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RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

Scipio Africanus — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 09:27:19 GMT

*tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick . . .*

Honesly, I am of a very mixed mind about abortion.

As a humanist, I believe that every individual (though not every POTENTIAL individual) has inalienable rights. That includes mothers, fathers, children, atheists, Islamofascists, etc.

I prefer to use "Individual" instead of "Human" because I believe we need to recognize that many other species of eukaryotes share some similar set of inalienable rights, at least to the point of having a right to NOT be driven into endangered, much less extinct status . . . but that is another thread.

The question then to me boils down to: (a) when does a fetus stop constituting a "potential" individual and start constituting a manifest individual; and (b) how does one reconcile situations where two individuals self-interests may be at odds (as in this case where I think we can agree that it is not necessarly in the best interest of the 11 year old child to give birth to a newborn child, but it is not necessarily in the best interest of the new-born child to be killed before it is born).

Honestly, with respect to (a), I think biology can supply some good answers here. Something like 50 or 60% of all preganancies that initiate terminate spontaneously within about a month or two (I THINK; it might actually be within the first 3 months, female repro is not my specialty; Locus?? got more precise numbers here?). In any event, there is a pretty clear division of pregancy b/w the early phases when many potential-individuals self-abort, and the latter phases where they are much less likely to self-abort, and thus, statistically constitute "manifest-individuals."

IMHO, that is the BASIC (but not absolute) dividing line between a just and unjust abortion, with the caveat of congenital defects which may make even a latter stage fetus unlikely to go to term. A fetus with sufficient congenital defects that it is not likely to survive even when it has made it to 6 or 7 months could arguably still constitute merely a "potential" individual, and not a "manifest" individual.

To summarize: aborting a "potential" individual where not aborting it could result in some harm or hindrance to other individuals (e.g., the mother, or others who are involved) is not only NOT unjust, it is JUST, because it prevents harm, and does little to no harm. Aborting a manifest individual, i.e., one that is likely without any intervention to be born healthy, and to face positive prospects of basic health, is basically (though not absolutely) unjust, much like killing a toddler, infant, juvenile, or adult simply because they are demanding or annoying would be unjust. But note: killing a juvenile who has gone on a school shooting spree, or assassinating an adult like Hitler in 1939 who represents a clear and present danger to the inalienable rights of other individuals mitigates the BASIC unjustness of such acts. Indeed, exactly as aborting a potentially harmful potential-individual fetus can constitute an act of justice, terminating the life of a destructive, or harmful individual can also be just.

This brings us to the (b) item above, how to reconcile situations where two individuals self-interests may be at odds. In cases like a Hitler, or a school shooter, it is not difficult to reconcile. An unprovoked aggressor which represents clear and present threat to others has forfeited his/her inalienable individual rights. Can a fetus/newborn, which has crossed the dividing line I described above and has become a "Manifest Individual" be held accountable for the potential harm or hindrance they will pose to others?

There is a part of me that would like to say yes. As a social and developmental scientist, I know that most of the world's problems at the macro-scale, emanate from processes at the meso- and micro-scale. By this I mean: troubled mother-child, or more broadly family relations tend to produce troubled individuals. Troubled individuals contribute to troubled societies. Troubled societies contribute to troubled international relations, which is prone to lead to international conflicts, wars, nuclear armaggedon.

So, an unwanted child is not a "no problem" situation. Families (or worse, lone mothers) struggling with unwanted children cumulatively generates more problems for everyone involved, including the larger society, and world. But here we must ask two questions: (i) does the birth of an unwanted child necessarily lead to the upbringing of an unwanted child by the mother/family which is not in a position to act as ideal nor even adequate parents? and (ii) who ultimately should be forced to take responsibility for unwanted child?

First let me answer (ii). I do not think the unwanted child should be forced to take responsibility. First of all, that child was not responsible for its coming in to existence, and it does not really have the capacity to "take responsibility" by any means other than to forfeit its inalienable rights to life. This is what abortion of a manifest individual for the convenience of the mother, family, or society generally constitutes: forcing the child to take responsibility for its being unwanted. This is very convenient, and it allows the status quo of our sick societies to carry on business as usual. From a selfish standpoint of being a man, a creature with an intrinsic drive to conquer as many female vessels as possible, there is an automatic allure to this solution. Much as I'm sure there is a similar allure to this for a female, a creature with an intrinsic drive for gratification, and satiation, no less powerful than those of the male, albeit perhaps somewhat different.

