Reverse scenario

[Northern Light]

I came across this satire recently and thought I'd share it. While it's meant to be taken lightly, it does a good job of pointing out the flaws in reproductive theology through inversely examining the issue.

A lot of effort has been invested in trying to create hoops that women have to jump through before they can have an abortion, but is our desire to regulate prenatal care at the same level? Should women be counselled about what parenthood entails before they are automatically encouraged to go through with pregnancy?

This piece turns the issue on its head.

A proposal for moms-to-be (like abortion, it's for their own good)

To ensure that the decision to go through with a pregnancy is fully considered, there would be a 72-hour waiting period between the time a pregnant woman first sees a doctor and the time she can get prenatal care.

Physicians would have to inform pregnant women about the risks of childbirth and motherhood. They would have to note that childbirth, compared with abortion, is roughly 14 times more likely to result in maternal death and is more often associated with depression and other forms of mental illness. They would also have to emphasize that working women in the United States can expect to see their wages drop 9 to 16 percent for each child and that having a child makes it significantly less likely that an unmarried woman will ever marry.

To ensure that women are not being coerced by partners, family members or clergy into bearing a child, DOMA would require that all women be interviewed about the circumstances of conception and their motives for continuing with pregnancy. Did a husband sabotage birth control? Was a woman unable to afford contraception because her employer refused to comply with the Affordable Care Act?

And, finally, pregnant women would be required to view a two-hour video featuring a colicky newborn, a toddler having a tantrum and a sulking teenager.

In addition to the provisions above, DOMA would remember the special needs of pregnant teenagers. Since a child’s decision to have a baby represents a significant turning point in a young life, lawmakers across the country have required that parents give consent or be notified before a pregnant teen can receive an abortion.

It is hard to understand why similar protections have not been afforded to girls who plan to give birth. After all, only about half of teen moms finish high school, and they may well rely on their parents to raise and support their babies. Therefore, under DOMA, prenatal care for a minor would not be available without at least one parent signing a statement acknowledging the limited life prospects and economic opportunities for teen mothers.

This is a great piece, and I'm glad someone brought it up!

The abortion debate spends so much time focusing on fetal rights that the appropriateness of parenthood is not even questioned. How should we respond to people whose upbringing was so horrendously awful and heavy in suffering that they wish they were never born?

If the desire is there to ban abortion, then why not regulate all of parenthood? Why not ensure that only the most qualified and prepared people are having children? This is a philosophical question, so please don't bore everyone with how the government doesn't have a right to do it, or there would be technological complications. I want a straight answer... no beating around the bush!

 

[JayDubya]

How should we respond to people whose upbringing was so horrendously awful and heavy in suffering that they wish they were never born?

"Why are you still here?"

 

[Northern Light]

"Why are you still here?"

I was asking the question because I'm wondering about the "right to life" question. What about the right to a good life by ensuring that a child is being born to good parents?

 

[JayDubya]

I was asking the question because I'm wondering about the "right to life" question. What about the right to a good life by ensuring that a child is being born to good parents?

No, not you, OP. I'm not asking you why you are here.

You asked a question. "How should we respond to people who say they wish they had never been born?"

I gave you an answer. See above.

Quite literally, if people don't want to be here, they have the power and the right to not be here... but that's not an argument for killing anyone, that's actually a really good argument against it.

 

[joko104]

The only problem is requiring parental consent. IF having a child suddenly ended with the girl turned 18, then sure. BUT that girl will have to raise that child long, long after her parents no longer have any obligation.

For example, do you think a parent could require a girl to have her entire body including her face tattooed as a "parental right?" In many ways, it is far worse for her if those same parents required her to have a baby. And tattoos would cripple, disfigure or kill you. They don't consume your time and money. They don't create civil and criminal liabilities.

Except in emergency health situations, I don't have a problem with a 72 waiting period and actually mostly support them. However, it should be noted that FAR more pregnant teens are pressured TO ABORTION than to have the baby. A 72 hour waiting period plus safeguards you suggest would go a HUGE way towards teens who do NOT want to abort not aborting and those who don't want the child doing so.

Too many - mostly men - pretend that a 15 year old teenager (male or female) is an independent adult, with independent mobility, independent funds and full knowledge of options and resources. In fact, most don't have any of that.

I could post a lot about pregnant teens of unplanned pregnancies and have in the past as we (mostly wife and other women) often interact with them LIVING in our home. The LAST thing they need is someone spouting platitudes, religion, slogans and pressure-sales pitches EITHER way on the abortion issue.

