Unfortunately she wouldn't have even made it to be called "Mom."  The article I read said she was pregnant with twins and her 9 year old uterus just didn't have the capacity for a single birth much less carrying twins.

A glaringly bright example of how every day religion digusts me.  That there are repurcusions for this child and the mother and the doctors involved despite the imaginary sentence of the Vatican should be abundantly clear.  Rather than somehow reducing suffering, the Vatican, the Catholic religion, has increased it to uphold a dogma that is clearly at odds with what is the most moral action to take.  It is only fortunate that the child underwent the abortion at all, rather than have to suffer unduely and perhaps fatally in order to carry, maybe not to term, the product of her horrid abuse.  As if the psychological trauma of the experience weren't great enough, the Vatican would rather have had her suffer further before her possible death and because she cannot now do that, it has pronounced an imaginary sentence that will have real world effects on her life and others'.  What better refutation of the utilitarian argument could there be -and at what cost?

And for the rapist step-father?

Silence.

Religion does not provide morality: it deforms morality.

It's more or less the ignorant trying to pass off as if they actually have some knowledge, and that they know better, after all they have the authority of god to tell others what to do, how to do it, no need to actually know anything of anything, they have god.

The issue with latin america is that the catholic church still has a strong hold for the most part, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, El Salvador, Mexico, pretty much most of the countries in central/south american still are under the catholic churches influence, now they are losing influence, to the evangelical side, but still they have a big pull on society in general. Now some of it is due to tradition, some of it due to ignorance, and of course some of it is just plain old power grab, if your on the churches side you can be in power.

But really the church should not have say in things it has no understanding, and if it were me I would ask them to show me god, to prove he is real beyond any doubt, not faith, if not, to keep their mouths shut has they have nothing to stand on but old traditions and lots of ignorance.....actually I have said that to a few priests in argentina.

I'll take that as a challenge.

Not quite. Without a mother to provide life and safety, the children are dead anyway. The mother was immature, incapable of providing a safe environment(she's too young biologically), and clearly the sexual encounter was not consensual. Her life was in danger, and the children's lives by extension. An abortion can save one life. Nothing will see three deaths. Now if you wanted an illogical theists response, you might have to wait a bit longer.

HI!

> >

But aren't you pro-life people fond of adoption?  

How do you adopt a corpse?

But why?

Isn't your position, as a pro-lifer, that the fetus deserves status as a living thing?

If that's the case, why is it better to end the life of two innocent victims rather than one?

 Let me make sure I have Pineapple's position straight:

1) A fetus is a human with the same rights as a person

2) Except when the mother was raped.

3) Except when the mother might die, even if there are other people who could raise the child in the event of the mother's death

4) Except (presumably) when the child might be born without, say... a spine.  (Pardon me if I presume too much, but I'm guessing you would allow abortion if the fetus... err... person... is going to be horribly disfigured and have a miserable life.)

I just want to make sure I've got the premises straight.  Please correct me if I'm wrong on any count.

First Kevin, do you even know what cognitive dissonance is? It's when an attitude conflicts with our behaviour or another attitude.

[edit]

and worse yet for you, it's only when the person becomes AWARE that their behaviour/attitude is in conflict.

[/edit]

Vaset said that one death is better than three hence no cognitive dissonance for the attitude of the death/value of a fetus.

I prefer the term developing human, but yes it should have as many rights we can grant.

Yes

Yes, because it's either the fetus or the mother. It's like a 15 car crash is better than a 16 car crash. Still a tragedy, but could be lessened.

Depends on the disability. The criteria I use if it's a life threatening disability than yes, but if not, it wold depend on the disability, and if it is relativly easy to overcome,.

Not even close.

In psychology, cognitive dissonance is an uncomfortable feeling or stress caused by holding two contradictory ideas simultaneously.

My views are not contradictory to themselves. I've weeded out the vast majority of conflicts within my mind and morality. That's why I eventually ended up on the side of pro-life. Before then, I was conflicted. But that was quite awhile ago.

