Abortion: A woman's right to choose

Legal Human Rights
21

And yet the really odd thing is all I can see is an even stronger argument for retrospective abortion.

[quote]Pastor’s abortion dream inflames bushfire tragedy


Danny Nalliah … says he had a dream

The Catch the Fire Ministries has tried to blame the bushfires disaster on laws decriminalising abortion in Victoria.

The evangelical church’s leader, Pastor Danny Nalliah, claimed he had a dream about raging fires on October 21 last year and that he woke with “a flash from the Spirit of God: that His conditional protection has been removed from the nation of Australia, in particular Victoria, for approving the slaughter of innocent children in the womb”.

Pastor Nalliah said he was helping to co-ordinate fire relief, including providing trucks to distribute clothes and food and giving his own blood, but he said he must tell “the truth”.

Asked by the Herald if he did not believe most Australians would regard his remarks as being in appallingly bad taste, he said today: “I must tell people what they need to hear, not what they want to hear.”

He said it was no use “molly-coddling” Australians.

Asked if he believed in a God who would take vengeance by killing so many people indiscriminately - even those who opposed abortion, Mr Nalliah referred to 2 Chronicles 7:14 to vouch for his assertion that God could withdraw his protection from a nation. [/quote]
:

Dear Pastor Nalliah.

We the Australian people regret the oversight of not realising what a useless piece of shit you were to become back when you were in the first trimester, however, we are eager to both acknowledge and correct this mistake and offer immediately, and free of charge, a retrospective abortion.

Yours with God’s love and compassion.

HG

22

Anti-abortion religious nuts in Australia? :astonished:

Whodathunkit?

23

Oh, Australia has its fair share of religious nuts. Mostly they are Protestant and Fundamentalist loonies who were unfortunately not lunatic enough to make it big in the American Bible Belt, but there are a fair few Catholic hard cores like Opus Dei and some of the Mother Mary Virgin cults kicking around, not to mention the Brethren (Don’t mention the Brethren, they’ll come around and cut you), as well as the usual crop of Muslim fundamentalists agitating to install Sharia law.

most of them don’t realise, like this pastor Nalliah guy, that it’s not a child until it’s born.

24

Interestingly, traditional Chinese belief is that a child is not human until it learns to be human (or alternatively, it’s reached one year or something).

Even more interesting, the young baby ie non-human is even threatening to human adults, because it may be a demon at this point.

25

It’s a logical belief system, I suppose.

26

Really? Then why do they (purportedly) calculate ones age from the date of conception?

27

Many Chinese beliefs about foetuses and children under one year are fascinating. There are a lot of interesting studies.

I’m guessing it comes from aspects of Taoism, east Asian Buddhist ideas about transmutation and reincarnation and simple expediency in a world with high infant mortality and favouring of male children. Any thoughts, JB?

28

[quote=“Buttercup”]Many Chinese beliefs about foetuses and children under one year are fascinating. There are a lot of interesting studies.

I’m guessing it comes from aspects of Taoism, east Asian Buddhist ideas about transmutation and reincarnation and simple expediency in a world with high infant mortality and favouring of male children. Any thoughts, JB?[/quote]

actually, major aspects predate pre-buddhist times, all the way back to neolithic period. More likely to do with the shamanistic/superstitions of that time. For example, those kinds of infants would not be granted a proper burial. This apparently is related to an old belief that man-eating ghouls or ghosts cry with an infant’s cry.

What’s also interesting is that babies and adults were sacrificed in building projects. Ie life was sacrificed to help consecrate each major stage of construction - this extended to people’s homes, to temples, and major public buildings. So in your home, under the pillars, there might be a jar containing a sacrificed dismembered, maybe even burnt infant, youth, or adult, perhaps along with bones of a sacrificed animal (that was used as burnt offering or as part of the feast that went along with the ritual).

So the mob weren’t the first ones to make cement shoes so to speak.

On top of that, your kin was buried in your front yard, not in public cemeteries; sometimes even underneath your floor. Add pits where you tossed bones of animals, fish you hunted, and you were literally living amongst and around the dead.

