Abortion - Why Doesn'T The Church Make A Stronger Stance On It?

[go_utes01]

I do not believe that the beginning of life is anywhere near as controversial as you make it sound. Even pro-abortion choice advocates admit that life begins at fertilization:

Peter Singer, an author so avidly Pro Choice that he even defends full-blown infanticide, has nonetheless written, “Whether a being is a member of a given species is something that can be determined scientifically, by an examination of the nature of the chromosomes in the cells of living organisms. In this sense there is no doubt that from the first moments of its existence an embryo conceived from human sperm and eggs is a human being.”(Peter Singer, Practical Ethics, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993, 2008), 85-86.)

In a 1992 Interview with David Frost on PBS, pro choice supporter Norman Mailer said of abortion, “Let me say something shocking. I am perfectly willing to grant that life begins at conception… let’s not pretend it is not a form of killing.”

Naomi Wolf, in her 1995 book defending a woman’s right to choose, bluntly urged fellow abortion advocates to “contextualize the fight to defend abortion rights within a moral framework that admits that the death of a fetus is a real death.” (Naomi Wolf, “Our Bodies, Our Souls,” The New Republic, October 16, 1995, 26.)

Planned Parenthood’s former medical director Mary Calderone said, “Fertilization, then, has taken place. A baby has been conceived.” (The Zero People: Essays on Life” by Jeffrey Hensley, Servant

And none other than Dr. Alan Guttmacher, founder of the staunchly pro choice Guttmacher Institute and former president of Planned Parenthood, told expectant parents that “a facet that makes the obstetrician’s burden unique in the whole field of medicine is his double obligation; he simultaneously cares for two patients, the mother and the infant… The essential step in the initiation of life is by fertilization, the penetration of the ovum by a spermatozoan and the fusion of the two cells into a single cell.” (Dr. Alan Guttmacher, Pregnancy and Birth: A Book for Expectant Parents New American Library; Revised Ed edition (January 1, 1962).

You say your goal is less abortions, do you really believe that outlawing abortions and providing consequences will not lessen abortions at all? Your claim that outlawing abortions will lead to "coat hanger" abortions for poor women and likely more deaths is not backed up by the data. First, regarding the myth of "back-alley abortions," Dr. Bernard Nathanson, co-founder of the National Abortion Rights Action League, admits that his group lied about the number of women who died from illegal abortions when testifying before the Supreme Court in 1972. "We spoke of 5,000 - 10,000 deaths a year.... I confess that I knew the figures were totally false ... it was a useful figure, widely accepted, so why go out of our way to correct it with honest statistics?" According to data from the National Center for Health Statistics, the legalization of abortion was not responsible for reducing abortion-related deaths. The discovery of antibiotics in the 1940's actually reduced all deaths by providing effective treatment for infections. The National Center for Heath Statistics reveals that before 1941, there were over 1,400 abortion-related deaths. Yet, after Penicillin became available to control infections, the number of deaths was reduced in the 1950's to approximately 250 per year. By 1966, with abortion still illegal in all states, the number of deaths had dropped steadily to 120. New and better antibiotics, better surgery and the establishment of intensive care units in hospitals all led to such a decrease, even in the face of a rising population.

By the year before the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision allowing legal abortion on demand in all fifty states, the death rate for illegal abortions had fallen to 24 in 1972 (with 25 additional deaths as a result of legal abortions). In 1973, there should have been a sharp drop in abortion-related deaths with abortion legal in all fifty states and "back-alley abortions" eliminated with their alleged total of maternal deaths. Yet abortion-related deaths increased again with 25 deaths resulting from legal abortion in 1973, 26 in 1974 and 29 in 1975.By the year before the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision allowing legal abortion on demand in all fifty states, the death rate for illegal abortions had fallen to 24 in 1972 (with 25 additional deaths as a result of legal abortions). In 1973, there should have been a sharp drop in abortion-related deaths with abortion legal in all fifty states and "back-alley abortions" eliminated with their alleged total of maternal deaths. Yet abortion-related deaths increased again with 25 deaths resulting from legal abortion in 1973, 26 in 1974 and 29 in 1975.

