Religious extremists attacking a PP in my state

[CancelMyService]

See, the thing is with these types of discussion is it always leads to stuff like "Well what about rape?" with the implication that if I agree with you on that, then it somehow concedes the point overall.

If a friend of mine was raped (which for the record, has happened) and she did something in retaliation, then you're arguing she should face the full consequences of her actions regardless of the context. I'm just saying that one should take all the facts into account before passing judgement (which is admittedly hard a lot of the time) rather than making what could be a kneejerk response.

Also I didn't mean to take anything out of context, I noticed the quote I put last when I was finished typing my post, and put it at the end since I (ironically) wanted to avoid the appearence of taking anything out of xontext. Apparently that was a fail on my part.


Now to respond directly to some comments:

How can you judge what's right or wrong in this case? Maybe his religion says it's ok. Then you get into the territory of discriminating against people for their religion.

On the same token, religious people sometimes need to understand/accept that not everyone holds the same views and may not have been taught the same things that religion taught them. The very nature of religion tends to put people not of the same belief on a lower level, which rubs alot of the unchurched types the wrong way. The whole idea of "my way is right because God said so" as a debating method is not very productive. Neither is claiming religious persecution whenever someone questions those views.

I just don't see how a person could take the position of nothing, or even almost nothing is black and white.

Life experiences? Stealing is wrong but sometimes it's something you have to do for survival. Desparation leads people to make choices that may go against the moral compass of others because they may feel they don't have any other options. That doesn't make what they do *right*, it just offers some insight on why they happen.

What do we have laws for then? What's the point if nothing is wrong or right? What's the point if nobody cares about anybody else and will just do whatever they feel is right?

Well obviously we need to have laws to maintain society, but even laws allow for context. If someone attacks you and you kill them in self-defense, you probably won't get life in prison for it.

[Seshat]

Well, since I consider them both humans

And here's the grey area. I don't. I don't think the foetus is 'a human being' yet. It's living human tissue, but so's my appendix.

Murder is wrong, but removing bits of tissue isn't. The 'shades of grey' comes in when you're trying to decide where to make the mark that says 'this is a person' on the line between a fertilized ovum and a squalling independant baby.

Even if it isn't alive (which I still have serious doubts on), it is becoming alive.

It's living human tissue as soon as the proteins and vitamins and minerals are absorbed by the parent - before it's even an ovum and a sperm, much less fertilised.

When is it an independant human being with its own rights? That's up in the air. I don't know.

Ok. Let's say your best friend got raped. He doesn't see anything wrong with what he did. Do you need anymore information?

Yes. Did she ever clearly indicate a lack of interest? Did he ever override her indicating a lack of interest? Sometimes it's very clearly rape, sometimes it's a horrific miscommunication. Sometimes it's a false accusation. Rape - especially date rape - is one of the situations which (IMO) is LEAST clearly black and white.

I just don't see how a person could take the position of nothing, or even almost nothing is black and white. What do we have laws for then? What's the point if nothing is wrong or right? What's the point if nobody cares about anybody else and will just do whatever they feel is right?

Most things are a continuum, especially ethical matters. There is distinctly wrong, distinctly right, and wobbly difficult-to-decide stuff in the middle. Laws cover the distinctly-wrong things, and some of the wobbly stuff. We have courts and human judges because of the wobbly difficult-to-decide stuff in the middle (as well as to determine exactly who did the distinctly-wrong stuff).

I'm actually more scared of people who think in black and white than I am of people who think of shades of grey. It's so easy to tell yourself 'I'm right, I know what is right for everyone, so I will override other people's judgements and beliefs in the name of my rightness'. And that gets horribly, horribly scary very quickly.

I have faith in people in general. If I think someone else is doing something wrong, I assume that they've thought it through and have reasons that they think are good to do it that way. I might disagree. I might disagree strongly! But if they're not affecting other people, I consider it to be none of my business what they do - because hey, I'm not in possession of all the facts.

Now, when they ARE affecting other people, I think intervention is appropriate. It's the old saying 'your right to swing your fist ends at my nose'. And that's when the legal/judicial system comes into play. Society as a whole decides where along the various ethical continuums to draw its lines.

People usually do what they think is right, or at least what they think is least wrong, given the circumstances they're in. Sure, there's a small percentage of people who take pleasure in bucking the system or playing it for what they can get, but I don't think there are as many of those as most people think. And these people show up pretty clearly anyway.

I'm not trying to force my beliefs on anyone.

You said that in an earlier post than the one I'm mostly responding to, but it highlights another point I'd like to get a response to.

Your beliefs say that abortion is wrong. My beliefs don't. Now, you may not be able to answer this, but:

If you (or people who believe like you do) prevent me (or people like me) from getting an abortion, isn't that forcing your beliefs on me?

