Ireland legalizes the killing of the unborn

[Tassman]

All the abortions I've ever had have been undertaken on a whim.

Oh you quixotic fool. LOL

In all seriousness, I think it's reasonable to assume that for most women who are considering getting an abortion, that it's one of the biggest decisions of their lives.

Of course it is, but not if you listen to the Evangelicals. For them it's all about selfish, promiscuous women getting their kicks and murdering their "poor innocent babies" in the womb.

[Cow Poke]

Abortion is not undertaken lightly, or on a "whim", as you lot try to portray those who are pro-choice.

Please show me where I have ever said or implied that abortion was done "on a whim". It's you sick 'lot' who equate it with "swatting a fly". Or was that just a accidental statement revealing the darkness of your foolish heart?

[Starlight]

Please show me where I have ever said or implied that abortion was done "on a whim". It's you sick 'lot' who equate it with "swatting a fly". Or was that just a accidental statement revealing the darkness of your foolish heart?

You just can't help yourself but throw in the nasty digs constantly can you? Speaks loads about your character, or should I say, lack thereof.

[Roy]

Then why does he say such stupid stuff like insisting that hair and spermatozoa are organisms? Is he just trolling us?

He has a position to defend.

Not really. I'm just highlighting flaws in MM's anti-abortion argument and his knowledge of basic biology. Have you fallen for MM and LPOT's other falsehoods, that I'm a rabid pro-choicer (I'm not) or that I've claimed hair and skin cells are organisms (I haven't)?

PS: thanks, but I do admit when I'm wrong.

[Roy]

[Skin cells] do not have the attributes that science uses to describe life (they don't organize, adapt, self-sustain, metabolize, respond to stimuli, etc.)

They do all those things, they have all those attributes.

No, they don't! You say stuff like this, and then you wonder why we laugh at you and question your credentials?

No, we know why you're laughing at us - it's because you're not only stupid enough to think you might know more about cell biology than people who've actually studied it, you're also too stupid to use Google before shooting your mouth off.

Seriously, man, if you came out of your science program believing that skin cells are organisms then someone took your money and handed you a worthless diploma.

I challenge you to find just one credible scientific source that describes skins cells as life-forms.

You're also too stupid to realise that your dishonest goal-post shift from cells growinbg/metabolising/responding to stimuli to cells being organisms is obvious to everyone.

[Roy]

Abortion on demand, whenever and for whatever reason, no matter how trivial, should be off the table.

It was never on the table. It seems to be a standard pro-life claim that abortion advocates want abortions to be legal at all stages of development right up to birth, with no justification being necessary.

That's simply not true.

[Cow Poke]

It was never on the table. It seems to be a standard pro-life claim that abortion advocates want abortions to be legal at all stages of development right up to birth, with no justification being necessary.

That's simply not true.

It seems to be true in some situations, Roy, but I'd admit that's probably very rare. There are, certainly, Partial-Birth Abortion advocates, but there's apparently a lot of misconception on both sides on this.

The article below is an OPINION piece by C. EVERETT KOOP, which will make the abortion defenders howl, but he was, indeed, a surgeon, and admits his own bias.

Source: NYT

The Senate is expected to vote today on whether to join the House in overriding President Clinton's veto of a bill last April banning partial-birth abortion. In this procedure, a doctor pulls out the baby's feet first, until the baby's head is lodged in the birth canal. Then, the doctor forces scissors through the base of the baby's skull, suctions out the brain, and crushes the skull to make extraction easier. Even some pro-choice advocates wince at this, as when Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan termed it ''close to infanticide.''

The anti-abortion forces often imply that this procedure is usually performed late in the third trimester on fully developed babies. Actually, most partial-birth abortions are performed late in the second trimester, around 26 weeks. Some of these would be viable babies.

But the misinformation campaign conducted by the advocates of partial-birth abortion is much more misleading. At first, abortion-rights activists claimed this procedure hardly ever took place. When pressed for figures, several pro-abortion groups came up with 500 a year, but later investigations revealed that in New Jersey alone 1,500 partial-birth abortions are performed each year. Obviously, the national annual figure is much higher.

The primary reason given for this procedure -- that it is often medically necessary to save the mother's life -- is a false claim, though many people, including President Clinton, were misled into believing this. With all that modern medicine has to offer, partial-birth abortions are not needed to save the life of the mother, and the procedure's impact on a woman's cervix can put future pregnancies at risk. Recent reports have concluded that a majority of partial-birth abortions are elective, involving a healthy woman and normal fetus.

