Legality of abortion VS homicide?
- Thread starter Alyssa Rose
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So by this logic it should be perfectly legal to kill a person in a coma. Or even kill a quadriplegic so long as the fatal injury occurs in a location where the person has no feeling. Even further, by the "logic" you're choosing to use here, since consciousness and the ability to "feel pain" seem to be the only preconditions under which killing a person is wrong, why should we not be allowed to chloroform someone and then slice their throat? I mean, they would be unconscious, and they wouldn't feel pain, so what's the big deal, right? What about smothering someone while they're sleeping? What about killing someone who is passed out from too much alcohol? I mean, they wouldn't feel it, they're unconscious... Ludicrous.
Nope, this is not my point.
My point is life begins when you're conscious (but it doesn't ends when your inconscious).
If you've never been conscious, you are not alive.
Where in the study does it say that? Or is this just your own scientific opinion, based solely on an article that you agree with? And just for reference, even scientists will acknowledge that "life" begins at conception. The definition of life is not what's at debate here, rather the definition of "humanness" is the issue.
The question of "when does life begins is being debated among scientists, some of the mdo think that life begins at conception. Some don't.
You may check this blog, interesting scientific explanations of why saying "Life begins at conception" is a mistake : http://hplusbiopolitics.wordpress.c...cy-in-the-life-begins-at-conception-argument/
You may check this blog, interesting scientific explanations of why saying "Life begins at conception" is a mistake : http://hplusbiopolitics.wordpress.c...cy-in-the-life-begins-at-conception-argument/
And you can check several other sites that claim differently. A fertilized egg is a living organism, whether it is "human" or not is what people seem to have a difficult time agreeing upon.
Fertilized eggs, from the moment of conception, exhibit chemical uniqueness, complexity and hierarchical organization, reproduction of cells, genetic programming, metabolism, development and interaction within their environment as has been proven by other scientists.
Jagger69
Three lullabies in an ancient tongue
A great point. Your conundrum is a valid one. I also wish more women (especially ones as smart as Nikki is) would comment.
You'd obviously call me names in the same flaming fashion that you did to Mayhem, Sam. However, I would more respectfully ask the same question of you. How can you possibly equate the execution of a human being with paying a speeding ticket? I'm sorry and, if you'd do some research on the issue, you'd find it isn't as just "simple as that". Seriously....how much research have you done on the system of capital punishment and the way it is instituted in the United States? Or is "an eye for an eye" all you need to believe in....close your eyes and your mind and ignore the nuances of how it is carried out?
The death penalty is administered in such an inequitable fashion that it defies logic. The constitution provides for equal protection under the law and due process for everyone....yet, if you look at the history of who ends up being executed and who doesn't, you would shake your head in amazement. That fact alone should make capital punishment unconstitutional.
I would urge anyone who cares to understand this injustice to read Among the Lowest of the Dead: The Culture of Punishment by David Von Drehle. It is an outstanding and factual look (not some "bleeding heart" missive) at the way the current death penalty system has evolved in the United States into its current grotesque form. Read it and, even if you are a death penalty proponent, I think any reasonably fair-minded person and certainly any constitutionalist would have to agree that the present system is terribly flawed and unjust. Nikki's original question is symptomatic of the dysfunctional legal system that drives capital punishment here in the land of the free and the home of the brave.
Sam Fisher
Banned
Jagger, for fuck's sake man! The point I was illustrating was: There are consequences to be paid when you do something that is against the law.
Get caught speeding? Pay the fine.
Get caught embezzling money? Go to prison.
Get caught killing someone with First Degree Murder? Your life should be taken. Simple as that.
(only YOU would contrue my example as "equating the execution of a human being with paying a speeding ticket) How fucking lame on your part to even suggest that)
You on the other hand want to spare the life of someone who kills innocent people because the death penalty is inhumane? That it might cause them pain and suffering [NOBABE]to the killer[/NOBABE] who is being executed? I say GOOD!
Why are you not concerned with the victims who were brutally murdered by a criminal? Why are you so sympathetic to the criminal?
