So a dad in Alabama rapes his 13 year old daughter and she gets pregnant through incest.
You think that child should be born?
At what point does it cease to be ok to kill the living organism that resulted from the incest? if the 13 year old doesn't realise she's pregnant and gives birth unexpectedly would it be ok to kill the new born child?
If its not ok to kill the newborn can you please explain why its not ok to kill the child?
and then moving on can you explain what's the significant difference (in terms of the child) immediately before and after its born? And for the mother the fetus has to exit her body one way or another.
The emergence of things like the consciousness and ability to suffer are things that develop over time in a gestating fetus and even for after birth for some things. The physical process of a vaginal birth or C-section delivery doesn't magically grant some instant change to the fetus'/ child's ability to suffer or consciousness.
The whole 'what about rape or incest' argument is a deliberately misleading argument.... I would suggest we should evaluate life and protect it based on the life itself and not the sins of others.
If the pregnancy puts the 13 year old's health at significant risk then its a decision for doctors as to whether the pregnancy should continue like in every other pregnancy. And like everyone else I would support a right for the 13 year old to seek an abortion earlier in the pregnancy up to a point that is informed by a compromise of the best scientific understanding of fetal development stages (and corresponding ability to suffer and level of consciousness) and the practical considerations of when a woman is likely to realise she's pregnant and hence be in a position to potentially want to seek an abortion.
People always bring up the 'what about incest/ rape' line when abortion comes up but the numbers are tiny
and we already know that such 'rape clauses' to provide exceptions for other laws end up being criticized as being 'traumatizing' for the women involved. Hence I suggest that such arguments aren't actually designed to provide exceptions for rape/incest but rather to increase abortion limits or entirely decimalize rape in a disingenuous fashion.
in a similar vein extremely early term limits for abortions are a disingenuous tactic to de facto seek a generalized ban on abortions.
25 white male Republicans vote to ban abortion in Alabama,
I love the implicit suggestion that the men being white is relevant to an
increased propensity to want to ban or restrict abortions when when even a casual examination of the facts would show that its more often than not counties with majority non white populations that tend to have the most extreme restrictions on abortion with Africa and the Middle east generally ahead of the field here....
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_law
The Alabama law will disproportionately affect black and poor women, because they are more likely to seek abortions, and less likely to have resources to obtain an abortion out-of-state.
Another gem of an argument....
Its like the 'benefit cuts are sexist because they disproportionately affect women' line which seems to rather ignore that the results are only disproportionate because women are disproportionate recipient's of benefits in the first place!
It isn't 'racism' that makes it more likely that a black woman will seek an abortion in the US rather the often corrosive, self destructive elements of cultures more prevalent in black communities which are often feted and defended by white 'progresssives' which lead to massively disproportionate rates of single mothers and pregnancies outside of commited relationships.
Being 'non white' in the US isn't universally an indicator or being economically inferior to whites either... With certain 'non white' groups outperforming 'whites' economically and academically on average...
I would however appear to the the case that its a good idea for a state to ensure access for poorer people in general (regardless of ethnicity) to birth control to seek to avert the 'poverty trap' issues that unplanned pregnancies can cause for some.
Do you have problem with women who like sex but don't necessarily want to end up pregnant?
How about turning the tables a bit and forcing every man who wants to have sex (but not run the risk of getting a woman pregnant) to have a vasectomy? Why should these men still retain their right to body autonomy but not women? Or are you going to argue that forcing men to do something with their bodies is unacceptable?
Your argument is misleading... the corresponding action to forcing men to have a vasectomy in the circumstances you cite would be sterilising the women you cite as wanting sex but but not children.
There isn't a corresponding action for men re restricting abortions in women
because men can't get pregnant!
This is just one of thoose inhernent ways that the universe doesn't conform to certain (human) ideas of 'fairness'. It isn't 'fair' that woman have to bear the physical brunt of preganacy but then it isn't 'fair' that males have higher rates of infant mortality and lower life expectancies based on their biology vs women.
It also isn't 'fair' that a man may be held financially responsible for a child after being mislead by a woman who claimed not to want children and/or who claimed to be using birth control when she was not and yet has absolutely no legal say in whether a pregnancy is allowed to continue or not.
Basically sex can have undesired/ unwanted consequences for both men and women, these consequences are not the same and both sexes should be encouraged to understand the potential risks and consequences for engaging in sex prior to the act.
And a womans body autonomy is one thing but at what point, if at all, does a fetus get afforded any degree of protection for its future shot at its own autonomy?
New born children don't have much bodily autonomy, being entirely reliant in other older humans for survival and decisions about their bodies and what is done to them but its illegal to kill them.
The law regularly has to consider the competing rights of different people.
An unwanted pregnancy is another example of this test in my mind and the decision is about finding a balance between the 'rights' of the mother and fetus based, in my opionon, on the developmental state of the fetus, any risk it poses to its mother and any birth defects identified that may affect the viability or quality of life for the unborn child.
