Is abortion ever acceptable?

[devin553344]

Why are you strongly opposed to abortion outside of the situations you list above?

I'm strongly against killing for selfish desires, I see it as murder.

Therefore a six month old who can only koo poop in diapers and cry when hungry is less than a person to Rover the dog who can understand my commands and obey?

You're attempting to appeal with the worth of humans over animals. Both are killing in my mind. And both have worth.

Therefore animals have more moral worth to you than even babies with not yet fully developed brains?

Babies and animals both have worth, but like I said in my post to SPF killing is done and justly so in certain situations to avoid certain types of suffering, like warfare to stop an oppressing nation and defending this free land.

The Scriptures do indeed address the taking of human life Exodus 20:13

I read that passage and I should point out it says "Thou shalt not kill". It says nothing regarding humans verse animals. So there is clearly something that is unfinished with that scripture that needs clarification on when killing is OK. For instance, after that verse there is recorded wars and enslavements, etc, which would include rape in the case of enslaving females captured during their warfare. You should have read a little further in Exodus, for example:

Exodus:

{21:28} If an ox gore a man or a woman, that they die: then the ox shall be surely stoned, and his flesh shall not be eaten; but the owner of the ox [shall be] quit.

{21:29} But if the ox were wont to push with his horn in time past, and it hath been testified to his owner, and he hath not kept him in, but that he hath killed a man or a woman; the ox shall be
stoned, and his owner also shall be put to death.

Notice the "his owner also shall be put to death" so then in your view, which has more worth, the ox animal or the owner human? Both are killed of God's command.

 

[JackRT]

People are sick aren't they? But you're leaving out the concept of sex slaves, which still is prevalent in some countries.

It is estimated that there are between 25K and 50K slaves in the USA today and the majority of them are sex slaves. It is not just "some" countries.

 

[NolaB123]

Unfortunately in a lot of countries, adoption is unthinkable due to keeping family lines direct and pure (yes, there are countries today that still believe that this is super important). In the United States there's a stigma attached to adopted children (some of my friends were adopted and they felt it too). People question why the child was put up for adoption and worry that any child they adopt probably came from bad circumstances (such as rape, drug abuse, etc) and will grow up with mental problems of some kind. Also, adoption is not easy financially. It actually costs A LOT of money to adopt a child so that people wont adopt children to traffic them. Also the adoption process is fraught with complications, especially if you're adopting a child from another country. And some of the time adopted children grow up feeling resentful of their biological parents and even their adopted parents for various reasons.

Adoption is not the easy way out either and it definitely is not all sunshines, rainbows, and happy endings. Not saying people shouldn't adopt because adoption is the best chance for a child born into bad circumstances to have a happy and healthy life out of the foster care system or an orphanage. But adoption isn't as simple or easy as many of us would think.

You are right Derpytia - Adoption isnt easy or culturally agreeable or affordable but maybe the culture should change that. Look how the culture has made the act of homosexuality acceptable. I think abortion should be more disagreeable in the culture than adoption. Dont forget we are adopted kids into Gods family. For me the culture seems to see good as evil and evil as good.

 

[redleghunter]

I think you're trying to appeal to the tender hearts of Christians. Which is compelling but not practical or just. It's like warfare, I would say it's just to defend the freedom of this country from oppression of nations. Even by killing humans that have worth. Sometimes to avoid certain sufferings allows for the killing of people with worth in the justice of law.

Killing innocent bystanders is morally necessary to stop suffering? Not even the Geneva Convention and Laws of Armed Conflict allow for this.

 

[devin553344]

Killing innocent bystanders is morally necessary to stop suffering? Not even the Geneva Convention and Laws of Armed Conflict allow for this.

Seriously, in warfare there are many innocent victims, friendly fire, accidental air strikes, accidental killing of civilians, etc. It happens all the time as an acceptable but unfortunate loss.

[edit] but also the innocence of the child is not the point, your trying to appeal to the tender hearts of Christians, which is compelling, but not practical or just.

I could argue that during a war conflict the enemy fighters may be innocent, but also put to death justly.

 

[dreadnought]

First we do biologically know when human life begins. That’s conception.

