Post birth abortion-A disturbing trend?

[Ishmael]

According to some it is.

Pro post birth abortion growing

First of all I don't find it surprising at all. I first broached this subject on Lit. over 10 years ago. At that time no one here were proponents of the idea. And it's not a new idea either. Advanced civilizations of the past practiced post birth abortion, some sects of the Greeks (most notably the Trojans) and virtually all of the Romans. They called it 'exposing the child' but it was essentially the same thing. The shocker in this article is the age to which the proponents think the act is acceptable, 4 years of age?????? Even the ancients didn't allow things to go that far.

The new threshold with the proponents is no longer 'viability', the bar has been raised to 'self-awareness.' I think that more than a few parents that have raised children might take issue with the age threshold now being proposed.

What are your thoughts on the subject?

Ishmael

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Our cripples and old folks will be next. But we'll spare every Muslim cut-throat.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

A2D-OP: That what we have been saying all along is true. Create an indifference to and even a moral code justifying the taking of life and like all religions the new philosophy will race to "morality."

We have seen "hands of my body" conflated with "don't force your religion on me" so often here in the past. What then crawls into that vacuum was reflected in this month past with the behavior of the doctor and the nurse and their very selfish attitudes towards the safety of others. The doctor thinks it's okay to lie, the nurse thinks that it is okay to self-diagnose and additionally, the President thinks it makes him look good in the eyes of the world to open up the orders for the free passage of peoples and the diseases they carry.

This new morality, this new religion, is only going to get more extreme before it is forced to moderate if history is any indicator of the inclinations in human behavior. Like the King and the Priest of our Dark Ages, the new Leaders of morality will soon see more and more opportunities with each new generation to behave ethically and morally and relieve people of their burdens and "punishments" (as in a woman cannot be punished with a baby).

 

[subdued_passion]

I haven't read the article as I find it hard to believe that there are people out there who would recommend the murder of infants and toddlers as a contraceptive measure. If such people exist, I hope their mothers perform a post birth abortion on them.

 

[DesEsseintes]

I haven't read the article as I find it hard to believe that there are people out there who would recommend the murder of infants and toddlers as a contraceptive measure. If such people exist, I hope their mothers perform a post birth abortion on them.

It's a report by a right-wing website, based on admittedly anecdotal evidence by pro-life groups (including one called 'Abortion Holocaust Survivors' or similar, to give you an idea), who apparently go round asking loaded questions about 'post-birth abortion' on campuses rather than 'killing children' in order to make a clumsy point about slippery slope/thin end of the wedge style moral decline. And even in those circumstances, they admit that on some campuses they can find no-one who supports even their weaselly-worded version.

In other news, it's a non-story based on non-evidence which serves only to reinforce an already affirmed world-view amongst readers deaf to other evidence. For the record, liberal news is no better on that front. But I certainly wouldn't worry that this is, you know, true, or anything like that.

 

[unregistered]

 

[subdued_passion]

It's a report by a right-wing website, based on admittedly anecdotal evidence by pro-life groups (including one called 'Abortion Holocaust Survivors' or similar, to give you an idea), who apparently go round asking loaded questions about 'post-birth abortion' on campuses rather than 'killing children' in order to make a clumsy point about slippery slope/thin end of the wedge style moral decline. And even in those circumstances, they admit that on some campuses they can find no-one who supports even their weaselly-worded version.

In other news, it's a non-story based on non-evidence which serves only to reinforce an already affirmed world-view amongst readers deaf to other evidence. For the record, liberal news is no better on that front. But I certainly wouldn't worry that this is, you know, true, or anything like that.

So my trust in humanity was not misplaced? Phew.

 

[DesEsseintes]

Ah, Des, the voice of reason.

...is only one of my official titles.

Good to see you around, beautiful lady.

 

[Ishmael]

It's a report by a right-wing website, based on admittedly anecdotal evidence by pro-life groups (including one called 'Abortion Holocaust Survivors' or similar, to give you an idea), who apparently go round asking loaded questions about 'post-birth abortion' on campuses rather than 'killing children' in order to make a clumsy point about slippery slope/thin end of the wedge style moral decline. And even in those circumstances, they admit that on some campuses they can find no-one who supports even their weaselly-worded version.

In other news, it's a non-story based on non-evidence which serves only to reinforce an already affirmed world-view amongst readers deaf to other evidence. For the record, liberal news is no better on that front. But I certainly wouldn't worry that this is, you know, true, or anything like that.

Typical 'attack the source' response allowing the poster to avoid the subject altogether. The fact of the matter is that there has ALWAYS been a small sub-set of proponents of post birth abortions. The article merely asserts that those numbers appear to be growing.

Ishmael

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

ust when you thought the religious right couldn’t get any crazier, with its personhood amendments and its attacks on contraception, here comes the academic left with an even crazier idea: after-birth abortion.

