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From: matt@brl-tgr.ARPA (Matthew Rosenblatt )
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Right to Procreate
Message-ID: <340@brl-tgr.ARPA>
Date: Wed, 31-Jul-85 10:03:19 EDT
Article-I.D.: brl-tgr.340
Posted: Wed Jul 31 10:03:19 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 1-Aug-85 21:25:43 EDT
References: Articles 1499,1501,1503,1504,1509
Distribution: net
Organization: Ballistic Research Lab
Lines: 69

The "right to procreate" protected by the Constitution does not include
the right to rape.  I never said it did.  I never said it should.

In article 1499, Marie Desjardins Park writes in one paragraph about
government intervention taking away "the ability to do what one wants
with one's own life," and three paragraphs later about "the father's
responsibility to help financially (and preferably emotionally ...)."
I assume she is writing about the case where pregnancy takes place by
accident, which is a possibility whenever any birth control method 
other than abstinence is employed, since the pill can fail and even
sterilizations and vasectomies can fail.  

In such a case, society does indeed enforce the father's responsibility
to help financially, even to the extent of putting him in jail if he
doesn't pay up -- as well it should.  And the judge will not listen
to his protestations that he didn't want the baby, that he tried to
avoid conception, that forcing him to support an unwanted child for
eighteen or so years will interfere with his ability to do what he
wants with his own life.

The difference between interfering with his life for 18 years, and
interfering with the pregnant woman's life for 9 months, is that it's
her body.  If you add "...and therefore she has the right to do what
she wants with it," which is Marie Desjardin Park's and Charles 
Forsythe's point, then you are trying to establish the right to abort
by assuming the right to abort.  

"Possession is nine tenths of the law," writes Charles Forsythe.
I don't think that's a good argument for the right to abort.  I can
respect the argument that the fetus is PART of the mother (though I
disagree), but not the argument that the fetus is a piece of property
OWNED by the mother.  And even if it is, the maxim "possession is
nine tenths of the law" refers to the right to continue possessing,
not to the right to destroy.  Try to burn down your own home -- it's
statutory arson, at least in my state.  Try to burn down your own dog 
-- it's cruelty to animals.

"This country is a DEMOCRACY, not a DICTATORSHIP," writes Charles
Forsythe.  "My opinion, for what it's worth," writes Marie Desjardins
Park.  Right, both of you!  Each of your opinions, as well as Marcia
Bear's, as well as mine, is worth exactly one vote in a democracy.  It is as
foolish to discount a man's opinion about abortion because he doesn't have to
worry about getting pregnant as it is to discount a woman's opinion
because men have most of the political power.  Sorry if you didn't
get the point of my flame.

Feminism, contrary to the opinions of almost everyone on the net, is
not universally accepted.  If it were, we'd already have the Equal Rights
Amendment and a whole lot of other changes in society.  I believe that
there is a causal relationship here:  Feminism is not universally accepted
BECAUSE it would bring about a whole lot of other changes in society that
most people in our society would not be willing to accept.  Since it is
not universally accepted, non-feminists have as much right as feminists
to express their opinions.  With many exceptions, the general rule seems
to be that feminists are pro-choice, and non-feminists are pro-life.  If
I interpreted Todd Jones's choice of pronouns as indicating that he is a
feminist, it was to point out that his opinions on abortion might be
colored by his feminism.  However, as has been pointed out to me in a
mail message, that was an ad hominem attack, calling Todd Jones a name,
and such attacks have no place in rational argument, so I'm sorry I made
it.

Moreover, things are not always what they seem.  Todd Jones's use of "their"
may just have been a colloquialism -- he may not be a feminist at all.  
Similarly, just because the only computer on our local net with a connection
to the usenet news happens to belong to the Ballistic Research Laboratory,
that doesn't mean I work for that Lab.  I don't.

				-- Matt Rosenblatt