Abortions.

and do you not think going through this whole experience will 'teach her a lesson'?

Romantica.:

If it's a teenage couple.
Had unprotected sex and ALL THEIR LIVES they knew
sex=babies then NO. The mother should not be allowed to have
an abortion. You had sex,you knew sex makes babies and now you
deal with it.
Can't support it? You should of thought of that.
You can't simply take away a life just because you weren't
thinking. You will bring that baby life. And if you still don't want it,then
put it up for adoption for a loving family to have.

But,if it's incest or rape,thats a different story.[/size]

Why is being raped such a different story? Aborting the product of a rape is the same as aborting the product of unprotected/drunken/casual/failed contraception sex, right? Just grow the baby, hand it over for adoption and never speak of it again. It's hypocritical to say that abortion is okay in one instance, but not in another - or is a fetus resulting from a rape somehow less human to you than one conceived within a relationship or when a condom breaks or when the parents are teenagers and cannot support the child resulting from it?

I also think it's incredibly naive to suggest that people who fall pregnant unintentionally 'should have thought of that' before engaging in intercourse. By that reasoning, you're saying an innocent child should essentially pay the price for their parents' error of judgment, whether it's by being brought up dirt poor, abused/neglected by uncaring parents, or spending an indefinite amount of time in the foster care system where all manner of unspeakable abuses may be carried out against them - not to mention the knowledge that their parent/s didn't want them and gave them away?

Also, you say that 'you can't take away a life just because you weren't thinking'. Try looking at it from this perspective - if a pregnancy is carried to term, chances are there is still going to be at least one life destroyed - the mother's. If she keeps the child and raises it, she is potentially missing out on things like an education, a career, an income, a partner (because there are a lot of men out there who aren't interested in raising another man's child, and would see a single mum as someone with 'too much baggage'), other children (because sometimes when you struggle with one, it puts you off having more, and if circumstances were different, you may have had the child/ren you always wanted with the man you always dreamed if only you hadn't already had one around), all the things that right now you take for granted as being a part of your future. Imagine how it would feel to possibly lose all that potential in the blink of an eye? And if the mother gives that child up for adoption, chances are her life is ruined anyway because losing a child is not something you just 'get over' and move on from. Chances are she would forever wonder 'what if?' and feel that a huge part of her was missing - she would wonder if the child she bore was okay, how they were doing, if they had found a family to love them, etc etc. I know from experience that bonding with a child does not happen from the moment of conception - it happens well before the child is born, yes, but it's not like sperm hits egg and you're in love with a baby. So it's not like you can just grow a baby for nine months and then forget it ever happened - your life is forever changed, for better or worse, and in a lot of adoption cases, I'd suggest worse.

everything mona had.:

^ simple, dont have unprotected sex. if shes smart, she would protect herself when she had sex. she should had thought about the consequences but in this case, i guess she didnt.
im not trying to judge her since i know nothing about your friend, but she should at least think about protection. that would probably teach her a lesson.

So, you should forever have to pay the price for an innocent mistake, an error in judgment, a moment of sheer lack of thought? I didn't notice that my daughter had gotten halfway up the stairs before she fell down again and split her lip on her teeth, should I have her taken away from me and never be allowed any further contact with children because I can't be trusted? A friend of mine punched a guy when he was drunk, over something stupid, and paid for his mistake by being sentenced to community service. Should he have lost his job, his friends, and everything he holds dear, forever, because of a stupid act committed in the heat of the moment - especially after he had already paid his debt as the judge decided?
No. We are all human. We all make mistakes. Some are more serious than others, but it is nobody's place to judge the circumstances or choices of another, especially when we are not personally familiar with that situation, or the person involved.
Worse than expecting one person to pay for a stupid mistake, though, is expecting innocent parties to also shoulder the burden. Again - children are not, and never should be, 'punishment' for someone's actions, or a 'consequence' of irresponsible behaviour.
Don't think that terminating a pregnancy is ever the 'easy way out', or that this person will not 'learn a lesson' from it. For crying out loud, why is our society so obsessed with punishing people for having sex? If you do it with more than one person, or before you're married, you're a slut and your name is mud forevermore. If you have too many children, you're either insane or a burden on the system, taking up too many resources for your own selfishness. If you choose not have children even when you're married and have a good job, you must be a cold-hearted child-hater. If you're raped by someone, you must have been asking for it because you were drinking or wearing a low-cut top. If you get pregnant without meaning to, it's all your own damn fault (never mind that the condom you were using in a responsible manner broke, or that your doctor failed to mention that the antibiotics he prescribed you for your ear infection interfered with the effectiveness of the Pill) and by God you're going to have to stand up and face the music, have that baby and be happy about it. There is no 'lesson' to be learned from having sex. There should be no 'consequences', especially human ones, from engaging in intercourse. There should not be any judgment passed upon a person, especially when it comes to their choices on governing their own reproduction.

