Abortion

Discussion is never a bad thing, but we should realize what is within our power. Talking about buying an island and creating our own government, for example, is foolish and should be nothing more than entertainment, a way to pass time and amuse ourselves.

Discussions can shape our beliefs; talking about why pointless wars are bad can make a person more decisive about the issue and maybe even get him/her to protest them. But saying that the government shouldn't pursue pointless wars doesn't accomplish anything; even protesting may not accomplish anything. Still, if you feel that something must be done, you should do whatever you can. But that doesn't mean expecting any real results.

There are a lot of things in this world that we cannot change, no matter what. But we can still have opinions and viewpoints and our own way of thinking concerning those things. So even if the discussion produces nothing substantial, I do think there is merit in the discussion.

Sorry if this seems too disconnected with reality. My mind's kind of floating right now.

this will always be a controversial topic, as is god, gays and guns in the US.

People certainly do say that life is sacred but not really as a legitimate argument, considering most people argue whether a fetus is alive or not, pretty much. So even if you say life is sacred it only matters if you're alive. Either way nobody in this forum has used that argument cop-out that I've responded to anyways.

On the issue of taxes, there are several things to say. First off, cutting off the funding of an organization doesn't necessarily overlook the beneficial aspects of it, rather, it weighs them against each other. If you fund a hospital that also performs human tests on its patients, sure it saves some people still, but it's also doing something you don't like. In the end it might still be positive, but you don't necessarily want that behavior, or want to encourage that kind of behavior.

As for the government, the system is generally supposed to work (though may not always) as the government following through with what the people want in terms of taxes. People vote on taxes and people vote on the people who put in taxes and who spent taxes. If the majority of people speak out that they don't want a tax, or that they do (which almost never happens), or that government funding shouldn't go to something, in the ideal version of the government (by way of its initial purpose), is that the government listens to the people.

Besides, just because abortion is legal doesn't mean the government should support it with tax money. If the government started pouring tax money into strip clubs people would riot because that's not necessarily a good use of government dollars.

If people couldn't influence anything with government spending or taxes, I'm fairly sure we'd have a bit of a Boston Tea party going on...Although funny thing is there sort of is, isn't there?
Ah well.



Guns are awesome.

Yeah, Outlawing guns will mean that only outlaws will have guns

Just a note: OP, horrible analogy

In any case, I'm for abortion. Dumb people shouldn't be allowed to raise children. Personally, I wouldn't do it but that's me

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHm4UF0EJWo

I just saw this and had to post it.

Should racists be forced to pay taxes to support poor blacks?

As for life being sacred, it's all just bullshit. Only human life is sacred and others are trash is what I think of pro-lifer's view.

No one should have to pay for abortions, make them pay for their own. Also that pro life stuff is mostly crap, if you believe every human life is precious, then go help someone who's already alive.

Thank you for your perspective. It seems like some of the folks in this thread just can't see it from the viewpoint of someone who's actually gone through with the process of abortion.



Neko, it makes me sad that people are -repping you for this. :(

Showing sympathy is verboten, apparently. *rolls eyes*

Anyway, this reminded me of something I read earlier today--the 1 in 3 campaign. One in three women will have an abortion in her lifetime, but we almost never talk about it. One in three. And it's so easy to dismiss the procedures as "fancy and caprice" when you don't listen to the stories of why women have abortions.

One woman who told her story for the project stated that she was in college and she knew she could not afford to have the baby and continue her education. Another woman already had a stable job and another child, but chose to abort because her husband left her and cleaned their accounts out, and she absolutely could not work and care for her child properly as a single mom if she continued with her pregnancy. Seifuku_nya shared her story and reasons here as well, which are similar to what these other women's reasons were. Wanting to have a better future for yourself and your children, or not wanting to raise a child in poverty are abso-fucking-lutely NOT capricious reasons to have abortions. They're logical, reasonable ones, that I believe should be paid for by the state if the mother cannot afford to do so.

Out of curiosity, how accurate do you actually believe their statistics are? One in three is supposed to be a shock statistic, but is that actually an accurate statistic? Considering you say they hardly ever talk about it, I find it hard to believe they had a very elaborate study to find this out.

Also in my opinion you have somewhat misunderstood what the original poster meant by fancy and caprice due to his specific word choice, no offense. I'll let the original poster address this though, if he happens to find his way here.

First of all, the whole issue on people not thinking they can give a baby a good enough life and thus they should not have the life...I've always thought that this seems a bit iffy. I've never had a horrid life, excepting past lives that may or may not exist I have only experienced one life that was not terribly poverty ridden. Yet I find it hard to believe a vast majority of people would not wish to live because they are not the wealthiest of people (The US's poverty has it better off than other country's rich! Just kidding maybe, referencing another topic in the forum), and I find it even harder to believe that someone else should be allowed to make this decision for them.

