Tired of the pro-choice lie

[Honesting]

I keep seeing people bring this up again, especially after Charlie Kirk’s assassination, that he once said if his 10-year-old daughter became pregnant through rape he’d insist she carry the baby. People call it misogynistic and vile. To be clear, that’s not my view and I’m not here to argue the pro-life case.

I actually have mixed feelings about abortion. I'm okay with the MAP and not okay with abortion up to the point of delivery. Where to draw the line is something I haven't decided yet.

What I do want to say is that it’s dishonest to pretend CK's position comes from hatred of women. The pro-life stance is very consistent and, internally, very coherent. If you genuinely believe an unborn child is a human being with rights, then ending its life is always wrong, no matter how it was conceived. We’d never allow a raped woman to kill her newborn, even if it was the product of rape. So if you see the foetus as having equal rights, then by that same logic, it shouldn’t matter whether conception was through rape.

I know the other side, and I understand it. I’m not dismissing the complexities. But the idea that the pro life argument is born of misogyny is simply false. It comes from a clear and reasonable moral framework: once human life begins, it carries human rights.

Honesting, what is this 'MAP'? Please can you explain?

We aren’t talking about an already born child. I’m specifically talking about allowing abortion before the point at which the foetus could survive outside my body.

Morning After Pill

A bunch of cells that might or might not turn into a baby are more important than you or your children (insert sarcastic tone).

Come on. NO ONE here is advocating for infanticide. We see a difference between a baby inside the mother and an independent baby outside the womb. Even if you can't comprehend that.

I personally would allow abortion up to viability, unless the mother's life is in danger.

I will quote your own analogy of kidneys vs uterus here.

its not a coherent argument at all. Car’s primary purpose is to transport people and goods. And sometimes as ‘collateral damage’ deaths occur. Gun’s primary purpose is to injure and kill with absolutely no other purpose at all.

No need to be snide. Of course I see a difference. What I was pointing out is suicidal ideation doesn't give someone rights to commit murder, so once again, it comes down to whether abortion is murder or not.

You are not acknowledging the clash of rights between a woman and a bundle of cells, @Honesting - which is the misogyny in the pro-life debate.

Fair enough. But injuring and killing for self defence is morally just. The primary purpose of guns is no more harmful than helpful.

You're not acknowledging that 'bundle of cells' is the actual debate. Is it that or is it a human being? That's the crux of the issue.

Don't they tend to be pro death penalty though?

Pro life isn’t consistent in my opinion. It is fact that restricting access to safe abortion dies not prevent abortion. It causes more deaths and infertility

the arguments ‘apart from disability and rape’ is inconsistent because you either think abortion is the murder of a child or you don’t. Their abilities or circumstances of conception should therefore be irrelevant

pregnancies are not terminated at term. How would that be done? It’s meant to prevent women being arrested for having a still birth or late miscarriage

being vehemently pro life IS misogynist because it reduces women and girls to secondary beings the moment they conceive. Their health, lives and desires no longer matter. This can only happen to females

you can be pro choice without being enthusiastic about abortion. I sincerely wish that no woman or girl should ever need to have one.
I refused prenatal testing in my last 2 pregnancies (in my 40s) because I didn’t want to be pressured into a termination by a system that is horrified at the idea of a disabled baby being born BUT I would never judge another woman for making that decision

I suppose that could make me seem inconsistent but it doesn’t feel that way to me .

No, it doesn't. Because of the fact that almost all the time abortion is pre-viability. So it's not a question of whether or not it's acceptable to "murder" an embryo or foetus. It's a question of whether or not it's acceptable to obligate a woman to provide life support to that embryo/foetus up to the point of its viability.

@Honesting you say you 'don't know anyone' who wouldn't make an exception if the mother's life was in danger.

How dare you ignore the women who have died and continue to die because abortion bans prevent doctors from intervening to save her life? This is happening. It happened in Galway. It happens in the US states that have enforced the total abortion bans which the far-right American fundamentalists have put in place. The people with whom Kirk aligned himself.

You may not know these people personally but you understand it is happening.

And human rights are not just the right to life. You're prioritising the foetus' supposed right to life over all of the mother's rights. That is unequivocally a misogynistic stance.

It’s all rather disingenuous of the op to talk blithely of an internal coherence to the anti-abortionists argument vis a vis the ‘human rights’ of a foetus. The issue is not one of the foetus’ rights as an absolute, but an issue of conflicting rights.

How to navigate conflicting rights is the main issue of society.

Likewise, the right to defend oneself vs a right not to be at higher risk of being shot or a higher risk of your child being shot for the simple act of going to school.

The anti-abortionists are pretty clear on the fact that the foetus rights take precedence over the pregnant women’s rights when this conflict of rights exists but there’s no internal consistency about that position.

...so its ok to defend yourself from death by shooting someone else, but for someone who is pregnant they cant terminate a pregnancy if it means they might die if the pregnancy goes to term???

The current republican administration has stopped funding research into childhood cancers , stopped school meals for the less fortunate and many other family friendly policies...force children into this world then make them suffer when theyre here. The hypocrisy is mind boggling.

Just met two americans who told me, if someone pulled a gun on him, his wife has a gun and so she could pull her gun out on the assailant.It's just a different way of thinking to yours.

Not in an argument about whether pro life is an inherently misogynistic position. That hinges on whether you think the rights of the woman (or girl) to bodily autonomy vanish at the point she conceives.

I’ve had 7 early miscarriages. At no point did I lose a baby. I lost the hope that I would have a baby.

Her name was Savita https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Savita_Halappanavar

So the OP had an abortion, which she thinks was an 'acceptable' one, but feels that there should be a ban on 'undeserving' abortions.

So do we have panels who decide?

OP could have been very unlucky - instead of an abortion, she could have been put a drip and a feeding tube for her pregnancy - afterall, women in comas have been kept on life support to keep a foetus alive, why was it different in her case? Once you let anyone other than the pregnant woman decide, you bring their own prejudices into it.

I had an unplanned pregnancy but kept the baby, does this mean that I get to sit on a panel to decide? Can I tell other women to 'buck up'?

An assault rifle? In her handbag?

so once again, it comes down to whether abortion is murder or not.

Abortion is not murder. As long as the bundle of cells is not capable of independent life, it is not a person. An embryo or early foetus is not a person, it is a potential person. Removing it is no different to removing any other bundle of cells growing in or on a woman's body, with her consent.

Once the foetus is capable of independent life, then, perhaps, it is a different matter.

If you consider abortion to be murder because you believe the embryo to have the same personhood as the mother, do you believe also that pregnant women who smoke, or drink or ride motorbikes while pregnant are committing the crimes of Actual Bodily Harm and Assault?

I’m glad you didnt feel that way. The people I know who’ve had miscarriages definitely felt like they lost a baby.

A man saying that a woman should not abort a pregnancy resulting from rape IS misogynistic. How on earth is it not?

But sadly, this ideology doesn't exist in a vacuum. It lives alongside systems where there are depressingly low convictions for rape. Poor maternity leave ( in the US).

Even for women where there wasn't a rape, men can and do choose not to support the children they father.

If someone hears 'single mum', they think very different thoughts than if they hear 'single dad'.

And through it all, women are blamed. Women are shamed.
Misogyny, innit

Before the point at which a foetus can independently abortion is not murder.

An abortion where there is an abnormality of sufficient seriousness to be classified as an incompatibility with life is similarly not murder.