JUST IN | US Supreme Court ends constitutional right to abortion

[tetrasect]

A fly, no matter how small the blocks, will never be able to put the cube into the square hole or the ball into the circular hole.

You'd be surprised. There are some crazy experiments out there, each one showing them to be more intelligent than the last. They can count, learn to recognize and respond to imagery, they have been found to think about and decide what to do when presented with a choice, it's really quite fascinating

It's a matter of potential, not temporal status.

Is it though?

This is what I was alluding to earlier. Is masturbation a sin because sperm has the potential to become a human being?

Drawing the line at "potential" doesn't make sense, it has to be drawn at the state where the actual abortion takes place. This is why everyone disagrees with abortion at 8 months and very few disagree with abortion at 4 weeks and almost nobody at 2 days.

 

[tetrasect]

As opposed to the people that have been cheering Ukraine.
Ukraine should just give up. Lives saved.

Inb4 but Russia should. reeeeeeeeee

And the circle continues.

Yeah the problem is not the Russians bombing civilians, it's the Ukrainians trying to stop them.
If only they had given up when Hitler was around, lives would have been saved.

 

[Gyre]

 

[konfab]

its the most unique situation on earth where the life of one entity is 100% dependent on a specific other entity being alive an well.

Absolutely, its uniqueness begets the restrictions.

You should thing about this matter philosophically. Let's take it as a fact for this argument that a foetus is a human being. The question is: is it morally justifiable to kill them? I am going to steel man this and give you the one of the best arguments in defence of abortion

This is the pro abortion side of the debate:

In her well-known article "A Defense of Abortion", Judith Jarvis Thomson argues that abortion is in some circumstances permissible even if the embryo is a person and has a right to life, because the embryo's right to life is overtrumped by the woman's right to control her body and its life-support functions; in short, Thomson's argument is that the right to life does not include or entail the right to use someone else's body. Her central argument involves a thought experiment. Thomson asks us to imagine that an individual (call Bob) wakes up in bed next to a famous violinist. He is unconscious with a fatal kidney ailment; and because only Bob happens to have the right blood type to help, the Society of Music Lovers has kidnapped Bob and plugged his circulatory system into the violinist's so that Bob's kidneys can filter poisons from his blood as well as his own. If the violinist is disconnected from Bob now, he will die; but in nine months he will recover and can be safely disconnected. Thomson takes it that one may permissibly unplug oneself from the violinist even though this will kill him. The right to life, Thomson says, does not entail the right to use another person's body, and so in disconnecting the violinist one does not violate his right to life but merely deprives him of something—the use of another person's body—to which he has no right. Similarly, even if the fetus has a right to life, it does not have a right to use the pregnant woman's body and life-support functions against her will; and so aborting the pregnancy is permissible in at least some circumstances. However, Thomson notes that the woman's right to abortion does not include the right to directly insist upon the death of the child, should the fetus happen to be viable, that is, capable of surviving outside the womb

Not withstanding the fact that this argument pretty much nullifies every leftist's dream of universal healthcare, it is a really good argument IMO.

However there is a response to this that I watched that really nullifies the concerns it raises, and pretty much convinced me on my stance on abortion.

Instead of being a violinist that needs your kidney to live, consider the following scenario. Instead of a hospital bed, you are confined to a cabin in the middle of nowhere, no-one else can reach you for 9 months. In this cabin there is a newborn baby. All the formula and equipment you need to look after the baby is there for you to use. After the 9 months, you have no real obligation to look after the baby. For all intents and purposes that baby is 100% dependant on you and your body to live.
Is it morally permissible for you to not look after the baby because the baby does not have the right to your body? If after 9 months, the cabin is opened and you are found with the corpse of a baby that starved to death when you had the means to feed and look after it, should you be charged with negligence ?

Why this argument convinced me, is that the child in question doesn't even need to be related to you. And it much more accurately represents the burden that a woman would endure from pregnancy. If you consider the calorific burden of a foetus on a woman, it amounts to almost nothing extra in terms of effort:

The reality is you need only 100 extra calories a day during your first trimester, and 300 extra calories a day in the next two. That means adding the equivalent of an extra glass of milk in the first trimester; a glass of milk, an apple, and a couple of graham crackers in the second and third.

Eating for 2 -- but Not Too Much

You should gain weight while pregnant, but there's a way to do it so that you and your baby are healthy.

www.webmd.com

Natural abortions happen all the time, the body decides all by its self that it no longer wants to carry the baby for a variety of different reasons.
Perhaps the body is under a lot of strain, not getting enough nutrition, sick etc
There are also several checkpoints where the fetus is evaluated and if its not growing fast enough or not developing correctly it will just reject it.
It really sucks when this happens, especially if your heart really wants a baby but if the body can choose for its self not to carry to term then why can't the mind.

