I believe the "golden rule" to be a fair representation of worldwide morality. And I don't think abortion adhere's to it.
You still don't get it. There are most probably several factors as to why a person rapes. Should they be addressed? Yes. Should we allow rapes to happen while we address the factors involved? No. We can address the many factors involved in having an abortion while still not condoning or even allowing abortion to take place. She's poor, young, not ready, abused, ect. All of these can and should be address, but none excuse the individual act of abortion.
To quote again from an article I cited earlier: "Poland banned abortion in 1993 after decades of abortion on demand as a Soviet satellite. Since then, not only has the number of legal abortions dropped considerably, from 59,417 in 1990 to 151 in 1999 (these were for rape, problems with the fetus, or threats to the mother's life or health), but so has maternal and infant mortality. Maternal mortality, recorded at 15.2 per 100,000 live births in 1990, dropped to 7.3 per 100,000 by 1999. Infant mortality also showed a steady decline, from 18.1 in 1991 to just 8.9 in 1999 (and dropped again to 8.1 in 2000)." I would dispute the notion that Poland "a more brutish an[d] nasty society" now than it was under the imposed atheistic dogma of the Soviets. Let's apply your logic to laws banning racial discrimmination. Was it wrong to impose the "religious/political dogma" of the (predominately Christian) American civil rights movement on southern white racists? Would it have been better to instead try to understand why racists wanted to oppress black people and to then experiment with various public policies hoping to eliminate the "economic, social, and cultural causes" of racism?
** OH Huck, that article again!?! OK I suppose I have to repost my criticisms of it. ** Post 502 I have been pleading from the beginning that what is needed in tackling this issue is a desire to understand and a willingness to actually help people. And I have had to point out time and again that some are so biased and eager to score points against the other that they often see what they want to see or manipulate the ‘evidence’ the ‘facts’ to fit in with their predetermined viewpoint. Huck makes it very clear that at this point he just wants to score points “A central argument for abortion legalization is that outlawing abortion supposedly puts women in grave physical danger. The empirical data indicates otherwise:” He is like an overgrown puppy wagging it’s tail in eager anticipation of chewing aunt Maud’s ankle, look he seems to yap ‘you think this but I have facts from unbiased people to prove you wrong’ Well before I come to his ‘evidence’ and the ‘objective’ people presenting it, I would ask him to take a look at what he seem to be saying and see if he can see if their might be a flaw? From what I can tell he want to imply that in places where abortion is illegal the reported cases of death due to abortion are lower than in places were abortion is legal. Think about that statement. Are the reported deaths in a society were abortion is legal and out in the open likely to be more accurate about the reason for death than in places were abortion is illegal and hidden? As you say “precise figures for illegal activities are unattainable” how true, but for Huck the problem is that prejudice can cloud his judgement. **
** Post 503 So we come to an analysis of the article itself. It’s objectivity - It is written for and by employees of the NRLC who are the National Right to Life Committee. A body devoted to the anti’s cause. Randall K. O’Bannon I believe the PhD is in Philosophy He is a member of the Assembly of God. These are just two of the 16 nonnegotiable tenets of faith that all Assemblies of God churches and their members adhere to (1)The Scriptures, both the Old and New Testaments, are verbally inspired of God and are the revelation of God to man, the infallible, authoritative rule of faith and conduct. (15) There will be a final judgment in which the wicked dead will be raised and judged according to their works. Whosoever is not found written in the Book of Life, together with the devil and his angels, the beast and the false prophet, will be consigned to the everlasting punishment in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, which is the second death. http://ag.org/top/beliefs/truths_condensed.cfm ** To quote O’Bannon: We should treat life as one of God’s greatest gifts. People need to see our joy in serving Christ and living in this beautiful world He has made. A Christian who only sees life’s tribulations can’t convince anyone of the value of life. We need to celebrate births, weddings and other milestones with great joy. And we can even celebrate the value of life when faced with the death of believers. The Bible tells us that the death of those who have lived a godly life is precious in God’s sight. People must see the joy of our transformed life, the joy of our eternal hope, and that we have divine purpose in all that we do. http://pentecostalevangel.ag.org/co...4524_bannon.cfm Laura Antkowiak Hussey, M.P.M I believe the MPM stands for Master of Arts in Pastoral Ministry ** The content Now remember what I said about predetermined viewpoint, personal prejudice and wanting to score points getting in the way of objective thought. Experts comment on the difficulty in interpreting these complex statistics as