I will try here to give my opinions with all of the honesty I can muster. In the first place, being male, I consider abortion a matter to be resolved between a woman and her doctor. Nevertheless, I have personal opinions about abortion. First, I could wish that no woman had to abort. Reasons for doing so, such as incest, rape or the possible death of the mother in childbirth are, for me persuasive. Second, the only well-known religious person, