Only if Mom says so

Abortion and miscarriage are the same thing, medically speaking. In fact, the medical term for miscarriage is "spontaneous abortion." Well, a bunch of guys arguing that if a woman has the right to get an abortion without asking them, they have the right to force her to abort without asking her certainly doesn't help.Even in this thread you can see the reflexive defense of patriarchy and male privilege. It's apparent every time the subject of a woman's body comes up. Clearly, he stole it. Hence, the charges of burglary.

But you still can't seem to explain how you get from a position of "the fetus's interests must be subordinate to the woman's self-determination" to a conclusion of "the potential murder of a potential life is such a graver crime than assaulting a woman that we're not even going to prosecute the latter."I can't understand it. If the mother isn't being subordinated to her fetus, where are the charges of assault? Nobody's been able to find any. Why is the headline charge, here, "attempted murder of a fetus" - something that almost happened - as opposed to the assault of a woman, which is a crime that did happen?Why is an attempted crime against a fetus more important than an actual crime against a woman? How do you support that state of affairs after saying that the woman's self-determination is more important than her fetus?Don't you think the woman, at some point, determined for herself that she would not like to be poisoned with RU-486? No, we read it; we just don't believe you believe it. How can we explain, otherwise, your support for a state of affairs that clearly privileges the fetus over the woman?

The important qualification there is "can be" - which is why I've been making a distinction between a wanted fetus and an unwanted fetus.A wanted fetus is like a healthy kidney - a part of the woman's body which is protected (or should be protected) by law. An unwanted fetus is like a diseased kidney. The woman's attitude is, "Get that thing out of me so I can get on with my life."Neither the kidney nor the fetus has (or should have) any inherent "rights". An attack on a kidney is an attack on the woman. An attack on the fetus is likewise an attack on the woman.One bad law (even in 37 states) doesn't change that.

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place” -- Joseph Goebbels

Anti-feminist is not automatically inclusive to being anti-female, anti-feminine, or anti-female rights. Your underhanded and dubious conflation is unwarranted, as it as an unfair mischaracterization of the issue.I suppose I am anti-feminist too, only insomuch that we first define what feminism is. If feminism is the belief that women deserve the inherent rights of men, then I trust that Holmes and I could be characterized as such. If it extends beyond this, as in, say, your version of feminism; a radical neo-feminism that seeks to ascribe masculine traits to women and then call it "feminine,", then I am anti-feminist. So its also assault to serve MSG's in a resturant without your knowledge.There is no doubt that what Patel did was wrong. We all seem to agree. We just disagree on the scope of his crimes. But if you are going to be consistent, then under your plan, Patel should receive a slap on the wrist.You are also going to have to be consistent with pro-choice talking points, the most important, being that a woman has a right to choose to either keep or terminate the baby. Well, she didn't choose. It was chosen for her.And the problem is that you are making the child out to be something as of much value (to her) as a shiny, new nickel. In other words, you are making it seem that, while she has a loss, its not worth that much.That's a bunch of malarky. This guy murdered her child, Crash. A crime of significance needs to be administered to him.

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“This life’s dim windows of the soul, distorts the heavens from pole to pole, and goads you to believe a lie, when you see with and not through the eye.” -William Blake

Huh? We've acknowledged this. Most of us have acknowledged that it might be appropriate to have extra penalties to take into account that the mother wasn't allowed to exercise her right to maintain or terminate the pregnancy. We are just saying that it's inappropriate to call it "homicide" or "murder".

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Progress in human affairs has come mainly through the bold readiness of human beings not to confine themselves to seeking piecemeal improvements in the way things are done, but to present fundamental challenges in the name of reason to the current way of doing things and to the avowed or hidden assumptions on which it rests. -- E. H. Carr

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This man has potentially killed numerous of her babies. Her hopes were dashed, not because the baby accidentally died, but because (excuse my language) this prick didn't feel like pulling out. One would think that going through the trouble of purchasing this drug and clandestinely mixing it in her drink is far more effort than just taking some general precautions.

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We'll get to that just as soon as you answer the questions you nimbly avoided and conveniently omitted.1. Are you a female?2. If so, (since you've told me you were in the past), can you sort of wryly be flippant about a man killing the unborn child in her? Can you, as a woman, see yourself pushing for a charge that ends in assault or battery? Great. But why? If you own a bicycle that you don't really ride anymore, should the crime be less severe on that account, than if you loved the bike and rode it daily? Since when does liking something a lot or a little determine a crime?Do you really expect the courts to recognize something as absurd as that? Since there was no damage to her, and the intent was never to harm her, but rather the inhuman, amorphous globule growing inside of her, then there is nothing in which to charge him with a single thing.

