touchy subject
 

i realize that abortion is a touchy subject, but i really wanna know some people's point of view without starting a fight.
I was wondering what any prochoicers thoughts were on the forced abortions that are taking place in china. If you don't know, china's population control plan includes forced contraception, forced sterilization, and forced abortions along with the one child policy. I listened to a professor from stanford give a talk about it (i forget his first name but his last name was mosser). He's one of the nations leading experts on population studies and he went to china to check out what they were doing. He talked about one abortion he witnessed where the baby's head was crowning and they gave it a lethal injection (in china as long as the baby is still in the birth canal, it is still a legal abortion). After this he started to speak out against these forced abortions because america was actually helping to fund this (we were giving a bunch of money to the united nations for population control funds who were in turn giving it to china...Bush then cut the fund, Clinton gave it back, little Bush cut it again). He first went to the national organization of women (or something like that...the big organization of women for women's rights who are very big pro choice) and asked them to help. He told them that these women are not being given a CHOICE. They told him that china had a population problem and they needed it. That struck me as odd. He also mentioned that europe is encountering a DEpopulation problem as they as a whole have actually started decreasing their population with some countries avg. around 1.5 children per family. So then i wondered "well what if their problem gets to the point where they outlaw abortion and have 'forced births'?"...I'm sure that organization would fight for the women's rights on that one. So for anyone who is prochoice (i'm pretty sure i can figure out the thoughts of prolifers), i'd like to hear your thoughts on this without starting a fight so please be nice. thanks

Forcing any medical procedure on any unwiling person is wrong. Whether or not Bush likes it, we need to give a lot of countries money and supplies for birth control and safe sex. I woould think that he would be able to rationalize distribution of condoms as being better than letting people die and letting babies be killed.

Pro choice is exactly that...<b>choice</b>. While I personally do not believe in abortion, I consider myself pro-choice. In as much as I do not believe in abortion, I also do not believe in forcing <b>my</b> morals, values and beliefs on others. I also expect the same consideration. China is not giving a choice. It is forced. I consider that wrong on so many levels it staggers the imagination. On the other hand China <b>does</b> have a population problem. I don't know how to solve it, but I would hope that another solution can be found.

here's a classic example of western "morals" being pushed on a foreign country, whether they want them or not. chine has been around for thousands and thousands of years without our help... what the fuck makes people think they need it now?


let them do whatever they want. it's their fucking country. if its citizens don't like it, they can help themselves and enact change. let them develop on their own, without meddling from the outside. i'm so damn tired of our government saving the whole damn world while they let their own country turn to shit, economically.

I take this happy opportunity to agree with phred!

Please keep in mind that cultural relatvisim can only go so far. If, while you were traveling there, China suddenly decided that all Americans (assuming you are one...if not, imagine for a second that you are) should be executed, I'd imagine you'd have a problem with it.

Perhaps a more realistic example: Germany had also been around for a long time prior to Naziism...

And another: Tibet has also been around for thousands of years, and is NOW under Chinese rule...

I'll let you fill in the blanks, because that's not the point anyway - the original post was asking for a moral (not political) interpretation from pro-choicers.

So, my interpretation: As voiced above, "choice" is the key word. As far as late term abortions, I think they're simply reprehensible. But phredgreen alludes to an important point - that it may just be our Western sensibilties. All the same, I can't imagine that a woman who keeps a baby until it's poping out of the womb would be partial to its death.

Generally, I favor population contol, but I feel that it can be imposed in ways that don't include death - economic penalties, for example (i.e., have a third baby, and you're taxed 50% of your family's income for the next 20 years.) It sounds harsh for the kid, but it's better than not living at all, no?

re: forced births - I honestly don't think that will EVER be a problem for China, given its cultural sensibilities. Which are the root of overpopulation there anyhow.

I understand my solutions aren't the most feasible - but the opinions that they're based on are rock-solid in my mind.

I am very "Pro Choice", meaning a woman has the right to choose to have sex or not. If pregnancy ensues, it is no longer a choice, it is a life.

an emphasis on "choice", period.

however, in this case I agree with phred,
we need to focus on here, now
we cannot be the babysitter of the world.

Friends of ours can't have kids of their own and consequently just paid $30000 to adopt a Korean child. They would like to adopt more, but just can't afford to do it. I can't understand why babies are being killed in China and other places when people here (Australia) are forced to pay enormous sums to try to adopt them. Seriously fucked up, if you ask me. I realise that not all the children in China and other third world nations would find homes like that, but a patload more would than do now if it was cheaper for them to be adopted. After you've spent tens of thousands on IVF, few people can afford to shell out another 30 big ones on adoption.

