Yep. Once you replace “rape” and “pregnancy” with different terms, you can start to see their total disconnect from reality, common sense, and empathy.
But that’s nothing new, is it?
hahaha if only we could get them all to go on a “cruise”
Is this some sort of anti-gun analogy?
LOVE IT!
I have never needed a life jacket. lol
i think Obama and Romney may need one the way they are hurling verbal torpedoes at each other. lol
what a great red herring! Compare something that saves a life to something that ends a life. Yeah, that makes sense (in some worlds, I guess)
haha. funny. if we can’t get life jackets banned make a law allowing big government to probe anyone wanting to use one.
This is trying to be smart but to me this is just dumb
To be fair republicans did give some push-back from the “legitimate” remark, though I think one or two nutbags agreed with him.
@grim_truth - I wouldn’t really call it red herring. Satire is more like it.
@grim_truth - I didn’t know you were Catholic? Your boy Ryan could use a dose of your Grim Truth cuz you are about the truth and all. I liked his 2:30 Marathon!!
@Saridactyl - it’s misleading and distracting from the issue. Thus, a red herring. Satire has to make sense. It’s not an equal comparison. If it was, then it would be satire.
@tendollar4ways - Ryan is not my boy and will not be getting my vote. Nice strawman.
Idiotic, comparing life-and-death with rape. Liberals are morons.
Swimming lessons would only encourage drowning. It’s a violation of my rights to forcibly teach my kids about swimming. You might as well be teaching them how to drown.
@grim_truth - ”what a great red herring! Compare something that saves a life to something that ends a life. Yeah, that makes sense (in some worlds, I guess)”
What the post clearly attacks is the logic of much of the pro-life arguments and sentiments. Calling the comparison a red herring doesn’t show how it is one, and merely pointing to he differences in the subjections of comparisons doesn’t dismiss the logical connections between the two.
@CanuckFascist - Your disdain and your ideas would be clearer if you typed in complete and correctly punctuated sentences.
@Celestial_Teapot – Sweetiepie, my English is PERFECT. Yours is not. Mwaaaaahhh
@Doubledb - When trying to compare two things that are not at all like each other…yeah. It does come across that way.
Let’s be more literal: Ban abortions in all cases no exceptions like if a woman’s life is endangered, if the child would be a product of rape or incest.
It sort of says Ban sex education, don’t teach the use of condoms (because of course rapists never want to learn that usage), you can’t use morning after pills nor is any other birth control allowed besides abstinence (which of course is useless for a woman who is being raped) The drowning parallel would be don’t teach swiming, learning cpr and other lifesaving techniques people who drown were fated to die anyway by drowning. In otherwords turn your attention away from any deaths from drowning. Turning our hearts away from any exceptions for having an abortion is part of the campaign to overturn Roe Vs Wade and to push the idiotic position of life begins at conception. However one would compare that position to that position that Children deserve the right to vote…When life begins is a bit complicated. Buddhists could claim that life never ends, it just get recycled and the soul migrates elsewhere.
@PPhilip - Apparently in Arizona life begins 2 weeks prior to conception. Women in Arizona are pregnant all the time. ;p
@Celestial_Teapot - Grammar is a tool special interest groups use to enslave the government and its people.
@Celestial_Teapot - There is no logical connection between the two. It compares something that saves lives with something that ends life. It clearly distracts from the actual issue by doing so. Thus, it is a red herring. It paints a picture that everyone of a certain segment thinks the same, which is untrue. Thus, it is also a strawman. (though I guess it depends on what one thinks the “lifejackets” are. One could take them as sex education, which would make a bit more sense, but at the bottom of the picture since it talks more of the “gift” and “legitimate” comments that have been made, it seems it is clearly more of an analogy for abortion. Which makes the comparisons not even close)
I’ll translate it for the people have difficulty making the connections:
“We should ban abortion and other forms of contraception [as well as the HPV vaccine], because they encourage sinful behavior. The only 100% effective way to prevent pregnancy is to refrain from sexual activity. And if by chance you find yourself struggling with pregnancy [read: rape, pregnancy that threatens the mother's life], no abortion procedures should be allowed to be administered. You got yourself into this mess, you deal with the consequences.”
