YouTube abortion confession
This past Saturday, December 11, Gia had an abortion. She then made a YouTube video describing her experience and reaction.
I’ve watched some of Gia’s other videos on her YouTube channel, and this poor young girl has issues – such as Borderline Personality Disorder, which she also mentions in this video, and body image/eating concerns – that I expect will only be compounded by her abortion.
American Life League, which found the video, asked its Twitter readers what advice they would give Gia. What would you say to her?
Dec.13, 2010 4:17 pm |
Post-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.
Two weeks ago at the HLI conference on the 50th anniversary of the pill, Dr. Janet Smith stated the obvious, rather simply:
You’re not ready for sex until you’re ready for babies.
You’re not ready for babies until you’re ready for marriage.
Case in Point.
If this young woman is going to work through her grief and guilt appropriately, then she needs to understand that 6 weeks of development looks like this:
http://www.ehd.org/movies.php?mov_id=30
My prayers are with this young woman for her healing. She’ll find that dying her hair black, etc just won’t do it over the long haul. The ex-boyfriend is a rare bird who tried his best to steer her in the right direction. She’ll find that moment in time to have been the fork in the road, and all subsequent therapy and healing will bring her back to that experience.
God be with her.
She’s “sorry to God” but also “100% sure she made the right choice.”
You think the boyfriend who was “shaking and yelling” at his pregnant, almost-abortive girlfriend is a “rare bird who tried his best to steer her in the right direction”? Yes, that’s some effective support and compassion right there. Would it have pleased you if he had locked her in her bedroom with a Bible until she gave birth?
Megan, I agree. The ex-boyfriend sounds like a bit of a jerk.
“Would it have pleased you if he had locked her in her bedroom with a Bible until she gave birth”
Megan, you just nailed the anti-choice ideology in a nutshell. Thou shalt give birth – like it or not!
I feel for her for multiple reasons. I wish I could give her a hug… she just seems like she needs one.
I do have to say that I don’t buy that she feels it was 100% right because of the majority of what she was saying and why would one be sorry if one had done something that was not wrong?
Clearly, someone has lied to her about the development of an unborn child. :(
Based on what she shared, I’m not sure that I like the exboyfriend. I understand his emotions were probably quite charged too, but I don’t think screaming and yelling at her probably helped to change her mind one bit. I know it was a life that was in the balance and that made it more pressing. I just think that a girl that was in the emotional state she was in with some of the issues she already has, that it probably had the opposite effect. My biggest thing though… didn’t she say he was the one paying for it? Why agree to pay for it if you’re against it? That fact right there makes him an accomplice to her baby’s murder. He will have to give an account to God for paying for her abortion.
How do we know that these women who do post abortion You Tube videos have even had abortions? Anybody can do a video.
And Julie
“He will have to give an account to God for paying for her abortion”
Did it ever occur to you that your god might be non existant? And if a person does not believe in your god (non-christians) than your god’s punishments might not mean anything to them.
I’d want someone to shake and yell at me if I were about to kill someone! As it was, the father of my children, shook, yelled and hit me because I wouldn’t kill our child.
Please, please God let tragic videos like this WAKE UP our country’s leaders to the damage the abortion movement has done to all of our people.
I don’t think she’s the least bit for real. Not. One. Bit.
DD and Megan, why is “choice” only honored for a mother? What about the other 2 people involved in this situation, namely the father and the baby? That seems to have gotten lost in the Christophobic rhetoric. So sad, 3 victims in this situation (although Gia may not be able to acknowledge that yet); the only one who is better of is the abortion profiteer.
”As it was, the father of my children, shook, yelled and hit me because I wouldn’t kill our child”
Amazing! You approve of domestic violence towards a woman who would excercise her right to an abortion. Wow. And you get upset when the “pro-life” movement is called out for being all about control of women!!!!
DD
Someone who is “sorry to God” obviously believes he exists and is untimely accountable…otherwise why be “sorry”.
DD and Megan, why is “choice” only honored for a mother
Because she’s the person who is carrying the fetus and as such has autonomy over what she does with her body. The “baby,” according to law is not a person.
DD
Add in some domestic violence on her child as well.
Someone who is “sorry to God” obviously believes he exists and is untimely accountable…otherwise why be “sorry”.
But here’s the connundrum. If those who are sorry to god, go to those clergy who condemn abortion, the pastoral counseling will be different from that given by clergy who accept abortion. The god business is tricky.
Add in some domestic violence on her child as well
The law doesn’t view the child as separate. But again, you folks seem to be fine with a man who stops his partner, by any means necessary, from having an abortion. Right?
Yes, there was a little soul in you~ You made the evil decision to never let that soul take it’s first breath, or walk, and play and sing and share. Others would literally have adored and nourished that tiny life. (Adoption.)
Josh, not a friend, SORRY. What’s with the trivializing such a hard day? (lip gloss?)
Julia, P my first reaction was the same, I want to hug her and let her grieve. No Christian who loves God would say it was the best for the little creation~ And, who ever paid for this was not a regenerative child of God either.
No, Gia. you need the Holy Spirit to indwell you and the Church to surround you to be there when your therapist can’t truly help. I think a lot of this is fake. The beginning she said, it was her first pregnancy then she said the comment about her boobs. There lots of red flags, but basically she is a confused troubled person. And, needs the truth of God’s redeeming grace to rescue her. This is what abortion friendly people end up like. They are compounding the issues with more and more unstable behaviour. I am praying, mostly that some some sense would come out of her pain.
Jeremiah 1:5 God had a plan even with this little precious one.
I couldn’t watch. I hope she emails me, though.
Wow, those of us who are older look back and wish we could download what we know to her via USB. At least it appears that she’s found a good church to attend. If she’s really fortunate, they’ll have a support group for post-abortive women with a “Carla” she can run to.
What would I tell her? Jesus loves her and forgives her. I would encourage her to get counseling at least once/week from someone at the church to help her through her feelings of guilt and grief in addition to other life issues. Like so many young people she obviously needs to make better choices. Over time she’ll need to realize that she did not make the right choice, that abortion is wrong but we’ve all made mistakes and that our God is kind and merciful and loving and that He will forgive her if she repents.
The best thing she can do is stay in church/youth group and continue to grow in grace, learn from her mistakes and grow in her relationship with God.
DD, you don’t understand. No one can talk us out of the existence of God because we already know Him. It would be like trying to talk you out of the existence of your father. You’re right though. If a person doesn’t believe in God, the thought of having to give an account to Him probably doesn’t mean much and they are at grave risk of being lost for eternity.
For one, I’d ”advise” Gia to cover up her cleavage. Then we can take it from there.
I am so glad there was no internet years ago. I don’t know if its for real (the video). I know that the morning that I went, only one girl in the whole room had make-up on. I remember thinking, “Wow, she actually looked in the mirror long enough to apply mascara…”
It’s always so tragic, so sad. I wish that more young women would consider adoption. I once had a dream that my child knocked on my door. I answered it and there was a young man who looked like one of my cousins. He told me he was my son. For a few minutes, it was so bittersweet. Then I woke up. I wish I hadn’t. My child’s tiny body rotted in some landfill.
But again, you folks seem to be fine with a man who stops his partner, by any means necessary, from having an abortion. Right?
Uh, DD, he was not able to stop her from killing their child.
I’m hoping real soon our country’s laws will stop the abortionists.
Wow, ninek.
What did you name your son?
Isn’t it amazing that a ghoul who leads lambs to slaughter would get riled up about someone else’s abuse? How disconnected can they be? This abuse is bad, that abuse over there is bad, but murder is good? Huh? Why isn’t all abuse bad? How come some abuse, as long as it kills a very small human being, is OK? Abortion is the ultimate and most violent abuse there could possibly be. But few of its victims ever survive to speak out. Gianna Jesson comes to mind. Gia. Gianna. Sadder still.
I dreamt of a boy, but I was certain at the time I was pregnant with a girl. I wrote “Rebecca” on the memo line of the check. I started to speak out loud to her in February, more than 20 years after the fact. I expect that in heaven I’ll find out the truth. I did think of the name Joshua, but since Joshua did make it out of the wilderness and into the promised land, it doesn’t seem the right name. An unborn child should be called Nadab, one of two who died by fire in the Sinai desert.
I would be very curious, in fact I suspect the sweater is hiding self mutilation, the hallmark of Borderline Personality Disorder.
Folks if this young lady is borderline, as she says she is and I am certain she is, her perception of reality is not as ours.
Wow,, true colors. The praying is one degree away from outright clinic violence. Anything to save the unborn no? And sorry Prax, but try as your lawmakers will to chip away at abortion rights, it’s unlikely that the core right to get one will hold. And say it does happen, Roe’s overturned: abortion will still occur. There will be underground networks, “Jane,” former physicians, concerned women, etc. who will continue to practice it.
“How come some abuse, as long as it kills a very small human being, is OK?” You might think abortion is unpleasant or ugly, but the situation demands recognition that two sets of rights (one potential) are in contention when a woman is carrying an unwanted pregnancy. You ask, “What stops us from killing born humans?” Well, what stops us from forcibly conscripting other people’s bodies for our needs? Our right to bodily sovereignty. If we all were simply guaranteed the “right to life,” but not the right to have the final say about our persons, then slavery would be rampant and people could be harvested for their organs. Not so far-fetched, either: heard of parents conceiving new children so they can produce donor matches for sick siblings? Yes, the “righit to life” at all costs is just an unqualified good, and who cares about whose body and mind and soul are used up in the process.
Hey, the NARAL cheerleading team is out tonight!
Shaking and yelling because a woman is about to murder her child is a sign of maturity and integrity in a young man. His passion comports with the gravity of the act about to be committed.
If the video s for real, there is a young man out there who has his priorities straight. Bravo!!
Yes, the “righit [sic] to life” at all costs is just an unqualified good, and who cares about whose body and mind and soul are used up in the process.
I’m so sorry for you, Megan.
Never mind whose body mind and soul are destroyed through abortion, right? Because a human life with a unique DNA signature doesn’t equal a person, right? Even when he or she has a face? A beating heart? A developed nervous system and brainwaves?
Tell me, Megan, when they can successfully keep a born 6-week-old fetus alive in a controlled environment apart from the mother, will you still support abortion as a “choice”?
Oh my goodness Gerard,
NARAL in their PA zeal do not know a disturbed woman when they see one. I only shake my head since I see this woman and her situation for what it is.
I continue to wonder if that sweater covers self mutilation.
Mary,
First, the question is IF, not when. It will be a long time before researchers develop a lung surfactant that allows unborn life of such an early age to life independently of their mothers. But say women’s bodies were no longer directly necessary for sustaining developing life, then the situation would change. Also, I’ve asked this before, but since when has having “unique DNA” started meaning “qualified for all the rights and protections under law”? Is it stated in the Bible somewhere?
Gerald:
Would you be happy if this boy had hit his girlfriend? Is that a sign of maturity as well?
Megan,
Are you addressing Mary Rose or me?
The man’s CHILD was about to be killed, and people are throwing stones at him for being upset? It’s the men who are “supportive” while their children are dismembered that should be looked down on.
This sad young woman was failed by just about everybody in her life, so is it that big a surprise that she failed her first child? Another “victory” for “choice”.
Our bodily autonomy ends when someone else’s body begins. If my child is in my body, I still do not have the right to dismember them.
Well, if there is anyone who knows something about BPD, it would certainly be you, Mary.
BTW, how’s your daughter?
Ninek,
I’ll bet your baby just can’t wait to hug you in heaven!
Hi Carder,
Thank you for your concern. She is presently in a Ph.d program and has been back with our family for a year after a 5 year estrangement. We don’t discuss it, just leave it as it is. So long as she is doing so well we can only be thankful.
I’m calling b.s. on this. I just have a feeling…
I don’t agree with shaking and yelling–because I think they’re ineffective methods of promoting life. However, since the pro-choice/abort side is so like “Well put yourself in so-and-so’s shoes, how do you think you’d feel?” I’m gonna put myself in his shoes. Desperation. Wanting to save the child.
But where I stop being able to empathize with the ex-boyfriend is when she mentions he pays for it. That sounds a bit contradictory to me. Also sounds like he gave up. (I mean I’m not suggesting he continue shaking her but he could plead with her).
As I watched the video I felt like (and she says so) that this girl has psychological issues, but several things jumped out at me:
1. Whenever she talkeda bout the abortion, she played with her hair, tried to move her sweater over herself, looked one way, then the other, and she looked down. She never looked at the camera when talking about it–EXCEPT when she said “I believe it was 100 percent the right decision.”
Two things com to mind: a. either lying. b. so distraught she can’t look anyone in the eye when she talks about it.
2. When she talked about dying her hair she said she was mourning the loss of the pregnancy–only she used just about every single term for pregnancy–INCLUDING child. Makes me think she recognizes a life.
a. She also said something about a soul that was not her own.
b. She said “I went against God” so obviously she has a feeling somewhere that this isn’t 100 percent right when it comes to God or it’s something she’s been told or knows and is regurgitating the information.