I consider myself pro-choice to a point - the closer a fetus gets to being 'viable' and therefore a potentially, immanently independent human being, the less comfortable I am with abortion on demand. In the first two trimesters, and especially in the first trimester, I think a woman should be able to do whatever she wants. I don't like the idea of "late-term" abortion unless the mother's life is in danger. Basically, if you've carried the kid for 6 months you've had plenty of time to make up your mind if it's an "elective" (non-medically-necessary) abortion. But I think, despite the republican rhetoric, these late-term abortions are incredibly rare. I don't have statistics, but that's my impression.

I basically think that if we're talking about abortion the country has done a piss-poor job of promoting birth control. I would love to see ZERO unwanted pregnancies, but that'll never happen so long as we're pushing abstinence-only education that has been scientifically proven to be ineffective. Everyone should be educated about and have access to affordable birth control, and abortion should be for those times when bc fails. I love the idea of the morning after pill - at that point we're just dealing with a collection of cells that has a huge chance of being spontaneously aborted by the mother's body anyhow (I believe I read somewhere that something like 60+% of all fertilized eggs are spontaneously aborted because they would not have been viable) and it's much less risky for the mother.

Anyhow, that's my 2 cents. I hate to see this issue so polarized - we ought to expect some level of personal responsibility from people who are having sex (and should educate them to be responsible), and we ought to give women the option to deal with their own bodies as they see fit.

This really isn't a pro-choice vs right-to-life issue. It's more about governmental control, social manipulation, and, partially, US imperialism.

Populations control themselves. It's a fact of nature. Now, it's not pretty when it happens, and when it happens in the human species, it's particularly hard to take. But nature will manage the population, in the long run.

This is sort of like aggressively stopping forest fires. When you do that, the underbrush that will naturally be cleared out by fire builds up to the point that a fire that you CAN'T stop will be particularly devastating. Messing with natural processes is a Bad Idea, and that's what's going on here.

Should China (and other countries) be allowed to grow unchecked until they all starve to death? Well.... that's a little hard to just say "yes" to as well. But some Authority dictating when enough people have been born is almost certainly the wrong approach.

I explained my unpopular views on TFP v 3.0 at length and I will do so again if this can stay civil.

As a side note, I recently had the opportunity to briefly discuss the one child problem with several tour guides in Shangai and Beijing. They are very carefull about what they say, but they seemed to think of it as a reasonable and very necessary policy. They have very different views about individual rights than we do.

I said years ago that abortion on a world wide scale would be very anti-woman. That is coming true. In northern India, young men are unable to find wives, because most of the woman of their generation were aborted because there is strong social pressure to have sons. India outlawed gender selection abortions close to a decade ago, but it will have major effects for at least one more generation. I understand that much the same situation exists in rural China. But rural families are allowed to have a second child if the first is a girl.

I believe that the most dangerous thing that could occur in our nation is if any religious group gains power and is able to legislate their moral code. I certainly do not think that my churches rules should become law.

The prime responsibility and role of our government is to protect our individual rights. In a civilized society, that means protecting the weak from the tyranny of the strong and the majority.

There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that a fetus is a member of homo sapiens with a unigue genome and that it meets every meaningful definition of life. It's cells are reproducing and maintaing homeostasis.

Does it have a soul? I don't know, and more importantly, it is not a question that should be addressed by the government. When governments get in the business of defining "human life" we end up with such atrocities as genocide and slavery.

Society has an interest in intervening in cases of child abuse. The same logic applies to abortion if you believe that the fetus is alive. Wether the fetus is alive or not is absolutely not a matter of opinion or choice. Either it is, or it is not. Either one side is right or the other is. I believe that society needs to err on the side of protecting the rights of the unborn.

I am going to go ahead and answer some of the things that some of you are going to want to say about me.

1) I don't think that the government should interfere in other areas of sexual freedom, except to protect minors.

2) I am opposed to the death penalty, although different logic applies because the life involved is not innocent. It may have a role in frontier societies for reasons of self preservation.

3) I would use deadly force to protect innocent life.

4) I don't give a shit what you do; but if there are consequences to your choices (ie conception) you are the one who has to deal with it; not me, or your child, or society in general.

For this I was referring to Europe. I agree that china will never have a depopulation problem, but Europe, on the other hand, will. Their population has been decreasing for the past 2-3 years. Also, Japan will run into this problem too. The prof. from stanford said that if Japan keeps going at the rate it is now, there will only be 500 people left in the year 3000...I realize that probably won't happen and sounds dumb, but it shows how serious the problem can get.

Also, lurkette, at the hospital the prof. witnessed the late abortion, they said they do about 400 of them a year, and that was just the one hospital. Most of the time, if a women gets "illegaly" pregnant and doesn't want the abortion, she'll try to hide, but then ends up getting dragged to a hospital by authorities (its tough to hide with a huge gut).

Another thing though, is that china is not doing this by themselves. The United Nations is the ones funding the whole thing and I wouldn't doubt that they're telling them what to do. The United Nations also exagerates china's population and lies to us saying that there are no forced abortions.