Every ridiculous argument in the poster is a prominent pro-life argument or sentiment with the relevant words replaced. The poster is effective because it adequately demonstrates that an outright abortion ban (like an outright ban on life jackets) is an emotional and illogical approach to a real-world problem that directly and adversely affects the health of individuals. Both flotation devices and abortion procedures demonstrably save lives and improve the mental and physical health of many women who receive them. It also demonstrates how archaic religious principles (that are, ironically, arguably absent in the Bible) can cloud people’s judgment and make them advocate for outrageous things regarding health issues.
Of course the arguments are nonsensical. That’s the point of the post. The source material (pro-life arguments) they are directly translated from are also nonsensical. Attempts to differentiate the applicability of the arguments to life jackets are also difficult given the misunderstanding of reproductive health that many conservatives have (e.g., abortions kill and/or hurts “babies”, abortion isn’t necessary to protect the health of women, controversial interpretations of the Bible are a sound bases of legal rights in America, etc.)
@GodlessLiberal - It’s being drowned out by all the cognitive dissonance in the comment section. But, I did notice that I got an erection for some reason. A common reaction to applause for me.
@UTRow1 - Strawman. It is not the majority of pro-lifers arguing for gov’t mandated abstinence.
Again, lifejackets save lives, abortions end lives. Therefore, it is not effective, except for those with preconceived notions of what the other side’s argument really is. Remember, the pro-life argument is about life. When it begins. Just because you place arbitrary criteria on life, doesn’t mean it is correct. I have explained non-arbitrary criteria that is already in use, and you simply dismiss it because it doesn’t jive with your platform. (no one can argue that it isn’t life. The argument is whose life. Current legal criteria in all cases except abortion, individualism is defined by our unique DNA code. It is a method already used to identify victims as well as perpetrators, thus it’s not arbitrary.)
Abortions do not demonstratably save lives. They are used to terminate pregnancies. Most of the pro-life crowd actually believes when the mother’s life is in danger, that it is then a decision to be made by the mother.
Again, it’s a strawman because all republicans were lumped in there, ignoring the fact that most do not think like that, that not all republicans are pro-life, and that there are pro-life democrats.
But then again, using logic and full thought wouldn’t allow you all to play partisan politics, would it?
@UTRow1 - It’s sad that someone had to literally spell it out like you did. Unfortunately, some people ^ are so dumb and/or so emotionally attached to their views that they still don’t get it. *eye roll*
@grim_truth - (1) The only way to prevent or restrict abortion to any meaningful degree given its current legal standing would be through government intervention and/or action. You would either have to make the act illegal through the legislative process or the courts, or you would have to prohibit health care providers from providing abortions. This is why pro-life candidates, the vast majority of whom have been conservative Republicans in recent decades, have been attempting to do both for over 60 years.
(2) Neither I nor the poster originally claimed a “majority” of pro-lifers or Republicans support “government mandated” abstinence. Ironically, you have committed a strawman fallacy because you are misrepresenting the arguments that have been made.
That being said, the vast majority of people who support a legislative ban on abortion, or most extreme abortion restrictions, are conservative, pro-life Christians. There’s absolutely no statistical evidence to the contrary. Similarly, of the people that want all or most abortions made illegal, a significantly higher percentage of them are Republican than Democrat. This really shouldn’t come as a surprise given crap like the GOP’s 2012 pro-life pledge, which was signed exclusively by self-proclaimed conservatives the last time I checked.
If you believe otherwise, I would like seeing some surveys that support your beliefs because no evidence I have ever seen indicates you would be correct.
(3) As I stated in my comment, the problem with your attempts to differentiate life jackets and abortion are not compelling and rely on assumptions that are scientifically and logically poor and/or unsubstantiated.
Take for instance your argument that abortion ends a “life.” More than 99% of abortions occur well before the third trimester, before the fetus is anything that can rationally or accurately be construed as a human “life”. 88% of abortions occur within the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, when the fetus has less in common with a child than a flatworm with a functional nervous system. And of the small number of abortions that occur during the third trimester–when the fetus develops the pharyngeal arcs required for pain perception, cognizance, and other characteristics that define the type of “life” that the law protects–the vast majority of them are performed to avoid imminent bodily injury or death caused by a complicated pregnancy. Here’s a good general source on abortion statistics that will directly support or cite to literature that supports all my claims.
I also believe it’s reprehensible and cruel to force a mother to birth a child that an ameniocentesis reveals will have a horrible, painful, debilitating health issue, such as anencephaly. The position is cruel to both the mother for forcing her to undergo childbirth and the potential deadly risks associated with it, and the “child” that is ultimately birthed, which will almost certainly die a horrible death within a few hours of birth.
