27 December 2005 - 8:26am
South Dakota: Where women are treated as cows
As sentient beings living in what purportedly is a free society, the right to self-determination is one of our most closely held values. South Dakota is doing all it can to take away self-determination away from women, as far as reproductive rights go.
In 2005, the South Dakota legislature passed five laws restricting abortion, after a bill to ban abortion outright had failed by one vote in 2004. And new laws are virtually assured for the coming year. A 17-member abortion task force, made up largely of staunch abortion opponents, issued recommendations to the legislature earlier this month that included some of the most restrictive requirements for abortion in the country.
The report states that science defines life as beginning at conception and recommends a law that gives fetuses the same protection that children get after birth, thus banning abortion. Until such a ban, the task force recommends requiring that a woman watch an ultrasound of her fetus, that doctors warn women about the psychological and physical dangers of abortion, and that women receive psychological counseling before the abortion, among other measures.
Here they go with the "science is what I say it is" approach. Does life really begin at conception? Where is this scientific evidence? Does implantation have nothing to do with it? What about gestation? You know, the nine months of what is required of the woman's body after the man's five-second contribution to the effort?
As national leaders on both sides of the abortion debate focus on the upcoming Supreme Court nomination hearings of Samuel A. Alito Jr., they are watching states such as South Dakota pass more and more restrictions that might be upheld by a newly constituted, more conservative Supreme Court.
"Samuel Alito wrote the blueprint 20 years ago on how to dismantle and eventually overturn Roe," said Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, referring to a memo Alito wrote in 1985 in which he mentioned passing restrictions on abortion as a way to mitigate the effects of Roe v. Wade. "If he is confirmed, Alito could cast the decisive vote that allows additional attacks on women's reproductive freedom from the states to stand."
Of course, that's exactly why the man who's "pro-life" views extend to warrentless strip-searches of 10-year-old girls is just wonderful in the eyes of the religious zealots.
But Mary Spaulding Balch, director of the state legislation department of the National Right to Life campaign, said South Dakota is one of many states that have had success in passing laws the organization has been espousing for more than 30 years.
"Working within the fact that the Supreme Court said that it's legal to kill unborn children," she said, "it makes sense that you do your best to save whatever lives you can."
Unborn children -- a nice, nonsensical phrase, because of course children are not children until they are born. But hey, potential children are almost children, right? Let's move the point of birth up to the point of conception. That way, women can be relegated to cow status, whose primary purpose is replenishment of the herd.
Moo.
media girl also blogs at other places.
Comments
Hi media girl,
Your post asks, "Does life really begin at conception? Where is this scientific evidence?"
Numerous textbooks in embryology clearly state that at conception a life has begun. I have some more at my blog if your interested but I've provided a few below. Do you have any evidence from science that says life begins at implantation or birth?
Why are children not children until they're born? How does a journey of nine or inches make a non-child into a child?
-"Although human life is a continuous process, fertilization is a critical landmark because, under ordinary circumstances, a new, genetically distinct human organism is thereby formed. ... The combination of 23 chromosomes present in each pronucleus results in 46 chromosomes in the zygote. Thus the diploid number is restored and the embryonic genome is formed. The embryo now exists as a genetic unity." (O'Rahilly, Ronan and Müller, Fabiola. Human Embryology and Teratology, 2nd edition. New York: Wiley-Liss, 1996, pp. 8, 29).
-"Almost all higher animals start their lives from a single cell, the fertilized ovum (zygote). ... The time of fertilization represents the starting point in the life history, or ontogeny, of the individual." (Carlson, Bruce M., Patten's Foundations of Embryology, 6th edition. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1996, p.3.)
-"Fertilization is a sequence of events that begins with the contact of a sperm (spermatozoon) with a secondary oocyte (ovum) and ends with the fusion of their pronuclei (the haploid nuclei of the sperm and ovum) and the mingling of their chromosomes to form a new cell. This fertilized ovum, known as a zygote, is a large diploid cell that is the beginning, or primordium, of a human being."
[Moore, Keith L. Essentials of Human Embryology. Toronto: B.C. Decker Inc, 1988, p.2]
-"The development of a human being begins with fertilization, a process by which two highly specialized cells, the spermatozoon from the male and the oocyte from the female, unite to give rise to a new organism, the zygote."
[Langman, Jan. Medical Embryology. 3rd edition. Baltimore: Williams and Wilkins, 1975, p. 3]
And you're done! You have a baby. Oh, never mind the nine months' gestation needed to actually make the baby. That's just irrelevant!
Never mind the nutrition from the woman. Never mind the billions upon billions of processes that must happen for an actual baby to result.
New math: potential baby = baby.
Babies are more than a jumble of genetics, Jivin.
Hi Media Girl,
You asked where the scientific evidence was and I provided some. Your response?
I never said that a newborn child is completely the result of spilling semen into a woman of child bearing years. That's a complete strawman.
You've also provided no reasoning for some of your assertions like how birth (a journey of nine inches) makes non-child into a child?
In fact, it's not very helpful to argue when "life" begins ... b/c we end up with arguments like yours, which would result in every spontaneous abortion requiring a police investigation. If you define that bundle of cells as "life", and that "life" = child, then one would have to determine if the termination of that child was a result of natural causes or perhaps manslaughter or murder. Was it b/c the mother smoked when she was younger? Maybe she got drunk before she knew she was pregnant and it damaged the fetus? Nature aborts far more fetuses than women choose to abort ... should we investigate every one? I know women are really an after-thought to this political movement, but are you really ready to make the "Handmaid's Tale" a reality? Because if the woman is just the "vessel" for this life YOU declare a "child", then the owner of that womb is subject to the control of the state, and thus a slave to the state. To "save" these lives (well, the male ones, since the female ones will only be of worth due to their eventually fertile wombs) are you willing to enslave half the populace?
However, lets be honest here. The real question is: when do these cells become a legal entity requiring the protection of the state? In other words, not just "alive" (slime molds and viruses are "alive") but when does a collection of human chromosomes become a PERSON? This isn't a question for science; it's a question for metaphysics (or theology, which is just metaphysics dressed up in fancy clothes and a funny hat). How do we define "person" ... and does a legal "person" differ from a living and breathing "person"?
Roe sought to find a compromise, giving the woman's rights priority in the first trimester and slowly asserting the state's responsibilty to maintain some limits until the third trimester, by which time many states require that elective abortions only be performed to preserve the life or health of the mother. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 98% of all non-spontaneous abortions happen in the first trimester.
