I am pretty speechless right now, babies born alive! How heartbreaking for all concerned. I went to a meeting last night. Operation Outcry was there, they offer a ministry helping to heal those affected by abortion by way of workshops etc, they also have little babyshoes you can name and write a little message to your lost little one, I did this for someone I know who had an abortion recently, I named her Esther. It was good to see someone doing something practical for women affected.

Great article. Well done for all those who attended march.

Damn shame that the anti-choice movement don't care as much once these kids are born.

In this day and age of modern medicine & life saving techniques, govt funding for people with disabilities, care net works and support agencies that we would pass a law to terminate a babies life right up until birth.

The pro-choice lobby say it is a womans right to choose and in a democratic society that's a fair comment, all things being equal. But what about those women or girls who are pressured into having an abortion because their partner doesn't want it or their parents have put pressure on them to get rid of the baby.
This happens in our community, what happened to those mothers right to choose to have the baby?
If we can stick up for our fish, how much more so we should stick up for unborn human life and for the mums to be facing this situation?

Unborn babies? The emotive title shows bias. There is no such thing. Human embryos are not babies. They will become babies if and when they are born. I will become a corpse when I die. So will we all. All living people can be referred to as undead people. It is inevitable that we will die, but it is not inevitable that a human embryo will become a baby. Many pregnancies do not come to term because of spontaneous abortions for various reasons.

I am an undead person, but there is no good reason to use the term. A human embryo is not an unborn baby.

A pregnant woman can make a decision that she would rather not continue the pregnancy. That is her right. Articles such as this seek to deny her that right.

The article ends. "The March was a peaceful witness to life and a visual demonstration that Victoria's abortion laws are "out of step with community sentiment", that surely values the life of a child over a fish."

In an abortion it is not the life of a child that is concerned. A human embryo is not a child. However, the life of a pregnant woman is concerned. That should be considered.

It is not the life of a child versus the life of a fish. It is the life of a woman as opposed to a continuation of a pregnancy. That is the issue stripped of emotive terms.

My cousin committed suicide during WW2 because she was pregnant, and her man had been killed in action. She did not have access to a medically safe abortion and saw no alternative to suicide. That suicide eliminated both her and the embryo in her. It would have been better had she had access to abortion and lived on possibly to have a baby under other circumstances in the future.

The fact that there are doctors and nurses who will abort a baby and watch as it struggles unsuccessfully to live, is frightening as well as abhorrent. It is wrong to condone such injustice.
Please keep marching.

Where's runner?

Runnerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

It's the easy way out Dave.

:-)

What gets me is when feminists bang on about 'reproductive rights'. For a start it's quite an exercise in Orwellian doublespeak to call aborting a fetus your 'reproductive right'. Why don't they call it their termination rights?

Secondly how is it an equality or feminist issue when women hold ALL the cards when it comes to unwanted pregnancies. If any party should be looking for equality in reproductive rights it's men.

It's a funny world.

'The fact that there are doctors and nurses who will abort a baby and watch as it struggles unsuccessfully to live'

I agree. They shouldn't watch.

I think the Article says it all.
I watched a news bulletin on the march the other night. Some people were carrying a banner which said,
" It's easy being pro-choice if you are not the one being killed"
I could add, or being left to die!

Wow! That is so sad to read that there is more legal protection for Australian fish than Australian babies in the womb. I am a student midwife. Midwives & doctors know very well that the babies being aborted are living human beings & that there is nothing magical about birth that changes a fetus from a 'non-human piece of tissue' to 'beautiful & precious little baby.' Any doctor or midwife who tries to claim that an unborn baby is not a human (and therefore worthy of basic human rights) should probably re-sit their Biology exam.

>>If any party should be looking for equality in reproductive rights it's men.<<

I agree but we have to be careful about which men we mean. If it's men who would become fathers without a termination I agree they should have same 'reproductive rights' as the mother to be. If it's men like Cardinal Pell - who shouldn't be fathering children in the first place - I don't see why their love for the Bible and Jesus should give them some special licence to pry into the personal business of pregnant couples. That would be like giving 14 year old twi-hards who've read Twilight like a hundred times and think Edward is dreamy 'equality in reproductive rights' with those couples: unwise and inexplicable.

