indie wrote:I'd still like to know what the hell any of this has to do with the subject of this thread.

You want to argue abortion? Make a damn thread for it, not derail existing ones that have nothing to do with it.

FWIW I shouldn't have indulged myself at all by posting in this topic once it turned into an abortion debate. It's a highly charged issue, and one I know intimately. In fact I regret posting the topic at all at this point. Perhaps I should stick with the coding from here on.

Lets not be afraid of starting a discussion shall we? This is the most action this group has seen lately. BTW, I know this issue intimately as well...maybe a lot more than any of you, but maybe not. So do not think that I have not dealt with this from both sides of the CHOICE.


Mr. P.

Niall001 wrote: Yup. Sometimes these things snowball.

We should have done that whole "sidebar" thing ages ago. Nobody would have posted in a thread that was actually about abortion. Is there anyway we can split off everything that came after Mad and Mr. P began discussing the terms pro-choice and pro-life?

Yes, I would have posted in a thread about abortion. I do not avoid important issues.

Mr. P.

Niall001 wrote:
Tehran.

I repeat...


Sorry Nick, I'm just taking the piss. You really should know by now! I'm in Ireland.

The original question was the piss...you missed it. The second response was the same.

New request:

Anyone in favor of not having an abortion:

Why do you think it would be better for our society to prevent people from having an abortion? Why?

Depends what you mean by society and better really.

Lets not be cute, huh?

I believe that people have a right to life and that the developing human has a right to life that should be protected just like any other life. I haven't encountered any coherent argument as to why we should recognise the right to life of a newborn or late prenatal human and not one during early development.

Rights are what we grant to each other. To me, the rights and choices of the people who are productive and able to support themselves and have real choices ahead of them come before a grouping of cells that cannot survive outside of the former's womb. There is no consciouness and no aspirations in that grouping of cells. It does not know what is outside, it knows no regret, has no hopees and thus cannot be adversely effected by being terminated.

If we killed off China, the rest of the world might be better off. They consume our resources, if we got rid of them, there'd be more for the rest of humanity. I doubt you'd advocate such a course of action, and it is for the same reasons that I do not advocate allowing people have abortions.

See! NOW your talking! Damn Chinks! Once again, it is the side of "Pro-Life" that is using polemical dialogue. How silly of you to post that. You obviously miss the point I make about cells and people.

Would you be willing to help a single mother support her baby for the length of time that child would need to grow into a contributing adult? Should the governement support the child/mother?

Do you care only about the birth, or would you take an active role in the childs development?

Yes I believe in well developed social welfare systems, though that's a different subject.[/quote]

Not what I asked. WOULD YOU take part to help as many people out that chose not to have an abortion. Since you are asking them to burden their lives, would YOU then offer your direct help and change YOUR life?

Mr. P.

Rights are what we grant to each other. To me, the rights and choices of the people who are productive and able to support themselves and have real choices ahead of them come before a grouping of cells that cannot survive outside of the former's womb. There is no consciouness and no aspirations in that grouping of cells. It does not know what is outside, it knows no regret, has no hopees and thus cannot be adversely effected by being terminated.

Where exactly does this place the newborn or indeed most kids? If you propose that the basis of granting someone the right to life is that they are productive, self-sufficient and have the capacity to make choices, then would that not leave a newborn without a recognised right to life? If viability is the criteria you choose to invoke, what is the implications of such a move on the terminally ill? The prenatal human is not conscious in the same way as you may be, but the same is true of a newborn child.

I'd be interested to hear just when you think humans should be granted a right to life, and the criteria you've used to come to that decision.

Once again, it is the side of "Pro-Life" that is using polemical dialogue. How silly of you to post that. You obviously miss the point I make about cells and people.

Nick, maybe I'm wrong but it seems to me that it is you who is missing the point. I do not care if someone is self-sufficient or productive. I regard the developing human as a person, just as I recognise the people of China as persons. Arguments about overpopulation etc. are irrelevant once you've recognised the prenatal human as Human unless you are the kind of utilitarian who'd advocate population control by genocide. By using the far-fetched example of killing off China, I only hoped to show you how irrelevant your arguments about overpopulation are to any debate about abortion. Clearly, I failed.

Not what I asked. WOULD YOU take part to help as many people out that chose not to have an abortion. Since you are asking them to burden their lives, would YOU then offer your direct help and change YOUR life?

Easy on the CAPS.

This is also irrelevant. Given that you support policies that prevent parents from engaging in infanticide, do you go out of your way to help parents who are burdened with children they regret having? Why not? Once you've answered that question, substitute foetus for child and you'll have my answer as to why I don't run around searching for mothers who wished they'd had an abortion in order to give them a few quid - though I suspect pamphlets on adoption might be of more use to these poor burdened women.

Gee this conversation has exploded. Niall and Mr. P. if we're looking to attract and keep new members we might want to respond to their request that we not divert the conversation away from the original topic. As indie said, it is easy enough to start your own thread. In fact, there was an abortion thread a while back where, if I recall correctly, I directed questions/statements to both of you that went unanswered.

