Derec

Outside of medical reasons self-defense does not apply.

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Long answer: For me, an embryo (as a proto-human at less than ten weeks LMP is known) or young fetus isn't a person at all. It doesn't have the most basic equipment required for human thought. Abort it, use its stem cells in research, it doesn't bother me. After about 20 weeks, I start to be concerned about the rights of the fetus.

Apperantly only if someone else than the mother kills it. If the mother decides that it should die than the young fetus is just out of luck heh?

Why should the rights of the fetus apply only if someone else other than the mother kills the fetus?

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Nevertheless, I can see justification for late term abortions, in addition to things like imminent threat to the mother's life or anencephaly in the fetus.

Such as?

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Birth is by necessity a dangerous, painful, and disfiguring event. Yes, even a healthy, normal birth.

So lack of convenience is a justification for murder? Becuase if you define a late term fetus as a person it is murder.

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A woman faced with, say, a certifiably insane full-grown man who threatened to do to her body what childbirth does to it would be justified in using lethal force against him, even though he lacks the ability to form the legal intent to harm her.

Isn't self-defense limited to proportional use of force?

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Therefore, if an abortion offers a less risky, disfiguring, or painful end to the pregnancy than live birth, I think it's arguable that such an abortion would amount to a form of justifiable homicide, leaving intact the personhood of the fetus without punishing the woman or her doctors for murder.
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If she waited long enough for the embryo to be developed enough to count as murder if someone lese ended its life then yes, she should be charged with murder.

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Because the surviving victims suffer more, even if the pregnancy was very new. Parents and other relatives have an emotional investment in a pregnancy even if they do not believe that the fetus is a person yet. The law routinely acknowledges and compensates for emotional harm.

And how is that the reason to keep all abortions legal?

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And to reiterate, LadyShea is right - the murder law applies only after the pregnancy reaches eight weeks gestation.

But it still does not apply when its mother murders it. Which is just plain wrong.

Clarice

UMOC, you seem to have read and responded to my post on a sentence-by-sentence basis, without actually reading it as a piece and comprehending it.

If you would read the rest of my post, you would see that I give reasons why self-defense does indeed apply.

There is a difference between having no rights, and having rights which are overshadowed by the rights of another. The law is constantly balancing the rights of competing persons.

Such as the one offered in the paragraph immediately subsequent to the one you are quoting.

Bodily trauma requiring hospitalization and at least a six week recovery period is hardly mere inconvenience.

No, the killing of a person is "homicide." If a homicide is justified, it is not "murder."

Generally one is allowed to use whatever force is necessary to prevent the threatened harm. For instance, a woman is allowed to shoot a would-be rapist in the head, because it is not feasible for her to prevent the rape by lesser force such as hand to hand combat.

Huh? That was a reason to make pregnancy an aggravating factor in murder. It was not presented as a reason to do anything regarding abortion.

nermal

The law Clarice cited is clear that if the mother wants a late term abortion for any reason, she may have one. It's a matter of law, not an emotional appeal.

Let's see, if we take that to be a national average (and it's probably close) we have
~3,000,000 * .0017 = 5100 late term abortions. I think that number is low. I have read 20k annually elsewhere.

Ed

nermal

Consider your source.

"The majority of patients undergoing this procedure do not have significant medical problems. In Dr. McMahon's series, less then ten percent were performed for maternal indications, and these included some ill-defined reasons such as depression, hyperemesis, drug exposed spouse, and youth. Many of the patients undergoing partial birth abortion are not even carrying babies with abnormalities. In Dr. McMahon's series, only about half of the babies were considered "flawed", and these included some easily correctable conditions like cleft lip and ventricular septal defect. Dr. Haskell claimed that eighty percent of his procedures were purely elective, and a group of New Jersey physicians claimed that only a minuscule amount of their procedures were done for genetic abnormalities or other defects. Most were performed on women of lower age, education, or socioeconomic status who either delayed or discovered late their unwanted pregnancies. It is also clear that this procedure occurs thousands of times a year, rather than a few hundred times a year, as claimed by pro-abortion advocates. This has been independently confirmed by the investigative work of The Washington Post, The New Jersey Bergen Record and the American Medical Association News."

From here:
www.house.gov/judiciary/22236.htm
Ed

trillian

Why do people here think that any woman in Calif. can waltz in and have an abortion any time she wants it? She can't. Here is the law:

The fact that doctors may use unethical practices regarding the law does not change the law. This fetus was viable and she (Laci) was healthy. It would have been illegal in California for her to abort the fetus at the point the baby was deemed viable(about 6-8 weeks before she was murdered, maybe even earlier).

I have no difficulty in seeing this as a double homocide.

Further, the act of terminating a life knowingly is not always murder. Doctors regularly (though rare) do this on conjoined twins to save the life of the one baby knowing they kill the other. In the same way they can terminate a late pregnancy if it poses risk to the mother.

Trillian

topane

Thanks for the correction.

Clarice

Actually, the law I cited states that if the mother consents to the killing of the fetus, it is not murder. Just because it's not murder doesn't mean it's legal. See Trillian's post for the law on whether a mother may legally have a late term abortion.

nermal

thanks for correcting me. It does still imply a double standard, though, doesn't it?

Ed

Viti

Rambling ahead...just thinking out loud

If a visibly pregnant woman is murdered or survives an attempted murder but the fetus died that she was planning to carry to term...then the law would call the death of that fetus murder

If a woman was planning an abortion, or was TRYING to abort by consenting to being hit or stabbed in the stomach...then the law would not call it murder

I wonder if the law is written as it is to include intent or motive; Someone who is solicited by a pregnant woman to induce a miscarriage cannot be charged for murder, and someone who would have no way of knowing a woman is pregnant can't be charged for double homicide

...does that make any sense or am I way off base?

nermal

It doesn't make sense because it doesn't make sense, not because you're off base. Abortion proponents are forced to accept and defend the irrationalities to which their premise leads, and they have no problem doing this.

One more to ponder,
If a woman is attacked on her way to an abortion clinic, and the fetus dies, the attacker can be charged with murder.

The unaviodable philosophical result of free access to late term abortion is this:
An 8 inch journey through a birth canal changes a non-human to a human.

You can't argue with it, because it's correctness is presupposed. It's right because it's right.

Ed