Roe v. Wade for men?

[John Galt]

EDIT: I'm going to go ahead and be up front here - I take this argument very seriously because I had to make that choice. It was a classic case of drunk and stupid for both me and him, so I'm not going to try and make any defense based on risk or responsibility. Neither of us had any excuse. I'm willing to discuss whether or not I had any right to make him pay for anything, kid or abortion, but I will never, ever concede the right to decide for myself, by myself, whether or not to have an abortion.

Exactly why I think a father should not have final say in an abortion. In a society such as ours with supposed equal rights, it would be ridiculous to give the final say to the person who would not have to carry and give birth to the child. If it's your body, then it's your property to manage, for moral good or bad, it's your call, no one else's.

If the father wants a child, then he should just find another partner or something along those lines, not force someone to go against their own judgement.

 

[Ciarog]

That's a separate argument. My uterus, my decision, just like they are your balls, so no one can force you to have a vasectomy, regardless of how many children you may have fathered on how many women.

Forced chemical castration? We do it all the time in Georgia, in fact it's technically the only legal way a repeat sex offender can live in most counties.

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

The ruling says I don't have to use my uterus to house and grow a fetus. It says nothing about how you or I have to house and grow a child once it's outside my uterus. That's a separate argument.

Except that it's not. A woman's control over her own body is absolute, but the simple fact of the matter is that the situation is not equal because the man does not have a means to avoid parentage...

Let's make a distinction on the definition of parentage here. It is my opinion that providing 50% of DNA does not make you a parent. If I give up a child for adoption, the people who adopted it are the parents, legally and morally responsible for its upbringing and welfare. If they die in an accident, nobody can come back to me and say, "You have to take care of the kid now," because I'm not a parent. I am then the birth-mother, but I am not the parent. You have no choice about whether a human being bearing your DNA is squeezed out into the world, I do, and that can't be modified without violating my physical sovereignty. "Parent" is a legally and socially defined role. Woman as sole owner of uterus is not. So they really aren't the same.

Seriously, do you care if a person carrying 50% of your DNA exists in the world if you don't have to pay for it or even know about it? Probably not. This is an economic and social argument and needs to be addressed as such without talking about whether or not I have the right to determine what I do with my internal organs.

Thing about that one is other people might see it differently too. It IS your child still, (however that one ebcomes religeous and ocne again theoretical) But that's a good thing, the point of this topic is about beleif, a more focused beleif, but still beleif.
Though I'm not even going to get into the adoption area, that one is just too wacky.

If I mistake your point or your argument, I apologize. I mean this in the upfront, snark-free way: Reading your posts, I not following the logic of your arguments. I'm not saying you are being illogical, I'm just saying I'm having a hard time understanding you.

When you say that the point of this topic is belief, that seems to me to be incorrect. Most of the posts here are talking about custody, child-support, and the right to be a non-parent. These are questions of law, not questions of belief. It's true that we make laws based on our beliefs, but we can have opposing beliefs operating in the same country at the same time, but we cannot have opposing laws operating in the same country at the same time. The title of the thread is Roe v. Wade For Men, so it seems to me that the point of this thread, or at least the original point of this thread, is most definitely legal.

I think the argument sbout parental rights and responsibilities and how they are legally established and distributed, and the argument about whether or not a woman can legally determine for herself whether or not to carry through with a pregnancy, can and should be discussed separately.

 

[Rodge]

Augh, this is one of my hot-button issues, but here I am anyway to argue the toss. I am tired and sick, so this probably won't make sense, but here we go!

Okay, first of all, pregnancy is not just 9 months of fun followed by a few hours of pain. It's a HUGE strain on the body, even if you are perfectly healthy otherwise. (I know this because I am not perfectly healthy, and if I ever decide to have a child it will be ...inconvenient, let's say. The medication that helps keep me alive and upright would not have the same beneficial effects on a foetus.)
So yes, it does in fact suck for the woman to be pregnant for nine months, and if you're so damn desperate for a baby why not impregnate someone who won't resent you for it? Or adopt!

If you get a girl pregnant, and she asks for child support, it's not because she's evil and trying to screw you out of money. Kids are expensive, especially when you're a single parent with no input from the kid's father.

And if I may make a suggestion? Next time you date someone, talk about your feelings about kids. No, really. Outright SAY 'I don't want children, and I don't want to have to pay for any accidents that might happen'. Hell, if your feelings differ that much, get a written contract!* It's totally not romantic, but it could save you money in the long run, and that is what matters. Oh, and wear a condom. Yes, even if she says she's on the Pill.