Either way, if the topic-originator asks us to keep the conversation on topic, then we should probably respect that request, especially when that request comes from the Eye of booktalk. At least, that is, until we discover and take possession of the One Ring.

BTW, Mad, that same previous abortion thread has at least references to what I mean by the anti-choice movement, if you're interested. If you want me to further clarify let me know elsewhere and I'll be happy to.

Niall001 wrote: Where exactly does this place the newborn or indeed most kids? If you propose that the basis of granting someone the right to life is that they are productive, self-sufficient and have the capacity to make choices, then would that not leave a newborn without a recognised right to life?

Look into the eyes of a newborn and then look into the eyes of a zygote. What color are the zygotes eyes? Can you discern a personality in the zygote? The infant? Can the zygote move about in any way or alert anyone of its desires?

If viability is the criteria you choose to invoke, what is the implications of such a move on the terminally ill?

Remember the Schiavo discussion? If a person has the means to keep themselves alive through medicine or care, then great. If they want to die, let them. If they cannot decide, the next of kin should decide without any repurcussions. I do not support keeping people alive if there is no hope of getting better or if they cannot function if it is on the dime of everyone else in the society.

The prenatal human is not conscious in the same way as you may be, but the same is true of a newborn child.

Well "The Pre-Natal Human" is a very general term. There are very specific phases of a pregnancy. At the very beginning it is not conscious at all.

I'd be interested to hear just when you think humans should be granted a right to life, and the criteria you've used to come to that decision.

The only time a human has a 'right' to life is after it is born. There is no guarantee that a fertilized egg will survive to birth. Now, I am fine with the laws as they are. No abortions after a certain time and all that.

Is it just humans you are concerned with or life in general? Is it because humans have a soul that you are so concerned about protecting human life?

Nick, maybe I'm wrong but it seems to me that it is you who is missing the point. I do not care if someone is self-sufficient or productive. I regard the developing human as a person...By using the far-fetched example of killing off China, I only hoped to show you how irrelevant your arguments about overpopulation are to any debate about abortion. Clearly, I failed.

What you and all who share your views miss, and refuse to even CONSIDER, is that myself and other like me do NOT consider the developing mass of cells human until a certain point in the development. Your far fetched examples are polemics, plain and simple.

What you also fail to accept is that Pro-Choice is NOT pro-abortion. You said earlier you would prefer to couch the discussion as Anti-Abortion and Pro-Abortion. To me that is more polemical than Pro-Choice. And this is because as someone who is Pro-Choice, I am leaveing that choice for people like you to NOT have abortions. You would have people do as YOU will (YOU = You and those that share your views). You would force only one option. ANd that would most probably not stop abortions anyway. Desperate women would still seek to have it done. But Niall would feel all cozy knowing that his uber-moral stand has won out. His will shall be done! Now off to the coffee shop...

Easy on the CAPS.

So 4 words capitalized to make a point is just too much for you huh? Get over it and stick to the questions.

This is also irrelevant. Given that you support policies that prevent parents from engaging in infanticide, do you go out of your way to help parents who are burdened with children they regret having? Why not?

I would support programs to help these people out. I would offer personal help where I could. I would not feel compelled to do more. Why? Because I did not want to pass a law that only gave them one option. I left them a choice at every step of the way, knowing how hard it is to raise children and how much it changes your life. I also would have supported programs to educate on use of contraception and also counselling on what to expect from whatever choice they would eventually make prior to carrying the pregnancy to full term. Because Pro-Choice is not Pro-Abortion. I do not know ANY Pro-Choice person who is out there advocating abortion. There are no imbeciles lined up at doctors offices shouting threats at people who are getting pre-natal care. There are no bombs going off at well baby visits. In fact, if I were to be sitting with someone contemplating an abortion (that did not include my interests personally), I would talk to them about all this. I would try my humble best to explain the choices as I understand them. I would not recommend a thing. I would just be there for the person that would realize a life that was changed, either way, by the decision she waws about to make. The cells would never know any better.

Once you've answered that question, substitute foetus for child and you'll have my answer as to why I don't run around searching for mothers who wished they'd had an abortion in order to give them a few quid - though I suspect pamphlets on adoption might be of more use to these poor burdened women.

With me, I would want to raise my own kids. Adoption is not an option. There are already tons of children out there without parents. Lets take care of them first huh?

Mr. P.

Mr P wrote:I never bought it and what do we do in that instance...NOT address or respond to an outright lie? Yeah, that would work when the 'leader of the free word' is talking shit...aaaannyway.

Well, the funny thing about it is -- and I think the Bush administration recognized this -- it didn't really matter whether it was a lie or not. Whether or not the Baath Regime really had WMDs was immaterial. What was really important was getting everyone to agree that WMDs were the issue. Once enough people agreed on that, the fact that the Baath Regime wanted WMDs, had tried to get WMDs, and were successful in keeping us from knowing whether or not they had was enough.

