Pro-Choicers - Is *this* murder?

[quote name='mykevermin']Right. Not everyone who thinks abortion should be illegal also thinks the same thing about contraception. In fact, those types of people are our allies, in fact. Abortion is a black-and-white issue to some, and we may never convince elprincipe that abortion isn't murder.

So let's just not try, shall we? Instead, people like him are useful to discuss potential ways and means we agree on to try to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies such that abortions naturally decline. Not wholly political enemies in the slightest.

pro-life or pro-choice is a difficult and sometimes meaningless debate to have, I feel. Why not focus on what we all have in common: that we'd like people to want to have the children they become pregnant with.[/QUOTE]

Bingo. If this country wants to make progress on this issue, this is where it's going to happen. I wish more politicians (and activists) would see things this way instead of focusing on areas where there is such bitter disagreement that it's not going to be settled anytime soon.
 
[quote name='gareman']that's why I said "usually", its completely anecdotal but every person whom I have talked to that is against abortion has been against the mourning after pill.

I do very much appreciate the fact that there are people out there that don't lump plan B in with abortion.[/QUOTE]

From what I understand about the morning-after pill, it prevents a pregnancy, not ends one. I'm all for anything that prevents unwanted pregnancies. Stigmatizing things like the morning-after pill is one of the stupidest things anyone pro-life can do, at least in my opinion, since it is sure to lead to an increase in the number of abortions - something nobody (except perhaps for abortion-clinic doctors) wants.
 
I was unaware there were all that many people against true birth control these days. Hell, even the Catholic church has mostly laid off the anti birth control heavy handedness, for the most part.
 
There are less people against birth control, but there are still lots of people in my experience who don't understand that the morning after pill prevents pregnancy. People still call it the abortion pill and think it kills the embryo etc.
 
I think that may be because of the hoopla that french "aborition pill" got a while back, which is often compared in press to the morning after pill. RU-486 or something like that.
 
No, many just think the morning after pill is abortion (though I'm sure some do just mix it up with RU-486).

For instance, take the following, which I found on what looks to be a Catholic Pro Life site.

http://www.morningafterpill.org/how-does-it-work.html

Proponents of "emergency contraception," as well as the Preven and Plan B websites, contend that emergency contraception does not cause abortion. They argue that emergency contraception prevents pregnancy and thereby reduces the need for induced abortion. However, they intentionally define the term "pregnancy" as implantation of a fertilized egg in the lining of a woman's uterus, as opposed to "pregnancy" beginning at fertilization.

Whether one understands pregnancy as beginning at "implantation" or "fertilization," the heart of the matter is when human life begins. It is important to keep in mind that scientists have confirmed that at the moment the sperm and the egg join (fertilization), a new human being is created who is completely different from his/her mother.

This is not a subjective opinion, but an objective scientific fact. Accordingly, any artificial action that works to destroy a fertilized egg (human embryo) is abortifacient in nature.
Click to expand...
 
It was my understanding that morning after pills prevent fertilization. This article contends that all it does is kill the fertilized embryo. So which is true?
 
The article says the pill does not "kill" the embryo, but prevents it from attaching such that it cannot develop.

The pill prevents the fertilized cell from digging into the uterine wall and making a home for itself, which is necessary for a fertilized cell to develop.

So, I dunno.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']The article says the pill does not "kill" the embryo, but prevents it from attaching such that it cannot develop.

The pill prevents the fertilized cell from digging into the uterine wall and making a home for itself, which is necessary for a fertilized cell to develop.

So, I dunno.[/QUOTE]

There are many fertilized eggs, which normally a woman would never even know were fertilized, that do not become implanted and begin to grow as a separate human being. To my knowledge nobody (or very few) would claim those fertilized but not implanted eggs were human beings. Since the morning-after pill just makes sure that a natural process happens one way (the one that ends in no pregnancy due to no implantation), I don't think it's logical to say that it causes the murder of a child (who doesn't exist yet).
 
Saying that pill is murder is like calling every woman that has unprotected sex before her period a murderer.


As for the article... how can those of you whom are pro-choice say it's murder? What is the difference between the fetus dying inside her and dying outside of her?
 
Well a lot of prochoicers don't suppport abortions that far along anyway.

And the general justification for pro choice is that the mother has the right to choose when the fetus is insider her and can't live in the outside world. If it's far enough along that it's out of the womb and has any chance of living that's a harder argument for mother's choice to make for many.
 
