Abortion for..................9 year olds.

[yxboom]

9-year-old's abortion sparks battle royal
By T. Christian Miller
Los Angeles Times
(http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/134660431_abort24.html)


"I don't want to have to share my toys with another kid," she told a local newspaper reporter. "I take care of my toys."

So, a few days later, suffering vomiting and false contractions that knotted her stomach hard as a flexed bicep, the girl took a pill that ended the nearly four-month pregnancy in a clandestine operation in a private clinic.

But it was only the beginning of an uproar that signaled how Latin America, especially Central America, has become the focus of an international battle over abortion.

The dilemma has transfixed Nicaragua, a predominately Roman Catholic nation where abortion is illegal except when the mother's life is in danger. Newspapers have devoted special sections to the drama. Television stations have sponsored call-in programs, featuring outraged proponents and opponents of the abortion.

A panel of doctors concluded that either pregnancy or abortion presented a threat to Rosa's life, prompting a women's group to whisk the girl away for the secret procedure. The girl and her family were kept in a safe house until the nation's attorney general ruled the abortion legal.

[Rubia Warren]

9 years old?!?!?! Sakes alive. How awful. Wow. Having a baby at ten, I can't imagine. You'd be 30 and your kid would be 20.. how wierd.
I don't even know how I feel about the abortion- well, I know how I feel about abortion, but, Geez, what a situation. I don't even know what to say. I wonder how a 9 year old body would handle a pregnancy.

[yxboom]

What an interesting one eh.

[Rubia Warren]

I really want to vote in the poll, but I am not sure what to vote, exactly.... somebody post on here and tell me what to think!

[yxboom]

You are really really wanting to give yxboom a check for $5000.

[Patroclus]

While I do not think it is necessarily right, I do not oppose abortions for rape victims. My mother's first pregnancy was because of rape. Even though she planned to carry it to term, she miscarried. Nonetheless, because I do not think that I could make the best moral choice in that situation, I would not condemn a rape victim who had an abortion.

Secondly, I support abortions for those mothers whose lives and/or health (in extreme cases) may be significantly at risk.

I was the one that voted that everybody involved did the right thing. There is no way that poor girl should have been expected to bring that baby to term. There is no way that girls should have brought that baby to term.

[spl_cadet]

Abortion is wrong, period. The reason I chose other is that I'm too lazy to click on the link and so I don't know if she knew what really was going on. If she did, and consented, she along with all the others who enabled and/or performed it are guilty of murder. If not, she is innocent though they are not.

[Rubia Warren]

I don't see how she COULD have carried it to term without having terrible problems... but at the same time, I hate for babies to be aborted, even in rape cases. In those cases, I am not so judgemental and harsh, but I hate that these things happen.

[spl_cadet]

My view is that s*** happens, but that doesn't mean you should be immoral to try and relieve that.

[yxboom]

Abortion is the intent of the doctors and those involved. Instead of "saving" the life of the mother their intent is to "kill" the baby. I would disagree Pat cause the intent of abortion is to go and remove the fetus (child) with no plans of incubation or medical administration, the life of the mother is purely consequential.
I am of the mind that for the doctors to do right their intent is to go in to save the life of baby and child and if one is lost (most likely the child) than that is a casuality of the whole situation however the intent of the doctors and those involved from the beginning was to "abort" with no concern or attempt in saving the baby at 4 months which is far reached but possible.

[Rubia Warren]

I know... I am just trying to imagine, still, a 9 year old body giving birth to an 8 pound baby. Then again, the baby didn't rape the girl- the guy did, so the baby shouldn't be killed for it. Then again, the 9 year old is a baby herself. Oooo... I keep going back and forth on this one.

[yxboom]

In rape cases you execute the rapist not the baby.

[yxboom]

The girl carried the baby for 4 months the doctors could have delivered the baby at the 4 or 5th month most likely Cesarean which would have allowed to save her the trauma of a full term pregnancy. Again it is the intent.

[Rubia Warren]

Yeah, you've got a point... they even could have shot for 6 or 7 months if they wanted to.

[adam.naranjo]

its murder. murder. muder. murder. And there is not argument to the contrary that is even partly persuasive. A human being, in or out of the womb, is put to death...that's murder.

[yxboom]

6th month pregnancies have a much less chance of the mortality than 4 months but if circumstances dictated 4 months could still be the expected date and again had it been unsuccessful they tried, but they chose rather to attempt at saving the life of mother and baby they chose to destroy the life of the child. The mother's life wasn't saved the babies was destroyed.

[yxboom]

Today @ 09:38 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49078#post49078)
adam.naranjo:

its murder. murder. muder. murder. And there is not argument to the contrary that is even partly persuasive. A human being, in or out of the womb, is put to death...that's murder.
In Rosa's defense by her comment that she didn't want to share her toys that weighs a lot (to me) in that she was clearly ignorant to exactly what position morally she is in.

[Patroclus]

its murder. murder. muder. murder. And there is not argument to the contrary that is even partly persuasive. A human being, in or out of the womb, is put to death...that's murder.

What a relief to know that this issue is so simple, simple, simple, simple, simple, simple, just black and white... simple.

You make some very good points Boom. And I agree with you about the girl's statement.

[Woman]

It must be nice to be so young...naive...sure of your black and white moral judgements.


So what should they do then? If Parents, child and Dr.s are all guilty of murder I suppose you want to kill them too?

[Socrates]

Patroclus:While I do not think it is necessarily right, I do not oppose abortions for rape victims.But this is executing the child for the crime of his/her father, contrary to Ezekiel 18:20. My mother's first pregnancy was because of rape. Even though she planned to carry it to term, she miscarried. You mother did the right thing, by realising that the child was innocent of the horrible crime committed against her.

[Solly]

I don't know how to vote either. I am anti abortion as well. What is more troubling than deciding who was morally culpable in this instance, is that fact that in Latin America, this might not be uncommon. Who judges then, who is judged, and what does one do?
I think would take a Jesuit to decide upon, and I don't mean that sarcastically. It's easy for us to judge from a distance, but to make a serious judgment, one would need to speak to the child, the parents, the doctors, the group involved, etc.

I think DD would remind us that they are all forgiveable.

As Christians, perhaps we should be slower to run to judgement, and quicker to thoughts of mercy and help. After all, if adults who have had abortions suffer, then what of a 9 year old child, who will one day understand what has happened?

Should it have happened? In America or Britain, no, but then we don't have a policy of letting rape babies go full term anyway. But in Latin America, who can lay down such hard and fast rules?

[Ryokan]

I agree with Patroclus. It is a terrible situation, and abortion isn't a good answer, but they were trying to do their best with what they had. And remember, Boom, this is Latin America, not the US. They may not have had the skill or the money to do the comlicated procedure you seem to be advocating.

[Patroclus]

But this is executing the child for the crime of his/her father, contrary to Ezekiel 18:20.

I know, Socrates. My point is that I am not going to hold somebody to a moral standard that I, myself, am not sure that I could keep. It is a VERY difficult issue for me.


You mother did the right thing, by realising that the child was innocent of the horrible crime committed against her.

I completely agree. And in that respect, she is a stronger person than I.

[yxboom]

Today @ 06:18 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49342#post49342)
Ryokan:

I agree with Patroclus. It is a terrible situation, and abortion isn't a good answer, but they were trying to do their best with what they had. And remember, Boom, this is Latin America, not the US. They may not have had the skill or the money to do the comlicated procedure you seem to be advocating.

Ryokan you seem to ignore the matter of fact what was the intent. Because it is easier and cheaper they should kill the baby? It is much easier and cheaper to steal a car than to go and work and buy your own so what should a person do who needs to have a car? Regardless of being rich or poor or having the means for a "successful" incubation for the premature born child the INTENT is to go and save the life of the child. You may not have considered that many trauma victims that enter hosiptals don't come out alive. No one accuses the doctors of wrong doing. When a mother goes to the hospital for an abortion are they going in as a trauma victim attempting a life saving procedure or are they going in to destroy the baby? Location is completely irrelevant.
So far the justification is you shoot your grandchild because your neighbor molests your daughter.

[Ryokan]

Buuuuuuttt, yxboom, I could get a job, or do something to the effect of what you descibed, here in the US. In Bolivia (or where ever), I have no money, there is no one willing to give me that much money, and the people who performed the abortion probably don't have enough money to do that, either. Where we are, it may not be very moral. In Latin America, it is a tad bit fuzzier.

[yxboom]

Ryokan than your position is simply it is too expensive in Latin America for a trauma victim to go in for a life saving procedure so it should not be done?

[Ryokan]

I am saying it should be done, but their social structure doesn't provide for a way for it to happen. In the third world, the poor die every day. What is one more to anyone? But the little girl could hardly sit and do nothing. And some westerners are willing to put up a little money for abortions. So, I think you try to do what is best with what you have, which in this case may have been an abortion. It is a terrible situation.

[Lazy Agnostic]

Today @ 12:38 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49078#post49078)
adam.naranjo:

its murder. murder. muder. murder. And there is not argument to the contrary that is even partly persuasive. A human being, in or out of the womb, is put to death...that's murder.

Was it murder when the Israelite soldiers sliced fetuses from wombs and killed the male virgins [keeping the female virgins "for yourselves"]?

[yxboom]

Today @ 09:21 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49479#post49479)
Ryokan:

I am saying it should be done, but their social structure doesn't provide for a way for it to happen. In the third world, the poor die every day. What is one more to anyone? But the little girl could hardly sit and do nothing. And some westerners are willing to put up a little money for abortions. So, I think you try to do what is best with what you have, which in this case may have been an abortion. It is a terrible situation.

Are you serious.....you say it is a terrible situation but preceed that with "what is one more to anyone?" I find your honesty quite disingenuous. Appeals to Rosa's physical state only enforces my point that she was to be treated as a trauma victim in need of medical attention to save the life of herself and child.

[yxboom]

Today @ 09:28 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49485#post49485)
Lazy Agnostic:



Was it murder when the Israelite soldiers sliced fetuses from wombs and killed the male virgins [keeping the female virgins "for yourselves"]?

As the author of this thread I am requesting you to start another thread to address that because this thread is regarding a 9 year old named Rosa and her abortion. Israel soldiers didn't do anything to Rosa.

[Ryokan]

What I am saying, Yxboom, is that westerners, the government, anyone who ought to give her and her baby the treatment they deserve, see her as just a number, at least until she went and had the abortion. I don't. So, given the options she had, I don't think she or her parents had any option but to go somewhere where they COULD have something done for her, cause the trauma care, while good in an ideal world, just isn't going to happen in the reality of Latin AMerica today. See what I mean. She couldn't get that care at all. It wasn't an option.

[Dee Dee Warren]

In general, and not specifically about this article...

If abortion is in fact murder, why would we support an exception for rape? The baby is no less human. The only difference is the nature of the sexual act that produced the baby. So, what is the implicit message?? This is how I saw it when I was a pro-abort...

If I am a "good girl" and was unwilling in the act, then I can have an abortion, but if I am a bad girl who willingly had sex then no abortion for me.

I am sorry but this is muddled ethical thinking that is mistaken for compassion. The baby is no less innocent and no less dead. Why would we compound the crime of rape with the crime of murder? Why would we execute the child for the sin of its father?

[yxboom]

Thanks for the clarification Ryokan and if in fact I misconstrued your remarks I apologize.

I will have to leave after this comment so I am not just leaving you hanging.

I would state that the "there is no other options" is begging and leaves a great amount of assumption that they don't deliver premature babies and they don't treat young children. For one granting that L.America is not to par with America's health care the intent of the decision still remains. It was the intent of the parents and doctors to kill the child. Saying there is no other way is again begging. The parents and doctors made a "choice" to kill the child than attempt a premie birth which puts them at the moral obligation. An unsuccessful attempt at salvation of the child's life is not a matter as I tried to point out earlier as many die on operating tables. When a person is in need of medical attention go into a hospital and the doctor rather than treat them leave "no other options" and instead suffocate the person. That would still put the moral obligation on those who removed ALL other options namely the parents and doctors.

[calvinistkid]

The whole problem can be cleared up with a single question: Is God sovereign in the situation? Was the man who raped her able to do so without God ALLOWING him to do so? Would she have gotten pregnant without God being directly involved in the conception process?
If your answer is no, God was unable to stop this from happening, then what does that tell you about God? How can you feel anything but apathy for a "deity" so anemic that he could not even prevent a single child from being raped?
If your answer is yes, then how can you condone the abortion? If it were only by a direct decision on the part of God to let this happen, then who are we, mere men, to act against that? To do so is to say to God "I know better than you do. I don't trust your decision-making ability. Sorry, God, but I think you made a bad move here, and now I am going to fix it."

[Dee Dee Warren]

Hey CK, I agree with your outcome, have serius issues with the way you got there. Is God able to cause rain to fall on areas afflicted with drought? Sure. Does that mean that we don't do things to alleviate the suffering of those afflicted by the drought??

Just because God allows bad things to happen does not mean then if we do something about those bad things, that we are spitting in the fact of God.

So, again, I agree with your outcome, it is the path that is problematic.

[yxboom]

Welcome to TWeb CK but seriously to even offer a response to that would require another thread.

[Dee Dee Warren]

Not that that stopped me from trying.

[yxboom]

As the author of the thread I am requesting that you keep the thread on topic DDW. Thanks.

[yxboom]

I started another thread Here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?postid=49542#post49542) to address your reply.

[calvinistkid]

Yeah, I am not trying to spark a debate on God's sovereignty here (although I would be happy to talk about it on another thread). However, I DID have to answer the question consistently with my worldview.

[yxboom]

I completely understand however I create a thread here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?postid=49542#post49542) so we can continue to discuss the aspect of God's soveriengty in this matter.

[calvinistkid]

I saw it... and have already posted my first reply. See you there.

:yipee: (Ooh... you guys have cool smilees too:teeth: )

[Ryokan]

I agree, yxboom. If the doctors or parent saw or could reasonably have seen that there was a reasonable solution within realistic grasp, like the one you suggested, then they are moral culpable for not having taken it.
And I don't mind you misconstrued my statement. I am not the best at clearly wording things, sometimes.

[Ryokan]

And the state and social structure, which removed said options, is also responsibble.

[adam.naranjo]

Today @ 12:43 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49080#post49080)
yxboom:


In Rosa's defense by her comment that she didn't want to share her toys that weighs a lot (to me) in that she was clearly ignorant to exactly what position morally she is in.

Clearly?

I tend to think that a girl her age knows what an abortion is...However, I suppose there is room for your point. So I concede that without further information it would be to soon to rule out ignorance.

Adam

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 05:18 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49056#post49056)
spl_cadet:
Abortion is wrong, period. The reason I chose other is that I'm too lazy to click on the link and so I don't know if she knew what really was going on. If she did, and consented, she along with all the others who enabled and/or performed it are guilty of murder. If not, she is innocent though they are not.

Christianity. The religion where nine year old children are murderers, but small, unfeeling blobs need love.

C'mon everyone, come warm your hands around the gentle glow of their Christian love.

Paul

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 05:50 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49495#post49495)
Dee Dee Warren:
If abortion is in fact murder, why would we support an exception for rape? The baby is no less human.

It's not a baby, it's a fetus.


Why would we compound the crime of rape with the crime of murder? Why would we execute the child for the sin of its father?

You're not executing a child, you're killing a small, unthinking and unfeeling organism that will one day become a child. This distinction is very important.

It's not sat in the womb thinking 'oh, I sure hope they don't kill me'. It's not thinking anything much at all until late into the pregancy.

This sentimental association between a fetus and a human is misleading. But it works well for the anti-abortion lobby, since it looks so much better to say 'They're killing ikkle defenceless baby-wabies' than to say 'they are destroying an early fetus with no capacity to think or feel'.

