[Abortion Thread] (POLL 4) A compromising position...

[Godular]

I reject the idea that the fetus should be held as superior to the woman.

What if it was a 3rd grader?

Age is irrelevant, doubly so because the consideration past-birth is largely moot.

[Des-Bal]

Age is irrelevant, doubly so because the consideration past-birth is largely moot.

I'm not talking about past birth, I'm talking about killing a third grader as a necessary aspect of an abortion. If an abortion required a human sacrifice, if it absolutely necessitated taking a thinking, feeling, person with dreams and aspirations and killing them would it in any way change the equation?

[Attempted Socialism]

Age is irrelevant, doubly so because the consideration past-birth is largely moot.

I'm not talking about past birth, I'm talking about killing a third grader as a necessary aspect of an abortion. If an abortion required a human sacrifice, if it absolutely necessitated taking a thinking, feeling, person with dreams and aspirations and killing them would it in any way change the equation?

Your example poses the question: If reality was exceedingly different, would ethics be different? And since ethics is built upon the material foundations we find in reality, probably. In this reality, no. I'm not keen on human suffering or losses, which is why I see no ethical issue with abortion prior to 20-24 weeks, but after that, there is, in my mind, a slowly escalating ethical responsibility on both society and the parents. Now, your hypothetical is ludicrous even when considering your attempt to contrast "danger to the mother" with "homicide", since the foetus and your hypothetical 8-year-old are far too different in several relevant regards for your comparison to work. So if instead you had asked a sane version (And there are good arguments for limiting abortion after 24 weeks), you could probably get a more interesting answer, but you didn't.

[Genivaria]

Age is irrelevant, doubly so because the consideration past-birth is largely moot.

I'm not talking about past birth, I'm talking about killing a third grader as a necessary aspect of an abortion. If an abortion required a human sacrifice, if it absolutely necessitated taking a thinking, feeling, person with dreams and aspirations and killing them would it in any way change the equation?

Then we're no longer talking about abortion and the question is irrelevant to this topic.

[Des-Bal]

Then we're no longer talking about abortion and the question is irrelevant to this topic.

We absolutely are, because if you believe that life begins at conception you believe abortion kills a person. If you wouldn't sign off on killing a third grader to complete the procedure you can't really persuade a pro-lifer with arguments about financial strain, potential health complications, or bodily sovereignty

[Genivaria]

Then we're no longer talking about abortion and the question is irrelevant to this topic.

We absolutely are, because if you believe that life begins at conception you believe abortion kills a person. If you wouldn't sign off on killing a third grader to complete the procedure you can't really persuade a pro-lifer with arguments about financial strain, potential health complications, or bodily sovereignty

Cool so then you believe that we can harvest Person A's organs/blood without Person A's consent to save Person B.
The age of the person's involved are irrelevant.

[Des-Bal]

Cool so then you believe that we can harvest Person A's organs/blood without Person A's consent to save Person B.
The age of the person's involved are irrelevant.

You're comparing allowing someone to take an action that kills a person and requiring them to save them. I stand by the example I gave. Abortion functions exactly as it does now but the process requires taking a child and killing them. If abortion did without question kill a person would you still support it? If you wouldn't 90% of abortion rhetoric is meaningless because everybody agrees that if it WAS murder it wouldn't be okay and it's down to that scientific question of when a thing is a person.

[Genivaria]

Cool so then you believe that we can harvest Person A's organs/blood without Person A's consent to save Person B.
The age of the person's involved are irrelevant.

You're comparing allowing someone to take an action that kills a person and requiring them to save them. I stand by the example I gave. Abortion functions exactly as it does now but the process requires taking a child and killing them. If abortion did without question kill a person would you still support it? If you wouldn't 90% of abortion rhetoric is meaningless because everybody agrees that if it WAS murder it wouldn't be okay and it's down to that scientific question of when a thing is a person.

No that's what YOU are doing, you literally brought an example of human sacrifice into this argument, don't pretend otherwise.

[Deacarsia]

Yea, “pro-choice” and pro-life are mutually exclusive.

[Des-Bal]

No that's what YOU are doing, you literally brought an example of human sacrifice into this argument, don't pretend otherwise.

No I'm not? Choosing not to do anything in the case of a pregnancy would be not performing the abortion, choosing not to do anything in the case of someone requiring a donation would be not performing the surgery.

I introduced human sacrifice as an example because it's what fits. Pro-lifer believe abortion kills a person so asking if you'd be okay with abortion if it killed a person the most basic step towars understanding and thereby arguing against the other side.

[Agarntrop]

We absolutely are, because if you believe that life begins at conception you believe abortion kills a person. If you wouldn't sign off on killing a third grader to complete the procedure you can't really persuade a pro-lifer with arguments about financial strain, potential health complications, or bodily sovereignty

Cool so then you believe that we can harvest Person A's organs/blood without Person A's consent to save Person B.
The age of the person's involved are irrelevant.

