Timberrrrrrrr wrote: » Absolutely disgraceful commenr by a so called "christian"! You seem to think that when a woman chooses to have an abortion (for whatever her reason is) that she makes this decision on a whim as if she is decidung between a caramel mocha or a frappachino! Disgusting and vile post!
J C wrote: » I'm not in the least patronising ... but I'm a little fed up by the 'too posh to push' brigade not being too posh to kill their unborn child ... just because they want to
smacl wrote: » A man trying to support their rather dubious argument with a term like too posh to push epitomizes the worst type of patronising and misogynistic nonsense we've seen on this thread. Are you not even vaguely circumspect in subjecting other people to hardships you'll never have to face yourself?
J C wrote: » If you are as disgusted, as you claim to be about the idea that a woman might abort on a whim ... why don't you campaign for abortion to only be allowed for serious issues affecting the mother and/or child? That would put the issue of abortion on a whim beyond doubt. If we have abortion on demand, I'm sure some women will abort on a whim ... which will be allowed under the proposed legislation.If she has given serious consideration and decides to abort a healthy child while she herself is also perfectly healthy, then she will just have added pre-meditation to her already grossly immoral decision to kill her unborn child. Of course, it may not be the woman who will be the prime mover in all of this ... but a family member or a partner pressuring her into having the abortion.
Timberrrrrrrr wrote: » And you follow up with another vile post that denegtates women and puts them in the same catagory as a cold blooded killer. The mask slips and your true colours start to show. Disgraceful.
J C wrote: » Please stop putting words in my mouth, that I didn't say. I said that the production of 'surplus' embryos should be avoided.
It all depends on what you call 'motherhood'. If you mean that she should have to be a parent to her child when it is born ... then I'm not saying that ... the option of fosterage or adoption should be available to her. If by 'motherhood' you mean that she should continue with her pregnancy to viability of her unborn child, then yes, she should behave as the mother that she has become to her unborn child, as a result of her pregnancy. ... and being a mother to your child doesn't give you the right to kill it.
They are all Human life deserving of the respect and protection that this implies.
With a newborn, or indeed a young born child ... potential isn't the same thing as actual either ... but this doesn't give anybody the right to cut off their potential by killing them.
... all protection for unborn children will possibly be moot if the 8th is repealed and unlimited abortion is introduced.
J C wrote: » The Shelia Hodgers case pre-dates the introduction of the 8th with its focus on the state doing everything practicable to save the life of both the unborn child and her mother. Thankfully this wouldn't happen now ... so it has no relevance to whether we vote for unlimited abortion with the repeal of the 8th.
J C wrote: » Where is there an error in the logic of what I have said? You are the one taking about cold blooded killing ... not me. Do you think that a decision to abort a healthy child while the woman herself is also perfectly healthy, is a morally corrrect decision?
J C wrote: » I have disdain for men and women who kill their unborn child for no reason other than they want to ... and I think most reasonable people would share my view on this. Is Human life to be so cheap that anybody who wants to kill their unborn child should be allowed to do so, even if both the mother and her child are perfectly healthy? Having said that, I would be the first to support such people, if or when they are hurting after their abortion.
J C wrote: » I'm not in the least patronising ... but I'm a little fed up by the 'too posh to push' brigade not being too posh to kill their unborn child ... just because they want to. There are serious life and death situations where abortion is necessary ... but it is sickening, quite frankly, for perfectly healthy women and their so-called partners utilising the plight of these seriously ill women, to campaign to be allowed kill their unborn children ... for no other reason, than just because they want to.
Delirium wrote: » I didn't anything of the sort. It was a question as clearly denoted by the question mark. And unless all embryos are implanted, then they are by definition surplus. If you don't want to answer a question, fine. But please don't pretend I did something that my post clearly shows I didn't.
Delirium wrote: » Yes, I meant mother in the biological sense as we are discussing abortion. Also, I am saying that women shouldn't have to become mothers just because they are pregnant. That they should have a choice in the matter.
Delirium wrote: » So frozen embryos should be implanted rather than stored indefinitely or discarded? <- Please the question mark
Delirium wrote: » What? I don't recall ever stating that a newborn or infant ain't a person? Or advocating for infanticide so not sure where you're going with that comment??
Delirium wrote: » Nonsense. The nation isn't going to start aborting 100% of all pregnancies so the unborn will still have protection.
J C wrote: » Only a tiny minority is actively campaigning on either side of the debate.
Its a fact that they are campaigning for and support the introduction of abortion on demand ... which is the killing of unborn children on demand. I never said that this was sociopathic ... you are the one characterising this behaviour as such.
'Baiting' people with hard case stories and then 'switching' the solution to abortion on demand is also deeply hypocritical IMO. It's exploiting the undoubted pain of hard cases, to introduce unlimited abortion just because somebody wants to. The two are not remotely comparable.
Having a child (and parenting it) should be a choice ... killing it should not be a choice.
... its worse than that ... they aparently love nothing better than campaigning for and voting for unlimted abortion ... while pointing to hard cases as justification for this completely disproportionate response.
With hard cases women certainly do ... and they should be facilitated ... but do you think that a perfectly healthy woman who aborts has given any meaningful consideration to the killing of her unborn child?
Delirium wrote: » You are joking. There are women currently required to travel abroad for medically necessary abortion, fatal foetal abnormalities being one such example, because we have a restrictive medical policy embedded in the constitution. To pretend that Irish healthcare is providing the best that it can for pregnant women is silly. And that's before even touching abortion. There are standard procedures and scans that are not carried out in Ireland because if a bad result is found then the 8th amendment puts the woman and the medical staff in a legally difficult position.
