Westside Posted February 26 Posted February 26 Whatever Kay wrote above I’m going to use it tonight if I can’t fall asleep. 💤 1
Buffarukus Posted February 27 Posted February 27 (edited) On 2/26/2024 at 8:10 AM, ComradeKayAdams said: Ok, there’s a lot here, but I’ll try to address it all (WARNING: likely gonna be super long)… Intent in criminal cases: It’s probably not a good use of our time to analyze every esoteric criminal scenario involving a pregnant woman. Let’s leave that up to prosecutors and defenders to prove or disprove intent. Suffice to say, I think the concept of a fetus potentially having “living person” status in criminal court cases is perfectly valid because, among many other examples, it serves as a deterrent for angry fathers physically assaulting pregnant mothers in order to avoid fatherhood. Father’s rights: While I do empathize greatly with all potential fathers who want to become a parent when the potential mother does not, those who must biologically take on the entire physical burden of pregnancy should also have the entire benefit of choice. I would advise all men to avoid these situations as best as they can by improving communication with their partners and also by elevating their character standards during the partner selection process. Abortion debate: For what it’s worth, I am privately much more on the pro-life spectrum, yet fully in support of legal abortion up to birth as a PUBLIC POLICY. Make sure you understand my distinction. I’m also very much open to second-trimester compromises if the exception-granting process is well-articulated in the abortion legislation. My full reasoning, in a hopefully easy-to-read outline form… 1. The rape exception: No victim of rape, at any point of the pregnancy, should ever be forced against her will to give birth to the rapist’s baby. Arguing otherwise is sociopathic and reveals a gross ignorance of what rape trauma fully entails. And for the sake of logical consistency, the obvious corollary to this belief is that a fetus therefore inherently falls into a category of “maybe not quite a person” because we would never otherwise allow a person to determine the life or death of another if it’s not a situation of self-defense (capital punishment debate notwithstanding). 2. Exception-granting dilemmas: I trust the medical professional community to evaluate abortion exceptions way more than I do the legal system. This is effectively the policy standard of many European countries, where an official note from a doctor or a therapist is sufficient qualification. By circumventing the often arduous and broken American legal system, legally unrestricted abortion access essentially expedites quality service of what is a major medical procedure and prioritizes the mother’s health. And it’s easy to imagine how legal requirements might lead to situations ranging from prohibitive to life-threatening. Abortion doctors will want to avoid risks of criminal prosecution and bankrupting-inducing legal challenges due to their own diagnoses (physical health of the mother, ectopic pregnancies, fetal abnormalities, fetal viability, miscarriages, dilation/curettage procedures, dilation/evacuation procedures, etc.). In cases of rape and i n c e s t, sometimes women and girls must also deal with intimidation from partners or family members, public shaming, prosecutorial red tape, and lengthy trials (in addition to all the emotional trauma) if the legal system gets involved. While it’s highly preferable that these victims charge their culprits with a crime, they also shouldn’t be forced to do so. 3. Other valid exceptions: There are numerous ones outside Trump’s big 3 (rape, i n c e s t, life of mother) that politicians commonly omit from political conversations or haphazardly address in legislation language. Lengthy abortion waiting lists, circumstances of insufficient contraceptive access, cryptic pregnancies from irregular periods or amenorrhea, and mental health crises of the mother are among the ones that I feel demand equally serious consideration. 4. Statistical reality: ~90% of all abortions are performed during the first trimester, ~96% are performed by Trump’s proposed deadline of 16 weeks, and virtually all of the remaining ~4% of cases qualify for any of the exceptions I’ve already mentioned above. So it’s blatant pro-life propaganda whenever someone claims the existence of an American scourge of “YOLO…whatevs!” jezebels whimsically having late-term abortions. 5. Political mendacity: Conservatives insisted that five decades of judicial precedent wouldn’t be overturned, but then Roe v. Wade was overturned and celebrated. They’ve argued that abortion should be a decision left up to the states, and now they’re pushing a federal ban. Trump reneges on his public statements that female abortion seekers should face “some form of criminal punishment,” but then he glad-hands with far-right donors and creepy Christian nationalists like Mike Johnson. Since Trump is not legally bound to his speciously “centrist” legislation proposal on the campaign trail, Democrats and independents should not trust him to handle this topic in good faith. 