On the matter of rape I pose the following question. What did the conceived child do to be sentenced to his or her own death?

The woman is a victim, the conceived child an innocent bystander and the rapist gets 7 years or less for good time (if caught and convicted!) and while in jail gets three hot meals, cable TV and a cot.

We don't know when the Lord places a soul inside a body.

 

[Paul of Eugene OR]

At what stage of development in the brain does one become a “person.” And please define “person” as the current definition of person is one who is a human being.

The definition of a person is not one who is a human being. Angels are persons, God considered to be three persons, those are not human beings.

If we are not human beings before your arbitrary definition of personhood, then what are we genetically?

Genetically we are living beings that are primed to become persons as we develop.

Secondly how is this supposed Christian view supported by Holy Scriptures and historic church teachings?

Scripture is silent on these issues. There is an interesting passage in the Apocryphal book of 2 Esdras that reads, referring to the resurrection: "Infants a year old shall speak with their voices, and women with child shall give birth to premature children at three or four months, and these shall live and dance" (2 Esdras 6:21, RSV translation)

Clearly that author didn't believe in the personhood from conception idea.

Catholics, of course, have papal authority to back up their contention, but as a protestant I reject that.

 

[redleghunter]

I'm strongly against killing for selfish desires, I see it as murder.

Yet you put very little value on human life in and out of the womb early in development.

So it can’t be a moral of don’t murder if you are willing to kill the young for general suffering of others. This imposes some sort of agressor species class to young human beings.

You're attempting to appeal with the worth of humans over animals. Both are killing in my mind. And both have worth.

I don’t have to attempt to make the point human beings are superior to animals. God already made that determination.

Genesis 1: NASB
26Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness, to rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, and over all the earth itselfb and every creature that crawls upon it.”

27So God created man in His own image;

in the image of God He created him;

male and female He created them.

28God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.”

I read that passage and I should point out it says "Thou shalt not kill". It says nothing regarding humans verse animals.

This should clear it up a bit:

Genesis 9: NASB

3Every living creature will be food for you; just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you all things.4But you must not eat meat with its lifeblood still in it. 5And surely I will require the life of any man or beast by whose hand your lifeblood is shed. I will demand an accounting from anyone who takes the life of his fellow man:

6Whoever sheds the blood of man,

by man his blood will be shed;

for in His own image

God has made mankind.

7But as for you,

be fruitful and multiply;

spread out across the earth

and multiply upon it.”

Notice the "his owner also shall be put to death" so then in your view, which has more worth, the ox animal or the owner human? Both are killed of God's command.

You are kidding? Right?

 

[devin553344]

Yet you put very little value on human life in and out of the womb early in development.

So it can’t be a moral of don’t murder if you are willing to kill the young for general suffering of others. This imposes some sort of agressor species class to young human beings.


I don’t have to attempt to make the point human beings are superior to animals. God already made that determination.

Genesis 1: NASB
26Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness, to rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, and over all the earth itselfb and every creature that crawls upon it.”

27So God created man in His own image;

in the image of God He created him;

male and female He created them.

28God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.”



This should clear it up a bit:

Genesis 9: NASB

3Every living creature will be food for you; just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you all things.4But you must not eat meat with its lifeblood still in it. 5And surely I will require the life of any man or beast by whose hand your lifeblood is shed. I will demand an accounting from anyone who takes the life of his fellow man:

6Whoever sheds the blood of man,

by man his blood will be shed;

for in His own image

God has made mankind.

7But as for you,

be fruitful and multiply;

spread out across the earth

and multiply upon it.”



You are kidding? Right?

OK, in your biblical passages, you've clearly pointed out that God will demand the life of those that shed innocent blood of humans. Now that we've made that distinction, a court of law can conclude that slavery is like forcing a human out of their life and is in proportion to the taking of someones life away. And forcing someone to live a life that they didn't choose can also be proportional to slavery.

In other words a court of law can conclude that slaver is similar to killing, and also be stopped by killing, thus we have the slave wars of the united states. Many wise Christians fought to free the slaves then. Many were killed to make peoples lives their own choosing.