The intellectual dishonesty of the Women's Enslavement Movement never seizes to amaze me. Flowery religious language is flung about, then emotional talk about "saving the babies" followed by self-rightous assertions of the biological sciences, sciences that are otherwise scorned by a sizable portion of the WEM. Meanwhile, actual living and breathing children, not yet old enough to assert their rights as legal persons, are left to the vagaries of the life into which they are born. If HALF of the effort was actually directed at saving the actual living and breathing ON THEIR OWN children we've brought into the world I'd be much more impressed that the WEM gave a rat's ass about children, and NOT just about asserting their religious beliefs into the lives of women.
Arguments like mine? Do you mean scientific reality that at conception a human life has begun?
Every miscarriage would require a police investigation? Since when? Did that happen when abortion was illegal?
Since when is not having the right to kill another human being the equivalent of slavery?
So it seems that at least someone here recognizes that the unborn are alive. What's the difference between a human being and a person? And why should anyone accept your definition of personhood over the definition of someone who says women aren't persons? The problem with the category of personhood is that it is almost always used by one group of human beings to arbitrarily discriminate against another group of human beings.
Actually Roe didn't do anything to limit abortions in the second trimester. It merely allowed that the state could limit who and where second trimester abortions are performed. In the third trimester, it limit abortions based on the woman's life and health but in Doe v. Bolton went on to accept a very broad definition of health to include : "all-factors- physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman's age.." so in other words - anything a woman can think up and an abortionist will agree to.
Your first trimester statistic is incorrect. According to the CDC's 2002 abortion surveliance report - 6% of abortion were performed at 13-15 weeks, 4.1% were performed at 16-20 weeks and 1.4% were performed after 20 weeks.
Have I been intellectually dishonest? I provided quotes from embryology textbooks when Media Girl asked about the scientific evidence for life beginning at conception and then asked her for some reasoning to back up her assertions. What religious beliefs have I asserted? Your last paragraph is an ad hominem attack. It personally attacks prolife people for their supposed lack of interest in helping born children instead of attacking their arguments.
does nothing of the sort. It begs the question, that's all. Some cells are alive w/ human chromosomes. Bundles of living human chromosomes get flushed down the toilet alive all the time. So what? The question is when does that bundle of cells become a person, something which you avoid. In your black and white world, blunt assertions of tautalogical truths (fetuses are alive, well duh) serves to reinforce you faith-based belief that that fact REQUIRES that the LAW treat those cells to all the same protections as an actual living-and-breathing person. The law is all about shades-of-gray definitions of "personhood".
Science doesn't provide those kinds of answers. Science gives blunt descriptions of natural processes based on reproducable observations. Just stating some fact of biological processes doesn't help you, at all.
So we're left with the law, which doesn't really even pretend to offer the kinds of certainties that science and religion do (science by limiting what it describes, religion by spouting whatever crap is convenient to reinforce its belief system). Law is messy and always moving. It consists of an amorphous collection of statutes and case laws, blunt declarations and slippery traditions. There are long legal traditions describing what a "person" was. For a long time, only males who owned property qualified. Everyone else was some gradiation of property. In this country, it's come to mean a human being who is "living and breathing". Roe's compromise was built around this idea, with more and more protection as the fetus is able to "live and breathe" on its own, thus the trimester scheme, but the first priority being the ACTUALLY "living and breathing" human being, the mother. How casually you dismiss her needs with "anything a woman can think up." Such contempt.
Oh, and "Roe didn't do anything to limit abortions in the second trimester" is contradicted by the next sentence, "It merely allowed that the state could limit who and where second trimester abortions are performed". See, there is that word "LIMIT" in there, which is exactly what I said.
As for your point about my statistics, I pulled it out of my ass. So lets find the real ones:
So, 88% vs 98%. I apologize for that, but we can see that the vast majority happened earlier in the pregnancy. Your assumption that that roughly 6% were performed as the result of some kind of flighty lark on the part of the women and those greedy abortionists betrays a deep abiding contempt for women and the very serious decisions they have to make about their health. Having witnessed that contempt my entire life, I feel perfectly comfortable launching ad hominem attacks at a political movement that is seeking to turn back the hands of time and rob women over the right to control their own destinies. If HALF the energy devoted to carrying around pictures of fetuses had been directed at ending childhood hunger, we wouldn't have one of the highest childhood poverty rates in the western world. The plain fact of the matter is that the vast majority of Women's Enslavement zealots are concerned with asserting their faith-based worldview on others, and demanding that sex remain something risky and shameful. I feel no compunction against launching piles of contempt your way. I find the "pro-life" movement to be a reprehensible and shameful segment of the body politic in this country. They make me ashamed of my fellow Americans and the large number of them who revel in ignorance, superstition and bigotry. Your crack about how women choose this medical procedure as some kind of meaningless thing has earned you every measure of contempt I can toss your way.
Madman,
I have to agree with Jivin. You say:
"Some cells are alive w/ human chromosomes. Bundles of living human chromosomes get flushed down the toilet alive all the time. So what? The question is when does that bundle of cells become a person, something which you avoid."
An embryo is NEVER just a bundle of cells. Scientifically, an embryo is a complete ORGANISM. I do not understand why this is so hard to grasp. Actually, Media Girl asked for scientific evidence and science will NEVER address the issue of when an embryo becomes a PERSON. Science is clear that a human being is created at conception and at no other time. (Last time I checked an Embryology book starts at fertilization not at implantation or when the fetus is viable)
I say in the abortion debate we take use facts that we can verify, not some debatable metaphysical and non-verifiable idea of when a PERSON begins.
You know, an embryo doesn't start for some time after fertilization.
You want to talk about "facts that we can verify," but then it seems to want to impart all sorts of meaning to those facts.
Fact: A zygote as 46 chromosomes. Wow. What does that mean?
Fact: Many if not most zygotes will never ever become babies. Uh oh. Better call out the SWAT teams.
Fact: The baby is not a baby until after gestation. That's why we have gestation. Maybe that's just too obvious for you to see. But without gestation, there is no baby.
Now some people say that's cause enough to break out the ankle chains and start locking up pregnant women and put them in the service of the government. After all, that's what criminalizing abortion means.
But the fact of the matter is that gestation is part of the creation process. There is no baby without it. And to try to push that all down as just a footnote to the monumental occasion of a man's spilling his seed is just ludicrous, imho.
Really? Were women locked up in ankle chains for getting abortions in 1972?
Gestation isn't part of the creation process (nothing new is created during gestation) - it's part of the growing process. The unborn is already created. That happened earlier - at conception. During gestation the unborn grow and mature. The same thing happens during infancy and adolescence.
