Pharyngula

ah, the MCCL billboards. One of the joys of driving from Mankato to I-35 was running into those in Janesville and Owatonna.

Has MCCL actually contributed anything positive to life in Minnesota (or the MFC)?

Posted by: MAJeff | July 14, 2007 6:37 PM

men never get abortions? If you aren't strong enough to have that baby, you've got no grounds to complain about male privilege.

You could have a winner! I'm having a little contest over at my blog:

Can you find a blogger that is more of an ignorant twit, more delusional, more lied to, more of pathetic excuse for a thinking human being than Tristan J. Shuddery?

Enter contest here:

Posted by: Norman Doering | July 14, 2007 6:59 PM

Norm, I'm 99% sure that the blog to which you link ("Shelley the Republican") is a parody.

The other 1% comes from the fact that some right wingers are that stupid.

Posted by: Orac | July 14, 2007 7:08 PM

Fetus ain't nothin' if it ain't free.

Posted by: Dan | July 14, 2007 7:37 PM

The war cry of the anti-abortionists:

"You can have my unborn fetus when you pry it from my cold, dead uterus."

Posted by: Hank Fox | July 14, 2007 7:47 PM

Zebrafish hearts begin to beat around 24 hours. This is the moment when they become truly human and their life must be respected.

Posted by: Shawn Wilkinson | July 14, 2007 8:01 PM

Norm, I'm 99% sure that the blog to which you link ("Shelley the Republican") is a parody.

Orac, I would see why you would say that, and the name Shuddery is sort of a give away, but unless you see something I don't think 99% is a trifle overconfident. I have heard amost as stupid a nonsence from Egnor.

Or is Shuddery different from Shelly?

Posted by: sailor | July 14, 2007 8:49 PM

... almost as stupid a nonsence from Egnor.

Egnor? And you think that name is for real?

Posted by: Norman Doering | July 14, 2007 8:57 PM

My personal favorite (seen here in Memphis) says, and I quote: "Yah mama was pro-life, dawlin".

I'm guessing the imitation of a thick-jowled, cousin-loving yokel accent is supposed to give it an air of folksy wisdom, but it just makes me grate my teeth. Especially since I know my mother, and I know for a fact that she is pro-choice (as was my grandmother, who was a co-chairwoman of the GOP back in the day, go figure).

Posted by: MJ Memphis | July 14, 2007 9:07 PM

there's another mccl billboard that goes something like 'duh, embryos are people too"

yes, complete with 'duh'

Posted by: david | July 14, 2007 9:30 PM

The war cry of the anti-abortionists:

"You can have my unborn fetus when you pry it from my cold, dead uterus."

It isn't their fetuses which are the problem, nor is it getting them. It's ours and getting rid of them.

"You can escape your growing, body-distorting parasite lovable, practically living-already baybeee over your own dead body, while we sit about risking nothing. Oh, and how dare you not jump to donate your body to a complete stranger your OWN CHILD when our God says you should?!"

Posted by: Kyra | July 14, 2007 10:14 PM

http://www.zeitgeistmovie.com/

Posted by: neo | July 14, 2007 10:17 PM

As for Tristan Shuddery -- he does have an entry on Conservapedia.

Conservapedia. Isn't that the site run by the self-loathing homosexual spawn of Phylis Schlafly?

Posted by: MAJeff | July 14, 2007 10:58 PM

I live in the area, PZ, and see the same damn ones driving from St. Cloud to Hastings.

Posted by: Kyle | July 14, 2007 11:32 PM

"A baby's heart starts to beat at 24 days."

So, it's DEFINITELY ok for abortion before 24 days, then?

Posted by: Richard Rosalion | July 15, 2007 12:12 AM

I saw a bumper sticker today with a fetal ultrasound and the caption "Mother, behold your son." My questions for whoever designed it:
Does that person think that the supposed target audience will actually recognize it as a Bible verse? Because they usually think women who get abortions are ignorant and not religious, so I don't see why they'd use Biblical references.
Does that person also know the context of that verse? It was said by Jesus, to his mother and his best friend, while Jesus was dying. Not the best pro-life scene, really.

Posted by: Carlie | July 15, 2007 1:01 AM

There's also "I'm Pro-Life and I Pray." To which I respond "My prayer cancels yours out!"

Posted by: Rey Fox | July 15, 2007 1:22 AM

RIGHTS FOR ICE!

Bob

Posted by: Bob O'H | July 15, 2007 3:25 AM

How about aborting the "fetus" a month before birth?

A week?

A day?

The same morning.

All of these things happen at the Tiller clinic in Kansas.