But she also said she couldn’t wait to go to Church the next day–so I’m thinking somewhere she’s seeking comfort; especially since she said she was in mourning.
3. She said the abortion was painful. That she cried and bled.
If this is for real, my heart really goes out to the girl. She’s bought into the false promises that abortion is “the right decision”.
She also obviously has a poor body image because she says she wants to lose weight–looking at that video she didn’t look fat to me–there’s a part where it drops to her waistline and I’m sorry, but I couldn’t tell she had very much weight on her at all. Her face didn’t look like she had much weight and neither did any other part of her. I hope she’s not anorexic or bulimic or something like that.
God bless Gia. And if this video is real, may the little soul of her baby rest in the arms of Jesus forever.
Carder thank you so much!
I know one thing about abortion, even two things:
1. It must end.
2. Healing is possible.
What a strange video!
She seems unusually detached to me. I find it hard to believe she had been crying earlier.
I don’t know what to make of it but I sure agree with Carder – cover up that cleavage.
I may be one generation older than a teenager, yet today’s teens sure make me feel like I’m centuries removed.
It’s detestable that you’re drawing unsolicited attention to this girl by shining a spotlight on her with this post. But that is the intention, isn’t it? To coordinate a campaign of harassment against her and inundate her with all the “pro-life” rage your readers can muster while she is in her most vulnerable state. And to what end? Recruiting another “post-abortive” horror story that you can point to as an argument against abortion. I hope she has the strength and presence of mind to keep her wits about her and not let others fill her mind with guilt and self-loathing.
Megan,
Gerald:
Would you be happy if this boy had hit his girlfriend? Is that a sign of maturity as well?
A man who doesn’t want a woman to harm her baby is not inclined to strike her. That’s the sort of thing done by men who beat their women who refuse to have an abortion.
Also, feel free to call me by my given name, Gerard, not Gerald.
That’s right, joan. I see a lot of rage in the comments section of the YouTube video page …
all 11 of them.
This girl is just tragic. Pray that she gets the help she desperately needs.
I think the basic gyst of her story is real, but there are segments in there which are inconsistent with the original premise.
As for the “hero BFF dude”in the photo…..what a poor excuse of a man.
“A man who doesn’t want a woman to harm her baby is not inclined to strike her. That’s the sort of thing done by men who beat their women who refuse to have an abortion.”
For such a champion of women’s rights, you’re certainly misinformed. See “Silverman et al. (2010). Male perpetration of intimate partner violence and involvement in abortions and abortion-related conflict.” Of the 1318 men surveyed in the Greater Boston area, 1/3 reported having physically or sexually assaulted a partner, or having been involved in a pregnancy that ended in abortion. Of men who were involved in a disagreement about abortion, 4% reported having tried to compel the partner to seek abortion, while 8% reported attempting the opposite: preventing their partner from seeking abortion. Among the forced-abortion group, 7.3% reported inflicting intimate partner violence, whereas in the forced abortion-prevention group, 14% reported inflicting physical or sexual violence against a partner.
In terms of male-perpetuated violence and abortion, the researchers found their data to be consistent with previous research: “These results likely reflected abusive men’s greater involvement in unintended pregnancy, stemming from a range of behaviors that include forced or coerced sex, condom refusal, and control over contraception. Female partners of abusive men may also seek abortions more frequently on the basis of their fear of a shared child limiting their ability to leave the perpetrator or a fear of the abuse and neglect of such a child from this same man.”
Do you want to keep arguing your point? Male-perpetuated abuse occurs in all types of social contexts, and is often inflicted against pregnant women out of the desire to gain control. Do you want to deliberately misread this study and claim that these men were just trying to “protect their unborn baby?” But then again, let’s look at your statement: “That’s the sort of thing done by men who beat their women who refuse to have an abortion.”
Their women? Yah okay. You make a strange bedfellow for any woman on this cite supposedly interested in advancing women’s rights.
She’s back, Mary??
That’s huge.
On meds?
I find it interesting she knows she has sinned against God and can’t wait to get to church but still believes she made the right choice. Only a contrite heart will God forgive not someone who says to Him…”hey God sorry about that but I know I did the right thing” Gods forgiveness does not work like that…she is not getting the real message of Jesus Christ Divine Mercy…
She is making herself out to be God. She has put herself above Him. The 10 commandments…1) thou shall not have any other God’s before Him.
If she has had an abortion and if she does hit that wall of pain and when she can wrap her mind around what abortion truly is…thank God there is help and healing for her especially with all her other issues. She needs our prayers.
It’s worth noting that she tried to cover up her cleavage at the beginning of the video but her stupid friend told her to remove the green shirt.
Praying that her relationship with Christ will grow to the point that she has the confidence to choose better friends.
Megan,
Get back on your meds, seriously. You’re setting up straw men all over the place and you are arguing against yourself. You are absolutely incoherent. Are you trying to justify a relationship?
Thanks, Good Doctor. You say you’re involved in the pro-life movement to help women, but there you go again: “Get back on your meds, seriously.” How many people in this forum are taking medication? Talk about stigmatizing their suffering.
Put your powdered wig back on and let’s get back to the start. You praised this girl’s boyfriend for his hysterics, claiming that he was only doing so out of concern for her unborn child. I question your praise and you say, “A man who doesn’t want a woman to harm her baby is not inclined to strike her. That’s the sort of thing done by men who beat their women who refuse to have an abortion.” I then present you with a peer-reviewed study about intimate partner violence in the context of contraceptive use as well as abortion-related decisionmaking. Research finds that abusive men who rape their girlfriends and sabotage their birth control are more likely to be involved in an abortion. One. And two, men use violence in equal measure, if not more, to prevent their partners from seeking abortion, as opposed to using violence to force their parnters to have abortions.
My contention: you claim that Gia’s ex-boyfriend tried to intervene on behalf of the unborn child. However, I say, and evidence says, that this boy could have just as likely been expressing a desire to control his girlfriend. Also, if he seems that hysterical now, he was probably abusive before. Did he puncture the condom, force her to have sex without one? Questions that need to be asked. And yes, one last thing, which needs to be repeated: abuse can happen in any context, whether by men who want their girlfriends to keep their pregnancies or get abortions. It would be doing a grave disservice to women to overlook this fact.
How incoherent was that?
I say Kel and X got it right. This is a phony.
Hi Carder,
She is on meds but does not elaborate so I don’t ask. The biggest stablizing factor in her life is her partner “Stan”, who is also seeking a Ph.d. They are both brilliant acadamians and I think that world is definitely one of its own, a breed of its own. For someone like her it is perfect.
joan 10:43PM
If you don’t want the world to know your business, don’t put it on You-Tube.
Hi ts,
Just by observing her behavior and her admitted personality disorder, I’m convinced she is for real.
Ah….what can I say….I think she’s probably the most misguided person I’ve met this week. It is either you are pro-life or pro-irresponsibility. You can’t have it both ways. If you’re pro-life then you have to own up to your responsibilities and provide the child with all tha you can offer. If you’re pro-irreponsibility then you can go ahead and have your abortion but for gods sake, mean it. Don’t try to say sorry to god. It just makes you sound lamer than you already are for screwing up so much.
All – I watched Gia’s other videos (link in post) before posting this video to get a sense whether it was legitimate. IMO, it is. Not only does she appear the type of person who would make this confession on video, but also, she’s right, her “boobs” are larger and she has gained some weight in the past 4 weeks.
I found it strange that she wanted to go to church the next day. That was plain weird to me.
It’s detestable that you’re drawing unsolicited attention to this girl by shining a spotlight on her with this post.
If you have a huge opposition to attention, you don’t make a public YouTube video anyone can watch. It’s not like someone broke into her house and stole her diary.
Provided this is real, the boyfriend sounds bizarro. Who pays for an abortion and then starts yelling about how it’s wrong?
This girl doesn’t think it was 100% the right thing to do. You’re not “sorry to God” for something you think was the right thing to do.
Gerard, as obnoxious as Megan can be, she’s right in saying that “get back on your meds” is insensitive. I’m on three different types of medication for depression, anxiety, and ADD. I hope you don’t act like this toward your patients, because if you do, it’s unprofessional, unhelpful, and generally unkind.
sorry, even after watching some of her other videos, this looks fake. My two cents.
Her emotions are her true God.
Hi Jill,
I am still very curious as to what is under those long sleeves. I would put my money on self mutilation. Like you, I am convinced this is for real just by observing her behavior and knowing BPD.
I don’t think we adults can presume what goes on in the mind of today’s modern, medicated teenagers. They’re tweeting, blogging, YouTubing, and Facebooking every private detail.
Privacy is insignificant. Celebrity is priority.
Megan, I respect that you’ve included material to back up your claim. But I am certain that the more abusive sector would be related to abortion. There is a disconnect that occurs in the mind in order to live with the decision and aftermath of abortion. This disconnect damages the ability to have compassion. The abuse is higher where abortion is present. Men who don’t want their children born would seem the more likely candidates to abuse (the mothers too) because of the psychological disconnect. I have friends and family who work in nursing and childcare. I don’t have a study or link for you, but I can stick my head out the window and see which way the wind is blowing (That’s a Dylan quote).
Ninek, the truth is often counter intuitive.
I think its real. My friends who aborted told me how they were numb the day of and days following. Its such a distressful, shocking experience to go through that your mind can’t even process it. Her “detached” manner seems more like the demeanor of a woman who has just experienced the most emotionally horrifying event of her life. She has just lost her child. And she recognizes that by her words. How do you come to terms with something so awful as that?
Gia, if you really are a Christian its time to start walking in the light. Its time to get on your knees and ask God to forgive you for leaving His way. When you are at the end of yourself and living life your way and making obviously destructive decisions (premarital sex, abortion, unhealthy eating habits) then you cry out “Abba!” which means “Daddy!” God will hear you and just like the parable of the prodigal son, God will run to YOU. You don’t even have to run to Him. When He hears you calling out in anguish to Him He runs to you. Nothing you do is beyond the mercy of God. But you have to stop living your life as if its only about you. You are bought with a price and ye are not your own! Your life was bought at the price of God’s own Son. Start living like it! I pray God’s healing power on your life.
“Gia, if you really are a Christian its time to start walking in the light. Its time to get on your knees and ask God to forgive you for leaving His way”
Doesn’t that depend on which Christian denomination she is a member of? Not all Christian churches preach that abortion (and premarital sex) is a sin. Re abortion – not all religions are alike.
Thanks DD. I’m not talking to you though. I’m talking to Gia. You are so disrespectful as to spell God “god”. So what do I care what you have to say? You’re not the expert on Christianity. You are not one, don’t understand God’s Word or His nature. You have no relationship with the King of kings and Creator of all. Your scope of understanding is limited by your obvious spiritual blindness.
A true Christian agrees with God’s word. A true Christian doesn’t matter what “denomination” they are. They read God’s Word and agree that sin is sin. God’s Word clearly spells out the preciousness of life and that God is intimately involved in the development of those humans still in the womb.
Since you can’t understand the basics of God’s nature and biology in general then I can’t really have a productive conversation with you.
Often? No, sometimes. But not this time. The truth is that the abortion industry has been lying and duping people for decades now. First it was, oh, the thousands of women, no make that millions of women who will die if they don’t abort (Bernard Nathanson admitted the big lie that was). Now its, oh, the pre-born are not people anyway, and no one has the right to use your liver, blah blah blah.
Abortionists don’t care about the truth. They care about $$. The abortionists didn’t care about this girl. Their only question is cash, check or credit? Abortuaries don’t help police nab abusers or criminals. They say, “We don’t want to know…” and proceed with killing an innocent child.
When was the last time a Planned Parenthood got a civic award for all the abusive boyfriends and husbands that were prosecuted with PP’s help? None? Oh, I am so suprised.
At least the Motherhas the potential to work things out through prayer, medication, counseling, etc. The baby does not have that blessing. The baby deserves our compassion and prayers.
I will be praying for her. She has alot of maturing to do! Hopefully, she will realize what she did was not the”right choice”. Maybe because of this experience,in the future she will be able to help someone else make the “right choice”
I would tell her that broadcasting any personal information about yourself on the internet is almost always a really bad idea and she should take this video down now.
I would also tell her that when she is at church tomorrow she should seek out someone there whom she trusts and have a serious discussion with them about what is going on in her life and why she thinks that what she did was “the right choice.”
The baby is now in heaven.
I haven’t watched the video yet. I am praying for this young girl though.
Ninek, do prenatal clinics ask women if they want to be pregnant, if the pregnancy is the result of abuse?
Well put Sydney M.!!
Megan,
Where did I say that “unique DNA” qualified for protection under the law? And kindly share, when did legal protection become the ultimate defining factor in right vs. wrong? I will again ask, when they develop the technology to keep a child alive separate from his or her mother’s body at 6 weeks, will you denounce abortion?
Also, I would like to join Mary in encouraging you to use my name. None of my friends or acquaintances call me Mary. It isn’t my name, it isn’t my handle, and it isn’t appreciated.
