Privacy is getting ever more confusing

I’ve long had mixed feelings about abortion. I find it inherently gruesome, and the more developed the fetus, the more it becomes genuinely grotesque. Recent accounts (like the one of a technician sticking scissors under the chin of a developed fetal boy and then snipping through his entire face to extract the brain) give me the creeps, and remind me of Josef Mengele’s medical experiments. Maybe I’m a bleeding heart, but I wouldn’t want people to do that to a fetal puppy.

Still, I have a huge problem with the state forcing any woman to bring a fetus to term, and I do not think it is right to imprison women for having abortions, as long as they don’t wait too long. At a certain point (and I am not sure exactly when that would be), there is a semi-human being in there, who, though unborn, does have a vested right that should be respected. At minimum, that being should have the same rights we would grant to an animal. This would include the right not to be treated cruelly. If cruelty to animals is not to be tolerated, then neither should cruelty to fetuses. Yet merely expressing that thought would inflame passions of abortion rights activists who maintain that even developed fetuses cannot feel the same pain which most of us agree an animal could feel. This inconsistency arises from the political arena, and typifies the activist view that conceding any point means a betrayal of “principles.”

Many of these same activists (who think it is a woman’s right to mutilate her developed fetus without anesthesia — a right grounded in privacy), would never allow the same woman to sell sex for money, pose for pornographic photos or films, or ingest recreational drugs. That strikes me as a wildly inconsistent view of privacy. If the government is to be kept out of women’s (and presumably men’s) bodies in the name of privacy, why is the theory limited to abortion?

Of course, the thinking of your garden variety abortion rights activist is most likely not oriented towards restraining the government, but expanding it. The right to an abortion no longer means the state can’t imprison people for it; the right now means a right to have everyone else pay for it. Excuse me, but doesn’t that mean the government is now involved? By the same logic, drug legalization (a right to take drugs) would ultimately mean the government has to give everyone whatever drugs they want.

Anti-abortion people like to say that “we” are all “guilty” of “murdering” umpteen million babies. I have always maintained that I am not guilty of what someone else does, and that each woman is responsible for her own decisions. I don’t believe in collective guilt. But if everyone pays, does my argument hold water? That’s the problem with socialized medicine. At the rate things are going, I’ll soon be told that “we” are all responsible for everyone else’s obesity.

How do I opt out?


Posted

in

by

Tags:

Comments

23 responses to “Privacy is getting ever more confusing”

  1. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    How classical are your values? Greeks and Romans routinely exposed unwanted infants.

  2. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    This society has rejected infanticide, and considers it a crime. Partial birth abortion is morally indistinguishable from infanticide, so it gets covered in a thick, gooey layer of euphemism. 6 month old premies routinely survive, yet it’s AOK to drag a 71/2 month old fetus 90% out of a womb and cut it’s brain out. Cutting them up them for spare parts just makes it even more repulsive. Absolutely should be banned. Life of the mother blah blah blah, call it a cesarian. Hardly ever a real situation, anyway, it’s a red herring for the pro abortion goon squad.

    Early term abortion maybe.

    Consider that the technology to make a synthetic uterus is not far away. It should in the near future be possible to bring a fertilized egg to equivalent birth size and weight entirely outside of a woman’s body. It therefore will also be possible to take an embryo at any stage of development from a woman and transfer it to an artificial uterus until it’s ready. In other words, all fetuses will be viable at any stage of development. Now what?

  3. Eric Scheie Avatar

    Ancient values varied as much as values today. The Hippocratic Oath is hardly modern.

    If all fetuses became viable, then no woman could be compelled to carry an unwanted fetus to term. She could simply give it up at any time, and caring for it would become someone else’s job.

  4. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    Right, but how to prevent baby farming? There has to be some sort of disincentive to unlimited fertility.

    On the other side of the moral dilemma with uterine replicators:

    “I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout.”

    How about raising babies for food? What if they are anencephalic or pithed?

    What about talking food in general, would you eat Kentucky Fried Parrot?

  5. Kathy Kinsley Avatar
    Kathy Kinsley

    I suggest we stick to chickens and cows and such, long pork is a taste I’d prefer my neighbors not get. (Heinlein said something of the sort once). Although that modest proposal did cause quite a stir of disgust back when, I fear that nowadays there are a number who would seriously consider it.

    That said, that vast number of abortions are early. And a mechanical womb does not make a fetus viable outside a womb. It only makes it transferable.

