Essay talk:The Lost Woman in the Abortion Argument

Hey there

I didn't read the essay through - I simply guessed that it's grasping at useless words, just like is to be expected from a person who boils a whole debate down to a single argument without even considering anything else.

But I want to talk about a very narrow aspect of this debate; namely how does the fact that you're a woman give you more "right" to talk about abortion? That would be very true if we talked about abortion as an emotional experience, but we are talking about abortion as a certain "medical" procedure.

Let me give you an example. If I see that a women is screaming at her children and I happen to be somebody who can make "personal" remarks (let's say, a close neighbor), then do I have the right to tell the women that what she is doing is wrong? I don't have children myself and I'm not even a woman. I have no ideas what it would be like to be a woman - the mother may have had a very bad day, caring for the children is very stressful and there may be thousands of problems that a mother has to face. I don't know any of those problems and I never will. Maybe I even would do the same thing if I was instead of her. But morality is quite apart from emotions that may push us into doing something. I don't need to be a mother myself to say that screaming at children is wrong - that knowledge does not emerge from somebodies experience of being a mother. It might be wrong of me to unconditionally condemn the women herself, because I'm not aware of what made her doing it, but I have the full right to disapprove of the act. --Earthland (talk) 21:09, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Grasps at useless words? without reading it? With no idea of the issues involved. what a fucking troll you are.En attendant Godot 21:20, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

As for being a woman giving me more right to talk about it? It does. You cannot be effected by any of the decisions you make, and you can ONLY see these issues from an intellectual position. It's a "theory" game to you. It's not a theory game to me. It's a reality of the life I live as a woman, as a woman who has faced two unwanted pregnancies. Sorry buddy, but all the "it's a life at conception", and "your life is not more worthy than the baby's" flys out the window the minute you are staring at a future that is not your choice, and a future you can change.En attendant Godot 21:20, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I didn't read your essay and I didn't "debunk" it either, I simply talked on one specific matter. Oh yes, it was arrogant to assume that you're just grasping at useless words, but aren't you now doing it again? You didn't answer my argument, you simply told yours over again. As I said, I really don't know how it would be to face an unplanned pregnancy as a women and I never will. If I did, I surely would understand better, why some women choose abortion. It would make it more "real" to me. But that all is irrelevant if we're talking about morality (morality, by the way, is also real). We're not talking about how somebody feels about abortion or how hard it all emotionally is etc etc. (For that we have Cosmopolitan.) The issue is Abortion and not Choice, because to imply that the issue is choice, is to say that what’s being chosen is irrelevant. That is clearly illogical given that all choices are not equal.

Often times if not always it is hard to choose things that are morally right. Abortion is the choice between what is right and what is easy (objectively. Subjectively it might be of course very hard for every woman. But that's just because a pregnant women sees it all emotionally and forgets about the other sides of it). You surely don't know how fucking fucking hard it is for me not to rape women, so you shouldn't talk a single word about raping women. (I have no such urge. That was simply an example).

It's very late in Estonia and I'm tired so that I probably should wait till morning with further argumentation. I feel that you might want to attack my rape example, which might not be the best one, I agree. Even if you do so, please remember that you haven't answered my main argument. --Earthland (talk) 21:43, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

If you're not going to bother reading it, get lost. Seriously. ADK^{...I'll edify your clock!} 15:50, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Hello Armondikov. Why so angry? I didn't need to read it through because I commented only on a little part of it. But I'm getting used to people who won't give up their ideas just because they're proven to be wrong. --Earthland (talk) 16:33, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

1 - you've never proven anything to be wrong. 2- you are talking about fetus and if its alive or not. I'm talking about a woman's right to decide who uses her body for life support. quite differnt things. 3 - if you can't be bothered to read what someone says, then you really don't merit a response.

Abortion is not an issue of logic, nor of numbers. it is not an issue of what it means to be alive or what it means to be human. it is an issue of emotion. of loss. of conrol (over self and others)... and that is why i find these silly "the fetus has a heart beat" "It can/cannot feel", "The bible/koran/poohbear says that life beings at conception" to be vapid of any real issues.