Megan, I asked first, is there a time when Planned Parenthood helped stop abuse? No. No key to the city for that one.
The local CPC’s near me (there are 2 close by) have a list of referrals, which includes battered women’s shelters and services covering two counties.
She said she was sorry that she made the right choice; Huh? She strikes me as phony but if not then she is really lost and needs a friend.
Actually ninek, you’re wrong again. Obviously only the rare missteps are reported to the media. You’re not going to read an article that says, “PP of Pennsylvania nabbed so-and-so for incest,” because it would be a serious breach of confidentiality, not to mention HIPAA laws. Anyway, here are some public resources provided by PP to victims of IPV, as well as a new screening program created from a collaboration between Columbia University and PP of New York:
http://www.plannedparenthood.org/files/PPFA/relabuse_06-05.pdf
http://endabuse.org/health/ejournal/2010/06/implementing-intimate-partner-violence-screening-in-family-planning-centers/comment-page-30/
“Abuse” isn’t a clear-cut issue. Each state has its own laws and procedures. But generally, Title X clinics are mandated to report cases of abuse perpetuated by a defined “alleged perpetrator,” usually defined as somebody in direct care/custody of a child under age 18. In cases where the girl and her partner are both over 14 and under 18, abuse doesn’t have to be reported to a stage agency. HOWEVER, clinic workers are strongly recommended to work with the victim of abuse and refer her to appropriate services: http://www.training3info.org/admin/resources/9-11-2006_12_00_49_PM_COMBINED_INFO_8-06.pdf
In cases of statutory rape, the legal protocol is even less clear. Most states encourage notification if there is >10 year age difference between the non-custodial partner and the minor girl(boy!). But cases with a lesser age-difference between partners involving an adolescent patient are generally not proioritized by state agencies. For one, state agencies need to focus resources on child abuse. It’s a lesser offense to have sex with an adolescent as opposed to a minor precisely because adolescents are deemed capable of consent. Here’s a statement from a member of the American Bar Association on reporting of statutory rape:
“Mandatory reporting of child and youth maltreatment…involves significant government intrusions into the lives of families,” notes the ABA’s Davidson. “There is a significant risk that simply requiring professionals to report [statutory rape] to authorities, without proper training and necessary infrastructure, could do more harm than good,” he warns, such as “deterring young people from getting medical care, and making it more difficult to identify fathers and collect child support payments.”
“Most states encourage notification if there is >10 year age difference between the non-custodial partner and the minor girl(boy!). ”
Megan, ANY adult having sex with a minor needs to be reported. Do you really think it would do more harm to expose the rapist then to hide the rapists actions from others and leave the rapist in society to offend again.
““There is a significant risk that simply requiring professionals to report [statutory rape] to authorities, without proper training and necessary infrastructure, could do more harm than good,” he warns, such as “deterring young people from getting medical care, and making it more difficult to identify fathers and collect child support payments.”
Megan, financial consideration is not justified here. It turns my stomach that anybody would leave a minor exposed to sexual abuse because the abuser lends financial support.
Truthseeker:
In cases of apparent child abuse, authorities need to be contacted, and CPS can become involved. Statutory rape laws are meant to prevent extreme abuse, like sex between partners with a large age gap. But when the age gap is less than ten years, the partners are relatively close in age, or this is a case involving a late adolscent, discretion is advised. Health professionals recognize that emotional maturity exists on a continuum, and that it’s impossible to create a “cut-off-point” where all people suddenly become capable of making sound decisiosn about their sex lives. As an aside, I know 20-year-olds who have the maturity of tweens.
Anyway, public health people know that “raid and rescue” efforts are often misguded and ineffective. People have this idea that calling the police on a 22-year-old having sex with a 16-year-old will bring immediate help and rehabilitation to the parties involved. That’s not usually the case. First, the younger party might feel perfectly capable of consent and not be welcoming of the “rescue” mission. Second, police don’t have time to investigate all statutory rape cases in full, especially when coercion or physical abuse isn’t apparent. Most of the resources are locked up for cases of child abuse.
My father worked in juvie for years and can attest to this: in the end, when the age difference isn’t that large, police intervention for statutory rape is hugely disruptive. The minor usually gets angry, defensive and defiant, and her guardians might punish HER severely if notified. Everybody in the local community ends up finding out and the girl is humiliated in school. Mandatory notification of statutory rape also PREVENTS adolescents from seeking medical care, everything from primary to prenatal.
There are more delicate ways of dealing with statutory rape than notifiying authorities, ways that ensure the dignity of the minor involved. Health professionals want to work WITH teens, not scare them away with punitive laws.
You’re missing the point, TS. We aren’t talking about children, but adolescents. Say a 17-year-old gets pregnant by a 22-year-old (not a coach, a teacher, a guardian in any sense). If he knows he’s going to face legal charges, he’s going to flee. Scram. And what if these two are having consensual sex? What if he wants to be a father? Health professionals know better than to think all sex between minors and adults is coerced or destructive. Again, when the age gap is small, the case needs to be dealt with on an individual basis.
Talk to me about Hipaa? Nice. Nice to put dead children’s bodies in the regular trash with their mother’s names on the bags.
Oh, abortionists are is so moral, so upright, so darn good at murder for hire. Megan, you advocate for murder. And now, I see by your recent comment, you also advocate for statutory rape. Nice. I’m so convinced by your side now.
Hi Megan,
It could be reported that PP turned in an incest case without it violating HIPPA so long as names and medical details are not mentioned. It was certainly reported that PP was sued for not reporting a high school girl impregnanted by her coach.
We have a major case in our city now of a teacher who had been molesting students. The privacy of the alleged victims is very well protected while the progress of his case and the allegations are very public.
Hi Ninek, 7:37am
Good point. Some months ago on “O’Reilly” someone from NOW tried to tell Bill that she had reviewed Tiller’s patient charts and had found nothing that suggested these women had abortions for convenience. WHAT! I almost jumped through the screen. Under what official capacity was this woman reviewing patient charts????
Come on Bill, ask the woman if she’s a liar or if she is admitting to violating federal law!! It has to be one or the other. I slapped my head in frustration as Bill let that one slip by.
Megan wrote:
Health professionals know better than to think all sex between minors and adults is coerced or destructive. Again, when the age gap is small, the case needs to be dealt with on an individual basis.
So… the force of law which “fails to recognize an unborn child as a person” is enough to justify abortion and make it sacrosanct, but the force of law which forbids statutory rape “must be dealt with on an individual basis” and ignored on a case-by-case basis?
Interesting reasoning, that.
Nothing is sacrosanct. When people point to Roe and say, “That’s the law of the land and that’s that,” they aren’t getting to the heart of the issue. It’s fundamentally a public health matter, a matter of social justice. An unwilling birth is bad for mom’s physical, emotional and social well-being. And if abortion were outlawed, the practice would just go underground. You can see it in every country that bans abortion. In Ireland women go to England. In Nicaragua they do it themselves, and a large % of female hospital admissions are abortion-related. You can lower the possibility that people get preggers in the first place, but there will always be unwanted pregnancies.
Hi ninek. Yes, I’m clearly “advocating” for statutory rape. Are you seeing so much red that you can’t read? It isn’t “advocacy” to say that statutory rape cases involving a late adolescent are tricky to deal with. I’m sure some of you here have some age gaps between yourselves and your partners. Say you started dating a high school senior when you were a freshman. Is that sexual abuse? Rape? Would it be better for the girl to have some respected adult talk to her to see what’s up, or have the police sweep in and cause major disruption?
And ninek, I’m curious. At what point did you decide abortion was wrong? In the waiting room? On the operating room table?
Yes Megan,
ANY statutory rape needs to be reported and prosecuted. Taking corrective/disruptive action to change the behaviour of the rapist is exactly the point of the law. And if he doesn’t like it he can meditate about it while sitting in a jail cell.
Amen, TS!! Statutory rape laws and mandatory reporting are there for a reason!! Who hems and haws and says, “Well, let’s see. She is 14 and he is 20 and well it was probably consensual and they are really in love and we don’t want to cause any major disruptions so……..”
We must protect the 14 year old girl from her rapist!!
Megan, at which point did YOU decide abortion was empowering and liberating? In the waiting room? Or when you were watching the glass bottle fill up with your child’s not-yet-cold remains?
Not that it’s anyone’s business, but I know that other people read these comments, maybe even a young woman who’s pregnant and frightened. What Oprah calls the aha moment occured after I was drugged, I wanted to leave, but was not permitted to. Hop on over to silentnomoreawareness and you can read a lot of stories like mine. The gory details are just that. (The thing is that once the tranquilizer took effect, I was no longer frightened of the baby. That’s how I know that if I’d just had a few more days to think about it… I’d be spending this Christmas with my adult child this year instead of wondering what landfill she or he ended up in).
Megan, I was 17 myself once (hard to believe, I know!). I remember what kind of 22 year olds who were trying to date me and my friends. After we graduated, the same losers still tried to get with girls at the high school and the age gap just grew wider. Or maybe you think guys in their 20’s date teenagers for the witty conversation.
I went over to You Tube and & after putting a lot of thought into what I wanted to say, posted supportive words and some food for thought for her, but then ended up deleting those and re-posting the comments with corrections, which has led my posts to get marked as spam :( Please help me keep my comments up by giving them a positive vote (green thumbs up)
To clarify:
Acknowledging gray area in the case of adolescents and sex doesn’t mean that we don’t sit up and take notice. It truly does depend on the situation, and they must be handled delicately. If you have an 18-year-old son who starts dating a girl who is 15, would you call him a rapist? Would you want your son’s face forever plastered to a sex offender registry?
And then there’s the case ninek describes: skeezy 20-somethings grooming mid-adolescents. Probably taking advantage of them–a situation that makes me angry. Girls in this situation, though, are less likely to seek medical care for fear of getting themselves or their partners in trouble if they think their doctor is going to call the cops on them. If a girl is pregnant, she needs to seek medical care, and no, I’m not just talking about abortion. You don’t want to scare girls away from prenatal clinics. The situation needs to be handled delicately. This doesn’t mean turning a blind eye, but referring the girl to a counselor or a social worker who can help her figure her situation out. Calling the police can be humiliating and might not do much to “empower” young girls. It’s better to LEAD girls to the healthier decision than to punish them for making the wrong one.
Ninek: I’m sorry about what happened to you. I did feel quite relieved after my abortion, but the providers asked for my consent at each point in the process up until it actually happened. Yours seems much more tragic (and no, I’m not being snarky).
Say you started dating a high school senior when you were a freshman. Is that sexual abuse? Rape?
Dating is not rape or sexual abuse Meg. I know it’s hard for you to believe but not everyone who is dating thinks it should revolve around sex.
I dated a boy my age all through high school and remained a virgin. What a concept.
Or maybe you think guys in their 20?s date teenagers for the witty conversation.
Yeah that must be it Ninek. LOL!
Nice. So now Megan says it’s ok for statutory rape AND abortion. Why am I not surprised about this?
If you were a teacher, Megan, and I found out that my 16 year old had been having sex with a 20 year old and YOU had known about it the whole time without telling anyone…you’d have hell to pay, I assure you. So would he/she, of course, but you would too, as far as I’m concerned.
If you have an 18-year-old son who starts dating a girl who is 15, would you call him a rapist?
I wouldn’t allow that in my house. Period. I’d be calling her parents first, but if I found out he had done anything to/with her, I wouldn’t be going to bat for him legally.
Megan wrote:
Nothing is sacrosanct. When people point to Roe and say, “That’s the law of the land and that’s that,” they aren’t getting to the heart of the issue.
Hm. Well… could you tell DD that? She apparently disagrees.
It’s fundamentally a public health matter, a matter of social justice.
I daresay. Dismembering a baby is certainly not good for the baby’s health, by anyone’s standard; nor is it “just” by any sane standard, either.
An unwilling birth is bad for mom’s physical, emotional and social well-being.
So is murdering her child, Megan. But even if we lived on a hypothetical alien planet where abortion left the mother physically, emotionally, “socially”, etc., unharmed, this would not justify abortion. No one is denying the fact that an unwanted pregnancy can be a serious burden to the mother (yes, even to the mothers who were fully responsible for getting pregnant in the first place); but we’re denying that she should have the moral and legal “right” to dismember and kill her child in an attempt to remedy the situation.
And if abortion were outlawed, the practice would just go underground.
Pardon me, Megan, but: what POSSIBLE difference does that make, so far as the morality of abortion (and the imperative to enact laws against it) is concerned? The idea of “people will do it anyway, so we might as well sanction it in law” is one of the most vacuous defenses of abortion in existence.
Praxedes wrote:
I dated a boy my age all through high school and remained a virgin. What a concept.
What a fascinating coincidence! I dated several different girls (and went steady for well over a year with one of them) throughout high school and college, and my wife and I were still both virgins when we married. What are the odds? :)
Paladin
you and Praxedes are rare breeds these days. If everyone understand why its OKAY TO WAIT, we’d have a LOT LESS STD infections. And a lot less broken hearts (both boys and girls).