Paul

[yxboom]

So the "blob" that makes up a involent cripple that has no sense of here nor there, an "unthinking and unfeeling organism" would be categorized as unhuman right?

[TenDimensions]

Today @ 12:50 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49495#post49495)
Dee Dee Warren:
If I am a "good girl" and was unwilling in the act, then I can have an abortion, but if I am a bad girl who willingly had sex then no abortion for me.

At first I thought that was a good point, but then I realized this is also oversimplifying the situation. In both cases the pregnancy is unwanted, but in the case of rape the pregnancy is not only unwanted it is a constant reminder of the horrible ordeal. It takes a special kind of person to carry around the product of such a vicious act as a constant reminder of the rape.

I can't imagine how one could pass a law to make abortion for rape victims illegal - let alone a little nine year old girl.

While intellectually I can understand the "it's murder because it potentially could become a human being" argument I can't understand how throwing out common sense makes it right to make abortion illegally across the board without leaving room for examining each case based on it's circumstances.

The real world is not black and white - very often it is made up of shades of gray. This particular case I think should be a tad more black and white than it seems it is for people deeply opposed to abortion - but I think abortion is, in general, definitely a very gray area that requires examination of each circumstance.

[yxboom]

Have you read the previous pages TenD?

As I stated before the justification so far is

Shoot your grandchild because your neighbor molests your daughter.

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 10:55 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49734#post49734)
yxboom:
So the "blob" that makes up a involent cripple that has no sense of here nor there, an "unthinking and unfeeling organism" would be categorized as unhuman right?

A cripple has thought and feeling. Even if severely mentally handicapped, nobody can deny that they can feel things, physically and emotionally.

An early fetus can feel nothing. It is not sentient, intelligent, or capable of any feeling or experience whatsoever.

The comparison holds no water.

Paul

[TenDimensions]

Today @ 04:59 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49703#post49703)
adam.naranjo:
I tend to think that a girl her age knows what an abortion is...However, I suppose there is room for your point. So I concede that without further information it would be to soon to rule out ignorance.

Hang on. I was going to let this go because this could stray off topic a bit - but are you suggesting that a nine year old is capable of understanding the process of an abortion? There are many states that aren't even willing to accept the possibility that a nine year old is capable of understanding his own murderous actions let alone the complexities of an abortion.

So, you're willing to put to death children who kill other children because they (according to what you said) are capable of understanding their actions?

I know that you concede that without "further information", but come on - how could you say under any circumstances that a nine year old has the mental faculties to get her head around this extremely complicated issue that all the intelligent people in the world can't decide on?

Is there nowhere in the Bible where God says, "Let a little common sense enter into the equation now and then?" I can't fathom that there is any decent human being with a normal sense of compassion and empathy that would even begin to contemplate this little nine year old girl should be forced to go through whatever medical procedures anyone could dream up that doesn't lead to the swiftest possible resolution to this horrific situation.

[yxboom]

Today @ 03:07 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49745#post49745)
lordsnooty:



A cripple has thought and feeling. Even if severely mentally handicapped, nobody can deny that they can feel things, physically and emotionally.

An early fetus can feel nothing. It is not sentient, intelligent, or capable of any feeling or experience whatsoever.

The comparison holds no water.

Paul
How long ago has it been documented that involents have thoughts and feelings? 200, 500 years ago? It has been thorougly documented that a 4 month old has brainwaves, sleeps, and has feelings. Ever saw an abortion? The baby DOES IN FACT fight off the instrument and does make facial expressions of anxiety and fear.

[yxboom]

Lordsnooty do you also advocate eating Bald Eagle eggs?

[Xmansmommy]

Wow, I have several thoughts as I've read this thread....I don't even know where to start. I have a sibling who is the product of a rape. I am very thankful that my mother chose life and chose to recognize that my brother (an unborn, living being) was not responsible for what happened to my mother.
Someone mentioned that a 9 yo understands abortion. I might simply suggest that most 9 yo's don't understand sex and the idea of pregnancy let alone abortion. I have 8 and 10 yo daughters. Neither have any real idea of the repercussions of pregnancy (let alone have a great understanding of how it occurs) nor any concept whatsoever of the thought of abortion. Just my 2 cents.

I'm almost at a loss of words over this thread...and that ain't easy to accomplish. :bonk:

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 11:16 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49752#post49752)
yxboom:
It has been thorougly documented that a 4 month old has brainwaves, sleeps, and has feelings. Ever saw an abortion? The baby DOES IN FACT fight off the instrument and does make facial expressions of anxiety and fear.

Got a source? Christian or anti-choice propoganda does not count.

I think more research needs to be done to discover when a fetus actually can think or feel, and that should then become a cut-off point, after which abortions should not be carried out (unless the life of the mother is in danger).

Paul

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 11:18 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49755#post49755)
yxboom:

Lordsnooty do you also advocate eating Bald Eagle eggs?

Not as a general rule, no.

Is this about that law whereby stealing the eggs of bald eagles is illegal, because bald eagles are a protected species?

Paul

[yxboom]

Any source cited would be suspect as you would agree so if you wish I will but as for the life of the mother argument I would ask you please read my earlier response (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?postid=49068#post49068).

As for Bald Eagle eggs they are not Bald Eagle's correct?

[lordsnooty]

Yesterday @ 11:54 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49776#post49776)
yxboom:
As for Bald Eagle eggs they are not Bald Eagle's correct?

Correct. But they will become bald eagles. And anyone that harms a bald eagle's egg may stop a bald eagle from hatching. In so doing, they are lowering the population figures and endangering the entire species.

This law is in place because the birds are rare, and their eggs must hatch if the species is to survive.

There are no real similarities to abortion here. Unless humans start to rapidly die out, in which case a similar law would probably need to be enacted to protect human population figures.

Paul

[spl_cadet]

Today @ 03:51 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49772#post49772)
lordsnooty:



Got a source? Christian or anti-choice propoganda does not count.

I think more research needs to be done to discover when a fetus actually can think or feel, and that should then become a cut-off point, after which abortions should not be carried out (unless the life of the mother is in danger).

Paul

http://www.actionlife.org/Life/lipain_e.phtml

Edited due to concern that it could violate plagerism rule.

[Socrates]

Snooty:Got a source? Christian or anti-choice propoganda does not count.Oh, and of course atheistic and anti-life propaganda is the epitome of objectivity. Isn't it strange that the IRS has no problem determining that the lives of animals begin at conception and that they are "alive" before they are born or hatched, but with human beings there is suddenly a blind spot.

It is also insufficient to claim "We don't know when life begins." If a civil engineer does not KNOW whether a condemned building has occupants, he would be criminally negligent if he blew it up before finding out. If an undertaker does not KNOW whether a person is alive or dead, he would never bury him. So even if we don't know whether the unborn child is alive, the responsible thing is NOT to kill her.

[yxboom]

Excellent points Socrates. So many safegaurds are taken into respect when dealing with the "potential" existance of life in different areas but not in the life of a child in a mother's womb.

[Xmansmommy]

Great Post Socrates! Agreed Y!

[bar Jonah]

03-30-2003 @ 10:30 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49068#post49068)
yxboom:

Abortion is the intent of the doctors and those involved. Instead of "saving" the life of the mother their intent is to "kill" the baby. I would disagree Pat cause the intent of abortion is to go and remove the fetus (child) with no plans of incubation or medical administration, the life of the mother is purely consequential.
I am of the mind that for the doctors to do right their intent is to go in to save the life of baby and child and if one is lost (most likely the child) than that is a casuality of the whole situation however the intent of the doctors and those involved from the beginning was to "abort" with no concern or attempt in saving the baby at 4 months which is far reached but possible.
Amen, YX! Rubia asked what effect this pregnancy would have on the 9-year-old girl. I would ask what effect this pregancy would have on the baby.

If the baby cannot possibly survive anyway, AND the mother's life is in jeopary (not health but life)... that is the ONLY situation in which I would condone abortion.

Even if the 9-year-old would have died giving birth, if there was a chance for the baby to survive the pregnancy, then that abortion was an act of murder and should be illegal.

[bar Jonah]

Yesterday @ 01:11 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49186#post49186)
Woman:
It must be nice to be so young...naive...sure of your black and white moral judgements.

So what should they do then? If Parents, child and Dr.s are all guilty of murder I suppose you want to kill them too?
This post is so out of line, I hardly even know what to say. It is crass and blatantly intellectually dishonest.


Yesterday @ 07:18 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49342#post49342)
Ryokan:

I agree with Patroclus. It is a terrible situation, and abortion isn't a good answer, but they were trying to do their best with what they had. And remember, Boom, this is Latin America, not the US. They may not have had the skill or the money to do the comlicated procedure you seem to be advocating.
They should have tried.


Yesterday @ 10:21 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49479#post49479)
Ryokan:

In the third world, the poor die every day. What is one more to anyone?
I can't believe you just said such a foul and abominable thing.


Yesterday @ 11:40 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49525#post49525)
calvinistkid:

The whole problem can be cleared up with a single question: Is God sovereign in the situation? Was the man who raped her able to do so without God ALLOWING him to do so? Would she have gotten pregnant without God being directly involved in the conception process?
If your answer is no, God was unable to stop this from happening, then what does that tell you about God? How can you feel anything but apathy for a "deity" so anemic that he could not even prevent a single child from being raped?
If your answer is yes, then how can you condone the abortion? If it were only by a direct decision on the part of God to let this happen, then who are we, mere men, to act against that? To do so is to say to God "I know better than you do. I don't trust your decision-making ability. Sorry, God, but I think you made a bad move here, and now I am going to fix it."
CalvinistKid, by your logic, God is also directly involved in the process of murdering babies every day, including Rosa's. If this is God's will, then your post only muddles the entire issue rather than clarifying it.

You think we should have apathy for a deity so anemic he could not prevent a single child from being raped. But you don't feel apathy for a God who would ordain that such a thing would happen as part of His will?

This isn't about Calvinism or predestination at all. I think you totally missed the mark on this one.


Yesterday @ 03:56 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49735#post49735)
TenDimensions:
While intellectually I can understand the "it's murder because it potentially could become a human being" argument I can't understand how throwing out common sense makes it right to make abortion illegally across the board without leaving room for examining each case based on it's circumstances.
You are being dishonest about the argument. The argument is that it's murder because it IS a human being.

Is it human? Do a test on the DNA, and it will not only indicate it is human, but that it's a human being distinct from the mother. Is it alive? Again, not even debatable.

A living human being. Not a "blob that has the potential of becoming a human being." Read a basic biology text book, and then rejoin the conversation.


Yesterday @ 04:08 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49746#post49746)
TenDimensions:
So, you're willing to put to death children who kill other children because they (according to what you said) are capable of understanding their actions?
NO! There's not a single person in this thread (or I dare say, on at TheologyWeb.com) who believes we should execute Rosa. For the love of all that's good, take your outrageous straw man argument and... you know the rest.


Yesterday @ 07:42 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49916#post49916)
Socrates:

Snooty:Got a source? Christian or anti-choice propoganda does not count.Oh, and of course atheistic and anti-life propaganda is the epitome of objectivity. Isn't it strange that the IRS has no problem determining that the lives of animals begin at conception and that they are "alive" before they are born or hatched, but with human beings there is suddenly a blind spot.

It is also insufficient to claim "We don't know when life begins." If a civil engineer does not KNOW whether a condemned building has occupants, he would be criminally negligent if he blew it up before finding out. If an undertaker does not KNOW whether a person is alive or dead, he would never bury him. So even if we don't know whether the unborn child is alive, the responsible thing is NOT to kill her.
This is, hands down, the single wisest post in this entire thread. Thank you, Socrates!

[lordsnooty]

Yesterday @ 06:26 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=50351#post50351)
RightIdea:
Even if the 9-year-old would have died giving birth, if there was a chance for the baby to survive the pregnancy, then that abortion was an act of murder and should be illegal.

It's because of opinions such as these that I will fight Christianity and all other forms of evil, depraved superstition until the day I die.

Paul

[Socrates]

Lord Snooty whinged emotionally:
It's because of opinions such as these that I will fight Christianity and all other forms of evil, depraved superstition until the day I die.Yet Lord Snooty can't justify the concept of evil under his own athestic philosophy. All we have is "I don't like it", but that is just a feeling that evolved for survival value, not because it is objectively morally right. After all, so what if people die -- as Carl Sagan said, the secrets of evolution are time and death.

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 06:58 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=50584#post50584)
lordsnooty:



It's because of opinions such as these that I will fight Christianity and all other forms of evil, depraved superstition until the day I die.

Paul
I choose to save one life at the expense of the other, and you choose the other at the expense of the one.

And that makes me evil... why?

[chanceycat]

It's so tragic that this little girl had to go through the trauma of being impregnated to begin with, but then to go through the sure trauma of getting rid of the baby.

I would think the girl had very little understanding of what exactly was happening to her. All I'm sure she knew was that she was hurting.

The "women's group" is the group I find suspect. In most cases they aren't looking out for the welfare of children (obviously because of their pro-abortion stance). They're looking to further their "cause" without careful regard to the moral ramifications of their actions.

The above article didn't say, but I wonder how the girl's doctor (not the abortion "doctor") played into all of this...

[Sher]

... except that it was a baby and didn't deserve to die. (forgive me but I closed the website that I got the pictures off of while I was compiling them ... I don't have the source)

[Eyeheart Pumpkin]

03-30-2003 @ 10:52 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=49019#post49019)
La Rubia:

9 years old?!?!?! Sakes alive. How awful. Wow. Having a baby at ten, I can't imagine. You'd be 30 and your kid would be 20.. how wierd.
I don't even know how I feel about the abortion- well, I know how I feel about abortion, but, Geez, what a situation. I don't even know what to say. I wonder how a 9 year old body would handle a pregnancy.
There was a girl at one of my old schools who birthed twins at the age of ten. The babies were born healthy, but it messed her up pretty bad for awhile. She recovered, but is unable to have anymore children.

[Eyeheart Pumpkin]

A panel of doctors concluded that either pregnancy or abortion presented a threat to Rosa's life, prompting a women's group to whisk the girl away for the secret procedure.
Is this a typo? Is that "either" supposed to be "neither?" If it's not a typo, then the whole thing makes no sense at all for them to have to do the operation in secret if Nicaraguan law already provides for abortion to be legal if the mother's life is in danger. But if it is a typo and is supposed to read "neither," then a lot of those arguments on here that the people involved "did the best they could" are bunk because the operation was completely unnecessary.

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 03:28 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=50654#post50654)
Socrates:

Lord Snooty whinged emotionally:


That's Socrates there. The most mature of all Christians. He shines out in the night like a stream of bat's piss.


Yet Lord Snooty can't justify the concept of evil under his own athestic philosophy.

I can, and have. Again and again. You just don't want to hear it because you live with your head in the clouds.


All we have is "I don't like it", but that is just a feeling that evolved for survival value, not because it is objectively morally right.

It is 'morally right'. You may not quite grasp this, but 'morally right' is subjective.


After all, so what if people die -- as Carl Sagan said, the secrets of evolution are time and death.

Socrates shows once again his amazing ability to misunderstand even the simplest of sentences.

Paul

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 05:39 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=50736#post50736)
RightIdea:
I choose to save one life at the expense of the other, and you choose the other at the expense of the one.

And that makes me evil... why?

The girl is nine years old. She is intelligent, sentient, capable of thought and feeling.

You value a half-developed fetus above that girl's life?

You're really so wrapped up in this fantasy world where abortion is the root of all evil that you actually value the undeveloped fetus above the mother?

Paul

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 10:24 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=50844#post50844)
SherBear:
... except that it was a baby and didn't deserve to die.

