Stanek weekend question: Why would a group promoting emergency contraception encourage men to buy it?
The National Institute for Reproductive Health sponsors the website, Back Up Your Birth Control.
The website “feature[s] our favorite EC e-cards” promoting emergency contraception. One I found particularly strange was this…
Why would a group advocating the use of emergency contraception encourage EC sales to men?
Sep.25, 2011 8:43 am |
Weekend question |
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.
So the men can give it to the women.
Or force it on the women?
So men do not have to take responsibility for their actions.
army_wife says:
September 25, 2011 at 9:23 am
Or force it on the women?
0 likes
Monarch says:
September 25, 2011 at 9:26 am
So men do not have to take responsibility for their actions.
(Denise) It’s most likely he will give it to the woman. If he’s plan on following the classic
seduce-and-abandon pattern, he doesn’t regard her pregnancy as his problem since he’s
long gone and probably even untraceable (having given a false name or extremely common name) when she begins suffering morning sickness or the panic that often
accompanies an unplanned pregnancy.
My guess, since the perception here is that women are so helpless and dumb, is that the man can get it for free, drug her up, force her to have sex…then tie her up and give her the EC afterwards.
I believe that is pretty close to what the author of the question is looking for.
Am I right? Do I win a prize?
Maybe the EC for men is little “time capsules” that you swallow, which lets you go back in time so you and your mate can better use birth control measures. Or at least lets you get some chili for your hot dog.
Doug -
Nice!
The number of abortions is decreasing. Read http://townhall.com/columnists/stevechapman/2011/09/25/the_growing_aversion_to_abortion
Denise,
Not necessarily. Some men (and I use the term loosely) will stay around and get their gratification until something happens to upset that routine, such as an unintended pregnancy. Although he doesn’t care about the baby, it is still his problem – after all, he doesn’t want to be stuck with child support for the next 18 years. Men in these type of relationships can and often do exert extreme influence with regards to EC or aborting the baby. After he knows the “problem” is dealt with (and that pesky child-support order won’t come back to bite him later), he considers himself free to hit the bricks.
Ex-GOP, moving past your sarcasm, of course there is the thought men will slip EC to their partners after the unprotected sex they all say they prefer to condoms.
But from your perspective, seriously, why encourage men to buy EC?
I’m wondering why the illustration on the e-card looks like a ten year old boy eating a hotdog. Anyone?
I agree with Denise. This seems like an instance of men providing emergency contraception to women so that they can shurk their responsibilities.
Michelle, the e-cards were submitted to the site by people, then the site selected some of them for display. The boy with the hotdog makes no sense to me.
http://ececards.tumblr.com/
Even as a pro-choicer I find some of them somewhat odd. ;)
“Babies are too damn hard. Take EC.” The picture is a happy baby and a woman that isn’t showing any distress as far as I can tell.
And, “Face it. You’d be a horrible mother. Use EC.” And the picture is a woman sitting there with a drink and a cigarette. (?)
Jill: But from your perspective, seriously, why encourage men to buy EC?
Jill, if the man is in doubt that any birth control was used, he might at that time get some and give it to the woman.
Because having a birth control mishap and needing to get EC can be stressful and it might be reassuring to know that your male partner can help out with that. Because the sooner you take EC, the more effective it is, so it’s good to know that your male partner can stop by the pharmacy and pick it up too if that’s more convenient. Because, with the exception of condoms, responsibility for contraception is usually seen as the woman’s job, so many men probably don’t even know that they can get EC too. Because every sexual encounter that could result in an unintended pregnancy involves both a man and a woman, so why shouldn’t they both know there is a back-up option if their birth control fails?
While its both possible and probable, that this drug will be abused this way, given its chemical similarity to naturally occuring 17 hydroxy progesterone (a precurser to both testosterone and estrogen) and the subliminal appeal of the ad, I’d say its more likely that they are attempting to reach the transexual population…. who would be buying LARGE amounts of it (taking it everyday) in order to get the effect they desire.
All for-profit businesses advertise for the same reasons:
1- Advertise to reach new customers.
2- Advertise to make more sales.
3- Advertise because it pays off over a long period.
4- Advertise to keep a healthy positive image.
5- Advertise to maintain customer morale.
This ad seems to fit the above goals perfectly.
The happy boy about to enjoy the big yummy hot dog…what more could a 17-year-old male aspire to possess?
This ad doesn’t objectify women/sexuality does it? (Implying a comparison to hotdogs.)
There have already been stories in the news about men slipping drugs like this to women to force them to miscarry against their will.
If people don’t know each other well enough to be responsible for a child, maybe they should think twice about sex, instead of considering it a “failure” if an innocent child is now part of their lives. We, as a society, need to stop assigning a negative value to human beings that abortionists use to justify killing them. No one deserves to die because someone else considers their existence a birth control failure. That’s just plain wrong.
I was the only sibling in my family who was PLANNED, and I was NOT the favorite child. Today’s conception, no matter how inconvenient, might be tomorrow’s beloved favorite child. When you kill a child after conception, you have no idea who the person is that you are killing.
Doug, if the man “is in any doubt that any birth control was used,” shouldn’t he have thought of that before having sex with the woman and used a condom?
MCD, your points are logical. On the other hand, do you not see the greater potential for men to abuse ECs by relying on them instead of condoms, by forcing them on underage rape victims, and by slipping them in morning after coffee of gfs or wives they don’t trust are trying to avoid conception?
Playing devils advocate…if women buy condoms to make sure they are protected, when clearly it is the man who will wear it…then men would buy baby-killin-pills (I refuse to call it “emergency” “contraception”) to “protect” themselves.
Jennifer says:
September 25, 2011 at 10:42 am
I agree with Denise. This seems like an instance of men providing emergency contraception to women so that they can shurk their responsibilities.
(Denise) You mean you agree with Army Wife and Monarch. They are the ones who made this point. I tend to believe men who wish to “shirk their responsibilities” just don’t regard pregnancy as a problem since they frequently give a false name (unless their name is so common as to untraceable) and then take off.
Here is a little advertising theory to help understand why they are using a boy with a hotdog in this ad. (It was NOT a silly mistake or poorly constructed ad.)
Leverage Points
A leverage point is the feature of an ad that leads the viewer to transform the advertising message into a personal value. To construct a quality leverage point, the ad designer must be able to build a pathway that connects a product benefit with the potential buyer’s value system. Ad designers spend considerable amounts of time creating powerful leverage points. Verbal and visual images are one tool designers use to help the consumer make the transition from being aware of a product’s benefits to incorporating it with his or her value system.
A key decision made by the designer determines the degree of emphasis given to the visual elements of the ad versus the verbal elements. In terms of the ELM (Elaboration Likelihood Model), a verbal ad is supposed to take the central route (most direct and easily remembered) of information processing, where a visually biased ad would be processed using the peripheral route.
Visual images:
Often lead to more favorable attitudes toward both the advertisement and the brand.
Tend to be more easily remembered than verbal copy.
Are stored in the brain both as pictures and words.
Jill -
Maybe a married couple wants to delay children and use condoms, but want to have some emergency contraception around in case there’s a break.
Because 14 year old girls (and 15 and 16…) can’t buy it.
Senior boy= 17 or 18 years old
Freshman-Junior girl=13-17 years old.
Not a hard concept why they want boys (young men) to know they can buy it too. In high school and college the most common ‘romantic’ attatchments happen between grades, and it’s almost always that boy who’s older. Most senior boys I knew of (who were sexually active) figured if she was in high school she was fair game. So a 18 year old senior ‘partying’ with a 14 year old freshman was hardly uncommon. Unfortunately I’ve known a lot of college boys who share the mentality (once you’re in high school you’re fair game). So a frat house throws a party and invites the local high school students and no one says boo about the 21 year old college senior finding a private room with the 14 year old high school freshman. It’s painfully common, and this way the older guy can just buy the pill for her, no messy parental knowledge necessary.
Don’t know about all that fake name business, Denise.
I assume that EC is available to both genders for the same reason condoms are.
Amber, i would say the only difference with that scenario is the woman can’t slip a condom on the male without his knowledge or consent, however EC can and has been given to women without their knowledge or consent.
Because it functions the same regardless of who purchased it?
Jill Stanek says:
September 25, 2011 at 11:44 am
Doug, if the man “is in any doubt that any birth control was used,” shouldn’t he have thought of that before having sex with the woman and used a condom?
MCD, your points are logical. On the other hand, do you not see the greater potential for men to abuse ECs by relying on them instead of condoms, by forcing them on underage rape victims, and by slipping them in morning after coffee of gfs or wives they don’t trust are trying to avoid conception?
(Denise) Jill, these are very valid points. However, it should be noted that, to a large extent, men are helpless after the sex act takes place. He can’t legally force her to have an abortion even if he doesn’t want to be a father. Nor can he legally force her to give up the baby for adoption for the same reasons. If she is pregnant and wants an abortion, he cannot force her to carry to term.
A woman might tell him she’s on the Pill and be lying or simply have forgotten to take it when she should have. She could fib about other contraception. Finally, she might prefer that he fetch the emergency contraception for her and this ad lets him know he can do that.
Again, let me reiterate that I support sexual abstinence and want to see chaperoned dating revived to that end. It also might be good to have a campaign to rigorously enforce the statutory rape laws.
The boy eating the hot dog is perfect, brilliant actually!
It speaks to the very mentality that gives rise to these drugs and the marketing of them to boys as young as 17. It is a juvenile adolescent frame of reference that sees a penis and a vagina as mere playthings that elicit profoundly powerful pleasurable experiences. They do, indeed!
The juvenile adolescent mentality does not admit long term consequences for one’s behavior, and seeks to escape the consequences by any and all means possible. That is in the nature of the very young to do so. The ad tells the boy that he may have his sex, pass the drug off onto the girl, get dressed, and get back to the other trappings and pursuits of boyhood.
All as innocent and natural as enjoying a hot dog at a barbecue.
As the male body matures into a man’s body, the prevailing culture stunts the growth of character, which would suggest to the male a certain responsibility for the baby, the woman, and his own growth into honorable manhood. It reinforces that women’s bodies are somehow disconnected from women’s psyches and souls, that men can have the one without regard for the other. Then we come to the discussion of whether men would actually slip the drug to the woman without her knowledge or consent.
No, a man wouldn’t. But a hot dog chomping boy trapped in a man’s body, twisted and distorted in his understanding of and regard for women would.
In a heartbeat.
This ad is proof that more contraception NEVER means less abortion, always more–more selfishness, more abuse, more violence, more death. The more the medical community offers “solutions” like this one, the less responsible everyone becomes, especially males.
Any sexual situation that encourages people to think of the innocent child as a problem is not only irresponsible, it is gravely evil.
The saddest part is, many young people will fall for this sort of commercial and think EC or any other form of birth control, means they are behaving as responsible adults. Then when the pills fail, the pro-aborts can pounce and get rich by “providing” abortions. Parents, teach your sons and daughters not to fall for it. The only truly adult behavior is to save sex for marriage. That’s what a real man would do.
I assume that EC is available to both genders for the same reason condoms are.
Right on, Jack. If you do not object to the use of hormonal contraception then it could easily be seen as considerate and compassionate for the male half of your partnership to have EC on hand. Lots of men buy the preferred sanitary product of their partners. Why? Because they love them and want to make their lives easier. Because they share in their partner’s body, and thus happily share responsibility for the health and well-being of their partner’s body. It’s ok to object to EC but it’s pretty extreme to act like a man NOT objecting to EC makes him a pedophile rapist.