I didn’t watch the video, but I’m not sure what I would say…..especially if the girl was using profanity.
Take heart Liz!!!
http://townhall.com/news/religion/2010/10/15/70_of_high_school_students_are_virgins,_study_reports
Megan wrote: Ninek: I’m sorry about what happened to you. I did feel quite relieved after my abortion, but the providers asked for my consent at each point in the process up until it actually happened. Yours seems much more tragic (and no, I’m not being snarky).
Wow! Thank you, Megan. I honestly appreciate that.
Attention: Don’t click on “Mike Edwards” name/link. It will take you right to a male enhancement advertisement. Gross, gross, and more gross! No thank you, my husband is just fine.
Praxedes, that’s a very good point. Perhaps the relationship isn’t sexual. All the more reason to approach the situation cautiously.
If I were a teacher and I found out one of my 16-year-old students was dating a 20-year old. What to do? Well, instead of immediately calling the cops or her parents, I’d sit her down and talk to her. Like the almost-adult person she is. I’d figure out who this guy is; if he’s a caretaker of any sort, or a coach, in which case I’d have to notify the appropriate authorities immediately. Otherwise I’d ask her about the situation, what kind of relationship it is, whether her parents (or other legal guardians) know about it. I’d ask her if she understands the implications of dating an older man.
You can find out more from talking than taking a reactionary approach. Say this girl is dating an older guy because she doesn’t have any money and he buys her nice things. Or what if she’s afraid of telling her parents because they might be abusive? Getting more information first can help you figure out what course of action to take, whether to call the school guidance counselor, her parents, a social worker, law enforcement, or empower HER to take action.
Megan,
There are certain adolescents that are preyed upon. They may be shy and quiet and looking for ANYONE who will give them positive attention. Adult males know this. Pedophiles know this. They know which kids are more vulnerable than others.
So should we.
She doesn’t have any money and he buys her nice things is A Ok then? Sounds like grooming to me.
And if her parents are abusive? That again falls under the Mandatory Reporting thang.
Carla,
It’s not ok. I absolutely agree with you. The thing is, it might be better to talk to a counselor of social worker first. The police often handle matters like this in what you’d call an “indelicate” fashion, and so I’d caution against going straight to them.
Great. I’m glad Megan not only has total power over life and death, Universe Queen-style, but now also knows better than a kid’s own parent(s).
I’m sorry, but if I found out you “empowered HER to take action.” instead of calling me, I’d get reactionary all over your face, and his butt.
I’m proud to be an “indelicate” person. Sometimes that’s the only way to take care of business and protect your own.
If a young girl needs help I will stop at nothing to get her that help. I was a teacher. I worked with Child Protection. I reported suspected abuse as I was mandated to by law.
Xalisae,
I cannot help but picturing what would happen to any fool that would stand in the way of me being there for my daughter!!
Well, “getting reactionary all over my face” qualifies as harassment, for one. And in that case I would be pretty afraid for your daughter. I’d probably recommend you all to family counseling. But seriously, you’re coming from the position of being a responsible, caring parent, xal. It’s not like that everywhere. A teacher can act in loco parentis and make decisions based on what seems best for the minor, and talking to a counselor or social worker first might put the girl in less immediate harm than calling mom and dad.
Plus a statutory offense is NOT considered “child abuse” in all states. Even the DHHS points out that states typically take other factors into consideration, like age differential, relationship, etc., and that reporting laws differe widely: http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/08/sr/statelaws/execsum.shtml
I think you’re missing the point. Not taking an immediately punitive approach doesn’t mean turning a blind eye. It means being smart and making sound assessments. Teenagers are sensitive about sex. If they think they’re going to get punished for having sex, if you’re going to call the cops on them and their partner, they aren’t going to seek the help they need. Why do you think girls get abortions? Because they’re afraid of their parents finding out. Afraid of getting in trouble. Afraid of seeing their boyfriends (no matter how sleazy) being sent to jail and feeling responsible for it. And young pregnant girls don’t seek early prenatal care for the same reasons. Say a girl gets pregnant and acquires HIV. Would you want her to be too scared to seek early help for fear of getting in trouble? Would you want her to delay seeking treatment for herself and her unborn child, increasing the likelihood that the baby will be born HIV positive?
Anecdote: The summer school I worked at linked up with an HIV prevention program for a few weeks. I met a girl who got kicked out of school for getting pregnant and wanting to keep the baby. Yes, it’s horrible–this happens in NY. There are specially-designated schools for pregnant girls, so administrators can say, “adios,” without helping the girl find a school, make the transition, etc. It’s basically like saying, “Ok, we don’t want to deal with this, seeya.” And where were her parents? Gone. Drugged out. The police didn’t particularly care, since she was poor. The only services she had were at that HIV clinic, who thankfully helped her find shelter, food, clothing, a job, etc. Sometimes the adults who are supposed to be most supportive end up really dropping the ball.
And please do not insinuate that I suggested she get an abortion. She wanted a baby and deserved to do what felt right for her.
The point is to protect the minor – no matter how enamored she was of the older boyfriend. The mandatory reporting is to protect her. And the school counselors and social workers can help with the family situations.
Here in our sister city, there was a teacher and he abused young girls in his class – these were either older elementary school or younger middle school girls. In this case – he was finally known to be a problem by the administration and they did not report him or directly remove him. He even came from a school district that got rid of him and allowed him to go to another school system, leaving destruction in his wake.
He finally had the legal system involved, had a trial and is now in jail. And the state took the administrators of the last school and prosecuted them for not reporting him as soon as they knew there was a problem.
But because school officials took the matters into their hands first, a score of other girls got abused.
We have great social workers here – and they could have handled the parents. It’s better to act on the side of caution and protect the girl. If she has to be protected from her parents, that can be done.
Why do you think girls get abortions? Because they’re afraid of their parents finding out. Afraid of getting in trouble. Afraid of seeing their boyfriends (no matter how sleazy) being sent to jail and feeling responsible for it.
Parents get upset and get over it. Sleazy boyfriends come and go. Girls become stronger when they face their fears. These things are all temporary. Aborting your child is forever.
Why do you think girls get abortions?
GIRLS GET ABORTIONS BECAUSE PEOPLE LIKE YOU CONTINUE TO SUPPORT THE LEGALIZED KILLING OF THEIR CHILDREN!
How can you watch the young girl at the top of this thread and still possibly believe that abortion in any way, shape or form is a positive for women? Nice prochoice buddy she’s got, eh? She’s all hyped on on painkillers and who knows what else and he’s the best friend videotaping her with that skimpy top on. Nothing like more objectification of women.
In case you missed it Megan: GIRLS GET ABORTIONS BECAUSE PEOPLE LIKE YOU CONTINUE TO SUPPORT THE LEGALIZED KILLING OF THEIR CHILDREN!
Yes! I’m shouting too!
Try saying that to a pregnant 15-year-old: “Your parents are going to be mad but they’ll get over it.” It’s not likely to register. They’re going to freak out if their parents are strict. It will seem like the end of the world to them, regardless of what the parents might or might not do. And they might go get an abortion, even if they’re considering keeping it. Life isn’t like Juno. Kids are scared of their parents, especially uber-conservative ones.
And sure, if abortion weren’t legal, lots of these girls would end up giving birth (maybe after asking their boyfriends to hit them in the stomach). Abortion might last forever, as you say, but what’s healthier, forcing a 15-year-old to give birth against her will? What if no amount of baby love can ease that pain?
Joy: I totally agree with you.
Megan,
You have post after post stating that mandatory reporting is bad policy. Then you say you agree with Joy when Joy says:
“The point is to protect the minor – no matter how enamored she was of the older boyfriend. The mandatory reporting is to protect her. ”
You Megan are a striking example of the duplicitous liberal mind bending technique.
“A teacher can act in loco parentis and make decisions based on what seems best for the minor, and talking to a counselor or social worker first might put the girl in less immediate harm than calling mom and dad.”
Megan,
Just, curious, would you ever take a minor pregnant girl to get an abortion without notification of her parents? Are you in favor of parental notification laws?
Duplicitous liberal mind bending technique. At least I have one. Tell me, how is it acting in an adolescent’s best interest to call the cops on her if you find out she’s been canoodling with a twenty-year-old? That’s the kind of “raid and rescue” tactic characteristic of conservative men. Shame the sluts, send ’em home to daddy for reckonin’. No wonder pregnancy teen rates are so high in red states. I can just imagine what you’d say if you found a condom in your daughter’s backpack. Shudder.
Janet:
I would never take a minor girl to a health clinic for a reproductive concern. That would be acting beyond my professional boundaries. The best I could do would be to offer neutral information on her options and gather resources related to each one. And I do support girls talking to their parents about abortion. Obviously an adolescent will have fears, and maybe her parents will be supportive. But “mandatory” laws are intrusive. If a girl isn’t willing to say something to mom or dad, there’s probably some kind of communication problem, a problem with trust. Maybe her parents will punish her severely, or inflict physical violence on her. Or maybe she became pregnant by a family friend, or a family member. Imagine having to get consent for an abortion from the father who impregnated you. How fair is that?
“Duplicitous liberal mind bending technique. At least I have one.”
And a mind is a terible thing to waste. If only you could get your mind to control your fingers and stop them from typing your thoughts.
Oooh, good one. Is this going to be a fun game of mudslinging? I’ll welcome it. Noticed that you haven’t put yourself on the line in terms of personal info. Why not, Truthsy? Maybe because it will become painfully obvious that you have no reason to act as an authority on any matter of sexuality, morality or law? Just a greying old man listening to conservative talk radio while his wife does the dishes. Getting out every once and a while for a coffee and to shake a rosary at the nearest PP.
“Tell me, how is it acting in an adolescent’s best interest to call the cops on her if you find out she’s been canoodling with a twenty-year-old?”
Are you serious Megan? Did you really mean to say why would you say call the cops on HER? Isn’t SHE the adolescent in this scenario? Yes I am conservative and yes I would call the cops on HIM and get his canoodle locked up and away from her till she was a legal adult. Now if you had asked how is it in her best interest to call the cops on the rapist, that is an easy answer. Cause she WONT have to deal with a pregnancy as an unemancipated minor/adolescent. Remember getting prego and aborting? If you report statutory rape you are reducing the possibility that this particular pedator will continue raping her and also reducing the possibility of her getting pregnant while she is still a child herself.
What personal info would you like to know most about me Megan?
Get real, truthseeker. You call the cops and both parties are implicated. Her parents find out. Her community finds out. She is shamed. He might end up in jail, but she sure as heck won’t be confiding in a trusted adult any time soon about her problems, or heading to the local health clinic to get tested for HIV the next time she puts out.
Megan,
Adolescents girls should not be having sex with adult men and keeping it from their parents. Do you or people you know have a vested interest in Planned Parenthood? I know Planned Parenthood has a vested interest in pushing promiscuous behaviour on minors and on teaching minors to use contraception and have sex behind their parents backs; but why would you feel that way Megan?
Well, if you’re a decent enough parent, shouldn’t your daughter be impervious to the supposed malfeasance of Planned Parenthood? If your daughter isn’t talking to you about her sex life, it’s probably because she knows you’ll put her on lockdown. Basic adolescent psychology.
But you know, you called it. I secretly want to entice teenage girls down to PP’s radical lesbian collective farm in Tennessee. It’s where we make them all swear an oath to hate men and their fathers and mothers forever and ever and to partipate in commune-wide orgies and get pregnant so that the clinic can make money off of them and invest it back in the grand communist take-over plot.
Oohh, nice stereotyping of pro-lifers, Megan, eventhough we represent various backgrounds and belief systems and it seems the majority here are either women working in professional careers (and let us not forget home-makers are a valid and full-time job too!) and/or in college.
“Tell me, how is it acting in an adolescent’s best interest to call the cops on her if you find out she’s been canoodling with a twenty-year-old”
It’s called statutory rape – you know the idea that an older man might possibly manipulate a much younger female or possibly coerce her into sexual relations.
I know this sort of thing confounds PP, because after all in their minds all girls past puberty should have the right to have sex (or so it seems).
The bottom line Megan, is that PP is in the business of handing out contraceptives. Contraceptives fail bringing their “clients” back again for abortion – which they view also as a “contraceptive”/”birth control”.
If they actually cared about the girls in these situations they would call the police. But as Lila Rose has demonstrated, they don’t give a damn.
“Get real, truthseeker. You call the cops and both parties are implicated. Her parents find out. Her community finds out. She is shamed.”
Hardly. First off, there is a protocol about how these things are handled. Where I live there is a publication ban even on the names of parents if it will identify the children involved. The offending adult IS named however, as he should be.
Secondly, her parents SHOULD find out. The have a moral responsibility towards her whether she likes it or not.
And these days, there isn’t much of a sense of shame about anything, anymore.
Her parents find out. Her community finds out.
Another wild concept. I want to know what adults are having sex with children in my community and unless its my child I don’t need to know who the children are.
How old were you when you aborted your child Megan? How old was your sex partner? Did you tell your parents?
