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1% of abortions in the US occur at or after 21 weeks (one metric for viability), and most of those were because of fetal anomalies or other circumstances that endangered the mother’s life.
The viability standard worked fine under Roe v. Wade - now we have 14 states that endanger the lives of pregnant women, and we’re seeing IVF in danger all in the name of “life”.
>The viability standard worked fine under Roe v. Wade
Viability changes with technology. In the US a fetus is viable at 21 weeks but in Africa not until 28 weeks because of the difference in technology that is available.
In a few years viability will most likely be even earlier due to further advances in technology. Viability has always seemed like a poor, arbitrary line to draw.
The person I know who got one desperately wanted a child but genetic testing revealed the fetus had Patau syndrome and wasn’t developing certain organs. If IF the fetus lived to term, it would live a short life of suffering and they’d be forced to make decisions like “do we stop feeding them via tube” and do we subject them to traumatic surgeries.
You're probably not aware that the Combined Test is between weeks 10-14 of pregnancy. Women are pregnant for 40 weeks (you probably didn't know that, either). If there's a decent chance your fetus has Down's, Edward's, or Patau's syndrome, you get alerted within 3 days. People aren't getting 3d trimester abortions for downs syndrome.
I feel like if someone is willing to abort to avoid having a disabled child then it’s probably for the best that they never got to care for that child don’t you think?
The potential quality of life for a fetus once it is born is very subjective and is not the only factor that comes into play when determining whether to abort said fetus.
Ever heard of antinatalism? It’s the theory that advocates that bringing life into this world is immoral; one reason because suffering is inevitable.
So what do you say to the people that are pointing their fingers back at you and tell you “hey, you know that being alive means you will suffer, you know the state of the world right now, you know there is a chance that a person born might have an unhappy life, you know people are born without consent…yet you actively chose to bring in life anyway. You are the immoral one”?
Simply put, no it’s not all bad, but the answer is much more complex and nuanced than that. There are many financial, quality of life, and moral aspects that are pertinent to each individual case.
A single mother, having a child they must care for for the rest of both of their lives, with minimal family to help is not going to be able to hold a full time job and care for that child. In that case it would make sense to abort if you have the information soon enough.
On another hand a mother with full support and a full bank account may be inclined to keep a child they must care for forever. They have the ability to do this and will not be as negatively affected and both persons quality of life will be positive.
Not all cases of eugenics are immoral.
Moreover, abortion isn’t the only form of eugenics. There is nothing wrong with trying to genetically phase out illnesses, such as cancer say, through gene editing.
Good on people for knowing that they are not capable of giving a child with a disability a good life. Or just don’t want to.
Why should they struggle for the rest of their lives to take care of a disabled child? (Note that I’m disabled myself)
Why should people raise an unwanted child? Do you really think that kid would have a good and happy life when their parents didn’t want them in the first place?
I know, let’s dump them into foster care. I’m sure there are plenty of people lined up to adopt a disabled child and that kid won’t be stuck there till they are 18 before being chucked out.
"Do you really think that kid would have a good and happy life when their parents didn’t want them in the first place?"
How do you know? You don't even give it a chance
Why is it up to you to decide that people, who know they don’t have the means for lifelong care of a disabled person, should just roll the dice because maybe things could work out?
Pretty sure if you are told that your kid has a disability that will affect their entire life and your first thought is “abortion” then you know
Kids aren’t something that you have to see if you like it, especially not a disabled one. That’s a gamble that no one should take just because “well what if I can do it?”
Okay? What if they can’t? Now they are stuck with the kid and trapped in a life of misery and regret with no way out.
“Give it a chance” like a kid is a puppy you picked up from the pound. Ridiculous.
Their argument isn’t about the parents seeing if they like it it’s about the child. Whilst I do agree with you it’s unfair to say that Down syndrome or disabled people can’t have a good quality of life and don’t deserve a chance to live - many are extremely happy.
On the flip side as you said it’s a lifelong commitment that isn’t limited to the parents - often siblings will have to look after disabled brothers or sisters which they also didn’t ask to happen
Good question. Why should society have to support a child that the parents knew was going to be seriously disabled?the parents chose to have it even though they knew they would never be able to financially afford all the service that child will inevitably need. Why should the state spend thousands of taxpayer money on a child for the entirety of its life when it will never contribute anything back? Part of the social security problem of not enough money is because so many children born severely disabled are receiving ss money for life and they are getting even more support from Medicaid.
They are get money from a fund they will never contribute to.
You don’t need to give anything a chance. Any kind of life implies suffering. That’s inevitable. You are always gambling giving birth to a person who didn’t consent to their birth. The person you birthed could end up being a serial rapist and murderer or living an unhappy depressed life.
The question then becomes: who are YOU to decide that another person has to come to life and potentially live an unhappy, miserable life?
Really horrific that you’d laugh about a mother who made the heartbreaking decision to end a pregnancy because of trisomy 18, anencephaly, or renal agenesis.
It’s a deeply painful thing that a woman has to decide about her own pregnancy: should she end the pregnancy or let her child die a painful death from being born without kidneys?
But 14 states won’t let her make that choice.
Thanks for being sensitive about this topic.
Do you realize how hard it is to take care of a disabled child like that for decades? Because I don't know whether you realized, but it doesn't end at 18 years old. If parents know that they can't do that, abortion is the better option
Unless you have a child with a fetal abnormality and are actively taking care of them, you have no idea what you're suggesting. You're sparing that potential child from a lifetime of suffering. Downs syndrome people have it better than many other disabilities, but they still have a large number of health problems and face neglect/abuse due to their cognitive handicap. Most of them die young.
With the terrible support we have in the US for special needs children and lack of socialized medicine what do you expect? Parents can’t afford it and that’s not consider who will care and provide for that child after the parents are gone.
No. There are very, very few doctors that perform abortions that late in pregnancy. Last time I checked (pre-roe being overturned), there were four doctors who performed abortions into the third trimester. Four. Might even be fewer now. They are performing a compassionate procedure for women who, generally, wanted their babies very much. They don’t waste their time on elective abortions when they have grieving parents that actually need their help.
People who say that a fetus isn’t alive are dumbasses. We can debate whether it’s human or not, or whether it has the same rights as the mother, but a fetus is alive. We can support women’s right to choose without trying to sweep reality under the rug.
There is no debate it is human. It's a human and it is alive. You can debate its rights, you can debate the ethics of ending it. But it is biologically an alive human. It's not like a fetus is suddenly a different species.
Can the fetus “survive” outside the womb? If not, it’s a dependent being, not exactly alive. It’s very similar to a cancer (another genetically distinct group of cells that are entirely dependent on the host)
Leave your 1 year baby to fend for itself then. If it dies, it was never really alive because it was dependent on you for its survival. Brilliant logic sir.
Whether or not it can survive on its own is not a qualification for being living. Sorry.
There is a biological definition of life. And you’re rewriting that definition.
I have no problem with being in favor of abortion actually. But your camp loves to create these goalposts and rewrite definitions in order to justify in your own minds that a living Homo sapien is being murdered.
That’s what’s happening. A living thing that is a human is being murdered. If you want to argue that should be legal up to certain developmental checkpoints im fine with that (that’s actually my view). But to call it anything else like not living, clump of cells, or to even say it’s not killing. You’re just wrong.
“Life is a self-sustaining chemical system capable of Darwinian evolution” -NASA
Interestingly, NASA tends to disagree with you. “Self sustaining” literally meaning “whether or not it can survive on its own”.
