Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by T A A on December 5, 2011 at 12:31am

Of course the courts won't throw you in jail for not breastfeeding by choice... but to intentionally impose that life for an infant goes against the rational of health concerns. So what you're saying in essence, as has been mentioned several times here in other posts, is that you place a foetus' rights above a newborn's rights... great !

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Permalink Reply by Jewelz on December 5, 2011 at 5:48am

I am just in shock right now over this attitude towards adoption. Wow. Breast milk is now a right? Like abortion, breast feeding or not breast feeding your child is a personal choice.

These are personal choices, but that doesn't make them exempt from scrutiny or discussion on which is the better choice. I advocate breastmilk over formula because with the health, immunologic, economic, and environmental benefits it is the better choice. Likewise, I advocate early abortion over adoption because there's no shortage of unwanted and unloved children on this planet and America has one of the highest rates of teen pregnancy, abortion, infant mortality, and poverty in the modern world. We need to get a handle on this situation, and encouraging/guilting females into having children they cannot afford is not the answer. In societies with better sex education and health care where abortion is not a hot button issue, early abortion does not cause the same amount of psychological trauma as adoption or having kids one cannot properly care for or support and, perhaps more importantly, the abortion rates are lower.

In your particular situation, I commend you for realizing your child would have a better life if adopted, and making that difficult choice. I'm glad you had a wonderful experience without much regret. However, that is not the case for many females and there are far too many young uneducated mothers who are pressured into carrying pregnancies to term and then, not having the will to give up their unplanned children, they end up adding to the overpopulation and vicious cycle of ignorance and poverty when the better choice would have been early abortion.

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Permalink Reply by Arcus on December 5, 2011 at 6:55am

"In societies with better sex education and health care where abortion is not a hot button issue, early abortion does not cause the same amount of psychological trauma"

Very much this. I think in the US, in particular, it's a social expectation that women feel guilt after an abortion, and the focus on potential psychological issues arising becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Incidentally, this topic came up on Saturday at a party with a number of girls from the FSU. Abortion is there viewed as contraception, and it is quite common for girls to have one or several during their lifetime. There is no social stigma attached - in fact, the expectations is that they walk out just fine - and they laughed a bit of the idea of bonding with a mass of cells. I'm not discounting the physiological reactions of pregnancy, but immediately assuming life long psychological trauma from abortion seems a bit extreme. 

As for adoption, I have a bit of insight seeing as my dad was adopted as an infant. I never heard my biological grandfather or -mother express regret, nor did it seem to have any impact on them. On the other hand, my maternal grandmother was manic-depressive, no doubt partially caused from one son killed by a truck when he was 9 and another dieing from crib death.

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Permalink Reply by Kenneth Montville D.D. on January 11, 2011 at 3:14pm

I will never change my opinion on that, ever.

So why are we discussing this subject?

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Permalink Reply by matt.clerke on December 1, 2011 at 5:46pm

It is wrong because the child could be saved via medical technology

Not necessarily... my mother in law was a midwife and has told me a few horror stories, sometimes a foetus should just be aborted.

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Permalink Reply by Kris Feenstra on November 30, 2010 at 3:39pm

why is late term 'less moral' than early stage abortion? Where is the difference morally?

I wonder if there have been any in-depth psychology studies looking at people who object to abortions at various stages and why. This issue is frequently conflated with social and political bias, religious and philosophical dogma, and, in my opinion, projection bias.

That's not to say that there are no individuals who think rationally on the subject matter; it's just that, culturally, our treatment of abortion feels like a circus.

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Permalink Reply by Atheist Exile on December 1, 2010 at 9:52pm

According to the courts (and me) the moral difference is fetal viability. I think the courts thought rationally enough on the subject and I agree with them. Ditto for the high courts of most progressive democracies in the world.

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Permalink Reply by Andrew Wilson on December 2, 2010 at 12:29pm

I am not a theist but would regard a foetus as alive somewhere between conception and full term. I just have a problem deciding exactly where the legal definition should be.

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Permalink Reply by Kris Feenstra on December 1, 2010 at 10:23pm

This is not true of the Supreme Court for the progressive democracy that I live in. Canada has been without laws regulating abortion for two decades.

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Permalink Reply by wisp on December 1, 2010 at 12:56am

I definitely would make an exception for cases wherein a late term abortion would be medically necessary. I just can't help being iffy on a totally elective abortion after the point at which the foetus would be reasonably viable outside the uterus.

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Permalink Reply by T A A on January 11, 2011 at 10:29am

I have no issues with late term abortions either. As the long as the foetus is not externally viable without medical intervention, its rights are non existent.

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Permalink Reply by Skycomet the Fallen Angel on November 30, 2010 at 4:03pm

"I don't think abortion should be legal for 'any reason.'"
I understand that this is the "light" position of "pro-lifers." However, a stance of "abortion shouldn't be performed unless the mother is raped or going to die" may be a noble stance, but it is not a realistic stance. The truth is that abortion did not begin with Roe v. Wade, it has been around since ancient times. During the victorian era of the United States history abortion was illegal and the penalty for beeing caught was death. However, history records a thriving black market of abortion practice during this time. Certain individuals were paid a fortune to destroy unwanted pregnancies. The most common clientele were young unmarried and wealthy women. Also... the poor women had their own way of doing abortions... and they risked their lives doing it. They would perform it on themselves with poisons [such as herbs and mushrooms said to induce miscarriage - sometimes they would just kill the woman instead as well as home performed surgical abortions that had high risk of death through hemorage and infection.]
Of course...some women throughout history have been either too cowardly to risk their life with home-abortions, and have resorted to something that would horrify anyone... infanticide

In ancient Rome, prostitutes would sometimes dispose of unwanted children by drowning them in underground water resevoirs. Other women would simply smother the child and then hide them from the law.

Fact is... throughout the time when abortion was illegal and dangerous... women were willing to risk death and imprisonment to get rid of unwanted pregnancies. If Roe v. Wade were oerturned... that would not stop abortion... it would only drive it underground where it would exist alongside the world of drugs. It would also make it far more dangerous and would spike the rates of BORN infant murders.

As you can see... some evils are not able to be destroyed by laws. [if you consider abortion evil that is]. Outlawing alcohol and drugs has been an absolute and embarrassing failure and outlawing abortion would be as well.

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