Cheers,

Tony

Way to go, Mr Flynn! How to stretch an analogy to the point where it snaps under the strain of its own inconsequentiality!

"Tragically, unborn babies in Victoria are not afforded the same protection as our undersized fish."

Unborn babies? Undersized fish? Puhleeeeze!

Even the associated imagery is profoundly inconsistent.

"If you are caught taking or being in possession of an undersized snapper it will be returned to the water and you can expect an infringement notice."

The author presumably wishes me to conjecture what might happen, should fish and unborn babies be treated the same under the law, if I am caught in possession of an undersized foetus. Return it to the womb? Be slapped with an infringement notice?

Surely not?

It's all very well making a case - however clumsily and crassly - against abortion. He, and the marchers, are quite within their rights to do so. But it is only half the story, is it not?

What do Mr Flynn and his Australian Christian Lobby suggest should be the punishment? What sort of "infringement notice" does he and his organization believe is appropriate in these cases?

Apart, of course, from eternal damnation. That goes without saying. But in his view, should offenders be sent to jail? To the workhouse, perhaps? And what about the penalties for the procurer, at what level should they be prosecuted - murder? Manslaughter?

When making such drastic changes to our society, it is important to be in a position to evaluate all the consequences. It is certainly not enough to create draconian laws merely to indulge the sanctimony of the religious conservative.

Not a tragedy, it is evil from the pit of hell.

Global liberal elites helped themselves to countless billions expanding bureaucracies, casting themselves as planetary saviours, proposed the reorder of industrial civilisation for their ridiculous CAGW movement http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/10/13/report-global-warming-stopped-16-years-ago/ - but organising to not subject the most innocent of the human family to lethal violence and instead welcoming them into life defeats us?

There is no way a child sacrificing society can survive, the tremors can be felt already. Everybody has to bind themselves to pro-human child groups and loose themselves from any works or from any silences that contribute to this mass murder.

We are most certainly living in a dark age and each individual, with God's help, has to find their way up out and into the light immediately.

Outstanding article highlighting the less than outstanding value our society places on the life of their own unborn human children. How sad the undersized fish have more protection than the unborn human being. The statistics listed are very revealing and extremely disturbing. The late term abortion law, needs to be revisited and withdrawn.

What value is placed on a human being? They have all faculties in place in the womb a few months after conception. A woman's body changes in response and you can feel the baby move within after a few months (a reason why abortion is carried out early to avoid the beauty of that feeling and create a cold, clinical approach to childbirth). How precious is this experience of carrying a baby to full term. Few relationships can compare to this time of bonding or that's how it should be. The law has become distorted in regards to what it protects. Maybe supporting each other has just become too bothersome. Easier to be kind to animals and trees so at least we feel like we are doing some good. But what value do we place on humanity? If none or even little, then what's the point? Change the law to abolish abortions. Raise your voice, Raise the standard!

Put your money where your mouth is guys. Next woman who wants to abort, tell her you'll look after her kid, or pay for their upbringing. Your missus could even be a surrogate!

I'm sure you don't mind a lot more tax dollars going to single mothers. That's what I always hear from conservatives, how much they love their tax dollars going to single mothers. They don't mind because it helps the children they always say. They cant wait to hand over the money!

What are your practical solutions to unwanted pregnancies. What further laws do you propose? Do you believe you can stop coat-hanger wire abortions? Child neglect and abuse? What are your contingency plans?

Houllie,
when you really think about it it's the anti-abortionists who are the main reason for women having abortions in back yards. As you said let the anti brigade come to the fore with supporting struggling mothers. Many of very young children live in unacceptable conditions because of the anti abortion lot.

I think Houellebecq has hit the nail on the head here. I'm told that the average cost of raising a child is $250,000, so that seems like a reasonable levy for each anti-abortionist to pay into a fund for bringing up unwanted children. Alternatively. they could volunteer to adopt and raise the child as their own. What a golden opportunity to inculcate anti-abortion propaganda into children who might otherwise grow up thinking that women should have a choice about what happens to their own bodies!

But I should point out that any human being as independently viable as a baby snapper is already protected by the full force of the law.

