POLITICS VS. SCIENCE
Which will the FDA (finally) choose?
By Dara Purvis | RAW STORY COLUMNIST
[i]If at first you don
Australia made the Morning After Pill over-the-counter last year.
There wasn’t any large uproars or anything.
You can get it here.
Part of every good girl’s nutricious breakfast.
[quote=“frokky”]Australia made the Morning After Pill over-the-counter last year.
There wasn’t any large uproars or anything.[/quote]
If they don’t have the brains to use a condom or be on birth control pills, what make you think this will be any better?
And here’s some news from July some of you may have missed:
[quote]Federal officials announced Tuesday that they are investigating two more cases of California women who died after using the abortion pill RU-486 and warned emergency room doctors to be on the lookout for unusual infections among women who have taken the pill.
At least five women have died in the United States after taking the pill since it began selling in 2000, including 18-year-old Holly Patterson from the East Bay, who died in 2003 after initially being sent home from a Pleasanton hospital where she sought treatment for abdominal pain.
Four of the deaths occurred in California and resulted from bloodstream infections. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said it suspects that those four were associated with a bacterium that lacks some of the usual signs and symptoms of infection, including a fever.[/quote]
There’s a BIG difference between the “Morning After Pill” and the “Abortion Pill”!
Thanks; I didn’t realize that these were two completely different items.
Still, if a couple uses RU469, they’ll never have to use RU486. Just a thought. 
I doubt the fetus sees much difference.
I doubt the fetus sees much difference.[/quote]You’re right; life is life, but there is a difference. The morning after, a cluster of maybe 4, 8, 16(?) cells sees and feels a whole lot less than a third trimester fetus. Neither one nor the other would be better, but if there’s going to a choice, it’s a pretty simple choice.
I doubt the fetus sees much difference.[/quote]You’re right; life is life, but there is a difference. The morning after, a cluster of maybe 4, 8, 16(?) cells sees and feels a whole lot less than a third trimester fetus. Neither one nor the other would be better, but if there’s going to a choice, it’s a pretty simple choice.[/quote]
So why not use half a brain and a condom?
[quote=“Comrade Stalin”]So why not use half a brain and a condom?[/quote]I’m not disagreeing with you on that point. There are other (potentially deadly) reasons to use a condom, as well. I’d like to see real, intense, no nonsense sex education in all schools, to make sure that even those running on a quarter-brain have enough sense to use at least a condom. But it isn’t a perfect world… people don’t have all the information, condoms break, ect, ect. After real education, and social (structural & moral) reforms that make it possible for a single parent (usually the mom) to raise a kid following an unexpected pregnancy without likely condemning herself and her chid to a life of poverty, the morning after pill seems the path of least harm.
Besides which, some forms of birth control don’t actually prevent fertilization, just implantation of the fertilized egg. Excepting the lack of foresight, and an irrational but, I think, understandable distaste for the method, the morning after pill isn’t any different. 
[quote=“Jaboney”]
You’re right; life is life, but there is a difference. The morning after, a cluster of maybe 4, 8, 16(?) cells sees and feels a whole lot less than a third trimester fetus. Neither one nor the other would be better, but if there’s going to a choice, it’s a pretty simple choice.[/quote]
But at the end of every termination, there’s something that ends up in the bucket or the toilet. We can bicker about whether that something is a ‘human life’ before or after a viable birth, but it’s a potential, a something – different from a tumor or a rotted tooth.
I disagree with your “spinning” of the morning after pill as a “friend” of working-class women. I would argue that the majority of the women using it are middle- to upper-class princesses from the suburbs that were too lazy,stupid, and irresponsible to do proper birth control planning and want to make sure nothing comes of their mistake.
[quote=“Chewycorns”][quote=“Jaboney”]
You’re right; life is life, but there is a difference. The morning after, a cluster of maybe 4, 8, 16(?) cells sees and feels a whole lot less than a third trimester fetus. Neither one nor the other would be better, but if there’s going to a choice, it’s a pretty simple choice.[/quote]
But at the end of every termination, there’s something that ends up in the bucket or the toilet. We can bicker about whether that something is a ‘human life’ before or after a viable birth, but it’s a potential, a something – different from a tumor or a rotted tooth.[/quote] Which is why I wrote “You’re right; life is life…”
I disagree with your “spinning” of the morning after pill as a “friend” of working-class women. I would argue that the majority of the women using it are middle- to upper-class princesses from the suburbs that were too lazy,stupid, and irresponsible to do proper birth control planning and want to make sure nothing comes of their mistake.[/quote]Do you actually have a point, or are you just looking to paint this in standard ideological stripes? Where’s the spin? Who made mention of working-class women? Anyone–male or female, lower class or middle–can expect to have a tough time making a go of it parenting alone. Some do a great job of it, most struggle. Check the stats of the percentage of single-parent families living in poverty. Ask a few single, middle class parents if their opportunities aren’t limited by a lack of support. Again, where’s the spin? Who’s making painting this as a right vs. left issue? :loco:
I doubt the fetus sees much difference.[/quote]You’re right . . .[/quote]
No he’s not right. The morning after a couple has sex there is no fetus. At most there is simply an egg that has been fertilized by a sperm. Technically, that organism can only be referred to as a fetus after it has developed for more than 8 weeks. Before that it is technically referred to as an embryo, not a fetus.