6. Moral prioritization hierarchies: I don’t see conservatives too concerned about, say, “welfare babies” or school shooting victims or Gazan children or any fetus, for that matter, immediately after birth. At a very primitive and subconscious level, the pro-life movement is about the control of female sexual autonomy and not about any principled respect for innocent life. People of my ilk, meanwhile, prioritize mothers and the autonomously living. A well thought out reasoning. Thanks for taking the time to articulate. I agree with most of what you wrote. Seems relatively rational, makes good points and just has a leftist slant in spots. overall there isnt alot anyone who isnt following a ideology of life at conception can truley think is extreme. Warning...equally as long. I find this argument interesting because it is easy to flip perspectives and ideology along with it. Both sides take on the others attributes. The right wants to protect the innocent and the left is saying "dont tread on me". move a circumstance or two and suddenly they are back to form. The question i posed does just that because it shifts the view on who is the victim. Your moral prioritization point for example. You say republicans dont care after they leave the womb. The left doesnt care before. How many stories from children are told of a beginning where mothers who were convinced by pro life/concervative groups to change their mind? Did the right save the lives of people that the left did not consider to have a life in the first place? Mitigated to a clump of cells that could be destroyed at will before a word of their story, their success, could be heard? If fetuses are looked at as living beings does abortion now exceed gaza atrocities and many others the left care about? those stories exist but we rarely hear them. The left controls the culture so only stories of how pro life hurts society are repeated. lets be honest, theres no logical evidence that the left will conceed that a fetus has life. Heartbeat, brain activity, pain receptors. I dont think they want any of those basic factors that represent life in the narrative. its much easier to just to say "if its in the mother its not alive" even if it really makes no sense in any other context. im playing devils advocate for the most part. Your point on 5 could be equally told about the "safe and rare" becoming far different over time. Sure you pointed the left extreme is not utilized much but It was advocated for under the same umbrella. Conservatives had the exact same view you have now. One could argue if one extreme was not so readily accepted and normalized the other would also be universally shunned as extreme. Pendulum swings both direction and now i think moderates are hoping both figure out a compromise. So for absolute clarity ill ask again. If a cluster of cells is prevented from developing into a child against the mothers consent. Should that be considered murder? " Unequivocally yes?" Without using intent or courtroom stances. Is that your personal answer? I think the only reason we would have to go in depth into criminal scenerios is to maintain the lefts view. Otherwise it is extremely straight forward. That suggests a fallacy to me. Edited February 27 by Buffarukus 1 2
BillStime Posted February 27 Author Posted February 27 5 minutes ago, BillsFanNC said: Karen Payop upstaging @Big Blitz on which party is truly panicked.
ComradeKayAdams Posted February 27 Posted February 27 14 hours ago, Buffarukus said: A well thought out reasoning. Thanks for taking the time to articulate. I agree with most of what you wrote. Seems relatively rational, makes good points and just has a leftist slant in spots. overall there isnt alot anyone who isnt following a ideology of life at conception can truley think is extreme. Warning...equally as long. I find this argument interesting because it is easy to flip perspectives and ideology along with it. Both sides take on the others attributes. The right wants to protect the innocent and the left is saying "dont tread on me". move a circumstance or two and suddenly they are back to form. The question i posed does just that because it shifts the view on who is the victim. Your moral prioritization point for example. You say republicans dont care after they leave the womb. The left doesnt care before. How many stories from children are told of a beginning where mothers who were convinced by pro life/concervative groups to change their mind? Did the right save the lives of people that the left did not consider to have a life in the first place? Mitigated to a clump of cells that could be destroyed at will before a word of their story, their success, could be heard? If fetuses are looked at as living beings does abortion now exceed gaza atrocities and many others the left care about? those stories exist but we rarely hear them. The left controls the culture so only stories of how pro life hurts society are repeated. lets be honest, theres no logical evidence that the left will conceed that a fetus has life. Heartbeat, brain activity, pain receptors. I dont think they want any of those basic factors that represent life in the narrative. its much easier to just to say "if its in the mother its not alive" even if it really makes no sense in any other context. im playing devils advocate for the most part. Your point on 5 could be equally told about the "safe and rare" becoming far different over time. Sure you pointed the left extreme is not utilized much but It was advocated for under the same umbrella. Conservatives had the exact same view you have now. One could argue if one extreme was not so readily accepted and normalized the other would also be universally shunned as extreme. Pendulum swings both direction and now i think moderates are hoping both figure out a compromise. So for absolute clarity ill ask again. If a cluster of cells is prevented from developing into a child against the mothers consent. Should that be considered murder? " Unequivocally yes?" Without using intent or courtroom stances. Is that your personal answer? I think the only reason we would have to go in depth into criminal scenerios is to maintain the lefts