That is perhaps the most absurd thing I've seen in any comments posted here this here. I may have to highlight it in my end-of-year round-up.
As for making women slaves of the government, that's exactly what you're arguing for. Are the ankle chains to vivid for you? Get used to it. In Texas, they're gearing up to make it a capital offense. Won't you just love it when your sister is executed because the rubber broke and she had just gotten into med school?
Why is it absurd? What new organism is created during gestation? The organs and limbs of the unborn grow and develop during gestation but no new organism is created. That's a nice assertion but there's no reasoning behind it. I could just as easily assert that what you've said is absurd with providing any reasoning.
They're gearing up to put women who abort on death row? Since when?
I don't have a sister but if I did I certainly wouldn't want her or any other woman to be executed for having an abortion.
Until the baby is there, the creating is still happening. Organs are created. Limbs are created. The brain is created. They are all created from the elements provided by the woman's womb, guided by what amounts to software code.
Now you say the software code is everything. I say the code needs to be run, and run well, and supported well, so that the code can create the being. Having just the code does nothing. It is not sufficient to be a baby itself.
Of course, that's irrelevant to you because you've decided it's so.
If you actually were interested in learning, I'd respond to you. Too bad you never learned critical thinking. What with the way you go on so illogically, you probably don't even realize how you're just spinning your wheels. You're arguing with strawman after strawman. Really, you can do that on your own time and stop wasting mine. Maybe you should go back to arguing with Carl Sagan. He'll give you the argument you deserve.
Until the baby is there? When does the baby "arrive?" What's the thing that's growing and developing in the womb? A non-organism that becomes an organism at birth? Is it not really "there?" Is it some kind of abstract entity that appears in ultrasound photos and moves around yet isn't really in the world?
Creating a new organism isn't happening. Development is happening. Growth is happening. These things (development and growth) also occur long after birth. Your equating development and growth with creating when they are obviously not the same.
Why does creating seem to stop at birth? The child continues to develop after birth in the same way that it was developing before birth. Why does a change in location make a non-child-baby which is being created into a baby-child that is created and is now just growing? Happens on that nine-ince journey down the birth canal? Is there some hormone unknown to me that is suddenly transfered to the non-baby entity to make that non-living, non-organism entity into a baby?
Software code is everything? Another strawman perhaps? Are you trying to say that I believe that human DNA is everything? You're right - something having human DNA doesn't mean that it is a human organism - for example, my hair has human DNA but it's not a human organism - it's merely part of me. The unborn on the other hand are orgnaism unto themselves who are growing and directing their own development.
...is the requirement of the woman's body to provide all the means of living.
So when you have a zygote, where does the brain come from? Does it get shipped in UPS? Does the heart get pulled from Door #3? No, they are created. Yes, it's wonderful and mysterious. But it's still part of the process of creating a baby.
By your logic, you can take any arbitrary point and say, "Ah, but it all started here!"
Maybe it was the gleam in James's eye.
Or the hard-on he had that morning.
Or the resolution he made that January to knock some woman up.
Or when the hair began to grow on his privates. Without that, you know, no baby!
You say creation is instantaneous. Bingo! Instant baby! The rest is just footnotes. All the same. Fetus or 70-year-old West Palm Beach bowling champion. Same difference!
When is that instant moment? Is it when the sperm's "head" touches the ovum? Is it once it penetrates? Is it after the tail comes through? Is there some moment in the chemical processes where you say, "Eureka"?
You obviously never do any cooking, or you would understand the concept that just having the ingredients does not make the meal. You have to create the meal. It takes preparation and energy and care. Maybe to you, dinner just appears on the table like magic, and it all seems instantaneous: You bought the groceries, therefore you made the meal. It's all just so logical!
But a lot more goes into creating than just assembling the ingredients. Gestation in a woman's body is not a trivial matter.
I know, you boys hanging out at Focus on the Family don't like to think of women as anything more than breeders. So here's a radical idea.
You're obviously passionately opposed to abortion. So don't have one.
It's as simple as that. As for imposing your religious views on everyone else, well, we live in a civil society governed by a Constitution where people have rights.
And women are people, too.
You want to think of an ovum with a sperm wriggling into it as a person, well, that's up to you, according to your dogma.
Now, to me it's clear that you're a serial troller of websites and you're not seeking to discuss anything, really. Keep coming here. I love all the traffic. But I have better things to do with my time than waste it on a christianist dogmatist trying to enforce his religious views by governmental force.
Hi mediagirl,
I'm wondering if you can answer some of my questions that you haven't answered or I've missed your answer to.
Where does "the baby" come from? How does the non-child become a child? Why does creating stop at birth?
You ask, where does the brain come from? While it certainly isn't given to the child from the mother. The unborn begins to develop it's brain around 20 days after conception. The heart and brain develop from cells that are in the embryo.
Did I say conception was instanteous? Nope. That seems to be another strawman argument - one of the many you have created to avoid answering questions and providing some reasoning to why you can't accept basic scientific facts. The embryo and 70-year-old from Palm Beach aren't completely the same, both they're both human beings.
I'd say conception is complete when the embryo begins acting like a unified whole organism.
Your cooking example is like comparing apples and oranges. Cooking is not a living organism, a human being is. If your creation criteria for cooking was used for human beings, then newborn children wouldn't be human beings because they are hardly finished developing, it also would eliminate adolescences because they too have not completed their development. So is a newborn not a human being because they haven't completed their development?
I'm sorry but this is the lamest pro-choice argument in the world. You're opposed to slavery, don't own a slave. You're opposed to killing newborns, then don't kill a newborn.
What religious views have I imposed on you? Have I quoted scripture? Or have I quoted embryology textbooks? Why is it that pro-choicers at this site feel forced to accuse others of imposing religion when scientific textbooks are quoted?
When did I use the philosophical term "person" when describing a zygote? I provided quotes from embryology textbooks which show that at conception the life of a human being begins.
Media Girl,
Actually, the definition on an embryo is from conception to about 8 weeks when the terminology changes to fetus.
here is a link: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/embryo
2b says this: In humans, the prefetal product of conception from implantation through the eighth week of development.
Just like with all terminology in biology, these terms are simply words. Zygote, embryo, fetus, newborn, toddler, teenager, middle-aged, elderly, these are all terms used to describe the SAME organism at different stages of development.
There is no need to call out the SWAT team when an embryo or fetus spontaneously aborts, just like with any natural death. Abortion is the artificial ending of a human life.
The gestation is really beside the point. When artificial wombs are perfected, the fact that a human being is present from the moment of conception will not change.