Fetus, not baby.

(Looks at pictures)

Aww, look! It looks something like I might expect a baby to look like!

Luckily, I have a brain and am capable of using it to deduce that the early fetus depicted in the 16 weeks photo is not a baby. It just looks like a baby because it is developing into a one.

Paul

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 05:10 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=50901#post50901)
lordsnooty:



The girl is nine years old. She is intelligent, sentient, capable of thought and feeling.

You value a half-developed fetus above that girl's life?

You're really so wrapped up in this fantasy world where abortion is the root of all evil that you actually value the undeveloped fetus above the mother?

Paul
No, I value the 9-year-old and the baby equally. We can either intentionally kill one of them to ensure the other will live... or fight to keep them both alive, knowing one of them may not.

You favor the first solution. I favor the second. It's because of opinions such as yours that I will fight atheism and all other forms of evil, depraved superstition until the day I die.

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 02:57 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=50986#post50986)
RightIdea:
No, I value the 9-year-old and the baby equally.

So why is something that doesn't think, and something that doesn't feel emotion, more valuable than a little girl that does?

And if the lives themselves are of equal value, surely the child must still have more value due to her extant personality and the fact that she has a family.

Why don't you just tell the truth. You think that as soon as a sperm fertilises an egg, God puts a super-duper magical soul into it, and to destroy that soul offends the magical sky daddy.


It's because of opinions such as yours that I will fight atheism and all other forms of evil, depraved superstition until the day I die.

Atheism isn't a superstition.

Paul

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 08:05 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=50996#post50996)
lordsnooty:
So why is something that doesn't think, and something that doesn't feel emotion, more valuable than a little girl that does?
What part of "value them equally" don't you understand? What part of "we want them both to live" don't you understand?

And if the lives themselves are of equal value, surely the child must still have more value due to her extant personality and the fact that she has a family.
If this is a living human being, then there's no such thing has "less value" or "more value." The value is absolute. So, even to save 500 lives, it would be wrong to kill one innocent life.

Or do you believe the Nazi experiments on living victims in death camps was justified? After all, these people were going to die in these death camps anway, and some of the research has ended up saving lives. (As attested by the fact that there has been significant debate as to whether to throw out what the Nazi doctors learned, or to keep it despite the terrible origins of such knowledge). So, a person is going to die anyway, and you can save a hundred or ten-thousand lives by taking this one life... Whaddya say, Snooty?


Why don't you just tell the truth. You think that as soon as a sperm fertilises an egg, God puts a super-duper magical soul into it, and to destroy that soul offends the magical sky daddy.
Works for me.

Atheism isn't a superstition.
Paul
A belief system based on ignorance and an acceptance of pseudo-science is a superstition. Atheism qualifies in spades.

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 03:15 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51005#post51005)
RightIdea:
If this is a living human being, then there's no such thing has "less value" or "more value." The value is absolute. So, even to save 500 lives, it would be wrong to kill one innocent life.

Well, I disagree. Even if that were so, a fetus is not a human being. It's human life, but not a human being.


Or do you believe the Nazi experiments on living victims in death camps was justified? After all, these people were going to die in these death camps anway, and some of the research has ended up saving lives.

Torturing living people is not the same as destroying a fetus.


A belief system based on ignorance and an acceptance of pseudo-science is a superstition. Atheism qualifies in spades.

Yeah, OK. So you think there's a magical man in the sky, and I'm ignorant.

You believe in biblical creationism, yet I am the one that accepts pseudo-science.

Seek help.

Paul

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 08:19 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51009#post51009)
lordsnooty:
Yeah, OK. So you think there's a magical man in the sky, and I'm ignorant.

You believe in biblical creationism, yet I am the one that accepts pseudo-science.

Seek help.

Paul
Exactly. See? That wasn't so hard. Admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery. :brow:

[yxboom]

So eating Bald Eagle eggs is an entirely different story than shooting a Bald Eagle?

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 03:45 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51016#post51016)
yxboom:
So eating Bald Eagle eggs is an entirely different story than shooting a Bald Eagle?

I will never understand this bizzare obsession with eagle eggs that anti-choice people have.

Yes, eating bald eagle eggs is different. But legally it's not. Because the birds are rare, and lengths have been taken to protect their future numbers.

Paul

[yxboom]

The bizzare obsession is due to the bizzare disdain for human life contrasted to the reverence and understanding that pro-choice advocates have for the life of an animal.

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 08:48 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51020#post51020)
lordsnooty:
I will never understand this bizzare obsession with eagle eggs that anti-choice people have.

Yes, eating bald eagle eggs is different. But legally it's not. Because the birds are rare, and lengths have been taken to protect their future numbers.

Paul
The relevance is magnified when we are talking about roughly a million abortions a year. Literally a third of our generation since the abomination of Roe v Wade, dead before they could take a breath of air. Measure that against a bunch of eggs.

I would kill every bald eagle on earth, personally, to save one human being's life.

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 08:51 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51023#post51023)
yxboom:

The bizzare obsession is due to the bizzare disdain for human life but the reverence and understanding that pro-choice advocates have for the life of an animal.
Exactly. If I did to a puppy what an abortion doctor does to a living child... I would be labeled a monster, and people would cry out for prison time.

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 03:51 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51023#post51023)
yxboom:
The bizzare obsession is due to the bizzare disdain for human life contrasted to the reverence and understanding that pro-choice advocates have for the life of an animal.

No, it's because of a misunderstanding on your part.

Bald Eagles are rare. If people collect the eggs, the species will die out and become extinct. That is why it is illegal to collect the eggs.

It's not illegal to take the eggs because we're afraid of hurting a bird fetus.

Paul

[bar Jonah]

There are a couple of university professors (completely independently of each other) who advocate a mother's right to terminate the life of her child up to the age of two, because they observe that such a young child isn't really any more intelligent (or valuable as a living organism) than a dog, a pig, a chimpanzee or perhaps a porpoise.

They use a rational argument (regardless of whether they're right)...

Your thoughts, Snooty?

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 03:52 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51024#post51024)
RightIdea:
Exactly. If I did to a puppy what an abortion doctor does to a living child... I would be labeled a monster, and people would cry out for prison time.

False analogy. A puppy is not a fetus. A puppy is a living animal with a degree of intelligence and the capacity for pain.

A fetus is alive, but that's about it. It's not sentient.

Paul

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 08:55 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51028#post51028)
lordsnooty:



False analogy. A puppy is not a fetus. A puppy is a living animal with a degree of intelligence and the capacity for pain.

A fetus is alive, but that's about it. It's not sentient.

Paul
And you know its not sentient... how?

Or is this just a belief you have, based on your personal wisdom or opinion?

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 03:54 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51026#post51026)
RightIdea:
There are a couple of university professors (completely independently of each other) who advocate a mother's right to terminate the life of her child up to the age of two, because they observe that such a young child isn't really any more intelligent (or valuable as a living organism) than a dog, a pig, a chimpanzee or perhaps a porpoise.

They use a rational argument (regardless of whether they're right)...

Your thoughts, Snooty?

They are insane.

A child has thoughts and feelings, so it would be totally wrong to kill it. An early fetus has neither.

Paul

[bar Jonah]

You see, a major part of my philosophical argument against abortion is that I keep hearing pro-choicers say, "We can't know it's really aliving human being... We can't know if they're 'sentient" or whatever. You don't know that life begins at conception!"

Of course I have religious beliefs about such matters. But my reply to these people is invariably:

"Don't know? Shouldn't you make d*** well sure you know before you start destroying a million unborn babies a year??? If you don't know... then you better withhold the knife until you DO know!"

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 03:56 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51030#post51030)
RightIdea:
And you know its not sentient... how?

Or is this just a belief you have, based on your personal wisdom or opinion?

If something doesn't have a brain (or the brain is the size of a peanut), it's safe to assume that it's not sentient.

Paul

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 08:58 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51031#post51031)
lordsnooty:
They are insane.

A child has thoughts and feelings, so it would be totally wrong to kill it. An early fetus has neither.

Paul
And a dog has feelings, but I can have my dog put to sleep without most people even batting an eyelash, and certainly no legal repercussions.

How is it that we can kill an animal, but we can't kill a baby whose mental development is roughly equivelant of a chimp or a porpoise?

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 08:59 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51034#post51034)
lordsnooty:



If something doesn't have a brain (or the brain is the size of a peanut), it's safe to assume that it's not sentient.

Paul
So as soon as it has a brain, you would cut off abortions? That's good to know. Obviously, I don't believe that's going far enough, but if you put the legislation on the table and sign it, brother, I will put pen to paper right after you do! It's certainly a start!

Anyone know, offhand, at what point the unborn child has a brain? How many weeks? Can we get that posted for Snooty's benefit?

[yxboom]

Today @ 07:59 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51034#post51034)
lordsnooty:



If something doesn't have a brain (or the brain is the size of a peanut), it's safe to assume that it's not sentient.

Paul

I guess we should have no repricussions going out and killing pygmy marmosets.

http://www.our-pets.net/images/pygmy1i.jpg

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 09:14 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51044#post51044)
yxboom:
I guess we should have no repricussions going out and killing pygmy marmosets.

Do they taste good, just out of curiosity? :yummy:

[yxboom]

Tastes like chicken.

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 04:14 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51044#post51044)
yxboom:
I guess we should have no repricussions going out and killing pygmy marmosets.

God, I knew there would be some smart arse who brought up pigmy marmosets.

What I obviously meant was that a human brain can't function at such a size (not because of the size per-se, but because it hasn't developed enough for any higher brain function).

For other animals, it's a different case. Look at insects, for instance.

Paul

[Socrates]

Lord Snooty:Why don't you just tell the truth. You think that as soon as a sperm fertilises an egg, God puts a super-duper magical soul into it, and to destroy that soul offends the magical sky daddy.This is actually a view which is also called "creationism" (i.e. of individual souls). But I think this contradicts the Scriptural teachings of: God’s creation having finished (Genesis 2:2).
God not creating anything fallen (Genesis 1:31).Instead, I favor traducianism, i.e. that the soul (the non-material aspect of man), as well as the body, is procreated from the parents. This seems consistent with the Semitic Totality Concept, where the body and soul are a unity. Naturally both creationism and traducianism are totally opposed to pre-natal baby-butchery.

[yxboom]

It was funny and you know it.

Would you also advocate performing the same exact type of abortion procedure on pregnant horses as they perform on pregnant women?

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 04:33 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51067#post51067)
yxboom:
Would you also advocate performing the same exact type of abortion procedure on pregnant horses as they perform on pregnant women?

Sure. Unless this is a trick question, I can't see any reason why early abortions are wrong in any species (except where the species is rare, and needs all the young it can get).

Paul

[yxboom]

It's not a trick question.

Just curious as you are pro-choice and what say so does the horse have in it's offspring being destroyed. If you don't know if the pregnant horse wants her offspring to be destroyed do you still perform the abortion?

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 05:10 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51091#post51091)
yxboom:

It's not a trick question.

Just curious as you are pro-choice and what say so does the horse have in it's offspring being destroyed. If you don't know if the pregnant horse wants her offspring to be destroyed do you still perform the abortion?

Yes, since a horse is unlikely to know or care if the abortion is undertaken reasonably early in the pregnancy.

Paul

[yxboom]

You state the horse is "unlikely". But can you state that as a perfect statement of fact that the horse does NOT want the offspring? By saying "unlikely" that is saying you can not make this perfect statement of fact. So are you not infringing on the "choice" of the horse and as a pro-choice advocate you are not being consistent.

[Eyeheart Pumpkin]

I notice an interesting conundrum, and I mentioned this before on TOL, but it is still quite interesting:

More concern and value on the unborn: Pro-Life
More concern and value on the living: Pro-Choice
More concern and value on plant and animal life: Pro-Choice

This is, of course, an extrapolation, based on the fact that Pro-Choice tends to be a liberal platform, and it is the liberals who tend most often to oppose war, to oppose violent intervention in political arenas, to oppose the mistreatment of animals, to oppose the clearcutting of rainforests, to support social betterment programs, and so on. In short, it seems overall that the Pro-Choice and liberal platforms have a greater respect for life than the Pro-Life and conservative platforms.

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 12:14 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51158#post51158)
Eireann:

I notice an interesting conundrum, and I mentioned this before on TOL, but it is still quite interesting:

More concern and value on the unborn: Pro-Life
More concern and value on the living: Pro-Choice
More concern and value on plant and animal life: Pro-Choice

This is, of course, an extrapolation, based on the fact that Pro-Choice tends to be a liberal platform, and it is the liberals who tend most often to oppose war, to oppose violent intervention in political arenas, to oppose the mistreatment of animals, to oppose the clearcutting of rainforests, to support social betterment programs, and so on. In short, it seems overall that the Pro-Choice and liberal platforms have a greater respect for life than the Pro-Life and conservative platforms.
Howabout a more accurate portrayal of the situation?

More concern and value on life, unborn or otherwise: Pro-Life
More concern and value on an individual's ability to avoid repsonsibility: Pro-Choice
More concern and value on plant and animal life (and even inanimate minerals) at the expensive of human life: Pro-Choice

[Eyeheart Pumpkin]

Today @ 01:18 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51162#post51162)
RightIdea:


Howabout a more accurate portrayal of the situation?

More concern and value on life, unborn or otherwise: Pro-Life
Nope, only on the unborn. The Pro-Lifers tend to be right there in the mix on war rally day screaming, "Kill, rape, maim, destroy!" They often advocate allowing a mother to die to save a child, which is merely displacement of responsibility. Nope, it's just the unborn lives they are concerned for. Their actions and advocacy of the bombing of abortion clinics and the stoning of anyone who even walks near an abortion clinic (I was stoned for walking to a diner a couple doors down from a clinic) speaks volumes about just how little respect the Pro-Lifers actually have for human life.


More concern and value on an individual's ability to avoid repsonsibility:
Equally distributed.

More concern with imposing their will on others: Pro-Life


More concern and value on plant and animal life (and even inanimate minerals) at the expensive of human life: Pro-Choice
Spin. Exactly how often has plant and animal life been placed over human life? Not often at all. You're confusing "expense of human life" with "expense of human comforts."

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 12:48 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51172#post51172)
Eireann:
Nope, only on the unborn. The Pro-Lifers tend to be right there in the mix on war rally day screaming, "Kill, rape, maim, destroy!" They often advocate allowing a mother to die to save a child, which is merely displacement of responsibility. Nope, it's just the unborn lives they are concerned for. Their actions and advocacy of the bombing of abortion clinics and the stoning of anyone who even walks near an abortion clinic (I was stoned for walking to a diner a couple doors down from a clinic) speaks volumes about just how little respect the Pro-Lifers actually have for human life.

Equally distributed.

More concern with imposing their will on others: Pro-Life
First of all, people who advocate killing abortion doctors or assaulting clinics (without assaulting people, only to shut the place down) are 1) criminals, and 2) not acting according to Christian principles. Although you should ask yourself what you would do if the will of those two professors were to come to pass, and people were exterminating 2-year-olds down the street from where you live. I do not advocate such violence. But can I understand the passion and rage from which it is born? ABSOLUTELY. I have stood outside a clinic, knowing that babies were being murdered a few feet away from where I stood. How do you think that made me feel?

Whether the pro-life view is right or wrong... surely you can understand the emotional basis for such rage. If I DIDN'T feel moral outrage as a result of my beliefs, I would be an inhuman monster.

Furthermore, supporting a war as a last resort is NOT equivelant to murdering babies, by any stretch of the imagination. It is a totally separate issue. If you want to discuss that, create a thread for that. But it has nothing to do with little Rosa's tragedy.

