Abortion...what factors contribute to the number of abortions performed in this count

Bowser:

Have you ever heard the following distinction between socialism and capitalism?

Socialism assumes people and their institutions are perfect, or at least can be made that
way. The result is an economic disaster for everyone. Capitalism assumes people and
institutions are never perfect and USES that fact. The result is prosperity for most with
disaster for unfortunate few. One can claim that capitalism is less moral because it accepts a priopri that some will fail. Socialism loftily tries to empower everyone, but fails to deliver.

Same with personal behavior. I believe in teaching people to be responsible and to
understand the consequences of their actions, but not to legislate morality nor treat
people's actions
judgmentally. Yes, with this approach some will end up having abortions or addicted to heroin, or both. But a lot fewer than in a climate of moral superiority where they are told "This is the right way, and don't even think of straying!" It does not work.

And as for your other point, while Europe certainly produced its share of monsters, they were never known for moral permissivness. In Hitler's Germany abortion was a prison offense, homosexuality was punished by death, and women's role was to be "Aryan Mothers". Hitler would have despised today's Europe.
 
Letticia,

Thanx for the link. I will give it a look later. My time is limited. I will hold my response to you for later.

<hr>

Tiassa,

"And we, the People of the United States of America have brought the world Manifest Destiny, the atomic bomb, and a worldwide economy whose biggest influence happens to be the one group of people (Americans) who refuse to give other people any consideration whatsoever in matters economic."

Where Europe is concerned, we Americans sacrificed thousands of lives in order to end two world wars. We spent millions of dollars to rebuild ravaged economies and to feed millions after those wars. We did not stay as victors but rather as protectors against other dictorial threats (communism). We released those peoples to govern themselves as they chose. America's morality saved Europe from it's greatest dangers...Fascism and communism. If we Americans were not so morally obligated to helping our "European neighbors," they would be goose-stepping now.



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It's all very large.
 
Where Europe is concerned, we Americans sacrificed thousands of lives in order to end two world wars. We spent millions of dollars to rebuild ravaged economies and to feed millions after those wars. We did not stay as victors but rather as protectors against other dictorial threats (communism). We released those peoples to govern themselves as they chose. America's morality saved Europe from it's greatest dangers...Fascism and communism. If we Americans were not so morally obligated to helping our "European neighbors," they would be goose-stepping now.
Click to expand...

I believe what you're describing is referred to as Jingoism.

What has that to do with Europeans being perverts? That since we fought a couple of wars there, they owe it to us to be perverts if we say they are?

thanx,
Tiassa :cool:

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Whether God exists or does not exist, He has come to rank among the most sublime and useless truths.--Denis Diderot
 
"Jingoism" <img src = "http://www.exosci.com/ubb/icons/icon10.gif">

I suppose you might percieve it that way--more so if you can't accept the positive contributions and the many sacrifices which are attributed to American morality. The Europeans are free to be perverts simply because we were there to defend their freedom. Our Christian values saved their free will. <img src = "http://www.exosci.com/ubb/icons/icon10.gif">

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It's all very large.
 
It's hard for me to contest American morality because American morality doesn't exist. By and large, American morality is a commercial scheme.

But the notion of American morality isn't so far-fetched for me to swallow.

Rather, it's your ethnocentric, jingoist assertion that Europeans are perverts.

It seems that, in the face of contradictory evidence concerning your notions about Europeans, the argumentative implications no longer need to matter since, as you've so eloquently characterized, Europeans are perverts, and they owe Americans such respect that the idea of reality has little to do with the issues at hand.

Tell Central America what the effect of American anti-communism is. And then listen to what they tell you.

Or are they, too, perverts, since they owe so much of their present condition to American morality?

thanx,
Tiassa :cool:

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Whether God exists or does not exist, He has come to rank among the most sublime and useless truths.--Denis Diderot
 
Our Christian values saved their free will.
Click to expand...

From Columbus' landing forward, morality in America has never been about "Christian values", except those that honor dominion, conquest, and greed.

American morality honors Genocide. But, as per the topic ... I suppose we need not worry about that since genocide's more acceptable than abortion?

thanx,
Tiassa :cool:

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Whether God exists or does not exist, He has come to rank among the most sublime and useless truths.--Denis Diderot
 
"From Columbus' landing forward, morality in America has never been about "Christian values", except those that honor dominion, conquest, and greed."

