Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade; states can ban abortion

Trunkage

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I know why they are doing this. It's because they want us, young people, to have more children despite the fact that some of those children will die, grow up poorer, and some young women and even fucking female kids will die. It has nothing to do with life otherwise these republicans would act like the catholic church who are assholes, but at least want social welfare programs along with their horrific anti-freedom abortion policies. It's what I called economically aligned social policy.

Stop treating this like a religious issue, it's an economic issue. Republicans want more economic fodder for the death cult that is the current economic system.
You missed a step. If people are tied to a child, they HAVE to take jobs. Thus companies can give lower wages

It's wage control
 

Gergar12

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Great fewer doctors in Ohio because we were such clowns on the abortion issue with regards to a 10-year-old girl having to travel to Indiana for an abortion. All of those boomer trolls who voted for this better treat their kids better or else they are going to an underfunded nursery home with fewer doctors in the future.

 

tstorm823

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Great fewer doctors in Ohio because we were such clowns on the abortion issue with regards to a 10-year-old girl having to travel to Indiana for an abortion.
Fun fact: the only evidence that girl even exists is the word of an abortion specialist who has already sued the Indiana state government over abortion restrictions in the past.
 
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Terminal Blue

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I imagine you're aware that's a few days of life you're counting out.
Less. Typically a few hours.

Again though, way to miss the point. I'm not really interested in drawing a magic line where personhood begins, be it conception, first mitosis or at any other point. The answer to the question of whether a fetus is a person is very seldom going to be a clear yes or no. Again though, I don't think it matters. Personhood is arbitrary.

It is red herring that is deployed by the pro-choice side to justify legal homicide.
How is it homicide?

Like, that's the one bit nature just sorts out on its own. You don't need to kill a fetus to perform an abortion, you only need to remove it from the womb.

But more importantly, what is even wrong with legal homicide? What do you think the army are for? What do you think the police actually do? If I wanted to justify legal homicide, I wouldn't go to the weird step of reclassifying an underdeveloped human body dying of natural causes as homicide. I'd just defend the institutions and people that the state uses to kill people.

IThe argument that fetuses are people doesn't start from a pro-life position, it is a reaction to the insistence that fetuses aren't people from the other side.
Even if it were true (and I don't think it is) why is it important? I don't think it really matters who is reacting to who.

When I say that I don't think the question of personhood matters, I don't mean that the answer is obvious. I don't think it's very honest to pretend that the answer is obvious, no matter what you believe. What I mean when I say I don't think the question matters is that I don't think it can be adequately resolved. Any line is going to be arbitrary, including a line drawn at conception.

Like, you talk in part of the post I snipped for clarity about it taking 25 years to become a person, and I understand your perspective there, but that should only make it even more obvious that you can't reasonably premise the right to live on what state of development you've reached.
Why not, exactly?

I mean, the same argument could be applied to the age of consent. It is, on the face of it, pretty silly that a person has to be protected from sexualization one day and can get railed as much as they like the next. But I think you can probably see the problem in that case, that we can't abdicate all responsibility for judgement just because judgment is imperfect. We have a responsibility to consider development because development is physiologically real.

This is no different. In fact, you can't really argue against abortion without referencing the state of development of a fetus because that's the reason it can't survive outside of the womb in the first place.
 

tstorm823

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How is it homicide?

Like, that's the one bit nature just sorts out on its own. You don't need to kill a fetus to perform an abortion, you only need to remove it from the womb.
And if I purposely removed you from the air, and you drowned, I'd be rightfully prosecuted for murder.
But more importantly, what is even wrong with legal homicide? What do you think the army are for? What do you think the police actually do? If I wanted to justify legal homicide, I wouldn't go to the weird step of reclassifying an underdeveloped human body dying of natural causes as homicide. I'd just defend the institutions and people that the state uses to kill people.
There are legal justifications for homicide, absolutely. And I believe a consistent legal system would similarly have legal justifications for otherwise illegal abortion. But personal choice is not one of those. In fact, I would argue that choice is the one specific thing that makes a human death a crime.
Even if it were true (and I don't think it is) why is it important? I don't think it really matters who is reacting to who.
When you call something a red herring, you are making an accusation of deceit. If an argument is a red herring, meant to mislead people, the party initiating that argument bears guilt that those responding do not. They are the victims of the rhetoric, not the perpetrators. And funny enough, the one user on this forum I can recall specifically trying to delineate between people and humans in the last couple weeks is the same user trying to justify Russia invading Ukraine with a whole bunch of disingenuous arguments meant to distract and mislead people from the core issue there.
Why not, exactly?