Another important point is that many of the abortion practitioners performing abortions after Roe v. Wade were the same people performing illegal abortions. In the July 1960 edition of the American Journal of Public Health, an article by Dr. Mary Calderon, then medical director of Planned Parenthood, stated:

"90% of illegal abortions are being done by physicians. Call them what you will, abortionists, or anything else, they are still physicians, trained as such... They must do a pretty good job if the death rate is as low as it is... Abortion, whether therapeutic or illegal, is in the main no longer dangerous, because it is being done well by physicians."

Here is a candid admission that not only are illegal abortions not being done by quack doctors, but that the death rate from illegal abortions was "low." This flies in the face of claims of several thousand women losing their lives to illegal abortions and the claim that illegal abortions were performed by quack doctors and not by physicians.

In conclusion, there were not several thousand women losing their lives due to illegal abortions performed by quack doctors. Effective medical treatments helped reduce abortion related deaths and the legalization of abortion never played a significant role (and never will) in affecting the numbers of women who died from legal or illegal abortion-related deaths. That women continue to die from so-called "safe, legal" abortions (perhaps in greater numbers than we know) is a clear indication that abortion is unsafe and hurts women - legal or otherwise.

Edited April 4, 2013 by go_utes01

[thesometimesaint]

I am definitely aware of atheists and agnostics that oppose abortion. Many atheists/agnostics are humanists and believe that human life is indeed special and deserving of special protection. For example, according to Secular Pro-Life member Julie Thielen, who identifies as a gnostic antitheist atheist, the best ways to reach secular people with the pro-life message are through biology and an appeal to human rights.

“When the sperm meets the egg, a genetically complete human being is formed, and all that is required for maturation is time and nutrition,” Thielen said. “As complete human beings in the most vulnerable stages, there should be protections afforded. As a society we are judged by how we treat the most vulnerable — the young, the aged, the infirm, those who can’t speak for themselves. The unborn belong here.”

But that "biology" is incorrect. Every cell in your body is a genetically complete human being. About a third of all pregnancies end in spontaneous abortions. Including when the uterine wall sloughs off for no apparent reason.

We make that determination all the time. When is life support to be discontinued. Believe me I have no desire to "live" as a vegetable hooked up to breathing, eating, and excrement tubes with little to no hope of recovery. The "Pro-Life" gang made Terry Schiavo their cause celeb circus. What a sick joke they are.

[go_utes01]

But that "biology" is incorrect. Every cell in your body is a genetically complete human being. About a third of all pregnancies end in spontaneous abortions. Including when the uterine wall sloughs off for no apparent reason.

We make that determination all the time. When is life support to be discontinued. Believe me I have no desire to "live" as a vegetable hooked up to breathing, eating, and excrement tubes with little to no hope of recovery. The "Pro-Life" gang made Terry Schiavo their cause celeb circus. What a sick joke they are.

Well, you as an individual should have the right to make that determination for yourself, that is the point of living wills. But, just like you should be able to make the decision for when your life ends, the same right to self-determination should be afforded the baby.

[Stone holm]

I do not believe that the beginning of life is anywhere near as controversial as you make it sound. Even pro-abortion choice advocates admit that life begins at fertilization:

Peter Singer, an author so avidly Pro Choice that he even defends full-blown infanticide, has nonetheless written, “Whether a being is a member of a given species is something that can be determined scientifically, by an examination of the nature of the chromosomes in the cells of living organisms. In this sense there is no doubt that from the first moments of its existence an embryo conceived from human sperm and eggs is a human being.”(Peter Singer, Practical Ethics, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993, 2008), 85-86.)

In a 1992 Interview with David Frost on PBS, pro choice supporter Norman Mailer said of abortion, “Let me say something shocking. I am perfectly willing to grant that life begins at conception… let’s not pretend it is not a form of killing.”

