SCOTUS removes Roe V Wade

[Jastall]

In respecting @tehdang's opinions on abortion, assuming what he's conversed about the topic with me is what he truly feels, his opposition to abortion is relatively tame among the pro-life crowd. He seems generally ok with abortion before viability.

But he has an unhealthy obsession with the 3rd trimester, and some seemingly simmering worry that doctors and pregnant women are doing evil shit. When that's as far away from the truth as you can get. I don't know if there's any logic he can accept in regards to that. Abortions in the 3rd trimester are just so fucking rare these days(and necessary!), and I don't know why he can't see that.

Because the third trimester is the politically expedient argument. It's a lot easier to frame abortion as killing babies when you talk about the times where it happens at later stages of viability, rather than the overwhelming majority of cases where it's earlier and less questionable all-around for anyone who isn't a zealot on the matter. He'll likely quote statistics at you like there being 10k+ "late term" abortions per year in the US, but last time I bothered to contest that number he basically picked and chose it based on a very select source (given that there's nowhere near a consensus as to what a late-term abortion is amongst professionals) and ignored the actual reasons why those happened, preferring to believe the fiction you present that a number of doctors are chomping at the bits to rip babies out of their mothers and only the wise guiding hand of the State stops that from happening. Context as to why they happen at those stages is irrelevant to him and his argument; that they happen is bad and means accessible abortion is bad and accessible abortion must be bad because it's a Democrat position that it is good.

Approach his post from the viewpoint of an extraordinarily partisan person. Then it starts to make sense, in its own way.

[Myradin]

How bout we not introduce an extreme to combat this? It’s been shown time and time again to escalate conflicts and polarize society—it doesn’t help.

While I agree its a bit dumb and extreme, its sad how Republicans get to punish everyone else unnessecarily but when someone else tries to do it its 'divisive' and 'escalating'.

[Edge-]

Did anyone bother to look the author up .. his bio blurb on google reads like a punchline.

I'm pretty sure based on the outlet and nonsense included in the piece that the guy probably believes in spirit crystals or some stupid shit.

- - - Updated - - -

How bout we not introduce an extreme to combat this? It’s been shown time and time again to escalate conflicts and polarize society—it doesn’t help.

Damn, holding people to their words is "extreme". Wild shit.

[PosPosPos]

The national review likes to pretend they're serious conservatives.

They are all "serious" conservatives, the only non-serious conservatives are people who satirize conservatives to mock and deride them for their overt evil.

[The Stormbringer]

-SNIPPED FOR LENGTH-

There's a lot to go through here, so let's get started. Regarding the first bit about doctors being more involved and debates happening, it's not about "getting their hands dirty". It is, as I said, the fear of authoritarian limits being set using "their say-so" according to politicians, and thus making things worse. In this instance it is less about being 'morally righteous' and more about trying to prevent additional harm to women.

To address the second bit and my joking advocation of violence... A ten year old girl was raped. When she wasn't allowed to have the pregnancy aborted, which it 100% should be because she's a ten year old girl that was raped, her home state would not allow it. So she went elsewhere to have this entirely necessary procedure carried out. Now the doctor who helped her is being sued for doing so. If you cannot understand why responding to that by wanting to beat the people responsible to a pulp, or burning their house down while they stand beside and watch is actually quite reasonable, then I don't know what to say. A ten year old girl was raped, and the only person willing to help her in her time of need is being punished for it. Do you understand that this is, in fact, not just, lawful, or good? That it is instead, extremely reprehensible and fucking infuriating? Because to me, it says that pro-birthers don't give a fuck about that ten year old girl who was raped, just like they wouldn't give a fuck about her theoretical child if it survived being carried to term.

And finally the last thing... human life is indeed very precious. It is, in fact, an amazing thing that I would call "a miracle" if not for my lack of religion. I find that our ability to think and feel in an uncaring universe is truly wonderful and astounding. You might be surprised to know I am typically very much against the death penalty, as I think human lives are special, and taking them away is very final. However, I think you are vastly underselling my points here. Parental readiness is extremely important, especially if we're talking about say, a single mother or a single father forced to raise a child, wherein that child will be neglected due to their parent being stretched so thin. Financial circumstances are extremely important, unless you want that child to grow up in hunger and poverty and be forced into crime. And one thing that's also important is the emotional capacity for those people to be parents. The child's life isn't going to be very good if they have an abusive parent who beats and/or rapes them, who humiliates and berates them, etcetera. No one asks to exist, and many people wish they never had. But hey, at least you acknowledged "severe fetal anomalies" being a good cause for exemptions, I guess.