You say "conception" but the definition says "implantation" -- and that's a big distinction in your talking points. Many fertilized eggs never successfully implant in the uterine wall.
No, actually abortion is the termination of a process in a woman's uterus. And the reasons for abortion rights is because of those last three words in the previous sentence.
A woman's uterus.
Not the man's uterus. Not the Government's uterus. Not the Preacher's uterus. The woman's uterus.
There we go again. Gestation is beside the point? That's an awfully convenient assertion on your part, but it doesn't really amount to anything meaningful or factual, does it? In fact, without gestation, there is no baby.
When the Government or Proctor & Gamble or the 700 Club create an artificial womb, then they can claim rights over it.
Until and unless that happens, a government that is given all of its power by the people cannot turn around and claim control of the bodies of half of them.
Abortion is sometimes the best decision that can be made under difficult circumstances. no one other than the woman involved, in addition to her health care providers (or anyone she cares to include), are fit to judge her situation or her needs.
the difference between (what i assume) your position (is) and mine is that i hold the woman's rights in high regard. you seem to hold the rights of the unborn sacrosanct, trumping all others. IMHO, It's not a baby unless the mother says it is. babies should be wanted, not force-birthed through legislative fiat and rule of law, which is where your (assumed) position leads.
roe vs wade is really a grand compromise between our two positions. the supreme court found for elements of your (the state's) argument but it also found for much of mine.
you say The gestation is really beside the point.
oh really? isn't that discounting an equally important part of the equation of fetal-life?
it seems to me that the life you seemingly hold so dear isn't even possible without gestation, is it? so how does it follow that the gestation is therefore beside the point? (answer, it's not). if gestation isn't beside the point then how can the gestator be?
you say There is no need to call out the SWAT team when an embryo or fetus spontaneously aborts, just like with any natural death. you don't really show any good understanding in that statement about the legal problems assocated with assigning full human rights to the unborn. you also don't seem to realize that "swat teams" are already on the move.
Let me illustrate by giving an example from the testimony before the South Dakota Task Force To Study Abortion. The illogical position of a "fetus's rights trump all" has serious moral and legal issues that is already causing many problems for women. And as the misguided movement grows, and unqualifed legislators across the U.S. pass additional flawed law, these instances of injustice will continue to grow.
high contrast, either/or, is/isn't cozy little world you people live in?
What ARE we talking about? Gametes, blastocysts, embryos, fetuses ... all organisms made up of human chromosomes. What NONE of them can do is fulfill the legal description of a "natural person" ... "living and breathing independently". The superstitious can cherry pick a few scientific words all they want, but it's still just cherry picking, and it won't solve the problem any more than the cherry picked verses in the Bible will.
Just throw crap at a rhetorical wall and pretend that you're creating anything more than a mess, but it's still just a bunch of random crap thrown onto a wall. There is a long and evolving legal system within which Roe fits, however imperfectly. At least it is of-a-piece with the system its part of.
You have a superstitious belief: that people are "special" and "precious", that they are so because God whipped them up after he finished everything else, and that they come to be these special things from the minute that Adam finishes thrusting into Eve. It's still just an arbitrary superstition.
I repeat, slime molds are complete organisms too. Nature, or God or the Cosmic Muffin or whatever randomly wipe out numerous organisms every nanosecond. Doesn't make them special. What makes people special is the worth we place upon them. It's plain that women matter not a whit to this political movement, and actual living and breathing children matter little more. What matters is a superstitious ideological ax being ground to a keen sharp edge, the better to punish people for their sins.
Hi Madman,
What argument did I make that was question begging? How does the fact that some human beings aren't unable to implant on a uterine wall and get flushed down the toilet prove that the unborn aren't alive?
You're right about science not giving us a definition for personhood. That's a wholly philosophical realm. My response was catered to Media Girl - who originally asked for scientific evidence. Do you agree with the quotes from embryology textbooks which say that at conception a human life begins.
If personhood is what matters - please provide a non-arbitrary definition of personhood. I'd be careful with your "living and breathing" criteria because we seem to already have settled that the unborn are alive and the unborn do "breathe" in a way. They don't breathe thru their lungs but they do take in oxygen through their placenta.
The Roe framework wasn't built on that idea. It was built on Harry Blackmun's skewed view of the legal history of abortion and his reverence for doctors.
When did I say they could choose abortion as some kind of meaningless thing? I merely pointed out that "health" was defined in such a way to allow for anything and everything to be "health" as long as an abortionist will agree to perform one. Making restrictions on when abortion can be performed impossible to enact or prosecute. I know that women don't take a decision to have an abortion lightly - far from it - I was just trying to point out that abortions done after the first trimester don't have to be because of what "health" traditionally means.
I thought your previous comment indicated that you thought states could limit abortion (i.e. prevent them from happening) and not just regulate who and where they are performed. My apologies if I misunderstood.
Have I reveled in ignorance or bigotry?
what's up with the banner ad at the top of the page linking to an anti-abortion site?
For a moment I was worried I'd mistakenly hit up Concerned Women of America or some equally odious site.
;-)
It's an experiment not paying all that well anyway.
look dude. heres the deal. if you're really into your faith and what-not thats fine. so just say so and spare us the quotes from your boring textbooks which are quite meaningless in this debate.
which begs the question, do you really have so little faith in your (religious) faith that you feel compelled to justify your faith to us certified unbelievers using science?
why don't you just relax and quit trying to couch whatever beliefs you have in semi-scientific terms. belief if fine. quit trying to sell it to us as if it were provable. ITS NOT PROVABLE. its belief. and thats fine. believe in whatever you wish, I'll do the same.
if you want to be pro-fetal-life because you believe in god and the resurrection and an afterlife and the sanctity of some clump of cells why don't you just let it out.
life began 4.5 billion years ago and hasn't stopped since. there is no beginning, there is no end, not really. egg and sperm were both alive before the union. so how exactly does life begin?
define life! lets hear that one!
what i "concept" what you're really talking about is when "personhood' begins.
its all opinion, you see. you have yours. i have mine. we disagree. live your life the way you wish, i don't really care.
i'll decide whats best for me and my body. you do the same.
.
Hi Bayprairie,
Really into my faith? Did I make a religious argument? Why is that when I provide scientific quotes from embryology textbooks that I'm a religious fanatic who's pushing his faith on others? Are pro-choice really that afraid of scientific facts?
How are quotes from embryology textbooks meaningless to whether life begins at conception? How is it not provable? If it was not provable then why are these quotes in mainstream embryology textbooks which are used in universities across America?