So, in my opinion, nearly all aborted fetuses are not “alive” in any meaningful sense. Furthermore, and this is the key, in an objective legal sense, a pre-third trimester fetus is not considered a “life” under the law. They do not receive constitutional protections, such as procedural due process, that all other humans receive, including the mentally handicapped, comatose, and children. Furthermore, at no point during the pregnancy does the life of the fetus supersede the life of the mother. That is, if the mother has a life-threatening medical complication and wants to abort the fetus, she has the legal right to do so under federal law. This, in and of itself, makes the pro-life position inferior from a public policy perspective because they are pining about things that are not the legal reality of the world we live in and will never be the legal reality of the world we live in. Period. We will never live in their world.
(4) I’m sorry, but abortion does demonstrably save lives. This is not a matter of opinion. If you believe otherwise, you are both appallingly ignorant and failing to engage reality.
At this point I would normally link to a bunch of peer-reviewed journals listing the pregnancy complications that often require induced abortion, but why take my word or the word of scientists on it? There are many women who have had their lives saved by an abortion who will testify to the indisputable. Focusing entirely on the fetus (and assuming it is alive) is clearly not a valid or complete approach to the issue. You can’t just ignore the wellbeing of the mothers because it suits your ideology.
Still, I would be interested in seeing you provide a single article from a reputable scientific journal or publication that argues abortion does not save lives.
@In_Reason_I_Trust - by “emotionally attached to their views” do you mean refusing to look at it objectively like pro-choicers do? There are already established criteria set and used that define life. It is the pro-choice crowd that uses a different criteria solely to excuse abortions.
@UTRow1 - 1) The only way to make it legal was to use the same methods you describe. Am I to understand that your view is only one side can do so?
2) I did not create a strawman argument. The picture satirically calls for the banning of lifevests, comparing it to abortion. Thus, it is indeed implied that the post is claiming that’s what pro-lifers want. If not, then it is a failed analogy, and thus any argument you make is invalid.
I’m not ignoring the fact that most pro-lifers are indeed Christians, Conservatives, or republicans. I just made the statement that the OP ignored that fact that there are indeed liberals, atheists and democrats that are also pro-life. Yet, he did not include them in his attempt at an insult, which shows pure party bias, and partisan politics as plain as the sun shines.
3) Again, you are using arbitrary criteria to describe human life. There are already criteria set in place that are used in criminal cases for those who are born. Those same criteria can be used on fetuses, but you just choose not to use them. By doing so, it is not up to me, but up to you to use scientific reasoning, not arbitrary criteria to explain why.
Your claims are not about when the abortion happens, but yet, you still ignore when life begins. Life. Not human life. First there has to be determined life. Sperm and eggs are life. When does it become human life? The same criteria must be used. How is the species of remains identified? DNA. What method is used to identify the individual those remains belong to? Again, DNA. You are using arbitrary criteria, not set up for life or science, but to justify abortion, instead. Therefore, WHEN an abortion takes place is irrelevant, unless that unique individual DNA has not been established.
Just because you believe it’s cruel and reprehensible, does not make for law. Many feel it would be cruel and reprehensible to kill the child regardless. When using that argument, one must make the case as to why your opinion is of more value than others. Until then, you cannot use that opinion to try to define law.
4) Your use of the word demonstratably implied that all abortions save lives, as I did state that there would be times where an abortion could save a mother’s life. By arguing that the lifevests are equal to abortions, you are implying that they both saves lives and are intended to save lives. The object of an abortion is not to save a life, but to end one. A quick search reveals that is less than .004%, making the “life-saving” comparison an grossly innacurate one, seeing how 100% of lifevests are designed to save lives.
So again, it is a red herring and a strawman, nothing more.
@grim_truth - (1) Right, but that would disprove you implication that conservative pro-life proponents don’t want to mandate restrictions or a ban through government action. That’s inherently nonsensical because the only way to accomplish these objectives is through government intervention. This is why virtually every pro-life Christian and/or conservative group actively campaigns for pro-life legislation.
That being said, the legality of abortion at a federal level was unresolved when the Roe v. Wade occurred. There, as an issue of first impression, SCOTUS held the right to abortion was constitutionally protected. So yes, I am asserting that the legal challenges faced by teh pro-life movement are (1) insurmountable without unparalleled judicial activism and (2) entirely different than those faced by the early pro-choice movement prior to federal legislation and case law supporting abortion choice. Furthermore, the most influential lobbies of medical professionals all reject abortion bans or significantly more restrictive abortion regulations. Pro-life proponents can’t directly confront decades of reproductive health evidence indicating that a functional first world society needs abortion to some degree. This only further reduces the already nominal chances that the pro-life movement will succeed on these grounds.