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“This life’s dim windows of the soul, distorts the heavens from pole to pole, and goads you to believe a lie, when you see with and not through the eye.” -William Blake

I don't know what a "masculine trait" is supposed to be, except in the consistent antifeminist usage that defines "masculine" as every positive trait suggesting leadership and control, and "feminine" as every positive trait that indicates submission, sacrifice, and caretaking.So, yeah, I pretty much reject that construction, since it's bullshit. MSG isn't a drug, it's a food additive, and as such appears on the ingredients list of the products in which it appears. So it's irrelevant to the discussion. No, under my plan Patel is charged with multiple counts of felony assault for poisoning his girlfriend over the past several years. You seem to consistently forget that there was a woman involved in this, too.I think he should be punished for what he did do, rather than for an almost-crime of attempting to murder somebody who doesn't even exist. He poisoned his girlfriend for several years. He should serve time for that. But he should serve time for what he actually did rather than for made-up crimes, instead.Ultimately if he goes to jail, I guess it's all the same. But it seems like the record should reflect his actual crimes as opposed to his made-up ones. Don't you think? I think murders should go to jail for murder and thieves for burglary, not the other way around. People should be punished for the crimes they did commit, not the crimes that are made-up. I agree. In fact I think I told you that, already. What's your point? Patel hasn't been charged with "causing a miscarriage" or "endangering a woman" or "assault" or "theft of a woman's fetus", as far as anyone can tell. He's been charged with "attempted murder of a fetus", indicating that the legal system has essentially no interest in the woman except in so far as there was a fetus inside her.That's a state of affairs I object to. There was no child, and it wasn't murdered. I mean she didn't even drink the smoothie. This is attempted murder of a fetus, which is a fictitious crime, and the fact that he's been poisoning his girlfriend for years is going completely unremarked by the legal system, here, which is completely consistent with the second-class legal status of women in our culture.

How many times do we have to explain how wrong you are about this? Of course there was intent to harm her, because the intent was to cause a miscarriage - which is harmful to the woman.Of course there was intent to harm her. How could there not be?

How is that any of your business, or pertinent to the topic? I think you'll find that I've been fairly consistent in the past in nimbly avoiding and conveniently omitting to tell you any such thing. Probably. Ah... finally an appropriate question in the morass.The distinction is an important one: a fetus is a fetus and an unborn child is an unborn child. A woman becomes a mother when she decides she wants the fetus to be a child. If she doesn't want it, the fetus is no different from a diseased kidney.If a man tries to carve out her kidney - diseased or healthy - it's an assault on her, not on the kidney. If a man tries to carve out her fetus - wanted or unwanted - it's an assault on her, not on the fetus. Theft is fundamentally different from assault. Try a better analogy. The courts recognize something as absurd as "fetal homicide", so let's not underestimate their appetite for absurdity. You know better than that. An assault has little or nothing to do with the damage done. It's about the potential damage. She could have suffered serious side effects from the drug. That's why it's illegal to drug people willy-nilly whenever you feel like it.If I empty my pistol in your direction and no bullet comes closer than an inch from your head, is that not still an assault?

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place” -- Joseph Goebbels

You mean, you're not Sharon Stone in The Quick and the Dead?

You said that it was by her body that the baby exists. I'm just clarifying that it isn't at all accurate. Nothing magical about it. Irrelevant since having entitlements to a child does not rely on the sex, all of which is formed in utero by the way, of a person.As some men callously say, "If it ain't a baby, then I don't have to pay for child support." As much as I see that at as a copout made a desperate man who doesn't want to lie in his own bed, he has a point in light of the pro-choice stance.Or similarly, one more accurate: "If it isn't a baby, then you aren't pregnant." I'm sorry, but I'm not sure what the acronym "EC" means. And if a pharmacist decides, for personal reasons, not to dispense birth control (which a very small percentage of the pro-life movement ascribe to), then let the company deal with that.You make it sound as if the Pro-Life movement is actually winning anything of significance. About the only big win was with partial-birth abortion. Meanwhile, NARAL and Planned Parenthood still legally burn, mince, chop, tear apart, poison, and puree millions. WHAT?!?!?! That's the entire debate summed up! If its a person, then its murder to kill that person. Pffft. A tangent. Please... The incoherent thing that gets real hazy for you, apparently, is how any other human gets inside of another human. You act as if the parents are not culpable in ANY way, and that the baby wills itself in to existence to torment his/her mother who provides him/her with his/her very life.Come on man.... Think it through. I know you aren't stupid, so why say stupid things?

