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From: dan@scgvaxd.UUCP (Dan Boskovich)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: Re: Dividing Lines
Message-ID: <255@scgvaxd.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 28-Jan-85 11:42:39 EST
Article-I.D.: scgvaxd.255
Posted: Mon Jan 28 11:42:39 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 30-Jan-85 05:41:28 EST
References: <150@spp1.UUCP> <252@scgvaxd.UUCP> <342@scc.UUCP>
Reply-To: dan@scgvaxd.UUCP (Dan Boskovich)
Distribution: net
Organization: Hughes Aircraft Co., El Segundo, CA
Lines: 58
Summary: 

In article <342@scc.UUCP> steiny@scc.UUCP (Don Steiny) writes:
>>
>> I propose that we should consider the "fetus" a human
>> being until proven not! 
>> 
>	
>	Ok, if I got drunk and accidently knocked you down the stairs
>and killed you, I could get  tried for homocide.  
>What should we do with a pregnent woman who gets drunk, trips, falls 
>down the stairs and miscarries.  If a fetus has the same status that
>someone who has been born has, then that woman would have to be tried
>for homocide.  Any miscarrage whatsoever would have to be subject of 
>a homocide investigation.  Since some fairly large percentage of 
>pregnancies do not come to term anyway, it would keep the police 
>and courts pretty busy.  

I must have been born yesterday! I didn't realize that these hypothetical
situations occured so frequently prior to abortion becoming legal. I
hope the authorities released all those poor girls that were serving
time for miscarriages before legalized abortion.


>
>	What happens if a mother does not have proper pre-natal care
>and her child is disabled in some way?   What is the difference between
>that and a woman who, say, gives her infant child alcohol, tabacco,
>and other drugs.  If the child has been born, then it is obviously 
>child abuse, what if it has not been born?

Maybe if we recognized the rights of an unborn, the mothers would take
better care of themselves during pregnancy. It would sure lower the
rate of birth defects.


>	It is nonsense to think that we could give a fetus 
>the same status as someone that has already been born.  The dividing
>line is not fuzzy at all.  The logical consequences of giving
>fetuses the same status as the rest of us are absurd.

The emotionalism of this argument is what is absurd! The anti-abortionists
cause is simply to stop the killing of innocent unborn babies that ARE
alive and just as HUMAN as a prematurely delivered baby; not to convict
a woman for falling down the stairs (obviously an accident).
I hope most people can see the obvious difference between purposely killing
a fetus and an accident. I am sure the laws could be adjusted to prevent
such a thing. I don't know of this happening before legalized abortion, do
you?

I am still not so sure that smoking, drinking alcohol, or any other drug
taken for no good reason but to get high or have fun, should be legal during
pregnancy, but in that area I am willing to compromise. I am sure we all
consider the fetus a "potential human being" at very least. This should
be enough to re-evaluate our current laws which allow the killing of
fetuses to the tune of 1.5 million per year of which more than 90% are
NOT cases of rape, incest or endangered mother.


						      Dan