Its not moral decay - its nature.

This is a weird and frankly, stupid argument. People die of heart attacks without intervention, therefore it is morally justifiable to induce a heart attack in someone else?

 

[Gyre]

 

[Arthur]

View attachment 1337138

Typical Democrat.
Kill what you don't want or like. And if you can't support yourself or your child, mooch off others.
Sick.

 

[konfab]

View attachment 1337138

So if there was a federal program that helped out lower income woman with their childcare costs, you would argue that elective abortions (that is non rape/incest/health) are Indefensible?

 

[Gnarls]

View attachment 1337138

He continues with his idiocy.

 

[tetrasect]

Typical Democrat.
Kill what you don't want or like. And if you can't support yourself or your child, mooch off others.
Sick.

Wow.

You're not helping your case.

In the U.S., the average cost of a vaginal birth is $13,024, including standard predelivery and postdelivery expenses such as facility fees and doctor fees. A cesarean section (C-section) is much more expensive, costing an average of $22,646 including standard predelivery and postdelivery expenses.

 

[konfab]

There is an easier way round it...

who ends up in the military - the poor
who has abortions - the poor

The military is actually kvetching about this:

Nothing is more important to me or to this Department than the health and well-being of our Service members, the civilian workforce and DOD families. I am committed to taking care of our people and ensuring the readiness and resilience of our Force. The Department is examining this decision closely and evaluating our policies to ensure we continue to provide seamless access to reproductive health care as permitted by federal law.

https://www.defense.gov/News/Releas...loyd-j-austin-iii-on-the-supreme-courts-ruli/

With recruitment already under strain due to factors including low unemployment and few eligible recruits, the court’s decision could make it even harder to attract new service members with some recruits wary of being based in states where reproductive rights are at greater risk.

That’s an added risk with so many military bases in states like Texas, Mississippi and Alabama, where abortion is already or expected to soon be outlawed entirely. Women make up almost 20% of the 1.3 million-member active-duty force.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...ssure-after-supreme-court-s-abortion-decision

 

[Gnarls]

So if there was a federal program that helped out lower income woman with their childcare costs, you would argue that elective abortions (that is non rape/incest/health) are Indefensible?

LOL

 

[vigras rojara]

Guys guys guys...

I know it's off topic and a little pedantic, but the plural of "woman" is "women".

It's ubiquitous in this thread. Are we all dummies? If we can differentiate between "man" and "men", then perhaps we can get this right too.

Ok, back to debating the world's moral/practical issues.

Thanks.

 

[Gyre]

LOL

 

[Gnarls]

View attachment 1337176

Moar bs.

 

[konfab]

Wow.

You're not helping your case.

In the U.S., the average cost of a vaginal birth is $13,024, including standard predelivery and postdelivery expenses such as facility fees and doctor fees. A cesarean section (C-section) is much more expensive, costing an average of $22,646 including standard predelivery and postdelivery expenses.

So is abortion morally indefensible in countries with generous government healthcare and childcare programs?

The fact of the matter is that even if the US had the same levels of state sponsored healthcare and childcare as Finland, the pro-abortion crowd would still insist on elective abortions being legal. Unless if you are willing to concede that elective abortions are not needed in a generous welfare state, I won't consider the cost argument you are making to be a valid defence of abortion.

 

[Nerfherder]

So is abortion morally indefensible in countries with generous government healthcare and childcare programs?

The fact of the matter is that even if the US had the same levels of state sponsored healthcare and childcare as Finland, the pro-abortion crowd would still insist on elective abortions being legal. Unless if you are willing to concede that elective abortions are not needed in a generous welfare state, I won't consider the cost argument you are making to be valid.

I bet they have less abortions though.

So then if you really wanted to solve the problem you would look at what they are doing

 

[rietrot]

Nope. Not telling people what to do with their bodies. It's telling them what not to do with their bodies, viz no-one may use their body to aggress against another innocent human.

This imperative (ie legal order/instruction) axiomatically arises from the fundamental social and civilisational rule that the only legitimate use of force is in self-defence to repel the aggression of another, and then only against the aggressor.

Society establishes institutions such as government to give effect to this fundamental rule. That is why society (via its police and courts) will punish you if you use your body to intentionally assault or kill another, or take someone else's property without their permission. It's telling you what you may not do with your body.

The whole of society is vitally interested in protecting the life and property of each individual in that society. Without exception. Or should be.

In its legal institutions it does so primarily by prohibiting aggression.

Without this rule social living quickly breaks down and civilisation crumbles.

