The idea of justifiable homicide does not sit well with me. I would hope that by raising the bar with regards to the value of life, the need for abortions would go down dramatically, especially those that are caused by rape and incest, both of which are intolerable. (It is a mystery to me that they do not garner as much interest as pro-life/choice debate…) A healthy dose of respect for others certainly would go a long way to achieving both ends. Blessings.

I think one of the main problems with the abortion debate is that it has become excessively all-one-not-at-all-the-other, pitting the owners of the uterus against the users of it. The bottom line to me (as I have stated elsewhere on this blog) is that abortion is a type of justifiable homicide. But unlike most other kinds of homicide, the sole role of the government should be making sure it is carried out safely and by qualified people.

A kidney or any other organ is of the substance of the person endowed with it. It is genetically speaking of the same substance. To loose an organ is to have it be gone from one for ever in most cases. In many cases there is a redundancy so as to give one the option or the safety of loosing one. Organs in and of themselves do not posses souls. (If one understands a person to posses one.)

An infant in the womb is not of the same substance as the mother, is not genetically identical, is not an organ, posses a soul, and is only very temporarily physically associated with her. The uterus is not removed, damaged, or compromised in most cases, and is occupied as a result of human behavior. In either case the individuals involved, the stakeholders have final control especially in the case of pregnancy. (It is interesting; in ancient Hebrew there is no word for ownership of anything, the words used mean, “it is to me.” That is we belong to God and all we have belongs to God as nothing can be taken away or added to. Ashes to ashes dust to dust; we are simply caretakers and stewards. I like that very much. When what we have we share with God, how much greater the value of the things we are entrusted with?)

It is not for the Government to dictate whether a person has control of their bodies unless the person is a danger to themselves, others or because of pathology. Granting a person is a person from the time they are conceived will broaden the discussion and raise human worth and hopefully motivate our society to have greater regard for all the weaker ones amongst us. Will give rise to greater respect for the cause and care of women in general; will hopefully move people to show greater care in providing healthcare and prenatal care for all women and children; will acknowledge the sacred responsibility to care for those that have the responsibility of caring for the new life that God blesses us with through them; will provide the momentum to support greater education and greater care in relationships and lower unplanned pregnancy. And hopefully will raise the consciousness of men as to be more mindful of how vulnerable many women are and to be responsible for themselves and accountable for their actions.

The recognition of rights that have been historically withheld has broadened and increased compassion in each situation that has experienced liberation. Are we better off as a result of lifting the restrictions from people of color? Are we better off for granting greater recognition to the equality of women? Will we be better off for granting that GLB folks are entitled to the same status as the rest of humanity? Compassion is a tide that raises all of our horizons. Acknowledging the sanctity and value of life increases humanity and grace every time. Sharing in the suffering and care for one another binds us all together in ways that is stronger than can be explained solely by the cost of sacrifice itself. We are not a bunch of individuals looking out for number one, but parts of a much larger body that is affected by each others actions. Love for one another and respect for life is a good thing. Blessings.

“After all, it’s not like a pregnant woman is a person herself: she is simply an organ, an incubator, a whole body support system for a potential person that doesn’t yet exist.”

I do not see what the need is to hurt with words like this. If anything, I would think by now you would understand that this is not my feeling or belief in the least. Were it so would I remain strongly in the right to choose camp? Were it so, would I have taken very open and un-PC (in my arena) stands for the promotion of women in the workplace and the Church? Were it so, would I have been an advocate for women’s shelters and healthcare for the homeless? I have ministered in AIDS homes for families, long term homes for single moms, and shelters for the battered. The desire to marginalize me and my beliefs to a dehumanizing and marginalization of women is wrong. Affording recognition to the personhood of the unborn child does not have to come at the expense of the recognition of the humanity or the rights of the woman. Isn’t that the very fear and argument used by the anti SSM folks? That by recognition it will reduce the value of the rest of marriage? What nonsense. All I am saying is that we recognize that the new life, the unborn do have a stake in the discussion. That they are there and by their presence demand some recognition as stake holders, and by seeing humanity as such we enrich all of us. (I have to go, my depression is really harsh right now, I will address the kidney thing when I feel better. I am glad you spoke to me mousehounde) Blessings.

Actually, it does. A fetus requires a uterus in order to grow into a possible person. The anti-choice view seems to be that a potential person, a person that doesn’t exist, but might later on, has more rights to the organ than the woman whose body the uterus is in. So it does sound like they are saying that taking and using an organ is OK. As long as it is only women that it happens to. After all, it’s not like a pregnant woman is a person herself: she is simply an organ, an incubator, a whole body support system for a potential person that doesn’t yet exist. Simply by becoming pregnant, a woman loses any recognition as a person in her own right. And other people feel they have the right to decide how her organs are used.

You are correct that I am a guy and have no intimate knowledge of what it is to be pregnant myself. (Not much we can do to change that, however we do what we can to understand how it might be.) I do not believe that one who aborts a child or has an abortion is guilty of murder. (Though ones motives could conceivably make that a possibility.)