Of course, Roe v Wade may be in trouble, as much trouble as Oliver Wendell Holmes decision in Buck v. Bell that "three generations of imbelciles is enought" or the infamous Dred Scott decision.

The 20th century will undoubtedly be looked back on in future centures as a century of mass exterminatins, gulags, death camps, and murder of innocents.

Posted by: K. N. Singh | July 15, 2007 7:32 AM

How about aborting the "fetus" a month before birth?

"A week?

A day?

The same morning.

All of these things happen at the Tiller clinic in Kansas."

To this comment I call bullshit. I'd like to see evidence or citations.

Posted by: Rick B | July 15, 2007 8:03 AM

Late term abortions are almost always done because birth would kill either one or both of the fetus and mother, or the fetus has a birth defect incompatible with life.

Pardon me while I fail to weep over the abortion of a fetus a week before its due date, when it has no brain and its full-term vaginal birth would threaten the life of its mother.

Fire-breathing mechanical Jesus, 99% of pro-life people are stupid.

Posted by: Mandolin | July 15, 2007 8:47 AM

Why worry?

A majority of US citizens still believe abortion is justified. Of course, a majority of those same citizens also believe in the existence of mythical beings and doubt or reject any findings of science which contradict those beliefs. Still, nobody's perfect.

And you still have Roe v Wade, although the opinion has some interesting tidbits if you read it.

For example, on the Hippocratic Oath it found:

What then of the famous Oath that has stood so long as the ethical guide of the medical profession and that bears the name of the great Greek (460(?)-377(?) B. C.), who has been described [410 U.S. 113, 131] as the Father of Medicine, the "wisest and the greatest practitioner of his art," and the "most important and most complete medical personality of antiquity," who dominated the medical schools of his time, and who typified the sum of the medical knowledge of the past? The Oath varies somewhat according to the particular translation, but in any translation the content is clear: "I will give no deadly medicine to anyone if asked, nor suggest any such counsel; and in like manner I will not give to a woman a pessary to produce abortion," 14 or "I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. Similarly, I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy."

Why did not the authority of Hippocrates dissuade abortion practice in his time and that of Rome? The late Dr. Edelstein provides us with a theory: The Oath was not uncontested even in Hippocrates' day; only the Pythagorean school of philosophers frowned upon the related act of suicide. Most Greek thinkers, on the other hand, commended abortion, at least prior to viability. See Plato, Republic, V, 461; Aristotle, Politics, VII, 1335b 25. For the Pythagoreans, however, it was a matter of dogma. For them the embryo was animate from the moment of conception, and abortion meant destruction of a living being. The abortion clause of the Oath, therefore, "echoes Pythagorean doctrines," [410 U.S. 113, 132] and "[i]n no other stratum of Greek opinion were such views held or proposed in the same spirit of uncompromising austerity."

So it is possible to oppose abortion and find classical support for that view without being a slavering Christian fanatic. Just call me a Monty Pythagorean.

Roe v Wade also has this to say about that old faithful, the woman's right to privacy:

The Constitution does not explicitly mention any right of privacy. In a line of decisions, however, going back perhaps as far as Union Pacific R. Co. v. Botsford, 141 U.S. 250, 251 (1891), the Court has recognized that a right of personal privacy, or a guarantee of certain areas or zones of privacy, does exist under the Constitution.

[...]

This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy. The detriment that the State would impose upon the pregnant woman by denying this choice altogether is apparent. Specific and direct harm medically diagnosable even in early pregnancy may be involved. Maternity, or additional offspring, may force upon the woman a distressful life and future. Psychological harm may be imminent. Mental and physical health may be taxed by child care. There is also the distress, for all concerned, associated with the unwanted child, and there is the problem of bringing a child into a family already unable, psychologically and otherwise, to care for it. In other cases, as in this one, the additional difficulties and continuing stigma of unwed motherhood may be involved. All these are factors the woman and her responsible physician necessarily will consider in consultation.

On the basis of elements such as these, appellant and some amici argue that the woman's right is absolute and that she is entitled to terminate her pregnancy at whatever time, in whatever way, and for whatever reason she alone chooses. With this we do not agree.(My emphasis)

[...]

We, therefore, conclude that the right of personal privacy includes the abortion decision, but that this right is not unqualified and must be considered against important state interests in regulation.

Of course, the purpose of this thread was to highlight the absurdity of some anti-abortion arguments.

My argument has always been that abortion involves the killing of a human being, albeit one at a very early stage of delevelopment and that killing a human being without sufficient cause is wrong. Is that absurd on its face?