(2) You did not accurately represent my argument or the post, and thus, it was a strawman. Please read my explanation again.
Nothing in the post or my translation framed the arguments in the manner you claim they did, used the language you did (e.g., “majority”), or made the substantive points you did. For example, nothing anywhere directly or indirectly discusses political ideology (e.g., conservative, Republican, etc.) into the equation. You brought that consideration into the discussion and proceeded to use that as a basis for calling the post a strawman. Changing the fundamental meaning and expression of an argument before arguing against it is the heart and soul of a strawman argument.
(3) You may not agree with them, but they are not arbitrary, by definition. The law on these issues is not “arbitrary”. They were carefully established over 40 years ago in an elaborate legal opinion and have been consistently interpreted, applied, and upheld since then. Similarly, my approach that looks at all characteristics of human life and personhood can’t be “arbitrary” because it is all inclusive. Furthermore, each each factor I mentioned is scientifically verifiable and adopted by the courts in their legal analysis of the issue.
What is truly arbitrary is focusing on one characteristic of humanity and making that the standard of defining life. Unfortunately, DNA is a nonsensical standard. First, the DNA of developing fetuses is not identical to birthed humans. The DNA is expressed and regulated differently at different stages of development, which is one of the mechansms that drives the development of the fetus. Furthermore, if we adopt your DNA standard, then a human corpse is a “life” because it has the same DNA as a living human. A detached toe nail is a live human because it has complete human DNA sequence. A single hair follicle is a live human because it has complete human DNA sequence. A single skin cell in a test tube is “life” because it has a complete DNA sequence. Clearly, DNA is, in and of itself, is an insufficient and nonsensical standard for life.
The better approach, clearly, is my approach, which is the approach reflected in the law. You look at all the factors that characterize human personhood and life. You don’t unduly focus on one or several factors for no reason.
This is all besides the point because you appear to be arguing that your definition of “life” deserves the legal protections expressly defined and provided by the law for human life alone. That’s the entire issue with these beliefs. You have yet to explain why “life” (if we are to assume it includes sperm and egg, which possess none of the characteristics of a living human) should receive the legal protections reserved in our laws only for viable human beings. Expanding “life” to include sperm and egg (which, by the way, independently and collectively do not have the DNA of a zygote, fetus, baby, or human) would create nonsensical results, like giving animals with 98% of the same DNA as a human 98% of the rights of a human.
(4) Saying “Abortion demonstrably saves lives” does not mean or imply that all abortions save lives. That’s not what those words mean on their own or in the context I used them. “Demonstrably” means I can demonstrate abortion can and does save lives. Nothing more. You are not comprehending what is written accurately. My statement is factually correct, as I have demonstrated. Conversely, saying “abortion does not save lives” is factually wrong. Abortions can and do save lives. The frequency of medically necessary abortions is irrelevant to anything that has been written by myself or GL. An extremist pro-life position would still necessitate taking away the right of women to have access to medical procedures that have been performed to save the lives or improve the health of millions of women. There is no rational defense for this position. And I am not entirely certain that it can be fairly said that life saver use is more likely to result in a life being saved or the quality of life being improved given the frequent recreation use of life jackets in swimming, boating, etc.
@grim_truth - I just saw the bottom of GL’s post, which mentioned Republicans. So, I can see where you believed political ideology was implicated by the poster.
Still, several things: (1) the poster makes no mention of Republicans or conservatives, (2) nothing I said mentions political ideology, and (3) the arguments presented by the poster are common among conservative Republican pro-life proponents. It’s still not a strawman to insinuate that these arguments are common with or strongly associated with that political ideology.
@UTRow1 – Dunno…I see the poster a little different and don’t see abortion as the point at all. Stupid republican logic..yea…but not really abortion.
We Should Ban LifeVests….i.e. we should ban condoms, the pill, sex education…….abstinence only. Teaching kids about sex only encourages risky behavior.
The poster could have made its point with this alone leaving the rest of it out.@grim_truth - you prove again you are just another Sean Hannity wannabe right-wing hack. The Truth!!!! LOL!!!
