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Join the Care Bears @ Abortion Debate!
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| The art of argument. |
[03 Jul 2009|10:59am] |
I was reading another community when it occured to me I haven't had to really think about a response to pro-life arguments in a long time. The arguments about abortion I see always follow down one of a very few paths, and are easy to predict. If you've had one argument about abortion, you've had them all, it seems. I'm willing to bet pro-life people feel the same way.
Do any of you yearn to hear a new conversation? Do you wish you'd be asked a question you don't already have an answer to (and have had the same answer for years)? If any of you have a question or a point that you'd like to see brought into the debate that you don't think people have already heard a million times, please post it.
My contribution:
Most of my patients (I work in an abortion clinic) refer to what's inside them as a baby. I have many, many religious patients who come in wearing crosses, bracelets with saints or stations of the cross pictured on them (or other non-Christian religious icons). Some of these patients even reference that abortion is against their belief system, but that they are sure this is the best decision for them. They have their procedures, and almost all of them are emotionally stable before, during, and after their procedures. It doesn't matter if a woman calls an embryo a baby or what sanctity she places on developing human life. Women will have abortions anyway, because other aspects of their life are more important to them.
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[01 Jun 2009|09:59am] |
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By ROXANA HEGEMAN, Associated Press Writer Roxana Hegeman, Associated Press Writer – 2 hrs 1 min ago
WICHITA, Kan. – A man suspected of fatally shooting abortion doctor George Tiller in church was in jail Monday while investigators sought to learn more about his background, including his possible connections to anti-abortion groups.
( detailed article under the cut )
I'm confused. If the shooter might have a possible connection to an anti-abortion group, wouldnt shooting the doctor have an OPPOSITE affect to his cause?
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| How Supportive Is Your Candidate? |
[11 May 2009|04:22am] |
Once again our elected elite here in the US has proven to us that they are a bunch of self-serving jerks with inflated egos. Arlen Specter (now democrat) decided to switch parties, and his reasoning for doing so? Well, his state has swung Democrat, and to quote him, "I am unwilling to have my 29-year Senate record judged by the Pennsylvania Republican primary electorate", i.e. I don't think my constituency and the people I was supposed to be serving should judge me fit for office. Yay!
A lot of pride is bandied about every 2-4 years for candidates in all offices who are Pro-Life, or Pro-Choice, or at least claim to be. I looked up my own man, David Scott (D-GA), and could not even find his reproductive rights stance listed on his website. But this is Georgia, that's sadly a safe move. Politically expedient. Guarantees reelection. Lacks principal and integrity.
But maybe Specter and Scott are just isolated cases; I'm sure you all out there have political figures you're proud of, or do you? Are you convinced that your candidate of choice, whether it be Senate, Congress, or Executive (or Judicial, whatever) actually cares about your issues on abortion/reproductive rights enough to weather political shifts or idealogical changes? You don't have to let the proverbial cat out of the bag, I personally don't care if people know I live in Fulton County, but YMMV. Does he/she care? Are they Pro-Choice, Pro-Life, or just Pro-Whatever-Gets-Me-Reelected? How do you judge that sort of thing? What are your thoughts on the matter?
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| Stem Cell Research |
[10 Mar 2009|08:30am] |
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Scientists can now destroy embryos with federal funds, in the name of research.
Does this weaken the prolife side of the debate? Especially since this was done (according to President Obama), to "restore scientific integrity to government decision-making".
Georgia has introduced legislation to try and protect embryos - defining them as people and prohibiting their destruction, and this would seem to be one defense, assuming it becomes enacted.
Will the prolife proponents shore up their defenses more in some way to protect embryos?
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| Don't agree with it? |
[15 Feb 2009|11:33am] |
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I think I've heard people say things like "Don't agree with abortion? Then don't have one." Now, in my mind this seems like an incredibly simplistic way of looking of things. To those who don't agree with abortion, abortion is murder, an act which takes away the rights of a second party. Whereas saying "Don't agree with gay marriage? Then don't have one.", getting married to another person of your gender for sure doesn't take away any rights of the person you're marrying. No-one would say "Don't agree with murder? Then don't murder." or "Don't agree with theft? Then don't steal." I'm not really speaking here of whether abortion is right or wrong, but whether this particular line makes sense. Thoughts?
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| Hypothetical US presidential election |
[17 Feb 2009|04:12pm] |
If the were a US presidential election in which the two candidates were Martin Sheen and Rudy Giuliani and you were eligible to vote, who would you vote for?
To clarify what I'm getting at here, Martin Sheen would be classified by most people as very left-wing and has been involved in a lot of direct action against war in favour of worker and immigrant rights. He's also a member of Consistent life, and as such opposes abortion, the death penalty and euthanasia. I think that he has been involved with funding crisis pregnancy centres. Rudy Guiliani is a Republican who describes himself as pro-choice and has donated money to Planned Pregnancy. Generally a lot of people assume that views on abortion fall into left/right political views, what I'm asking is would you prefer a pro-life lefty or a pro-choice right-winger in the White House.
My answer: I'm an anti-abortion lefty and Martin Sheen would kinda be my ideal US president.
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| Terminology, revisited. |
[07 Feb 2009|12:16pm] |
I know a terminology debate has had to have been done before, but let's revisit this.
-- On what levels are the terms pro-life, anti-choice, and anti-abortion the same? How are they different?
-- On what levels are the terms pro-choice, pro-abortion, and anti-life the same? How are they different?