Megan wrote:
And sure, if abortion weren’t legal, lots of these girls would end up giving birth (maybe after asking their boyfriends to hit them in the stomach).
I really have to shake my head in sorrow and amazement when you write things like this, Megan. Your “let’s keep abortion legal, because they’re going to do it anyway” is utterly foolish (didn’t I just get done saying that?), and I suspect you know it, at least on some level. Try the same argument with murder and rape laws, and you might (?) see what I mean. Drop that particular argument, Megan; it’s a no-starter.
Abortion might last forever, as you say, but what’s healthier, forcing a 15-year-old to give birth against her will?
“Murder is forever, but what’s healthier: forcing someone to endure a person you hate? Forcing a rapist to restrain his lust?” Think about what you’re saying! I’ll be blunt, and answer you clearly: yes, it’s “healthier” (odd choice of words, btw) to prevent a 15-year-old child from having her baby murdered by dismemberment. Care to try to explain why that’s not true, without recourse to all the drama-ridden rhetorical questions?
What if no amount of baby love can ease that pain?
Tell you what: do some research, and come up with as many stories as you can of women who say, “I wish I hadn’t given birth to that baby; I wish I’d have killed her before she was born.” I’m genuinely curious, here… because it really sounds as if you’re talking from ignorance and wishful thinking, here.
It really makes me wonder whether you have a true loathing of motherhood in general; you (and DD, and others of like mind) have often described motherhood and childbirth in the most macabre, dark, Machiavellian terms that you can conjure. It makes me wonder whether you’re on the same planet as the women (some of whom also had unexpected pregnancies) who (while not at all ignoring the sacrifices of pregnancy and motherhood) describe the birth of their child as a glorious gift, and a veritable window into Heaven!
Forgive me, Megan, but I think your own abortion is colouring and screening out the glorious aspects of motherhood that you never allowed yourself to experience. You started with your experience of horror and panic, and the death of your child (with your own consent) “froze” you in that state. How can we ever convince you that there’s more to it than in your understanding?
Go look for those stories (mentioned above), and maybe that’ll help. Math (i.e. the paucity of results) may succeed where emotional appeals fail.
Okay Praxedes. I’m sure you’d like the local newspapers plastered with, say, the face of your 19-year-old son who thought that 16-year-old in Latin class was reaaalllly cute. Or how about my partner’s brother, an avowed member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, recently engaged to a girl six years his junior? At age 20, she would’ve been 14. What if they had expressed interest in each other while she was a teengager–should this have been deemed wildly inappropriate?
The statutory issue is COMPLICATED, precisely because they don’t want to scare kids from confiding in social service agencies and adults. The DHHS even recommends that people proceed with caution: is it consensual? are they peers? what’s the age differential? what does the guy do for a living? And btw, my father worked in juvie for years. He does know how these things pan out. Police aren’t trained in matters of sensitivity, let’s just say.
Praxedes: Both in our early twenties, and yes, my parents knew.
Paladin: Enough with the purple prose. Sorry to be rude, but sometimes reading your comments is like sitting through a lecture on Proust. And you’re just patently wrong in some instances. “Abortion going underground” is an important issue to consider, because unlike rape or murder, the health of a woman is potentially at stake. Whether you’re prolife or prochoice, it must be acknowledged that women will still attempt abortions. Let’s face it, your efforts to change hearts and minds (aww) just aren’t going to overpower everybody’s attitutes toward motherhood. So what to do? It’s a public health consideration. In countries like Nicaragua where there’s a total ban, hospitals are often hesitant to treat women who harm themselves during a self-abortion attempt, for fear that authorities will consider them to be “aiding and abetting.”
Who do you think PP is run by, a bunch of sexless robots? They’re women. Many have faced unexpected pregnancies themselves and been glad for the abortion option. They didn’t want to endure it, face the hardship, the prospect of raising a child for 18 years, etc. NOT because they hate children, or hate motherhood. I can’t wait to be a mother, to adopt a child in need. But I digress. The question of whether content/relieved post-abortive women “would have been happier or not” with a child is absolutely moot, and quite frankly, insulting. If my father goes in for major surgery, you can bet as hell his doctor won’t say, “How can we ever convince you that there’s more to it than in your understanding?” You might want to find a different, less obviously patronizing way of framing your concern, bucko. Argue for the rights of my unborn fetus, whatever, but to imply that I wasn’t, and still am not, a rational actor and don’t know what’s best for me (and that you do!) is vomit-inducing.
You’re right, there might not be any stories of miserable mothers on the web. Which website wants to host a forum entitled, “I decided to give birth and I really hate this whole gig and can’t stand the sight of my child?” Right, because there’s no acceptable outlet for negative maternal thinking. The most visible cases are when something goes horrribly awry. Andrea Yates and Casey Anthony are two that come to mind, and I’m sure you can think of some more.
Megan Wrote: And sure, if abortion weren’t legal, lots of these girls would end up giving birth (maybe after asking their boyfriends to hit them in the stomach).
Abortion might last forever, as you say, but what’s healthier, forcing a 15-year-old to give birth against her will?
You don’t know that. Why do pro-choicers always frame the argument that a woman is being forced to carry an unplanned pregnancy to term against her will if she is not given the option of abortion nor chooses abortion and attach such stigmatiing labels and negative connotations such as “brood mare” and “incubator” to carrying an unplanned pregnancy to term? Also, consider that from dialouge with women who’ve had an abortion, we learn that most women don’t choose abortion as an act of empowerment against the so-called chains of motherhood, but rather as an act of desperation in a difficult situation because of a lack of emotional support and socio-ecomic resources. So why then not instead of offering abortion as the best option and attachinh such negativity aand stigma to continuing an unplanned pregnancy and against motherhood, empower these women with the support, resources, and skills they need in order to have a healthy pregnancy, learn and strengthen parenting skills, build self-esteemand self confidence, build healthier relationships, and further their education and to stregthen and develop their job skills.
So its worth letting the older man take advantage of a young girl because if we butt in she might not get an HIV test? Come on Megan! So if this girl gets an HIV test and its positive, then what? We might have saved her a certain death sentence and a lifetime of medications and pain and sorrow if we were protecting her from perverts in the first place.
I never understand the love affair with HIV testing that liberals have. Once the result is positive its already too late. Pro-lifers are trying to prevent the need for an HIV test in the first place.
Rachael: By “most” women, you mean the staunch prolifers on this website who had negative experiences with abortion? All options should be viable. You can empower a woman to the nth degree, but ultimately the decision to continue a pregnancy or not is her responsibility.
Sydney: You’re missing the point. I’m talking about a reactionary approach. You know, calling the cops, calling her parents, calling thd dude. Speaking with the girl calmly and then contacting a social worker to understand how to proceed isn’t inaction in the least. And yes, if a girl perceives that she will get in trouble, she’s less likely to reach out to the trusted adults around her. What’s that you guys always say about help and hope and healing? Don’t you want to create a trusting environment where she feels safe? Yeah.
The liberal love-affair with HIV testing. Really? When conservatives have fought tooth-and-nail over HIV education classes in public schools? You know, where they teach kids the basics of protection and the importance of respect in relationships (meaning fidelity)? Hm. All you’ve got to offer the at-risk is a Bible and a nasty tongue. “It’s too late.” Would you ever say that to an HIV-positive adolescent, in an era when ARV therapy is helping positive individuals lead longer, healthier lives? Do you even know how many babies are prevented from contracting HIV each year because their mothers were tested at prenatal clinics and given appropriate treatment? Yeah, I thought so. You really are as ignorant as they come.
Megan, you are falling back on your sarcasm again here when you say “But you know, you called it. I secretly want to entice teenage girls down to PP’s radical lesbian collective farm in Tennessee. It’s where we make them all swear an oath to hate men and their fathers and mothers forever and ever and to partipate in commune-wide orgies and get pregnant so that the clinic can make money off of them and invest it back in the grand communist take-over plot.”
Try to give an honest answer without sarcasm Megan. I know it gets you in trouble when you do because some realy ugly things come out, but it is the best way you can work through your issues. I’ll ask again, “I know Planned Parenthood has a vested interest in pushing promiscuous behaviour on minors and on teaching minors to use contraception and have sex behind their parents backs; but why would you feel that way Megan?”
I wouldn’t call it “promoting,” first of all. If a girl feels comfortable with her parents, she should be able to talk to them about sex. Parents should be the primary source of information about sex and it’s their decision to set forth some house rules. But let’s face it, kids don’t always do what their parents want them to do, whether out of irrational or legitimate fear. The conversation here is about doing what’s in the best interest for the girl. Turning her “in” to her parents for having sex is punitive, and punishment leads to rebellion. Are you a father?
I’m sure you’d like the local newspapers plastered with, say, the face of your 19-year-old son who thought that 16-year-old in Latin class was reaaalllly cute. Or how about my partner’s brother, an avowed member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, recently engaged to a girl six years his junior? At age 20, she would’ve been 14. What if they had expressed interest in each other while she was a teengager–should this have been deemed wildly inappropriate?
Yes. A 14 year old’s reasoning and life experience are not the same as those of a 20 year old. What does an 8th grader have in common with a guy in college? (Or a better question, SHOULD an 8th grader have ANYTHING in common with an adult male in college?) See the difference? My sister-in-law and brother-in-law are six years apart. They met as ADULTS. There is a huge difference there.
By “most” women, you mean the staunch prolifers on this website who had negative experiences with abortion?
Before I became a “staunch prolifer” I was prochoice. I tried to get others to abort so I wouldn’t have to face the fact that I paid someone to kill my first child. I said the same things that you say now, Megan.
Megan wrote, in reply to my comments:
Enough with the purple prose. Sorry to be rude, but sometimes reading your comments is like sitting through a lecture on Proust.
Your commentary on my style is noted and logged, Megan. Begging your pardon, but: I’m not going to change my basic style to suit your tastes. I won’t go out of my way to insult or aggravate you, no; but you’re just going to have to bite the bullet and endure whatever “colours of prose” I offer you. If I were blunt and crass, you’d gripe about that; if I were profane, caustic and foul-mouthed, you’d find complaint there, as well. Let’s stick to addressing substance, rather than style (so long as we’re both civil), all right? Your own style can be irritating to me, as well, but I haven’t been making a fuss about that.
And you’re just patently wrong in some instances. “Abortion going underground” is an important issue to consider, because unlike rape or murder, the health of a woman is potentially at stake.
You’ve missed my point, completely. When you say, “We’d better allow it, because people will do it anyway”, you’re talking nonsense; or else you’d also approve of abolishing all laws against rape and murder (and more), since people obviously “do it anyway”. As for health: don’t you think that a murderer might be in danger of health risks in the circumstances surrounding the murder? Shootouts with police, high-speed chases, mismanagement of murder weapons in a fit of passion–heavens, and that isn’t even starting to consider the emotional trauma of being hunted by the law (whose stress can present all sorts of long-term health risks) and the potential social shame of being stigmatized as a law-breaking murderer! Think of what’s at stake!
Get my point? And this is completely aside from the MOST important issue: that we’re simply not free to use evil means to achieve our ends (even if the ends are good). I’m not morally free to murder you to get your money or property, or to stop you from keeping me awake by snoring in the apartment above me; you’re not morally free to kill your baby in order to safeguard your health, or to reduce your stress, or what-have-you.
Whether you’re prolife or prochoice, it must be acknowledged that women will still attempt abortions.
Some will, no doubt. Some will also attempt infanticide, of which I assume you don’t approve. (See below for more on that.)
Let’s face it, your efforts to change hearts and minds (aww) just aren’t going to overpower everybody’s attitutes toward motherhood.
Aside from your snark (were you seriously giving *me* grief for *my* style?): are you telling me that you (Megan) AREN’T “trying to change hearts and minds” on the abortion issue? You don’t want to see the number of abortions diminished? You find abortion to be a positive, desirable good?
So what to do? It’s a public health consideration.
I already commented on this; the health of the baby is destroyed, yes?
In countries like Nicaragua where there’s a total ban, hospitals are often hesitant to treat women who harm themselves during a self-abortion attempt, for fear that authorities will consider them to be “aiding and abetting.”
Then they need to be educated in sound medical ethics. How would you respond to hospital workers who refuse to treat someone’s injuries gotten in a murder, rape or robbery attempt? The morally sensible thing to do would be to treat the woman, and then transfer her to the prisoner wing of the hospital (barring extraordinary and grave circumstances).
Who do you think PP is run by, a bunch of sexless robots? They’re women. Many have faced unexpected pregnancies themselves and been glad for the abortion option.
“It’s okay, because some people want it.” I see. Your collection of fallacies is growing, Megan.
They didn’t want to endure it, face the hardship, the prospect of raising a child for 18 years, etc.
And hardships such as you describe do not, and will never justify, murder of a child. I fail to see why you can’t grasp that. It’s the core point of our argument.
NOT because they hate children, or hate motherhood.
Perhaps not in the absolute sense. Some murderers murder not out of hatred, but out of a desire to feel powerful (and they don’t even know their victims). This really doesn’t further your point, at all.