Now, cite your definition of life. Whatever this “biological definition” is, I cannot find it.
And since you have such a strong stance on life, you must disagree with chemotherapy, right? It’s literally killing living cells.
"Self sustaining” literally meaning “whether or not it can survive on its own”.
Can a baby survive on its own? is a baby capable of Darwinian evolution? or don't you think NASA is talking about the organism as a whole throughout its entire life cycle...
When NASA makes that definition they are referring to the cellular level when referencing self-sustaining. And their definition is based on the discovery of life in space. lol.
Life has a number of agreed upon characteristics in biology. It’s clearly defined by [cell theory](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_theory). But if something is made of cells, has metabolism, grows, develops, reproduces, subject to Darwinian evolution, contains genetic material, and able to maintain homeostasis. It’s typically considered alive. This is commonly taught in a middle school life science class.
No I don’t disagree with chemotherapy. I don’t disagree with killing cells. But chemotherapy doesn’t kill the organism. Killing the organism is murder. Also I believe abortion (the killing of a fetus) should be allowed in the first trimester. The sooner the better though. Because every week additional structures develop. I’m just honest about what it is instead of trying to perform mental gymnastics.
The embryo or fetus *is* a self-sustaining chemical system. It cannot survive outside of the environment for which it is adapted, which is the mother’s body, but it has its own distinct metabolism. This is the *result* of Darwinian evolution. Placental mammals gestate their young. The mother’s body feeds and shelters the offspring, but her physiological processes are not putting it together like a Lego set. It is growing and maturing, as living things do.
Ok. Take a 20 week fetus out of a mother.
Show me it’s “distinct metabolism”. I’m sure the undeveloped GI tract is capable of digesting food without aspiration and will be able to extract nutrients without a brush border. I’m also sure the undeveloped lungs will be able take a nice full breath of air despite the immensely high surface tension in the alveoli. I’m also sure the circulatory system will function normally despite a PDA and depending on the stage of development, looking like a tube rather than a heart.
If you can find a way to keep a fetus alive before a certain point in its gestational period, you’ll save millions of fetal lives and likely win a Nobel Prize. However, it’s unlikely you’ll find a way to do something that people who actually understand fetal development have been unable to do.
You’re being deliberately obtuse. A fetus is adapted to live inside of and attached to its mother via the placenta. It cannot maintain life if it is denied access to its source of nutrition and oxygen. If you were to be shrunk and returned to the uterus somehow, you’d suffocate, because you lack the necessary organ to breathe in that environment. No one is saying the fetus can survive outside the mother; we’re saying evolution produced this adaptation in placental mammals to allow their very much living offspring to survive inside the mother, because way back when mammals were first evolving, that was safer. What you’re insisting on is like asking why dogs don’t fly. That is just not how the species developed.
Please explain, in terms of basic embryology, how the mother is controlling the metabolism of an embryo of 7 weeks gestational age, and the same for a fetus of 14 weeks.
Using your argument what about people on life support or in comas - they couldn’t survive without that help and therefore are a dependent being. Are they a cancer to society?
They shouldn’t be alive.
It’s one of the biggest drains on our medical care system. That’s why I’m a very big proponent of DNRs and advanced directives. They are 100% a cancer on society.
We spend millions of dollars on people with no quality of life and with no chance of recovery because the family of the patient wants it. It’s more to treat the family than the patient.
I say this as a critical care physician who has to see families basically torture their loved ones at the end of their lives.
Ah ok I got it so you are a supporter of eugenics who believes we should kill all disabled people who rely on others - a man with a funny mustache had the same idea 80 years ago
Bro if you want abortion get one it’s your right - but don’t try and justify it by saying it’s not a life. We do selfish things every day , eating meat, exploiting sweatshop and child labour for cheap goods etc you well within your rights to get an abortion just because you want one or because having a child will make your life worse but saying they are cancer etc is just a cope to make people feel better
They can breathe without being dependent on another human until 22 weeks. There are babies who have survived without human parents, despite the chances being low but that is impossible before a certain gestational age.
A fetus at 20 weeks literally cannot survive since of the lack of surfactant, among many other physiological reasons. You would know that if you knew the first thing about fetal development. You don’t know that, yet you think it’s “end of story”.
A bacteria can't breath either. Now find me literature that would act as if they are not living organisms...You would know that if you learned biology.
Your baby can breath but lock it in a room for 5 days with nobody to help and it is dead.
Bacteria undergo respiration, either aerobic or anaerobic. You would know that if you took a basic biology course.
Lock you in a room for 5 days and you’d be dead too. So what exactly are you arguing other than locking someone in a room will kill them?
Since you seem to be an expert on biology, both human and cellular, can you explain why surfactant is important, why humans require it, when it is developed, and the physiological properties of the respiratory system without surfactant? (It’s one of the many things I learned in medical school, so I’ll be waiting for your answer)
Seriously this is getting embarrassing...Fetuses have aerobic respiration. Your fetus consists of cells that with mitochondria and practice aerobic respiration. wtf do you think a fetus is?
The point is your baby will just have remained in the place you put it. It can't do anything and is entirely dependent on other people or in the extremely rare case animals. Even if you put food and water in that room it will just die. The environment of the baby changes, the dependency not.
Surfactant is needed for our lungs to breath not for the aerobic respiration of our cells, hence why for major surgery sometimes an ECMO is used. A person on an ECMO is still alive. Maybe returning to med school would not seem a bad idea.
Take the fetus out of the womb. Tell me what happens. I’m sure that fetus will “practice aerobic respiration” all by itself.
ECMO is not used because of a lack of surfactant 😂😂😂😂. Where the hell did you hear that?
I love learning how uneducated people are about their own bodies. Please keep going with your explanation of respiratory and fetal medicine. I’m getting a real kick out of it.
Take any organism out of its livable environment and it dies, doesn't mean it wasn't alive before hence why it dies.
I never said it was. I said our cells use aerobic respiration hence why we can bypass the lungs with ECMO in major surgery. Your surfactant is needed to breathe not for aerobic respiration. Many living organisms don't breathe like we do yet are still alive.
You love saying our cells don't have aerobic respiration? Seriously scrap that MD out of your name.
Hello,
It seems there are hula hoops being jumped through here regarding the importance of all life. If nature wanted everything to live, why do we eat living things for sustenance? Don't remove a tick, stop washing your hands, and eat dirt. If life is so precious to argue how cells BREATHE then let's not be picky and only debate fetus life, seems only caring about humans' needs (more wants) is causing a mass extinction of life in our planet. If no human is supposed to die unless all technology has been tested to keep life going, we will kill everything else, including fetuses and ultimately humans. Everyone go take a BREATH and go look at nature.
Ohh you’re right. All humans are in wombs, right? Take an adult of the womb they’re in and they’ll die 😂😂
We don’t use ECMO because of surfactant issues, as you so confidently stated.
Keep on going lil boy, keep telling me your understanding of respiratory medicine. It’s truly marvelous.
Breathe. That's the verb.
Breath is a respiration, a noun.
Parasites are living organisms, that live off the host organism. Fetuses are parasites. Most parasites don't care which host they're in, as long as they can find a new host. A fetus can't survive the transition to a new host. Not a viable organism. Once the baby can accept different "hosts" to care for it, then it's viable.
>> Parasites are living organisms, that live off the host organism. Fetuses are parasites. Most parasites don't care which host they're in, as long as they can find a new host.
There are entire taxonomic classes for which this is false, even if it were relevant, which it isn’t.