We all do dumb things from time to time. Show me a person who's never screwed up, and I'll show you a f***ing liar. Most of us get away with our mistakes - some of us don't. And I wouldn't believe anybody for a second if they tried to tell me that terminating a pregnancy is 'getting away with it' or 'not taking responsibility for your actions' or anything of the kind. If anything, it sounds like the person in this scenario is a very responsible person - she knows that she cannot, at this stage in her life, provide a suitable home and upbringing for children, and that proceeding with the pregnancy (with the notion of giving the children up for adoption) would seriously damage her chances of going on to be a good mother in the future - or, if she chooses not to have children, that continuing with the pregnancy at this time would still seriously impact on her chances of completing her education and becoming a productive member of society.

<bows down to the wisdom that is Donna> I couldn't have said it better! It's been bugging me for awhile that women have gone back to being extremely judgmental of one another again (not to mention completely unsympathetic.) Why is this happening? Is the competition for men really that steep again? Be that as it may, to put things into even colder terms: the human race is currently obliterating all other life forms. This makes it very difficult to argue that women should bring unwanted children into the world, for me.

Romantica.:

And plus,is a teenage girl is pregnant,and WANTS to keep the child. NO ONE is to obligate her to have an abortion. Her Body. Her choice. No one else. Not her boyfriends,fathers or mothers. HER choice.

Okay, the law isn't forcing anyone to have abortion! And second of all, why is only the option of keeping the baby about her body, her choice? What about the other options? If only one option is a choice, then it's not really a choice anymore, is it?

Romantica.:

But I don't like abortions. It's killing a human. Even tho it doesn't look like one,it is.

Okay, one more thing to say. Why is it that there are never any outraged threads when a child with whom we were actually sharing the planet is brutally murdered? Those stories tend to be met with virtual silence. I find that very curious.

Quote

But I don't like abortions. It's killing a human. Even tho it doesn't look like one,it is.

No one likes abortions, there never a decision taken lightly.

abortions are pretty sad and i vthink that the parents of that baby that could have a life should die...abortions should become illegal if they cdont want the kid atleast let it live ya know give it a life dont take its life away... cause technically its murder...even though its legal its murder...

i think they r very wrong!!!

^ I'm not sure if this is correct or not, but I think that the number of abortions would actually go down if abortion was illegal. Of course a woman should have the right to a safe, legal abortion, but I think more women would choose to carry the baby to term than to have a dangerous, illegal abortion if they did not have the option of a safe, legal abortion.
This could possibly be what people think when they say that abortion should be illegal-- less abortions take place, and if the mother does choose to have an abortion, "she knew it was illegal".

Deb:

Okay, one more thing to say. Why is it that there are never any outraged threads when a child with whom we were actually sharing the planet is brutally murdered? Those stories tend to be met with virtual silence. I find that very curious.

I think there aren't 'outraged threads' on the matter because we'd all be in agreement [or I hope we would be;] That murder {of a person already living} is 100% wrong. I AM outraged with things like the Caylee Anthony case, the case of the girl murdered by the Sunday School teacher, they make me livid. But there would be no point in starting a thread about that because it'd be full of people agreeing and, inevitably, a mod locking it because there would be no DISCUSSION.

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^ I'm not sure if this is correct or not, but I think that the number of abortions would actually go down if abortion was illegal. Of course a woman should have the right to a safe, legal abortion, but I think more women would choose to carry the baby to term than to have a dangerous, illegal abortion if they did not have the option of a safe, legal abortion.
This could possibly be what people think when they say that abortion should be illegal-- less abortions take place, and if the mother does choose to have an abortion, "she knew it was illegal".