Deciding whether or not to have a child is an extremely important decision that will have repercussions beyond yourself. Sometimes, that decision has to come after a pregnancy has started for a variety of reasons. Pro-birthers refuse to accept that, and instead say that if a pregnancy has started, then that fetus must be allowed to grow into a baby and be born, no ifs and or buts, no excuses, no reasons, no justifications. They will move heaven and earth to make sure that woman does not abort, but then they will turn around and do nothing to help the family and child afterwards, assuming any of them even survive to begin with.

[Endus]

How bout we not introduce an extreme to combat this? It’s been shown time and time again to escalate conflicts and polarize society—it doesn’t help.

Sorry, we're dealing with people who want to fundamentally deny women their own self-ownership in pursuit of enforcing a deeply misogynistic religiously extremist agenda on all those who don't share their beliefs. I don't care if they think the "nuanced" point of view requires massive concessions to their position. They're wrong, and they seek to inflict harm and suffering on innocents.

They're the ones instigating conflict. Stop dishonestly chiding those of us who push back just a little bit, by pointing out their intentional malice for what it is.

[PosPosPos]

How bout we not introduce an extreme to combat this? It’s been shown time and time again to escalate conflicts and polarize society—it doesn’t help.

Not surprised that your previous vocal advocacy of women rights is nothing but performative; you are here tone-policing instead of criticizing your side of the aisle for propagating abuse against women.

[Endus]

I think the problem is that the pro-life view most people are aware of completely misconstrues the pro-choice view. This prevents debate and conversation. You value the potential of life. So do pro-choice people. Pro-choice people aren't pro abortion. They're pro-"it's not my business" and pro-let the doctor/patient decide based on a multitude of factors(economic/medical/trauma/etc).

If the 2 sides can come together and find something workable, great. I have my doubts, because one is based on emotion and the other is based on science. I think legislation, if it's agreed by most that legislation is necessary, should involve all sides without one siding calling the other "pro-murder" or that a clump of cells is a baby, or that every pro-life person wants women in chains birthing babies at will.

FWIW, I have repeatedly asked pro-life advocates to explain to me what they believe in a way that is comprehensible and not based on religion, and they have either failed, or accidentally let slip a fundamental maxim that is precisely as malicious and misanthropic as I am describing it to be.

Literally, without exception. Not once

I dont attack supply-side economics with this kind of venom, precisely because advocates have explained beliefs that tturned out to be deeply flawed but could, at least, have been honestly held. Silly, but I can see where they got the idea.

Not pro-life stances.

[Egomaniac]

How bout we not introduce an extreme to combat this? It’s been shown time and time again to escalate conflicts and polarize society—it doesn’t help.

Well, that's one way to out yourself.

[Jastall]

I can't really argue with anything you state here. I will say that in my conversations with tehdang, he seemed reasonable in terms of 1st/2nd trimester abortions. I couldn't crack the nut regarding 3rd trimester, and my earlier post and his response really highlight that, I think.

You won't. Budging from that would mean admitting that Democrats have a point and that'll never happen because he's hyperpartisan in a way that blinds him to all else. It's the same thing with, to use one example so I'm not going too off-topic, the Twitter files that he somehow still clings to last time I checked. No one takes those seriously anymore save partisan hacks looking to make a point about how bad the Democrats are.

[tehdang]

There's a lot to go through here, so let's get started. Regarding the first bit about doctors being more involved and debates happening, it's not about "getting their hands dirty". It is, as I said, the fear of authoritarian limits being set using "their say-so" according to politicians, and thus making things worse. In this instance it is less about being 'morally righteous' and more about trying to prevent additional harm to women.

I think badly written exceptions in the case of life of the mother and severe fetal abnormality present HUGE risks of additional harm to women. The doctors that are refusing to advise on these laws are powerless to stop a 15-week ban from going into effect. They do have some limited power in helping craft a law that creates genuine exceptions that are easy for doctors (and hospital lawyers) to interpret. So, yes, this is about preventing additional harm to women and I hope you can come around to preventing that harm.

