Ron Paul and Abortion " My thoughts" Please contribute

WHO estimates that 40-50 million babies are forcefully aborted every year!
This is the genocide of the unwanted unborn, and it is the greatest tragedy of our time.

Ron Paul as an obstetrician who delivered over 4000 babies and never found it necessary to perform an abortion.
I value his opinion on this matter, most people just have an opinion on this topic, but really what makes anybodies opinion have more validity than another persons. How about a person who is doctor that actually knows, because he has been on the front lines of this?
I think the supreme court judges should go watch a dozen abortions get performed and then revisit this topic in the courts.

If I had my way, 100% of pregnancies would end in abortion unless you could prove you were able to provide adequate care for your child for the first 18 years of its life. If you cannot, the pregnancy needs to be aborted so that it does not become a draw on state resources.

Now, seeing as I am someone willing to negotiate compromise, I see no problem with a woman's ability to choose whether or not she is able or willing to take care of a child for 18 years.

I find your arguments that every child should be born just as ludicrous as you view mine, however, unlike you, I am perfectly happy to compromise my beliefs without feeling like I am abiding in the destruction of the planet. Because we aren't.

Only when someone forces their own beliefs on another can a tyranny take hold.

reply to post by begeegrace


Hey Begeegrace! Welcome to ATS! Thank you for your fair and very well thought out post.

I looking forward to seeing you on the boards as I think you have a lot to contribute on various topics.

BTW, I agree 100% with your post and couldn't have stated it better myself.

reply to post by yoyoyoyo


First: the morning after pill doesn't kill anything. It's there to prevent a sperm from reaching the egg, which is a process that can take days. It thickens the mucous and, if possible, prevents ovulation so the sperm can not reach that egg. Then, a period is forced. There is no abortion.

Second: you only posted this so you could start a fight about abortion. If you were looking for other peoples' thoughts on this, you wouldn't use adjectives such as "disgusting".

Regardless of when life begins, women have and always will have abortions, legal or not. When a 14 year old girl who had a condom break on her or a pill that failed and wound up pregnant gets scared because her family will possibly beat her or disown her for being pregnant, abortion seems like a good idea. When a drug addict gets pregnant, she has the right to an abortion. It's either kil the fetus or kill the child with years of neglect and abuse.

Another thing: planned parenthood doesn't perform abortions. That's all people see when they think of planned parenthood. My medication therapist who put me on Prozac hated planned parenthood. Funny. A conservative out me on Prozac, which you claim blinds people like me to the truth. Planned parenthoods will refer people to an abortion clinic, yes. But that's when they ask. They are legally not allowed to deny a service the same way a school can not deny an education based on the beliefs of others and themselves. And what happened to keeping eyes open? Planned parenthood supplies free or cheap services to girls and boys. Often minorities because this scum country keeps them in the slums in most scenarios due to racism and "good ol' American customs".

Just because you had an abortion doesn't mean you can now accuse everyone who is pro choice of being devil worshippers. I have news: not everyone is Christian therefore not everyone believes in the devil. Most people just believe in options. Pro lifers are pro death penalty. So they aren't pro life, many pro lifers kill bugs bigger than the fetus being aborted. So they aren't pro life.mif you're going to point a finger at pro choicers and tell them they're savages, prepare to bite the bullet because we have as strong opinions as you do.

Abortion is a topic that can be bickered about for decades but you know what? It will never go away. Let me give you a few quotes by George Carlin:

Boy, these conservatives are really something, aren’t they? They’re all in favor of the unborn. They will do anything for the unborn. But once you’re born, you’re on your own. Pro-life conservatives are obsessed with the fetus from conception to nine months. After that, they don’t want to know about you. They don’t want to hear from you. No nothing. No neonatal care, no day care, no head start, no school lunch, no food stamps, no welfare, no nothing. If you’re pre-born, you’re fine; if you’re preschool, you’re f***ed.

Now, is a fetus a human being? This seems to be the central question. Well, if a fetus is a human being, how come the census doesn’t count them? If a fetus is a human being, how come when there’s a miscarriage they don’t have a funeral? If a fetus is a human being, how come people say “we have two children and one on the way” instead of saying “we have three children?” People say life begins at conception, I say life began about a billion years ago and it’s a continuous process. Continuous, just keeps rolling along. Rolling, rolling, rolling along.

Now, I bet you're a respectable person. I really do. I bet you're really kind and fun to be around. But picking fights and calling people names because they can't afford a child is as sick as telling a child it's their fault that nobody has money, and, in the long run, isn't that true?

Originally posted by yoyoyoyo
thinkprogress.org...

