abortion old hick Abortion stops a beating heart. So does fishing. 000123 ... Q And let's not forget the hearts of women. Women whose hearts will stop as a direct consequence of the actions of people, who arrogate falsely to themselves the label "pro-life" and some of whom sympathize openly with murder of adults, to encroach on women's (and men's) privacy and women's liberty in decisions about their bodies, their souls, and their lives in connection with sex and reproduction. The consequences of these encroachments include pregnant women in desperation dying from attempting abortions by using hangers on themselves and from botched abortions by quacks in back alleys. These things happened regularly before 1973, when at long last the US Supreme Court had the courage to again legalize abortion in the country. It had been legal everywhere in the country before about 1840. I am old enough to remember such deaths, and the vividness remains very painful. Deaths like these are happening again, because the encroachers have scared spineless, mostly male legislators and governors into making laws that require "parental" consent before a woman under 18 can have an abortion legally. Deaths like these will happen more and more, the hearts of more and more, mostly young, women will be stopped with outrageous, murderous prematurity as long as the encroachers on our freedoms, the sanctity of our bedrooms and relationships, and our lives keep getting their way. 000123 ... VCell There is only ONE argument to be made about abortion. It is mostly a rhetorical one. Does human life begin at conception or not? Explore it as a devil's advocate. If life does not begin at conception, but rather at some later stage of gestation, then it is no one's decision except the pregnant woman's (particularly not the decision of any of us men) whether or not the pregnancy should or shall be terminated. If, however, human life does begin at conception, then that life is santified. Thus, any termination of that life can only be defined as murder. The only exception to this rule that I can fathom would be in the case of a woman physically protecting her own life from a potentially dangerous pregancy. But in this 21st century I can't imagine what a case like that would be. I don't see how any other issue applies. Rape, incest, piss-poor planning; as rash as it sounds (forgive me, as a man I couldn't possibly understand the sensitivity of these issues)these are meaningless under the simple rhetorrical argument posed above. A women's choice or a human life. You can't have it both way's. It's not for me to decide. I can't get pregnant. I certainly wouldn't want to meet my Creator with the possibilty of a murder on my soul. God bless. 000212 ... daxle There are some lives that should not be lived. A child who is born to parents who do not want them, for whatever reason, should not be forced to exist. Our true creators are our parents. 000213 ... kari i venture to say that the child would be wanted by someone else. in many instances. parents longing to have what can't be theirs for reasons of... fate biology what have you... and, and it's all said the wrong way when you write: a child shouldn't be forced to live (or was it "to be born" no matter) because there's only one option that so few of us would have taken. even suicides would rather have lived for some short time. and no, i'm not pro-life. you're just wrong. 000225 ... aaroni parponi it's wrong to have an abortion for this simple reason: God is creating this baby, and if you didn't want it created, then why were you doing the horizontal mumbo-jumbo? i believe that anything that God is creating shouldn't be destroyed by our "need" for sex before marriage. and if you are married, then there is even less of a reason to abort. 000225 ... daxle what about the millions of kids who are abused daily by their parents? their parents didn't give them up for adoption. so every day for god's little creature is a living hell. we don't choose to be born- our parents choose for us to be born, and I think that someone who is wise enough to realize when their pregnancy should not turn into a birth should have the option of stopping a horrible mistake from happening. It makes no difference whether the parents are married as to whether their child can live a decent life. Those commitments on paper are no more solid than those spoken and felt. 000316 ... a what bothers me is people that talk about abortion that haven't experienced it. it seems like there are many people out there verbalizing their opinions about how wrong or right it is and they have never had to deal with it first hand. 000316 ... marjorie so many arguments for and against. but why not just face the problem of sex. as sex is the leading cause of pregnancy in this world. birth control, marjorie says. birth control. 000520 ... Thors Kitten Horrifying in it's absolute simplicity Extraordinary in it's relative ease Thanking whoever watches over me Abortions are available Or I'd have a baby Guilt for those who have no need And hate me for it Grateful things are good now. 000606 ... samayyel as for that guy who left you to pay for the problem he helped you create did you take any of that hate out on him? or did you save it all for me. I just know i wish i had been born a couple of years later and to someone who was not so catholic then maybe i could be an abortion too 000606 ... silentbob Personally i'm all about animal rights and stuff. i think that every cell is a life. every SPERM cell is a life. so to me masturbation is murder. letting all those tiny little spermie wormies die in my depends under garments. Maybe abortion is "wrong" maybe not. i kind of have issues with what's Right and Wrong, like how its all relative. either way, abortion is really sad and scary thing and it should be much better left to a professional. if you dont want one, dont get one. if you want one, you shouldnt be afraid. if its not yours, dont worry about it. 000627 ... sutor Today I was driving down I-94 in southern Michigan and there was a man driving what looked like one of those mobile diner trucks. All over the truck were plastered giant, 4-foot-tall, graphic pictures (which I believe were heavily doctored)of bloody, mutilated fetuses accompanied by phrases like "abortion kills" and "God will punish you." My mouth hung open for a good three minutes in utter disbelief and horror. After a long, heated discussion with my travelling companions, I decided that that man couldn't have come up with a better way to strengthen the convictions of pro-choicers and to marginalize the pro-life, right-wing nutballs. So, thank you, you funny, silly, hateful man. You have just made it easier for me to feel confident that I will continue to be in charge of my body . 000709 ... grendels sunday prayer god kills indiscriminately and the sheep chant the same mantra "it is god's will" who will punish god for his senseless acts of depraved indifference, for the cruel and callous homicides and fratricides and genocides that he has set in motion fuck him and his mindless legions 000709 ... claudia prior to voicing an opinion concerning abortion (either pro or con), one must ask themself two very different questions. is abortion right for me? answers may vary, pending on religious affiliation, situation and otherwise. if one is the god-fearing type, believing that they could never face their creator after murdering their own child, the answer would be no. if aborting a child causes any moral questioning or guilt, the answer is no. however, if you answered yes, that is your own personal choice. it is also your life that you need to worry about. either a yes or no is perfectly acceptable. what right does one have to say whether abortion is right for another? none. under any circumstance. what right does one have to judge? none. even the religious say it: god judges. if abortion is truly a mortal sin, the aborting mother will face that upon her final judgement. so what's the problem? pioneering for life is no solution. excecuting doctors, eh? how's that for mortal sin? yeah. so, for all of those zealots and picketers speaking (judging and killing accordingly) for god, you'll burn in hell along with all of the murdering parents and doctors. the bottom line: worry about yourself, and make the choice that's right for you. every woman has the right to choose. your body, your everything. no one needs a prophet with a gun after them. and for every spiritually-clean i-may-cast-the-first-stone 'good' soul: in the event that there really is a god. IF there is really a man with a naughy or nice list, he's got it covered. for the rest of sanity, live life as you will, and make the pro or con decision which is right for you. as for the rest of the world, mind your own self. 000802 ... j how can any of you say its right or wrong? have you had an abortion? have any of you ever had anyone telling you that if you have this child that they will leave you out on the street? have they ever beaten you in hopes that you will change your mind?? have they ever constantly hurt you so bad that they wish you would lose the baby? until someone has done any of this to you you have no right to say anything about this. i had no choice and to give it up for adoption was just out of the question. it may have been the wrong thing to do but I could not stand the thought of my child whose father did not want her out there some where. if she found me someday and asked WHY? i dont think i could tell her. it should not be thought of as an easy way out because its not. there are so many things that happen to you. the hurt,pain, nightmares, thinking that you made the wrong chioce, and in the end alone. in the end they never stay, they always leave you so until you have actually been in this situation where you have to make the chioce dont pass judgement 000819 ... turmoil coat hangers 000820 ... splinken a baby is the sword that hangs over my head any time i'm not alone while i undress for bed. i know what i'd have to do if i got pregnant. i've been celibate for months. 000820 ... fetaljuice I have eaten the fruits of many ripe abortions, and let me tell ya.... six weeks is the most supple, tender fetus there is! Ain't no other medical waste that tastes so good. 011009 ... Aimee I'm pro-choice.. who are you to decide what i can and can't do with my body.... but for me, I couldn't abort my child, but in some cases... it's just necessary and I understand and support those very difficult decisions women have made. If you outlaw abortion, women will have it done on their kitchen tables by men or women who don't know how. If improperly performed, both shall die. 011009 ... batman FUCK YOU ABORTION BLOWS 011012 ... Sonya Abortion may be horrible to some people, but it seems like the pro-lifers can easily ignore the millions of children who get put up for adoption or end up in orphanages and don't get adopted because no one wants them. (A lot of minority babies available.) It's harsh to say it that way but it's the truth. What kind of life are they going to lead if they never get adopted? (And there are many who reach the age of 18 without being adopted.) Ever stop to think of that? A choice is a choice. If isn't yours to make, mind your own damn business. It's interesting how the pro-lifers are so pro-life, yet the majority of them support the death penalty! Argh!!!! 011012 ... . : * p s y b o r g * : . I used to say I was pro-life, but that was a good point. So now I guess people can just do whatever they want and I have no opinion. 011101 ... emo emo The satistic says that fifty percent of women have one of these in their life time. Is it murder to you? To me, it was scary, painful, horrible, terrible, final, and my only choice. For my mistake, i will always know what i had to do to fix it. My life would have changed and my dreams would have melted if i had not gone in that day. The day after my 17th birthday. i dreamt about it, i knew without testing. It grew inside me, it was a part of me. For a little while there was someone else worth living for. Their inside my belly, there was a living person, with arms and legs and a head and a heartbeat. In my heart i could feel it. It was like nothing i have ever felt before. I hope someday i feel it again. I stopped smoking for it. I stoped drinking for it. I had cravings for what it wanted. It was a small part of me. Nobody could know that feeling. Then i went in that day. And came out, and it was gone. I had gotten used to it being there. It was just ripped from my body. Like nothing. But it was. I had no choice. And now, again. Could it be possible? I don't ever want to do that again. Never. I'm going to pray... 011203 ... EMO I have a great burning firey hate right now in my chest. I think about all of those ignorant people, who have absolutly no fathumful idea what they are talking about. Although I concede that it is your right to free speach and right to your own opinion, If you have not been in the position of needing to choose to have or not to have an abortion, how could you possibly know what would be the right thing to do? IT IS YOUR BODY AND YOUR DESCISION. The human body produces natural abortions on its own. So what is the difference between a doctor's medicinal process of giving an abortion and a women's natural process of ridding her body of tissue and cells that are not even capable of sustaining life on their own! How is that murder? And ethnically, if it is not acceptable, what should be? In the near future, I bet anything that couples will be paying money to their doctors to have babys pre-designed to be the perfect baby. We will be able to pay money to decide our childs hair and eye color. Is that Ethical? Where does "God" play his role in that? Isn't that medicinal and unethical? Whatever. My point is that, In my opinion, Abortion is not murder. It is a medical choice. Like taking a persons liver, or kidneys or heart after they die in a car crash. If they consent to it and had chosen to be an organ donor. Well to me thats all on the same page. TO ALL OF YOU PEOPLE WHO THINK THAT ONLY WOMEN WHO COMMIT INFIDALITY OR WHATEVER ARE THE ONLY ONES WHO GET ABORTIONS, OPEN YOUR DAMN EYES!!!!!! THE STATISTIC IS THAT 49% OF WOMEN BETWEEN THE AGES OF 15 AND 25 WILL HAVE 1-2 ABORTIONS. tHATS THE GOD DAMNED TRUTH. GOD WILL NOT PUNISH ME FOR HAVING AN ABORTION. 011203 ... god i won't punish. 011212 ... bzzmel i'm not for it 011213 ... Jenna I don't know if anyone's "for" abortion... I mean, it's not something anyone wants to go through. It's just something you have to do sometimes. I have been the friend a person would call during a pregnancy scare. Good thing there has not been an actual pregnancy yet. I wouldn't know what to say. 011213 ... lady lunchbox it was the hardest thing i've ever done. i saw arms and legs and a tiny little head in a pool of red, and by then it was too late. if some almighty power is going to punish me for it, then that's fine. i did what i had to do so that my child wouldn't grow up with a drugged-out father and no food on the table. i did it so my child would be welcome in his grandparents' home. i did it so my child would not have to suffer. i didn't do it for me. yes, i was scared, but i wanted that child more than anything. i just wanted my child to be happy and taken care of, and that just couldn't happen then. she would be two months old now. i cry for her every day. every fucking day. not a moment goes by that i don't think about her. that's my punishment. she knows that i loved her, and that i didn't want her to go. but i'm sure she knows that i did it for her sake. 020216 ... tyler i think of abortion as involuntary suicide, and therefore homocide, and although you have created the baby, if the baby dies as a result of a doctors seringe, you have allowed that doctor to kill that baby let me put it this way if there was no heaven and no hell (the child hasn't decided a religion yet) would you rather be alive or dead? 020216 ... tyler sorry, i hadn't read any of these things before i put my thoughts down, they were directed at noone 020216 ... # I used to say I'd never do it. I was young. I was horny. I got pregnant. Then I did what I always said I would NEVER do. Never say never. 