For a man to use EC in place of condoms with his girlfriend or wife, or even just a one-night stand – even if he were to “slip” BOTH doses to the woman without her consent – he would need to convince the woman to have unprotected sex. Which she would obviously be aware of. Also, most women I know who have taken EC have experienced some strong side effects, so slipping EC in her morning coffee every – what? week? month? day? the man would need to have a rough idea of when she’s ovulating, for it to have even a chance at being effective, unless he just gave her a pill every day, which would be hundreds and hundreds of dollars a month – would be a pretty difficult way to just “double-check” that a woman is not secretly aiming for pregnancy. She would be ill constantly, bleeding intermittently or missing periods, etc. EC is not a convenient way to avoid pregnancy.
Also, I do believe that while EC is available OTC, you need to sign for it, like with certain drugs that can be used to make meth. So in some ways, really, EC might make it EASIER to find men who are raping underage women and drugging them to avoid pregnancy. You have a documented record of who is buying what how often, and you can look into anyone who seems suspicious.
Ec costs about fifty dollars. By letting people of both sexes know men can by it to, it makes getting the couples responsibility and not the womens responsibility. This way after you realize the condom broke you can send your sweetie out to grab it for you while you rest warmly under the covers
Those suggesting college boys r going to ground them and put them into high school girls drinks. Shouldn’t we wbe more worried about the character of the boys than the availability of the pill. I mean if someone grinds up an Advil and puts it in my drink should we be thinking about the distribution practices of anvil or um the fact that someone poisoned me against my will… And focus on putting them in jail?
JTO: Brilliant! Amen!
Shannon: While I disagree that it’s about responsibility…as it would be more responsible to just not have sex if you do not want a child, I have to agree with your second part. A lot of people here are make men out to sound like horrible creatures lurking about trying to destroy women…and while, of course, some men are like that, some women are like that too. I think it’s less about men slipping it in a women’s drink and more about…should this even be available to ANYONE? And, to pro-lifers like myself, that answer is a resounding NO!
Is it really that hard to understand that a ton of married, monogamous couples use contraception? I do NOT want to get into the BC debate again, but I am really tired of seeing contacepting couples painted as hedonistic sluts who hate children. If you really think it’s immoral to use BC, more power to you, but at the very least attempt to characterize your opponents correctly.
Same goes for the ridiculous assumptions about men who buy BC.
“should this even be available to ANYONE? And, to pro-lifers like myself, that answer is a resounding NO”
Other than the militant anti-choice movement, it appears that most Americans don’t have a problem with the morning after pill which, if one (and many do) defines pregnancy as starting at implantation, it isn’t any more of an abortion than non implanted fertilized eggs, that wash out with menstruation, are dead babies. But even if it is taken off the market (and it won’t be), people will still have sex. And without the availability of this pill, there will be more unplanned pregnancies and more abortions.
Be careful what you wish for?
And putting any medication in somebody’s drink, without their consent, is criminal.
“Parents, teach your sons and daughters not to fall for it. The only truly adult behavior is to save sex for marriage. That’s what a real man would do.”
LOL, that’s what was drummed into the heads of Catholic school kids for eons. Based on the activity of the kids at my all girls Catholic school, in the mid 60’s, it didn’t work. Obviously we shouldn’t be telling high school kids to have sex. We should be telling them that if they do decide to have sex, then they need to have safe sex in order to prevent pregnancy and STD’s. Abstinence only education does’t work as seen by the high rates of teen pregnancies in states that provide abstinence only education. As noted by Alexandra, the morning after pill comes with side effects and young women need to be award of that. Perhaps that might be a deterrent to sexual activity. Then again it might not and, in that case, taking the pill is the best course of action to prevent an unplanned and unwanted pregnancy.
LOL, that’s what was drummed into the heads of Catholic school kids for eons.
LOL, this is still being drummed into the heads of Catholic school kids. The path hasn’t widened since you were in Catholic school, CC.
The wise still listen and hear. The unwise listen too but still think they know better.
CC’s just looking to expand her market for the new line of turkey basters. All she has to offer is the witness of her cold and sterile existence.
There’s a better way, CC. Try reconciling with God and the baby killed by your own hand. Leaving as a legacy to the world the barren string of posts you’ve left to date would be the supreme tragedy.
A man/boy would want to buy EC because it
solves his problem without him having to take on any physical risk. And it’s cheaper than abortion.
The risk and responsibility are still dumped on the woman. She just doesn’t have to pay for it.
Stay classy, guys. Yeah.
It automatically doubles their target market and quite possibly their market share.
It’s all about the money – always has been.
“Why would a group advocating the use of emergency contraception encourage EC sales to men?”
To sell more product.
It is a business.
Follow the money.
They don’t go through all the trouble to get a product approved so that they cannot sell it.
They want anyone to be able to get it so they can sell more.
How much does it cost? And what fraction of the price is profit?
“And putting any medication in somebody’s drink, without their consent, is criminal.”
I wonder how bad it tastes.
Maryann and others saying the man that buys his gf/wife/ one night stand EC is making the woman bear the responsibility for his “sexual irresponsibility” you know she is the sole one who has to get pregnant and actually bear the child right?
EC absolutely takes a toll on a womans body but is anyone really arguing it takes less of a toll than a pregnancy?
You paint sexual responsibility in a very narrow way that serves zero purpose. If a man gets a woman pregnant and wants her to keep the baby he is automatically more loving and responsible hardly. There are plenty of husbands who treat their wives and children like crap
I see no difference between this and men who buy menstrual products on behalf of the women in their life. Gentlemanly, considerate and advancing beyond the conservatively ingrained ‘yuck’ of ‘womens’ business’.
Just like men getting pads/ tampons? Except for the mega dose of unneeded artifcial hormones.
I wonder why the elusive bc pill for men never materialized… Maybe because it’s bad medicine?
Some women prefer a quick dose of extra hormones to pregnancy.
The biggest problem with male-based contraception is that it’s not men who get pregnant. Therefore there probably isn’t quite as much incentive for men to be reliable with it. The only really reliable form of male contraception is vasectomy.
Slam. Bang. Here you go, ma’am. See ya!
Pharmer (having the sick humor acquired in health care) is laughing at the individuals who could find no difference between feminine hygiene products, or condoms and the morning after pill. Mary Ann, on the other hand, appears to have things figured out.
Plan B One-step (levonorgestrel 150 mcg) is the form which is available over the counter, and which may be purchased by both males and females.
Here is a Blast from the Past from pharmacy academics who favored the availability of the original Plan B for use in underage females. This was the intended result of bringing the drug over the counter.
(If you read the entirety of THIS article, you can appreciate the utter incompetence of one of the academics referenced in the Blast from the past link.)
It’s very important to remember that these morning after pills are NOT very effective. The effectiveness is about 60 percent per SINGLE use. Used repeatedly, the drugs are an absolute joke for preventing pregnancy. Encouraging reliance upon the morning after pills (Ella included) is really an effective way to sell surgical or later forms of chemical abortions. Encouraging guys to believe that the pill can increase their access to sex is a smart marketing move for the abortionists. It also places the health and well being of girls and women at risk, since males can give them the drug without their consent.
It is a public service for Jill Stanek to have asked this question about the marketing of morning after pills to males. This question needs to be repeated whenever and wherever possible, to highlight the rationale behind the morning after pills.
Ella (ulipristal acetate, analog of RU-486 mifepristone) is available for morning after use by an ONLINE PRESCRIBING process. It’s easy to obtain fraudulently and doses can be accumulated for later chemical abortions initiated at home. This mechanism was allowed by the FDA in order to make up for the shortfall of physicians willing to do surgical abortions.
The only positive aspect of this scenario is that it is ultimately self-limiting. Enhanced by the immunosuppressive qualities of the progestins, Chlamydia trachomatis and other STD organisms can help to prevent further propagation of people with this socially destructive mindset.
CC says:
“Other than the militant anti-choice movement, it appears that most Americans don’t have a problem with the morning after pill which, if one (and many do) defines pregnancy as starting at implantation,…”
See, this is the pro-aborts’ new tack: deny that the new life is a “pregnancy” until it implants. ”And many do…” Like who? Certainly not biologists, not to mention every single physician currently practicing medicine, who was taught in medical school that the fertilized ovum is a biologically distinct new life.
The feeble parsing that you are doing, CC, does not change the FACT that before implantation we have a verifiable unique, living human being. Every. Single. Time.
You hate the truth so you attempt to construct a lie, which you think is so clever, and is not. But the truth is not subject to your false twistings and turnings. Truth is still Truth. A baby is still a baby from conception, not implantation.
“Pharmer (having failed to read what I said accurately) is laughing at the individuals who could find no difference between feminine hygiene products, or condoms and the morning after pill.” – I made no comparison of the products. I was talking about men obtaining products on behalf of their women. Gentlemanly and considerate.
Same if they wanted an ice-cream “I’d love a double dip choc with cookie crumbs”; or a gun “I would feel safer and better protected if I knew it was around”. Hm, that one could apply to the EC too.
Ah, yes, we sure have utopia don’t we: when a woman can nestle under her blankets while her partner runs errands to procure the poison to murder their own child. Yes, two went to bed, three woke up, but only two are allowed in this situation and will use force to maintain it.
Many of you are concerned about the acts that lead to conception. How do we, in a humane and reasonable manner, decrease the amount of this type of sexual activity?
Would reviving chaperoned dating be a first step?
That horse has already bolted Denise. There’s no going back now.
It’d be like trying to ban motorised transport. And how well did alcohol prohibition work?
All we can do is educate and provide increasingly better protection.
Like we’ve done with driving.
Doug says:
September 25, 2011 at 11:06 am
And, “Face it. You’d be a horrible mother. Use EC.” And the picture is a woman sitting there with a drink and a cigarette. (?)
(Denise) Is every fertile female likely to become a good mother?
Is every fertile female who may not be likely to become a good mother likely to shun intimate heterosexual relationships?
ninek says:
September 26, 2011 at 1:30 am
Ah, yes, we sure have utopia don’t we: when a woman can nestle under her blankets while her partner runs errands to procure the poison to murder their own child. Yes, two went to bed, three woke up, but only two are allowed in this situation and will use force to maintain it.
(Denise) It would appear that EC works to prevent the fertilization of the egg. It may be possible it prevents implantation but it appears to primarily work by preventing the egg from being fertilized. Thus, it seems like a measure that would also work against abortion. Of course, we may also work against abortion by decreasing a type of sexual activity or decreasing sexual activity per se. I am interested in ways to do that.
http://ec.princeton.edu/questions/ecwork.html
Jill: Doug, if the man “is in any doubt that any birth control was used,” shouldn’t he have thought of that before having sex with the woman and used a condom?
Sure, but if he’s in doubt, afterward, then of course it’s too late for that, Jill.
“And, “Face it. You’d be a horrible mother. Use EC.” And the picture is a woman sitting there with a drink and a cigarette. (?)”
Denise Noe: Is every fertile female likely to become a good mother?
Obviously not. I was just surprised to see that one selected for display.
____
Is every fertile female who may not be likely to become a good mother likely to shun intimate heterosexual relationships?
Same deal – definitely not. I think it’s much better to use contraception versus having an abortion.