You believe it's wrong. I believe it's just a medical procedure. You (and those like you) hypothetically make it unavailable, thus forcing women who get pregnant despite precautions against it to endure a pregnancy and all its complications and permanent effects. Because of nothing more than your beliefs.

That's why the pro-choice side gets so upset. Especially the ones like me for whom a pregnancy would be horribly traumatic.

[Amethyst Hunter]

I guess I am a "religious extremist" then, because I am a Christian.

That depends. Would you take VIOLENT ACTION against those who perform abortions/dispense contraception/would get an abortion? Or would you allow others to live their own lives while still at the same time retaining your personal view that all abortion is wrong?

The latter is legitimately "pro-life." The former isn't - and that's EXACTLY the type of extremists we're facing in this situation. Ever heard of Operation Rescue/Operation Save America? They are a de facto hostile extremist group that has been known to resort to violence against clinics in the past. I would even go so far as to call them terrorists, because that's EXACTLY the kind of crap they engage in. They've partnered with another anti-choice group (PLAL/PLAN) and believe me, these guys are NO friend of "pro-life" people.

PLAN's founder, Joe Scheidler, has already announced *in print* that he fully intends to obtain permits to picket (read: harass and intimidate) the HOMES of PP employees and anybody even remotely associated with them (PP even said that while the building was being constructed these nuts were taking *pictures* of construction workers' license plates). Given this group's questionable history and their association with OR, I would NOT trust that one loose (or more) cannon that you know is out there to not try and start something.

You can disagree with abortion; that's fine. But harassing people at their HOMES goes too far as far as I'm concerned. Don't those people have a right to life too?

[AFPheonix]

The other thing to consider is that not all PP offices perform abortions. A few do, yes, but most of them have a few nurse practitioners, doctors and PAs who do routine stuff like pap smears and whatnot.
I took advantage of PP's services when I didn't have insurance but still needed birth control and monthly checkups. I am GLAD they're there.

Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater, so to speak.

[BlaqueKatt]

Not to denigrate anyone's beliefs but there world doesn't operate in just black and white. There *is* middle ground in almost everything, and to insist there isn't is pretty much the source of most conflict in the world since you're into "I'm right, you're wrong" territory.

yeah let's just go back in time and redo the whole civil war because the I'm right you're wrong isn't true.

I'm not religious-and that's essentially why I believe abortion is wrong-we judged a person's worth as a human by the color of their skin, now we're doing it based on physical location(inside another human)

Comparason of Dred Scott and Roe v Wade

[ThePhoneGoddess]

I don't see the comparison between those two decisions at all. Most of the connections they make are extremely tenuous.



In an 1857 court case, known as the Dred Scott decision, the Supreme Court ruled that slaves, even freed slaves, and all their descendants, had no rights protected by the Constitution and that states had no right to abolish slavery.

The purpose of a court is to interpert the laws the government has passed, especially in relation to other laws which affect the same issue. The court stated here that according to the laws at the time the states did not have the legal ability to abolish slavery, and that 'negros' had no rights as defined by the constitution. This is correct---this is the way the laws were written because the slaveholding states held so much power over the federal government, they insisted that the right to slavery be enshrined as a federal issue that the states had no control over. One of the biggest causes of the Civil War was this issue of state's rights.

Slavery was perfectly legal under our laws, and slaves not considered human beings with human rights, until the 13th and 14th Amendments were passed. Abortion is no different---it is perfectly legal under our current laws, and would take a serious law---such as an amendment---to give a fetus personhood status.

The Dred Scott ruling was the CORRECT decision---based on the laws in place at that time. Whether it was a MORAL decision is an entirely different issue.

[CancelMyService]

Ironically, when it came to slavery the argument was that it's a "state's rights" issue just as it was 100 or so years later with civil rights. That of course is obvious code for "states should be allowed to have discriminatory laws", but when it comes to abortion many of those same people demand federal action like a Constitutional Amendment take place.

Honestly, the Civil War wasn't a clear cut case of "I'm right, you're wrong" either. History has distilled it down to being about slavery, but that was just one of the issues the war was about. The war was mostly about the fledgling federal government wanting to establish itself against the first major challenge to its authority by a state. Even Lincoln was pragmatic about it, as he knew that it wasn't going to be the most popular thing to abolish slavery, but not only was it the right thing to do it was what was needed to maintain the authority of the US government.

Not to say Lincoln didn't believe slavery needed to be abolished, clearly he did, but it wasn't an altruistic plan as one would think.

[DexX]

I used to be rabidly anti-abortion, except in cases where the mother's life was in danger. Yes, I was a black-and-white thinker. These days I just don't have a cohesive opinion of abortion, and it's probably the one hangover issue from my faded Chairtianity that still confuses and concerns me.

The one thing I know for certain is that abortion is a big thing for any woman, and should never be taken lightly. I also believe it is idiotic to rely on abortion rather than contraceptive drugs or barriers (though those who do are likely to be the victim of moronic abstinence-only sex education).