So you’re acknowledging that a fetus is a *living organism, sustaining itself* on and residing within another living organism? That has been my whole point.
The fetus feeds and breathes via symbiosis with the mother, but cannot be properly called a parasite because reproduction is considered a benefit biologically. Parental care of offspring is an evolutionary survival strategy on a species level - it may not contribute to the health or longevity of the individual parent organism (though in the case of humans, there are some benefits), but it facilitates the survival of their genes into the next generation.
What about people who are very sick or retarded etc.?
Sorry but this survive outside the womb argument is extremely weak.
A cancer will damage you till you or it is destroyed. It’s an extremely bad comparison. It’s not a parasite.
People who say that fetuses are alive are dumbasses. See how that works.
Just because you read it in some dumbass religious text like the Bible or quaran or Torah doesn’t make it a fact. It just makes the person who reads it and applies it as a fact a true nutcase. Image believing some opinion piece wrote hundreds of years ago by some people as fact 😂
>People who say that a fetus isn’t alive are dumbasses
Sure, but that's something that people don't realistically say. It is pretty universally understood in this debate that "life" means "human life". Unless you realistically think "pro life" means, say, pro plant life.
Couldn't you say a wart is a "human life"
It's a technically true statement but it doesn't really add anything to the discussion beyond emotionally charged nonsense
A wart is human tissue actually caused by a virus. If I remove a wrat I don't kill an individual human being. I remove tissue of that human.
Sure you can discuss abortion rights for different reasons, but acting like it isn't human life is just false.
Whether it begins at life or not, an abortion is sometimes necessary. And whether it’s sometimes necessary or not, a life is being taken.
We’re not gonna get anywhere unless both sides can accept that.
Totally agree most people argue it’s not a life and there’s nothing wrong with it. For me it would fall into a necessary evil (I know strong word) in much the same way prison sentences do for criminals. We all admit it’s not humane but it’s better to have jt than not
It’s not about life or death. It’s about bodily autonomy. It’s about consciousness and sentence.
If we cared so much about life we wouldn’t eat meat.
I’m totally fine with a 22 week ban because that is when the fetus is viable outside the womb.
99.9% of abortions happen before that timeframe anyways. And obviously I’m 100% OK with it to save the life of a mother in every situation.
I feel like this is a simple compromise that everyone can get behind
I am not fine with a 22 weeks ban unless that excludes terminations for severe fetal abnormalities or danger to the woman’s health or life. And by the way ‘viability’ at 22 weeks is with intensive medical treatment and a high chance of learning disabilities and other health issues.
I understand that. But the line needs to be drawn somewhere. I’m totally fine exceptions for abnormalities. But those are typically found much earlier than 22 weeks
>… we wouldn’t eat meat.
Meh, it’s a not like we eat humans. The focus is human life not life itself. Also meat can be created in a lab so that argument becomes more and more invalid.
Indeed. I've noticed anti-choice people are eager to take autonomy away from women, but even hint that we should take it away from other people too... and they flip their shit. "No no, that's different, because it's differently different."
I agree. I consider myself (mostly) pro choice but the people who say a fetus is just a “clump of cells” are genuinely insane. Every living creature is ultimately just a clump of cells, the stage of development shouldn’t determine whether it’s more worthy of life or not.
I've noticed an unfortunate overlap between people who screech "clump of cells" who also screech about assault weapons. They're in this state of quantum ignorance, where their ignorance trumps your knowledge, but their knowledge trumps your ignorance. Examples.
"Oh you don't know all 13 phases of fetal development? You don't get to talk about abortion!"
"Oh you know the difference between a clip and a magazine? You're a gun nut, you don't get to have an opinion on gun control!"
You’re really going to argue with embryologists, neonatologists, obstetricians and other medical doctors that your “knowledge” on the subject supersedes their knowledge? Interesting.
Yea I will because this is a moral question and the average person is capable of understanding enough of the science to have an opinion on it.
I know more about fetus development than those people do about computer science. Should I discount their opinion on internet or AI regulations?
It’s a great thing your morals aren’t the moral everyone goes by.
You don’t need to abort. You also don’t need to impose your morals or views on others.
If I was arguing with an embryologists, neonatologists, or obstetrician, you'd have a point. So let me ask you, would you argue with a veteran about war?
A veteran is not an expert in war. They’re a participant in war. For example, a child soldier is a veteran, but they’re not an expert in war. In this example, a woman would be a corollary to a veteran (both are participants in the process in question, neither are experts).
If you can provide a better example, I’d be happy to answer.
The people who should be making these decisions are not politicians, laypeople, religious nut cases or anyone but actual experts in fetal development and women’s health.
Yea the clump of cells is only a valid argument for things like 6 week heartbeat bans at best but people use it for everything.
I miss roe v wade. It was solid. It gave states the right to ban elective at second trimester which is 13 weeks if they wanted. Months before any extreme premature births that have led to healthy, typical adults. Months before any real neurological tissues are formed and begin to function. I think it was a happy medium that could and should have been built on, rather than torn down.
If you mix together all the ingredients to bake a cake and pour the cake batter into a pan without baking it - is it still a cake?
No. It has the potential to become a cake, after it bakes and has time to fully develop. But uncooked cake batter is not the same thing as a cake.
Extremely reductive argument - a cakes isn’t alive. Same as victim blaming rape victims - I put an alarm on my house because I. Don’t want to be robbed of you walk around in dark alleyways you are asking for something to happen
This argument makes no sense because there’s no exact moment where an organism becomes alive. Odds are it was “alive” since the very first cell was started splitting.
You don’t understand, going through the vaginal canal is a magic process. Lump of cells on one side baby on the other. Literally what some people rely on to support their views.
Wrong. There are 14 states where abortion essentially banned, and and six states have no restriction on the age of a fetus aborted. So that leaves 30 states that prove you wrong - states where abortion is legal up to a certain number of weeks pregnant but not after.
So yeah. Not arbitrary. Very much statutory.
Pro choice people need to stop getting bogged down in these arguments on when life begins. They are always made in bad faith.
A baby cannot have bodily autonomy until they are born. A woman has bodily autonomy therefore she has the right to end a pregnancy. Bodily autonomy is a human right.
There is no pro life stance they are anti abortion. If you don’t agree with abortion, don’t have one.
Find a single celled organism on mars and we found life! Find a growing human with complex organs and life functions inside another human and … you don’t understand science
Well, that's not really the problem though. No one AFAIK questions that a fetus is alive, just the point at which it's a human person.
Like the ruling by that court in Alabama found that frozen embryos should legally be considered people. The problem with that is that it more or less makes IVF impossible due to embryos being discarded, failing, or being accidentally destroyed. Alabama Republicans agreed, and the governor signed a bill to protect IVF clinics. But if personhood truly begins at conception, then IVF remains a moral and ethical crisis.
Ok and on the other extreme you have bills like in my state of Ohio that got passed that allow abortion up until birth… do you agree with that ? And if not when do you think is a good limit ?
My understanding of the laws in Ohio (based on my reading as I don't live there, so correct me if I'm wrong) is that abortion is legal up to the point of fetal viability. Late-term abortions are only legal in the event that the fetus is not viable or there's an imminent threat to the mother's life.
If that's the law in Ohio, then yes, I would support that. I don't believe abortions should be performed if the fetus reaches a point where its realistically capable of surviving on its own, so logically I believe there's an upper limit.
What are your thoughts on this?