Doug says:
September 26, 2011 at 6:56 am
“And, “Face it. You’d be a horrible mother. Use EC.” And the picture is a woman sitting there with a drink and a cigarette. (?)”Is every fertile female who may not be likely to become a good mother likely to shun intimate heterosexual relationships? Same deal – definitely not. I think it’s much better to use contraception versus having an abortion.
(Denise) Isn’t it ALSO better to use contraception than to give birth to a child who will be neglected or abused?
I guess we have to leave out placed for adoption as it is considered bad form to mention the negative aspects of adoption despite the fact that there is no way to address problems that go unacknowledged.
“Certainly not biologists, not to mention every single physician currently practicing medicine, who was taught in medical school that the fertilized ovum is a biologically distinct new life.”
I believe that there are physicians at the NIH
“What is pregnancy?
Pregnancy is the term used to describe when a woman has a growing fetus inside of her. In most cases, the fetus grows in the uterus.
Human pregnancy lasts about 40 weeks, or just more than 9 months, from the start of the last menstrual period to childbirth”
http://www.nichd.nih.gov/health/topics/pregnancy.cfm
Notice – the language is clinical. Nothing about “distinct new life.” It’s the anti-aborts who have substituted the pure, scientific language of embryology with emotionally laden phrases such as “distinct new life.” In teaching the techniques of abortion, medical school curriculum doesn’t instruct the students that they are “taking a life” which is the anti-aborts phrase for terminating a pregnancy. And it’s just not graduate schools. Secular high school and undergrad biology courses don’t use the anti-aborts lexicon when talking about the development of a fetus.
And BTW, the image in the “card” is clearly a young boy. 17 year old males look more adult than what is pictured.
Amy1 says:
September 25, 2011 at 11:29 pm
CC says:
“Other than the militant anti-choice movement, it appears that most Americans don’t have a problem with the morning after pill which, if one (and many do) defines pregnancy as starting at implantation,…”
See, this is the pro-aborts’ new tack: deny that the new life is a “pregnancy” until it implants. ”And many do…” Like who? Certainly not biologists, not to mention every single physician currently practicing medicine, who was taught in medical school that the fertilized ovum is a biologically distinct new life.
The feeble parsing that you are doing, CC, does not change the FACT that before implantation we have a verifiable unique, living human being. Every. Single. Time.
(Denise) What happens to that human being when the zygote splits in two? Is the one human now two humans? Or did the unique living human being die so that twins could be created?
(Denise) Isn’t it ALSO better to use contraception than to give birth to a child who will be neglected or abused?
Since the drugs in question kill a zygote/embryo/unique human being, the above statement has a distinctly pro-choice stink to it. The cruel-aid drinkers want you to think these drugs merely prevent conception, but that’s just another lie to make people feel better about buying them. “Morning after” is after conception. Also, we have gone over this ad nauseum: using contraception (before conception) sets up an attitude that expects no children to result from sex. When it’s seen as a ‘failure’ the ‘solution’ is to kill the child.
The question of whether a child is better off dead than abused has also been debated. When I was a kid, we were socially taught that life was hard and you had to work hard. My dad’s favorite expression was “No one ever told you life was fair.” But in today’s twisted wonderland, people expect everything to be easy for them. If a child can’t have a perfect life, off with his head!!
Finally, my value as a living human being is not determined by my parent’s or grandparents mood at the time before my birth. To say it is, is completely unscientific and non-biological.
ninek says:
September 26, 2011 at 10:15 am
(Denise) Isn’t it ALSO better to use contraception than to give birth to a child who will be neglected or abused? Since the drugs in question kill a zygote/embryo/unique human being, the above statement has a distinctly pro-choice stink to it. The cruel-aid drinkers want you to think these drugs merely prevent conception, but that’s just another lie to make people feel better about buying them. “Morning after” is after conception. Also, we have gone over this ad nauseum: using contraception (before conception) sets up an attitude that expects no children to result from sex. When it’s seen as a ‘failure’ the ‘solution’ is to kill the child. The question of whether a child is better off dead than abused has also been debated. When I was a kid, we were socially taught that life was hard and you had to work hard. My dad’s favorite expression was “No one ever told you life was fair.” But in today’s twisted wonderland, people expect everything to be easy for them. If a child can’t have a perfect life, off with his head!!
(Denise) You are mistaking what I’m saying. I’m asking: Is it better to ensure that conceptions occur under favorable circumstances?
When I was 15 years old, a very attractive man targeted me for seduction. As a good girl, I avoided his company and pleasured myself. If I had “visited” the man, as he wanted, the child who might have been born would have been born under VERY disadvantaged circumstances. That child was not killed. He or she was never conceived.
Conceptions are avoided every time a fertile female says a firm “no” and retires to her room to enjoy her own company and imagination. I’m sure you aren’t opposed to abstinence.
No, you did not say it was better to go avoid sex: what you said was:
“Isn’t it ALSO better to use contraception than to give birth to a child who will be neglected or abused?”
USING contraception, see? USING is doing something, it means having sex while using a barrier method or some other method.
Abstaining is NOT using anything.
But hey thanks for dodging the issue and oversharing at the same time. While you were off playing with yourself, did it occur to you to tell your parents that an older man was coming on to you? (I assume he must be older because generally teenage girls don’t refer to their peers as ‘men.’) Why didn’t you just ask your parents to chaperone you and have a nice relationship with this ‘man’?
ninek says:
September 26, 2011 at 12:21 pm
No, you did not say it was better to go avoid sex: what you said was:
“Isn’t it ALSO better to use contraception than to give birth to a child who will be neglected or abused?”
USING contraception, see? USING is doing something, it means having sex while using a barrier method or some other method.>>
(Denise) What I’m saying is that it is best to influence the circumstances under which conception occurs. That can be through contraception. It can also be through abstinence. In either case, no pregnancy is conceived.
<<Abstaining is NOT using anything.
But hey thanks for dodging the issue and oversharing at the same time. While you were off playing with yourself, did it occur to you to tell your parents that an older man was coming on to you? (I assume he must be older because generally teenage girls don’t refer to their peers as ‘men.’) >>
(Denise) I was 15 years old. The man was 24. I was jailbait and what he wanted to do was statutory rape.
My mother knew he was coming on to me. I was outside watching my little brother and the man was talking to me over the brick fence that separated our homes. She saw what was happening through the window and came out and chatted with my would-be seducer.
<<Why didn’t you just ask your parents to chaperone you and have a nice relationship with this ‘man’?>>
(Denise) As soon as he started the conversation, I felt an overpowering physical attraction to him. I couldn’t trust myself to keep things cool and was afraid he might try to get me alone. He at first asked if he could “visit” at my home since I told him I didn’t date. My mother would have been at home and perhaps my father as well. But I knew that he would have suggested we meet privately or even — given that he was so extremely bold — have tried to consummate the relationship with my mother or mother and father in the house.
AS A GENERAL RULE, chaperones are a good idea. They not only protect from STDs and problem pregnancies but they protect from sexual experimentation that can leave psychic scars. While the young people may feel constrained from certain discussions because of the chaperone, the fact that they can’t immediately jump into physical intimacies means they have a chance to really get to know each other.
Ok, I’ve given you two chances. You’re almost as good at deflection as some of our tenacious anti-life commentors.
Your comments about contraception SEEM very pro-choice.
Are you in fact pro-choice? Do you in fact think that Roe v Wade should NOT be overturned?
PS to the rest of the readers: I’d bet my hat, my left shoe, and granny’s jewels that NOBODY takes the emergency contraception pills BEFORE having sex.
ninek says:
September 26, 2011 at 1:40 pm
Ok, I’ve given you two chances. You’re almost as good at deflection as some of our tenacious anti-life commentors.
Your comments about contraception SEEM very pro-choice. Are you in fact pro-choice? Do you in fact think that Roe v Wade should NOT be overturned?
(Denise) My views don’t fit into either camp. Roe v. Wade absolutely must be overturned as it went much too far. The right to the bodily expulsion of an abortion should never have been enshrined as a constitutional right.
Females seeking abortions must be required to see a photograph of an embryo or fetus at the stage of pregnancy they are at. If they are blind, they should be required to hear a description of what the embryo or fetus looks like. The abortion-seeking female must be informed as to whether or not a heart is beating and if there is brain activity. Exactly what the abortion will do — for example, tear arms and legs off — must be explained to her. If she still wants the abortion, she must be required to sign a document saying she has received this information. The abortion can legally be performed after the aforementioned has been completed.
I believe this mandatory information will not cause abortion to disappear by any means but will lead to a dramatic reduction in the number of abortions.
In the very rare instance in which a late abortion results in a live birth, the baby is automatically placed for adoption. This can be an open adoption.
Pregnancy is the term used to describe when a woman has a growing fetus inside of her. In most cases, the fetus grows in the uterus.
Human pregnancy lasts about 40 weeks, or just more than 9 months, from the start of the last menstrual period to childbirth”
Notice the language is clinical. . .
Sorry, CC, the language is not clinical, it’s not even very accurate. Pregnancy is when a woman has a fetus inside her? What about the earlier stages when a woman has an embryo inside her? A zygote? Oh, wait a minute pregnancy begins on the first day of the mother’s last menstrual period? That would be before she conceived at all. No embryo, no fetus no nothing yet. That’s a seriously flawed definition.
What the writer seems to have in mind is the fact that for many years doctors have used the “first day of the last period” as an external marker for measuring how far along a woman is in her pregnancy and when she can expect to give birth. This was done in the past because there generally were no other external markers to go by. No one would have thought a woman was actually pregnant on the first day of her last period. This was because very little attention had been given yet to the signs of ovulation (matching the time when conception, or fertilization will most likely take place). Of course, there are better markers now. In fact, nowadays women who chart their ovulation for NFP can usually tell the doctor the exact day they conceived. So the information given on the website does not reflect the actual time of conception.
So, no clinical language, but a rather inept attempt at popularization, written for the information of the general public. Certainly not written by a scientist.
Just goes to show how much you know about clinical language. It’s odd you should put it up and claim it’s clinical and accurate, when it fact it misses your own favorite marker for the start of pregnancy — implantation — by a mile.
And by the way, numerous posts and comments over the years have been put on this site – quotations from actual medical books – stating that yes, a unique new being is created at the moment of conception. You surely must have seen them.
Excellent comment Lori.
Denise, this may come as a shock to you, so sit down.
You are pro-choice.
Thank you ninek – O brave pro-life warrior princess.
ninek says:
September 26, 2011 at 2:37 pm
Excellent comment Lori.
Denise, this may come as a shock to you, so sit down.
You are pro-choice.
(Denise) Under this proposal, an abortion seeking female is legally denied an abortion if she will not see and listen to the information.
In the rare instance in which a late-term baby survives, the aborting female loses the “choice” to raise her baby.
Under your proposal, at any time during gestation a woman will still be able to pay someone to kill her child and parents can still drag their teen daughters across parking lots to force them to abort. There’s no way to spin that as not being pro-choice.
I hope that you will do some very serious soul-searching. I hope that you will come to see each human child as unique and worthy of legal protection.
ninek says:
September 26, 2011 at 3:43 pm
Under your proposal, at any time during gestation a woman will still be able to pay someone to kill her child and parents can still drag their teen daughters across parking lots to force them to abort.
