Abortion Distortion

According to your formulation of what should be a crime, murder does not qualify - as it only directly affects one person, it doesn't fall under the "does not harm or affect the public at large" reasoning.

Your reasoning is flawed, obviously, as murder *is* a crime. And given the viewpoint of anti-abortion activists, so is abortion. To allow abortion in their viewpoint, you have to show that an abortion is not the same thing as ending a life. Your arguments so mischaracterize the arguments that you are arguuing against, you are either deliberately misstating them (so you can easily argue against them, known as a straw-man fallacy), or you are simply not listening to people that disagree with you.

Either way, you aren't worth arguing with.

Do you think murder should be illegal? If so, why? It doesn't effect the public at large. It's just killing a person, which is what an abortion is. Aren't a lot of our laws driven by ethics? Think about it. Gay marriage is illegal in most places because of morality. Murder is illegal because killing another person is "wrong," not because killing another person effects the whole world.

~Sarah

Thank you, amschat... I didn't see your reply before I posted mine. You said it well.

A crime, by definition, has to affect the public at large.

uhh...wrong!

A crime affects the public at large. Murder affects the public at large. First of all, it leaves open the posibility that you could be murdered if it weren't illegal, and second if one person is murdered, it will scare people and cause a reaction. Since a fetus under a certain age is not according to the law considered a person, abortion can not be murder. The definition of a living human capable of being murdered is someone able to maintain life outside of the mother. Up untill this point, they are a part of the mother. Or do you disagree that a non sustainable fetus is a person?

Crimes are defined and punished by statutes and by the common law. Most common law offences are as well known, and as precisely ascertained, as those which are defined by statutes; yet, from the difficulty of exactly defining and describing every act which ought to be punished, the vital and preserving principle has been adopted, that all immoral acts which tend to the prejudice of the community are punishable by courts of justice.

sandy: How do you know a person (child, adult, etc. not a fetus) is dead? What are the physical "qualifications" that must exist for a person to be considered no longer living?

if one person is murdered, it will scare people and cause a reaction.

But that is not why a murderer is prosecuted. The murderer is prosecuted for a crime against a person, not for scaring society or causing a reaction.

Personally, I have my own reasons for why the government shouldn't be involved in pregnancy/childbirth, etc., but your's is a weak argument.

I agree that its not only slightly distorted, but also a week argument. The point I'm trying to make is that its not something you can make illegal because you don't agree with it. I have other arguments, but when I have tried them in the past I have been shouted down.

"The point I'm trying to make is that its not something you can make illegal because you don't agree with it"

Racism, sexual harassment, slavery, drug laws, almost every law we have is based upon a moral judgement. Abortion is the killing of what would otherwise be a living, breathing thing. The hypocrisy is that if someone attacks you and kills your fetus, it is a living thing, but if you kill your own it isn't.

Abortion is taking a life. If you we as a society can legalize the taking of a life and not degrade ourselves in the process, fine, but many people differ, and your morals are no more superior than theirs. Abortion is no more a right than drug use or anything else.

Racism, sexual harassment, slavery, drug laws, almost every law we have is based upon a moral judgement. Abortion is the killing of what would otherwise be a living, breathing thing. The hypocrisy is that if someone attacks you and kills your fetus, it is a living thing, but if you kill your own it isn't.

Yes because a crime has to hurt someone, and a fetus is not a someone. If you abort your child, it is your choice, and therefore you are not being hurt. After the point where the baby could sustain life without the mother, killing the fetus or child is hurting the baby, and therefore wrong. Racism is not illegal by the way, and slavery does in fact hurt people. Drug laws are I believe somewhat wrong, but the point is that even drugs hurt other people besides the user of the drugs, as does alcohol.

"Yes because a crime has to hurt someone, and a fetus is not a someone."

Your own moral judgement, WHICH, I might add the law often is ambiguous about. When someone's pregnancy is terminated by negligence or a crime, the fetus is a living thing. When Liberals want to do it themselves, it isn't. You are apparently saying that as long as you kill your own children, it is okay.

There's no universal reason or truth to your argument, just a subjective values judgement. When you enter that realm, the society as a whole has to decide on those values, and as much as you'd like to thing otherwise, the jury is still out...