I'll admit to a personal bias: In my 30 years as a pediatric surgeon, I operated on newborns as tiny as some of these aborted babies, and we corrected congenital defects so they could live long and productive lives.

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[Cerebrum123]

Generally - I agree with points 1-3. Morally, I agree with point 4 as well. Here's my problem. If the government steps in and makes a law about #4, then the government is stepping in to tell an independent citizen with mature faculties who has not committed a crime what they can and cannot do medically with their own body. There is simply no way I can walk through that door. Neither can I endorse "abortion on demand." This is an issue that pits two closely held ideals against one another: life and liberty. The government exists to protect life - but also exists to protect liberty. Because of the entwined nature of the mother/child, there is simply no way to resolve this issue without sacrificing one or the other position.

Ergo, I believe abortion should be as non-existent as we can make it. I also believe the only way we can achieve that is to come together (left and right), put all of the techniques we can conceive of for avoiding unwanted pregnancies on the table, and then implement programs to drive unwanted pregnancies as low as they can go. Focus on the impact on the child, the mother, and the community. Emphasize birth control in all of its forms (abstinence, condoms, etc.). Make "unwanted pregnancy" something nobody wants to do. And then implement programs to support those mothers who do end up with an unwanted pregnancy, to encourage them in every way possible/effective to carry the child to term and then either raise it, turn to an adoption agency, or turn to family.

I believe it is possible to get abortion to a fraction of what it is today - but it requires us to work together to achieve it. As long as the focus is law and pitting one side against the other, nothing more will happen and abortions will continue unabated - which would be a travesty.

I see what you did there.

[Cow Poke]

You just can't help yourself but throw in the nasty digs constantly can you? Speaks loads about your character, or should I say, lack thereof.

I quoted YOU, Star.... YOU are the one who compared "swatting a fly" with ending the life of an unborn baby. It's a "nasty dig" to quote your own words?

Well I don't think "you're inconvenient" would be a good reason for killing your 10 year old kid, but it seems legitimate grounds for swatting a fly or a human embryo that has similar mental capabilities to a fly.

Your words - your character.

[Roy]

It seems to be true in some situations, Roy, but I'd admit that's probably very rare.

Very rare seems right.

So why didn't you correct CMD? He implied pro-choices wanted abortion available "whenever and for whatever reason, no matter how trivial". You're objecting to pro-lifers being characterised as saying pro-choicers want abortions on a whim, but when CMD says something to that effect you not only didn't correct him, you Amened his post.

Your cite says that both sides are presenting misleading pictures. That will never change unless people are willing to correct misinformation put out by those they agree with.

[Cow Poke]

Very rare seems right.

So why didn't you correct CMD? He implied pro-choices wanted abortion available "whenever and for whatever reason, no matter how trivial". You're objecting to pro-lifers being characterised as saying pro-choicers want abortions on a whim, but when CMD says something to that effect you not only didn't correct him, you Amened his post.

Your cite says that both sides are presenting misleading pictures. That will never change unless people are willing to correct misinformation put out by those they agree with.

I posted it here for all to see, Roy.

[rogue06]

It seems to be true in some situations, Roy, but I'd admit that's probably very rare. There are, certainly, Partial-Birth Abortion advocates, but there's apparently a lot of misconception on both sides on this.

The article below is an OPINION piece by C. EVERETT KOOP, which will make the abortion defenders howl, but he was, indeed, a surgeon, and admits his own bias.

Source: NYT

The Senate is expected to vote today on whether to join the House in overriding President Clinton's veto of a bill last April banning partial-birth abortion. In this procedure, a doctor pulls out the baby's feet first, until the baby's head is lodged in the birth canal. Then, the doctor forces scissors through the base of the baby's skull, suctions out the brain, and crushes the skull to make extraction easier. Even some pro-choice advocates wince at this, as when Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan termed it ''close to infanticide.''

The anti-abortion forces often imply that this procedure is usually performed late in the third trimester on fully developed babies. Actually, most partial-birth abortions are performed late in the second trimester, around 26 weeks. Some of these would be viable babies.