I mean, the same argument could be applied to the age of consent. It is, on the face of it, pretty silly that a person has to be protected from sexualization one day and can get railed as much as they like the next. But I think you can probably see the problem in that case, that we can't abdicate all responsibility for judgement just because judgment is imperfect. We have a responsibility to consider development because development is physiologically real.
You're comparing two unlike things. Life is an absolute essential right that people need. The things we age gate (getting railed, drunk, etc) are not only inessential, they are all things that are age gated specifically because they pose a threat to the person's life. We don't want children drinking or smoking or banging or driving because we are protecting their lives from their own decisions. Society does not value choice over the lives of children in any context.
 

tstorm823

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The 10-year old abortion story from Ohio was fake.

I think it's a bit too much to actively call the story fake. I think it's sufficient enough to say we can't say it did happen, and neither can any of the people who reported on it without question.

But if you want something silly, check "The Bottom Line" from the WaPo fact check:

"This is a very difficult story to check. Bernard is on the record, but obtaining documents or other confirmation is all but impossible without details that would identify the locality where the rape occurred.

With news reports around the globe and now a presidential imprimatur, however, the story has acquired the status of a “fact” no matter its provenance. If a rapist is ever charged, the fact finally would have more solid grounding."

That is one hell of a perspective of what fact is.
 

Terminal Blue

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And if I purposely removed you from the air, and you drowned, I'd be rightfully prosecuted for murder.
Except you aren't arguing against drowning people, you're arguing against exposing them to air.

Are you saying that we have an obligation to give medical and scientific consideration the development of human lungs, but should not give the same degree of consideration to the development of a human nervous system?

More importantly, this analogy falls down because the air I am breathing is not provided by another person against their will.

There are legal justifications for homicide, absolutely. And I believe a consistent legal system would similarly have legal justifications for otherwise illegal abortion. But personal choice is not one of those.
When a police officer or soldier pulls the trigger on their gun, is that not a personal choice?

Even if their lives are in danger, or the alternative risks their death, did they not choose to enter into a dangerous situation with a firearm in full knowledge that they may end up using it? That certainly seems like a choice.

If an argument is a red herring, meant to mislead people, the party initiating that argument bears guilt that those responding do not.
That's not necessarily true at all.

A person can respond with deceptive level of defensiveness to an argument that is sincere but which the respondent considers to be weak, to avoid having to address arguments that may be stronger or more difficult to counter.

Regardless, I don't actually buy that that's what happened in this case. Your objection seems to be more with the fact that anyone ever questioned what you hold to be the absolute truth that a fetus is a person, rather with the actual reason why I consider this argument a red herring - that it is extremely difficult or impossible to reasonably define what a person is and when a fetus meets that criteria. Even you seem to understand that the pro-life position that personhood begins at conception precedes criticism of that position, you just don't seem to think that any criticism of that position should exist.
 

Terminal Blue

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And funny enough, the one user on this forum I can recall specifically trying to delineate between people and humans in the last couple weeks is the same user trying to justify Russia invading Ukraine with a whole bunch of disingenuous arguments meant to distract and mislead people from the core issue there.
That means nothing to me.

Assuming we're talking about Seanchaidh, I've said some pretty angry things to them (some of which I regret) and I think they're outright, dangerously wrong on the topic of Ukraine and imperialism. But I would attribute that less to some kind of personal evil than to the influence of a pernicious media environment that manipulates well meaning people. It's a slightly frightening reflection of how vulnerable we all are to the manipulation of our deeply held beliefs. In that regard, I don't think you're as different as you might want to pretend. I think you both have beliefs that you have staked your personal identity on and are resistant to self-reflection, and which have been effectively weaponized by bad-faith actors.

And this is not to absolve myself. I have no doubt that I have similar blind spots. I don't think any degree of academic training can really eliminate that completely. But what I'm saying is that I don't think arguments are bad just because of where they come from, because I think people who are normally rigorous and intellectually curious can still argue in bad faith on topics that are too close to their personal or political identities.

You can disagree with attempting to delinate between people and humans, but I don't doing so is a sign of a disingenuous argument. In fact, if you want to argue that human and person are synonymous, I will happily pick that apart, because I don't think personhood is that easiy to define, hence why it's not very useful in the context of this discussion.

Life is an absolute essential right that people need.
According to whom?