[quote name='elprincipe']There are many fertilized eggs, which normally a woman would never even know were fertilized, that do not become implanted and begin to grow as a separate human being. To my knowledge nobody (or very few) would claim those fertilized but not implanted eggs were human beings. Since the morning-after pill just makes sure that a natural process happens one way (the one that ends in no pregnancy due to no implantation), I don't think it's logical to say that it causes the murder of a child (who doesn't exist yet).[/QUOTE]

Fair enough. I was trying to think through what someone who's pro-life might argue, and clearly didn't do a very good job of it. Given the quote he posted initially, though, there are undoubtedly some who would consider it murder.
 
Well I think the argument many of those people (particulary only that catholic pro life site) would make is that the fertilized eggs that do not implant naturally are "god's will" and that someone taken a drug to keep them from implanting goes against that and thus is murder.
 
If you extrapolate that further, it's like saying God wants women to be raped.
What does that say of God?

[quote name='dmaul1114']Well I think the argument many of those people (particulary only that catholic pro life site) would make is that the fertilized eggs that do not implant naturally are "god's will" and that someone taken a drug to keep them from implanting goes against that and thus is murder.[/quote]
 
Definitely true. As always religious arguments to justify anything are always through of holes and moral conundrums like that.
 
[quote name='dmaul1114']Well I think the argument many of those people (particulary only that catholic pro life site) would make is that the fertilized eggs that do not implant naturally are "god's will" and that someone taken a drug to keep them from implanting goes against that and thus is murder.[/QUOTE]

While I understand the logic that lead to this argument, I completely reject it. Either it's a human or it's not. If it's not a human, how can you say it's murder? You can always argue something's against "God's will," but that does not make it murder. And obviously if an action such as taking the morning-after pill harms no one, which I think is accurate, I fail to see how you can argue for governmental interference.
 
[quote name='elprincipe']While I understand the logic that lead to this argument, I completely reject it. Either it's a human or it's not. If it's not a human, how can you say it's murder? You can always argue something's against "God's will," but that does not make it murder. And obviously if an action such as taking the morning-after pill harms no one, which I think is accurate, I fail to see how you can argue for governmental interference.[/QUOTE]

I'm not sure I'm getting your point here.

I think these religious people consider the fertilized egg human.

A regular miscarriage (or egg just not implanting) isn't murder because no one did anything to cause it. Taking a drug to block the implant (morning after pill) or cause a miscarriage (RU-486) is murder to them.

To pro choice folks most don't consider the embryo life until it's at a point it can survive outside the body. Anything done to terminate the pregnancy before that point is not murder. Some go further and are fine with partial birth abortions etc. and think the mother can do whatever she likes with the embryo/fetus as long as it's in her body.

But I don't think you'll find many people who think the story in question wasn't murder since the abortion didn't happen, the baby was born, and the employee stuffed it in a bag and threw it away.

Regardless of the when life begins arguments, there's not many (if any people) ok with killing a baby outside the body. Once it's born it's hard to argue against it having rights. Inside the mother--debatable at any point of the pregnancy and that's just a moral issue.
 
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[quote name='dmaul1114']I'm not sure I'm getting your point here.

I think these religious people consider the fertilized egg human.[/QUOTE]

Yes, some do, and I understand why they do. I just think that if you think logically about the situation pregnancy has not occurred and a new life has not been created, so why logically can you call that murder? I can understand opposing the morning-after pill, although I strongly disagree. But even if you oppose it how can you call it murder? Unless you think every fertilized egg that doesn't result in a baby being born was murdered, but in that case "murder" happens all the time by itself during the natural process.
 
Your just being obtuse.

Murder requires human action. If a fertilzed egg isn't implanted for natural reasons, how is that murder even to the small minded religous blow hards?

Murder is human action that takes the life of another human. If it's a miscarriage, egg never implanted for natural reasons etc. It can't be murder in anyone's mind. But if someone takes a drug to prevent tha fertilized egg from being implanted, then some small minded people can call it murder since there was human action involved.
 
[quote name='dmaul1114']Your just being obtuse.

Murder requires human action. If a fertilzed egg isn't implanted for natural reasons, how is that murder even to the small minded religous blow hards?

Murder is human action that takes the life of another human. If it's a miscarriage, egg never implanted for natural reasons etc. It can't be murder in anyone's mind. But if someone takes a drug to prevent tha fertilized egg from being implanted, then some small minded people can call it murder since there was human action involved.[/QUOTE]

I'm not being anything of the sort. If there is no human life to begin with, murder cannot occur. You are acting as if it's reasonable to say a fertilized egg which has not been implanted and begun to grow is a person. I think that's a crazy argument. It's the same one that holds a fertilized egg in a test tube is a person.
 
I think it's a crazy argument too. But some people don't.

I was just outlining that view point of people opposed to the morning after pill. Not saying I agreed with it or thought it reasonable.
 
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