Blastocyst Liberation
mikethemadbiologist | October 5, 2009By way of Digby, we learn that the anti-abortion movement has decided on a new tactic--declaring that a fertilized egg is a person:
It is one of the enduring questions of religion and science, and lately of American politics: When does a fertilized egg become a person?
Abortion foes, tired of a profusion of laws that limit but do not abolish abortion, are trying to answer the question in a way that they hope could put an end to legalized abortion.
Across the country, they have revived efforts to amend state constitutions to declare that personhood -- and all rights accorded human beings --…
mikethemadbiologist | April 10, 2009A recent post about the idiocy in Fairfax County regarding a student who was expelled for two weeks because she took birth control pills during school received some great comments. But as you might expect, with enough comments, one of the 'contraception is abortion' morons showed up (can't you morons leave me alone during my vacation?). Ordinarily, I would have let the commentors administer an ass kicking (which they did very well). But when the commenter wrote:
I just wanted to remind readers that some believe life begins at conception (and that it doesn't get a postmodernist exemption to…
mikethemadbiologist | December 2, 2007Michael Kinsley sums up the ethical inconsistency of the Blastocyst Liberationists:
Third, although the political dilemma that stem cells pose for politicians is real enough, the moral dilemma is not and never was. The embryos used in stem-cell research come from fertility clinics, which otherwise would discard them. This has been a powerful argument in favor of such research. Why let these embryos go to waste? But a more important point is, What about fertility clinics themselves? In vitro fertilization ("test-tube babies") involves the purposeful creation of multiple embryos, knowing and…
mikethemadbiologist | October 14, 2007Knute Berger relays the following email from Ed Lazowska, the former co-chair of the President's Information Technology Advisory Committee (italics mine):
The years of the [George W.] Bush administration have been a black time for science in this nation. I speak with the experience of having co-chaired the President's Information Technology Advisory Committee for Bush, and having chaired the Defense Department's DARPA [Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency] Information Science and Technology Study Group during his presidency. Funds for research, the seed corn of our future competitiveness…
mikethemadbiologist | October 6, 2007
In some wickedly funny satire, Amanda Marcotte shows us how to create an anti-menstruation movement:
The "abortion is icky" argument is such that the anti-choice crowd could easily start agitating for a ban on menstruation without skipping a beat. The fact that menstruation is incredibly common shouldn't slow them down; after all, the anti-choice position demands that you believe that more than 1/3 of American women are murderers. Menstruation is, except maybe to a handful of insistent earth mother crunchy feminists, generally regarded as pretty icky. I throw a bloody tampon at you, you'll…
mikethemadbiologist | July 10, 2007Over at Pandagon, Amanda raises an interesting issue about the subtext of the phrase "trusting women" when used to argue for reproductive freedom:
Okay, in all honesty, I think the phrase, while well-intended and certainly catchy, is bad framing. I don't trust women, not all women. Hell, I don't trust myself on occasion. We are all capable of bad decision-making, as anyone who's had a hangover or an ex-boyfriend who calls you at work and harasses you can attest. (*cough*) The phrase "trust women", while most definitely not intended this way, upholds the frame that women's freedom is…
mikethemadbiologist | May 7, 2007By way of ScienceBlogling John Lynch, I read that George Gilder calls biologists "Darwinian stormtroopers." In the same NY Times article, John West claims (italics mine):
The [Darwinian] technocrats, he charged, wanted to grab control from "ordinary citizens and their elected representatives" so that they alone could make decisions over "controversial issues such as sex education, partial-birth abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research and global warming."
While Gilder and West don't realize it, they have stumbled across our Evil Darwinist Plot:
That's why we want the embryonic…
mikethemadbiologist | November 21, 2006Some brilliant Republican solons from the great state of Missouri have released an official state report that argues that abortion has led to illegal immigration. The 'argument?'
Abortion has eliminated U.S. workers, leading to a need for illegal immigrants.
Clearly, these brilliant minds have never heard of the meat-packing industry. The meat-packing industry used to be unionized, and, consequently, virtually all of its workers were either legal residents or citizens. Then the unions were busted, resulting in crappy pay and dangerous conditions, and many people--rightfully so--did not…
mikethemadbiologist | October 27, 2006More than a few conservatives are upset about the Michael J. Fox commercials because they're unfair: how do you respond to the emotional pull of someone who has Parkinson's disease? If you watch the full-length CBS interview, Couric cruelly hammers Fox over and over with the question of if he overexaggerated his symptoms for the commercial (she's obviously trying hard to dispel the image of being the nicest of the big three anchors). But where she truly entered the realm of tastelessness was when she repeated Rush Limbaugh's charge that Democrats use victims for political purposes.…
mikethemadbiologist | September 21, 2006 In the November general election, South Dakota will have a referendum that could overturn its law that bans abortions, even where the woman has been raped, is the victim of incest, would suffer long-term medical problems, or would be unable to have future children. The first of the political ads are running, so I thought this post would be appropriate (and certainly in the style my readers have come to expect....). From the archives:
Well, that got your attention, didn't it?
Of course, I realize that it's utterly inappropriate to introduce religion into the abortion debate.
(Thankfully,…
mikethemadbiologist | September 15, 2006From Kristine at Amused Muse:
People are always pointing at scientists and screaming, "Why don't you find a cure for cancer?" Well, now that scientists finally have, loopy-loo fundies deny the treatment for their daughters! Screw them. Not only should this vaccination be required for all young girls, any parent who seriously thinks that this "encourages immorality" should have his or her children taken away. They aren't fit to be parents.
Pregnancy as punishment, cancer as coercion. Welcome to Bush's America.
mikethemadbiologist | August 24, 2006...and the Christopaths want to kill it anyway. There is a method that could be used to harvest embryonic stem cells that does not harm development of the embryo:
The new technique would be performed on a two-day-old embryo, after the fertilized egg has divided into eight cells, known as blastomeres. In fertility clinics, where the embryo is available outside the woman in the normal course of in vitro fertilization, one of these blastomeres can be removed for diagnostic tests, like for Down syndrome.
The embryo, now with seven cells, can be implanted in the woman if no defect is found. Many…
mikethemadbiologist | July 25, 2006400,000 to-be-discarded embryos? The Mad Biologist has a very evil, nefarious, and sinister idea for them:
(photo from here)
They're mine. All mine! I will rule the world galaxy! I will adopt a menacing deep, baritone voice!
It's really hard to take the blastocyst liberationists very seriously...