[Eyeheart Pumpkin]

Today @ 05:38 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51376#post51376)
RightIdea:


First of all, people who advocate killing abortion doctors or assaulting clinics (without assaulting people, only to shut the place down) are 1) criminals, and 2) not acting according to Christian principles. Although you should ask yourself what you would do if the will of those two professors were to come to pass, and people were exterminating 2-year-olds down the street from where you live. I do not advocate such violence. But can I understand the passion and rage from which it is born? ABSOLUTELY. I have stood outside a clinic, knowing that babies were being murdered a few feet away from where I stood. How do you think that made me feel?
How it makes you feel is irrelevent. It's a legal issue, and the place to take up legal issues is in the courtroom, not standing out on the sidewalk throwing rocks at people. Murder is the unlawful taking of human life. Since it isn't unlawful, you can't call it murder at any rate. And whether or not a fetus is a human life is the subject of numerous threads and debates, and neither side has come close to objectively establishing their case. Your side attempts to establish its case based on emotionality, which is about as far from objective as you can get.


Whether the pro-life view is right or wrong... surely you can understand the emotional basis for such rage. If I DIDN'T feel moral outrage as a result of my beliefs, I would be an inhuman monster.
Sure, and there are a lot of things that affect me that way, but I don't advocate going out and killing in order to correct the problem.


Furthermore, supporting a war as a last resort is NOT equivelant to murdering babies, by any stretch of the imagination. It is a totally separate issue. If you want to discuss that, create a thread for that. But it has nothing to do with little Rosa's tragedy.
I'm talking about a number of people both on this board and at TOL who support the war as a FIRST resort simply for the sake of having a good and exciting war. They know who they are. I posted a poll once asking whether people thought we should have used war as the first option, from the get-go, foregoing all the diplomatic attempts, and you would be surprised just how many people answered yes to that one. Those aren't Christians who support war as a last resort. Hell, I support war as a last resort! Those are Christians who want blood and excitement, many of whom are nominally pro-lifers but their answers on that poll show quite clearly how little they truly regard human life.

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 04:48 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51412#post51412)
Eireann:
How it makes you feel is irrelevent. It's a legal issue, and the place to take up legal issues is in the courtroom, not standing out on the sidewalk throwing rocks at people. Murder is the unlawful taking of human life. Since it isn't unlawful, you can't call it murder at any rate. And whether or not a fetus is a human life is the subject of numerous threads and debates, and neither side has come close to objectively establishing their case. Your side attempts to establish its case based on emotionality, which is about as far from objective as you can get.
By your logic, it would have been wrong for anyone to resist or fight back against the murders of the Nazi death camps. After all, they weren't unlawful, and therefore not murder... right?

A recent movie called "The Grey Zone" portrayed a group of Sonderkommandos in a death camp -- Jewish prisoners who helped the Nazis despose of dead bodies at a death camp. This unit was the only one, anywhere, that fought back. Against something lawful, something you don't classify as "murder."

Sure, and there are a lot of things that affect me that way, but I don't advocate going out and killing in order to correct the problem.
And neither do I. Didn't you read my post? Such a response is not Christian. Look at the history of the church in the first century. Christians were horribly persecuted (just as they still are around most of the globe). They were fed alive to lions and tigers as entertainment. They were stuck on poles and burned as functional street lamps. And they did not fight back.

I'm talking about a number of people both on this board and at TOL who support the war as a FIRST resort simply for the sake of having a good and exciting war. They know who they are. I posted a poll once asking whether people thought we should have used war as the first option, from the get-go, foregoing all the diplomatic attempts, and you would be surprised just how many people answered yes to that one. Those aren't Christians who support war as a last resort. Hell, I support war as a last resort! Those are Christians who want blood and excitement, many of whom are nominally pro-lifers but their answers on that poll show quite clearly how little they truly regard human life.
You're not talking to them. You're talking to me. When you talk to them, tell them they are wrong for seeking war as a first option. And I will stand by your side and agree with you, and rebuke them as a Christian.

Next?

[Socrates]

RightIdea:

Howabout a more accurate portrayal of the situation?

More concern and value on life, unborn or otherwise: Pro-Life

Eireann:
Nope, only on the unborn. The Pro-Lifers tend to be right there in the mix on war rally day screaming, "Kill, rape, maim, destroy!" Be careful about hypocrisy charges, because they come straight back at you. What sort of "peace" protesters squeal at a war against a murderous despot while SUPPORTING the war on the unborn?They often advocate allowing a mother to die to save a child, which is merely displacement of responsibility.Do they? Any proof? Eireann once more spruiks on stuff he has no knowledge of. E.g. one of the major pro-life apologetics books, Politically Correct Death by philosopher Dr Francis Beckwith, says that life of the mother is the only exception. But at least this is a genuine life-for-life issue, and even here the INTENTION is to save the life mother by REMOVING the unborn from a place like the fallopian tube where it would inevitably cause death to both. And the death of the unborn is deemed not to be wrong because of the Principle of Double Effect. But IF they had the technology to save this child outside the womb, they should do so. Conversely, the whole intent of abortion is to produce a dead baby, and this is graphically illustrated in the gruesome Democrat-loved "partial birth abortion". And this is done NOT to save the mother's life, and in fact there is no psychiatric evidence that abortion even improves the mother's mental health. Rather, it's to allow the woman to have her skiiing holiday or finish her university course, etc.
Nope, it's just the unborn lives they are concerned for. Their actions and advocacy of the bombing of abortion clinics and the stoning of anyone who even walks near an abortion clinic (I was stoned for walking to a diner a couple doors down from a clinic) speaks volumes about just how little respect the Pro-Lifers actually have for human life.
Once again, the VAST majority of pro-lifers support only PEACEFUL protests. But of course, the pro-abortion media highlight only the tiny minority who are not peaceful.

[bar Jonah]

You know, back when I was Wiccan, I was just as vehemently and vocally pro-life. In fact, most Wiccans I knew were pro-life, as well. It never ceases to amaze me that a Wiccan can be anything but. It is a set of spiritual beliefs centered around the respect of, and love for, Life itself. And it at least claims to be greatly concerned with the concept of personal responsibility. I have always believed a pro-choice Wiccan is a contradiction in terms.

[Eyeheart Pumpkin]

Yesterday @ 08:36 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51667#post51667)
RightIdea:

By your logic, it would have been wrong for anyone to resist or fight back against the murders of the Nazi death camps. After all, they weren't unlawful, and therefore not murder... right?
Not by a technical definition, no, it isn't murder if it is allowed for by law. That doesn't mean it isn't wrong. Legality isn't the only measuring stick for the rightness or wrongness of something. Nevertheless, you're bringing up a very popular but invalid comparison. The slaughter of Jews in WWII cannot be compared to abortion, because it's comparing apples to oranges. I can't even objectively say that death is a common factor in both, because death occured in one case, but the other is a case of life not being permitted to begin. Not the same thing.


A recent movie called "The Grey Zone" portrayed a group of Sonderkommandos in a death camp -- Jewish prisoners who helped the Nazis despose of dead bodies at a death camp. This unit was the only one, anywhere, that fought back. Against something lawful, something you don't classify as "murder."
That, too, is not comparable. Fighting back the way they did was the only option they had. It was fight or die. That is not the case with abortion protestors here. Here in America they have the first option of fighting it in court. They simply choose not to use that preferable option.


Christians were horribly persecuted (just as they still are around most of the globe). They were fed alive to lions and tigers as entertainment. They were stuck on poles and burned as functional street lamps. And they did not fight back.
Look at the history of the church overall. This is just a guess, since I don't have any stats on it, but I would guess that Christians have historically been the persecutors a lot more than they've been the persecutees.

[Eyeheart Pumpkin]

Yesterday @ 11:02 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=51788#post51788)
Socrates:

Do they? Any proof? Eireann once more spruiks on stuff he has no knowledge of. E.g. one of the major pro-life apologetics books, Politically Correct Death by philosopher Dr Francis Beckwith, says that life of the mother is the only exception. But at least this is a genuine life-for-life issue, and even here the INTENTION is to save the life mother by REMOVING the unborn from a place like the fallopian tube where it would inevitably cause death to both.
I don't consider people who advocate that as "pro-life." There is a movement which I have advocted a number of times on here to make a better distinction between camps. To us, "pro-lifers" are the radicals who say "no abortion in any circumstance. If the mother dies, it's fate, so be it."

Those of us involved in this movement offer four classifications, not just two:

Pro-Life = no abortion in any case

Conditional pro-abortion = abortion permissible in extreme medical cases

Pro-choice = may or may not condone the act of abortion but do not believe they have the right to impose their will on others

Pro-abortion = see nothing wrong with abortion in any case and refuse to see the prenatal fetus as a human life.

When I speak of Pro-Life, I am speaking of the first group. Most of us fit in the second group, and it is not those of whom I speak. There is a need for a distinction because there are many, many people who call themselves "Pro-Life" and many, many people who call themselves "Pro-Choice" who believe that same way, and both sides claim that position belongs to their respective camp. Thus the need to separate that position from either side.


Conversely, the whole intent of abortion is to produce a dead baby, and this is graphically illustrated in the gruesome Democrat-loved "partial birth abortion". And this is done NOT to save the mother's life, and in fact there is no psychiatric evidence that abortion even improves the mother's mental health. Rather, it's to allow the woman to have her skiiing holiday or finish her university course, etc.
On the first point, I disagree. That is not the intent of abortion. That is the intent of some abortions. But what you are referring to is a "convenience abortion," which in my opinion should be neither legal nor condoned in any case. That's why they have adoption agencies.


[/list]Once again, the VAST majority of pro-lifers support only PEACEFUL protests. But of course, the pro-abortion media highlight only the tiny minority who are not peaceful.
The pro-abortion media does choose to highlight only those who aren't peaceful. Just as the pro-life media chooses to highlight only the cases of convenience abortion. Just as the pro-war media chooses to highlight only those protesters involved in violent protest, ignoring the vast majority who engage in peaceful protest. Name a slant, and I can show you where your own camp is equally guilty.

[kiwimac]

So Crates,

Please crawl back under your rock! Your endless vehemence and hatred are nausea inducing. I wait for the long-sought day when you will a: be pleasant and b: debate rather than vilify.

Kiwimac

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 06:20 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
kiwimac:
So Crates,

Please crawl back under your rock! You're endless vehemence and hatred are nausea inducing

Kiwimac
Yes, how terrible, those people who fight to defend helpless babies. Such hate... :ahem:

[Eyeheart Pumpkin]

Today @ 07:22 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
RightIdea:

Yes, how terrible, those people who fight to defend helpless babies. Such hate... :ahem:
It's not the fact that he fights. It's the way he fights. With but few exceptions, he tends to fight (on all issues that I've seen) by namecalling and mudslinging.

[Blake Reas]

03-31-2003 @ 05:38 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
adam.naranjo:

its murder. murder. muder. murder. And there is not argument to the contrary that is even partly persuasive. A human being, in or out of the womb, is put to death...that's murder.

One question for everyone. Why does the baby have to die? Surely it did not ask to be brought into the world in such a way! It is murder.

By His Grace For His Glory,
Blake

[kiwimac]

So...

Would we compassionate and loving Christian folk ask a 9 year old to bear a child conceived in an act of violence?

Why? What has the 9 year old done to deserve that? Lets not even talk about how the hormones which come with a pregnancy will screw-up a 9 year old's body, let's not talk about the fact that after having to endure the nightmare of being raped, she is now being told by the loving Christian community on this board that she is a murderer!

Thank you all for the depth of your compassion, I'm sure the Good Lord would be very proud of you all! :no:
Kiwimac:hrm:

[bar Jonah]

So...

Would we compassionate and loving Christian folk ask a 9 year old to murder a child conceived in an act of violence?

Why? What has the baby done to deserve that? Lets not even talk about how he or she can't even cry out against those cold-hearted abortionists. Abortion will destroy a life, let's not talk about the fact that after having to endure the nightmare of being raped, she is told by the loving feminists in her community that she should take another's life rather than suffer all of the rape's consequences, herself.

Thank you all for the depth of your compassion, I'm sure the Good Lord would be very proud of you all! :no: :hrm:

[Socrates]

SherBear rightly pointed out (and supported it with great photographs) here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?postid=50844#post50844):


... except that it was a baby and didn't deserve to die.

This is the key issue, and all the others are just red herrings.

But Snooty screamed:Fetus, not baby.Of course it's baby. If she looks like a baby, sucks her thumb like a baby, has the genetic code of a human baby, then it's a baby. Also, if the mother WANTS the baby, she'll certainly tell people that she's carrying a baby or a child. And she will probably also use the old expression for pregnant, "with child". And since meanings of words are defined by usage, the unborn being IS a baby.

If you want to use medical terms like "fetus" rather than common ones like "baby", then be consistent and call the pregnant woman a "gravida". And to be even more refined, if it's her first pregnancy, she's "gravida I" or a "primigravida"; if it's her
second, then "gravida II" or "secundigravida"; then terti-, quadri- etc.

[Sher]

04-02-2003 @ 07:13 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
lordsnooty:

Fetus, not baby.

(Looks at pictures)

Aww, look! It looks something like I might expect a baby to look like!

Luckily, I have a brain and am capable of using it to deduce that the early fetus depicted in the 16 weeks photo is not a baby. It just looks like a baby because it is developing into a one.

Paul The point was that the girl could have waited, and the baby could have been put up for adoption to a waiting home.

Unfortunately, Paul, your "fetus theory" falls down in the face of those that survive outside the womb as a baby at very early stages.

The man I dated before I dated my husband, has a sister who had severe pregnancy complictions that were threatening her life. She was not going to survive the pregnancy, so they did an emergency c-section at 22.5 weeks (a little over 1 pound) ... and the "fetus that was not a baby" (cough) that was born survived and thrived ... and she is now (::counts on fingers::) 18 or 19 years old. (Funny how the doctors didn't ask her what she wanted to name the fetus ... and she didn't bring her daughter home in the latest fetus clothes ... or put her in a fetus cradle. :duh:) While I haven't heard of any 16 week old babies surviving outside the womb, this one instance is a good case for it being a baby.

Therefore, your assertion is flawed and unsupported. People with opinions like yours, which devalue life, are why we also have legal partial-birth abortions and euthanasia in America.

Futhermore, with your (implied) assertion that a fetus doesn't become a baby until birth, it begs the question of how one "fetus" can still be aborted, and not considered a baby, at 20+ weeks ... and yet another, is born and considered a baby at 20+ weeks and the doctors struggle for hours/days/months to insure the baby's survival.

Meet John Henry (http://members.aol.com/Suzanne900/index.html) ... born at 24 weeks.

Meet Marley (http://www.geocities.com/icetrout/) ... born at 22.5 weeks.

And Mary McClain Williams (http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Ridge/2437/) who was born at 22 weeks and 5 days.
[...] Luckily, I have a brain and am capable of using it to deduce [...]Yes, thank your mother for not aborting you so that you have that brain to use.

[kiwimac]

Sherbear


The man I dated before I dated my husband, has a sister who had severe pregnancy complictions that were threatening her life. She was not going to survive the pregnancy, so they did an emergency c-section at 22.5 weeks (a little over 1 pound) ... and the "fetus that was not a baby" (cough) that was born survived and thrived ... and she is now (::counts on fingers::) 18 or 19 years old. (Funny how the doctors didn't ask her what she wanted to name the fetus ... and she didn't bring her daughter home in the latest fetus clothes ... or put her in a fetus cradle. ) While I haven't heard of any 16 week old babies surviving outside the womb, this one instance is a good case for it being a baby.

Presumably this man's sister was older than 9 years and wanted to have the baby?

As for our friend with the bad hair:

why should a 9 year old have to bear all the consequences of being raped? Or are you suggesting that it is somehow her fault?

