Can people who disagree on abortion stop attacking each other?

[Whyayeman]

We know very well that a fetus is a distinct human being with its own, unique DNA.

No. We don't.

We know a foetus has its own unique DNA. What is in question is when that foetus becomes a person. The law maintains that it at the point of birth. Objectors to abortion disagree with that.

 

[Friedrich Rubinstein]

No. We don't.

We know a foetus has its own unique DNA. What is in question is when that foetus becomes a person. The law maintains that it at the point of birth. Objectors to abortion disagree with that.

I said human being. Not person. I'm sure you can differentiate between a biological term and a legal term.

 

[Margaret3110]

Do you believe that any kind of legislation regarding abortion is problematic? I find it more problematic when a society allows to willy-nilly slaughter unborn children out of convenience. At the moment, abortions because of rape/incest and the mother's life being threatened make up about 1,5% of all abortions. Let's say all these shall be legal and fine. What about the other 98.5%?

In my opinion it's an extremely complicated, sensitive issue, and I am uncomfortable with the rhetoric on both sides. I think "slaughtering unborn children out of convenience" is not a fair characterization any more than suggesting the fetus is a parasite.

To be honest, I don't have much faith in the ability of our current polarized government to fairly legislate such a complex issue. I think most ordinary pro-life folk sincerely want to protect human lives, but I am pretty cynical about politicians and their motives. The issue of abortion has become a political weapon in the United States.

 

[Friedrich Rubinstein]

In my opinion it's an extremely complicated, sensitive issue, and I am uncomfortable with the rhetoric on both sides. I think "slaughtering unborn children out of convenience" is not a fair characterization any more than suggesting the fetus is a parasite.

To be honest, I don't have much faith in the ability of our current polarized government to fairly legislate such a complex issue. I think most ordinary pro-life folk sincerely want to protect human lives, but I am pretty cynical about politicians and their motives. The issue of abortion has become a political weapon in the United States.

Do you know why there are almost 1,000,000 abortions in the US alone every single year? Health reasons aren't the main reason, health is 7th reason only. The 6 main reasons are purely "out of convenience". Imagine how many lives had been saved if "out of convenience" was not a valid reason to end your child's life.

Why Do People Have Abortions?

The decision to have an abortion is complex, difficult, and personal. Learn about the different reasons for abortion that people consider to terminate a pregnancy.

www.verywellhealth.com

 

[Margaret3110]

Do you know why there are almost 1,000,000 abortions in the US alone every single year? Health reasons aren't the main reason, health is 7th reason only. The 6 main reasons are purely "out of convenience". Imagine how many lives had been saved if "out of convenience" was not a valid reason to end your child's life.

View attachment 324767

Why Do People Have Abortions?

The decision to have an abortion is complex, difficult, and personal. Learn about the different reasons for abortion that people consider to terminate a pregnancy.

www.verywellhealth.com

"Financial reasons" could be a single parent barely making ends meet, who is worried (probably with good reason) that they'll lose their job if they're pregnant or have another infant to take care of. "Issues with partner" could mean a partner who is abusive. "Need to focus on other children" could be because they have a child (or more than one child) with disabilities, like autism, Down syndrome, or medical complexity. "Lack of maturity" could be a 13 year old. These are valid concerns. I don't think abortion is the ideal solution to their concerns, but that doesn't mean their concerns can all be reduced to convenience or that there is some other, easy solution.

 

[rturner76]

So instead of debating whether abortion is right or wrong and on what basis, I want to see if people are able to have a friendly discussion on the topic that does not devolve into crap such as, "You are not a Christian," or stupid name-calling.

This is one topic where I have not seen a debate that doesn't question someone's morality

 

[Desk trauma]

The 6 main reasons are purely "out of convenience". Imagine how many lives had been saved if "out of convenience" was not a valid reason to end your child's life.

Imagine how many abortions could have been avoided if anti-abortion forces had focused on those reasons rather then running after state coercion and dove head first into sado moralism.

