What have you learned lately?

[Maj]

Depends. What are the people with kids saying?

I don't know. I don't know exactly who here has kids.

Also men cannot have children, so were you only asking women?

No. I was asking the guys, too. Being with someone who's gone through pregnancy and witnessing labor does give a guy an opinion about the subject, even if he never will know what giving birth is like.

[TarkisFlux]

Have a 3 mo old that is fantastic and I love every minute I get to spend with him. Just said I favor on-demand termination of pregnancy but not ability to secure death of viable fetus. Not sure how those two things are related, but there ya go Maj.

[shadzar]

Also men cannot have children, so were you only asking women?

No. I was asking the guys, too. Being with someone who's gone through pregnancy and witnessing labor does give a guy an opinion about the subject, even if he never will know what giving birth is like.

OH, well I have seen someone giving birth, and was throwing up for a week afterwards. If I were to base my opinion on that, I would say everyone needs to be aborted.

Carol Burnette described labor pains. "Take your bottom lip and pull it over your skull." Others say pass a gall stone the size of a grapefruit. But guys aren't built as elastic as women, so it wouldn't heal from stretching at that angle I would guess.

Either way....I am anti-abortion, but also anti-kids...so figure that one out if you want.

[Maj]

OH, well I have seen someone giving birth, and was throwing up for a week afterwards. If I were to base my opinion on that, I would say everyone needs to be aborted.

I also said being with someone who's gone through pregnancy... I didn't want to specify father or husband because I understand that sometimes a guy is supportive of the woman he's with even though it's not his kid, or they're not married or something. But my intention was a man who's an integral part of a woman's experience of pregnancy and birth. I know there's at least one of those on the boards, but I don't know who else.

[shadzar]

Wasn't given that chance so....pregnancy no clue...birth I had been a part of.

[Cynic]

Oh boy have I gone through pregnancy -- the wife was all about the stereotypical barking at me.

On abortion: I've always been pro-choice and still will especially after the kid's birth. I had the choice to get her aborted and I didn't go with it out of a personal choice but the crazy aether that surrounds having a kid and raising one should be ones own choice rather than a forced decision.

Also, you can't make this choice while inhaling the crazy ether either.

[Koumei]

ML is such a pain in the ass that I wish he had been aborted. Come to think of it, perhaps he's against it because, given a glimpse into the future, the doctors would have decided that's the best thing to do.

Also, new idea: every pro-lifer is now legally required to adopt every child that would have been aborted but was just abandoned instead. They have to care for the children, putting the needs of the children above their own, and have to ensure the children experience wonderful lives despite being adopted (and for that matter, despite existing in this world).

Failure on any point, including refusal to take part, is punishable by 10-20 years in the electric chair.

That being said, I'm also of the opinion that euthanasia should be something anyone can just get prescribed after a 10-minute doctor consult for any or no reason. They can then go get their $5 Heroin overdose (or KCN powder or whatever) at the pharmacy and the longest part of the whole process was the wait at the clinic.

[Crissa]

I filmed my sister's birth, and held my mother's hand.

It's a good thing she really loves home movies.

-Crissa

[Username17]

This very point is why men should not be enslaved after a woman makes a choice to keep the baby.

This is importantly true but unfortunately problematic. It comes down to contracts. A woman who carries a pregnancy under the good faith belief that a man will "be there" to help raise the baby should be able to get Palimony if the man skips out - thereby breaking his contract. On the flip side, if a man uses a condom or even relies on the good faith belief that his partner is using birth control, then having a baby happen is a breach of contract on the part of the woman. Unfortunately, many of these are at best informal contracts and many people don't even have those conversations - it's one of the reasons comprehensive sex education is so important.

But it's beyond that. The law currently treats having a baby as an investment in extending the family line of the man. And frankly, that's insane. Not only is it a culturally myopic definition of having a kid, but it's a minority way of thinking about it in present day United States. Having a baby is an investment in the future generation of the country. It's necessary work for the country but it's not necessary or necessarily positive for the people actually raising the child. The entity paying to make sure all the children eat should be the State, because it is the nation as a whole that actually needs there to be a new generation of children to become soldiers and firefighters and garbage collectors and bureaucrats.

Individual people don't need the country to have a new generation of anything. They could go retire in Vietnam or Poland or something.