020217 ... jessica well, i think the evidence is clear. abortion is okay because men are pigs--they leave, they are irresponsible, they rape, and they can't get pregnant. abortion is okay because people, usually white and republican, don't adopt children. abortion is okay because a lot of pro-lifers are idiots, but pro-choicers are really cool and liberal and enlightened. abortion is okay because women get sad when they have unwanted babies. abortion is okay because if the law determines that it isn't, women will have it done with coat hangers. abortion is okay because unborn babies aren't humans yet. abortion is okay because--unlike things such as murder or stealing that have clear-cut moral implications, but rather much like personal preferences for lipstick and nail polish--it's a personal decision, or whatever works for you. abortion is okay because not everyone believes in god, and only people who believe in god and sin and stuff suffer from the consequences. abortion is okay because i'm undecided or have no opinion and thus determine the moral laws of the universe with my indecisiveness. abortions are okay because other living children are abused, or live in poverty, or grow up to become drug addicts. [might i suggest jonathan swift's "a modest proposal"?] abortion is okay because women get raped. [similar dilemma: i call a very large and muscular man some names while standing next to my boyfriend. the man, unwilling to hit a lady, beats the shit out of my boyfriend.] abortion is okay because death is better than the life we've predicted for those people. [in fact, this point gives us another opportunity to dispose of children--give them up for slavery. those un-white neanderthals had it better on the plantation than they could ever do without the white folk.] abortion is okay because the babies are in OUR bodies, so we can do what we want with them. [similar to that texas law that allows us to shoot people who come onto our property unlawfully.] abortion is okay because i've done it and you haven't. [so tomorrow, i'll get pregnant and have an abortion. then it will be okay for me, too.] i'll stop now. don't forget to add the biting sarcasm, it helps the medicine go down. 020217 ... lulie Abortion on demand. No apologies. 020217 ... Arwyn my body, my choice... no man should have any place in the final decision.. they may have an opinion, but it's my decision... not theirs.. it's every woman's decision, not a man's. It's MY body. 020218 ... Mateo Stoping crime at a very early stage. 020218 ... jessica sounds like the same old rhetoric to commit them. 020218 ... yrope "...little advice for the medical students teaching cowardice not medical prudence lobbying pressure from the a.m.a. cracker don't treat women and you call yourself a doctor marching with your cross and your dead fetus picture don't let me see you or i'll jam it up your sphincter you're lucky that i find violence so heinous but my wife and her friends'll put a foot in your anus ...had to make a choice between god and her sisters you imitate your oppressor so you dissed her even though you told me you had the procedure just 'cause you're rich and you're white that freed you from the consequence of a child out of wedlock from the family shame at the congregation potluck crazy pregnant woman citing her religion the baby's going to die without cesarian section i won't support scientific intervention give her the freedom to deal with her actions if you don't want a nazi in your house don't let one don't know a fundamentalist 'till ya met one if you've memorized your civil rights don't forget one if you don't want an abortion - DON'T GET ONE! ru486? yes i am sir ru486? yes i am sir anything to empower women that's for damn sure know what it means when they're bombing all the clinics who's going to say get off the fence to the cynics harassing g.y.n. with a death threat say that you're doing god's work well yeah i bet respect women and give her some room believe in her rights stay out of her womb if you want to see women stop termination give her a future and a real education do you think women want to kill their own babies? do you think women want to kill their own babies? if got your own twisted baggage then MAYBE!" -- "Butyric Acid" by Consolidated (lyrics) 020219 ... reitoei do any anti-abortionists hunt?fish?or swat flies?we think its so terrible to kill a human being. but were just animals. how are we different. we presumably have a more highly developed brain, but who can really say, i think we might be slightly biased. cats are very intelligent. so we say somethings human because it looks and acts and thinks like one. a fetus doesnt. there is virtually no brain tissue, and none that can preform high level thinking at the age an abortion is done. a fetus isnt really human yet. its just organic matter, like the chicken i had for dinner. i dont think theres an ethical issue here, just a personal choice and religion. 020219 ... kx21 A universal process in Human_Cloning... 020220 ... bryanfrbs abortion is just a form of genocide. don't agree? go to www.cbrinfo.org and click on the genocide link. It brings up some great points about genocide compared to abortion. Read it with an open mind (to all of you liberals who say you have "open minds") and take in all the FACTS instead of the emotions. Tell me what you think.... 020222 ... daxle I'm not against genocide I'm for letting people die by any means possible, including myself, including everyone I know and love I love the world enough to know that humans are ruining it 020222 ... Arwyn I said it before no MAN has the right to tell me what I SHOULD and SHOULD NOT do with my body. It's my body, and it's my choice. NO MAN CAN TAKE THAT AWAY FROM ME AND NO WOMAN SHOULD TRY! 020222 ... birdmad bryanftbs - quick point of order: that "all you liberals" remark guaranteed that no one on the other side of your ideological fence is going to give you the benefit of the doubt. this isn't a goddamn yahoo mesage board. learn a little tact (but then i should remember that outside of buckley, tact is something the average outspoken consertvative lacks) [CAUTION: irony in use] 020222 ... misstree "mother" is the name of god on the lips and hearts of all children. (name that quote) i almost had an older brother, by four years. i'm glad things turned out the way it did. a small nudge, a few extraneous cells removed or left (like a liposuction, or removal of cancer), and future history is forever altered. 020222 ... Mateo Its not history if it never happened, its "mistory" 020223 ... jessica even though spilled milk is an accident and wiped up with a paper towel, the thing itself still happened. the problem with any abortion debate is that people label the argument as "liberal" and "conservative." but it's about human life--it is, whether you want it to be or not. if it wasn't about the controversy over human life, it wouldn't be a controversy. and, of course, the other problem is that few are willing or mature enough to discuss the topic itself without getting personal. imagine what could be done if abortion itself was discussed, instead of the people who possess opinion A or opinion B. in case this fact was overlooked, you won't get too far calling people "baby killers" or "balding white male conservatives." no one is trying to "take all of your rights away!" or "kill all the little precious babies!" that's mildly absurd and not at all helpful to anyone. 020223 ... kx21 Is it Right or Wrong? Logical Response:- Memory of the Universe- data, information, wisdom, etc. Searched the web for Abortion, human Cloning & Ethics. Results 1 - 10 of about 8,810. Search took 0.26 seconds. What's the states of Matter? Emotional Response:- Ethics / Values (e.g. Ten_Supreme_Hearts) What's the states of Heart(s)? Spiritual Response:- Faith / Belief What's the states of Mind? Physical Response:- Choice = Matter + Heart + Mind Right or Wrong: - Mind / Heart over Matter... "Tell me how to force an old cow to drink water. And_I_will_tell_you_how_wonder_you are..." Reference: Simply A Matter of Mind Over Matter http://www.lovepoetry.com/poem.asp?x_id=8850 020223 ... kx21 Is it Right or Wrong? Logical Response:- Memory of the Universe- data, information, wisdom, etc. Searched the web for Abortion, human Cloning & Ethics. Results 1 - 10 of about 8,810. Search took 0.26 seconds. What's the states of Matter? Emotional Response:- Ethics / Values (e.g. Ten_Supreme_Hearts) What's the states of Heart(s)? Spiritual Response:- Faith / Belief What's the states of Mind? Physical Response:- Choice = Matter + Heart + Mind Right or Wrong: - Mind / Heart over Matter... "Tell me how to force an old cow to drink water. And_I_will_tell_you_how_wonder_you are..." Reference: Simply A Matter of Mind Over Matter http://www.lovepoetry.com/poem.asp?x_id=8850 020223 ... kx21 Is it Right or Wrong? The PCA:- It's dependence on the states of Mind / Heart... Logical Response:- Memory of the Universe- data, information, wisdom, etc. Searched the web for Abortion, human Cloning & Ethics. Results 1 - 10 of about 8,810. Search took 0.26 seconds. What's the states of Matter? Emotional Response:- Ethics / Values (e.g. Ten Supreme Hearts) What's the states of Heart(s)? Spiritual Response:- Faith / Belief What's the states of Mind? Physical Response:- Choice = Matter + Heart + Mind Mind / Heart over Matter... "Tell me how to force an old cow to drink water. And I will tell you how wonder you are..." Reference: Simply A Matter of Mind Over Matter http://www.lovepoetry.com/poem.asp?x_id=8850 020224 ... bryanfrbs Arwyn - you have the right to do whatever you want with YOUR body, but what about that little body that will be inside of you? Is it your choice whether you can end that life? Also, this is the same argument that rapists use: It's my body, and I can do anything that I want with it, even if it hurts another individual.... birdmad - You're right, I should have used a little tact. Usually, I am, but I was having a bad day. Anyway, did you read the article. You sound like a reasonable individual and I would like to hear your reaction to that article. I always like discussion about this subject. jessica - I totally agree with you. I didn't mean anything by the "all you liberals" comment. I hope that everyone here can have an intelligent conversation and look at all the facts. There will be no more name calling from this blatherer (call me on it if I do). Hopefully this article (www.cbrinfo.org and click on Genocide) sparked some controversy in your minds. I encourage you all to read it. I hope this post has been tactful. Sorry about the other post guys and gals! 020225 ... braulio I`m aborted and it doesn't feel that bad at all 020225 ... bethany we throw the fish back ALIVE if i listened to my mick rascist family i would have turned my house into an abortion clinic i'm too selfish to not be for abortion, but it's a big step in the wrong direction to a perfect world so is having 10 kids 2001 was the first year in america that the birth rate outweighed the death rate ...but the first year teen pregnancies went down since 95(i think that's the right year) 020225 ... just somebody i am alone now. but before i felt alone too. now i am just a shell of what i thought i could be someday. maybe one day this will go away. this is not easy 020310 ... dionysos Been there...and I still wonder. BUT I was not the one to decide...it was hers and hers alone. If If If If If.... Could I rise to meet the challenge? Atone for generations of dysfunction? Be the father mine should have been? Maybe. Maybe not. In my ignorance/irresponsibility I at least understood that it was not my decision to make. ... I met two children in Peru that I wanted to adopt. They deserve so much more than they have. I realized that the ego that seeks to reproduce itself is the same ego that seeks to impose its belief system on others. If you truly care for the unborn, first care for the born. They are waiting for you in every corner of the planet. Unwanted, malnourished, disenfranchised, uneducated... Just don't preach from your burbclave about morality. 020311 ... good people i just found out today that my parents almost aborted me. they were even at an abortion clinic, but they decided against it. 020312 ... Lindsey i told him i wouldn't have an abortion if i was, and he told me that maybe i shouldn't be saying that so soon. we couldn't take care of it, he said. and it would be crazy. it would be better off dead if it was going to turn out like him. i thought he was just scared and selfish. i didn't realize how much he loved that baby too, imaginary as it was. that it would have been a part of him as well. i thought i knew something about pregnancy and abortion and motherhood. i thought that being a mother was more important than being a father. i wanted to kill him when he told me that maybe i should abort the baby because it might be born into a world that didn't understand, into a body that couldn't contain what was going on in its mind. he tried to kill himself on friday. i shouldn't have been so quick to judge. 