I would agree with everyone else saying not to push our morals on them, except that the vast majority of china has the same morals. You have to remember that the people are being forced into these things. I mean, if the people wanted to do it, I'd leave them alone. It's kinda like if the Jews wanted to be killed, there wouldn't have been a war.

I don't know, maybe I'm just being dumb, but I think that the United Nations can find a better way of dealing with it.

before you read the whole post please understand that my views change. i hope i never, ever get to the point where I see things in one way only.

also note that I've always pondered this subject since i heard the word 'abortion'.

i doubt i will read this thread and so far not particpated in any on abortion. so if you are curious about me, ask me in PM cause i do not plan on returning to this thread.

I think abortion is highly wrong in most cases.

when used almost as a birth control option i see it as sheer evil. example:

if girl a got pregnant because she took no prevention and then aborted cuz 'she wasn't ready' she is a murderer.

if a girl is pregnant and the birth has a great risk of killing her, then i agree. abort. taking life for life is silly.

if a girl is raped i'd beg her to adopt it off, but if she wanted an abortion then i'd not have the heart to deny her.

i do firmly believe that you are killing a life, not just goo after it starts developing.

that's all. and yes, i realize that was a paper thin argument. it is all i am willing to type right now.

What I'm about to say may offend some, and I'm sorry.
But sometimes, abortion is merciful.
I'd rather see a a life get ended before it begins than to see a child born addicted to crack and with almost no chance at a happy childhood or a happy life in general.
I think abortions should be granted, sort of an abortion permit. And you would obtain this permit by going to court and presenting your case, or a family member doing it for you. If there is a valid reason for the abortion, then a permit will be granted. If not, then deal with your motherfucking responsibility.

ok well i think early term abortions should be legal... ive met too many kids that are 16 and their parents are 32-35 and EVERYSINGLE ONE of those kids have been losers... and many of them had kids themselves at 16- 19 years old... having a kid at such a young age fucks up your life.... gotta drop out of school... gotta work... and then the kid will prolly turn out to be pretty messed up...

having an abortion could prevent a life from being ruined then great go for it...

as for the forced abortions in china... its pretty fucked up... and i dont think anyone should be forced to have an abortion... they should offer free sterilizations after the woman has had her one child... but again not forced sterilization...

I think in general if people let other people live their lives without interference,the world would be a better place. People usually have prescribed opinion's as to how other people should live their lives,but generally get pissed off when someone tells them how to live their's.

forcing an abortion to "control" the population is going to far. forcing anything is wrong.

gotta agreee with that

Oh man.... forced anything is just not right no matter how warped your lines of thought.

It was already said,

The women are not being given a CHOICE, so I don't see how either side can support China's policy.

it is a bad solution to a real problem

I'm not pro-choice, I'm pro-abortion. But forced abortion is fucked up, unless they're retarded or something.

I gotta agree with some people, let the Chinese do as they do within their own country. How, this is for the people living in USA, feel if let's say the Chinese were forcing forced abortions on us? Where is it our place to be the ones on the we're-always-right highground all the time? Don't get me wrong, I think this is barbaric and totally wrong, but again, let them do as they do and let's spend our money on ourselves and let others look up at us and maybe emulate us if they please. If we didn't focus so much on other countries and pushing our views, , many horrible things that have happened to us probably wouldn't have happened.

It's also about personal responsibility. We all should take responsibility for our own actions. I know this is a broad statement, but I think it fits in many cases today.

I'm less certain about this concept of inter-cultural interference.

Germany and the National Socialist movement is a tremendously bad example, since the matter only arose once the world war started.

Instead I would recognise certain basic rights exist in all people. So does the Un. Those of you who think the Chinese govt. need the assistance of the UN (or even their "orders") to carry out brutal assaults on women need to examine the organisation they accuse.

Forced abortion is wrong simplicitor. So is forced sterilisation and lobotomisation. These are crimes against humanity.

The key is consent. In all things this is the fulcrum of morality for me. People must be protected.

And phred, china was there long before, but not in the form we know now. They are using a system derived from a German, living in England during the nineteenth century, which was implemented by a chinese person who was trained by a Russian organisation headed by a Georgian.

Nations are not independent from one another, we're all part of humanity last I checked.

Exactly, taking responsibility for your own actions and how it affects everyone around you.

Imho, the women that fall "victim" to the stipulation are the ones that do not take their responsibility, or figure that the rules don't apply to them somehow.

China has a serious problem with overpopulation, so the government has told them again and again that this is in fact a very easy way to reduce the population, to use their common sense and realise it can't go on like this. They told them the why and how.

And accidents with contraceptives happen all the time, I agree. So do the right thing in that case and end it within the first 2-3 months.

I don't have any problems with abortions.

As for China, I think they're doing the right thing. Overpopulation is a big problem, something must be done about it.