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The Forum > Article Comments > She's a brick ... > Comments

She's a brick ... : Comments

By Audrey Apple, published 5/1/2007

Audrey Apple tells us about her experience of abortion. Best Blogs 2006.

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THANK YOU Audrey Apple for your great piece. You are wonderful and brave in this society were the Abbott’s have had too much power and had it for too long.

I am so sick of the current Howard Government language of “too many abortions”. Who says? Which particular ones were the ones too many? Who decides? And if there is a point of too many - by the same token - then there must be point of too few. Who then decides which ones were the ones that should have had abortions? It is just so stupid and illogical.

A woman’s body – a woman’s choice.
Posted by Billy C, Friday, 5 January 2007 10:47:12 AM
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Onya Audrey,for a refreshingly straightforward,no nonsence article.
Posted by maracas, Friday, 5 January 2007 11:25:18 AM
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“It was not a baby. It was a fetus”

Denial of a fetus’s humanity

.” As far as I’m concerned, it’s an area in which they shouldn’t DARE to try and dictate the parameters of to women”.
This is Misandry , Men have a stake in this debate as well.
“Peace out (and respect to all those that fight to defend sexual freedom).”
You are like every other person free to copulate with any one you please but don’t think that “sexual Freedom” extends to the inalienable right to kill unborn children and pretend that they are not human beings.
Abortion should be available safe and RARE.
Posted by IAIN HALL, Friday, 5 January 2007 11:34:35 AM
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Good onya Audrey for speaking out!
Posted by billie, Friday, 5 January 2007 12:00:01 PM
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I like and agree with this article... though I do think men should have some input into whether or not an abortion takes place... I'm certainly not saying they should be able to override the woman's choice, but to ignore the father entirely isn't fair either.

And Iain... you say a fetus is a baby. Many don't. If you're going to fight this argument, that's where the real persuasion has to take place. Those who hysterically scream 'baby killers' are about as persuasive as those 'end is at hand' screeching types.
Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Friday, 5 January 2007 12:53:32 PM
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When I read this article on the author’s website I was disturbed by women respondents who applauded the author as a heroine and lauded the operation as a victory and a triumph. Some went so far as to suggest that a celebration was in order.

By definition, an ‘unplanned’ pregnancy is an accident. Hopefully such accidents should be unusual for adults (at least) given the availability of birth control.

Where there is abortion by choice the moral decision is with the woman, however reasonableness and ethics should indictate that the ‘father’ would be involved in the decision, after all it took two to tango. Nonetheless there could be circumstances where such consultation might not be such a good thing.

However where the father is not consulted or is not in favour of the action taken, how can the community then expect that he be accountable for the outcome?

I don’t think anyone who decides to abort is necessarily brave, although choosing to have and raise a child could well be. Both decisions would involve a lot of soul searching and there is no way practical considerations can be ruled out.

If it is any consolation to women contemplating a termination, there is reason to suggest that the life-long pain of having a child taken away through adoption (as happened to many young girls in the past) would far outweigh the distress of an early termination. Thank goodness for the morning after pill and who could ever return to the fifties?

I do not believe that describing the foetus as a ‘parasite’ or a non life-form assists the long term emotional wellbeing of the woman. De-personalising the 'enemy' is what armies do and it has no application to pregnancy termination. Prior to and after a termination it is normal and OK to mourn and to give vent to very complex, conflicting emotions. It is just awful decision that is less awful if it can be done early enough. That is why most people see value in the morning after pill.
Posted by Cornflower, Friday, 5 January 2007 1:49:41 PM
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As someone who had a hand in compiling BBP2006, I'm glad to say this piece landed in my in-tray and that I was able to recommend it to Ken Parish and Nick Gruen. It is brave, thoughtful, gutsy and lots of other good things. Well done.
Posted by skepticlawyer, Friday, 5 January 2007 2:02:52 PM
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The tone of the article says it all... abortion should be free because *I* want to do what I want, when I want, and damn the consequences, damn the taxpayers, damn everyone who gets in the way of what is convenient for me at this point in time. Another example of the inbalance between rights and responsibilities in Western Society. Part of (sexual) freedom is taking responsibility for your actions, and using freedom responsibly.

I used to get upset about these types of hypocritical stances, because this is the worst example of middle class, egocentric, consumerist culture that the left supposedly rallies against. However, I now find that self centred people tend to end up being very lonely, bitter people, so I just feel sorry for them.
Posted by Gekko, Friday, 5 January 2007 2:11:54 PM
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Iain Hall your comments are just ludicrous. To say the author is denying the humanity of a foetus is misleading and wrong. You do not have to be a Roads Scholar to figure out that a foetus and a baby, both biologically human, are different. A foetus is a potential person that can not survive without a physical attachment to, and total physical reliance on, another person. A baby is a person and a person does not require physical attachment to another person to survive. Year 8 biology.

I get quite confused about why some men persist with the idea that men have a stake in another persons medical procedure that they them selves will never have. I am also equally perplexed as to why some women seek to deny other women access to a procedure that they themselves will choose not have. If you do not want an abortion – simple – don’t have one.

Men may be, and are often are, invited to give their input into an individual woman’s decision – but the invitation for input is entirely up to the woman. The decision is the woman’s and the issue is entirely between an individual woman and her doctor.
By “rare” I think you mean you get to choose who is worthy enough to access an abortion and who is not. Your further comments about the author are just disgusting and reveal, I think, a disturbed mind.

Hey Cornflower - I think the issue of access to, and education about, free, safe and available contraception is most important but – at the same time - not at all related to the issue of access to abortion. Just as a woman’s decision to access abortion is entirely hers and the issue between her and her doctor, so is the issue of contraception for both individual men and women. Education about reproductive health, however, is a social responsibility. It should be comprehensive for both men and women and cover all aspects from conception planning to contraception as well as abortion.
Posted by Billy C, Friday, 5 January 2007 3:24:18 PM
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The number of times the word 'I' is used in this article says its all. If only we could think past 'I' maybe then we would not have to murder the unborn.
Posted by runner, Friday, 5 January 2007 3:35:06 PM
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Billy C - I completely agree. Attempting to morally outline the acceptable cases of abortion is illogical and most importantly unsafe. Women will access it however they can, so the question is really whether we prize the fully formed life of a woman or the potential life of a foetus.

maracas - I'm glad you liked it :)

Iain Hall - I agree that in an ideal world men would have equal weight in the debate. However, until men are able to produce children and deal with the burden of pregnancy, I'm afraid I have to consider their opinions less valid. And absolutely - abortion should be rare. But that comes with a far greater emphasis on safe sex education; even then, genuine contraception failures like mine will happen.

Turn Right Then Left - Exactly. I'm more than willing to listen to pro-life arguments as long as emotive, illogical language like baby-killing is left out of it.

Cornflower - I don't believe I was ever called a heroine ;) I also pointed out a number of times that I didn't feel like I should be applauded for bravery. However, I did say that people consider me brave because I say what very few women feel they are allowed to. After delivering this piece to a conference in Adelaide I had a number of women thank me afterwards and tell me that they had never felt able to express their own relief for their abortions. Something to think about, non?

skepticlawyer - I have you to thank then!

(comments continued below)
Posted by audrey apple, Friday, 5 January 2007 4:17:47 PM
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Gekko - I'm a taxpayer too you know, and as yet I haven't used hospital for anything other than this procedure. Further, I think recognising that I have economic or emotional capability for a child right now is exercising far more responsibility than having one to please the likes of you.

Billy C - "Education about reproductive health, however, is a social responsibility. It should be comprehensive for both men and women and cover all aspects from conception planning to contraception as well as abortion." The problem it seems is that many who rally against abortion also seem to rally against comprehensive sex education - I could be generalising, but the two seem to hand in hand in a grand celebration of the conservative.

runner - *I* fail to see how *I* could write about *my* experience without reference to *myself*. I also get a sense that you consider women's natural inclination to be motherhood, as it seems you consider anything that rejects this model to be selfish.

Thanks everyone for reading the article. It's clearly an area that inspires a lot of emotion. My biggest wish though is for the stigma of guilt to be removed from abortion, even within the pro-choice camp. If women could feel comfortable about admitting to abortions, we might get past this notion that they truly are something to be ashamed of rather than representative of a woman making her own choice to govern her reproductive rights.

Peace out
Posted by audrey apple, Friday, 5 January 2007 4:18:09 PM
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There seems to be a few people commenting on this article who seem very quick to judge the author. However, apart from the few small pieces of information she has deemed relvant to the article, very few details are given. I can't blame her for wanting to protect her privacy, but several posters seem to think they have enough knowledge of the situation to pass judgement. Other seem to think, that with NO knowledge of this womans situation, that they know what was the best course of action to take.

Comments such as "You are like every other person free to copulate with any one you please" seem to indicate that the commentor knows more about the situation that the author was in than is presented in the article.

Other comments suggesting that she is selfish, and a "worst example of middle class, egocentric, consumerist culture", indicate a personal knowledge of the womans situation.

How do you how the conception took place? How do you know that the author is so egocentric, and selfish without knowing the full details of her situation? To criticise the actions of others, without having any knowledge of the situation is foolish.

Take a leaf from Atticus Finch. Before critising others actions, climb into their skin and walk around in it for a while. Try to empathise. And before launching an attack, ask yourself "do I know enough about the situation to comment on it?"

Perhaps this young woman was in real trouble. I leave it to her to make the best possible descion for herself in a situation I know (almost) nothing about.

Now, a hypothetical. From the tone of the article, it seems as though this woman was very determined to terminate the pregancy. Would it be a reasonable assumption to say she would go ahead with it, regardless of the access to safe, medical abortion? If so, ask yourself, would you rather she have a safe abortion, or risk going to a "back yard butcher"? For me, the choice is obvious.
Posted by ChrisC, Friday, 5 January 2007 4:23:12 PM
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Gents, imagine your lady friend is pregnant and asks if you will marry her to provide for her and the foetus until the child is school age and she can earn her own living. And she expects you to provide for that child until it is 25.
If you decline her hand in marriage then gents you really have no say in whether the pregnancy continues.

Another scenario, imagine the mother discovers that the longed for baby is severely disabled and will require lifelong care for as long as it lives, say the next 30 years. The doctors strongly suggest termination, would you condemn a parent that aborts in these circumstances? Would you be happy for the child to receive lifelong non-means tested invalid pension and its mother to recieve lifelong carers pension also not means tested and you are willing to provide 3 months per year respite care for the child. If your answer is no then again butt out.

Are you happy to extend these same generous conditions to teenage petrol sniffing aboriginal mothers or fully cloaked muslims?
Posted by billie, Friday, 5 January 2007 4:32:00 PM
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"Iain Hall your comments are just ludicrous./Snip/ Year 8 biology."
Your distinctions are purely semantic and my point is that wether you call an unborn child at conception +1 day one thing and at full term another. It is still a child that is being killed. People like the distinctions that you use to dehumanize the child so it is easier to have a clear conscience after the killing.

"I get quite confused about why some men persist with the idea that men have a stake in another persons medical procedure that they them selves will never have."
I draw breath and I am a human being so why should my gender preclude me have an interest the killing of my fellow humans because I am a male and that human being is as yet unborn?

"The decision is the woman’s and the issue is entirely between an individual woman and her doctor."
Well that is the legal position in this country and I am not advocating a change in the law. However I think that there is nothing wrong with me, or anyone else reminding every one that an abortion is not some minor medical procedure like having a mole removed it is the killing of a child.

"By “rare” I think you mean you get to choose who is worthy enough to access an abortion and who is not."
No my statement is so simple that any one can understand it; Abortion is sometimes justifiable but that it is something that is not to be undertaken under the misapprehension that it is NOT the killing of a human being. Take it as my advocating that there be true informed consent on the part of the woman involved, not the delusional denials of the humanity of an unborn child based upon some arbitrary distinction of its age since conception.

" Your further comments about the author are just disgusting and reveal, I think, a disturbed mind."
My mind is entirely cogent I just think that one does not call something a manual-digging implement when it is clearly a spade
Posted by IAIN HALL, Friday, 5 January 2007 4:39:25 PM
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Audrey,

If you knew absolutely (by some gift of the universe) that the baby was a living human, like you or me, would you still support abortion?
Posted by StewartGlass, Friday, 5 January 2007 4:47:57 PM
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I'm a mother of two and have had the privilege of being pregnant. Yes, ladies, it is a privilege.

I am not anti-abortion. I am not anti-choice. But I do not think abortion should be touted as a lifestyle saving procedure. Abortion is not a form of birth control.

Women should be entitled to have freedom over their bodies. But for those of us who have carried a child, those of us who have desperately tried to fall pregnant, those of us who have gone in for a 6 week ultrasound check to look for a heart beat - a fetus is a living, feeling, amazing miraculous soul. Don't dare tell us otherwise.
Posted by Blackstone, Friday, 5 January 2007 7:56:38 PM
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Billie – your hypotheticals were excellent examples. Often the underlying aggression of particularly male pro-lifers is directed at woman wanting to avoid their motherly duties.

Iain Hall – I’ve got a hypothetical for you: You have a daughter. Beautiful, intelligent, extremely intelligent. Gets into law. Studies her brains out. Passes with honours. Does clerkships. Kisses major arse, works 60 hour weeks and finally gets a foothold in a large, successful firm. She’s going to run the place within a decade or two. The boss calls her in. Says he’s very pleased with her work and she’ll go far, as long as she puts in the hours for the company and doesn’t do anything dumb like get herself knocked up. His exact words. Bosses can be turds, can’t they? Anyway, she falls pregnant. The guy buggers off. If she continues the pregnancy, the job’s gone. The other clerks she studied and worked with will get her job while she’ll be experiencing the joys of single parenthood, probably for the next five to ten years. She wants to get an abortion. Would you presume to tell her not to?
Posted by Franzy, Saturday, 6 January 2007 1:50:35 AM
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The abortion debate has been going on for years, with little change. We still allow the most vulnerable and loving among us, our unborn children, to have their life terminated. Though the grounds to abortion are clear and of a high bar when law allowed it, because there is no consequence to any breach, practically it only takes a woman to present herself for one...and the path is cleared for one...then everyone goes back to what they were doing besides lip service for personal 'issues' but none for the dead child and 'what if allowed to live outcome' including that the child could have become a fine good adult we all could be proud of...

I for one have taken the power in my control to extreme care level ie my sperm. I do not release within a woman, even with condom. The release is away from the woman, and have soap and wet towel nearby to collect them soon after. This way I know that I will not be responsible for an abortion under any circumstances...I sleep better for it...

Of course I have learnt to resist the temptations of words like 'just come' at the heat of the moment by keeping in mind good sex is a controlled balanced event of body, sexual energy and rhythm, not passion out of control where all consequences are pushed out of the mind at that moment...

Sam
Posted by Sam said, Saturday, 6 January 2007 9:12:07 AM
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Sam said, Hi. You're a pretty tough guy, aren't you? No coming, even when you want to, resisting temptation and man enough to clean up after yourself in the bedroom. What a man.

"...practically it only takes a woman to present herself for [an abortion]..."

You make it sound so easy!
'Let me see,' says sexually active woman beginning her day. 'Shopping, visit Karen, oh - get an abortion, pick up something for dinner, then back out on to the pub for some more sex!'

And the following phrase: "then everyone goes back to what they were doing besides lip service for personal 'issues' but none for the dead child" reveals another little truth about you, my macho friend: You have never spoken to a woman who's had an abortion. In fact, I don't believe you've spoken to many women. You certainly don't seem to have much respect for them. No women EVER forgets having an abortion. Some have no regrets, some hate themselves bitterly for the rest of their lives for it, but still would make the same decision.
But I guess those are just female 'personal issues' that can be dabbed away with a Kleenex and a trip to the after-Christmas sales, eh?

ps. 'soap and a wet towel'? Why would we need to know that?
Posted by Franzy, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:43:48 AM
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Franzy

I actually have a daughter who is, “ Beautiful, intelligent, extremely intelligent.” And I have no doubt that if she were to go into law she would excel at it and were she to fall pregnant when this was inconvenient she would make the right decision for herself (she is very strong willed and determined and she is not yet eight) The scenario that you paint would however contravene all kinds of anti discrimination laws and I would expect that if my daughter were the absolutely brilliant advocate that you suggest she would be then her employer would value her enough to accommodate changes in her life. And If they would not I am sure that she would make their lives hell through the courts.

I wonder if this scenario comes from your experience Franzy?

“Would you presume to tell her not to?”

I used to be quite fervently ‘pro choice” (which is a misnomer if ever there was one) but when my wife and I finally decided to have children it was not as easy as do the business and get a child. That experience made me realise just how precious each child actually is. So my position has changed. I’m not going to picket abortion clinics or deny any woman the rights that the law allows them but I will through venues such as this do my best to point out that putting on a pair of rose colored glasses to make it “easier” for a woman to choose to kill her child by denying its humanity is wrong. Killing that child may sometimes be justifiable or necessary but denying its humanity is NEVER required.
Children are not just fancy pets or accessories to a life focused on work. Having children is not just a choice it is a biological imperative for all creatures. The question I would ask any one when trying to make a decision that puts a career against having a child is :
Do you work to live or live to work? Personally I would choose the former over the latter every time
Posted by IAIN HALL, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:58:19 AM
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Franzy, there is nothing to be gained from cheap shots along gender lines: “Often the underlying aggression of particularly male pro-lifers is directed at woman wanting to avoid their motherly duties.”

With respect, the example you gave is a no-brainer and it is a pity you got hooked up on men and male bosses, which detracts from the point that certain career choices and lifestyles can compete with motherhood (or fatherhood for that matter).

The obvious answer is that this female professional should do two things:
firstly, work out what is really important to her in life, including her long term priorities; and
secondly, allow her feet to do the talking if there is any aspect of the work or work environment that militates against achievement of her goals.

If family and quality of life are important to her she should be very aware that both women and men choose to balance personal life and work demands. Of course there are a few women and men who choose career (and $$) above all else. That is their choice and they wear the consequences. The Beamer, status and restaurants are worth it to some.

It is a myth that women bosses are more flexible and less demanding on personal time.

I don’t know that the risk would be high that an intelligent young professional focussed on career would fall pregnant very often, but if it happened, she would realise that time is of the essence. That is why we supported the morning after pill. She would be very timely in her response, either way.

As I said earlier, climbing the greasy pole is life's ambition for some. However for lesser mortals the biological clock is always ticking and from media reports there are women who claim they were misled into believing that their fertility after age thirty was fine, but later to their cost they discovered otherwise.

There are pros and cons of all decisions and there are no simple answers. However individuals must learn to take responsibility for their own decisions and not blame others.
Posted by Cornflower, Saturday, 6 January 2007 1:26:31 PM
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Great piece Audrey apple.
After reading I thought "thanks for the insight" as a man I'll never know what it's like to be pregnant. So it was interesting to let us into your world in a small way. The next thing I thought was I hope a sane person got to post before the wacko's do. Thanking fully that was the case. I'm also glad to say that while many of the post where predictable some where not, and the fact is the post held my interest as much as the article did. I was going to comment on some of the post but found you've done that already.
The comment I will make is this. To continue to believe that fertilised ovum should be given the same rights as a fully from human is to define the reality of our understanding biology. This belief can only be rooted in irrational thought. However the real point to be made here is that the so called prolifers have little interest in the foetus their real goal is to control to force their beliefs onto the rest of us. You see the point they really don't get is that pro-choice is just that pro choice. If you don't want an abortion don't have one. If you want one have one.

Ps abortion is a legitimate form of birth control, we have used it ever since the birth control pill was invented. Taking a drug that doesn't allow the ovum to attach to the womb is now different to pulling it off.
Posted by Kenny, Saturday, 6 January 2007 3:36:54 PM
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StewartGlass what’s the relevance of asking when human life begins? Until it’s born the foetus can die in utero for any number of reasons, admittedly a rare occurrence in white Australia with our excellent access to health care – for now.

As the Kelloggs ad for Special K asks, hasn’t the mother got any rights? Why should a woman compromise her health bearing a child she doesn’t want, can’t care for adequately.

No don’t mention adoption, many of us remember that up until the 1970s unwanted babies grew up in orphanages. Current estimates indicate that there would 70,000 babies surplus to requirements. The social cost of rearing these children in orphanages with the stunted outcomes these environments provide is beyond the cost that Australian society wants to cover. There are no jobs for unskilled kids who leave school at 15, there really aren’t many jobs for university graduates who aren’t prepared to work overseas either [ however that’s another story].

Iain Hall, discrimination on sexual grounds is still illegal on the statute books but is all too common in the workplace. Where do women who get into the higher echelons of the workforce climb the career ladder? Very rarely in private industry - women in their 40s and 50s who have climbed the corporate ladder did so in public service organisations. And when a potential boss admits to selecting a male over you 15 years later there is bugger all you can do.

Cornflower suggests that women need to decide their work life balance, and implied in that is the idea that career women shouldn’t get pregnant. In Australia most professional women find they work full time or not at all. If the woman isn’t in a stable relationship she won’t have children – perhaps the brightest Australians aren’t reproducing.

Other factors - high price of housing and availability of affordable longterm childcare.

And gents how many of you have heard or uttered the memorable phrase “I don’t want someone else’s brats”. This phrase alone indicates the precariousness of a single mother ever being in a long term stable relationship.
Posted by billie, Saturday, 6 January 2007 4:19:32 PM
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billie

I was referring to Franzy's hypothetical. To become a partner or senior manager in any firm you have to put in the hard yards. It is not a case of get the job then relax either. That doesn't leave much time or opportunity for family or a social life and if you were expecting this to change with women in senior positions you would be sadly mistaken.

Maybe the public service and universities are less demanding of their senior staff.

The professions do offer a lot of scope for flextime, reduced hours and contract work.
Posted by Cornflower, Saturday, 6 January 2007 6:32:47 PM
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Chris C - Ah, but everyone who criticises you always assumes they know best and that they would never have behaved as 'selfishly' as you ;) I conceived despite using a supposedly 100% effective contraceptive. And I'm branded irresponsible by people who'd rather judge than place themselves in my position. People criticise women for 'using abortion as a form of birth control' - I argue that if women DO use it as such a thing (as if it was so easy to organise!) then it is due to a lack of proper sex education in this country rather than a lack of 'morals' on behalf of the woman.

billie - Yes. It's ironic how many anti-abortionists are also anti single mothers because 'they're nothing but bloody dole bludgers'.

iain hall - "Abortion is 'sometimes' justifiable." In just what circumstances? Not, according to you, if it threatens the 'lifestyle' of the woman. In your mind, the ability of a woman to determine her own existence and responsibilities becomes a lifestyle choice. How selfish of her to want to priorities her own ambitions over her biological ability.

Stewart Glass - Foetuses do of course develop into humans like you or I - but as a cluster of cells, the comparison is utterly ridiculous.

Blackstone - I'm happy you considered it a privilige. I considered pregnancy a horrendous invasion of my body both physically and emotionally. I found out I was pregnant at 6 weeks and was forced to wait until 8 weeks because it was considered medically more reliable. You clearly don't know that the general stress of abortion is so high that it could never be utilised as a form of 'birth control'.

Sam said - "practically it only takes a woman to present herself for one.."...Have you had one? As Franzy says, it's not like popping down to the shops for a loaf of bread. Utilise some facts in your arguments before speaking about things of which you clearly have no knowledge.

(cont below)
Posted by audrey apple, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:23:21 PM
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Franzy - Don't you know we all just get horrendously drunk afterwards and laugh about it?

Iain Hall - While I sympathise, limiting women's ability to govern their reproductive rights won't make it any easier for you and your wife. You shouldn't condemn them because you feel they are contemptuous of an experience you would fight tooth and nail for.

Cornflower - Similarly, individuals must allow others to deal with their decisions and not foist their own unwanted criticism on them.

Kenny - You basically just said everything I believe.

billie - Refer to below comment re men in the pro-life camp.

Cornflower - "Maybe the public service and universities are less demanding of their senior staff." Is this insider knowledge of billie, or are you just assuming her pro-choice 'bleeding heart lefty' stance places her squarely in these fields?

Thanks again peeps. Someone referred earlier to the use of the morning after pill. The MAP can only be taken up to 72 hours after sex, which makes it pretty much useless for most women in accidental situations. Further, It occurred to me today that the prevalence of male voices in the pro-life camp might be because the masculine biological urge to spread their seed is unconciously offended by the idea that a woman might willingly rid their body of that seed. I truly can't conceive of any other reason why men would get their hackles up so vehemently about this issue, especially as they will never understand the physical and emotional reality of pregnancy - or will feel the intense pressure to change their lives so totally to accomodate said child.

I have great difficulty with the concept that women should somehow 'like it and lump it' when it comes to pregnancy. Women have been practising abortion for years, often dangerously. It. is. never. going. to. go. away. There's a despicable attitude that women who don't want children are somehow acting selfishly - as if they're primary function is to breed and everything else is merely just killing time. I blow raspberries in that direction.

Peace out.
Posted by audrey apple, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:23:46 PM
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Met a woman in hospital forced to have a baby against her will.
Raped by hubby coz she tried to leave him.
Wanted an abortion when she discovered she was pregnant,hubby locked her in a room for a month with only water.
Tried to kill herself so the law gave hubby legal control over her body to keep the pregnacy going.
She was tied in her bed.
The baby was born with all the disabilities the doctors predicted,due to the beatings,starvation and suicide attempt.
Hubby raped her 3 hours after the birth,in our 4 bed shared ward,and every chance he could after that.
Hubby adopted the baby out at 6 weeks.
She succeeded in killing herself 3 months later when she discovered she was pregnant again.
2 lives destroyed but Hallelujah peoples !
Hubby got his say and his way and no nasty abortion happened.
This was in 1997.
Posted by Bugs, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:48:47 PM
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Audrey and Billie,

I am just trying to wrap my head around your perspective. But neither of you have actually answered my question.

"if you knew the fetus was living would you still support abortion?"

Audrey - you are still a cluster of cells as am I
Billie - I know that fetus's can die. so can little babies (think cot deaths)

what I really want to know though is:

"if you knew the fetus was a living thing would you still support abortion?"
Posted by StewartGlass, Saturday, 6 January 2007 11:54:57 PM
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A short reply is due... particularly in response to Franzy and audrey apple. Firstly, in general your presumptions are wrong. To put things into perspective, I am a doctor. I have done hundreds of 1st trimester abortions. My perspective was solely for the womans interest in that situation and little for any thing else, as how I was trained and instructed. I have referred thousands of women for abortions as well. I have seen the real side of this industry and know exactly what goes on...I do not wish to go into it but woman who have had the procedure know what I mean and ask if some of you will state the bare facts or it, but now I will not refer a woman for an abortion or perform one again except say that the womans interests is not the only overriding concern in this situation, and refer the woman to another doctor and I would like to see doctors trained with a more balanced attitude in this area...

My point still holds, as a man I am responsible for my sperm, and if any woman does not like that...well...does not change anything. If I can act to prevent a problem, then that is a higher cause to strive to achieve...

But, now my view is rather extreme...In nature killing ones young only because it is 'inconvenient' is an abomination. Circumstances exist where an abortion is the most humane of act, and extreme examples eg by bugs does not help particularly when I have never heard of such a reporting in media or law, and tying a woman through pregnancy by court order?!!...this situation needs level headed approach and everything else be discarded...for a balanced solution must be found...90,000 abortions a year just in Australia is crazy

Sam
Posted by Sam said, Sunday, 7 January 2007 12:27:10 AM
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Sam said -
Whether you heard about it in media or law is immaterial.The woman was restrained through use of bandaged-wrapped back boards,attaching her forearms to the cotside railings.She was in a 4 bed shared ward only as it was in full line of sight from the nurses' station.
As you say you are a doctor I'd expect more compassion from you,knowing full well what women go through during an abortion.
The journey to the decision to have an abortion is fraught with stress and exhausting emotions which you don't witness,merely the end result,for which you have no respect.
Women have the right to determine whether or not to carry a child to full term and no grandstanding or breast-beating from men should be able to change that simple fact.
Posted by Bugs, Sunday, 7 January 2007 1:23:25 AM
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People. My hypothetical wasn’t intended to open up any kind of debate about workplace practises, work/life balance or what SHOULD happen in the face of sexism in the workplace. It was all a set up to see if Iain Hall would support a women close to him in making a decision about having an abortion or whether he would attempt to talk her around. He missed question.

I should have just asked: ‘If your mature daughter wanted an abortion AND your support, would you give it?’

I think anything other than support for her decision amounts to not trusting the woman with her own body.

Having an abortion isn’t about human vs cell cluster or career vs motherhood, although these are influencing factors. It’s the decision of one woman and one woman alone.

StewartGlass – I’m not sure Audrey or Billie will stoop to answering your question, but I think that they both know that a foetus is a living thing, like a tapeworm. And I think we all see what you’re getting at: human life starts at conception, all zygotes are as much walking talking laughing loving human beings as the people posting on this blog.

Try this on for size: human life begins when the pregnant woman says it does. All the razzle-dazzle about ‘killing human children’ is worded to imply that there are 90,000 Australian women out there who consciously murder babies. These women are evil. These women are untrustworthy and cannot be allowed to handle their own sexuality and fertility.

Having an opinion about abortion and the actual start-time of human life is one thing, but having the strength to hand over the power to make the decision about it to the woman who will carry and care for this person is quite another.

Are any of you in the anti-abortion camp strong enough to look a pregnant woman considering an abortion in the eye and say ‘I will support your decision, whatever it is’? Or do you still have a say over some part of her body too?
Posted by Franzy, Sunday, 7 January 2007 2:48:39 AM
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FRANZY - so you believe a fetus is living, though not human. When then do you believe it is human? Are you suggesting that a fetus at 39 weeks, is not human because the mother says it's not? ("human life begins when the pregnant woman says it does")

I am just trying to understand where you draw the line. Obviously you, and Billie and Audrey don't see yourselves as selfish or murdering - (though you do see abortion as killing but not murder).

PS - thanks for letting me know what a zygote is! I had never heard the term before
Posted by StewartGlass, Sunday, 7 January 2007 10:38:04 AM
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Many years ago I had to act as a parent for an unrelated 18 year old who had just discovered that she was pregnant to her boyfriend who had disowned his obligations in the matter.

Her family refused to give her any help whatsover and so it was left to me to compassionately run through her 3 options. They all bravely disowned her!

1. Have the baby
2. Have the baby and then have it adopted out
3. Have a termination.

I even offered (if I could afford it)to assist her financially if she chose to keep the baby. I didn't want money to be the reason for her decision.

After many tearful, heart breaking discussions the young woman of her own informed free will decided to have the termination.

Once again no-one (not the boyfriend nor the family nor the govt)offered her any assistance - just little old me. I took her to the termination, sat in the waiting room, and paid for the termination as she couldn't afford the procedure.

Do I feel bad about what I did... not one bit! I was more pro-life than the parents, the boyfriend or anyone else for that matter. I was pro the young woman's life - unconditionally.

You can argue this topic till the cows come home... but unless you have been through the process and been at the coal face watching an emotionally brittle young person take the biggest decision of their lives ... then please shut up!

Where are all the single fathers that shared in creating all the single mothers? Oh that's right they're down the pub boasting of their latest conquest, whilst the poor woman is at home worried sick about hers and her possible babies futures.

Many of the men (thankfully not all) I have spoken to on this subject want a say in the decisions but no role in the obligations that go with the decisions.

I remain "Pro Choice" - the woman's choice
Posted by Opinionated2, Sunday, 7 January 2007 1:34:17 PM
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Stewart - this is my point. It doesn't MATTER when I believe human life begins, nor does it matter when you believe it begins. The pregnant woman and the pregnant woman alone makes that decision. Nobody else gets to even speculate. Because once you do, you’re taking away control the woman has over her own life. You are saying to the woman ‘You cannot be trusted with your own body.’
And, before you start with the ‘what about the baby’s life’ line of thought, the woman’s life is also at stake. This runs around to the debate between the camp that sees women who get abortions as doing so because it will interrupt cocktail hour with the girls (essentially: women’s lifestyles are just frivolities and women who get abortions are doing so for shallow, selfish reasons) and the camp that actually realises that for a woman to have a baby will change her entire existence and being and a failed contraceptive isn’t the proper catalyst for this kind of change (essentially: lifestyle is something you do and are every day for the rest of your life. Not having control over this because some bastard labels you a baby-killer is a horrible thing).

“Are you suggesting that a fetus at 39 weeks, is not human because the mother says it's not?”

What a monstrous inference. How dare you suggest that there are women out there who would think like this. That kind of question is exactly what I’m talking about when I say that anti-abortionists can’t allow themselves to trust women with their own bodies.

ps. Zygote – year eight biology!
Posted by Franzy, Sunday, 7 January 2007 2:01:17 PM
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Franzy
Just how can you expect any one to take you seriously when you say two things within on post that each contradict the other?
I reproduce the offending sentences below
This
“The pregnant woman and the pregnant woman alone makes that decision. Nobody else gets to even speculate. Because once you do, you’re taking away control the woman has over her own life. You are saying to the woman ‘You cannot be trusted with your own body.”

Contradicts this
““Are you suggesting that a fetus at 39 weeks, is not human because the mother says it's not?”

What a monstrous inference. How dare you suggest that there are women out there who would think like this. That kind of question is exactly what I’m talking about when I say that anti-abortionists can’t allow themselves to trust women with their own bodies.”

You are undone by a refusal to admit the humanity of an unborn child. Even in the current law there is a point beyond which it ceases to be a simple matter of the woman deciding that she wants the child killed. Can’t you see that a woman’s right to kill her child is NOT as absolute as you wish to claim it is.

Frankly I would say that YOU are the sort of woman who HAS claimed as you do here in my first quote, that a fetus of 39 weeks gestation is NOT a human being.
Posted by IAIN HALL, Sunday, 7 January 2007 3:55:44 PM
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Perhaps we should have a lottery on Foeticide.

We could do what they used to do in the middle-ages, and make a full public spectacle out of it.

What we should do, is select all women who have chosen to repeat the foeticide experience. Any female who wishes to again remove human life forms from the planet ought to be entered in to competition. They should be humiliated, rallied and struggled against in public places. And if they still wish to go ahead, they would be entered into a 50/50 lottery. One in which they draw a card with a symbol on each side which determines who is to be put to death. The Femme-fatale, or the hapless Foetus. It should be done this way, because the foetus is unable to represent itself strongly enough, though it does dread and knows to fight. Indeed, it is like a pitiful, speechless and fearful creature, with seemingly few post-birth humans prepared to represent it in its proto-womb form; labelled negatively already as it is by the carcass carrying it. Wouldn’t Howard Becker be bemused by such social deviance?

The foetus is a human organism from the time of conception. It evolves into no other thing except a human (with the occasional technical hitch). Therefore, from this moment on, from this day forth, with its aim to be had and to be held, to love and be loved unto death do it part us --is a person. It is brought to bare, by two fellow humans, both alive and not killed. Yet dead some may be. This rot about wimins reproductive rights is nothing more than a cult, and ought be treated accordingly.
Posted by Gadget, Sunday, 7 January 2007 8:40:40 PM
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Ah Gadget your idea gives new meaning to battle of the sexes.

Why not get all men to donate sperm then sterilise them. When the man wants to be a father he can impregnate his partner. Problem solved no more unwanted pregnancies thus reducing the number of abortions.
Posted by billie, Sunday, 7 January 2007 10:52:26 PM
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Clean up on aisle 37, Graham. That comment is very disturbing.
Posted by skepticlawyer, Sunday, 7 January 2007 10:52:59 PM
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IAIN HALL -
I note you have not yet answered Franzy's question -
If your daughter wanted an abortion would you give her your support ?
Or would you cut her out of your life....like you say all women who abort cut their fetus' out of their lives?
What's the difference?
Shall the law dictate that the likes of Iain Hall MUST see his grandchild born against his daughters' wishes? Will he and his wife bring up their grandchild and force their own daughter into paying chld support for a child she didn't want? Would the father of the same child contribute also or simply go on welfare to pay the bare minimum?
Will grandparents be forcing their own children to visit children they did not want ?
What kind of psychological basis is this for bringing a child into the world,knowing their own mother was FORCED to give it life against her own judgement,ability,wants,needs and decison?
Posted by Bugs, Monday, 8 January 2007 2:39:05 AM
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Bugs
I bet you don't have any children do you? If you did you would not write such a post.
I have two and my love and support for them is absolute and imutable.My daughter would have my support form me no matter what. However that does not mean that she would get my approval for everything that she might do
Posted by IAIN HALL, Monday, 8 January 2007 5:13:28 AM
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Gadget........................arrghhh. Why I have suddendly thought of The Crucible.

Perhaps we could also do the same thing to men who beat their wives, men who impregnate women and do not take their share of responsibility for the child or men who leave silly comments on public forums.

That's right; we've moved on from the Middle Ages, although in the last instance that might be a shame.

Here's a quote from Katha Pollitt from an article in Bitch magazine (oh, I'm reading a feminist magazine, string me up and shame me):

"The pro-choicers have let the antis set the terms of the debate. We are always on the defensive. We don't say, Look its okay for women to postpone motherhood to get an education, to get established at work, to find a mate, to grow up. It's okay to only want one child. In fact, it's okay not to want children at all. Instead we defend abortion by emphasizing (sic) the extreme cases - rape, incest, dangerous pregnancies....But sometimes abortion is an easy decision (See how cold and frivolous that sounds? You're not supposed to talk like that!) If you're not ambivalent about the pregnancy, you might not feel so sad.

For society, legal abortion is a matter of common sense. Beside the issue of women's health and safety, would we be a better society with more very young single mothers, more high school and college dropouts, more shotgun marriages, more children whose parents couldn't cope, more women - and (more) men too - trapped by a stray sperm in lives they never wanted."
Posted by Darlene, Monday, 8 January 2007 7:14:54 AM
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Gadget the definition of when a foetus becomes a human has changed over time.

Until about 100 years ago the catholic church did not consider still born babies to have souls, they were buried outside church graveyards in unconsecrated ground.

Personally I think a foetus is a baby when its capable of living on its own outside the uterus, say from about 30+ weeks. I have seen infants who were born at 24 weeks and its still hit and miss whether they will end up with brain damage etc.
Posted by billie, Monday, 8 January 2007 7:56:26 AM
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At the height of the Communist era, ideology and ones black-art interpretations about the notion of wimins reproductive rights was viewed, even there, as ‘a protest on the part of women against their traditional role.’

Women were not happy with having children and working at the same time, and viewed X amount of children as burden. In China, women had to work, there was no choice in that. But contraception was endorsed by the Marxist state, not abortion. The pill was introduced in 1964. The Russians published no statistics on abortion, however China did. Russian foeticide appeared at certain times to be quite high. Different from our politicised society however, Marxists in China couldn’t get rid of the traditional family, patriarchy was acceptable, and ‘wives consider themselves just women.’ However, the grandiose notions of the Cultural Revolution saw to it that ‘a “struggle” takes place in which husband and wife confront each other in public, with the wife supported by other like-minded women in her community as well as the Communists. In many cases the husband undergoes a severe beating if he shows unwillingness to mend his ways’.

B W Jancar. ‘Women under Communism’. 1978. USA. Pp 60-73.

In a certain northern territory, there are 96, 100 females. The total indigenous population is around 58,000. It is known that the abortion rate can exceed 1000 per year.

‘The incidence of abortion since the liberalisation of abortion laws in the seventies is important, and in recent times there has been a consistent pattern of around one in five pregnancies resulting in an abortion.’ http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/abs@.nsf/90a12181d877a6a6ca2568b5007b861c/0b82c2f2654c3694ca2569de002139d9!OpenDocument

And for Darlene, my proposal is a matter of common human sense. Salvation.

Fetoscide is a death cult, and should be apprehended along with the Feminazi movement.
Posted by Gadget, Monday, 8 January 2007 11:58:38 AM
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I don't think the rants of modern feminists help women very much, rather they alienate people. Equally the pro-life movement has its rock to sit on, from which it will not be budged.

Along with probably the greater rump of the community I believe that independent advice and professional abortion clinics must be readily accessible. I am also very much in favour of there being no limit on age - a girl below the age of 15 can and should be easily able to get advice and a procedure performed of her own volition and without parent/guardian approval.

There is nothing to be gained from putting hurdles in place because all that does is cause women to seek help from where it can be obtained.

Of course the feminists and pro-lifers only want to rant about abortion, but I suspect that the remainder of the community while accepting that termination is the choice of the woman is appalled by the number of procedures and requires reassurance that they are always 'necessary'. That means simply that there should be more research into the reasons for the apparent failure of contraception and the lack of support for families in the community (where 'family' includes solo parents).

Why is it that by far the greatest bulk of terminations are for women aged 20-25, with those aged 25-30 coming in second? The number of unwanted pregnancies for youth aged 15-20 has dropped and remained stable over the years.

There would appear to be no simple explanations for these statistics and urgent research is required in Australia. There also needs to be robust, open consultation with the community on the way forward, because quite obviously the law is different in jurisdictions and there are anomalies.
Posted by Cornflower, Monday, 8 January 2007 12:36:55 PM
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Go save yourself, Gadget, and leave women to save themselves.

No point debating the point with you, so I'll just put on my jackboots and walk away. Oh, and calling people feminazis is so 1999. I take it as a compliment if it's coming from someone like you.

If feminists didn't do things that offended people over the years, they wouldn't have got anything done. Leave things to the softly, softly crowd and fundamentalists like Gadget have all the say
Posted by Darlene, Monday, 8 January 2007 12:43:46 PM
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Dear Iain,

BWAHAHAHAHA!!

“Frankly I would say that YOU are the sort of woman who HAS claimed as you do here in my first quote, that a fetus of 39 weeks gestation is NOT a human being.”

Abortion debates shouldn’t contain much hilarity, but this really did make me laugh. The blind presumptions of the anti-abortion camp summed up in one stern pronouncement. Dude, maybe you should check my website. I just checked yours – I liked your posts "Why are some people gay?" and "Why Gay Marriage Activists are so Dangerous"

On your blog you wonder if you would “make that change” for you children if they were gay (what change, I'm not clear on), but you still haven’t answered my question about supporting your daughter through an abortion.

I didn’t really understand the contradiction you are pointing out between my statement that the pregnant woman decides when the pregnancy becomes a human life and my reply to StewartGlass’ suggestion that a woman who has recognised the human life growing inside her (ie. decided to go through with the pregnancy) would then go ahead and kill it. This is the anti-abortion camp trying (again) to prove that women are untrustworthy monsters.

“You are undone by a refusal to admit the humanity of an unborn child.”

I’ll go over it AGAIN: Men (in this case, me, you, StewartGlass, everyone) DON’T get to decide a) when a human life begins and b) whether abortion is okay. Women who aren’t carrying the pregnancy in question DON’T get to decide what happens.

Unborn children ARE human. What’s an unborn child? Ask the pregnant lady.

If she says: ‘This zygote is called Steve, he’s my son’ then it’s an unborn child.
If she says: ‘This pregnancy has come at the worst possible time, I don’t want it, I can’t afford it, if I ever have a kid that child will get a mother who wanted it from the moment she was able to have it on her terms, not because she couldn’t access abortion’ then it’s not a human life.

Ask the pregnant lady.
Posted by Franzy, Monday, 8 January 2007 12:47:01 PM
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Phew, thanks Franzy. I have struggled all my life with the question of what makes us human, how we should uphold the principles of the sanctity of life, when we should see a child as a distinct entity (both legally and ethically). But you've devised a wonderful way to use relativism to solve the world's moral and ethical dilemmas. If we say it's a baby, it is, but if we say it's not a baby, it isn't. Maybe we can do the same for old people. Once they stop being productive members of society, and only become a drain on the state, we can decide that they are no longer 'human'.

In fact, why don't we apply such logic to all human actions? It would certainly free up the need for all sorts of decision makers, such as judges, parliament, the public service, etc. After all, we don't need to think about the concequences of any actions we take, we just need to correctly label our actions and others around us to suit our own desires at any given time. Sounds like a great way to run a safe, sustainable and just society.

However, getting back to the serious debate, I'd like to pose a question. At what point, legally, should a child become an independent being with individual legal rights? When it leaves the mother's womb? When it turns 18? Leaving moral and ethical discussions aside, how does the law deal with on-demand abortions? If a woman can abort at any time, does this extend to killing a newborn child? Or to a baby born prematurely? If not, why not? On what basis is a decision made as to when a child is 'human' and deserving of protection in the eyes of the law?
Posted by Gekko, Monday, 8 January 2007 2:00:55 PM
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Debate on this topic is always going to be hot and a big 'kudos' goes to Audrey for her courage.

I'd like to address Ian and the other pro-lifers (I hate that term!). Imbuing the foetus with all the characters of a full life opens us all to the path of much suffering. During the first weeks of our first pregnancy- a very much anticipated and desired pregnancy- my wife caught a fever. During that time the foetus she carried was badly damaged. Soon afterwards she miscarried, painful both emotionally and physically. Since then we have had a beautiful and healthy little boy. At times I think the first one and I console myself by saying that, while it was had potential, it was not a full life. What gives the 'pro-lifers' the right to challenge that opinion? Who says that they are able to make my pain, and the pain of thousands of other people, more intense by telling us that that foetus was just as alive as my little boy?

No one goes though an abortion unscathed. Despite the front shown to the world this is one of the hardest things to decide on and to live with. It is not one made for convenience. It is one made in the face of a harsh evolutionary equation: can I afford to give this child the life that it deserves? The massive investment in resources necessary to raise a child in our fragmented society makes this a vital question. If pro-lifers want more women to make the 'right' choice then they should be trying to rebuild the structures that made child rearing a community responsibility- not demonizing young women for coming out on the losing side of an equation we have given them.

One final point: the comment was made earlier that calling the foetus a parasite was a way of making it the 'enemy'. So is calling women who go though an abortion and the people that support them 'murderers'. It is just a way to make them 'not us' and therefore easier to hate.
Posted by mylakhrion, Monday, 8 January 2007 2:41:48 PM
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Audrey, it all depends if it's "only a fetus" or if it really is a human being. If it's a human being growing inside you then all arguments abuot personal freedom are nuked by the prohibition on murder. If it's only a collection of cells accidentally growing as a parasite in your body then there is no moral prohibition on removing it and no public interest. So all other rhetoric and emotional arguments aside, how can we as a society confidentally say that the new life inside you is not human? We do confidently call a new-born baby human, and also one that is due tomorrow. And also one who is due to be born in 2, 3 4, 5 etc days. At what stage do we say the new life is not human? Unless we can confidently, with 100% certaintly say that the unborn baby is no human then we have no right to take it's life. If you were blindfolded, given a gun and asked to shoot, would you do so if you were unsure if there was a human being standing in front of you?
Posted by mykah, Monday, 8 January 2007 2:47:28 PM
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Franzy is operating according to some strange modernist mentality in which there is no objective truth but only our own subjectively created reality.

According to her, if the unborn is wanted by the mother then it's human. If it's not wanted by the mother, then it's non-human.

This is not just individual preference determining right and wrong (I don't want the unborn so it's alright to terminate it). It's individual preference determining the nature of being itself (I don't want the unborn so its being changes from human to non-human).
Posted by Mark Richardson, Monday, 8 January 2007 3:06:57 PM
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Although I generally support the right to choose, I would have reservations about the late term termination of an otherwise healthy foetus where the mother's health is not at risk. Quite obviously at this stage of development the foetus does not resemble a 'tape worm' as it was described by one respondent and nor would most people perceive the foetus as being entirely without rights at that stage (although the law could differ on that). In what I consider to be a worst case scenario (though unlikely), a healthy foetus that could survive with little assistance could be delivered then killed.

However I don't think the standard should be set at the stage at which the foetus could be supported outside the womb with the full assistance of life support and probably with the likelihood of some detriment to brain or other bodily functions if it survives.

Maybe those who are not engaged in the slanging match over all or none might similarly like to discuss these issues.
Posted by Cornflower, Monday, 8 January 2007 3:44:44 PM
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MYKAH: You hit the nail on the head. The real questions are:

1. When does the fetus/zygote begin living?
2. When does the fetus/zygote begin being human?

All the other questions come next (ie is abortion acceptable in cases of rape, incest, mental health of mother, lifestyle changes, father support issues etc).

But if we can't answer the 2 fundamental questions we are trying to do quantum physics when we haven't finished primary maths.

I would be interested in hearing everyone's views on this (although I think Franzy has responded already)
Posted by StewartGlass, Monday, 8 January 2007 3:44:57 PM
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Ha ha! Franzy’s a boy y’all…

Stewart Glass – I did answer your (ridiculous) question. I believe that the foetus is a living organism that is not a human being.

Sam said – People often throw out the statistic of 90,000 abortions a year without qualifying that this includes standard D&C procedures that have nothing to do with terminating a foetus. As a doctor, you should know that.

Stewart Glass – “Obviously you, and Billie and Audrey don't see yourselves as selfish or murdering - (though you do see abortion as killing but not murder).” I never said I thought it was killing, so please don’t imply that I am selfish and murdering through rose coloured glasses.

Opininoated2 – “I was more pro-life than the parents, the boyfriend or anyone else for that matter. I was pro the young woman's life - unconditionally.” Thankyou for illustrating so succinctly the most important issue at hand here – and good on you for helping the woman when her family had abandoned her. When ranting about the supposed ‘pro-abortion’ industry, few people acknowledge that the people who are most likely to talk a woman into abortion is her family, her friends and her partner. I wish people would understand the the pro-choice camp’s only agenda is to provide unqualified support for the pregnant woman seeking help.

Franzy – I know you are more than capable of looking after yourself, so as you were.

Iain Hall – I think Billie sums it up perfectly when she says that a foetus becomes a baby when it becomes able to survive outside the womb. Until then, it is reliant upon the host for its survival and said host has the right to decide if she wants to share her body with it.

Gadget –I’m willing to deal with zealots but you’re actually just offensive, sexist and crazy. Please refrain from commenting here anymore.

Bugs – Everyone knows the woman’s desire is immaterial when it comes to birthing children silly!
Posted by audrey apple, Monday, 8 January 2007 3:56:11 PM
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Iain Hall – How nice for your daughter to have the kind of father she might be frightened of confiding in over a serious and potentially traumatic decision because of your ‘disapproval’.

Darlene – Have you been rummaging through my magazines again, you naughty femme-fatale, you?

Cornflower –I’m a feminist and I absolutely agree with you that there needs to be more research into the reasons for high cases of unwanted pregnancies and better support for single or struggling parents. However, there’s nothing more insulting than the suggestion that women who abort for reasons other than medical or psychological fears are somehow frivolous and selfish. If men were the ones to get pregnant, do you think they’d be so willing to sacrifice their lives, ambitions and careers to stay at home with a baby they didn’t want?

Gekko – When it is old enough to survive by itself outside the womb. Of course we’re not going to go around killing two year olds and old people (which, might I add, is one of the most tiresome and illogical of emotive arguments from Team Pro-Life). This is because they are human beings. And no, I don’t believe foetuses are.

Mylakhrion – “If pro-lifers want more women to make the 'right' choice then they should be trying to rebuild the structures that made child rearing a community responsibility- not demonizing young women for coming out on the losing side of an equation we have given them.” Team Pro-Life are well into the community activity of berating those who choose abortion, but perhaps not so much into the community activity of collectively raising a child. It takes a village and all that…

Mykah – How can you confidently say it IS? There’ll never be any definitive test to prove humanity in a cluster of cells, so we must continue as we are now – with the pregnant woman being free to determine the circumstances of her reproduction without condemnation from people who have no understanding of her circumstance, situation or desires.

Mark Richardson - Boy. He's a boy.
Posted by audrey apple, Monday, 8 January 2007 3:57:52 PM
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Franzy
Did you read the article I discuss in that blog post? I think not, you are putting your foot in your mouth, again.
The link http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2088-2534611,00.html.The ponit I make in the post is If I could, should I?

Now what part “support for my daughter is absolute and immutable” is beyond your comprehension?

Do you have any children? I think that you don’t and I think that your rant about the humanity of a child is decided by the mother does not advance your cause at all. It is just feminist dogma poorly articulated. In Australia any woman can legally procure an abortion should that be necessary. The difference between you and I is that you think that any whim of the woman concerned is adequate excuse for killing that un born child but I think that due care and concern should be given to the fact that from the time of conception that Zygote or fetus or what ever term you choose to use is a human being.

“I didn’t really understand the contradiction you are pointing out”
You claimed that a woman has the absolute right to decide the humanity of an unborn child .No Ifs Buts or Maybes. Then you took offence when your argument is taken to its logical extreme; that a woman can decide that a fetus, at term, is not human if it suits her. And therefore kill it.
Do you get that? It is a contradiction that makes you look very silly indeed.
Posted by IAIN HALL, Monday, 8 January 2007 4:10:16 PM
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AUDREY you said:

"I never said I thought it was killing, so please don’t imply that I am selfish and murdering through rose coloured glasses"

and you believe a fetus is living (but not human til it is born)

Q: If you don't murder or kill a fetus, what do you call it when you stop it living via an abortion?
Posted by StewartGlass, Monday, 8 January 2007 4:31:49 PM
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Oh Audrey - thou hast outed me! I was wondering when they were going to figure it out.

Iain - So if you would support your daughter absolutely and immutably, why not someone else getting an abortion?

I read the article. I get it. You are wondering whether you would genetically alter your unborn child so they wouldn’t turn out gay? I know gay people have a tougher life, but does thinning out their numbers remind you of anything?

I AM offended by the ridiculousness of taking the argument to its logical extreme. Find me a woman who would willingly abort her healthy pregnancy in the 39th week (abortions performed in the third trimester are extremely rare in Australia and are always matters of life or death for the mother) and then find me a doctor willing to perform that abortion after the health of the pregnancy and the health and sanity of mother has been established. THEN you can have your logical extremes.
Please - find me a doctor who says "We performed the abortion when the mother said she just couldn't face going through the ordeal of giving birth next week."
And find me the pregnant woman who says "Had all the ultrasounds, booked into Women's and Children's, but suddenly I just didn't want it anymore! I changed my mind! Abortion please!"

Logical indeed...

StewartGlass – A: An abortion. (duh?)

Mark Richardson – Heh heh heh heh. “Franzy is arguing for chick’s rights, so Franzy must be a chick!” Heh heh heh.
Posted by Franzy, Monday, 8 January 2007 5:02:36 PM
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Franzy, the reason I assumed you were female is that you write like someone who's doing an arts or humanities PhD, and such people are overwhelmingly female.

It's not easy to get the mind so far into intellectual modernism and so far away from normal modes of thought - it takes long exposure to the academy.

BTW, the fact I mischaracterised your gender doesn't affect my criticisms of your arguments on this issue. I had actually hoped you might tell us reassuringly that I had misunderstood what you wrote.
Posted by Mark Richardson, Monday, 8 January 2007 5:33:35 PM
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Thank you, Audrey, for sharing your story. I must confess that I don't know what I would have done in the same circumstance. I am lucky enough to have had my daughter when I was in a stable, committed relationship. I tend to think that if I had fallen pregnant in less certain circumstances, I would keep the baby, but I don't know. I have had two friends in situations like yours, and they both chose to terminate their pregnancies. In one instance, the girl in question had mental health problems which made her decide that she needed to get treatment before she became a parent. In the other instance, the girl was young and did not feel ready to become a parent. She wanted to finish her degree and establish her career. She was vehement that she did not want the child at all.

I did not feel totally comfortable with termination in either case (that's just my personal view) but there is no way that I would ever have told either girl that what she was doing was wrong, and I offered my unconditional support to both girls. After all, I wasn't the one who would have to bear the child! The problem is that it's usually the woman who ends up having to "hold the baby" (literally). If the father wants, he can walk away much more easily (having no physical connection), and it's likely to have much less effect on his life and career.

There's so much grey (what if the foetus is a product of a rape? what if the foetus is severely disabled? if you support abortion, what about euthanasia of a severely disabled baby?). I don't like to see it in black and white. If my daughter came home and told me she was pregnant, I would support her in whatever choice she made. I would try not to let my own views get in the way.
Posted by Legal Eagle, Monday, 8 January 2007 6:43:15 PM
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Gekko,

I think you are on the correct path. The succinct questions you ask don’t allow for plausible deniability.

Especially these: ‘If a woman can abort at any time, does this extend to killing a newborn child? Or to a baby born prematurely? If not, why not? On what basis is a decision made as to when a child is 'human' and deserving of protection in the eyes of the law?’

In the post above, I believe the answer is to be found in super-natural, cultist wisdom. The inability of even the lawmakers to answer Your questions, will definitively prove that it is only the wisdom of which was then in the middle and dark ages, that gives the Feminists a thin clutch on the laws gonads and rationality.

And so, here it is folks, straight from the host animals mouth, the very interpretations I have been mentioning. Apple et al are quite prepared to someway label the foetus un-remorselessly, whilst the ‘host’ is able to interpret through some unknown, (or at least un-reavealed) medium, that the glorious child within is, perhaps, unworthy. Apples one eyed views, of course, are not silly (or so she would have us believe). Nor was her very own pre-human ‘tapeworm’ form, and her subsequent childhood. All the way to the present.

Apple, you do not yet live in a communist nation. I have the right to freedom of speech. Nothing you can think, say or do can stop me from providing hardcore evidence of the incorrect thought behind withchcrafted foeticide. You do not hold a monopoly on debate, and can not tell me:- ‘Please refrain from commenting here anymore.’
Posted by Gadget, Monday, 8 January 2007 9:23:15 PM
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Specifically to answer the question when does the foetus become a baby... I think the answer is 'us', meaning we use ourselves as the reference point. When the growing baby begins to start looking like us and functioning like us, then it is a baby...

http://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/
has good pictures of the early stages, or do a search on 'embryology'.

For me its when the baby start to respond to painful stimuli, ie feels pain.
http://www.spucscotland.org/education/beginningoflife/foetaldevelopment/
Yep, read that section again... before 10 weeks of age...when most abortions occur...
And this is what caused the huge worldwide reaction against abortions, there are pretty gruesome high definition ultrasound showing the baby responding to an abortions, heart rate spikes, face turns into a cry_ from the ultrasound the baby looked about 16 weeks

I think different people will determine when a unborn baby is a human child, and of course if they are anti or pro abortion...

Sam
Ps~I am trying to verify if 90000 abortions per year includes d&c (dilatation and curettage, a procedure also for woman who have already miscarried to remove the remaining products of conception, and it seems the actual abortions are more than 90 000 as number of women have them in private clinics outside medicare (item no 35643)...
http://www.ama.com.au/web.nsf/doc/WEEN-6CG284
Posted by Sam said, Monday, 8 January 2007 9:24:02 PM
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sam said: "it seems the actual abortions are more than 90 000 as number of women have them in private clinics outside medicare (item no 35643)..."

As mentioned earlier, it has also been reported that the grestest incidence is in the 20-25 age group and the second highest in the 25-30 age group, yet the number for the 15-20 age group is much lower and has dropped to a plateau over the years. It is time there was independent research into what is going on, because there would seem to be more complex forces at work rather than 'failure of contraception'.
Posted by Cornflower, Tuesday, 9 January 2007 2:12:09 PM
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IAIN HALL -
I note you accuse myself and others of not having children,otherwise we wouldn't post the messages that we do.
Sorry to burst your bubble but not only am I a mother,I also know several mothers who have assisted their daughters in having abortions.
One girl was in year 12,the other partway through her uni degree.Both were using contraception but,after the abortions,both girls(not related) were found to be highly fertile,rendering even the strongest contraceptive useless.I know of other mothers who have had abortions inside marriage,for various reasons.
And yes I would support my daughter if she told me she was going to have an abortion.
It's HER body,it's HER decision.
Not yours or mine but HERS.
Posted by Bugs, Tuesday, 9 January 2007 2:56:05 PM
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Audrey said: "Mykah – How can you confidently say it IS? [is human] There’ll never be any definitive test to prove humanity in a cluster of cells, so we must continue as we are now – with the pregnant woman being free to determine the circumstances of her reproduction without condemnation from people who have no understanding of her circumstance, situation or desires."