Yes, the European perversion of morality was devistating for the natives. Dominion, conquest, and greed...who brought those to America? I believe that our identity has evolved past that of those across the Atlantic. Maybe we have taken what is best of those old perverted values and are shaking off the dirt.

"American morality honors Genocide. But, as per the topic ... I suppose we need not worry about that since genocide's more acceptable than abortion?"

Certainly our early European heritage gave us the moral justification for such acts, but we have grown past that.

Also, the cultures which were destroyed by the early European invaders had, at the very least, an opportunity to fight back or run away. A fetus doesn't have even that much. I suppose it is easier to suck a child out of its womb than it is to face the moral responsibility.

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It's all very large.
 
Letticia,

Thanx again for the link. I need to go back for more reading later. From what I've seen, there is a lot of room for error in those numbers...


<hr>"For the United States, we used data published by The Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI) in preference to government statistics, which are incomplete for many states."

"For France and Italy, we used estimates made by local experts.13 For the remaining countries, we took into account the opinions of local experts, as well as abortion rates in countries with a similar profile of abortion service provision and similar legal and social conditions regarding abortion. Seventy-one percent of our estimated number of legal abortions worldwide were reported and 29% were estimates of uncounted abortions."

"Data compilations published by the Council of Europe and the United Nations (UN) were used if data were unobtainable or if gaps existed in available official data.14 For some countries, we used birth estimates provided by the Population Reference Bureau. For countries for which we could not obtain official estimates of the population of women aged 15–44, we relied on the estimates of the UN Population Division15 and interpolated where necessary."
<hr>
These are the numbers which I found through your link:

<hr>
Northern America 1.5 Million Abortions
Europe 7.7 Million Abortions
<hr>

I'll get back to your post later.

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It's all very large.
 
Latticia,

<hr>
"Have you ever heard the following distinction between socialism and capitalism?

Socialism assumes people and their institutions are perfect, or at least can be made that
way. The result is an economic disaster for everyone. Capitalism assumes people and
institutions are never perfect and USES that fact. The result is prosperity for most with
disaster for unfortunate few. One can claim that capitalism is less moral because it accepts a priopri that some will fail. Socialism loftily tries to empower everyone, but fails to deliver."

First of all, is "priopri" truly a word? <img src = "http://www.exosci.com/ubb/icons/icon10.gif"> Truly, if I gain nothing else from my exposure to these message boards, I will walk away with a larger vocabulary--at the very least.

Anyway, that is an interesting analogy, but it is also a can of worms and a whole other topic for argument. I won't touch it here.

"Same with personal behavior. I believe in teaching people to be responsible and to
understand the consequences of their actions, but not to legislate morality nor treat
people's actions
judgmentally. Yes, with this approach some will end up having abortions or addicted to heroin, or both. But a lot fewer than in a climate of moral superiority where they are told "This is the right way, and don't even think of straying!" It does not work."

Morality is responsibility, a responsibility to others as well as to yourself. When a woman becomes pregnant with an unwanted child, it is not because morality has failed them. Look, contraception has been a topic of American education since the 40's. The one difference between then and now is that there has been a change in our perception of morality. If we now have a problem with abortion, it is because education has failed, not morality.

"And as for your other point, while Europe certainly produced its share of monsters, they were never known for moral permissivness. In Hitler's Germany abortion was a prison offense, homosexuality was punished by death, and women's role was to be "Aryan Mothers". Hitler would have despised today's Europe."

No comment... <img src = "http://www.exosci.com/ubb/icons/icon12.gif">




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It's all very large.
 
Jingoist denial.

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Whether God exists or does not exist, He has come to rank among the most sublime and useless truths.--Denis Diderot
 
"Jingoist denial."<img src = "http://www.exosci.com/ubb/icons/icon10.gif">

Too late in the day to argue about it.

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It's all very large.
 
Education ....

--teaches us about our bodies, and how to use and abuse them properly.

--teaches us about our world, so that we might relate to other human beings in a manner conducive to the advancement of the human endeavor.

--teaches us about our world so that we might relate to things not human without unnecessary fear and its accompanient menagerie of damages.

--teaches us about our human conventions, the artifices of society (economy, government, religion, &c), so that we might exist within them, employ, exploit, and refine them in a manner conducive to the advancement of the human endeavor.

... in relation to abortions ...

* Education offers women (who, by proxy of biology, have the abortions) the skills to participate in society in a manner not "reduced" to a breeding factory.