Kiwimac

[lordsnooty]

Today @ 07:57 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
SherBear:

The point was that the girl could have waited, and the baby could have been put up for adoption to a waiting home.


Yes, after having further ruined the nine year old's life.


Unfortunately, Paul, your "fetus theory" falls down in the face of those that survive outside the womb as a baby at very early stages.

Not at 16 weeks, and when they do survive early births, they can't do it without a lot of medical help.


Therefore, your assertion is flawed and unsupported. People with opinions like yours, which devalue life

I do not devalue life. Life is the most precious thing there is in the universe. Life and happiness are the only things worth bothering about.

But an early fetus (not one of the late ones, capable of surviving outside the womb) is not a child. Let's face it, you'd still apply these ridiculous arguments to a day old fetus, even though we know for a fact that at that age it wouldn't have any sort of brain whatsoever!


are why we also have legal partial-birth abortions and euthanasia in America.

What's wrong with euthanasia for people that are dying in terrible pain? Are you really that sadistic that you'd deny them a dignified and painless death?


Futhermore, with your (implied) assertion that a fetus doesn't become a baby until birth

I didn't say that.


, it begs the question of how one "fetus" can still be aborted, and not considered a baby, at 20+ weeks

How many abortions are carried out at 20+ weeks? Not very bloody many, and I do not condone abortions done at that time unless the mother is in danger.


Yes, thank your mother for not aborting you so that you have that brain to use.

If she had aborted me... so what? I wouldn't care. I would never have known!

Paul

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 03:49 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
kiwimac:
Sherbear

Presumably this man's sister was older than 9 years and wanted to have the baby?

As for our friend with the bad hair:

why should a 9 year old have to bear all the consequences of being raped? Or are you suggesting that it is somehow her fault?

Kiwimac
OF COURSE NOT! How dare you continue to infer that we blame this poor little girl or wish to somehow inflict punishment on her! This girl is a victim, not a monster like the abortion doctors.

She shouldn't have to bear all (or any!) of the consequences of being raped! But we're not the ones who inflicted those consequences on her. The rapist did. But she should not commit murder to lessen those consequences for herself. At age 9, I don't believe she's capable of making that decision, so I don't blame Rosa in any way. But the point is, you shouldn't punish the baby for the rapist's crime.

[kiwimac]

RI,

You may not have inflicted anything on her but you are insisting that she bring to term one of the consequences of an act of violence, in NZ, we call that "Blaming the victim."

Kiwimac

[Bill the Cat]

Well, just to let you know, Guinness web site lists:

Most Premature Baby
James Elgin Gill was born to Brenda and James Gill on May 20, 1987, in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. He was 128 days premature, and weighed just 624 g (1 lb 6oz). James' parents were told he had no chance of survival. Much of his body was still developing, including his skin, hands, ears, and feet. James' eyes were still fused shut.

[Bill the Cat]

Thought you'd find this interesting too. I can't verify it's authenticity but here goes:

Peruvian five-year-old Lina Medina, accompanied by her 11-month-old-son Gerardo, and Doctor Lozada who attended her son's birth, are shown in this 1940 file photo taken in Lima's hospital.

When her child was born by Caesarean section in May 1939, Medina made medical history, and is still the youngest known mother in the world.

Lina Medina's parents thought their 5-year-old daughter had a huge abdominal tumor and when shamans in their remote village in Peru's Andes could find no cure, her father carried her to a hospital.

Just over a month later, she gave birth to a boy.



Medina was born on September 27, 1933 in the small village of Paurange. She was only 5 years 8 months old at the birth of her child on Mother's Day, May 14, 1939.

Born at full term at Lima's maternity clinic, her child was taken through a caesarian operation (Dr. Lozada and Busalleu, operators, Dr. Colretta, anesthesiologist). The child (boy), weighing 2,700 grams, was well formed and in good health. Child and mother were able to leave the clinic after only a few days.

Doctor Lozada has conducted very detailed studies since the diagnostic of the pregnancy which aroused much curiosity in the country; he took an x-ray of the child and her baby, established a diagnostic of the fetal situation, observed the state of functionality of the little mother who had begun menstruating at the age of 8 months. At four years old she had already developed breasts as well as pubic hair, her body proportions were a bit amazing and her bone hardening a bit advanced, things that are often observed in cases of such premature pregnancy.

After taunting from schoolmates, Medina's son, Gerardo - who was named after one of the doctors who attended Medina and who became their mentor - discovered when he was 10 that the person he had grown up believing to be his sister was in fact his mother.

Gerardo died in 1979 at age 40 from a disease that attacks the body's bone marrow, but it was said it was not clear there was any link with his illness and the fact his mother had been so young at his birth.

Medina herself married and in 1972 had a second son, 33 years after her first. Her second child now lives in Mexico.

Found it on Reuters too... http://www.telegraphindia.com/1020827/asp/foreign/story_1140311.asp

[Socrates]

Kiwimac:You may not have inflicted anything on her but you are insisting that she bring to term one of the consequences of an act of violence, in NZ, we call that "Blaming the victim."In Australia we reserve that term for those who impute wrong-doing to the victim, which RI does NOT. Rather, we don't believe that the child of the rapist should be punished for the crime of her father.

[kiwimac]

Today @ 04:52 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
Socrates:

Kiwimac:You may not have inflicted anything on her but you are insisting that she bring to term one of the consequences of an act of violence, in NZ, we call that "Blaming the victim."In Australia we reserve that term for those who impute wrong-doing to the victim, which RI does NOT. Rather, we don't believe that the child of the rapist should be punished for the crime of her father.

But you seem quite happy that the victim of the rapist should suffer. Suffer with hormone's her body is not yet ready for, suffer by her body having to support a fetus while her own body is still growing, suffer by the fact that, even though she has done no wrong herself, she would likely be made to feel as if she should be ashamed!

So why is there more compassion for the fetus than there is for the rape victim?

Kiwimac

[Socrates]

Kiwimac:But you seem quite happy that the victim of the rapist should suffer.I'm not. But I'm even less happy about relieving suffering by dstroying life. Suffer with hormone's her body is not yet ready for, suffer by her body having to support a fetus while her own body is still growing, suffer by the fact that, even though she has done no wrong herself, she would likely be made to feel as if she should be ashamed!She would be more likely to feel ashamed by punishing an innocent child for the crime of her father.So why is there more compassion for the fetus than there is for the rape victim?Why does Kiwimac ask leading questions, and dehumanise the innocent child of a rapist by this medical term? Should I call the 9yo girl by the equally medically correct term primigravida?

[kiwimac]

But Socrates she cannot, by definition be primigravida, SHE WAS PREGNANT. Whereas a fetus is the proper name for a pre-term human being.

I am not denying the humanity of the fetus (though I acknowledge some will disagree) I am indicating an interst in understanding why you and others like you are so focused on the fetus they can't see the suffering of the 9 yr old?

Kiwimac

[dawnghost]

04-02-2003 @ 12:13 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
lordsnooty:
Luckily, I have a brain and am capable of using it to deduce that the early fetus depicted in the 16 weeks photo is not a baby. It just looks like a baby because it is developing into a one.


lordsnooty:[/i]
So why is something that doesn't think, and something that doesn't feel emotion, more valuable than a little girl that does?


lordsnooty:[/i]
It's human life, but not a human being.


lordsnooty:[/i]
A child has thoughts and feelings, so it would be totally wrong to kill it. An early fetus has neither.

my guess: lordsnooty chose to ignore important information posted in this thread.

what about:


SherBear:[/i]
20 weeks - the child can hear and recognize her mother's voice.

no thoughts and feelings eh?

taken from a link (http://www.actionlife.org/Life/lipain_e.phtml) he probably didn't consider as well:

"Dr. Ervin Nichols, of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (ACOG), purporting to speak for the ACOG's 24,000 members, supplied the New York Times (Jan. 31, 1984) with this statement: "We are unaware of any evidence of any kind that would substantiate a claim that pain is perceived by a fetus."

This statement prompted 26 other physicians, all specialists in the field, two of whom were past presidents of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, to denounce Dr. Nichols' "official answer." They wrote: "Over the last 18 years, real time ultrasonography, fetoscopy, study of the fetal EKG (electrocardiogram) and fetal EEG (electroencephalogram) have demonstrated the remarkable responsiveness of the human fetus to pain, touch, and sound The ability to feel pain and respond to it is clearly not a phenomenon that develops de nova at birth. In deed, much of enlightened modern obstetrical practice and procedure seeks to minimize sensory deprivation of and sensory insult to, the fetus during, at, and after birth..."

just trying to organize something here.

when does a fetus become a 'baby'? the very moment it is taken out of the womb? oh wait, maybe it's the moment it 'breathes', right? or is it when the umbilical cord is severed?

WHEN does life start?

[Socrates]

Kiwimac:But Socrates she cannot, by definition be primigravida, SHE WAS PREGNANT. What are you talking about?? A primigravida is DEFINED as a female pregnant for the the first time :dufus:. Whereas a fetus is the proper name for a pre-term human being.They are EQUALLY proper, or as I would argue, equally IMPROPER medical terms for colloquial parlance.I am not denying the humanity of the fetus (though I acknowledge some will disagree) I am indicating an interst in understanding why you and others like you are so focused on the fetus they can't see the suffering of the 9 yr old?You have answered your own question, leading as it is. It is BECAUSE of the humanity of the unborn child that we see that it is wrong to destroy her to relieve the suffering of her mother.

[kiwimac]

Today @ 05:11 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
Socrates:

[quote]Kiwimac:But Socrates she cannot, by definition be primigravida, SHE WAS PREGNANT. What are you talking about?? A primigravida is DEFINED as a female pregnant for the the first time :dufus:.

I KNOW what the phrase "Primigravida" means, what I was not sure of was whether you were reading my responses or not, as you seem to have been ignoring my main point. Which is: The right of the 9 yr old NOT to have to undergo pregnancy is of a higher value than the life of a 26 week old fetus.

Why?

Because that child had done nothing, she was the victim of a terrible crime. Were she an adult and able to decide for herself to keep the child then that is another matter entirely. But as a minor child who has already been victimised by this terrible crime she should not have to carry the fetus to term.

In point of fact most adult women in the same situation would also abort the fetus.

Further you might want to consider telling me why it is that you would force such a small kid to have to bear a child? Where is your compassion, are you so focused on the "rights" of the fetus in utero that you cannot see that the little girl ALSO has rights and one of these is not to be made to suffer twice.

Kiwimac

[Sher]

Kiwimac: But Socrates she cannot, by definition be primigravida, SHE WAS PREGNANT.

Socrates: What are you talking about?? A primigravida is DEFINED as a female pregnant for the the first time

Kiwimac: I KNOW what the phrase "Primigravida" means

SherBear: :argh:


Further you might want to consider telling me why it is that you would force such a small kid to have to bear a child? Where is your compassion, are you so focused on the "rights" of the fetus in utero that you cannot see that the little girl ALSO has rights and one of these is not to be made to suffer twice."Further you might want to consider telling me why it is that you would force such a small kid to have to bear" an abortion? You ignore the very real fact that abortion is very often suffering for a woman ... a different sort of suffering, that is often much worse than sustaining an unwanted pregnancy for a few months and putting an unwanted child up for adoption. Many woman are tramatized for life over the decision they made to abort ... and not all of them are Christians, or even religious. So you fail to prove that the girl didn't still suffer twice, once from the rape and the second time from the abortion.

Furthermore, who made you judge of which rights are more important ... based on your apparent thought that the mother's rights superceed the baby's rights?

[kiwimac]

Today @ 10:40 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
SherBear:

Kiwimac: But Socrates she cannot, by definition be primigravida, SHE WAS PREGNANT.

Socrates: What are you talking about?? A primigravida is DEFINED as a female pregnant for the the first time

Kiwimac: I KNOW what the phrase "Primigravida" means

SherBear: :argh:

*** I note you have carefully avoided copying my underlined words. I was attempting (successfully, I might add) to get SOME response from Socrates indicative of him having read my previous posts.

"Further you might want to consider telling me why it is that you would force such a small kid to have to bear" an abortion? You ignore the very real fact that abortion is very often suffering for a woman ... a different sort of suffering, that is often much worse than sustaining an unwanted pregnancy for a few months and putting an unwanted child up for adoption. Many woman are tramatized for life over the decision they made to abort ... and not all of them are Christians, or even religious. So you fail to prove that the girl didn't still suffer twice, once from the rape and the second time from the abortion.

*** This might indeed be so if the person were an adult where the sustaining of an "unwanted pregnancy" is no particular hassle (comparatively speaking!) but this is a CHILD we are talking about. As for her suffering from the emotional affects of the abortion, yes, she might well do & I would hope that counselling will be made available for her BUT it is still less than the psychological and emotional strain of bearing the child of your rapist.

Furthermore, who made you judge of which rights are more important ... based on your apparent thought that the mother's rights superceed the baby's rights?

***God gave me the ability to THINK and reason and to work through for myself what is right and wrong and forcing this little one to have a child is simply wrong

Might I further point out that while you and others like you are busily decrying the decision made on behalf of the child, you do it in safety because you are NOT the ones who would have to live with the effects of either decision.

Kiwimac

[Sher]

Kiwimac: But Socrates she cannot, by definition be primigravida, SHE WAS PREGNANT.

Socrates: What are you talking about?? A primigravida is DEFINED as a female pregnant for the the first time

Kiwimac: I KNOW what the phrase "Primigravida" means

SherBear: :argh:

Kiwimac: *** I note you have carefully avoided copying my underlined words. I was attempting (successfully, I might add) to get SOME response from Socrates indicative of him having read my previous posts.

SherBear: I "avoided it" because it was irrelevant to the definition of primigravida or the fact that you did or didn't know what it meant ... but here, is this better?
I KNOW what the phrase "Primigravida" means, what I was not sure of was whether you were reading my responses or not, as you seem to have been ignoring my main point. Which is: The right of the 9 yr old NOT to have to undergo pregnancy is of a higher value than the life of a 26 week old fetus.Leaving the underlined (and all the rest) still doesn't negate the :argh: Maybe you would like to kindly explain how you misrepresenting the definition (aka intentionally lying) was used to get Socrates attention on the remainder of your "point", especially since one had nothing to do with the other? ... and your bolded point only speaks to how truly sad mankind has come ... it is of lesser value because it inconveniences the mother. That whole attitude is extremely sad, Kiwimac.
*** This might indeed be so if the person were an adult where the sustaining of an "unwanted pregnancy" is no particular hassle (comparatively speaking!) but this is a CHILD we are talking about. As for her suffering from the emotional affects of the abortion, yes, she might well do & I would hope that counselling will be made available for her BUT it is still less than the psychological and emotional strain of bearing the child of your rapist.And you know this ... how? What experiences have you had in life that give you the authority to make this claim? Have you ever been raped? Carried the child of your rapist? Or even birthed a child period? Have you ever had an abortion?
God gave me the ability to THINK and reason and to work through for myself what is right and wrong and forcing this little one to have a child is simply wrongBut forcing her to have an abortion (being that she is too young to make a decision of that nature ... just like she would be too young to consent to sexual relations) is RIGHT to your thinking and reasoning? And God gave you this ability ... I think not ... Thou Shalt Not Murder is a commandment.
Might I further point out that while you and others like you are busily decrying the decision made on behalf of the child, you do it in safety because you are NOT the ones who would have to live with the effects of either decision.For that matter, neither are you. And again I say that you also have no idea, assuming you are a man by your name, what it even means to carry a child, never mind aborting one and the afteraffects that accompany said decision. So to decry us for typing from the "safety" of our computer rooms is assine. This is a discussion which could possibly affect the decision of others who might find themselves in similar situations, and as such, is valid and worth discussing. Perhps it won't be the product of rape (or perhaps it could be) but it could be an unwanted pregnancy by a young daughter ... or by an unmarried woman. If one devalues life as less important than inconvenience, it can carry over to other inconveniences and can become a pattern for others to follow.