Morality and legality will change nothing. women who do not want a baby, who do not want to be pregnant will abort. even if it is a risk to their life. THAT is the single most compelling argument. period.En attendant Godot 16:39, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Because you clearly didn't get the point of it. And if you're not going to understand the point and angle someone is coming from you have little, if any, right to critisise it. You have not proved anyone wrong because you failed to actually grasp what Godot had said. This is why I'm angry; here is someone who has been there and done it and has the experience and you just want to keep plugging away without even bothering to take that in. I don't accept that sort of argumentation (or lack thereof) from anyone. ADK^{...I'll vocalise your raid!} 16:42, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

@Godot. I pretty much agree with you on everything here, but do you really belive the question of whether or not a fetus can feel to be 'vapid of any real issues'? --Danfly (talk) 17:22, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I think was I was trying for - and while i love to write I fully admit i'm not as good as i think i am, grins - is the idea that when facing an abortion, it's really not something I hear most women thinking about. Intellectually, and in arguments like "is there a point where choice really shouldn't come into play", yeah, it's relevant. but in that space where you are saying "I'm pregnant; i'm scared/sad/ambivalent/angry/happy/etc" i'm not sure it is relevant. There are two "me's" on this issue. the one that thinks about things logically, and the one who knows none of that mattered. being pregnant mattered. I'm clearly not good at explaining that problem. :-)--En attendant Godot 17:30, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, I made an argument and noone has said what exactly I "got wrong". You just keep hammering that I've not "been there". That is very true. That is exactly what I was talking about.

I have more concerns about WFGT saying "you are talking about fetus and if its alive or not." I don't remember saying anything on that matter right now. Furthermore, I don't remember her saying anything about the right to decide (in conversations with me), she only keeps talking about emotions. It's not that Godot doesn't get my point, she doesn't even get hers.

One more question: what do you mean by saying that morality changes nothing? That morality is irrelevant in the question of abortion? --Earthland (talk) 18:14, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Abortion is a moral issue only because some people have chosen to make it so -- like any other moral issue. The things that we decide fall under the category of "morality" are fluid and contingent. Homosexuality and masurbation used to be "moral questions," now, overwhelmingly, they're not. The question of how we treat the environment has a moral dimension that it did not have a few centuries ago. P-Foster_{The Holy Roman Empire was neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire. Discuss.} 18:22, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

So I do not understand my own argument, simply because I say the argument is not about morals and ethics in some socially ascribed sense, but the views, morals and ethics of the woman only. Cause that seems like a pretty clear argument to me. I define abortion as an issue that starts and ends with the HOST and her choice to be used or not by another living being. I compare it to society legally mandating that if your child has a liver condition, must you be required by law, to donate part of your liver? what if it is a kideny? what if it is your heart? Does society have the right to tell a person who cannot swim that he or she must necessarily risk their life to save a drowing human? Does society even have the right to tell all people they should register on the bone marror list? We do not do this, because we believe that each person has teh right to make these kinds of decisions for themselves, and that telling them otherwise is taking their enherant right to personal decisions about how their body will be used by society.

your claim is that since the baby is in me, and needs me for survival, it is amoral of me to say "sorry, don't want to do that'. my claim is this is ONE moral view. It is not mine. My moral view, my philosophically correct moral view is that my body belongs not to the state and not to the baby inside of me, but to me. and if i decide that i want a D&C just cause it's Tuesday and I do that each third Tuesday in months that have an R in them, then that is what I decide. that a baby will be harmed is rather not part of my moral decision to control what i do with my body and how it is used.