Or, where you get a HUGE protest? ProLife men! They absolutely do NOT want any regulations or laws about THEM whatsoever when it comes to unwanted pregnancies they would make. As soon as that baby is born and thus could take their time, put them at legal risk, and they having to raise the baby - wow do they HOWL! "It's all the woman's fault!!!"

 

[joko104]

"Why are you still here?"

So you mean like when John McCain said how horrific torture was, you'd ask him "so why don't you kill yourself now?"

Or to ask you since you declare abortion is murdering babies, why aren't you physically trying to stop women from doing so? Or is it that you don't REALLY believe a word you write - or that you of course exempt yourself from your thousands of demands and fury moral declarations?

 

[Henrin]

I was asking the question because I'm wondering about the "right to life" question. What about the right to a good life by ensuring that a child is being born to good parents?

There is no such thing as a right to a good life and for good reason.

 

[JayDubya]

So you mean like when John McCain said how horrific torture was, you'd ask him "so why don't you kill yourself now?"

:roll:

I don't think John McCain is somehow exempt from the general principle at hand; if you want to be dead, you can make yourself dead.

Or to ask you since you declare abortion is murdering babies, why aren't you physically trying to stop women from doing so? Or is it that you don't REALLY believe a word you write - or that you of course exempt yourself from your thousands of demands and fury moral declarations?

Please don't waste our time with your weird internet tough guy shtick. Just go back to telling us more stories about "your wife."'

:giggling:

 

[joko104]

I was asking the question because I'm wondering about the "right to life" question. What about the right to a good life by ensuring that a child is being born to good parents?

There also is the social issue as a collective matter. Unwanted children born into poverty, extreme abuse, etc have extremely high rates of crime including violent crime of the most nightmarish kinds - plus 50 million orphans and unwanted children would shatter the economy, cause the public to overall have contempt of children and put little value on them, and cause massive social upheaval.

IF society DEMANDS women have babies they don't want, then society should equally demand that all members of society be required to raise such abandoned children with VERY strict and total parental time, money, liability and duty obligations. It could be a lottery. Every person age 21 or older would be subject to being assigned a child - of whatever age and whatever disabilities, behavorial issues, education, criminal record - to raise as his/her own child 100%. NO GOVERNMENT AID MONEY either.

More than "regulate," to "REQUIRE" everyone in society be liable on an individual personal level for what they decide society is demanding of others.

 

[joko104]

:roll:

I don't think John McCain is somehow exempt from the general principle at hand; if you want to be dead, you can make yourself dead.



Please don't waste our time with your weird internet tough guy shtick. Just go back to telling us more stories about "your wife."

You message is nonsense. McCain can not go back before the torture and undo it by retroactively committing suicide.

Your last two sentences is just a dodge. You don't actually DO anything consistent with your rantings about "aggressive homicide," do you? Would you? Or would you?

That's a HUGE difference between you and I. If I saw a person about to murder a child, I WOULD STOP THAT PERSON. Physically. If necessary, shoot the person.

Not you it seems. Not for the answer - ie dodge - you made. You could have said "of course if anyway possible I would stop her." But you didn't. You'd go online and say someone else should do something to keep that from happening to other children. To you this all it is about your using the forum expressing your fury against women in anonymous messages, not about protecting children. My "internet tough guy shtick" has nothing to do with it. Your messages are either hypocritical or show cowardice or at least no real concern for "babies killed in aggressive homicide" as you call it.

 

[Fisher]

If you are old enough to have sex, you are old enough to use protection.

 

[joko104]

If you are old enough to have sex, you are old enough to use protection.

So what you are saying is men have no excuse.

 

[JayDubya]

You message is nonsense. McCain can not go back before the torture and undo it by retroactively committing suicide.

You're the one who brought up John McCain... appropriate of nothing. Don't whine at me when you say something stupid and you don't make sense. I can't make you make sense, either.

Your last two sentences is just a dodge. You don't actually DO anything consistent with your rantings about "aggressive homicide," do you? Would you? Or would you?

I vote for good, principled people who want to see good and literate people on the Supreme Court.

That's a HUGE difference between you and I. If I saw a person about to murder a child, I WOULD STOP THAT PERSON. Physically. If necessary, shoot the person.

My, that's rather brave of you, seeing as the law entirely permits you to do that, so you would never suffer negative consequences as a result of your action. :roll:


One does not have to be John Brown to be an abolitionist. I realize that you have carefully cultivated this faux, internet-exclusive thuggish persona, but others don't have to play along, and we don't have to heed your incitement to violence.

 

[Fisher]

So what you are saying is men have no excuse.

Since men have no abortion rights, that would be yet another attempt to create a strawman to act like women are too stupid to use protection if they are not prepared to go through with a pregnancy as men cannot get pregnant

 

[JayDubya]

So what you are saying is men have no excuse.