one put it “Scanty data, however, make an accurate assessment of the status of abortion and abortion laws throughout the world a daunting, virtually impossible task”. In other words since the data doesn’t always say when and where abortion was or wasn’t a cause of death it is difficult to say how important it was in each case or country. This can be down to the methods of data collection. But even given these difficulties The articles wants to score a point so its argument is that pro abortionist believe that the legalization of abortion eliminates many threat to women's health. In that illegal abortions cause women to die. Personally I’d need more evidence one way or the other than set out in this poorly constructed piece. Also that is not my argument, if you asked me what was the major threat to women’s health in the world, I’d say it was the often dire social, economic and cultural conditions they have to live under. Abortion might be part of it but first we would need to understand the situation then act on it not go with a pre determined idea. They agree that social, economic and cultural conditions are important but they desperately want to score that point so they seem to claim that pro abortions say that abortion would bring maternal mortality figures down everywhere at a stroke. Well if someone did I’d call them a fool, but that is Randall and Laura’s assertion. So they argue that the biggest killer for people in undeveloped countries is such things as poor drinking water and sanitation, famine, malnutrition, the distance from healthcare if any healthcare is available and so on. Basic social, economic and cultural problems. Do they argue that governments like theirs (USA) that gives the lowest amount of aid (per gdp) should give more or have fair trade agreements or cancel third world debt. No. They seem to be implying aid money shouldn’t go to groups that in any way support abortion. You see they want to score points so the reason why resources don’t go to the upgrading of hospitals, equipment, emergency care, and medicines; meeting sanitation challenges and insuring the availability of clean water; and addressing agricultural, economic, and transportation issues that hinder food production and distribution. Is because so many resources are going to promote abortion. So the reason why things are so bad for women in the third world is because of pro abortionists. Twaddle really if you think about it. It therefore stands to reason (and here again they find ‘evidence’ to back them up) that the pro abortionist argument is bad for women’s health in the developed world. So they first seem to claim that the maternal mortality rates of a country reflect the number of death due to abortion (unproven). They then claim that countries that have legal abortion have drastically higher maternal mortality rates than countries that have made abortion illegal (unproven). For example that Ireland were abortion is illegal had MMR rates three and a half times lower than that reported for the UK where abortion is legal. I couldn’t find many of the figures that are quoted in the article anywhere else except in that article do you know where they got them since they don't seem to say. So I have used the official figures from the WHO. And they don’t seem to back up the articles claims. The WHO and UN figure (http://www3.who.int/whosis/menu.cfm...anguage=english) for 1990 and 1995 were Maternal mortality rate (per 100,000 live births) 1990 Ireland 10 Poland 19 UK 9 USA 12 Maternal mortality rate (per 100,000 live births) 1995 Poland 12 Ireland 9 UK 10 USA 12 Here is a long report on the 1995 figures http://www.childinfo.org/eddb/mat_mortal/matmor.pdf **
Post 504 So let us look at another veiwpoint Maternal mortality and its prevention. Schuitemaker NW, Gravenhorst JB, Van Geijn HP, Dekker GA, Van Dongen PW. Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Leiden University Medical Centre, The Netherlands. Maternal mortality rates in developed countries have declined steeply during the last 50 years. The introduction of sulphonamides and blood transfusion techniques contributed much to lowering maternal mortality rates. The maternal mortality rate in The Netherlands in 1983-1988 was 8.8/100,000 livebirths. In 57% substandard care factors could be identified. This suggests that further improvement in preventing maternal mortality is possible. Maternal mortality rates in developing countries are still unacceptably high as a result of high fertility and a high risk of dying each time a woman becomes pregnant. Complications of illegal abortion are responsible for 25-50% of maternal deaths. Safe contraception could probably result in an important reduction in the number of maternal deaths, but also the provision of accessible maternal health services is essential to reduce maternal mortality in developing countries. PIP: Physicians analyzed 1983-88 data on 99 maternal deaths in the netherlands to examine causes of death and to what degree substandard care contributed to the deaths. 