The question of whether content/relieved post-abortive women “would have been happier or not” with a child is absolutely moot, and quite frankly, insulting.
So… why did you bring it up (i.e. “they would have been burdened, miserable, etc., and no one should ask them to suffer such torture, grief, etc.”)?
If my father goes in for major surgery, you can bet as hell his doctor won’t say, “How can we ever convince you that there’s more to it than in your understanding?” You might want to find a different, less obviously patronizing way of framing your concern, bucko.
(*sigh*) “Patronizing.” Right. When you’re wrong, and I call you on it, you call me “patronizing”. Knock yourself out, Megan.
You had just finished insinuating that “nothing could ‘ease the pain’ of ‘forcing a 15-year-old’ to carry a pregnancy to term” (and your portrayal is upside-down; if anyone “forced” her to become pregnant, it was the biological father; we’re just trying to keep her from adding murder to rape). Your portrayal was an exercise in rhetorical hyperventilation that did your imagination proud, but which left reality and sanity behind in the dust. Honestly: you dramatize pregnancy as a worse-than-death-sentence, and you then have the nerve to complain about the rhetoric of others?
Argue for the rights of my unborn fetus, whatever, but to imply that I wasn’t, and still am not, a rational actor and don’t know what’s best for me (and that you do!) is vomit-inducing.
You flatly asserted that murder of a child was far preferable to “forcing” a girl to carry a pregnancy to term. I described how that view is downright madness. You don’t like that. So be it.
You’re right, there might not be any stories of miserable mothers on the web.
Who’s limiting it to the web? Search any type of media you like.
Which website wants to host a forum entitled, “I decided to give birth and I really hate this whole gig and can’t stand the sight of my child?”
No sane ones, anyway.
Right, because there’s no acceptable outlet for negative maternal thinking.
Ah. So you think there are untold numbers of women out there who secretly regret their non-abortions, and would kill their child in-utero if given the chance to do it again? You have no evidence for this bizarre and macabre vision of yours Megan, and I’ll keep calling it stuff and nonsense until you do.
The most visible cases are when something goes horrribly awry. Andrea Yates and Casey Anthony are two that come to mind, and I’m sure you can think of some more.
Interesting cases. Both entail the deaths of *born* children; do you approve of what they did? SHouldn’t they have been free to do as they did, without the stigma of prison, insanity diagnoses, etc.? So far, your examples are limited to people who were willing to kill, born or unborn; and that really wasn’t what I requested. If you’re going to paint horror stories of “trapped, oppressed girls who would gladly have killed their unborn children, if only the world would have offered some toleration and understanding”, then I’m quite within my rights to ask you for evidence for those stories, yes?
What if they had expressed interest in each other while she was a teengager–should this have been deemed wildly inappropriate?
Here is where I would swear if I could. Yes, Megan. Wildly inappropriate.
Thanks Kel for your explanation. I understand why PP supporters LOVE these ‘relationships.’
Abortion is a ghoul that feeds on secrecy and lies.
Teenager’s brains are not fully developed. They don’t have a sense of what they will or won’t regret 10 years in the future. A teenager doesn’t ask an adult to be as responsible as another adult. A 22 year old guy with no prospects for the future looks like a loser to a 22 year old girl. But a teenager? Oh, he’s so cute, he drives, and tells me I’m so wonderful… A teenage girl will not have the same impatience with his immaturity. That’s one of the reasons creeps target young girls.
Wasn’t Andrea Yates post-abortive?
And, if you want to talk about “forced motherhood”, Casey Anthony is a good example. However, rather than kill her child through abortion, she had actually at the very beginning of her pregnancy, arranged for a former classmate of hers to adopt her child. The grandmother found out later and made her call the whole thing off. I don’t see what the big deal is for you though, Megan. Abortion in the womb, or abortion a couple years down the line, potato/po-tah-toe, right?
I wish I knew where Megan worked. I bet they’d be interested to learn her position on mandatory reporting.
Is that a threat, Xalisae? It’s a pretty crappy attempt at one. I know you have the moral code of a Viking but other people in this country understand nuance a little better. The laws differ from state to state, and the DHHS asks concerned parties to use discretion where a late adolescent is concerned. The age differential between 14 and 22 is pretty big, but what about 16 and 19? You’ve already answered that one, but not the others. Dear Praxedes, you got a call from the police because your son, who’s a senior in high school, was caught in a compromised position with a neighborhood sophomore. Inappropriate contact with a minor. Statutory rape. Congratulations, your son’s officially a sexual pervert and the girl gets off scott-free. What to do??
And you do know that most abortions happen in the early-twenties age group, right? And research shows that the YOUNGER the adolescent, the more likely she is to give birth. Score one for the pro-lifers, minus one for the pro-aborts!! Oh, but PP’s surely raking in the dough from all the 14-year-olds it extracts $400 for the abortion. I suppose OB/GYNS and hospitals don’t receive thousands of dollars every time they deliver a baby, not to mention cash for the epidural, the episiotomy, the bed, the food, the high touch, etc. Thank God for Medicaid, eh? In real-world terms that’s groceries for a year, a down-payment on a car, one semester’s tuition. Who’s talking big money now?
PalXal: I bet you couldn’t look me in the eye and say you think Caylee Anthony’s murder is morally the same as an abortion would have been. And Rusty Yates was of a Quiverfull mindset and deliberately manipulated a wife that already demonstrated she was having a hard time emotionally raising so many kids. But you know, people like you who claim to know so much about women’s embodied experiences related to reproduction can’t seem to get it that a woman might not be overjoyed at the thought of being pregnant. Go on yahoo and google “I hate my baby.” It’s quite tragic. So you’ve got the high profile murder cases, the quiet cries of misery, and the situation that occurred when Nebraska softened its safe-haven child drop-off policy. Kids abandoned at state hospitals left and right. But they’re all insane, right Pal?
Yep Pal, you really are a champion for women. I know you’d clamor to be on whatever ethics board your imagined Handmaids Tale future calls for. “Oh hallo, we’ve got a Mrs. Paladin here today. Just had a miscarriage, don’t know if it was self-induced or not. Looks like we’ll have to have the ethics board check the situation out. But we’re really busy right now so she’ll have to wait in the penitentary next door.” Is that the kind of future you want to see become reality?
Wow. Megan gets a little touchy when she’s doing damage control. I guess publicly admitting you think statutory rape is a-ok will do that to ya, though. And once again, just as in the case of abortion, being able to comprehend the difference between right and wrong is attempted to be portrayed as ignorance or a lack of understanding. If condoning abortion and statutory rape is what passes for sophistication these days, I’m proud to be Viking-esque.
I bet you couldn’t look me in the eye and say you think Caylee Anthony’s murder is morally the same as an abortion would have been.
I can, I would, and I’ve said as much before on this very board in the past. I would seriously think that someone who had already rationalized the killing of her own child via abortion could understand that it’s the same process when they do it just a little later down the road.
PalXal: I bet you couldn’t look me in the eye and say you think Caylee Anthony’s murder is morally the same as an abortion would have been.
You really shouldn’t be so free with your money. I can’t look you in the eye through the internet, but please believe that I’m dead-serious when I say this: there is no substantial moral difference (in the sense of the unborn child’s murder being somehow “less grave”) between an abortion and Caylee’s murder, or an abortion and the murder of Terri Schiavo, or an abortion and the murder of any other human being who ever lived. The fact that you might not have the capacity to believe me on that point does not affect the reality in the least. If anything, the murder of the unborn child is even more grave, since the child is even more innocent, more helpless, and more dependent on her mother; under no sane circumstance can abortion be called a “lesser crime” than any other murder. Culpability might be lessened through cultural brainwashing and coercion (though you’ve been indignant at such suggestions, in the past, if memory serves…), but that’s a separate matter. See below.
And Rusty Yates was of a Quiverfull mindset and deliberately manipulated a wife that already demonstrated she was having a hard time emotionally raising so many kids.
If Andrea Yates was truly manipulated and emotionally abused, then her culpability was lessened, thereby; I have no idea, frankly. If any woman is manipulated and pressured into an abortion, her culpability would be lessened, thereby, as well. How does this advance your point (whatever it is)?
But you know, people like you who claim to know so much about women’s embodied experiences related to reproduction can’t seem to get it that a woman might not be overjoyed at the thought of being pregnant.
Now, you’re just being snarky and silly. Re-read my posts, and you’ll see that you’re talking nonsense, here. I presented the fact that some “pregnancy-regretting” women, after giving birth to their child, change their attitude completely (as opposed to your all-black “horror story” version, which I was specifically criticizing); nowhere did I say that there wouldn’t be occasional women who still wish to kill their children.
Go on yahoo and google “I hate my baby.” It’s quite tragic. So you’ve got the high profile murder cases, the quiet cries of misery, and the situation that occurred when Nebraska softened its safe-haven child drop-off policy. Kids abandoned at state hospitals left and right. But they’re all insane, right Pal?
Good grief; can you calm down? You purport to be logical and a “voice of reason”, but then you lapse into virtual hysterics when you’re pressed for details and reasoning. What point, exactly, are you trying to make, here? This is all over the map…
Yep Pal, you really are a champion for women. I know you’d clamor to be on whatever ethics board your imagined Handmaids Tale future calls for. “Oh hallo, we’ve got a Mrs. Paladin here today. Just had a miscarriage, don’t know if it was self-induced or not. Looks like we’ll have to have the ethics board check the situation out. But we’re really busy right now so she’ll have to wait in the penitentary next door.” Is that the kind of future you want to see become reality?
In your sarcastic tirade, did you forget your own example?
[Megan]
In countries like Nicaragua where there’s a total ban, hospitals are often hesitant to treat women who harm themselves during a self-abortion attempt, for fear that authorities will consider them to be “aiding and abetting.”
If you want to change your example to “non-self-abortion attempt” or “unknown situation”, fine… then tell me so. I was replying to what you’d written. Is that not acceptable, somehow?
Truthseeker was right: when your points are pushed, you have a nasty habit of throwing discourse out the window, and spitting sarcastic venom in all directions. Knock it off, eh? If you have a solid point, it can be made without the histrionics.
Dear Praxedes, you got a call from the police because your son, who’s a senior in high school, was caught in a compromised position with a neighborhood sophomore.
The law states an 18 year old is an adult and is responsible for his own behavior. Why would the cops call me if he were over 18? My son might call me but the cops wouldn’t. Statutory rape is statutory rape whether it involves someone I know or not, male or female. Do you think I would ask the cops or the girl to cover it up to give my son a break?
You don’t want the parents or cops to be involved when a child is under 18 but you think the cops should call the parents when people break the law as adults.
Go figure.
But you know, people like you who claim to know so much about women’s embodied experiences related to reproduction can’t seem to get it that a woman might not be overjoyed at the thought of being pregnant.
And actually, Megan, I have full understanding of a woman not being overjoyed at the thought of being pregnant. I wasn’t when I found out my daughter was inside me. But, she was still my daughter, and I’m just not self-centered enough to be a sociopath. ;_;
This statement from a pro-abortionist just makes me laugh:
“…and the situation that occurred when Nebraska softened its safe-haven child drop-off policy. Kids abandoned at state hospitals left and right…”
Yeah! THOSE KIDS SHOULD’VE BEEN KILLED MONTHS AGO! lol
Megan asked,”are you a father.”
Yes Megan I am. My gravatar is a picture of one of my three sons. I also have three daughters.
Yep, and what a novel idea that is. End a pregnancy when it’s six weeks along and still inside a mother’s body (and yes, under her ultimate jurisdiction) vs. putting a born child through hell (and potential death). Hm. In terms of net suffering, I’d say it’s worse to be killed when you have a fully-developed neurological system, but whatevs, believe what you want.
Paladin:
I don’t even know what you’re talking about anymore. Yes, I do get worked up when I’m irritated, which is something I won’t apologize for. But culling that back-and-forth for something useful to proceed with: ah, pregnancy and its health implications (not moral). I understand that abortion might not be the right choice for every woman, but also that pregnancy isn’t always a Joy from Heaven. Your opinion on the matter is skewed by your moral inclinations. Regardless of what you think about the moral status of a fetus, you have no authority whatsoever to claim that abortion is more harmful to a woman’s physical and mental psyche than giving birth to an unwanted child. Make all the claims you want about fetal rights, but please do not make unfounded generalizations and blanket statements about what’s “good,” healthwise, for a woman. It makes you sound, quite frankly, very paternalistic.
Megan,
Do you believe there is such a thing as a spiritual existense? Were you aware that 80% of the worlds population believes in God? And those people understand that loss of your soul is much worse for a persons health then any kind of physical or mental difficulty. Choosing to extinguish the life inside you is a grievous offense against the Giver of Life. When these 80 % of people see the truth they repent because the loss of your soul is much worse for a persons health then any kind of physical or mental difficulty. Out of the remaining 20% who do NOT believe in God many still believe abortion is wrong. So when you state that you feel no regrets about your abortion we feel saddness. We see this poor lost girl who tweeted this abortion; and she said she was sorry that she made the right choice; Huh? She is definitely going to feel regret and the people who killed her baby and traumatized her should be jailed.