To address the second bit and my joking advocation of violence... A ten year old girl was raped. When she wasn't allowed to have the pregnancy aborted, which it 100% should be because she's a ten year old girl that was raped, her home state would not allow it. So she went elsewhere to have this entirely necessary procedure carried out. Now the doctor who helped her is being sued for doing so.

Now it's my turn to repeat something you said, which is "The amount of misinformation and propaganda against abortion is fucking absurd." She was not sued for providing the abortion. Please read further than the title of the article and jokes related to the existence of such a lawsuit so you avoid spreading disinformation yourself. The poster of it should've quoted the article.

In any case, I don't thinking joking about carrying out violence as part of a mob is justified from the headline of an article you didn't read. I get that this is a charged issue and you said that as part of your anger over it, but what you've posted defends only becoming infuriated, not encouraging violence.

And what I said stands. There has been too much arson vandalism and threats of violence against pro-life organizations and crisis abortion centers for me to ever see my way to condoning your post about violence and joking about it.

And finally the last thing... human life is indeed very precious. It is, in fact, an amazing thing that I would call "a miracle" if not for my lack of religion. I find that our ability to think and feel in an uncaring universe is truly wonderful and astounding. You might be surprised to know I am typically very much against the death penalty, as I think human lives are special, and taking them away is very final. However, I think you are vastly underselling my points here. Parental readiness is extremely important, especially if we're talking about say, a single mother or a single father forced to raise a child, wherein that child will be neglected due to their parent being stretched so thin. Financial circumstances are extremely important, unless you want that child to grow up in hunger and poverty and be forced into crime. And one thing that's also important is the emotional capacity for those people to be parents. The child's life isn't going to be very good if they have an abusive parent who beats and/or rapes them, who humiliates and berates them, etcetera. No one asks to exist, and many people wish they never had. But hey, at least you acknowledged "severe fetal anomalies" being a good cause for exemptions, I guess.

I'm really speaking into the motivations and sincerely held beliefs of people sitting further from my moderate position. People who would call me a squish for "not really being against abortion because you're ok with 90% of them happening legally." Sadly, their voices are not present on this sub-forum so it's me. Ending another human life is a vastly important decision, and when weighed alongside "Parental readiness" it's akin to saying "The baby is better off dead than raised by such unprepared parents." That's the important flip side. And it's a battle of extremes. If you've ever read or experienced the people who had shitty childhoods and overcame them through people they met in school and after, you would know that "forced into crime" vastly undersells human potential. The presence of kind teachers, all kinds of aid programs that are nationally available, and mentors are all focused on showing lives are important despite tragedies in the upbringing. The "shitty childhood argument" essentially appoint the parents as gods with divine, unerring vision into their future child's life, determining that the life they're prevented from living would necessarily be "not good." And, like gods, they are the moral arbiters in what level of "not good" means "better off not alive." And maybe you'd see the "shitty life" excuse as being as unpersuasive in abortion when applied to a 30-week gestating baby as a 3-month-old. It feels less cruel because you aren't seeing and playing with the poor thing, but if these bad-life prognostications were so determinative, then the logic would also apply post-delivery. Like I said, it's a battle between extremes.

These are some of the things I've had to grapple with in my present position on the issue. Better-to-not-exist must be weighed against predicted-bad-life. It is an absolutely terrifying judgement to pronounce on the unborn, and I want great effort into adoption and state-run orphanages for the post-viable babies. If they still wish they had never existed after having a shot at it, then we'll have that discussion. Obviously, if ninety out of one hundred babies that were only carried to delivery have such shitty lives that they wish they had never been born at 18 or 25, then I'd have to rethink my doubts on predestination with unready, cash-strapped parents. If abortion wasn't such a life-ending issue, we'd have an easier time seeing if the extremes of upbringing justified such extremes in life & death during pregnancy.

Deciding whether or not to have a child is an extremely important decision that will have repercussions beyond yourself. Sometimes, that decision has to come after a pregnancy has started for a variety of reasons. Pro-birthers refuse to accept that, and instead say that if a pregnancy has started, then that fetus must be allowed to grow into a baby and be born, no ifs and or buts, no excuses, no reasons, no justifications. They will move heaven and earth to make sure that woman does not abort, but then they will turn around and do nothing to help the family and child afterwards, assuming any of them even survive to begin with.