You are also correct that I am very much pro life, in the broadest sense. All life it seems to me is treated too cheaply. It is IMO hopeless to try and increase the respect for humanity (women’s rights, gay rights, rights for the poor etc.) while reducing the value of it on other fronts, (war, racism, religious intolerance, abortion, etc).

I do try and understand what it is like to face the specter of being pregnant and being scared from it, especially if one considers the baby a person; how awful that choice would be. I would not consider judging one who makes a decision in either sense. The analogy to forcibly taking an organ does not compare though. It is my belief that granting the unborn with a higher status than benign tissue would give greater value to all personhood. That greater care would be taken in all relationships. By raising the care we show for the weakest of those in our society can’t help but to increase the compassion that we extend to the rest of creation.

I would hope that one needing a kidney, bone marrow, blood, platelets, a lobe of lung tissue etc. would be granted that from those of us that have them to give. It is by God’s incredible design that we have excess of many tissues to contribute to our brothers and sisters in need. This is not a burden, but a Blessing.

Apparently everyone’s wondering that.

Rock: As much as a civil person can recognize the right to govern ones body, and recognize that women have been marginalized for too long: one can also see that few are as marginalized as a voiceless child in the womb.

Oh, please. This kind of language is used by people who don’t give a damn about marginalizing these “voiceless children” once they’re born - it’s rhetoric that’s made use of, not out of care for children, but in order to marginalize women by turning us into incubators.

Your leap to suggesting murder as a position is ludicrous and rude. Homicide is not an extreme position, it is pathological behavior.

You are using language such as “a voiceless child in the womb” that strongly suggests you think of abortion as homicide. Certainly that kind of language is used by the anti-choice extremists who support the murder of doctors who carry out abortions.

To be able to at least see how someone could come to the conclusion that a baby in the womb is a person and as such would have rights, even if one does not agree with that premise, is not a difficult concept

It is a difficult concept when it’s my uterus, Rock. (At a guess, you’re male, at a guess, you’ve never been pregnant, and no guess needed, you lack the human empathy necessary to think what it would be like to be pregnant and not want to be.)

Fetuses do not have legal rights, because by definition they cannot have legal rights without subtracting legal rights from a woman who is pregnant. To argue that women deserve lesser or less secure legal rights than men - which is the basis of the argument that fetuses are “people” with “rights” - is not a grey area: it’s fundamentally wrong.

There are few things in life I am that assured of which I would cease to question; as a matter of fact, when I think of one, I will let you know.

Do you ever question the idea that you have no right to control your own body? That, for example, should someone need one of your kidneys to survive, you feel have no right to make the decision whether or not to let them have it: their need is sufficient to permit a court to order you to be taken in hospital, anesthetized, one of your kidneys removed, and transplanted to someone else - and if you refuse or resist, you should be prosecuted or jailed and your kidney taken from you anyway? That is your argument - writ large - when you argue that I have no right to control my body.

Your leap to suggesting murder as a position is ludicrous and rude. Homicide is not an extreme position, it is pathological behavior. To be able to at least see how someone could come to the conclusion that a baby in the womb is a person and as such would have rights, even if one does not agree with that premise, is not a difficult concept. What would anyone loose by getting to respect that there is gray in the discussion? What would folks have to gain? Respect for each other for one, isn’t that the best place to start to find a solution to most issues? There are few things as dangerous as a true believer, assured that their belief is the only way. (There are few things in life I am that assured of which I would cease to question; as a matter of fact, when I think of one, I will let you know.) Blessings.

You find it “disconcerting” that I do not see any reason for my uterus to be declared public property? Believe me, what I feel about that line of thinking is rather more intense than just “disconcerting”. My uterus is private. Any concept of “reasonable doubt” that it’s not private is, frankly, obscene. This is not an extreme position to take: to argue that a woman’s right to privacy is “extreme” is just… bizarre.

just as the extreme positions of some of the anti abortion folks is also.

Oh, for god’s sake. The “extreme position” of an anti-choice anti-privacy campaigner is that doctors who carry out abortions deserve to die for it. If you’re seriously comparing a women’s right to privacy with an anti-lifer commiting murder, that goes beyond bizarre into the deeply offensive.

As far as NARAL and all, it would be great to pressure our reps into doing something that looked more like representative Government. I do not believe they have much power as those who are pro-choice are not going to be voted out over a Supreme Court position. It may be counter productive to undermine a sitting Dem. Over this, (if that is who you support) to where they could be replaced by the opposition. Blessings.

Nope: this is only a “conundrum” if you think I have no right to privacy. If you acknowledge my right to privacy, my uterus, and its contents, are mine to make decisions about.

As Jeanne at Body and Soul points out (somewhere) the whole principle behind the anti-choice movement is that the woman who is pregnant is not the best person to make decisions about her pregnancy: someone else ought to make decisions on her behalf with the legal power to override her decisions. The whole principle is one of disrespect for women.