Audrey, you are implying that you can't unequivocally show that it's not human. The burden of proof in this case rests with you, and any others who would like be free to dispose of a human life. As I said before, would you shoot a gun if you were blindfolded and were not sure that a human being was in the firing line? I suspect you wouldn't and I suspect 100% of "pro-choice" proponents here wouldn't either. The unborn human (or foetus) situation is just the same. You cannot prove that its no human so don't pull the trigger.

By the way, this is not a matter of private morality. We can take a personal-options approach for many things, but what we're talking about here is ending human life. It wouldn't be feasible to say to someone who kills another human that they are just exercising choice. We do have public standards of right and wrong that are enforceable by the state and the prohibition on the willful taking of another human life is the most basic of our protections. It remains a public issue until you can prove that the unborn is not human, any protestations about your personal circumstances and desires being beside the point.

How do you think the public would respond if some lunatic wilfully killed the foetus of some endangered mammal, or destroyed the eggs of some endangered reptile or bird? No doubt there would be a public outcry and the perpetrator would be rightly charged with some sort of crime against animals. Surely a non-born human life is worth just as much respect, if there is any value in human life at all, and if logic and justice mean anything.
Posted by mykah, Tuesday, 9 January 2007 3:47:41 PM
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Mark R - that's incredible! You've hit the nail on the head! I AM doing a cultural studies PhD! Fear me and my capacity for abstract thought!
Although I'm not overwhelmingly female, I must say. More overwhelmingly male, last time I dropped my dacks.
Do you get overwhelmed by females, Mark? Squawky, opinionated, academic, over-educated ones? Like Audrey and about 50% of my colleges? Is that why you want an objective line between what's okay and what's not okay to do with their bodies? Something decided by an arbitrary, non-judgemental, scientific entity? Who should that be?

And there it becomes sticky. Once you start talking in terms of human life rather than access to abortion you miss the point. Woman are always going to access abortion. This doesn’t necessarily preclude them from having beliefs about human life. And once you start looking at the beliefs of those women, you are labelling them as murderers once and for all.
90,000 a year. That’s a lot of amoral killers out there. Do you believe that?

Mykah – No! The proof is on YOU to prove that it IS human! Is too! Is too! Is too! Stop that first trimester abortion! Take the poor baby AWAY from the killer! Take it all the way home and protect it! Give it booties and love!
What happened? It died? But it was human! Humans can survive outside the womb, can’t they? Why can’t this one? All you had to do was give it a few more months and it would have been fine! It was becoming a human, even though it was utterly reliant on being inside a womb attached by flesh to the mother for another six months.
If potential for humanity = humanity then we must pass laws that regard all love, sex and twinkles of the eye across crowded rooms as potential people and keep a close eye on the women to make sure they follow through every time so that not a single life may be cut down by these murderous feminazis
Posted by Franzy, Tuesday, 9 January 2007 4:40:09 PM
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I think parents on the anti-termination side should take a step back and think :

Would your daughter/granddaughter if unexpectedly pregnant

1. Be in a position to talk to you knowing your hard held views?
2. Get the true love & compassion that this situation needs?
3. Feel confident enough to express her own views without fear of you bombarding her with your view?
4. Be confident of all options being discussed reasonably in a calm and loving manner?
5. Be confident that you would support independent councelling with all choices openly explained?
6. Be confident of you not disowning them, withdrawing your love or forever making them feel guilty if they had the nerve to make a different choice to your view?

OR would it just be YOUR way or the Highway?

Seems to me that if you hold a very strong anti-termination view your child could be more likely to terminate a pregnancy behind your backs without you ever being told. Afterall, what you don't know, won't hurt you!

How could they approach you? - you espouse loudly that you know what's best for everyone in society already! Your view to your pregnant child therefore becomes irrelevent.
Posted by Opinionated2, Tuesday, 9 January 2007 4:42:19 PM
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Stewart Glass - Q: If you don't murder or kill a fetus, what do you call it when you stop it living via an abortion?

Uterine evacuation is one of the medical terms, and that pretty much suits me. As I don’t believe the fetus to be human, it exists as any living organism might. Do you call harvesting vegetables murder? If you do, then you’re silly.

Mark Richardson – “Franzy, the reason I assumed you were female is that you write like someone who's doing an arts or humanities PhD, and such people are overwhelmingly female.

It's not easy to get the mind so far into intellectual modernism and so far away from normal modes of thought - it takes long exposure to the academy.”

I’m not really sure what point your trying to make here MR. Is it that humanities students in general are irrational and illogical, or that women in these fields are more likely to be lefty pinko feminists as a result of this irrational school of academia? You’re confusing me…but I AM just a girl after all.

(cont)
Posted by audrey apple, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 12:37:26 PM
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Gadget - “whilst the ‘host’ is able to interpret through some unknown, (or at least un-reavealed) medium, that the glorious child within is, perhaps, unworthy…”

I’ve revealed the medium over and over Gadget. As the woman carrying said fetus, I know it’s not a ‘glorious child’. I can feel it. Nothing I say will convince you otherwise. Other women may feel it is. That’s perfectly their right and I wish them well. I forgot to mention it before, but your ridiculous idea of a lottery falls down on the basic fact that it was the woman chosen to die, the fetus would go down too. Because. It. Is. Reliant. On. Her. To. Survive.

“Apple, you do not yet live in a communist nation.” Thank Dumbledore for that. I suppose you assumed I must be a communist because I’m a feminist baby killer.

“I have the right to freedom of speech.” Yes, unfortunately this is true.

“Nothing you can think, say or do can stop me from providing hardcore evidence of the incorrect thought behind withchcrafted foeticide.” - No, your own inability to provide such evidence works quite well enough actually.

Mykah – “How do you think the public would respond if some lunatic wilfully killed the foetus of some endangered mammal, or destroyed the eggs of some endangered reptile or bird?” – Hopefully they would be as outraged as if someone wilfully destroyed the fetus of a woman who hadn’t given them permission to do so, much like the animals in your hypothetical. It’s not as if abortionists are running through the streets kicking pregnant women in the stomachs silly.

It’s been lovely chatting with all of you judgemental males, but it’s probably time I went back to writing about how communism will save the world for my humanities PhD before heading out with the cocktail club to kill a few more glorious children while drunk on cosmopolitans. Until then, I ask that you read this link:

http://www.sapphireblue.com/25years/

Peace out
Posted by audrey apple, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 12:38:02 PM
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Parents cannot be laissez faire in raising children; they must be proactive, give guidance and take the leadership role. It would never be adequate to just stand back and be 'supportive'. However if it comes to termination then sure the woman (and the man) should be supported through and beyond that too.

My parents always assured me that if there ever was an accident there was no such things as a 'surplus' child and 'one more baby' was always welcome in our family. That was the family's experience in the past too, where children were raised by grandparents and elsewhere in the extended family. There were cases and probably will be more in the future where a late teen and her child were both parented through a bit of cooperation (and non-judgemental behaviour).

There was also a teen father taken in and helped. That couple parted some fifteen years later without rancour.

Of course there are some women and men who would want to keep the child but cannot see any practical means of doing so. Although governments of all political persuasions say they support families, when it comes down to practical things, such as housing, transport and extended parental leave, they very soon duck for cover. Government spends huge sums on migration but is parsimonious in assisting young families.

In summary I don’t think my first reaction could ever be, “Sweetie, if you want an abortion that is fine by me”. Wherever possible the first assurance should be that the child is wanted if she wants to go through with it and she can count on me and the family for full support which could be me raising the child as parent. However I am sure enough that in the unfortunate event that the mother is very young that the wear and tear on her body should be prevented.
Posted by Cornflower, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 1:19:21 PM
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Seings how the pro-Lifers are despised by the pro-Foeticideists: and they find our wishes to abort this unsavoury practice unthinkable, perhaps the satanic death cultists would find this more tasteful:

http://poetry.rotten.com/infantiphagia/taboo1.html
Posted by Gadget, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 2:16:04 PM
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Gadget thanks for the link to the picture of the dismembered Chinese baby. Every one knows that China conducted a strict one child policy.

What is its relevance to Australia and this debate?
Posted by billie, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 2:44:18 PM
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Since this debate is winding down owing to a distinct lack of credible, evidence-based responses from the "abortion is murder" camp, I'd like to point my finger of laughter and derision away from Mark "I can't believe a brother would think like that" Richardson (although I could probably point with two fingers using my feminine, multi-tasking brain) and towards Gadget The Researcher Extraordinaire.

AHA!

AHAHAHAHA!

I thought you would be regretting the “witchcrafted foeticide” comment. I thought that you would have wanted to maintain a little bit of credibility in this debate.
But no. I was wrong!
You weren’t satisfied with people just SUSPECTING that you are an alarmist wowser with a browser and a bible.
You wanted to remove all doubt.
And done that you have with your response to Audrey’s photo of a woman dead from a botched abortion.
Audrey – you big silly! Don’t you know that dead foetus trumps dead woman any day of the week?!? Looks to be around second trimester to me too – that lady must just have been too darn busy to book herself into the Chinese abortion clinic because of all the lifestyle she was enjoying.

Well, enough jeering for now. Hard evidence, anyone?

http://www.snopes.com/horrors/cannibal/fetus.htm

Gadget, buddy, still waiting on that ‘hard evidence’, my crusading friend.
Posted by Franzy, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 3:25:18 PM
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Bugs
Supporting my child is as I said “absolute and immutable” Look that up. And the reality is that the most common “failure” of contraception is the failure to actually use any in the first place
Yeah so you would support your daughter having an abortion but would your sacrifice your lifestyle to support he and her child if she chose to keep it? If you would not you are not giving her a real choice are you? That is a bigger commitment though ..

Franzy

Three letters mate; DNA just as you are defined as a human being by the most fundamental building blocks of life so too is every child from the moment of conception .every other part of your rant is just semantics
There is a name for the women who hang out with homosexual men “fag hags “ and you are a very sad example of the male equivalent, more rabid than the feminists you wish to cultivate and sadly much more silly. It seems to me that you could not think for yourself if your life depended on it.
Opinionated 2
Sounds like a reflection of your own life you are giving us here and sad for you.

Gadget
Will you please drop the shock jock stuff? It does not save any children and just alienates those who might otherwise be convinced
Posted by IAIN HALL, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 3:35:05 PM
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Actually Iain... the most obvious shock jock stuff I've seen has come from you... fag hag? What the?

You're simply saying that because Franzy is a man, and he has a feminist viewpoint that disagrees with yours, he musn't have an opinion of his own.
I can't help but feel you'd feel differently if he simply adopted yours without question.

In your comment, you basically say that the issue is simple, and merely semantics. Well, if it were so simple, perhaps it would have been solved by now.

Perhaps you see it as a simple matter. Others do not.

I happen to think opinionated2's comment was the best I've yet seen on the thread. It wasn't haranguing people to agree with someone's viewpoint, and I can't fault it for accuracy. In simple logical terms, where is the flaw in Opinionated2's comment?

I'm somewhat disappointed by your reasoning here Iain. You fail to find a problem with opinionated2's comment, so you resort to commenting on what may or may not be someone's circumstances.

You have based this on what exactly?

For someone who claims that this is an issue of 'semantics' you do a miserable job of employing logic, instead resorting to personal attacks.

Issues to consider:

- A foetus cannot survive without it's host parent. Granted, babies need constant care - though they can function with care from say, a devoted father. This isn't the case for a foetus.

- I'm informed that the neo-cortex, what is frequently regarded as a key part of the brain that distinguished people from lower order intelligences, is fully formed at approximately 25 weeks. Can a thing be regarded as a person before it is capable of independent thought, or even breathing?

Whilst I'm in the pro-choice camp, I would be genuinely interested to hear honest responses to these questions from the other side of the fence.

And guys... can we keep this civil and to the point? personal attacks degrade more than the target.
Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 4:55:55 PM
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Hi Iain!

Thought we’d lost you for a while there.

I’ve got to agree with TurnRightThenLeft here … or no, wait a minute … I almost fell for that one! That would be not thinking for myself!

Jokes and insults aside, I do like what you’re saying with the DNA argument, but you’re still avoiding the special and unique circumstances of a developing foetus – that is physical dependency on the mother. The scab I just picked has DNA, and like a foetus, under the right conditions (womb, test-tube) it could truly grow into a wonderful human being. Should I protect the scab’s ‘life’?

You and your mates (sorry Iain, you can refer to me as such, but I’m not one of them) keep searching for that one piece of undeniable evidence, the golden rule that would state the when of humanity and decide right from wrong (with you on the right side, of course). So far we’ve had DNA, heartbeat, zygotes, sex, blind shooting, squashing platypus eggs, baby-eating abortionists, ‘It is because I say it is’, primary mathematics, crazy women chickening out of motherhood and cries of “WITCH! WITCH!”

At the end of the day, anti-abortionists will never EVER concede a women’s right to choose over their decision that foetus = person. I bet everyone arguing for Foetus Rights in this discussion will swear that, while I and the rest of the pro-choice camp have been brain-washed by feminism, academia and liberal humanists into this stance, they themselves have worked out their ideas about abortion all by themselves using the day-as-day evidence at hand and learning from the school of hard knocks, university of life and workplace of the real world.
I will also bet that no one in the anti-abortion camp has had any contact with a woman undergoing the complete process of utterly unwanted pregnancy -> abortion -> aftermath. None of you has had to hold the woman’s hand and hear her reasons or share her story.
That’s what Audrey’s post was for. So you could see the other side of the coin for a change.
Posted by Franzy, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 5:40:44 PM
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TRTL
The point you raise is not the humanity of the fetus but its sentience, when does it become self-aware? Most of the "pro-choice" crowd has been trying very hard to argue that before some undefined point of time a fetus is NOT HUMAN, a parasite, a tapeworm. I take it that you are arguing that it is fine to kill the fetus before sentience is demonstrated. The trouble with this argument is that taken to its logical extreme it then becomes permissible to kill people with only marginal brain function. That is a rather more worrying prospect don’t you think?

Opiniated2’s hypothetical makes assumptions about those of us who consider that abortion is not a social virtue and the sort of family dynamic that we may have, these were shallow and given the word and posting limits here not worthy of detailed response so I made an of handed comment.

Me a Shock Jock? Oh come on I have repeatedly said that I support the legal status quo but that if a woman has to have an abortion do it but don’t pretend it is just like having your legs waxed. Or some minor cosmetic surgery. We sugar coat with euphemisms so many things in our lives and I just think that the ethical issues have to be faced; what is so shocking in that?