I understand there is a severe shortage of babies for adoption, hence no need for some vindictive tax. Last trimester abortion is murder, the mother has had 6 months to get her act together.
Frankly the kill-them-all lobby remind me of the Phoenicians, even the Romans were disgusted.

6 months is too old for abortion !

Emotive article and I agree that some of the links are tenuous. However, this is an emotive topic. I must admit, it does sometimes seem as though we care for all other creatures more than we do unborn children. It's only a perception but it lingers all the same...

I am married to a midwife, so I would echo Sarah-Jane's comments. You cannot play semantics with fetus/baby/tissue, etc. What changes when the baby is "born"? Only the location, really.

As a society, we need to do a lot better by women in this situation. However, instead of doing this, we allow the termination of lives. To me, this is how society approaches difficult problems these days. EG - we can't stop illegal drugs, so let's make them legal (I am NOT comparing this to abortion, only the concept of "it's too hard, so let's allow something we really shouldn't to solve things"). I am sure I haven't worded that as well as I would like but I hope the concept is coming through.

Would I adopt a child from a women/couple who couldn't cope? Absolutely! And I'm sure I'm not alone. Abortion takes that opportunity away as well.

The statistics on abortion in Australia are horrifying. Figures are hard to come by (generally grabbed by one "side" or the other and distorted for their purposes.) However, most governments have something you can find, if you dig hard enough. Have a look at:

Google - South Australian Abortion Reporting Committee; Fourth Annual Report, 2006, Table 4a - for a start. Not cheerful reading.

I can't believe either how naive some people are, or unwilling to listen to reason. Some of the argument for abortion are ridiculous. Starting with its only a foetus, others have answered that well, but a foetus is a living human being and deserves the same right to life as you and me. A corpse is not living by the way, just in case you don't realise the difference. In fact when a mother is first pregnant she knows because her body starts changing and developing, helping the baby to grow and develop until it is big enough to be born.
The other silly argument that is always used is that so many children are already abused and neglected ( I'd be interested in real statistics here) . So you are trying to say that they are better of dead? And not having a chance at live at all?? Interestingly enough, I think you will find that the women who are more likely to neglect their children because of drug or alcohol abuse for instance, are the group LEAST likely to have an abortion.
You argue that we should raise the child - well I would love to! If I could ask a woman to keep her child and I would raise it, I would gladly do so. But once again, we all know that is not possible because adoption in this country is so restricted.
I would love to go into the hospital and care for all the babies born alive, but its not possible.
If the government did allow it, I am sure there would be 100's who would be lining up to care for unwanted babies.
But the real issue is, are these babies truly unwanted or are the women made to believe that they would be irresponsible to have a baby when they are young, when they haven't finished uni, when they are not married, when their partner doesn't want it, when they will lose their job.... The list goes on.
So please spare a few brain cells to think about this honestly and seriously.

Dear Broome,

I have thought about it honestly and seriously. In most cases a woman should have a right to terminate a pregnancy that she does not want to continue. It's her body and her life. She does not have to have a child. If she was unwise in becoming pregnant or if her situation has changed since she became pregnant she has the right to end it. What right do you and those who agree with you have to make her continue a pregnancy? Her life and what she wants to do with it are more important than the survival of a foetus. She should not have to continue a pregnancy she doesn't want to make a baby for someone else to adopt. That is my honest and serious thought.

"Her life and what she wants to do with it are more important than the survival of a foetus."

Who on earth are you to make that call, David F?

"Who on earth are you to make that call, David F?"

Well, obviously a mature and thoughtful human being that can think independently and allow people to make their own decisions on what happens to their own bodies.

The obvious followup question is, who on earth are you to prevent that?

I am constantly amazed that people can talk about the rights of the woman without reference to the rights of the unborn child. NEITHER should be ignored.

An "Unborn child", i.e embryo or foetus, has no rights independently of the mother that carries them. They certainly have no rights that supercede the mothers rights of self-determination. That is self-evident in that it requires third parties with other motives that may not have the mothers best interests at heart to impose the rights that they argue the foetus has.

Even if you are religious, you cannot argue that the foetus is a 'person', as according to the bible, as it has no soul. The soul is only imbued upon taking the first breath.