*Note: do NOT do this for the other way around. 'If you get pregnant I will force you to keep it' = not cool.

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

That's a separate argument. My uterus, my decision, just like they are your balls, so no one can force you to have a vasectomy, regardless of how many children you may have fathered on how many women.

Forced chemical castration? We do it all the time in Georgia, in fact it's technically the only legal way a repeat sex offender can live in most counties.

And I oppose that on the grounds that such a practice punishes a person for a crime they have not yet committed, as well as being a violation of their physical sovereignty. Similarly, I think a woman who is a chronic child abuse offender should not be sterilized or forced to abort any future pregnancies. But I will also say that the rights of convicted felons are restricted in many ways after their release (some of which I oppose), and so that example does not really bear on the discussion at hand.

 

[Ciarog]

Yoyu're right, I beleive the world is very much unbalanced, and with as much freedom as we have, and our lifestyles, it's true things are different than they once were.
A good long time ago people took responsibility for their actions, it wasn't really until the 'if it feels good, do it' era that the law needed to step in on children and parenting. The universe is indeed a strange, and confusing place, and I can't wait till science finds out how it truly works.

It's easy to see little or no difference between humanity and the rest of the natural world when you have very little real contact with it. Such is the predicament of Technological Society, where humanity is philosophically reduced to a writhing mass of cells. Such a line of thinking can excuse even the most repugnant of atrocities, thus one of many reasons the last few centuries have been so bloody.

 

[John Galt]

And I oppose that on the grounds that such a practice punishes a person for a crime they have not yet committed, as well as being a violation of their physical sovereignty. Similarly, I think a woman who is a chronic child abuse defender should not be sterilized or forced to abort any future pregnancies. But I will also say that the rights of convicted felons are restricted in many ways after their release (some of which I oppose), and so that example does not really bear on the discussion at hand.

While I'm all for physical sovereignity, I disagree with you there. If you're a repeat sex offender, you've demonstrated to society that you have a hard time coping with sexual urges. Therefore, you violate your victim's right to their own physical sovereignity(via rape). If chemical castration for sex offenders is the only way to control them in society, then I feel we should make it part of their prison sentence. Also, it gives us the added bonus of not having them further disrupt our gene pool.

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

EDIT: I'm going to go ahead and be up front here - I take this argument very seriously because I had to make that choice. It was a classic case of drunk and stupid for both me and him, so I'm not going to try and make any defense based on risk or responsibility. Neither of us had any excuse. I'm willing to discuss whether or not I had any right to make him pay for anything, kid or abortion, but I will never, ever concede the right to decide for myself, by myself, whether or not to have an abortion.

I didn't mean to scare you guys off with this, by the way. I hope I have demonstrated in other threads that I don't carry a flamethrower, so when I say I take an argument very seriously, that doesn't mean I intend to open a big can of CAPLOCK all over your ass if you disagree with me about a woman's right to an abortion. My entire family are religious fundamentalist and if I can get along with or ignore them, I can get along with or ignore you as needed.

Please continue discussing whether it is right and just to force parenthood on a man in the case of an unplanned pregnancy. I'm very interested in what you have to say, because I really haven't made up my mind on that specific topic. Have I made up my mind that pregnancy tends to suck, especially if you didn't plan for it? That would be a yes. Have I made up my mind that single parenthood tends to suck, especially if you didn't plan for it? Yes again. Do I think it is inexcusably stupid to screw around unprotected? Oh hell, yeah, for so many reasons. I've most certainly answered all these questions to my satisfaction. But does a woman have a right to enforce legal parent status on a man, and under what conditions? I'm not sure.

I'm also not averse to discussing my own experience in this matter, either publicly or in PM (because I'm actually a 45-year old man who has never left his mother's basement - HEY STOP THAT! Excuse me, that was my sister logged into my computer under my name) because I think having a specific scenario can really help ground a discussion and keep it from flying off into increasingly fantastical what-ifs.

Also, if I can get an OMG U R A HOR!!1 out of someone, that will help me get one of my Web Scout flame badges. I'm still missing my "feminazi" badge as well. (Over 10 years on various boards and I still haven't gotten that one. Can you believe that? What am I doing wrong?)

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

And I oppose that on the grounds that such a practice punishes a person for a crime they have not yet committed, as well as being a violation of their physical sovereignty. Similarly, I think a woman who is a chronic child abuse defender should not be sterilized or forced to abort any future pregnancies. But I will also say that the rights of convicted felons are restricted in many ways after their release (some of which I oppose), and so that example does not really bear on the discussion at hand.

