Abortion Clinics

Warrior4Jah

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First of all Rufus, I agree wth you in the case if a female is in danger of her life. Yet this is extremely rare, i still agre in that intsnace. for any other reason I thnk its wrong, but once again Im no one to judge. "Judeg not lest ye be judged" I dont feel right about abortion, but I dont know every woman in america. Instead of getting the governemnt to outlaw it, Id rather try to get the word out and educate people on the causes and the effects of abortion. But what I dont agree on is that teenagers will have sex and its a fact of life. Three years ago I became a legal adult, throughout my entire teen age years I never had sex because I KNEW the consequences, my parents had educated me as did my school. There are many ignorant little teens out there who WILL have sex despite the warnings, but to say all of them will no matter what and no matter what we say tehy will continue is just stupid. Stupid. Your saying we should abandon trying to teach them at all, I was taught about it and it sure helped me. Im sure the majority of christian teens arent having sex before marriage becaus ethey have a higher sense of morals and they ave parents who strive to teach them consequences. Now im not saying taht everyone who isnt christian are stupid andd will have sex, but im right. Its far more likely an atheists child or a teen of another religion will have sex. You may not have to believe like we do, but as a christian we strive to be the best people we can be and have a high standard of morals.
 
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foolsparade

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Warrior4jah, I agree with some of your comment. you write: " Its far more likely an atheists child or a teen of another religion will have sex" How do youy know this? Can you provide any statistics and their source?

you write: " Im sure the majority of christian teens arent having sex before marriage becaus ethey have a higher sense of morals and they ave parents who strive to teach them consequences." so are you suggesting that parents who are not of your religion, dont strive to teach their children responsibilty and consquences??
 
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JeTmAn

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This has been a disturbing issue for me lately...it came to me when I tried to think of abortion in a different light.

What would we do if it was legal to kill Christians?

What if there were certain places where Christians could be taken to be killed?

Now, we don't know these people, but they're people...they're Christians...and they're being executed. Wouldn't that be a cause for war and/or rebellion?

Really, what's the difference? A child is a person, unborn or not, right? If so, millions are murdered every year. It's like a pre-natal Holocaust. Will these generations be looked back upon in years to come as those who stood by and did nothing? What do we do if we can't change the law?
 
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Lacmeh

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No woman is FORCED to go to an abortion clinic. Therefore equalling abortion with holocaust is an insult to the victims of it on so many levles, it isn´t funny.
You can´t twist murdering pro abortionists to legal emergency defence of a third person. Since the mother is not FORCED to undergo this procedure. Nor the child can make its will known.
I don´t know, if I should laugh or cry. NO ONE, who is still sane would undergo an abortion as a form of BIRTH CONTROL. This is like getting a full narkosis for bandaging a cut in your little finger. Abortion is a severe medical surgery. No one would undergo any sort of surgery lightly. Those, who do, have (or think, that they have) no other choices. Then those terrorists line up and help in getting a more severe psychological trauma. Great work, really. Like bashing a person, that already is in a deep depression.
 
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Originally posted by Warrior4Jah
First of all Rufus, I agree wth you in the case if a female is in danger of her life. Yet this is extremely rare, i still agre in that intsnace. for any other reason I thnk its wrong, but once again Im no one to judge. "Judeg not lest ye be judged" I dont feel right about abortion, but I dont know every woman in america. Instead of getting the governemnt to outlaw it, Id rather try to get the word out and educate people on the causes and the effects of abortion.

Good, I'm glad there are at least some religious conservatives that agree with me on that.

But what I dont agree on is that teenagers will have sex and its a fact of life. Three years ago I became a legal adult, throughout my entire teen age years I never had sex because I KNEW the consequences, my parents had educated me as did my school. There are many ignorant little teens out there who WILL have sex despite the warnings, but to say all of them will no matter what and no matter what we say tehy will continue is just stupid. Stupid. Your saying we should abandon trying to teach them at all, I was taught about it and it sure helped me.

