patrick.net

The Reasonable Man says

It's a tough question. All I know is that everyone I have ever known, read or heard about, seen or heard, everyone on this blog, and I, were all fetuses at one point. No person who ever walked on the planet was not a fetus. Even Democrats were once fetuses. There's no clear line. If there's no clear line, it's a mistake to arbitrarily kill off life which, just maybe, might be people.

Why stop at fetuses? Every sperm is sacred.

Dan8267 says

I would argue that they are certainly sentient enough. To compare the level of sentience of a newborn baby to a zygote

We aren't talking about zygotes.

The Planned Parenthood videos have doctors talking about aborting 17 and 20 "weekers".

The doctor in the LA Planned Parenthood video says that their clinic ALONE aborts over 3,000 babies in the 2nd trimester and older each year and said some babies were even delivered before they could be aborted. So they could sell an intact "fetal cadaver".

Dan8267 says

We can therefore place a very safe lower limit on when abortions should absolutely be legal and considered moral.

So where is this limit? America has the most permissive abortion laws in the world 2nd only to China with their evil One Child Policy.

But every-time Republicans try to put some reasonable restrictions on abortions to be in line with Europe and the rest of the civilized world, the Democrats go ape-shit and screech that Republicans are waging war on women and are all about patriarchy.

Who are the extremists here?

There are Jews in the world there are Buddhists
There are Hindus and Mormons, and then
There are those that follow Mohammed, but
I've never been one of them

I'm a Roman Catholic
And have been since before I was born
And the one thing they say about Catholics is
They'll take you as soon as you're warm

You don't have to be a six-footer
You don't have to have a great brain
You don't have to have any clothes on you're
A Catholic the moment Dad came

Because every sperm is sacred
Every sperm is great
If a sperm is wasted
God gets quite irate

Every sperm is sacred
Every sperm is great
If a sperm is wasted
God gets quite irate

Let the heathen spill theirs
On the dusty ground
God shall make them pay for
Each sperm that can't be found

Every sperm is wanted
Every sperm is good
Every sperm is needed
In your neighborhood

Hindu, Taoist, Mormon
Spill theirs just anywhere
But God loves those who treat their
Semen with more care

Every sperm is sacred
Every sperm is great
If a sperm is wasted
God gets quite irate

Every sperm is sacred
Every sperm is good
Every sperm is needed
In your neighborhood

Every sperm is useful
Every sperm is fine
God needs everybody's
Mine and mine and mine

Let the pagan spill theirs
Over mountain, hill, and plain
God shall strike them down for
Each sperm that's spilt in vain

Every sperm is sacred
Every sperm is good
Every sperm is needed
In your neighborhood

Every sperm is sacred
Every sperm is great
If a sperm is wasted
God gets quite irate

https://www.youtube.com/embed/fUspLVStPbk

thunderlips11 says

Why stop at fetuses? Every sperm is sacred.

Each ejaculation spurts out 200+ million sperms, desperately seeking to survive, but end up in the toilet.
The greatest murderers in the history of mankind are teenage boys.

thunderlips11 says

Why stop at fetuses? Every sperm is sacred.

Yeah, I saw that movie.

I guess because a fertilized egg has all the components for a human being. I guess that's a line between sperms and fetuses.

Call it KKKrazy says

But you have never known a fetus, so why collapse the distinction? Perhaps you reject the distinction.

Everyone I have ever known is a fetus, grown up. Everyone I have ever known is an infant, grown up. I don't get your point.

The Reasonable Man says

Everyone I have ever known is a fetus, grown up. Everyone I have ever known is an infant, grown up. I don't get your point.

That's like saying everyone I know was born.
I don't know anyone, who knows anyone, that was never born.

socal2 says

The Planned Parenthood videos have doctors talking about aborting 17 and 20 "weekers".

Roe v. Wade makes it a federal right for a woman to have an abortion without restriction during the first trimester. The case also leaves it up to the state to handle restrictions, if any, on second trimesters. Are you saying that states rights should not apply to the issue of abortion? If so, then why should states rights apply to anything? Shouldn't all rights be guaranteed at the federal level unlike what republicans have always said? Should all laws with damn few exceptions be federal laws?

The second trimester is when the offspring ceases to be a mindless ball of cells and starts becoming a person, but the process of becoming a person takes months if not years depending on where you draw the arbitrary line.

socal2 says

The doctor in the LA Planned Parenthood video says that their clinic ALONE aborts over 3,000 babies in the 2nd trimester and older each year and said some babies were even delivered before they could be aborted. So they could sell an intact "fetal cadaver".

And we can debate the ethics of that, but only if everyone involved in the discussion is willing to admit that the "soul" is bullshit and no magic makes a fertilized egg a person. Once we stop talking about bullshit mythological beliefs from the Bronze Age, we can have an adult conversation on where to draw the line on abortions and why. As long as religion dominates moral and ethical debates, that conversation is impossible.