But, before that it’s not even referred to as an embryo but as a zygote. The day after a woman has sex, if a sperm connects with an egg, even the term embryo would be deceptive as it suggests the life form looks somewhat like a fetus. At that initial stage it does not. At that stage it is simply a one-celled egg that has been fertilized. It then splits into two cells, then four, then eight, but it looks nothing like a fetus or a human being at that point.
Photo of a fertilized human egg
Anti-abortion protesters who shout “murderer” and wave placards depicting bloody fetuses ignore the fact that women who terminate pregnancy immediately have not killed a human being or a fetus – they have merely stopped an egg from dividing.
To argue otherwise – to say that an abortion in hte first week constitutes murder – would be akin to claiming that a chicken egg and a chicken are the same thing. Obviously they are not. An egg has the potential to develop into a fetus and then into a chicken or a human. But at first it is simply an egg.
I don’t mean to suggest that abortion should be taken lightly. I agree with Stalin that people having sex should use extreme care to prevent pregnancy if they’re not ready to have a child. Abortion is a very serious procedure with profound moral implications and ideally every pregnancy would be planned and wanted and no woman would ever consider having an abortion. But mistakes (and rapes and incest) happen.
But I didn’t want to argue the pros and cons of abortion – just to point out that “the morning after” there is no fetus, only an egg (or a zygote), and I feel the analogy of a chicken egg and a chicken can be useful for seeing the facts as they really are.
ahh, he said, innocently opening a can of worms…but the soul is already in it, isn’t it? 
Some brands of P pills can be used as morning after pills. 10 years ago it Taiwan, they used a mornign after injection - a good thing if the condom broke, but it was priced at NT$1000 if I recall correctly. It was more corrective action after the fact than anything else. Also, when you eat a morning after pill, you have no idea as whether you are pregnant or not - it’s somewhat different when eating RU486
If you are against morning after pills, then you should be against mini p pills as well, as they do roughly the same thing.
[quote=“Mother Theresa”]No he’s not right. The morning after a couple has sex there is no fetus. At most there is simply an egg that has been fertilized by a sperm. Technically, that organism can only be referred to as a fetus after it has developed for more than 8 weeks. Before that it is technically referred to as an embryo, not a fetus.
But, before that it’s not even referred to as an embryo but as a zygote.[/quote]I know, and I think Comrade Stalin knows as well. But whether it’s technically a zygote, blastocyst, or fetus–just fertilized egg or have-developed chick–life is life, and there is a difference. I don’t want to get into an argument over the exact nature of that difference, but save for those taking a hardline position, I think most of us can deal with it. I also expect that after taking a look at the information, most of us can accept that the use of this pill isn’t entirely outrageous, but nor is it ideal.
I didn’t believe this when I first heard it, but it’s obviously true- you can tell these people have never thought about the consequences
It sounds like there is a huge misunderstanding of the morning after pill. Nothing has happened, no fertilization or no attachment, therefore no pregnancy. The reason you have to have the pill in 72 hours is because that’s technically how long it would take for the egg to become fertilized and successfully attach itself to the uterus. By taking the morning after pill you send a quick message, “DONT FERTILIZE THIS EGG, WE MIGHT ALREADY BE PREGNANT.”
Can’t get pregnant twice! If you are against the morning after pill, you are against all oral birth control because they are the same thing, one dose much stronger than the other. And for those that don’t know, the morning after pill brings on your period, to discharge the egg, as normal.
The purpose of taking the morning after pill is not to destroy, but to prevent. Women get rid of eggs all of the time, no life contained.
Check it out: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morning-after_pill
While the primary aim should be good sense, the reality is that mistakes happen. These mistakes should not force the hand and determine the lives of people in a society that clearly has the science and sense to offer alternatives.
Personally I see attempts to stifle choice as being in no way different to Islamofascists trying to limit the shape and nature of political discussion/freedoms and the freedom/rights of woman and others.
Fer chrissake, if a gaggle of cells is even remotely akin to a human soul/child in the first several weeks of pregnancy, then I’m afraid every jack-off should be equally blameworthy and each passing of the menstrual cycle a time of grief.
To (mis)quote Kerry Packer: I’ve seen the bottom of the suction container after an abortion sonny, and I can tell you there’s fucking nothing there.
. . . every sperm is sacred . . . ?
HG
Just wanted to say that this is one of the “least bad” discussions of abortion (or contraception, I suppose that’s part of the question) that I have seen in a while.
For me, the idea of framing abortion as a social policy question, or “women’s rights” issue, has always seemed rather bizarre. The only questions that matters is whether the action results in a loss of human life. And this depends on what you consider to be a human life.
All the rest is just contemptible political posturing.
Nobody questions the notion that a woman does not have the right to kill her newborn baby. Because we all agree that a newborn baby is a human being, a woman who did this would be a murderer. There would be no question of “social issues”, or “women’s issues” how “hard it is to raise a baby as a single mother”, or anything else. If it’s a life, and you end it, then it’s murder. If it’s not a life, and a what a woman is doing is having a medical procedure on her own body, then that’s where the story ends as well (I’ve never heard any pro-life figure argue that a woman cannot have an operation that affects only her body).
So cheers to MT and everyone else who has focused on this question. It’s an important one. Not everyone will come to the same conclusion, but it is nice to see the focus on the question that matters.
H