020313 ... Aimee you know something.. the only reason this is such a huge issue is because it's a fucking human life.... We have no problem with killing other animals and their young, but when it comes to killing our own, the issue of the sanctity of life comes up. Honestly, if I saw the need, yes I would abort a child. It would be a difficult decision, but nonetheless i would do it. Why? Well let's see, if I were to have the child, at this point i would not be able to give it the life it deserves or needs. We would be barely making it in life and I wouldn't be able to buy them all the things they need. So why not give it up? Right, and have someone else raise my child. Have them call someone else mommy. I don't fucking think so. So what else am I left with? Abortion. You bet your ass. I'm not going to worry about the fetus's eternal soul. Sorry, but I personnally think it's okay to abort a FETUS before it becomes quick. (an old term for when the child first begins to move around and can be felt moving). Before that point, I don't really consider there to be a soul.. it's just cells dividing and other various stuff. Yes, that is a cold way to look at it, but you know.. if you can kill any other animal and say "it's not like it has feelings" I sure as hell can kill a fetus for the exact same reason. I'm just so tired of people telling me what I can and can't do. If abortion is declared illegal and all the clinics are shut down then I would be forced to have it done on a kitchen table with dirty utensils and risk loosing my own life. Other women would try to do it themselves using crochet hooks and wire coat hangers and in the process kill themselves as well. Yes I know some of you believe that it's just God getting his almighty revenge, but you know something. It's a forgiveable sin, and since when are you without sin? You throwing your judgement on me and others in my situation automatically throws you in the same dirty pool as me. So maybe I do deserve to die.. but you know something... you don't have the right to tell me what to do. And also, what would you refer to a miscarriage as? God aborting the child himself? Come now, we're not all that naive. Things happen, but in all technicality, that would be referred to as a natural abortion. I'm sorry if this is coming across as bitchy, but most of you people have never even met someone who's had an abortion, much less had one yourselves. Especially you Bryanfrbs... if I'm not mistaken, you have a fucking penis.. you wouldn't know the first thing about it. I'm comfortable with the decisions I've made with my life.. yes I do wonder, and somedays I regret, but honestly, I have made peace with myself over this. So screw off. 020314 ... misstree aimee, you summed up the better part of my feelings on the subject... a few more thoughts: if you're against abortion, don't have one. standard line, but rings so true. politically, pro-choice is not pro-abortion. i was arguing about this in a bar the other night, and someone said that when he was 17 and his gf was 15, they were denied the ability to buy contraceptives (small town fuckers), and they had unprotected sex. the girl got pregnant, and though he insisted he'd be able to take care of the kid, she had it aborted. he is anti-abortion to this day, but leads a successful and fulfilling life as a dj, and is one of the biggest players i know. in a case like this, what are the two paths that could have been taken? the abortion was done, both went on with their lives and parted ways. with the responsibility of a child, most of life's flexibility is taken away: you can't go for any amount of time without housing, food, water, etc. you can't work and go to college, as you have a kid to take care of. if your mate is still around, is it someone that you carefully selected that will be around for the next 18 years, or will that child grow up in a broken home? how ugly will the process of breaking be, or sometimes even of staying together? can you give that child a good life? if you're not certain about these questions, if you don't *know* you can take care of a kid, then for fuck's sake don't have one. the gentleman also made the point that they shouldn't have had unprotected sex in the first place, and should have faced the consequences. well, they're not the only ones facing it, and that's like a bullet in the head for stealing a candybar. i agree that unprotected sex is wrong as hell, but it's going to happen no matter what. best we can do as a society is try to make things better. good point from... someone (sorry :) about adoption, too. 020314 ... good people aimee and mistree, you share my exact feelings. i have almost gotten into arguments about this, with people that are so very anti-abortion its strange. 020314 ... dr.d And the pope rides around in his bulletproof pope-mobile (faith in action?) telling people in the third world that contraception is wrong... I'd like to roast that motherfucker on a KYjelly-lubricated spit. fuck him, and if you agree with him, then fuck you too. 020315 ... jessica for the record, i'm a woman and i've known several women who have had abortions and/or babies. i'm in college, so i'm not in a stable financial situation. not married. it's poor logic to say that society must "try to make things better" as a result of inevitable unprotected sex. the same logic could be applied to a demand for slaves in lazy america. being lazy happens, so maybe we could solve this problem by purchasing slaves. furthermore, the same poor logic can be applied to the concept that fetuses are worthless as such. at one point in america, it was commonly believed that black people were animals and had no feelings. i find it interesting, amiee, that, despite your pro-abortion stance, you call abortion a sin, albeit a forgivable one. i also find it interesting that one would have qualms with this mass of "cells dividing and other various stuff" calling someone else "mommy." your argument is messy. another thing: if abortion is a forgivable sin, why would women be punished with death for having abortions? christians--i'm assuming you assume that most anti-abortionists are christians--believe only good comes from god. negative consequences only come from bad things. for instance, lung cancer is a result of smoking. most of this is addressed to amiee, but i want to once again state that i (personally) am not in the business of judging people. i don't think it's wrong to judge and have an opinion about a thing, and thus i think abortion is wrong. it doesn't make me bossy or a personal threat to someone else to be against abortion any more than being pro-abortion makes someone else a threat to me and my interests. i think, amiee, that if you were truly at peace with yourself over this, you would have a cleaner argument and you wouldn't be so angry. 020316 ... jessica (PS--sorry for spelling your name wrong.) 020316 ... silentbob being at peace with herself doesnt necessarily mean arguing it to anyone else would make it any cleaner. and in the bible it says there's only one unforgivable sin, and thats to sin against the holy spirit. So... uhhh. if abortion is a sin...it is forgivable. Get it? it doesn't really seem that complex. 020316 ... silentbob i don't know anyone who's "pro-abortion" its more like... pro- someone having the right to make the choice what to do with their own body. and there are other things that are sins that are, and i'm speaking for aimee here, forgiveable, in her summation i imagine. 020316 ... jessica if you'll notice, i didn't say it wasn't forgivable. that wasn't my point at all, and i agree with you. 020316 ... jessica the "at peace" issue--i don't really want to argue about it, because i think it detracts from the larger issue. i only mentioned that because it seems her argument would be more sound and less passionate/angry if she had found peace about it. no one's trying to pick a fight here, just attempting to have an unbiased, fair discussion about a specific issue. i think, with this in mind, that it would be best not to talk about aimee in the third person. she can speak for herself. hi, aimee. 020316 ... phil The older you are, the more worthless you become, and the more things become your fault. So abortion is killing the most valuable innocent thing. 020316 ... rachael the fact that abortion has to even exist is sad, where does the soul go if it begins at conception and is then aborted?..think of all those souls that never even made it into this world 020317 ... rachael the fact that abortion has to even exist is sad, where does the soul go if it begins at conception and is then aborted?..think of all those souls that never even made it into this world 020317 ... misstree where do souls go when they die? still unsettled, probably never will be... reminds me of a quote that basically said that, who, if given the choice, knowing all the pain they would go through, would take the choice to face this harsh world again? as far as "socitey making it better," it seems a bit of a difference between sex ed and condom distribution as preventative measures and slavery. really. 020317 ... misstree and, one more time, class, PRO-CHOICE IS NOT PRO-ABORTION. even those who would have one under certain circumstances don't exactly go skipping and singing into the clinic, and many who *are* pro-choice are anti-abortion personally. 020317 ... dionysos amen. 020317 ... silentbob when i was going out with alicia, she was all i blathered about when i first started in june 2000. but her step dad didn't want me to be anything more than friends with her because i wasn't christian. SO he sat me down and explained this to me, the way you might a child, and said if i ever had any questions about christianity i could ask him, as if he could tell me things i couldn't find in the bible. So i asked what about chinese people? do they all go to hell cuz they don't get cable? And he said yes, and that's why its important to witness in different countries. And i said what about babies? Do they go to hell because they aren't old enough to realize they are sinners? and he said, No of course not, and i don't remember if he said it was in the bible, because otherwise its just naive, but he said that jesus considers babies pure and until they get older, they aren't sinners, so when a baby dies it goes straight to heaven, that probably goes for fetuses too. So aborted babies, according to Scotts christianity, go to heaven. Of course this starts making me wonder like, when exactly does a baby grow into a sinner, and all that kind of thing. Personally, i think life begins in the adult body. You're half a person in your father, you're half a person in your mother. BEcuase both the egg cells and the sperm cells are alive, and then when they join together to make a zygote, then they become one life. But its still living cells. Your skin cells are alive too, but you don't bomb a skin care clinic when you get bad dandruff. as the cells grow, they develop little fetus eyes and little fetus arms and little fetus thumbs to suck on. but its still all new, its a collection of ...i don't know how many, probably a lot... of cells. And when you are born, there's even more cells. All human beings are is a collection of cells. So when you masturbate, do you pray for all the sperm cells that burn in the semen that will never go anywhere? do cells have souls? Maybe you say, a soul is created when the sperm hits the egg to create a zygote. Thats when a soul is made. WHo made that soul? Your mom and dad. because it wouldn't have been there if the egg and the sperm didn't hook up. God kills people, or at least allows people to die, every day. Are you going to bomb a church because you're mad at God for killing someone whose life was cut off too short? Are you going to stand around and picket? There was a sign that said God is Pro Life. I thought about that a minute. God gives human beings free will and the right to choose whether or not to believe in him, hypothetically speaking of course. So wouldn't that make god pro-choice? 020317 ... jessica just because the christian god gives humankind free will doesn't mean he is behind the choices people make. most christians believe that people are vehicles for either good or bad. i don't think any of us are truly qualified to say when a soul is created, since this has been the argument of philosophers and theologians for centuries. the term "pro-abortion" is merely a semantic problem. i used it to avoid using the term "anti-choice" because i think it's an equally weighted term. just because i don't believe in abortion doesn't mean i want to take away ALL choices and that i want to take away ALL choices from women specifically. if someone could find better, unbiased terms, i would use them. so far, i've only heard "anti-choice" used by supporters of the right to abortion. society making it better--i used the instance of slavery because both situations are taboos and deal with a lack of regard for human life. if you believe that fetuses are merely tissue, then it *would* only be a matter of sex education and condom distribution. personally, i don't see a difference between slavery and abortion. maybe you can show me how it's different, under the assumption that i've given this a lot of thought and am not a dumb inferior in need of teaching. 020317 ... silentbob no one harvests the fetuses and makes them do work and sells them to other people. But like i said. I believe life starts before the womb, as all the cells are alive. all things die. 020317 ... Syrope there ya go bob...no one lets black fetuses grow up not knowing why they cant play with the white kids and then once they are old enough, douses them with saline solution strong enough to kill them. slaves knew what it was like to be free because they saw it all around them, but...fetuses don't know what life is, so they won't miss it. they don't have "rights" ...its the parents' fault that the fetus exists, so they have a responsibility to make a decision here - try to raise the kid without enough resources (whether this be money, maturity, etc) or put it out of its misery. 020317 ... misstree jessica, i think we're mixing our topics here with the slavery comparison. slavery vs. preventative measures. until the zperm hits the egg, they're nothing. we waste the ingredients all the time. if i'm wrong in the assumption that you're not against contraception, let me know, but i'll assume for the moment that this is confusion... slavery vs. abortion: Syrope had a *very* good point. I understand the point that you make, that it is taking the life of another human being (assuming that you count fetuses in that category at that point, which i will for this part) and imposing your utter and complete will on it, to detrimental effects. But as syrpoe said, the fetus has no knowledge of what it is, what is happening, or what it will miss. Indeed, to force women to bear a child to term if they have strong reasons not to seems like an imposition of will to me, and to be faced with the coice of raising a child (which, to me, is about the equivalent of slavery... i'm not the parent type...) or give a child up for adoption (if you're white, as babies of other ethnicities aren't in very high demand), hoping that the home it gpes into is good, knowing that you have a child out there *somewhere*, and knowing that that child is going to think that you never loved them... no choice here is really a good one. it simply seems to me that, in some circumstances, abotion is the one that causes the least suffering. maybe i'm biased because i get woken at least once or twice a week to the sound of the child next door screaming and sobbing, accompanied by the sounds of impact from something i can't even identify. kinda kicks you in the gut with perspective. 020317 ... jessica actually, frederick douglass wrote that he didn't know what freedom was until he began to read. white slave owners, including his own, wouldn't allow their slaves to receive an education because of people like frederick douglass, who passionately worked to teach other slaves how to read. according to him, it was only until he gave them the the gift of education that they desired freedom. so, you see, slaves didn't know what freedom was because white slave owners--even northern ones--kept their slaves from being exposed to any other kind of life. i suggested it earlier, but i'll suggest it once more--read jonathan swift's "a modest proposal". they didn't have enough resources to care for the ever-increasing infant population in irish society, so he suggests eating them. those damn uneducated poor people and adolescents should be responsible and eat the fetuses. 