.
truth – how? I’ve worked with CHC’s – PP isn’t one, and they have no relationship with them.
Posted by: Ex-GOP Voter at March 19, 2010 6:25 AM
Pro-abort HHS Secretay Kathleen Sebelius will designate the functions these Obamacare CHC’s provide. It won’t be the typical CHC’s you have seen in the past. That is why they are fighting so hard not to adopt the Stupaklike language.
Phil Schembri: The Republican Party platform today is nominally “pro-life” only because the power-hungry, social(ist) “conservatives” infiltrated it and managed to impose their free market-destroying values from the top down; even so, these values will never be a genuine article of Conservative political theory. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m against you and your progressive ilk “making abortion 100% illegal” (or even 1% illegal). As for your “out of touch, irrelevant”, et al, nonsense, you’re simply using the favorite statist tactic of projecting your inadequacies on others and it’s not going to work on me.
Keli Hu: You’ve got some nerve calling me apathetic. I’m standing up for the fundamental economic principles of my besieged, hijacked, abused Republican Party. The real apathy here is from the socially “conservative” people who have shed their disguises and shown themselves to not care at all about the free market and the basic supply side economic fundamentals that undergird it. It’s extremely obvious to me that any single “pro-lifer” here would gladly accept a fully socialist America if it meant accomplishing their social engineering agenda by banning abortion. And you have the audacity to tell me I’m in the wrong party.
Whatever, Oregon “Republican.” The Republicans have always believed in law and order, and they have always seen the necessity of laws against murder. Elementary, my dear Oregonian. Oregon was the first state to allow assisted suicide, wasn’t it?
At least you aren’t attempting to call yourself a Christian. I’d rather have a “Republican” like you than a “Christian” like President Obama.
Oregon Republican: “The animal rights activist says that ‘animals are people too and deserve human rights!’ The statist ‘social conservative’ says ‘fetuses are people too and deserve human rights!'”
Non-human animals are not human beings, though I do believe they should receive greater protections than they are currently getting now.
Human fetuses most certainly ARE human beings, and I wonder about the cognitive capabilities of anyone in denial of that scientific fact.
OR:
You’re a Democrat Troll.
The stench is unmistakable.
Posted by: Oregon_Republican at March 18, 2010 11:16 PM
——
If you think government grants you the right to life, then:
1) You don’t know what the founding documents reveal on this matter;
2) Government can take away “rights” that it grants;
Keli Hu: You’ve got some nerve calling me apathetic.
You are apathetic. You don’t care how many bodies the free market has to climb over to function the way you want it to.
I’m standing up for the fundamental economic principles of my besieged, hijacked, abused Republican Party.
Oh, poor baby. Would you like a cookie?
The real apathy here is from the socially “conservative” people who have shed their disguises and shown themselves to not care at all about the free market and the basic supply side economic fundamentals that undergird it.
Interestingly enough, there’s a market for human traffickers in the world right now. But I have this sneaking suspicion that it won’t be made legal in the US any time soon, despite the fact that doing so would allow capitalism to reign supreme in that market, too. Why? Because human trafficking violates the more foundational rights of the victims to life and liberty. You are really having trouble accepting that point, but it remains true regardless of however much you don’t like it.
It’s extremely obvious to me that any single “pro-lifer” here would gladly accept a fully socialist America if it meant accomplishing their social engineering agenda by banning abortion.
LOL. I’m fairly certain we can ban abortion within the principles of the Republic as they exist right now. Way to false dichotomy there, but nice try. (PROTIP-II: Glenn Beck is pro-life. Seriously, he is. If you’re going to parrot the man’s talking points, at least get them right.)
And you have the audacity to tell me I’m in the wrong party.
Bzzt! Wrong! I said you weren’t a Conservative. Conservatives ? Republicans. There may be frequent overlap, but the groups are not the same. A real Conservative recognizes that some restrictions on what may be bought and sold are necessary to protect essential liberties. Republicans are the people who brought us the Patriot Act and the first bailout. Hardly the party of capitalist, supply-side economic values. But you’ve identified yourself with them, and I wish you joy of them.
