Were the consequences not so grave, the weaving and bobbing done by the liberal left on the abortion issue would be laughable. Alas, 40 million abortions are not a laughing matter.

Assuming a coffin four feet long, the grave yard for these 40 million would extend 100 miles long by 100 miles wide... Sobering to contemplate. Most especially when the extermination of a "mere" 6 million by the Nazi regime is viewed as a "Holocaust". The moral relativism surrounding this issue is intriguing to contemplate as well.

The misguided mindset that sexual intercourse is a recreational activity is largely responsible for this most terrible statistic. At risk of being labeled "old fashioned", why is it considered so very difficult to return to standards of morality from not so long ago? Are we "better" off today?

Perhaps when historians attempt to describe the decline and fall of the United States, they will properly describe the important role deviant sexual behavior patterns played in the demise.

Please, spare us. A single fetus is nowhere near 4 feet long. I am curious, are you male or female; married or single?

"deviant sexual behavior"

crazy how you guys can turn even heterosexual sex between two consenting adults into deviant behaviour. Handmaid's Tale, anyone?

The "standards of morality from not so long ago" were not so swell for some of us. If you're harking back to the golden age of the 1950's, I would remind you that women were shut out of the majority of jobs and blacks weren't allowed to eat, find lodging in, or sit in the same bus seats as whites. Women were maimed or killed by the thousands due to unsafe abortions...except for affluent women, who were always able to have the problem discreetly taken care of. And I hate to break it to you, but sex has ALWAYS been a recreational activity. Kinky pornographic images can be seen going back to ancient civilizations. Google it sometime.

Look, I agree that using abortion because you can't be bothered to use birth control is immoral. But in so many cases, abortion is the least bad option. So who you gonna trust to make that decision: the people intimately involved in a sucky situation, or the government? And if it's the government, are you then going to allow the taxpayers to be on the hook for the life of the child?

peachfuzz:

Assuming a coffin four feet long, the grave yard for these 40 million would extend 100 miles long by 100 miles wide...

90% of all abortions are done prior to the 12th week of pregnancy. At 12 weeks gestation, the fetus is 2 inches long. Why would you bury something <2 inches in a four foot coffin?

peachfuzz:

Most especially when the extermination of a "mere" 6 million by the Nazi regime is viewed as a "Holocaust".

Most abortions are done long before the fetus can think, thus terminating a pregnacy is not nearly the same as killing sentient beings.

peachfuzz:

The misguided mindset that sexual intercourse is a recreational activity is largely responsible for this most terrible statistic. At risk of being labeled "old fashioned", why is it considered so very difficult to return to standards of morality from not so long ago? Are we "better" off today?

Yes, we are far better off today because we have choice and more time to make the choices.

peachfuzz:

Perhaps when historians attempt to describe the decline and fall of the United States, they will properly describe the important role deviant sexual behavior patterns played in the demise.

I doubt sexuality will play any part in the downfall of this country. Like every other empire, we will fall due to either cultural stagnation or influx by another cultural with a more efficient method for achieving their ends.

LEARN A LITTLE BIT BEFOURE YOU POST>.....

12 weeks or 84 days.....the brain starts functioning, and can be detected by the electroencephalogram (EEG) at about 40 to 43 days after conception.

You need to read more history before you make statements about returning to standards of morality from earlier times. Women have made decisions when faced with an unwanted pregnancy from time immemorial. Through most of that time, abortions were not unlawful. Laws in the U.S. were first enacted in the 1820s, prohibiting abortion only AFTER THE FOURTH MONTH.

Rather than focusing on the pregnant women considering their options, wouldn't the pro-life lobby be better served by pro-life community promoting adoption in-house? Wouldn't it be better to prepare pro-lifers to adopt children of special need, of infants born drug-affected or addicted? Wouldn't it be better to promote funding to provide life-long care to these infants?

Anyone who could honestly call his/herself pro-life should adopt at least one child. Otherwise, how can they offer pregnant women that option?

An EEG could also, if calibrated for it, detect functioning in a toaster. Does that mean that we should never throw a toaster in the trash? Just because an organism is showing electrical activity, doesn't mean that it is actually thinking by any definition of the word.

Everyone, everyone...

While I applaud your efforts to be logical (I side with you and have been there), you have to understand that neanderthals like Peachfuzz don't use logic to make decisions, but gut feelings and hazy rhetoric found in their bibles.

The "pro-life" movement doesn't care about life; they care about punishment. They don't like contraception because they don't like the idea that young people can have sex without consequence - it destroys all their precious upbringing morality tales. So instead, they want teens to remain ignorant, and when pregnancy does occur, they essentially want that female to pay for her "sin" - to be punished.

They don't care about the baby; it's just a useful tool to teach that girl a lesson. They are anti-women's rights, and essentially sadistic - even if you end up with a murdered toddler like Caylee Anthony, at least her mom didn't have the abortion she wanted, right (HER mom convinced her not to)?

So your argument is pointless, because the "pro-life" movement is nothing but a coverup for their real agenda - keeping teens and young adults under their thumbs under a pretext of choosing life but really to keep them Christian - how else to keep the church coffers full?

ellamenta makes a good point. There's nothing "old fashioned" about this morality. For most of human history the use of abortifacients has been uncontroversial.

TruettCollins:

LEARN A LITTLE BIT BEFOURE YOU POST>..... 12 weeks or 84 days.....the brain starts functioning, and can be detected by the electroencephalogram (EEG) at about 40 to 43 days after conception.

Susan gave a reasonable answer, but I figured I'd reply as well. I've read quite a bit about this after the first time it was brought up a few years back. It's not true in the manner that you imply.

See:

<link>

thus terminating a pregnacy is not nearly the same as killing sentient beings.

Says who and why not? Allowing abortions is just a matter of semantics and not based on any real moral or legal code. We just declare afetus not a person and wash our hands of it. Like a previous poster said, our moral compass is different and improved to day than 1950. lets push that back a 100 years and we will find that Blacks, Indians, and women were "not people" either. If that is your ethical cornerstone- I imagine it will crumble as technology progresses to the point that we think of a fetuses as "real people."

gunsmoke:

lets push that back a 100 years and we will find that Blacks, Indians, and women were "not people" either. If that is your ethical cornerstone- I imagine it will crumble as technology progresses to the point that we think of a fetuses as "real people."

Says who? Says the scientists that have shown, thus far, that literally the first few weeks of an embryo there is no evidence of functioning brain or nerves.

Look, your argument is like apples and oranges; the whole "not people" line wasn't based on any scientific logic; it was based on racism, sexism and any other 'ism you've got.

The scientific approach to embryos is entirely different, and as of now, they are not considered "persons" until they can function outside a womb on their own. And please, don't bog down the argument with "well, they really can't live on their own for many years, so soon you'll argue that children and babies should also have no rights and can be killed."

I've heard that slippery slope, too, and it's also stupid.

PhysicsGirl:

90% of all abortions are done prior to the 12th week of pregnancy. At 12 weeks gestation, the fetus is 2 inches long. Why would you bury something <2 inches in a four foot coffin?

Because it wouldn't have nearly the same dramatic impact. Which gives me a great idea: When I die I want to be buried in a coffin 144 feet long. Not sure if I have enough frieds to be pall-bearers, though :(