So what you're saying is that you think women are helpless and / or dumb.



Funny that, given that you always call us sexist.

 

[joko104]

You're the one who brought up John McCain... appropriate of nothing. Don't whine at me when you say something stupid and you don't make sense. I can't make you make sense, either.




I vote for good, principled people who want to see good and literate people on the Supreme Court.



My, that's rather brave of you, seeing as the law entirely permits you to do that, so you would never suffer negative consequences as a result of your action. :roll:


One does not have to be John Brown to be an abolitionist. I realize that you have carefully cultivated this faux internet thug persona, but others don't have to play along, and we don't have to heed your incitement to violence.

:lamo Given the number of times you've posted about "aggressive homicide," what a joke.

I didn't write a qualifier of "only if I could get away with it," did I? If I knew/saw someone about to kill his/her child, I wouldn't think "hmmm, can I legally get away with stopping that." I'd like to get away with it, but that would not be the decisive factor. Your now trying to bait me with "tough" guy and "thug" does not in the slightest change what your messages seem to suggest is your personality in relation to actually protecting children.

It doesn't take being a thug or tough guy to protect a child. You're a big gun-guy, so that's not it, is it? But personal cowardice and apathy towards children will prevent protecting a child.

 

[JayDubya]

Your argument amounts to, "If you don't shoot up Planned Parenthood, you don't really care."

I've given your argument the respect such an argument deserves...

 

[Fletch]

There also is the social issue as a collective matter. Unwanted children born into poverty, extreme abuse, etc have extremely high rates of crime including violent crime of the most nightmarish kinds - plus 50 million orphans and unwanted children would shatter the economy, cause the public to overall have contempt of children and put little value on them, and cause massive social upheaval.

IF society DEMANDS women have babies they don't want, then society should equally demand that all members of society be required to raise such abandoned children with VERY strict and total parental time, money, liability and duty obligations. It could be a lottery. Every person age 21 or older would be subject to being assigned a child - of whatever age and whatever disabilities, behavorial issues, education, criminal record - to raise as his/her own child 100%. NO GOVERNMENT AID MONEY either.

More than "regulate," to "REQUIRE" everyone in society be liable on an individual personal level for what they decide society is demanding of others.

The issue with abortion is one of rights and when they begin. An "unwanted" baby is still a baby and in possession of rights equal to yours or mine. You dont get to end a life simply because you dont want that life around. That is murder.

 

[joko104]

So what you're saying is that you think women are helpless and / or dumb.



Funny that, given that you always call us sexist.

Actually, if you look back, I posted that - in response to your claim - that on average women are both more powerful and smarter than men like you. I was real clear about that. :lamo

 

[joko104]

Your argument amounts to, "If you don't shoot up Planned Parenthood, you don't really care."

I've given your argument the respect such an argument deserves...

No, I made it far closer to home than that and made NO mention of PP whatsoever. If you could stop A woman via force from having an abortion - ie "killing a baby by aggressive homicide," would you? If you could lock her in a basement safely to her and - let's say you knew you could get away with it too - that you'd never be prosecuted - would you (since prosecution seems one of your fears)?

 

[joko104]

The issue with abortion is one of rights and when they begin. An "unwanted" baby is still a baby and in possession of rights equal to yours or mine. You dont get to end a life simply because you dont want that life around. That is murder.

What about the government forcing you to be the parent for life of that unwanted baby. You ok with that? I mean, my gosh, you don't want it murdered! So what are YOU willing to give up?

 

[JayDubya]

"Look, if you don't want the 7-11 shot up, you're going to have to give that gas station attendant a room in your house. It just makes sense."

 

[AlabamaPaul]

What about the government forcing you to be the parent for life of that unwanted baby. You ok with that? I mean, my gosh, you don't want it murdered! So what are YOU willing to give up?

The better question would be, what would the woman give up to not be in that position? It has become acceptable for a woman to do as she pleases with no consequences which doesn't say much for our "society"...

 

[Henrin]

What about the government forcing you to be the parent for life of that unwanted baby. You ok with that? I mean, my gosh, you don't want it murdered! So what are YOU willing to give up?

I don't think there will be a time when I read posts like yours Joko, and don't think think WTF is this ****.

 

[Fletch]

What about the government forcing you to be the parent for life of that unwanted baby. You ok with that? I mean, my gosh, you don't want it murdered! So what are YOU willing to give up?

Why is it my problem? And besides, the government isnt forcing you to do do anything. It is preventing you from violating someone elses rights. If you dont want to be a parent, use protection when having sex. If that fails, you can put the child up for adoption. As an analogy, the state preventing me from killing my neighbor is not forcing me to live next to the guy.