Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!yale!husc6!think!mit-eddie!mit-trillian!melissa From: melissa@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU (Melissa Silvestre) Newsgroups: talk.abortion Subject: Re: 2-year-olds vs fetuses-survival Message-ID: <1242@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU> Date: Wed, 8-Oct-86 16:42:32 EDT Article-I.D.: mit-tril.1242 Posted: Wed Oct 8 16:42:32 1986 Date-Received: Thu, 16-Oct-86 05:07:24 EDT References: <648@houem.UUCP> <1233@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU> <652@houem.UUCP> Reply-To: melissa@trillian.UUCP (Melissa Silvestre) Organization: MIT Project Athena Lines: 57 In article <652@houem.UUCP> marty1@houem.UUCP (M.BRILLIANT) writes: > >I still think viability outside the mother's body is a criterion for >personhood. If the fetus can be transplanted, that means the mother >can refuse responsibility for it without killing it, and then the state >can protect it without violating its mother's freedom. My main problem with that is that modern medicine has (or will soon) reached the point where NO abortions will be allowed on the basis that the fetus is viable (can be kept alive outside of the mother for a full 9 months). I would rather accept an arbitrary time limit, like " you have X months to determine if the genetic makeup of the fetus is such that you wish to abort it - beyond that you may not kill it." Where X months is sufficient for reasonable determinations. Of course, as medicine improves, X may also drop. Until it does, however, I don't want technical, "miracles-of- medicine" viability preventing me from making an informed decision. I'd like to know, how do other pro-choice'ers deal with the fact that 0 months is rapidly becoming the age of viability? [...] >I echo their question, "where will it end?" But I have always >answered, "it ends at birth." When a fetus has been removed from the >womb, it has been "born" (if viable) or "aborted" (if not viable), and >its mother relinquishes control to the state. What if a $50 operation = abortion (kills it) but a certain $100,000 procedure can keep it alive at exactly the same stage? Viable according to what level of medical technology (and what price?) Would you force me to beggar myself to pay for an operation that would enable the State to keep the fetus alive until it can be adopted? Can we as taxpayers afford for the State to pay for such expensive medical procedures? I consider these to be very real questions, that need answering before I can accept viability as my overriding criterion. >The key phrase is "No man has the right to force me to bear his child." >Once you have had the fetus removed from your body, you are no longer >bearing it. Killing it is, in your own terms, "negative" rather than >"positive" eugenics, and I find it unacceptable. I don't understand this at all. HOW I remove it can very well determine whether it is still alive when I walk out of the clinic. One procedure costs more money than the other. Who should pay the difference? Does anyone even have the right to force me (at their financial expense) to choose one over the other? >M. B. Brilliant Marty Here in the early 1980's, I can accept viability as a good dividing line, because it still gives me sufficient time to make the choice that I consider crucial. My concern is that that will not continue to be the case in the future. -- Melissa Silvestre (melissa@athena.mit.edu)