Welcome to Gaia! ::

It seems to be that we've reached a (atleast) semi-mutual undertsnading of our view on the subject. To bring a sence of closure to it I'll atempt to find the stories on the parents, as well...thats just it...that what we're talkign about. It cant survive on its own. Thats what we feel. We see a human being innocent of any real crime, and unable to survive with out the help of another individual...and here you have that individual denying help.

Okay...I'll try to help you understand. First off, there is no potential life. Every human biology class will teach you that life starts at conception once you get to human reproduction. Science textbooks say it, science sites say it. There are no potential lives. If you mean "life" in a philosophical sense...well...I hate to say it, but philosophy is irrelevant to the argument at hand. When it comes to the biology of the unborn, I don't argue philosophy, only biology.

You know we see the unborn as people deserving the same rights as every one else. No, instead of simply telling your self you cant understand, and simply leaving it at that...try. Try to understand. Stop seeing the fetus as an object, and look at it as a life, one like your self. Its not hard to do if you actually try.

Okay, now, look at it like this. Lets say a man/woman was crushed. Lets say that if they were to spend the next few months on life support, they would survive. Would you pull the plug anyways?

If there is a way to keep that fetus alive without using the mother's body, I'd be all for it. I'm not about denying the fetus help to survive, I'm about allowing the woman the freedom to decide who she gives help to and who she lets use her body.

Well, that's true. But if you want to get technical with biology, one could possibly argue that the life starts before conception, since the sperm and egg cells are alive before they meet.
But I meant potential as in it's still developing, doesn't have the necessary organs or fuctions to survive on its own, and relies on the mother completely and totally for its life. Without the mother, it's life will end. I don't consider it the same kind of life as you or I, since it isn't yet and has not ever been self-sustaining.

I don't think that would be the same thing, since the man/woman won't be depending on another person's body and had survived before on their own. But I know what you mean by it. I do understand where your argument is coming from, and I can better picture a fetus as a life like myself or a friend or someone.
I just still have trouble allowing the fetus to use the woman's body if she doesn't want it there, even if I considered it the same as an adult. I'd still have a problem with an adult doing what a fetus is doing, so...

But I have gotten a much better picture of the pro-life logic though. Before this guild and this particular discussion, I'd only ever encountered the insanely emotional, freakishly religious fourteen year old pro-lifers. I've never actually had a chance to debate or have any kind of conversation with someone who's put so much thought into the subject. It's been really rewarding. Thank you all. =]
I hope I haven't offended anyone in here or caused any hard feelings.

Same here. I don't really care much for kids but I don't want their life to end either. They didn't nothing wrong so they deserve a chance to live.

By the way i'm agnostic not christain

That depends on the woman really, some might have morning sickness as early was two weeks after conception, sometimes a few weeks or a few months into or some may not have morning sickness at all and on rare ocasions, some woman don't know their pregnant until the second or third trimester cause they had no symptoms.

Most woman don't have long lasting systems or problems. Usually nothing permenant. I know alot of people that have been pregnant. Some have a difficult pregnany while others didn't but none of them hadn't any pyshical problems after giving birth so it really depends on the woman.

Most people can still fallow their dreams and keep their plans. Sure it might be harder and things might change but if you work hard enough alot of people made things work and didn't let pregnancy or children stop them.

Why let it stop you from following your dreams? Alot of woman still work or go to school during and after pregnancy (some might take time off but alot of places are willing to let them take time off and work with them).

The sperm and the oocyte are considered alive in the sense that they are alive for as long as they remain active cells. The two are incapable of reproducing with out one another, and are there for incapable of producing any progeny on their own.

As it stands, it really isn't debated when human life starts. Most biologist, even cytologist, agree that human life starts the moment the sperm meets the female's egg. Before this moment, the life isn't considered human life, its simply (yet complexly XP) cell life.