I never said abandon teaching sex ed. I said we should adopt a more honest and realistic sex education system, like many european countries have. One that teaches about sex from a secular perspective that is medically accurate. Abstinance only programs that receive fed funding aren't even required to be medically accurate. (That provision was voted down in Washington.) Teenagers, especially girls, need to know how to use a condom and why, even if they chose to not become sexually active.

Im sure the majority of christian teens arent having sex before marriage becaus ethey have a higher sense of morals and they ave parents who strive to teach them consequences. Now im not saying taht everyone who isnt christian are stupid andd will have sex, but im right. Its far more likely an atheists child or a teen of another religion will have sex. You may not have to believe like we do, but as a christian we strive to be the best people we can be and have a high standard of morals.

From my own experiences and that of my Christian wife, the opposite is true. Teenagers do have sex, even ones brought up in conservative Bible-fearing families. In my wife's highschool and religious community, all the girls that she knew who got pregnant in highschool were from very religious families that stressed abstinance only. But they were truely unprepared when faced with the emotional preassure of hormones, and boyfrieds that might not have cared or thought about them. This she attributes to a complete and utter failing of her school to stress realistic sex ed and a community in denial about teenagers growing up.

Now to look at who is more likely to have sex, Christians or atheists we need to look at teenager mating behavior. Which male high schooler is more likely to have sex, the football player or the geek? Which one is more likely to be Christian, the football player or the geek? A similar thing can be said for girls. Furthermore, most HS atheists I know of were outcasts in one form or another and had a hard trouble dating. It's hard to have sex if no one wants to date you, or you don't want to date anyone.
 
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seebs

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This is an exceptionally tough issue, because the people coming to it are simply not coming to it with the same premises at all.

Personally, I don't *know* how to be sure whether or not a given set of cells is "a human life". It can't be complexity - my cat is at least as complicated as a newborn human. It's not "human cells" - if a bit of my skin gets scraped off, it's not a "human life". Is it potential? I'm not sure.

I think that, at some point, it's pretty clear that something is "a human life". I think it's possible for people to honestly wonder about *when* that happens, and not to agree, and I can't show one group to be right or wrong. God knows us long before any conception happens, so the argument from God knowing us doesn't answer the question.

In the end, this is a unique moral question. I can't think of anything else comparable; there's no other circumstances in which one life depends on another like that.

I think a Christian response to the issue must involve compassion for everyone involved. A friend of mine was raped, and got pregnant. Is it compassionate for me to demand that she spend nine months suffering to bring her attacker's child into the world, constantly reminded? I don't know.

I think it's pretty clear that abortion as a form of after-the-fact birth control is callous at best, and it seems pretty clear to me that it's immoral. In cases where the pregnancy could kill the mother? I'm not so sure.

However, my duty in this is pretty clear. If anyone I know is thinking about abortion, I'm going to counsel them to be very cautious about irreversible choices. If one of my friends had an abortion, and was miserable, it would be my duty to bring comfort, and to remind my friend that sins can be forgiven.

For legal purposes, I'm pro-choice. Only God knows for sure what is or isn't "a human life". I don't like the idea of society imposing moral standards on people in cases like this. I think that, in some cases, abortion can be a life-saving medical procedure. I also think that organizations which recommend better alternatives should be respected and supported. I know a couple of people who have interacted with Planned Parenthood, and at least around here, they are very down on abortion; they will perform one under some circumstances, but they see it as a failure either way. They recommend other ways of avoiding unwanted children, and really seem to discourage people from abortions except in cases of rape or serious risk to the mother.

A friend of mine and his wife have nothing but praise for a local doctor who performs abortions. If it weren't for him, they probably wouldn't have any children at all - their first child was nearly born two months premature, in a way that could have sterilized the mother, and this doctor came up with some brilliant solution that kept the baby in the womb another month, and allowed the birth to go normally. You see, I've never heard of an "abortion doctor"; I've heard of lots of obstetricians who may do abortions, in addition to thousands of different ways of bringing babies into the world alive.

It's not a decision I think any of us are qualified to make for anyone else. Stand by your friends, comfort them in times of sorrow, and *SUPPORT* them. Of those people who have abortions, I bet a fair number have abortions because they know that their "friends" would abandon them if they gave birth out of wedlock. Are we really doing all we can to provide a welcoming environment for *ALL* children? If not, I don't think we get any moral high ground.
 