I personally have seen crisis pregnancy centers stocked with newborn clothes, carseats, diapers, food, and playthings. This is absolutely lies and misinformation given to the ignorant or the willingly deceived. The pro-life side is rife with donations and advocacy for support for new mothers. Yes, I would ask that anybody who believes this is true to visit their nearest pro-life organization and ask for resources for new and expecting mothers that involve no cost to them. If this is your real feeling about the issue, I'd say it's worth your while. You won't have to re-evaluate your core beliefs on which abortions should be legal.

I think the problem is that the pro-life view most people are aware of completely misconstrues the pro-choice view. This prevents debate and conversation. You value the potential of life. So do pro-choice people. Pro-choice people aren't pro abortion. They're pro-"it's not my business" and pro-let the doctor/patient decide based on a multitude of factors(economic/medical/trauma/etc).

If the 2 sides can come together and find something workable, great. I have my doubts, because one is based on emotion and the other is based on science. I think legislation, if it's agreed by most that legislation is necessary, should involve all sides without one siding calling the other "pro-murder" or that a clump of cells is a baby, or that every pro-life person wants women in chains birthing babies at will.

If the pro-aborts never figure in the baby post-viability, then I think it's just an intractable argument. There's another person in that woman-doctor meeting. And post-viable abortions aren't just involving anything rationally described as clumps of cells (unless it's in the sense that you personally are just a clump of cells), as any picture would show you.

I hope you've read a few pages of this thread before saying how it's the pro-life side that's into the emotion. All the emotional grief of woman prevented from obtaining an abortion, how we might be at the point of forming mobs with pitchforks, young mothers that ought to have qualified for exceptions. All, perhaps worthy and understandable to people who think like you, plays on the emotions to influence policy. I don't get why the bumper-sticker meme of science vs emotion is even brought up; the science of that growing baby being a separate person, or the emotional pleas I read weekly here and elsewhere? It's a values and worldview difference. The science and emotion aspects are both claimed by both sides, and it's just an interpretation war based on ... values and worldview.

I've given up on the rhetoric like "pro-murder," just like I've given up on reforming the guy a page ago in this very thread that stretched to "pro-rape." It's abortion. Somebody is giving their opinion on when it should be acceptable to end the life of a human in its gestational phase. I don't think the rhetoric can be divorced from such a hot-button issue. Especially in what I'd consider the height of throwing around extremist terms like fascist and nazi and transphobe bigot, or groomer communist and anti-religious zealot. Negotiated rhetorical disarmament may be for a future generation, but I do not think this one.

I have some hope of settling on a state-by-state policy of 20-24 week general bans with exceptions, with a few state holdouts. That's mostly due to compromising with individuals that come to different conclusions regarding science, morality, and society.

You quoted the Atlantic and one eccentric abortion doctor that never really stated whether he performed all abortions or not. The article leaves that out.

That's not a slamdunk, tehdang.

https://www.nationalreview.com/corne...term-abortion/
I really wish it was just one doctor. Abortion orgs and clinics do offer them, and their bulk numbers defy rational explanation to explain all them away as narrow exceptions. I'm starting to believe that you wish this weren't true, but would never be willing to yield that it's true.

They're being performed above 10,000. You've read the doctor that stated, plainly, in response to what about "a pregnant woman with no health issues comes to the clinic, say, at 30 weeks, what would you do?" was irked and said "Every pregnancy is a health issue." You've heard and understood the rhetoric from the pro-aborts about woman-and-doctor-only decisions. Guttmacher (pro-choice institution) admits that the data suggests elective abortions done for reasons other than fetal anomaly or life endangerment. If you really, REALLY, want to believe in god-of-the-gaps in late term abortions for personal reasons, I guess you can make that choice.

How many medically necessary abortions are done in the 3rd trimester? How many of them are non-medically necessary?

I really wish this data was collected. Pro-abort administrations in several blue states don't want to provide them. Democrats have torpedoed legislation nationally. I'd love to see a reversal of this trend, if pro-aborts really think their lack of statistical basis hurts their arguments, rather than help. That would be a net-benefit to my personal pro-life views, rather than relying on surveys and some of them commissioned and/or funded by orgs with a bias towards some outcomes.