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Since a fetus is not a person, according to you, but has the potential to be one, then should it be legal for a woman to smoke cigarettes and drink copious amounts of alcohol?

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I was asking you a moral question. I want to know if you think it is right for a woman to drink and/or smoke during her pregnancy. You seem to think that a person going through a lifetime of health problems because of their selfish mother is cool. Mom's life effects child's life. No one is free to do absolutely and everything they want, especially when it involves someone else. If Mom keeps baby, and baby grows to be an adult, then her actions directly reflect his/her outcome for the rest of their lives. Unfortunately, there is no such law. In the last case, the one in the story, its only attempted murder. However, they are investigating the previous miscarriages since it looks highly suspicious, given the circumstances. He made the choice for her. She wanted baby. Apparently if Mom says its a human, only then its a human, in which case, its murder for someone who kills her baby. Mom, I guess, is the arbiter of life and the harbinger of death. No, she isn't insignificant at all. If, in a robbery, both of you were shot by the assailant, she lived, but you died, she wouldn't then become insignificant just because your injury was worse than hers. There is patriarchy. It just incidentally has nothing to do with abortion.

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“This life’s dim windows of the soul, distorts the heavens from pole to pole, and goads you to believe a lie, when you see with and not through the eye.” -William Blake

Sorry to burst your bubble.

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“Faith moves mountains, but only knowledge moves them to the right place” -- Joseph Goebbels

She used to be Lee Van Cleef. Now he's Sharon Stone.

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Progress in human affairs has come mainly through the bold readiness of human beings not to confine themselves to seeking piecemeal improvements in the way things are done, but to present fundamental challenges in the name of reason to the current way of doing things and to the avowed or hidden assumptions on which it rests. -- E. H. Carr

Of course it's accurate. One sperm weighs, like, one nanogram. A newborn infant weighs somewhere around 13 kg. Where do you think all that extra mass comes from? It doesn't come from the sperm; it doesn't come from anything the father has anything to do with.It's provided by the woman's body. It's only in the twisted worldview of the antifeminist that one nanogram = 13 kg. Relevant, because women bear, solely, the risks of childbirth. The greater risk they bear translates into veto power over the whole procedure.It's reasoning that you would accept in any business arrangement, NJ. Bearing the risks entitles you to a greater share of control. In this case, since women bear all the risk, they have all the control as to whether or not the pregnancy should continue. Apologies - "emergency contraception." You are - the radical rollback of women's reproductive freedom in this country. There's a hundred examples - from college students in Minnesota being denied access to contraception due to a stealth provision in a new law to the wholesale ban of a procedure that doesn't even exist - so called "partial-birth abortion." How it gets in is irrelevant. Trespassing is still trespassing even if the door was unlocked. It's still illegal to refuse eviction even if you were invited in, originally. Oh, now it's "during her pregnancy", is it? Lol, ok. How far does her legal culpability extend in your opinion? Does she have to know that she was pregnant? Do you have to prove that she knew, and that she knew smoking and drinking were bad? Do you have to prove that she's pregnant to charge her, or can yous imply lock up any woman you want who you see smoking, on suspicion of being pregnant? So charge him with "violation of choice." Why not? If this law is supposedly about the violation of a mother's choice, why isn't it called "violation of choice in the first degree" or whatever?Why does the very law itself suborn the mother's interests to protecting fetuses, if it isn't about suborning the interests of mothers to protecting their fetuses? Sure she would, if the robber was charged only with one count of murder in the first, and was never charged with attempted murder (or felony assault, or whatever.) Do you understand? If the only charges result from me being shot, and charges never resulted from her being shot, then that's a clear indication that the law considers one crime significant and the other insignificant (or unprovable, perhaps.)If you shoot two people at the same time, and there's the same evidence for both, but charges only result from one shooting then it's obvious that the law considers one of those people insignificant. Similarly, if both my wife and I are shot, but charges are only filed that represent me being shot, that's an indication that my wife is irrelevant to the law. HAHA! As if. The amount of male-entitlement preening that goes on in abortion threads is abundant proof of how wrong you are.

Uhm I don't know if you are used to the imperial system rather than SI units, but the average weight of a newborn would be in the area of 3500 grams, or 3.5 kg.The large baby recorded to have been born weighed in at just under 11 kg, and I can only pity the poor woman! My son is now 8 months and large for his age, but he still just weighs under 11 kg. In fact my 3 year old nephew weighs 14 kg.I'll go back to lurking now Edited by kongstad, : spleling eror