-Username17

[shadzar]

No, we don't need any more bureaucrats. The rest is. "What about the children" means everyone has to pay a fair share. One day those children will be making sure your life support doesn't get turned off on you when you cannot afford the cure.

So you best pay for them now so they will be able to do for you later. That would include higher than high school education.

Who sang the song? "I believe that children are our future"? I think it was MJ.


EDIT: Nope it is Whitney... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1KjpyHX7X-o

[TavishArtair]

Many children do not have the opportunity to care for their elderly parents. Something about them dying before that happens. Some elderly parents even go and make sure of this. What is it to them if their children are left behind?

Conversely, many children if forced to depend on their parent's income will likely not be able to care for their elderly parents in future years. What incentive can turn lead into gold?

[shadzar]

Preparing your children for the future, and making them WANT to care for you when you get older would help.

[Crissa]

Yeah, that's the point, shad. Frank just tends to say it in Communist lingo.

Tavish, the idea is to make sure they have the advantages so they do not have to depend upon the parents, and can pay tax (or whatever) to support others as they become incapable of supporting themselves.

The right-wing is all about limiting these advantages to people they approve of who are related by blood, which limits people's incentive to do community help on a personal level. While at the same time, they disable the ability of society at large to help individuals.

Once again, free public schooling, food for the hungry, and healthcare are important parts to greasing the wheels of society.

-Crissa

[shadzar]

Frank is a communist?

[Cielingcat]

It is something he is quite open about being, yes.

[shadzar]

So he wants everyone to have cheap toilet paper?

[Cielingcat]

I genuinely do not understand what stupid implication or comment that is. If you're trying to be funny you're not doing so.

[shadzar]

Old joke about Russian queues for toilet paper.

[Crissa]

Yes, this is why we don't have a jokes forum.

-Crissa

[RobbyPants]

I'm curious to know if opinions on abortion here are related to whether or not the poster has had a child?

Depends. What are the people with kids saying?

I don't think my opinion on abortion has changed since I've had my daughter a year ago. Although, to be honest, I've never fully hashed out my opinion in the first place. So, while I can say that I can see points on both sides, I can also say that having a kid hasn't pushed me one way or the other.

[mean_liar]

ML is such a pain in the ass that I wish he had been aborted. Come to think of it, perhaps he's against it because, given a glimpse into the future, the doctors would have decided that's the best thing to do.

Honestly, if your contention is, "unborn children should be killed at whim by the mother" you have to accept that there are actual, legitimate reasons why people are going to disagree with that.

Any killing - insects included - has to be justified, not just rationalized. That's the moral responsibility that comes with sentience.

Look, I don't believe in an afterlife or sin and ultimately think that what we do with our lives is meaningless on a grand scale. I'm not arguing this from a perspective of damnation - it's coming from a deep belief that you can generally say that killing and harm = bad.

Also, new idea: every pro-lifer is now legally required to adopt every child that would have been aborted but was just abandoned instead. They have to care for the children, putting the needs of the children above their own, and have to ensure the children experience wonderful lives despite being adopted (and for that matter, despite existing in this world).

Failure on any point, including refusal to take part, is punishable by 10-20 years in the electric chair.

Flippant though it is, this is actually relevant. I find people that are adamantly pro-life that don't think that government has a role in social services and providing contraception are the horrid people you think they are.

That being said, I'm also of the opinion that euthanasia should be something anyone can just get prescribed after a 10-minute doctor consult for any or no reason. They can then go get their $5 Heroin overdose (or KCN powder or whatever) at the pharmacy and the longest part of the whole process was the wait at the clinic.

Counseling first. THEN death.

It's a blob of cells, it has no feelings. And they fail to complete their 40 week progression to humanhood all the time. Naturally.

Yes, and people get cancer and heart attacks naturally too, so that means we can just kill anyone whenever we want because hey we all die anyway. Not only that, but it's decently clear that children in the womb achieve sentience prior to delivery, so we're not talking about a blob of cells. A blob of cells is what RU486 deals with and I'm okay with that.

You're smarter than this, Frank, and this is just a bullshit argument. If you really want to debate this I'm game but this here is just rank elementary shit that you're masquerading as a reasonable argument.

But here's the thing: if you are a medical professional, then you have a thing called "Patient Confidentiality."