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Would you like to be aborted, just because your mommy didn't want you?

Ummm...the answer to that is an emphatic "YES!!". Even the kids who ARE wanted being born today are condemned to living life in which industrial pollutants permeate every cubic inch of the earth's atmosphere and lithosphere and one which is depleting every single resource imaginable at unprecedented speeds...even while the population increases exponentially. Quite frankly, barring any real sort of highly improbable "game changer" like the invention of a $3,000 cold-fusion reactor for the home or benevolent aliens landing on the White House lawn the future...even the near-future...is the place of fu%$ing nightmares.

I suppose the exception would be if there was some sort of massive, global, depopulating event such as nuclear holocaust or a "superflu" pandemic...however then a child born today was just LITERALLY born into the Apocalypse. Now remember...this rather bleak future is a reality for even kids who are born into good ol' American upper middle-class families with two loving parents, a white picket fence, and golden retriever.

Can you imagine the hell that an unwanted child is born into? What could be more cruel and sadistic than condemning these innocent victims to life knowing full well that extreme poverty, addiction, abuse, neglect, and repeated incarceration, or some combination thereof are almost assuredly in their future?

Life is only "precious" when you are fortunate enough to be born into a situation which isn't an endless source of physical, mental, and emotional misery.

...but then again...I'm also pro-euthanasia. I just don't believe in needless suffering.

This is a non topic that has no business in political discussions. What someone else does with his/her body is none of anyone else's damn business.

Lets stick to topics that matter, abortion and contraception aren't one of them.

The real topic for the so-called pro life should be war. If you're really pro-life, how can you support blowing up children of other countries and sending our own children to die in meaningless wars. I am sick and tired of these topics that are designed to distract and keep us fighting with each other, if you're pro-life, you should have to be anti-war, most of the pro life group are not. Rick Santorum for example is anything but pro-life, who's life is he interesting in protecting? His own? He won't go to war, or send his own children, but has np sending mine or yours, wake up people.

Why do people assume RP would make abortions illegal?
He said he himself does not believe in it since he has witnessed one.
Didn't say everyone should be denied the choice.
He believes in keeping the government out of private lives..
Just because he is running under the republican party doesn't mean he's a bible basher.
I feel he is a just and practical man.
He does not believe that his beliefs should infringe other people's lives.
I frankly am sick and tired of people using religious-based accusations and making life more difficult for those who can live life without condemning others in order to fill the void created by Christianity.. (NOT JESUS, but Christianity. Big difference IMO.)
If the mother does NOT want the child, she should have a choice to ABORT.
It is fact that babies are not born aware.
They have no depth perception, no awareness of object permanence (like a dog, where you leave the room and you are lost and gone forever to them), no sensory or motor functions..... these develop OUTSIDE THE WOMB. They do not feel emotion for others...
Yes, these develop, but OVER TIME.
The fetus is not self aware.
A mother's body will self-abort the fetus if it is a problem of some sort.. miscarriage
How is this not different than aborting because it will be a problem for the parent's life?
I am a woman who does not believe it is moral to bring an unwanted child into the world.
Do you realize HOW MUCH children cost these days?
It is a HUGE deal, a lifechanging event.
And it should be a situation where there is absolutely no decision on my part?
You can say "selfish," but personally I would wait until I had the means to make sure my child should never worry about anything pertaining to "adulthood" until they are adults themselves.
America makes it impossible to have a child.
Families struggle and fall into debt because they don't have a choice.
Our society is too damn expensive for the working class, and it only gets more expensive, while they are not paid more to compensate for inflation.
A dollar has no value anymore, but people are still paid mere dollars on the hour.
We hear screams of overpopulation, and yet some turn right around and scorn those who choose not to procreate becuase they are not ready.
Or procreate because their child will not have a fulfilling life.
I don't think that is selfish.
Their soul will find it's way to earth in another way.