Your logic and beliefs on the death penalty are truly un-fucking-believable.
Get caught speeding? Pay the fine.
Get caught embezzling money? Go to prison.
Get caught killing someone with First Degree Murder? Your life should be taken. Simple as that.
(only YOU would contrue my example as "equating the execution of a human being with paying a speeding ticket) How fucking lame on your part to even suggest that)
You on the other hand want to spare the life of someone who kills innocent people because the death penalty is inhumane? That it might cause them pain and suffering [NOBABE]to the killer[/NOBABE] who is being executed? I say GOOD!
Why are you not concerned with the victims who were brutally murdered by a criminal? Why are you so sympathetic to the criminal?
Your logic and beliefs on the death penalty are truly un-fucking-believable.
Sam Fisher
Banned
Dfp!
Who said that ? Can you name at least ONE great mind of human History who actually said that murderers shoud be executed ? And, off course, you may show the proof he said it...
In fact, the US Supreme Court said it NOT "simple as that" and that making it "simple as that" was ILLEGAL
Woodson v. North Carolina - 428 U.S. 280 (1976)
http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/428/280/case.html
Rattrap
Doesn't feed trolls and would appreciate it if you
This is the predominant question I've wondered about for a while. Good to know.
You know, PR, I used to quite enjoy your posts and was happy to have another intelligent conservative voice on the board but lately, especially with shit like this (I'm really surprised you'd participate in such a shining example of Reductio ad absurdum), you come off more and more as bitter old man.
I realize we're emotional hardwired to, for lack of a another better word, get emotional over the unborn. It's an obvious biological programming. Most of the time, though, this response isn't logical or pragmatic - we're well beyond the days where the human population is at all in danger of ever getting too low. A 'person' is ultimately defined legally, so we can't argue over that - what I will argue to is that, up to a point, a fetus is no more a 'separate organism' than one of its mother's organs. Like I said - getting a hair cut or clipping your nails. Having a kidney removed. Etc, etc. Where that point is, I think consciousness is as good a benchmark as any.
To put it into another perspective...we already participate in the wholesale slaughter of countless organisms that do not have consciousness without a second thought.
Marginalizing human life based on a convenient, debatable definition is never pragmatic. Likening abortion to clipping one's nails or getting one's haircut is vile at best.
Rattrap
Doesn't feed trolls and would appreciate it if you
I see nothing but an emotional response, and that simply isn't useful. Is that it?
Mr. Daystar
In a bell tower, watching you through cross hairs.
I don't understand why people can't see the plain, simple answer to this question.
The fact is, most states that have the death penalty require there be "special circumstances", to bring capitol murder charges. If you just shoot someone, for no reason, you may get charged with first degree murder, but if you commit another felony, such as rob a store, you've stepped into another level. Another way to do that, is consider child murder, or multiple murder a special circumstance.
Therefore, if they consider an unborn child a life, they can seek the death penalty when charging, and trying a case. The problem is, even pro choice politicians, never realize, in their zeal to climb the ladder of success, that, pro life politicians will jump on this, and use it for their anti abortion agenda.
The fact is, most states that have the death penalty require there be "special circumstances", to bring capitol murder charges. If you just shoot someone, for no reason, you may get charged with first degree murder, but if you commit another felony, such as rob a store, you've stepped into another level. Another way to do that, is consider child murder, or multiple murder a special circumstance.
Therefore, if they consider an unborn child a life, they can seek the death penalty when charging, and trying a case. The problem is, even pro choice politicians, never realize, in their zeal to climb the ladder of success, that, pro life politicians will jump on this, and use it for their anti abortion agenda.
I don't have the answer and I haven't seen it written in this thread either. I'm Pro-Choice with the regret that I have to be anything on this topic. It is a horrible thing. People's lives can be ruined, poverty can be perpetuated, and there can be ugly casualness about it. I would do away with abortion if I could do away with the need. On this topic, I think the debate should continue. It shouldn't go away. I believe we need to challenge ourselves on this one constantly.
Not useful to you, at least. I would marginalize those comments, too, if I had similarly morally reprehensible views.