 

[Friedrich Rubinstein]

"Financial reasons" could be a single parent barely making ends meet, who is worried (probably with good reason) that they'll lose their job if they're pregnant or have another infant to take care of. "Issues with partner" could mean a partner who is abusive. "Need to focus on other children" could be because they have a child (or more than one child) with disabilities, like autism, Down syndrome, or medical complexity. "Lack of maturity" could be a 13 year old. These are valid concerns. I don't think abortion is the ideal solution to their concerns, but that doesn't mean their concerns can all be reduced to convenience or that there is some other, easy solution.

"Financial reasons" may be a valid concern in some cases, but certainly not 40%. Government assistance exists, and even if you don't qualify for it there are a number of institutions that offer help for mothers and families in need. You don't even have to keep the child past birth, as there are many, many couples waiting to adopt a child.
"Issues with partner" could mean an abusive partner, sure. But who would've thought that doing the child-making-act with an abusive person is a good idea in the first place? Adults are still responsible for their actions, and ending the child's life because you don't want to be bound to an abusive person you slept with is "out of convenience".
"Need to focus on other children" doesn't mean you have to end your latest child's life. There are currently about two million couples waiting to adopt a child in the US - roughly 36 couples for every child placed for adoption.
"Lack of maturity" could be a 13-year-old, but if there are 70,000 13-year-olds getting pregnant every year in the US you should be worried.

American Adoptions - How Many Couples are Waiting to Adopt a Baby?

As you start to look for the perfect family, you might have one big question: How many couples are waiting to adopt a baby? Find the answer here.

www.americanadoptions.com

 

[Margaret3110]

"Financial reasons" may be a valid concern in some cases, but certainly not 40%. Government assistance exists, and even if you don't qualify for it there are a number of institutions that offer help for mothers and families in need. You don't even have to keep the child past birth, as there are many, many couples waiting to adopt a child.
"Issues with partner" could mean an abusive partner, sure. But who would've thought that doing the child-making-act with an abusive person is a good idea in the first place? Adults are still responsible for their actions, and ending the child's life because you don't want to be bound to an abusive person you slept with is "out of convenience".
"Need to focus on other children" doesn't mean you have to end your latest child's life. There are currently about two million couples waiting to adopt a child in the US - roughly 36 couples for every child placed for adoption.
"Lack of maturity" could be a 13-year-old, but if there are 70,000 13-year-olds getting pregnant every year in the US you should be worried.

American Adoptions - How Many Couples are Waiting to Adopt a Baby?

As you start to look for the perfect family, you might have one big question: How many couples are waiting to adopt a baby? Find the answer here.

www.americanadoptions.com

It seems as if you have never been in a situation like this, where hard choices had to be made. I've actually lost my job due to pregnancy. I've been on government assistance (it's not a picnic, by the way) and struggled financially. I have a disabled child. The birth was extremely difficult. You speak as if having a baby (the whole process of pregnancy and giving birth, possibly by c-section) and then giving it up for adoption is easy.

As far as this - "But who would've thought that doing the child-making-act with an abusive person is a good idea in the first place? Adults are still responsible for their actions"... I guess you've never heard of rape or coercion within marriage?

 

[GodLovesCats]

This is one topic where I have not seen a debate that doesn't question someone's morality

There are different types or morals on the issue.

Is your morality in favor of freedom for girls and women who suffer the physical, mental, and social pains of accidental pregnancies that cannot be felt by their unwanted offspring growing inside them?

Is it with the children who were forced to be born against the will of their single mothers who can't take care of them, knowing they will never meet their fathers whi9le being abuse3d and neglected?

Or is it with people like Job, who wished they had been miscarried because they know an automatic trip to heaven would have been much better than a very slow route to hell?

Everyone who opposes abortion says, "All life is sacred." If that is true, why don't they ever think about the mother's life being sacred or that unwanted child's life being sacred after birth? Why is it that people only talk about unborn lives being sacred?