I think you could do some research on this and find that it's not true. A lot of women who had illegal abortions DIED because of bleeding or subsequent infections. Abortion/forced miscarriage has been around since the beginnings of time when people started using herbs as medicines and found that certain ones were abortifacents, and medicine women/healers/"witches" would provide/sell them for that purpose. Today's abortions get a lot of press because we now have the technology to see exactly what the abortifacent does to the fetus, whether it gets burned by saline, torn apart by vacuum, or other methods that result in a malformed fetus. Medical abortifacients typically cause miscarriage-like symptoms, so people would assume it happened naturally, while in fact the woman caused it herself.

questionable content:

I think that the number of abortions would actually go down if abortion was illegal. Of course a woman should have the right to a safe, legal abortion, but I think more women would choose to carry the baby to term than to have a dangerous, illegal abortion if they did not have the option of a safe, legal abortion.

Yes, the number of abortions would probably go down... but not significantly, and at what cost? As Tabitha pointed out, women will still go to desperate measures to achieve an end result - should our 21st century society revert back to the 'good old days' of a bottle of gin and a hot bath... or getting a trusted friend to throw you down a flight of stairs... or take 'herbal remedies'... or try any other primitive measures that may or may not result in a successful termination of pregnancy? Fact is, a lot of these methods didn't work back then, and they won't work now - how many babies that *would* have been either born healthy, or safely removed from the womb before they had become babies, would then be born horrifically disabled, both physically and/or mentally, disfigured, sickly, and therefore vastly reducing their chances of being adopted by a 'loving family' or their mother deciding to keep them... and how many women would inadvertently kill themselves in the process of trying to achieve a miscarriage? How many women would quite literally drink themselves to death? How many women would severely injure or accidentally kill themselves in an attempt to lose the pregnancy?

Besides this, there is no guarantee that the number of abortions would actually be reduced - there would just be no way of recording statistics on the issue because you would have to get women to admit to their actions (and let's face it, chances are if they're successful in their attempt, they're going to deny, deny, deny), and it's not like you can ever get an accurate reading of the number of terminations, if terminations are outlawed and therefore not available in a clinical setting where records are obtained and kept for reference.

And, back to the 'at what cost?' question - sure, some women may throw their hands up in despair and continue with their pregnancies... but again, how detrimental would this be to the mother? Whether she keeps the child or not is almost irrelevant - although the psychological trauma of being forced into a corner, and then either becoming a parent against your will, or bonding with a child for nine months, then birthing it and never seeing it again, cannot be underestimated.
A pregnancy is not a temporary thing, it isn't a situation where you go, 'Oh, I'm pregnant - meh' and keep on living your life unhindered, then deliver a baby and move onto Step 2. I, for instance, got fired from my job when I was pregnant. I'm not alone in that - many women are either unable to work, or are told they're no longer needed. A lot of women actually suffer debilitating illness or injury caused by pregnancy - these can be temporary conditions that are 'cured' once the child leaves the womb, or they can affect a woman every day of her life until the day she dies. I know of at least two women who are in this position, and let me tell you, it's no picnic.
An unwanted pregnancy can not only cause physical illness or injury, but can seriously impact on a person's mental health. Again - this is regardless of whether the woman chooses to keep or give up her baby... the presence of the baby itself, growing inside her, is enough to push a person over the line into the realm of severe mental illness - a lot of times, with horrific consequences.

And... we talk like adoption and keeping the child are the only two options out there. I know that in some American states, they have established 'Safe Haven' laws where a woman can leave an unwanted newborn at a nominated facility where the child will receive medical care and attention until it is able to be fostered out, no questions asked - in most other countries, no such laws exist, and unfortunate as that may be, it means that quite a lot of unwilling mothers actually dump their newborns in places like dumpsters, bus stops, airport terminal toilets... the list goes on, and if you want proof, I can easily come up with at least three situations in Australia alone where this has occurred in the past few months. A funeral was held on Thursday morning here for the newborn baby boy who was found in a rubbish dump with his umbilical cord still attached - his mother has never been found. Maybe if she, and others like her, had been able to access a safe, cheap and legal abortion (in some states here, abortion is technically a criminal act, and there are out-of-pocket costs that someone on a low income may not be able to cover themselves), this tragedy would not have occurred.
And - if abortions are outlawed, forcing women to have the babies they didn't want to fall pregnant with, how many more babies will be dumped? You cannot force somebody to be a good mother just by saying, 'Well you can't get rid of it before it's born, you'll just have to live with it'.

Every woman, no matter what her circumstance, has the right to a safe, easily affordable, legal termination of pregnancy, for whatever reason. There is no point outlawing such a vital service, as the consequences would be nothing short of barbaric for both women and children.