Naomi Wolf, in her 1995 book defending a woman’s right to choose, bluntly urged fellow abortion advocates to “contextualize the fight to defend abortion rights within a moral framework that admits that the death of a fetus is a real death.” (Naomi Wolf, “Our Bodies, Our Souls,” The New Republic, October 16, 1995, 26.)

Planned Parenthood’s former medical director Mary Calderone said, “Fertilization, then, has taken place. A baby has been conceived.” (The Zero People: Essays on Life” by Jeffrey Hensley, Servant

And none other than Dr. Alan Guttmacher, founder of the staunchly pro choice Guttmacher Institute and former president of Planned Parenthood, told expectant parents that “a facet that makes the obstetrician’s burden unique in the whole field of medicine is his double obligation; he simultaneously cares for two patients, the mother and the infant… The essential step in the initiation of life is by fertilization, the penetration of the ovum by a spermatozoan and the fusion of the two cells into a single cell.” (Dr. Alan Guttmacher, Pregnancy and Birth: A Book for Expectant Parents New American Library; Revised Ed edition (January 1, 1962).

You say your goal is less abortions, do you really believe that outlawing abortions and providing consequences will not lessen abortions at all? Your claim that outlawing abortions will lead to "coat hanger" abortions for poor women and likely more deaths is not backed up by the data. First, regarding the myth of "back-alley abortions," Dr. Bernard Nathanson, co-founder of the National Abortion Rights Action League, admits that his group lied about the number of women who died from illegal abortions when testifying before the Supreme Court in 1972. "We spoke of 5,000 - 10,000 deaths a year.... I confess that I knew the figures were totally false ... it was a useful figure, widely accepted, so why go out of our way to correct it with honest statistics?" According to data from the National Center for Health Statistics, the legalization of abortion was not responsible for reducing abortion-related deaths. The discovery of antibiotics in the 1940's actually reduced all deaths by providing effective treatment for infections. The National Center for Heath Statistics reveals that before 1941, there were over 1,400 abortion-related deaths. Yet, after Penicillin became available to control infections, the number of deaths was reduced in the 1950's to approximately 250 per year. By 1966, with abortion still illegal in all states, the number of deaths had dropped steadily to 120. New and better antibiotics, better surgery and the establishment of intensive care units in hospitals all led to such a decrease, even in the face of a rising population.

By the year before the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision allowing legal abortion on demand in all fifty states, the death rate for illegal abortions had fallen to 24 in 1972 (with 25 additional deaths as a result of legal abortions). In 1973, there should have been a sharp drop in abortion-related deaths with abortion legal in all fifty states and "back-alley abortions" eliminated with their alleged total of maternal deaths. Yet abortion-related deaths increased again with 25 deaths resulting from legal abortion in 1973, 26 in 1974 and 29 in 1975.By the year before the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision allowing legal abortion on demand in all fifty states, the death rate for illegal abortions had fallen to 24 in 1972 (with 25 additional deaths as a result of legal abortions). In 1973, there should have been a sharp drop in abortion-related deaths with abortion legal in all fifty states and "back-alley abortions" eliminated with their alleged total of maternal deaths. Yet abortion-related deaths increased again with 25 deaths resulting from legal abortion in 1973, 26 in 1974 and 29 in 1975.

Another important point is that many of the abortion practitioners performing abortions after Roe v. Wade were the same people performing illegal abortions. In the July 1960 edition of the American Journal of Public Health, an article by Dr. Mary Calderon, then medical director of Planned Parenthood, stated:

"90% of illegal abortions are being done by physicians. Call them what you will, abortionists, or anything else, they are still physicians, trained as such... They must do a pretty good job if the death rate is as low as it is... Abortion, whether therapeutic or illegal, is in the main no longer dangerous, because it is being done well by physicians."

Here is a candid admission that not only are illegal abortions not being done by quack doctors, but that the death rate from illegal abortions was "low." This flies in the face of claims of several thousand women losing their lives to illegal abortions and the claim that illegal abortions were performed by quack doctors and not by physicians.

