Judge forces 13-year-old to have abortion

leela,

Thanks for the clarification. It's true, the fundamental difference between the two sides is that pro-lifers believe that unborn humans have rights too, and we are interested in protecting both the unborn's rights and the mother's rights. We feel that abortion is more than just an action a woman takes on her own body; it's an action she takes on an unborn life that has rights. So we think that type of action should be restricted. Not because we want to force anything on the mother, but because we want to protect the child.

I am all about choice concerning a woman's own rights - choose abstinence, choose birth control, choose adoption, choose to raise a child, choose piercings and tattoos, choose botox and breast implants, etc. But it is my belief that choosing to shred or poison or otherwise violently attack a developing human life (and most scientists would agree that an implanted, 46-chromosome, growing embryo or fetus is a human life) goes beyond the woman's own rights and starts infringing on another human's rights.

To me, protecting an unborn life from abortion is no different philosophically from protecting a child after birth from medical or other actions that would cause its death. Or protecting a disabled or elderly person who inconveniences others, isn't particularly valued by society, and can't speak in his own defense.

Suppose your profoundly disabled child, or your elderly mother, was living in a room in your house, depending on you to feed her, and getting to be inconvenient. Suppose you could painlessly terminate her by cutting off heat to her room. Would that be OK? After all, she is in YOUR house and don't you have the right to do what you want with YOUR house? No, that would be illegal and immoral in our society. We pro-lifers see abortion the same way. Our individual rights are always subject to the individual rights of others, including the unborn.

The court in Roe v. Wade even recognized the unborn child's rights. Only in the first trimester did Roe v. Wade decide that the mother's rights outweighed the child's rights. (I am fairly sure most pro-choicers don't even realize this.) This judgment was not based on personal opinions, but a careful analysis of a variety of US laws. Hence, the concept of the rights of the unborn is not an alien concept; it is quite mainstream. To me, it is the only view that is consistent with a general value for life.

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"Why are pro-lifers being bashed for stating their opinions? So far I haven't seen anyone say "everyone in this discussion has to agree with me." Both sides are stating their opinions but only pro-lifers are being accused of shoving their opinions down others' throats. Could we be a bit more balanced?"

SKL, are you serious? YOU, of all people are making this charge and expect to be taken seriously? You are the same SKL who said this back in comment #20?

"I am sorry but some people on this board are disgusting. If I thought, like you, that I had a right to assign value to humans, I would assign the lowest value to these pro-abortion pro-culling pro-eugenics posters and their like."

How, exactly is that not namecalling and shoving your opinion down the throats of others in the most unpleasant of manners? What, exactly, about that charming little diatribe was balanced?

It really is people like you, making comments like this, that smear every pro-choicer with the same brush.

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Non,

If you read my post #20, you would know that it was only attacking the anti-choice attitudes held by SOME of the people who call themselves pro-choice. Those were the people who were against a mother's CHOICE not to have an abortion, where the fetus in question didn't meet standards that they set. I agree I used strong language because I, like many of the pro-choice posters, am outraged by this "I get to choose whether your kid gets to live" attitude. I do not apologize for the language that I used, which was actually quite restrained compared to some posts.

But I never said pro-choicers don't have a right to their opinion. Just that, if they really oppose "choice" in all circumstances, they should not label themselves as pro-choice. It ought to offend pro-choicers that one of their group supports the violation of this mother's rights. Just like it offends pro-lifers that some of our group think violence is an acceptable way to prevent abortions.

I am not slamming the pro-choice view, even though I have a right to say I disagree with it. I do think that pro-choicers should look more closely into what the word "choice" has come to mean, and consider whether this meaning actually reflects their views.

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My apologies, SKL, I meant PRO-LIFERS. Because it really is offensive rhetoric like what I quoted that makes the entire movement look like it's made up of a bunch of nutjobs looking to blow up clinics. Something to think about, the next time you want to denigrate people, their opinions (since you seem to think yours is so sacred), and their CHOICES (since you seem so committed to yours).

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Non,

I have already noticed that lots of people don't read others' posts carefully and take things out of context.

I generally receive a lot more name-calling than I dish out, but this case was too outrageous for me to treat blandly.

Doesn't it offend any pro-choicers that people call themselves pro-choice yet push an anti-choice agenda? I think it should. Am I giving pro-choicers too much credit? If so, I apologize for that.

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I, for one, don't understand the "rape and incest" exception that the religious anti-abortionists seem to support, for the most part.

Either it's a divinely-created being brought by God or it isn't, it's just a nonviable fetus and can be aborted.

Allowing "exceptions" according to human judgment and intervention after-the-fact simply exposes the inconsistencies in their logic.

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Leela, if you believe that it's life after viability, would you place restrictions after viability? If you would, you will be accused of not following "live and let live" and interfering with a woman's privacy. You probably wouldn't care, because life is life and should be protected. If you don't support viability-based restrictions, then how do you reconcile your belief of life-begins-at-viability with state-sanctioned abortion?

Sandyone- in response to your questuions above.
I would not let my personal beliefs about viabilty determine what another woman should be able to do with her body.

SKL- Just so I can get named called too. I don't beleive that in this case the 13 year old should have a choice. I think she is still a minor and her parents have the right to choose for her. For me it is very black and white. I understand that some people beleive that the embryo/fetus has rights too but I just don't see it that way. Why is it OK for parents to make all decisions about their children except for this one?

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Nancy Toby, I have the same frustrations with the "it's not a life until it's viable" crowd. And the "I'd never kill my baby but I can't impose my morality on others" crowd. And the "only until it *looks* like a baby" crowd. The inconsistencies are ridiculous, but in order to allow any abortion, you have to be willing to allow them all the way up to birth. Frankly, I don't see why we stop there...a newborn ain't gonna live long without support of milk or formula.

Either it's a life and deserving of protection or it's a blob of tissue inside of a woman and has no rights. Or, and sadly, this is what seems to be the most popular, it is a life but we don't care because we still want to be able to get rid of it.

For the record, I am pro-life, 100 percent of the time. There are no exceptions.

And, very, very few rapes result in a pregnancy. The trauma of the rape will postpone the woman's ovulation. Pregnancy can occur if the ovary had released the egg in the 24 hours before the rape.

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I must say that I come at this one from both ends. Yes I do agree that at 13 I was still wearing jogging pants everyday and playing with barbies, and that there are many health/birth risks to having a baby so young. However there are also health risks to having abortions that are not well understood or explained. I'm writing this in bed rest at 22 wks pregnant(my second) at 25 years of age. I had an abortion when I was 18 as it was not the right time, even at that time I was not mature enough, in my personal opinion and choice.
I carried my first born without any probs, and with this pregnancy I have a cervix that will not stay closed, and must remain horizontal for 4 whole months, if I want to avoid preterm labor/birth. Research and evidence exist that support 'incompotent cervixes' can be caused by cervix damage, as in clinical abortion/D&C.
Yes it is unfortunate that 13 year olds get pregnant before they have mentally matured, I feel for the poor dear to have to go through that. And worse yet is to be forced to have any procedure not warranted. She may forever hate her parents and have reproductive problems as a mental/emotional result. Issues often stay in the tissues-from a metaphysical perspective.
Abortion cannot be black and white, it must be objective, yet subjective to situation and with out personal judgement. Guilt and lifelong grief is far more hurting than the procedures themselves, from external forces or from making the always hard decision to abort. To each their own...

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