Franzy
Have you noticed my view the legality and availability of abortion? I’m not trying to prevent any woman making her own choice.
I think you are making the same argument as TRTL and confusing sentience with humanity. You are trying to make it easier to choose an abortion as the answer to an inconvenient pregnancy when it should be the very last option if all others are impractical. The battle to make abortion safe and affordable has been won. However as I see it there is no contradiction between supporting that and trying to convince women to not have an abortion. This is why I make the point ,calling a spade a spade that abortion is the killing of a human being
Posted by IAIN HALL, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 6:25:28 PM
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Oh that was hurtful Iain with the extra i.... OUCH! Wasn't my hypothetical, as you so eloquently put it, up until Tony Abbott awarded the contract the status quo and didn't you prove my point without you even realising it?

Aren't people like Tony Abbott sneakily attempting to skew the status quo against the woman having choice, independent advice, guidance and councelling? So which status quo are you now talking about?

If you are so intellectual why would you need more than 350 words just to say "I agree The Pro Choice reasonable people are right"?...Ha!
Posted by Opinionated2, Wednesday, 10 January 2007 9:09:53 PM
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Now we're getting a little closer to the meat of the matter:

You make a fair point on the sentience v humanity argument, and you highlight the notion that it could lead to the termination of people with nominal brain function - again, fair enough.

On the other hand... if someone's brain function is so limited they are incapable of breathing or surviving without assistance, the plug is often pulled.

This bears more similarity to a foetus, though were I to draw a direct comparison, it would not acknowledge the fact that the foetus is developing and has a chance at life, while the brain damaged individual does not.

So we have the same runaround. Again it comes back to the perception of humanity, there are those who view foetuses as human, and there are others who see that the intertwined nature of the foetus's survival makes it more a part of the parent than an individual.

Two things to consider, when comparing people in states with limited brain function, which makes them different to a foetus:

One: do they have a chance of recovery (this one isn't so much a difference, but it leads into point two)

Two: They have lived a life... if they are comatose or something similar and have a chance of recovery, it represents a hiatus in brain function, which is different from a potential life (and make no mistake it is a potential life, many foetuses naturally terminate without assistance).

(And I've yet to see anyone show that opinionated2's argument is flawed).
Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Thursday, 11 January 2007 9:22:00 AM
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To date, I have worked out that the following stats relevant to above are true; I have tried to be impartial:

Pro-Foeticide posts = 34, including support by –proxy.

Anti-Foeticide = 11, including a Bi-Polar post by Franzy

Central/Nuetral posts =21, including Questions and Comments.

Some posters had multiple scores, they were: IanHall 8, BillyC 2, Billie 6, Turnrightleft 3, Cornflower 7, Skeptic 2, Gekko 2, AudApple 4, Stewglass 5, Franzy 9, Samsaid 3, Bugs 4, Opinion2 3, Gadget 4, Darlene 2, Mykah 2 and MarRichardson 2.

I am in full support of this definitive and properly humane/human post by Blackstone:

‘I'm a mother of two and have had the privilege of being pregnant. Yes, ladies, it is a privilege. I am not anti-abortion. I am not anti-choice. But I do not think abortion should be touted as a lifestyle saving procedure. Abortion is not a form of birth control. Women should be entitled to have freedom over their bodies. But for those of us who have carried a child, those of us who have desperately tried to fall pregnant, those of us who have gone in for a 6 week ultrasound check to look for a heart beat - a fetus is a living, feeling, amazing miraculous soul. Don't dare tell us otherwise. ‘ Posted by Blackstone, Friday, 5 January 2007 7:56:38 PM

I believe this is our national benchmark, a place from where to begin repairing the damage perpetrated by the rabid death cult of abortion.

I think the Federal Parliament ought to form a National body, to oversee abortion. It should be enshrined in legislation, with a Salvationist perspective as part of its core functions.

Anyone contemplating foeticide should be hauled before this panel of Medical Experts to determine the validity of the impending slaughter. Make the body be populated with Doctors, Ethicists, Psychologists, Atheists-(1 of) and Church leaders on the panel.

Down with Abortion
Posted by Gadget, Thursday, 11 January 2007 1:41:29 PM
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Terminations will occur regardless so the best anyone can do is to look earnestly and frankly at what pressures contribute to the high termination numbers. There is nothing to be gained from forcing women to have children when there are systemic limitations and penalties for having them. We should not expect the underlying causes to be simple and some drilling down is needed.

To take an example, both men and women are having to study longer to compete in the jobs market and this combined with having to pay off a HECS debt and the lack of 'permanent' positions mean that couples are prevented from forming households as early as for previous generations. This is but an example of a possible scenario for some couples.

Maybe another of the causes could be that the brave new order of the intellectual elite that advises government is not conducive to family formation. For example, there is reason to suspect that many men could regard Family Law as being unfair. Stories abound of men who have lost all including access to their children following divorce.

There is also the other end of the problem which is finding out why contraception appears to be failing more than it should and for unexpected age groups (eg women 20-30).
Posted by Cornflower, Thursday, 11 January 2007 3:26:21 PM
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Gadget and others vehmently anti-abortion -

What is your position on abortion where the pregnancy genuinely threatens the life of the woman? For example, when she has cancer? In these cases the pregnancy will both prevent treatment occuring and increase the spread of the cancer, likely making it beyond cure? Do you then still insist that the pregnancy must continue?

I am not being rude, I am genuinely interested as to how you would view such a situation.
Posted by Laurie, Thursday, 11 January 2007 3:51:41 PM
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Iain, I see what you mean about you not denying women the choice to have an abortion and that is commendable. Also commendable is the fight against attempts to de-emphasise the importance of the decision to abort or continue with a pregnancy.

The problem with accepting that a foetus is a living human being is that it makes every abortion murder. This, in turn, makes every woman and doctor who performs abortions murderers. The only solution to this outcome is to outlaw abortions in all cases—rape, threat to mother’s life, everything. This will stop the murder of unborn children. Mostly. Women will continue to access backyard and illegal abortions and the implications of that have been discussed.
In advocating for the recognition of foetus humanity, you are, while still supporting the availability of abortion, advocating the dehumanising of any woman seeking to access abortion.

The other solution is at the end of conception. Here the solution is no sex at all or contraception which can and does fail (as we have seen) and will result in an unwanted child or an illegal and dangerous abortion.
Iain, as a parent, you know that there is probably no greater upheaval to one’s life than a child. You probably also know that for any woman planning to have a child, regret, disappointment and unfulfilled ambition and potential in her own life are probably not high on the list of emotions that that woman wants to have hanging around going into that pregnancy. She would want to have a child under her own terms, not those of a parliament, a failed contraceptive or a rapist. These terms would also include choosing if, when and how she has that child. Hence, the ability to choose safe abortion.

Gadget – Thanks for that unintelligible comment on my personal blog! What happened? Losing friends in the Anti-foeticide camp? I’m also pretty sure that using ‘bi-polar’ to mean ‘crazy’ will lose you the few supporters you may have had left. Credibility, on the other hand … what’s nothin’ from nothin’?
Posted by Franzy, Thursday, 11 January 2007 3:59:34 PM
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Franzy said: 'The problem with accepting that a foetus is a living human being is that it makes every abortion murder'.

So presumably 'parasite' or 'tape worm' would be preferable to foetus.

At this stage maybe a quote from Lewis Carroll's Alice Through the Looking Glass is relevant:

`When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, `it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less.'

`The question is,' said Alice, `whether you can make words mean so many different things.'

`The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, `which is to be master -- that's all.'

Not taking sides however some of the rhetoric in this thread is so pompous and funny and would not be out of place in a student rag.
Posted by Cornflower, Thursday, 11 January 2007 4:48:39 PM
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TRTL
I was actually thinking of those children like that girl(subject of controversy over having her growth stunted) in the US who have enough brain function to draw breath but are not responsive to the world around them. Rather than Brain damaged adults.

Franzy
The killing of a fetus does not meet the definition of murder under our criminal code. So your Hypothetical musing is wrong. I want to make abortions that are truly necessary safe and available. However I do want that decision given enough gravitas to match the act being contemplated so don’t mince words about what is being considered.
I am a great believer in prevention rather than a cure and I will certainly be suggesting to my children that abstinence is the most certain and effective contraception. The next best "choice" is some form of barrier method (like Condoms). Next comes hormonal contraceptives and then changing your life to accommodate the child if the more preferred options fail, Finally if there is some pressing reason not to have that child …

By the way Franzy what is the URL to your blog?

You see I have had to consider the matter because as older parents we faced the decision should the Ultrasounds shown that either of our children have had Downs’s syndrome so this is not just an academic issue…
Laurie see my response to Franzy
Cornflower
Good point about the use of words

Opp2
Your last post made no sense please try again :o)
Posted by IAIN HALL, Thursday, 11 January 2007 5:54:33 PM
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Laurie:

I think the life of the woman must come first (where there is a chance of serious harm to her physical or mental health).

I think it is entirely reasonable to consider all abortion killing, but murder is a sub-category of killing. (All murder is killing but not all killing is murder).

Murder is a combination of knowledge, intention and motives - thus it wouldn't apply to all abortions (particularly as mentioned in my first paragraph).
Posted by StewartGlass, Thursday, 11 January 2007 6:58:36 PM
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There were about 265,000 births in Australia in 2005. Abortion rate seems to hover around 25% at 90,000 annually. Upper band of the most conservative estimates of paternity fraud put it at 8,000 annually - we avoid measuring that even more.

As men, I guess we should be grateful for small mercies women (and state) allow us these days when it comes to male reproductive rights. Apart from rape, health reasons, contraceptive failure, and lifestyle choices, doubtful paternity could well be up there with the best of reasons that validate abortion.

Attempts at bullying men into marriage don’t seem to work so well with mere threats of contraception failure, either.
Posted by Seeker, Thursday, 11 January 2007 11:02:26 PM
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Hey Iain,

I think the pressing reason not to have that child is not wanting to bring a life into the world that is not immediately wanted and cared for from day one. That mothering instinct doesn't come naturally to everyone.

My URL is in that little house on the icons at the bottom of this post. Gadget found it and has posted a couple of sarcastic remarks already. I'm sure you will do much better than that zealot. Can you believe this guy? Salvationism and witchcraft? I'm beginning to suspect that he's pulling everyone's leg - no one could be that far out. Could they?
Posted by Franzy, Thursday, 11 January 2007 11:21:46 PM
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Gadget... you took the part of blackstone's post you liked and ran with it. You also ignored the 'women should have freedom over their bodies' and the 'I am not anti-choice.'

As far as I could tell, Blackstone's post was discouraging abortion if there are other alternatives, and to her, the foetus was a 'living amazing thing'

All fair enough. I didn't hear her raving about 'rabid death cults.' It is language like that that really annoys me in this debate.
I can just as easily call the other side 'rabid body-hijacking reproduction enforcing zealots' but that wouldn't contribute to debate.
It would merely make me sound hysterical, foolish and unable to absorb other people's views.

I note that your panel would consist of 1 atheist, but a range of church leaders. So... how many church leaders would there be against this one atheist? (who I'm assuming is a token pro-choice individual, but perhaps not).

To the anti-abortionists - do you really wish to create a world where once a woman is pregnant, she has no choice over the matter at all?
She has to give birth regardless? what of cases of rape?
Am I to believe that all women will just give up and accept this?
What do you say to the notion that many women will have to attempt backyard abortions, risking their very lives?

These are but some of the problems I envisage. What exactly are the anti abortionists proposing in relation to them?
Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Friday, 12 January 2007 9:22:29 AM
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Gadget - abortion will continue in the country whether or not it is legal and under medical supervision.

In the glorious 1960s the Royal Womens Hospital in Melbourne had a 20 bed ward for women who were admitted with botched backyard abortions. There was one death a week from sceptecaemia. Of course the wealthy classes visited Collins St. specialists.

You would have liked the 1960s when married women couldn't work in the public service, when no women had no access to superannuation, all women earned two thirds of the male wage and no women, except barmaids, were permitted in pubs. Women really knew their place when they wanted to borrow money for a house - where was their male guarantor. Although there were up front university fees only one third of students paid them - the rest were on cadetships and scholarships and when you dropped out there was full employment. ie walk around a small factory area for a morning and get 3 job offers for full time work starting Monday.

Why aren't young women worried that the growing right wing trends won't strip away their current rights.
Posted by billie, Friday, 12 January 2007 10:01:41 AM
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Franzy said: "Mykah – No! The proof is on YOU to prove that it IS human!....Humans can survive outside the womb, can’t they? Why can’t this one?"

You seem to be saying that unaided survival is a test for true humanity. What about people on respirators or other life-support systems, for example someone in a coma who may or may not recover. Your argument falls flat.

And could you please answer my original question. At what age, definitely, without question, confidently, can you say that the unborn is not human? Where does it cross that line?

And Audrey, at what stage of development does the foetus become someone that the mother does not own, and cannot choose to dispose of? Could you please answer the question rather than indulging in name-calling (calling me and others who disagree with your position "judgemental males"; we would only be judgemental if we were not actually defending a living human being, something which you have yet to prove).

By the way, if the foetus really belongs to the mother and is an integral part of her to dispose of as she wishes, why does it have its own unique DNA which biologically (factually) marks it as a separate being?
Posted by mykah, Friday, 12 January 2007 10:49:29 AM
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Oh for crying out loud mykah - I've answered your question over and over on this thread. I believe the fetus becomes something the mother has no control of when it has matured enough to survive outside of her womb. What part of this answer do you not understand that you make me repeat it over and over?

TRTL puts it pretty well with: "I'm informed that the neo-cortex, what is frequently regarded as a key part of the brain that distinguished people from lower order intelligences, is fully formed at approximately 25 weeks. Can a thing be regarded as a person before it is capable of independent thought, or even breathing?"

As for your question about keeping people alive on machines, I think it's a ridiculous waste of time, money and most importantly emotions. I was glad when Terri Schiavo was finally allowed to die with at least a little dignity. Without cognitive spark, a body isn't a human to me.

As for calling you judgemental males, I fail to see how you are anything but. You have no conception of what it's like to be pregnant, no understanding of what it feels like to share your body with something that, to you, feels like an unwanted invasion. You claim abortion is used as a lifestyle choice, but that's because deep down you have no respect for the chosen lifestyles of women because as soon as they fall pregnant you expect them to sacrifice everything to fulfil their biological and moral duty.

Nuts to you.

For the final time: A fetus becomes a human when it can survive outside of the womb. This is why I can abort one at 8 weeks and confidently say I'm not murdering a human being.
Posted by audrey apple, Friday, 12 January 2007 1:06:23 PM
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Even though i'm a man i usually put my two cents in on these social and conscience issues. A lot has been said already on both sides of the argument and it's been an interesting read. It looks like the support is weighted on the pro-choice side from the posts above so i don't think Ms/Miss/Mrs? Apple need worry too much about feeling discrimintated against.

