> At 08:44 PM 10/29/96 +0000, Hakeeb A. Nandalal wrote:
[CLIP]
> >The point of the right to abortion is the privacy of a woman's body.
> Killing someone after birth, regardless of
> >how many months have passed, is a different issue entirely as in capital
> punishment.
> >
> >Slavery was abolished because society (not the slaves) decided that it was
> unacceptable to own someone.
> >Similarly, it is wrong for the State or anyone else for that matter to tell
> a woman "you have no say in what
> >goes on in your body". Every tenet of our civilization points to the
> sovereignty of the individual's body. I
> >have not found a single cause for forcing a woman to have a child which she
> does not want which is so critical
> >to the State's interest that it necessitates enforcement by the law. All
> anti-abortion laws previously in
> >effect were the result of legislation passed by Christian legislatures with
> Christian popular support.
> >
> >Every anti-abortion group, to the best of my knowledge, is rooted in
> religion. There are no valid secular
> >reasons to prevent abortions. By thinking of a fetus as a baby, we are
> using hindsight, we see a happy child
> >playing in a field and our parental instincts cause us to be repulsed by
> the thought of then "killing" that
> >child. This is crooked thinking which must be straightened out by clear
> logic : a fetus is not a child, its
> >rights do not exceed the mother's. To give a fetus superior rights, we're
> declaring the mother's rights null
> >and void. In every other aspect of civilization the rights of a woman are
> paramount except when she is
> >pregnant. To me, this sound like a form of punishment for an unfortunate
> biological-function albatross.
> >
> >Have you ever seen a religious fanatic shouting in the face of a scared
> woman trying to access an abortion
> >clinic? Would you say that that behavior is a tad tyrannical? If all the
> anti-abortionists did was stay home
> >and brood, I wouldn't even bring up the subject. The problem lies with
> people being physically obstructed and
> >mentally abused. The famous "gag" order preventing federally funded clinics
> from advising women on abortion is
> >part of the abuse.
> >
> >The abortion issue to me is pure memetics : any time a membot seeks to
> inflict his beliefs on others even when
> >it's clear those views are not appreciated, we have tyranny. When the
> membots start influencing the laws, we
> >have State-sanctioned tyranny.
>
> Hmmm... what is left to say? Clearly there can be no argument that
> abortion is simply a matter of a womens right to control her own
> body, and any civilized person must respect that choice. Moreover,
> to object would entail being a member of a religious group (does this
> list count?) since there are "no valid secular reasons to prevent
> abortions". To oppose abortion rights would also necessarily
> "give a fetus superior rights" while "declaring the mother's rights null
> and void".
>
> Where does this leave us? Are we to now assume that all people on
> the anti-abortion side are evil, uncivilized, ignorant, mean,
> etc etc? Do they "just not understand"? Is the issue really cut
> and dry?
>
> What are we to make of those who, after hearing your arguments, still
> do not agree with your point of view (which is, after all, simply
> "the facts")?
>
> My opposition is not with you, or this subject. Rather it is with
> viewpoints that are so firmly entrenched that they do not allow
> for other points of view to be examined. This causes an us vs them
> mentality which creates strife needlessly. It is what i dislike
> about some religious groups. It is what i dislike about the
> political correctness movement in the states. It is what i dislike
> about each of the extreme sides of the abortion issue (what the heck,
> i argue it both ways ;) ).
Hakeeb, think very carefully about the psychological (non)defense of
projection. Usually, such virulent statements like "when the memebots
start influencing the laws", combined with such extensive rhetoric, is
positive ID that the SPEAKER is dangerously close to a memebot.
It is obvious that you are extremely religious on this issue.
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/ Towards the conversion of data into information....
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/ Kenneth Boyd
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