Yes, this is why people with body dismorphia or transsexuals don't have to get counseling authorization prior to their treatments, because that would be so wrong it's awful to even contemplate.

And what about the people who took the regular pills and got pregnant anyway? Those things are only 98% effective. Real women go to all the trouble of suppressing their ovulations and then ovulate anyway because of random hormone spikes. Are they so "lazy" that they should be subjected to ridicule and unsanitary procedures? What the fuck dude?

This is part of the responsibility of being human and having functional reproductive organs. Sometimes you end up losing the toss of the dice and get pregnant. It happens. It sucks. No, you don't get to kill your baby.

I believe that the government should basically pay people to stay at home to raise kids and cover day care and other social elements too - including post-secondary education. This isn't a "too bad so sad" situation, but one where people take responsibility for the fact that sex can equal pregnancy in the best of cases.

The linchpin of this argument is that the baby is alive and sentient, despite being dependent for physical needs on the mother. I suggest tailoring your argument against that rather than these bullshit distractions that don't deal with that fundamental assumption.

[Crissa]

Yes, this is why people with body dismorphia or transsexuals don't have to get counseling authorization prior to their treatments, because that would be so wrong it's awful to even contemplate.

ML, that's why we have standards of care, not random strangers peering in with interruptive laws. Them not being treated is not so awful to contemplate; there are no large numbers of regretful of being treated or happy about being not-treated dysmorphic people out there - in fact, they're very few, to the point at where in the entire industrialized world we could probably count them on one person's fingers.

That's horrible?

-Crissa

[mean_liar]

It was a flippant comment, and I should have quoted Frank in his entirety.

Basically, he was making the point that confidentiality rules meant that determining why someone wanted an abortion (or the circumstances of pregnancy) was so obtrusive as to be unable to be seriously considered.

My flippant response was that there are already circumstances where these sorts of things go on and they don't seem to work too poorly, to my knowledge.

Expanding the scope of "standard of care" to include prohibitions on abortion circumstances would not be an alien or unworkable thing. By its nature it would be intrusive, but that's the nature of any counseling corresponding to a medical procedure. These aren't "random strangers" anymore than any counselor is.

If I haven't elucidated my point clearly to you then I think I don't understand yours, sorry.

[Username17]

The linchpin of this argument is that the baby is alive and sentient, despite being dependent for physical needs on the mother.

Then your argument falls like a house of cards. First of all, it's not a "baby" until it's born. It's not even a neonate. It's a fetus. And while fetuses do get some nerve function, they are less "sentient" than pigs or chickens.

Do you or do you not have a big moral dilemma when eating a hot dog? Do you even consider forcing people to go into mandatory counceling before allowing them to eat a hot dog?

This kind of radical veganism is a completely absurd non-argument. Flies are sentient. They learn and shit. Being sentient isn't a mandate to have an ethical debate over killing something for convenience. Being sapient and perhaps capable of language is a big deal. Fetuses don't have that. Frankly, actual babies don't have that until after they've been born for some time. But we aren't even discussing the moral implications of exposing newborns, we're discussing terminating fetuses.

I seriously don't know how you think embryology and gynecology works, but it doesn't work the way you think it does. People aren't waiting until 35 weeks into the process and then terminating for convenience. They are futzing around until the 22nd week and terminating after they are sure that the fetus has genetic malformities or they can't get their shit together to feed another mouth. And people who delay all this time have to reconcile their conscience with the fact that the fetus has a developing inner ear. Holy crap, it has an automatic balancing reflex that is almost as developed as the one in maggots.

Seriously dude, what the hell? You know why no one ever writes any books or sings any songs while they are a fucking fetus? Because they are a fucking fetus you fucking moron!

-Username17

[CatharzGodfoot]

Mean, I disagree with you on the abortion issue, but I think that the difference is almost completely philosophical. You believe that there is some fundamental worth to every life. That's not a terrible philosophy, but I can't get on board with it. I think that some lives have positive value, some lives have negative value, and some lives have no value at all. Some of the value is intrinsic, but most of it is added by living, learning, and connections with those around you.

An unwanted pregnancy begins as nothing but a burden on the mother. The fact that it will likely gain positive value as time goes on does not outweigh the immediate cost.