We could therefore conclude that: the parties most immediate to the impending social-developmental crisis are the ones who should be forced to take responsibility: the mother, her partner(s), her parents, her society. In a case like this one where the mother was raped, clearly this is not a fair and equitable solution. But even in other situations where there is some culpability on the part of the mother in the sense of "she got herself pregnant," it is still not really a satisfactory solution because, an 18 year old could very likely be easily seduced into doing something that she might not normally do, let alone an 11 year old.

Even a 30 year old woman can do something stupid. Two wrongs do not make a right, and forcing that 30 year old woman to care for her unwanted manifest individual would constitute a vindictiveness that would not ameliorate, and would only worsen the situation. If she gets an abortion during the early stages during which medical science still cannot fully explain how/why so many fetuses spontaneously abort, that is one thing. But if she has allowed it to progress to the latter stages, it is not really a good solution to tell her "you've made your bed, now sleep in it." We need more and more GOOD, healthy, thriving individuals, and forcing a woman to care for an unwanted child produces not just two more BAD, unhealthy, struggling individuals, but potentially a lot more than just two of them.

Thankfully however, we do not even need to pursue the question of forcing responsibility on the immediate parties any further than that. This is because: there are many, MANY people on our increasingly globalized Earth, who are unable, or unwilling to produce new people, but who very VERY MUCH want the opportunity to nurture, and parent new people. In short, adoption.

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

Konrad von Richtmark — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 06:21:53 GMT

What jerm said.

Though I don't oppose abortions that are done really early, a child at that stage is definitely a human being, and should be quite conscious too. She should not be granted an abortion, but be transferred to a hospital for monitoring to protect her against the complications of giving birth at such a young age.

Of course, the uncle should be held legally liable for all the suffering she goes through.

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

Nuclearcow — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 03:41:54 GMT

*looks at the bomb ticking quietly and decides to pass on it again* :P

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

jerm — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 11:52:37 GMT

I would say that aborting a fetus at certain stages of development (certainly in the embryo stage) is not the same as murder like many of these kinds of groups claim. See, both sides of the extreme coin (which is unfortunately also common on each side) take black and white positions on this issue. On the one hand you have the religious right which makes the claim that abortion, no matter when it is done, is the killing of a child and therefore murder. On the other you have the vocal pro-choice crowd who claim that even at 40 weeks, as long as it's in the womb, it's still a fetus and therefore not murder.

I think that if this girl had told her parents what had happened and had an abortion early on, there would not be such an uproar. The problem is, at this stage in development, babies can actually survive outside the womb. There's a lady in my neighborhood who had a baby born at around 20 weeks. It had severe health problems for a few months and had to be on an incubator and all sorts of IVs but now she's relatively healthy and beautiful.

This case is a rather extreme case however. She was raped and is only a child herself and so while I'm of the opinion that most abortions are immoral (though not murder), I would take exception to this one. Now one must look at the child in the womb. I know she's scared but why not give this child to someone who really wants one but can't have one? Blaming or condemning this girl if she has an abortion would be wrong but I don't hold anything against a group who wants to try and save this child.

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

Konrad von Richtmark — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 08:34:03 GMT

Cruelty? Perhaps. Consistency? Definitely.

If the life of a fetus at any stage of the pregnancy is as valuable as that of a born human, as these kinds of Church groups claim, it follows very directly that rape is not a valid reason for an abortion, as aborting a rape-baby would be equivalent to executing an innocent third party.

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

Locus Coeruleus — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 18:36:27 GMT

an 11 year old raped by her 19 y.o. Uncle, All bets are off. If an abortion is a legal practice in the UK at 20 weeks, but not in Romania, and her family, etc. wants to fly her there for the abortion, so be it. As it is, she would have to get doctor approval over there anyways so late in the term. I don't have a problem with it, and these church groups need to minds their own damn business, I think the Romanian Orthodox Church got it right this time.

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

cleopatra143 — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 17:37:15 GMT

[quote][b]jerm (6/26/2008)[/b][hr]It should be mentioned that she is 20 weeks (half way) into her pregnancy. This is a baby at 20 weeks:

[img]http://health.state.ga.us/wrtk/images/n22weeks.jpg[/img]

It's okay to disagree with them, but I hardly think that it's hardcore anti-abortion if you want to try and save this baby. I honestly don't know what I'd tell her to do if I were her parents. There's always adoption.[/quote]Exactly jerm, thank you. I am pro-life but I am also pro-choice. I don't think it is up to the government to decide for us but I also hope that women have some common sense when it comes to unplanned pregnancies. Since this case was out of the girls hands, the *** needs to go to jail, and if carrying this baby to full term won't harm the girls life I think she should. But that's just me.

