[GCFL-discuss] Life Stats

[gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net]

Just to begin Matthew, if we refrain from imposing criminal penalties for
abortion, that does not, in itself, take one dime of money out of your
pocket.

Nor are people who have abortions necessarily too poor to pay for their
own. Rich women have always had abortions when they wanted to -- when and
where it was illegal, they simply caught a plane to a clinic in
Switzerland.

Now this has led to the argument that the government should pay for the
cost of abortions for women who want them, who cannot afford them, like
any other medical procedure. I believe you have a valid point on that. A
woman may have a privacy right to make this intimate decision without
state intervention. That does not mean that the state necessarily should
pay for her abortion. Although, if she cannot afford medical care, the
taxpayers probably will pay for her delivery. From a strictly fiscal
perspective, saving taxpayers money, etc., abortion is the cheaper
option. So your argument bites its own tail, because you rest on two
morally opposite foundations.

I believe we must at least be consistent, and most people with strong
opinions, pro-life or pro-choice, are simply not consistent. That's why
this debate is such a mess.

It is true that if you simply say, abortion is murder, then allowing
abortion is no better than allowing open gun battles on the street.
However, the fact remains, that a fetus is growing inside the body of an
adult woman (at least biologically mature). No other person can take
responsibility on themselves to carry that fetus to term as a fully
formed baby capable of survival on its own. So, while it is more than a
liver, it is not an independent life yet. If you could tell a pregnant
woman, don't have that abortion, I will carry the baby in MY abdomen,
then accepting that offer should be mandatory. But you can't. So, until
those who are pro-life can take full responsibility for the consequences
of their own preferences, I recognize that the woman bearing the
pregnancy should have some privacy to make this intimate decision for
herself.

What Roche pointed out is a simple fact: the lowest rates of abortion are
in countries that do not impose criminal penalties, but where the
community takes sufficient responsibility for the child/children that
women don't feel the same pressure to abort that women in other countries
-- many of which have criminal penalties -- feel and act upon. What do
you want? A sharp decrease in the number of abortions? Or to feel smug
about your own morality and politics while millions of abortions are
performed every year?

Siarlys


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