Reply #63: ladidah, bladiblah

[iverglas]

Yes, I believe a fetus is a life.

I didn't actually ask for a statement of belief from you. I addressed this nonsense already, and you have failed to address anything I said.

That's not how it works, you know? If you just plan to say the same thing over and over and over, why would anyone want to waste time talking to you?


Yes, I even call a fetus a baby and I have no problem with the words unborn child.

Hey, good for you! It's all about you! Let's have a hand for the person in the back there! She has an opinion!


No, I do not oppose, either constitutionally or morally (based upon my interpretation of the Bible), a woman's right to have control over her body and have an abortion.

And doesn't that just make you look clever. I believe it's homicide, but it's okay by me!

Namely, while I believe that a fetus is a life, ...

Oh, wait. Is killing a life (assuming it's a human life, assuming that's what you're saying) homicide?

I know that killing a human being is homicide. That's just definitional. If you've ever studied Latin, you'll know that. Is "killing a life" homicide? I'm not recalling the word "vivicide" from my high school Latin classes on English derivatives. I'm not seeing how it would make sense.

If it isn't ... can you maybe explain what you're talking about, and why?

Are there other instances in which "killing a life" is not homicide, if this one isn't homicide?


Namely, while I believe that a fetus is a life, I also believe that while a fetus is dependent on the mother (oh no, I said mother, should I call it its host? :eyes:) for survival, the involved female (there maybe I'm politically correct in your eyes now) has the right to terminate the pregnancy.

First: no, you aren't politically correct. You're insufferably rude.

Funny how the word "woman" doesn't appear anywhere in that verbiage.

I'll tell you why words that personify a fetus or describe a pregnant woman as a mother don't bother me.

Do I need to explain in smaller words why I don't care?


I have had family members (strongly Democratic and pro-choice family members) miscarry. It was emotional and devestating for them. Try telling them that their child was not a life and they should just get over it.

Why would you instruct me to utter such utterly moronic and rude words to another person? Because that's the sort of thing you would do?

When a miscarriage occurs, prospective parents hoping for a birth and a child suffer the loss of their fetus and the hopes and dreams they had invested in it. Very often it is a tragedy. (Truth be told, it is sometimes a relief - very often, for women throughout history and geography who have had no way of terminating an unwanted pregnancy. And yet the event is exactly the same.)


Then try telling a woman in the hospital who was just beat by her abusive boyfriend and thus miscarried that the best the legal system can do is charge the bastard for simple assault.

Again, why would I do such a profoundly stupid thing?

Here's how my law deals with these things.

http://www.canlii.org/en/ca/laws/stat/rsc-1985-c-c-46/latest/rsc-1985-c-c-46.html

Assault

265. (1) A person commits an assault when

(a) without the consent of another person, he applies force intentionally to that other person, directly or indirectly; ...

Assault with a weapon or causing bodily harm

267. Every one who, in committing an assault,

... (b) causes bodily harm to the complainant,

is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding ten years or an offence punishable on summary conviction and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding eighteen months.

Aggravated assault

268. (1) Every one commits an aggravated assault who wounds, maims, disfigures or endangers the life of the complainant.

(2) Every one who commits an aggravated assault is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding fourteen years.

I can't imagine why you would suggest that I characterize an assault that terminates a pregnancy as "simple assault".

You do know why it is so important - apart altogether from the fundamental issue of human rights involved - that abortion be legal, right? Because terminating a pregnancy without proper medical care carries all manner of health risks for the woman?


But I'm personally able to draw the distinction between a woman exercising her right to choose to have an abortion and a woman exercising her right to have a child. This is what reproductive freedom is. The law needs to protect both classes.

Actually, I think you're identifying the likeness between the two women: they are both exercising their rights.

The law needs to refrain from punishing women who exercise the right to terminate their own pregnancy, and punish people who commit violent crimes, including assaults on pregnant women. Amazingly, I think you'll find the law does that.

I completely fail to see how calling the termination of a pregnancy without a woman's consent "homicide" has anything to do with protecting a woman's exercise of her right to have a child.

I have a right to eat pizza for breakfast. If you steal my pizza off my table, as I am about to exercise that right, shall we charge you with homicide? I mean, assuming that *I* don't die of starvation as a result of your theft.


I'm generally against the death penalty, but when I hear about monsters like Scott Peterson who murdered his nine month pregnant wife rather than just get a divorce, I wholly support him being convicted for a double murder.

Whew, a non sequitur and two irrelevant opinions all wrapped up in one. Oh, I get it. Does two murders get you the death penalty while one only gets you life? Yes, that's what the law is all about. Making shit up to punish someone for something they didn't do, up to and including killing that person.

However --

Yikes, Connor Peterson (yes, that was his name that his mother gave him) was born alive during the assault.

I think you will find that most legal systems (mine, anyhow) treat an assault prior to delivery that results in the death of an infant that was born alive is treated as homicide. This is a very grey area -- life is about drawing lines, and that's one that is extremely debatable; and life is a process, and things we do often affect people not yet born. But it is actually easy to distinguish this from a non-consensual termination of a pregnancy, i.e. causing an abortion/stillbirth.

By the way, Juanita (yes, that was the name my best friend gave her car) was totalled when some asshole sideswiped her. Homicide?

You have every right to defend these type of scum, but if you ever practiced in the United States don't expect to get very far on an argument that a murder of a pregnant woman cannot be tried as a double murder.

Hey, I wouldn't expect to get far in 1990s Afghanistan on the argument that the murder of a pregnant woman was a single murder.

Your point was?


Riddle me this. If your position is all about protecting pregnant women and securing the exercise of their rights, how could a man who was asked by a woman to strike her in order to cause an abortion, and not just asked, but urged, be charged with "fetal homicide"?

Since it has happened, and since you support these laws, you seem to need to explain this.