For me, this whole issue turns on the questions of, first, whether individual human beings have a right to life, second, if they do, does that right extend to their entire lifespan and, third, can that lifespan be said to start at the point of conception?.

Roe v Wade touches on the issue the issue:

The third reason is the State's interest - some phrase it in terms of duty - in protecting prenatal life. Some of the argument for this justification rests on the theory that a new human life is present from the moment of conception. 45 The State's interest and general obligation to protect life then extends, it is argued, to prenatal life. Only when the life of the pregnant mother herself is at stake, balanced against the life she carries within her, should the interest of the embryo or fetus not prevail. Logically, of course, a legitimate state interest in this area need not stand or fall on acceptance of the belief that life begins at conception or at some other point prior to live birth. In assessing the State's interest, recognition may be given to the less rigid claim that as long as at least potential life is involved, the State may assert interests beyond the protection of the pregnant woman alone.

Texas urges that, apart from the Fourteenth Amendment, life begins at conception and is present throughout pregnancy, and that, therefore, the State has a compelling interest in protecting that life from and after conception. We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer.

Posted by: Ian H Spedding FCD | July 15, 2007 9:22 AM

A baby's heart starts to beat at 24 days.

Obviously these people have never looked at cultured heart cells; there is nothing freakier than opening up a cupboard door to see plates full of tissue beating, with nothing attached......

Posted by: Luna_the_cat | July 15, 2007 9:46 AM

To abort something we've been "programmed" to accept, nurture, risk our life for, etc. is PROBABLY something that is NOT casually done. At least listening to women who had abortions, reading and hearing 2nd hand stories about woman who have struggled with that decision, and knowing something about our "instincts" suggest that it is for us as humans a considered and heart-wrenching decision. I could be wrong... but that is NOT the point.

It really boils down to this: women have a RIGHT to control their bodies and their lives! I know that one can point to a million cases where that is not so (that one is restricted with what they can do with their body or with their life)... but to me that is a weak retort to the main principle involved. My restriction on you here justifies my restriction on you elsewhere?!? Analogy is ALWAYS the weakest form of argument. But again not the point I want to make here. Rather...

Abortionists and women that get abortions if sane do NOT want to "kill" anything. That is not their objective. They want relief in some fashion. So why don't the pro-lifers (ANTI-CHOICERS) invest their time, energy, and money into:

1. Proper, safe, affordable and realistic birth control methods with accompanying good and proper education.

2. Methods of taking out whatever in whatever stage from a woman's body without destroying or harming either.

3. commitments and social instruments to TOTALLY absolve the woman of any responsibility, that also guarantee proper, adequate and good lifetime support to whatever in whatever stage is removed naturally or artificially (you can start with UNconditional adoption for all, with care for all in all conditions)

Want to reduce abortions? Improve what you UNconditionally do for BORN babies that are "unwanted" by mothers and parents, and support research and actions as implied above. In other words - PROVIDE REAL RELIEF!!

An abortion does not have as its end goal "killing"... it has a goal of relief for the mother and people involved with the mother. Concentrate on the RELIEF and you ANTI-CHOICERS will reduce what you claim you are against.

PS... you ANTI-CHOICERS (institutionally) REALLY are not hell bent on stopping the "killing" you rant about I think. It is more about maintaining CONTROL over people and their most private thoughts and actions, to give you all the ruse of moral superiority, and to maintain the concept of the sky-daddy and the ghost in us that you need to own. You people are DANGEROUS!!! And I bet you people fail to advance in any significant way root cause solutions or really effective remedies after the fact. It is not in your blood. All religions need poverty and hardship and ignorance and fear and the CONTROL OF SEXUAL LIVES to exist !! They do!! That's why you need to fight anything that advocates pro-choice or that takes your sky-daddy out of the equation. You are becoming less and less relavant and you know it. You need causes to justify your existence. But you are dying as a worthy concept.

Even in good old Fundie USA that while it is the only advanced country that seemingly clings to its superstitions "officially", even in USA religious ferver is an allusion. Under the cover SCIENTIFIC looks show the USA is mostly less religious (and getting less so) than it claims to be.

But you are still DANGEROUS, because RELIGIOUS FANATICS always are, even if there are only a relatively few of them.

Posted by: ConcernedJoe | July 15, 2007 10:19 AM

Ian asks: "Is dating the start of an individual human life to the point of conception the least arbitrary and absurd choice? "

Probably is the most absurd and arbitrary to the max - at least to me!!!

But again NOT the point. I believe born people's rights trump the unborn. And especially when a matter involving the DIRECT control of a person's body is involved.. the individual trumps the unborn parasite (of course I as a human want to protect the unborn as a general concept -- don't go there -- I am talking "parasite" as related to the carrier woman).