No, I didn’t make this up. “Partial-birth abortion” is a term invented by pro-lifers. But “after-birth abortion” is a term invented by two philosophers, Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva. In the Journal of Medical Ethics, they propose:

[W]hen circumstances occur after birth such that they would have justified abortion, what we call after-birth abortion should be permissible. … [W]e propose to call this practice ‘after-birth abortion’, rather than ‘infanticide,’ to emphasize that the moral status of the individual killed is comparable with that of a fetus … rather than to that of a child. Therefore, we claim that killing a newborn could be ethically permissible in all the circumstances where abortion would be. Such circumstances include cases where the newborn has the potential to have an (at least) acceptable life, but the well-being of the family is at risk.

http://www.slate.com/articles/healt...ion_the_pro_choice_case_for_infanticide_.html

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Furedi accepts birth as the first logical time limit, though not for reasons of fetal development. (See her comments 44 minutes into this video.) But Giubilini and Minerva push beyond that limit. They note that neural development continues after birth and that the newborn doesn’t yet meet their definition of a “person”—“an individual who is capable of attributing to her own existence some (at least) basic value such that being deprived of this existence represents a loss to her.” Accordingly, they reason, “The moral status of an infant is equivalent to that of a fetus, that is, neither can be considered a ‘person’ in a morally relevant sense.”

See post #3.

 

[DesEsseintes]

Typical 'attack the source' response allowing the poster to avoid the subject altogether. The fact of the matter is that there has ALWAYS been a small sub-set of proponents of post birth abortions. The article merely asserts that those numbers appear to be growing.

Ishmael

I'm not attacking anything except the lack of evidence. Prove me wrong - get a nationwide polling agency to do a proper poll based on support for killing children up to the age of 5. If you get a statistically significant number above 0 I'd be amazed.

 

[subdued_passion]

Typical 'attack the source' response allowing the poster to avoid the subject altogether. The fact of the matter is that there has ALWAYS been a small sub-set of proponents of post birth abortions. The article merely asserts that those numbers appear to be growing.

Ishmael

You know, I've come across so many people who confuse postpone and prepone I find it easy to believe that many of the people saying yes to post birth abortion in all likelihood don't understand that they are discussing the slaughter of babies.

 

[John Doe]

I haven't read the article as I find it hard to believe that there are people out there who would recommend the murder of infants and toddlers as a contraceptive measure. If such people exist, I hope their mothers perform a post birth abortion on them.

It's third-hand information. The article quotes "prolife activists" who claim to have spoken with university students that find infanticide "morally acceptable".

And from a website that's upfront about its political bias no less. Its slogan: "Your daily dose of right-minded campus news and commentary from across the nation" (emphasis theirs).

 

[John Doe]

So my trust in humanity was not misplaced? Phew.

It may still be misplaced, but for other reasons.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Typical 'attack the source' response allowing the poster to avoid the subject altogether. The fact of the matter is that there has ALWAYS been a small sub-set of proponents of post birth abortions. The article merely asserts that those numbers appear to be growing.

Ishmael

Substitute any Social Cause with the word government, including abortion limits:

There is black and white, and if you refuse to believe that, then you will accept grey and let me tell you gray tends to black for when you say ∃ of anything is a good function of government then ∃ is everything ¬∀ and while you may be able to advocate for ∃ you won't be allowed to define it and in this manner its limit will be ∀ for ∑f(∪∃)i [i=from you to the total population] will never tend to ∅ by definition so it is easy to see that it is, indeed, an ∀ or ∅ when it comes to government. (Now, the ∑f(∩∃)i [i=from you to the total population] will tend to ∅ but that is politically unattainable for the obvious reason that the more ∃ is defined, the smaller the ∩∃ becomes.)
A_J, the Stupid

In short, for those who cannot follow, there is a large subset of the population that agrees on abortion. They differ on the timeline of life, but in order to reach consensus and compromise (and thus a critical voting mass), they will err to the side of slight discomfort in order to be reasonable. With time they can thus then be "reasoned" along a little further down the path if they sense they are becoming marginalized and will again compromise that belief to a position just a slightly bit less uncomfortable.

 

[DesEsseintes]

See post #3.

Philosophical thought-experiments are often useful in order to find out where our boundaries lie. The whole point with personhood is that, unless you believe it begins with conception, the definitions are almost infinitely flexible. The Nazis didn't believe Jews were persons. The Spartans didn't believe their helots were, nor the Romans their slaves. If we define cognitive development, self-awareness, etc as key, then it is factually correct to say that some of the great apes are more 'persons' than some new-born babies, people in persistent vegetative states or advanced dementia, etc, etc. That does not mean to say that we go on to kill those people. You cannot, as Hume wrote, move from an 'is' to an 'ought'.

 

[John Doe]

Philosophical thought-experiments are often useful in order to find out where our boundaries lie. The whole point with personhood is that, unless you believe it begins with conception, the definitions are almost infinitely flexible. The Nazis didn't believe Jews were persons. The Spartans didn't believe their helots were, nor the Romans their slaves. If we define cognitive development, self-awareness, etc as key, then it is factually correct to say that some of the great apes are more 'persons' than some new-born babies, people in persistent vegetative states or advanced dementia, etc, etc. That does not mean to say that we go on to kill those people. You cannot, as Hume wrote, move from an 'is' to an 'ought'.

