*abortions to save the mother*
The difference is if the mother dies it is by all means a natural death - no one is responsible, but if the baby is aborted to save the mother, the baby dies because a deliberate, violent act was inflicted on him or her by another person. Someone was directly responsible for causing the baby's death and they have blood on their hands.
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Moral dilemma: If the choice is between killing one to save another or letting them both die, a lot of people won't like to decide but the proper thing to do is save one of them. Especially if the one you're saving is a fully grown human and the one you're sacrificing isn't anywhere near developed, let alone sentient.
Morals aren't black and white, they're shades of grey. People like you don't like this but that doesn't change it. Deal with it.
"The difference is if the mother dies it is by all means a natural death - no one is responsible"
If you're going to give a clump of cells "personhood" then isn't that person responsible for the death of the mother? You can't have it both ways.
Just sayin'...
So what about ectopic pregnancies? The baby won't survive no matter what you do, but allowing it to grow has one of three consequences: the mother's fertility is halved, completely ruined, or she dies as well. And all three consequences are completely preventable.
And if you're gonna believe that all human life is sacred and needs to be preserved, then guess what? The mother is human, too. On top of that, if she lives then she has the opportunity to try this whole pregnancy thing again (hopefully with more success). If pregnancy turns out to be a problem for her, then she can adopt or look for a surrogate.
Technically, you could consider any fatal illness a natural death. By your logic, we could argue that fighting against cancer would be wrong because it would involve the voluntary destruction of human tissue.
You are a horrible human being. There is nothing more to say.
You're OK with essentially killing the mother even though something could be done to save her life all because of this retarded notion that a clump of parasitical cells is more important than a living, breathing, functioning human being.
You people disgust me.
Taking into account your belief that the embryo or fetus or whatever is a person...
To allow another to come to harm through inaction is also murder. To Allow them both to die would be a double murder, so I say that to save one, even at the cost of the other (who would die anyway) is a heroic act.
First responders must sometimes also face similar dilemmas. I wonder if any has ever said, "I'm sorry, I can't save either of you. I'm only able to help one and that would essentially be murder for the other so I'll just have to let you both go. Have a nice day!"
This is moral cowardice of the most craven kind: in order to avoid having to make an emotionally fraught decision you are willing to let someone die, and inflict the suffering that always accompanies death on the woman's family, friends and loved ones.
@adc
The difference is if the mother dies it is by all means a natural death - no one is responsible
So, you are asserting there is no moral obligation to help someone survive what may be considered a "natural" death?
Wait, I think I remember this, this is Kant's philosophy of ethics, right? It is better to let great evil occur through inaction than to cause little evil to occur.
This old moral dilemma is so stupid.
It's simple math, one death Vs. two deaths. At the end of the day it doesn't matter how you got there, your still there.
You'd rather let both die then shoulder the responsibility of taking action. It's called cowardice.
If you want to be a coward and selfishly think only of your own "clean" hands in a life or death situation then fine, be an asshole, but don't demand the same of others.
@ Fun to play with, not to eat.
"Is anyone surprised that they consider a non-sentient clump of cells to be equal to themselves, in self-awareness and intelligence? Sounds about right to me."
You win an internet.
If the fetus is allowed to kill the mother, then that fetus is directly responsible for killing the mother. No natural death about it, at all, as long as it is preventable by a simple medical procedure. The pro-life crowd has just as much blood on their hands as the pro-choice crowd does.
A passive harm is easier to commit than an active harm, and easier to rationalize away so as to avoid facing up to your own actions. That does not make it a morally superior choice.
So you're afraid of hard choices and difficult consequences; that doesn't make it moral or acceptable for you to commit what is essentially passive murder just so your poor little feelings won't be hurt. If you can't face that reality fine, your inadequacies are your own business, but don't you dare try to take that option away from those who do have the moral courage to deal with it.
Having blood on your hands is not the worst fate there is. If I were to kill someone in defense of someone I love, I would regret the necesity, but I would still be glad I had the courage to act. Many life-saving surgeries are plenty bloody, but if the lesser harm, actively committed, prevents a greater harm from being passively allowed, the action is good.
I dont know about you, but in public confession at my church we say "we have sinned against you in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have failed to do. " Having the ability to help someone and intentionally letting them die because you don't want to take responsibility is just as sinful as killing them yourself.
I am not particularly in favour of abortion as a fall back polition for failure to use contraception.Neither am I against it when there is good reason to use it. But ultimately, if a woman acts within the law, the it is nobody else's business.
I am, however, positively in favour of abortion in a situation where a woman has a family to love and care for, and which loves and cares for her. I cannot set those rights aside very easily in favour of something that has no effective legal existence. But then, what choice is made is the woman's - or should be.
This would be a good thing to remember, adc, when you're bleeding to death.
After all, all deaths are natural by definition. We are born and we die.
Unnatural would be if you reverse the order.
Think it through, sonny. Always think it through.
