From: stevef@bug.UUCP (Steven R Fordyce)
Newsgroups: alt.rush-limbaugh,talk.abortion
Subject: Re: rights and responsibilities
Summary: Is an unborn child a person?
Keywords: abortion
Date: 22 Jan 93 03:00:56 GMT
Reply-To: stevef@bug.UUCP (Steven R Fordyce)
Organization: Handmade Designs, Salem, OR, USA

In article <8JAN93.15355979@vax.clarku.edu> hsims@vax.clarku.edu writes:
|In a previous article, stevef@bug.UUCP (Steven R Fordyce) wrote:
|>In article <17DEC92.14494300@vax.clarku.edu> hsims@vax.clarku.edu writes:
|>|In a previous article, stevef@bug.UUCP (Steven R Fordyce) wrote:
|>|>How are they different?  To kill a new born child is unquestionably
|>|>murder.*  What happened in the few hours of the birthing process the
|>|>unborn child into a person?  
|>|
|>|Before the birthing process the fetus is using and living inside a woman's 
|>|body.  After birth it becomes an independent, legal person, no longer 
|>|occupying a woman's body.  It's a significant difference.
|> 
|>True (except that a newborn is not "independent"), but the difference
|>is not in the child (which I use here for both the born and unborn),
|>but in his surroundings.
|
|A newborn is not dependent on just one person.  A whole range of
|people can  provide whatever care a newborn needs.  If one person
|doesn't want to care for  him/her, someone else can.  If a pregnant
|woman doesn't want to take care of a  fetus, can someone else do it for
|her?  It's more than just the surroundings.  

This has been covered before.  It isn't relevant to the question of what
the unborn child is and the parents can't just abandon or kill their
born child.  Yes, they can leave him in the care of someone else, but it
is their responsibility to see that that happens, and it isn't always
possible, especially short term.  In other words, the parents
responsibilities are independent of the availability of someone else to
assume that responsibility.

You are simply avoiding the question: what makes the new born a person
if just a few moments before he wasn't.  You keep trying to shift to
the mother, but personhood is a quality of an entity.  It does not
depend on that entity's location or relationship with others.  Your
personhood does not depend on your independence from others.  By
accident or decease, you may find yourself completely dependent on
others.  You may even loose some Rights due to incompetence, but you
would still be a person and it would still be murder to kill you.

|Consider the damage and health risks associated with having a fetus
|inside  you.  Raising a newborn carries none of the same risks.

I have considered this, but it isn't relevant to the question of what
the unborn child is, which is the question at hand.

|>|>Where in the changes from conception to adulthood does the concepta
|>|>become a person?  There is no bright line, no change we can point to
|>|>that clearly marks this boundary, except conception.  
|>|
|>|Why not birth?  Seems like a very "bright line" to me.
|> 
|>Why birth?  What about the fetus himself has changed?  Principally only
|>that, after birth, he must breath for himself.  He is still dependent on
|>others for food (although I'll admit it needn't come from the mother
|>now, she is still legally responsible) and all other needs.
|
|Do you think conception is clearly marked?

Yes, reasonably so.

|How do you determine the exact moment of conception?

It isn't necessary to determine it in every case.  The point is there is
a definite transition and we know it has occurred.  Knowing the exact
point in an individual case is unimportant.

|Consider this - If conception takes place inside a  woman using an IUD,
|and the product of conception is washed away two weeks  later as a
|result of the IUD, has a person been killed?  Is this murder?

Yes, if the unborn child is a person, it is murder.

|>No I'm not.  If the unborn child is a person, then the mother may not
|>simply kill him for any non-vital rights she claims the child is
|>violating.  You can't kill a house-guest just because he has overstayed
|>his welcome and doesn't want to leave and you think he is violating your
|>rights.
|
|You can take all kinds of other actions to remove that house guest.  Call the 
|police and have them remove him.  In early abortions, there is no way to 
|remove a fetus without killing it.

That doesn't justify killing him if he is a person.  No matter how unfair
you think it is, that there is no way to remove the unborn child
without killing him, in no way justifies killing him.  If he isn't a
person, no justification is necessary.

|By the way, an unwanted fetus is doing a lot more than just
|overstaying its welcome.

I didn't say the analogy was perfect.  You are taking it into territory
I didn't intend.  I was trying to make my point clear, and the point
still stands: you can't kill a person for your convenience.

|It is posing health risks to the woman, and the woman is faced with a
|risk of death greater than zero for as long as the fetus is inside her.

Yes, but it isn't the imminent threat of death that would justify
using deadly force in self-defense against a person (see my previous
posting).  You pose a non-zero death threat to other drivers every time
you drive on the road with them.  However, that wouldn't justify their
killing you to eliminate that threat.

|>|If these fetuses were turning in to babies in an artificial 
|>|womb I'd agree with your arguement.  If a fetus is using a woman's body 
|>|against her will, there is a significant difference between that fetus and 
|>|your typical born person.
|> 
|>The child is still an imposition on the parents after birth.  Adoption
|>is possible, but not always.
|> 
|>In any case, there is no difference in the fetus in your two examples. 
|>If it is wrong to kill the fetus in one case, it is wrong in both. 
|>Likewise, if it is ok in one, it is ok in both.
|
|I've pointed out some of the differences.  

None of the differences you point to are differences in the child
himself.  And, none of the differences you point to would justify
killing a person.  Again, if the fetus isn't a person, then no
justification is necessary.
-- 
orstcs!opac!bug!stevef          I am the NRA              Steven R. Fordyce
uunet!sequent!ether!stevef         . . .  	        Deer are for Dinner
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