After the point where the baby could sustain life without the mother, killing the fetus or child is hurting the baby, and therefore wrong.

The problem with using that as a yardstick (or meter stick if you prefer) of what is right or wrong is that you are using a moving target. These days we honestly and truthfully can keep babies alive if they are born as early as 25 weeks. Think about that. That is just 5 short weeks over half way. Not that many years ago we were lucky if we were able to keep them alive after 30 weeks. When my wife was born at 33 it was miraculous she survived and is perfectly normal.

So if we use your above test to determine if it is wrong or right we have to say that 10 years ago it was okay to have an abortion at 29 and 6/7 weeks because before 30 we couldn't keep them alive. But now we lower that standard to 24 and 6/7. So does that mean we need to go back and find any women who had abortions after 25 weeks (because if you don't think that happens, as horrific as it is to me at least, you are woefully deluded) and prosecute them? By your above definition what they did was wrong.

As has been stated in this thread already, most laws are based on someone's moral judgment. When it happens to be a moral judgment you agree with then it is okay. But when it isn't they are obviously wrong. Right? Since of course, your moral judgment is right. Yep.

No. The law is actually quite clear in what it says, and it says what I am telling you. It defines murder as the unlawfull killing of a human being, who inturn must be able to be sustained outside of the mother. Baker- Where does the law say that when you kill someone who is 10 weeks in that you are also killing the baby?

who inturn must be able to be sustained outside of the mother.

But that part right there is what is changing at a rapid pace. And a moving target never makes for a good standard.

Reply #5 By: sandy2 - 9/27/2004 6:50:24 PM A crime affects the public at large. Murder affects the public at large. First of all, it leaves open the posibility that you could be murdered if it weren't illegal, and second if one person is murdered, it will scare people and cause a reaction. Since a fetus under a certain age is not according to the law considered a person, abortion can not be murder. The definition of a living human capable of being murdered is someone able to maintain life outside of the mother. Up untill this point, they are a part of the mother. Or do you disagree that a non sustainable fetus is a person? Crimes are defined and punished by statutes and by the common law. Most common law offences are as well known, and as precisely ascertained, as those which are defined by statutes; yet, from the difficulty of exactly defining and describing every act which ought to be punished, the vital and preserving principle has been adopted, that all immoral acts which tend to the prejudice of the community are punishable by courts of justice.

And at *what* point do you consider life to have started? That is how they make it a crime! They consider it life beginning at "conception!

"Where does the law say that when you kill someone who is 10 weeks in that you are also killing the baby? "

10 weeks? Hardly. Attempts to make late term abortions illegal have been overturned by activist courts. You're just sugar-caoting the process now. I can't argue with your moral stance any more than I can argue with a member of Hamas or anyone else. Just know that your "ideals" are NOT universal, and that you are not defending some "inalienable right", any more than someone defending prostitution or legalized drugs is.

I can't reason out of you what wasn't reasoned in. Your lack of respect for human life is a character issue, and your character is sadly your own affair.

What I find weird is that the government says that up until a certain age, I wasn't considered a "human being." So when I was conceived, I wasn't human, but now I am? How is that possible? I thought I was always human, a homo sapien. Does a fetus mutate from one totally different species to another? I didn't think so. I'd like to see someone tell me how I'm wrong. I guess I could really care less what the law considers "human" because, I'm sorry, it's wrong.

If someone wants to ban abortion, they have to both ban sex before marriage without condoms or other birth control.
If only abortion is banned, there will be more unhappy children and crimes in the world.

Of course, I think it's better not to cause an abortion.

There WOULDN'T be so many abortions if the religious right would stop treating contraceptives as a mortal sin.

Reply #19 By: KoopaTroopa211 - 9/28/2004 9:36:54 PM There WOULDN'T be so many abortions if the religious right would stop treating contraceptives as a mortal sin.

That's not the answer either! All they need to do is keep it in their pants.

I'm not saying that it's right to have sex before you're married (in fact, I think it's wrong), but if 2 people seriously want to do it that bad, all those lectures on abstinence won't mean squat. A condom or diaphragm, however, can stop things like abortion from ever becoming an issue in the first place.

"Abstinence has a high failure rate."