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JeTmAn

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Originally posted by Lacmeh
No woman is FORCED to go to an abortion clinic. Therefore equalling abortion with holocaust is an insult to the victims of it on so many levles, it isn´t funny.
You can´t twist murdering pro abortionists to legal emergency defence of a third person. Since the mother is not FORCED to undergo this procedure. Nor the child can make its will known.
I don´t know, if I should laugh or cry. NO ONE, who is still sane would undergo an abortion as a form of BIRTH CONTROL. This is like getting a full narkosis for bandaging a cut in your little finger. Abortion is a severe medical surgery. No one would undergo any sort of surgery lightly. Those, who do, have (or think, that they have) no other choices. Then those terrorists line up and help in getting a more severe psychological trauma. Great work, really. Like bashing a person, that already is in a deep depression.

The doctors aren't forced to do the abortions, either. If they don't want to do one, they don't have to. They're getting PAID. This is WHY it's so very wrong. It's LEGAL for them to make the choice to murder a baby. Should it be legal to murder anyone you want? And there aren't enough medical crises or "urgent" situations to explain how millions of babies are aborted every year. It's laziness. People don't care, they'll just abort them.
 
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JeTmAn

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Originally posted by seebs
I think a Christian response to the issue must involve compassion for everyone involved. A friend of mine was raped, and got pregnant. Is it compassionate for me to demand that she spend nine months suffering to bring her attacker's child into the world, constantly reminded? I don't know.

On the same token, is it right to kill an innocent child because its father was an evil man?

For legal purposes, I'm pro-choice. Only God knows for sure what is or isn't "a human life". I don't like the idea of society imposing moral standards on people in cases like this. I think that, in some cases, abortion can be a life-saving medical procedure. I also think that organizations which recommend better alternatives should be respected and supported. I know a couple of people who have interacted with Planned Parenthood, and at least around here, they are very down on abortion; they will perform one under some circumstances, but they see it as a failure either way. They recommend other ways of avoiding unwanted children, and really seem to discourage people from abortions except in cases of rape or serious risk to the mother.

Society imposes moral standards all the time. That's why it's illegal to steal, to kill, to cheat your business. God knows for sure what is or isn't a human life, but it's our responsibility to know too. How else can we make the correct laws?

It's not a decision I think any of us are qualified to make for anyone else. Stand by your friends, comfort them in times of sorrow, and *SUPPORT* them. Of those people who have abortions, I bet a fair number have abortions because they know that their "friends" would abandon them if they gave birth out of wedlock. Are we really doing all we can to provide a welcoming environment for *ALL* children? If not, I don't think we get any moral high ground.

Except...murder isn't a decision that's left in anyone's hands. If these fetuses really ARE people, then it has nothing to do with decisions. If a life is created, and thus destroyed, that is murder (with the possible exception of choosing between the baby's life and the mother's). So, either the fetuses are human life and it's wrong to kill them for ANY reason (and therefore we MUST make that decision for everyone who lives in this country by making laws), or they're not and it doesn't matter. But there is no middle ground.
 
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seebs

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Originally posted by JeTmAn


The doctors aren't forced to do the abortions, either. If they don't want to do one, they don't have to. They're getting PAID. This is WHY it's so very wrong. It's LEGAL for them to make the choice to murder a baby. Should it be legal to murder anyone you want? And there aren't enough medical crises or "urgent" situations to explain how millions of babies are aborted every year. It's laziness. People don't care, they'll just abort them.

This is unpersuasive, because it presupposes the point under discussion. I can't tell for sure whether or not a given thing is a "baby", or whether or not its death is "murder". If a woman doesn't know she's pregnant, and she drinks, and a zygote fails to implant, was that an abortion or just a death?

I can't find any statistics that strike me as well-supported. I found a particularly charming page that says that the figures they use are all inflated "to account for underreporting".

The main problem here is, how do we tell which ones are which? While there may not be enough medical crises to explain all of the abortions, how many *would* they explain? I have no idea how to get statistics showing the reasons for abortions. Are some of them sheer lazyness? Yes.