65 cases were classified as direct maternal deaths, 14 ad indirect maternal deaths, and 20 as fortuitous maternal deaths. They did not include the 20 fortuitous deaths in the maternal mortality rate which stood at 8.8/100,000 live births. The physicians knew all the details in 66 maternal deaths. They identified substandard factors in 57% of these cases. Most of the cases associated with substandard care were women with pregnancy induced hypertension (eclampsia). The substandard care factors included patient or physician's delay, wrong diagnosis, insufficient knowledge of proper treatment, operating without knowledge of clotting disorders, interventions on patients in an unstable condition, inadequate postpartum and postoperative surveillance, and lack of organization. The leading direct cause of maternal death was eclampsia (34%) then thromboembolism (21%), and obstetric hemorrhage (19%). 41% of the women who died from eclampsia also suffered from cerebrovascular hemorrhage. Only 2 women died from septic abortion. The major indirect cause of maternal death was cerebrovascular hemorrhage (57%). Among the direct maternal deaths, 52% had disseminated intravascular coagulation and 25% had a cesarean section. As recently as 1935 in developed countries, puerperal sepsis was the leading cause of maternal deaths (50%) then obstetrical hemorrhage and eclampsia (25%). Mortality rates began to fall with the introduction of sulphonamides and later penicillin. In developing countries, however, maternal mortality remains very high. High rates are due to high fertility and a high risk of death each time a woman is pregnant. Availability of safe contraception and elimination of illegal abortions would reduce maternal mortality considerably. PMID: 1809606 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/...6&dopt=Abstract **
** Shane So your argument is that anyone can just one day decide to rape or murder someone. That you, me any of your friends and family could just decide to rape or murder someone for no reason what so ever? My dear Shane, you might think about seeking medical help, because that sounds very like paranoia. I mean how do you interact with people if you think that at any moment they could attack you for no rational reason? Wow man I’d hate to have your life. But let us think about this. You believe that no outside influences have any real impact on what at person does that “it ALWAYS boils down to individual choice” and that individuality of thought is virtually wholly independent and separate and uninfluenced by anything? Do you honestly think that if you had been taken from your mother at birth and placed in isolation, where you never talked with anyone, never received any education, and were feed on bread and water, that at your age now you had been released into Ohio that he would act and have the same thought processes as you? You seem to be claiming that social, economic and cultural factors have no influence on an individual’s though processes, that an individual’s choices are unconnected to any influence. Do you never question why you think in a certain way, why you like some things and dislike others, if you get angry do you wonder and do you ever think why you might be happy? If you don’t, it is never too late to start. **
** Shane I presume by the golden rule you are talking about the ethic of reciprocity? The Christian version being “Do to others as you would have them do to you." Well the first thing to warn you about is never go out with any Sadomasochists. The second is to explain that this is too simplistic otherwise we wouldn’t have so many laws or religious and political philosophies. It comes down to the position from which you view the rule and it’s interpretation. A bugler is shot and killed by the owner of the house. If the owner had been in the bugler’s position would he want to have being shot? You might argue that the owner would never have been in the buglers position, that the bugler by not following the rule doesn’t have the protection of the rule. So the rule is then “Do to others as you would have them do to you as long as they didn’t break the rule first” ** For instance, if the option is kill or be killed it is ruled self-defence. So the rule then is also “Do in others before they do you in." ** But there are other views of the ethic of reciprocity. How about “Treat others as you would treat yourself” So a company owner treats himself or herself to a pay rise does he treat his workers the same way? In fact shouldn’t they be on the same pay? How about …..Well I think you’ve got the idea. **
** You still don't get it. Well Shane m’old buddy, just how am I to ‘get it’ when you keep changing your mind. There are most probably several factors as to why a person rapes. You said most categorically that those factors were unimportant that "it ALWAYS boils down to individual choice". So if you believe that these factors of yours don’t really count why is it you think they should be addressed? I mean if you think that at any moment anyone could just decide to rape for no rational reason from any walk of life and from any background, just what ‘factors’ are you talking about and how are you going to address them? ** But putting that aside the argument you seem to be presenting is silly. First rape is a criminal offence, abortion is legal. Your argument seem to rest on the idea of changing the status of abortion to illegal which implies that you want to decriminalise rape? Otherwise the argument doesn’t make sense Think about it if your saying that it doesn’t matter if abortion is legal or illegal to deal with the factors involved with it, then it doesn’t matter that the thing you want to compare with, rape, is legal or illegal, and since rape is illegal now and abortion legal, if we change their status it wouldn’t matter. Well