(Denise) I should have added that once viability is reached, there could be no legal abortions, only Caesarian sections in which every effort is made to deliver the baby alive and keep him or her alive.
There is simply no way to force a female to carry if she is determined not to carry. As I’ve pointed out before, should she die, the unborn will — unless it is late in the pregnancy in which case I would ban all abortions and only allow C-sections — automatically die with her.
This proposal makes use of the “yuk factor,” the pregnant female’s natural revulsion against destruction, to persuade those who are “persuadable” to continue to carry.
“There is simply no way to force a female to carry if she is determined not to carry.”
Ah, a pro-choice mantra if ever I read one. I still read news stories about women who try to self-abort, sometimes with the help of the baby’s father. So legalization did not protect anyone, especially not the baby. When I was young, it was this fear for desperate women that was the wedge in my psyche through which the pro-choice disease launched it’s infection. Thank God, I’ve recovered from that illness.
Now that I am older and wiser: If you are willing to risk your own life to kill your innocent child, then your own blood, as well as your child’s, is on your own head. I will not particate in nor will I tolerate the legal slaughter of children merely to protect your own life while you willfully destroy your child. If you are a grandparent, spouse, or other person forcing a mother to abort, her and her child’s blood is on your head.
And of course, I always have to qualify that with: treating ectopic pregnancy is NOT abortion.
“What about all the women who don’t want to be pregnant?”
Wait up to 9 months and you can legally abandon your living, breathing child who may be adopted by another family.
“What about the adoption waiting, won’t there be no families waiting if abortion ends and all the families get a child? Won’t there be left-over children? What about them?!!!”
Orphanages don’t need to be run like some old Charles Dickens’ novel. We are smart enough and we can do better. A child raised in an orphanage is alive and can grow up to be anything they want.
“What about how all the abadonned children who will turn into criminals and serial killers??!!”
Why don’t you mentor an orphan and help ensure his or her success in life? Or is it just easier to kill them?
Oops sorry for the spelling errors.
Pro-lifers will hopefully agree with me on this one:
“What about all the pregnant mothers who have no support and need help?”
Subsidiarity: we can help mothers on a local level. This is much easier when abortion advocates stop fighting CPC’s tooth and nail. Many pregnant moms don’t know how much help is available. Teens can be emancipated* and can qualify for assistance for their pre-natal care. Many adoptive families are more than willing to pay their medical costs (which keeps them off the government dole, right?).
*’emancipated’ was the word used in the county where I used to live to get medical coverage temporarily if one is under 18. There is a specific name for teens in the state where I live now, but the word escapes me.
Additionally, if one out of every ten abortion advocates became pro-life and started working with CPC’s to improve and broaden their scope of assistance, there’s no limit to what cooperate human beings can accomplish. Peace!
My views don’t fit into either camp.
Yes, they do. You are a proabort.
“And by the way, numerous posts and comments over the years have been put on this site – quotations from actual medical books – stating that yes, a unique new being is created at the moment of conception. You surely must have seen them”
LOL. Comments sourced from anti-choice websites such as the one that at first glance looked like it came from Princeton when it really came from the Princeton anti-choice group. The “quotations” from “actual medical books” were cherry picked to reflect what the anti-choice lobby believes; i.e. that pregnancy begins at conception which is not a universally held belief but one that has its basis in certain Christian denominations. I would love to see a quote from texts used by medical schools that teach abortion procedures.
As I have often said, pro-life women should hold a little funeral for the product of each menstrual cycle as there could be dead “babies” on those tampons! And priests should baptize all those “babies” in the in-vitro labs as they are “human beings.” If “personhood” begins at conception, then our whole legal system needs to be changed to reflect the “rights” of the fetus which would supersede the rights of the incubator – which is how the anti-choicers see women.
The notion that “life” begins before it even attaches to the uterus is patently ridiculous.
“If you are willing to risk your own life to kill your innocent child, then your own blood, as well as your child’s, is on your own head”
Ah, the compassion of the “pro-life” movement that worships the fetus and doesn’t give a you know what about she who carries it. If this comment isn’t a summation of “right to life” I don’t know what it. But it’s definitely worth a screen grab for e-mailing to pro-choice website. It would make a great fund raising poster for pro-choice. You could have a picture of a woman bleeding to death and Ninek’s quote.
“Wait up to 9 months and you can legally abandon your living, breathing child who may be adopted by another family”
Another screen grab. You could have this quote under a picture of a pregnant woman whose belly is an incubator. The caption could be something about how women just love to be breeding machines.
“parents can still drag their teen daughters across parking lots to force them to abort”
Funny, you guys don’t have a problem with parents forcing an teenager to give birth. Parental rights. Right? Can’t have it both ways here. Funny, in this case, you want the teen to have a choice. Got hypocrisy?
“Just goes to show how much you know about clinical language.”
So is the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology a pro-aborts group?
“The purposes of this study are to assess the use of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists’ (ACOG) definitions of conception (a synonym for implantation) and the beginning of pregnancy (at implantation) in the clinical practice of its members and to explore the implications of differing definitions of conception and pregnancy onset for the process of informed consent”
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9848690
“Wait up to 9 months and you can legally abandon your living, breathing child who may be adopted by another family.”
Gross. Maybe the CPC volunteer who dissuade women from getting abortions should have to simulate pregnancy at the same time, including the weight gain; nausea; altered hormone levels; potential complications like pre-eclampsia, gestational diabetes or placental abruption; labor pains; post-partum depression; and any psychological sequelae that might stem from the experience of having one’s body used against one’s will in a potentially traumatic way.
A Pro-Life Couvade Companion! How wonderful.
“Teens can be emancipated* and can qualify for assistance for their pre-natal care.”
So you’d be perfectly fine with the state interceding on the minor’s behalf in cases where families either won’t or can’t support their pregnant daughters, yet you consider it to be violent breach of parental rights that teens can access confidential, unbiased sexual health counseling at Planned Parenthood?
The notion that “life” begins before it even attaches to the uterus is patently ridiculous.
CC, yes because we all know there are thousands and thousands of substances and combinations of substances that can attach to the uterus and continue to become larger humans. Patently ridiculous for sure.
Megan, Maybe the abortion volunteers who push women into getting abortions should have to wear tshirts with pictures of aborted fetuses that say, “I am so darn proud to support this!” How wonderful.
So is the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology a pro-aborts group?
Yes, they are. Why? Because they let an inexperienced legal clerk write in her own hand on one of their own documents and then they go ahead and re-write the document with her words on it, even though she had absolutely NO medical experience or education and her notes were purely motivated by politics. YES.
“yet you consider it to be violent breach of parental rights that teens can access confidential, unbiased sexual health counseling at Planned Parenthood?”
No, Megs, you must be confused. I consider it a violent breach of the embryos’ rights to be brutally murdered inside their mothers’ wombs. And I have to laugh at your phrase ‘unbiased…counseling.’ That’s hilarious. You gotta write for Bill Maher! Some of his one-liners are staler than last month’s bread.
cc, who-despite-herself-is-yet-a-beloved-child-of-God, you go ahead and quote me, an individual, who is not the head of any pro-life organization. Sure, lots of pro-lifers will use softer phrases and nicer vocabulary. And they watch their words get mangled by abortion fans. So, go ahead, quote ME. Guess you must be plumb out of stale rhetoric this week. Eat too many rhetoric burritos last week?
Just so you know
The equivalent of forced abortion is not “forced birth.”
There is no such thing as forced birth. A baby grows all on its own with no force whatsoever.
“…including the weight gain”
Every time I think about Megan having paid someone to kill her child, and she mentions this as a reason some people abort their children, I think that perhaps her degree wasn’t the only reason that she had her child killed, and perhaps this was among one of the chief reasons (since this is at least the second time I’ve seen her write it first in the list of reasons). Then my stomach churns and I shudder at what an absolutely horrible, shallow, and cold person she might be. Killing one’s child to avoid gaining weight is just…it’s so hard for me to wrap my head around. I can’t imagine such a cruel and self-centered person.
CC, let’s forget about pregnancy for a moment and focus on my contention that medical textbooks say that a unique individual human life begins at conception (i.e. fertilization). Here are the medical textbooks. I am not going to tell you where on the web I got the quotes, because you will only try to find some pro-life connection to shoot them down. These are the textbooks. This is what they say:
“The development of a human begins with fertilization, a process by which the spermatozoon from the male and the oocyte from the female unite to give rise to a new organism, the zygote.”
[Sadler, T.W. Langman’s Medical Embryology. 7th edition. Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins 1995, p. 3]
“Fertilization is a sequence of events that begins with the contact of a sperm (spermatozoon) with a secondary oocyte (ovum) and ends with the fusion of their pronuclei (the haploid nuclei of the sperm and ovum) and the mingling of their chromosomes to form a new cell. This fertilized ovum, known as a zygote, is a large diploid cell that is the beginning, or primordium, of a human being.”
[Moore, Keith L. Essentials of Human Embryology. Toronto: B.C. Decker Inc, 1988, p.2]
Do these look to you like the type of textbooks that would be used at a major university? They sure look like it to me.
Now let me issue you a challenge. Since you know so much about medical textbooks (not to mention clinical language and all), find me one that contradicts the above. and put up what it says. Come on, give me the quote. You talk a good fight – you always say medical textbooks are different from what pro-lifers say – but I have yet to see you put up a single actual quote. Well, show me the money!
By the way, ACOG changed its definition of pregnancy from conception to implantation because of the whole business about birth-control pills preventing implantation. This has been gone over here many times as well. Whether or not they are a pro-abort group, I don’t think this makes them a very honest group, to change medical definitions for political and social purposes.
I’ve been pregnant twice. I gained 30lbs, I was in agony because I had to be off my pain medication, I dislocated: 2 new ribs, 2 bones in my foot, 1 bone in my wrist, had all 3 joints in my pelvic girdle become loose enough to grind together, slipping out of place, causing frequent falls, and even landing me in a wheelchair, my entire spine was drug downwards as my babies decended pulling my entire rib cage out of alignment, and that’s just the easy to list stuff.
AND I’D DO IT AGAIN IN A HEARTBEAT IF I BECAME PREGNANT AGAIN.
Women don’t need to be ‘saved’ from pregnancy, even the negative aspects like weight gain, nausea, and, heaven forbid, discomfort and maybe health risks (which are actually rare, the vast majority of women come out the other side no worse for wear after a bit of recovery). What they need is the courage, conviction, help, and support to find the inner stength, fortitude, and feminine grace to do what every single last woman was born to do, give a new life a safe place to grow.
I’m not talking about martyrdom (which I know some pro-abort is going to say ‘not every woman wants to be a martyr’), I’m talking about being a mature and grown woman. If a girl doesn’t want to grow into womanhood, then she shouldn’t be doing woman things. If she chooses (that’s where the CHOICE comes in people) to do woman things, then she should have everyone’s support to make it through the most womanly thing in the world, pregnancy, but she should never have *any* support to forsake her womanhood and kill the life growing inside her. Not with a pill, not with a coathanger, not with a chemical, not with suction device, not with scissors, not with anything.
it’s not a matter of ‘choice’, “bodily autonomy’, ‘repression’, or ‘slavery’. All that comes BEFORE you CHOOSE to get pregnant. I would support the E.C. pill *if* before it was despensed a woman took 1) a pregnancy test and 2) and ovulation test. If she isn’t already detectibly pregnant and the ovulation test doesn’t show she’s ovulated recently or currently ovulating, than E.C. is a valid ‘contraceptive’ that I have absolutely no trouble with. But that doesn’t happen. And E.C., as it currently stands, is a crap-shoot as to being a contraceptive or an abortion. So, like *all* abortions, it should be completely shunned and anyone seeking it should be utterly discouraged.