While I'm all for physical sovereignity, I disagree with you there. If you're a repeat sex offender, you've demonstrated to society that you have a hard time coping with sexual urges. Therefore, you violate your victim's right to their own physical sovereignity(via rape). If chemical castration for sex offenders is the only way to control them in society, then I feel we should make it part of their prison sentence. Also, it gives us the added bonus of not having them further disrupt our gene pool.

I am sympathetic to all of your arguments (except the gene pool thing), and indeed, I might agree with you if it were not for my deep reservations about the current state of our justice system and the prison-industrial complex, which do not bear discussion here. Suffice it to say that I see such measures as the top of a slippery slope, and having said the words "slippery slope", I have put us on the slippery slope to the realization of Godwin's Law, so I'm just going to stop right here.

It may interest you to know that in Washington state, sex offenders are moved right from prison to a secure mental health facility on the ground of danger to self and others.

 

[Easykill]

Ok, maybe some people blame their deeds on the concept that we are just bags of meat(I've never heard of it though), but in my opinion, that's better than blaming it on "Fate", or god.

 

[Ciarog]

That's a separate argument. My uterus, my decision, just like they are your balls, so no one can force you to have a vasectomy, regardless of how many children you may have fathered on how many women.

Forced chemical castration? We do it all the time in Georgia, in fact it's technically the only legal way a repeat sex offender can live in most counties.

And I oppose that on the grounds that such a practice punishes a person for a crime they have not yet committed, as well as being a violation of their physical sovereignty.

Both of those points could (and are by many, myself included) just as easily be used in opposition to the prison system in general; what's the point of keeping someone locked away from his peers instead of trying to repay his debt to them, if not to prevent him from repeating his offense?

Similarly, I think a woman who is a chronic child abuse defender should not be sterilized or forced to abort any future pregnancies.

Not quite sure what you mean here, I'll wait for extropalation before I comment.

But I will also say that the rights of convicted felons are restricted in many ways after their release (some of which I oppose), and so that example does not really bear on the discussion at hand.

While true, it is nonetheless an example of reproductive rights being legally negotiable, even if not morally.

 

[Ciarog]

Except that it's not. A woman's control over her own body is absolute, but the simple fact of the matter is that the situation is not equal because the man does not have a means to avoid parentage that the woman does. Just as you would expect society to protect the woman's right over her body, wouldn't you expect society to render equal treatment for all parties involved?

There are multiple legal possibilities, such as allowing a parent to dissolve legal gaurdianship in cases of deception, or where the man made it clear that he did not want a child from the outset. Of course, this can be difficult to prove and interpret, but if the law didn't get complicated, it wouldn't require peopel to interpret it or render judgements on it.

We render unequal treatment all the time. We've made freedom of religion a fundamental right, even thought that means atheists don't have as many excuses for getting out of jury duty or combat or prosecutions for possession and use of peyote. In the same way, abortion is a fundamental right that gives women an excuse for getting out of having to support a child that men don't have.

The kind of equality you're talking about means we should all be allowed to choose one drug from Schedule I to use the way Native Americans can use peyote or the UDV [http://www.udvusa.com/faq.php] gets to use hoasca. Maybe that's what you want to argue, but, you should be sure of the full implications of those words--"wouldn't you expect society to render equal treatment for all parties involved"--in the context of fundamental rights.

Didn't Engels support something like that (ceiling cap on freedom)?

 

[Cameoflage]

Given that it's currently impossible to remove a fetus from its mother's body without causing its death (at least, in most cases -- it may be possible to transfer embryos into a surrogate mother prior to implantation, but I'd think that'd require it to be caught earlier than most people even realise that they're pregnant), the situation is inherently unequal. Both for reasons of maintaining bodily sovereignty and the various physical stresses involved, it's the lesser of two evils to allow a woman to terminate a pregnancy against the father's will than to give him the final say regarding abortion. It's not a fair situation by any means, but as I said, it's preferable to forcing her to put herself through the stresses of pregnancy and childbirth, especially if the mother has health issues that make it impossible to carry a pregnancy to term without having her quality of life plummet in the meantime and/or risking death.

However, if the woman does decide to carry the child to term and the man wants nothing to do with raising it (especially if he was deceived into fathering it in the first place), he should be able to sever his ties with it rather than be forced into paying child support for a child he never wanted in the first place and in whose birth he had no choice. I'm not saying that he should be able to force the mother to terminate a pregnancy she wants, but he should be able to walk away from the situation rather than be tied to something he had no control over for the rest of his life.