Rattrap
Doesn't feed trolls and would appreciate it if you
Ad hominem! You're on a roll. Well, nevermind.
But, I shall clarify, lest another get hung up on two lines and selectively ignore the rest of the post:
I do not mean to say that having an abortion is the same as these examples (and re-reading it, I realize that's what it looks like I'm saying - I apologize for that) - what I mean is that at points, an embryo is no more, cellularly speaking, than these other extensions of the body. The book The Selfish Gene doesn't touch on this particular subject at all, but does make very interesting observations about what defines an organism as separate from another and these observations can lead to some interesting perspectives.
I fully agree with everything you've said here, mike.
Ultimately the question we should be asking is: what course creates the least suffering? I can tell you right now it isn't 'life at conception' nor is it late-term abortions. I still believe the choice should be firmly in the woman's hands so long as pregnancy takes place in her body (which as far as I can tell in any near future short of some weird medical science stuff, it will continue to) - but that doesn't mean we can't find an acceptable position we can steer our culture toward. The first step is obviously to reduce the need for abortions entirely - of which a key step is education. And none of this silly 'abstinence-only' shit prudes keep pushing.
vodkazvictim
Why save the world, when you can rule it?
Why wasn't sam aborted?
Hi Nikki! I used to live in Cincinnati, and sort of all over the SW Ohio/NKY region. It tends to be a Bible-thumping, conservative area, as you know, but you seem pretty level-headed.
I'm not going to go "all-in" on this discussion, because to be honest, I've been through it too many times, and I know I need to extricate myself from the moral-political-religious threads here, as I tend to get a little too wrapped up in them and don't always show my best side in the end.
But I will suggest that although you're right to sense some hypocrisy in the law, I think the abortion debate largely turns on the primacy of the mother: her body, her choice. I'd have to count myself among the Pro-Choice crowd in that even though I strongly dislike abortion as an option, I have to side with a woman's right to choose. I'm also disgusted by unnecessary (i.e., there is no threat to the life of the mother) late term abortions, and wouldn't be able to support or stay with a woman who made that decision. But in the end, I have to believe it's her decision to make.
So if a woman decides to terminate her pregnancy, in my opinion that's her choice, and it's really not for anyone to judge, least of all men who have absolutely no clue what it's like to be a woman facing the prospect of motherhood. The baby is part of her, and she alone can make the choice to end its life. But if she chooses to carry the baby to term and they're both killed, then I think it should count as two murders. Not that it matters, though. Despite differences of opinion on the status of a fetus, I don't think anyone disagrees about cold-blooded murder of a fully grown person, so one murder should really be enough to justify locking up a killer for the rest of their life.
Just my two cents.
I'm not going to go "all-in" on this discussion, because to be honest, I've been through it too many times, and I know I need to extricate myself from the moral-political-religious threads here, as I tend to get a little too wrapped up in them and don't always show my best side in the end.
But I will suggest that although you're right to sense some hypocrisy in the law, I think the abortion debate largely turns on the primacy of the mother: her body, her choice. I'd have to count myself among the Pro-Choice crowd in that even though I strongly dislike abortion as an option, I have to side with a woman's right to choose. I'm also disgusted by unnecessary (i.e., there is no threat to the life of the mother) late term abortions, and wouldn't be able to support or stay with a woman who made that decision. But in the end, I have to believe it's her decision to make.
So if a woman decides to terminate her pregnancy, in my opinion that's her choice, and it's really not for anyone to judge, least of all men who have absolutely no clue what it's like to be a woman facing the prospect of motherhood. The baby is part of her, and she alone can make the choice to end its life. But if she chooses to carry the baby to term and they're both killed, then I think it should count as two murders. Not that it matters, though. Despite differences of opinion on the status of a fetus, I don't think anyone disagrees about cold-blooded murder of a fully grown person, so one murder should really be enough to justify locking up a killer for the rest of their life.
Just my two cents.
Leonardo da Vinci was probably a good candidate for abortion. He was born out of wedlock from a rich father and a peasant woman who may have been a prostitute. I'm glad it didn't go that way.
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