Woman and woman. We are meant to have babies resulting from sex. Until that fundamental biological fact changes anyone supporting abortion is doing women a huge disservice and is inherently misogynistic. Abortion and a love for women, real women, can not go hand in hand. It’s biologically impossible. We are hardwired to protect our offspring; a pregnant woman is hardwired to do everything to protect their pregnancy. Women’s bodies will even stave themselves to produce a healthy (as possible) baby in times of famine. It does a woman far more harm to do harm to a pregnancy than the rigors of pregnancy might do to them.
“If elected President, I promise two hotdogs in every pot.”
Jespren: I’ve been pregnant twice. I gained 30lbs, I was in agony because I had to be off my pain medication, I dislocated: 2 new ribs, 2 bones in my foot, 1 bone in my wrist, had all 3 joints in my pelvic girdle become loose enough to grind together, slipping out of place, causing frequent falls, and even landing me in a wheelchair, my entire spine was drug downwards as my babies decended pulling my entire rib cage out of alignment, and that’s just the easy to list stuff.
<<<shudder>>>
Doug, certainly not the most physically pleasant thing I’ve been through. Although there were upside, my misshappen hips were forced into something more resembling normal after the 1st birth. Was wheelchair bound for about 2 weeks and on a walker for nearly 3 months, but the change in position have greatly decreased my daily pain for my hips and changed my walk so old injuries in my feet don’t bother me as much after I healed up fully. I can even sit cross legged now! (Which I could not before). Unfortunately caring for two young kids caused further dislocations of my wrist and sublaxations of both elbows. It’s a daily problem now, but the frequency actually cuts down on the pain, so it’s more annoyance than anything else. It’s worth it. I’m a stronger, better, more complete woman for it (the pregnancy and kids I mean, not the specific problems. Chronic pain might help with empathy and willpower but it’s not really a ‘life experience’ i’d want anyone else to go through. But having to go *through* pain and hardship doesn’t make the good things in life any less good.)
Thanks for the showing of sympathy.
Wow, Jespren, you are a champ! Hope you kids appreciate you. :-)
xalisae says:
September 26, 2011 at 8:50 pm
“…including the weight gain”
Every time I think about Megan having paid someone to kill her child, and she mentions this as a reason some people abort their children, I think that perhaps her degree wasn’t the only reason that she had her child killed, and perhaps this was among one of the chief reasons (since this is at least the second time I’ve seen her write it first in the list of reasons). Then my stomach churns and I shudder at what an absolutely horrible, shallow, and cold person she might be. Killing one’s child to avoid gaining weight is just…it’s so hard for me to wrap my head around. I can’t imagine such a cruel and self-centered person.
(Denise) I hope you’re a Jayne Mansfield fan. The late sex goddess was strongly anti-abortion. All 5 of her pregnancies ended in the births of live and healthy babies. Mickey Hargitay, husband #2, taught her how to use 5 pound weights to do exercises that helped get her narrow waist back.
Jayne Mansfield said, “I believe that a girl can have a baby every year and become more beautiful, have a lovelier complexion and a better figure, with each newborn. I am living proof of my theory.”
Pregnancy can cause the breasts to grow which is something that many, although by no means all, women want to happen.
The equivalent of forced abortion is not “forced birth.” There is no such thing as forced birth. A baby grows all on its own with no force whatsoever.
Well said Carla. After conception, birth is the natural order — there is no force required.
“These are the textbooks. This is what they say:”
LOL. These books are the same books sourced by the Princeton anti-choice group. They are sourced on a number of anti-choice websites and used by the Catholic bishops as “proof” that “life” begins at conception. They are “training tools” for the anti-choice movement. I asked you for something other than what was already quoted and you gave me the same old, same old. I don’t think that these are the texts used by secular med schools that teach abortion techniques. Just sayin…
“Now let me issue you a challenge. Since you know so much about medical textbooks (not to mention clinical language and all), find me one that contradicts the above. and put up what it says.”
Game on, Lori. Here’s part of a suggested curriculum, developed by Yale, for teaching 9th graders about the reproductive system:
The Germinal Stage. During this stage which begins with fertilization and ends when the ovum is embedded in the endometrium, the fertilized egg is referred to as a zygote.
No mention about “human being” or “distinct life.” It’s pretty clinical - but wait
“If there are sperm present the egg will be bombarded before it proceeds through the first third of the fallopian tube. After fertilization (the sperm nucleus combining with the egg nucleus), the egg continues its journey to the uterus. At this point the body becomes aware that it is pregnant and prepares the lining of the uterus (endometrium) to receive the fertilized egg. Nine months (266 days) after the sperm has entered the ovum it becomes a fully functional human being.”
What, what - only becoming a ”human being” at birth. Looks like Yale is teaching “pro-aborts” material. Don’t send yer kids to Yale!!!
Indeed, CC. I remember you giving the same reply last time you were given the quotes, and then I responded and I never heard a response back from you. I’ll post my response again in case you missed it:
CC,
” It’s from an index of pro-life articles so there is a bias. It was composed on a Princeton server by somebody from “Princeton Pro-Life”
If I were to copy and paste the quotes up onto a website that was affiliated with nothing, would you then give them more credibility? I really don’t understand this objection at all. You asked for quotes from medical and college textbooks, and that is what you were given. Does a quote from a college textbook become less of a quote from a college textbook because of where one finds it? Either the quotes really are in textbooks or they aren’t. Where we happen to find them is completely irrelevant to the question of their accuracy.
“Sherif rightly states that the human embryo is a member of the species homo sapiens. But he fails to argue why species membership is of any moral import whatsoever…”
Yes, but this was not your original contention. You stated “Could you provide some quotes from college level medical textbooks which definitively state that a fetus is “a human being.” and this is what was provided. We never claimed that this proves the moral status of the unborn. If you would like to know some reasons why one might give any sort of moral status to teh unborn, then please ask, but don’t ask for proof that the unborn is human and then turn around and criticize our proof that the unborn is human for not being proof that the unborn have value.
“I believe that the ”species” of fetus is “human” but no more a human “person” deserving of any rights than my former fibroids. ”
So this REALLY raises the question as to why above you demanded proof that the unborn is human, blew off scientific quotes that the unborn is human as being biased because of where the quotes were found, and now admit that the unborn is human. This leads me to believe that there really isn’t a well established, coherent, and succinct justification for abortion that you have in mind.
Actually, this is sadly common amongst pro-choicers. They argue that the fetus is not human, and then once they are confronted with the overwhelming evidence that they are human, go to the next step and argue that they are not persons or that they do not have moral worth. Why not just claim that they do not have moral worth or are not persons to begin with? Because being pro choice is a ground decision many times- that is, one begins with the assumption that the pro choice position is the correct one and then builds the rest of their evidence and worldview on this starting assumption. It is usually not something that is deduced from an argument, or come to upon careful consideration of the facts, but a ground assumption. Once particular personhood arguments don’t seem to be going very well, we will then see a retreat into the “bodily rights” argument.
“BTW, fertile women, who have had unprotected sex before their period, should mourn the period because it’s possible that some little “people,” (zygotes) that didn’t attach (implant) to the uterus wall, get flushed down the toilet. How sad. ”
Yes, this is certainly possible. What follows concerning the morality of abortion and the ontological status of the unborn?
” I don’t think that these are the texts used by secular med schools that teach abortion techniques.”
As Lori mentioned above, I would love to see just one example you have of a medical textbook used by PC medical schools which state the biologically teh unborn is not a human being; not philosophically, but biologically.
“Well said Carla. After conception, birth is the natural order — there is no force required”
And obesity is the natural order if one eats too much. Guess that means that stomach stapling surgery is unnatural and should be banned?
“You asked for quotes from medical and college textbooks, and that is what you were given”
You’re correct. These are quotes from textbooks which are used to buttress the anti-choice position. But the next question is if these texts are currently in use and at which colleges. These are only two books in a plethora of texts. But the argument rests on the term “human being.” Note, the Moore text references “the beginning of life” which suggests a progression. The Sadler text also referenced the “development” of a human being which, again, suggests a progression and not a final state of humanness. The issue is one of a view which is based on semantics. There is obviously a debate as to when a pregnancy is officially started. For those who are anti-choice, it starts with fertilization hence every zygote is sacred. For those of us who are pro-choice, neither fertilization nor implantation are relevent as we believe that a woman has the right to terminate both processes. I, personally, believe that while a fetus is physically a “human” (homo-sapiens,sapiens) it’s not a human, philosophically speaking, in the sense of a post-born person and should not, therefore, be accorded rights apart from the woman who carries it. Thus, the tricky legal nature of “personhood” laws.
The anti-choice movement claims that a fertilized egg is a pregnancy and hence, life. I was just trying to point out the anti-choice claim that ”science” says that pregnancy and therefore life begins with fertilization is debatable.
CC says:
September 27, 2011 at 10:03 am
“Well said Carla. After conception, birth is the natural order — there is no force required”
And obesity is the natural order if one eats too much. Guess that means that stomach stapling surgery is unnatural and should be banned?
(Denise) It’s just too obvious what the difference is. If you eat to much and get fat, attempts to deal with that impact on yourself. The fat is not a separate organism that anyone wants to protect.
People who want abortion illegal are trying to protect the unborn. We can argue about exactly when a human being comes into existence but it seems to me evident that one exists early in the pregnancy (even if not at conception).
To be born, the embryo or fetus needs to be carried for months in the pregnant female’s womb. Abortion criminalization advocates believe that, while the law is necessarily imperfect, it will tend to save lives because most females who find themselves pregnant will — even if they didn’t want to get pregnant — accept the pregnancy and either start or build their families.
It really does no good to equate anti-abortion laws with laws banning stomach stapling, liposuction, etc.
“At this point the body becomes aware that it is pregnant”
Gee that looks like a sentence that says the body becomes aware, it sure doesn’t say ‘becomes pregnant.’ Need any pico de gallo with that burrito?
So, cc, I gotta call you on your constant deflection. We know that millions of girls in America every year are forced by their mothers to become pregnant and give birth (see I’m not even asking you to prove this, I’m just going to pretend it’s true though I can’t imagine how they defy biology in that way).
So, tell me this and try not to deflect, sweetness: When you help a mother who is dragging her daughter against her will in your local abortion facility, do you grab the girls arm? Do you tell her ‘Stop crying, this is all for the best’? Do you get behind her and push while the mother pulls? Tell us, cc, in your experience as an escort, what have YOU done?
CC, I carefully read your above quotes, which don’t even meet your *own* request for *college* textbooks since this is “suggested” for “9th grade”, but am at a loss to why you think they support your position. I think you need an English and grammar refresher course to go along with your desperately needed biology course.
“At this point the body becomes aware that it is pregnant” the important word there being ‘aware’. In a simple reading this means, according to standard English grammar, that the pregnancy predated this point. In order to ‘become aware’ that which something/one is recognizing must already exist. So even this vaulted example shows pregnancy begins before implantation, it even points out that the body *knows* it’s pregnant before implantation.
