Abortion: Why is a lump of flesh worth more than another lump of flesh

• 1) Yes.
• 2) Yes.
• 3) ~shrug~ Keep working on it.

Right, but, practically speaking, what's your position on whether abortion should be legal operating under the assumption that we live in the real world, presuming that the legality of abortion as it stands at this very moment in time is up for debate, controlling for all other variables?

Also, I'd suggest that if it turns out that embryonic stem-cells can be used to save lives and that abortions (like, first week stuff) are required to gather those, it may be the case that there's still some kind of tradeoff just from that-but I concede to not knowing the science on the topic.

The legality of abortion at the moment is irrelevant to me, as the necessary social/governmental changes have not been made yet. When such changes are in place, I'll worry about whether or not it's legal.

As for embryonic stem cell research, whether or not I support it depends on what it's for, and I thought they had umbilical cord stem cells and/or could do things with adult stem cells now, or something like that, so the whole embryonic stem cell thing had lost relevance...

The legality of abortion under current circumstances is what I'm asking you about. You can't just avoid the question like that!

That is to say, if you had POWER UNLIMITED POWER!!! but only to decide whether abortion should be legal now what would you decision be.

edited 23rd Jan '12 5:03:06 PM by TheyCallMeTomu

I'm not avoiding the question. The answer is "it doesn't really matter, because the other things that must necessarily be done before the abortion question can be properly answered are not done, and thus asking the question prematurely is pointless." I'm not exactly happy that it's legal, but it's not the actual issue yet.

As for "if I had unlimited power," I really doubt abortion would be top of the cue, actually.

You are dodging the question.

Holding all else equal-the country overturned Roe v Wade somehow, and then there's a bill that will put it into the constitution that abortion is illegal except under circumstances 1 and 2. You are the deciding vote on this piece of legislation. The country is-somehow-otherwise identical.

What. Do. You. Do?

<Flyboy> I don't vote-I'm not yet 18.

<mod-had> Calling a thread time-out until I finish looking over the last few pages. </mod-hat>

Presuming that we're talking about the country as it is now, rather than as it should be ideally?

I could not in good conscious vote either for or against such a thing. Either choice would probably be morally wrong, to varying degrees.

God dammit. Okay.

<mod-hat> Flyboy. Tomu. Stop talking at each other in circles. I don't want to see pages of just the two of you passive aggressively sniping at each other, understand? </mod-hat>

edited 23rd Jan '12 5:11:55 PM by Katrika

I'm not sure I know what the distinction between "passive aggressively sniping" and "focusing on an individual troper as part of an intelligent argument" is. Could you be more specific?

Re: Flyboy's response: So, you're morally neutral to it, then, so that if your vote is worth two votes, then if the electorate says "No abortions!" then you'd "decide" for no abortions, and if the electorate says "Abortions for everyone!" then you'd decide yes abortions-but a decision by inaction, then?

And yes, I'm being a bit bombastic when I say "No abortions/yes abortions" we're actually talking about the aforementioned decision tree, not "Mandatory abortions for everyone!" or some such nonsense.

I have come to the decision that it is morally wrong to advocate for the illegalization of abortion from the point it's at now, because society hasn't met the burden necessary to do so properly. At the same time, it is morally wrong to allow it to get any farther—say, by repealing the Hyde Amendment—and thus cause even more problems.

I guess you could say I treat it like I'd have treated communism as it was in the Cold War. Tolerable as a temporary measure where it was, but not something you wanted to spread or rapidly collapse without preparation (which ended up happening either way, but whatever).

The point I'm getting at is that, if you take action X (which can be as simple as not voting), abortion becomes illegal except in the case of rape/incest/save the mother's life. Your choice is between that, and the status quo. In order to maintain status quo, you have to vote-in order to overturn the status quo, you have to either not vote, or vote in favor of the proposal.

Would you vote/vote in favor of the proposal? If you would not vote, would your response be different if the deciding factor was voting in the other direction vs not voting?

Basically-if it's wrong to advocate for the illegalization of abortion as it stands, then isn't it wrong to decide-by action or inaction-that abortion is illegal as it stands?

edited 23rd Jan '12 5:28:18 PM by TheyCallMeTomu

TRANSLATION: Wait for someone else to post some stuff before continuing.

Oh.

So, you want us to not participate because others aren't participating? I guess it makes sense, if a fierce back and forth ends up scaring people off.

I fiercely disagree with that proposal though.

<modhat>I want you to leave off the back and forth because it's going nowhere and getting dangerously close to actionable personal attacks, and because you two apparently have a history of this.

Knock. It. Off.</modhat>

I'll drop the thread from my watchlist then. I don't remember who necro'd it in the first place, but it was probably unnecessary.

<modhat> Locking thread. </modhat>