As for a blob of cells being human, well, I just can't believe that any more. I used to trot out a silly metaphysical argument about time travel - if someone existed in your time and you could go back and convince the mother to have an abortion, would you be a murderer? One day it occured to me... what if you went back a few months earlier and just knocked on the door when you knew the conception was about to occur? What if you prevented conception? If my (very weak) argument proved abortion was murder, then poorly-timed door-knocking was murder too.

Imagine you have two petri dishes, one in each hand. In one is a human ovum, and in the other is some sperm. Both are healthy and viable. Let's say you have the technology to grow a healthy baby from the contents of those dishes. All you have to do to kick it off is tip one dish into the other. According to many pro-life arguments, if you don't, you're a murderer.

Why?

Because those two dishes contain a potential person, and if you don't combine them you are denying them to the right to exist.

It seems ridiculous to me now (though ten years ago I was thoroughly convinced) that minutes after the sperm meeting the egg, a human being with full rights exists. It's some cells. While I am morally uneasy about drawing a line, these days I am more inclined to think that a real, genuine person only exists when a foetus exhibits brain function, and maybe not even then.

All that said, I think women should be careful of abortion. Simple though it may be, it's an invasive medical procedure that subverts the natural, healthy course of biological function. Even women I know who are fiercely pro-choice still speak solemnly of their own abortions. One dear friend of mine says she made the right decision, as she is not psychologically suited to motherhood and her marriage was on the rocks, but she still wishes she hadn't needed to do it.

So yeah, teach kids about safe sex (well, as safe as it can be) and get them using the pill, condoms, or whatever works for them, but as uneasy as it makes me feel at times, if all else fails make sure they also have the right to a reasonably early-term abortion.

(Wow, that was longer and more rambly than I intended.)

[Pedersen]

As a Christian, I also believe that God knows what He is doing. He created a woman's body to abort a child on its own if it's not going to make it. It's called miscarriage. Abortion in any case is wrong.

Allow me to ask something please?

God, over the past few millenia, has:

1. Created all of existence.
2. Turned water into blood (ref: The "persuasion" of the Pharaoh to release His chosen people)
3. Killed only the first born people of each household of Egypt that did not show the proper symbols to the Angel of Death (ref: see same)
4. Lit a bush on fire, but without burning the bush itself (ref: Moses and the burning bush)
5. Brought two men back from the dead (ref: Lazarus and Jesus himself)
6. Caused a woman to give birth to a male child without intercourse with a human (ref: The Virgin Mary, Immaculate Conception, etc)
7. Saved a condemned man from being devoured alive by hungry beasts (ref: Daniel and the Lions)

And that's just a list from the Bible. Around us every day, we have things like:

• People having horrific accidents, and managing to survive them when they should have died, judging by all acounts.
• People dying from things that should not have killed them.
• People praying for (and receiving) the things they most need to stay alive (sometimes money, sometimes a specific form of help, etc).

And you are going to tell me that God is limited by modern medical science?

if God wanted that woman to have that baby, then that woman would have that baby. And no abortion could stop it.

Unless, of course, he is not actually omnipotent.

So, now I have to ask: Is God omnipotent, or not?

If so, then the point is moot. A woman having an abortion must be acceptable by God, since he is allowing it to happen.

If not, then again the point is moot. God is not omnipotent, and is therefore not the God of Christian scripture, and thus any edict from that God must be a false one.

[CancelMyService]

I'm sure there's a loophole that explains it, there always seems to be one.


As far as abortion goes, it always seemed pretty clear that there is a point where a fetus could survive outside of the womb. Before that point, the fetus is basically just a parasite feeding off the host (mother). I know that's controversial since the knee jerk response is all "OMG ITZ A BABY" but to me until it is a viable being that can live outside the womb, it doesn't deserve full rights and privileges to a fully formed being. Isn't the main argument against gay marriage always that ridiculous claim that legalizing same-sex unions will lead to legalizing all unions, like animals and children? Why doesn't anyone ever spin that one around and say if you're going to grant fertilized eggs full rights, why not amoebas or protozoa?

Besides, I always thought God must be OK with terminating pregnancies, since it happens naturally (miscarriages) all the time.

[Seshat]

Even women I know who are fiercely pro-choice still speak solemnly of their own abortions. One dear friend of mine says she made the right decision, as she is not psychologically suited to motherhood and her marriage was on the rocks, but she still wishes she hadn't needed to do it.

You don't have to look far to find pro-choice women who haven't had an abortion - because they have always been both careful and lucky, and their contraception of choice (which might be celibacy) has worked. Heck, there are pro-choice women who've had their contraception fail and decided to keep their child, while not in any way changing their pro-choice views. The view there is "I'm for choice, and keeping her was my choice".