All this talk about unborn children having rights is only a very modern phenomenon.

Bugsy - with all due respect, that is an opinion.

The Bible does not teach the opinion you have out forward, re when a foetus is a child. Indeed there are passages where God clearly speaks about the unborn (Psalm 22, 139, etc).

Even if the talk of rights for the unborn is a modern phenomenon (which I would dispute, but anyway), does that automatically make it wrong?

"Even if the talk of rights for the unborn is a modern phenomenon (which I would dispute, but anyway), does that automatically make it wrong?"

Not necessarily, but it makes any religious basis for such an opinion a modernist reinterpretation to suit a modern opinion. This is also fine, but don't pretend that this isn't what's happening.

The notion of the soul and the rights of such an entity that is asserted to carry one appears to be the basis of much of the anti-choice opinion. The notion of the existence of the soul is itself problematic. So I wouldn't be basing any arguments that foetuses have rights on the basis they have souls.

The other options are that 'it just feels wrong' or 'they are humans too'.

Bugsy, you were the one who raised souls and religion. My reasons for my stance are bigger than that. Medically speaking, the foetus is well and truly alive and is therefore worthy of the same considerations given to the mother. You probably interpret that as "they are humans too." Fine.

It doesn't "feel" wrong to ignore the rights of the unborn - it is unjust.

Yes, some arguments are based on religion but others are based on a person's own moral code, wherever that may have come from. No one argues this topic without their own premises or prejudices. Many I have discussed this with are textbook pluralists, though they often deny both that fact or that it influences their thinking. No different to those who come from a religious basis. Everyone is influenced by their beliefs (or whatever name they like to call them).

My wife (previously a midwife) wrote a thesis about abortion some years back. As with any thesis, she read extensively and broadly. There are a lot of opinions out there, each with their own "evidence."

This is my opinion and I stand by it with integrity.

"Medically speaking, the foetus is well and truly alive and is therefore worthy of the same considerations given to the mother. "

This is not adequately explained. Why is it 'worthy of the same considerations'?

When the rights of a foetus are equated with the rights of the woman who has that foetus in her body religious mumbojumbo has triumphed over common sense.

Would it not be reasonable though, rational-debate, to assume that your views are strongly informed by your religion?

>>Yes, some arguments are based on religion but others are based on a person's own moral code<<

I suspect that using the Psalms as "evidence" may have given it away, just a little.

>> Indeed there are passages where God clearly speaks about the unborn (Psalm 22, 139, etc).<<

I had a quick look at Psalm 22, and it is obvious that the author is human. Furthermore, nowhere does he claim that he is channelling God's words. Therefore, it is categorically incorrect to use the phrase "God clearly speaks", when he manifestly does not.

It did give me cause to look a little more closely at the author, though. It does appear that he was a thoroughly despicable character, who despite having eight wives to his credit (possibly not all at once, I suppose) still thought adultery was pretty neat idea. Not to mention organizing his mistress' husband to be killed.

Yet his written work still appears to be the basis of some folks' opinion on abortion, all these years later.

What was that about "a person's own moral code" again?

As stated previously Pericles, I mentioned the Bible passages in response to a question/statement from someone else. They do not overly inform my thoughts on this matter.

Let me ask Pericles and David F whether or not you consider murder wrong. Or stealing, rape, etc. I am going to assume that you do. My question is why? On what basis do you make that call?

Bugsy, I can't make it any clearer. Sorry if that frustrates you.

I am so glad that my mother was unable to get the abortion she and my father desperately wanted when she was pregnant with me - yeah, I may have just been a foetus, not a person with any rights , but I'm really, really grateful that I got a chance to live. Funny thing too, so are my parents now. She seems to like my kids a fair bit too!

"Bugsy, I can't make it any clearer. Sorry if that frustrates you."

I'm not frustrated by it, but if you cannot explain why, it just means that it's an assertion. What you are assuming is that I know and understand what your basis for the statement is, especially the "and is therefore worthy of the same considerations given to the mother" bit. Why is it 'therefore'?

As for your question about considering "murder" wrong. Well, what you usually have is a death of a person, the motives and the circumstances determine whether it is 'murder' or not. Therefore the definition of what constitutes murder is sometimes in dispute, on a case by case basis. Removing someones feeding tube is considered 'murder' by some and 'wrong', but not by others.