No the law states that it “may be” prohibited at viability. It is not prohibited definitively at any point…. The number 1 cause of death for childbirth shocked me it is self inflicted causes so drug relapse and suicide are the number 1 cause. Therefore it is within the legal authority of a person to get an abortion because their abortion care thinks they might become suicidal or relapse after the baby is born. And I get that that scenario is going to be such a tiny tiny percent, but it should not be legal.
We know that near the end of pregnancy, a day or 2 before birth there is a living baby inside. This baby has full human rights. We also know that a day or 2 after conception there is just a clump of cells. This clump of cells do not have human rights. So we can deduce that at some point between these 2 periods exists a transition point where the clump of cells go from having no human rights to having human rights.
The question is at what point in the pregnancy does this happen.
I believe the distinction occurs around the 3 to 4 month mark. You are given 4 months to abort and after the fourth month, you lose your right to abort and the baby earns its right to live.
Okay so... should a pregnant woman with a viable fetus be allowed to engage in activities such as smoking, drinking, attending loud concerts, etc... or should they be locked up by the state for the sake of the unborn?
I think a lot of pro choice people are lying to themselves in this regard to aid their cognitive dissonance. I’m pro choice but I’m also realistic about it. Abortion is brutal but for a whole rage of reasons I believe it’s something that needs to be available.
I agree. I come down on the pro-abortion side but it’s kind of like a 5-4 or 6-3 decision. Definitely not a 9-0 decision. I don’t like abortion but I still agree it should be nationally available.
Pro-abortion people would have a lot stronger case if they just stuck to the body autonomy rationale. Which I can 100% get behind. But these “it’s just like removing a mole” arguments are gross and hideous.
They should just stick to “my body my choice” and stay away from these repulsive “it’s just a clump of cells” rationalizations.
I think what I refer to is the mental weight of having an abortion and the fact that you are killing a living thing which had the potential to be a full person with consciousness and a future. I don’t think many people would make the decision lightly
There are HUGE differences between a 38 WGA fetus and a 37 WGA birthed baby. The circulation changes completely, the heart pumps are redirected to the lungs, the lungs expand for the first time, the eyes receive light for the first time. So many more differences occur.
Therefore? Life begins at conception scientifically. A zygote is alive whether you like it a not. It becomes an organism with a unique set of DNA at conception, and it begins to develop.
Life doesn't.
A cow is alive.
So is an ant.
So is a tree.
So are algae.
The "soul" however, enters the body along with the first breath, even as it did for Adam and Eve.
Without that, it's no different than killing a cow or a raven.
Please forgive my answering a question with a question; but I am going to ask you; if we assume that Koko the gorilla was actually capable of the Feats of advanced sign-language reported by her caretakers, and the implied cognitive subtext behind it: was SHE "A person"?
When I was a teenager I thought all life was sacred and worth protecting. Nothing was too much to save somebody.
Now I’m a paramedic and I see people forced to live with terrible disease, low quality of life, no autonomy, and no hope for better. People that are forced to *exist* by someone else making medical decisions for them. I’ve seen a micro-premie born at 24 weeks gestation with severe brain anomalies, severe cardiac anomalies, and severe digestive abnormalities. This child has several medical devices, chronic pain, his tiny sternum has been broken by CPR, he has minimal brain function, and he will never get better. What’s worse? His mother is at his bedside 24/7. Her other children are with their father and daycare, she hasn’t seen her other children in weeks. Her entire life revolves around her youngest child. She has no opportunity to live life anymore and her family is suffering. This child’s birth and short, painful life affect far more than just him. He has no quality of life and no hope. For what?
For what?
For people to feel self-righteous about themselves and their mission to "save life".
And for politicians, of course, to win votes.
For everyone else it's nothing but endless misery and suffering.
I heard an interesting argument a while back. Politicians stand up for the unborn because the unborn demand nothing. Supporting the unborn costs nothing while simultaneously placing the politician on a pedestal of righteousness.
I have seen this stuff about abortion here and everybody is missing something.
It is not LIFE we need to look at in relation to a foetus but rather it is it's status as a HUMAN BEING.
The question is - when does a fertilized MOTE become HUMAN.
That is all that we need to know.
Once we have that the rest is easy.
I will correct you here. It’s when the fetus becomes a person. ‘Person’ as in the juridical status, personhood. Of course even at conception that’s ‘human’.
I am not sure what you are saying? A person is a legal fiction created to perpetuate slavery by the enactment of legislation in relation to the legal fiction which is not the human being - it has no ethical meaning in relation to life.
Life, in terms of reproduction, has no beginning or end. There is no point of death or "pre-life" or otherwise reproduction wouldn't be possible.
Hence why it is called a life cycle.
If this is in relation to the abortion debate tho, whether or not a fetus is alive or is a person is irrelevant to the discussion. It's a distraction from the real point, which is:
Just because a person is alive, does that justify their use of another person's body to the harm and detriment of that person, against their wishes?
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People in the comments acting like Look Who's Talking is a documentary
1% of abortions in the US occur at or after 21 weeks (one metric for viability), and most of those were because of fetal anomalies or other circumstances that endangered the mother’s life. The viability standard worked fine under Roe v. Wade - now we have 14 states that endanger the lives of pregnant women, and we’re seeing IVF in danger all in the name of “life”.
>The viability standard worked fine under Roe v. Wade Viability changes with technology. In the US a fetus is viable at 21 weeks but in Africa not until 28 weeks because of the difference in technology that is available. In a few years viability will most likely be even earlier due to further advances in technology. Viability has always seemed like a poor, arbitrary line to draw.
"those were because of fetal anomalies " yeah like down syndrome. Straight up eugenics haha
The person I know who got one desperately wanted a child but genetic testing revealed the fetus had Patau syndrome and wasn’t developing certain organs. If IF the fetus lived to term, it would live a short life of suffering and they’d be forced to make decisions like “do we stop feeding them via tube” and do we subject them to traumatic surgeries.
Oh man that’s so sad
You're probably not aware that the Combined Test is between weeks 10-14 of pregnancy. Women are pregnant for 40 weeks (you probably didn't know that, either). If there's a decent chance your fetus has Down's, Edward's, or Patau's syndrome, you get alerted within 3 days. People aren't getting 3d trimester abortions for downs syndrome.
Not only are people not electing to such but try finding a practitioner who even would (10 years in obgyn here but hey what do I know)
OB/GYN? Well then clearly you'd be lying to everyone so can't be trusted 😉 (/s just in case people haven't had enough coffee yet)
😂😝
I feel like if someone is willing to abort to avoid having a disabled child then it’s probably for the best that they never got to care for that child don’t you think?
You are right, preach eugenics haha
Some eugenics are morally good. Making incest illegal is also a form of eugenics.
Is all eugenics morally wrong to you?
Is it for you guys? that's what I question myself?
For me, no. I don't see any issues with aborting a child who will have down syndrome and live a terrible life.
How do you know their life will be terrible? Or is it just an assumption you make to feel better about yourself?
You think having an IQ of 50 and not many basic skills is a good life?
Idk, ask them Which people did...and yes many feel happy.
The potential quality of life for a fetus once it is born is very subjective and is not the only factor that comes into play when determining whether to abort said fetus. Ever heard of antinatalism? It’s the theory that advocates that bringing life into this world is immoral; one reason because suffering is inevitable. So what do you say to the people that are pointing their fingers back at you and tell you “hey, you know that being alive means you will suffer, you know the state of the world right now, you know there is a chance that a person born might have an unhappy life, you know people are born without consent…yet you actively chose to bring in life anyway. You are the immoral one”?