If you want to work to provide REAL relief to woman and others involved to reduce abortions .. I can see and support that. I can even see "you" advocating alternatives to women - even if they are not perfect. But if you want to restrict personal freedoms because you philosophically give MORE weight to an unborn entity that is essentially a parasite.. well I kind of resent that. But if I misread you I sincerely apologize.

Posted by: ConcernedJoe | July 15, 2007 10:48 AM

IHS: The original Hippocratic oath also prohibits physicians from doing any surgery, with surgery to remove kidney stones being specficially mentioned. Does that mean that surgeons are evil and surgery should be prohibited in the modern world?

Posted by: Dianne | July 15, 2007 10:49 AM

Ian, you happen to be in luck! Nobody will ever force you to carry an unwanted fetus to term. Wow, having testicles instead of ovaries really affords you the luxury of wanting to make decisions for others based on your version of morality without having to suffer the consequences personally, doesn't it?

I have always found Pro-Forced-Maternity men to be the most odious of creatures.

Posted by: Wolfhound | July 15, 2007 12:42 PM

Concerned Joe (#47): This is why some feminist commenters and bloggers have begun to refer to the "pro life" crowd as "pro birth" which is a much more accurate description of them.

Their concern for these babies' lives ends the minute the emerge from the womb.

Posted by: twincats | July 15, 2007 1:42 PM

I have always found Pro-Forced-Maternity men to be the most odious of creatures.

Wolfhound - There's odiouser: Anti-abortion guys who hit on pro-choice women, whom they believe to be, as the expression goes, accessible--the idea being that they'll eventually marry anti-choice women, but they're entitled to a little fun first. (1)

Suppose such a creep does up in bed with a pro-choice woman. What does he think she's going to do if he knocks her up?

That's right. So in hitting on a woman he disagrees with, he's potentially suborning something he claims to believe is wrong and how creepy is that?

Wait, it gets better: These guys see such a situation as no problemo: He owes her nothing--not moral support, not help with the termination, not even a goodbye note, because she's pro-choice; since it's her choice, it's entirely her problem. And if she actually has the baby, like he claims is the right thing to do? Still owes her zip: She wanted choice, right? Let her deal with it.

If asked, our anti-abortion 4-Fer will whine about how Roe v Wade victimized him by letting women have more say about these things than he gets. (2)

Anti-choice types sometimes complain that liberalized abortion laws allow men to act like pigs. What they mean is, those changes allow their men to act like pigs.

_______
(1) Because even men who are willing to marry them think that, w/r/t this particular form of fun, anti-abortion women are a waste of time.
(2) "Mommmyyyy!! She got a present and I didn't!! It's not fair"

Posted by: Molly, NYC | July 15, 2007 4:03 PM

ConcernedJoe wrote:

If you want to work to provide REAL relief to woman and others involved to reduce abortions .. I can see and support that. I can even see "you" advocating alternatives to women - even if they are not perfect. But if you want to restrict personal freedoms because you philosophically give MORE weight to an unborn entity that is essentially a parasite.. well I kind of resent that. But if I misread you I sincerely apologize.

If the mother is unwilling or unable to care for the child after it is born, then it should be taken into care immediately and put up for adoption.

If the pregnancy itself is distressing the mother then the unborn should be removed as soon as medical science allows and placed either with a woman who has volunteered to be a surrogate mother or in some form of artificial incubator. Once that becomes possible at any stage during pregnancy, there will no no need for abortion and I will have no further objections.

Posted by: Ian H Spedding FCD | July 15, 2007 4:23 PM

Dianne wrote:

1. The spontaneous abortion rate is as high as 80%. If human life begins at conception, then we have a huge epidemic of very early death and the average life expectancy in this country is something like 15 years. But someone no one in the pro-life movement is interested in this problem. When I bring it up they offer some extremely weak excuses for not wanting to end the epidemic of dead "babies" (aka zygotes).

2. If life begins with the first living cell then it must end with the death of the last cell in the body. If that is so, we're burying an awful lot of live people on the flimsy excuse that they're brain dead.

3. Surgery is, of course, also murder.

Posted by: Ian H Spedding FCD | July 15, 2007 5:01 PM

Steevl wrote:

The Sorites paradox is fun, huh?

Likewise, you don't need to pinpoint the start of an individual human life. You just need to choose a point where it definitely hasn't started yet, and any abortion performed before that is morally neutral.