In conclusion, there were not several thousand women losing their lives due to illegal abortions performed by quack doctors. Effective medical treatments helped reduce abortion related deaths and the legalization of abortion never played a significant role (and never will) in affecting the numbers of women who died from legal or illegal abortion-related deaths. That women continue to die from so-called "safe, legal" abortions (perhaps in greater numbers than we know) is a clear indication that abortion is unsafe and hurts women - legal or otherwise.

Interesting proposition. I wonder if you put it to a vote at Church how many of the women would vote to make the pill illegal. What do you think 90%? 10%? Because if you take the position that preventing a fertilized egg from developing into a baby, then you are saying that when a women is on the pill they are potentially having an abortion every time they have sex, because the pill doesn't prevent fertilization.

[go_utes01]

Interesting proposition. I wonder if you put it to a vote at Church how many of the women would vote to make the pill illegal. What do you think 90%? 10%? Because if you take the position that preventing a fertilized egg from developing into a baby, then you are saying that when a women is on the pill they are potentially having an abortion every time they have sex, because the pill doesn't prevent fertilization.

I was speaking with my wife about that very question. When she found that out she was shocked. She was not aware that the common birth-control pill was an abortive facient. I think that would be the common experience among women (probably because the producers have done a good job of hiding it/pro-life groups have not been great at education). She was horrified to find that out. I think if you explained to church members that taking the pill can lead to an abortion, you would find many more members against its use. Just being against abortive facients does not mean that you are against family planning or other contraceptive devices. There are other options.

[Stone holm]

I was speaking with my wife about that very question. When she found that out she was shocked. She was not aware that the common birth-control pill was an abortive facient. I think that would be the common experience among women (probably because the producers have done a good job of hiding it/pro-life groups have not been great at education). She was horrified to find that out. I think if you explained to church members that taking the pill can lead to an abortion, you would find many more members against its use. Just being against abortive facients does not mean that you are against family planning or other contraceptive devices. There are other options.

Yeah, its not only that we in Church are not good about explaining it, i don't think that pro-life politicians are very good at pointing it out either, and I doubt that a majority of the fertile women in the Church would go -- oh hey let's do away with the pill then. Truth is the Church has never taken the stance that life begins upon fertilization of the egg, at least I have never heard that from anyone in authority.

[Calm]

I think Ute has a position that is more logical for me personally. I have a difficult time trying to define when a spirit is and is not present in a child's development. It only makes sense that anything that endangers the life of a child be undertaken with extreme caution in all its facets: spiritually, morally, etc. Any choice that indicates the ending of life for one's personal convenience is among the vilest of sins. I don't think we need to be taught specifics in all things to know the right from wrong.

Is there anything in the Church's position that indicates to you they don't approach anything that endangers a child's life with extreme caution?

[go_utes01]

Yeah, its not only that we in Church are not good about explaining it, i don't think that pro-life politicians are very good at pointing it out either, and I doubt that a majority of the fertile women in the Church would go -- oh hey let's do away with the pill then. Truth is the Church has never taken the stance that life begins upon fertilization of the egg, at least I have never heard that from anyone in authority.

I think you are correct about the Church's position. But, I believe that many members in the Church might have a different personal position when it comes to abortion. I know my wife was upset when she found out that taking the pill can lead to an abortion. And, I believe many other members would feel the same way.

[Calm]

Well, you as an individual should have the right to make that determination for yourself, that is the point of living wills. But, just like you should be able to make the decision for when your life ends, the same right to self-determination should be afforded the baby.

What is your opinion when the life of the mother is at risk?

[go_utes01]

What is your opinion when the life of the mother is at risk?

I think it should be up to the parents in consultation with their doctor and God at that point. Just like self-defense or justifiable homicide or whatever, if the life of the mother is at risk, I think there should be an exception - that is the only exception I agree with though. I was speaking with my wife about this as well, and she said she didn't know if she would be able to go through with the abortion even if she knew she would surely die - if there was a chance the baby could survive that is. It would be a very tough situation. We have other children that need their mother, but at the same time if the baby could be saved...very difficult.