We’re obviously arguing in circles here. You keep repeating the same nonsense, I keep correcting you, and you ignore it and continue to spout the nonsense. I’ve already debunked your points, explaining in detail why you’re wrong, and yet you pretend I haven’t.
You are apathetic. You don’t care how many bodies the free market has to climb over to function the way you want it to.
Interestingly enough, there’s a market for human traffickers in the world right now. But I have this sneaking suspicion that it won’t be made legal in the US any time soon, despite the fact that doing so would allow capitalism to reign supreme in that market, too. Why? Because human trafficking violates the more foundational rights of the victims to life and liberty. You are really having trouble accepting that point, but it remains true regardless of however much you don’t like it.
I already explained to you that I don’t support or accept human rights being violated in the name of the free market or anything else. As I said in an earlier post, my view of the role of government is Lockean: its exclusive purpose is to protect life, liberty, and property. Fetuses don’t fall under this scope and therefore don’t enjoy government protection, thus, the government has no business whatsoever banning or restricting abortion access.
LOL. I’m fairly certain we can ban abortion within the principles of the Republic as they exist right now. Way to false dichotomy there, but nice try. (PROTIP-II: Glenn Beck is pro-life. Seriously, he is. If you’re going to parrot the man’s talking points, at least get them right.)
The principles, as they have been corrupted by progressives, yes. The foundational Conservative principles cannot and have not been corrupted. They are timeless. The Republican Party’s job is to provide a political vessel for these Conservative values to be expressed. My goal for the Republican Party is to expunge the statist “social conservative” dogma from its platform, and I think the political winds are starting to shift in a favorable direction for this end. I never once brought up the alcoholic, Mormon weirdo Glenn Beck and frankly don’t care in the least about him or what he thinks.
Bzzt! Wrong! I said you weren’t a Conservative. Conservatives ? Republicans. There may be frequent overlap, but the groups are not the same. A real Conservative recognizes that some restrictions on what may be bought and sold are necessary to protect essential liberties. Republicans are the people who brought us the Patriot Act and the first bailout. Hardly the party of capitalist, supply-side economic values. But you’ve identified yourself with them, and I wish you joy of them.
Some restrictions, as long as they are in the interest of protecting and promoting, once again, life, liberty, and property. Banning abortion because some people think it’s immoral is completely beyond the scope of any reasonable restrictions.
OR wants to argue that pro-life values are free-market destroying? How about if we set aside for a few minutes the fact that abortion destroys a human life and look at this in pure ECONOMIC terms. 52 million dead since 1973, adjusting for the approximate age they’d be entering the work force and even taking into account those who would not work, translates into a loss of $18 Billion in annual tax revenue alone.
For a more comprehensive picture, look at a few totals from The George Bailey Effect :
Total Missing Workers: 31,000,000
Missing Second Generation: 12,000,000
Cumulative 30-yr salary: $1,500,080
Cumulative Total Payroll: $32,614,966,929,870
” Taxes and Fees Uncollected/yr: $10,762,939,086
” Interest on Debt not Pd due to missing Taxes: $6,058,602,468,744
I’m not looking at abortion in “economic” terms. I’m looking at it in terms of free market principles, and the free market has no right or expectation of potential people becoming players in the market. What’s more, considering that fetuses have no rights whatsoever (including a “right to be born”), a calculation like that is no more persuasive to me than a calculation about how many potential lives have been snubbed out by condom usage, and the potential economic benefits that could have been derived in the absence of protected sex.
We can look at this phenomena unfolding overseas, particularly in Japan for a picture of where we’re headed as our population also ages without sufficient younger workers to support them. They propose this fix.
I forget which poster’s wise advice it was, to replace the word fetus with the n-word to get to the heart of a pro-abort’s message. Do so with OR’s 12:40 paragraph of:
I already explained to you that I don’t support or accept human rights being violated in the name of the free market or anything else. As I said in an earlier post, my view of the role of government is Lockean: its exclusive purpose is to protect life, liberty, and property. Fetuses don’t fall under this scope and therefore don’t enjoy government protection, thus, the government has no business whatsoever banning or restricting abortion access.
Dred Scott, Roe v. Wade = a class of people denied those very rights. Don’t bother to respond they’re not people, because the 3/5 of a person malarky’s the same.