020317 ... jessica misstree, i will agree with you that no choice is a good one. this is usually the result of bad choices to begin with--unprotected sex, rape, incest, a plethora of horrible things. i think the idea that fetuses are just tissue isn't valid because we have no evidence of that. i've read several essays written by people in the medical field who give evidence to the contrary, but even then i don't think it's a valid argument to say that fetuses are tissue or not. the point is that we're discussing human life. having said that, i'm not necessarily sure it should be illegal. there's no question in my mind that children who are conceived through careless, unprotected sex should be given up for adoption. i would *really* like to see modern science find a way to allow other women to carry the unwanted children. this would release the burden and make it easier for other couples to eliminate the consequences of their carelessness. however, i think before abortion laws can even be questioned that there should be harsher sentences imposed on rapists and sex criminals. the man involved in a pregnancy is not always required to be responsible by law, and i think this needs to be addressed first. 020317 ... silentbob i don't think any punishment will deter them enough. if some sick asshole wants to rape a random woman, i doubt he'll reconsider at the last minute and say, "Oh heavens, i may just get that really awful punishment they just announced." if anything, they will just make themselves harder to catch. and then comes when its her word over his and he didn't really rape her, but she claims, yes yes he did, and then he gets that really bad punishment but he's innocent, and it all started just so there could be something for some hypothetical rape victim to fall back on after she has an abortion, i may have killed my child, but at least the man who raped me died too. I just don't think there's punishment enough for rape. How can you decide at what level punishment must be set? If there were some way for criminologists to make rapists into women, give them this sense of security and purity for a number of years and then have it taken from them, brutally and psychologically damaging, only to have the man carry a child he doesn't want, as a constant reminder of what happened, and then actually make him live with the knowledge that he was violated, and that he killed his child when no other option seemed feasible, instead of just killing him. Sometimes the death penalty seems too cruel. Other times it doesn't seem cruel enough. 020317 ... Syrope or if men could try to carry a baby for 9 months and go through labor! or have their girlfriends give them the sorry excuses guys use for not using a condom!...oh wait, my vengeful and feminist fantasies are interrupting the discussion... oh and up there about slaves (maybe i should look at peoples names before i click "blather"...) they may have been isolated, but they heard stories, and they saw how the familes they worked for lived. babies dont have a heartbeat for 4 weeks... arent even male or female for 10 weeks ...and after they're born their senses don't operate separately for another 2 months or so...it takes a lot to make a fetus a person, including love. babies who have no physical or emotional contact before age 5 are permanently caged in the mentality of a scared puppy. sometimes parents can't give love... i have a new plan! every female has her tubes tied at birth...then when she feels she's ready, she can apply to become a mother, and if she's deemed fit, she can have her tubes untied. can you imagine though? all the underground reverse-hysterectomy clinics would be getting bombed... oh my i've blathered much too much... 020317 ... jessica i think most of this has already been said before, so i'll just stick by what i've already said. i do want to address one thing: the label of "feminist" on your fantasies about men experiencing the same reproduction grief of women. firstly, i consider myself a feminist in the most basic sense of the word and don't desire to reduce women to their reproductive capabilities. secondly, i see the possibility to produce children in my womb as a gift and not a burden. i don't dislike or resent men because they can't experience this. not all men create excuses for not using a condom, and women shouldn't be having sex with someone they can't trust. furthermore, there are measures that can be taken if the condom breaks or isn't used at all. i think the biggest dilemma in the entire abortion debate is that the value of human life is determined by whether or not the life is wanted. if it isn't wanted, it isn't valuable. what a scary 1984-esque era we're creating. 020317 ... Syrope *sigh* so what you're saying is i should take my blathers elsewhere, perhaps to the sarcasm page? 020317 ... Quintin jessica, you need to get your head out of your ass and stop looking down on other people for them being lesser than you on your scale of perfection. 1)pro-choice does NOT equal pro-abortion 2)You may know a few people who have had abortions, but honey, until you have one yourself you're not going to understand shit. 3)You can't seem to grasp the meaning of Aimee's blathe. She was looking at all areas of the spectrum. You know, being open minded enough to realize that maybe it is a sin, maybe, but at least it's a forgivable sin... doesn't mean she's not at peace with her decision and who are you to judge her for it? What's done is done, and you can't reverse it. 4) I'm assuming you're a girl who has never been with anyone (which could definitely be wrong seeing as how I don't know you), but if you've never had that risk of having a child, how could you honestly understand the mental condition of the mother and the father. That kind of choice takes a great deal of soul searching in a very short time span. 5) Put yourself in someone else's shoes before you start jumping on someone for decisions they made in their life. I'm not saying that 'Aimee' is innocent of this, but everyone should at least attempt a little compassion. 6)The stance of pro-choice means exactly what it says. Pro-Choice. The woman's right to choose what happens. I agree whole-heartedly with the argument of pro-choice. If it were to be out-lawed, women would be doing it with coat-hangers and crochet hooks just as they were doing it in the early 20th century and long before then. When abortions were legalized, we made a huge step in the area of women's rights. Jessica, i hope this helps you, and if not, well then I hope it at least makes you stop and think, and again if not well then, nothing will change your mind and I have to respect that.. but at least think about this before you post your scathing response... Thanks 020318 ... jessica quintin, i don't think it was appropriate or constructive to tell me i have my head in my ass. what i initially said and have been saying all along is that it's more constructive to argue the issue itself without getting personal. just because i don't agree with you doesn't mean that i'm ignorant, and you would be wise to remember that you don't actually know me and have no knowledge of my own experiences to make any sort of judgement about what does or doesn't qualify me to have an opinion. i don't have to qualify my life to have a valid standpoint on abortion, but i've already done this more than was necessary. i apologize if i appear to be condescending, as that's really not the case. unlike you, i've not gotten personal by sarcastically calling people "honey" or suggesting that they're ignorant based on incorrect assumptions about their lifestyle. i've not suggested that other peoples' opinions are somehow "lesser" than mine on my "scale of perfection." i've not even suggested that my responses "help" others come to the opposite conclusion, as you have. instead, i'm presenting my own understanding of abortion and indicating weaknesses i see in other peoples' arguments. others are more than welcome to do so with my arguments; in fact, i welcome it. this is part of the reason why i really appreciate misstree's responses and not yours. i never judged aimee personally for her comments, but rather the comments themselves. surely you see a difference. how are we to have a dialogue about any issue if we don't examine each person's arguments? i have openly read and examined the responses here without contempt or personal judgement. may i ask: have you given me that courtesy? if you find this response "scathing", i suggest you read it with a different tone in mind. i've made a conscious effort to be civil and respectful to everyone i've encountered here, which you didn't have the decency to return to me. i don't see why this discussion has to get nasty. if the purpose of this discussion is to pat oneself on the back for being pro-choice, i will leave and allow that activity to continue. 020318 ... jessica syrope, i'm not suggesting you take your arguments anywhere else. i'm just addressing them. as a sidenote, my comment about the value of life goes unaddressed. is the value of life determined by whether or not it's wanted? and if it isn't wanted, it isn't valuable? 020318 ... g h o s t God is pro-life? the same god who according to the old testament killed the entire Assyrian army in the desert while they slept to help King David? the same god who killed the firstborn of Egypt (yeah, the pharaoh was an asshole for being stubborn, but come on, Everybody's firstborn?) The same god who predetermined that his child would die on a crucifix The same god who commanded that the faithful rise up against those who worshipped the golden calf and kill them the same god in whose name wars have raged since near the dawn of recorded history the same god invoked by clinic bombers and hijackers and people with voices in their heads i envy the aborted because they will never have to put up with the world as it is 020318 ... yoink It isn't our choice who lives and dies. 020318 ... phil evidently it is 020318 ... velvetdesire it makes me sick that some of you actually believe that you have the ability to comprehend what it's like to be someone else . . . soon girls are going to have to choose between dark allies and daddy's fists 020318 ... silentbob i personally don't believe it when someone says, "i'm not judging you, but..." because...yes you are. Its impossible NOT to. its human nature, and thinking you're above being judgemental is really...like... stuck up, kind of. Even if you think you aren't, you are. The only way to not judge someone is if you really don't care about what they are saying and are ignoring it and its not affecting you in anyway. Unless there's some kind of holy judgement that you are referring to, and not just with your eyes. If you didn't judge someone, you wouldn't be responding to their arguments. 020318 ... jessica god isn't pro-life or pro-choice. that's reminiscent of the idea that "god is on our side" and "we will prevail." god isn't an imperialist; he's on everyone's side. 020318 ... jessica silentbob, it *is* possible to judge arguments and not people. people who judge other people based on their viewpoints are insecure, and that's not an insult. i think most anger comes from our own insecurities. however, it's also a means of defending what believe isn't secure--beliefs, self-esteem, etc. 020318 ... g h o s t i'm more inclined to believe he isn't on anybody's side anymore. but that is just my take on the matter 020318 ... misstree Qunitin, jessica is right, she's been very nice though this entire discussion, though judging by the number of posts from both viewpoints, there have more been arguing against her than with her... to reduce yourself to personal attacks during a debate only weakens your position. and again, i'm going to have to agree with aimee that you can accept someone's opinion without judging them personally for it... how one presents their opinion might color in how you view that person, give a view inside their personality, but just because someone's opinion is different than yours doesn't mean you look down on them: that's where tolerance or intolerance comes in. this has been a relatively open discussion so far, people, and even if it doesn't change your mind, it makes you think. let's keep it civil. oh, and as far as the sanctity of life being determined by whether it's wanted or not, again it comes down to whether you consider a 0-3 month fetus to have "life" or not... 020318 ... jessica i think that's the precise point where those for and against abortion diverge. out of curiosity, do you think you would support abortion if it was discovered that human life begins at conception? that is, if it could be proven that the fetus was more than just tissue in early stages. i don't intend to attempt disproving your answer, i'm just curious. 020319 ... Syrope i think the value of life definately depends on whether its wanted or not. people who are suicidal think life has no value...and so do people faced with living forever in a vegetative state, which is why euthanasia (spelling?) and abortion are sort of in the same spectrum for me. 020319 ... Arwyn *sighs* the neverending debate in which EVERYONE thinks they're right... maybe we should focus more attention on more important matters? 020319 ... misstree If life did begin at conception, I don't know that I would change my stance as far as legality... I'm not sure that my personal view would change, either. I tend to think of people as meat machines, living tissue walking and talking and having very strange and complex reactions to stimuli... but, as I said on my hedonism rant, I realize that this is an opinion not shared by all, nor should it be. When you start to discuss things like the sanctity of life, it's very easy to start pulling back more and more layers, bringing it from a moral discussion to a philosophical one (as often happens). "What is sanctity?" some dead guys would say. "Why does life have value?" Taken from that stance, though, *no* life could have value... straight philosophy tends to lose the human element in its logic. Honestly, I'm going to have to think about this one. I'm chasing my tail a bit here, and I need to figure out how all the elements can be reduced to managable bits. Hmmm... if 2 + 3 = 5... that's "if" now... 020319 ... misstree another good point about suicide & "living wills"... the first difference that comes to mind is that termination in those cases is the choice of the individual, whereas with abortion the fetus/child/tissue/thing has no choice. 'course, until you're 18 your parents make all your choices for you, which skews that a bit... but it does cast a shadow on "sanctity of life"... also considering points made earlier about the "sanctity of life" of cows and food animals and such... treating humans differently does seem a bit prejudiced, when looked at that way. :) 020319 ... misstree I don't particularly think I'm right... I think I have an opinion, both strong and thought out, but opinions always shift as new information comes in... I'm as right as I can be for me at this moment... tomorrow I will be a different kind of right... and, well, regardless of the kernel of the discussion (abortion), i think it is an important matter. people wouldn't get so worked up about it if it didn't tie into a lot of other basic issues--sanctity of life, reproduction choices, religion... also, i consider this a complete *lack* of waste of time. reminds me of the old days, when i'd grab a cup of coffee with a couple of hard-headed friends and debate everything from feminism to god to science to ewoks and back. keeps the mind sharp, and like i said, helps opinions evolve so they can be re-evaluated and be more right for your viewpoint. 