[Calm]

but at the same time if the baby could be saved...very difficult.

And if there was no way for the baby to be saved? What if carrying a child that did not have any expectation to live once born was an extreme physical hardship for the woman, not likely to kill her, but leave her in a less healthy state, especially during the pregnancy itself? For example in the past pregnancy for diabetic women could be very traumatic on their bodies.

If it was known that the infant would not survive and even likely miscarry eventually, would it be alright in your view to abort the baby so as to allow the woman to get pregnant another time where if she carried the baby as long as she could, it might interfere with her ability to carry another one to full term?

[go_utes01]

And if there was no way for the baby to be saved? What if carrying a child that did not have any expectation to live once born was an extreme physical hardship for the woman, not likely to kill her, but leave her in a less healthy state, especially during the pregnancy itself? For example in the past pregnancy for diabetic women could be very traumatic on their bodies.

If it was known that the infant would not survive and even likely miscarry eventually, would it be alright in your view to abort the baby so as to allow the woman to get pregnant another time where if she carried the baby as long as she could, it might interfere with her ability to carry another one to full term?

What does "did not have an expectation to live" mean? If the baby had no chance at survival (seems like that would be an almost impossible situation as long as the fetus is still living), it would be a tough call. If the baby has any chance at survival, I do not believe it should be killed just because it has some physical/developmental defects.

[Stone holm]

What does "did not have an expectation to live" mean? If the baby had no chance at survival (seems like that would be an almost impossible situation as long as the fetus is still living), it would be a tough call. If the baby has any chance at survival, I do not believe it should be killed just because it has some physical/developmental defects.

It is a very tough call, my first wife opted to increase the chance of survival of the fetus and both wound up dead. But the real question here isn't the toughness of the call, but who gets to make it.

[go_utes01]

It is a very tough call, my first wife opted to increase the chance of survival of the fetus and both wound up dead. But the real question here isn't the toughness of the call, but who gets to make it.

I explicitly stated that when the life of the mother is at risk there should be a valid exception. Just like there is self-defense or justifiable homicide in the case of killing a born human, there should be an exception for taking the life of an unborn human when the life of the mother is at risk. Otherwise, I would like to live in a society that recognized that killing unborn babies for convenience is immoral, evil behavior that should be punished as a deterrent.

[Stone holm]

I explicitly stated that when the life of the mother is at risk there should be a valid exception. Just like there is self-defense or justifiable homicide in the case of killing a born human, there should be an exception for taking the life of an unborn human when the life of the mother is at risk. Otherwise, I would like to live in a society that recognized that killing unborn babies for convenience is immoral, evil behavior that should be punished as a deterrent.

But you see its always a certain shade of gray when pregnancy is involved, and the question ultimately becomes whose call is it? Is it the call of the woman who must as the saying goes go through the shadow of death to have the baby, or is it some government statute which literally lays down the law which has to be very clear or else it put physicians in jeopardy and women in jeopardy. And that becomes very difficult when there is no societal consensus on the matter. Plus there is the problem of fairness to the women. Regardless of the law, the rich woman or girl is going to have access to a safe professional abortion, its the middle-class and especially the poor that are not. So what happens? You wind up having poor girls and women getting killed in unsafe back alley abortions. It seems like it is a very simple black and white thing, but it really isn't -- so it comes down to who do you want making the decision.

[thesometimesaint]

I explicitly stated that when the life of the mother is at risk there should be a valid exception. Just like there is self-defense or justifiable homicide in the case of killing a born human, there should be an exception for taking the life of an unborn human when the life of the mother is at risk. Otherwise, I would like to live in a society that recognized that killing unborn babies for convenience is immoral, evil behavior that should be punished as a deterrent.

We've already tried your way and it didn't work.