In terms of net suffering, I’d say it’s worse to be killed when you have a fully-developed neurological system, but whatevs, believe what you want.
And in terms of overall health and well-being of a child, medically, I’d say dead is a more clinically severe condition than not dead, and at least the kids in Nebraska were being given a chance to recover. But, you want to try and make yourself feel better about killing your child by telling yourself you “saved” them from some horrible imagined life they hadn’t even had the chance to live yet…so…believe what you want. Whatevs. Suffering can get better. Dead is forever, in or out of the womb.
Megan wrote:
Yep, and what a novel idea that is. End a pregnancy when it’s six weeks along and still inside a mother’s body (and yes, under her ultimate jurisdiction) vs. putting a born child through hell (and potential death).
Did you even read what you wrote, here? You’re trying so very hard to avoid:
1) calling the unborn child a “child”;
2) saying that the unborn child will be killed (as opposed to “ending a pregnancy”; save for birth, I don’t know of any way to “end a pregnancy” without killing the child; do you?).
Beyond that:
Why do you say that an unborn child is “under the mother’s ultimate jurisdiction”, while a breast-feeding newborn (say, who’s allergic to formula) is not? Doesn’t the mother have the right to withhold her breast milk (and caresses, body warmth, etc.) if she feels that its “extraction” is an unwanted intrusion and a burden? Doesn’t she have the right to do what she pleases with her body, even if it means the death of the newborn? Be consistent, Megan; if (for example) a baby’s only possible means of life-support is her mother (and no one else), and if the mother’s demands for “bodily autonomy” cause that baby’s death, you would support her “choice”, yes?
Hm. In terms of net suffering, I’d say it’s worse to be killed when you have a fully-developed neurological system, but whatevs, believe what you want.
Ah. So it’s better to kill someone when they’re sleeping, than to kill them when they’re awake. It’s better to kill someone who has congenital inability to feel pain, than it is to kill someone who doesn’t have that disorder. It’s better to shoot someone in the back of the head, unawares, than it is to shoot them any other way. Is that what you mean?
I don’t even know what you’re talking about anymore. Yes, I do get worked up when I’m irritated, which is something I won’t apologize for.
Your choice. But when you spew sarcastic bile and ignore key points which you don’t want to address, you make it far more difficult to talk to you, or to take your comments seriously.
But culling that back-and-forth for something useful to proceed with:
(*sigh*) As opposed to topic-relevant snarks about “purple prose”, I suppose? You might want to hold yourself to your own standards…
ah, pregnancy and its health implications (not moral).
I really *would* like you to address the morality-related idea of “I have no right to kill my baby in an attempt to improve my health and/or stress-level”, sometime. You mentioned Andrea Yates and Casey Anthony in a negative context, and–for the life of me–I don’t see why you would. What difference would a few months or years make, if you’re still talking about the “life and health of the mother”?
I understand that abortion might not be the right choice for every woman, but also that pregnancy isn’t always a Joy from Heaven.
Right… and you’ll note that I said as much, above. I also said that a failure for pregnancy to be “a joy from Heaven” does not justify ripping your child to pieces; you are not morally free to kill your child in an attempt to reduce your stress, improve your health, etc. You consistently skid around that point on two wheels, whenever it’s mentioned. Care to address it, sometime?
Your opinion on the matter is skewed by your moral inclinations.
The arrogance of this statement is rather thick, Megan. You’re implying, of course, that your opinion is not skewed; right? Care to explain your reasoning for that? Or are you saying that you have no moral inclinations which could “skew” your own opinions?
Regardless of what you think about the moral status of a fetus, you have no authority whatsoever to claim that abortion is more harmful to a woman’s physical and mental psyche than giving birth to an unwanted child.
And you have authority to say the opposite? Please explain.
Make all the claims you want about fetal rights, but please do not make unfounded generalizations and blanket statements about what’s “good,” healthwise, for a woman. It makes you sound, quite frankly, very paternalistic.
Megan, throwing epithets like “paternalistic” really doesn’t make your position sound any more sensible, especially since it’s quite obviously your raw opinion (if not an “unfounded generalization” or a “blanket statement”). Are you simply discriminating against my position because I’m a man? Then what of the many women on this board who say the same as I do? Will you call them “paternalistic”, or do you have another ad hominem epithet in store for them?
If you really want to get back to substance, then riddle me this: why do you think you have the right to kill your child so that you can exercise bodily autonomy, improve your health, and/or reduce your stress? Your distorted views about “women’s rights”, “bodily autonomy”, “health and stress”, etc., all fall apart when pushed for specifics and clarity; they’re mere bumper-stickers. If you can lay out a reasoned argument which shows why you’re morally entitled to kill your baby before birth, then let’s hear it. No more snark, no more red herrings, no more sarcastic evasions and dodges. Answer the question, please.
Megan only has functionalist argument. Fully developed neurological system? Give me a break. It’s like saying “Killing a twenty year old is worse than killing a ten year old.” I don’t care what stage of development a person is in….It is a PERSON, a human being, who has the right to exist, and nobody has the right to take that away. Ever.
Thank you MaryLee, I was just about to make that argument. Where does it end Megan? So because a 6 week old baby in the womb is less developed and maybe doesn’t feel pain its somehow moral to kill that child? People who take that view will soon start to make excuses for infanticide (its already happening!) “I thought it was better to smother my newborn now than let her live a life of suffering.” It leads down that path where someone can very well say “Well, its better to kill Megan when she is asleep than when she is awake. Its okay to kill her when she’s sleeping because she won’t suffer.” But would you be any less dead? NO! Would it be any less evil to kill you even if you didn’t suffer? No! Because you are a human being and as such have the RIGHT to LIVE. So does a 6 week old unborn child. It doesn’t matter if the 6 week old can feel pain or not or has conscious awareness or not. That child is a human being and thus should be afforded the rights of one.
Here’s the (short) story of two competing, potentially “authoritative” moral discourses:
1. “Thou shalt not murder.”
2. “Thou shalt not use any person as a means to an end.”
Both share a common prerequisite: to define the “personhood” or “not-yet-personhood” of a fetus. In order for abortion to be considered “murder,” as opposed to mere “killing,” one has to define the fetus as a person deserving of moral value and status. The second injunction, “thou shalt not use any person as a means to an end,” could be used in both pro-life and pro-choice contexts. If a fetus is, indeed, a person, then a mother cannot justify abortion because murder of the unborn child is a means to satisfy the end of her desire not to be a mother. However, if a fetus is a person, then it could be considered to be using the mother as a means to an end. I won’t force that point because obviously the unborn aren’t rational actors, but forcing a woman to carry an unwanted pregnancy could be considered an indirect use of her body as a means to an end. On the flip side, if a fetus is a person, then it has no claim to the mother’s body in the first place, and abortion is absolutely allowable.
But we always come back to that fundamental question of personhood. You can try to answer it by making reference to biology, but as discussed before, that project is also laden with ambiguity and fallacies. The BUMPER STICKER phrase, “Life begins at conception,” is a fallacy, since sperm and egg are living entities born of other living entities, which were…and it’s turtles all the way down. Okay, so you say when the gametes fuse, new life begins. First, imagine we have the technology to slow down this process of fusion. Some laboratory somewhere probably already has a patent on this technology. Anyway, we slow and control down the process of fertilization until we can see the whole process occur as if it were a powerpoint slideshow. Ampulla interaction. Chemicals guiding the sperm’s movements. The sperm’s acrosome fusing with its plasma membrane, allowing for attachment to the egg. Is it a person now? Op, the sperm’s head has transcended the plasma membrane and is now half inside and half outside the egg. Is it a person now? The sperm is now completely inside the egg and the cortical reaction process hasn’t occurred, meaning the egg can still, in theory, be penetrated by other sperm. Is it a person now? Now cortical reaction is complete but the egg hasn’t undergone meiosis. Is it a person now?
The phrase “life begins at conception” attempts to inject the authority of biology into the debate, but it still isn’t specific enough. And moving on, you define a person as a unique entity containing 46 chromosomes. Well, my fingernails do, too. So then what? You say “that can develop into a human being.” Well now, you’re talking about POTENTIAL more than anything else. Is a potential person the same thing as a person?
And so on and so on. We’re still left with an unresolved moral question, but you’ve already answered it for yourself (and women everywhere). I think you’re just as guilty of acting from, and making appeals to, raw emotion, since you are a man. I’m more apt to take Carla or even Sydney seriously than you who attempts to speak for the female condition, never having experienced it yourself.
Megan wrote:
Here’s the (short) story of two competing, potentially “authoritative” moral discourses:
1. “Thou shalt not murder.”
2. “Thou shalt not use any person as a means to an end.”
I’m not at all sure why you think these maxims (and they’re both valid, though the second one needs some qualifiers and clear definitions) would need to “compete” (in the sense of “conflict”).
Both share a common prerequisite: to define the “personhood” or “not-yet-personhood” of a fetus.
If you’re applying them to abortion, then yes; agreed (given the qualifiers above)… though the word “define” has issues (see below).
In order for abortion to be considered “murder,” as opposed to mere “killing,” one has to define the fetus as a person deserving of moral value and status.
A human fetus (Latin: “small child”) has to be recognized as a person with corresponding rights, yes. “Define” is a bit slippery, depending on who’s doing the “defining”, and how. Blacks were “defined” as non-persons in our country, by the highest court of the land, less than 200 years ago; women are “defined” as “less than male persons” in many Islamic countries, even today. That proves nothing.
The second injunction, “thou shalt not use any person as a means to an end,” could be used in both pro-life and pro-choice contexts.
Yes, and no. The reason WHY “objectification” of people is immoral depends on their God-given dignity; the only proper response to a person is to love them, not use them. Love gives and receives, it doesn’t take, and it doesn’t “use” in the depersonalizing sense. If you depersonalize an unborn child for the sake of taking the social and/or emotional freedom to kill her, for the purpose of making your own life easier, then you’ve violated the same principle at a deeper level.
If a fetus is, indeed, a person, then a mother cannot justify abortion because murder of the unborn child is a means to satisfy the end of her desire not to be a mother.
Among other things, yes.
However, if a fetus is a person, then it could be considered to be using the mother as a means to an end.
Nonsense. You’re using the phrase “use another person” in a moral context, which requires an act of the free will–a free choice. The baby had no choice in the matter at all, and cannot be indicted under the “thou shalt not use another person” schema.
I won’t force that point because obviously the unborn aren’t rational actors, but forcing a woman to carry an unwanted pregnancy could be considered an indirect use of her body as a means to an end.
Only if you also say that forcing murderers and rapists to restrain their murders/rapes could also be considered an indirect use of their bodies, minds, freedom, etc., for the end of saving other lives. Do you want to go there?
On the flip side, if a fetus is a person, then it has no claim to the mother’s body in the first place, and abortion is absolutely allowable.
Balderdash, madam. This is raw opinion, on your part, with not an ounce of reasoning to support it, thus far. In addition to your inappropriate use of the connotation-laden word “claim” (an unborn child has neither the freedom nor the ability to “claim” anything, so no violation of justice by the child is possible), you beg the question: WHY does the child not have the right to remain in the womb? You can’t expect us to accept that idea simply on your say-so!
But we always come back to that fundamental question of personhood. You can try to answer it by making reference to biology, but as discussed before, that project is also laden with ambiguity and fallacies.
That can be true; but it’s also advisable to have the particulars clear in your mind, first. Sweeping statements such as “I’ve looked at pro=life biological arguments, and I’ve seen fallacies, so the whole of it is rubbish” are hardly logical.
The BUMPER STICKER phrase, “Life begins at conception,” is a fallacy, since sperm and egg are living entities born of other living entities, which were…and it’s turtles all the way down.
All right. Perhaps you might consider that the bumper-sticker is a summary of the fuller phrase, “Human personal life (i.e. personhood) begins at conception”, and go from there? To take an inadequate presentation of [x] as an excuse to reject [x] in general is a fallacy known as a “straw man”, and it simply won’t do.
[Example of “slow-motion fertilization”, followed by repeated questions of “Is it a person now?”]
Two hints, here:
1) Rhetorical questions have no logical weight, whatsoever. If you have a conclusion to make, make it in declarative form.
2) Your example begs yet another question: “Once human [personal] life has begin, is it morally licit to kill him/her in order to serve one’s own ends?” The answer to that (which you echoed, above) is a clear “no”.
Since your question is hypothetical, I’ll match it with a hypothetical answer: “If, at any point, we become morally certain that a person has come into existence, then that person’s life must be defended with maximum possible determination. If we are morally certain that a person has not yet come into existence, then the question is moot. If we are genuinely uncertain (because of limitations of technology, etc.), we should give he benefit of the doubt to the possible person, in the same way that a deer hunter should not simply shoot at whatever bush happens to move; it is immoral to use lethal force recklessly, and without proportionately grave reason.”
The phrase “life begins at conception” attempts to inject the authority of biology into the debate, but it still isn’t specific enough.
