Pro-stem-cell-research yet pro-Christianity?

[Antityranicals]

Know well that I literally don't care what the irrelevant bureaucrats at the UN want to declare, and that their declaration literally changes nothing.

If you are determined to discard the definitions of words again, and instead substitute your own definition in order to try to make a point, then I don't see how we can discuss this with any semblance of seriousness.

No, I'm just noting that the UN's declaration doesn't make a definition any more than my declaration would. The definition I'm going with is: "The deliberate killing of a large group of people," which I believe is the actual definition.

[Salus Maior]

[

As far as I'm concerned, a fetus that hasn't developed viable organs and the appearance of a person isn't a person. It's something that may become human but human it is not. By the time the fetus is what I would call a human, it can survive outside the womb (with some medical assistance or maybe without it) and can become a fully grown normal person. A fetus that is two months old is as human as the skin cells I killed when I washed my face this morning.

That's a dreadfully objective statement for a paragraph full of subjectivity.

[The New California Republic]

If you are determined to discard the definitions of words again, and instead substitute your own definition in order to try to make a point, then I don't see how we can discuss this with any semblance of seriousness.

No, I'm just noting that the UN's declaration doesn't make a definition any more than my declaration would. The definition I'm going with is: "The deliberate killing of a large group of people," which I believe is the actual definition.

No, that is not the definition of genocide. If you want to discard the definition of a word and substitute your own in its place then you need some damn weighty justification and evidence that such a change is justified.

[Salandriagado]

Not equivalent.

Where's the discrepancy?

I'm not literally connected to and entirely dependent on my house.


Though yes, I'd say that the contents of my house are a part of my house.

[Crockerland]

Both very good descriptors for abortion, too.

Abortion isn't genocide.

Of course it is.

From UN General Assembly Resolution 96

"Genocide is a denial of the right of existence of entire human groups, as homicide is the denial of the right to live of individual human beings; such deniel of the rich of existence shocks the conscience of mankind, [...]"

Abortion facilitates the genocide of, among others, the following human groups:

The Disabled
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/down-syndrome-iceland

Since prenatal screening tests were introduced in Iceland in the early 2000s, the vast majority of women -- close to 100 percent -- who received a positive test for Down syndrome terminated their pregnancy.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/indiahome/indianews/article-2280183/Prenatal-testing-prompts-rise-abortions-deaf-babies.html

Hearing loss can be a curse if it's linked to a revelation as heart-breaking as this.

According to a survey conducted by Delhi's Sir Ganga Ram hospital, a majority of would-be parents would opt for an abortion if knew they are going to have a hearing-impaired child.

The study was published in a recent issue of American Journal of Medical Genetics.

LGBTI Individuals, specifically Intersex people
https://web.archive.org/web/20170422141944/http://astraeafoundation.org/wearereal/#human-rights-issues

"The idea that all bodies should fit neatly into mutually exclusive categories of “male” and “female” sexes ignores the diversity among us and perpetuates the stigma associated with being intersex. Such convictions are used to justify non-consensual and cosmetic medical interventions to make intersex bodies conform to societal and medical norms. They also underlie the discrimination that intersex people face in various aspects of daily life. Due to the dominance of the medical discourse, such harmful practices have only recently begun to be recognized as human rights violations. Only a few countries have explicit legal protections for intersex people, which means that abuses continue to this day and reparations or access to justice remain rare.

[...]

In some cases, a decision is made even before a child is born, where fetuses with intersex traits may be subjected to prenatal “normalizing” treatments or selected for abortion. In places where access to medical care is more limited and beliefs about intersex are deeply negative, the choices made can also be extreme; intersex rights groups report that in parts of Uganda and rural China, intersex infants may be abandoned or killed.

http://stop.genitalmutilation.org/post/Selective-Intersex-Abortions-Hypospadias-Intersex-XXY

"Scientific "marvels" nazi-eugenicists could only dream of are widespread reality today – e.g. selective (late term) abortions of intersex foetuses "undesirable from an eugenics standpoint" (Hans Christian Naujoks 1934) because of "hereditary diseases due to abnormal predispositions, including hypospadias, pseudohermaphroditism, intersexuality, cryptorchidism and epispadias" (Baur, Fischer, Lenz 1936) – in exponentially growing rates thanks to prenatal testing. Nonetheless, public debate of such "eugenic indications" is found lacking, with occasional exceptions proving the rule mainly zeroing in on trisomy 21."