Comments (33)
Yep. Once you replace “rape” and “pregnancy” with different terms, you can start to see their total disconnect from reality, common sense, and empathy.
But that’s nothing new, is it?
hahaha if only we could get them all to go on a “cruise”
Is this some sort of anti-gun analogy?
LOVE IT!
I have never needed a life jacket. lol
i think Obama and Romney may need one the way they are hurling verbal torpedoes at each other. lol
what a great red herring! Compare something that saves a life to something that ends a life. Yeah, that makes sense (in some worlds, I guess)
haha. funny. if we can’t get life jackets banned make a law allowing big government to probe anyone wanting to use one.
This is trying to be smart but to me this is just dumb
To be fair republicans did give some push-back from the “legitimate” remark, though I think one or two nutbags agreed with him.
@grim_truth - I wouldn’t really call it red herring. Satire is more like it.
@grim_truth - I didn’t know you were Catholic? Your boy Ryan could use a dose of your Grim Truth cuz you are about the truth and all. I liked his 2:30 Marathon!!
@Saridactyl - it’s misleading and distracting from the issue. Thus, a red herring. Satire has to make sense. It’s not an equal comparison. If it was, then it would be satire.
@tendollar4ways - Ryan is not my boy and will not be getting my vote. Nice strawman.
Idiotic, comparing life-and-death with rape. Liberals are morons.
Swimming lessons would only encourage drowning. It’s a violation of my rights to forcibly teach my kids about swimming. You might as well be teaching them how to drown.
@grim_truth - ”what a great red herring! Compare something that saves a life to something that ends a life. Yeah, that makes sense (in some worlds, I guess)”
What the post clearly attacks is the logic of much of the pro-life arguments and sentiments. Calling the comparison a red herring doesn’t show how it is one, and merely pointing to he differences in the subjections of comparisons doesn’t dismiss the logical connections between the two.
@CanuckFascist - Your disdain and your ideas would be clearer if you typed in complete and correctly punctuated sentences.
@Celestial_Teapot – Sweetiepie, my English is PERFECT. Yours is not. Mwaaaaahhh
@Doubledb - When trying to compare two things that are not at all like each other…yeah. It does come across that way.
Let’s be more literal: Ban abortions in all cases no exceptions like if a woman’s life is endangered, if the child would be a product of rape or incest.
It sort of says Ban sex education, don’t teach the use of condoms (because of course rapists never want to learn that usage), you can’t use morning after pills nor is any other birth control allowed besides abstinence (which of course is useless for a woman who is being raped)
The drowning parallel would be don’t teach swiming, learning cpr and other lifesaving techniques people who drown were fated to die anyway by drowning. In otherwords turn your attention away from any deaths from drowning.
Turning our hearts away from any exceptions for having an abortion is part of the campaign to overturn Roe Vs Wade and to push the idiotic position of life begins at conception. However one would compare that position to that position that Children deserve the right to vote…When life begins is a bit complicated. Buddhists could claim that life never ends, it just get recycled and the soul migrates elsewhere.
@PPhilip - Apparently in Arizona life begins 2 weeks prior to conception. Women in Arizona are pregnant all the time. ;p
@Celestial_Teapot - Grammar is a tool special interest groups use to enslave the government and its people.
@Celestial_Teapot - There is no logical connection between the two. It compares something that saves lives with something that ends life. It clearly distracts from the actual issue by doing so. Thus, it is a red herring. It paints a picture that everyone of a certain segment thinks the same, which is untrue. Thus, it is also a strawman. (though I guess it depends on what one thinks the “lifejackets” are. One could take them as sex education, which would make a bit more sense, but at the bottom of the picture since it talks more of the “gift” and “legitimate” comments that have been made, it seems it is clearly more of an analogy for abortion. Which makes the comparisons not even close)
@UTRow1 - Can you hear my applause from here?
I’ll translate it for the people have difficulty making the connections:
“We should ban abortion and other forms of contraception [as well as the HPV vaccine], because they encourage sinful behavior. The only 100% effective way to prevent pregnancy is to refrain from sexual activity. And if by chance you find yourself struggling with pregnancy [read: rape, pregnancy that threatens the mother's life], no abortion procedures should be allowed to be administered. You got yourself into this mess, you deal with the consequences.”