Now I didn't put little value on human life. In fact the killing of any life is unfortunate for that lifeforms.

 

[redleghunter]

Seriously, in warfare there are many innocent victims, friendly fire, accidental air strikes, accidental killing of civilians, etc. It happens all the time as an acceptable but unfortunate loss.

Not according to the principle of proportionality.

[edit] but also the innocence of the child is not the point, your trying to appeal to the tender hearts of Christians, which is compelling, but not practical or just.

The innocence of the life is the point. It is murder when innocent blood is shed.

God had much to say about innocent blood:

Take a look

 

[redleghunter]

We don't know when the Lord places a soul inside a body.

What’s your point?

 

[dreadnought]

What’s your point?

My point is that a woman who has been raped has rights, also.

 

[redleghunter]

The definition of a person is not one who is a human being. Angels are persons, God considered to be three persons, those are not human beings.

Then give us your definition of person.

Genetically we are living beings that are primed to become persons as we develop.

Embryologists and geneticists and High school biology informs us we are human beings genetically at conception. The parents each give 23 human chromosomes to create a new distinct human life. There’s the answer. We are human beings at conception. We can’t be anything else. We are small and look exactly the way we should for that stage of our development.

Scripture is silent on these issues

No it’s not. Holy Scriptures addresses protecting innocent life and the premeditated killing of other human beings.

Where you assert Scriptures are silent the Incarnation speaks loudly of the sanctity of human life at the earliest of stages. Jesus Christ was once a zygote as we were.

Scripture is silent on these issues. There is an interesting passage in the Apocryphal book of 2 Esdras that reads, referring to the resurrection: "Infants a year old shall speak with their voices, and women with child shall give birth to premature children at three or four months, and these shall live and dance" (2 Esdras 6:21, RSV translation)

This is your evidence? An apocryphal book?

Clearly that author didn't believe in the personhood from conception idea.

This is clearly not Scriptures but now seeing this is what you want to present.

Catholics, of course, have papal authority to back up their contention, but as a protestant I reject that.

Christians condemned abortion long before there was a Roman Catholic Pope.
The Didache is attributed as one of the earliest pieces of evidence of early church teachings outside of the NT. It clearly taught abortion was murder.

 

[devin553344]

Not according to the principle of proportionality.


The innocence of the life is the point. It is murder when innocent blood is shed.

God had much to say about innocent blood:

Take a look

What if I kill it without shedding it's blood then, is that OK with God in your mind? In other words, you're putting particulars on killing but earlier you said it was OK in the case of Exodus 21:28-29.

[edit] I could argue that the only person ever created that was innocent was Jesus the Christ.

 

[redleghunter]

OK, in your biblical passages, you've clearly pointed out that God will demand the life of those that shed innocent blood of humans. Now that we've made that distinction, a court of law can conclude that slavery is like forcing a human out of their life and is in proportion to the taking of someones life away. And forcing someone to live a life that they don't want can also be proportional to slavery.

No I don’t think a court would conclude an innocent life in the womb enslaves a woman. Perhaps Third wave feminists make this argument but the Holy Scriptures does not and reasonable people would not.

In other words a court of law can conclude that slaver is similar to killing, and also be stopped by killing, thus we have the slave wars of the united states. Many wise Christians fought to free the slaves then. Many were killed to make peoples lives their own choosing.

Therefore killing an innocent life in the womb is justified because that innocent life has somehow enslaved the pregnant woman. Do we throw 3 year olds in jail for accidentally burning down a house?

 

[redleghunter]

My point is that a woman who has been raped has rights, also.

Of course. She has a right to justice against the rapist. So logically the rapist should be put to death. What did the kid in the womb do?

 

[redleghunter]

What if I kill it without shedding it's blood then, is that OK with God in your mind? In other words, you're putting particulars on killing but earlier you said it was OK in the case of Exodus 21:28-29.

The life is in the blood. If you kill someone their blood no longer carries oxygen for life.

Again Genesis 9:6 addresses this.

 

[dreadnought]

Of course. She has a right to justice against the rapist. So logically the rapist should be put to death. What did the kid in the womb do?

She has the right not to carry the child she didn't ask for.