But here's something to think about. Imagine if abortion was not possible, not because of legality or accessibility, but physically could not be done or always resulted in the death of the mother or something. What then? I guess that we'd either have huge population problems (unless culling of new borns was legalised) OR some more contemplation about children might come in BEFORE the sexual act (or the government might bring in some sort of sex license to regulate the who thing - scary thought).
This may be silly but it does highlight a fact that seems to be overlooked a little in this matter and that is that the basic purpose of sexual intercourse is procreation and continuation of the human species. Sure it has a pleasurable aspect, but until we grow babies in test tubes and all men and women are 'fixed' to prevent natural reproduction we unfortunately have to live with the fact that the product of sex is babies, and pleasure is mainly a by-product.
My heart goes out to Audrey for all the pain and trauma she had carrying her parasite and the fact that she now has to defend her decision to abort against the overwhelming damnation that she must be facing to prompt this article. But unless she is a rape victim or the Virgin Mary she did make certain sexual choices at some point which lead to her dilemna. So maybe she's just lucky, rather than brave, that abortion was possible and available to her.
Posted by Donnie, Friday, 12 January 2007 3:37:06 PM
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Audrey
I have previously refrained from offering any Judgment on the reasons that drove you to make your choice but it seems to me that yours was the poorest reason of all; that is because having a child at that time would be inconvenient for your chosen lifestyle. Now you chose to have the sex that resulted in the pregnancy and I think that it is not beyond the scope of this debate to ask just what measures did you take to ensure that a pregnancy would be avoided?
As Donnie says the primary purpose for sex is procreation. And procreation is not a "burden" imposed upon women by men; it is a biological imperative that drives us all.

You still want to pretend that the fetus that you had killed was not a human being don’t you? Well the facts, and the nature of humanity are not on your side. I suspect that you do this because despite your feminist bluff and bluster you know that killing is wrong and that perhaps your justifications for doing so are not as watertight as you want to believe that they are.
Some times I think that when obtaining a safe abortion was more difficult that the true gravity of what was desired (the killing of an unborn child) was actually thought through. Now it is perhaps too easy and when activists, such as yourself, pretend that the child killed is not human then we are all devalued as human beings
Posted by IAIN HALL, Friday, 12 January 2007 8:16:32 PM
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Donnie – Here’s something else to think about: Imagine if abortion were not only possible, but that women could do it spontaneously, without any assistance (or interference). The moment the women realised she was pregnant, all she had to was think really hard and feel the right feelings and presto, no unwanted child!
Wouldn’t that be something? Women having complete, autonomous, biological control over their bodies and reproductivity? I bet you’re shaking in your boots.
This is essentially what happens now. Only women who desperately don’t want to have children have to go to a clinic and endure people groaning on about ‘destroying human life’.

Iain – I reckon you can speculate all you like on Audrey’s true, deep-down beliefs, but I think you’ll still find that they don’t match your own beliefs. As incredible as that may be.
Find me a sexually active women, or, check that, a female who is seriously considering becoming sexually active who HASN’T considered what she would do if becoming pregnant. Beforehand. Before the sex. Not at the moment of the pregnancy test or the missed period or broken condom. Women are all too aware of the consequences of sexual activity. Just about all of them have a game plan. All of those ‘game plans’ are based upon their beliefs about sex and life (their own included). Some women know from day one that abortion is out of the question. Others know that pregnancy is. Some change their minds. ALL take it seriously.
If you don’t want to understand why women who chose abortion make that choice, instead labelling those whose views, opinions, belief and knowledge differs from yours as irresponsible and “devaluers of human life” then you don’t deserve to be part of this debate.

Mykah – yep, what Audrey said: life support systems, coma patients and other non-responsive people? None of them need 24-7 amniotic fluid, an umbilical cord and folate-hungry mothers to keep them going.
Here is my prediction for your response: FOETUSES ARE PEOPLE! HUMAN BEINGS! THEY ARE TOO! THEY ARE TOO! BECAUSE I SAY SO!
Posted by Franzy, Saturday, 13 January 2007 1:36:01 PM
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Audrey is an activist. She is so fixed on her issue(s).

Over 20+ years of my adulthood (beginning at 30yo) I have witnessed many activists of numerous causes. They are like opportunistic weeds that thrive on the good soil of a cause - good and bad.

Only an activist could write what Audrey has written as an expression of self pride.

She admits her cause of action was convenience. She denies human life as potentiality in the fetus; it is mass of cells that at some arbitrary level of complexity becomes human; in the meantime it is disposable at her will.

Audrey expresses gratitude to "whoever" for "being given" to her parents, as if by the stork. In light of her activism, perhaps the thanks should be of the parents who found her "potentiality" not a hindrance.

I know so many "inconveniences and hindrances" to confirm that the decision of the parents is underpinned by the great promise of life; things will be okay; just adjust your expectations and get on with it in trust of doing the right thing. This being the basis of our Christian western social development at the level of the ordinary.

Activist either become enlightened to the barrenness of their folly and self-justifications, or sadly dig in and eventually sink to a state of ongoing, soporific delusion. Where enlightenment has occurred and it is matched with acknowledgement of wrong done then good life follows, with all of its hindrances and inconveniences. Life is lived as it is.

Lack of acknowledgment leads to a sad pathetic, passivity cynicism.

It is long road ahead, Audrey. I hope your burden is not too much. Best wishes
Posted by boxgum, Saturday, 13 January 2007 2:18:18 PM
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Religious right fanatics are hijacking democracy! And guess what--men do not own women's bodies! the only body a person should and can have control over is their own...that old story, you know, the one about eve biting the apple? the one about god being the good cop and the devil the bad cop? sounds like a form of social control that's being rejected by sophisticated intelligentsia these days. you right wingers can rant on all you like but the truth is that the youth of today aren't swallowing the bull. YOU are being phased out...and you can kick and scream in your death throes but when the current generation gets to middle age, your days are numbered!MWA HA HA HA!
Posted by mjk, Sunday, 14 January 2007 3:06:36 AM
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Chaps, a hypothetical. You've got testicular cancer. Your doctor says the only way to save your life is to cut your balls off. But you go away, do some research, and come across a promising new treatment that may allow you to live AND keep your testes. You go back to the doctor and tell her you want this treatment. But she insists the new treatment is experimental, life is more valuable than testicles, you're not being rational because you're overly emotional, so you're not really capable of making a decision. She's assembled a team of experts - a couple of (celibate) priests, some female doctors, a left-wing feminazi ethics lecturer at a communist university, and they all say you need the operation. They're experts, clearly they know more about your bodily integrity than you do? Or do you think you have the right to refuse the operation?

Control over our own bodily integrity is one of the most fundamental rights we have. You don't want an operation? You have the right to refuse all medical treatment.

And yet you clearly think it's okay to FORCE a woman to carry an unwanted foetus around in her belly for nine months and then to be strapped to a table, sliced open and have the foetus pulled out of her after her essential organs are pulled out and moved to one side?

To FORCE a woman to lie on her back, legs in the air, have her vagina cut with scissors and large metal objects shoved up her without adequate anaesthesia?

To FORCE her to have drugs pumped into her because doctors think her body can't do an adequate job, have monitors strapped to her, needles shoved into her spine, hooks inserted into her vagina, electrodes attached to her, to deprive her of food and drink for twenty four hours, to stick a vacuum suction device into her vagina? All against her will?

Every last thing I just mentioned is okay by you, to be done to a woman without her consent, obviously, if you're against abortion being safe, legal and available.
Posted by Rebekka, Sunday, 14 January 2007 1:50:23 PM
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The distinction about where life starts and ends is a red herring.

It never ceases to amaze me that when a pregnancy is unwanted, its just a featus, a bundle of cells.

Later in life, when the pregnancy is wanted, the very same person changes their mind and its a 'bundle of living joy' that gets music played to it at month three.

If you wanna kill it, keep it, terminate it, go to term or whatever other term of self serving liguistic revisionism you choose to validate your actions and double standards, then just go ahead and do it. Save us the justifications. Its your choice and its legal. Get over it and stop explaining your actions... its very lame.
Posted by trade215, Sunday, 14 January 2007 3:19:16 PM
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Ahhh Trade, you always manage to reduce every transaction to its basest raw emotion.

Let’s trade some volatile derivatives tomorrow instead of wasting time on the abject irrationality of the heart.
Posted by Seeker, Sunday, 14 January 2007 6:06:00 PM
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Let's not and say that we did.
Posted by trade215, Sunday, 14 January 2007 8:16:22 PM
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"Later in life, when the pregnancy is wanted, the very same person changes their mind and its a 'bundle of living joy' that gets music played to it at month three."

Anyone who plays a foetus music at month three is wasting their time. The foetus can't hear until month seven.

And of course a woman's attitude towards a wanted, planned pregnancy that she hopes will end with a baby for her (and her partner) is different from her attitude towards an unwanted, unplanned pregnancy that comes at a time in her life when she is not wanting it and is not able to take on a responsibility that will be hers - and possibly hers alone - for the rest of her life. Duh.
Posted by Rebekka, Sunday, 14 January 2007 9:39:42 PM
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Rebekka
I think you miss the point my objection to the dehumanizing of an unwanted fetus it is all about Audrey and her pals being self deluded about the difference between humanity and sentience. When faced with any moral dilemma we all seek ways to make the decision more palatable. Why do you think that in war time the propaganda makes the enemy out to be less than human? It is to make it easier to overcome our cultural prohibitions against killing. Thus it is with Pro-abortion advocates by declaring that the fetus is "not human" or "not a person" until Blah point in its development. It is easier to justify killing it. As Audrey and her Ilk are so very keen to do.
And frankly it is not just a question about bodily integrity as you suggested in an earlier post. With the notable exception, of a pregnancy that results from a rape. No woman gets Pregnant with out first deciding to have sex. Pregnancy is the natural consequence of doing that and if no child is desired then stick to abstinence or sexual activity that does not put sperm where it will find the ova, simple really.
Posted by IAIN HALL, Monday, 15 January 2007 7:44:27 AM
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Franzy - hi, yes that is also something that could be imagined.
But why stop there? Wouldn't it also be something if a woman could just swallow a pill (or think really really hard and have the right feelings) and WHAMMO instant bun in the oven! Save all that finding a man to have sex with for sperm. Then she really would have complete autonomous control over her reproductivity.

I guess eventually, we industrious humans will find a way to separate the sexual act from reproduction totally so then we'll all be able to run around and have sex with anything and everything we please, wherever and whenever we like, with absolutely no thought in the wind of possible consequences, because there wouldn't be any (besides the occasional pesky STI). O brave new world that would be. I mean we've already done pretty well with all the contraception we have and now with abortion becoming easier and the stigma of it being eradicated by the valiant efforts of the Audrey Apples of the world with their "sexual freedom" war cries. Soon we will have our way i'm sure.
Now wouldn't it be ironic if after all this has been achieved we come to the discovery that the act of sex, once intimately linked with the creation and survival of our species but now just a fun pastime, is no longer that pleasurable?
Posted by Donnie, Monday, 15 January 2007 10:06:50 AM
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IAIN, "or sexual activity that does not put sperm where it will find the ova" - you will probably find if you look around that the most adamant of the anti-choice mob obect to a lot of those options as well.

One regular poster objects to gays in part because they waste sperm by putting it where there are no ova (but seems to have not issues with an apparently celebate Jesus or catholic clergy).

I do think that there is value in the point you make about a tendency to try and change the perception of the seriousness of an action to make it more palatable. It is a common habit to pretend that our opponents are villans (or just stupid).

I'm undecided about the humanity of the fetus at an early age, I see truth in both sides of the argument.

I've often been intrigued by a perception that the most adament of the pro-life group are often also pro capital punishment and willing to support non defensive wars whilst the most adament of the pro-choice group are often very anti capital punishment, anti war etc.

R0bert
Posted by R0bert, Monday, 15 January 2007 10:11:40 AM
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Donnie – You missed my point (although, it may not have been glaringly obvious): we don’t live in your perfect world where women can’t control their reproductivity or bodies, nor do they live in mine where they do. Well, we’re a bit closer to my utterly bizarre fantasy than to yours.

The mode of argument on this forum is beginning to go around in circles. If someone (usually pro-choice) makes a point then an anti-aborter will leap about chanting something about killing babies and coma patients or pushing the statement to an illogical extreme (what if we lived in a world where you couldn’t abort pregnancies? That would teach people to have sex!). Donnie, how can you want to be taken seriously by suggesting that science is working towards removing sex from the procreative process? What possible furthering of debate could that statement possibly have? And before anyone bothers pointing out my previous statement about women self-aborting, remember that it was to serve as a mirror example of Donnie’s extremism, not as a serious wish.

Iain – You can make all the points you like about the softening of language around abortion to make it easier. But it never never never is easy. Not even the slightest bit. Have you talked to anyone who’s actually had an abortion yet?
You want the language changed so that women realise what they’re doing? Fine. But I can bet you whether you call it an abortion clinic, a baby-abattoir (babattoir?) or Women’s Happiness Centre, women will still go there to get abortions/kill babies/make their lives more convenient. They will still experience the extremes of fear, depression, terror, sadness and relief, whatever you want to call them.
Next you’ll be telling people not to say “My son passed away” but “My son was killed in a blazing inferno”

One more point: “With the notable exception, of a pregnancy that results from a rape.” How about broken condoms? Failed vasectomies? Poor or no sex education? Religious pressure to breed?
Posted by Franzy, Monday, 15 January 2007 12:34:47 PM
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Snigger....babbatoir.
Posted by audrey apple, Monday, 15 January 2007 2:00:00 PM
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I'm glad you're seeing the humour, Audrey!

The only possible answer to Iain's comment about sex = pregnancy, so if we ladies don't want to get pregnant, we shouldn't have sex, is to say that if you men don't want us ladies killing babies for our own convenience, then don't have sex with us.

Other than that, it's up to us, because you're not ever going to be the ones facing an unwanted pregnancy, so quite frankly, you don't get a say - unless we choose to give you one because you're involved in our lives.

So you can go back to your cave, or wherever it is you live, leaving us in charge of our sexual destinies, as thank goodness we are.
Posted by Rebekka, Monday, 15 January 2007 3:09:32 PM
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Rebekka, that's exactly the point that you keep reinforcing. Thanks very much.

Its your choice. Invent as many self serving head games as gets you thru the day. And leave us menfolk out of it. Because, the point l make to you is simply, its your body, its your choice and most of us men dont give a rats arse wot you do with it. Or for that matter what other men do with theirs. People can drink draino if they like. Sure we'll clean up the mess, but most dont care.

Just playing your silly head games for the sake of sport... its fun exposing blatant hypocracies and double standards. Accidental humor is priceless. lm starting to think that internet forums are just a fairly convincing facade for sniggering, judgemental egocentricity.

Of course, contrary to your assertions of male reproductive powerlessness, we can do what we've done for eons, something that trumps everything all of the time, without exception, which is to vote with our feet. The only thing which anyone truelly recognises. And, like you say, there's nothing you can do about it. Like you say, its our reproductive destiny and we can too can choose to involve you or not, at our discretion, alone. See, this crap works both ways.

You set the tone. You are driving the wedge. Congratulations and well done champ.

