[net.abortion] Abortion and the taking of life.

wa371@sdcc12.UUCP (wa371) (11/23/84)

     Forgive me if the following has been covered already--I am new to 
this discussion.
     If abortion is not murder when it does not involve the taking of life
then someone please tell me when life begins.  (Facts only, no
quotes from the Bible, or other *belief* systems, please!!)
Since both the sperm and the ovum are alive even before joining, the
beginning of life is not at conception either.  To place it there
is as arbitrary as placing it anytime after (or before) conception.  It seems
that the beginning of life for everyone who has existed or is yet to be
conceived was in the primordial soup billions of years ago.
     Therefore, If the taking of any life is murder:
          Any abortion is murder.
          Any form of birth control is murder, because the sperm
               and the ovum will die without joining.
          Any woman is a murderess if she does not stay pregnant.
          Every man is a murderer because most of the sperm that 
               he produces will die anyway.
          Wet dreams are mass murder.
          Celibacy is murder.
Therefore we are all murderers.
     So, the best we can do is to minimize the murdering.
An unwanted child will be (emotionally) murdered
countless times in his/her lifetime.  Is that better than one *early*
abortion?
PS: Please don't tell me that sperm and ovum do not constitute human
life!
Bernd

carnes@gargoyle.UChicago.UUCP (Richard Carnes) (11/26/84)

Bernd (new to net.abortion) writes:

>Since both the sperm and the ovum are alive even before joining, the
>beginning of life is not at conception either....
>     Therefore, if the taking of any life is murder:
>          Any abortion is murder.
>          Any form of birth control is murder, because the sperm
>               and the ovum will die without joining.
>          Any woman is a murderess if she does not stay pregnant.
>          Every man is a murderer because most of the sperm that 
>               he produces will die anyway.
>          Wet dreams are mass murder.
>          Celibacy is murder.

   Boy do you have a lot to learn, Bernd.  This is a transparent attempt to
inject reason and logic into an emotional, mud-slinging debate.  Are you
trying to spoil the fun, or what?  Pro-lifers know deep down in their hearts
that abortion is WRONG.  If you disagree, that's because you're an immoral
slimewad or a dumbshit liberal or both.  

   I'll say it a thousand times if I have to:  KEEP REASON, LOGIC, AND
FACTS OUT OF NET.ABORTION!!!  Liz Allen's recent description of an
abortion seems to me to be close to the ideal type of posting for 
this newsgroup.  

   From another writer:
> Unfortunately, thought is not a requirement when discussing abortion.

   It is ABSOLUTELY FORBIDDEN, twit!!

	Richard Carnes, ihnp4!gargoyle!carnes

friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) (11/27/84)

In article <124@sdcc12.UUCP> wa371@sdcc12.UUCP (wa371) writes:
>
>     If abortion is not murder when it does not involve the taking of life
>then someone please tell me when life begins.  (Facts only, no
>quotes from the Bible, or other *belief* systems, please!!)
>Since both the sperm and the ovum are alive even before joining, the
>beginning of life is not at conception either.  To place it there
>is as arbitrary as placing it anytime after (or before) conception.  It seems
>that the beginning of life for everyone who has existed or is yet to be
>conceived was in the primordial soup billions of years ago.

    A valid point, in fact one of the sharpest and most clear-cut transitions
in the reproductive process is the release of the ovum from the ovary,
which is quite literally explosive(at a small scale).  It is at this point
that the potential human being ceases to be merely another cell in the mother's
body and becomes a nutritional independant "organism"(at least for awhile).
    In fact fertilization is less than mest people think it to be, since the
genetic material contributed by the father is *not* expressed immediately,
but only after several hours.   In fact the early stages of developement
can be stimulated physically or chemically, *without* any sperm, and
it will procede normally until the point in time at which the father's
genome is normally expressed.

>     Therefore, If the taking of any life is murder:
>          Any abortion is murder.
>          Any form of birth control is murder, because the sperm
>               and the ovum will die without joining.
>          Any woman is a murderess if she does not stay pregnant.
>          Every man is a murderer because most of the sperm that 
>               he produces will die anyway.
>          Wet dreams are mass murder.
>          Celibacy is murder.
>Therefore we are all murderers.
>     So, the best we can do is to minimize the murdering.
>An unwanted child will be (emotionally) murdered
>countless times in his/her lifetime.  Is that better than one *early*
>abortion?
>Bernd

    The above is good - one problem, the definition of murder is *not*
"the taking of any (human) life", but rather the taking of human life
*unlawfully*, either according to some moral code or civil law.

      Therfor the argument boils down to: At which arbitrary dividing
line should the moral/legal concept of murder be made appplicable.
As has been pointed out several times now, *all* dividing lines during
the reproductive process are arbitrary, since all biological processes
are intrinsically gradual, and generally grade into one another.