It's true that life began a long time ago but it's also true that the life of each individual organism begins at one time or another, correct? I've provided evidence that at conception, the life of a human being has begun. Do you have any evidence to back up your view?
I'm not talking about when personhood begins. Media Girl asked for evidence to life beginning at conception. I've provided that.
When you say that you have your opinion and I have mine you're confusing objective claims with subjective claims. I'm not claiming that vanilla ice cream is the best or that Brad Pitt is more attractive than Justin Timberlake (those are subjective claims) - I'm claiming that the unborn are living human beings (that's an objective claim which is either right or wrong). If I claimed that a piece of paper was a living human being, would you argue that "I have my opinion and you have yours?" I certainly hope not. You'd say I'm wrong and provide me with evidence to show that I'm wrong.
You provided some second-hand accounts, out of context, by authors unknown, whose backgrounds are not provided, presenting no argument, just a little paragraph here and there.
I can do that, too. Whoopdeedo. Search this site and you'll find "facts" that state that a pregnancy does not begin until implantation.
What you call 9 inches makes it all seem so trivial -- why is it "inches" to you, anyway? But there's quite a bit that goes into a baby than DNA.
But if you want to buy into a twisted sort of nature over nurture argument, and say we're nothing but a jumble of nucleic acids sloshing around in so much water, then sure, I could see why you believe that DNA = baby.
But the reality is that there's a lot more that goes into making a baby than the man's spilling his seed. Those 9 months are not trivial. It's often fatal for the woman -- often enough that it's never a trivial decision. All the man has done is dump his jism to provide some genetic material, but it's the woman who makes the baby from that, and that is a long process.
Making a baby takes nine months.
And you know what? That's a scientific fact. It's repeatable. And it doesn't take any dogmatically exclusionary view of the world that discounts how life develops in a process. Your notion that people are just DNA is like saying computers are just software, so who needs all that hardware?
Oh if life really were so easy.
I provided quotes from embryology textbooks that clearly indicate when life begins - how is that not evidence?
You haven't provided a shred of evidence that at conception - life hasn't begun.
What does pregnancy not being until implantation have to do with whether at conception the life of a human being begins?
I never said DNA=baby. Could you please try not to create obvious strawmen. I could pluck off a piece of my skin and it has my DNA in it - does that make it me? Of course not.
I never said those 9 months are trivial. They are certainly an important part of the development of the unborn.
This assertion is preposterous. What about children who are born prematurely? Are children who are born at 7 months not really babies until they are out of the womb for two months?
You're going off on these sentences from "textbooks" you've dug up. But quoting declarations is not presenting an argument. You've provided no argument at all. One wonders if you have one.
As for what's preposterous, look at the things you are claiming, and then look at the language you use. Such as:
unborn -- as in not born, as in has not yet come into this world
And gestation is not just an "important part" -- it's an essential part. Do such distinctions matter to you?
yet you seem to be equating them.
You asked for scientific evidence that at conception the life of a human being begins. I provided that from scientific embryology textbooks written by some of the world's leading embryologists. You didn't ask for an argument - you asked for evidence - which is what I provided.
If you want an argument for why abortion should be illegal - I can provide that as well -
1. Intentionally ending the life of an innocent human being should be illegal.
2. Abortion intentional ends the life of an innocent human being.
3. Conclusion - therefore abortion should be illegal.
So is "Making a baby takes nine months" still a scientific fact?
Just because something isn't born doesn't mean it isn't in the world. It certainly is in the world or else why would women have abortions? If the unborn don't exist in the world then why do women pay $400 to have an abortionist kill them and remove them from their wombs?
Can something that isn't in the world kick her mother's stomach? How can ultrasound technology take pictures of something that isn't in the world?
Important vs. essential? Both true. Gestation is an important and essential part in the life of the unborn. You'll get no arguments from me there.
Your ideology binds your tongue, or keyboard.
I asked you to define your terms, and you have refused. You provided no evidence, because you did not define your terms.
Your argument to make abortion illegal makes no sense, because your premises are false.
Which terms would you like me to define? I couldn't find where you've asked me to "define terms" in our past discussion. Maybe I missed it. When did you ask me to define my terms?
Again, is "Making a baby takes nine months" a scientific fact? You've avoided backing up or denying this statement twice now. Maybe third time will be lucky.
Please show how my premises are false. Do you think it should be legal to intentionally kill innocent human beings? I've provided evidence from embryology textbooks to back the fact that the unborn are human beings - do you have any evidence from science which shows that they are not human beings?
Of course, if you cannot define your terms, then nobody can pin you down on what you mean.
Yes, it typically takes nine months to make a baby. Sure, sometimes it can be less, sometimes more. It's a wonder you've never noticed pregnant women walking around.
Your undefined terms:
What is "intentionally ending"? Does that mean murder? What about self defense? What about out of negligence? What if conflicting interests lead to the requirement that someone must die?
"life" -- what is life? Was Terri Schiavo alive? Is the auto accident victim whose brain was smashed but whose heart still beats? I'm sure you say a fertilized ovum is "life", but why do you make that claim? Because of DNA? This "life" could not live without being completely and totally supported by someone who actually is alive, a woman.
"innocent human being" -- What on Earth does that mean? Who's "innocent"? Innocent of what? A crime? Are you innocent? I suppose self-sacrifice to save another also would be wrong, in your eyes. Your phrase is filled with implications, too -- that murder is justified for non-innocent "human beings". My my, what importance you put on your own view of the world.
"illegal" -- Illegal how? A ticket? Prison? Execution? Work camps? Or do you advocate pre-emptive measures, such as locking up women in leg irons and hauling them off to breeder camps where diet and environment can be fully regulated and controlled by the State?
This is an assertion of faith. "innocent human being"? I'd say abortion ceases the process of creating a human being. Just because the process has started doesn't mean the process is complete. One thing at a time, you know.
Given the faith-based assumptions and vague, undefined terms you use, your argument makes absolutely no sense and carries no weight.
Hi Mediagirl,
For the fourth time - is
a scientific fact? You said this. I responded and you've yet to either admit that your assertion was wrong (which it obviously is) or provide any defense for it. Saying that pregnancy typically takes nine months is not what you stated earlier. Would you like to withdraw your supposed scientific fact?
Intentionally ending isn't specific enough for you? I'm trying to think what could be more specific. How about "intentionally ending the life of a living human being who is not guilty of a capital offense or a threat to the life of another human being with the purpose of ending the life of that organism which is a member of the species homo sapiens and without proper justification should be a crime in the United States of America?" Self-defense? No, self-defense wouldn't fit because someone who is defending themselves obviously isn't ending the life of an innocent human being. Neglience? Is the neglience intentional or unintentional?