Every ridiculous argument in the poster is a prominent pro-life argument or sentiment with the relevant words replaced. The poster is effective because it adequately demonstrates that an outright abortion ban (like an outright ban on life jackets) is an emotional and illogical approach to a real-world problem that directly and adversely affects the health of individuals. Both flotation devices and abortion procedures demonstrably save lives and improve the mental and physical health of many women who receive them. It also demonstrates how archaic religious principles (that are, ironically, arguably absent in the Bible) can cloud people’s judgment and make them advocate for outrageous things regarding health issues.
Of course the arguments are nonsensical. That’s the point of the post. The source material (pro-life arguments) they are directly translated from are also nonsensical. Attempts to differentiate the applicability of the arguments to life jackets are also difficult given the misunderstanding of reproductive health that many conservatives have (e.g., abortions kill and/or hurts “babies”, abortion isn’t necessary to protect the health of women, controversial interpretations of the Bible are a sound bases of legal rights in America, etc.)
@GodlessLiberal - It’s being drowned out by all the cognitive dissonance in the comment section. But, I did notice that I got an erection for some reason. A common reaction to applause for me.
@UTRow1 - Strawman. It is not the majority of pro-lifers arguing for gov’t mandated abstinence.
Again, lifejackets save lives, abortions end lives. Therefore, it is not effective, except for those with preconceived notions of what the other side’s argument really is. Remember, the pro-life argument is about life. When it begins. Just because you place arbitrary criteria on life, doesn’t mean it is correct. I have explained non-arbitrary criteria that is already in use, and you simply dismiss it because it doesn’t jive with your platform. (no one can argue that it isn’t life. The argument is whose life. Current legal criteria in all cases except abortion, individualism is defined by our unique DNA code. It is a method already used to identify victims as well as perpetrators, thus it’s not arbitrary.)
Abortions do not demonstratably save lives. They are used to terminate pregnancies. Most of the pro-life crowd actually believes when the mother’s life is in danger, that it is then a decision to be made by the mother.
Again, it’s a strawman because all republicans were lumped in there, ignoring the fact that most do not think like that, that not all republicans are pro-life, and that there are pro-life democrats.
But then again, using logic and full thought wouldn’t allow you all to play partisan politics, would it?
@UTRow1 - It’s sad that someone had to literally spell it out like you did. Unfortunately, some people ^ are so dumb and/or so emotionally attached to their views that they still don’t get it. *eye roll*
@grim_truth - (1) The only way to prevent or restrict abortion to any meaningful degree given its current legal standing would be through government intervention and/or action. You would either have to make the act illegal through the legislative process or the courts, or you would have to prohibit health care providers from providing abortions. This is why pro-life candidates, the vast majority of whom have been conservative Republicans in recent decades, have been attempting to do both for over 60 years.
(2) Neither I nor the poster originally claimed a “majority” of pro-lifers or Republicans support “government mandated” abstinence. Ironically, you have committed a strawman fallacy because you are misrepresenting the arguments that have been made.
That being said, the vast majority of people who support a legislative ban on abortion, or most extreme abortion restrictions, are conservative, pro-life Christians. There’s absolutely no statistical evidence to the contrary. Similarly, of the people that want all or most abortions made illegal, a significantly higher percentage of them are Republican than Democrat. This really shouldn’t come as a surprise given crap like the GOP’s 2012 pro-life pledge, which was signed exclusively by self-proclaimed conservatives the last time I checked.
If you believe otherwise, I would like seeing some surveys that support your beliefs because no evidence I have ever seen indicates you would be correct.
(3) As I stated in my comment, the problem with your attempts to differentiate life jackets and abortion are not compelling and rely on assumptions that are scientifically and logically poor and/or unsubstantiated.
Take for instance your argument that abortion ends a “life.” More than 99% of abortions occur well before the third trimester, before the fetus is anything that can rationally or accurately be construed as a human “life”. 88% of abortions occur within the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, when the fetus has less in common with a child than a flatworm with a functional nervous system. And of the small number of abortions that occur during the third trimester–when the fetus develops the pharyngeal arcs required for pain perception, cognizance, and other characteristics that define the type of “life” that the law protects–the vast majority of them are performed to avoid imminent bodily injury or death caused by a complicated pregnancy. Here’s a good general source on abortion statistics that will directly support or cite to literature that supports all my claims.
I also believe it’s reprehensible and cruel to force a mother to birth a child that an ameniocentesis reveals will have a horrible, painful, debilitating health issue, such as anencephaly. The position is cruel to both the mother for forcing her to undergo childbirth and the potential deadly risks associated with it, and the “child” that is ultimately birthed, which will almost certainly die a horrible death within a few hours of birth.