Here's a display of the abortion rates of those with Klinefelter Syndrome in various countries:


https://ihra.org.au/25621/submission-ethics-genetic-selection-intersex-traits/

"Despite these low rates of diagnosis, termination rates for 47,XXY once diagnosed during pregnancy are known to reach up to 88% The framing of this diagnosis as a major genetic disorder thus has a dramatic impact on the percentage of pregnancies carried to term. We believe that this impact far outweighs the largely benign consequences of sex chromosome differences."

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/10/intersex-babies-genetic-embryo-testing

""Designer babies” seems like a concept from a dystopian future, but they’re here now: would-be parents who utilize in-vitro fertilization to conceive often also have the option of genetically testing embryos and then picking which one to implant.

Scientists can test for hundreds of things, from fatal genetic traits like Tay-Sachs and Huntington disease to non-fatal but culturally devalued embodiments like Down syndrome, deafness, blindness and intersex conditions.

Like pre-natal tests, the purpose of preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) is clear: to allow women to choose which embryo or fetus to try to bring to term, and to terminate those which they do not. Like many scientists, I support women’s choices to terminate pregnancies or select against a potential fetus, even when I might prefer they did not. But it is important to acknowledge that using PGD to select against culturally devalued bodies, like those of people with disabilities or who are intersex, is simply a contemporary example of eugenics."

Women
https://phys.org/news/2019-04-long-term-gender-based-abortions-skewed-gender.html

"A team of researchers from Singapore, the United Nations Population Division, and the U.S. has found that abortions based on gender lead to larger-than-thought distortions in gender ratios. In their paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the group describes their five-year study of population and gender ratios and what they found.

[...]

The researchers refer to the babies that were not born due to gender-based abortion as "missing females." They calculated that China currently has approximately 11.9 million missing females and India has approximately 10.6 million missing females. The grand combined total for all of the countries in the study came to approximately 23.1 million missing females. The researchers suggest that such calculations need to be taken into consideration when making population estimates in the future."

[Salandriagado]

Yes. Before birth, it's a part of the mother's body. Separation is when it becomes an independent being with its own life.

The fetus is not a part of the mother's body, though. It is an independent living organism that relies upon the mother for the resources and environment necessary for it to develop to the point where it can survive independently outside of the mother's body. Based on this criterion and your concept of personhood, that would be around 22 weeks for the earliest current potential viability of a prematurely-born baby.

It isn't independent, though. It's entirely dependent. On what basis are you claiming that it is not part of her body? In particular, what distinction are you making between a foetus and a tumour in that regard?

[Salandriagado]

Except they aren't, as a latter disconnect does not prove a difference in the here and now. If the person's existence from the moment their existence started was being physically plumbed into the house in such a manner as to be totally dependent on it, without an ability to be separated from it lest they die, then they would for all intents and purposes be part of the house.

But this analogy is just fucking ridiculous. It was before, but the amount of bending and twisting it needs to make it remotely equivalent to what we are discussing is obscene.

Things are defined by their essence. The essence of an embryo is just as fundamentally different from the essence of his or her mother as the your essence is different than that of your mother. Physical attachment does not homogenize two separate essences.

What the flying fuck is an "essence"? Define it.

[The New California Republic]

Abortion isn't genocide.

Of course it is.

From UN General Assembly Resolution 96

"Genocide is a denial of the right of existence of entire human groups, as homicide is the denial of the right to live of individual human beings; such deniel of the rich of existence shocks the conscience of mankind, [...]"

That still does not make abortion genocide.