When you make my body part of the government's control. when you say "it is morally wrong to do X or Y with your body" then you are saying that i do not have a right to control what goes into my body, what comes out of my body and who can harm my body. That is amoral of society to do. we did not like it when slaves where whipped, we do not like it when women are told they must have sex and cannot say no. we say that is all "amoral" of society. You say otherwise. My point is when push comes to shove, the morality that matters is not yours, cause you are not effected by this issue. the morality that matters is the woman who is in this scenario. En attendant Godot 19:33, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

In my largely irrelevant opinion, you're wrong

about morality. If, by morality, we mean ethics, ie "right or wrong", then society or people do not have a right to decide what affects morality. For example, eating a sandwich can be analyzed morally: one is perhaps eating healthy and slightly decreasing the chance of heart disease (good), but assisting in violating an animal's rights by buying non-free-range turkey (bad), while contributing to the local economy and thus helping some guy keep his job (good) and propping up a parasitic multinational corporation (bad). We can ignore the consequences of eating a sandwich because this impact is negligible and not worth the effort. (The same is true for masturbation and sexual preferences.) But, a human being's privacy and right to body, not to mention possibly another human's right to life, are at stake in abortion. And because it is so widespread, thousands of people's rights are involved. Therefore, abortion must be a moral issue until it is resolved, because there is no dispute that something important is at stake. The basis of decision-making in a free society is morality and reason, not emotion. --Talpidae (talk) 19:10, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

This is a key point in what is often called 'feminist ethics", that some how reason and logic are more important and more valuable in making moral and ethical decisions that the heart and emotions. Why is that? `why is logic better than emotion? I've never understood this. I can logically decide that the best way to handle a prisoner is by killing him to take him out of the gene pool, not have to deal with feeding him, etc. i can emotionally decide that his mother will be sad, and therefor it is wrong. Dismissing emotion is dismissing a huge part of how humans make decisions every day. It has been argued (Kierkagaard is one, but so are the feminsts ethic writers Gilligan, Ruddic, and Nodding) that all decisions are emotional ones, and we search for justifications after teh fact. ie., we "know" something is wrong or right before we even rationally approach it. I'm bothered that a society must use ONLY logic and reason to decide what is right for people in a host of issues.En attendant Godot 19:41, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Shame on you RW

How can none of you have pointed out the inherent contradiction of Earthland's request that we read their entire essay with his blasé dismissal of bothering to read Godot's entire essay? And now we will never have the chance, because they are retired! Every respondent here should hang their head! --Bertrc (talk) 18:56, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

(or her blasé dismissal; I am not certain Earthland ever admits to one or the other since I haven't bothered to read through all their stuff! :-D ) --Bertrc (talk) 18:56, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Clear risk

Reading:

“”And that tear might hold. And, it might not. And no one can tell you if it will or if it won't. And, in most circumstances, it will not actually tear. you have a 90% chance, in fact, of carrying to term safely. If however, it is torn, and the baby pushes through, because of the amount of blood flowing to the uterus, and the tension on the uterus, if it's torn, you must get surgery within 5-10 minutes, or you will die. So the odds that you will die, from one direction, are unlikely. But, the odds once something goes wrong, are virtually assured that you will die.

Reminds me very much of Black Swan Theory, which I think you might enjoy reading up on. It's a point about Taleb's fragility and anti-fragility. Your potential gains and loses can be directly compared. In the 90% case that you're fine, you're just fine, but in that 10% case, you're fucked. No one would get on a plane if the odds of it crashing were 10%, your week long holiday abroad just isn't worth those sorts of odds. ADK^{...I'll sacrifice your etching!} 15:55, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I read this very real story of this very real woman when Okie was trying to first pass teh 3 doctor law. But i hadn't thought of this in other contexts. I will read (and likely enjoy) the link. Odds are a wierd thing. as you said, if your odds of dying in a plane crash were 10% no one would do it. If your odds of dying from having back surgery to relive pain were 10% no one would do it. In fact 10% seems huge. I used to rock climb and dive, and teh "odds" were like 1 in 100,000 that you would fall to your death off a cliff, and less dangrous for deep diving. I think the only time i'd take a 1 in 10 risk is if my risk for not doing it were greater. And yet, in this issue of abortion (late term) in rural places like SD, that kind of number is tossed around easily. freaky. gonna read about Black Swan now. En attendant Godot 16:32, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

If you don't mind the heavy reading, I would recommend the book. Although the concept itself is easy to get your head around and I think Yudkowsky does a better job of it in some of his essays (not that I can remember for the life of me which one). ADK^{...I'll quantify your cable!} 16:44, 5 August 2011 (UTC)