view. Otherwise it is extremely straight forward. That suggests a fallacy to me. Yes, unequivocally: the prevention of a cluster of cells from developing into a child, when intentionally done against a mother’s consent by another human, should be considered murder. This is my personal answer for what I believe to be true, in principle, as well as what I think should be true legally. But once again…intent can often be hard to prove in a court of law, so I would expect most successful charges to end up less punitive than murder charges…especially when the mother isn’t visibly pregnant. You seem to be looking for a “2+2=4” type of answer on this general topic, Buffarukus, but all that I can offer you is a “wave-particle duality of light” type of answer. Let me try explaining myself this way… 1. A scientific perspective: Human life begins at conception. 2. A philosophical perspective: Human life begins at the first sign of brain activity (~8 weeks into pregnancy). 3. An ideal legal perspective: Human life begins whenever the mother says it does, up to the point of birth. 4. A practical/social contract perspective: Human life begins somewhere in the second trimester, with certain agreed-upon exceptions (essentially the Roe v. Wade standard…but preferably the general European standard of up to 15 weeks or with approvals from medical professionals). 5. A private/personal perspective: Life begins at the nebulous gestational limit where I could no longer live with myself for having had the abortion. I believe all the aforementioned to be true, just like I believe light is both a fundamental particle and a wave. How you analytically treat light depends on the particular circumstances in which you make observations of the light. Similarly, how we approach the definition of human life depends on our frame of reference, with each frame of reference valid in its own domain of inquiry. Let’s try working with another analogy: veganism. I believe it is unethical to treat sentient life like food, unless it’s done out of genuine necessity. Does that mean I think meat consumption should be made illegal? NO!! It is my job, as a vegan activist, to persuade you to willingly choose not to eat meat using whatever perspective (animal rights, environmentalism, healthy diet, etc.) I feel is compelling. I fully understand that eating animal meat is inherently different than, say, cannibalism. I feel the same way about abortion. I can persuade other women to reconsider it: maybe I could tell them about their adoption options, mention examples of successful adults who were almost aborted, or even show them graphic images of aborted fetuses. It is NOT my right, however, to use the legal system to physically force nine months of pregnancy and childbirth on another woman…especially when I don’t know her physical, emotional, financial, career, or family circumstances. The question of life is inherently less clear for a fetus than, say, a crawling toddler. I’m sorry if my responses aren’t helpful. If you’re still uncomfortable with dualities, then try considering this more pragmatic point of view: women important to you in your personal life, encountering situations in which they might resort to seeking out dangerous “back-alley abortions.” How do these thought experiments affect your public policy stances? Because as you probably know by now, we women can be extraordinarily willful… 1
Tommy Callahan Posted February 27 Posted February 27 Courts ruled it's a state issue. The entire narrative of making it illegal or legal on a federal level is the strawman.
ComradeKayAdams Posted February 29 Posted February 29 On 2/27/2024 at 2:52 PM, Tommy Callahan said: Courts ruled it's a state issue. The entire narrative of making it illegal or legal on a federal level is the strawman. No, your Tenth Amendment argument deflection is the strawman. Trump is peddling a 16-week, 3-exception proposal at the federal level. Biden is promising to sign any federal codification of Roe v. Wade/PP v. Casey if re-elected. Judy Chu’s Women’s Health Protection Act (H.R. 12, 2023) passed through the House and was only a handful of votes shy in the Senate. So addressing abortion at the federal level is very much part of the public discourse. The Ninth Amendment argument is what’s pertinent. Many of the red state abortion laws and law proposals we’ve seen since Dobbs v. Jackson (2022) are blatant violations of a woman’s inalienable rights (privacy, life, liberty, pursuits of happiness, etc.). Unless someone here would like to try and defend the merits of 6-week abortion limits, banned contraception, criminalization of abortion, interstate travel restrictions for abortion, etc…?? The right-wing forum silence is deafening… A word to the conservative wise: get abortion figured out at the federal level ASAP, since you guys keep underperforming in elections and are going to lose every public policy you hold dear within a generation’s time. Consider compromise and understand that progressives will have to pack the court if this Christian nationalist version of the Lochner Era persists.
Tommy Callahan Posted February 29 Posted February 29 See the EU for how abortion is handled on a state by state basis. Been working there for a long time. From full bans to a 24 week limit. The privacy argument went out the window in the COVID lockdown . Again. Anything that passes though the congress would be struck down by the courts as they already ruled it's a state issue.
BillStime Posted February 29 Author Posted February 29 9 hours ago, BillsFanNC said: 👆 20 hours ago, BillsFanNC said: It's like asking a heroin addict to quit.
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