I haven't read Hume lately. I think it's time to rectify that.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Philosophical thought-experiments are often useful in order to find out where our boundaries lie. The whole point with personhood is that, unless you believe it begins with conception, the definitions are almost infinitely flexible. The Nazis didn't believe Jews were persons. The Spartans didn't believe their helots were, nor the Romans their slaves. If we define cognitive development, self-awareness, etc as key, then it is factually correct to say that some of the great apes are more 'persons' than some new-born babies, people in persistent vegetative states or advanced dementia, etc, etc. That does not mean to say that we go on to kill those people. You cannot, as Hume wrote, move from an 'is' to an 'ought'.

I just addressed that and why I feel the definition has to be conception.

I, too, though, in order to be "reasonable" and not relentlessly attacked for being a Christian Moralist* and worse, have been willing to go to the slightly uncomfortable position of the day-after pill, when every logical construct assures me that this then makes me a wiling participant in the larger overall problem of devaluing life for individual convenience.

Bring on the artificial womb!




* I am actually an Atheist.

 

[DesEsseintes]

I haven't read Hume lately. I think it's time to rectify that.

Never a bad time to reread the Enquiry. Good to meet a fellow inquirer, sir.

 

[subdued_passion]

It may still be misplaced, but for other reasons.

Nope. People are always more than you give them credit for- more sincere, more assholish... more.

Substitute any Social Cause with the word government, including abortion limits:

There is black and white, and if you refuse to believe that, then you will accept grey and let me tell you gray tends to black for when you say ∃ of anything is a good function of government then ∃ is everything ¬∀ and while you may be able to advocate for ∃ you won't be allowed to define it and in this manner its limit will be ∀ for ∑f(∪∃)i [i=from you to the total population] will never tend to ∅ by definition so it is easy to see that it is, indeed, an ∀ or ∅ when it comes to government. (Now, the ∑f(∩∃)i [i=from you to the total population] will tend to ∅ but that is politically unattainable for the obvious reason that the more ∃ is defined, the smaller the ∩∃ becomes.)
A_J, the Stupid

In short, for those who cannot follow, there is a large subset of the population that agrees on abortion. They differ on the timeline of life, but in order to reach consensus and compromise (and thus a critical voting mass), they will err to the side of slight discomfort in order to be reasonable. With time they can thus then be "reasoned" along a little further down the path if they sense they are becoming marginalized and will again compromise that belief to a position just a slightly bit less uncomfortable.

The whole timeline thing is a slippery slope but only to the extent that medical science will allow, because there is a safe period for a medical termination of a pregnancy. Doctors aren't going to risk the mother's life by trying to abort a baby in the third trimester unless some serious medical complications leave them with no alternatives.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

...

The whole timeline thing is a slippery slope but only to the extent that medical science will allow, because there is a safe period for a medical termination of a pregnancy. Doctors aren't going to risk the mother's life by trying to abort a baby in the third trimester unless some serious medical complications leave them with no alternatives.

Perhaps.

Now, you see we start running up against the pro-abortion rhetoric. If you deny a woman her right to a doctor-assisted abortion and she wants it badly, then you are condemning her to "the back alley coat hangers..."



... and as we see with Gosnell and Tiller, that there are doctors out there who have no problem what-so-ever with performing such a procedure.

 

[about_average]

http://www.slate.com/articles/healt...ion_the_pro_choice_case_for_infanticide_.html

And here's a more recent piece by the guy who wrote the above.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/saletan/...ing_web_sites_turned_my_old_article_into.html

 

[Que]

If it is moral to kill a collection of cells that, if left alone will grow into a sentient person without regard to when that might occur, it is at least as moral to kill someone who was once sentient, and never will be again.

You absolutely cannot make the criterion for person hood whether the person is aware they are a person.

Once you open Pandora's box of deciding whether a life is to be valued, you cannot justify any of this with any claim of moral authority.

You can decide to do what you wish for pragmatic reasons, for reasons of no living victim to complain, but that set of "morals" means any murder where the victim doesn't see it coming and is not missed by anyone OK.

Spend sometime with a severely, multiply handicapped person. Someone incapable of communicating at all. Not even an eye-blink. If, in their presence, you cannot sense a living soul in there, you have no soul yourself.

Plenty of people do not believe in any version of a person having some vital essence. People are just collections of cells and random memories based on life experiences. I pity such people.

I have five children. Each of them came intact from birth with individual and unique personalities. If some accident in utero up to the present left them unable to communicate, they would still have their own, unique essence. These college students interviewed, likely have no experience with the wonder that is new life.

 

[Ishmael]

Any discussion of this sort always, and necessarily, dives into the realm of ethics. But there are legal implications as well. If such a notion were to catch hold would the decision to terminate require the ascent of both parties or could either party, unilaterally, decide to terminate? Or would the party(s) wanting the termination have to petition a court for the order to do so?

Most life insurance policies become effective upon the fact of 'live birth.' Would the insurer be required to pay up if the decision to terminate were actualized? Or would there be an exclusion clause? Or alternatively no policy would cover any infant under the elective termination age?

Ishmael