[bcuzbcuz]

I explicitly stated that when the life of the mother is at risk there should be a valid exception. Just like there is self-defense or justifiable homicide in the case of killing a born human, there should be an exception for taking the life of an unborn human when the life of the mother is at risk. Otherwise, I would like to live in a society that recognized that killing unborn babies for convenience is immoral, evil behavior that should be punished as a deterrent.

I don't live in the same black and white world you occupy.

I will give you an example. Say that there is a young girl, 14 years of age, who becomes pregnant by a man 7 years older than her, a man who has demonstrated severely violent behavior in the past. He mistreats this young girl, before and during and after her first pregnancy. He continues with brutal behavior to the first child, behaviors which are reported at least three times to the local authorities. The second child, which arrives 11 months following the birth of the first, is also brutally treated. So violently treated that the baby is shaken almost to the point of death. The baby survives, but has permanent brain damage, with damage so severe that all normal body functions, sight, hearing, voluntary control of muscles in arms and legs and even swallowing and digestion, are forever damaged. The child is shaken at three months age and will never progress beyond those three months, gaining neither speech, understanding nor intelligence. although the child lives to be more than 23 years old.

Only once the damage has occurred, to the second child, do the authorities step in and remove the first child from the home. The young mother is made pregnant a third time, even while the father's trial is in progress, and gives birth to a healthy child 13 months following the birth of baby number two. The authorities remove the third baby immediately from the home.

But my focus returns to baby number two. This child, although alive, eventually ends up being tube fed, never able to swallow normal food, not even pablum or formula. The child never progresses beyond diapers, never regains any sight to the trauma damaged eyes, never learns any speech, nor even to recognize simply words such as its own name, ever. The child is confined to a wheelchair, permanent, 24 hour care, never able to achieve voluntary movement in hands, fingers or legs. The spasmodic contractions of back, arm, leg and bowel muscles torment the child daily and nightly, throwing the child into twisted contortions of pain, such pain that medicines offer only temporary relief. The child cries and screams in torment with regularity, allowing only short, agonized periods of sleep. This lack of sleep and continual shocks of pain to the babies system continue until the child reaches three years of age, when finally a combination of drugs and surgeries mercifully allow the baby to get its first full night of sleep.

This is what happens to a child, a victim of Shaken Baby Syndrome. The mother was too young, too inexperienced to protect either herself or her children. The oldest and youngest child were adopted, the damaged child was placed in foster care.

Do you mean that this young, barely teenage, mother should have been punished? If, following her first unprepared pregnancy and childbirth, she had correctly assessed the situation and understood the dangers of bringing a second child into this brutal environment, if she had chosen an abortion, instead of birthing the child, that she should have been punished?

If punishment is the deterrent, does it prevent early teen pregnancies?

[go_utes01]

I don't live in the same black and white world you occupy.

I will give you an example. Say that there is a young girl, 14 years of age, who becomes pregnant by a man 7 years older than her, a man who has demonstrated severely violent behavior in the past. He mistreats this young girl, before and during and after her first pregnancy. He continues with brutal behavior to the first child, behaviors which are reported at least three times to the local authorities. The second child, which arrives 11 months following the birth of the first, is also brutally treated. So violently treated that the baby is shaken almost to the point of death. The baby survives, but has permanent brain damage, with damage so severe that all normal body functions, sight, hearing, voluntary control of muscles in arms and legs and even swallowing and digestion, are forever damaged. The child is shaken at three months age and will never progress beyond those three months, gaining neither speech, understanding nor intelligence. although the child lives to be more than 23 years old.

Only once the damage has occurred, to the second child, do the authorities step in and remove the first child from the home. The young mother is made pregnant a third time, even while the father's trial is in progress, and gives birth to a healthy child 13 months following the birth of baby number two. The authorities remove the third baby immediately from the home.