And then again:
“Becomes a fully functional human being” this doesn’t say anything about *when* it became ‘human’. Grammatically speaking the modifier “fully functional” is referencing a change in status. Meaning the ‘human being’ existed before and has now changed to be a ‘fully functional’ human being. By rules of grammar the sentence requires the ‘human being’ to be in existance prior to this point.
it’s also clearly a basic description of the standard process, since, by the straightforward reading of this passage would mean a baby born at 39 weeks, or 37 weeks, isn’t a ‘fully fuctional human being” even though babies born at these ages are considered full term and generally healthy. It also means that a pregnancy that goes for 41 or 42 weeks has a “fully functional human being” *inside* the mother still. The obvious contradictions and incompleteness of the above quotes is clearly indicitive that it was meant as a general 9th level supplement, not an indepth analysis.
Are you familiar with the Law of Biogenesis? It is summed up in the simple phrase “life begets life”. Life does not come from non-life. When a human sperm (the male half of sexual reproduction) meets a human egg (the female half of sexual reproduction) a new life, with it’s own DNA and drive to survive is formed, life from life. HUMAN LIFE FROM HUMAN LIFE.
A fibroid, as you love to bring up, is a *part* of *your* life. It has *your* DNA and is derived exclusively from your body, just like your kidney. But a human zygote has unique DNA and is, for several days, even completely separate from another human, surviving on their own power, and even protecting themselves from their environment. They then, like all placental mammals, attatch to the maternal half of their reproductive parents to be sustained as they grow for a time. Usually this time of sustainment last about 9 months. But rare cases last as little as 5 months or as long as 12 months. At no point in that time period does a dead thing suddegnly become a live human. Nor does a part of a singluar adult human bein suddenly become a separate life. The human offspring, just like the offspring of every single heterosexual reproducing creature on the planet, is 100% a living member of the parental kind from the moment a unique creature comes into existance with the joining of egg with sperm.
If you want to argue that simply being human is inconsequential, okay. But you’re just embarrassing yourself by trying to deny that humans reproduce humans.
So here’s the thing, Ninek, honey. I’ve never seen a mother “dragging” her daughter against her will into our Planned Parenthood. The girls I’ve seen walk in by their own volition – I know, hard to believe. But if a mother was seen “dragging” a girl into a clinic, in way that constituted force, our police officer would intervene and contact the DCYF if he/she felt it was abuse. That principal would obtain for ANY situation where a child was being manhandled by an adult cuz it’s the law, in our pro-choice blue state, that one has to report abuse and if one doesn’t, one could be prosecuted.
But here’s a question for you, sweet cheeks. How do you feel about those men who sabotage their partner’s birth control so that the woman will become pregnant or forcibly prevent their partners from having abortions? Are these guys just being “real men” by forcing their women to fulfill their god given roles as future mothers?
What would you do, as a “sidewalk counselor” (LOL) if you saw a man dragging his girlfriend away from a Planned Parenthood – or a parent dragging their child away. Would you cheer?
“If you want to argue that simply being human is inconsequential, okay. But you’re just embarrassing yourself by trying to deny that humans reproduce humans”
I said that a human fetus is a ”human” in the biological sense. But the words “distinct human life,” which is anti-choice rhetoric, were not included in the quotes that Lori provided. But whether human life begins at implantation or conception is not universally agreed on. The anti-choice movement claim that “life” beginning at fertilization is used to butress their claim that the morning after pill and some forms of contraception are abortions. This is specious as “science” is not in universal agreement about whether this occurs because there is no universal agreement about when a pregnancy begins. So yeah, it’s “biological” life but the law doesn’t recognize it as separate and entitled to the legal rights of whom the state recognizes as a “person” and, therefore, entitled to human rights. “Personhood” is based on the pro-life assertion that a fetus has a soul and that is something that is definitely not agreed upon. The argument here is not about “human” physical life but what this physical “life” means in a philosophical sense and how that impacts on our laws. But right now, the morning after pill is not considered an abortifacient by those who approved and market it based on their definition of pregnancy.
Again – you have no right to tell me what I can do with my body - and that includes my uterus. The state has no vested interest in a woman either carrying a fetus to term or terminating it.
In summation – fetus, zygote, blastocyst, whatever. It’s human so big deal. As “life” it’s no more “life” than the cow that provides me with a Rib-eye steak. As such, it neither deserves nor needs special rights.
CC,
Your quote in no way shape or form lends any evidence whatsoever to the thesis that the unborn is not a human being. I will address your points individually.
“No mention about “human being” or “distinct life.””
I’m quite surprised that you are actually making the argument from silence here. Just because something doesn’t mention something does not mean that it does not think that that something is true. It simply does not follow that lack of mentioning that the unborn is a distinct human being lends evidence to the position that the unborn is not a human being. In fact, just this past hour in my linear algebra class, teh concept of an idempotent matrix came up. I looked in the book and sure enough, our linear algebra textbook did not mention idempotent matrices. Does it therefore follow that the author does not think that idempotent matrices exist? Of course not. Everything doesn’t mention everything about it’s particular subject. At the very best, the fact that it does not say anything about the unborn means that we can infer NOTHING from this quote.
“What, what – only becoming a ”human being” at birth.”
This is truly desperate, CC. The quotes says “Nine months (266 days) after the sperm has entered the ovum it becomes a fully functional human being.” Not just “human being” but “fully functional human being.” No pro-lifer would disagree with teh fact that born is a fully functional human being. Actually, no, it depends what is meant by fully functional. But the point is that just because you are a fully functioning human being at birth does not imply you were not a human being before birth. I became a teenager human being when I turned 13 but that does not imply I was not a human being before then.
So the bottom line CC, is that there is simply nothing in these quotes that a person who defends that the unborn is human would disagree with. It’s fine to admit the unborn is human. All informed pro-choicers do. They defend abortion because they claim the unborn is not a person or via bodily autonomy. So you can still be pro-choice without being anti-science.
“But the next question is if these texts are currently in use and at which colleges.”
The burden of proof just keeps getting more and more refined, more and more specific. What would convince you that the unborn is a human being? If the textbooks were used at 2 colleges? 15?
“Note, the Moore text references “the beginning of life” which suggests a progression.”
Yes, teh beginning of life. Life has already begun in order to discuss a progression. So the fact that you admit to a progression implies that life has already begun.
“The Sadler text also referenced the “development” of a human being which, again, suggests a progression and not a final state of humanness.”
Final state of humanness? I’m not sure what you mean here. A human being goes through stages and develops. It is not saying that teh idea of a human develops or that the organism develops gradually into humanness where at one point it’s only 3% (hey, like the percentage of abortions PP does in relation to all their services!) human and another it is 5%. The humanity has already begun and goes thorough stages. Otherwise, this proves too much, for now you and I are going through humanity and maybe we are only 89% human.
“There is obviously a debate as to when a pregnancy is officially started.”
Now you are shifting teh debate. Note I have not mentioned when pregnancy is defined nor do I care. I care about the ontological nature of the unborn.
” For those of us who are pro-choice, neither fertilization nor implantation are relevent as we believe that a woman has the right to terminate both processes.”
Ah, based on what? Her bodily autonomy? Great! Than why hold to this nonsense that the unborn is not a human being? A woman has a right to an abortion because of her right to her body, regardless of whether or not the unborn is human. This is a perfectly defensible and much more rational position to hold to. In other words, the humanity of teh unborn is moot.
“I, personally, believe that while a fetus is physically a “human” (homo-sapiens,sapiens) it’s not a human, philosophically speaking”
Oh, well than fine! Great, so you mean to say it is not a PERSON. Fine, again, a perfectly defensible position. But please use the term “person” now and make it clear that you don’t believe the unborn is a person i.e. it is a human organism but it is not worthy of rights or whatever. This could have saved much confusion and discussion.
“I was just trying to point out the anti-choice claim that “science” says that pregnancy and therefore life begins with fertilization is debatable.”
You have failed to show this. Rather, your defense of abortion is based on what it means to be valuable. So concentrate on why we should value a zygote and not whether or not it is biologically a person because above, you do indeed admit it is a human organism. So remember, you believe in a right to abortion not because the unborn is not human, but because it does not have those properties that a being we value has (whatever those properties may be).
“Again – you have no right to tell me what I can do with my body – and that includes my uterus.”
No, okay, so you believe in teh right to abortion based on the woman’s bodily autonomy. Again, whether or not the unborn is a human is moot, but also whether or not teh unborn is a PERSON is now moot. This is what teh bodily autonomy argument says. See Judith Jarvis Thompson’s article “A defense of abortion” in which she talks about the violinist anaology. She fully concedes that the unborn is a person because it is moot to her main argument in favor of abortion. I suggest you do the same to avoid confusion. The reason is because we spend all this time discussing humanity and personhood of the unborn and then you turn around and say “well the woman has a right to her body” which nullifies everything we said. But then we’ve just wasted our time trying to discuss an argument that we thought you held to but that you didn’t because you seem to be confused about why exactly you’re pro-choice.
So let’s put this all together. The humanity and the personhood of the unborn are moot points. There is no reason for you to argue about them because even if they could be established, that would not address your main argument in favor of abortion which is that a woman may do what she pleases with her body. Being able to state your position succinctly and articulately will save so much time and headache for both sides in the future.
“ our police officer would intervene and contact the DCYF if he/she felt it was abuse.”
Oh, they rely on their feelings, huh? No objective parameters there in RI? “Gee, I saw that the gal didn’t want to go, but I just didn’t feel that it was abuse..” Wow, that really makes me feel all warm and fuzzy about the rent-a-cops at your “clinic.”
Oh, and I just love (or is the pro-abort word ‘luuuurv’?) the way you constantly try to deflect onto ‘forced pregnancy.’ I gotta ask myself, honey-bunches, if you help women kill their children and grandchildre as a way to keep the score even?
And as long as abortion just kills a cow, er, I mean person, why do you even care if a woman concieves a child because her boyfriend sabotages her pills? (or according to your earlier comment: her mother may even sabotage her birthcontrol in an effort to become a grandmother, right?) I mean, if a pregnant woman shows up at your clinic to get rid of the ‘sabotage baby’ then it’s all good to you, an abortion fan, right? Why would you care how many babies are conceived as long as you get to see them enter the abortuary in their mother’s wombs and exit in a pail of “medical waste”? Right, cc?
Now, to answer your other inquiry: I have yet to see anyone, friend or relative try to drag the mother from the parking lot of an abortion facility. So I will let you know what I do as soon as I see that happen!!
Guess that means that stomach stapling surgery is unnatural and should be banned?
If that stomach stapling ends up killing another human, I think it should be banned? Wouldn’t you CC?
I’ve yet to hear how someone choosing stomach stapling kills someone else. Please provide any links if you find them and I will start my protest. Thanks.
CC,
.
“The anti-choice movement claim that “life” beginning at fertilization is used to butress their claim that the morning after pill and some forms of contraception are abortions. This is specious as “science” is not in universal agreement about whether this occurs because there is no universal agreement about when a pregnancy begins.”