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

Really? I live in Bremerton, Washington. My brother is a level 3 sex offender and he was never in either. It's odd really, he was convicted, but not sentenced, had someting to do with his ex, who was the one who charged him, being high on cocaine at the time of pressing charges.

I should clarify - offender classified as "sexual predators" can be sent directly from prison to, basically, psychiatric prison. If your brother was never actually incarcerated, he probably doesn't meet the threshold for such treatment.

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

Similarly, I think a woman who is a chronic child abuse defender should not be sterilized or forced to abort any future pregnancies.

Not quite sure what you mean here, I'll wait for extropalation before I comment.

I mean that as an example of violation of a person's right to govern their own body in the name of preventing crimes, specifically preventing crimes with a high recidivism rate and dire social impact. It's also a policy that has been proposed for actual use.

But I will also say that the rights of convicted felons are restricted in many ways after their release (some of which I oppose), and so that example does not really bear on the discussion at hand.

While true, it is nonetheless an example of reproductive rights being legally negotiable, even if not morally.[/quote]
Yes - and reproductive rights are legally negotiated in other ways as well. For instance, I could not, in most states, have a third-trimester abortion. But that does not affect my point that the right not to be forced to gestate and deliver a child is a separate discussion from the right not to be forced to parent a child, and that conflating the two arguments serves no productive purpose.

If you want to start a separate thread about the rights and wrongs of the prison system, I will do my best to participate, though I will not be able to contribute quite so readily. I have been thinking and talking and writing about feminism for 20 years, but the prison-industrial complex is a relatively new issue for me, so a great many of my thoughts and opinions on the issue are still unclear. But I do think that continuing a prison discussion in this thread is off-topic, so we should probably take it elsewhere.

 

[qbert4ever]

Guess it's my turn to toss my body to the sharks...

The way I see it is, if the woman becomes pregnant through forces outside of the mans control (ie: the condom breaks, she lies about being able to conceive, etc.), then the man should have the right to walk out. Do I think the right thing to do is at least be a part of the childs life, through money or direct parenting? Yes. A thousend times over yes. But it is still his choice to say "I'm not ready for a child, she lied to me about her abillity to conceive just so she could get knocked up".

If, however, the woman becomes pregnant because of somthing stupid (Drunken monkey sex, trying the "pull-out method, counting on the pill), then if the woman decides to keep the child, it is both parants responsibility to care for the child.

The biggist thing to remember in all this, is that we're not talking about making some guy/girl be unhappy just because of a 1-night stand, we're talking about a human child. Do I belive that a woman has the right to an abbortion? Yes. If the man wants a child, and the woman he's with does not, the he should find someone else to have a family with. But if she has the child, then both parents should think long and hard about the next option they take. Because as soon as that child is born (Assuming she is either pro-life or wants the kid), then whatever happens next will directly influence the child for the rest of it's life.

Having a child should be an act of love and responsibility between two people. Not an act of spite. And besides, there is always the option of putting the child up for addoption

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

Similarly, I think a woman who is a chronic child abuse defender should not be sterilized or forced to abort any future pregnancies.

Not quite sure what you mean here, I'll wait for extropalation before I comment.

I just re-read that and realized I typed "defender" when I meant "offender". Word swapping is a bit of an issue with me, both in spoken and written language. Makes for some rather surreal conversations at times. Sorry about the confusion. I will correct.

 

[GrowlersAtSea]

This is a very interesting discussion, when I saw it's name, and it's length, I was expecting it to be akin to the average Halo thread, but pleasant surprises are always nice.

First of all, I would like to address physical sovereignty. It doesn't appear that the government as a whole subscribes to that idea in the first place. At one time they did, but currently, there is a rather long list of what you can and cannot do with your own body or to it. You cannot take some drugs, you can be forced to take others, you cannot sell your own organs to others, and even your right to die isn't absolute. Sadly, I don't think anyone is truly sovereign over their own bodies with the current laws and boundaries the government currently has.

But for the main point, I don't think men should have a legal say or legal recourse if a woman seeks to terminate a pregnancy. So long as it is legal I feel that it is her choice, since it is her body and the child rearing would be primarily her responsibility and would be so for the next 18 or more years. If she doesn't want it, she has ways out.

Men have their own responsibilities as to the child, and it is primarily financial in most cases. Sure, having a father figure impacts your life greatly, but in most family arrangements he provides the roof over your head, the food on your table and and would do so for the next 18 or more years. If he does not want his responsibility though he is out of luck, he has no ways out. There's no legal recourse, choice or alternatives, it's two decades of financial responsibility taken out of his hands (and let's be honest, most men define themselves by their financial success).