'sides, this is blather, if it's not designed to waste time, i don't know what is. ;) 020319 ... silentbob when i said "judge" i didn't necessarily mean "look down on" i just meant that no matter what we make judgements about everything thats happening. like right now, i am judging that jessica is making judgements about everyone. because thats all i've experienced. and i've experienced a lot of people who say "i'm not judging you...but... your idea lacks substance for these reasons, such as you're insecure, or you have a short temper." i'm not saying thats what everyone says to me, i'm just using that as an example. there are always judgements. and no one THINKS they are doing it, because they think judging is a BAD thing, but its inevitable. its waht you do with that judgement that counts, and the amount of effort you put into finding the truth and convincing yourself you are wrong one way or the other. get it? but yeah. human life. begins with cells. the cells are alive. they are live in the egg and they are alive in the sperm. the sperm cell is a living cell. its alive inside the seminal vesicles. life begins BEFORE conception. you can't deny that they are alive, they grow, and do everything. its scientifically proven that life begins with one cell. everything else is a completely different argument, about whether or not its ok to kill a certain amount of living cells at a certain age before they come out of a mommy's tummy. thats all polotics. but one thing is for sure. cells are alive. 020319 ... jessica so i guess that's where the "pro-life"/"pro-choice" argument breaks down. it's difficult at this point to not discuss morality and personal philosophies, i think, because of the emphasis on personal values. it's no surprise that christians would defend pro-life, for instance, because of their beliefs about the sanctity of life. i think the heart of the debate rests in the designation of rights to living things. who has them? who does not? who designates them? etc. and, at that point, the argument essentially becomes: "yes, they do TOO have rights!" "no, no they DON'T!" the debate for abortion ends and the examining of values/where they come from begins. perhaps this is why there has never been a conclusion but instead fierce conflict over abortion. but at any rate, it's clearer to me now just where the conflict begins, which is certainly helpful. thanks for openly and honestly expressing your viewpoints, misstree; it's been enlightening. 020320 ... silentbob jessica you rock 020320 ... misstree thank you as well, jessica. it's been very enlightening for me, as well... it's also a difficult topic to keep away from arguments of emotional reactions, and really sit down and look at the nuts and bolts. some very interesting conclusions i hadn't realized before, and some good steps along the way. and i have to agree with silentbob, you rock. :) 020320 ... jessica thanks, guys. i don't know about that, but i've certainly enjoyed talking about this with you politely. this is the first conversation i've ever had about abortion that hasn't deteriorated into name-calling and idle threats. thanks for being open-minded enough to discuss this with me. 020321 ... jessica (i should edit that to say "online" conversation about abortion, etc...) 020321 ... bryanfrbs Zao - Tool to Scream Goodbye They breathe but cannot scream They have no tools to build voices They wait in fetal position Martyrs on altars of mistakes The martyr They have not the tools to scream They are just the ones upon the altars of mistakes There is no safe place The marytr 020408 ... Skinny jim Take the comfort away. 020410 ... rchicken its scary. not like a fearful thing. its scary enough to cry. 020527 ... lo misstree story the couple who had unprotected sex and the guy said that they should face the consequences of that and have the kid made me think...the whole idea that this kid would be branded as a consequence...that somewhere in the backs of the parents minds he always would be somewhat equated to a punishment. that's just a horrible thought. 020528 ... onemorebumpintheroad i'm going to planned parenthood on friday. they said that they had to confirm the pregnancy before they could give me any information on abortion. i wonder how soon after friday this will happen. i can't stop thinking about it. my heart is breaking. i know i couldn't take care of this child, and he would resent it. and i cannot in good faith put it up for adoption and hope it would have a good life. i've seen the world. i've seen the worst parts of it. i wouldn't want any child to feel the pain that i've felt. i feel myself crumbling. i don't know if i can stand up to this. losing my father was the hardest thing i ever thought i'd go through. i'm sure that this will be worse. 2 pink lines ended my life. 020529 ... deus ex machina just look out for the religious fanatics stalking about with cameras if you see any, ask them how it feels to be so handy with that first stone 020529 ... misstree an anecdote: when i was 16, i got a positive result on a home pregnancy test. my mother found out what happened, and discussed my options with me. i also talked to the person who would be the father, and we all agreed to terminate the pregnancy. my mother had had an abortion when she was 16, then gave birth to me when i was 20. i sometimes wonder what it would be like if i had an older brother or sister. i'm glad i don't. with a divorce when i was 4, i'm glad no one else had to go with what i did. my mother called me in sick to school and went to the clinic with me. i went through the pre-interview, and had the scan (which i can't remember the name of now) that would detect where the fetus was... the nurses couldn't find it. they did a quick pregnancy test, a part of normal procedure, and found out that the home test had been a false positive--i wasn't pregnant. they sent me home, and my mother and i went out to lunch instead. it's hard to explain what i was feeling during that lunch. astonishment, a close bond to my mother, relief. i consider myself incredibly lucky that the positive on the home test was actually a false. but i stand by the decision that i made with that information. i can barely imagine how my life would have been altered if i had gone through with the pregnancy. keeping the child was not an option, any more than it is at 25, any more than it will be at 35. but even adoption... to go through a pregnancy is a very changing experience at any age, and to go through it so young would have made me a very different person. anyhow. i don't know why i didn't share this before now. but there it is. 020529 ... things_have_to_get_better_right? I was 14. I knew I was pregnant, but I didn't want to know for sure. I wanted it to go away. But my mom wouldn't let it. She knew too. She bought the test. She looked at the results becuase I couldn't. When she gave me that look, I fell to the floor in a soggy, sobbing ball. She took me to the doctor, and I had an ultrasound done. I saw my little baby's heart beating. I looked away from the screen. I didn't want to see it living. I knew what I had to do. I had all of high school left. I had all of my life left. I had the pregnancy terminated. I bled for over a month afterwards. When I get older and married I do want to have children. If I have a daughter, and this happens to her, I will share my story with her so she knows she's not alone. Last summer, my mom told me she had been pregnant when she was 17. She miscarried Christmas day. She was going to have it. Just knowing that she had made the same mistake I had made comforted me. I didn't feel like a monster as much anymore. I don't think of my child as much as I used to. This has made me good at blocking things out. I block it. I know someday it'll will come back, staring me in the face. That is when I'll face it, but for now, I'm living my selfish life. 020603 ... suggestivegulp my best friend from elementary school had an abortion two months ago. the day she was pregnant, she called me before she told anyone, and i found that really strange because we hadn't spoken in weeks and hardly ever saw eachother. i went over there with my mom and we waited in the living room, the one in which i had danced and played as a kid, while she knocked on her mother's bedroom door and waited for her to get dressed and emerge from the bedroom with her married lover in tow. they went into lauren's room and when they came out, lauren was crying. her mother had told her it was no big deal. they would just make an appointment and have it taken care of. now, i have never been pregnant, but if i was i would keep it. i didn't want her to do it. i wanted her to have it. just because you're fucking high on e with your exboyfriend and you're not careful doesn't mean a child should have to die. but i promised myself i would be supportive. i did try to talk her out of it, but it didn't work. i even said i would take care of it myself, pay for her mistake with my life and all she would have to do was carry it for nine months. she said she couldn't do it. after the abortion, i called to check on her, but i was just so angry. i couldn't even talk to her so i got off the phone. last week she showed up at my house and i didn't let her in. we stood in my driveway and i faked like i was happy to see her while she told me that she and her new boyfriend never use protection. i swear to god, if she kills another baby, i'll kill her. 020627 ... for hecuba "just sign on the dotted line all it takes is one whisper one word just sign on the dotted line and give the permission that was never yours to give he loves you he's inside you he loves you like only a child could love a mother he loves you he loves you he loves you" -All Things Considered R.I.P 020706 ... EMO Last August the day after my 16 birthday, I was having an abortion at a clinic in Springfield. I was pregnant by Josh or by Trey, I still have no proof which one. Whom ever, I’m not sure.... To this day, I still don't know which person impregnated me... Either way it didn't make the situation any better. So I was pregnant. .. and well, I knew I was pregnant ! I told myself that it wasn’t true I didn’t want to believe it. I didn't want to deal with it. I thought that maybe it would just go away…..? I / That was irresponsible and I didn't care. I just didn't care I suppose a month or so went by, with no period and without taking a pregnancy test. I’ll wait and see if Maybe my period just skipped a month… I just kept telling Josh and myself that it wasn't true, I couldn’t be pregnant. It was simply that my period had skipped a month. We would wait it out until my next menstrual cycle to take a pregnancy test. I was really just denying what I knew in my heart was true…I was pregnant… and I was procrastinating…. With everything else in my life going on and flying by… I tried to grasp reality , and scrambled for a way to make sense of it all, gather myself up and get it together and start figuring out what to do. Next month.. I’m too afraid to get the test, I tell Josh. I ‘don’t want to be seen buying one.’ He says he will buy it for me. But I say, let’s just wait. The truth is I don’t want to know… But I know I am. From my head , to my heart , to my gut , I know that I am pregnant. I see the baby in my dreams. It keeps me awake at night worrying. I knew that day when I first thought I could be. I know I knew then. That was when the procrastinating started. My denying level went from a two to ten. I’m sitting here right now with a blanket over my head looking absolutely ridiculous... but I’m cold and you loose like 30 or 40 % of your body heat through you head... so its staying there. So where was I… I have a tendency to go and get off topic, stray away from what I am talking about and never seem to get directly to the point. Although, it is though these slight mislead excursions that I discover I come to a sense of way more over all fulfillment from writing then just to stay on the mainstream and discussion in deeper straight forward detail aligned perfectly one after the other to one main topic. So, I am pregnant. Everything is telling me that I am. My mind, my body, my soul and the thing living, developing and striving for life inside of me I stop smoking. I stop drinking. I stop do everything. Even though I know there is no hope for the baby forming inside me… It will be aborted there is no other option… there never was…. I never thought of any other way seriously. I won't live with the fact thingking that if for some rason i HAVe to have this baby it would be born messed up because i had to smoke a ciggarette and could damn well wait till this innocent baby was out of my body to go ahead and pollute my self with this tar and cyanide enriched smokey nicotine. something like that.. or maybe i just think that its gross ly odd and perverse to be pregnant and still smoke... weather i am having htis baby or not... soemthing inside me , maybe it was this thing living in my womb... told me that it was bad to smoke... that it wasn't the right thing to do... i don't know... and wow... now i think to myself .. what if that baby was mean tto come into this world? what if i felt all of that love and felt like i need ed to protect and nurture this baby.. LIke i need ed to keep my body out of harms way for the sake of this baby and keep myself healthy for this baby... i needed to do that... i dont know if i imagined this feeling .. but i think it was reall i actually liked it.... i liked the feeling that there was someting inside me that was worth while that was worth protecting sometihng... that there was a reason to protect my self... and what was inside me... But i just had it scooped away out of my body and flushed away down a toilet somewhere... an unborn fetus.. with limbs. and and head. and a heartbeat.... a tiny little heart beat there it was on the screen in a sea of black and grey and blue.. thumping.. perpetuating its existance.. struggling for life.. striving to become something more than a cluster of cells. it had shape it had a form to it... it had a heart beat bum bum... bum bum... bum bum... even mute i could hear it in my head... as if my brain was some how connected to my womb, and i could hear it in my ears... bum bum...bum bum... bum bum... this little life.. inside of me... was growing living and existing it was two.. i was two i was multiplying...... i could create something as innocent and as real and alive and vertuous and beautiful as life.... no matter who it was with... and i know... that it was trey i might wish that instead it was josh... but it wasn't... it was trey i know that... it was i just know... and i know that really i want it to be him... So i will never ever forget the baby that was meant to be the one who should have breathe his or her first life breath taken their first step in my arms and maybe been a larger part of my life... but this baby had no name this baby had not to be this baby had no name. this child i was affraid to let live to let it in to my life to mess things up and screw it up not once but twice... so i let it go... i let her go i let him go and flush away down some toilet somehwere and then trey left or mabye he was already gone in the desert somewhere i don't really know i wasn't really paying attentionto him at that time... i just know that when he got bakc i knwe that i had to tell him... i knew that he had to know because iknew that it was his... i nkew it .. in my heart i know i knew Alkl of those great times i shared with josh were gone at this time at that place right there in that mall right then when he came back from the dessert and saw me that day.. i knew that he was the one... i knew i had to tell him he had to know So but by that time the baby was gone it was like this, i went into this place my mom sat on one side of me and josh the other... what they were thinking about each other at that momment... well i have no idea... to