It's interesting to look at real statistics on pregnancy rates and abortion. One big number that leaps out is that a very large percentage of abortions happen among people who are not using birth control methods; perhaps birth control would reduce the abortion rate. This is certainly true in poor countries.

As I understand it, the best long-term way to reduce the rate of unplanned pregnancies (and correspondingly, of abortions) appears to be better education for women.

Looking at the statistics, I think there's a lot of cultural things we could do that would have a much stronger effect on abortion rates than any amount of lobbying... Perhaps that would be more productive.
 
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seebs

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Originally posted by JeTmAn

On the same token, is it right to kill an innocent child because its father was an evil man?

I refer you to Deuteronomy, in which the answer is clearly "yes"... but that's hardly how we make decisions today. :)

The problem here is that the basic premises are not agreed on. I am not particularly convinced that a few dozen human cells are a "child". I don't know what the cutoff is; I think that, by 8 months into a pregnancy, we're probably talking about a "baby", but *I* don't know.


Society imposes moral standards all the time. That's why it's illegal to steal, to kill, to cheat your business. God knows for sure what is or isn't a human life, but it's our responsibility to know too. How else can we make the correct laws?

Laws should reflect the bare minimums we need to have a functioning society. Society doesn't tell you when to go to church, or what church to go to, or whether or not to use birth control, or what music to listen to... the key being that we only legislate things when we're pretty sure that anyone who doesn't agree is mentally unwell. Abortion is a much more complicated issue; it depends on being able to identify a "life" reliably, and we can't do that.


Except...murder isn't a decision that's left in anyone's hands. If these fetuses really ARE people, then it has nothing to do with decisions.

And if they aren't, don't *we* look stupid. :)


If a life is created, and thus destroyed, that is murder (with the possible exception of choosing between the baby's life and the mother's). So, either the fetuses are human life and it's wrong to kill them for ANY reason (and therefore we MUST make that decision for everyone who lives in this country by making laws), or they're not and it doesn't matter. But there is no middle ground.

Sure there is. There's the middle ground we have on almost everything: "We don't know." It's a moral question which cannot be resolved by debate, so far as we have been able to observe, so we encourage people to make their own moral decisions.

I don't think we should make laws against things just because they're morally wrong; we should make laws against things because we need people not to do them for society to continue. There's lots of things that you and I probably agree are morally wrong, which are not illegal. In most of those cases, I probably believe that they *shouldn't* be illegal.

Another example would be euthanasia, or even assisted suicide. I am very skeptical about the moral grounds on which we decide when to end someone's life... and yet, I don't want anyone else pretending to the authority to tell me or mine what to do. So, I want the laws to leave us fairly broad latitude to make our own moral decisions, as God intended.

If I would do an immoral thing, but don't because I'm afraid of punishment, no morality has occurred; we've just seen someone deterred by punishment. God is not glorified by deterrence; He is glorified when people come to do the right thing because they understand why it's right.
 
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Lacmeh

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The main point in abortion discussion is:

Abortion is a severe invasive surgery.

No one in his right mind would undergo invasive surgery, if he/she would not know a way out of it.

So we can hopefully agree, that those women undergoing an abortion have weighted the pros and cons very carefully.

Fanatic Christians protest vehemently this point.

Besides, the government should not make "moral" laws. I wouldn´t want to live in a country, that has Islamic law, I wouldn´t want to live in a country with Christian law, either.
 
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LouisBooth

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"I am not particularly convinced that a few dozen human cells are a "child". "

Umm..seebs..you mean the first week of pregency? Because that's pretty much it if you're talking about just a blob. Have you ever studied human development or seen a good ultrasound?
 
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LouisBooth

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" we should make laws against things because we need people not to do them for society to continue. "

Society can continue with people stealing, but we have laws against that. Copyrighting too... It sounds like you want to decide for yourself reagardless of any authority..sounds like a guy I read about...I think his name was Adam ;)
 
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Originally posted by JeTmAn
This has been a disturbing issue for me lately...it came to me when I tried to think of abortion in a different light.