But the misinformation campaign conducted by the advocates of partial-birth abortion is much more misleading. At first, abortion-rights activists claimed this procedure hardly ever took place. When pressed for figures, several pro-abortion groups came up with 500 a year, but later investigations revealed that in New Jersey alone 1,500 partial-birth abortions are performed each year. Obviously, the national annual figure is much higher.

The primary reason given for this procedure -- that it is often medically necessary to save the mother's life -- is a false claim, though many people, including President Clinton, were misled into believing this. With all that modern medicine has to offer, partial-birth abortions are not needed to save the life of the mother, and the procedure's impact on a woman's cervix can put future pregnancies at risk. Recent reports have concluded that a majority of partial-birth abortions are elective, involving a healthy woman and normal fetus.

I'll admit to a personal bias: In my 30 years as a pediatric surgeon, I operated on newborns as tiny as some of these aborted babies, and we corrected congenital defects so they could live long and productive lives.

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Not just partial birth abortion (which was a big issue during George W. Bush's Administration^[1]) but even after-birth abortion. From a 2015 thread:

As I noted in a thread from awhile back...

I had a thread on after-birth abortions that was lost in the crash. From Slate (described as a United States-based liberal, English language online current affairs and culture magazine created in 1996 by former New Republic editor Michael Kinsley)":

...“after-birth abortion” is a term invented by two philosophers, Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva. In the Journal of Medical Ethics, they propose:

[W]hen circumstances occur after birth such that they would have justified abortion, what we call after-birth abortion should be permissible. … [W]e propose to call this practice ‘after-birth abortion’, rather than ‘infanticide,’ to emphasize that the moral status of the individual killed is comparable with that of a fetus … rather than to that of a child. Therefore, we claim that killing a newborn could be ethically permissible in all the circumstances where abortion would be. Such circumstances include cases where the newborn has the potential to have an (at least) acceptable life, but the well-being of the family is at risk.


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Ann Furedi, head of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS), the primary abortion provider in Britain, is on record as saying at the 2012 Fédération Internationale des Associés Professionnels de l'Avortement et de la Contraception (a.k.a., International Federation of Professional Abortion and Contraception Associates or FIAPAC) Congress that, “There is nothing magical about passing through the birth canal that transforms the fetus into a person" demonstrating her support for this concept.

This appears to be the opinion of BPAS's American counterpart, Planned Parenthood, when a lobbyist for their Florida affiliates, Alisa LaPolt Snow had the following exchange with Jim Boyd and Jose Oliva -- members of the Florida House of Representatives:

"It is just really hard for me to even ask you this question because I’m almost in disbelief," said Rep. Jim Boyd. "If a baby is born on a table as a result of a botched abortion, what would Planned Parenthood want to have happen to that child that is struggling for life?”

"We believe that any decision that's made should be left up to the woman, her family, and the physician," said Planned Parenthood lobbyist Snow. . . .

Rep. Jose Oliva followed up, asking the Planned Parenthood official, "You stated that a baby born alive on a table as a result of a botched abortion that that decision should be left to the doctor and the family. Is that what you’re saying?”

Again, Snow replied, “That decision should be between the patient and the health care provider.”

You can see the exchange here:

Melissa Victoria Harris-Perry, who hosts a weekend news and opinion television show on MSNBC and was recently in the news for mocking Mitt Romney and his adopted black grandson (for which she later apologized for), appears to be another advocate of after-birth abortions based upon her comments on her show back on July 21: ""When does life begin? I submit the answer depends an awful lot on the feeling of the parents. A powerful feeling -- but not science."

And keep in mind that while a senator in the Illinois legislature, our current president, Barack Obama, opposed efforts to protect babies who had survived abortion attempts voting against Born Alive acts in Illinois as well as opposing legislation that would define those babies as persons. During debate over one of the Born Alive bills Obama made it clear that he was far more concerned with things like protecting abortion itself and with protecting doctors who just shouldn’t be required to preserve the lives of babies who stubbornly refused to die and were born alive as can be seen from his remarks:

As I understand it, this puts the burden on the attending physician who has determined, since they were performing this procedure, that, in fact, this is a nonviable fetus; that if that fetus, or child — however way you want to describe it — is now outside the mother’s womb and the doctor continues to think that it’s nonviable but there’s, let’s say, movement or some indication that, in fact, they’re not just coming out limp and dead.