Newsflash: Abortion intentionally destroys the fetus. It dosen't just remove it from the body. The fetus is destroyed, in the mind of someone who believes life begins at conception, it is logical to equate abortion and child murder.

[Genivaria]

No that's what YOU are doing, you literally brought an example of human sacrifice into this argument, don't pretend otherwise.

No I'm not? Choosing not to do anything in the case of a pregnancy would be not performing the abortion, choosing not to do anything in the case of someone requiring a donation would be not performing the surgery.

I introduced human sacrifice as an example because it's what fits. Pro-lifer believe abortion kills a person so asking if you'd be okay with abortion if it killed a person the most basic step towars understanding and thereby arguing against the other side.

And then you bring it right back to the level of harvesting someone's organs without their consent.
I'm already fully granting that the fetus is a human being, I'm also saying it's irrelevant.

You can't force someone to remain pregnant against their will anymore than you can force people to donate parts of their body even to save an actual walking, talking, thinking human being.

[Galloism]

No I'm not? Choosing not to do anything in the case of a pregnancy would be not performing the abortion, choosing not to do anything in the case of someone requiring a donation would be not performing the surgery.

I introduced human sacrifice as an example because it's what fits. Pro-lifer believe abortion kills a person so asking if you'd be okay with abortion if it killed a person the most basic step towars understanding and thereby arguing against the other side.

And then you bring it right back to the level of harvesting someone's organs without their consent.
I'm already fully granting that the fetus is a human being, I'm also saying it's irrelevant.

You can't force someone to remain pregnant against their will anymore than you can force people to donate parts of their body even to save an actual walking, talking, thinking human being.

And notably, this is true even if you accidentally caused their need of the organ or even blood.

Here’s a scenario -

You are driving a car. You drop your coffee, and rear end a guy on a motorcycle at a high rate of speed. Lucky for you, he’s alive. They rush him to the hospital. He needs blood. Unfortunately, the hospital’s applicable blood supply was recently exhausted by a building collapse nearby.

Good luck for the motorcycle rider - you’re a match.

Can you be forced to give him your blood? Can they strap you down and take it, given you caused his need via an accident?

[Molither]

And then you bring it right back to the level of harvesting someone's organs without their consent.
I'm already fully granting that the fetus is a human being, I'm also saying it's irrelevant.

You can't force someone to remain pregnant against their will anymore than you can force people to donate parts of their body even to save an actual walking, talking, thinking human being.

And notably, this is true even if you accidentally caused their need of the organ or even blood.

Here’s a scenario -

You are driving a car. You drop your coffee, and rear end a guy on a motorcycle at a high rate of speed. Lucky for you, he’s alive. They rush him to the hospital. He needs blood. Unfortunately, the hospital’s applicable blood supply was recently exhausted by a building collapse nearby.

Good luck for the motorcycle rider - you’re a match.

Can you be forced to give him your blood? Can they strap you down and take it, given you caused his need via an accident?

You can't be forced but it's the moral thing to do. Same thing with abortion, you shouldn't be legally forced to keep the fetus but it's immoral if you abort it.

[Genivaria]

And notably, this is true even if you accidentally caused their need of the organ or even blood.

Here’s a scenario -

You are driving a car. You drop your coffee, and rear end a guy on a motorcycle at a high rate of speed. Lucky for you, he’s alive. They rush him to the hospital. He needs blood. Unfortunately, the hospital’s applicable blood supply was recently exhausted by a building collapse nearby.

Good luck for the motorcycle rider - you’re a match.

Can you be forced to give him your blood? Can they strap you down and take it, given you caused his need via an accident?

You can't be forced but it's the moral thing to do. Same thing with abortion, you shouldn't be legally forced to keep the fetus but it's immoral if you abort it.

Based on what? I say it's extremely immoral to either force someone to give up part of their body or be forced to give birth to a child against their will.
And yes donating an organ or blood is an admirable action, so is running into a burning building to save someone inside, in neither case however will you be arrested for failing to do so.

[Molither]

I wouldn't advocate for abortion to be illegal despite my personal objections to the practice.

However I would advocate for a law that requires that Anaesthesia be applied to the fetus past 15 weeks if practical in order to make the procedure as painless as possible for the fetus.

I would also advocate for more research into more humane methods of abortion and research into fetal pain and how it can be relieved.

[Molither]

You can't be forced but it's the moral thing to do. Same thing with abortion, you shouldn't be legally forced to keep the fetus but it's immoral if you abort it.

Based on what? I say it's extremely immoral to either force someone to give up part of their body or be forced to give birth to a child against their will.
And yes donating an organ or blood is an admirable action, so is running into a burning building to save someone inside, in neither case however will you be arrested for failing to do so.