So, in my opinion, nearly all aborted fetuses are not “alive” in any meaningful sense. Furthermore, and this is the key, in an objective legal sense, a pre-third trimester fetus is not considered a “life” under the law. They do not receive constitutional protections, such as procedural due process, that all other humans receive, including the mentally handicapped, comatose, and children. Furthermore, at no point during the pregnancy does the life of the fetus supersede the life of the mother. That is, if the mother has a life-threatening medical complication and wants to abort the fetus, she has the legal right to do so under federal law. This, in and of itself, makes the pro-life position inferior from a public policy perspective because they are pining about things that are not the legal reality of the world we live in and will never be the legal reality of the world we live in. Period. We will never live in their world.
(4) I’m sorry, but abortion does demonstrably save lives. This is not a matter of opinion. If you believe otherwise, you are both appallingly ignorant and failing to engage reality.
At this point I would normally link to a bunch of peer-reviewed journals listing the pregnancy complications that often require induced abortion, but why take my word or the word of scientists on it? There are many women who have had their lives saved by an abortion who will testify to the indisputable. Focusing entirely on the fetus (and assuming it is alive) is clearly not a valid or complete approach to the issue. You can’t just ignore the wellbeing of the mothers because it suits your ideology.
Still, I would be interested in seeing you provide a single article from a reputable scientific journal or publication that argues abortion does not save lives.
@In_Reason_I_Trust - by “emotionally attached to their views” do you mean refusing to look at it objectively like pro-choicers do? There are already established criteria set and used that define life. It is the pro-choice crowd that uses a different criteria solely to excuse abortions.
@UTRow1 - 1) The only way to make it legal was to use the same methods you describe. Am I to understand that your view is only one side can do so?
2) I did not create a strawman argument. The picture satirically calls for the banning of lifevests, comparing it to abortion. Thus, it is indeed implied that the post is claiming that’s what pro-lifers want. If not, then it is a failed analogy, and thus any argument you make is invalid.
I’m not ignoring the fact that most pro-lifers are indeed Christians, Conservatives, or republicans. I just made the statement that the OP ignored that fact that there are indeed liberals, atheists and democrats that are also pro-life. Yet, he did not include them in his attempt at an insult, which shows pure party bias, and partisan politics as plain as the sun shines.
3) Again, you are using arbitrary criteria to describe human life. There are already criteria set in place that are used in criminal cases for those who are born. Those same criteria can be used on fetuses, but you just choose not to use them. By doing so, it is not up to me, but up to you to use scientific reasoning, not arbitrary criteria to explain why.
Your claims are not about when the abortion happens, but yet, you still ignore when life begins. Life. Not human life. First there has to be determined life. Sperm and eggs are life. When does it become human life? The same criteria must be used. How is the species of remains identified? DNA. What method is used to identify the individual those remains belong to? Again, DNA. You are using arbitrary criteria, not set up for life or science, but to justify abortion, instead. Therefore, WHEN an abortion takes place is irrelevant, unless that unique individual DNA has not been established.
Just because you believe it’s cruel and reprehensible, does not make for law. Many feel it would be cruel and reprehensible to kill the child regardless. When using that argument, one must make the case as to why your opinion is of more value than others. Until then, you cannot use that opinion to try to define law.
4) Your use of the word demonstratably implied that all abortions save lives, as I did state that there would be times where an abortion could save a mother’s life. By arguing that the lifevests are equal to abortions, you are implying that they both saves lives and are intended to save lives. The object of an abortion is not to save a life, but to end one. A quick search reveals that is less than .004%, making the “life-saving” comparison an grossly innacurate one, seeing how 100% of lifevests are designed to save lives.
So again, it is a red herring and a strawman, nothing more.
@grim_truth - (1) Right, but that would disprove you implication that conservative pro-life proponents don’t want to mandate restrictions or a ban through government action. That’s inherently nonsensical because the only way to accomplish these objectives is through government intervention. This is why virtually every pro-life Christian and/or conservative group actively campaigns for pro-life legislation.
That being said, the legality of abortion at a federal level was unresolved when the Roe v. Wade occurred. There, as an issue of first impression, SCOTUS held the right to abortion was constitutionally protected. So yes, I am asserting that the legal challenges faced by teh pro-life movement are (1) insurmountable without unparalleled judicial activism and (2) entirely different than those faced by the early pro-choice movement prior to federal legislation and case law supporting abortion choice. Furthermore, the most influential lobbies of medical professionals all reject abortion bans or significantly more restrictive abortion regulations. Pro-life proponents can’t directly confront decades of reproductive health evidence indicating that a functional first world society needs abortion to some degree. This only further reduces the already nominal chances that the pro-life movement will succeed on these grounds.