Why do I make the claim that a zygote is alive? Are you kidding me? Could you please scroll back up to my first comment and again examine the quotes from scientific textbooks. It's true that an embryo wouldn't be alive if she wasn't supported by her mother. But how does that make it right for her mother to have someone kill her? A newborn infant completely relies on others to provide him with food, water, clothing, shelter, etc. without which he would quickly die.
How is whether something is a human being an assertion of faith? If said my cat was a human being - would you say that is an assertion of faith or would you laugh because it is obvious that a cat isn't a human being. It's an objective assertion which is either right or wrong. I've provided my evidence to why it is right while you've yet to provide of scrap of scientific evidence to back up your view.
"process of creating a human being" - by your definition wouldn't infantificide do the same thing? From our previous conversations, it seems that you equate development and growth with creation but you've yet to come up with any reason why creation (in reality growth and development) stops at birth. The process isn't complete with a newborn infant, the process isn't complete with a toddler, the process isn't complete with a teenager. Do you have any scientific evidence to back up your view that "abortion ceases the process of creating a human being?" If not, then what are you basing your view on?
...that you weren't reading.
who gets mad when someone refuses to walk into an obvious booby trap you've laid. Let it go. Peddle your wares somewhere else. You've memorized a simple line of talking points, an "argument" that depends upon the other person accepting your initial premise. I don't. It seems apparent that no one else here does either. Your utter disregard of the nine often dangerous months that a mother spends creating this life within her is deeply troubling and indicative of a sick chauvinism.
Give ... it ... up.
I'm mad? How could you tell? I've actually got a big smile on my face right now. But aren't you the "Madman?"
Since when do I have an utter disregard for pregnancy? I've previously said that I think pregnancy is both important and essential.
I'm not just a fundie wacko but now I'm a chauvinist. Man, the
cheap insultspro-choice arguments get better everyday.You start from one premise. You refuse to accept that there can be any other premise. Therefore, no argument.
For years we've been told that as liberals we need to be tolerant even of the intolerant. I will not. I cannot. You push one line, and only one line, to the exception of any and all other perspectives.
These are not meant as cheap insults, but a reflection back at you of what you are. You are an authoritarian pushing an ideology that places a woman as a lesser being, a life-support system for the pre-baby. A slave. A piece of livestock. I know you're used to people giving deference to this idea as though it is something reasonable, but it isn't. You are at a complete loss to argue from any other line of reasoning, but only from this one perspective. Do you see how shallow that is?
Many here tried to be reasonable with you and your tag-team buddy, but it's a waste of time. Comfort yourself that the "madman" was unreasonable to you, but you're the one putting on intellectual "drag", pretending to make a "scientific" argument where all you're pushing is a religious belief. You are little different from those fools who claim the fossil record was placed here by God to test people's faith, as though the purported Creator had nothing better to do than torment and tease his creations.
Have a nice day.
I provided quotes from embryology textbooks that clearly indicate when life begins - how is that not evidence?
Hi Jivin J,
Since you're citing texts here, let's cut to the chase. Your quotes from embryology textbooks are evidence only that a zygote is *necessary* for human life, not that it is *sufficient*. And this is what media girl has been (all too patiently) trying to explain to you.
My textbook quote say that at conception, a human life begins. I don't know where your sufficient and necessary criteria come from. Do you have any evidence from science that the unborn child isn't a human being? When do the unborn usually become alive, if not at conception?
Media Girl hasn't been trying to explain anything. She's been creating obvious strawman, making obviously flawed assertions with nothing to back them up and denying evidence from scientific textbooks.
Hi Media Girl,
I am a board certified oral and maxillofacial surgeon with extensive training in embryology, especially head and neck embryology. The textbooks that JivinJ quotes from are the same one's I have used in my medical school embryology training. If they are not adequate for the purpose of showing that the life of an individual human being begins at the moment of conception, I'm not sure what would be. You asked for evidence - he used medical school level texts to give it to you. Either you are having a difficult time understanding and accepting a scientific fact because of your ideological presuppositions, or the entire field of human embryology is involved in a conspiracy to hide the truth in order to subjugate women.
All living organisms change throughout their natural lives. The human organism goes through several stages of development, from zygote, to blastocyst, to embryo, to fetus, to newborn, to toddler, to adolescent, to adult, to elderly person. As the organism goes through these changes, it always remains alive, and it always remains an organism of the species homo sapiens. In other words, it is always a human being. This is scienitific fact. If you have any evidence to support your view, that the organism is somehow not alive prior to birth, but becomes alive after the magical journey down the birth canal, I'd like to hear it.
One more thing, I have been involved in some of the fetal surgical procedures that have taken place at Children's Hospital in Detroit. It is becoming more common to operate on human fetuses for pathological problems like spina bifida. Question: when we are doing surgery on a human fetus' spine to correct SB, what exactly are we operating on? Are they alive or dead? Are they human or non-human?
Serge
I admire anybody disciplined enough to become a surgeon.
However, we're arguing apples and ... well, rocks here. The question is when some grouping of cells becomes a legal person. You can insist that because it's "human", and because it's "alive", then therefore it's the same as a walking around person, but they are not the same thing. Why is that so hard to understand? You can insist it begins from conception, or from implantation, or from "quickening" or whatever, there is ALWAYS an arbitrary line. If you move the bar back to far before actual birth, before "independent and breathing", then you have reduced a woman to a vessel, to LESS than a person. In order for your scheme to work, for it to have the force of law, then by definition ONLY male embryos would be "persons", since the "personhood" of the woman is limited by the requirement that she be forced to become a vessel for some future fetus.
You can claim some "scientific" basis for your belief, but your belief MUST lead to women being less than the potential (male) life. It seems that many on the anti-woman side of things are just fine with that idea, but don't try to claim that some mechanistic fact of biology renders a metaphysical dispute moot. It doesn't.
Madman,
I'd love to engage you in a discussion regarding the metaphysics of human life and especially if human life is intrinsically or instrumentally valuable. However, mediagirl started this post about scientific evidence. Before we bring metaphysics into the discussion, would you agree that an individual human organism is present after conception on a purely scientific basis? If so, we can move on to consider how should treat individual human organisms. Until that time, lets stick with the science.
What is "an individual human organism"? A lump of DNA? What are the elements, please?
Please, define "life."
Going by the rhetoric of the "pro-life" crowd, my guess is that life begins at conception and ends at birth. Is that wrong? Is that your scientific determination?
You talk about metaphysics but then fall back on these vague terms with shifting meanings.
