When Life Begins. A Fact or a Definition?
Notice that if you ask "When does life begin?" you get a definition, not a fact. What does this mean for the debate between pro-choicers and pro-lifers, one side defining life to begin at birth, the other at conception? Doesn't it mean that it's a problem without a solution?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Rob Klaers on -
As long as you're female... you'll never see it from a man's perspective. Just like as long as I'm a male I will never truly see things from a woman's perspective. That's just how it is..
Now, I can support my wife (as I did) when she pushed out a being weighing the size of a small bowling ball. But I will never know what it's like. To be honest, after seeing her go through 54 hrs of labor, I really don't want to know..
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Permalink Reply by Cara Coleen on -
Imagine a wasp injecting its eggs into a caterpillar so that the eggs can hatch inside of it and consume it from the inside out. The wasp does not have to have the consent of the caterpillar to "impregnate" it. If the caterpillar was able to find a way to eject those eggs, could we fault it for doing so? Would we argue the parental rights of the wasp? No and no.
It doesn't "take two to tango." It can take one overpowering another. Besides, the "tango" doesn't imply consent to fertilization. A man can deposit his semen inside a napkin or a woman. Just because he happens to deposit it inside another human being does not give him a right to use her body as an incubator for his sperm. Sorry. He's got plenty to spare, and this sperm isn't more special because it happened to reach her egg.
I don't really care how harsh this comparison sounds. I'm not going to be an unwilling participant like the caterpillar. If I don't want some little organism growing in my body, consuming my nutrients and destroying the integrity of my organs, I'm going to opt out of this little possession. I will not be the host of some dude's spawn if I don't want to be. He can find another body to use as his incubator.
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Permalink Reply by Unseen on -
I ask again, what gives anyone other than and outside of the pregnant woman ANY standing in her case? What presumption!
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Permalink Reply by Cara Coleen on
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Good for you, for having an easy, safe pregnancy. I'm sure you know, however, that you're not the standard.
Kudos to you for choosing to birth them naturally - I guess - but that would not have been an option for my mother. My older brother was 10 lbs and broke her tailbone after 24 hours of labor. I was 10.5 lbs. My younger brother was a whopping 11 lbs. Her stomach was stretched to hell. Her abs were split, but we didn't find that out until she was in her forties and underwent a hysterectomy... which subsequently also included a bladder suspension and tummy tuck (which was hardly just for vanity). She can't even laugh without leaking. She had horrible nausea while pregnant, and she was HUGE (as one can imagine with 10+ lb babies).
Please don't think pregnancy is safe for everyone because it was safe for you. Everyone's body is different... not to mention the fact that labor is more dangerous for human females than any other mammal (because of our huge heads and small hips). It's actually quite dangerous, and the infant mortality rate in the U.S. is higher than many other first-world countries.
And you seem to be painting all women who don't want kids with a very broad brush. I don't want kids, but I'm not shy or timid. Am I afraid of childbirth? Hell yes, after witnessing what it did to my mother. Sorry, I'm not signing up for that mess, and I don't think I should be judged or called "paranoid" for not wanting to recreate the horrific experience my mother endured. The difference is that she wanted kids; I don't. Not even a little. So pregnancy is a dangerous transition into what, I feel, is a life of oppression. You think it's beautiful... fantastic! It's the least appealing thing I can think of, from start to finish.
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Permalink Reply by Rob Klaers on
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Damn, I can't find the "like" button.. Where the hell is it..?
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Permalink Reply by Kris Feenstra on -
It's just a Monty Python reference.
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Permalink Reply by Rob Klaers on
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"We are living on the only planet in the whole universe that has life on it as far as we currently know."
Dare I point out... that's science. For a self-professed anti-science person you sure love to use examples from it and quote famous scientists,
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Permalink Reply by Afton Hardin on -
Aside from the points that Kris and Rob have already made above me, I just want to add that we are the only species on our planet who willingly have abortions because we are the only species advanced enough to have them. I'm pretty sure every animal species is guilty of neglecting and abandoning their young once they birthed them. It could either be because they didn't feel able to care for the offspring, they thought it was sick and would jeopardize the other members of the group, or they thought it would attract predators, again jeopardizing the group as a whole.
I may sound repetitive with these references to my sugar gliders, but they are the perfect examples. Our sugar gliders procreate about as freqently as rabbits. They can have up to 3 joeys for each pregnancy and can become pregnant about every other month. Plus, the male glider has a double-pronged penis while the female glider has two vaginae and a divided uterus, so she can have two pregnancies occur simultaneously. Now, as many times as our female has gotten pregnant, once they'd grown enough to take up most of her pouch but still needed nutrients (i.e. weren't old enough to be self-reliant), she would kick them out of her pouch and wouldn't even let them sleep in the parents' sleeping pouch that we have for them. There are a few different reasons as to why she would've done that. A.) The joeys were sick in some way B.) She had a pouch infection, which isn't realistic because she would likely be dead by now C.) She thought of me or my boyfriend as predators anytime we went in the room to feed them, or D.) She just isn't capable of caring for her joeys due to some mental or biological issue.
So to say that we are the only creatures who neglect or abandon our young is absurd. It's also absurd to say that because we are more advanced when it comes to intelligence that we have higher value than any other animals. You might as well say, "Sure, we can go ahead and wipe out all other species. They never had much use anyway, being dumb and all." Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it?
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Permalink Reply by Cara Coleen on
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My gerbil ate its babies. What a good mother! Those animals sure can teach us a lot about caring for our young!
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Permalink Reply by Kris Feenstra on
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And in that case, possibly nutrition.
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Permalink Reply by Afton Hardin on
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I had a hamster who did the same thing when I was a kid. Our gliders have even done it; pretty sure it was with their very first pair of joeys.
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