Ok, I’m done. I’ve fed the troll, I admit. But the numbers above are large enough to choke even Congress.
We’re obviously arguing in circles here. You keep repeating the same nonsense, I keep correcting you, and you ignore it and continue to spout the nonsense. I’ve already debunked your points, explaining in detail why you’re wrong, and yet you pretend I haven’t.
You’re right that I’m not moving off any of the points I’m making. Because you haven’t said anything that actually challenges any of them.
I already explained to you that I don’t support or accept human rights being violated in the name of the free market or anything else.
I’ll believe that when I see it.
As I said in an earlier post, my view of the role of government is Lockean: its exclusive purpose is to protect life, liberty, and property. Fetuses don’t fall under this scope and therefore don’t enjoy government protection, thus, the government has no business whatsoever banning or restricting abortion access.
And this is why I don’t believe you. You are making what is called a bald assertion. You claim that the unborn don’t deserve rights under the law and support that assertion with nothing. Since it’s already been pointed out to you, numerous times, by other people exactly why and how that is wrong, I’m not retreading that ground. And you’ve presented no counter-arguments to challenge the ones offered to you. In fact, your entire argument that excludes the unborn from the human family may be summed up in two points.
1. The unborn are not people because they are not protected under the law.
2. The unborn are not protected under the law because they are not people.
I never once brought up the alcoholic, Mormon weirdo Glenn Beck and frankly don’t care in the least about him or what he thinks.
Then how is it you manage to sound exactly like a less-intelligent, poorer-read clone of him? It’s like you’re bizarro-Beck or something. All of the same core values, but in you it’s all Gone Horribly Wrong.
Some restrictions, as long as they are in the interest of protecting and promoting, once again, life, liberty, and property. Banning abortion because some people think it’s immoral is completely beyond the scope of any reasonable restrictions.
Some people think fraud is moral. Should we make that legal? A lot of people thought slavery was moral, but we banned that anyway. Reasonable restriction? I bet the slave owners and traders didn’t think so. You want to divy up the human race into persons and not-persons so that it will be more convenient for you. That rhetoric is, and always has been, the province of the oppressor.
Oregon Republican…I am not a socialist. I abhor socialism and would do anything to prevent such a state in our country. I believe in the free market. I learned a lot in my economics class and I know capitalism (true, unfettered by government hogwash capitalism) works!
That being said…socialist states are the ones that deem certain people “non-persons” and slate them for death.
In China they throw girl babies in the trash and haul Christians off to prison. You are actually aligning yourself philosophically with communists and socialists. Pro-lifers are the ones who align themselves with true freedom lovers.
Oregon- you don’t want the pictures shown because it totally defeats your claim that fetuses aren’t people.
Silly man, only PEOPLE have the kinds of arms and legs and heads and bodies that are shown (sadly, dead).
Look at the pictures, man.
Why would it disturb you if the fetuses aren’t human? Why can’t you just love them? Time to be more honest with yourself.
BTW…Keli Hu…your posts are AWESOME! Dead on and articulated so very well!
Great post Mary Ann
THIS IS FABULOUS! College campuses are the perfect place for these because these young adults need to see what ABORTION really is. What it looks like. Because when we don’t see things, like war, poverty, abortion, etc., it won’t effect us in anyway. Thanks for being RAW–Real Authentic Women.
Thought I’d try giving up anger for Lent, but it didn’t work.
The “Genocide Awareness Project” is terrorism, plain and simple, and your talk about “freedom” and the “sanctity of life” is merely empty rhetoric. “Pro-life,” to me, would mean striving to raise the quality of life for children and those yet-to-be-born, not stepping over women’s bodies to ensure that a fetus at four weeks gestation sees its way to that birth canal.
I can’t really reconcile your stance with the logistics of implementing anti-abortion policy. How do you propose the country sustains the addition of another, say, million individuals to its population each year? Would you open up more orphanages, expand welfare? Would you criminalize women who seek illicit abortions, or fine women who experience miscarriages? I don’t think any of you have truly given these issues any consideration, because the pro-life position ends at the level of blind ideology, which doesn’t say much for your advocacy of maternal and child health.