The right to individual privacy is regularly impinged upon when it affects an interested third party or is dangerous to the individual or society

The argument that anyone but the woman who is pregnant is “an interested third party” is really, really shaky. (With the arguable exception of the man who provided the sperm: but, if they have a good relationship, he’ll be involved in the decision anyway: if they have a bad relationship, the law has no business empowering him to make decisions for her.)

Making abortion unsafe and illegal is provably dangerous for the individual women: and forcing women to become criminals in order to end an unwanted pregnancy is bad for society.

Creating laws that protect the right as well as framing it within acceptable contexts would insure safer, less emotional and a more civil basis to deal with the issue.

I agree that women in the US would be safer if a federal pro-choice legislation was passed that cast the debate strictly in pro-life terms: making abortion illegal/unsafe is wrong, and the anti-lifers who want to see women suffer and die ought not to be tolerated in public debate, no more than pro-torture people ought to be tolerated. Unfortunately, there are a large proportion of men in power who see disrespect for women as a useful campaigning tool, and so support anti-choice laws. It would be better, finally, if the US had a system of government that allowed people to vote for politicians who would actually represent their views in government. Given that the political system in the US is unlikely to change any time soon, I would hang on to the respect implied in the decision that women do have a right to privacy, if I lived in the US.

We are in agreement with the privacy issue where it relates to piercing etc. and as you so aptly put it, it is your uterus. The conundrum arises when the issue of the life that is in the uterus comes into play, which we all are aware of. There is plenty of Jurisprudence dealing with legally controlling what happens in private. (One cannot legally use heroin, kill themselves, etc. even in private.) In many places one cannot alter what they legally own such as felling adult trees etc. The right to individual privacy is regularly impinged upon when it affects an interested third party or is dangerous to the individual or society. The privacy clause is a weak one to hang this issue on, and it makes it an either or thing that is subject to the composition of the court. Creating laws that protect the right as well as framing it within acceptable contexts would insure safer, less emotional and a more civil basis to deal with the issue. Blessings.

What I mean is: It is perfectly logical that a right to choose abortion in the US shall be based on a right to privacy. Enforcing a law that makes abortion illegal is only possible if you allow that women have no right to privacy of the uterus and no right to medical confidentiality with any regard to any part of their reproductive system.

Nevertheless, it might well have been better for women in the US had the legislation been based, as it was in my country, squarely on the pro-life stance - that abortions must be made legal, because saving lives is more important than taking a hifalutin’ moral stance that means women suffer and die.

Anyone who is arguing that abortion ought to be made illegal is arguing for women suffering and dying (or else has simply never thought through the consequences and is living in a happy fantasyland where making abortion illegal does not lead to illegal abortions). That is an effective argument.

But then, to my mind, so is the point that my uterus is not a public space, and that I have a right to basic medical confidentiality. The argument that women don’t have such a right seems to strongly violate the US Constitution in itself.

It would be quite impossible for Bush to nominate a candidate acceptable to all people, even all of his constituents- the handful that remain. The President has the prerogative of nominating whomever he/she feels is competent and supportive of his/her views. That’s all. The Senate has the right to advise and consent. That’s all. All Chafee said when Bush pushed Boltan through(paraphrase)- we exercised out prerogative under the law. He exercised his.” Bush is under no *obligation* to leave the court in the same idealogical balance as it was when he took office. In fact, his role as President( as someone of assumed wisdom…quit snickering), allows him to seat judges for whom he feels the court will most benefit. Presidents have always done this. After all, Clinton certainly felt no compunction to maintain the “balance” of the court when he replaced conservative Byron White with Ruth Bader-Ginsburg.
What goes around comes around.

As for saying Brown v. Board of Ed. wasn’t warranted, I have to ask you whether you’re actually acquainted with its holding. In Brown, which you can find in its entirety here here, the Court held (and unanimously, I might add), that state laws requiring the segregation of children by race in the public schools violate the Fourteenth Amendment and are unconstitutional. Nothing less, but certainly nothing more. Do you think the Court should have ruled otherwise? And if so, what do you think the Court should have done?

As a matter of interpreting the constitution, I don’t think it was warranted. As an issue of cosmic justice, I think you could argue that the justices were right, at least in what they envisioned would be the result of their decision.

But my point is that as a practical matter it was ineffective, because whites facing forced integration tended to flee rather than accept integration.

“I’m also curious, as a native resident of a city that is somewhat famous in the annals of busing history, to know why I should blame white flight on anything but white racism.”

Blame the flight on what you like, the point is that trying to force the integration of the schools did not cure the racism, it simply caused the whites to flee, which had a negative effect on the tax base, thus hurting the schools. In other words, as a practical matter, Brown was a failure because of unintended consequences that none of the people supporting the decision seemed to consider.

It seems to me that from a practical standpoint, it would have been better to have forced more spending on the black schools; if you did that, you would have achieved the actual goal, which was educational parity, without, I think, quite as many unintended consequences.