* Education offers men (who, by proxy of biology, knock up the women who have abortions) manifold reasons to respect what biology teaches (via education) about women (whom the men knock up, as covered above).

* Education offers men and women alike (since reproduction is a two-way street) the ability to make responsible and informed choices regarding their participation in the human endeavor.

* Education offers both individuals and the collective society "opportunity", a perennial political buzzword that, when unadulterated by a candidate's glittering smile, has some meaning.

* Education cultivates the idea of human independence, and thus the idea of consent. (In 1875 the age of consent was 10 years old for a girl in Massachusetts; consent could be won with gifts, essentially through prostitution. I don't think the 2 and 2 are difficult to add here.)

* Education cultivates responsibility by instilling in the individual the ability to perceive the relevant factors in making a responsible decision.

Education leads to knowledge, economic empowerment, and independence. So long as we refuse these things of all human beings, they will continue to behave in a manner which results in the many abortions we see.

Life should never be its own worst enemy. Human beings, however, can make it so.

As we learn about nature, we learn to manipulate it. Since we're all on-line here, I'll just remind that we all have electricity, so yes, we learn to manipulate nature. As we learn more about how we, the people, function together, why should we not learn from the mistakes of our past, and thus manipulate our own human nature by deliberate will?

We can, if we educate people.

Ignorance only helps those persons who would oppress--willfully hurt--the ignorant.

Consider the schoolborne issue of sex education in public institutions. Is sexuality something reserved for the home? Ideally, yes. Is it the "right" of the parent? Most certainly. Does the parent have a responsibility that coincides with that right? Well, if the parent isn't selfish, and understands (via education) what's at stake when we--as Spooner accuses--keep our children ignorant in order to maintain the illusion of virtue, then the child might reach maturity with enough proper information to not make irresponsible choices out of virtuous ignorance.

The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. The dumber we raise children to be, the dumber adults they are. How stupid do we want them?

thanx,
Tiassa :cool:

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Whether God exists or does not exist, He has come to rank among the most sublime and useless truths.--Denis Diderot
 
Sure, education is good, bot it's not the total answer. It is useless without morality.

<hr>
Northern America 1.5 Million Abortions
Europe 7.7 Million Abortions
<hr>

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It's all very large.
 
Education, unadulterated by artificial demands, provides the individual the opportunity and authority to recognize morality.

It's when we start claiming it to be a "right" to lie to our child because it's simply easier than telling them the truth that we get into trouble.

Consider, simply, the fact that a parent has chosen to add another human being to the fray, and is responsible for raising that person. It is my feeling that the parent has an obligation to do their damnedest to raise that child "properly". Now, if the arbitrary moral conditions which are a parent's "right" incite the child to advocate conditions detrimental to humans individually or collectively, then what has that right garnered, except the satisfaction of having created a negative force on the face of the earth. Hardly the goal of either morality or parenthood, eh?

I mean, just because a parent wants it to be so doesn't mean it is. And they should consider what happens when they teach the child the lie as truth.

Is it just that some people are so bitter about being unable to be moral without the force of threat that they want all of us to feel so threatened?

Damn ... it's just so sad. All of these people who need God to tell them that abortion's wrong.

Or has it never occurred to those anti-abortion folk who happen to be religious that the pro-choice crowd have no greater desire for abortion? That's possible ... anyone happen to be religious and anti-abortion who wants to chime in with a bit of an image of how you see the typical choice advocate?

All I'm getting at with that is that those of us who believe in safe, legal abortion as a medical alternative don't particularly enjoy the thought of abortions. We happen to find it a tragedy. But we would rather that every child be a planned, wanted child, period.

Religious anti-aboritonists quite often give the appearance of not giving a rat's behind about that aspect of it. From where I sit, it often takes the appearance of religious people angrily trying to extend their dominion over other people.

I consider anti-abortionism as the religious, so-called "pro-life" movement describes it, to be counterproductive to any goal of reducing the number of abortions performed.

True Anti-Abortionism would call for economic justice, education, social equality, and personal responsibility. So far, religious anti-abortionism favors personal responsibility because it's easier for the anti-abortionist.

(I'm happy to have those notions demonstratively dispelled, but that's a mighty tall effort.)

thanx,
Tiassa :cool:

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Whether God exists or does not exist, He has come to rank among the most sublime and useless truths.--Denis Diderot

[This message has been edited by tiassa (edited October 08, 2000).]
 
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