The rights of an adult woman is simply not to be equated with the rights of part of her body whether that part is or is not a foetus unless we are dealing in religious mumbojumbo. Murder is a crime defined by the state. Sometimes laws are just sometimes unjust. However, most states do not consider abortion murder. However, killing a human being who has been born is murder where there are no extenuating circumstances.

Oh no, not that old chestnut, rational-debate.

>>Let me ask Pericles and David F whether or not you consider murder wrong. Or stealing, rape, etc. I am going to assume that you do. My question is why? On what basis do you make that call?<<

That "on what basis" question is a classic give-away of the religious mind, the assumption being that such considerations of right and wrong are obtained exclusively from some Greater Being.

Hogwash.

As we have evolved into the various civilizations around the world, standards of conduct have been largely agreed between people. Murder is wrong, because to deprive someone of their life is uncivilized. Ever the pragmatist, society has also contrived to avoid describing wartime deaths as murder - even Christians subscribe to that, despite their "thou shalt not kill" instruction. Stealing is wrong because it is makes living in society less palatable - despite which, churches seem quite happy to extort money from people, using the implicit threat that if they don't, they will be harmed.

Rape is wrong because it is a form of person-to-person violence, which many societies have determined as being detrimental to the orderly functioning of that society. Interestingly, these rules also have been frequently discarded during warfare - by Christians too - throughout the ages.

>>As stated previously Pericles, I mentioned the Bible passages in response to a question/statement from someone else. They do not overly inform my thoughts on this matter.<<

So, how did you know where to look?

Being honest about your prejudices, predilections and preferences is not a requirement of Forums like these. But it does make discussions easier to follow if you declare them, instead of dissembling.

Pericles,

Re: your point on society contriving to avoid describing wartime deaths as murder: This quote from Voltaire sums it up beautifully.

"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets."

There are couple of aspects of this ongoing debate on abortion that I would like comment on.
We all know that when a child is conceived there is joy, fear or anger depending on the circumstances of that conception. No matter the circumstances every body knows when they receive the news, that it is another unique human life that has begun. It may yet be small with budding human features, but protected and nourished, unless there is a natural reason, an unfortunate mishap, or direct human intervention to terminate, that a child will be born. Then it is protected and nourished until the child is old enough to live independently, and that is generally well into the child’s teen years as our legal system recognizes.
What society should be doing is seeking to encourage young people, both males and females, to understand about human life, to respect it, to respect themselves and each other, to be responsible in their attitudes to sex. Ideally they should be encouraged to see that sex in its most noble form is an act of love, that is best saved for a committed life together, preferably as man and wife in a marriage contract in which children will be wanted and cherished as reflective of the love between the mother and father. A child has its best chance to develop as a capable, socially responsible citizen in such a family setting. Ultimately I believe so many of society’s ills would be significantly reduced if the great majority of people aimed for this ideal. In the mean time until a change in behaviour has a chance to begin to effect the demand for abortion, society should be assisting those women who feel forced into abortions to bear their child, support if they desire to keep the child, and support if they decide to offer their child for adoption.

I dunno, I reckon fluffy bunnies would help too. You shouldn't discount bunnies.

I am currently in Mae Sot on the Thai Burma Border. Over the past 60 years, hundreds of thousands of Karen and other Burmese have fled here to escape Burmese government oppression and war. Hopefully there are signs of change inside Burma, but it will take much improvement before many will feel secure enough to return. On the way here I passed through Cambodia and revisited the notorious S-21 at Tuol Sleng and the associated "Killing Fields" just outside of Phnom Penh. Between 1975 and early 79, the Khmer Rouge tortured and slaughtered nearly 20,000 men, women and children. At the "killing Fields", there is the so called 'Magic tree' which is festooned with small, coloured commemorative rings. This tree is where the KR soldiers took babies from their mothers, and killed them by bashing the babies' brains out against the trunk. The Khmer Rouge are universally condemned for their genocidal behavior.