When do you believe an "individual human organism" becomes a baby? Just curious.
conception in merely necessary, not sufficient, to create a "person". Merely combining human dna isn't creating a full human being. As has been stated above, there is an entire process that has to happen. A already existing human being, a woman, herself plays a necessary, not sufficient, part in creating a human being. I assert that an already existing human being has primacy over one small piece that may someday, through HER SACRIFICE AND POTENTIALLY DANGEROUS EFFORTS, may one day become a human being.
An acorn is not an oak. It is a necessary starting point, but so much else combines to become that oak. An acorn without the proper medium for it to take root, prosper, grow and eventually combine that acorn, soil, essential nutrients, sunlight, carbon dioxide that all combine to "become" that oak. That's science. Human life is the result of a process, of numerous essential elements that have to combine in the right way. JJ is trying to argue that the acorn IS an oak. It just ain't so, scientifically or metaphysically.
if an acorn isn't an oak? (and it's not)
then an Egg McMuffin isn't a McChicken sandwich!
:::snickering:::
I never said anything about a "person". J has offered evidence that the individual life of a human being begins at conception. Do you agree or not? If not, could you provide some scientific evidence to support your point of view? Or would you just like me to take it on faith?
Serge
and you know it. However, like all conservatives, you and JJ start out an "argument" by demanding that we accept your definitions, your terms, of what "human life" is. I, and others here, have made it very clear that we reject your starting premise. JJ started out by making a fallacious appeal to authority: his textbooks. Now, those textbooks merely tell you that there are living cells at conception. You and he obviously accept some Platonic/Catholic idea that the whole of a thing is present in the potential for that thing. I reject that definition. Since initial definitions must be agreed on in order for us to even have an argument about this, we are plainly shouting past each other.
This entire thread has been a rhetorical battle over the shape of the conference table. The problem w/ arguing w/ anti-woman crusaders is your insistance that you have the backing of the Prime Authority, and refuse to recognize that anyone else might base their lives, moral decisions or ways of looking at the world without appeals to your Big Invisible Friend. Since you refuse to recognize ANY possible definition other than the ones you start with from your Book, this is a pointless exercise. You can insist that you're making a scientific argument, but it's "science" like ID is "science".
This reminds me of the arguments I used to have w/ theology students back in college. Always, zealotry demands that the contest be fought within boundaries determined by the believer. I reject your narrow definitions. I reject these ideas that led to centuries of lost human potential, potential squeltched by narrow, frightened superstitions and patriarchical bigotry. A human being isn't a narrow thing determined by the mere mixing of genetic material. Human beings are processes, growing and changing and creating. Your narrow, frightened little world view would squelch all of that potential in order to preserve your sad, limited definitions, spelled out in old, moldy mistranslated books by old men long dead.
This has been fun. Thanks.
Madman,
Color me disappointed. I have simply asked you whether or not basic scientific facts that are presented in the medical literature are true or not. This is not difficult. They are not "my" definitions. They are devoid of any political affiliation. They do not require the backing of any higher power, and I have not asserted any. I have not argued regarding potential. I have made one claim:
The life of an individual human being begins at conception.
I (actually, J )has provided evidence for that fact. Scientific facts do not change based on what we would like them to be. They are not affected by our individual ideology. Scientific facts are out there for all to note. If you wish to reject them without reason, you place yourself amongst those who believe in a flat earth.
Serge
JJ quotes textbooks that say that a fertilized ovum is living tissue. I have no argument with that. This scientific fact is then conflated with the assertion that that fertilzed ovum is a "human being", a legal person, and thus due legal protection from the state. In order for that argument to work, you have to accept the premise "living tissue w/ human dna = human being/person". Again, I reject your premise. The "persuasive techniques" that you two carry into website after website isn't flying here. We reject your premise. Intellectual Luddism is unattractive, and frankly it's become boring. Thanks for the jousting, but that's all this has been.
Go harrass some college freshmen that haven't taken logic classes or learned anything about science yet.
Hi Madman,
The embryology textbook quotes do a little more than say a "fertilized ovum is living tissue." They actually don't say that at all.
The quote from Bruce Carlson's textbook says, "The time of fertilization represents the starting point in the life history, or ontogeny, of the individual."
Keith Moore's textbook says, "This fertilized ovum, known as a zygote, is a large diploid cell that is the beginning, or primordium, of a human being."
Langman's embryology says, "The development of a human being begins with fertilization, a process by which two highly specialized cells, the spermatozoon from the male and the oocyte from the female, unite to give rise to a new organism, the zygote."
I don't see the word "tissue" in any of those quotes.
Both Serge and I are trying to see if you recognize that the unborn are scientifically human beings, i.e. members of species homo sapiens. We're not trying to trick you into admitting that the unborn are legal persons.
Neither of us believe that living tissue with human DNA equals a human being. We both recognize if we scratched our skin - we'd have in our fingernails living tissue with human DNA but that we wouldn't have a human being.
Earlier, you seemed to recognize that the unborn could be living human organisms but not persons. Did I read you wrong because now you seem to be equating living human organisms and persons?
thanks for giving this website some extra traffic w/ your tired old intellectual grift. I'm sure Media Girl and her advertisers appreciate the extra hits.
Happy New Year.
Madman,
The quotes from JJ indicate that a zygote is a living human organismm not simply human tissue The wisdom tooth I extracted 10 minutes ago has living human tissue in it. It has human dna. It is not an organism. An embryo is.
Once again, do you believe that an embryo is a living organism of the species homo sapiens (I'm being as clear as I can here)? If not, why not? Do have any scientific evidence to support your claim, or do you choose to reject science for ideological reasons?
I have made no claims that an embryo is a legal person. That is not science.
Serge
and I see clearly what you are demanding me to recognize. A bundle of living cells that resulted from the fertilization of an ovum IS NOT YET a human being. It living human tissue that has the potential to be a human being. That's all it is. You are attempting to build a political argument on a premise that you claim is science.
A zygote is living human tissue. It can, with the proper conditions and a great deal of effort on the part of a woman's body, become a full living and breathing human being. It is not yet a human being just because it may one day BECOME a human being. Many times they don't. Many times they get flushed out because her body rejects it, or some chromosome is scrambled or the stars aren't aligned properly.
I think that's perfectly clear and consistent w/ science. Go peddle your rhetorical games and superstitions somewhere else. This is just the sort of cafeteria science that gets misused by people like you all the time to push your political and philosphical crusades. Science describes natural processes. That's all it does. I've had this argument before. It's boring. You prove nothing.