-- Which of these six terms to you consider yourself, and why? Which do you find offensive? Why?
-- Which do you believe the opposite side should be labeled, and why? Which of these offend you? Why?
-- Should we find motive-neutral term to designate each side? Should we regulate the usage as it pertains to the opposite side? Should we simply stick with the well known "pro-life" and "pro-choice" terms that are allowed in this community to date? Should we allow the terms to designate one side of the issue (i.e. as either a woman only or life only issue) when the community deems it as multi-faceted?
Long story short, I want to know your opinions on the terminologies in use today with regards to each side.
( My own thoughts below )
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| Attitudes toward abortion and birth |
[03 Feb 2009|09:14pm] |
This one's less of a debate and more of a sharing but I'm sure we'll manage to get some debate going off of it.
In my broodiness I've been looking at some communities about pregnancy and birth. I've noticed that quite a lot of the people interested in 'natural'/home/low intervention pregnancy and birth are also either strongly pro-life or strongly pro-choice. Now I can see the connection in that if you're interested in one thing to do with pregnancy you're likely to be interested in others, but I think that it's more than that. I think that some women's attitudes to labour and abortion are connected. Women who are pro-choice and into 'natural' birth seem to see the issues as connected through women's control of our bodies. Women who are pro-life and into 'natural' birth seem to connect the two through a the belief that pregnancy and birth are normal parts of life and seeing abortion as part of the pathologisation and medicalisation of the two.
Anyway, how are your views on abortion and birth connected?
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| An oldie but goodie... |
[16 Dec 2008|10:47am] |
Do you consider abortion to be "the easy way" out of a pregnancy, and thus potential future parenthood?
Does this affect your view point on abortion?
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| Post-abortion syndrome |
[05 Dec 2008|08:25am] |
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I've heard the argument of "post-abortion syndrome" in the past, and wondered if it was still being used. It's particularly interesting in light of the most recent look into the supposed affliction.
Were there any prolifers here who used this as an argument against abortion? Does this change any minds?
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| Safe, legal, 100% unapologetic |
[17 Nov 2008|12:01pm] |
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Doesn't it seem that even giving an inch on abortion (late term limits, etc) implies that the fetus is in fact a human or developing human with full rights, and thus any abortion would in fact be murder?
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| In the spirit... |
[20 Jan 2009|01:43pm] |
What do you think the new president is going to do for your side of the abortion rights movement?
What do you feel that the last president did for your side of the abortions rights movement?
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| Cecil Adams and the Abortion Fracas |
[24 Nov 2008|10:12am] |
So recently, my favorite person Cecil Adams decided to take on the difficult topics.
As a quick aside, I'll note his snide treatment of the actual questioneer is not particularly surprising; he does that with everyone who writes in, no matter what the topic. So it's not a special case, if you've never read his stuff before.
Frankly, I was surprised. Cecil, except for one article where he argued that packing cigarettes has no effect, has always been very dead-on and also very liberal with his arguments, but here he is, taking what I would say as a moderate (and some on this forum might say as extremely conservatve) viewpoint on the stance of abortion. I won't get into his main-body justifications (what's so special about brainwaves? what ISN'T?), but the main thing that interested me, and which I'd like to talk about after the initial skirmish over his actual article, is the meta-argument over politics and the abortion debate landscape.
He mentions snidely that the absolutist view on abortion rights is "one of the reasons we got stuck with eight years of George Bush", and that those arguments "drive the religious right to new heights of zeal". Further in the article, he says "The failure to find a middle ground on abortion has been a major contributor to the polarized politics that has plagued the country since Roe was handed down."
I do want to stress that he's not just picking on the far-left on the issue, but the far-right as well, and also that he's not saying either side is right or wrong, no matter how extreme, just that the divisiveness and the absolutism on either side has slaughtered rational politics in the US. Fresh off of an US election, I think it's all still on our minds.
Do you agree? Disagree? Does the pro-life/choice view either way justify destroying American politics to get done, or is there a better way to do this (like with compromises)?
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| mod post |
[18 Nov 2008|09:12pm] |
As many of you probably noticed, this community was hacked earlier today. Fortunately, LJ acted quickly and the proper maintainers were restored (with the exception of ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) kali_kali, who appears to have been the target of the hacker). Unfortunately, our community info page is gone. But we will be working to recreate it soon. In the meantime, play nice. And post!
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| Responsibility sans abortion? |
[03 Apr 2008|09:13pm] |
If there were ever a time where abortion had simply never existed (say far far far in the future in some utopia or let's just imagine,) might giving a child up for adoption be viewed as an irresponsible measure?
I'm thinking in terms of the way some people may view abortion as being just "killing off the problem" or running away from responsibility. Might adoption be looked at as simply giving your problem to someone else to handle, and not handling it like a real, responsible adult, if abortion had somehow never existed?
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[10 Mar 2008|11:33am] |
Consider the following: This couple want a deaf child. Should we try to stop them?
For those what don't want to read the whole thing, here is the pertinent bit:
( pertinent bit )
So, debaters, my question to you is this: Should there be legislation that automatically discards embryos with genetic "abnormalities" when a) these people are legally seen as equal in the eyes of the law and b) there are people who are seeking children and don't care one way or t'other what "abnormalities" may be present or are actually actively seeking a child with an "abnormality"?
Please disregard whether this legislation is going on in your own country or not. We're speaking in general here.
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