However, while I am making a point that it may not be the wisest to make decisions for the unborn baby/fetus, it is true that it could make the life for the mother terrible or worse and may necessitate adoption/dropping out of school.

Also having abortions do cost money as well...I'm curious as to how much, if anyone knows a very good statistic, and perhaps instead of the government paying for the abortion they could help support the mother (of course, just having the baby is one operation as well, and either helping raise the child or putting it in an adoption home...probably more expensive this way). They also already do this I suppose.

In addition, I will note that while specific stories like you're referencing and that were shared on the forum already, while incredibly sad and do have some relevance, it is very important that people's emotional reactions to not cloud their judgment on subjects like this. There is a very tender balance between the emotional and logical aspects of many arguments, and having one overshadow the other can be a very iffy thing.

As a final question, I would like to know what your views are the "when life starts" issue, OR, if it even matters.

More on the numbers here. That article actually states that it is closer to 40%.



The very reason that Sam used "fancy and caprice" is to make a difficult decision seem frivolous. MAYBE I'm misunderstanding it, but the connotations of those words are very clear.



Yes, it does cost the government much more to pay for welfare, medical aid, etc. I did mention earlier that paying for abortions and birth control would save the government a lot of money. I don't have the figures right now, though.



It's not just the emotional aspect. It's the financial aspect. The quality of life aspect. Yes, the stories are sad, but I feel like you're dismissing the logical reasons behind why these women chose to abort just because it goes along with emotions. Emotions do not mean lack of logic or judgement. You can be emotionless and illogical, and passionate and perfectly logical.



I already addressed that earlier--too lazy to find the post, but in a nutshell, I personally go with the legal definition of viability, which is sometime at the start of the third trimester. Call me the heartless feminist bitch, but I would say it doesn't even matter in determining whether the government should pay for abortions or not. Fact is, abortions up to a certain point (viability) are perfectly legal, and as such, they should be treated like any other legal medical procedure.

Out of curiosity, have you looked at the study data that person is indicating? I will not attempt to refute that the study is at least fairly accurate, but I don't quite agree with the specific person's interpretations of the data. Considering I don't want to spend an immense amount of time looking through the entire PDF, though I will bookmark it for later reading, I didn't read it to the utmost accuracy, but the datapoint that I thought was most interesting was that, per year, it's actually on average about ~20 abortions per 1000 women in the United States. This doesn't sound like much, but you also have to factor in that this is per year, so you could say incrementally, it's 20, 40, 60, 80, etc., which is I think what the author of your source did to some degree.
The issue with this line of thought is also that they're not including the cyclic rate at which the population changed over the thirty plus years that the data was gathered (they simply took the final year's population, which doesn't account for deaths, for example). I can't be considered an expert on this data, and the abortion count DOES seem surprisingly high to me, undeniably, but I'm cautious as to using such specific percentages like 40% of all women in the US have had an abortion, ESPECIALLY when it is not a legitimate study, unless it is actually stated to be 40% in the ACTUAL data (which I may not entirely believe), the way those numbers were derived was by mixing two questionably compatible groups of data.

As for connotations, it's true that the connotations would seem offensive to most people, but connotations are not definitions, and at this point we're arguing semantics. I'm just saying that you should consider what the person could have meant by the words and not decide for them. You could be completely right in your interpretation, however.

I'm trying to get through this quick so I'll get back to you a little more thoroughly later, probably to your response but,

I'm curious as to if you should be adding another thing to what the government should be spending money on. This would depend on your views of how you want the government to be. You could also say that because they are providing services such as child support, they might save money by paying for abortions. There are a number of angles to this. Basically I'm curious as to who should pay for the abortion (health care, out of pocket, government), if situations would depend for this (rape yes, accident no, I think you say for all though), if situations of the relative wealth of the person effect this ie, if they can pay for it themselves, and if the cost difference between not allowing abortions and child support, while more expensive, are worth the "effort." (that last bit is slightly weirdly worded)



This feels like a bit of a sweeping judgment of what I'm factoring into this debate and I'd like to make it clear that I have absolutely no opinion on which side is actually correct, if there is such a thing, I'm just discussing.
Basically I'm saying that specific stories are not actually required bits of information to make a judgment, although they can help. I think often if people are too emotional they let their logical opinions become "clouded." By the emotion. I don't mind you arguing that the women have to drop out of school and that they weren't able to afford it or even, though I've made points against it, that they don't think the child should live in such conditions. But specific stories can often convince people through their emotions and I don't usually like those methods.