The prohibition is all-encompassing, includes all humans, and admits no exceptions -- It matters not whether the victim aggressed against is awake or sleeping, conscious or unconscious, old or young, dependent or independent, intelligent or stupid, large or small, black or white, citizen or alien, sick or healthy, handicapped or abled, willing or unwilling. Etc.

Babies in the womb are human babies. They are entitled to the same protections as any other human.

Yes, they might not legally be persons in the way the law uses that term for matters like inheritance, contract, liability, and so on. But they are emphatically human in every other respect. Like all other humans of whatever status or condition, they may not be intentionally or negligently killed.

Abortion is an horrific and unconscionable assault on a fellow human being.

Allowing it legally corrupts our legal system at its core because it makes an exception to the fundamental principle against aggression. Once society allows exceptions to the law against aggression, everything else is fair game. It's the line that cannot be crossed without bringing disaster on everyone.

Now we cannot completely abolish human iniquity. Murders, assaults, thefts and other aggressions will always be a sad reality. But under no circumstances can or should they become legally permissible.

You are talking to someone that just tried to make the argument that a human life doesn't matter.

The same kind of mentality that a cold blooded murder have, when they kill someone for a cellphone.

But at the same time spews off regressive talking points about bodily autonomy.

 

[Nerfherder]

Absolutely, its uniqueness begets the restrictions.

You should thing about this matter philosophically. Let's take it as a fact for this argument that a foetus is a human being. The question is: is it morally justifiable to kill them? I am going to steel man this and give you the one of the best arguments in defence of abortion

Its not a human being.

This is the pro abortion side of the debate:

Not withstanding the fact that this argument pretty much nullifies every leftist's dream of universal healthcare, it is a really good argument IMO.

I don't see how. It would work both ways then as you must have universal healthcare if you want to restrict abortion in anyway.

However there is a response to this that I watched that really nullifies the concerns it raises, and pretty much convinced me on my stance on abortion.

Instead of being a violinist that needs your kidney to live, consider the following scenario. Instead of a hospital bed, you are confined to a cabin in the middle of nowhere, no-one else can reach you for 9 months. In this cabin there is a newborn baby. All the formula and equipment you need to look after the baby is there for you to use. After the 9 months, you have no real obligation to look after the baby. For all intents and purposes that baby is 100% dependant on you and your body to live.
Is it morally permissible for you to not look after the baby because the baby does not have the right to your body? If after 9 months, the cabin is opened and you are found with the corpse of a baby that starved to death when you had the means to feed and look after it, should you be charged with negligence ?

Why this argument convinced me, is that the child in question doesn't even need to be related to you. And it much more accurately represents the burden that a woman would endure from pregnancy. If you consider the calorific burden of a foetus on a woman, it amounts to almost nothing extra in terms of effort:

I don't get it at all... will have to watch the video when I have time. i have a response but let me understand what you are saying first because I don't think I have heard this argument before.

This is a weird and frankly, stupid argument. People die of heart attacks without intervention, therefore it is morally justifiable to induce a heart attack in someone else?

Then you have misunderstood it. Would you keep a 100 year old cancer patient alive (using extreme measures ) and choose not to help a sick child who just needs some meds ?
Everyone dies eventually so there are many cases where you would exclude care for someone to save another.

Like if a mother has 2 kids already and having a 3rd means she will put her life at risk. Do you take the chance she will die just to save a baby that would starve anyway along with its siblings ?

 

[tetrasect]

So is abortion morally indefensible in countries with generous government healthcare and childcare programs?
I won't consider the cost argument you are making to be a valid defence of abortion.

That is only one of the reasons to have an abortion.

I was making the point that financial reasons for getting an abortion are not concocted, they are valid. And forcing someone to carry a child and then call them a mooch when they can't afford it is despicable.

Also, it stands to reason that yes, if there were actual generous government healthcare and childcare programs there would be less abortions.

 

[Arthur]

Wow.

You're not helping your case.

In the U.S., the average cost of a vaginal birth is $13,024, including standard predelivery and postdelivery expenses such as facility fees and doctor fees. A cesarean section (C-section) is much more expensive, costing an average of $22,646 including standard predelivery and postdelivery expenses.

You're right. The moral case against abortion makes no sense to someone whose primary values are economic, utilitarian or consequentialist. For those people, everything - including the value of every human life - is a financial or pragmatic calculus. For them there are no absolutes or principles, so they are unable to think in terms of objective principles. In the final analysis, they cannot coherently arrive at objective Right and Wrong, and so are reduced to splutters of personal preference where their will legitimates any action they desire. They have lobotomised themselves, so their desire and will is the final arbiter of right and wrong, good and evil.

This is not a view to which I subscribe.