"Women are Hosts"

Discussion in 'Ethics, Morality, & Justice' started by ElectricFetus, Apr 1, 2017.

  1. billvon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    21,634
    If there were no fetal rights there would be no discussion. Since there is, your assumption is incorrect.
     
  2. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  3. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,935
    Is that not exactly what I have been saying?

    (I think you may have read my post without reading the previous ones, where I point out that the ascension to personhood must lie somewhere between conception and birth. It is just a matter of where.)

    Lifers/Choicers all agree a collection of cells has no rights.
    Lifers/Choicers all agree that a newborn has rights as a person.
    They only disagree in the middle bit.
     
    Last edited: Apr 2, 2017
  4. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  5. Michael 345 New year. PRESENT is 72 years oldl Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,077
    As a midwife Australia we were given a very short talk about the law covering births

    A born fetus becomes a person at the cutting of the umbilical cord

    Stillborn require burial formalities

    Miscarriage is generally left to the wishes of the family

    Medical and social issues should govern termination

    If non judgmental laws could be drafted as guidelines with suitable funded programs for ANY decision reached that would be ideal

    Just keep religion out of it if possible

    I understand this not always possible as the mother herself may bring Religion into the situation

    Perhaps better expressed as keep religion out of other mothers business

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  6. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  7. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,935
    That was decided as a practical marker, yes, but it is by no means a given. That point is what is in contention.

    I seriously doubt it would protect a (hypothetical) parent who decided that that was the time they wanted to abort the fetus. See?

    Another issue that is in contention.
     
  8. Michael 345 New year. PRESENT is 72 years oldl Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,077
    Agree

    But that's the marker we have

    If your senerio occurs the law would be called in for a ruling

    If the law was at 38 weeks gestation that would be a even more questionable marker

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  9. Bells Staff Member

    Messages:
    24,270
    And I am personally pro-life, but would never ever assume that my personal beliefs should apply to other women's bodies. I also recognise that this is a decision that should be left to the individual woman for herself and her body. Would I have an abortion? No. If my life were at extreme risk, then I should be free to make that decision for myself. In other words, it is not up to others to determine what I do with the contents of my uterus.

    Do I see validity in the pro-life argument? No. The reason I do not, even though I am personally pro-life, is that they are determined to control the bodies of women and take that decision away from them. As a woman who has been pregnant and had one problematic pregnancy and was advised to terminate, but chose to persist and was supported for my choice, that should be my choice and no-one else's.

    The pro-life brigade demand that what they say about women's bodies goes. Women are being denied the right to choose for themselves and their bodies.

    And I absolutely object to having people refer to my body as a host and removing my rights as a result of it. It should always be a personal and private matter that should remain between the woman and her doctor, not one where the State gets to sanction what women do with their bodies.

    The pro-life movement seeks to remove any right to the woman's body. Even when she is brain dead, they seek to continue to use her body as a "host", despite the wishes of her next of kin and what would have been her wishes. It is still her body and thus, her right and her choice. To demand that a potential for life that exists inside her body somehow or other has equal rights to her is the extremes that I find troubling and offensive. What we see from the pro-life movement is that that potential for life has more right to life than she does.

    And it is putting the lives of women at risk. Women who are miscarrying are being denied treatment because there is still a foetal heartbeat and we have seen one woman die in Ireland as a result of pro-life laws, and women in the US, for example, being allowed to go septic because of a miscarriage, with doctors in some hospitals refusing to treat them and do a D & C or induce labor, because there is a foetal heartbeat. Why? Because the so called life she is miscarrying has equal and/or more right to life to her.

    The notion of referring to women as hosts, is in a way, objectifying her as an incubator. It is deeply offensive and controlling.

    Most importantly, it has dangerous consequences and it is only a matter of time before more women die.
     
  10. Bells Staff Member

    Messages:
    24,270
    Lifer's demand that personhood be granted at the point of conception.

    Which is why some areas in the US, for example, are trying to pass laws that would result in miscarriages being subjected to criminal investigations.

    http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2011/02/miscarriage-death-penalty-georgia
    http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/bl...nes-some-miscarriages-as-qcriminal-homicideq-

    That's an interesting one, actually. Ask conservative pro-lifer's what they think about dropping bombs on hospitals in Muslim countries.. Or gun rights that endanger the life of newborns in domestic violence households where the newborn is at risk of being shot, or gun owners who leave guns out for children to play with, resulting in deaths of children and whether gun restrictions should be put in place to protect said newborns..
     