If you want to talk about all life being sacred, you must begin with the mother, who is already born and, unlike most zygotes, will live long enough to suffer both physically and psychologically during gestation.

 

[Friedrich Rubinstein]

It seems as if you have never been in a situation like this, where hard choices had to be made. I've actually lost my job due to pregnancy. I've been on government assistance (it's not a picnic, by the way) and struggled financially. I have a disabled child. The birth was extremely difficult. You speak as if having a baby (the whole process of pregnancy and giving birth, possibly by c-section) and then giving it up for adoption is easy.

I don't think anyone should lose their job due to pregnancy, and I don't know why that is even a thing in the US. I thought the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and the federal Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA) would prevent that. Those should definitely be enforced.
Of course complicated pregnancies occur, but let's not ignore that 92% of pregnancies progress without incidents. It is always questionable to argue from the fringes to the masses. Generally speaking a pregnancy is not harming the mother and/or child.

As far as this - "But who would've thought that doing the child-making-act with an abusive person is a good idea in the first place? Adults are still responsible for their actions"... I guess you've never heard of rape or coercion within marriage?

I fail to see how this is an argument in favor of abortion. What's the benefit of killing the child here? It would maybe make some sense if the wife wanted to leave the husband and having a child makes that harder, but
a) it takes a couple of months before your pregnancy prevents you from leaving, so get out of there before it's grown
b) if the husband is repeatedly doing it, why is she not using birth control? (no, the <1% of failed birth controls doesn't justify the other 99%)
c) if she doesn't plan on leaving for whatever reason, why kill the child? In fact, aborting the child only allows the husband to do it again sooner because he doesn't have to wait for the pregnancy to end naturally.

Ending another human's life should be allowed under extreme circumstances only, not because you are in a bad relationship.

 

[AJHnh]

I always cringe when people compare the fetus to a parasite. That's a truly messed up way of looking at it.

I believe all human life is valuable and that abortion is wrong (with exceptions, such as an ectopic pregnancy, which is not viable and threatens the mother's life) and always tragic. However, I also believe that having the government legislate abortion is problematic for a number of reasons. For instance, a woman who has a miscarriage is in danger of being prosecuted, if abortion is illegal. I talked to a woman once who had had a late-term abortion; her baby's organs were all on the outside of its body. These are tragic, painful, intimate situations, and when we legislate them, we merely add to the pain and invasiveness.

A miscarriage is a medical event and there would not be any charges-the reality is of all the arguments for late term or in general ( life of mother, fetal issue or severe medical condition) accounts for in 1–2 % of all abortions-( real number is closer to <1%. This leaves 98 % or so that are for birth control. Anyone using this argument if protected for the 1-2% will not discuss the other 98% at all.

 

[rturner76]

There are different types or morals on the issue.

Is your morality in favor of freedom for girls and women who suffer the physical, mental, and social pains of accidental pregnancies that cannot be felt by their unwanted offspring growing inside them?

Is it with the children who were forced to be born against the will of their single mothers who can't take care of them, knowing they will never meet their fathers whi9le being abuse3d and neglected?

Or is it with people like Job, who wished they had been miscarried because they know an automatic trip to heaven would have been much better than a very slow route to hell?

Everyone who opposes abortion says, "All life is sacred." If that is true, why don't they ever think about the mother's life being sacred or that unwanted child's life being sacred after birth? Why is it that people only talk about unborn lives being sacred?

If you want to talk about all life being sacred, you must begin with the mother, who is already born and, unlike most zygotes, will live long enough to suffer both physically and psychologically during gestation.

I'm not a woman so I don't know what it is like to carry an embryo to its birth. That's why I think it's an issue for women to decide.

 

[GodLovesCats]

I, too, wish that people on both sides were more charitable. I have been on both sides; my views have evolved over time and have been influenced by my experiences as a pregnant woman and mother to a baby with birth defects who spent time in the NICU.

I wish I was allowed to post an article about a teenager whose rape baby had multiple severe birth defects because no example of why I am pro-choice as a Christian is better than that one.

