Paradox with Death Penalty and Abortion

Back in one of those threads, I had suggested the term "war-willing" as opposed to pro-war. It works for me.

 

See, this is why we need the smiley.

 

I knew a guy in college who defined himself as pro-death -- he said he was pro-death penalty, pro-physician assisted suicide, and pro-abortion, so it was easier to just respond "pro-death" whenever those issues came up.

I find this position really disturbing, more so than people who are very much pro-death penalty who want revenge, or whatever. The fact that you could reduce life or death to $$$ frankly scares me.

Question - at what point, however, does it actually become more than a little bit of tissue or fluids or whatever? When somebody spanks the monkey should they mourn the thousands of potential people? What about birth control pills, where the zygotes are conceved, but dont develop beyond the next period? How about people who get pregnant but have miscarrage at like a week? Should they hold a full-fledged funeral?

 

How is that hard to understand?

Do not believe that abortion is the first/best option that should come to mind/be considered, but that the OPTION should be available.

 

I think the issue of abortion is too complex to reduce it to a "pro" or "anti" choice.

If I say, if a woman has been raped or one knows 100 % sure that her child will have a terrible disease when it is born that will make it suffer for a few years with a certain painful death, then I would say she can have an abortion without legal consequences, does that mean I am "pro-abortion"?

If I say I am generally against abortion, but I would not impose severe legal sanctions on women who do it, does it mean I am anti-abortion or pro-abortion?

With regards to the death penalty, the case is clearer: I am absolutely against it, even though sometimes, when you hear of horrible crimes, it makes you think that the guy who did it "deserves to die" - I could go on and on about this, but the bottomline is that I am against it.

P.S.: I understand how you are thinking the two topics are linked, but I think that they are mostly to be looked at separately from each other as many factors other than the simple "both mean killing some form of human life" play into these issues.

 

I'd be glad to abandon my tolerance of the Death Penalty for Capital Crimes if others would give up the right to abort unborn children. Fair deal?

 

What if a woman was raped? Would you force her to have the child?

 

Isn't receiving the death penalty <i>their</i> judgement call? With abortion, the baby can't choose what's going to happen, but I'm pretty sure most murders can choose not to murder. I'm firmly in the pro-death penalty/anti-abortion philisophical camp. Babies are haven't done anyting wrong whereas criminals have done something wrong - and they know it's wrong and what will happen to them if they get caught. However, the real world is more complicated than simple black and white so while it's easy to proclaim a belief, in reality it's harder to justify that belief in all situations. For example, can you always be sure someone is guilty of murder or that all defendants have an equally fair chance at defending themselves? And what about health risks to mom and so forth.

 

Not to mention that they could plead guilty and receive a lesser sentence with a plea bargain. That would save the enormous expense that the bigger cases extract.

 

Personally I wouldn't... nor would I in instances where the mother's health was in danger from the pregnancy continuing.

Those, too, though would be mournful events.

 

Has there ever been a pregnant woman who received the death penalty?

 

You just blew my mind.

 

Interesting question although her child would be in Middle School or High School by the time the sentence were carried out.

 

It seemed like a serious question to me .

 

Another legal contradiction with regards to pregnancy; the state would recongnize the 'zygot's right to life in this case, and would allow the mother to carry it to term. I don't know that it's happened, but considering the rulings on cases where someone caused the death of an unborn child by malicious action, the state does indeed recognize the validity of the prescence of a life.


If anyone here thinks the state would rule that the fetus is just part of the condemed woman's body, and terminate it along with the woman, I'd like to hear the argument. If they don't, I;d like to hear the distinction.

 

Probably was. I was just trying to bring a little humor to this thread through an obscure Kramer quote.

 

Calling <b>andymoon</b>!

 

I think in one of the previous abortion threads, one of the posters (can't remember who) said either they were or they knew someone who was conceived during a rape. Just because the conception of a child was a horrible act, does not mean that the child deserves to be killed. The only reasonable case where abortion should be considered an option is if there is a reasonable chance that the mother will die without the abortion, in which case the choice should be left to the mother.