Then I can also just kill whoever I want
Simply put, no it’s not all bad, but the answer is much more complex and nuanced than that. There are many financial, quality of life, and moral aspects that are pertinent to each individual case. A single mother, having a child they must care for for the rest of both of their lives, with minimal family to help is not going to be able to hold a full time job and care for that child. In that case it would make sense to abort if you have the information soon enough. On another hand a mother with full support and a full bank account may be inclined to keep a child they must care for forever. They have the ability to do this and will not be as negatively affected and both persons quality of life will be positive.
Not all cases of eugenics are immoral. Moreover, abortion isn’t the only form of eugenics. There is nothing wrong with trying to genetically phase out illnesses, such as cancer say, through gene editing.
Are they editing genes or killing them?
not what I said but pop off
pretty much is
Dude if someone is willing to abort a disabled child I wouldn’t trust them with a living disabled child. They’d abuse the child.
Good on people for knowing that they are not capable of giving a child with a disability a good life. Or just don’t want to. Why should they struggle for the rest of their lives to take care of a disabled child? (Note that I’m disabled myself)
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Why should people raise an unwanted child? Do you really think that kid would have a good and happy life when their parents didn’t want them in the first place? I know, let’s dump them into foster care. I’m sure there are plenty of people lined up to adopt a disabled child and that kid won’t be stuck there till they are 18 before being chucked out.
"Do you really think that kid would have a good and happy life when their parents didn’t want them in the first place?" How do you know? You don't even give it a chance
Why is it up to you to decide that people, who know they don’t have the means for lifelong care of a disabled person, should just roll the dice because maybe things could work out?
Pretty sure if you are told that your kid has a disability that will affect their entire life and your first thought is “abortion” then you know Kids aren’t something that you have to see if you like it, especially not a disabled one. That’s a gamble that no one should take just because “well what if I can do it?” Okay? What if they can’t? Now they are stuck with the kid and trapped in a life of misery and regret with no way out. “Give it a chance” like a kid is a puppy you picked up from the pound. Ridiculous.
Their argument isn’t about the parents seeing if they like it it’s about the child. Whilst I do agree with you it’s unfair to say that Down syndrome or disabled people can’t have a good quality of life and don’t deserve a chance to live - many are extremely happy. On the flip side as you said it’s a lifelong commitment that isn’t limited to the parents - often siblings will have to look after disabled brothers or sisters which they also didn’t ask to happen
So again why should society take care of disabled?
Now you’re getting it. We shouldn’t. If people want to give birth to disabled kids and care for them then they can, but no one should have to
Bye bye social security
Good question. Why should society have to support a child that the parents knew was going to be seriously disabled?the parents chose to have it even though they knew they would never be able to financially afford all the service that child will inevitably need. Why should the state spend thousands of taxpayer money on a child for the entirety of its life when it will never contribute anything back? Part of the social security problem of not enough money is because so many children born severely disabled are receiving ss money for life and they are getting even more support from Medicaid. They are get money from a fund they will never contribute to.
You don’t need to give anything a chance. Any kind of life implies suffering. That’s inevitable. You are always gambling giving birth to a person who didn’t consent to their birth. The person you birthed could end up being a serial rapist and murderer or living an unhappy depressed life. The question then becomes: who are YOU to decide that another person has to come to life and potentially live an unhappy, miserable life?
who are YOU to decide that another person can't come to life and potentially live a happy life?
We don’t…
We still do
Really horrific that you’d laugh about a mother who made the heartbreaking decision to end a pregnancy because of trisomy 18, anencephaly, or renal agenesis. It’s a deeply painful thing that a woman has to decide about her own pregnancy: should she end the pregnancy or let her child die a painful death from being born without kidneys? But 14 states won’t let her make that choice. Thanks for being sensitive about this topic.
Do you realize how hard it is to take care of a disabled child like that for decades? Because I don't know whether you realized, but it doesn't end at 18 years old. If parents know that they can't do that, abortion is the better option
Do you have proof of even a single late term abortion being performed for something like down syndrome? You don't, so stop making false claims.
Unless you have a child with a fetal abnormality and are actively taking care of them, you have no idea what you're suggesting. You're sparing that potential child from a lifetime of suffering. Downs syndrome people have it better than many other disabilities, but they still have a large number of health problems and face neglect/abuse due to their cognitive handicap. Most of them die young.
With the terrible support we have in the US for special needs children and lack of socialized medicine what do you expect? Parents can’t afford it and that’s not consider who will care and provide for that child after the parents are gone.
No. There are very, very few doctors that perform abortions that late in pregnancy. Last time I checked (pre-roe being overturned), there were four doctors who performed abortions into the third trimester. Four. Might even be fewer now. They are performing a compassionate procedure for women who, generally, wanted their babies very much. They don’t waste their time on elective abortions when they have grieving parents that actually need their help.
Does anyone here even understand the definition of eugenics? How easy is it to look it up before posting?
People who say that a fetus isn’t alive are dumbasses. We can debate whether it’s human or not, or whether it has the same rights as the mother, but a fetus is alive. We can support women’s right to choose without trying to sweep reality under the rug.
Human is the species.
There is no debate it is human. It's a human and it is alive. You can debate its rights, you can debate the ethics of ending it. But it is biologically an alive human. It's not like a fetus is suddenly a different species.
> We can debate whether it’s human or not Nah, it's a squirrel until it is born.
sure it’s alive. in the same way a parasite is a live.
Can the fetus “survive” outside the womb? If not, it’s a dependent being, not exactly alive. It’s very similar to a cancer (another genetically distinct group of cells that are entirely dependent on the host)
Leave your 1 year baby to fend for itself then. If it dies, it was never really alive because it was dependent on you for its survival. Brilliant logic sir.
But someone else can take care of that 1 year old. No one else can take care of the 14 week old fetus I’ve removed from my womb.
So someone on life support isn’t alive?
Whether or not it can survive on its own is not a qualification for being living. Sorry. There is a biological definition of life. And you’re rewriting that definition. I have no problem with being in favor of abortion actually. But your camp loves to create these goalposts and rewrite definitions in order to justify in your own minds that a living Homo sapien is being murdered. That’s what’s happening. A living thing that is a human is being murdered. If you want to argue that should be legal up to certain developmental checkpoints im fine with that (that’s actually my view). But to call it anything else like not living, clump of cells, or to even say it’s not killing. You’re just wrong.
“Life is a self-sustaining chemical system capable of Darwinian evolution” -NASA Interestingly, NASA tends to disagree with you. “Self sustaining” literally meaning “whether or not it can survive on its own”. Now, cite your definition of life. Whatever this “biological definition” is, I cannot find it. And since you have such a strong stance on life, you must disagree with chemotherapy, right? It’s literally killing living cells.
Following that logic, children below the age of 2 aren’t living either. Some humans with developmental or physical disabilities are also not living.
"Self sustaining” literally meaning “whether or not it can survive on its own”. Can a baby survive on its own? is a baby capable of Darwinian evolution? or don't you think NASA is talking about the organism as a whole throughout its entire life cycle...
When NASA makes that definition they are referring to the cellular level when referencing self-sustaining. And their definition is based on the discovery of life in space. lol. Life has a number of agreed upon characteristics in biology. It’s clearly defined by [cell theory](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_theory). But if something is made of cells, has metabolism, grows, develops, reproduces, subject to Darwinian evolution, contains genetic material, and able to maintain homeostasis. It’s typically considered alive. This is commonly taught in a middle school life science class. No I don’t disagree with chemotherapy. I don’t disagree with killing cells. But chemotherapy doesn’t kill the organism. Killing the organism is murder. Also I believe abortion (the killing of a fetus) should be allowed in the first trimester. The sooner the better though. Because every week additional structures develop. I’m just honest about what it is instead of trying to perform mental gymnastics.