  11. ElectricFetus Sanity going, going, gone Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,523
    I'm talking about the question of "what is a right?" that is a whole other topic

    Question: do animals have rights? If so why is person-hood important? We can give specific rights to a fetus, irrelevant if it is a person or not. We can even say that it is a person, but it is parasitizing off another person who has the right to cut it off.

    Oh it has rights, it is just that its right to live is inferior to the mother's right to not have it feeding off her.

    Apparently the "women are host" guy believes otherwise

    And I agree that is what most of the pro-lifers believe, but not this "women are host" guy, his argument is that even the father has a rights over that fetus (He should have rights once it is born, but not while it is inside her) that she is purely a host(ess).
     
  12. Jeeves Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,089
    http://www.ncsl.org/research/health/fetal-homicide-state-laws.aspx
    That's because they're trying to catch up with the least enlightened banana republics
    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...e-crime-of-having-a-miscarriage-a7053501.html
    It's nothing to do with concern for the "baby". They prove, both in South America and in Darkest USA, that they don't give a damn about child welfare: these are the same states that refuse women adequate perinatal care, contraception, sex education, or protection from sexual predators; the same ones that don't care whether their children have decent food, shelter, education or protection from abuse.
    The whole fuss about "rights" to life is a sales-pitch to the ignorant, who keep chanting it without a second's reflection as to the quality of life they're forcing on people.
    It's all about putting women back in biblical serfdom. And that's all it's about.

    Oh, sorry, I forgot. It's about putting poor women down. The rich ones, and those with rich and influential patrons, can always terminate embarrassing pregnancies elsewhere, safely, in comfort and in secret. Conservatives want the good ol' days back, when the peasants were prolific, expendable and on the edge of starvation, so they could be made to do anything for their overlords.
     
    Last edited: Apr 2, 2017
  13. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    7,057
    Why differentiate between a sperm one nanosecond before penetration and a sperm one nanosecond after penetration?
     
  14. Jeeves Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,089
    And what about clones?
     
  15. billvon Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    21,634
    Because you have to draw the line somewhere.
     
  16. Michael 345 New year. PRESENT is 72 years oldl Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,077
    Funny that

    There is no line to be drawn

    Except if you want to divide

    LIFE before on the PAST side of the LINE

    and LIFE after on the FUTURE side of the LINE

    LIFE does not STOP and START

    It is a CONTINUUM

    From the time LIFE arose it has not stopped being LIFE

    It has diversified into many successful franchises with a common core of being LIFE

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
    sideshowbob and Jeeves like this.
  17. Michael 345 New year. PRESENT is 72 years oldl Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,077
    Funny that

    There is no line to be drawn

    Except if you want to divide

    LIFE before on the PAST side of the LINE

    and LIFE after on the FUTURE side of the LINE

    LIFE does not STOP and START

    It is a CONTINUUM

    From the time LIFE arose it has not stopped being LIFE

    It has diversified into many successful franchises with a common core of being LIFE

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  18. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,935
    Right, but you see that the woman's right to her body isn't necessarily the only rights involved here. There is (potentially) a competing set of rights - those of the unborn child.

    If that is actually what they want, then that's a big problem. I don't actually know their stated or implicit ulterior motive.

    Cynically though, it certainly sounds like Pro-choicers would want people to think that...

    Again, I plead ignorance of the facts agenda-wise. I feel the principle needs to be addressed before the practical can be effectively resolved.
     
    Last edited: Apr 3, 2017
  19. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,935
    A sperm is not a complete set of blueprints for a person. It is merely a list of as-yet unchosen options (the person on-order could get blue eyes. Not sure yet).
    There is no entity until both sets of chromosome define who it is.


    Obviously, it's a continuum. But the point of genetic combination that finally defines a complete genetic makeup is a pretty good 'earliest possible' point.
     
  20. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,935
    Clones still need two sets of chromosomes.
     
  21. Michael 345 New year. PRESENT is 72 years oldl Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,077
    Dispite what the American Constitution states we are not born with unalienable rights

    The rights you are born into are determined by where you are born and they are far from unalienable

    Most of the rights confered are a generalagreement from society

    Although not necessarily true most of the pro lifers have a religious bent

    Being a religious bent it assumes a superiority over mere mortals rights to pursuit of life and liberty and happiness

    Again get religion out of it

    Also the political bent who are only pandering to the religious bent for votes

    Concentrate on the overall health of the society

    Hard but not impossible

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  22. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    18,935
    I was thinking more of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
     
  23. Michael 345 New year. PRESENT is 72 years oldl Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,077
    I know of the Document

    Not that familiar with the contents

    However whatever rights it contains are given by mortals for mortals and I hope realistic

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     

Share This Page