This issue, above all else puts lie to those who have any pretentions to mutual responsibility and equality.

So, there ya have it, my little pointless contribution to the cheap entertainment that is forum based 'discussion.'

Good luck, and dont forget to take the pills. duh.
Posted by trade215, Monday, 15 January 2007 4:03:45 PM
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"Of course, contrary to your assertions of male reproductive powerlessness, we can do what we've done for eons, something that trumps everything all of the time, without exception, which is to vote with our feet. The only thing which anyone truelly recognises. And, like you say, there's nothing you can do about it. Like you say, its our reproductive destiny and we can too can choose to involve you or not, at our discretion, alone. See, this crap works both ways."

So....by voting with your feet you're saying that you're going to stop sleeping with women? Hah! Good luck recruiting men to that club buster.

You do realise, trade215, that stringing lots of words together and making grammatically correct sentences doesn't actually ensure that said sentences will make any kind of sense whatsoever. Further, I rather wonder why, considering you think talking about abortion is a useless waste of time because you don't care what anyone else does, you bother to involve yourself in a discussion about it.

As for your earlier comment Iain - I was using implanon. Supposedly 100% pregnancy proof. I had it out the day after I had sex and, according to the doctors, conceived 'immaculately' sometime during the following seven days while my boyfriend was out of town. I've probably gone and knocked off the next massiah. Crumbs. THAT'S not going to go down well on Judgement Day...
Posted by audrey apple, Monday, 15 January 2007 4:38:24 PM
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Franzy - i may have missed your point but you have missed mine and proceeded to paint a mural.

Here's mine in black and white without satire:
- The basic purpose of sex is to reproduce.
- I assume that Audrey made a choice to have sex with a man. She became pregnant. She didn't want the baby and was able to terminate it therefore i think she is lucky that such a procedure was available to her.
- The more ways and means we have of easily preventing or cancelling pregnancies, the more the act of sex may become detached from it's basic pupose and the more it can be indulged in, worry-free, as an act of pleasure alone. It is possible that the reason sex is so pleasurable is because of this link to procreation.

Now here's a few more to respond to your post:
- I'm not anti-abortion, i support the responsible and informed choices of pregnant women with regards to their bodies, taking into account the father (if he is man enough to be around) and the future life of the fetus, and also the impact on their family and society and even the whole race.
- Science, or more accurately human beings, are working towards a lot of things, some are beneficial to humanity, some are destructive. I don't know if our science is working towards removing sex from reproduction but it is certainly making it a possibility.

I'm furthering the debate by moving it along, not a just adding a tired pro-choice or pro-life response on the merry-go-round argument of is it human or just cells.
I see the should/shouldn't debate about abortion as basically over as society is clearly moving in the pro-choice direction. i think discussion should turn more to the ethical use of abortion because the more accessible and hassle-free it becomes, the more it can and will be used to allow total irresponsibility when it comes to sex and the method of our procreation.
Posted by Donnie, Monday, 15 January 2007 5:18:01 PM
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Gee, audrey, ya think?

Voting with ya feet means you're not the only one who can walk away from a pregnant body. 'medical procedure' or no. whether he's pointlessly for or against abortion. his reproductive freedom is in his biology. other options, not of his undertaking, merely enhance that freedom. thats the stripped down reality. all this crap works both ways.

make of it what you will.

You do realise, apple, that stringing lots of assumptions together and making self servingly correct justifications doesn't actually ensure that said justifications will make any kind of sense whatsoever. Further, I rather wonder why, you wonder about more pointless stuff, like my motivation.

you do realise that jumping to conclusions is a good way to keep arguing with yourself.

wading thru contradictory self serving justifications that bear no logic upon a topic is certainly a waste of time. all that personal rationale gets in the way... you know, that stuff about different behavioural standards being acceptable, or not, due ultimately to subjective and often vascilating feelings driven by self interest.

Thats all a crock and you know it is. Its a good tactic tho. Wasting time, as you know, is a very useful device for avoiding the truth, which must be avoided at all costs. It would only lead to compromise, and in something as fundamentally central to the essence of power between the sexes (reproduction --> survival), we cant have that.

Basically, think the whole angle about how men get the short end of your mercy stick in the game of life, being pushed in various quarters, is a rhetorical device. It teases out stuff thats usually very guarded. Its a way to get folks to show their hand. Political reconnaissance. Useful to know where people really stand. Its a great time saver.

as for talking about something on a net forum... who needs a reason for such egocentric indulgence. ah well, if ya gonna demand reasons the qualification may as well be specious. well done. good time wasting.

this is fun.
Posted by trade215, Monday, 15 January 2007 9:35:54 PM
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I'm quoting from memory, but Helen Garner said something about the fact that you will never change a woman's adamantine refusal to give birth to a child that she cannot adequately parent.
I believe a foetus is human, therefore I believe there are worse fates for it than to never be born, such as to be born to a reluctant, resentful, desperate parent - who will neglect or abuse it and don't talk to me about adoption - the trauma of adoption is legendary. My mother -a counsellor - said she spent literally thousands of hours counselling women who had given up babies for adoption and to people who had been adopted - their tears filled oceans. She did not spend a single hour counselling those who had had abortions - it was mentioned, but in passing, it was simply not traumatic. The tragedy is the unwanted pregnancy - not the solution.
In Freakenomics the authors discovered that 18 years after Roe v Wade made abortion legal in the US, the rate of crime fell. At first they thought this was just a co-incidence, then they investigated states that had legal abortion prior to Roe v Wade. Guess what, precisely the same result - a fall in crime exactly 18 years later. It ain't giving birth to a child that matters, its the 20 odd years you spend afterwards bringing it up, and if you can't do that properly, better - by far - not to have it at all.
Posted by ena, Monday, 15 January 2007 9:56:13 PM
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Babattoir seems so apt. But should we not have all-female babattoir staff? Otherwise we surely leave ourselves open to accusations of patriarchal oppression. No?

Are babottoirs the only places in this country that have proper contracts for women to sign that can be actually enforced? I don’t see too many of them being sued after she changes her mind – or is this the only case where her choice stream can be forcefully terminated?

And what of adoption? More traumatic for the mother than abortion? The attitude of “if I can’t have you, you must die” seems psychopathic in any other language, except of course, in that of abortion.
Posted by Seeker, Monday, 15 January 2007 10:50:22 PM
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Audrey – Don’t worry. I’m sure he’s just a VERY naughty boy. No Judgement Day necessary.

Trade – “self serving" “self serving” “self serving” … do you work at a petrol station?
Seriously though, you are by no means, not by a LONG shot, the most interesting, intelligent, insightful or entertaining poster on this forum. No way. And I know you so badly want to be the guy who strolls in and makes all us feminazi, fag-hag, brain-washed-by-the-academy, pro-wymin’s rights squawkers look like childish buffoons playing in the adult world where men can take back everything they’ve had ripped from them by bleeding heart law-makers and lesbians, but really, in actual fact, looking at all the available evidence … you’re not.
SnoreFest 2007.
Gadget had buck-toothed religious zealotry.
Iain Hall has semantics.
You have … zzzz … wha’! Where was I?
Oh yeah.
You have the phrase “self serving” and the point that Audrey is wrong because her beliefs differ from yours. Or her argument style. Or her argument HAS style. Or something…
Before you respond, please order everyone a round of strong coffee.
However I WOULD like to hear more about this idea of yours that we men should only have sex with each other to keep the abortion rate down.

Donnie – You’re still asking everyone to take seriously a world in which sex is separated from procreation. Because of science. Uh-huh. Anyway …
I see what you’re saying here: “We are making abortion so easy that women will just start using it as contraception because they no longer take sex, procreation or pregnancy seriously!”
This is the same A changing to B will surely continue to C argument pattern (‘the slippery slope’) that the anti-gay lobby uses. Observe: “If we let men have sex with other men, then surely they will start having sex with children and animals! Who knows where it will end!”

Iain hasn’t answered this question yet and I’m sure you’ll dodge it too, but I’ll give it a shot:

Have you spoken to anyone who’s actually gone through an abortion?
Apart from Audrey?
Posted by Franzy, Monday, 15 January 2007 11:33:35 PM
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”Iain hasn’t answered this question yet and I’m sure you’ll dodge it too, but I’ll give it a shot:

Have you spoken to anyone who’s actually gone through an abortion?
Apart from Audrey?”

Actually Franzy I have known two women who have had abortions and I was not a disinterested party in one of those cases .I was in fact quite horrified how one of them, a woman of Russian extraction just saw having abortion as another method of contraception. She had perfected that ability to dehumanize the fetus, to her it was nothing of consequence that she had procured an abortion.

With regard to the Trauma of adoption I think that hose that make such claims are very much overplaying their hands and that may of the women who were traumatized by adoptions in the fifties and sixties were traumatized by the prevailing paradigm that saw them coerced into adoption and the subsequent secrecy enforced by legislation that meant that they could never know of the fate of their child. A rather more open paradigm prevails these days and surely an act of aultruism, in giving a childless couple that which they want most in the world; a child to love and nurture, trumphs the expedient killing of an unborn child every time...
Posted by IAIN HALL, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 8:01:28 AM
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IAIN HALL: "Actually Franzy I have known two women who have had abortions..."

Actually Iain you would know many, many more - but I'm sure they'd never tell you about them.
Posted by CJ Morgan, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 8:38:28 AM
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Franzy - Once again instead of digesting my post raw, you have added your own flavours.

"You’re still asking everyone to take seriously a world in which sex is separated from procreation. Because of science."
I said it's making it a POSSIBILITY not a reality.
I actually had my tongue in my cheek about us industrious humans separating sex from procreation because i got the impression from Audrey's article that she might think abortion is somehow a valid method to enable 100% consequence-free sex (seeing as contraception only gives us about 99%).

"I see what you’re saying here: ““We are making abortion so easy that women will just start using it as contraception because they no longer take sex, procreation or pregnancy seriously!” "
Here you are turning things clearly stated as possibilities into absolutes and drawing broad generalities from what could easily be understood as qualified remarks, in order to ridicule.

"We are making abortion so easy" - Absolute. I would have said "easier".
"women will just start using it as contraception" - Generality and absolute. SOME women MAY do this (and some men MAY agree with it too).
"because they no longer take sex, procreation or pregnancy seriously!" - Generality and absolute. I'd say only women that already do not take sex, procreation or pregnancy seriously will POTENTIALLY see it as a means of contraception, or contra-reproduction.

Perhaps you haven't heard of prediction, a valid reasoning tool used to consider possible outcomes and consequences (including extremes) of courses taken in the present, so that the best decisions can be made to lead to a desirable future.
And need i mention Murphy's law?

ps. It could be argued that a debate is dying when you begin to squabble over semantics and syntax.
Posted by Donnie, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 12:07:41 PM
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Well. This discussion is becoming nothing short of a 'hoot.'

Iain - You keep speaking of how important it is to distance humanity from sentience.
The problem here is defining humanity. Sentience is clearly a part of it - perhaps not all, though seeing as you appear to ascribe humanity to a foetus, I am curious as to why a foetus warrants this.

Is humanity about being unique or special? Aside from poking around genetically, I don't see how a foetus has had the chance to differentiate itself from other foetuses.

It hasn't had the chance to determine it's interests - it isn't gifted at the violin, and it doesn't have a particular penchant for devouring peanut butter. The unique tendencies that make us human have not yet been developed.

This, I suppose, could be said of babies, but even at the earliest ages, parents will tell you that babies have behaved differently to earlier siblings. Some cry, some don't. Some seem to like prams, while others like to be carried.

Is it then, the potential for these tendencies?
To me, this argument appears to hinge on the potential of such a foetus.

Well... I'm afraid in my eyes, it will never be as logical to argue on the basis of what may be, as opposed to what is.
At least in any way that we can determine.
Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 4:29:53 PM
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franzy, get a grip lance-a-lot.

... argueing with yourself.

... agenda driven assumptions... 'zzz'.

... men's reproductive freedom = no straight sex? Bwahahahahaha. Reflects seperationist undertones of your ideology.

Man has sex with woman, woman gets pregnant, wants baby, he
doesnt, man walks away. Confused? Rights and freedoms... exerciced. Feewings have no beawing on weality's ugwy twuths.

Abortion debate is a red herring (its legal). Balance of sexual power is the issue. duh.

Politician Tiny Abutt is stirring the political pot.

Realise distiction between the 'debate' and the deed. She wants one, she gets one, no need to debate nor justify anything to anyone. Least of all a net forum.

Simply stated truth sans fuzzy filters... things that dont effect a person, dont effect a person. Its not that complexcated. Exposing contradictions of the debated red herring illustrates the ruse. You are hoping people cant tell the difference.

People have different outlooks. Thanks for imparting that wisdom. That's lost amongst ideologues who cherry pick the good (rights) and ignore all the rest (responsibilities).

Fuzzy thinking fundies love nebulous concepts like equality. The half-truth is the PERFECT lie. The most potent foundation upon which to construct ideology. Employ it WHEN IT SUITS YOU, tweak the spin when it doesnt.

Credibility. Rare thing for an 'ist' to possess. Double standards dont get taken seriously. You alienate obvious allies, relegating your movement to the shadow boxing of hazy talk-fests.

Used to be one of you. Weight of truth was too much to bare. The essence of your philisopy has some merit. The ways and cynical ends to which you twist it, l cant be part of that anymore. Haggle over titanic deck chairs. Ignore icebergs, especially big ones, most of which are hidden.

Do continue with third-rate attempts to distort by projecting your homo-erotic hangups. Too much fun.

Style, irrelevant. Some are trying to transcend the fog.

Ok, grass hopper, be at one, with your fog.

Life is long and there are brain cells to kill.

Let the byte sized fun continue.
Posted by trade215, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 5:25:49 PM
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Donnie, I think your arguments are very interesting, especially in regards to sex becoming less pleasurable should the act of conception be removed from it entirely. Perhaps one of the reasons that sex is so enjoyable with a partner is the knowledge that the act of it could wind up, nine months down the track, creating a tangible object that is neither of you but both - EVEN, and I stress this, if you don't want it to happen at this moment.

However, if such a thing were to happen, surely we wouldn't miss it. If you remove pleasure from an action, so too do you remove interest in that action.

Frankly, I don't consider we've come anywhere near as close as we could to providing adequate contraception. Not only is there only one supposedly 100% effective one available on the market, but the chemical combination of many contraceptions can wreak havoc on a lass's body. Moodiness, depression, weight gain, lowered libido - it's a wonder people have sex on the pill at all!

People on this board have talked about contraception and the responsibilities of sex - but it's a fact that contraception DOES fail, and also a fact that the majority of sexually active people who have to take responsibility for the contraception are women. I'm not saying it's a patriarchal conspiracy - just a fact. The pill can be affected by a number of different factors - too much vitamin c, diahorrea, flu, stress - the list goes on. Accidental pregnancies do happen and abstinence as the best contraception is an outdated mode of living - because it's never really men who have to practice it.
Posted by audrey apple, Wednesday, 17 January 2007 12:37:55 AM
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