Timberrrrrrrr wrote: » If you cannot see what is wrong with what you have written then i truly despair for you as you are so blinded by your religious views that you can only see this issue in black and white. With comments like that you obviously have no respect for women and just see them as incubators.
J C wrote: » I have answered your question ... and I said that surplus embryos shouldn't be created
A pregnant woman has already become a mother ... whether she wants to continue with motherhood is a decision she may morally make when her child is safely delivered.
They shouldn't be created, in the first place.
I was pointing out that potential exists along all stages of life ... and isn't a valid argument to say that because a Human's potential hasn't been realised yet, they can be aborted.
They will have no protection under law ... the percentge that will be killed, as a result, is a moot point, for any unborn children who are killed. We will then have zero tolerance for killing born children ... and full tolerance for killing unborn children (up to 12 weeks, anyway). ... a grossly immoral situation.
J C wrote: » Our healthcare system can obviously be improved for everyone. ... and additional legisaltion can be introduced for hard cases under the 8th ... and if futher enabling legislation is needed it should be provided. Opening the floodgates to unlimited abortion isn't a proportionate reaction.
Delirium wrote: » A foetus is a potential person. An infant is a person. It shouldn't be that difficult to grasp the distinction.
Manach wrote: » That is uninformed and wrong. At one end there are bioethicists who argue that the personhood is only achieved after several years and hence infanticide is perfectly acceptable - as per Peter Singer. On the other one can look into the work of legal analysts like John McKweon (book Law and Ethics of Medicine) that argue there is a continuation of the biological entity from unborn to child and so legal protections are a right. To strip away the concept of legal rights based on the dubious concept of personhood looks to degrade the inherent worth of human life.
Delirium wrote: » That suggest that a significantly higher number of women would have abortions if international travel was taken out of the equation. That's a good reason that the 8th should go tbh.
end of the road wrote: » in what way would an increase in the abortion rate be a good reason that the 8th should go? unless i'm misunderstanding your point?
Delirium wrote: » Having another constitutional referendum every time another hard case arises is not the way to implement medical policy.
ABC101 wrote: » If medical science were to advance to the point where a 12 week foetus could be transferred to a special incubator and continue to develop as a normal baby human, then could the point a which society were to consider a foetus a person be revised downwards?
Delirium wrote: » How do they know they're surplus? Multiple embryos are created because not all implantations are successful, much like the natural method. So surplus embryos are always going to exist. Seriously, a basic understanding of biology would reveal that anybody. So a woman successfully gets pregnant but has two more embryos left. Is she now required to implant those two?
Delirium wrote: » Disagree. Just because an embryo successfully implanted does not mean that woman is now to become a mother. Especially as you said a human life begins at fertilization. Women use contraceptives to stop implantation .By your line of thinking, those devices/pills should be outlawed as it's killing an unborn.
Delirium wrote: » ..I've already said I don't know when personhood begins and that my own view on abortion is allow it early in the pregnancy weeks before any foetus would be considered viable. So the 12 weeks on request limit is an acceptable limit from my perspective.
smacl wrote: » My own opinion is that there is a huge difference between survivability and being grown from an early gestational stage in-vitro. There's nothing to say that science may not progress where a person can be grown entirely in-vitro but you still have to choose a developmental stage where you start calling the foetus a baby. My opinion would be when measurable brain activity moves beyond a rudimentary stage. Maybe science might even reach the stage where the foetus could be transferred to the innards of a middle-aged pro-life bloke, though I imagine they might become scarcer at that point
end of the road wrote: » they won't have protection from the law and the state. the protection will only rely on them being wanted. they need to be protected whether they are wanted or not, just like new born children.
recedite wrote: » That's probably a reasonably common view. So if we take the first 8 or 9 weeks as being the embryonic stage, the embryo is not known as "a foetus" until after that. The foetus is more highly developed, a lot more human or baby like in various ways. However this referendum is all about withdrawing the constitutional right to life from every foetus right up until the moment of birth. Which means they can live or be killed at the discretion of future politicians, medical science, owners, or parents. The alternative would be to declare via a different referendum wording, that the provisions of the 8th would only kick in after the 8 weeks (or 12 weeks or whatever) That would protect the right to life for any unborn entity older than that, just as they are currently protected. But if the mothers life was endangered by the pregnancy, the foetus would still be aborted, as per the current situation. Then separately there is this vague proposal for the politicians to legislate for abortion afterwards (assuming the total repeal of the 8th succeeds). Currently they are saying up to 12 weeks, but that could change at any time, eg if any govt. is tight on numbers and needs a few extra TDs to stay in power. That proposal would have to make it through the Dail as per any other bill, and would be completely independent of the constitutional change.
J C wrote: » Not necessarily ... but there is a moral imperative to treat them with respect. They could be 'adopted' by another woman wishing to become pregnant, but finding it impossible with her own eggs.
Their primary method of operation is by preventing ovulation. A secondary mechanism may prevent implantaion. These contraceptives haven't been adjudged to fall foul of the 8th ... so no need to repeal the 8th to allow the morning after pill. The 8th is a reasonably balanced piece of equality legislation.
How do you define a person? It would seem to me that a baby-like foetus is no more or less a person than a newborn. A newborn is almost as helpless and under-developed (relative to an adult) as a foetus is. A newborn can't walk, talk or even control it's limbs or bodily functions. There is no substantive difference between a newborn and a 10-week old foetus.
The idea should be to minimise abortions (which almost everyone agrees are not good for either women or children). ... introducing legislation to open the floodgates to unlimited abortion is going the wrong way IMO. ... its just increasing the long-term misery for women who have abortions ... and increasing the killing of unborn children.
