scigirl

What do you mean it doesn't apply???

Women are currently having abortions because they find out their child has a medical condition. Is it moral to bring a child into this world with a painful and debilitating medical condition? Is it moral to terminate a fetus that has that condition? Those are the two choices - you don't get a third one once the woman is already pregnant.
How is that different than bringing a child into the world that got sickle cell anemia by chance? THey both produce the exact same outcome.

No I shouldn't have to point out glaring inconsistencies in someone's alleged rational argument.

scigirl

P.S. Above I meant Eric Rudolph, not JR Rudolph.

Machiavelli

[QUOTE]Originally posted by scigirl
[B]How is that different than bringing a child into the world that got sickle cell anemia by chance? THey both produce the exact same outcome.[/qb]

So do heart attacks and shootings. It's about intent.

scigirl

Ok let's consider autosomal dominant disorders:

All kids of a parent with an autosomal dominant disorder will get this disorder (ok there are a few kooky exceptions but this is the morality forum not the genetics forum).

Is it ok for a woman who has familial adematous polyposis coli disease (she will get colon cancer) to produce offspring?

scigirl

Machiavelli

Can I think of a situation where it would be "ok"

Yes.

In order to produce an heir to a kingdom that is fighting to free an enslaved population. If there is no heir, then the slavemasters take over and enslave the world. So she has to create an heir for the greater good of mankind.

but

If she did it because having a child would serve her selfish desires to experience motherhood and childbirth before she dies, despite the knowledge that the childs life would be brief and end painfully. I'd have a problem with that.

Got any more?

Jennie

There's only a fifty percent chance the child will have the autosomal dominant, not a hundred.

I think the argument that we should demystify motherhood so that women would feel better about giving a child up for adoptions would only affect a tiny number of women (though it would be good for other reasons, like helping new mothers stay sane because they don't have to be perfect). An abortion saves much more tangible dangers to the mother's life and body than it saves her the shame of not being a perfect mother.

dk

dk: So, if in a biological sense a fetus has parents, then in a rational world wouldn't fetus be a child?... because of biology.
Daleth: No. Is a child an adult? No. Why? They're both human.
dk: When my mother gave birth to me I was an infant. By necessity I dk (one person after all these years), was that infant. I know for certain it was me. How can I know for certain…because when I was born the umbilical cord wrapped around my scrawny little neck and stopped the delivery and they had to pull me out with clamps that left scars I still have, after all these years. I know I’m still the same person that got those scars being born because I still have them.

Daleth: Why is a fetus not a child? The same reason a child is not an adult. It has not reached that stage of development yet. Maybe it never will. An adult is a human being who has gone through puberty (or in the eyes of the law, a person past a given age). A child is a human being that has been born.
dk: A fetus is not a child because it might die before birth. Once birth takes place the fetus becomes a child, and by necessity the fetus and the child are the same person, despite appearances.

Daleth: It's a silly question. I have parents. Does that mean I am a child? My 61-year-old mother has parents. Does that mean she is a child? If she is a child, is she also a fetus?
dk: When you were a child you might have died without becoming an adult, so it was necessary you be called a child. You’ve become an adult, and by necessity remain the same person.

Daleth: You know, you can leave off what I said about biology vs reality, because it was not germaine to the argument you wished to make. It was merely an extension of my thoughts on parenthood. Yes a fetus has parents. Simple and direct.
dk: Cool, I only wish to point out that any solution fashioned for the problem of abortion, by necessity, needs to address the larger issue of personhood, right to life, and the necessary order of natural rights (inalienable).

dk

That's what happens when science and politics collide. Maybe morality and ethics have some place in the world and law. What do you think?

Jennie

Well, as long as we're all wandering off-topic a bit: here's a rather impractical method of reducing, though not eliminating abortions.

If you encourage all bisexual people to choose same-sex partners rather than opposite sex partners; those who would have gotten or begotten would not, and thus would not face the choice of having an abortion.

I think wide-eyed innocence would be the best method of presenting this to the pro-life world.

yguy

If this would be better than encouraging heterosexuals to confine there sexual liasons to their spouses, I can't imagine why...unless, of course, the right to get one's rocks off is to become the unacknowledged foundational premise of the new American morality.

brighid

You do know that married women choose abortion in conjunction with their spouses for many of the same reasons non-married women choose abortion?

I think encouraging responsible sexual intercourse between consenting adults has been proven to lessen the rate of unwanted pregnancy and abortion. Abstinence programs have failed miserably and therefore I cannot support abstinence only programs.

I also think a practical solution for preventing unwanted pregnancies and abortions is to have a better system in place to punish and hold responsible the male partner who very often is let off the hook when it comes to life outside of the womb.

We could simply model Swedens example and provide adequate sexual education for males and females (teaching equal responsibility to males and females), birth control and abortion at no cost, extended and paid maternity leave so a woman (and her partner) do not have to worry about the problems of working,supporting a child and the exorbitant costs of day care, adequate and safe health care, removing the social stigma of parenthood and a social and work structure that is conducive to properly raising healthy children.

The current American "morality" regarding the care of children etc. does more to make abortion a more viable choice then the existence of legal abortion ever has or will.

There are reasons why women feel the most make the horrible choice of abortion and it is not simply because they don't want to be inconvienced as the pro-life movement would have us believe.

There are also solutions, none of which punishing a woman and her subsequent off spring serve any purpose in rendering.

Brighid