So if the doctor was wrong and the baby certainly was viable in that it actually survived an attempt to kill it, then the doctor shouldn't be "burden[ed]" with trying to keep the baby alive since it had the gall to "not just coming out limp and dead."

I guess if someone is sick or injured and a doctor assumes that they won't survive but in fact does then that doctor shouldn't be burdened with helping to keep them alive but should be free to refuse all treatment and even food and water so that they will finally die.

[/quote]

What does it say about our society when it can even entertain such a reprehensible evil practice?

Oh, and in spite of the joke that is Snopes when it comes to fact checking controversial subjects (especially if politics is involved) proclaiming that after-birth abortions (which is in effect euthanasia) are nothing more than a "manufactured controversy from several years ago" it appears to already be taking place in the Netherlands:

Source: “After-birth abortion” already exists in the Netherlands

“After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?” by Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva, was merely an infanticide thought-experiment. The special issue of the Journal of Medical Ethics includes a contribution from a paediatrician who actually has done it. Dr Eduard Verhagen, a paediatrician at University Medical Centre Groningen in the Netherlands, says that, in his experience, infanticide is sometimes preferable to second-trimestre abortion.

The so-called Groningen Protocol (GP) in the Netherlands allows euthanasia of newborns under strict conditions if there is “hopeless and unbearable suffering” and both parents give “informed consent”. Dr Verhagen claims that there were fewer instances of newborn euthanasia after the publication of the GP – but for reasons not connected with it. With more prenatal screening, more women opted for terminations of pregnancy in difficult cases like spinal bifida. The number of newborn euthanasia cases actually fell from 15 in 2005 to 2 in 2010.

The GP is, of course, very controversial. In an article in The Lancet in 2008, a paediatric oncologist and bioethicist at the Cleveland Clinic, Erik Kodish, angrily repudiated it. “The very notion that there is an ‘accepted medical standard’ for infanticide calls for resistance in the form of civil disobedience,” he wrote.

However, in some cases, “after-birth abortion” might be the most sensible treatment, Verhagen believes, as it allows the parents and the doctors to make a more accurate diagnosis and to discuss treatment opinions. “If all stakeholders conclude that the prognosis is very grim, the babies condition is judged as one with sustained and intolerable suffering, and the parents request for euthanasia, why should that not be permissible as an alternative to second trimester termination?”

In any case, Dr Verhagen points out, the official opinion of the American Academy of Pediatrics is that it is morally permissible to withdraw or withhold hydration and nutrition from newborns in some cases. These include ”children in a persistent vegetative state or children with anencephaly”. This is a form of euthanasia, but the child lingers for a long time while it starves to death. “If the parents wish to shorten that course, and organise their child's death more in the way they have envisioned it, shouldn't euthanasia be available for them?”



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And then there is this (check from the 5 minute mark):

indicating that Planned Parenthood in St. Paul, Minnesota will “Break the Baby’s Neck” if the abortion process fails and the baby is born alive:

We don’t tell women this […] but if we was to proceed with the abortion and the baby was to come out still alive and active, most likely we would break the baby’s neck

1. And IIRC Republican opposition to it was the reason that Trump left the Republican Party and became a Democrat

[KingsGambit]

The issue at hand is whether (as CMD's post appeared to imply) the majority (or even many) pro-choice advocates support this, not whether anybody supports this. I'm not sure myself.

[rogue06]

Very rare seems right.

So why didn't you correct CMD? He implied pro-choices wanted abortion available "whenever and for whatever reason, no matter how trivial". You're objecting to pro-lifers being characterised as saying pro-choicers want abortions on a whim, but when CMD says something to that effect you not only didn't correct him, you Amened his post.

Your cite says that both sides are presenting misleading pictures. That will never change unless people are willing to correct misinformation put out by those they agree with.

Unfortunately there are those who see abortions as being something to celebrate and are unhappy when abortion numbers drop and happy when they go up.

From a few short past posts:

Celebrating abortions:

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Among certain elements it is virtually becoming a sacrament.

Earlier this year Planned Parenthood was able to gather 20 religious leaders to bless their newest center in Washington D.C. built next to an Elementary school. The president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington gushed, "In almost every message to our staff, I talk about our doing sacred work. This confirms the sacredness of the work we do." Providing abortions (and let's not kid ourselves, in spite of their protests to the contrary, that is pretty much PP's primary activity) is "sacred work" for these people.