Hi,

I'm a women
I find this subject most sensitive. I've once used the morning pill, due to an accident with my boyfriend condom, at the time i was only 16, i couldn't have a baby for many reasons, many than i can count, but first of all, it would never be a planned pregnancy, and at the time, if i had got pregnant i couldn't keep the baby with me, i didn't had a life where i could provide a child a decent life and as i said, there were many reasons that took me to decide that i had to take the pill.
In my country abortion is legal, and the main reason that made the law to accept abortion were the unplanned pregnancies, resulted from accidents like mine or rapes, psychological or financially unhealthy moms...
But according to some doctors and statistics, the majority of abortion cases are from careless people who really have no respect regarding life, there actually are people who use abortion almost on a daily basis, and i'm very against that. So this is where i get divided, cause the way people use that permissive law, is not a responsible way. And that i take as consented murder by our government. This subject can go on and on and in the end we still get divided with this issue, cause it is really sensitive.
Again, i've used the pill cause i had no choice, nor could ever had or keep a baby at the time. But people should be more serious when considering aborting a baby, they shouldn't do it so lightly as some do.
Human or not, life is far too valuable to throw it away, but a child should also be planned by its family, and if it represents a problem and if the parents can not give them a decent life until adulthood, abortion is in that case a responsible and merciful decision. In the end this is a family decision, not a governmental one.In our time, it is most difficult to assure a healthy life for a newborn child due to our society rhythm and life cost. Not just in the U.S.A, but also here in Europe.

Best regards,
Amiba

reply to post by Amiba

But according to some doctors and statistics, the majority of abortion cases are from careless people who really have no respect regarding life, there actually are people who use abortion almost on a daily basis, and i'm very against that.

What! It is physically impossible to use abortion on a daily basis! I don't know what doctors are saying that unless they are referring to the pill which is taken daily.. Are you opposed to the pill or the Nuva Ring?

Maybe you don't understand the argument against birth control is based around the fact that a certain effect of the above methods is to prevent a fertilized egg to implant in the uterus, if the method fails to prevent insemination. Do you consider this form of birth control to be daily abortion, or immoral?

Originally posted by PrincessofSwords
Why do people assume RP would make abortions illegal?
He said he himself does not believe in it since he has witnessed one.
Didn't say everyone should be denied the choice.
He believes in keeping the government out of private lives..
Just because he is running under the republican party doesn't mean he's a bible basher.
I feel he is a just and practical man.
He does not believe that his beliefs should infringe other people's lives.
I frankly am sick and tired of people using religious-based accusations and making life more difficult for those who can live life without condemning others in order to fill the void created by Christianity.. (NOT JESUS, but Christianity. Big difference IMO.)
If the mother does NOT want the child, she should have a choice to ABORT.
It is fact that babies are not born aware.
They have no depth perception, no awareness of object permanence (like a dog, where you leave the room and you are lost and gone forever to them), no sensory or motor functions..... these develop OUTSIDE THE WOMB. They do not feel emotion for others...
Yes, these develop, but OVER TIME.
The fetus is not self aware.
A mother's body will self-abort the fetus if it is a problem of some sort.. miscarriage
How is this not different than aborting because it will be a problem for the parent's life?
I am a woman who does not believe it is moral to bring an unwanted child into the world.
Do you realize HOW MUCH children cost these days?
It is a HUGE deal, a lifechanging event.
And it should be a situation where there is absolutely no decision on my part?
You can say "selfish," but personally I would wait until I had the means to make sure my child should never worry about anything pertaining to "adulthood" until they are adults themselves.
America makes it impossible to have a child.
Families struggle and fall into debt because they don't have a choice.
Our society is too damn expensive for the working class, and it only gets more expensive, while they are not paid more to compensate for inflation.
A dollar has no value anymore, but people are still paid mere dollars on the hour.
We hear screams of overpopulation, and yet some turn right around and scorn those who choose not to procreate becuase they are not ready.
Or procreate because their child will not have a fulfilling life.
I don't think that is selfish.
Their soul will find it's way to earth in another way.

Good post, Dr Paul would never legislate against abortions, it's only his personal feelings towards an issue near and dear to him. He is right that it's the morality of the people that need to change, not the laws, this is such a non issue, I cringe every time I hear these fake pro-lifers go on about it.

Why is this rant not in the rant section?

Abortion is not murder, nor is ending the life of someone clinically braindead and having machines work for them.

anything pre-3 months is just that...a fully braindead mass of replicating cells Until brain activity is established, then there is no life, there can be no life..it is simply cells with a purpose..and to extract them is like extracting any other mass growing inside you..a tumor, a first trimester fetus, cancer, etc...

Once brain activity starts, then yes, I agree..its a life and should be protected...some say 5 months, but I think a fully functioning nervous system = beginnings of consciousness.


3 months is long enough for anyone to decide frankly. Anyone still hmming and hurring after that.well, subconsciously they already did decide.

Originally posted by macaronicaesar
Good post, Dr Paul would never legislate against abortions, it's only his personal feelings towards an issue near and dear to him. He is right that it's the morality of the people that need to change, not the laws, this is such a non issue, I cringe every time I hear these fake pro-lifers go on about it.