 

[JackRT]

Abortion, on Middle Ground

by David Katz M.D.

Director, Yale Prevention Research Center

I confront the polarizing topic of abortion with equal measures of trepidation and resolve to state: I am emphatically pro-choice.

And I am just as emphatically anti-abortion.

The first statement from a public health physician with public policy leanings left of center should come as no great surprise. The second might surprise -- but shouldn't. It is the second side of the same position. No one is 'for' abortion, least of all the women who resort to it.

I know such women. They are among my friends (and perhaps yours), my family (and perhaps yours), and my patients. No one of them is for abortion. Each of them confronted it as a last resort. Some with equanimity. But some made the most anguished decision of their lives. And some have dreamt in troubled agitation ever since of that life that might have been.

Yet few would revisit the decision, even after the clarity of retrospection, and the filter of patient reflection. The regret that derives from a last resort is not resorting to it, but needing to; being left with no better options in the first place.

The moral debate over abortion is, in fact, an insoluble distraction. On the one hand are compelling arguments about autonomy, on the other, compelling arguments about competing autonomies, and the sanctity of life. Both sides of the argument inspire passions, but neither persuades. In the end, the war of words is internecine; everyone loses. An opportunity for unified purpose and unified progress is squandered.

Those, like me, who are pro choice might cite the principle of autonomy -- that I and I alone should rule the destiny of my very own skin. But ethicists point out that my autonomy is bounded: my right to swing a stick ends where your nose begins. How that relates to the unique dyad of pregnancy, and an entity that is not yet viable on its own, is debatable. The issue of viability, and privacy rights, were central to the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. But abortion, arguably, puts two noses in play. Autonomy is not an ironclad defense of the right to choose.

The sanctity of life is by no means an ironclad argument against it, either, because it is not a principle we fully honor. We live in a society that sanctions capital punishment, meaning some priorities -- punishment among them -- trump life itself. The same societal groups that most adamantly oppose abortion seem most adamantly to defend capital punishment, and lethal means of self defense.

We accept that our police are entitled to shoot and kill those who threaten their lives and limbs, and soldiers are entitled to kill those who might pose a threat to our way of life. An unintended pregnancy could very well constitute a far more certain threat to one's way of life than the basis for certain wars.

We even accept, although of course with deep regret, the collateral damage of war -- the death of innocent bystanders an ostensibly greater good demands.

The notion that the heavy hands of government might disentangle the delicate stands of this Gordian knot seems very far-fetched. We have historical evidence they can not. When abortion was illegal in the United States, it was nonetheless common -- just also unsafe.

According to Planned Parenthood, there are still over a million abortions each year in the United States. That number is much lower than it was during the 1980s and 1990s, but we should be able to agree across ideologies it is too high.

Lowering it will not result from ideology, but rather epidemiology: the public health science of what actually changes outcomes at the population level. Our immediate and common needs are better addressed by data, than diatribe.

Whatever changing abortion laws might do to abortion rates, it would do nothing to change the rates of unintended pregnancies, or the transmission of HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases. Posting the Ten Commandments on a classroom wall does nothing at all.

Data show that educational programs that empower girls and convey a sense of responsibility to boys are helpful. Emphasizing abstinence as an option works, too, provided there are contingencies for when it is not the option chosen. Acting as if it always will be is among the most ineffective strategies of all: denial.

Teaching about barrier contraceptive use -- condoms in particular -- and making such contraceptives readily available is highly effective. And, of course, these interventions are just what is needed to reduce the toll of HIV as well.

Current policies in the United States all too often place ideology ahead of epidemiology. Sexual education and contraceptive access are inconsistent; abstinence-only instruction is championed. Family planning services are underfunded, and threatened by additional cuts. Contraception is left uncovered by many insurance policies.

Opposing a desperate remedy while propagating its malady is badly muddled at best, at worst, downright hypocritical. As political positions are debated and policies compete, hypocrisy should not be among the contestants. I dare to hope that whatever our disparate positions, that is a policy on which we all might agree.

 

[redleghunter]

She has the right not to carry the child she didn't ask for.

How does she accomplish exercising this so called right?