According to the UN and the US constitution, for example, we all have a right to life. This right to life has coexisted, in US history, with the institution of chattel slavery, with lynching, with capital punishment, with involvement of wars that have killed millions of people, with the development, use and proliferation of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, with the use of torture, with medical experiments on human beings, with indifference to the victims of epidemic disease, with rampant police violence, with mass-incarceration for non-violent crimes..

But even assuming we can take the right to life at face value. Why do we have it? What is the point in it?

The right to life is one part of a wider principle of human dignity, that all human beings possess intrinsic value and should be treated accordingly, hence why it appears alongside the right to liberty and the right to the pursuit of happiness. The right to life is not an abrogation of respect for human beings, it does not mean keeping terminally ill people alive so that they can suffer for longer. It does not mean never turning off life support to people whose brain stems are dead and letting them linger in a humiliating state until their bodies finally wear out. Life has value in the wider context of dignity, not to the exclusion of dignity.

A woman who gets pregnant is a person with an intrinsic right to dignity, not just to life. That same principle of human dignity holds that her body is not public property, but is hers to do with as she sees fit.

A fetus that does not have a working nervous system, that possesses no consciousness by which it can value its own existence or conceive of a desire to live or to die, may be a human, it may or may not be a person according to your standards, but it is only alive in the sense a braindead person is alive. Its dignity does not require us to keep it alive, especially not when that requires the violation of another person's bodily autonomy. That is not what the "right to life" means, if anything that is the abuse of the right to life in order to violate the dignity of someone else.

The things we age gate (getting railed, drunk, etc) are not only inessential, they are all things that are age gated specifically because they pose a threat to the person's life.
No they aren't.

Unless you are using life figuratively here, in which case well done you're beginning to get it, these things pose no more intrinsic risk of death than many things it is legal for a child to do, and to the extent they do pose a risk of death that risk often remains present into adulthood.

Death is not the problem here. There are bad things in the world other than death. In fact, as far as bad things go, death is really very gentle.
 
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tstorm823

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When a police officer or soldier pulls the trigger on their gun, is that not a personal choice?
Not legally, unless they are acting outside of their orders.
Your objection seems to be more with the fact that anyone ever questioned what you hold to be the absolute truth that a fetus is a person, rather with the actual reason why I consider this argument a red herring - that it is extremely difficult or impossible to reasonably define what a person is and when a fetus meets that criteria.
My objection is that is the entire purpose of the argument. The reason people try argue that "person" is a different categorization than just "human being" is so that they can define person as an unfalsifiable, abstract concept.
You can disagree with attempting to delinate between people and humans, but I don't doing so is a sign of a disingenuous argument. In fact, if you want to argue that human and person are synonymous, I will happily pick that apart, because I don't think personhood is that easiy to define, hence why it's not very useful in the context of this discussion.
I mean, there are two options:
a) The dictionary perspective: person is synonymous with human being, that's just actually what most dictionary's say.
b) The philosophers wasting time perspective: person isn't synonymous with human being and has no objective definition, making it completely useless in this discussion, to take your perspective and make it just a touch harsher.

Neither of those perspectives justifies abortion. Option b is brought up specifically to muddy the water.
But even assuming we can take the right to life at face value. Why do we have it? What is the point in it?

The right to life is one part of a wider principle of human dignity, that all human beings possess intrinsic value and should be treated accordingly, hence why it appears alongside the right to liberty and the right to the pursuit of happiness. The right to life is not an abrogation of respect for human beings, it does not mean keeping terminally ill people alive so that they can suffer for longer. It does not mean never turning off life support to people whose brain stems are dead and letting them linger in a humiliating state until their bodies finally wear out. Life has value in the wider context of dignity, not to the exclusion of dignity.

A woman who gets pregnant is a person with an intrinsic right to dignity, not just to life. That same principle of human dignity holds that her body is not public property, but is hers to do with as she sees fit.
That's not dignity. Killing your offspring is not dignified. Letting someone kill because you pity their circumstances is not treating them with dignity. Sometimes dignity requires holding people to standards.
A fetus that does not have a working nervous system, that possesses no consciousness by which it can value its own existence or conceive of a desire to live or to die, may be a human, it may or may not be a person according to your standards, but it is only alive in the sense a braindead person is alive. Its dignity does not require us to keep it alive, especially not when that requires the violation of another person's bodily autonomy. That is not what the "right to life" means, if anything that is the abuse of the right to life in order to violate the dignity of someone else.

Death is not the problem here. There are bad things in the world other than death. In fact, as far as bad things go, death is really very gentle.
And both these points are just you staking out the moral stance of hedonism.
 