That's the point I'm trying to make. It wasn't clear before hand that WMDs should ever really be an issue. If WMDs were the most pressing issue, why were we worried about Iraq in particular? There must have been two dozen other potential WMD-holders who were more worrisome than Iraq. But, most Americans felt domestic security from foreign attack to be an immediate concern in the wake of the WTC/Pentagon attacks, and most Americans had recently intensified their focus on the Middle East. And because of those concerns, we (and to clarify, by "we" I mean the majority of people who made the invasion possible) allowed the Bush administration to set the terms. They decided what issues to press, and we, as a nation, followed suit.

We didn't have to, of course. If we had been a little more circumspect we could have asked enough questions to deflate the terms set by the Bush administration.

I wrote:Why can't both life and choice be issues that pertain to the issue of abortion?

Mr. P wrote:Uh...What?!

What's so hard to understand about that. Saying that the crucial issue is life doesn't preclude choice as an involved issue. Saying that the crucial issue is choice doesn't preclude life. A person can be "pro-choice" and still believe that an unborn fetus is a life worth protecting, and by the same token, a person can be "pro-life" and still think that a woman's choice is still worth protecting. It doesn't have to be an either/or scenario, and I think treating it as though it were one is one of the side-effects a lot of people encounter when they buy into polemical terminology.

It is about you being able to choose for yourself what you do and what happens to your body, mind and future.

The censorship analogy is one that only works if you presume from the start that a life is not involved in the abortion debate. To that end, I won't dismiss it as trivial, just unrelated. Beyond which, I'm not interested in debating pro-life v. pro-choice. I only brought it up (sorry, Indie) as an example of the way in which polemical terminology acts against any sort of reasonable resolution. The fact that the debate has been going on for decades -- not to mention the fact that my bringing it up as an example restarted the debate -- should serve to corroborate my point.

Why do you think it would be better for our society to prevent people from having an abortion? Why?

And this is where I bow out. It's interesting to me, because I never declared for one side or another. You seem to have assumed (perhaps because you know that I'm a theist? I wonder if you'd have made the same assumption had Rivercoil raised the same point I did) that I was pro-life, and the fact that I objected to the term seems only to have confirmed that assumption for you. The fact of the matter is that my approach to the topic doesn't situate into either of the "pro" camps, and the likelihood that you'd guess what I actually believe about the matter is pretty small.

That said, I don't intend to talk about it now. I didn't mention the abortion debate to discuss the merits of either side. I brought it up as a very visible instance of polemical terminology that has only frustrated any attempts to resolve an issue. That it led automatically to more debate ought to demonstrate, at the very least, that I'm not plucking that idea out of the blue.

MadArchitect wrote:Last Post

Have you seen what this turned into? Why would you continue this at this point?

Anyway, you NEVER really declare anything you stand for. That is the frustrating part. You bow out right when you would be expected to explain your position. Frustrating.

But I am done with this thread. You want to continue join the new thread. If not that is fine.

Mr. P.

Mr. P wrote:Anyway, you NEVER really declare anything you stand for. That is the frustrating part. You bow out right when you would be expected to explain your position. Frustrating.

But in this thread I have declared something that I stand for: the need for improving public debate by cutting through polemics. That may not be an issue that you find particularly important, but that doesn't mean it isn't something I'm passionate about.

In fact, I declare things that I stand for all the time. They aren't beliefs or ideas that get expressed in the popular terminology of the moment, but that doesn't make them any less important to me. A lot of them are about the ways that we address the problems of our time, because I really believe that, when an issue goes on and on for decades without getting resolved, it's a pretty strong indication that there are problems with the way we're addressing that issue. As Aristotle pointed out, sometimes the best start is just asking the question in the right way.

It might tie together for you a lot of what I've written on this site over the years to say that I think a lot of our problems would be easier to resolve -- and with some measure of satisfaction for both "sides" -- if we made certain adjustments to the way we handle information from history, science, and philosophy. If you go back and look at some of the older threads I've posted in, that's almost always what I'm talking about. If I haven't, to your satisfaction, taken a stand on issue x, in part that's because I'm not convinced it will do anyone any good for me to express my opinion until we've agreed on a way of talking that will make it so that both our opinions will contribute to some sort of conclusion. Just lobbing opinions back and forth across the net doesn't interest me. I want our discussions to lead to some sort of positive change.

This topic provides a perfect example. Say I had given you my stance on abortion. What would that have achieved? Maybe I could have phrased it so eloquently, could have made my logic so tight, that it shook your resolve a little. Maybe you could have turned it all around on me, so that I started to question my own opinion. Some people seem to enjoy that sort of exchange quite a bit. Frankly, I'd rather not have our discussions be about using logic or rhetoric to batter one another into submission. And I think enough of you, on a personal level, to believe that you're ultimately of the same mind on that. But the atmosphere of public debate makes combat-discussion an easy habit to fall into.

You want me to take a firm stand? Here it is: the terms people use to discuss issues, even their choice of what issues to present, often make the best solutions difficult or even impossible to recognize. Questioning the value of those terms is an important starting point for making discussion better than just steamrolling over the opposition. The more we work towards understanding a person's best reasons for taking a position that differs from our own, the better a chance we stand of resolving that issue to everyone's satisfaction.

And that's really all I meant to imply when I joined in on this thread.