think about it will blow my mind away... i can't it grosses me out to think in that way.. about the two of them sitting htere in the abortion clinic reception ist office.... waiting for me to fill out paopers and things... then being left alone to the two of them tyogether to watch me walk away behind closed doors in this scuzzy place... to sit there together and wait for me .. tooknow what was happening to me... to think about what the other was thinking... they had a tie between them.. it was me... So Josh me and mom sitting there in the resoponist office lobby the waiting lounge... at the abourtiuon clineic.. i get all the paper work done.. get up and leave the tow of them there.... walk throught the doors close behind me... getting undressed.. they wait for me.. thinking about what the other is thinking.. That thougth creeps me out.... weirds me out and grosses me out all at the same time.. So anyways... i go in discrobe...sit there flipping through magazines ... something... i dont even remember.. i was totally scared.... i wans't even looking in them just flippin g through the pages... there was a girl sitting in a hospital gown next to me as well... with just sneakers on... she was nerveous... also... i could tell... her fooot was twitching and it wouldn't stop... I wanted to talk to her.. at the time i wanted to talk to her... to console her... to help make myself feel better... to just be able to bite out off "are you nerveous too/ scared too?" But i already knew what her answer would be... and well it was idle... and it would make me feell stargely more inseceure and out of control.. and werid.. so i didn't talk to her... now i could see my self asking the girl with the twitching foot that question and her reply "yes, im scared to death! " then just throuwing myself on her for a mutal consolation hug.. between two complete strangers... who some how have this clinic and these magazines in common and share the same perdicament. We both some how ended up here... but with no un denailbity were we put here by different circumstances... the same practicce had to be ccarried out to end up in the same place... to be sitting here. that day .. in hospital gowns and sneakers... flipping through a magazine... in a dirty clinic with a police officer at the door.... So anyways.. then after that.. there were probably some standard procedures... between that waiting room.. the chaning room with the basket for you clothes on the floor and the drugs that induced... some strange half sleep numbness conscousness.... and the operating table and the coldness of the clamps and the picture of something ... ... buildings...... on the ceiling above the table..... meant to be focused on and relieve stress.... and anxiety.... and then the mans face..... it was a man.... of all of the people.... it had to be a man.... he was bearded.... red bearded..... He wwas perverted in my eyes... the worst case senario.... but who wouldn't be to take that job..... he had dark brown eyes... and he was cold.... i felt a pinch in my vagina.... a sharp pinch llll like a needle... it was it beccame "numb.." i was loosing it... stuggling ... tensing up .. sccared .. crying... a woman stood over me and held my hand tight... and told me consoled me that i would be alright it would be okay... i just kept crying and crying... and crying... i was so scared and my god, it hurt so unbelievably bad... my insides weere being sucked out of me.... i wonder what i would have looked like i imagine what i looked like lying on that table.....ankles crossed from that womans point of view... i didn't know her... but she was kind to me... and the man became kind too..... he wasn't as scary.... he wasn't as mean or unfreindly unkind... it wasn't him that was hurting me anymore..... it was that ungodly load suction noise ... because the tube was inside... suciking everything out of me..... and that was what hurt muscles inside contracting and retracting and then contracting agian... and squeezing... liek really bad menstral cramps... and pressure like getting a tooth pulled.... i just lay there and cried and cried and creid.... i was humiliated humilliating... that is the word that i choose to discribe the entire thing... and pain.. but mostly humiliating... i left the operating table ... druged barely able to move... have conscous... and incoherant... sleepy and messed up and in lots and lots of pain... so then i just remember lying in a chair or a bed propped up or soemthing... all druged...and dazed and wondering if i was gonna feel better sooner than later.. cuz it sucked... and i had never felt pain in tissue like that before... it was over... there was no turning back.. that baby was gone... killed right then and there. i had no choice... i needed to go to college. So anyways... i came to find that in the days following and preceedeing i had come to protect my body and the thing living inside me... as if it were both the same.. this strange maternal feelling overwhelmed me for days... and i needed to nurture. after the fetus was gone... i didn't have a baby... no baby but still maternal feelings of sadness and longing and nurturing... so, i went out and bought a kitten .strange phenomenon.... it was almost as oif, like i replaced the baby lost through aboutriotn with this small kitten.. to take care off. in the same maternal way... i had to feed it lceean it take care of it.. hold it pet it ... love it... kiss and hug it... change the litte.r. was the same thing.. i didn't buy it to console me.... in the loss or the hard times... but to help nullify the feeling s of loss and to give these maternal feelings and outlit.... to express them on a nother living creature.... i need ed to motheer something ... take care of something......like i would have done for the lost bqaby..... and that last statement wa the phenomenon i wished to discuss. and have now done so... i feel relieved and will edit and fix the preceeding. 020830 ... devalis when I had my scare I debated whether I would get an abortion if I was, indeed, pregnant. I personally think that it's the woman's decicion on if she wants to do it. I have reservations about doing it myself, I don't think I could kill something inside of me on purpose even if it meant I was devoted to it for the next 18 years, but I'm most definitely pro-choice. 020831 ... je5icafletcher a lot of people have them. i wonder what it's like.... to be aborted. 030206 ... sed abortion stops a beating... 030206 ... screwing for virginity to throw in my two cents: i think that abortions are awful, imoral things and no one should ever have one. But i feel that it is a pregants woman choice weather or not to have one, not mine. 030206 ... carlita pro-choice... not to say that it should be used as "birth control" by any means, but sometimes it's better than the other choice... raising (or trying to raise) a child when you're not able, ultimately ruining their life, and yours. i went with a friend of mine for her to get an abortion when we were 15. not a pretty thing, but in the end, i believe it was necessary for her at that time. then again, i look at some of my other friend's kids (most of which were born to teenagers) and think... what would life be like without them??? i, myself, could never have an abortion, but i believe it is ultimately the woman's choice. 030604 ... DammitJanet y'know i still remember those words that were screamed by an angry mother at my best friend... after she left i hugged her and we both cried. i cried for her, how hurt she must be, how hurt i would be if i heard those words from my own mother. i loved her more after that. someone needed to. "I should have listened to my friends and had an abortion when i was pregnant with you!" how can someone say that to their child? 030604 ... endless desire i am not even sure what i think. my religious affiliation would make most believe that i am completely pro-life. and for most of my life i have been. until i really thought about it and it came down to. . .what would i do if i got pregnant now? not what i think is right. but just what i would do. at my age. and im not sure, to tell you the truth. but i dont know if anyone has a right to decide for me. i just think that if the baby is too far developed, that it's absolutely awful. god, if you are going to kill your baby, do it before they start to look like one. hmm now im angry. you see, its a controversy. every controversy has valid points on either side. if it didnt, no one would argue it in the first place. im very good at see both sides of an issue usually. sometimes its hard for me to form an opinion because i keep shooting back and forth. and thats all i have to say about that. 030604 ... Amithyst Sey Blade the water around me is starting to burn the fear that surrounds me making me yearn to be closer to you yet i am alone screaming out in fear kicking around can't you feel the pain? can you hear me mommy? what's happening to me? my eyes hurt my throat is raw it's getting brighter but the burning is now fire stop it mommy protect me maybe if i move the pain will subside... that didn't work mommy, i want to hide the closer i fold up the harder it is to feel mommy, just stop the pain can't you feel me? now as i lay my head down and sleep i pray you know where i shall keep fading fading fading away mommy... whats... happening... to... ___ now what do you think? 030605 ... endless desire my god that sounds so sad 030606 ... a sweet girl i feel abortion can be considered euthanasia, in some cases where death after birth is imminent, or divorce after the shotgun wedding is foreseeable. sometimes we have to ask: by bringing this child into this world, are we sustaining life? or prolonging death? are we creating love, or providing doubt? it's in everyone's best interest to allow this one soul a chance to find a different home, in my mind. i would prefer a child was never born into a life where he or she had to ever feel unwanted, or unloved. though i have never been in this situation, i doubt i'd ever have an abortion. i am pro-choice, but i would never be able to live with myself for choosing abortion, despite my ideals. 030606 ... Minerva You have know idea how this will tear a woman apart life unwillingly ripped from inside something so precious destroyed by the very being who helped create it I could never justify what I did, nor would I want to 031011 ... nomatter I remember when I had my "scare" I was so young. But my friend asked what I was going to do..."you're parents will KILL you." Having an abortion would be the most selfish thing possible. I would be a bitch if I would rather commit murder than to face my own consequences, which i completely brought upon myself 031023 ... Little Lost Riding Hood Is it my fault I created it just like it was MY FAULT the way I was taken without permission? Did I ask to be pushed on the bed by someone who is like my father? To beg, streaming eyed to my persecutor that I didnt want this? 17 years old and I guess I should have know better, eh. MY FAULT is what screams at me from you righteous bastards who preach of God and destroying un-born life...how about this life that was destroyed that day and forever more? What God would let something so horrible happen and then want me to bring into this world a reminder of that? You talk of creation and empathy and how we should have thought of that before... come back to me when you have laid there night after night, empty and alone. Skin crawling and full of guilt and blame and self-repulsion. Empty and numb, no feeling, just creeping nightmares that tear your mind in half, waking you in ragged gasps and dry tears... You have no idea. 031023 ... Little Lost Riding Hood Sorry - I know that sounded harsh, and everyone is entitled to an opinion, but with so many conflicting factors in the debate, how can you have a RIGHT OR WRONG? 031023 ... misstree personal rights and wrongs are easily forged. universal, well, people mistake the first for the second far too often. and not harsh. passionate conviction. gets my "rant approved" stamp, which is worth slightly less than the glittery ink it's marked with. 031023 ... Little Lost Riding Hood Thanks misstree, you are right you know. We can all say 'hyperthetically speaking...' but its when its hard, gritty facts are behind your opinion that I beleive in something. Peace. 031024 ... Lemon_Soda If your prolife, go demonstrate at a grave yard. Keep THEM from going 6 feet under. When you pull that off, I'll listen to what you have to say. As for proabortion...shit, your the one that has to live with it, not me. I ain't gonna say "do what's right" , I"m gonna say do what you want, cause thats what we all end up doing anyway. If I PERSONALLY happen to knock somebody up and they want an abortion, I"ll do my best to convince them not to so that I can have my child, but I won't hate them forever and a day nor blame them if THEY decide THEY want an abortion. 031024 ... marked for the future. 031109 ... good i dont think anyone will make it to this lil guy all the way at the bottom which is ok, because in comparison to all these bold opinions and brave, scary experiences i have nothing. nothing except for unprotected sex. selfish, scary, sometimes feeling like simply the medium for some guy to get off (lying bored and just being pumped) repeated, for no explicable reason sex... scared of condoms because they make it seem more real. and so many times now the fear of pregnancy and so many times the prayers that i wont be, and twice walgreens pregnanacy tests... and always the promise that i will stop having sex or get over my stupid condom thing. but i will. because my momma had two abortions. and she doesnt seem like "the type", ya know? even though there cant be "a type" i dont know. i guess my subconcious stereotypes excluded her. so i could be the type. i am young. too young for an abortion and too young for a baby. i should find a way to be good. 040412 ... good i dont think anyone will make it to this lil guy all the way at the bottom which is ok, because in comparison to all these bold opinions and brave, scary experiences i have nothing. nothing except for unprotected sex. selfish, scary, sometimes feeling like simply the medium for some guy to get off (lying bored and just being pumped) repeated, for no explicable reason sex... scared of condoms because they make it seem more real. and so many times now the fear of pregnancy and so many times the prayers that i wont be, and twice walgreens pregnanacy tests... and always the promise that i will stop having sex or get over my stupid condom thing. but i will. because my momma had two abortions. and she doesnt seem like "the type", ya know? even though there cant be "a type" i dont know. i guess my subconcious stereotypes excluded her. so i could be the type. i am young. too young for an abortion and too young for a baby. i should find a way to be good. 040412 ... good i dont think anyone will make it to this lil guy all the way at the bottom which is ok, because in comparison to all these bold opinions and brave, scary experiences i have nothing. nothing except for unprotected sex. selfish, scary, sometimes feeling like simply the medium for some guy to get off (lying bored and just being pumped) repeated, for no explicable reason sex... scared of condoms because they make it seem more real. and so many times now the fear of pregnancy and so many times the prayers that i wont be, and twice walgreens pregnanacy tests... and always the promise that i will stop having sex or