Corrupted Dreams.:

there would be no point in starting a thread about that because it'd be full of people agreeing and, inevitably, a mod locking it because there would be no DISCUSSION.

Yes, but my point here is that pro-lifers will picket, blow up abortion clinics, murder doctors, distribute films and literature, all in the name of abortion being "the murder of another human being." All I'm saying is that you don't see a similar outcry when children who are already here are murdered; why are those scenarios not as worthy of the attention?

Deb:

Yes, but my point here is that pro-lifers will picket, blow up abortion clinics, murder doctors, distribute films and literature, all in the name of abortion being "the murder of another human being."

O_O
What the hell. That happens?


That's just shocking. And scary.

Oh yes:

They sure do, unfortunately.

Deb:

Yes, but my point here is that pro-lifers will picket, blow up abortion clinics, murder doctors, distribute films and literature, all in the name of abortion being "the murder of another human being."

I think the important thing to note is that while many pro-lifers will distribute films and literature, and picket, the vast majority will not blow up abortion clinics nor murder doctors.

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I think the important thing to notes it that the vast majority will not blow up abortion clinics nor murder doctors.

All well and good; my argument was simply that no one seems to get that sort of vigilante outraged over the murder of an actual child, was my only point.

^ There was quite a bit of outrage over the murder of Caylee Anthony, but there was a very young girl who was impregnated by her stepfather (I believe?) in Brazil and had an abortion; her mother and doctor were both excommunicated from the Catholic Church. If anything, there was more outrage over the excommunication of the mother and of the doctor, not of the abortion the girl had.
Anyway, to sum it all up, what you said is true, but more than anything, many people equate a fetus's life with that of a young child; innocent and uncapable of defending themselves, and I think the outrage for abortions is more because of the sheer number of abortions as opposed to the relatively small (but still large) number of child murders, and because of the large portion of the population who support abortion rights.

questionable content:

I think the important thing to note is that while many pro-lifers will distribute films and literature, and picket, the vast majority will not blow up abortion clinics nor murder doctors.

But... it's *not* important to note that while abortion is legal, only a very small percentage of women will choose it as an option when faced with a pregnancy, unwanted or not?
And, it's okay for people to get outraged over the 'murder' of 'unborn children', but nobody gives two s**** about PEOPLE WHO CLAIM TO BE AGAINST MURDER, MURDERING ACTUAL, LIVE PEOPLE? A doctor who performs abortions is STILL a living, breathing human being with feelings, thoughts, a family, and a lot to live for. But somehow radical pro-lifers think it's okay for *them* to be murdered - but it's not okay for a woman to have a clump of unthinking, unfeeling cells scraped out of her uterus in the first trimester of an unwanted pregnancy?

...Hypocritical much?

(On a side note, I think it would pay to bear in mind also that doctors who perform abortion services for women are highly likely to be qualified OB/GYNs - which means that they are trained, qualified, and most likely practice in aiding women to give birth to their babies!! Just something to remember - the people who anti-choicers see as 'murderers' and 'ending lives' are the very same people who are in fact GIVING life to children who are wanted - the local OB/GYN who is handling my pregnancy, and that of a huge number of other local women, also works a couple of days a month at the clinic the next town over - we don't have one here - because he cares about the welfare of his patients so much that he provides whatever service he and the patient agree is best for their individual situation... whether that be aiding them throughout their pregnancy in order to birth a healthy, much-loved baby, or terminating an unwanted pregnancy for the benefit of the mother's mental health and wellbeing.)

^ My point was that it is anti-abortion extremists who murder living, already-born people. Yes, it is wrong, beyond a doubt! But you cannot confuse those extremists with pro-lifers who only picket and distrubute literature. It's like saying that all Muslims murder in the name of Islam when it is only the extremists, a very small number, who do.

The percentage of pregnancies that are aborted is not small. In the United States, it's around 40% for unwanted pregnancies (source)

But you're right. It is hypocritical. But to those people who blow up abortion clinics and murder doctors, if they believe in their cause and are willing to do that, murder, would it matter to them if their actions were hypocritical?

I didn't know that, but I think that even if they are giving life, radical pro-lifers still see the "taking life" side of it, and even if the woman decides that abortion is her best choice, they still think of the person who performs the abortion, no matter what he or she has done to help others, as a murder.

By the way, Donna, congratulations on your pregnancy =)