(2) You did not accurately represent my argument or the post, and thus, it was a strawman. Please read my explanation again.
Nothing in the post or my translation framed the arguments in the manner you claim they did, used the language you did (e.g., “majority”), or made the substantive points you did. For example, nothing anywhere directly or indirectly discusses political ideology (e.g., conservative, Republican, etc.) into the equation. You brought that consideration into the discussion and proceeded to use that as a basis for calling the post a strawman. Changing the fundamental meaning and expression of an argument before arguing against it is the heart and soul of a strawman argument.
(3) You may not agree with them, but they are not arbitrary, by definition. The law on these issues is not “arbitrary”. They were carefully established over 40 years ago in an elaborate legal opinion and have been consistently interpreted, applied, and upheld since then. Similarly, my approach that looks at all characteristics of human life and personhood can’t be “arbitrary” because it is all inclusive. Furthermore, each each factor I mentioned is scientifically verifiable and adopted by the courts in their legal analysis of the issue.
What is truly arbitrary is focusing on one characteristic of humanity and making that the standard of defining life. Unfortunately, DNA is a nonsensical standard. First, the DNA of developing fetuses is not identical to birthed humans. The DNA is expressed and regulated differently at different stages of development, which is one of the mechansms that drives the development of the fetus. Furthermore, if we adopt your DNA standard, then a human corpse is a “life” because it has the same DNA as a living human. A detached toe nail is a live human because it has complete human DNA sequence. A single hair follicle is a live human because it has complete human DNA sequence. A single skin cell in a test tube is “life” because it has a complete DNA sequence. Clearly, DNA is, in and of itself, is an insufficient and nonsensical standard for life.
The better approach, clearly, is my approach, which is the approach reflected in the law. You look at all the factors that characterize human personhood and life. You don’t unduly focus on one or several factors for no reason.
This is all besides the point because you appear to be arguing that your definition of “life” deserves the legal protections expressly defined and provided by the law for human life alone. That’s the entire issue with these beliefs. You have yet to explain why “life” (if we are to assume it includes sperm and egg, which possess none of the characteristics of a living human) should receive the legal protections reserved in our laws only for viable human beings. Expanding “life” to include sperm and egg (which, by the way, independently and collectively do not have the DNA of a zygote, fetus, baby, or human) would create nonsensical results, like giving animals with 98% of the same DNA as a human 98% of the rights of a human.
(4) Saying “Abortion demonstrably saves lives” does not mean or imply that all abortions save lives. That’s not what those words mean on their own or in the context I used them. “Demonstrably” means I can demonstrate abortion can and does save lives. Nothing more. You are not comprehending what is written accurately. My statement is factually correct, as I have demonstrated.
Conversely, saying “abortion does not save lives” is factually wrong. Abortions can and do save lives. The frequency of medically necessary abortions is irrelevant to anything that has been written by myself or GL. An extremist pro-life position would still necessitate taking away the right of women to have access to medical procedures that have been performed to save the lives or improve the health of millions of women. There is no rational defense for this position. And I am not entirely certain that it can be fairly said that life saver use is more likely to result in a life being saved or the quality of life being improved given the frequent recreation use of life jackets in swimming, boating, etc.
@grim_truth - I just saw the bottom of GL’s post, which mentioned Republicans. So, I can see where you believed political ideology was implicated by the poster.
Still, several things: (1) the poster makes no mention of Republicans or conservatives, (2) nothing I said mentions political ideology, and (3) the arguments presented by the poster are common among conservative Republican pro-life proponents. It’s still not a strawman to insinuate that these arguments are common with or strongly associated with that political ideology.
@UTRow1 – Dunno…I see the poster a little different and don’t see abortion as the point at all. Stupid republican logic..yea…but not really abortion.
We Should Ban LifeVests….i.e. we should ban condoms, the pill, sex education…….abstinence only. Teaching kids about sex only encourages risky behavior.
The poster could have made its point with this alone leaving the rest of it out.@grim_truth - you prove again you are just another Sean Hannity wannabe right-wing hack. The Truth!!!! LOL!!!
what a great example