[Salandriagado]

Sorry, but that does not make abortion and genocide the same thing, as genocide is intentional action to destroy a people in whole or in part. Abortion does not fit that.

The legalization of abortion is an intentional argument to destroy the subset of the human race which is not yet born and which is undesired by their parents. The legalization of abortion is genocide.

That's not a genotype.

[Salandriagado]

If you are determined to discard the definitions of words again, and instead substitute your own definition in order to try to make a point, then I don't see how we can discuss this with any semblance of seriousness.

No, I'm just noting that the UN's declaration doesn't make a definition any more than my declaration would. The definition I'm going with is: "The deliberate killing of a large group of people," which I believe is the actual definition.

Then you are simply not speaking English.

[Salus Maior]

The fetus is not a part of the mother's body, though. It is an independent living organism that relies upon the mother for the resources and environment necessary for it to develop to the point where it can survive independently outside of the mother's body. Based on this criterion and your concept of personhood, that would be around 22 weeks for the earliest current potential viability of a prematurely-born baby.

It isn't independent, though. It's entirely dependent. On what basis are you claiming that it is not part of her body? In particular, what distinction are you making between a foetus and a tumour in that regard?

Independence has no bearing on humanity. There are plenty of human beings which are dependent on others for survival, newborns in particular.

And call a fetus a tumor as if they're the same in front of any professional in the field, and they'd laugh their asses off. They're not the same, and it's a bad analogy.

[Salandriagado]

It isn't independent, though. It's entirely dependent. On what basis are you claiming that it is not part of her body? In particular, what distinction are you making between a foetus and a tumour in that regard?

Independence has no bearing on humanity. There are plenty of human beings which are dependent on others for survival, newborns in particular.

And call a fetus a tumor as if they're the same in front of any professional in the field, and they'd laugh their asses off. They're not the same, and it's a bad analogy.

That's not what I said. Stop fucking lying.

[Antityranicals]

No, I'm just noting that the UN's declaration doesn't make a definition any more than my declaration would. The definition I'm going with is: "The deliberate killing of a large group of people," which I believe is the actual definition.

No, that is not the definition of genocide. If you want to discard the definition of a word and substitute your own in its place then you need some damn weighty justification and evidence that such a change is justified.

Plug it into Google. What I wrote is what you'll get.

[Salus Maior]

Independence has no bearing on humanity. There are plenty of human beings which are dependent on others for survival, newborns in particular.

And call a fetus a tumor as if they're the same in front of any professional in the field, and they'd laugh their asses off. They're not the same, and it's a bad analogy.

That's not what I said. Stop fucking lying.

Then why mention dependency at all? Why mention tumors?

My apologies if you're getting upset, but that's your own damn fault for having a shitty ideology and argument.

[Salandriagado]

That's not what I said. Stop fucking lying.

Then why mention dependency at all? Why mention tumors?

My apologies if you're getting upset, but that's your own damn fault for having a shitty ideology and argument.

You not reading the discussion that you jumped into the middle of is a you problem.

[Salandriagado]

No, that is not the definition of genocide. If you want to discard the definition of a word and substitute your own in its place then you need some damn weighty justification and evidence that such a change is justified.

Plug it into Google. What I wrote is what you'll get.

Liar.

[The New California Republic]

No, that is not the definition of genocide. If you want to discard the definition of a word and substitute your own in its place then you need some damn weighty justification and evidence that such a change is justified.

Plug it into Google. What I wrote is what you'll get.

Genocide, the deliberate and systematic destruction of a group of people because of their ethnicity, nationality, religion, or race. The term, derived from the Greek genos (“race,” “tribe,” or “nation”) and the Latin cide (“killing”), was coined by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish-born jurist who served as an adviser to the U.S. Department of War during World War II.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/genocide

Genocide is an internationally recognized crime where acts are committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group.

https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-preventi ... s-genocide

genocide noun

geno·​cide | \ ˈje-nə-ˌsīd \
Definition of genocide
: the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/genocide

genocide
noun [ C/U ]
US /ˈdʒen·əˌsɑɪd/

POLITICS & GOVERNMENT
the intentional killing of all of the people of a nation, religion, or racial group

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dic ... h/genocide

Abortion is not genocide.