What would we do if it was legal to kill Christians?

What if there were certain places where Christians could be taken to be killed?

Now, we don't know these people, but they're people...they're Christians...and they're being executed. Wouldn't that be a cause for war and/or rebellion?

Really, what's the difference? A child is a person, unborn or not, right? If so, millions are murdered every year. It's like a pre-natal Holocaust. Will these generations be looked back upon in years to come as those who stood by and did nothing? What do we do if we can't change the law?

Thats what I am wondering about...I mean, I don't know how we can support our armed forced to go into a "just" war, but yet, allow the murder of babies, simply because it is PC.
 
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Originally posted by seebs
I bet a fair number have abortions because they know that their "friends" would abandon them if they gave birth out of wedlock. Are we really doing all we can to provide a welcoming environment for *ALL* children? If not, I don't think we get any moral high ground.

Do we seek the respect of men, or of God?
 
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seebs

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Originally posted by s0uljah


Do we seek the respect of men, or of God?

Ideally, both; are we not commanded to avoid even the *appearence* of evil?

I don't think God's respect is won by abandoning the defenseless at their darkest hour. Did the unwed mother get where she is thorugh sin? Almost certainly. Does that give us *ANY* excuse whatsoever for not sustaining her in her need? No.
 
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Originally posted by seebs


Ideally, both; are we not commanded to avoid even the *appearence* of evil?

I don't think God's respect is won by abandoning the defenseless at their darkest hour. Did the unwed mother get where she is thorugh sin? Almost certainly. Does that give us *ANY* excuse whatsoever for not sustaining her in her need? No.

And what of the babies needs? 
 
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seebs

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Originally posted by s0uljah


And what of the babies needs? 

Please reread my original post, you clearly missed my entire point.

My point is, if you're concerned about unwed mothers having abortions, the best thing to do is not ostracize them and cut them off from the support they'd need to have to raise children. People with functioning, healthy, families and support networks and friends are not that likely to have abortions; it's women who, upon becoming pregnant, discover that their family and friends have abandoned them, who despair and realize they can't handle a child.

That said, let's assume we're talking also about women who *did* have an abortion. Rejecting the *person* does not help anything. The person sinned, sure. So have we all. We're still obliged to stand by the needy, even if we feel it's partially or entirely their own fault.

What about the baby's needs? That's a question I can't personally answer, except to observe that the baby has a much better chance of being born if the mother feels that her friends will support her decision, whether it's raising the child or putting the child up for adoption. If she's been told that, by becoming pregnant, she's become a shame to the family's name, and had better never come home again, then the family isn't exactly living up to expectations. God does sustain us, but most often, He does this by having us sustain each other. When we reject this obligation, we reject Him.
 
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I'd like to design a sex-ed class for teens.

I'd start out by saying that the purpose for sex is to create new life. Period. The fact that it FEELS GOOD is secondary. It feels good so people would be compelled to have sex, and thereby life would carry on. But ultimately, even if you DO practice "safe sex," the goal is still to create new life. Birth control can and does fail. So with each act of sex, you still have that possibility.

Then I'd take the kids on a field trip. We'd start out at an imaging clinic, and I'd let them SEE ultrasounds of babies, at all stages of the pregnancy. Like Louis pointed out, at six weeks you can SEE the heart beating, and see the limb buds, with the beginnings of hands and feet.

Then we'd go to a pathology lab, where there are fetuses in different stages of development, in glass jars.

Our next stop would be a birthing clinic. We'd begin at sitting in on prenatal visits, where the kids could listen to the baby's heartbeat, through the electronic stethoscopes. We'd find women at different stages of pregnancy, and feel the baby kick. The finale of the clinic would be to watch a couple of births. A quick stop at the hospital to maybe see a Caesarian birth would be good, too.

The kids would pile back into the bus, and we'd go to a daycare. One with infants, toddlers, and preschoolers.

The last stop would be to parcel each teen into the home of a teen mother. The mom would get the evening off, and the teen would have to spend the night with a REAL LIVE BABY. Preferably one with colic or chickenpox.


Peace,
~VOW
 
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