It's true that a woman's reach on the matter is more robust. A woman has multiple chances to change her mind because it is HER body. Nevertheless, a man also has a chance so it isn't like we our left out in the cold, as you would like to paint. Yes, it DOES work. And it also works that a woman can make decisions about what to do with her body. Biology absolutely necessitate's law. To determine when you are drunk has to do with body weight. So is it unfair that bigger people get to drink more? Sorry dude, fact remains it is the woman that has to carry the baby so she has more say in the matter. For hundreds of years, men could vote. Laws based on gender are not uncommon. There is maternity leave for woman but what about paternity leave? Respectfully, that is an ignorant thing to say. Rape involves physical violations to the woman. Abortion does not physically violate a man. Apples and orange comparison. Nope. Sorry. It would only be equal rights both ways if man were to push a 7 pound watermellon out of your ass. Until then, ANY woman will seriously take issue with your assertion about "equal rights."
You've referenced this twice now. You may want to have another of those birds-and-bees talks with your dad. Try to get specific about which orifice is in play. Rocket River, I'm with you. I would point out though, I believe, in many states, when a child is put up for adoption, the father gets a right of first refusal.
Since a sperm is required for conception, couldn't one theoretically argue that the resulting baby is part of him as well?
You can theoretically argue biology and rights all you like....but it's the woman who carries the child to term. So if you accept that abortion is an option...the decision should be hers, and hers alone. Men get it pretty good through the whole conception and pregnancy deal...so while it's true they lose control here -- her body -> her call. ( I know this gets to the gist of the abortion debate ). If you are against abortion...I expect you would be if favour of anthing that makes it more difficult to obtain one. More about your stance on abortion, perhaps, than the fathers 'rights.' As RMT stated -- what if HE wanted one...should the matter then go to an arbitrator to decide whether she's forced to have one? Is there anyone here who is in favour of abortion on demand...but agrees that the husband / boyfriend should be able to veto her decision, and force her to carry the child to term against her wishes?
If you give a woman a necklace and she breaks up with you 6 months later, are you entitled to that necklace back? Nope! If she decides to sell the necklace, do you have any say in the matter? Nope! Once the sperm left your body, you no longer have possession of it. Possession is 9/10ths of the law. The woman is now in possession of your sperm. As a man, you have 100% control of avoiding an abortion. Avoid conception. Period. End of story. Quit complaining that men get the screwed on the matter. Just making the point that a man's body does not physically bear the responsibility of child bearing. It is fundamentally natural on the most basic level possibly imaginable, that women have more say in child bearing. If a woman choses to smoke or drink during pregnancy, you can't really stop her. It isn't your body! Life is full in inequalities. Life isn't always fair. Get over yourself.
Bottom Line: If men were the ones having the babies, we would not even be having this discussion. Yea,...men would argue that women should have a say on whether we had an abortion or not? NOT A CHANCE IN HELL! Also abortions would be federally funded.
I don't think it's helping you to repeat the argument many pro-lifers use against abortion in the first place. Women can avoid conception as easily as men. There is no difference there.
If the woman says .. .she does not know whe the father is. .then what? Does she goto prison or get punished for denying the father his rights? My thing is this IF YOU ARE PRO ABORTION - [beleive a woman has the right to walk away from her responsibilities] then How are you PRO-CHILD SUPPORT - if a man wants to walk away from his responsibilities? Rocket River
It isn't pro-life to promote safe sex. Pro-lifers promote regulation of your personal life through new laws. I've had an argument previously here and I argued that if prolifers were truely interested in stopping abortions, they would pour ALL their energy into stopping unwanted pregnancies. The pro-lifers on this BBS never could muster themselves to acknowledge this. They'd rather change the laws to outlaw abortion (which won't stop it from happening) than spend their energy/money on social programs to reduce the rate of unwanted pregnancies. The irony is if they HAD worked on social programs, they could have prevented millions of "deaths." Instead, they focus on law.
Actually, pro-lifers do put effort into stopping unwanted pregnancies, you just don't know about them. I wouldn't say it was all their effort, because to do that would mean to neglect too many other things that are important -- like supporting women in crisis who are pregnant, or trying to reduce the spread of venereal disease, encouraging men to stick around and be fathers, etc. I think the difference is that pro-lifers tend to be favor private organizations in trying to affect social change, and pro-choice-folks don't see it because they aren't trying to create a government department to do that work. But, making abortion illegal is something everyone can plainly see because it is being done through government. Rocket River, if a state were to require a father to get first dibs and the woman could not identify the father, she'd likely end up in a bureaucratic limbo (or her child would) where no adoption could take place until a father was produced. More likely though is that it would be a right a man would have to assert, so if he didn't know he'd be out of luck. Minn, for example, has a system where you can register if you think you are a father of a child and then will be notified if the kid is put up for adoption. You could then try to establish your paternity if you wanted.
