Infaticide and Abortion

[Bern80]

i think you are a bit misguided on what the right thinks about sex, acludem. Most conservatives are not under the assumption that u suggest. We are well aware that all that teenagers are horny and will act on it regardless of the amount of education they receive.

As i said above when dealing w/ people in that age group u walk a very fine line b/t educating them about sex, the risks, and contraception w/o making it sound like "Don't have sex until u're ready for the consequnces, but if u wanna have sex do X, y, and z and you'll be fine."

The question is do you think the occurance of teenage sex will rise or fall if we start handing out birth control and condoms in school? My guess is rise because you are eliminating reasons to not have sex instead of creating more.

 

[bamthin]

I think it's a case of conservatives wanting their cake and eating it too. If they would concede the moral dilemma of providing access to birth control to teenagers, they would undoubtedly lower the abortion rate. The strategy of withholding education and contraception and hoping kids do the "right thing" just won't work in this American society that literally markets sex to teenagers (see Albercrombie & Fitch, video games, music, etc.)

I think they should pick their poison.

-Bam

 

[tybalt]

I believe that we, as a society, are devaluing life. In the workplace, people are regarded as nothing more than a commodity. There are natural resources and human resources. If it's okay to screw up our environment in the process of exploiting natural resources, why should anyone care about the consequences of exploiting human resources?

In the state that I live in, property seems to be more important than a human life. A person is 7 times more likely to do jail time for a crime against property than for a crime against another human being. My state set a liability cap of $250k for negligence resulting in death. However, the penalty for downloading a copyrighted music file is up to $175k per file with no cap. The dollar figure for the amount of copyright violations residing on computer hard drives in my town probably exceeds the free-market value of this country's population. And this is just for intangible property!!!

Unfortunately, we are a consumer society and our morals reflect that. When the highest law is "supply and demand," cheap labor equals cheap lives.

 

[jon_forward]

have we, of our own making turned ourselves into the "coolies' of the 21 century? [sorry, couldnt come up with a better term for cheap and expendable labor]

 

[Moi]

Originally posted by bamthin
I think it's a case of conservatives wanting their cake and eating it too. If they would concede the moral dilemma of providing access to birth control to teenagers, they would undoubtedly lower the abortion rate. The strategy of withholding education and contraception and hoping kids do the "right thing" just won't work in this American society that literally markets sex to teenagers (see Albercrombie & Fitch, video games, music, etc.)

I think they should pick their poison.

-Bam

I completely disagree with this. The fact that people KNOW if they have sex they are risking pregnancy and KNOWING about birth control aren't the problems. The problem is that the people who are having unprotected sex don't suffer the consequences. You are pregnant and don't want to be, poof, have an abortion. Most likely you won't even have to pay for it. You have sex and don't want the baby, poof, kill it or leave it on the police or hospital doorstep. Again, most likely you don't even have to pay for the privledge. If all else fails, have the baby and live on welfare for the rest of your life.

People aren't made to pay for their mistakes, their families don't pay for the mistake of not teaching their children abstinence or about proper birth control and voila, a society that faces no consequences and thus has no NEED to act accordingly.

No amount of free abortions or birth control will ever curb the problem of unwanted pregnancies unless and until there is a consequence to the action; so far, these consequences have been successfully removed from society.

 

[Dan]

Sex education is a huge waste of time and money. First off, I don't think I'm going out on a limb by assuming that most kids know what they need to about sex by the time they're 11 or 12. Second, as Bern said, it's impossible to try and teach abstinence and safe sex at the same time. And, as everyone's saying, it's not like my generation was the first one to invent premarital sex. Most teenagers are going to have sex, it's a fact, watch any slasher movie for evidence. I honestly have no conclusion for what to do on this front, some kids are going to be stupid and have unprotected sex and really, I can't think of a single way to stop it.

The problem is that the people who are having unprotected sex don't suffer the consequences. You are pregnant and don't want to be, poof, have an abortion. Most likely you won't even have to pay for it. You have sex and don't want the baby, poof, kill it or leave it on the police or hospital doorstep. Again, most likely you don't even have to pay for the privledge. If all else fails, have the baby and live on welfare for the rest of your life.

I don't really agree with this. Granted, there are probably plenty of women out there who think abortions are no big deal, and they need to be incarcerated or something. But, I have talked to a lot of people, men and women, who had gone through an abortion. They said it really messed them up a lot, some said they felt what they were doing was wrong, but knew trying to raise a baby in their situation would've been wrong, too. It's kind of an insult to say that every woman who has had an abortion just shrugs it off and runs out to have more sex. That said, Moi, I'm pretty sure that's not what you're saying, but I've heard some people say that in so many words, and I think it's really misleading and unfair.

 

[Moi]

Originally posted by Dan
Granted, there are probably plenty of women out there who think abortions are no big deal, and they need to be incarcerated or something. But, I have talked to a lot of people, men and women, who had gone through an abortion. They said it really messed them up a lot, some said they felt what they were doing was wrong, but knew trying to raise a baby in their situation would've been wrong, too. It's kind of an insult to say that every woman who has had an abortion just shrugs it off and runs out to have more sex. That said, Moi, I'm pretty sure that's not what you're saying, but I've heard some people say that in so many words, and I think it's really misleading and unfair.

The fact is, Dan, that the majority of women who have abortions do have an emotional reaction to the procedure; AFTER THE FACT. What I'm saying is that prior to engaging in the behavior, they give it little or no thought. If if they do, it's pretty much in the back of their mind that abortion is a solution. I absolutly agree that many will suffer some sort of guilt or emotional upset afterwards. And I'm not being cavalier when I say that apparently, that's not enough of a reason to stop them from putting themselves in that situation. We've made it easy, convenient and affordable to have them. Why wouldn't people take advantage of that solution.

Let's face it, if the outcome were different, that women had to keep the baby or the families were responsible for the costs of an abortion or adoption and welfare didn't exist, you'd see a marked decrease unwanted pregnancies.