Megan, we would do what we have to do. We sustain more people born into the country every year, as well as more people who come to the country. We would do for the extra million or so babies what we already do for the others that enter our land every year.
As for who to criminalize, I believe that most of us see the women as victims, as well, and would rather punish those who facilitate the abortion – namely the doctors and the people who push women into abortions.
Also, I just thought I’d let you know, you can’t be both pro-choice and Catholic – it’s grounds for excommunication. But I have been where you are. I was once pro-choice. Then I realized that I was wrong. I realized that more women are hurt by abortion than helped by it, and there are other ways of dealing with the situations that caused these women to run to abortion. It’s not blind ideology for me. My belief is: if it works in Ireland, it can work here.
Megan…why even give up anything for lent? Why observe lent at all? Does it somehow cancel out that you support child-murder? pulease.
You talk about raising quality of life for children and those “yet to be born”…how can we raise quality of life for those yet to be born when people like YOU refuse to even let them BE born?
First, I don’t give a damn, Sydney, whether you decided to give birth or not, but in solipsistic, enraged mother bear pro-life thinking, you seem to fear that pro-choicers are coming after your six year olds with battle axes. This isn’t a war against us and your children, not some kind of eugenics campaign. Invoke Margaret Sanger’s legacy all you want, but you’ll find that her line of thinking doesn’t hold truck with any modern theories of reproductive justice. We DON’T CARE if you have babies–reproduction is about individual autonomy and decision making, and perpetuating the whole “pro-choicer as baby hater” is absolutely foolish.
Second, and I don’t want to beat a dead horse here, but it doesn’t make sense to extend the rights of personhood to an entity solely, physically dependent on someone else’s body. Do you celebrate your birthday on the day you were conceived?
And third, the extent to which Ireland’s abortion policy has succeeded is really open for interpretation. “Success” in terms of making it very difficult for a woman to make decisions about her body, sure, but a) women often travel to GB for the procedure and b) women have been, and are, contesting the policy as a violation of basic human rights: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1540344.
Also, and this point is really laughable:
“We would do for the extra million or so babies what we already do for the others that enter our land every year.” What, deny them adequate housing and healthcare? Relegate them to our city’s fine crumbling inner cities like we do with the rest of our country’s “undesirables”? Sounds like a viable plan to me.
Megan, the project is not terrorism. Look at the pictures of little human arms and legs and faces and bodies. ABORTION is terrorism- killing fetuses is violent terrorism-
and the project is just showing people what it looks like.
Abortion hasn’t solved problems of poverty, etc. And not only poor women abort their fetuses, anyway.
Take a long look at the dead fetuses, their hair and legs, and mangled remains.
If you still think abortion is a solution to problems, you should be ok with the pictures.
Actually Megan…most people aren’t sure of the exact day that they were conceived so how would anyone celebrate conception day? My husband and I believe our son was conceived on February 12 and yes, we mark the occasion every year.
I posted
“Megan…why even give up anything for lent? Why observe lent at all? Does it somehow cancel out that you support child-murder? pulease.
You talk about raising quality of life for children and those “yet to be born”…how can we raise quality of life for those yet to be born when people like YOU refuse to even let them BE born?”
And you responded
“First, I don’t give a damn, Sydney, whether you decided to give birth or not, but in solipsistic, enraged mother bear pro-life thinking, you seem to fear that pro-choicers are coming after your six year olds with battle axes. This isn’t a war against us and your children, not some kind of eugenics campaign. Invoke Margaret Sanger’s legacy all you want, but you’ll find that her line of thinking doesn’t hold truck with any modern theories of reproductive justice. We DON’T CARE if you have babies–reproduction is about individual autonomy and decision making, and perpetuating the whole “pro-choicer as baby hater” is absolutely foolish.”
Your response makes absolutely no sense, but then should I be surprised coming from someone whose brain power cannot compute (even with scientific and photgraphic PROOF) that abortion kills a tiny human being.