 

[AJHnh]

I'm not a woman so I don't know what it is like to carry an embryo to its birth. That's why I think it's an issue for women to decide.

All life is sacred, but I understand abortions happens. It is wrong in my mind without question but again I understand it occurs-but to say abortion is the right of the mother up to delivery is simply silly.

I wish I was allowed to post an article about a teenager whose rape baby had multiple severe birth defects because no example of why I am pro-choice as a Christian is better than that one.

So it is better to abort 60 million over the last 50 years to prevent one event? Also Abortion is not illegal-

 

[Margaret3110]

A miscarriage is a medical event and there would not be any charges-the reality is of all the arguments for late term or in general ( life of mother, fetal issue or severe medical condition) accounts for in 1–2 % of all abortions-( real number is closer to <1%. This leaves 98 % or so that are for birth control. Anyone using this argument if protected for the 1-2% will not discuss the other 98% at all.

So how do you differentiate between a miscarriage that occurred spontaneously and one that the woman induced herself?

 

[Neutral Observer]

Near as I can tell the bible isn't really clear on when the soul enters the body, with Jewish traditions ranging from the moment of conception to thirteen years old. So it seems to me that religion has no grounds upon which to claim authority in the matter. Thus it has to be left to either individuals or governments to decide, because the definitive Christian source for morality is decidedly ambiguous on the matter.

That raises the obvious question, who do you want making this decision, the government or the individual?

Given the bible's lack of clarity on the matter I vote for the individual over the government.

 

[Whyayeman]

"Financial reasons" may be a valid concern in some cases, but certainly not 40%. Government assistance exists, and even if you don't qualify for it there are a number of institutions that offer help for mothers and families in need. You don't even have to keep the child past birth, as there are many, many couples waiting to adopt a child.

Financial reasons are certainly a valid concern. As a category in a survey I think it requires expansion to be of any value. Tick-box surveys can be made to give almost any result you like, just by framing the possible responses.

I don't put much trust in survey results that come down to tables and percentages.

 

[GodLovesCats]

All life is sacred, but I understand abortions happens. It is wrong in my mind without question but again I understand it occurs-but to say abortion is the right of the mother up to delivery is simply silly.

If all life is sacred, there is absolutely no reason to think for one second the mother's life does not matter. If you only care about the unborn, you do not believe any people are sacred. Do you care at all about the mother's psychological and physical suffering when she is pregnant? The reason a lot of abortions happen is people do not care about the women who get pregnant when they don't want or can't take care of babies. If you care about those girls and women, what is your plan for making sure they never suffer as a direct result/ of their unwanted pregnancies that could not have been prevented?

And who ever said any viable, healthy, full-term fetus is aborted instead of put up for adoption? If a late-term abortion happens, it is always either because the fetus has no chance of becoming viable or the mother would die without one. Whenever possible, doctors keep babies in the NICU to keep them alive if they must be born prematurely.

So it is better to abort 60 million over the last 50 years to prevent one event? Also abortion is not illegal?

I have no idea what you are talking about. One event can't kill 60 million zygotes. But God did. Most zygotes do not become blastocysts; most blastocysts never become embryos; and most embryos never become fetuses . . . because GOD killed them.

Of course abortion is legal. There is no federal law banning it. Women's reproductive rights are in state constitutions. And even where many abortions are banned, women still have their right to life.

 

[GodLovesCats]

Do you believe that any kind of legislation regarding abortion is problematic? I find it more problematic when a society allows to willy-nilly slaughter unborn children out of convenience. At the moment, abortions because of rape/incest and the mother's life being threatened make up about 1,5% of all abortions. Let's say all these shall be legal and fine. What about the other 98.5%?

The whole purpose of this thread is to NOT have extremely obvious and offensive lies such as "slaughtering unborn children" that make people look like evil idiots instead of real Christians. Read the thread title again.

What do you think the Bible says about treating others with love and respect even if you totally disagree with them? And what did you learn in English classes at school about the definition of "child, which is a BORN human being?