Now, here's a scary thing. The leading cause of death among pregnant women (aside from pregnancy related complications) was murder in the US (for that age range it's usually accidents). And you can bet it's not random strangers doing it in most cases.

I'm not bringing that point up to excuse the behavior in any way, but I think it offers insight into the current state of things. When you take an immature individual who is not ready for any of the responsibilities of life (however they make act), take all control away from them, then force the responsibility on, they'll either grow up or blow up.

So the way I see it is the woman has the child rearing and physical responsibilities of a pregnancy, which she can, if for whatever reasons are necessary, get out of (either through terminating the pregnancy or adoption). While the man has primarily financial responsibilities, which he, for whatever reasons, cannot get out of.

I think it would be only fair to allow him a way out as well. Implementation of any such system though is extraordinarily tricky though. The choice to end a pregnancy or give up a baby is final, while writing a check every month is not quite as concrete. Humans are fickle creatures, you wouldn't want a man saying he'll support the child, then when the time comes he decides that he doesn't want to anymore and can legally say he doesn't want any such responsibility could leave a woman in a real bind.

Honestly, I think you would have to have the parental situation outlined in writing early in the pregnancy, by the time what is going to happen with it, to avoid any trouble.

I would also worry about the societal impact as well, since it is generally beneficial for a child to have two parents, and I don't doubt that if many men had an easy way out as opposed to child support or marriage, they would take it. I somehow doubt that would be a good thing for many children.

 

[Katana314]

Man, having never been in a relationship, and holding some pretty strong beliefs myself, I hope I don't get rebuked for what I say.

First off I sort of want to say how I feel about abortion, which may in the end not really have any effect on how you look at my opinion. The biggest problem most people have with abortion is that it's essentially killing someone. Someone whose age has a negative sign, but still someone. But me; in a way I'm not too bothered. I look at people as a sum of their experiences and accomplishments. If a guy was born and sat around doing nothing all his life, I wouldn't really think much of him. An unborn baby really hasn't even formed its mind yet, so in a way, you could say that not very much is lost from killing it; sex is so common in our modern world that life itself isn't really a precious thing anymore, but a person is. There are certainly people in the world that would hate me for thinking that way, but I'm just trying to be honest about how I feel.

Anyway, I watched an episode of Boston Legal that had a very similar issue to this and it did seem very controversial to me. In certain scenarios, men are looked at stereotypically and are given no say in any statement involving the word "child". On the other hand, the idea of enforcing a legal requirement for a woman to have an abortion is especially traumatic. But I think there is a middle ground I could settle on.

Let me clarify these "certain scenarios" in the second sentence above. If a man says to a woman before sex that he "plainly does not want kids, and I'm going to use a condom, and if child support issues come up, I'm OUT"...then I'm sorry, but that's not enough. Pregnancies happen and there's not much you can do about it. You're going to have to take that gamble. However, the situation in Boston Legal was that in a way, the woman "forcibly" removed his sperm while he was asleep. Previously, he had made it clear that he wanted nothing to do with her, and that having a child would ruin his political reputation. In this scenario, there was literally NOTHING he could do. He didn't want to have sex, he made the circumstances clear, but she became pregnant anyway. Given the unlikely circumstances here, plus the fact that the woman DID commit a crime, I could see a forced abortion. We already put people through a lot of mental/physical trauma in jail, and heck; this is just a pill.

However, often this isn't the case. Men look for a night on the town, and end up with this big hassle wearing a diaper. Well, you took Sex Ed in High School so tough luck, bud. SHE had to go through 9 months of pain (21 years if you include everything up to college) and since you're the Criminal's Accomplice so to speak, you serve the time too. But speaking outside of legal requirements, I really hope that she goes for an abortion anyway. I know I'd rather be killed painlessly before birth than get killed slowly through lack of support.

 

[General Ma Chao]

Thank you, everyone, for your intelligent and civil responses.

I find it stupid how grown adults, especially men, are now EXPECTED to be having lots of sex but if the unthinkable happens, they're stuck. I mean talk about cognitive dissonance. I honestly think American society needs to reevaluate its outlook on sexuality. I've seen unexpected pregnancies ruin the lives of friends and family. And on top of that it potentially ruins the lives of the resulting offspring. Abortion, as far as I'm concerned, should remain as is. I would like to think though that it will only be employed during situations of extreme duress. I have to wonder what it's going to take to get people to be more responsible with their lives.