I understand it's a tricky moral question which is why I don't support banning it. I hope that in the future that fetuses destined for abortion could instead be transferred into artificial wombs, my partner and I can't conceive a child naturally and there's a shortage of adoptees in my country.

[Achidyemay]

And then you bring it right back to the level of harvesting someone's organs without their consent.
I'm already fully granting that the fetus is a human being, I'm also saying it's irrelevant.

You can't force someone to remain pregnant against their will anymore than you can force people to donate parts of their body even to save an actual walking, talking, thinking human being.

An idea that I've been toying with is that an abortion is harvesting the fetus' organs without consent. IDK, earlier in this thread we found out that medical abortions cause an "untethering" at a location that is a mix of the mother's and baby's cells....

Based on what? I say it's extremely immoral to either force someone to give up part of their body or be forced to give birth to a child against their will.
And yes donating an organ or blood is an admirable action, so is running into a burning building to save someone inside, in neither case however will you be arrested for failing to do so.

You would be arrested if you started the fire, though, or pushed the person into the building where they died. I can't claim someone drowned and I simply "failed to save them" if I was actively holding them under water. Abortion is inherently an action, the "inactive" thing to do in the case of pregnancy is to stay the course of the pregnancy, this is part of what makes the ethics weird.

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Lastly, just gonna throw this out there real quick: If I killed all of the other patients in the hospital, real quiet like so no one knew, then I could get phenomenal care from the other doctors since I would be their sole patient; we can't just go around killing people because it would improve outcomes.

[The Alma Mater]

And then you bring it right back to the level of harvesting someone's organs without their consent.
I'm already fully granting that the fetus is a human being, I'm also saying it's irrelevant.

You can't force someone to remain pregnant against their will anymore than you can force people to donate parts of their body even to save an actual walking, talking, thinking human being.

An idea that I've been toying with is that an abortion is harvesting the fetus' organs without consent.

That is correct. Hence why a position that says abortion is fine but fetal stemcell research is not can be defended.

Of course, people will then bring up the whole "an embryo does not have a neural net and therefor cannot have experiences" argument; but that is debate nr 2.

[The Alma Mater]

Based on what? I say it's extremely immoral to either force someone to give up part of their body or be forced to give birth to a child against their will.
And yes donating an organ or blood is an admirable action, so is running into a burning building to save someone inside, in neither case however will you be arrested for failing to do so.

I understand it's a tricky moral question which is why I don't support banning it. I hope that in the future that fetuses destined for abortion could instead be transferred into artificial wombs, my partner and I can't conceive a child naturally and there's a shortage of adoptees in my country.

So you are pro-choice - you believe the choice should be allowed to be made; but you would prefer a world in which the choice is not even needed.

[Suriyanakhon]

Yea, “pro-choice” and pro-life are mutually exclusive.

Why is pro-choice in quotation marks? It's literally always been about choice.

[Des-Bal]

And then you bring it right back to the level of harvesting someone's organs without their consent.
I'm already fully granting that the fetus is a human being, I'm also saying it's irrelevant.

You can't force someone to remain pregnant against their will anymore than you can force people to donate parts of their body even to save an actual walking, talking, thinking human being.

By focusing on the donation example and "forcing someone to remain pregnant" you're shifting focus from abortion as an act which terminates pregnancy and destroys the fetus. If there wasn't a difference here you wouldn't have an issue with my example, because if it truly didn't matter and abortion did without ambiguity or equivocation kill a person according to you it would be okay.

Because we're talking about person A taking a positive action that kills person b it's more like halfway through a blood transfusion you're saying, "give me all my blood back yes it will kill the person I'm attached to but that's cool."

[Des-Bal]

Why is pro-choice in quotation marks? It's literally always been about choice.

It's not, it's about abortion. So is pro-life. The names are rhetoric.

[Necroghastia]

Why is pro-choice in quotation marks? It's literally always been about choice.

It's not, it's about abortion. So is pro-life. The names are rhetoric.

Yes, being able to make the choice to keep a pregnancy or not. I'm not sure what point you think you're making.

[The Alma Mater]

Why is pro-choice in quotation marks? It's literally always been about choice.

It's not, it's about abortion. So is pro-life. The names are rhetoric.

Pro-life: abortion should be forbidden, women should be forced to carry a fetus to term.

Pro-choice: it is up to the woman if she wants to abort or not

Pro-abortion: abortion is mandatory, women are forbidden to carry a fetus to term

People in the pro-choice camp usually do not like abortion, therefor often pleading for decent sex-ed and cheap contraceptives to prevent unwanted pregnancies.
People in the pro-life camp stereotypically do not give a damn about what happens to the unwanted child after it is born.
People in the pro-abortion camp tend to be chinese or nazis.