Conversely, you have to search very, very hard to find a pro-choice person (of either gender) who is actually for abortion. For the vast majority of pro-choice people, abortion is a regrettable medical procedure. As with most medical procedures other than screenings, prevention is better than any treatment, and a non-invasive treatment is usually better than an invasive one.

From some of the ways you've phrased things, it seems as if that comes as a surprise to you - almost as if you expected pro-choice people to want to have abortions. As if we think of it as a primary form of contraception, or a casual thing.

Is that a common belief among anti-choice folk?

[CancelMyService]

Judging from what I hear when I scan past talk radio or flip past Fox News, the strawman is that pro-choice people want "abortions on demand" like some kind of perverse McDonald's drive thru setup. They tell their listeners/viewers that somehow being pro choice means you enjoy abortions or some other silly nonsense.

[Seshat]

My husband, my two best friends, and I have all been tempted at times to get t-shirts with a slogan something like "Oops! I forgot to have an abortion!"

Variations include:

Things to do before you die:
<random nice things like 'walk barefoot in the sand' or 'share a sunset picnic'>
* have an abortion

My life is missing something - oh yeah, I haven't had an abortion

Get me pregnant: I haven't had an abortion yet!

I guess to us, the strawman is just so self-evidently ridiculous.

Of course, one of the main reasons we haven't done it is that we don't want to offend the moderate anti-abortion people: the ones who agree that the strawman is ridiculous, and will potentially believe we're setting up the strawman just to publically pull it down and weaken the moderate anti-abortion argument.

(In Australia, we have far fewer extremist anti-abortion 'noise' than you do in America. Over here, it would be a reasonable thing for a moderate anti-abortionist to believe. However, those of you in the States where the extremist strawman is so strong, please feel free to use these slogans!)

Unfortunately, the extremist anti-abortionists are setting up such a strong strawman in the US that the honest moral dilemma of abortion is being overshadowed by the extremists' propaganda. Ironically, they're weakening their own side.

I feel women should think about all the moral issues of abortion. And we should do so at puberty, and every year between puberty and the time their personality and morality settles down - usually between 18 and 25. Then revisit it periodically until menopause. When we're pregnant it's too late to think about it calmly and intellectually - we'd benefit from knowing what we felt and thought about it before one of us realised her period was late.

[BlaqueKatt]

I feel women should think about all the moral issues of abortion. And we should do so at puberty, and every year between puberty and the time their personality and morality settles down - usually between 18 and 25. Then revisit it periodically until menopause. When we're pregnant it's too late to think about it calmly and intellectually - we'd benefit from knowing what we felt and thought about it before one of us realised her period was late.

I would like to add also think of the MEDICAL issues(at least in the states)
1, the abortion industry has NO REGULATION-they "police themselves"
2, a doctor that performs abortions is the only doctor not REQUIRED BY LAW to have malpractice insurance
3, abortion is the ONLY medical procedure where INFORMED CONSENT is not MANDATED by law

there was a case where a clinic in NY used the same equipment from patient to patient without even running it under water, much less sterilizing it-clinic is still open and operating-why because "have a regulatory comitee and clinic inspections could close clinics and make access linited which is unconstitutional" same argument was made when the AMA wanted to force them to carry malpractice insurance, and informed consent---the argument was made by planned parenthood, who also ignored a court order for a 14 year old girl to not have an abortion due to a medical condition-they arranged for her transport to another state, and maintained they did nothing wrong when the girl died from "complications"


my other issue is there are studies that show after an abortion it becomes very difficult to concieve/carry a child to term(a D&C results in scar tissue that forms over the fallopean tubes resulting in an 85% chance of ectopic pregnancy), but women going in for the procedure are never told this.. They are also not told about the 17 seperate studies done in sweden and china that show abortion increases the risk of breast cancer by up to 280%. The branch of the CDC that is responsible for reporting injury and death statistics for abortion has not released any data since 1988-why is that? And why are all the staff at the CDC that are in charge of collection the data employed at or investors/owners of abortion clinics. Would you let the head of a tobacco comapany run the american lung association, and compile reports on the safety of tobacco? That's what the CDC does for abortion, the reports on safety cite other studies written by other people in their branch exclusively-NO outside sources at all.


One of my best friends had to have her uterus removed to stop the bleeding from a puncture made during a "safe" suction abortion her parents wanted her to have-she was 16 and wanted to keep the baby, now she'll never have one. Neither her nor her parents were warned that it was a common complication(before 1988-last year statistics available around 40% rate of occurance)

[TheRoo]

In the U.S a lot of states have passed laws superseding the informed consent laws when it comes to abortion. The breast cancer/abortion link has been discredited many times. The methodology of the study that found a link was flawed.

http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/f...on-miscarriage

All of the other physical risks to the mother are actually greater if she choses to deliver the baby.