[dawnghost]

Today @ 11:30 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
kiwimac:***God gave me the ability to THINK and reason and to work through for myself what is right and wrong and forcing this little one to have a child is simply wrong

have you ever watched (or read) the novel "A Clockwork Orange", Kiwimac?

maybe you could benefit from the following article:

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/4572/ce1.htm

[kiwimac]

Today @ 12:35 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
SherBear:

Kiwimac: But Socrates she cannot, by definition be primigravida, SHE WAS PREGNANT.

Socrates: What are you talking about?? A primigravida is DEFINED as a female pregnant for the the first time

Kiwimac: I KNOW what the phrase "Primigravida" means

SherBear: :argh:

Kiwimac: *** I note you have carefully avoided copying my underlined words. I was attempting (successfully, I might add) to get SOME response from Socrates indicative of him having read my previous posts.

SherBear: I "avoided it" because it was irrelevant to the definition of primigravida or the fact that you did or didn't know what it meant ... but here, is this better? Leaving the underlined (and all the rest) still doesn't negate the :argh: Maybe you would like to kindly explain how you misrepresenting the definition (aka intentionally lying) was used to get Socrates attention on the remainder of your "point", especially since one had nothing to do with the other? ... and your bolded point only speaks to how truly sad mankind has come ... it is of lesser value because it inconveniences the mother. That whole attitude is extremely sad, Kiwimac.And you know this ... how? What experiences have you had in life that give you the authority to make this claim? Have you ever been raped? Carried the child of your rapist? Or even birthed a child period? Have you ever had an abortion? But forcing her to have an abortion (being that she is too young to make a decision of that nature ... just like she would be too young to consent to sexual relations) is RIGHT to your thinking and reasoning? And God gave you this ability ... I think not ... Thou Shalt Not Murder is a commandment.For that matter, neither are you. And again I say that you also have no idea, assuming you are a man by your name, what it even means to carry a child, never mind aborting one and the afteraffects that accompany said decision. So to decry us for typing from the "safety" of our computer rooms is assine. This is a discussion which could possibly affect the decision of others who might find themselves in similar situations, and as such, is valid and worth discussing. Perhps it won't be the product of rape (or perhaps it could be) but it could be an unwanted pregnancy by a young daughter ... or by an unmarried woman. If one devalues life as less important than inconvenience, it can carry over to other inconveniences and can become a pattern for others to follow.

Oh dear, I used a lie to get Socrates to prove he was reading my post, well that's me damned in perpetuity!

As for your tripe on "inconvenience", I NEVER used or intimated the word. This is not about the fact that a pregnancy would have INCONVENIENCED this child, its about the fact that forcing her to bear the child of her rapist is just one more attack on her as a person.

I was a counsellor for many years, I have dealt with this kind of situation professionally, have you?

Kiwimac

[tgamble]

03-31-2003 @ 08:17 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
Socrates:

Patroclus:While I do not think it is necessarily right, I do not oppose abortions for rape victims.But this is executing the child for the crime of his/her father, contrary to Ezekiel 18:20.[list]

Nevermind that Christian dogma is contrary to that. Punishing all mankind for the actions of two (fictonal) people!:bonk:

[Socrates]

SherBear:


I "avoided it" because it was irrelevant to the definition of primigravida or the fact that you did or didn't know what it meant ... but here, is this better? Leaving the underlined (and all the rest) still doesn't negate the :argh:

KiwiMac:Oh dear, I used a lie to get Socrates to prove he was reading my post, well that's me damned in perpetuity!Now that Kiwimac has admitted to lying, can he be trusted on anything else? It's more likely from his statement and my reply that Kiwimac did NOT understand what primigravida means, and that it was equally appropriate or inappropriate as "fetus":


Kiwimac: But Socrates she cannot, by definition be primigravida, SHE WAS PREGNANT.

Socrates: What are you talking about?? A primigravida is DEFINED as a female pregnant for the the first time

[kiwimac]

Socrates,

Boil your head~

I would have admitted frankly if I did not understand the term, I saw an opportunity to see if my posts were being read or simply ignored. Do you have a personal problem with that?

Before you answer try reading ALL my posts, see if you think I might be "lying" anywhere else!

Furthermore you say


Now that Kiwimac has admitted to lying, can he be trusted on anything else? It's more likely from his statement and my reply that Kiwimac did NOT understand what primigravida means, and that it was equally appropriate or inappropriate as "fetus":

Just a point here, I have noticed that neither you nor Sherbear are actually addressing my points just attacking me and finding various ways to do it. Is it that your stance is as indefensible to you as it is to me?

Or has it finally dawned on you that your lack of compassion for the victim of the rape is morally / ethically wrong?

So feel free to attack me but do try and answer my question. Why is it wrong for a 9 year old child to not want to bear a child which is the end result of a rape?

You say why punish the child in utero so why punish the child who is pregnant?

Kiwimac

[Socrates]

Kiwimac:
Or has it finally dawned on you that your lack of compassion for the victim of the rape is morally / ethically wrong?Will it ever dawn on you that ASKING LEDING QUESTIONS is morally / ethically wrong? And since you're a moral / ethical relativist, on what grounds can you make that claim.
So feel free to attack me but do try and answer my question. But you haven't explained why it's OK to use medicalese about the unborn ("fetus") but not about the pregnant woman ("gravida"). You say why punish the child in utero so why punish the child who is pregnant?It's not a punishment -- it's a refusal to destroy an innocent life.

[kiwimac]

Today @ 05:24 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=#post)
Socrates:

You say why punish the child in utero so why punish the child who is pregnant?[/list]It's not a punishment -- it's a refusal to destroy an innocent life.

So, Socrates, you are refusing to destroy an innocent life BY PUNISHING AN INNOCENT, hmmm... You might want to consider the ethical implications of that.

As to whether or not I am an "Ethical Relativist", that is really unimportant, because its YOU I'm asking the questions of.

So, be blunt, If you believe its acceptable for a 9 year old to have to bear a child implanted in her by an act of rape, SAY SO!, Lets not shilley-shalley about.

Kiwimac

[Socrates]

KiwiMac:So, Socrates, you are refusing to destroy an innocent life BY PUNISHING AN INNOCENT, hmmm... You might want to consider the ethical implications of that.I have. And I've already told you -- the main thing is that I am refusing to destroy an innocent -- YOU are the ones who claim I am punishing one, which I am not. It's the Principle of Double Effect coming in.As to whether or not I am an "Ethical Relativist", that is really unimportant, because its YOU I'm asking the questions of.It's perfectly relevant, if I can show that your own framework chops off the branch on which your question is sitting.So, be blunt, If you believe its acceptable for a 9 year old to have to bear a child implanted in her by an act of rape, SAY SO!, Lets not shilley-shalley about.
I'll not -- the important thing is that this innocent child is not destroyed. Whether she grows to term in her mother's womb or somewhere else is beside the point -- as long as she is given this chance and not sacrificed to relieve suffering.

[Butters]

What Does The Bible Say
About Abortion?
Absolutely nothing! The word "abortion" does not appear in any translation of the bible!

Out of more than 600 laws of Moses, none comments on abortion. One Mosaic law about miscarriage specifically contradicts the claim that the bible is antiabortion, clearly stating that miscarriage does not involve the death of a human being. If a woman has a miscarriage as the result of a fight, the man who caused it should be fined. If the woman dies, however, the culprit must be killed:

"If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.

"And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life, Eye for eye, tooth for tooth . . ."--Ex. 21:22-25

The bible orders the death penalty for murder of a human being, but not for the expulsion of a fetus.

When Does Life Begin?
According to the bible, life begins at birth--when a baby draws its first breath. The bible defines life as "breath" in several significant passages, including the story of Adam's creation in Genesis 2:7, when God "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." Jewish law traditionally considers that personhood begins at birth.

Desperate for a biblical basis for their beliefs, some antiabortionists cite obscure passages, usually metaphors or poetic phrasing, such as: "Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me." Psalm 51:5 This is sexist, but does nothing other than to invoke original sin. It says nothing about abortion.

The Commandments, Moses, Jesus and Paul ignored every chance to condemn abortion. If abortion was an important concern, why didn't the bible say so?

Thou Shalt Not Kill?
Many antiabortionists quote the sixth commandment, "Thou shalt not kill" (Ex. 20:13) as evidence that the bible is antiabortion. They fail to investigate the bible's definition of life (breath) or its deafening silence on abortion. Moreover, the Mosaic law in Exodus 21:22-25, directly following the Ten Commandments, makes it clear that an embryo or fetus is not a human being.

An honest reader must admit that the bible contradicts itself. "Thou shalt not kill" did not apply to many living, breathing human beings, including children, who are routinely massacred in the bible. The Mosaic law orders "Thou shalt kill" people for committing such "crimes" as cursing one's father or mother (Ex. 21:17), for being a "stubborn son" (Deut. 21:18-21), for being a homosexual (Lev. 20:13), or even for picking up sticks on the Sabbath (Numbers 15:32-35)! Far from protecting the sanctity of life, the bible promotes capital punishment for conduct which no civilized person or nation would regard as criminal.

Mass killings were routinely ordered, committed or approved by the God of the bible. One typical example is Numbers 25:4-9, when the Lord casually orders Moses to massacre 24,000 Israelites: "Take all the heads of the people, and hang them up before the Lord against the sun." Clearly, the bible is not pro-life!

Most scholars and translators agree that the injunction against killing forbade only the murder of (already born) Hebrews. It was open season on everyone else, including children, pregnant women and newborn babies.

Does God Kill Babies?
"Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones."--Psalm 137:9
The bible is not pro-child. Why did God set a bear upon 42 children just for teasing a prophet (2 Kings 2:23-24)? Far from demonstrating a "pro-life" attitude, the bible decimates innocent babies and pregnant women in passage after gory passage, starting with the flood and the wanton destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, progressing to the murder of the firstborn child of every household in Egypt (Ex. 12:29), and the New Testament threats of annihilation.

Space permits only a small sampling of biblical commandments or threats to kill children:

Numbers 31:17 Now therefore kill every male among the little ones.
Deuteronomy 2:34 utterly destroyed the men and the women and the little ones.
Deuteronomy 28:53 And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body, the flesh of thy sons and of thy daughters.
I Samuel 15:3 slay both man and woman, infant and suckling.
2 Kings 8:12 dash their children, and rip up their women with child.
2 Kings 15:16 all the women therein that were with child he ripped up.
Isaiah 13:16 Their children also shall be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses shall be spoiled and their wives ravished.
Isaiah 13:18 They shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb; their eyes shall not spare children.
Lamentations 2:20 Shall the women eat their fruit, and children.
Ezekiel 9:6 Slay utterly old and young, both maids and little children.
Hosea 9:14 give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts.
Hosea 13:16 their infants shall be dashed in pieces, and their women with child shall be ripped up.
Then there are the dire warnings of Jesus in the New Testament:

"For, behold, the days are coming, in which they shall say, Blessed are the barren, and the womb that never bare, and the paps which never gave suck."--Luke 23:29
The teachings and contradictions of the bible show that antiabortionists do not have a "scriptural base" for their claim that their deity is "pro-life." Spontaneous abortions occur far more often than medical abortions. Gynecology textbooks conservatively cite a 15% miscarriage rate, with one medical study finding a spontaneous abortion rate of almost 90% in very early pregnancy. That would make a deity in charge of nature the greatest abortionist in history!

Are Bible Teachings Kind to Women?
The bible is neither antiabortion nor pro-life, but does provide a biblical basis for the real motivation behind the antiabortion religious crusade: hatred of women. The bible is anti-woman, blaming women for sin, demanding subservience, mandating a slave/master relationship to men, and demonstrating contempt and lack of compassion:

"I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee."--Genesis 3:16
What self-respecting woman today would submit willingly to such tyranny?

The antiabortion position does not demonstrate love for humanity, or compassion for real human beings. Worldwatch Institute statistics show that 50% of abortions worldwide are illegal, and that at least 200,000 women die every year--and thousands more are hurt and maimed--from illegal or self-induced abortions. Unwanted pregnancies and complications from multiple pregnancies are a leading killer of women. Why do antiabortionists want North American women to join these ghastly mortality statistics? Every day around the world more than 40,000 people, mostly children, die from starvation or malnutrition. We must protect and cherish the right to life of the already-born.

Do Churches Support Abortion Rights?
Numerous Christian denominations and religious groups agree that the bible does not condemn abortion and that abortion should continue to be legal. These include:

American Baptist Churches-USA
American Ethical Union
American Friends (Quaker) Service Committee
American Jewish Congress
Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
Episcopal Church
Lutheran Women's Caucus
Moravian Church in America-Northern Province
Presbyterian Church (USA)
Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
Union of American Hebrew Congregations
Unitarian Universalist Association
United Church of Christ
United Methodist Church
United Synagogue of America
Women's Caucus Church of the Brethren
YWCA
Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice
Catholics for Free Choice
Evangelicals for Choice
Belief that "a human being exists at conception" is a matter of faith, not fact. Legislating antiabortion faith would be as immoral and unAmerican as passing a law that all citizens must attend Catholic mass!

The bible does not condemn abortion; but even if it did, we live under a secular constitution, not in a theocracy. The separation of church and state, the right to privacy, and women's rights all demand freedom of choice.

http://www.ffrf.org/nontracts/abortion.html

[Butters]

One sided. That's the abortion stance of most Christians -- one sided. We hear the Christian Coalition speak against abortion. We hear Focus on the Family tell Republican candidates it will not support them unless they state their opposition to abortion. We hear Operation Rescue's Christian members praying God will turn back the clock and make abortion illegal again. Over and over we are bombarded with the "Christian" perspective that abortion is outright wrong, no exceptions.
With all these groups chanting the same mantra, there must be some pretty overwhelming biblical evidence of abortion's evil, right?

Wrong. In reality there is merely overwhelming evidence that most people don't take time to read their own Bibles. People will listen to their pastors and to Christian radio broadcasters. They will skim through easy-to-read pamphlets and perhaps look up the one or two verses printed therein, but they don't actually read their Bibles and make up their own minds on issues such as abortion. They merely listen to others who quote a verse to support a view they heard from someone else. By definition, most Christians, rather than reading for themselves, follow the beliefs of a Culture of Christianity -- and many of the Culture's beliefs are based on one or two verses of the Bible, often taken out of context.

This is most definitely the case when it comes to abortion. Ask most anti-abortion Christians to support their view, and they'll give you a couple of verses. One, quite obviously, is the Commandment against murder. But that begs the question of whether or not abortion is murder, which begs the question of whether or not a fetus is the same as a full-term human person. To support their beliefs, these Christians point to one of three bible verses that refer to God working in the womb. The first is found in Psalms:

"For Thou didst form my inward parts; Thou didst weave me in my mother's womb. I will give thanks to Thee, for Thou art fearfully wonderful (later texts were changed to read "for I am fearfully and wonderfully made"); wonderful are Thy works, and my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from Thee, when I was made in secret, and skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth. Thine eyes have seen my unformed substance; and in Thy book they were all written, the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them."
Psalm 139:13-16
Although this passage does make the point that God was involved in the creation of this particular human being, it does not state that during the creation the fetus is indeed a person. According to Genesis, God was involved in the creation of every living thing, and yet that doesn't make every living thing a full human person. In other words, just because God was involved in its creation, it does not mean terminating it is the same as murder. It's only murder if a full human person is destroyed.
But even if we agreed to interpret these verses the same way that anti-abortion Christians do, we still have a hard time arguing that the Bible supports an anti-abortion point of view. If anything, as we will soon see, abortion is biblical.