“I am strongly pro-life. I think one of the most disastrous rulings of this century was Roe versus Wade. I do believe in the slippery slope theory. I believe that if people are careless and casual about life at the beginning of life, we will be careless and casual about life at the end. Abortion leads to euthanasia. I believe that.”

-------

“As an O.B. doctor of thirty years, and having delivered 4,000 babies, I can assure you life begins at conception. I am legally responsible for the unborn, no matter what I do, so there’s a legal life there. The unborn has inheritance rights, and if there’s an injury or a killing, there is a legal entity. There is no doubt about it.”

-------

“The first thing we have to do is get the federal government out of it. We don’t need a federal abortion police. That’s the last thing that we need. There has to be a criminal penalty for the person that’s committing that crime. And I think that is the abortionist. As for the punishment, I don’t think that should be up to the president to decide.”

Nothing about these quotes taken directly from RonPaul.com seem to indicate that he wouldn't help ban abortion the moment it came across his desk.

The biggest problem with abortion is that we don't know when life is truly conceived. Furthermore, how far are we going to stretch the spectrum of "alive?" For example, a tree or a plant is alive, yet because both exist in a vegetative state we consider them less "alive" than, say, animals or people. Furthermore, we could argue that a fertilized egg is very much like an acorn or seed (it's planted in the womb and grows); are squirrels committing mass murder every time they munch on acorns? I don't think so. Is every acorn a tree? No, though every acorn is a potential tree. If an acorn is not a tree, a fertilized human egg is not a human being, but a potential human being. If conditions are right, the egg will grow into a fetus and eventually develop into a human baby, but the fertilized egg is not, prior to development, a human baby. It would take a great amount of exaggeration and self-deception to come to the conclusion that a fertilized egg is a human baby.

Once we discover at which stage the fetus develops consciousness, or a soul, we can conclude when it is technically alive, for it is able to think; without consciousness, it's simply an unoccupied potential vessel. If a person in a vegetative state is technically 'braindead," a fetus in a vegetative state is as well; no functioning thought is braindeath.

Death is the state of the body once the soul has permanently been severed from it, or in less spiritual terms, when consciousness is permanently lost; if the body was never occupied by a soul, its destruction is not murder because it was never alive to begin with.

I hope this makes sense to you; something needs to be alive to, well, be "alive;" the potential for life and being alive are not the same thing.

Furthermore, the fetus is a parasite, the woman is a voluntary host. If the host wants to rid itself of a parasite, it has every right to do so and outlawing abortion will not change this.

reply to post by macaronicaesar


Exactly! I have met too many "pro-lifers" that want to crawl up every woman's womb and tell her what to do with it, but these same people are fully for the death penalty and wars in which people are killed and maimed.

Abortion is one of those topics with which one can be self-righteous and blow a lot of hot air about the "sanctity of life" and how every infant is a blessing from God, etc.....It's very safe, isn't it? Yet putting your money where your mouth is and helping mothers in poverty, helping children who live in ghettos and have to dodge gunfire as their daily exercise, or taking in foster children who were never wanted and have been abused and turned into mentally ill kids is never on their agenda.

Roe v. Wade was passed because too many girls and women were having back-alley abortions and dying from septicemia because of it. It was a public health measure to save at least one life out of two that are involved in an unwanted pregnancy.

I remember back in college riding my bike around town and seeing a bunch of protesters in front of a clinic, with signs that say "abortion is murder". I stopped and asked one of the protestors about it. She wasted about 10 minutes of my time acting like the Defender of The Innocent, telling me how it is murder and therefore wrong, and how all babies should be allowed to be born. I asked her if she was in favor of the death penalty and she said, "Of course!" I asked her if she was in favor of war and she said, "Yes".

I then asked her what she was doing to assist teens and young women with unwanted pregnancies. She gave me a deer-in-the-headlights look. I went on to explain that, most teens and young women have to have help with these unwanted pregnancies, and perhaps she could offer a room or two in her house for these girls to live in, and then when they have their babies, assist them with either getting on welfare, or helping them with paperwork to put their baby up for adoption.

I then got another 5 minutes of her excuses as to why she couldn't actually HELP, but she could waste a Saturday protesting.

I said, "So you're saying it's OK to kill somebody convicted of murder, or for a soldier to kill somebody innocent in a foreign land, but you think abortion is a sin......And yet, you can't do anything to help these girls who are in trouble?"

She said, "Well....yeah."

I looked at her with disgust and said, "I thought so", and pedaled away from her as she stood there angry because I exposed her hypocrisy.

So, OP, unless you are anti-death penalty, anti-war, and actively assisting pregnant women or unwanted, abused children, I see you as another hypocrite.