But my focus returns to baby number two. This child, although alive, eventually ends up being tube fed, never able to swallow normal food, not even pablum or formula. The child never progresses beyond diapers, never regains any sight to the trauma damaged eyes, never learns any speech, nor even to recognize simply words such as its own name, ever. The child is confined to a wheelchair, permanent, 24 hour care, never able to achieve voluntary movement in hands, fingers or legs. The spasmodic contractions of back, arm, leg and bowel muscles torment the child daily and nightly, throwing the child into twisted contortions of pain, such pain that medicines offer only temporary relief. The child cries and screams in torment with regularity, allowing only short, agonized periods of sleep. This lack of sleep and continual shocks of pain to the babies system continue until the child reaches three years of age, when finally a combination of drugs and surgeries mercifully allow the baby to get its first full night of sleep.

This is what happens to a child, a victim of Shaken Baby Syndrome. The mother was too young, too inexperienced to protect either herself or her children. The oldest and youngest child were adopted, the damaged child was placed in foster care.

Do you mean that this young, barely teenage, mother should have been punished? If, following her first unprepared pregnancy and childbirth, she had correctly assessed the situation and understood the dangers of bringing a second child into this brutal environment, if she had chosen an abortion, instead of birthing the child, that she should have been punished?

If punishment is the deterrent, does it prevent early teen pregnancies?

While obviously a tragic story, I think you could find many tragic stories regarding child abuse - do you think that justifies the preemptive killing of the innocent baby? Why not argue for better law enforcement against the abusive man or oversight by child protective services, or aid in helping the young girl get out of the abusive situation? Should the young mother be punished? Just like in all criminal prosecutions there are layers of protections. Prosecutors have discretion on if/what charges to bring. Also, there would be mitigating circumstances, like the age of the offender, her psychological condition, etc. However, the doctor that performed the illegal abortion likely for profit is a different question. In the end, while there are always difficult individual cases (for all criminal prosecutions), I believe that killing innocent babies is evil (it is sad that many try to obfuscate that simple reality and continually try to complicate the situation in order to assuage their conscience on the matter) and should be be punished as a deterrent. I do not want to live in a society that believes that a mother's choice to kill her own baby should be a protected right. We would not say that a mother's choice to kill her baby a month after the child is born (even in a tragic scenario like you painted - if the young mother realized that her living situation was terrible and that the child may get injured, would she be justified in preemptively killing her one or two month old?) should be protected, why do we believe that it should be protected prior to birth? I believe it is simple (black and white). Evil is evil and as a society we should not protect people's "rights" to inflict harm on others - including the unborn. I agree that there are shades of gray and individual cases may be difficult, but that is true in the implementation of all laws.

[ERayR]

Do you mean that this young, barely teenage, mother should have been punished? If, following her first unprepared pregnancy and childbirth, she had correctly assessed the situation and understood the dangers of bringing a second child into this brutal environment, if she had chosen an abortion, instead of birthing the child, that she should have been punished?

If punishment is the deterrent, does it prevent early teen pregnancies?

Are you really so short sighted as to not be able to see that there are more and better alternatives than abortion to this problem? I fully support the Church policy on abortion but can not see any way your scenario could fit into this policy.

[Stone holm]

While obviously a tragic story, I think you could find many tragic stories regarding child abuse - do you think that justifies the preemptive killing of the innocent baby? Why not argue for better law enforcement against the abusive man or oversight by child protective services, or aid in helping the young girl get out of the abusive situation? Should the young mother be punished? Just like in all criminal prosecutions there are layers of protections. Prosecutors have discretion on if/what charges to bring. Also, there would be mitigating circumstances, like the age of the offender, her psychological condition, etc. However, the doctor that performed the illegal abortion likely for profit is a different question. In the end, while there are always difficult individual cases (for all criminal prosecutions), I believe that killing innocent babies is evil (it is sad that many try to obfuscate that simple reality and continually try to complicate the situation in order to assuage their conscience on the matter) and should be be punished as a deterrent. I do not want to live in a society that believes that a mother's choice to kill her own baby should be a protected right. We would not say that a mother's choice to kill her baby a month after the child is born (even in a tragic scenario like you painted - if the young mother realized that her living situation was terrible and that the child may get injured, would she be justified in preemptively killing her one or two month old?) should be protected, why do we believe that it should be protected prior to birth? I believe it is simple (black and white). Evil is evil and as a society we should not protect people's "rights" to inflict harm on others - including the unborn. I agree that there are shades of gray and individual cases may be difficult, but that is true in the implementation of all laws.