Also I would prefer statistics over individual stories. Individual stories represent very few people. Emotional input is good data but it's very, very narrow. Data on the reasons that people get abortions is better, and such data may exist. I have wikipedia open and it seems to have some data. I'm not going to bother checking their sources because I don't have the time.

According to wikipedia, roughly 40% of abortions are due to: health risks, rape, incest, not having enough money, disruption of education and jobs.
Another 40% are people who simply don't want to have children.
And a final 20% are too young or otherwise somebody objects (that's really not specific of them), other, or percentages I lost from my rough estimates.
Sure this is a skyhigh view of things, but it's something you should consider. I'll try looking at their specific studies and other details later, or you could.

Sorry about all the text, I hope you read it. I was even trying to quick about it funny enough.
Anyways I'll try to emphasize on a few of the points I made after you respond and when I have more time. Till then, have a good night everyone.

[font=verdana][color=green]I really wish you quoted me directly Neko...or else that comment you made might have gone unchecked.

The words "Fancy and Caprice" were used to cover situations where the woman chooses to have an abortion for herwell being. Of course, this doesn't cover where the women would face medical difficulties if she were to bring the baby to term, but the point still remains that the reasons for having an abortion are purely selfish; be it she doesn't want it, can't raise it or whatever.

You seemed to think that I used the words on purpose, to add a sense of frivolity to the mix. If I really thought that these decisions were frivolous, then I really shouldn't be arguing in this topic of debate. I know that making the decision can be hard, but the fact still remains that other people i.e. taxpayers shouldn't make up for your own personal mistakes. If it's a situation of rape, the woman being in danger or the baby has serious genetic defects, then there would be no way of knowing beforehand what would happen. But, let's just say that the woman never wanted a baby? Let's say she knew what would result if she had a baby? Are you telling me, despite that, others should still pay for her mistakes, despite her knowing the risks? That attitude doesn't hold people accountable. If others bail them out, they will never learn.

I still standby my word choice.

EDIT: Woops. Forgot the most important thing. Adoption is a great alternative, but I have already discussed this at length, yet you failed to reply. Why isn't this an option for the "Fancy and Caprice" reasons?

Too blah to reply in depth right now, so I'll just throw out some fact sheets from the Guttmacher Institute.

Stats on induced abortion in the US.
http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.html

The latest "reasons" survey, which was done in 2004. I expect the reasons to be more or less the same if the survey were to be repeated in the present--maybe with an increase of people doing it for financial reasons.
http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/journals/3711005.html

I'm not convinced a survey of 1200 abortion patients out of 50 million can be really that entirely accurate.
http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/journals/2411798.html
The Guttmacher's also have this, which says similar things, but the top reason they found was because people wanted to postpone childbearing. This seems extremely general but considering there are categories for if they don't have enough money or things like that, I assume it means that they simply didn't want kids...This may be an incorrect assumption though.

As for the induced abortions bit, as I've said,
the person used the census data in 2005 and compared it to the 50 million abortions conducted over the past ~30 years. This doesn't account for the births and deaths, immigrations and emigrations, and other such factors. In other words you can't compare the census data.
Just to pull a random number out of a hat, it may be possible that the total number of people who existed in these years is actually more like double what the census data was. This would lower the statistic to around 20%. This is still a pretty shocking statistic but since I've already pointed out what at least I consider to be a major flaw in the reasoning used to make the 40% statistic, I would be overall skeptical of making any sort of statistic based on the style that the author used.

Oh yeah also I would like to point out that the study which all of this reasoning seems to stem from never once as far as I saw said that 40% of all women had abortions.



Child support can be considered taxpayers paying for your mistakes. Is that more expensive or a different situation? Adoption places are government supported aren't they?
I'm a bit curious about this now that I'm thinking a bit more about the price of things.

[font=verdana][color=green]Do you just refuse to acknowledge my adoption query? Everything else aside, why isn't adoption used as a alternative for abortion for these women? I would really like to hear your opinion of this, as this is the third time of asking.



[font=verdana][color=green]Acknowledged, and I will answer your good question.

As I have stated earlier in this thread, I would rather have money be used to raise a life than destroy a potential one. Even if the costs are so much more expensive, the fact remains that the women who choose to still have the baby besides being, want for a better word, poor haven't chosen to chicken out of their responsibility. When you have sex at the time of ovulation, condom...spermicide aside, you should be prepared to think "Okay, if things go bad, I might end up getting pregnant". If you can't do that, then you're too immature to be having sex in the first place.