Anytime we take one or two verses out of their context and quote them as doctrine, we place ourselves in jeopardy of being contradicted by other verses. Similarly, some verses that make perfect sense while standing alone take on a different feel when seen in the greater context in which they were written. And we can do some rather bizarre things to the Scriptures when we take disparate verses from the same context and use them as stand-alone doctrinal statements. Some prime examples of this come from the same book of the Bible as our last quote. Consider these verses that claim that God has abandoned us:

"Why dost Thou stand afar off, O Lord? Why dost Thou hide Thyself in times of trouble?"
Psalm 10:1
"How long, O Lord? Wilt Thou forget me forever? How long wilt Thou hide Thy face from me?"
Psalm 13:1
"O God, Thou hast rejected us. Thou hast broken us; Thou hast been angry; O, restore us.
Psalm 60:1
Not only can we use out-of-context verses to support that God doesn't care for us anymore, we can even use them to show how we can ask God to do horrible and vile things to people we consider our enemies. In this example, King David even wanted God to cause harm to the innocent children of his enemy:
"Let his days be few; let another take his office. Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow. Let his children wander about and beg; and let them seek sustenance far from their ruined homes. Let the creditor seize all that he has; and let strangers plunder the product of his labor. Let there be none to extend lovingkindness to him, nor any to be gracious to his fatherless children."
Psalm 109:8-12
Are we indeed to interpret that God, speaking through David in these Psalms, is saying we have been abandoned by God and that when wronged we can ask God to cause our enemies to die and cause our enemies' children to wander hungry and homeless? Indeed, it would seem the case.
But rather than interpret that God is with us as a fetus, but forgets us as adults, and yet will allow us to plead for the death of our enemies, we need to look at the greater context in which all these verses are found: songs.

Called Psalms, these are the songs of King David, a man of great faith who was also greatly tormented. He was a man of passions. He loved God, lusted for another man's wife, and murdered him to get her. He marveled at nature and at his own existence. All his great swings in emotion are recorded in the songs he wrote, and we can read them today in the Book of Psalms. What we cannot do is take one song, or one stanza of a song, and proclaim that it is indeed to be taken literally while taking other stanzas from David's songs and claim they should not be taken literally.

Yet that is exactly what anti-abortion Christians are asking us to do. They use those few verses from the Psalms to support their dogma that abortion is wrong. They proclaim those verses as holy writ and the other verses as poetry that we should not be following. Clearly, this is a perfect example of taking verses out of context. And it leads us to only one conclusion: if we cannot trust that God wants to kill our enemies and abandon us, we must also conclude that we cannot trust that God has defined the fetus as being a person.

For indeed, if we allow that kind of thinking we could also make an argument that God is willing to maul children to death if they make fun of a bald guy who just happens to be in God's favor. You think I'm joking, but I'm not. In the book of Second Kings, our hero, the Prophet Elisha, who was quite bald, so it seems, was taunted by a group of young boys. Elisha's response was bitter and cruel:

"...as he was going up by the way, young lads came out from the city and mocked him and said to him, 'Go up, you baldhead; go up you baldhead!' When he looked behind him and saw them, he cursed them in the name of the Lord. Then two female bears came out of the woods and tore up forty-two lads of their number."
2 Kings 2:22-24
Did God kill those forty-two kids for making fun of a bald prophet? We can certainly make an argument for that if we use the anti-abortionists' kind of thinking.
Likewise we can also use the anti-abortionists' methods to establish that God approves of pornography, as seen in these following verses by Solomon as he pondered the female body:

"How beautiful are your feet in sandals, O prince's daughter! The curves of your hips are like jewels, the work of the hands of an artist. Your navel is like a round goblet which never lacks for mixed wine; your belly is like a heap of wheat fenced about with lilies. Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle."
"Your stature is like a palm tree, and your breasts are like its clusters. I said 'I will climb the palm tree, I will take hold of its fruit stalks.' Oh, may your breasts be like clusters of the vine, and the fragrance of your breath like apples, and your mouth like the best wine."

Song of Solomon 7:1-3,7-9
Pretty steamy stuff. Taken by itself, it would appear God is indeed promoting a written form of pornography. But just like Psalm 139:13-16, we cannot take it by itself. Instead we must take it within the context it was written.
The same is true with the other two verses used by anti-abortion Christians to defend their cause. From the book of Jeremiah, these Crusaders are fond of quoting the phrase, "Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee," from the first chapter. But they never quote the entire passage, which changes the meaning considerably:

"Then the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations. Then said I, Ah, Lord GOD! behold, I cannot speak: for I am a child. But the Lord said unto me, Say not, I am a child: for thou shalt go to all that I shall send thee, and whatsoever I command thee thou shalt speak. Be not afraid of their faces: for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord. Then the Lord put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. And the Lord said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth. See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant."
Jeremiah 1:4-10
This is a special event -- the birth of a prophet. God brought the prophet Jeremiah into the world for a divine purpose, and because of that, God was planning Jeremiah's life "before" he was even conceived. God was preparing him to do miraculous things, such as speak on behalf of God while still a child and setting him up as an overseer of nations and kingdoms. But the anti-abortionists simply overlook this on their way to claiming that the one phrase they quote proves God sees us as individual people while still in the womb. God saw Jeremiah in that way, but to claim it applies to all of us is akin to saying that we were all prepared as children to speak for God, and that God has placed all of us "over the nations and over the kingdoms" of the world. In essence, to claim this verse applies to anyone other than Jeremiah is to claim that we are all God's divine prophets. We are not; therefore, we cannot apply these verses to our own lives.
Another problem in this passage is the phrase, "Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee." In Psalm 139:13-16 the anti-abortionists claim that because God was active in the creation of King David in his mother's womb that we must conclude the fetus is recognized by God as being a person. But here we see God stating that he knew Jeremiah "before" he was formed in the womb. By anti-abortionist logic, we would have to conclude that we are a human person even before conception. Since this is a ridiculous notion, we must, therefore, conclude that the anti-abortionist is interpreting these verses incorrectly.

The last verse most often quoted by anti-abortion Christians relates the story of Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, and Mary, the mother of Jesus, while both were pregnant. When they meet, the pre-born John the Baptist leaps in his mother's womb at Mary's salutation. Let's read the original:

"And Mary arose in those days, and went into the hill country with haste, into a city of Juda; And entered into the house of Zacharias, and saluted Elisabeth. And it came to pass, that, when Elisabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elisabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost:"
Luke 1:39-41
As much as the anti-abortion lobby would like this to mean that all fetuses are sentient persons because one is recorded as knowing Mary's words and then leapt inside the womb, the logic is as flawed as the Isaiah misquote. Again we have a miraculous event. Again we have a divine prophet whom God had ordained since before he was conceived. And this time it's even more miraculous, because the gestating John the Baptist is reacting to the approach of Mary, who at the time was pregnant with Jesus. Unless we believe all of us are chosen before birth to be the divine prophet ordained by God to herald the arrival of Christ on earth, then we cannot claim this passage refers to us. And indeed, it does not. While gestating fetuses are known to move and kick as their nervous systems and muscles are under construction, only divinely-inspired babies understand the spoken words of the mother of Jesus and can leap in recognition.
The point to all this is simple: we cannot take the verses we like and interpret them to support what we want to support. And, more to the point, we cannot simply accept what some Christian leaders proclaim as being God's word on a given subject without carefully reading the full text of the book and taking into consideration the entire context. We cannot, as we have shown, simply interpret those few verses from Psalms, Isaiah, and Luke as a reason to be against abortion. And, as we will see in a moment, there are still other verses -- if interpreted in the sloppy manner demonstrated by anti-abortion Christians -- in the Bible that could easily lead us to argue that indeed God, at times, supports abortion. Let's take a look.

In the full context of Ecclesiastes, King Solomon makes the point that much of life is futile. Over and over he writes that if life is good then we should be thankful. But when life is not good, Solomon makes some interesting statements:

"If a man fathers a hundred children and lives many years, however many they be, but his soul is not satisfied with good things, and he does not even have a proper burial, then I say, `Better the miscarriage than he, for it comes in futility and goes into obscurity; and its name is covered in obscurity. It never sees the sun and it never knows anything; it is better off than he.'"
Ecclesiastes 6:3-5
Clearly there is a quality of life issue being put forth in the Scriptures. And in this case, Solomon makes the point that it is sometimes better to end a pregnancy prematurely than to allow it to continue into a miserable life. This is made even more clear in these following verses:
"Then I looked again at all the acts of oppression which were being done under the sun. And behold I saw the tears of the oppressed and that they had no one to comfort them; and on the side of their oppressors was power, but they had no one to comfort them. So I congratulated the dead who are already dead more than the living who are still living. But better off than both of them is the one who has never existed, who has never seen the evil activity that is done under the sun."
Ecclesiastes 4:1-3
Here we have an argument for both euthanasia and abortion. When quality of life is at stake, Solomon seems to make the argument that ending a painful life or ending what will be a painful existence is preferable. Now remember, we're not talking about David's songs here. We're reading the words of the man to whom God gave the world's greatest wisdom.
And Solomon was not alone in this argument. Consider the words of Job, a man of great faith and wealth, when his life fell upon the hardest of times:

"And Job said, 'Let the day perish on which I was to be born, and the night which said, "a boy is conceived." May that day be darkness; let not God above care for it, nor light shine on it.'"
"Why did I not die at birth, come forth from my womb and expire? Why did the knees receive me, and why the breasts, that I should suck? For now I would have lain down and been quiet; I would have slept then, I would have been at rest, with kings and with counselors of the earth, who rebuilt ruins for themselves; or with princes who had gold, who were filling their houses with silver,. Or like the miscarriage which is discarded, I would not be, as infants that never saw light. There the wicked cease from raging, and there the weary are at rest. The prisoners are at ease together; they do not hear the voice of the taskmaster. The small and the great are there, and the slave is free from his master."

Job 3:2-4,11-19
And again a few chapters later Job reiterates the greater grace he would have known if his life had been terminated as a fetus:
"Why then hast Thou brought me out of the womb? Would that I had died and no eye had seen me! I should have been as though I had not been, carried from womb to tomb."
Job 10:18-19
Clearly there is a strong argument here that the quality of a life is as important if not more important than the act of being born. Indeed, we could claim that the Bible supports ending a pregnancy in the face of a life without quality. And, if I wanted to be bold, I could claim that this interpretation is in fact a biblical mandate to support the use of abortion as a way to improve our quality of life. And taking these verses to their extreme, I could claim that abortion is not just a good idea, it is a sacrament.
Actually, I will stop short of making that claim. In fact, I will stop short of making the claim that the Bible condemns or supports abortion at all. It does neither. The condemning and supporting comes not from the words of the Bible but from leaders within our Culture of Christianity who use verses out of context -- the same way I just did to support abortion -- to support their views against abortion. The condemning and the supporting comes not from the Scriptures but from average Christians who take the easy way out, accepting one or two verses of the Bible as proof that their leaders are speaking the gospel truth. The condemning and supporting comes not from God but from those who do not take the time to read the Bible, in its own context, and decide for themselves the meanings therein.

For indeed, there is one passage in the Bible that deals specifically with the act of causing a woman to abort a pregnancy. And the penalty for causing the abortion is not what many would lead us to believe:

"And if men struggle and strike a woman with child so that she has a miscarriage, yet there is no further injury, he shall be fined as the woman's husband may demand of him, and he shall pay as the judges decide. But if there is any further injury, then you shall appoint as a penalty life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise."
Exodus 21:22-25
This is a very illuminating passage. In it we find a woman losing her child by being stuck by men who are fighting. Rather than it being a capital offense, however, it is relegated to a civil matter, with the father-to-be taking the participants to court for a settlement. But, as we read on, if the woman is killed, a "life for a life," then the men who killed her shall be killed. Some have claimed that the life for a life part is talking about the baby. But from reading the context we can see this is not true. It also states a tooth for a tooth and a burn for a burn. Babies don't have teeth when they are born, and it is highly unlikely a baby will be burned during birth. It is pretty clear that this part refers to the mother. Thus we can see that if the baby is lost, it does not require a death sentence -- it is not considered murder. But if the woman is lost, it is considered murder and is punished by death.

It's important to note that some anti-abortion lobbyists want to convince us the baby in this passage survived the miscarriage. They point to the more "politically-correct" translation they find in the New International Version of the Bible. There it translates the term "miscarriage" into "gives birth prematurely" (the actual words in Hebrew translate "she lose her offspring"). While this may give them the warm and fuzzy notion that this verse might actually support their cause if maybe the child survived, it is wishful thinking at best. In our modern era of miracle medicine only 60% of all premature births survive. Three thousand years ago, when this passage was written, they did not have modern technology to keep a preemie alive. In fact, at that time, more than half of all live births died before their first birthday. In a world like that, a premature birth was a death sentence.

Others have looked to the actual Hebrew words, themselves, to try and refute these verses. They note that the word "yalad" is used in verse 22 to describe the untimely birth, and that yalad is also used in other places to describe a live birth. They then go on to say other places in the Bible use the words "nefel" and "shakol" to describe a miscarriage. Therefore, the argument goes, the baby in Exodus 21:22 must have been born alive. It's easy to see how a novice might make this mistake, but a closer look at the words in question reveal the flaw in this argument.

The word yalad is a verb that describes the process of something coming out - the departing of the fetus. Since it is describing the process, and not the result, it could be used to describe either a live birth or a miscarriage. Shakol which shows up in Hosea 9:14, is also a verb, but its meaning is to make a woman barren. Now a barren woman certainly might miscarry, but with this understanding of the word, it's clear why the writer of Exodus would not have used it since this miscarriage was caused by an accident, not by barrenness. And the word nefel is not even a verb. It's a noun. True, as a noun it is the term for a miscarried fetus, but the writer wasn't using a noun. He was using a verb to describe the coming out of the fetus. Thus, if I were describing a man falling to his death, I would use the verb "to fall" which can be used for both those who die and those who survive a fall, but to describe the man himself I would use the word the "fatality." So we can see that while a novice might mistake a verb for a noun and come to the wrong conclusions about the original Hebrew words used in the Exodus passage, a more careful look proves that the words only describe the action of losing the fetus, not the fetus itself. And that being the case, we can't use the Hebrew translations to determine if the fetus was alive or not when it came out - so we are forced to accept that in all certainly, considering the medical knowledge at the time, the preemie died. This makes it even more clear that the "tooth for a tooth" passage refers only to the mother, not to the miscarried fetus.

What has been so clearly demonstrated by the passage in Exodus - the fact that God does not consider a fetus a human person - can also be seen in a variety of other Bible verses. In Leviticus 27:6 a monetary value was placed on children, but not until they reached one month old (any younger had no value). Likewise, in Numbers 3:15 a census was commanded, but the Jews were told only to count those one month old and above - anything less, particularly a fetus, was not counted as a human person. In Ezekiel 37:8-10 we watch as God re-animates dead bones into living soldiers, but the passage makes the interesting note that they were not alive as persons until their first breath. Likewise, in Genesis 2:7, Adam had a human form and a vibrant new body but he only becomes a fully-alive human person after God makes him breathe. And in the same book, in Genesis 38:24, we read about a pregnant woman condemned to death by burning. Though the leaders of Israel knew the woman was carrying a fetus, this was not taken into consideration. If indeed the Jews, and the God who instructed them, believed the fetus to be an equal human person to the mother, then why would they let the fetus die for the mother's crimes? The truth is simple. A fetus is not a human person, and its destruction is not a murder. Period.



http://elroy.net/ehr/abortion.html

[Socrates]

Butters shows his tremendous copy/pasting skills. Pity he doesn't copy from people who know what they are talking about, and instead parrots from some apostate nobody called McKinley. Last time it was "Hitler was a Christian", which was thoroughly demolished, so that more honest atheists like Lord Snooty and Flipper repudiate this argument http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?postid=56147#post56147. Before that, it was the usual canard that the Galileo affair was "science v religion" when it was really science v science (Aristotelian), as my colleague Socratism and I showed at www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?postid=46901#post46901

I've demolished a few of those pathetic McKinley pro-abortion arguments, e.g. about Ex. 21:22, in this post www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?postid=41060#post41060

[BibleThumper]

No matter the situation, nothing justifies murder.:cry:

[kiwimac]

It is only a murder if the fetus is defined as a human-being rather than a part of the process of becoming a human-being.