get over my stupid condom thing. but i will. because my momma had two abortions. and she doesnt seem like "the type", ya know? even though there cant be "a type" i dont know. i guess my subconcious stereotypes excluded her. so i could be the type. i am young. too young for an abortion and too young for a baby. i should find a way to be good. 040412 ... someone its not ur business to decide wether its right or wrong .. people get abortion for thier own reasons A 15YR OLD GIRL WHO WAS RAPED BY HER OWN DAD AND GOT PREGNANT DID AN ABORTION would u say that shes wrong? U CANT SAY THAT WHY DIDNT THEY PROTECT WHEN THEY HAD SEX..CUZ SOME OF THEM DID AND STILL GOT PREGNANT..let this topic rest in peace..u cant blame anyone 040926 ... superleni no one should cancel a life without a damn good reason no one has a right to make a person have a baby there is no answer to this question. we should not assume an unwanted child should not be born. it might want itself and be glad of its life. every woman and man who faces this question deserves support, and sympathy, if they want it. 040927 ... BatmanNoMore I just wanted to let everyone know that I am pro-choice. The batman above is an ignorant fuck. I will no longer be writing under this name. 041013 ... BatmanNoMore I just wanted to let everyone know that I am pro-choice. The batman above is an ignorant fuck. I will no longer be writing under this name. 041013 ... Zao Lithos A law to protect the right for a person to have life is more important than a law protecting a woman from experiencing an inconvenience or hardship. To me, that is the irrefutable point that gives a pro-life stance validity. Unless someone can convince me that Life is less important than convenience... I don't see how I can ever be pro-choice again. Every woman who does have an abortion suffers in many ways. The (heavily documented) trauma experienced from abortive mothers causes pain for days, months, and in many cases years. A woman can try to rationalize her actions, but deep inside there is a sense of loss, a grief similar to that of a death in the family. But the grieving process is generally not allowed to work its healing process because the woman refuses to grieve as she grapples and tries to defeat her feelings of guilt and confusion with her reasoning. This causes tremendous psychological damage... 041110 ... Persona wondering what it's like? sock footed, in my robe and johnny shirt, the nurse led me into the freezing cold procedure room. I was instructed to take off my pad covered panties and put them under the pillow, pull the clothing up to my waist, and lie back on the table with my legs spread and held up by props, a sheet across my knees so I couldn't see the metal instruments I heard clattering on a tray. I stared fixedly at the purple butterflies on the ceiling, bracing myself as the doctor first inserted her fingers and pressed down on my belly to check my uterus. Then a speculum was insterted and opened. The nurse leaned over me and asked "So, where's home?" I knew the needle was coming. "You don't have to talk", I said. I wanted to be ready. So I stared at the picture on the ceiling as local anasthetic was injected into my cervix. Then, painfully, my cervix was opened by pushing first a small, then a larger object through. A moment later, the doctor switched on the machine and the nurse asked if I'd like to wear headphones so I wouldn't have to listen. "No, I'm ok". Then it started. Every muscle in my body clenched and I let out a whimper. My breath came in short sucking gasps and a wave of heat washed over me. "Try to breathe", she said "My hand is here if you want to hold it". I clutched onto her hand like she was my own mother and struggled to breathe. She guided me "Breathe in... out.." I had just managed to gain control and it was over, everything removed from my body. Nausea immediately hit me and I was left on the table shaking and my head spinning. "I think I might be sick", I said with my eyes closed. The nurse put cool cloths across my forehead and under my neck, a pan placed beside me. I lay there, feeling weak and empty until the nausea passed, the pain inside still very apparent, my legs still propped up. I couldn't seem to move them at first. The nurse helped me put my panties back on and I slowly sat up, I almost passed out when I stood but managed to walk to the recovery room. The nurse helped me into a reclining chair where I cried at what I'd had to do and was given cookies, crackers, pills and coffee until the cramps subsided enough for me to go home. to_my_unborn_child 041222 ... . i will never forget the man who sucked the life from my womb and then held my hand as i lay crying telling me i did the right thing. god bless him. that won't make sense probably to anyone who's not experienced an abortion. 041222 ... . and if it's not been said [i don't have time to read the entirety], babies don't 'come out of a mommy's tummy'. unless it's cesarean. i discount any argument that uses these words. c'mon? how miseducated are you? 041222 ... Persona oh ferchrissakes! Was that necessary? Here you go "..as the doctor first inserted her fingers and pressed down on my LOWER ABDOMEN to check my uterus." Better? trifling nitpicker. 041223 ... misstree it's not a matter of sanctity of life, it's different viewpoints about when "life" begins. i doubt a fetus has the logic to think of what a life they've missed, and if you're not a vegetarian, you can quietly back away from the sanctity of life argument please. i have no problem with people bring pro-life, as long as they don't think that i should be as well. 041224 ... trifling nitpicker umm... i wasn't referring to what you had written. sorry you thought this. :\ 041224 ... daxle she wasn't there that day so you managed to spare a few hours for me 041225 ... Zao Lithos My son's heartbeat could be heard on the monitor just a few weeks after conception (7 weeks). A heartbeat is the universal sign of human life... When the heart stops beating, you're dead. 041226 ... misstree clinical death is taken from brain activity; when does brain activity begin in the womb? (and yes, it does begin in the womb.) and cessation of breathing is as valid as cessation of heartbeat as a sign of death; does life therefore begin when first breath is drawn? 041226 ... Jinglehorse wow mistree, you should listen to yourself. An infant doesn't have the logic to contemplate life either, does that mean a doctor should strangle it or dissolve its body with a saline solution? 050102 ... .۞. One day, years from now, they will look back on our_time with shock and disbelief, recognizing it as a bleak, dismal period in which cruel and barbaric acts were performed in the name of convenience. Abortion is that ugly stain on American Society's Carpet. 050102 ... camille when a fetus knows it's unwanted.... it aborts it's mother? 050121 ... for you ABORTED FETUS ON BOARD 050121 ... Q Here is a bit of historical reality not contaminated by religious hypocrisy, zealotry and sometimes perversion that would breach the sanctity of our privacy and steal from every woman ultimate control of her own body: Everywhere in the US before 1840, abortion before "quickening" (about 20 weeks gestation) was legal. At that time, religious and other anti-feminist crazies, who thought women should be confined to being baby-making machines, started to get into the act (no pun intended). There are many reasons we look back with chagrin at American history before 1840. But women having the right to choose is not one of them. 050125 ... daxle Yeah. sure. it's a matter of "convinience" People take these extreme, emotional, and illogical points of view so that their arguements sound more true. The truth is always in the middle, but moderation isn't passionate enough for us. 050125 ... camille I do not consider myself to be any womb-mans judge. Should a woman decide to abort, that is namely only her decision. Only she can decide whether there is life or death. It is not a decision i could make, but then again, i am not pregnant, nor are their circumstanial decisions to consider. I am pro-choice. I am no man or wombman's judge. 050126 ... Zao Lithos It's all about money. Come on in and we'll have one of our "counselors" (aka salespeople) consult you about your "options" (aka: Murder your child or suffer the consequences of moderate inconveniences!) Most women who have abortions suffer Post_Traumatic_Stress_Disorder. For some reason, when these women agreed to the murder conspiracy along with the salesperson, they weren't told about how they would still have to give live birth, then someone would hold the baby while it struggles for several minutes, until it finally dies and they throw it into the trash. It's funny how easily we are misled when someone drops the "Woman" word into the conversation. Even to the point of duping us into believing that it's OK to murder someone, as long as it's the most innocent, defenseless person on the planet, an unborn woman. It's not about "a woman's right to choose". A woman has the right to choose to ABSTAIN from sex until she can support a child. It's not going to kill her to wait. It COULD kill her (via disease), and her baby (via abortion) if she doesn't wait. 050127 ... misstree "...give live birth, then someone would hold the baby while it struggles for several minutes, until it finally dies and they throw it into the trash." omfg! that is the most hilarious thing i've seen in quite some time. even if you were referring to partial-birth abortions, which are ONLY done when the mother's life is in danger and in later pregnancy, the child is not taken out kicking and screaming. we're not delivering children and then smashing their heads with a hammer. we're terminating the life of an organism within the womb that is usually about the size of a peanut, never bigger than a plum, for first trimester abortions, and most places, again, won't do them past the first trimester without medical necessity. it's not a baby. it's a peanut-sized wad of potential baby. if you're going to be a crazed fanatic at least get your facts straight. 050128 ... Freak abortion doesn't necessarily stop a beating heart. You have to be so far alond before the baby has a heart and even farther before the heart is one that is actually beating 050128 ... Deomis I don't know how people can say that that baby's life is the mother's choice... that baby has it's own DNA that baby has it's own blood that baby will have it's own heartbeat, all while it is still in the womb. I don't know how people can say that that baby is not alive. It is NOT just a lump of tissue, look at that thing and it is a BABY. but who's gonna listen to me? Most people will just go on, living their happy everyday lives, ignoring the truth. we_are_the_whogivesafuck_generation 050128 ... . cancer has its own dna too. 050128 ... Zao Lithos Like I said earlier, when my son was seven weeks along (about one inch in length, yeah, peanut sized) I heard his beating heart on the monitor. How is it "crazed" and "fanatical" to say he's alive at that point? I'd argue that most would agree that it's crazed and fanatical, pathetic even, to try and suggest that a being that moves in response to stimulus from its environment, has a heart that beats, pumping blood to living tissue, which grows, sleeps, wakes, feels and learns every day is NOT ALIVE. (Yes, even though he's the size of a peanut or a plum. Guess what? Even things that are the size peanuts or a plums are still alive. Whoever told you that if something is peanut sized then it doesn't qualify as a living thing was crazed and fanatic. In the real world of biology your argument is substancially lacking.) Here's a friendly tip Misstree: Do some research. (http://www.abortionfacts.com/providers/quotes.asp contains eyewitness accounts from actual abortion clinic workers. (yeah, real hilarious.)) Learn something. Educate yourself. Then... (and only then) pretend you know what you're talking about. And everyone, please, let the ignorance stop! 050129 ... iNsEcUrE_GoTh_GiRl Personally, I'm pro-choice. I agree with misstree's point of not forcing the woman into bearing a child that she might have to give up for adoption, and that it is like slavery to be forced to undertake something as huge as that if she is unable or unwilling to have a child then she should not be forced into having one. It really comes down to whose free will you are willing to compromise. That of something that doesn't know what it's losing out on, and what may have a terrible life of suffering when it is born, from parents who don't want it to abusive foster homes and other such things. OR The woman. Who ultimately, has to care for the child until it is born, and if it isn't given up for adoption, it's life afterwards. Ordinarily, if somebody doesn't want to do something and is brave enough to say 'No', we praise them, say that they're good not to conform and to have their own opinions. However, if a woman doesn't want to keep her child then it isn't fair that she is criticised for that decision. If she's thought about it, and thinks that the child would be better off not being alive in the world, then that is her own personal decision. Trying to take that away is a breach of the freedom of will that humans beings have. 050130 ... phil Adoption, or death. Phew! Tough call there! That's a tricky one! I close my eyes and I see...GREED! Sorry, that must be the 'struggle to maintain personal freedom that stems from a lack of self control' throwing off my visions. 9 months for the miracle of child birth, oh is that too long to wait? I'm sorry, let me buy you a pony. I guess being altruistic doesn't really pay off in the end, but hey, that's jsut the definition. I mean seriously, fuck being a heroin. Just kill the little bugger. No need for compassion or love in this world! Her own fault for trusting you, don't ever let it get you down! :) Let's say you were, raped or something, abducted by aliens. After the fight is over, when you have a decision, when you have control, having the child might help you get past your personal problems. That sort of forgiveness might put you in line for sainthood. You really think the child is going to be some sort of reminder? Like you won't remember it anyways? Then there's the thought of raising the half satan child. Bad things do happen and more bad things could keep happening too. But if that child turns out to be bad, then you can kill it later. Don't condemn it just because you think it's got bad genetics. But when no one around you cares for your well being. When you seem locked off from the rest of the world, failure can seem so inevitable. You can't care for a child so you do the complete opposite thing? Is not a solution. Acting in a way that you want others to act, and treating other people the way they treat you. Is. 050130 ... Purple It's so easy to condemn to death those you can't see. If you want to kill - animals the unborn convicts the disabled the 'enemy' you should be forced to look. Red & Blue are one and the same: ideologies of hatred and violence. 061116 ... Purple It's so easy to condemn to death those you can't see. If you want to kill - animals the unborn convicts the disabled the 'enemy' you should be forced to look. Red & Blue are one and the same: ideologies of hatred and violence. 061116 ... Purple It's so easy to condemn to death those you can't see. If you want to kill - animals the unborn convicts the disabled the 'enemy' you should be forced to look. Red & Blue are one and the same: ideologies of hatred and violence. 