You started out by saying that some people claim that life begins at fertilization, and counter that by saying that not everyone agrees that pregnancy begins at fertilization. After replacing the second half of one thought (people claim that life begins at conception and that contraceptives cause abortions because they end that life which began at fertilization) with the first half of another (the life of the zygote is not ended by EC because {in your opinion} a woman becomes pregnant at implantation) to form what looks like a non-thought, (They say that contraception can cause an abortion {which they define as ending the life of a new human in the womb}, but we don’t agree that a woman’s body is pregnant at fertilization, so obviously contraception does not cause abortions) If you want to argue “abortion” is something that ends a pregnancy, and something can only be ended if it has been started, and that pregnancy begins with implantation, so preventing implantation is not an abortion but contraception, just do it! As a favor to anyone who reads what you write, could you define “life,” “pregnancy,” “abortion,” “conception” and “implantation” so we can understand what you are trying to say?
.
“So yeah, it’s “biological” life but the law doesn’t recognize it as separate and entitled to the legal rights of whom the state recognizes as a “person” and, therefore, entitled to human rights.”
This is making my head spin. Earlier you said “But whether human life begins at implantation or conception is not universally agreed on.” Now you admit that biologically, it is undeniable that life begins at fertilization (if you are differentiating between implantation and conception, can we equate conception with fertilization?) Now you switch to talking about how the law differs from BIOLOGY in its “opinion” of what constitutes a separate life. Earlier it seemed like you were going to base your argument on science, which makes sense since biology as the study of life would be completely useless if it could not determine what principles can be used to differentiate between two organisms, and biology is certainly not useless. You are right when you say that the law does not recognize the biological fact that a zygote is a separate organism from the mother. You are also dead on when you say that it is the philosophical meaning of this life that ought to impact our laws. I was thinking about the U.S. Constitution the other day. It occurred to me that this document makes it very clear that the government does not define what a person is. The government can only recognize as persons those who are already persons in their own right.
“All persons born or naturalized in the United States and
subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United
States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall
make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges
or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall
any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property,
without due process of law; nor deny to any person within
its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
According to the Constitution, citizenship is gained at birth. It seems that personhood is regarded as something that is not defined by the laws of any country or state. Because citizenship is a privilege, it can be conferred by the government, whereas personhood is a part of being human that contains within itself the right to protection by the government, which the government may not deny to any person. As citizens we have to figure out what personhood is so that the government may protect all persons equally. This is what we are doing, CC.
.
““Personhood” is based on the pro-life assertion that a fetus has a soul and that is something that is definitely not agreed upon.”
I am so glad to learn that you believe in souls. :)
.
“In summation – fetus, zygote, blastocyst, whatever. It’s human so big deal. As “life” it’s no more “life” than the cow that provides me with a Rib-eye steak. As such, it neither deserves nor needs special rights.”
Human life is insignificant. Got it. Because you eat a cow, which was alive, a human which is alive does not deserve rights.
“I mean, if a pregnant woman shows up at your clinic to get rid of the ‘sabotage baby’ then it’s all good to you, an abortion fan, right?”
Wow. Stark raving mad. If you really believe in your “abortion fan” strawman, then it’s time to see a therapist. Or at least get a dog.
“Are you familiar with the Law of Biogenesis? It is summed up in the simple phrase ‘life begets life.’ Life does not come from non-life.”
…a statement that sort of negates the whole “life begins at conception” belief, no? Why draw the line at enshrining the rights of zygotes, completing forgetting about their totally “living” cellular parents?
““Are you familiar with the Law of Biogenesis? It is summed up in the simple phrase ‘life begets life.’ Life does not come from non-life.”
…a statement that sort of negates the whole “life begins at conception” belief, no?”
No, because as the person who you quoted wrote, it is SUMMED up in that phrase. But of course in summing something up, you lose technicalities and important distinctions. That is the price one pays for being pithy. Thus, the phrase “life begets life” is shorthand for the fact that the product of conception is not an organism that is dead, but a living organism. Furthermore, the kind of organism it is is the same kind as teh parents so that seals beget seals, doges beget dogs, humans beget humans, etc. The kind of thing that a couple produces together is never a gamete or a just a cell that does not have the potential reproduce itself, but an organism of the same kind as the parents.
“Why draw the line at enshrining the rights of zygotes, completing forgetting about their totally “living” cellular parents? ”
Because of the kind of thing the zygote is; that is, the zygote is a whole organism with the natural potential for self-directed growth into the fetal, infant, teen, and adult stages of human life. That is the kind of thing that a zygote is ordered towards. It is an integrated whole, unlike a skin cell or a gamete whose ends is simply to be part of a greater whole. All the “parts” of the zygote work together for a common good of growing and living through all stages of human development. The same cannot be said of a skin cell. Even if we consider somatic cell nuclear transfer, the skin cell that is used is no more and a different organism, an embryo which is an integrated whole, is teh resulting organism, biologically distinct from the original cell. Again, this organism, given the proper nutrients and environment, is ordered towards growth through all stages of human existence. So that is why we would value the zygote and not the gametes from which it came- because of the kind of thing it is intrinsically.
Interesting suggestion, Megsmeister. Ironically, all my most zealous pro-choice friends have been in therapy for years (I can’t name one that isn’t), many of them are on anti-depressants (Oooh sue me - I’m a medicine cabinet snoop! but many admit it).
My pro-life friends? Not as depressed. Can’t think of one that is on medication or in chronic therapy. But hey, no such thing as ‘post-abortive-syndrome’ right? And it’s not like you all scream and contort your angry faces when you encounter us at the Walks for Life?
It reminds me of the Dalai Lama (you know, he’s one of those religious patriarchs). He smiles so much, his smile muscles are enormous! Look at his cheeks – he
looks like a cherub!
Bobby, we can annoy them further by breaking into a rousing chorus of Monty Python’s “Every sperm is sacred!”
“Well said Carla. After conception, birth is the natural order — there is no force required”
And obesity is the natural order if one eats too much. Guess that means that stomach stapling surgery is unnatural and should be banned?
Abortion shouldn’t be banned because it is unnatural; abortion should be banned because it kills a human being. Denying someone stomach-stapling surgery would not be forced obesity. Every person is free not to become one who “eats too much” the same way every person is free not to become pregnant.
I’m back after a particularly long night at work, and sleeping quite late. I sure missed a lot! Bobby, you are particularly brilliant today. You answered all of CC’s contentions much better than I could! Thanks to everyone else who commented as well.
Well, CC, now we know that you have no knowledge at all of medical textbooks on embryology and were bluffing when you said you did, can’t differentiate between a college textbook and a ninth-grade curriculum, get constantly mixed up on the definitions of pregnancy and fertilization, announce loudly that pro-lifers base their contentions on religious arguments while all the while they are desperately trying to straighten you out on your science, and end up with the usual mindless mantra of “it’s my body.”
Do you know why I still bother trying to answer you? There is not much hope you will change your mind (though miracles are always possible). I do it because I keep thinking of the person who wrote here in a comment a while back that she had been on the fence about abortion, but after reading the comments of both sides on this blog, she became pro-life — because pro-lifers had all the evidence on arguments on their side, and the pro-aborts had none.
Airing all the arguments each side really has does a great deal to clarify things.
Just keep writing as you have done, CC, and you may convert even more people to the pro-life side!
“Well, CC, now we know that you have no knowledge at all of medical textbooks on embryology and were bluffing when you said you did”
This is what I said: ”I don’t think that these are the texts used by secular med schools that teach abortion techniques. Just sayin.” Ergo, I’m not sure what texts are used at different schools. If these texts have anti-choice bias, would they be used in courses which provide abortion instruction? I don’t know. But given that you can’t tell me which schools use these books (which are only a small segment of books which, by coincidence are revered by the anti-choice movement) then you really don’t have much more knowledge about texts than I do.
And the curriculum that I cited was developed by those at Yale. As I said, the language provided was clinical without any references to unique life, blah, blah, blah. But the debate about the personhood and value of the ”pre-born” can be seen in this article, in the Harvard Magazine, which has two professors debating the issue. The pro-choice position is articluated as such: “The fact that all persons were once blastocysts does not prove that all blastocysts are persons…” The science isn’t settled, by any means.
Here’s a website that describes fetal development. Very clinical and not concerned about unique human beings and all that jazz. Again, I suspect that most college texts use the same lexicon without editorializing about how abortion kills babies.
http://www.biologyreference.com/Ep-Fl/Fetal-Development-Human.html
That is a great point about why you write here, Lori. In fact, I was thinking something very similar when writing my responses today too. I always say that many pro-choicers are pro-choice based on it being a starting assumption and THEN look for evidence to justify their position. This thread has been fantastic evidence to support that position. We see that we start with the assumption that abortion is morally permissible and then look for reasons that might justoify it, whatever those reasons may be. Can I argue it’s not a human? Oh great, yes, that is why I’m pro-choice. Can I argue that it isn’t a person? Oh good, cool, that’s why I’m pro-choice. Can I argue that a woman can do whatever she wants with her body? Oh super, that is why I”m pro-choice. Can I argue that it is moral because the government says so? Great, that is my reasoning. Etc etc. This is most evident when we don’t see a single, coherent defense of abortion but rather a blind acceptance of anything and everything that might imply that abortion is morally permissible.
Many pro-choicers do not know why they are pro-choice and are not able to give a coherent defense of their position. They’ve heard some things here and there about human development and bodily ownership but have not taken the time to read current pro-choice literature or give any serious thought to their own arguments. Whenever this is exposed, it shows the lack of intellectual rigor of the majority pro-choice position.
“The fact that all persons were once blastocysts does not prove that all blastocysts are persons…”
Well its a good thing that this is a strawman and not really an argument put forth by serious pro-lifers.
“”The fact that all persons were once blastocysts does not prove that all blastocysts are persons…” The science isn’t settled, by any means.”
You said it was above! You said the unborn are human organisms. After that, we go into philosophical discussions which science says nothing about. Furthermore, the person making that statement was not making a scientific statement nor does he think he’s making a scientific statement. So I don’t know how you get from the philosophical strawman “The fact that all persons were once blastocysts does not prove that all blastocysts are persons” to saying something about science. The statemnet says nothing about science, and you admitted above that science says that the unborn are human beings.
“Again, I suspect that most college texts use the same lexicon without editorializing about how abortion kills babies.”
Ah, notice now the switch to the language of “babies.” I, as well as others here, have been very careful to use the “proper scientific and medical terms” because the only real pro-choice response that tends to be given to any pro-life argument is that we don’t use the correct terms. The entire pro-choice movement is built on a solid foundation of semantics and I never give the pro-choice side a semantical opening from whence to pounce since that is the forte. I call teh unborn a fetus (not baby), I call people those who support abortion pro-choice (not pro-abort), I call the late term abortion technique Dilation and extraction (not partial birth abortion), etc. so that the pro-choicer will not focus on the words I use but teh arguments. Here, however, we see that you put the word “baby” in here to make this about semantics. I nor any other reasonable pro-lifer would claim that medical texts claim that abortion kills a baby. Rather, it kills an embryo or fetus.
WOW. From the article
“Probing the assumptions underlying the equal moral status view of the embryo, Sandel asks how a person holding that view would behave if confronted with a fire in a fertility clinic.”
Is this guy seriously a professor at Princeton? The fire in the fertility clinic scenario is a joke. I have to be honest- I bet this article was put together by pro-lifers. I mean, putting Robert George up against this government professor? Why not have George interact with an intelligent pro-choicer like Singer or Tooley, someone his philosophical equal?
