From: feathers@serss0 (Michael Feathers)
Newsgroups: talk.abortion,alt.society.civil-liberty,alt.rush-limbaugh
Subject: Re: Pro-choicers must condone infanticide
Date: 17 Dec 92 23:53:05 GMT
Organization: Florida International University, Miami

In article <gf=h2Uy00iV2I7iYcZ@andrew.cmu.edu> ml3e+@andrew.cmu.edu (Michael Loomis) writes:
>Excerpts from netnews.talk.abortion: 15-Dec-92 Pro-choicers must condone
>i.. by Doug Holtsinger@csl36h.c 
>> Clearly, pro-choicers who support unrestricted abortion-on-
>> demand must argue that the child should not be considered
>> as a person.  This position implies that newborn infants 
>> are not persons, since there is no difference between a 
>> late-term fetus and an infant, and hence these pro-choicers 
>> must condone infanticide.
>
>Like Mr. Holtsinger, I too see no particular reason to oppose a woman
>who wishes to kill her own newly born child.  The surprising concept is
>that there exists people who would forbid a woman who wishes to kill her
>newly born child from doing so.  It seems merely another manifestation
>of the cruelty in society that has lead to so much suffering.  We just
>need to love each other more.
>
>Michaeloomis

Count me in also.  The fact is that most people never stop and consider
why murder is wrong.  They know that they never want to get killed but
they never perform any introspection and wonder why.  Personally, I blame
it on Phil Donahue and the rest of the mindless talk show caravan.

Here is the reasoning:  People do not want to be murdered because people
generally enjoy living.  A devil's advocate could say "well.. what if people
are killed in their sleep by a murder?  Is murder still wrong if victim
never knows he/she is murdered?"  I'd say that it is still wrong because
each person who has been conscious has an expectation of life.  Murder is
wrong because it is a crime against beings i.e., entities which have been
conscious at least once.

Based upon that reasoning abortion and infanticide both are not crimes 
against a "person" unless that "person" has been conscious.  Although,
I can think of numerous reasons that a society would want to keep infanticide
illegal.  Personally, I wouldn't have minded being aborted, basically 
because there would not have been a *me* to mind it.

Side note...

If I remember correctly, ancient greek society used to condone infanticide
and I believe the early catholic church used to look the other way also 
for generally the same reason: they both believed that the soul or the
consciousness spark only enters an infant a good while after birth.  Both
positions were made in societies which held reason in esteem.  I do not
think that our culture is capable of thinking beyond the neuro-chemicals
that are created when we see something that meets our biological template
for cuteness.  The fact that some people get in a lather of the killing
of baby seals with single stroke of a club and don't say anything about
people who pull fish around on hooks for hours and let them 
asphyxiate on a boat deck...   that says something about biologically
triggered aesthetics dulls the intellect, doesn't it?

 
Newsgroups: talk.abortion,alt.fan.rush-limbaugh