What a woman does is between herself and God. It is NONE of your business.

Originally posted by FissionSurplus
What a woman does is between herself and God. It is NONE of your business.

I agreed with your post, but as a secular humanist, I would amend this one thought with..

What a woman does is between herself and her doctor. It is NONE of your business.

Hi OP,

Thank you for your emotive statements, I feel that the brainwashing thats happened in the last century regarding abortion is part of the depopulation agenda. The arguments used here are the same and centralize around either quality of life or when is the start of life.

I was so saddened to read some of the narcissistic statements made, i felt compelled to offer my support, the whole My Body rubbish or Anti Religious nonsense, seriously.

Its 9 months of your life, there are potential parents with money lined up waiting for babies to adopt who desperately want these children and can provide for them.

Planned Parenthood is a eugenics organization, it originally had eugenics in its name prior to the Holocaust.

Everytime i see a woman talking about My Body, all im reading is, I'll Loose my Body.

The fact is, every woman who goes on about My Body is trying to justify to themselves they are not hurting anybody because they are or where afraid, afraid to loose their figure, afraid to endure labor, afraid they'd fall in love with their child and stop being able to go out and party with their girlfriends.

Abortion is the easy way to play on this fear and Planned Parenthood has made it emotionally easy as well as physically easy, and they have made it this way to further the depopulation agenda.

Spew all the logic you like, this is why MOST abortions happen and you all know it.

Originally posted by Achey
Spew all the logic you like, this is why MOST abortions happen and you all know it.

So what if it is?

Do you think those women would make good parents?

reply to post by Bone75


I'm not going to entertain the fantasy(delusion) of every couple , monogamous married or not , makes love for the soul purpose of procreation. You say " I can continue to justify ....." That's exactly what I'm doing , something need not be moral in order to be justifiable. If I want to strap you down and take your blood to help a dying person who needed a transfusion , one could say that you are immoral for not offering if you are the only person that can help , but it would be justifiable for you to refuse. If taking your blood was theoretically has the potential to cause you trauma, or mild to severe lifetime health complications or turn your life upside down it would be justifiable and possibly even moral. I know a 26 year old who has to wear a pacemaker for the rest of her life due to cardiac complications from her pregnancy. She could have died , but I guess people feel "oh" well , only a small percentage of pregnancies develop into that. So you want the right to flip a coin and tell women what you believe is in their best interest and screw all the consequences.

What I am talking about is the procuring not just equal rights, but rights of the fetus that trump the rights of the mother. Giving both fetus and mother equal rights is impossible and based on one's notion of morality , people want a panel of politicians to stand up and decide who's rights are more important and who's get's to be violated.

A one size fits all model "law" does not work , and you don't have the authority to sit through each and every individual case to play moral police. Your idealistic world where every fertilized egg has a name and legal rights, is fact an ugly draconian one that opens a Pandoras box of consequences that will follow for generations.

Originally posted by Achey
Hi OP,


Its 9 months of your life, there are potential parents with money lined up waiting for babies to adopt who desperately want these children and can provide for them.

The operative word being "your" life. If it's not my life, then whose is it? Why should I be responsible for providing a child to parents whom, for some "god" given reason, have been denied children?

The fact is, every woman who goes on about My Body is trying to justify to themselves they are not hurting anybody because they are or where afraid, afraid to loose their figure, afraid to endure labor, afraid they'd fall in love with their child and stop being able to go out and party with their girlfriends.

This is not a fact, it is your, very shallow and insensitive, opinion. What difference should it make to you the reason why a woman chooses not to deliver a child or be a parent. A woman is not a surplus baby making factory for people that , for whatever reason, can't have their own children. Why is it your business what someone else decides to do with THEIR BODY!?!

Abortion is the easy way to play on this fear and Planned Parenthood has made it emotionally easy as well as physically easy, and they have made it this way to further the depopulation agenda.

GOOD!

Spew all the logic you like, this is why MOST abortions happen and you all know it.

So you don't like logic? Just curious cuz you mention religion, do you support gay couples' right to adopt said child?

reply to post by windword


When i meant daily basis, i meant that it is a common practice. I meant that many people use the law without really thinking. They use that law as if they were throwing out garbage. It is too permissive, there should be a more rigorous investigation about peoples intention when using the law. It is almost like the issue regarding murder vs self defense, there is a big difference between them. Abortion should only be legal when properly justified.

I have a high scientific skill. You probably didn't understand me properly due to a problem of expression .
My mother language isn't english, sorry.I'll pay more attention when writing in english. Thanks

Best regards
Amiba