The fetus cannot live without the mother. It's physically impossible. Maybe in a few years we'll have technology capable of replacing the womb, but for now we do not. Therefore the fetus must be considered after the mother, because without the mother neither fetus nor mother exists. It's efficiency and damage control, not cognitive dissonance. :P 

How do you grow up when you are dead because your mother died while you were still in the womb?

Try again.

No I didn't. Your question dodged the issue. I brought you back on track.

Consent is irrelevant in this particular case. It's simply an additional factor at most. It is not what I made the determination on.

Again, irrelevant. This is about simple numbers, not consent. 3 dead, or 2 dead. 2 is always preferable to 3.

Oh - just for the sake of completeness:

So - anyone care to explain how it is perfectly congruent to consider fetus's to have all of the rights of fully developed people and condemn their abortion, but also consider it prudent to abort any fetus's causing distress to their mother or impregnated into her with consent?

Ah, okay. So you personally think that aborting a raped fetus in most cases is wrong, then?

Ah, right. So, in your opinion then, if the mother had been able to carry the twins to term at her own peril, it then would have been wrong to abort the fetuses?

You're trying to make this tricky. In cases of rape, a man is stealing genes from a woman in order to force her to conceive his child. IF there was an alternative to abortion, I would take it. There isn't, so abortion is the way to go. As per my disclaimer.

As per above and my disclaimer, if abortion is the only option, and it is, then it will have to do. If, however, the future should give us the technology to allow a child to develop without the mother, then that would be the proper way to go. 

I have no idea how you came to this conclusion.

Did you read the why?

And that brings me right back to accusing you of dodging the issue. Quit it.

Editted for an emoticon I meant to have within

You did not. You changed it with every post, or changed the angle of approach, which changes the question.

I don't suppose you would do the same with my response? Didn't think so. So no.

If you aren't going to read my disclaimer, then you have no position to argue from anymore.

Same as above.

Hey, y'know - this is actually a pretty fun exercize.

I think I'm going to try and find a question people cannot at all answer more often, as each dodge is amusing to watch.

Again (we're at ask #5, for those of you at home who need help keeping score):

What bearing does a mother being raped have on the rights of the innocent fetus that allegedly deserves full human rights as a potential human?

...And what about the 'stupid idiots' whose protection failed?

My questions to Vastet:

Every single response Vastet has had to this question, since the beginning of the thread:

(Nope. Nothing to do with the question at all.)

(Addresses the question, but dishonestly, as he implicitly states that consent is 'irrelevant'...)

(...And then when he realizes how crazy that sounds, he backpedals)

(Go back and read my five questions at the top of this post. See if they seem particularly different to you)

(I read the disclaimer. In fact, this whole line of questioning comes from confirming his position on rape and abortion via his disclaimer. This is, again, just another way of avoiding having to give an answer to a simple question).

(...And now I'm dodging, apparently. Goodness knows what, given that I haven't even been asked anything).

Anyway, it's been a slice Vastet, and I've had more or less exactly the conversation I expected to have given your mental faculties. Feel free to continue shaking your fist and pretending that you've kicked my ass all over cyberspace; I honestly was only really interested in baiting Alison into this topic, and while this was an enjoyable little side-affair, I'm done with it.

*Waits for our fruity deist to throw the ball*

Pointing out your irrelevant statements and showing how you ignored my responses do not help your case. They prove mine further.

No, you did not. You proved that beyond a shadow of a doubt with the last post you made, which I specifically addressed in my disclaimer. So now you aren't just dodging, you're lying too.

The answer is apparently beyond you, even though it's been spelled out ad absurdum.

If the shoe fits...

I already told you what you were dodging. Reading comprehension failure now too? Look again.

*snort*

Any time you grow a brain and some balls, feel free to bring it up again. 

Funny how you didn't mention that, and left it wide open. Well, since you can't respond to my logic and reality, feel free to live in your own little world.