As a liberal, I have no problem with the banning of second trimester abortions if it can be demonstrated that an even somewhat functioning mind exists at that time. The question is really at which week to stop allowing abortions, and that question can only be answered with science, not religion. Every person who says something stupid like "life begins at conception" and takes that to mean that a fertilize egg is a person simply prevents us from drawing more precise lines regarding when abortions are allowed and when they are not.

The Reasonable Man says

I guess because a fertilized egg has all the components for a human being. I guess that's a line between sperms and fetuses.

That is a stupid criteria. If you chop off the arm of a person, he does not cease being a person because he "lacks components for a human being". Nor does the severed arm, if kept alive, constitute a person because it has all the genetic information necessary to build a human. In contrast, a severed head kept alive and conscious in a jar most certainly is a person as it has a mind, which ultimately is all that matters. A human mind digitized and executed inside a computer is also a person for the same reason. It's not your limbs or your body parts that make you a person; it's your mind. The only body part that counts is the brain.

Blurtman says

Every sperm is wanted

Every sperm is good

Every sperm is needed

CIC disproves that conjecture.

Call it Crazy says

and this guy below is still at it as an adult...

Well, your daughter only takes it up the ass.

Your daughter thinks of my ass all the time. Like mother like daughter.

Dan8267 says

And we can debate the ethics of that, but only if everyone involved in the discussion is willing to admit that the "soul" is bullshit and no magic makes a fertilized egg a person. Once we stop talking about bullshit mythological beliefs from the Bronze Age, we can have an adult conversation on where to draw the line on abortions and why. As long as religion dominates moral and ethical debates, that conversation is impossible.

Deflecting again. Who is talking about religion or souls on this thread?

Thought that Libs were big into "SCIENCE"? Anyone can look at an 8 week fetus (let along a 20 week fetus) and realize its a growing human being.

Why do Libs go ape-shit at banning abortions at 20 weeks? Are they that scientifically ignorant? Are they so indoctrinated to think it is nothing but a "gob of goo" and don't want to face the horror and barbarity that they support?

FFS - we have tougher laws on animal cruelty than we do protecting babies a few weeks from being born. That is a sign of a very sick and ethically confused society.

I firmly believe that 100 years from now, we will look back at abortion supporters with the same horror and disdain and slave-holders. Lots of slave-holders used science to justify their inhumanity.

socal2 says

Deflecting again. Who is talking about religion or souls on this thread?

It's hardly deflection when people say stupid things like "life begins at conception" as code for "there's a magical soul that is infused into cells at conception". You are deflecting from the issue. That abortion should be legal for the first trimester when there is no brain and should gradually become more illegal as the second trimester unfolds.

socal2 says

Thought that Libs were big into "SCIENCE"? Anyone can look at an 8 week fetus (let along a 20 week fetus) and realize its a growing human being.

A fertilized egg is a "growing human being". Who cares? As I've stated five million times, whether or not the egg or zygote meets your arbitrary, and yes it's arbitrary, definition of human being is irrelevant. What matters is whether or not it's a person. The non-sentient cells of Henrietta Lacks can be called a human being from any biological perspective, but they don't constitute a person. A brain-dead living human body can be considered a human being, but it's not a person. A chimpanzee is NOT a human being, yet it is a person.

And you're criteria is stupid. One does not judge personhood based on how a being looks. If a new born baby had a mutation and it looked nothing like a human being, but had a fully functional mind, would you say it was not a person?

socal2 says

Why do Libs go ape-shit at banning abortions at 20 weeks?

They don't. You just don't know what the fuck a liberal is and no matter how many times I explain it to you, you won't get it because reality contradicts your dogma.

I'm the most liberal person on PatNet, possibly on this planet. I do not object to restrictions on abortions at 20 weeks. Neither does Roe v. Wade.

Why don't you conservatives go ape-shit when coal power planets force abortions on women through miscarriages caused by pollution? Is the "free market" more important than the lives of babies to you? Of course, you won't have the balls to answer this question.

socal2 says

FFS - we have tougher laws on animal cruelty than we do protecting babies a few weeks from being born.

That's complete bullshit. Have you seen factory farms?

https://www.youtube.com/embed/JJ--faib7to

socal2 says

I firmly believe that 100 years from now, we will look back at abortion supporters with the same horror and disdain and slave-holders.

So you lump all "abortion supporters" in one group. People who believe in the use of the morning after pill are no different than those who want abortion at 8 months to be legal. You are a fucking retard.

Dan8267 says

It's hardly deflection when people say stupid things like "life begins at conception" as code for "there's a magical soul that is infused into cells at conception". You are deflecting from the issue. That abortion should be legal for the first trimester when there is no brain and should gradually become more illegal as the second trimester unfolds.

