Right to Life Ethical Considerations

I am certain that a fairly completely formed brain is required to experience being alive: no brain, no experience.A huge percentage of fertilized eggs are spontaneously aborted due to genetic/developmental issues, essentially rejected as defective. If nature (or God, if you wish) works comfortably with a system that discards so much potential human life, then any line we draw between the sanctity of fetal life and the interests of the mother's health, (physical, emotional, physical), or the mother's preferences, is surely arbitrary.The abandonment of defective or unwelcome babies is historically common and continues today: I say this not to endorse the practice, per se, but to point out that safe abortions are an advance in both technology and humaneness from historically common practices.Sperm is alive; eggs are alive: should they enjoy protection against donor procedures, masturbation, and contraceptives? Many abortion opponents would say they do.Most opponents of abortion make exceptions in the case of rape, though this exception is inconsistent with a position defined by an overarching regard for the sanctity of life. This inconsistency points to what I feel is the true reason for much opposition to abortion: a desire to control female sexuality with punitive consequences.I would prefer to see the notion of the sanctity of human life applied to the millions of starving, malnourished, stunted and exploited children at hand. Like the conservative notion of "property rights," the right to life is (apologies to Hamlet!) honored more in the breach than the observance; as "property rights" defend a certain social status quo (who is a have and who a have-not), so the "right to life" champions primarily seek a social control for which they have no warrant. Edited by Omnivorous, : No reason given.

About a quarter of the states now allow you to use deadly force against an intruder crashing through your door (setting up some interesting situations, given the recent SCOTUS decision endorsing no-knock entries by police).Many states (Florida and Texas come to mind) have also changed their laws to remove the somewhat traditional element of measured response: you no longer have to use lethal force as a last resort, being required to back away from the threat if possible.You can stand your ground and plug 'em.Now that's sanctity (of the gun owner's) life for you.

That's a reasonable position but not a necessary one: I don't think science is going to provide the framework for an ethical solution to this particular controversy.Unless we consider every woman her own scientist.

Indeed, iano uses his slippery slope for many things, including Rockin' Arena Bestiality to militate against gay marriage.But in any event, why stop at conception? The Catholics church doesn't, and an increasing number of evangelicals don't. Their self-written warrant to police the sexual and reproductive lives of others extends to eggs and sperm.

Yes, there is a difference, and there is a difference between deciding to become pregnant and becoming involuntarily pregnant, whether as a consequence of rape, contraceptive failure, or one too many martinis ("I love a martini,/two at the most:/ three I'm under the table,/ four I'm under my host."), and none of these are likely to produce a human life destined for fulfillment.You confuse me, rR. I thought you opposed abortion based on the sanctity of human life, believing that the fertilized ovum is a human being. The child of rape is no less innocent than the child of loving straight married parents who support the death penalty.If it's not about punitively controlling female sexuality, why does the rightness or wrongness of an abortion hinge on whether the woman participated willingly? We have many powers; we have many responsibilities; we have many choices. One of those choices is to not allow a pregnancy to come to term; women have been making that choice for millennia. Who can reasonably take the responsibility of that choice away from them?Why do the religious so often seek secular power to control the choices and responsibilities of others? If Christians don't abort, and Christians hate to see others abort, then they should evangelize more efficiently and make more Christians, not try to become the God Squad.

You have thoroughly repeated yourself Am I correct in recalling that you oppose abortion but make an exception in the case of rape? Please answer. I didn't suggest that you experience it as a religious decision; I am pointing out the correlation between religious belief and the desire to command the mores of others. You don't believe it is a causal relationship? How do you account for the strong correlation between opposition to reproductive freedom and declared religious belief?The notion that we are here for a reason is an opinion, in your case a religious one. Even if we grant your opinion for the sake of argument, there are still a myriad views on how one might go about respecting that origin, purposeful or not. We have no reason to think your belief should be imposed on others.Aren't we smart enough (yet) to respect the beliefs of others, and to content ourselves with commanding our own lives?

Coercing a woman to carry a fetus to term because her reason for seeking an abortion doesn't meet another's criteria, on the basis of whether or not she was willingly sexually active, is by definition a punitive control scheme: one wishes to discourage an activity and so makes the determination of guilt or innocence based on intentionality and then dictates the consequences.An exception for rape makes a mockery of the "protect the innocent" rationale for restricting access to abortion. That fetus poses no different threat to the physical well-being of the woman than any other; if the logic is that carrying a fetus conceived through rape threatens the emotional and psychological well-being of the woman, then the distinction is being made on that basis, not the rape: determining whether emotional and psychological well-being is threatened is a job best done by the person whose mind and body are involved. But others' beliefs should be imposed on us, the, um...undead?

I don't believe that, and I know you don't either. Laws do seek to modify or control behavior, ideally in just ways. My argument does not require the shedding of all law, and it's a straw man maneuver to claim it does. Further, none of those laws apply or not depending on whether you have had consensual sex, do they?Opponents of abortion are proposing new, more restrictive laws and/or the readjudication of existing law to deny choices women currently have. This is exactly the appropriate moment to fight unjustly passed new law and reinterpreted old law. Women do not will themselves to become pregnant, so rape is not required for a woman to find herself with a pregnancy that was "against her will."So how about this? You feel it is better not to be born than to know something ignominious about one's origins? Our concern for the potential child's damaged self-esteem is so great that we prefer it dead?Don't shake that family tree too hard. Ignominy is a common fruit.

I'm still trying to figure out where taters gets the numbers to justify the assertion.