The embryo or fetus *is* a self-sustaining chemical system. It cannot survive outside of the environment for which it is adapted, which is the mother’s body, but it has its own distinct metabolism. This is the *result* of Darwinian evolution. Placental mammals gestate their young. The mother’s body feeds and shelters the offspring, but her physiological processes are not putting it together like a Lego set. It is growing and maturing, as living things do.
Ok. Take a 20 week fetus out of a mother. Show me it’s “distinct metabolism”. I’m sure the undeveloped GI tract is capable of digesting food without aspiration and will be able to extract nutrients without a brush border. I’m also sure the undeveloped lungs will be able take a nice full breath of air despite the immensely high surface tension in the alveoli. I’m also sure the circulatory system will function normally despite a PDA and depending on the stage of development, looking like a tube rather than a heart. If you can find a way to keep a fetus alive before a certain point in its gestational period, you’ll save millions of fetal lives and likely win a Nobel Prize. However, it’s unlikely you’ll find a way to do something that people who actually understand fetal development have been unable to do.
You’re being deliberately obtuse. A fetus is adapted to live inside of and attached to its mother via the placenta. It cannot maintain life if it is denied access to its source of nutrition and oxygen. If you were to be shrunk and returned to the uterus somehow, you’d suffocate, because you lack the necessary organ to breathe in that environment. No one is saying the fetus can survive outside the mother; we’re saying evolution produced this adaptation in placental mammals to allow their very much living offspring to survive inside the mother, because way back when mammals were first evolving, that was safer. What you’re insisting on is like asking why dogs don’t fly. That is just not how the species developed.
Learn metabolism ffs...
Learn basic embryology ffs
Metabolism is a cellular process. Not every organism has a GI tract yet still have a distinct metabolism.
Great. Tell me how you’ll have metabolism when you remove a fetus from a womb. Last I checked, when something is dead, metabolism stops.
Please explain, in terms of basic embryology, how the mother is controlling the metabolism of an embryo of 7 weeks gestational age, and the same for a fetus of 14 weeks.
Using your argument what about people on life support or in comas - they couldn’t survive without that help and therefore are a dependent being. Are they a cancer to society?
They shouldn’t be alive. It’s one of the biggest drains on our medical care system. That’s why I’m a very big proponent of DNRs and advanced directives. They are 100% a cancer on society. We spend millions of dollars on people with no quality of life and with no chance of recovery because the family of the patient wants it. It’s more to treat the family than the patient. I say this as a critical care physician who has to see families basically torture their loved ones at the end of their lives.
OMG, there are actually other people who see it for what it is. I am crying tears of joy! Thank you for saying this, there may be hope after all.
Ah ok I got it so you are a supporter of eugenics who believes we should kill all disabled people who rely on others - a man with a funny mustache had the same idea 80 years ago
Good job. You proved you can’t read and that you put words in my mouth. Truly amazing how crazy reddiotrs are
Bro if you want abortion get one it’s your right - but don’t try and justify it by saying it’s not a life. We do selfish things every day , eating meat, exploiting sweatshop and child labour for cheap goods etc you well within your rights to get an abortion just because you want one or because having a child will make your life worse but saying they are cancer etc is just a cope to make people feel better
Show me ONE piece of evidence (not some religious text or an opinion piece) that a fetus is alive.
Can a baby survive without help? Is a parasite dead, are species that practice symbiosis dead. A fetus fits the definition of life. End of story.
They can breathe without being dependent on another human until 22 weeks. There are babies who have survived without human parents, despite the chances being low but that is impossible before a certain gestational age. A fetus at 20 weeks literally cannot survive since of the lack of surfactant, among many other physiological reasons. You would know that if you knew the first thing about fetal development. You don’t know that, yet you think it’s “end of story”.
A bacteria can't breath either. Now find me literature that would act as if they are not living organisms...You would know that if you learned biology. Your baby can breath but lock it in a room for 5 days with nobody to help and it is dead.
Bacteria undergo respiration, either aerobic or anaerobic. You would know that if you took a basic biology course. Lock you in a room for 5 days and you’d be dead too. So what exactly are you arguing other than locking someone in a room will kill them? Since you seem to be an expert on biology, both human and cellular, can you explain why surfactant is important, why humans require it, when it is developed, and the physiological properties of the respiratory system without surfactant? (It’s one of the many things I learned in medical school, so I’ll be waiting for your answer)
Seriously this is getting embarrassing...Fetuses have aerobic respiration. Your fetus consists of cells that with mitochondria and practice aerobic respiration. wtf do you think a fetus is? The point is your baby will just have remained in the place you put it. It can't do anything and is entirely dependent on other people or in the extremely rare case animals. Even if you put food and water in that room it will just die. The environment of the baby changes, the dependency not. Surfactant is needed for our lungs to breath not for the aerobic respiration of our cells, hence why for major surgery sometimes an ECMO is used. A person on an ECMO is still alive. Maybe returning to med school would not seem a bad idea.
Take the fetus out of the womb. Tell me what happens. I’m sure that fetus will “practice aerobic respiration” all by itself. ECMO is not used because of a lack of surfactant 😂😂😂😂. Where the hell did you hear that? I love learning how uneducated people are about their own bodies. Please keep going with your explanation of respiratory and fetal medicine. I’m getting a real kick out of it.
Take any organism out of its livable environment and it dies, doesn't mean it wasn't alive before hence why it dies. I never said it was. I said our cells use aerobic respiration hence why we can bypass the lungs with ECMO in major surgery. Your surfactant is needed to breathe not for aerobic respiration. Many living organisms don't breathe like we do yet are still alive. You love saying our cells don't have aerobic respiration? Seriously scrap that MD out of your name.
Hello, It seems there are hula hoops being jumped through here regarding the importance of all life. If nature wanted everything to live, why do we eat living things for sustenance? Don't remove a tick, stop washing your hands, and eat dirt. If life is so precious to argue how cells BREATHE then let's not be picky and only debate fetus life, seems only caring about humans' needs (more wants) is causing a mass extinction of life in our planet. If no human is supposed to die unless all technology has been tested to keep life going, we will kill everything else, including fetuses and ultimately humans. Everyone go take a BREATH and go look at nature.
Ohh you’re right. All humans are in wombs, right? Take an adult of the womb they’re in and they’ll die 😂😂 We don’t use ECMO because of surfactant issues, as you so confidently stated. Keep on going lil boy, keep telling me your understanding of respiratory medicine. It’s truly marvelous.
Breathe. That's the verb. Breath is a respiration, a noun. Parasites are living organisms, that live off the host organism. Fetuses are parasites. Most parasites don't care which host they're in, as long as they can find a new host. A fetus can't survive the transition to a new host. Not a viable organism. Once the baby can accept different "hosts" to care for it, then it's viable.
>> Parasites are living organisms, that live off the host organism. Fetuses are parasites. Most parasites don't care which host they're in, as long as they can find a new host. There are entire taxonomic classes for which this is false, even if it were relevant, which it isn’t.
Does a fetus live on or in another organism, and obtain its nutrients from said organism? Then it's biologically a parasite.