Life does begin at conception. It is just a matter if our society and laws thinks that "life" is worth human protections. Many pro-abortion supporters think that life only deserves protections if the mother "chooses". If a Mars rover found a single cell bacteria specimen, the headlines would be "life discovered on Mars".

Dan8267 says

A fertilized egg is a "growing human being". Who cares? As I've stated five million times, whether or not the egg or zygote meets your arbitrary, and yes it's arbitrary, definition of human being is irrelevant. What matters is whether or not it's a person.

Make up your mind. I assume you think it is a "growing human being" sometime after 12 weeks based on your comment above about banning abortions in the 2nd Trimester.
Dan8267 says

And you're criteria is stupid. One does not judge personhood based on how a being looks.

Most abortion supporters are so biologically ignorant to think it is nothing but a gob of goo or a tumor. But If they were actually educated on what they are destroying (a fully formed baby with limbs, brain, beating heart and organs), they may have 2nd thoughts.
Dan8267 says

They don't. You just don't know what the fuck a liberal is and no matter how many times I explain it to you, you won't get it because reality contradicts your dogma.

So fucking tired of your "you don't know what a liberal is" shtick.

The simple fact is that the vast majority of the Democrat party (which is filled with Liberals, Progressives or what ever you call yourselves these days) is 100% in lockstep with unrestricted abortion.

socal2 says

I firmly believe that 100 years from now, we will look back at abortion supporters with the same horror and disdain and slave-holders. Lots of slave-holders used science to justify their inhumanity.

This is a weird analogy, given that most modern conservatives admire slaveholders.

Dan8267 says

It's hardly deflection when people say stupid things like "life begins at conception" as code for "there's a magical soul that is infused into cells at conception"

Red herring. The two are not necessarily synonymous.

Dan8267 says

The non-sentient cells of Henrietta Lacks can be called a human being from any biological perspective, but they don't constitute a person.

Nonsense. In your world, perhaps this is true, but this may come as a shock - you are wrong. You are equating a cancer cell line with a human life. That is absurd however you look at it. Sometimes when analogies fail it is because the underlying position is flawed.

Every abortion is a good thing.

A childhood as an unwanted child creates a terrible life, and drags down the rest of society.

I would be perfectly satisfied if all of Planned Parenthood's government funding was used to perform abortions, and encourage more women to get them. Sadly, none of the money goes to that purpose.

Throw away everything else.
This is the tipping point between a libbie and the rest of mankind.
Unless it can be taxed, fed from the various social safety nipples, and chained to government dependency, it ain't alive.

Dan8267 says

A fertilized egg is a "growing human being". Who cares?

And 100 years from now libbies will say that year2000 libbies are todays conservatives...and they wonder why they inherit so much guilt...

socal2 says

I firmly believe that 100 years from now, we will look back at abortion supporters with the same horror and disdain and slave-holders.

"Morality! Morality! End inhumanity!" said the ancient institution.

how many libbies does it take to steer a fetus??

thunderlips11 says

By the way:

To achieve this end, the Inquisitors employed several means of torture to aid their victims in confessing their hidden allegiance to the Pentateuch or the Koran. One of the most popular techniques was something called called tortura del agua (water torture), which consisted of introducing a cloth into the mouth of the victim, and forcing them to ingest water spilled from a jar so that they had the impression of drowning. (The current American term for this torture technique is "waterboarding," and it is being employed against alleged enemy combatants at the direction of the President and the Department of Justice.)

The Casa de la Inquisitión was like Club Gitmo!

I'll get morality judgements from those organizations without a history of using the Judas Chair.

Never burn your T-bone again with the new Libbie Temperature Probes!!!

thunderlips11 says

Abortion is not easy to eliminate as it is deeply rooted in ancient libbie rituals...

thunderlips11 says

SoftShell says

how many libbies does it take to steer a fetus??

That's a helluva large fetus. Mother must have been 20' tall.

socal2 says

Life does begin at conception.

No, it begins BEFORE conception. The sperm and the egg are alive. Your statement is simply incorrect. It's a biology thing.

socal2 says

I assume you think it is a "growing human being" sometime a

You assume wrong. The very question is meaningless without a definition of human, which you seem unable to provide. In any case, it's not DNA that makes a person.

socal2 says

Most abortion supporters are so biologically ignorant to think it is nothing but a gob of goo or a tumor.

That is a false statement.

socal2 says

So fucking tired of your "you don't know what a liberal is" shtick.

Then learn the fucking definition. There is nothing in liberalism that says whether or not abortion should be legal or when. There are pro-life and pro-choice liberals, and most liberals are both depending on the stage of development.