Whether or not it is able to sustain itself is biologicly irrelevant, as considering somthign alive on the ground as to whether it can sustain itself is a philisophacal argument. And like I said before, when it comes to biology, I keep philosophy out, but I do understand what your saying, from a philisophacal view point only though.

That aside, its still not a potential life. Left alone all those things WILL develop, no question asked. The only real potential is the potential for failure or something to go wrong.

Like I said, the comparison isn't perfect, but its pretty close. The nine months in the womb is similar to being on life support for nine months. Thats why I used the comparison, and, in a way, those people are dependent on other humans. They depend on the power company to keep the machine working when its plugged in, the depend on the electricians who check the wiring and make sure nothing gets fried, they depend on the doctors who monitor the machines and they're conditions. Think of it this way. The injured human is the baby, the life support machine the womb, and the doctors and every other person involved, down to the lowliest assembly line worker who wraps and packs the machine, their mother. Is it just the tiniest bit clearer now? A slightly better example would also be a premature baby, in that they were dependent ont he mother, are born a little too early, and now must be placed on life support. In that example, every thing carries over, and they were dependent on another human being in some way before hand.

Whats rewarding is the privilege to have a conversation with a prochoicer who isn't the equivalent to the lifer you just described =p

Also, I am a bit offended, not by your posts by by two images in your signature. One being the "Christian majority religion 'help we're being oppressed'" signature, the other being the "Jesus grab a snickers" signature. The offensiveness of the second fore mentioned signature being the "oppression" most Christians complain about these days, so that the point of the first fore mentioned signature is lost due to the slight amount of hypocrisy that is present when some one views both signatures in the same signature loop. Did you get any of that? BTW, its not that I'm with out humor. I got the humor in the second one and the "irony" in the first one...but liek I said...the "irony" is lost when the second signature is viewd before or after the first one mentioned.(also, this is an entirely separate thing...I would rather not debate it in this thread...if there is a debate)

Edited five minutes later: "Tiger of the fire once wore a tea cozy to church going undercover as a nun" Okay...I might not have room to complain after seeing that in my own signature o.0

Dressing in scanty clothing is an active choice. Having consensual sex is an active choice. Being a victim of rape is not your choice. Getting pregnant is a biological function, and not a choice.

Even though the choices might have lead up to what caused the unwanted outcome, the outcome itself wasn't a choice.

Though, of course, not all people who dress in a provocative way get raped, only a very small percentage of them do, actually. While 80ish% of people who have unprotected sex will become pregnant (within a year). I believe that condoms have a 14% failure rate with common use, including human and factory error (within a year). I think that birth control pills might be 11%, but I'm not sure on that one.

A gun is a weapon. It has only one purpose, to kill. Pointing a gun at someone, even an unloaded gun, is always a bad idea, except when one is planning to kill them. Every time one fires a gun, the bullet has the potential to kill someone.

Sex has many different purposes, one of which is procreation. While the potential for pregnancy is always there, one can only become pregnant at very specific times. And pregnancy doesn't need to result in death.

Like I've said, and others have said many times, nothing else is really much like pregnancy. Rape can be compared to it only in that they are both unwanted things that can happen (though pregnancy isn't necessarily unwanted in all cases), but they are very dissimilar in most other ways. On the same note, shooting a gun is similar in that both can have resulting bad consequences, but they are not very similar in most ways either. No analogy is very accurate when it comes to pregnancy, because there just isn't anything else that is like pregnancy. But there are a few ways in which it can be compared to other things.

I imagine that you aren't very fond of pregnancy being compared to rape for the exact same reason that I'm not very fond of pregnancy being compared to shooting someone. Because such comparisons rather favor the "other side" when it comes to this issue.

But there are comparisons for both. Unintentional pregnancy (from consensual sex) is a result of one's actions, and it is also something that one did not choose to have happen, even though one's actions did help to cause it (since women can't control ovulating).

Huh? Putting on clothes is a passive choice in the context of a rape situation. If it's in a man's heart to rape a woman, I doubt she needs to be in slutty clothing for him to do it.

Sex is an active choice.