See above. If bumper-stickers aren’t good enough for you, perhaps you might read the arguments themselves (from which the bumper-stickers are extracted)? You’ll notice that I don’t lambast you for shallow pro-choice slogans such as “my body, my choice”, and other logically anemic abortion-tolerant slogans.
And moving on, you define a person as a unique entity containing 46 chromosomes.
I do? I “define” God as three Persons, only one of Whom could be said to have chromosomes at all…
Well, my fingernails do, too.
Oh, come, now! Straw man #2 (at least): you assume that something which is NECESSARY for the definition of “human person” (i.e. having 46 chromosomes for humans–a questionable assumotion, given Trisomy disorders, etc.) is also SUFFICIENT to “define a human” (a corpse also has 46 chromosomes, but it is not a full person), and that is not so. I know of no one who’s said that “46 chromosomes is all that’s necessary for personhood; biological activity, etc., need not be present!” DO you?
So then what? You say “that can develop into a human being.”
I do?
(*sigh*) Megan, you really need to read the ACTUAL arguments proposed by the pro-life side; this (which you present) is a mish-mash. To say that “anything which can develop into a human being is a person” is nonsense, or else gametes would have personhood status (which no pro-life person of any sanity argues). Pro-lifers believe that, once a person (with however many cells) has come into being, he/she doesn’t have to “develop” into a person at all; THEY ALREADY ARE A PERSON. Embryonic persons develop into infant persons, who develop into toddler persons, and so on… but “personhood” is an EVENT, not a process.
Well now, you’re talking about POTENTIAL more than anything else. Is a potential person the same thing as a person?
No.
And so on and so on. We’re still left with an unresolved moral question, but you’ve already answered it for yourself (and women everywhere).
Given your gross misrepresentation of pro-life arguments, you’re in no position to say anything of the sort. Your last gloss (by which you insinuate that we’ve settled our views by raw opinion, and nothing more) is, ironically, your raw opinion, and nothing more.
I think you’re just as guilty of acting from, and making appeals to, raw emotion, since you are a man.
“Since” I am a man? Maleness somehow caused my appeals to emotion? Who’d have known…?
Seriously: I sometimes do appeal to emotion in non-debates (and in other aspects of life)… such as when I’m comforting a friend at a funeral, or rejoicing with afriend who’s just given birth. I have not done so here, nor do you have any basis for assuming anything of the sort. Even a cursory glance at my comments can tell you that I try to be systematic and logical in my arguments; I don’t appeal to emotion when making foundational points.
I’m more apt to take Carla or even Sydney seriously than you who attempts to speak for the female condition, never having experienced it yourself.
Ah. So you’re content to dismiss me for chauvinistic reasons. Where is the logic in that? Would you consider it fair for me to dismiss your claim that “2 + 2 = 4” on the basis that I’ve studied far more mathematics than you have, and you haven’t taken an abstract algebra course (by which the addition operator, the equivalence relation, and the positive integers are analyzed in-depth) in your life? I hope not! If I insist that 2 + 2 = 5, you (even without having “experienced the abstract math study for yourself”) would be perfectly justified in rejecting my statement as nonsense.
Now… if femininity is so important to you on this point, care to aim your response to that particular point at Carla, Sydney, and/or the other women, and I’ll just listen? Otherwise, it seems like a cheap dodge, on your part: “you’re a man, so I don’t have to reply to you!”
Somehow, I don’t think it matters to Megan one way or the other, female or male. She seems to ignore any comments I make from the perspective of having been in a crisis pregnancy with my daughter. Or perhaps I’m just too much of a savage for her to address me. ^_~
Given that Megan hasn’t exactly fallen all over herself in showing comparative respect and/or agreement with you and the other female pro-lifers on the board, I’m inclined to agree. We used to call that “posturing”… using any old stick, no matter how inconsistent it was with the sticks used in the past, with which to try to beat your opponent.
Care to address the salient points, and stop dodging, Megan?
I’m not making a personal attack because it’s fun. Frankly, I think your tone is pompous, and your assumptions about what women “think” or “feel” irritate me. Xal’s account of her experience is just as valid as Carla’s or Joan’s or mine, yet you choose to flatten all these testimonies and speak for everybody: abortion hurts women. They don’t know what they’re doing. Etc. etc. And if someone like ninek tells me “no, that’s not how WOM[AN] thinks/feels,” I’m annoyed, but it’s doubly annoying when someone who could never be in that position tells me how I am experiencing it.
–
Oh, but to hit respond. If I don’t hit all of them, it’s because I’m catching a plane soon, so feel free to badger me to “hit the salient points,” i.e. conform my opinions to yours, once I have Internet access again.
1. “Personhood is an EVENT, not a PROCESS.” Really? Then you would be perfectly content if all embryos existed in vitro, or in a frozen state, never to be implanted in a woman’s body. Would you say, “Hello, there’s a person in that freezer?” I don’t think so.
2. All of this boils down to our definition of personhood. In the Western humanist tradition, the term “person” is used to denote a physically-bound entity capable of rationality and possessing a distinct sets of beliefs, thoughts, opinions, etc. If suddenly a being, whether sentient or rational or not, can be allowed to possess a woman’s body against her will, then the fundamental concept of personhood changes. The idea of physical sovereignty changes. What then? If the “right to life” is the only principle salient to the concept of personhood, then we should have no concern for the beings or people this “right” uses, harms or inconveniences, as long as nobody commits murder. If a master needs a slave, so be it. If a man wants a child and rapes a woman, then so be it. If a government allows its people to live in abject poverty, so be it. Parents have also begun conceiving children in the hopes that they will serve as organ donor matches for their other sick children. This practice would also be morally permissible.
3. And one last thing, addressed to the crowd: Y’all care so much about the wellbeing of the girl-child, so willing to throw an 19-year-old in jail for daring to touch a younger adolescent, that your conservative House reps shot down a bill that would help prevent young girls worldwide from being forced into marriage: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s111-987
And why? Out of fear that somehow the bill would allow for abortions to be performed with US money. Except that the bill doesn’t have anything to do with abortion. Good job, prolifers, really protecting “innocent postborn life.” Op, cue drive-by prolifer-ing from Sydney M., truthseeker, ninek, etc etc. Merry Christmas!
Megan wrote:
I’m not making a personal attack because it’s fun.
Believe it or not, I never thought anything of the sort. I think that you make personal attacks because you’re feeling outraged and defensive, and you don’t always have enough self-control to self-edit.
Frankly, I think your tone is pompous,
Noted. I think your current (and predominant) tone is shrill, inflammatory and insulting. Feel better now? Or shall we move on to substantial matters?
and your assumptions about what women “think” or “feel” irritate me.
I don’t suppose you’ve entertained the idea that I got those so-called “assumptions” from actual other WOMEN? (I’d condemn abortion as a heinous crime, even if all women who went through it emerged physically, mentally and spiritually pristine; and I’d certainly have harboured suspicions of “unseen damage” by even the most “seemingly peaceful” slaughter of a woman’s unborn child; but it’s the testimonies of women which confirmed that suspicion.) When you decry my audacity in “assuming”, it really doesn’t help your credibility when you “assume” that my views are mere “assumptions”. They are not.
Xal’s account of her experience is just as valid as Carla’s or Joan’s or mine,
(??) “Just as valid?” Carla’s account and Xalisae’s account flatly *contradict* yours! They can’t be equally valid. You know that. You might as well say that “2 + 2 =4” and “2 + 2 = 5” are “equally valid”, since they may both be sincere views which bott acknowledge the common ground of mathematics! Or are you attempting to play one pro-lifer off against the other, here?
yet you choose to flatten all these testimonies and speak for everybody: abortion hurts women. They don’t know what they’re doing. Etc. etc.
Megan, some things can be known from “first principles” alone. I don’t know every last human person on earth, and I certainly haven’t examined them all; but I’m confident in saying that every last one of them has human DNA, for example. I haven’t interviewed every last abused woman in the world, but I’m confident in saying that every instance of abuse hurt them… no matter how they might deny or reject that idea (for whatever reason). I also know that every deliberate choice to kill an innocent child in the womb is wrong, for the same reasons that it is wrong to kill an innocent (born) child or adult. Or would you insist that I examine every last case of infanticide, and decide “wrongness” (culpability, or guilt, is a separate matter) on a case-by-case basis? I sincerely hope not.
And if someone like ninek tells me “no, that’s not how WOM[AN] thinks/feels,” I’m annoyed, but it’s doubly annoying when someone who could never be in that position tells me how I am experiencing it.
My apologies for annoying you; believe it or not, I don’t intend to do so. But again: I will not choose to call green by the name of “orange”, simply to please someone else’s preferences; things are what they are. We treat reality as reality. That’s called “sanity”.
As for your annoyance at my comments to that effect: why do you take offense at them if I’m merely repeating what Ninek, etc., already said? How does the fact that I say it make it any “less true” or “less valid”?
Oh, but to hit respond. If I don’t hit all of them, it’s because I’m catching a plane soon, so feel free to badger me to “hit the salient points,” i.e. conform my opinions to yours, once I have Internet access again.
Assumptions, again? I want you to avoid sarcastic, red-herring-esque snark (which you often use to dodge awkward questions), and address the substance. You’ve done so, several times, on this very thread; so I know you’re capable. Just stick to it, and stop wasting time with side-shows. At very least, start holding yourself to your own standards (e.g. stop making assumptions about my thoughts and motives; you’re not very good at it, anyway).
1. “Personhood is an EVENT, not a PROCESS.” Really? Then you would be perfectly content if all embryos existed in vitro, or in a frozen state, never to be implanted in a woman’s body. Would you say, “Hello, there’s a person in that freezer?” I don’t think so.
Please tell me that you know you’ve dodged this question?
Let me answer your own question plainly: YES, I point to every last “embro freezer” in the world (monstrosities that they are) and say, “There are persons in there.” NO, I would not “be perfectly content” if all embryonic children were conceived and imprisoned outside of the womb, precisely because they ARE persons, and they have the right not to be manipulated like toys or experiments.
So… now that I’ve disabused you of your incorrect assumption, can you explain to me why you think personhood is not an event? You didn’t even *attempt* an answer, above.
2. All of this boils down to our definition of personhood. In the Western humanist tradition, the term “person” is used to denote a physically-bound entity capable of rationality and possessing a distinct sets of beliefs, thoughts, opinions, etc.
First: why is the “western humanist tradition” the “gold standard” by which personhood should be recognized? What makes it right, and not simply one spurious opinion among many?
Second: By “humanist”, I notice that you’re excluding, a priori, all traditions which speak of the human soul, yes? Why? And how do you demonstrate that your view is correct, as opposed to your mere opinion? What reasoning can you provide to show it?
Third: do you realize that your definition would classify newborns (and unconscious adults) as non-persons, since they have no recognizably distinct sets of beliefs, thoughts, opinions, etc.? Do you mean to do that?
Fourth: by your standard, are you denying such “non-persons” (as described in #3) the right to life? If so, why?
If suddenly a being, whether sentient or rational or not, can be allowed to possess a woman’s body against her will, then the fundamental concept of personhood changes.
Megan, this is simply mish-mash; given your definition above (which says nothing at all about physical sovereignty, and the like), this simply doesn’t follow, one way or the other.
The idea of physical sovereignty changes. What then? If the “right to life” is the only principle salient to the concept of personhood,
Who said it was the “only” principle? I didn’t…
then we should have no concern for the beings or people this “right” uses, harms or inconveniences, as long as nobody commits murder.
Back up, a moment (leaving your incorrect “right to life = only principle” aside, for the moment). Can you explain to me why you think murder is “wrong” (and not simply “unpleasant”)? What standard do you use, when declaring that murder is wrong? This is a very critical point, and it bears directly into your own questions.
If a master needs a slave, so be it. If a man wants a child and rapes a woman, then so be it. If a government allows its people to live in abject poverty, so be it. Parents have also begun conceiving children in the hopes that they will serve as organ donor matches for their other sick children. This practice would also be morally permissible.
All right… and your conclusion is… what? Don’t leave things dangling; make your case, and finish it; otherwise, it’s just winds and words.
3. And one last thing, addressed to the crowd: Y’all care so much about the wellbeing of the girl-child, so willing to throw an 19-year-old in jail for daring to touch a younger adolescent, that your conservative House reps shot down a bill that would help prevent young girls worldwide from being forced into marriage: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=s111-987
Why, exactly, do you (Megan) object to “child marriage”? You seem quite comfortable with child sex (with “child” = “under 18”, as described in the bill you mention) and child abortions; why the concern now?
And why? Out of fear that somehow the bill would allow for abortions to be performed with US money. Except that the bill doesn’t have anything to do with abortion.
Perhaps you’d understand if we don’t simply take your word for that?
Good job, prolifers, really protecting “innocent postborn life.” Op, cue drive-by prolifer-ing from Sydney M., truthseeker, ninek, etc etc. Merry Christmas!
And to you, Megan. God grant that you get healing, someday. (Yes… I know you’ll find that condescending and paternalistic. So be it.)