From: bskendig@netcom.com (Brian Kendig)
Newsgroups: talk.abortion
Subject: Re: In Suzanne's Defense
Date: 29 Sep 92 15:59:23 GMT
Organization: Starfleet Headquarters: San Francisco

c164-ad@po.berkeley.edu (Martin Guerrero) wrote (in article <1992Sep29.082752.1337@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU>):
>The pro-life movement (I can't speak for it though) and I are concerned
>about HUMAN life BORN and UNBORN.  Human life begins at conception.  A 
>discussion on "PERSON" (a fight over semantics) may not even be that
>relevant.  It's a human life.  Doesn't that count for anything to people?

You speak about your position as if anybody who disagrees with you is
either nitpicking over semantics, or doesn't value human life at all.

I understand where you're coming from, Martin.  At first glance it
seems outrageous to be killing off human life, and why can't we just
make all women carry their unborn to term?

That's a very naive view of the situation, however.  I don't mean to
say that you haven't thought about it, but do you at least acknowledge
that there are women out there who had no idea that sex would get them
pregnant (undereducated teens), or who were forced into it (rape), or
who thought that contraception would be completely reliable, or for
whom something changed during pregnancy to give the woman a very good
reason not to want to have her child?  (Like coming down with a
disease whose treatment involvs drugs that would severely damage the
fetus, or going through intense emotional stress?)

To say that, well, let's just let every woman have an abortion any
time just 'cause she should is a position that's not thought out well
either (although it can be justified after some consideration, for
reasons I won't go into here).  We've got to reach a compromise.  What
is it that makes human life more special than animal life?  Can we
define exactly the qualities that make you more important than your
dog?  If we can, then can we consider a fetus against these qualities,
and find a point along its development at which it becomes the same
sort of stuff we are in more than just its DNA?

That's why the question of 'personhood', that which sets you and I
apart from animals and plants and rocks, is indeed very relevant to
this whole debate.  There's no question about it -- abortion involves
doing something nasty to the fetus, or doing something nasty to the
woman.  Pro-lifers tend to believe that if she didn't want a baby, she
should have kept her legs together in the first place.  Pro-choicers
tend to believe that a woman will never take a pregnancy lightly, and
that if she eventually decides that it would be best to not have a
child at this time, then she should be allowed that option, because
nobody else is qualified to make that decision for her.  Who are you
to tell her she has to give birth?

If you've thought a great deal about the situation and weighed the
alternatives and you've decided on a pro-life stance, then so be it; I
look forward to hearing your reasoning for choosing your position.
But asserting that "human life" is enough reason to put a woman
through nine months of pregnancy and possibly a lifetime she never
wanted tends to be looked on as an irresponsible and ill-thought-out
decision.

     << Brian >>

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_/_/_/       Brian Kendig  Macintosh Jedi           Live never to be ashamed
 _/_/   Starfleet Captain  Oracle Employee         if anything you do or say
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Newsgroups: talk.abortion,soc.men,alt.abortion.inequity