well, yes and no. They do work through churches a lot which I agree with is low profile. However, they don't talk much about contraception...usually just abstenence. Also, the religious right is also the same group that doesn't like sex education. With the wider use of contraceptions and more sex education, "deaths" by abortion could be dramatically reduced. Even if the church doesn't like these angles, they could find their own angles other than the legal battles. Well, had they poured all the time and money spent on attempting to change laws and poured that energy directly into social programs, America's pregnancy rate would be dramatically lower than it is today, IMO. Agreed. Point taken.
It's true they focus mainly on abstinence, but there is a sensible motivation to it. They simultaneously want to discourage casual sex, which increases unwanted pregnancies (contraception doesn't always work), and encourages deadbeat fathers (if you can get the milk for free sort of thing), and spreads genital contact diseases like gonorhea (sp). I do wish they'd talk more about contraception and probably would if they didn't have the polarizing presence of Planned Parenthood already pushing the contraception route. It is the unfortunate product of politics that each side must entrench further in their respective forts just to avoid giving the opposition any ground. I know the Carenet Pregnancy Centers here will not recommend contraception even for married couples and that never made any sense to me. I can't fault them too much though, with all they do. Also, I'd point out that the pro-life faction is a large and disparate faction. It is not an organized monolithic group. It's a bunch of people and organizations each pushing for what they think is right. So, you have some groups who oppose contraception or sex education while others disagree with that approach. You get folks like Pat Robertson embarrassing the whole movement. And, you have groups that try to fill complementary roles and leave the main stuff to the leading groups. So, of course they are all over the board; it is very much a grass-roots effort. I'd say there are a hundred different angles being played, but none of them with as concerted an effort as the legal one, which is about the only one that unites and defines the whole group. Groups that don't want to criminalize abortion but try to work in communities to reduce abortions would not likely be considered pro-life, if they even existed.
Speaking of rights, in any pregnancy, I think there are rights due to the 3 distinct individuals involved: father, mother, and fetus/unborn child. The point of the article was that current law gives fathers essentially no rights in determining the fate of a pregnancy, yet is perfectly fine with assigning financial responsibility to them for a decision that they are not allowed to participate in. We also only give fetuses/unborn children any rights after the point of viability, which is somewhere between 23-24 weeks gestational age, but they are considered a bag of cells prior to that, thus affording them no rights. Mothers have rights over their own bodies, which trump the rights of the former two in nearly all cases. Does this make sense?
Isn't this the group whose children are almost certainly contributing to the unwanted pregnancy and abortion problem at a relatively low rate and yet you find them to be "hindering" the solution? Don't you find great irony in that?
Are you saying pro-lifers have a lower pregnancy rate than pro-choicers? Please provide facts. Thanks in advance. Then we can discuss the irony.
Yes, it makes perfect sense to me. 1. Father. You says the father has no rights? I disagree. The father willingly engaged in the sex act and deposited his sperm in the mother. He could have chosen NOT to have sex and the conversation ends there. 2. Mother. The mother now has possession of the sperm...not the father. The mother has to bear the burden of pregnancy and labor...not the father. 3. Unborn. The Supreme Court has ruled that the mother's rights supercede the unborn child during the first trimester. Period. I don't beleive any country on earth recognizes the unborn as having 100% equal rights of a full grown human. For example, In America, we don't issue a SS# until birth. A baby gains citizenship of a country upon birth...and not before. Birth is, and can only be, the final say in affording full legal rights to a human. That's not to say the unborn have NO rights. They certainly have SOME rights. But they will never gain their full status as a citizen until birth. Even that is questionable because then they are legal minors until they turn 18. So even newborn citizens don't have the same rights as the mother. How is that unfair?
We've both made assumptions here: yours is that the two groups are equally responsible; mine is that the two groups are not equally responsible. Why do you not feel the need to substantiate your own argument when you feel threatened by mine?
When they started issuing SS cards, there was no capability of knowing a baby's sex prior to birth. Some parent's still don't want to know until the birth. Also, most parents don't name the baby until it is born... and the baby is not formally named until the name goes on the birth certificate which cannot be issued until the child is born. Those issues have NOTHING to do with the lack of personhood of the child in question. They are simple administrative issues.
i'm not making fun of you...but this is the first time i've heard abortion come down to a property rights issue! reminds me of Matthew McConaughey's character in Amistad. possession is 9/10ths of the law, i guess!