CC, if you think Sandel makes any intelligent or defensible points, I’m happy to address them. They are so standard, typical, run-of-the-mill, pro-choicer (or in this case pro-h-ESCR) on teh street points that I have heard them dozens of times. When one sees something in an Ivy League paper, you expect a certain level of discourse. I guess I was just so shocked to see that his arguments really are your typical arguments found on message boards; not worthy of the Ivy League.
And the curriculum that I cited was developed by those at Yale. As I said, the language provided was clinical without any references to unique life, blah, blah, blah.
There’s undoubtedly a reason it doesn’t mention new life, just as there is a reason it uses non-clinical emotive terms like “the body becomes aware it’s pregnant.” It’s written for ninth-graders, so it’s designed to be colorful. It’s also designed to teach kids – and not just science.
I’m sure you are aware, CC, that colleges and universities in this country are – or at least would like to think they are – the great arbiters and teachers about how we are to live. I’m not surprised that Yale isn’t willing to teach ninth-graders that a human life begins at conception. College textbooks in biology, however, are usually written by scientists for budding scientists. They absolutely have to be accurate if science is to make any headway. So yes, I’d trust something written by a scientist in a textbook over someone from a think tank at Yale trying to indoctrinate ninth-graders in the search for the new society of the future, blah, blah, blah.
Again, I suspect that most college texts use the same lexicon without editorializing about how abortion kills babies.
It was never my contention that college textbooks say that abortion kills babies. Nor do the ones I cited say this. You evidently mean they are editorializing when they say that the life of a human being begins at fertilization. Now even you on some level admit that this is a fact, that a newly fertilized zygote is human. So to you, this is a fact, but simply stating it is “editorializing”or showing a “pro-life bias”? How in the world do you come to this conclusion?
And where did you acquire your notions of what clinical language is? The textbooks use pretty much the same lexicon as your website. You only criteria apart from that is apparently that the language not be emotive (though your curriculum example is), and it must never, never, never mention the fact that a human life begins at conception. Where exactly do you get these criteria?
As for the “unique new life.” One of the texts states that fertilization gives rise to “a new organism.” An organism is a living thing. “New” means it wasn’t there before. Therefore it isn’t either of its parents. Nor is it any other organism. So yes, a unique new life.
And even though the text doesn’t state it, at least not in this excerpt, all you have to do is look at the unique and unrepeatable DNA that comes into being for each individual at conception. So yes, unique.
Pure science, CC.
“all you have to do is look at the unique and unrepeatable DNA that comes into being for each individual at conception. So yes, unique.’
But still the private property of the woman who carries it – for those who are “pro-life” the incubator. And that’s the key, I believe, to the argument as the argument about what defines “life,” in the philosophical and legal sense will never be agreed upon. Yeah, fetuses have “life” in that their systems are “living” in a purely biological sense (and many say that it is incomplete and potential “life”)- but does that mean that their “life” is equal to the life of somebody who exits the birth canal and thus, in need of legal protection. While your church has its opinion, there’s lots of other opinion that doesn’t agree. Ain’t it America, for you and me…
“Rather, it kills an embryo or fetus”
For me, as the fetus is nothing more than a body part that’s not a problem. Obviously, it’s a legal and political issue that the state of Mississippi will be dealing with in November. It will be interesting to see what the SCOTUS says as there will be suits if it passes. The overriding issue is that this non person is in my body which the state has no jurisdiction over.
And BTW, if a zygote can’t come into being as a human “being” without the lining of the uterus, how is it a “person?” And that’s where the NIH disagrees with the anti-choice movement about the morning after pill (topic of the thread, hello) being an abortion pill. Thankfully, your side lost on that one!!!!!!
Hey Lori, I’ve been refraining from what you consider to be anti-Catholic comments. You still kicking into the pro-life coffers? I just sent in $50 to Planned Parenthood as we are totally mobilizing against the efforts to put women back into the dark ages. I could say something anti-clerical here but I won’t.
“But still the private property of the woman who carries it –”
Wow, in grades school we learned that the slaves had been freed. Today we hear from anti-lifers who despise the comparison of abortion to slavery. So, well done, cc!! I am relieved that anti-lifers are finally admitting what we all know: abortion is the same and as bad as slavery.
“So, well done, cc!! I am relieved that anti-lifers are finally admitting what we all know: abortion is the same and as bad as slavery.”
Slavery involved post-born people who were denied their liberty. Fetuses are clearly not in the same category. (the little fetuses are just crying out to be free and some of them are trying to escape to their freedom!) How do you deduce that we are admitting that abortion is the same as slavery? What we’re saying is that forcing a woman to bear a child (which is what slave masters did with their breeding stock of slave women in order to increase their “property”) is the same as slavery. Criminalizing abortion enslaves women.
Check out Ta Nehisi Coates article: “The Unbearable Whiteness of Pro-Lifers and Pundits” as that debunks the abortion = slavery argument of the pro-lifers whose abortion = Shoah argument is so offensive to American Jews, the majority of whom are pro-choice.
And Ninek, if a woman’s uterus isn’t her private property, whose property is it? Are you, the great and awesome saver of babies, able to take custody of the wombs of American women who are going to abort. Good luck with that!
“I am relieved that anti-lifers are finally admitting what we all know: abortion is the same and as bad as slavery.”
And what of the pregnant woman, ninek? What is she but a holding vessel for new life if she doesn’t consent to carrying that life in the first place? Honestly, the slavery analogy is such a weird smokescreen, since the pro-choicers’ use of it is so much more logical.
But let’s carry your analogy to ITS logical end. Say the relationship of fetus–mother really is comparable to the relationship between master–slave. How far would you take “liberation”? I for one would LOVE to life in a country where women had to report their menstrual cycles to the government, or were spied on during pregnancy to ensure that all “miscarriages” were purely accidental. Wouldn’t you? Oh how I would thank the magnanimous pro-lifers for their undying “concern” for women!
“were spied on during pregnancy to ensure that all “miscarriages” were purely accidental. Wouldn’t you? Oh how I would thank the magnanimous pro-lifers for their undying “concern” for women.”
So true. With budget shortfalls, the social services are laying off workers. If Ninek had her way, we would need to expand our protective services and the court systems which would be necessary to monitor all those fetuses that the state has custody of. And those pregnant women whose fetuses aren’t in custody would need to be very careful lest somebody, like Ninek, see them at a bar and report them for endangering their fetuses. We would need a new state department for fetuses and their families.
Talk about intrusive “big government.”
“In summation – fetus, zygote, blastocyst, whatever. It’s human so big deal. As “life” it’s no more “life” than the cow that provides me with a Rib-eye steak. As such, it neither deserves nor needs special rights.”
Wow. The author of this gem of ignorance must hail from the dark ages. For all their logical and emotional faults, no pro-choicers talk like this anymore.. For decades no one has disputed the humanity of… human… fetuses. Thanks to scientific advances in ultrasound technology, we know a lot about how we as a species develop in the womb than we did 30-40 years ago.
Who can take this commenter seriously when she is so behind the times? Clearly the ‘biological solution’ is not too far away for someone like this, who refuses to adapt to new knowledge. What a stunning display of ignorance. It’s like talking to soemone who thinks the earth is flat.
Great CC. You now admit that the only real argument you have is the bodily autonomy thang. So can we expect you from now on to refrain from all attempts at arguments based on what science has to say about the origins of life? — because it really hurts when I laugh.
Thanks for refraining from the anti-Catholic stuff. I have donated some to the Susan B. Anthony list. I wanted to donate directly to the Archdiocese of New York, but they don’t seem to have a general pro-life fund listed on their website, just individual things like pro-life school projects you can donate to. I couldn’t make up my mind which one to donate to. Plus I ran into some financial difficulties and have had very little extra money till now. However, I do hope to meet Archbishop Dolan soon about a project I’m planning. Maybe I can give him a check personally. I think it ended up being $50. If I can manage to get a photo of that, I’ll post it :-)
“But still the private property of the woman who carries it – for those who are “pro-life” the incubator.”
The fetus is contained by, connected to and nourished by the mother’s body. This does not make the fetus the private property of the mother. Women are so much more than incubators, even when they are pregnant. I do not understand what it is that you do not understand about the teaching of the Catholic Church on human dignity. It is a beautiful, glorious thing.
And that’s the key, I believe, to the argument as the argument about what defines “life,” in the philosophical and legal sense will never be agreed upon.
Life is defined by biology. That is all.
Yeah, fetuses have “life” in that their systems are “living” in a purely biological sense (and many say that it is incomplete and potential “life”)- but does that mean that their “life” is equal to the life of somebody who exits the birth canal and thus, in need of legal protection. While your church has its opinion, there’s lots of other opinion that doesn’t agree.
Exiting the birth canal does not change the inherent status of the fetus as an organism or a human being. It changes the environment of the fetus and the method by which the fetus gets the resources needed for survival. Its need of protection does not change.
Please feel free to prove otherwise.
Post-born babies rely upon their parents for survival, which makes the parent-child relationship one of “custody”. A child is never considered “private property”, even though the child could not survive without the parents.
Therefore, the assertion that the pre-born baby is private property because s/he couldn’t survive without the mother is false.
gh
M
Science and biology are not on your side. All you’ve got is “might makes right.”
Science and biology are not on your side. All you’ve got is “might makes right
And the court system. And while the pre-born fetus is “life” in the biological sense (no universal agreement on ensoulment), does that mean it deserves the same rights as the post born? Funny, scientists aren’t clamoring for the criminalization of the procedure that takes this “life.” Wonder why? Tell us, Ninek.
Science and biology are not on your side. All you’ve got is “might makes right
And the court system. And while the pre-born fetus is “life” in the biological sense (no universal agreement on ensoulment), does that mean it deserves the same rights as the post born? Funny, scientists aren’t clamoring for the criminalization of the procedure that takes this “life.” Wonder why? Tell us, Ninek.
Sounds pretty much like the whole slavery deal. No science, no biology – only might makes right and the court system. At least half of this nation wasn’t “clamoring” to criminalize the enslavement of their “property” either. The reason is because oppression to preserve one’s current way of life is so much easier than doing what is right and moral in considering the lives of others. Why should we have to change when all that matters is “what I want”?
People have a way of ignoring the smoke billowing from the concentration camps, don’t they – so long as it doesn’t affect their pretty little lives in any way. Abortion is the same way.
“Funny, scientists aren’t clamoring for the criminalization of the procedure that takes this “life.””
How does one respond to this? “Do you live under a rock” doesn’t seem like it would be respectful enough to have a dialouge… Pointing out the obvious, “Scientists ARE clamoring for the criminalization of this procedure” will probably be ineffective, all things considered. How about “Funny, there are people who aren’t applying their knowledge of the reality of the world to their actions?”
CC, are you a satirist? Have you ever read “A Modest Proposal?” Are you able to recognize sarcasm? Irony?
Or is your idea of a scientist something that necessarily includes an agreement with pro-choice philosophy?
CC: “”The fact that all persons were once blastocysts does not prove that all blastocysts are persons…” The science isn’t settled, by any means.”
Bobby: You said it was above! You said the unborn are human organisms. After that, we go into philosophical discussions which science says nothing about.
Science is not what determines personhood. Sure, many scientific things about the unborn are settled (but not all). Meanwhile, the abortion debate is really about our philosophy and societal approach.
Doug,
Isn’t that what Bobby said?
I just want everyone to know, I am pretty sure I only became a fully functioning human being like, maybe, 6 years ago. And I’m 44. I sure wish I’d known I wasn’t protected in CC’s world. Yikes.