...So the fetus has it's rights suddenly stripped-away because the mother is 'going through enough already'. So as long as a parent is significantly stressed, in your opinion (since they have a larger share of relationships than their child), they should have the ability to strip any rights from their children?

Your final statement only undercuts you whole argument, as it seems to recognize that potential people are not worthy of the same number of rights as developed people.

Don't you think there's a difference between consenting to sex and consenting to carrying a pregnancy to term? Does engaging in any action that has potentially unwanted consequences automatically mean you consent to living with those consequenses without attempting to mitigate them, or does this only apply to sex? For example, if I open my window and a burglar comes in does that mean I consented to being robbed and I have to let him walk away with my stuff?

Yes, there's a difference, but more of the former increases the chance of the latter. Just because a women didn't want to get pregnant doesn't mean she should abort the pregnancy.

No, but if you engage  in an activity [sex, leaving window open] with a risk [getting pregnant, well for females at least, getting robbed.] there's a chance that could happen.

I'm not saying it's "good" you got pregnant or robbed, but you can decrease the risks. Like I said above, the fact that you don't want to be pregnant or get robbed, doesn't mean you have responsablities related to them.

What job?

Care to enlighten a fruity basket case Deist?

I'm not what you'd call pro-either/or at all, I hold pretty much the same position as Vastet (ie given the state of of the world as regards to how we deal with our own and other people's sexuality - it's a right fine mess - abortion is a lesser category of moral dilemma that runs consequent to the appalling protection failures of our societies) but I personally don't label myself pro-life as he does, I'm not sure where we depart from each other about that, but anyway...

That said, Yes I personally feel aborting a rape foetus is wrong in probably the majority of cases basically because there are other preventative measures available for educated adult victims of rape (see emergency contraceptives).

On the other hand the very young among us are a different matter, for them to have conceived after having been raped reflects a failure on our part, not theirs, it is not within their means to have prevented the pregnancy any other way and in the case that they are particularly young and underdeveloped, as with the girl in the article, it puts their lives at risk as well.

We can't morally protect the rights of such unborn, regardless of their innocence because to do so is to cause suffering and death to another innocent. The only way to protect the rights of the innocents involved is to do all we can to prevent the second one from entering the equation to begin with, with better practices and ideals in our fundamental social structures.

And, incidentally, that is the main reason why I don't call myself  "Pro-life", as far as I am concerned the pro-life movement does absolutely nothing at all to further the more pressing moral agenda, in my opinion. Which is, fixing the social protection failures that become these tragic circumstances.

Since I have time for more than a few one liners now, and Kevin felt it so necessary to pull out a bunch of quotes:

This is Kevin baiting any pro-lifers that happen to be viewing on a false premise. He's not really interested in discussing this particular subject, he wants to brow beat them into submission by changing the subject as soon as he has someone.

Kevin's only response to my response is to accuse me of cognitive dissonance. He has nothing to back this up, so he doesn't post anything to back this up. Instead, he changes the subject. Which was his intent all along. He also starts tossing in ad hominem attacks, hoping his opposition will completely lose it's cool and fall apart. Little does he know...

And so he's dodged the very subject he invited people to discuss, and switched to a discussion on consent. Which had nothing to do with anything. Now I admit I was thrown at first, and tried to answer him with the thought that my disclaimer was in this topic, because I didn't enter the discussion for a debate. My views were arrogantly challenged by someone who didn't know what he was talking about, so I responded to them. I wasn't expecting or intending it to stretch into a debate, so while my responses attempted to address what he was looking for, he'd already proven his intent was deception. So I was unwilling to fall into another trap. As such, I tried to keep the subject on topic.

But Kevin refused to stay on track. At about this time I realized that my disclaimer wasn't in this topic, so Kevin couldn't understand the position I was coming from, and I realized that he'd need to read it before he could understand my position. So I posted a link to my disclaimer on the subject.

Which Kevin has proven twice now that he never read, since it directly covered contraception, amongst other things.

After which the discussion was pointless, and degenerated further.

And now, considering Kevin never really wanted an honest discussion on the subject in the first place, I'm done with it.