I don’t think anybody here is deluded when it comes to imagining what happens during an abortion. A pregnancy is terminated, a fetus is killed. Got it. But these pictures, juxtaposed with Holocaust imagery, beget nothing but hate and anger. My Jewish friends find the whole campaign incredibly insulting to Holocaust victims. As Jews, they believe the GAP campaign is exploitative, and they condemn GAP for strongarming schools into publicly displaying such filth. A protest is one thing, but presenting graphic images–devoid of context, of the stories of women who chose this route–does nothing but incite repulsion and hatred towards women. No wonder this country still suffers from so much misogyny.
A protest is one thing, but presenting graphic images–devoid of context, of the stories of women who chose this route–does nothing but incite repulsion and hatred towards women. No wonder this country still suffers from so much misogyny.
Posted by: Megan at March 21, 2010 10:35 PM
Are you kidding me? DEVOID OF CONTEXT? How would the insufficient rationalizations of WHY they paid someone to do this to there defenseless children somehow justify their limbs torn from them? If I get interviews from the machete-wielding Hutus who massacred Tutsis, does that somehow lessen the effect of pictures of the victims? The motto of the Holocaust survivors is NEVER AGAIN. That means never again for ANY group, NOT just Jews, not just Rwandans, not blacks with the Supreme court Dred Scot decision that said they were only 3/5 of a person, nor with the unborn humans put at the mercy of their mothers with the Roe v. Wade decision.
*there = their defenseless children
Women deserve better than abortion!
Megan…dear. Its NOT a potential life. IT IS LIFE. THAT IS BIOLOGICAL FACT. Why are you pro-aborts so unscientific? Do you also believe the earth is flat and that our health is governed by the four humors?
Sydney: we suscribe to the same biology. I’m not arguing that a fetus isn’t “life.” The question is whether the fetus has an inherent right to keep existing while it cannot survive outside the body of another person.
Also, to clarify my previous post: perhaps irrelevant at that moment, but I was responding to posters on this site who seem to think that pro-choice individuals are OPPOSED to birth, are OPPOSED to babies and motherhood, that we want to feed all fetuses to the “abortion mill.” This is simply not true. We just realize that women deserve to be the chief decisionmakers when it comes to pregnancy.
Sydney: we suscribe to the same biology. I’m not arguing that a fetus isn’t “life.” The question is whether the fetus has an inherent right to keep existing while it cannot survive outside the body of another person.
I spoke to a woman today whose situation, I think, is emblematic of the main issue with the pro-life position: it engenders terrible ambivalence. This woman (raised Catholic) told me she absolutely does not want to be pregnant, yet she said she is personally opposed to abortion. She will have the baby and keep it (I asked her if she had thought about adoption), but confessed to “sometimes wishing” she would miscarry. To me, this situation just screams unhappy pregnancy and unhealthy baby. With such mixed feelings towards her pregnancy, do you think this woman is doing everything she can do to ensure its healthy outcome? Do you think she’s taking prenatal vitamins, heading to the ob when she needs to, preparing herself emotionally, physically, financially?
Now hear me: I am NOT prescribing what this girl should do. I am NOT saying that she “should” seek an abortion, merely that the abortion debate has sealed her off from this option, yet has also left her feeling very conflicted. If abortion is outlawed, many women aren’t simply going to rise to the motherhood occasion with joy and “responsibility.” Unwanted pregnancies are still going to occur, and women are going to feel as unsure and guilty about them as ever. Doesn’t sound very healthy to me–to the women or the millions of fetuses that will be “spared.”
Megan…I know a lot of women who felt ambivalence during their pregnancies. That does not mean the child should die, or the that the mother will not be a good mother to that child.
A lot of it has to do with the hormones coursing through a woman’s body when she is pregnant.
I very much wanted my unplanned baby but there were times I felt “ugh” too…like “what have I gotten myself into?” I think those feelings are completely normal! There are moments now that he is three when he is acting like an absolute brat that I throw my hands up in the air and think “Why did I think motherhood was so wonderful!”
But the truth is, it is. 90% of the time its the most wonderful privilege on earth!
My friends had families that were ambivalent about their pregnancies too. My one employee’s mother was pushing her towards her second abortion. This woman did NOT want this grandbaby! Today she loves that little girl more than ANYBODY!
Feelings change. Right and wrong don’t.