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

Scipio Africanus — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 17:25:21 GMT

Now I know better than THAT! I've been playing Call of Duty 2 and, despite watching my squad mates walk up to potato mashers, pick them up, and toss them back at the Jerries, I have learned the hard way that the -F- key does not work so well when I, the human player, attempt to handle the proverbial "hot potatos."

I tell ya what I think . . . if there were some reliable and readily reversible means to temporarily sterilize all people . . . it should be obligatory at about age 7.

Then _IF_ you pass an extensive, and rigorous battery of tests (created by developmental scientists, educators, cops, health professionals, etc.) you can get the procedure reversed, and get licensed to procreate. Any child found to be an "unlicensed" child becomes de facto a ward of the state, although remaining in parental custody in a sort of probationary period of a year to two, during which time the illegitimate (meaning unlicensed) parents must pass the battery of tests else share long-term custody with social services. Also, parents of unlicensed children, are immediately charged, and tried with the misdemeanour "Operating an Unregistered Reproductive Apparatus." If found guilty they are of course subject to the termporary Reproductive Cessation Treatment, and also subject to fines, community service, and educational 'indoctrination' . . .

The rest of the nations in the world can either adopt the Scipio World Order or lose all U.S. trade subsidies, grants, aid, etc.

The Scipio World Order would make all debates about abortion moot, and instead put the debates where they should be: what is a good parent, and what is the range of acceptable that should be allowed by society for someone to plead their personal privilege of being licensed by society to become a parent?

As far as the economic crunch that could ensue if the current models of social welfare are not altered to fit with the long-term demographic changes from radically reduced rates of pumping out babies: robots, more efficient management and labor organization, an end to offshoring, and elimation of the enormous U.S. tax code with a simple consumption based tax system or something of that nature . . . .

Building ANYTHING more than 5 miles from one of the centers of an existing major metro area would become essentially illegal. Structures (including roads) deemed to be non-essential to sustainble society would be razed, and disintegrated into their components to provide bases for new wildlife habitat. Vast tracts of land currently squandered on things like free-range cattle, suburbia, bedroom communities, shopping malls, etc., would be over the course of the next 20 years, dismantled, and returned back to mother nature, with the long-term goal being to concentrate humanity the way it needs to be in order to achieve a truly sustainable human presence in the global ecology: condensed, efficient communities with minimal infrastructure beyond city centers sufficient to maintain nature conservation and interpretation, but not to allow actual human invasion of and destruction of wildlife habitat. I'd say concentrating humanity into about 1/10th the space it currently squanders could go hand in hand nicely with reducing our population below one billion within the next 500 years . . .

Don't worry, I (or one of my sage advisors on the 1BC game site) have it all figured out, so you're in good hands with Team Africanus, world social engineers and policemen . . .

The rights of the individual must not be exaggerated to the point of the long-term viability of the many, meaning humans and all the other species and ecological communities of Earth.

. . . Now, what was this about some "controversy" about aborting some fetus somewhere?

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

ddmagnan — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 17:05:50 GMT

[quote][b]Nuclearcow (6/26/2008)[/b][hr]*looks at the bomb ddmagnan threw and decides not to touch it* :P[/quote]

Aww come on. It will not go off. I promise. Just poke it a few times.:D

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

Nuclearcow — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 17:03:18 GMT

*looks at the bomb ddmagnan threw and decides not to touch it* :P

RE: Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

jerm — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 16:56:35 GMT

It should be mentioned that she is 20 weeks (half way) into her pregnancy. This is a baby at 20 weeks:

[img]http://health.state.ga.us/wrtk/images/n22weeks.jpg[/img]

It's okay to disagree with them, but I hardly think that it's hardcore anti-abortion if you want to try and save this baby. I honestly don't know what I'd tell her to do if I were her parents. There's always adoption.

Groups fight abortion for 11-year-old Romanian

ddmagnan — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 16:37:59 GMT

Now that is hardcore anti-abortion. They want to force this 11 year old to bring her uncle's baby to term. Talk about cruelty.

[url]http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25393910[/url]

[quote]Twenty church groups on Thursday urged a government committee not to allow an 11-year-old girl who was raped by her uncle go to Britain for an abortion.[/quote]