Also, adoption allows those who can't have children to have children for themselves. The women who didn't want to have the child, sure, they might have made a mistake in their eyes, but to the people who adopted their child, they made the best decision in the world to bring the child to term. That decision should be encouraged; hence why taxes should fund adoption agencies and not fund abortion clinics.

I was tired yesterday from the STUDENT OF DOOM, so I didn't answer then.

If you look back a couple of pages, the issue of adoption has already been addressed. It has been stated several times on this thread that adoption is not always the best solution. But if you want a more in-depth explanation, here it is.

For one thing, as Flaser said:



I absolutely agree with him. Pregnancy isn't a cakewalk. Pregnancy can and does kill women, and even if it doesn't, it's a huge strain. It's expensive to pay for pre-natal visits and labor and delivery, and if the woman is poor, how is she to pay for that? Under the NHS, I suppose those are covered, but still, the loss of work hours for doctor's visits and for maternal leave could make a dent in one's finances. I did post some numbers earlier--too lazy to look for that post but in the US it was about $400 for an abortion vs. at least $8000 for carrying a pregnancy to term. And for what? Would this child even have a good chance for a better life with adoption?

I've said before on the thread that the foster care/adoption system is already swamped with a unwanted children. Skymir also mentioned this fact in this post:



(Emphasis mine)

Why add to that if the woman does not want to? It's not like if you pop out a child, there is instantly and magically a set of adoptive parents that will want it. White, healthy babies are more "prized" by adoptive parents, while Black (or other minority) and/or babies with disabilities and other health problems have trouble being adopted and end up languishing in orphanages or the foster care system until they get kicked off.

Sure, as you said, you can add funding to the adoption system to make the lives of these children a little better, but that still does not address the fact that there are more adoptable children than potential adopters. Adoption isn't cheap. In the US adoptive parents can expect to pay between $5,000 to $40,000, depending on the circumstances of the adoption. For that price, many childless couples would rather pay for IVF or other assisted reproduction technologies to get their own biological child, rather than adopt a child. Some adoptive parents would also rather adopt from abroad rather than from "the system," for various reasons. This would decrease the likelihood that the child would be adopted.

There is also the emotional strain that the both the birth mother and adoptive families can go through. Pro-lifers like to say that abortion can give you mental health issues, but in reality, those are more likely to happen with adoption. Birth mothers can suffer from depression, anxiety, and a slew of other mental health disorders due to the grief of separation from the child. Adoptive children can suffer from attachment difficulties, behavioural problems, learning disabilities and so forth--if the adoptive child was from a poor mother who did not get good pre-natal care and nutrition during the pregnancy, this is more likely to happen. Those problems can cause further strain in adoptive families. Some sources estimate that up to 2/3 of adoptions have moderate to severe problems.

Now, I'm not saying that adoption is always bad, but it definitely has a longer list of problems associated with it, and these problems are more common than you would think. This is why I fucking hate it when people throw it out as a solution to unwanted pregnancies like it's not a big deal at all. If the woman wants to go through it, great--more power to her, and she should absolutely be supported in this issue--but adoption should not be forced upon anyone just because they did not have the resources to undergo an abortion.

Finally, on the point about society paying for the mistake or irresponsibility, Razbutane does bring up the point that even if the child were delivered, that is also society paying--and paying much, much MORE, at that. You may say that it's more moral to do so, but others, myself included, may feel that it is more immoral and irresponsible to bring into the world a child that you know will not be cared for. Sex happens, and even with planning, women may get pregnant. You can crow about responsibility and maturity until the cows come home, but it's just a fact of life that humans are sexual beings and that shit happens. I would rather that women have access to a full range of choices for unplanned pregnancies--whether that is abortion, adoption, or keeping the baby--rather than limiting it due to finances or laws or whatever reason.

unprotected sex makes babies. Babies are expensive. Avoid unprotected sex, avoid babies. Simple. If you do manage to get pregnant after the 3+ layers of protection then deal with it. If you can't deal with the results of sex (i.e. babies) then keep your legs closed. As for the guys, if you can't man up and handle the responsibilities then keep it in your pants.




Because, actions have consequences. Don't want to go through pregnancy, don't have sex. It's called being an adult and being responsible for your actions.




The emotions are irrelevant. If a mother is depressed for being separated from her child then she should seek counseling or avoid the emotionally distressing situating situation.




I hate to sound Libertarian on this but, your fuck up, your responsibility. If your friends and family want to help you raise the baby. God bless them. A lot of shit is unplanned. I didn't plan to lose my job or my apartment but, you would never hear me whining about it.

Though, you logic amuses me "Ah, something inconvenient kill it!"

...I think if men could also become pregnant from sex, you'd feel a bit differently about this idea of "responsibility".