I don't have the numbers, but considering I respect the medical profession, I'm going to assume the answer to the 1st question is vastly prevalent to the answer to the 2nd question. You may find this outrageous, but I find it to be common sense. Why? Because that assumes a level of maliciousness that doesn't exist.

Assuming you agree that the overwhelming majority(probably all?) of 3rd trimester abortions are medically necessary, wouldn't that then lead you to the conclusion that pregnancy is difficult and rife with complications? Or would you rather just assume people are STILL malicious enough(both the doctor AND the patient) to snuff out a viable child's life?

This is where the pro-life and the pro-choice crowd mostly diverge, by the way. Pro-choice folks recognize the dangers that pregnancy poses to both the fetus and the mother, pro-life people seem to ignore these dangers, or at the least, handwave them.

Past studies have suggested the reverse: that circumstances unrelated to the life of the mother and developing baby are responsible for the majority of third trimester abortions. These have been cited as Jones Kooistra 2011 (2008 data) and Foster DG et al 2012 (2007-2008). I wish the full text of the studies were made accessible for all members of the public. But from what data we do have and research that has been performed, the reverse is true.

Given that past research has contradicted your basis for believing these things, would this make a lick of difference to your opinion? Doctors can still assert that pregnancy is a health issue in and of itself, like the doctor you tried to make a national exception earlier. The presence of a fetal anomaly or diagnosed condition in the mother doesn't change somebody that thinks that way. So if the mere existence of gestating baby imposes enough risk to condone a late-term abortion in your view, do you really care if you're wrong about the proportion that are done for identified health reasons? I thought the woman-and-doctor stance presupposed that the specific cause didn't matter, so I never really thought anything depended on asserting prevalence.

[Cthulhu 2020]

I think it's funny that pro-birthers are dropping the pro-life label themselves, because they're starting to become self aware and realizing they don't actually care about human life.

With the amount of suffering and death caused by right wing policy, it's impossible to call oneself pro-life. There are so many measures that would make life more sustainable on the left side. A society that pays its workers well as well as provides child care services for the parents causes a dramatic increase in birth rate. The right's one policy position is pro business, and anything that hurts business profits is shunned. That includes more worker benefits that would ultimately result in more births and better lives for people and children.

But business > life in the right wing world.

[Egomaniac]

I think it's funny that pro-birthers are dropping the pro-life label themselves, because they're starting to become self aware and realizing they don't actually care about human life.

There's also increasing in their efforts to label the opposition as "pro-abortion" instead of "pro-choice".

[uuuhname]

it's so cute the soy conservatives have no real reason to treat the pro choice position as sincere since they have never had a sincere position beyond the hatred they have for everyone else. never mind how things like contraceptives and sex education have been cornerstones of the pro choice position from the beginning, and forget how those two things contribute vastly to abortion rates bottoming out. when all you care about is owning the other side but have the spare time to type out essay's that always boil down to "neener neener neeeener" your bankrupt creativity still always manages to stick out like a sore thumb.

[Captain N]

What do I get in return?

Bad faith arguments, a temper tantrum, and name calling? The same as any other thread he participates in.

[The Stormbringer]

@tehdang I did read the article, thanks. It seems like you didn't...? I may have misspoke about one thing, though. The doctor wasn't sued, no, she was reprimanded and fined. Same fucking thing, my dude.

This story quickly drew the ire of conservatives, including Rokita, who accused Bernard of failing to abide by Indiana patient privacy and mandatory reporting laws.

Rokita filed a complaint with the Indiana Medical Licensing Board against Bernard, alleging the physician violated her patient’s privacy. The board ultimately determined Bernard violated privacy laws and issued a reprimand and a $3,000 fine against her.

Throughout this conflict, IU Health maintained Bernard followed Indiana’s abortion reporting laws, and it would later state it disagreed with the licensing board’s decision.

But in a Friday statement, Rokita alleged the health system violated numerous laws by supporting Bernard, accusing it of failing to prevent HIPAA violations in various ways and of being deceptive to consumers.

She shared her account of what happened because it needs to be heard, because conservative scumbags keep trying to cover this stuff up.