29

In Chinese culture, and here in traditional families of Chinese ethnicity, babies are only given their proper name at the age of one. and your age is calculated from the time you were born, so as soon as you are born, you are 1 , as in “this is your first year of life”. hence the apparent contradiction.

babies under the age of one can well be demons. we have a ‘difficult’ baby living a couple of floors down. very healthy lungs, to be sure. bastard.

well, probably not technically a bastard, but you know what i mean.

30

I’d like to vote, but all the options except for one are way too far to the right. The one exception, “It’s the woman’s right to choose, regardless” is just to the right of center. There’s no option to suggest that men should have any say whatsoever, that marriage is something that men and women enter together, where they make decisions together and take responsibility together.

My preferred option is way to the left of that, but unfortunately it’s not there. Abortion (in the first trimester) should be compulsory unless evidence can be shown of reasonable living standards, a good environment for raising a children, parents are not addicted to harmful substances, parents can show they have some understanding of how to bring up a child, and preferably have either an income or some dough put aside. It should be easier to get a car licence than to obtain complete responsibility over another life.

31

[quote=“Jack Burton”]

On top of that, your kin was buried in your front yard, not in public cemeteries;[/quote]
Still are. Kind of bothered me when I visited my students’ homes in Sichuan and was introduced to the dead relatives. Their graves are right there beside the house.

And Quentin, a 17-year-old is not necessarily a bad mother, and no one here is saying she is. How do you know you ruined your parents’ lives? They had another kid 2 years after you, so maybe they liked children or wanted another.

32

My problem is not that it is the choice of the woman, rather the fact that the man has so little say. We are supposed to be moving toward this concept of equality, but the status quo provides more protection for the mother than the father.

Yes, the final decision to carry a child to term needs to be made by the mother. Its a year of her life carrying a child and trashing her body. However there needs to be some legal protection for the father. If the father wants the kid and the woman doesn’t, he has(and should not have) any way to stop her. However if he does not want the child but she does, he should be able to sign a document legally absolving him of any responsibility for the child.

This system also would depend on a better social network surrounding unexpected pregnancy. Potential parents in this situation need to have all the facts about all possibilities. If a mother, after being educated about how she is in no way financially stable enough to raise a kid, decides to carry to term and not put the child up for adoption, then she is on her own. The man should have the OPTION to help raise that kid, but he should not be forced to contribute anything.

That is equality, if a man can’t make a woman carry his child, then the woman can’t force a man to raise one.

33

I think women should have the right to choose an artificial abortion within reason (later-term abortions only for those fetuses that endanger the mother’s life or have serious defects).

I think pro-lifers should be required to adopt at least one of the children they wish to save or should be taxed extra to cover the services and care of children who would have otherwise been aborted (or they should just mind their own damn business).

I also feel that those who have serial abortions for reasons other than a threat to the mother’s life or the child’s health or treat abortion as a form of birth control should be charged exponentially each time they have one.

34

choice is needed

35

I see abortion as being similar to bankruptcy. It happens because of making poor choices more often than not or because of bad luck (breaking condoms, etc.) but it should be a decision that is not made lightly. I don’t think you can file for bankruptcy every time you can’t pay your bills because you chose to buy a new car or go on that vacation you’ve always wanted. The same thing for serial abortions. Most serial abortionists are so because they are self-centered on doing what is convenient or feels good rather than being responsible. By making subsequential abortions higher and higher in cost, the price of an IUD doesn’t look that bad in comparison.

36

Abortion is a savage ritual in which the life of an as yet to be born child is sacrificed for the irresponsibility of the would-be parents.

37

No, it’s a FUN! way for women to control their own destiny without the input of their menfolk!

38

In certain cases, perhaps. I know many women who don’t fit that category yet have taken the no-doubt agonizing decision. So do you, probably. Don’t be so quick to judge.

39

In certain cases, perhaps. I know many women who don’t fit that category yet have taken the no-doubt agonizing decision. So do you, probably. Don’t be so quick to judge.[/quote]

Confused by the use of the word ‘ritual’.

sandman, women who have sex are all sluts. God forbid they put their own health, livelihood, independence and quality of life above a potential baby they’ve never even laid eyes on. And tc, society hates single mothers more than women who have abortions.

40

No society I have ever lived in or known.