So in the case of ectopic pregnancy where both the fetus and the mother are very highly likely to die if untreated, it should be that the woman dies as well for it's better to die a "natural" death despite having treatment?
No, just no.
EDIT: #1132111 beat me to using the ectopic pregnancy example but I feel it still stands.
The Bible ( the infallible word of god, right?)implies that the Mother is more important than the unborn children. Exodus 21: 22-23 sums it up pretty well. It says that if someone causes a miscarriage ( but no serious harm) then a price must be paid. Monetary. That is it. Nothing about blood on hands. Eye for an eye comes in if THE MOTHER is killed.
READ YOUR OWN BOOK CRAZY PEOPLE!
BUT if you abort the child and save the mother, the mother can get pregnant again and do it right next time, thereby giving birth to a healthy child and surviving the process to potentially have more. So we have two choices here:
1) Allow one life and one potential life to be lost without helping and thereby cut off the potential for future lives to spring from the same source.
2) Extinguish the potential for one life to save one current life and thereby retain potential to create future life.
Hmm...now, one of these positions sounds like it's ACTUALLY in favor of life. Let's see...option one results in only death and no new life, while option two results in one saved life and potential for new life. GEE, I WONDER WHICH ONE IS THE BETTER CHOICE?
What if the mother has other children at home? This idiot advocates killing the mother in preference to a clump of undeveloped, unborn, non sentient cells. But it's OK if the mother dies? For a zygote, you would leave her other living children motherless? Fundie logic is unbelievable!
Uh, I know you guys are horrible at seeing the gaping holes in your reasoning, but I thought it was pretty obvious that an embryo or fetus can't live without its mother. If she dies, it dies too and I feel that as long as two people are going to die if you do nothing, it's morally correct to save at least one. Unlike most moral decisions, there's no gray area here: it's either save one or save neither and only a moron would choose the latter.
violent act was inflicted on him or her by another person.
I think I finally understand. They only think girls are worth something if they're still in the womb. (Boys too, but to a lesser extent.)
> if the mother dies it is by all means a natural death ... Someone was directly responsible ...
It's not just a "natural death". It's "an inevitable natural death due to lack of medical intervention". To spin it the other way: "A preventable natural death."
Direct responsibility is just as bad as indirect responsibility. You're just sitting there and pretending the problem will go away. And it does. Now you have two deaths. If you had done something, you'd only have one death.
Just because something happens inevitably doesn't mean it's automatically acceptable.
You could as well argue that all deaths are inevitable and thus acceptable no matter how they happen. Does that fly well with your morality?
So, instead of saving just one of them, it's far better to let them both die?
I just can't understand fundie logic. And these people call themselves "pro-life." But we all know that it really means "pro-life inside the uterus, fuck all who have been born."
Well, following your logic, no medicine. You know, we all know of natural deaths, isn't it?
Been on one too many cases like this. Your opinion is one formed from complete ignorance. You're short sighted concerning what happens to the mother's other children(if there are any). Of course somebody like you would have a godly home for them, wouldn't you? Stupid, stupid, stupid person you are.
Morally bankrupt person is morally bankrupt. It really is amazing how these people have ( or don't want ) so little an understanding of fertilization, gestation, childbirth, and female anatomy/physiology during. Just for a start they should read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pregnancy
Well, since you're advocating killing the mother over killing the fetus, then I'm going to go ahead and assume you wouldn't support abortion in the case of rape.
So suppose a woman is raped... if the resulting baby kills her, technically, the rapist's actions killed her.
An evil act unknowingly resulting in death, or a good act (saving a life) resulting in death.
What about situations where both the mother and the child would die? If God has given humanity the necessary tools to save one or the other, shouldn't people do their best to preserve at least one of the lives? And if the baby is too far gone, wouldn't it be best to save the mother?
I pray you never, ever have to tell this to a loved one. That their life should be forfeit on the off chance...yes OFF CHANCE, because if the pregnancy kills the mother, it's pretty damn likely, the baby dies too...that the fetus will survive to term. That although their death is preventable, it's a natural death, and they should just accept it. And I pray that if such an occasion does occur that said female loved one kicks you so hard in the balls that they touch your tonsils.
By this logic, a bystander who casually leaves an injured person to die in an accident without even bothering to notify the police or paramedics hasn't actually done anything wrong, since he didn't actively do anything to kill the victim.
Just admit you. You think women are nothing but expendable wombs. I can't believe I'm about to say this.....
Get beaten black and blue by someone who lost their mother because a bunch of mindfuckers like you wouldn't let her get an abortion to save her life.
I'm a prolifer, but in the case of injury of the female that is pregnant, she should certainly place her own safety first.
Also, Rape cases are another exemption.
I'm a prolifer, but
Okay.
in the case of injury of the female that is pregnant, she should certainly place her own safety first.
She usually does. But if she goes into a Catholic hospital with the expectation that they'll help, she may not come out alive.
Also, Rape cases are another exemption.
Be more specific, hadomaru.
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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