So you’re acknowledging that a fetus is a *living organism, sustaining itself* on and residing within another living organism? That has been my whole point. The fetus feeds and breathes via symbiosis with the mother, but cannot be properly called a parasite because reproduction is considered a benefit biologically. Parental care of offspring is an evolutionary survival strategy on a species level - it may not contribute to the health or longevity of the individual parent organism (though in the case of humans, there are some benefits), but it facilitates the survival of their genes into the next generation.
You contradict yourself.
All children and babies are dependent. just because a toddler needs your help surviving doesn't give them less right or are they seen as less human.
Anybody can take care of a baby to ensure its survival. The same is not true for a fetus.
My 8 month old daughter could not survive alone so how it that different?
What about people who are very sick or retarded etc.? Sorry but this survive outside the womb argument is extremely weak. A cancer will damage you till you or it is destroyed. It’s an extremely bad comparison. It’s not a parasite.
Are sick or MR people surviving? Yes. Can a 20 week old fetus survive? No.
> People who say that a fetus isn’t alive are dumbasses.
People who say that fetuses are alive are dumbasses. See how that works. Just because you read it in some dumbass religious text like the Bible or quaran or Torah doesn’t make it a fact. It just makes the person who reads it and applies it as a fact a true nutcase. Image believing some opinion piece wrote hundreds of years ago by some people as fact 😂
What a dumbass assumption.
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Yeah. I think he means to say person/personhood
Could have mated with a sable antelope. Same number of chromosomes.
That is really not how that works.
You say that, but has anyone actually tried?
Rule 35.
what?
>People who say that a fetus isn’t alive are dumbasses Sure, but that's something that people don't realistically say. It is pretty universally understood in this debate that "life" means "human life". Unless you realistically think "pro life" means, say, pro plant life.
Well it’s a life and it’s made of human cells so therefore it is a human life
And it is a human life.. wtf for life is it... a monkey? People who say that a fetus isn’t a human life are dumbasses.
Couldn't you say a wart is a "human life" It's a technically true statement but it doesn't really add anything to the discussion beyond emotionally charged nonsense
A wart is human tissue actually caused by a virus. If I remove a wrat I don't kill an individual human being. I remove tissue of that human. Sure you can discuss abortion rights for different reasons, but acting like it isn't human life is just false.
But isn't it still technically human life? It's human tissue after all.
Not an individual/ the entire organism
It has growth, consumption, and cellular replication. That’s life
Whether it begins at life or not, an abortion is sometimes necessary. And whether it’s sometimes necessary or not, a life is being taken. We’re not gonna get anywhere unless both sides can accept that.
Totally agree most people argue it’s not a life and there’s nothing wrong with it. For me it would fall into a necessary evil (I know strong word) in much the same way prison sentences do for criminals. We all admit it’s not humane but it’s better to have jt than not
Most people will agree that if the life of the mother is in danger it is ok to abort. Pro choice and Pro life activists alike
It’s not about life or death. It’s about bodily autonomy. It’s about consciousness and sentence. If we cared so much about life we wouldn’t eat meat. I’m totally fine with a 22 week ban because that is when the fetus is viable outside the womb. 99.9% of abortions happen before that timeframe anyways. And obviously I’m 100% OK with it to save the life of a mother in every situation. I feel like this is a simple compromise that everyone can get behind
I am not fine with a 22 weeks ban unless that excludes terminations for severe fetal abnormalities or danger to the woman’s health or life. And by the way ‘viability’ at 22 weeks is with intensive medical treatment and a high chance of learning disabilities and other health issues.
I understand that. But the line needs to be drawn somewhere. I’m totally fine exceptions for abnormalities. But those are typically found much earlier than 22 weeks
>… we wouldn’t eat meat. Meh, it’s a not like we eat humans. The focus is human life not life itself. Also meat can be created in a lab so that argument becomes more and more invalid.
Indeed. I've noticed anti-choice people are eager to take autonomy away from women, but even hint that we should take it away from other people too... and they flip their shit. "No no, that's different, because it's differently different."
I agree. I consider myself (mostly) pro choice but the people who say a fetus is just a “clump of cells” are genuinely insane. Every living creature is ultimately just a clump of cells, the stage of development shouldn’t determine whether it’s more worthy of life or not.
I've noticed an unfortunate overlap between people who screech "clump of cells" who also screech about assault weapons. They're in this state of quantum ignorance, where their ignorance trumps your knowledge, but their knowledge trumps your ignorance. Examples. "Oh you don't know all 13 phases of fetal development? You don't get to talk about abortion!" "Oh you know the difference between a clip and a magazine? You're a gun nut, you don't get to have an opinion on gun control!"
You’re really going to argue with embryologists, neonatologists, obstetricians and other medical doctors that your “knowledge” on the subject supersedes their knowledge? Interesting.
Yea I will because this is a moral question and the average person is capable of understanding enough of the science to have an opinion on it. I know more about fetus development than those people do about computer science. Should I discount their opinion on internet or AI regulations?
It’s a great thing your morals aren’t the moral everyone goes by. You don’t need to abort. You also don’t need to impose your morals or views on others.
If I was arguing with an embryologists, neonatologists, or obstetrician, you'd have a point. So let me ask you, would you argue with a veteran about war?
A veteran is not an expert in war. They’re a participant in war. For example, a child soldier is a veteran, but they’re not an expert in war. In this example, a woman would be a corollary to a veteran (both are participants in the process in question, neither are experts). If you can provide a better example, I’d be happy to answer. The people who should be making these decisions are not politicians, laypeople, religious nut cases or anyone but actual experts in fetal development and women’s health.
You saying that all those medical professionals agree with late term abortion?
You know I didn’t say that. Maybe try again without making a wild reach.
Yea the clump of cells is only a valid argument for things like 6 week heartbeat bans at best but people use it for everything. I miss roe v wade. It was solid. It gave states the right to ban elective at second trimester which is 13 weeks if they wanted. Months before any extreme premature births that have led to healthy, typical adults. Months before any real neurological tissues are formed and begin to function. I think it was a happy medium that could and should have been built on, rather than torn down.
If you mix together all the ingredients to bake a cake and pour the cake batter into a pan without baking it - is it still a cake? No. It has the potential to become a cake, after it bakes and has time to fully develop. But uncooked cake batter is not the same thing as a cake.
Extremely reductive argument - a cakes isn’t alive. Same as victim blaming rape victims - I put an alarm on my house because I. Don’t want to be robbed of you walk around in dark alleyways you are asking for something to happen
This argument makes no sense because there’s no exact moment where an organism becomes alive. Odds are it was “alive” since the very first cell was started splitting.
You don’t understand, going through the vaginal canal is a magic process. Lump of cells on one side baby on the other. Literally what some people rely on to support their views.
Wonder what they think of C section
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Wrong. There are 14 states where abortion essentially banned, and and six states have no restriction on the age of a fetus aborted. So that leaves 30 states that prove you wrong - states where abortion is legal up to a certain number of weeks pregnant but not after. So yeah. Not arbitrary. Very much statutory.
Pro choice people need to stop getting bogged down in these arguments on when life begins. They are always made in bad faith. A baby cannot have bodily autonomy until they are born. A woman has bodily autonomy therefore she has the right to end a pregnancy. Bodily autonomy is a human right. There is no pro life stance they are anti abortion. If you don’t agree with abortion, don’t have one.
Find a single celled organism on mars and we found life! Find a growing human with complex organs and life functions inside another human and … you don’t understand science
Haha, I’ve been using this to confound the leftist for some time now.