McElroy

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And both these points are just you staking out the moral stance of hedonism.
I reckon getting "more pleasure" out of "not having to go through this pregnancy" is ways removed from the inherent hedonism of having non-reproductive sex in the first place, which is maximized through other things (online dating apps, contraception, childfree culture etc.)
 

Phoenixmgs

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What evidence proves that?
There's no evidence that the story is true. The main/only source "heard" of it. The burden of proof is on the claim. If it was the opposite, you can just make up bullshit, then put the burden of proof on someone to disprove it when you provided no proof yourself.
 
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Silvanus

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And both these points are just you staking out the moral stance of hedonism.
Less so than justifying killing animals on the basis that they enjoy eating meat, and their enjoyment outweighs the pain inflicted.
 

tstorm823

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Less so than justifying killing animals on the basis that they enjoy eating meat, and their enjoyment outweighs the pain inflicted.
That's still an argument based in hedonism. Either side of that argument is stating a moral position as a measure of pain or pleasure.
 

Schadrach

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holds that her body is not public property, but is hers to do with as she sees fit.
...notes the lengthy history of conscription around the world and into the present day. Of course you said "her" body, and people described by that pronoun are usually not subject to that one, so I guess note retracted?

With news reports around the globe and now a presidential imprimatur, however, the story has acquired the status of a “fact” no matter its provenance.
Someone clearly doesn't understand what a "fact" is.

OTOH, someone has actually been charged today with the rape in question (and is mentioned in an update to the very article linked), a Columbus man named Gershon Fuentes. So apparently the story has some actual teeth.

But holy fuck that whole it's a fact regardless of whether or not it's true bit is just fucked, especially from somewhere like WaPo you'd expect to have better standards.
 
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Silvanus

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That's still an argument based in hedonism. Either side of that argument is stating a moral position as a measure of pain or pleasure.
Wait, that's what you think hedonism is?

...wild.
 

immortalfrieza

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There's no evidence that the story is true. The main/only source "heard" of it. The burden of proof is on the claim. If it was the opposite, you can just make up bullshit, then put the burden of proof on someone to disprove it when you provided no proof yourself.
As true as that is, that hasn't stopped people thousands of years ago from doing exactly that dozens of times and getting most of mankind of think one bullshit or the other is true in spite of a lack of proof.


Regardless, I don't actually buy that that's what happened in this case. Your objection seems to be more with the fact that anyone ever questioned what you hold to be the absolute truth that a fetus is a person, rather with the actual reason why I consider this argument a red herring - that it is extremely difficult or impossible to reasonably define what a person is and when a fetus meets that criteria. Even you seem to understand that the pro-life position that personhood begins at conception precedes criticism of that position, you just don't seem to think that any criticism of that position should exist.
The entire "person" argument is a red herring. The anti-abortion crowd just hates the practice for no logical reason, which is why any reason given is hypocritical at best, factually wrong at worst. The Pro-Abortion crowd draw arbitrary lines as to what a "person" is in an attempt to compromise with people who aren't reasonable to begin with. The fact is, it shouldn't matter in the least whether the fetus was just conceived 1 minute ago or is 1 minute away from pushing out of the mother on it's own. The mother should have the right to say "no, I don't want to have this baby and I don't have to" and that is that. The very fact that abortion is both safe for the mother and even a possibility is all the justification that should be needed.

We're not living in caves anymore, women have always throughout the history of the human race tried to abort their fetuses for various reasons by various means most of which were completely ineffective at best and killed the mother at worst. Now we finally have a means to abort that is both safe for the mother and effective and like every new technology there's people whining and moaning that it shouldn't happen, even if like with abortion it would be unambiguously beneficial to all of mankind.

Women in the same numbers are going to keep aborting somehow regardless of if it's been banned or not just like women always have. They are simply going to look for illegal places and methods to do it, ones that are going to result in lots of pregnant women dying as well as the fetus. If any of the "Pro"-life people actually cared about life at all as they would claim, they'd care about be 100% behind legal abortion because they'd be concerned about the life of the mother. However, they don't, which is because their hatred of abortion just a knee jerk reaction that doesn't have a shred of rationality nor compassion behind it.

If there's any sense in this world we'll an amendment in our future that guarantees abortion in the United States permanently for as long as the country exists.
 

Avnger

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There's no evidence that the story is true. The main/only source "heard" of it. The burden of proof is on the claim. If it was the opposite, you can just make up bullshit, then put the burden of proof on someone to disprove it when you provided no proof yourself.

At some point, one would imagine you would get sick of being so obviously wrong and re-examine your approach to life.
 
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