  6. Eric Scheie Avatar

    I’ll only eat it if I’m pithed.

  7. Kathy Kinsley Avatar
    Kathy Kinsley

    Thanks, Eric. I needed to clean my monitor screen anyway…

  8. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    Surely after the Uteromatic(tm) and I Can’t Believe It’s Not Placenta(tm) are working in the lab it’s just a matter of engineering to get the operating conditions right and keep the fetus unit alive until decanting, simbirth, Real Burth(tm) or whatever, just pop the clasps and hope for the best.

    Although, why open the jug at all, exposing the little bundle of joy to all the nastiness and dangers of Earthly existance? Just transfer the fetoid into a larger one under controlled conditions, hook it up to the internet and let it have The Genulife Experience(tm), completely untouched by human hands.

  9. newrouter Avatar
    newrouter

    >If all fetuses became viable, then no woman could be compelled to carry an unwanted fetus to term. She could simply give it up at any time, and caring for it would become someone else’s job.<

    so if a man and a woman crash their vehicle into your house they then simply award ownership of the vehicle to the state and all of society's problems are solved?

  10. Eric Scheie Avatar

    Sounds like utopia to me!

  11. Simon Avatar

    Well,

    The current abortion debate centers around Christian values.

    For Jews:

    It is not human until it exits the birth canal.

    If the mother’s mental health (or physical health) is at stake abortion is REQUIRED at any time during pregnancy.

    ========

    Back in the day when humans butchered their own meat and each other squeamishness was not so pronounced.

  12. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    Well, goody gumdrops for the Jews.

    What would Hillel think about sucking it’s brain out while it’s still nominally in the birth canal?

  13. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    The problem with the abortion “debate” is how completely disgusting the activists on both sides are. In fact, I once organized a demonstration against both sides. (keep your laws off my body and out of my wallet)

  14. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    What do you think about the people claiming that the reason the crime rate went down is legalized abortion?

    (approx 20 years after Roe v Wade crime rates drop markedly)

  15. CapitalistRoader Avatar
    CapitalistRoader

    The left is generally enamored with all things European, especially all things Scandinavian. I wonder how bringing up Norway’s/Sweden’s/Denmark’s relatively strict time constraints on abortion (relative to the US, Canada, China, and North Korea) would go? The problem is that both sides are absolutists, with the left insisting on abortion up ’till birth and the right insisting on no abortion whatsoever. I think the best thing to do is throw it back to the states.

  16. Randy Avatar
    Randy

    Thoughtful piece. Thanks, Eric.

    Dear pro-lifers, everyone gets it that you think abortions are wrong morally. But your moral outrage doesn’t move the football down the field. Forty plus years of your bitching about Roe v. Wade has taken us nowhere on the issue. And overturning Roe v. Wade won’t make abortions illegal as many of you believe. Setting aside Roe v. Wade would return the issue to the states and nothing more.

    One of the complaints pro-lifers have about abortion rights is that the Roe v. Wade ruling took the issue out of the electorate’s hands. Fair enough. But that doesn’t mean that the electorate is now politically impotent in the face of the 1973 ruling. You see, the constitution provides us an avenue for over-turning court rulings via the amendment process. The electorate can still have its say via approval of an amendment addressing abortion rights if enough support can be garnered. Admittedly, that is one big “if” given that super-majorities are required for amendments to the constitution.

    But there you have it, pro-lifers. There is a legitimate legislative pathway for your side to address and overturn abortion rights as they currently stand. So get off your morally outraged asses and persuade the public to pass a constitutional amendment eliminating/curtailing abortion rights in some manner or, you know, STFU.

    Cheers!

  17. Eric Scheie Avatar

    Thanks Randy. I am old enough to remember what it was like in the pre-Roe v. Wade days (in PA, where I grew up in a medical household). While abortion on demand was illegal, there was a huge loophole allowing “therapeutic abortion.” A doctor simply needed to state that the abortion was medically therapeutic if the mother’s physical — OR MENTAL — health required it. In other words a girl who said she was mentally stressed out from an unwanted pregnancy would qualify so long as she could find a doctor who would agree. Women who wanted abortions had little trouble getting them, and this was in a heavily Catholic state. I’m not saying this was better, but the myth of the bloody coat hanger that the abortion activists push is overblown. OTOH, the anti-abortion people would have everyone believe that we lived in a Godly world in which abortion was completely illegal everywhere. Not so. (Nor was abortion treated as murder as they maintain it should be now.)

