From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Newsgroups: talk.abortion
Subject: Re: Oh Steve! Oh Canada!
Date: 14 Apr 92 05:27:41 GMT
Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Labs, Livermore CA

In article <1992Apr14.015607.28531@cs.dal.ca> franklin@ug.cs.dal.ca (Steve Franklin) writes:
>In <1992Apr13.195424.16434@s1.gov> lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich) writes:

::Anti:
::Housewife
::High-school education
::Often Catholic
::Religiously observant
:   Heh... What a poor generalization. Well in any case, most of the women
:I konw who are pro-life (including those my family) include an engineer,
:lawyer, Chartered accountant, and teacher. Hmmmm... 

	Actually, Kristin Luker's study was based on a study on those
who participate in activism on abortion. She used those who spent more
than ten hours a week on the anti-abortion side and those who spent
more than five hours a week on the pro-choice side. Your family
clearly contans a lot of exceptions :-).

::Pro:
::Career woman
::College or university education
::Often "personal" religion or none
::Often nonobservant
:   A personal religion. Does that mean the worship of the self? 
:How lovely a religion. can I worship you too? no, I think not

	I think a personal religion is one that one has that one has
constructed oneself. It is NOT necessarily self-worship.

::Anti:
:
::Abortion makes possible a drastic form of optional motherhood, and
::therefore threatens identity as a mother. It suggests that babies are
::somehow expendable.
:   No... Abortion creates a drastic change in the concept of life. Women
:and men see this as a threat against the sanctity of life. It suggests
:that babies are expendable...

	Sanctity of fetal life, more likely. Why are fetuses supposed
to be off-limits? It seems to me like saying that a woman has the
painful duty to bear any children she conceives. Personally, I
disagree; I believe in voluntary motherhood.

::Pro:
:
::Abortion makes possible control over how many children one has, and
::helps keep motherhood from being involuntary. It is not the most
::pleasant thing in the world, but it is a good backup to birth control.
:Abortion reinforces the concern for the self. It is not the most
:pleasant thing in the world, but if you tell yourself it is a FETUS,
:and not an UNBORN CHILD, then it makes things easier. ALso, if you
:dont' see any pictures of it in it's 3rd trimester, it is also
:easy...

	Most abortions occur in the 1st trimester, though some in the
2nd trimester. 3rd trimester abortions, I think, should only be done
if absolutely medically necessary; restrictions then will probably not
affect the vast majority of abortions performed. I can see why
anti-abortionists are fond of citing the 3rd trimester; then, the
fetus definitely looks like a baby. The same cannot be said of an
embryo that is only a couple of weeks old, and which has gill bars and
a tail.

::	Just about all those on the Internet are people with careers,
::so we do not get many housewives. Not surprisingly, there is only one
::persistent anti-abortion woman here: Suzanne Forgach. In contrast to
:   I don't agree with this. i know lots of people here at school who
:have computer accounts and don't use them. The ones that _do_ use them
:more on average are those who dont' seem to hae anything better to do.
:I do not think the internet audience is a general population. I don't think
:it has to do with it's education or it's wisdom. I think it has to do
:with a specific mentality we are dealing with. The internet audience
:is exceptionally liberal, and mostly thinking of themselves.


	"Don't have anything better to do"??? Like you, Steve??? :-):-)