In Victoria each year some 20,000 babies are aborted, some 80-100,000 in Australia. The methodology of abortion procedures on the living, genetically unique foetus is appalling, especially the late term abortions. Although there has been much debate on the subject, there is no doubt that the foetus experiences pain, some medical research suggests from 8 weeks, but certainly from around 13 weeks. When an induced abortion occurs, depending on what stage of the pregnancy, the unborn child can die a variety of deaths – sucked to pieces, cut to pieces, twisted and dismembered, poisoned, right through to partial birth abortion (just prior to what would be a normal birth, when an induced death would be called infanticide) where after all but head has been delivered, the surgeon jabs the child’s head with scissors and sucks the brain out to collapse the head.

Consistency in respect of human life and human rights at all stages of life is one which any person could philosophically derive through a humanistic approach. and such a philosophy is reflected in such instruments as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. That each human life has value in its uniqueness and potential from the moment that life begins which by its very nature has to be at biological conception
If we deny such a position I believe that we adopt an increasingly utilitarian attitude towards human life, which has the potential to take us down many questionable roads. Ultimately we reach a point where the question has to be asked “Does the end justify the means?
In the case of a Christian humanist and human rights activist, a position which I openly subscribe to, there is the added perspective of every human life as having a spiritual dimension and dignity. Whether conception is the moment of suffusion of a human soul in Christian theology I don’t know, but it is certainly is the beginning of a human life from which it will progress through many stages until old age and death, unless terminated at some earlier stage before and after birth, by natural or human intervention or misadventure.
Seriously, we have to really understand the reality of abortion, and that both male and female should be responsible, not all the onus thrown on the mother

Do I detect just a smidgeon of personal interpretation here, bagsyl?

>>...such a philosophy is reflected in such instruments as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. That each human life has value in its uniqueness and potential from the moment that life begins which by its very nature has to be at biological conception<<

There is, as you would be well aware, no definition in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of where life "begins". You have conveniently added the "at biological conception" part, presumably to try to align the Declaration with your own prejudices.

Sorry. It doesn't work that way.

You are of course perfectly entitled to make up your own mind. But you can forget about co-opting Human Rights to provide support to it, since it tends to say a heap of stuff that contradicts your position.

Even the USA - that hotbed of Christian rigidity - determined in the case of Roe vs Wade that abortion was a privacy issue, not one of Human Rights.

But it quite possibly should be. In which case, I would support the rights of women to come to their own decision, under the various clauses that are designed to promote the individual's freedom from State interference or intervention - Articles 1 and 2 pretty well spell that out.

The only argument that you could possibly employ for your anti-choice stance under the umbrella of Human Rights is to redefine where life begins, as you attempt to do here. Be assured, though, your definition will never be incorporated into any future Declaration, for exactly the same reasons it has not done so to date. A foetus is not a person.

Hi Pericles
Not a surprising legalistic objection from yourself.
I believe that the framers of the UN Charter would not have even taken the termination of human life in the womb into consideration. At that time psychosocial abortion was not sanctioned in most civilised states. As I indicated in my earlier posts I cannot see how there can be any logical argument against conception as the beginning of the journey of life for each human person. Whether that life is short or long.

UNDHR Article 3 says that every person has the right to life. I know that you will argue the semantics of the definition of 'person', as you already stated that a 'foetus' is not a person, at least in legal terms, although there is a crime of foeticide in some jurisdictions.

From my viewpoint Roe V Wade and similar legal judgements are wrong. Just because they may have being decisions in a democratic society, does not necessarily mean that they are just or right. The same goes for Legislation. Over the centuries there have been many unjust laws enacted, often to be repealed at some later time.

I am not opposed to women's rights in fact I have the greatest respect for human rights of all humanity. But 'rights' have a corrollary in 'responsibilities' and in this sort of case on both genders.

I realise that anything I say is not going to change the opinion of yourself and others with similar world view, but my understanding of humanity is at complete variance with you over this fundamental issue on the right to life

Fair enough, bagsyl.

>>...my understanding of humanity is at complete variance with you over this fundamental issue on the right to life<<

So all we need to do is alter your earlier statement from

"... the moment that life begins which by its very nature has to be at biological conception<<

to

"... the moment that life begins which by in my opinion is at biological conception"

Then we can happily agree to differ.