Is the zygote a living human organism? If not, why not? If so, please explain the scientific diference between a living human organism and a human being.
I know that you fundie wackjobs at Focus on the Family hope that the scales will fall off our eyes, we'll see the "error" of our ways now that you've explained "science" to us (and who else to turn to to learn about science than a religious nut?). We'll fall to our knees, beg to be saved and then go immediately out and start yelling "baby killer" at scared and stressed out women.
I've answered your and JJ's questions. "Human being" when it comes to legal rights has nothing to do with science. You using the words interchangably in two different contexts doesn't convince me, though I'm sure it works really good when you go and rant at naive college kids.
You don't like my answers, ask your imaginary friend to toss a thunderbolt my way.
Thanks, though, for providing MG with some extra traffic, and maybe click thru on some of her fine advertisers while you're here.
Hi Madman,
Does or could the law define when other organisms become organisms? For example, could a law say that all cats are really dogs and be correct? Or is what kind of organism we are biologically a question for biology and not law?
If the law defines when someone is a human being or not, then couldn't the law also define individuals you recognize as human beings into the realm of not being human beings? For example, women or African-Americans, or toddlers. Let's say the New York legislature decided that newborn infants weren't human beings until they were out of the womb for 21 days. Would newborn infants then be non-human beings for the first 21 days? If mom and pop took the kid to New Jersey (which hypothetically wouldn't have 21 day law) in the first week, would the newborn then turn into a human being at the New Jersey border and then turn back into a non-human being upon reentering the state of New York?
Huh? I'm still trying to fathom the thinking behind this quote. So are all embryologists religious nuts?
I'm happy to provide traffic but I don't think I'll click thru the advertisers though the "Club sandwhichs not seals" t-shirt did catch my eye.
the advertising dollars work on page loads not click-throughs. it goes without saying that there is a tasty bonus if you click through, but hardly anyone does that.
loading the page, refreshing the page, hundreds of times, thats where the action is. a few cents here a few cents there, after a while it adds up. coming to this thread and commenting reloads the page. you load the home page to get here. when you hit post you reload the page. everything is counted and every load generates tiny revenue. the software even knows how long you spend here j, and if you sit here parked for a few hours that makes the average time spent on site rise bigtime, which is valuable.
so feel free to not click through. you're still helping to fund a pro-choicer!
The ads are pre-sold. Rates are set roughly by market and site traffic. I'm sure the advertisers would only be interested in people clicking through and buying or signing up or do whatever they're promoting. Whether Jivin clicks through or not is irrelevant -- which perhaps gets to the heart of the matter.
Actually scientificually an acorn is an oak. It's not yet an oak tree but it is an oak. In the same way, an oak seedling is an oak but it's not an oak tree. In the same way, an oak sapling isn't yet a 30 foot oak tree yet it's still an oak. That's it's genus and species - just like the genus and species of a unborn human being is homo sapiens.
In the same way, an infant isn't yet a full grown human being nor is a toddler, nor is an adolescent yet they are all human beings. The fact they aren't fully grown doesn't mean that they can't be part of that genus and species.
You cast projections through time and space and see an oak, but an acorn is only an acorn until it is no longer an acorn. Again, you fail to define any terms. Jivin Jivin Jivin, if you can't say what you mean, you can never mean what you say.
You obviously cast meaning into little "facts" that you focus in on, and ignore how you're projecting a whole belief system onto what is observable. That is called faith, and that's great. Fine. Have at it.
But that's not science.
Why, for example, do you say the acord is an oak, which requires projection into a hypothetical future that the acorn may never have, rather than say the oak is an acorn, which requires only that you go back and look at the processes that led up to the oak's existence?
Why would you make the absurd claim that an acorn and an oak are "scientifically" the same? Does "scientifically" mean that little corner of knowledge that you think you cling to, at the exclusion of all other evidence and knowledge?
I suppose I should be flattered that you and Serge brought your tired old dog and pony show here, but really, this is getting repetitive. Do you do impressions?
Hi Media Girl,
You never asked me to define my terms. You asked Serge to define terms. I just recently read that comment to Serge. I can't speak for Serge but I'll try to define the terms you've asked for.
An individual human organism - a living organism that is a member of species and genus homo sapiens - a simple lump of DNA isn't an organism - or else when I cut my hair I would have killed thousands of organisms.
For something to be a living organism it must grow (and not necessarily grow in height or waist measurements but by converting external materials into mass for itself), have a metabolism (convert energy), should direct its own development, be able to reproduce sometime in its life (there are obvious exceptions to this one) but generally to be alive a species must be able to produce more of its own in one way or another, and interact with its environment. These aren't quite textbook definitions - Serge may have some of those.
Life doesn't begin at conception and end at birth. Life continues after birth or else I'd be dead. :(
How am I projecting my belief system? How am I casting meaning into facts? I've provided evidence from science after you asked for it and which you've ignored after I've provided it. Your belief system has prevented you from accepting scientific reality based on what? You haven't provided a single shred of evidence from science which says that the unborn aren't living organisms. You've yet to admit that the unborn are living organisms even though Planned Parenthood admits this (go to teenwire.com type in fetus into the search engine on the top of the page and click on "quick definition") - they say that a fetus is an "Organism that develops from the embryo at the end of about seven weeks of pregnancy and receives nourishment through the placenta."
I never said that an acorn and an oak tree were scientifically "the same." I said they were the same genus and species - which is true. They differ in numerous ways such as size and level of development but that doesn't mean they can't be the same species. An acorn is an oak at the beginning of its development and an oak tree is an oak at pinnacle of its development. How do these facts prove that the unborn aren't living human beings?
actually serge this post is about women being abused due to misguided pro-fetal-life law. by way of example the title of this post is:
South Dakota: Where women are treated as cows
here's the problem
The report states that science defines life as beginning at conception and recommends a law that gives fetuses the same protection that children get after birth...
here's an example of where that legal concept takes you:
Was a woman there in the operating room? I thought I'd ask since you didn't mention it.
That's the point.
Ah, but it doesn't always remain alive. How many zygotes never make it to birth? What are the conditions that lead from zygote to healthy baby? Does the woman just happen to be there? Or is she, in fact, providing an essential component of bringing a baby into being?
What we see all the time now are these arguments that once the man ejaculates, well, there's the magic. And everything else is just footnotes. The woman? Immaterial. She's just a woman, after all.
And so, by extension, it makes total sense to make women into slaves of the state to deliver men's babies, and that women should have no say in what happens in their own bodies.
The problem is that every argument that is offered by the pro-fetal-life crowd about when life begins also applies to the w