[Antityranicals]

Plug it into Google. What I wrote is what you'll get.

Liar.

Did you plug it in? Do it. The result is "the deliberate killing of a large group of people, especially those of a particular ethnic group or nation." "Especially" doesn't mean only.

[Crockerland]

Plug it into Google. What I wrote is what you'll get.

Genocide, the deliberate and systematic destruction of a group of people because of their ethnicity, nationality, religion, or race. The term, derived from the Greek genos (“race,” “tribe,” or “nation”) and the Latin cide (“killing”), was coined by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish-born jurist who served as an adviser to the U.S. Department of War during World War II.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/genocide

Genocide is an internationally recognized crime where acts are committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group.

https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-preventi ... s-genocide

genocide noun

geno·​cide | \ ˈje-nə-ˌsīd \
Definition of genocide
: the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/genocide

genocide
noun [ C/U ]
US /ˈdʒen·əˌsɑɪd/

POLITICS & GOVERNMENT
the intentional killing of all of the people of a nation, religion, or racial group

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dic ... h/genocide

Abortion is not genocide.

So, according to you, the mass murder of disabled and LGBTI people by Hitler's regime during the Holocaust wasn't a genocide?

As I already cited above, the definition of genocide according to UN General Assembly Resolution 96 is simply "denial of the right of existence of entire human groups." I have given in-depth examples of why, even if you do not want to count the unborn as a qualified "human group" for the purposes of genocide, abortion is used to facilitate the eradication of other groups, such as the disabled and the intersex. This is a ridiculous point to argue.

[The New California Republic]

Abortion is not genocide.

So, according to you, the mass murder of disabled and LGBTI people by Hitler's regime during the Holocaust wasn't a genocide?

Not "according to me" at all.

As I already cited above, the definition of genocide according to UN General Assembly Resolution 96 is simply "denial of the right of existence of entire human groups."

And that definition has been superseded by the The United Nations Genocide Convention.

[The New California Republic]

abortion is used to facilitate the eradication of other groups, such as the disabled and the intersex. This is a ridiculous point to argue.

Abortion being used to facilitate genocide does not make abortion in and of itself genocide.

[The New California Republic]

And I have just now realized that this genocide discussion is off topic. Oops.

[LimaUniformNovemberAlpha]

Which election are you talking about?

The 2004 US election.

True, but it also did an enormous amount of good during that same period.

Such as?

This doesn't diminish culpability for the evils committed by Christian churches during their history but even that pales in comparison to the horrific crimes committed by secular ideologies in the 20th century such as fascism and communism.

And what, if anything, would the presence of Christianity have done to prevent such horrible crimes?

Communism was a backlash against years of rich people abusing the poor. It went overboard, but it was a natural consequence of suppressing anti-elitist rage until it could no longer be contained. Fascism, beyond Hitler's invoking of religious rhetoric, tapped into more primal instincts like racism, the same ones these days primarily tapped into by the same politicians elected by religious states.

[Salus Maior]

Then why mention dependency at all? Why mention tumors?

My apologies if you're getting upset, but that's your own damn fault for having a shitty ideology and argument.

You not reading the discussion that you jumped into the middle of is a you problem.

So you're going to pretend you're not using the dependency argument when you say this?

Yes. Before birth, it's a part of the mother's body. Separation is when it becomes an independent being with its own life.

Come on, this isn't even hard.

[Xmara]

I am a pro-life Christian, but I am willing to make an exception for stem cell research because it has saved so many lives. Many embryos used for stem cell research come from fertility clinics where they were never implanted and were stored for too long to be viable. So rather than just discard them, why not use them to save lives? To me, wasting them would be a greater violation of the sanctity of life and supporting stem cell research is fully compatible with being pro-life.