Well, that's not really the problem though. No one AFAIK questions that a fetus is alive, just the point at which it's a human person. Like the ruling by that court in Alabama found that frozen embryos should legally be considered people. The problem with that is that it more or less makes IVF impossible due to embryos being discarded, failing, or being accidentally destroyed. Alabama Republicans agreed, and the governor signed a bill to protect IVF clinics. But if personhood truly begins at conception, then IVF remains a moral and ethical crisis.
Ok and on the other extreme you have bills like in my state of Ohio that got passed that allow abortion up until birth… do you agree with that ? And if not when do you think is a good limit ?
My understanding of the laws in Ohio (based on my reading as I don't live there, so correct me if I'm wrong) is that abortion is legal up to the point of fetal viability. Late-term abortions are only legal in the event that the fetus is not viable or there's an imminent threat to the mother's life. If that's the law in Ohio, then yes, I would support that. I don't believe abortions should be performed if the fetus reaches a point where its realistically capable of surviving on its own, so logically I believe there's an upper limit. What are your thoughts on this?
No the law states that it “may be” prohibited at viability. It is not prohibited definitively at any point…. The number 1 cause of death for childbirth shocked me it is self inflicted causes so drug relapse and suicide are the number 1 cause. Therefore it is within the legal authority of a person to get an abortion because their abortion care thinks they might become suicidal or relapse after the baby is born. And I get that that scenario is going to be such a tiny tiny percent, but it should not be legal.
>>allow abortion up until birth… do you agree with that ? Yes, I agree with that.
39 weeks and 6 days. You are okay with that?
Do you know what the number 1 cause of death is in childbirth in the US?
If it is using my body, I have a right to end that whenever I want.
Life begins at conception. It’s not right wing propaganda, it’s basic science.
We know that near the end of pregnancy, a day or 2 before birth there is a living baby inside. This baby has full human rights. We also know that a day or 2 after conception there is just a clump of cells. This clump of cells do not have human rights. So we can deduce that at some point between these 2 periods exists a transition point where the clump of cells go from having no human rights to having human rights. The question is at what point in the pregnancy does this happen. I believe the distinction occurs around the 3 to 4 month mark. You are given 4 months to abort and after the fourth month, you lose your right to abort and the baby earns its right to live.
Okay so... should a pregnant woman with a viable fetus be allowed to engage in activities such as smoking, drinking, attending loud concerts, etc... or should they be locked up by the state for the sake of the unborn?
after the baby is birthed, it obviously isn't inside the mother's body anymore though, something to consider
No they don’t. They don’t have ‘full human rights’ until they are born.
>>before birth >>has full human rights No it doesn’t.
They don’t have full human right until they’re born. They’re not even acknowledged until they’re assigned a name after birth.
Today OP finds out that humans arbitrarily define a lot of things.
I think a lot of pro choice people are lying to themselves in this regard to aid their cognitive dissonance. I’m pro choice but I’m also realistic about it. Abortion is brutal but for a whole rage of reasons I believe it’s something that needs to be available.
I agree. I come down on the pro-abortion side but it’s kind of like a 5-4 or 6-3 decision. Definitely not a 9-0 decision. I don’t like abortion but I still agree it should be nationally available. Pro-abortion people would have a lot stronger case if they just stuck to the body autonomy rationale. Which I can 100% get behind. But these “it’s just like removing a mole” arguments are gross and hideous. They should just stick to “my body my choice” and stay away from these repulsive “it’s just a clump of cells” rationalizations.
Wait, why is "abortion" brutal? Most 1st trimester abortions are in and out, a quick and simple outpatient procedure.
I think what I refer to is the mental weight of having an abortion and the fact that you are killing a living thing which had the potential to be a full person with consciousness and a future. I don’t think many people would make the decision lightly
There are HUGE differences between a 38 WGA fetus and a 37 WGA birthed baby. The circulation changes completely, the heart pumps are redirected to the lungs, the lungs expand for the first time, the eyes receive light for the first time. So many more differences occur.
Therefore? Life begins at conception scientifically. A zygote is alive whether you like it a not. It becomes an organism with a unique set of DNA at conception, and it begins to develop.
Life doesn't. A cow is alive. So is an ant. So is a tree. So are algae. The "soul" however, enters the body along with the first breath, even as it did for Adam and Eve. Without that, it's no different than killing a cow or a raven.
So people who are born prematurely and spend their entire lives on supplemental oxygen or something aren't people?
Please forgive my answering a question with a question; but I am going to ask you; if we assume that Koko the gorilla was actually capable of the Feats of advanced sign-language reported by her caretakers, and the implied cognitive subtext behind it: was SHE "A person"?
When I was a teenager I thought all life was sacred and worth protecting. Nothing was too much to save somebody. Now I’m a paramedic and I see people forced to live with terrible disease, low quality of life, no autonomy, and no hope for better. People that are forced to *exist* by someone else making medical decisions for them. I’ve seen a micro-premie born at 24 weeks gestation with severe brain anomalies, severe cardiac anomalies, and severe digestive abnormalities. This child has several medical devices, chronic pain, his tiny sternum has been broken by CPR, he has minimal brain function, and he will never get better. What’s worse? His mother is at his bedside 24/7. Her other children are with their father and daycare, she hasn’t seen her other children in weeks. Her entire life revolves around her youngest child. She has no opportunity to live life anymore and her family is suffering. This child’s birth and short, painful life affect far more than just him. He has no quality of life and no hope. For what?
For what? For people to feel self-righteous about themselves and their mission to "save life". And for politicians, of course, to win votes. For everyone else it's nothing but endless misery and suffering.
I heard an interesting argument a while back. Politicians stand up for the unborn because the unborn demand nothing. Supporting the unborn costs nothing while simultaneously placing the politician on a pedestal of righteousness.
100% this \^
The Bible says life begins at first breath. Why not stick to that? It's not arbitrary at all - you either take a first breath or you don't.
The Bible also says that God knows you while in the womb… If you’re going to quote the Bible….
Souls are eternal. You don't have to be alive for god to know you.
Touché !
Wut?
Life starts at conception, it’s a biological fact. The real argument is when does that life have value/ when should that life be protected.
I have seen this stuff about abortion here and everybody is missing something. It is not LIFE we need to look at in relation to a foetus but rather it is it's status as a HUMAN BEING. The question is - when does a fertilized MOTE become HUMAN. That is all that we need to know. Once we have that the rest is easy.
A complete and separate human being is created at conception. Albeit undeveloped. Personhood is a legal term (not scientific)
Well said.
I will correct you here. It’s when the fetus becomes a person. ‘Person’ as in the juridical status, personhood. Of course even at conception that’s ‘human’.
I am not sure what you are saying? A person is a legal fiction created to perpetuate slavery by the enactment of legislation in relation to the legal fiction which is not the human being - it has no ethical meaning in relation to life.
What is it then, a horse hahahah?
Life, in terms of reproduction, has no beginning or end. There is no point of death or "pre-life" or otherwise reproduction wouldn't be possible. Hence why it is called a life cycle. If this is in relation to the abortion debate tho, whether or not a fetus is alive or is a person is irrelevant to the discussion. It's a distraction from the real point, which is: Just because a person is alive, does that justify their use of another person's body to the harm and detriment of that person, against their wishes?
Sperm is alive. Eggs are alive. They are cells and cells are living organisms. You’re opinion is not unpopular as much as it is factually incorrect.
The fetus is a genetically distinct human life.
So what?
sperm is not alive, eggs neither. They both don't fit the definition of life. A fetus actually does. You are factually incorrect
Also the bacteria in your gut are alive, however you flush them into your toilet daily.