What is Liberal?

Hi, Yaro.The main problem with "liberal" and "conservative" is that these words actually have many meanings. I know I have used the words very differently in different conversations.Originally, the word conservative is one who wishes to preserve the status quo, including the privileges and power of the ruling class.Originally, the word liberal was used for one who advocated expanding the franchise to a much wider group of people, as well as increasing the civil liberties and personal freedoms that are necessary to make this kind of democratic system possible.

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Pro Choice at it's core is about convienence and expediency.

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Which is good enough for me.--

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Pro Life is about protecting the developing human until it is born....

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As you said: "Pro-life" is about forcing women to bear an unwanted fetus despite the medical and social complications that this entails.

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Pro-Life is about setting priorities for those who are unable to do so themselves.

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Who are you to determine when someone else is unable to set her own priorities? Every person has the right to a fullfilling and enriching life, and every person has the right to determine how to achieve a fullfilling and enriching life. If a person decides that she doesn't want to be pregnant, she should have the right to not be pregnant.-

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Pro Life states that the life of a human, especially in the most inocent and vulnerable state as gestation, is far more important than "social complications.

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Again, wrong. Pro Life states that the life of a fetus, especially in the most inocent and vulnerable state as gestation, is far more important than "social complications. And that is exactly what is wrong with pro-life.-

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The "medical complications" is a non-player in the debate because the statistics of how many abortions performed on women because of risks to the mothers life verses the number performed out of convienence or "social complications" is extremely small.

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Actually, I was speaking about the fact that there are fewer medical complications and risks, including the risk of death, associated with first trimester abortion than there are with bringing a pregnancy to term.-

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This is where evolution breaks down for me....

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Wha...? What does evolution have to do with this? Abortion is right or it is wrong -- evolution doesn't enter into it at all!-

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...Even in lower mamals, the reguard for new life is paramont.

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Anyone who has raised hamsters will know that this is incorrect. "Lower mammals" routinely engage in infanticide when conditions are not right. Many species will spontaneously abort when conditions are not right. I believe (but may be wrong) that rabbits can even absorb the fetus. Not that I understand what the hell this has to do with whether it is right or wrong for a human being to have an abortion.

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Nobody has a "right to a fulfilling and enriching life." Where do you get that? The PURSUIT of same is protected by the US Constitution however. Big difference.

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Fine, I actually agree with you on this; no one has the right to a fullfilled life because there is no way for an outside party to give someone a fullfilled life -- that can only be achieved by the person herself. The rights that a person has are that there should be no unnecessary obstacles to her "pursuit of happiness", and that a reasonable amount of resouces necessary to her pursuit should be made available.-

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But the right stops short of harm to another. If it's murder, she shouldn't have that right.

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I agree that one person's "pursuit of happiness" cannot interfere with another's, but we aren't talking of murder here -- we are talking of abortion.

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Every first term abortion results in the death of at least one human being.

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No, it doesn't.-

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unborn human

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An oxymoron.-

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You are a modern day Western Social Liberal (WSL).

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All I can say is (P.S., I'm not a liberal.)

Actually, I'm a communist, which is very, very different from a "liberal". But Lizard Breath may (or may not) understand what the difference is. I'm sure that some on this very thread think that "liberal" and "communist" are more or less the same thing (which is kind of funny, since I think of "liberal" and "conservative" as more or less the same thing -- but I doubt they will see the joke).Hey, this is kind of back on topic!

Yeah, the problem with the Marxist-inspired left is that it is even more sectarian than the Christians.Actually, "anarchist" is probably a better description of my beliefs (a syndicalist might even be more accurate), but as you can see I have no problem with being called a communist. As you say, they are pretty much the same thing. I had trouble explaining that to a Troskyist friend of mine, though.

Oh, don't ask me to explain sectarian differences! I think that the different ideas and responses of different philosophies are very interesting, but I get cross-eyed when these get parcelled out in such a way to label this group or that faction.If you have any interest in the history of the early Church, then you know what I mean. The different ideas and philosophies and the discourse between different schools are all fascinating, but I get confused when they try to explain what, exactly, defines this sect, and what that heresy really was all about.As far as I can tell, if a communist thinks about the "withering of the state" at all she tends to just assume that it will happen of its own accord as exploitation disappears under socialism, whereas an anarchist feels that the abolition of the state won't occur on its own but must be an explicit part of the program. At least, that's my opinion.But then both communists and anarchists will probably scream at me for not understanding anything at all.

Not too mention all of those human beings who never come into existence when I choose not to have sex at all.

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no no, both are generally for the radical overthrow of the state.

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I hate to get into one of those arguments about definitions that seem so popular here lately, but the traditional Marxists have been for seizing control of the state, while some anarchists were for overthrowing and abolishing the state outright.

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Let's say the founders were the total Enlightenment jerks you all believe they were....

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I have an idea: let's say, for the sake of argument, that the founders were Christian and intended the U.S. to be a Christian nation. So what? What do the beliefs and intentions of people 200 years dead have to do with the way we choose to live our lives today?

10 weeks still sounds a little early to me, but then I'm not an embryologist.

Calling a fetus "human" and then claiming that it has rights sounds like tortured language to me. But then, I'm a Western Social Liberal.

Perhaps. Maybe I should read some Marx -- I do like the history of ideas. But I have so little time to read everything I want -- considering that a century and a half of histiry has occurred since Marx wrote his works I have tended to stick to more contemporary works. Still, I have read both Origin of Species and Descent of Man, despite those books being terribly out of date.

My genome doesn't talk.