excuse me but I think rape should stay illegal and just what kind of person are you that wants it decriminalised? ** Rape is not chosen and nearly always about power and dominance it is still very badly under reported because of the sigma many people (male and female) feel that a confession will bring. Even with the long period that rape has been illegal, in the UK rape advisor think that the numbers we have could be only a third (some say a fifth) of the true number of occurrences. Abortion is chosen, and we have reasonably accurate figure because the practice is legal and discreet. If we want to deal with the factors that are associated in people wanting an abortion having those figure is a great indicator of if the policies are working. Make it illegal and it will not stop it will just go underground, like it seems to have in Poland, were the state figure don’t reflect the reality of the true numbers. **
Let's apply your logic to laws banning racial discrimmination. Was it wrong to impose the "religious/political dogma" of the (predominately Christian) American civil rights movement on southern white racists? Would it have been better to instead try to understand why racists wanted to oppress black people and to then experiment with various public policies hoping to eliminate the "economic, social, and cultural causes" of racism? Oh really Huck you truly have got to the bottom of the barrel of your arguements. It is always good to hear from an American about their history, it can be so enlightening. I mean take Huck’s lecture on the predominately Christian civil rights movement against those southern white racists. Isn’t it just good to know that all the Christians were against those evil southern white racists. So what were those evil southern white racists were they Muslims, maybe they were communists or some other form of godless atheists? You see I was always told that these evil southern racists claimed not to just to being ‘predominately’ but wholly Christian. I mean what the fuck is this Huck, because it certainly isn’t a rational argument, this isn’t just pathetic it is actually insulting to your readers intelligence. ** As to those civil rights laws they didn’t come in until 65 for fuck sake, just when did Jefferson say that all men were born equal, wasn’t he a Christian that owned slaves? As to racial discrimination do you think that was the end of it, you had the predominately Christian civil rights movement, so nothing more needs doing? From what I’m told and read the US is still a very racist country, I mean there was the research done that showed that companies would prefer to interview a white person with a criminal conviction and poor qualifications than a black man with good qualifications and a clean record. Jozak for one was shocked. Maybe you should be thinking about why some people discriminate against others try and understand their reasons? **
***** As I’ve said many times in the course of this thread with increasing amazement - I’m shocked. The quality of the arguments being presented by the anti’s is just dire, often completely illogical, irrational and ill thought through. So far I think only Jozak, to his credit, has produced an argument not based in someone’s religious faith. Please rather than just reacting or trying to score points - start thinking, read, ponder, look at the issues from many angles, use your brains, that is what they are there for. Hopefully yours Balbus *****
Here are the numbers you cited from the WHO: Maternal mortality rate (per 100,000 live births) 1990 Ireland 10 Poland 19 UK 9 USA 12 Maternal mortality rate (per 100,000 live births) 1995 Poland 12 Ireland 9 UK 10 USA 12 Note that Poland's decreased in the time abortion was largely banned. Note also that Ireland's is comparable to the UK's. As I understand it, these figures are for total maternal mortality, regardless of cause. Are you suggesting that many women in Poland and Ireland are dying from illegal abortions and their deaths are not being reported at all? That's a pretty fanciful argument. The author presents absolutely no evidence to support this claim. That is sheer conjecture. What do you suppose the "real" numbers are, and on what basis? Don't just conveniently claim that no evidence is available. I don't expect exact figures, but you must present at least some credible evidence, or your argument is worthless. I never said that things were perfect now. I simply said that the church-led civil rights movement was justified in pressuring the government to forcibly restrict racial discrimination. I asked if you agree, and you went on a tirade instead of answering my question.
** As I’ve said many times in the course of this thread with increasing amazement - I’m shocked. The quality of the arguments being presented by the anti’s is just dire, often completely illogical, irrational and ill thought through. So far I think only Jozak, to his credit, has produced an argument not based in someone’s religious faith. Please rather than just reacting or trying to score points - start thinking, read, ponder, look at the issues from many angles, use your brains, that is what they are there for. Hopefully yours Balbus **
** Gary Heavin is a Born Again fundamentalist Christian and also supports abstinence based sex education. Does anyone think that his reasons for supporting such things might be based on the same irrational ideas I’ve already mentioned? **