  18. CapitalistRoader Avatar
    CapitalistRoader

    But there you have it, pro-lifers. There is a legitimate legislative pathway for your side to address and overturn abortion rights as they currently stand. So get off your morally outraged asses and persuade the public to pass a constitutional amendment eliminating/curtailing abortion rights in some manner or, you know, STFU.

    Ditto for pro-choicers. If you’re unhappy with the 41 states that have some sort of term restriction on abortion then pass a constitutional amendment eliminating those restrictions, if you can. Otherwise STFU.

    Or both sides could come to a federal legislative compromise. Nah, what’s the fun in that? They’d rather bitch and moan about how awful the other side is.

  19. Randy Avatar
    Randy

    @CapitalistRoader

    Ditto for pro-choicers. If you’re unhappy with the 41 states that have some sort of term restriction on abortion then pass a constitutional amendment eliminating those restrictions, if you can. Otherwise STFU.

    But the pro-choice side doesn’t need to compromise because, metaphorically speaking, they’re holding a royal flush in the form of the Roe v. Wade ruling. Like it or not, the Roe v. Wade ruling stands astride the issue in the favor of the pro-choice side like a giant boulder in the road.

    The pro-life side has passed various restrictions at the state level but they are routinely challenged in court as unconstitutional, citing Roe v. Wade. And they are usually set aside when challenged in court. About the only thing that’s passed judicial review are parental notification laws. This is why I bluntly state that the pro-life side needs to address Roe v. Wade directly if they want to make any permanent, real progress in their objectives on the abortion issue. Otherwise, as the past several decades have shown, they’re just pissing in the wind.

    I have some sympathy for the pro-life side and I’m a pro-choicer that would support a compromise amendment of some sort. But I’m definitely tired of the tactic of passing state-level restrictions with the hope that the USSC will set aside Roe v. Wade. It just keeps kicking the can down the road.

    Interestingly, the abortion law that Republicans introduced this year in Congress showed a great deal of compromise on their part and therefore shows promise on the issue. But they need to pursue it as an amendment for the reasons already stated.

    The bottom line is I see two ways to put the issue to rest once and for all; (1) pass a compromise amendment that both hard-core pro-lifers and pro-choicers will hate but the rest of the country can live with or (as you suggest), or (2) failing that, just move on because if you can’t get a compromise amendment passed, the pro-life side has virtually no chance of passing an amendment that doesn’t compromise with the pro-choice side in significant ways. The point would therefore be moot.

    That’s my buck-o-five anyway.

  20. CapitalistRoader Avatar
    CapitalistRoader

    According to that NYT article I linked to more than half the states, covering more than half the population, prohibit abortions past the 24th week, or getting close to the end of the second trimester. Another ten or so restrict to 22 weeks or slightly less. That’s where all the litigation is. Contrast that to abortion on demand in Sweden is limited to the 18th week; Norway, 12th week; ditto for Denmark and Finland.

    Those PP videos being slowly released by the ingeniously named Center for Medical Progress are having an impact. There’s room for compromise, much to the chagrin of hardliners on both sides.

  21. Karen Avatar
    Karen

    Instead of mucking around with laws and The State, how about those who want to end abortion work towards changing the situations that contribute to why women make the decision to get an abortion.

  22. Gringo Avatar
    Gringo

    Karen
    Instead of mucking around with laws and The State, how about those who want to end abortion work towards changing the situations that contribute to why women make the decision to get an abortion.

    It would appear to me that a large percentage of abortions could have been avoided by use of contraception. What can the state or non-state actors do to encourage contraceptive use among those who engage in sex but do not want pregnancy arising from sex? Do tell.

    Eric
    Thanks Randy. I am old enough to remember what it was like in the pre-Roe v. Wade days (in PA, where I grew up in a medical household). While abortion on demand was illegal, there was a huge loophole allowing “therapeutic abortion.”

    In her final decade, my grandmother told me that she had had a “theraputic abotion” in the 1920s.

  23. Joseph Hertzlinger Avatar

    Simon’s attempt to convert me to Christianity did not work.

    The fact that Judaism classifies some abortions as justifiable need not imply that fetal lives don’t matter. The right to life of a fetus threatening a member of society can be disregarded in the same way the right to life of an enemy soldier is. OTOH, the overwhelming majority of abortions in the US are unjust wars.

    This explains why it makes sense to protest abortion clinics with sit-ins but not by assassinating abortionists.