Evil is evil. Keep running into this notion of evil in the abstract, innate evil. A very few animals will kill for play, domestic house cats being one of these. Say a domestic house cat is large enough to play with and kill a newborn baby when the mother is momentarily distracted and the cat gets in where its not suppose to. Is the cat evil?

[Tacenda]

Are you really so short sighted as to not be able to see that there are more and better alternatives than abortion to this problem? I fully support the Church policy on abortion but can not see any way your scenario could fit into this policy.

I agree, I think that it might hurt the teenager that was abused to abort her baby, kind of putting back the violence that happened to her.

[Nemesis]

Shock and horror for the belief that human life is sacred and should be treated as such? Again, telling and a bit creepy.

This is an inappropriate response. We do not allow other posters to psychoanalyze others even using innuendo. Next time you will be banned from the thread or suspended.

Nemesis

[Stargazer]

That's an interesting question.

I've never personally heard of an atheist that was against abortion, but it makes me wonder if there are some out there. Anyone know?

Doris Gordon, who founded Libertarians for Life, is an atheist.

The organization does not bring religious arguments into the discussion. They use pure libertarian principles (especially the principle of non-initiation of force or aggression):

1. Human offspring are human beings, persons from conception, whether that takes place as natural or artificial fertilization, by cloning, or by any other means.

2. Abortion is homicide -- the killing of one person by another.

3. One's right to control one's own body does not allow violating the obligation not to aggress. There is never a right to kill an innocent person. Prenatally, we are all innocent persons.

4. A prenatal child has the right to be in the mother's body. Parents have no right to evict their children from the crib or from the womb and let them die. Instead both parents, the father as well as the mother, owe them support and protection from harm.

5. No government, nor any individual, has a just power to legally "de-person" any one of us, born or preborn.

6. The proper purpose of the law is to side with the innocent, not against them.

Everyone in the thread should check out their website. They have some rather interesting arguments. go_utes1 will be particularly interested.

Edited April 8, 2013 by Stargazer

[Stargazer]

I have been interested by the arguments in this thread. Actually, it reminds me of the situation vis-a-vis divorce. In the New Testament, Jesus made it clear that divorce was originally allowable under the Law of Moses because of the inability of the people to live the higher law, which forbids divorce. Now we today supposedly are living a higher law, yet divorce is still permitted.

When it comes to current Church policy on abortion, I sustain the First Presidency and the Q12 when it comes to the abortion policy, but I believe that the higher law would be no abortion except in the matter of the life of the mother.

Were I a woman who was raped and became pregnant thereby, I believe I would carry the child to term, and I believe I would raise the child myself. Since I am not a woman, I can only be theoretical about it.

Note please that I am not setting myself up as a standard. Just saying what I would do.

Edited April 8, 2013 by Stargazer

[thesometimesaint]

I have been interested by the arguments in this thread. Actually, it reminds me of the situation vis-a-vis divorce. In the New Testament, Jesus made it clear that divorce was originally allowable under the Law of Moses because of the inability of the people to live the higher law, which forbids divorce. Now we today supposedly are living a higher law, yet divorce is still permitted.

When it comes to current Church policy on abortion, I sustain the First Presidency and the Q12 when it comes to the abortion policy, but I believe that the higher law would be no abortion except in the matter of the life of the mother.

Were I a woman who was raped and became pregnant thereby, I believe I would carry the child to term, and I believe I would raise the child myself. Since I am not a woman, I can only be theoretical about it.

Note please that I am not setting myself up as a standard. Just saying what I would do.

I absolutely agree with the Church on its position on abortion. What I am in internal conflict about is making our Church rules mandatory on others not of our particular faith.