Even now you can't even write down a correct definition of liberal. Come on, prove me wrong.

socal2 says

The simple fact is that the vast majority of the Democrat party (which is filled with Liberals, Progressives or what ever you call yourselves these days) is 100% in lockstep with unrestricted abortion.

Another blatant lie.

Most, but not all, Democrats support the right to FIRST TRIMESTER abortions without restrictions. Damn few Democrats support THIRD TRIMESTER abortions except in the case where the mother's life is in danger. You don't even know what your opponent's position is. And you clearly don't have the balls to try to make the case that first trimester abortions should be illegal, but you're not willing to admit that they should be legal.

The Republican efforts to restrict abortions have included first trimester abortions.

Only a tiny, stupid minority believes that fertilized eggs should be consider persons with legal rights from conception. No one believes that an offspring withing days of being born is "just a glob of goo" with no rights. If you misrepresent the opposition's arguments that means your position has no merit.

Blurtman says

Red herring. The two are not necessarily synonymous.

What other justification has ever been given for considering a fertilized egg to be a person?

Blurtman says

Nonsense. In your world, perhaps this is true, but this may come as a shock - you are wrong. You are equating a cancer cell line with a human life.

In the exact same way that the "life from conception" people are equating non-sentient body cells with personhood. Thus my point that it is ridiculous.

SoftShell says

Unless it can be taxed, fed from the various social safety nipples, and chained to government dependency, it ain't alive.

This is a clear Straw Man argument that demonstrates the so-called pro-life community has no justification for its beliefs. If there was an actual other side of the argument, they would be able to refute the criteria I actually proposed for personhood, which is the presence of a mind, rather than telling a lie. Basing personhood on the existence of a mind is not the same thing as basing personhood on taxation and government provided social services. The two are not even remotely related to anyone is isn't severely delusional.

And you can bet Shrek won't admit his mistake here and address my actual arguments.

[Who's Shrek? That's his standard response.]

SoftShell says

Never burn your T-bone again with the new Libbie Temperature Probes!!!

Of course, Shrek has to show images of religious conservatives and their evil behavior and lie about them being liberals, their exact opposite, in order to make his delusional point. What's next? Showing a white slaver whipping a black girl in the 1840s and saying "look how awful the blacks treated whites"?

Dan8267 says

socal2 says

Deflecting again. Who is talking about religion or souls on this thread?

It's hardly deflection when people say stupid things like "life begins at conception" as code for "there's a magical soul that is infused into cells at conception". You are deflecting from the issue. That abortion should be legal for the first trimester when there is no brain and should gradually become more illegal as the second trimester unfolds.

Stop making sense Dan. You are confusing everyone.

Dan8267 says

socal2 says

Life does begin at conception.

No, it begins BEFORE conception. The sperm and the egg are alive. Your statement is simply incorrect. It's a biology thing.

At conception it's still not a human being. Maybe a future human being just like every sperm and egg, but a ways to go before it's human. Nature often self aborts if the pregnancy is not progressing as nature intended

Dan8267 says

https://www.youtube.com/embed/JJ--faib7to

This is cruelty plain and simple. Why can't they identify a fertilized egg to determine it's sex, and not let the males hatch in the first place?

Dan8267 says

In the exact same way that the "life from conception" people are equating non-sentient body cells with personhood.

Yes, you have your logical argument worked out, and anyone who deviates from it must be wrong. I get it. Folks who believe life begins at conception have their logical arguments worked out as well. Consider if you are wrong, however.

Strategist says

At conception it's still not a human being.

Your belief, your assumption. Everyone is making assumptions. Consider if yours are wrong.

Blurtman says

Yes, you have your logical argument worked out, and anyone who deviates from it must be wrong. I get it. Folks who believe life begins at conception have their logical arguments worked out as well. Consider if you are wrong, however.

You have presented no arguments. Nor have you supported any of your assertions. Nor have you even attempt to redress the facts I presented.

There are folks who believe the Earth is flat and only 6,000 years old. Regardless of how fervently they believe that, it's not true. Belief does not create truth.

Blurtman says

Strategist says

At conception it's still not a human being.

Your belief, your assumption. Everyone is making assumptions. Consider if yours are wrong.

It's an opinion, just like your belief is an opinion. If science proves otherwise, I will quickly change my mind.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/MMzd40i8TfA

Dan8267 says

Belief does not create truth

Absolutely. You cannot prove when life begins because it is merely a matter of human definitions. In your case, you cannot prove when life or personhood begins. Anyone who takes a position does so based upon assumptions. And anyone can be wrong. If pro-abortion folks are wrong, millions of humans are killed. If the anti-abortion folks are wrong, millions of unwanted children result, the lives of women are changed, some would say ruined, and many will die in back-room abortions. Which is the worst outcome? You decide.