And about the same time the TV show Degrassi: Next Class in an episode called "#IRegretNothing" has a 16 year old going to an abortion clinic where one of her friends says "Making that difficult choice and standing up for it? You’re courageous! We should go out and celebrate!" And they all go out to celebrate by having ice cream. They call it celebrating a second time when one proclaims that they're going "To celebrate Lola’s bravery!" Yeah real brave, killing a defenseless unborn baby. Maybe she should get a medal.

As an aside, the girl who had the abortion remarks that she doesn't feel sad about aborting her baby to which one of her classmates adds "A lot of women have abortions and feel no shame," and goes on to cite rapper Nicki Minaj as one celebrity who had an abortion while still in High School. What is left out is that in 2014 Minaj told Rolling Stone magazine that this decision has "haunted me all my life." Darn those pesky details.

Two years ago there was a piece in the Huffington Post urging women to celebrate Mother's Day with abortion. Talk about the world turned upside down. Since then others have celebrated Valentine's Day with abortion such as TeenVogue.com which posted a "What to Get a Friend Post-Abortion" guide including this (crass and crude warning to those who click on it). And the Vegan website VegWeb.com was promoting a "Valentine’s Day Sale" for abortion pills.

And the entire #ShoutYourAbortion movement is little more than an effort to celebrate abortions

Happy about increased abortions:

Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains, located in Las Vegas, Nevada (Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's turf) gave its Aurua, Colorado abortion clinic an award for increasing the number of babies killed in abortions.

Source: Planned Parenthood Gives Clinic Award for 'Exceeding Abortion Visits' of Previous Year

Proving once and for all that Planned Parenthood's business is abortion, Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains gave its Aurora abortion clinic an award certificate for "exceeding abortion visits [in the] first half of FY12 compared to the first half of FY13."

Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains is the 2nd largest Planned Parenthood facility in the U.S.

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The picture of the award was snapped by a former worker who saw it posted on a bulletin board in Denver. The board displays awards satellite clinics have earned.

The award challenged the Planned Parenthood worker's thinking, since it showed that clinics were given abortion "quotas" to meet, and that this particular clinic had "exceeded" expectations and received an award for doing so.

From a blog post by Abby Johnson, former Planned Parenthood director turned pro-life advocate:

Ever since I left Planned Parenthood, I have been talking about the abortion quotas that are established inside abortion facilities. Many abortion supporters refused to believe it, citing that surely Planned Parenthood wants abortion to be safe, legal and RARE. If they want something to be RARE, they certainly wouldn't have quotas, right?

Planned Parenthood had a net revenue of $1.21 billion last year, and received $540.6 million in U.S. taxpayer funding.


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So much for wanting to make abortions rare but safe and legal when you award clinics for increasing the number of abortions

Unhappy when abortion rates drop:

For years the pro-abortion crowd has told everyone that they want to make abortion "safe, legal and rare." For instance back in 2008 Hillary Clinton proclaimed at a campaign event that she thought abortion should be "safe, legal and rare, and by rare I mean rare." But the reality of the situation is that some really are not interested in the rare part and see a decrease in abortions as being a bad thing.

Case in point, in a tweet earlier this week Cosmopolitan magazine, a long time major advocate for abortions, lamented an increase of babies born in Texas after that state defunded organizations, such as Planned Parenthood, that provide abortions.

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The link in the tweet goes to a Cosmo story about a study conducted by the Texas Policy Evaluation Project at University of Texas Austin which found a 1.9% "increase in the birthing rate in counties that once had state-funded Planned Parenthood clinics." And as can be seen by the accompanying sad-face emoji in the tweet Cosmo thinks that people having more babies and less abortions is a negative result.

So much for "safe, legal and rare" -- or at least for the last part. But then what can you expect from a magazine that last year started a campaign trying to get women to say how great abortions are (#ShoutYourAbortion). After all, why would you want to make something that is so positive a rare thing?

[Mountain Man]

You're also too stupid to realise that your dishonest goal-post shift from cells growinbg/metabolising/responding to stimuli to cells being organisms is obvious to everyone.

My goalposts are sitting right where they've always been, kiddo. You've just been running the wrong way on the field.

The fact that you're apparently clueless about "the scientific definition of life", a term I originally used and which is not at an ambiguous concept, is really not my problem.