Posted by: Ian H Spedding FCD | July 15, 2007 5:23 PM

On the contrary, it is nor more unreasonable to frame the debate in terms of the difficulties of pregnancy than if you where arguing whether or not, on similar grounds, you had the right to shoot someone who threatened your life, or you should just stand their and let them maim or kill you. The argument for birth defects would, in that framing, say, "But, he only intended to shoot you in the leg, not kill you, so you had no right to kill him instead!", the more extreme view being, "You have no more right than him to kill someone, so you should have just stood there and hoped that your opinion or everyone else's was wrong, and that he only had a) one bullet, and b) missed." Abortion in the same thing, when talking about pregnancy difficulties, If its going to kill one or both, why should the choice be, "Wait and see if the doctor is wrong and both survive (instead of being very wrong and both dying), or, alternatively, "Well, they are only a little malformed, brain damaged, etc, so you *must* carry to term and accept the care for them after!" The choice issue.. Is a bit sketchier, but it could, in some cases, still be looked at in terms of the consequence to everyone involved, if the outcome is suboptimal care, feeding, housing, education, or treatment, from one or both parents, if they *can't* handle a child at that point. Some of the more extreme cases of which *could* be the equivalent of insisting that someone, in this case the child, stand still, while someone shot them in the leg.

Trying to claim that its unreasonable to frame the debate in terms of **real** practical issues and concerns that you never personally have to deal with, and when forced on someone because they are not considered, you will likely never know about, is just bullshit. Morality requires considering all consequences, not just the ones we can imagine effecting **us** personally. And it demands that we do not reject, out of hand, what we consider too minor, insignificant or rare to mean anything. Especially given that genetic problems, mistreatment of kids in environments where the parents are not ready, and many other issues are as common, in some cases, like with minor heart defects and such, as 1 in 100, or worse. How common does a problem need to be exactly, before its acceptable to "frame" the abortion debate around it, given that the other side would love to exclude, by law, **any any all** such contingencies from being valid grounds to do something?

Posted by: Kagehi | July 15, 2007 6:12 PM

Fundie Forced-Maternity F***head thus spake: "The question is, though, even if I were a woman, would it make any difference to whether or not the unborn have a right to life?"

Obviously it doesn't to you. But, it would give your opinion a bit more value as far as most Pro-Choice women are concerned. Not that you care. I have absolutely no respect for Pro-Forced Maternity men such as yourself because you will never be faced with a pregnancy of your own.

In answer to your (non) question of whether or not a fetus has the "right to life", the answer is "NO!" Any part of your body can be chopped out, via your personal consent, as part of a surgical procedure. Them's the facts. Tough shit if you don't like it. I'll bet you don't think that's "fair", do you?

Done feeding the stupid troll.

Posted by: Wolfhound | July 15, 2007 7:33 PM

You have no idea what you're talking about.

Now, now, Molly, with only facts and reality on your side, how do you expect to go up against not only a time-traveling Dr. Who but now also Babylon 5?

Seriously, Ian, someday you might want to consider examining whether there is any correlation between the crappy, illogical, and misogynistic quality of your arguments, and the fact that you seem to get a lot of your information about life from imaginary science-fiction characters.

Posted by: RavenT, Adjutant Minion | July 15, 2007 11:09 PM

Human rights are, in effect, constraints on human behaviour, nothing else. The right to life simply prohibits people from killing each other unlawfully. It says nothing about accidents like being killed by a lightning-bolt - or spontaneous abortion.

Have you ever heard of "lightning rods"? They're these nifty little devices that people invented so that lightning bolts would kill fewer people. In other words, normal people are NOT indifferent to death due to accident, whether it be lightning bolts, sudden infant death syndrome, or other "acts of god." Does the FAA only worry about accidents caused by acts of terrorism and shrug off all other accidents as simply unavoidable? Does the CDC only track and attempt to reduce deaths by murder and suicide (ie acts of will)? Of course not! Normally, people are interested in reducing deaths from any cause, whether natural or unnatural, due to malice or not. Yet pro-lifers are completely indifferent to the fate of the 80% of zygotes that abort spontaneously. The only possible explanations are 1. They don't know about them--not true in your case. 2. They don't really believe that single celled organisms are people. 3. They are very immoral and indifferent to suffering when it is not caused by something "sexy" like murder. So, which is it in your case?

Posted by: Dianne | July 16, 2007 3:21 AM

Murder is the wilful and unlawful killing of individual human beings. The cells killed accidentally during surgery or other forms of treatment are not usually fertilized eggs so there is no crime nor any violation of rights.

Once again, any nucelated, diploid cell has the potential to form a unique human being. So how is killing so many potential humans in surgery then anything other than murder if abortion is murder?

Posted by: Dianne | July 16, 2007 3:31 AM