Moreover, while lots and lots of folk here have spoken about the sadness of the fetus being killed, very few have spoken compassionately about the plight of the 9 year old. I find that a telling indictement on the focus of most of the christians on this board.

Kiwimac

[Bill the Cat]

Well, Kiwi, as you have the right to disagree, allow me to interject. Do you think this girl will be any less traumatized after the abortion? She is still a rape victim and always will be. As far as the health of the 9 year old, the post I put in about the 5 year old mother clearly shows that no permanent physical harm will be done to the girl. The 5 year old that got pregnant and had a baby by caesarian gave birth again as an adult. I understand that the child would be a reminder of what happened to her, but even after an abortion, she will still be reminded that she is a rape victim.

[Socrates]

KiwiMac:It is only a murder if the fetus is defined as a human-being rather than a part of the process of becoming a human-being.It is a being, and it's human, so it's a human being! QED. :bonk:

What sort of being do YOU think it is? And what gives you the right to impose this unscientific view on the unborn child?

The baby has a unique human genetic code, not the code of anything else. So it's not something that's growing into a human being, but a human being that's growing!

[kiwimac]

Socrates,

I have finally had all I can take of your attitude! If I am able to I will now put you on ignore. Not only are you lacking in compassion, you are lacking in the fruits of the Spirit. I suppose this makes you exactly like every other fundamentalist I have ever met!

Kiwimac

[Socrates]

From: The Pro-Life Infonet <infonet@prolifeinfo.org>
Reply-To: Steven Ertelt <infonet@prolifeinfo.org>
Subject: Nine-Year Old El Salvadoran Girl Doesn't Have Abortion
Source: El Diario de Hoy, Lifesite; April 4, 2003

Nine-Year Old El Salvadoran Girl Doesn't Have Abortion

San Salvador, El Salvador -- A girl of nine years and three months of age has given birth to a healthy baby boy, and is herself doing well after the Caesarian section birth. The very young mother says she was repeatedly abused by her stepfather but says the birth of her son has made her happier than she has been in a very long time.

The El Salvador pro-life group Yes to Life is taking care of the young mother and her baby at a home for unwed mothers.

Julia Regina de Cardenal, president of the pro-life group said that the nine-year-old's mother is still wanting custody of her daughter but insists on remaining with the man accused of assaulting the girl. DNA tests on the baby will confirm the identity of the rapist.

Cardenal said, "the healthy and happy birth of the baby is in stark contrast to the situation in Nicaragua where another 9-year-old rape victim had her baby aborted after relentless pressure by feminist groups who wished to use her case to advance the cause for legal abortion."

Meanwhile, questions still remain in the Nicaragua case.

The case of Rosa, the nine year old Nicaraguan girl that was raped and became pregnant and later received an abortion when her baby was already 17 weeks ols, remains a puzzle. Elida Solorzano, a pro-life leader in Nicaragua said that those who aborted the girl's baby did not retain the fetal remains for DNA evidence against the rapist.

The pro-abortion group calling itself "Women's Network Against Violence" has had the girl and her parents in hiding since the case emerged, and continues to conceal their whereabouts even after the abortion. Even the Ministry of Health, which is responsible to evaluate the girl's health, does not know where she is.

The pro-abortion group said an abortion was necessary to save the girl's life, however medical examiners said the risks of an abortion were the same as those of giving birth. The healthy birth of a baby to the El Salvadoran demonstrates the possibility of such births without serious physical complications for the mother.

Solorzano also said that it has not yet been determined who was responsible for Rosa's pregnancy. An 18-year-old suspect who is being held in custody will be released since he was not found to have the same sexually transmitted diseases that Rosa sustained during the assault.

Rosa's stepfather is suspected by some of being the rapist. However, since the abortionists - who received permission to abort the child from the ste father- destroyed the baby's remains, there is no evidence to identify the culprit.

Pro-life groups charge that the "Women's Network Against Violence" has no interest in brining the rapist to justice, but only to further their cause of making abortion legal. They have approached the District Attorney with a list of 11 violations of the law in the case. However the DA's office has not responded to the group in the mandatory time allotted. The pro-life groups plan to press the issue but were not surprised by the resistance from the DA's office.

The assistant District Attorney is the founder of a pro-abortion NGO which in turn is a member of "Women's Network Against Violence."

--
Find pro-life books, materials and merchandise at Life Cycle
Books. Go to http://www.lifecyclebooks.com

[Socrates]

Kiwimac:Not only are you lacking in compassion, you are lacking in the fruits of the Spirit.One must wonder where Kiwi gets his knowledge of the fruits of the Spirit. I get mine from the Bible, but Kiwi explicitly rejects Biblical authority. But if he nevertheless claims to believe this section of Scripture, on what grounds can he claim that this is not one of the errant parts?

(Note to Woman -- this part is written by Paul, :brow:)

[Pilgrim]

Yesterday @ 04:23 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=58217#post58217)
BibleThumper:

No matter the situation, nothing justifies murder.:cry:

I take it you are against the war in Iraq then?

[Socrates]

BibleThumper:


No matter the situation, nothing justifies murder.

Pilgrim:I take it you are against the war in Iraq then.Talk about question-begging! Murder is defined as intentional killing of innocent humans. Killing in war is cleary NOT murder, as the Bible makes clear.

[kiwimac]

Better watch out Pilgrim, Socrates will probably tell you that the OT commandment only applies to peacetime situations.
:huh:

Conveniently ignoring Christ's commands to loving acceptance of the other in the NT. of course, this would require Spot to treat others with tolerance and to show forth the fruits of the Spirit.

As well, we can dream, can't we?

Kiwimac

[Sher]

04-06-2003 @ 06:13 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=56754#post56754)
kiwimac:

I was a counsellor for many years, I have dealt with this kind of situation professionally, have you?Counseling cannot give you the insight save from a secondary postition ... and judgment from the outside can never be 100% accurate. I have personal experience and let's leave it at that.

{edit spelling error}

[kiwimac]

Sherbear,

I understand better your depth of feeling here but unless you have spent time working with others your experiences are solely for you, they cannot be extrapolated out to others.

It is only as you work with folk in situations like this and discover that there are all kinds of emotional / social / ethical / moral distinctions between them as well as similarities that you begin to see that the balck and white "abortion is wrong regardless" position is over determined.

God Grace you

Kiwimac

[Sher]

04-06-2003 @ 11:29 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=56999#post56999)
kiwimac:

Just a point here, I have noticed that neither you nor Sherbear are actually addressing my points just attacking me and finding various ways to do it. Is it that your stance is as indefensible to you as it is to me? Or has it finally dawned on you that your lack of compassion for the victim of the rape is morally / ethically wrong? So feel free to attack me but do try and answer my question. Why is it wrong for a 9 year old child to not want to bear a child which is the end result of a rape? You say why punish the child in utero so why punish the child who is pregnant? Point A ... I NEVER said that I lacked compassion for the child who was raped... it is a horrible thing. Point B ... destroying a human life is not avoiding punishing the mother ... it is adding punishment that will harm her later as others who have had abortions can attest. Point C ... a 9-year-old child complaining of not wanting to share her toys isn't capable of making this decision for abortion ... it was made for her ... which is why I never said she'd make a GOOD mother but that the child should have been put up for adoption instead of being destroyed.

Your intentional lying was only a side issue that sat wrong with me ... even if you were trying to make a point. But what should I expect from someone who apparently feels it is okay to pick and choose one human life over another ... that mindset is what I really think is indefensible.

I wonder what this child is going to be told when she is a young woman someday and either can't have any more children from a second rate abortion ... or grieves over the destruction of her first child ... will she still feel it was the right decision? Or will she always wonder what the child could have been?

[Sher]

Today @ 01:41 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=59979#post59979)
kiwimac:

Sherbear,

I understand better your depth of feeling here but unless you have spent time working with others your experiences are solely for you, they cannot be extrapolated out to others.I don't think you do/can understand my depth of feeling ... both as a mother and as a rape victim. Thank the Lord no child was the product of that rape; however, as a mother who had many medical complications, I do know the healing power of love of a child that overshadows all sorts of ills. And as a person who has personally counselled, not professionally, other rape victims, it is easy to see that there are hurt feelings that continue for a very long time. That still doesn't negate that a baby is a human life that is precious and one of God's children ... and should not be destroyed because one crime was already committed. Just as two wrongs never make a right ... two moral crimes never make a right.
It is only as you work with folk in situations like this and discover that there are all kinds of emotional / social / ethical / moral distinctions between them as well as similarities that you begin to see that the balck and white &quot;abortion is wrong regardless&quot; position is over determined.Yes, those are valid things but humans are basically the same when it comes down to it ... and there are just too many women who regret the abortion later.
God Grace youYes, God's grace to you also, Kiwimac. Forgive my hard words on this issue but my stance will not be compromising to keep from hurting someone's sensibilities.

[Bill the Cat]

Kiwi, I'd love to hear you're take on my original post. :thumb:


Yesterday @ 12:04 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=58611#post58611)
Bill the Cat:

Well, Kiwi, as you have the right to disagree, allow me to interject. Do you think this girl will be any less traumatized after the abortion? She is still a rape victim and always will be. As far as the health of the 9 year old, the post I put in about the 5 year old mother clearly shows that no permanent physical harm will be done to the girl. The 5 year old that got pregnant and had a baby by caesarian gave birth again as an adult. I understand that the child would be a reminder of what happened to her, but even after an abortion, she will still be reminded that she is a rape victim.

[kiwimac]

Bill,

Thank you for reminding me of your points. I was not ignoring them but I am in the middle of planning a house-shift from Auckland, NZ to Christchurch, NZ (800 kilometres or so) So I am easily distracted at the moment.

You say


Do you think this girl will be any less traumatized after the abortion? She is still a rape victim and always will be. As far as the health of the 9 year old, the post I put in about the 5 year old mother clearly shows that no permanent physical harm will be done to the girl. The 5 year old that got pregnant and had a baby by caesarian gave birth again as an adult. I understand that the child would be a reminder of what happened to her, but even after an abortion, she will still be reminded that she is a rape victim.

I don't think she is yet old enough to understand what bearing a child or having an abortion is BUT she will one day be. My hope is that she would have access to quality counselling that will enable her to understand what happened and to move on in her life.

Really, whether a 5 yr old was delivered of a child is actually secondary. My concern is not actually about the physical damage a birth or a C-section would produce but more about the fact that try as she might it would be difficult for her to see the child born of the rape as anything other than a further 'punishment'.

At the end of the day most churches agree that the lives of those who draw breath, ie, those who are ex-utero are of greater value than the fetus in utero.

The crime that was forced upon this child was tragic, IMO, to ask her to bear the child of that crime without her being able to understand what was being asked of her would be a greater crime still.

it is, as I have said elsewhere in this thread, one thing to ask a mature adult to make this decision, it is quite another to ask it of someone so decidely a minor child.

Kiwimac

[Bill the Cat]

OK. I was not acusing you of avoiding my post, just curious of your view. I respect your points made. The 9 year old probably does not understand the ramifications of abortion, but I can assure you, counseling 12 and 13 year olds who were sexually abused as early as 4, they still remember and it is traumatic. Nothing will worsen the pain for them, not a baby, not still living with their abuser, nothing. What happened was heinous and the man who raped her should be dealt with OT style IMO, but why put her through a procedure as dangerous as an abortion? The complications of abortion are well more long term than her having the baby. Just some fat to chew on.

Cheers!!

[Socrates]

Kiwimac:My concern is not actually about the physical damage a birth or a C-section would produce but more about the fact that try as she might it would be difficult for her to see the child born of the rape as anything other than a further 'punishment'.Why? First, why would she see her child at all if the child were adopted? Second, what's the proof that the child would be a punishment. Consider a woman with a child from a vicious abusive husband that she wants to divorce and escape from? Would this woman leave her child because it reminds her of her abusive husband? Au contraire, most women would fight tooth and nail for custody.

[Socrates]

From: The Pro-Life Infonet <infonet@prolifeinfo.org>
Reply-To: Steven Ertelt <infonet@prolifeinfo.org>
Subject: Planned Parenthood: Iraqi Women Need Abortion
Source: NewsMax; April 8, 2003

Planned Parenthood: Iraqi Women Need Abortion
by Father Michael Reilly

[Pro-Life Infonet Note: Father Michael Reilly is the religion editor for NewsMax.]

What do Iraqi women need now more than ever? According to Planned Parenthood, if you answered food, water or medicine, you're wrong.

Instead, the pro-abortion advocacy group sees the liberation of Iraq as an opportunity to extend abortion and birth control to yet another civilization.

"If we are fighting for freedom in Iraq, then most surely that freedom should extend to women globally and in the United States," says Planned Parenthood President Gloria Feldt, in a statement posted on the group's Web site. "The most fundamental freedom is the freedom of reproductive self-determination."

But the Bush administration, Feldt complains, is standing in the way. "In mid-February, a leaked State Department memo indicated that the administration intended to extend the global gag rule to cover all health programs, including reproductive health programs for refugees."

Imagine the outrage on the "Arab Street" if the U.S. war of liberation became a genuine liberal culture war, with a victorious America imposing abortion on Muslim women of a conquered land.

How might the Muslim world react, for instance, to the words of abortion crusader Margaret Sanger, who favored the practice of eugenics to limit "inferior" populations?

"We are paying for and even submitting to the dictates of an ever increasing, unceasingly spawning class of human beings who never should have been born at all," Sanger wrote in a screed she titled "Pivot of Civilization." "The wealth of individuals and of states is being diverted from the development and progress of human expression and civilization."

If the Bush administration decided to take Planned Parenthood's advice, observations like Sanger's would surely fuel Arab speculation that the U.S. is more interested in aborting Iraq than rebuilding it.

--
Find pro-life books, materials and merchandise at Life Cycle
Books. Go to http://www.lifecyclebooks.com

[TenDimensions]

I really had to get away from this thread for a while because what I was reading was just sickening me. But I read a quote recently that everyone should read, absorb, and take to heart next time they claim to know what's right because they think they are standing on the moral bedrock called the Bible:



Moral clarity often requires hiding certain realities

You think about it some - I hope you all see the deep truth to that statement. I'd even pray for all of you if I thought it would make a difference. :cry:

[Bill the Cat]

A bit cynical 10? A majority of the arguments here are about the scientific question of when does a zygote/fetus/baby become a protected entity. Moral clarity has nothing to do with hiding anything. If you'd be so kind as to give an example, I'm sure the good folks here would love to have an opportunity to respond. The thread here is simply discussing whether it is proper to 1) make this 9 year old have an abortion (a term I'm sure she's not familiar with) and 2) make this 9 year old continue the pregnancy (another term I'm sure she's not familiar with) Any questioning morality should follow a general point made by a poster here and not be a sweeping dismissal of Christian morality in general.

[bar Jonah]

Today @ 06:44 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=60704#post60704)
TenDimensions:

I really had to get away from this thread for a while because what I was reading was just sickening me.
You're not alone, believe me.