EDIT: Oh, I wasn't able to mention it before, but I suppose I'll address the "pregnancy crisis centers". Charities, much like churches offering soup kitchens out the back for the homeless, are not and never will be enough, as they do not have the backing of government and REAL funding and power. Might there be some deluded people who wind up helping a few mothers and babies because of them? Sure, I won't deny that. But they aren't a SYSTEM in place to help ALL mothers and children forced into such awful circumstances. They are not good enough, and never will be until things like that are actually written into law... but good luck with that, since they also tend to push pro-birth instead of simply being a resource available to help expecting mothers... like Planned Parenthood, the thing righties everywhere froth at the mouth about.

[Endus]

I think badly written exceptions in the case of life of the mother and severe fetal abnormality present HUGE risks of additional harm to women.

Abortion is safer for women than childbirth. Categorically. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22270271/

What you "think" or "believe" literally does not matter. It just means you're openly admitting to being willfully ignorant on the subject, but wanting your misinformed misogyny to be given equal credence as actual data and analysis.

In any case, I don't thinking joking about carrying out violence as part of a mob is justified from the headline of an article you didn't read. I get that this is a charged issue and you said that as part of your anger over it, but what you've posted defends only becoming infuriated, not encouraging violence.

And what I said stands. There has been too much arson vandalism and threats of violence against pro-life organizations and crisis abortion centers for me to ever see my way to condoning your post about violence and joking about it.

That you say this with a straight face, expecting to be taken seriously, only demonstrates your own personal malice.

https://www.justice.gov/crt/recent-c...care-providers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-abortion_violence

Pro-life violence is orders of magnitude greater in both prevalence and the specific scale of the violence in question, as compared to anything directed at pro-life movements. If violence was actually a concern for you, you'd be pro-choice and oppose the pro-life movement, by your own argument. But you're not, you're just going to openly lie to all of our faces and hope nobody pulls the stats on you.

Well, I'm pretty sure you've got me on Ignore, but everyone else can take a gander at the data and see how dishonest your position is.

I'm really speaking into the motivations and sincerely held beliefs of people sitting further from my moderate position.

Civil rights don't really have "moderate positions". If someone says "a little slavery's okay, just don't go full plantation slavery", they're a slavery advocate, not a "moderate". If someone says "you can say whatever the government approves, that's free enough", they're not a free speech advocate. They're hostile to those civil rights, they're just being performatively moderate.

These are some of the things I've had to grapple with in my present position on the issue. Better-to-not-exist must be weighed against predicted-bad-life. It is an absolutely terrifying judgement to pronounce on the unborn, and I want great effort into adoption and state-run orphanages for the post-viable babies.

The unborn don't exist, which makes them a super convenient group to advocate for, because they'll never contradict your position. Talking about a person that would have existed in an alternate timeline where things happened differently is just fantasy, not an attempt to discuss reality. You're pushing your religion into the discussion, and nobody else should be held to your religious dogma.

If the pro-aborts never figure in the baby post-viability, then I think it's just an intractable argument. There's another person in that woman-doctor meeting.

No. There isn't. Not legally speaking, and not scientifically/medically. This is what I mean about you pushing your religious views onto non-believers and trying to get the law to enforce it for you.

That you find sticking to reality and science an "intractable" position says one fuck of a lot more about you than it does those who won't agree with you.

I hope you've read a few pages of this thread before saying how it's the pro-life side that's into the emotion.

Says the guy who literally just made up a fantasy about a person that doesn't and will never exist solely to tug on people's heartstrings over the issue, rather than dealing with it honestly and on the facts alone.

[Egomaniac]

Bad faith arguments, a temper tantrum, and name calling? The same as any other thread he participates in.

Don't forget about the condescension.

[PosPosPos]

Whether I find the label hypocritical enough personally, I still extend that olive branch to him during these discussions. What do I get in return?

I'm starting to think you're not interested in discussion, just using this topic to bludgeon the party you oppose.

Took you long enough where basically everyone else figured out long ago.

[diller]

"Well she should have thought of that before having sex."

She was raped.

"Oh...um...well, surely there are other options for a healthy adult to handle the situation."

She's ten.

It's fucking disgusting that they want to ruin her life, it's bad enough that she was raped.