061116 ... And so on Daxle, who the hell are you to decide who should live and who should die? 061116 ... Waxwing Insecure, what if I think you would be better off not being alive in the world? 061116 ... Xindaris Abortion is the murder of a child while still in the womb, or immediately out of it. Abortion stops the heart of a person with a soul before even giving them a chance to try living. Abortion is sin, abortion is evil. The very idea is repulsive. 070601 ... kind Hier bin ich, ich bin Dein Kind, sicher und warm in Deinem Leib liegend. Milliarden von Frauen wurden von mir überlistet. Ich bin das ungewollte Leben. Und ich lauere in Deinem Körper, und ich lauere in Deinem Leib. Oh, und jetzt weinst Du? Ich wollte Dich niemals zum weinen bringen. Aber ich existire tatsächlich. Und Du mußt dafür Sorge tragen. Für den Rest Deiner armseligen Tage. 070606 ... Jealous Yaweh "Abortion stops the heart of a person with a soul before even giving them a chance to try living." Good for the murdered fetuses. They get to immediately ascend to heaven. 070607 ... j what was god's gift to mankind? free will, i.e. the gift of choice. i rest my case, bitches. 070608 ... jane the kind of people who are against the right to choose are the same people who will turn in a cat for euthanasia because they changed the carpet in their living room and the cat no longer matches. 070608 ... bluten so sad. but the decision of one alone. 070819 ... Lyn --- Outside the doors they flock, holding their pickets, chanting their mantra, -“It is god’s will.” I laugh to hide the tears I laugh at their naiveness. I laugh to ease the pain -“It is my decision.” This is the only way… The sheep continue -“Murderers!” Inside the double doors, So many faces -Painful regret a choice that had to be made It is here I sign away a life with my name. This is for me… I swallow the pill hard. 090421 ... Lyn Inside I feel the death surrounding, There is no turning back now, I’m sorry, I’m sorry I can’t take care of you, I’m sorry I don’t have money, I’m sorry your daddy doesn’t love me, I’m sorry there isn’t a way… I’m sorry you’ll never be. –I love you This was my only option, Time will only heal me now. Until I am hallow once more. --- it wasn't an easy choice...but it was made 090503 ... hsg You said you had two. It took me two years to figure out why you were so upset when you told me. They were ours. You left that part out. 100421 ... minnesota_chris the other day I drove past a planned_parenthood facility which had both protestors, saying that abortion has to end, and escorts walking women past them to have their abortions, and I thought, I could easily be either the protestor or the escort, I agree with them both. 100421 ... dafremen Oooo boy. Abortion. What a conundrum. One side says it's about God and babies. The other side says its about science and rights. And my opinion had damned sure fit into one of those boxes, because the replies I'll get are SURE to be scripted, knee-jerk responses. (It gets really weird having people respond to points I never made..while they insist that the public being brainwashed is a conspiracy.) I think science indicates that abortion may be a heinous crime against the evolutionary process and a betrayal of the trust given women (and all mothers) by the universe, through that process. It only takes a cursory knowledge of evolutionary history to realize that we're doing something it doesn't want. To see this, we must first follow the science. In the beginning, they say we were only single-celled organisms. Making babies? We did that by dividing in half. And then crucially, although we could have eaten that baby to keep ourselves alive, we didn't. (Some early jump-start species might've. They just wouldn't have survived very long, because cannibalism is a bad survival strategy over the long haul. Especially the infanticide brand of cannibalism. Evolutionary dead end.) So we divided in two.. and off our little babies went; entirely dependent on their own mechanisms and adaptability to survive. It was very primitive reproduction. Here's an interesting point: the offspring were independent organisms from the very first division of cells. They were alive (and an independent life at that.) But the story doesn't end there. We moved along to the egg-laying epoch of our evolutionary adventure. This was a huge step. Up until that time, the traits of a species were pretty much set in stone except for random mutations or environmental adaptation. Evolution was SLOOOOW until egg-laying became a thing. Egg production really gave us a chance to try different combinations. Instead of producing two equal copies of our genome, we'd split our gene in half and mix mosh it with pieces from others who might have experienced different mutations. It's no wonder that the fossil record was so alive with growth once egg-laying came around. The mutations that provide variety had always been isolated within a single organism and its descendants. Now they could be shared, and all sorts of adaptability explored, through the trial and error of male-female reproduction. (Please take a moment to keep the expression "trial and ERROR" for consideration.) Before we get to mammals, pregnancy and live birth, it's important to know how egg-laying itself evolved over time if we're to understand the direction that evolution was moving in. At first, a mother only squirted her eggs into the ethers wherever there were a lot of males available. (Think dive bar or dance club after midnight.) Later, scents evolved to attract the males and work them into a frenzy. The mother's role in her childrens' future was this: she had none. It was a crap shoot. But with the explosion of species, we quickly added new methods to our survival toolbox. It's unsure which came first, mate selection strategies or egg nurturing strategies. They both changed the landscape of reproduction (and evolution) forever. With mate selection strategies she (and he) would improve the odds of their offspring thriving and surviving by only providing their genetic material to those mates who passed some test. Maybe he would pass feats of strength. Maybe it was intelligence. Maybe it was a matter of him dominating her or outsmarting her. In these species, she made herself strong and able to fight. In many cases, to keep the male from dominating her, she grew larger and more powerful than him. Or ate him. (Think the money, manipulation and legal wrestling involved in modern marriage-divorce-child support culture. Society, throwback edition.) Eventually males began to develop courtship behaviors as well. The nurturing of young goes back at least 300 million years. Alligators in particular are doting mothers and have been for eons. We know that many species provide a "pregnancy outside the womb" where the mother protects her young during their most vulnerable years. This was a later adaptation and again indicates that the evolutionary process seems (when unchallenged by human motives) moving toward a nurturing mother inclined to protect her offspring. Eventually the males took on nurturing as part of their courting ritual, especially in monogamous species. (Another adaptation.) And what of nurturing? I'm both fascinated and horrified by the line we casually draw between what is a life form and what isn't. When the chicken lays the fertilized egg, at what point is it still a part of her, free to her whim, and at what point is it a separate life form under her care? The law makes allowances for both instances and the entire abortion debate seems to stem on this legal gray area. But if a chicken laid its eggs and started pecking them open, mutilating them..would we consider that a healthy chicken? Even if the farmer allowed it? Whether mother, hen or not..would we consider a rooster that did it healthy? And yet, society isn't exactly a hen house (much) and humans aren't chickens (technically), so it's easy to make it seem not so cut and dry as that..even though it probably is. Fortunately, the evolutionary process wasn't done yet. Because as her trial and error magic moved us up the tree of zoological goodness, she decided that the mother should hatch the child inside of her. The separation between them would be lessened, the connection deepened, by this gestation period. The bond between them would create initially, a deeper and longer need to nurture the child. But secondly..and perhaps most importantly, this provided the foundations for family. And it's this interesting divide we find ourselves at. It's doesn't really seem to be about God lovers versus baby killers or religious zealots stomping on the oppressed uteruses of the world. That's the brainwashing thing that's probably a conspiracy (but maybe not.) For me, it comes down to: what did we do to mess up the evolutionary process so badly that it seems to make sense to disintegrate families and kill babies instead of nurturing them (even if we got into them by animal accident), when it took so many hundreds of millions of years to develop the opposite impulses? Evolution tested all of the ways of living and thriving..through trial and error (let's not forget the importance of unseen mutations and accidents.) Trillions of lives have been spent getting us here. It knew what it was doing. We don't. We need evolution. But evolution needs opportunities and cooperation. If we seem to be running backwards and getting colder, it's because however we frame it, killing babies, turning young people into belligerent rebels and busting up families was absolutely indicated as a bad strategy by the evolutionary process itself, long before humans came on the scene. That's why I oppose abortion. Thanks for your time if you made it this far. 230725 ... . easy for a man to say if you had a uterus you probably would be crying about your freedom instead of telling half the population that they should be forced to be pregnant even when they don't want to be because 'the family is under attack!' 230725 ... ... and pretty sure evolution will continue and be more than happy if the species that's hellbent on destroying itself and the planet stops reproducing evolution does not need humans. the hubris involved in the thought process of 'evolution needs human reproduction' is exactly what brought us the modern chemical age, gain of function research, and genetically modified food and 'medicine' if you're so concerned about human evolution go find a woman that doesn't mind being a walking womb and knock her up repeatedly until she either reaches menopause or dies in childbirth. you can't be against vaccine mandates AND abortion. bodily autonomy either exists or it doesn't. 230725 ... dafremen The human race is all but doomed by it's own selfish cowardice. Anyone watching this spectacle unfold, for any length of time, knows that our species is just the clueless villain getting our come uppance. You'd hear more cheering from me as we're flushed by our own hand down the shitter of evolutionary history, but as a human, it's certainly of interest to me that my species and its ridiculous society get with the program. (Especially since we have a habit of dragging each other around by the hair of our subservience to power and into the hell of our ever ratcheting, ego-driven idiocy.) Being alive is nice, and being human is a great gift outside of the mental chains society has waiting for us. Still, as you point out, the evolutionary process does NOT need human reproduction. We'll eventually be surpassed by those organisms that are still engaging the process instead of hiding from it in a technological bubble. That, if we aren't wiped out first. On the uterus thing: as a man I've been foolish enough to take on raising many children that weren't mine by blood. As an orphan, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have aborted them if I were their mothers, (although childbirth sounds like a painful ordeal.) 230725 ... dafremen P.S. I've never been against legalized abortion. P.P.S. We are not brainwashed. We are not binary thinkers. The working class is not weaponized against itself by the media. 230725 ... ^^ Let me rephrase that. I don't support abortion bans. 230725 ... John Donne No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as any manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. 230726 ... no_shit_sherlock "They found human DNA samples from two different people. One was the victim's DNA, the other was the killer's. Since the victim was dead from trauma, they determined that it was likely a homicide, and that the mother had probably killed her child; possibly for lack of a nurturing instinct, possibly so she could remain free of parental responsibility." 240103 ... dafremen From another conversation - I'm up to discuss this rationally. Here's my position in a nutshell: If there are two sets of DNA, then there are two human beings represented, not one. Under modern law, DNA establishes identity. This means a zygote isn't a part of a woman's body. It's a separate, helpless human being put under her care for some reason. But I also believe it's true that no one can stop her from killing it. No law has been devised that could. So that's my opinion on the subject. Abortion is, technically at least, manslaughter and possibly murder. Any input on the idea that a zygote has a different DNA signature than its mother? How about the idea that in law, DNA = legal identity? Is that just for every other case but the case where we handed our kids condoms and they didn't use them? I know I sure as hell didn't want to use a condom at 17..fer the feels. And since the majority of abortions occur between the ages of 16 and 28..well. This seems like "next day" contraception. Quick background: According to the history I've read and the popular media I've been studying from the era, working class women were coaxed into the workforce to dilute the labor pool and keep labor's leverage low right when unions were forming at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries. This was on the heels of them flooding the economy with immigrants to lessen their dependence on small businessmen and skilled domestic labor. Once both parents were working as corporate slaves (or trying to build their own labor plantation, a business to sell off to large corporations), the media came in and started working on the kids, to loosen the parents' purse strings and make the next generation of laborers more compliant. All because a united working class (small business, skilled labor, unskilled labor, the motivated poor, families and their children) is the only capital that the working class has. Without our unity, all of our people will run to where the money is and forsake each other. Which we are, have and did. So, I'm very open to hearing what might explain how this rabid push for abortion rights isn't post-coital contraception made available to shore up the consequences caused by condoning the slow, steady sexualization of kids. It would've been impossible to get the middle class to allow the sexualization of their children without abortion. Once their little princesses started torpedoing their futures in droves with teen pregnancy, the parents would've turned their attention to the media that was sexualizing them. So abortion seems key to this fairly obvious act of social engineering. And again I'd love to hear your thoughts on the 2 sets of human DNA and what makes the fetus not a legal human. Thanks. This should be great. 240224 what's it to you? who go blather from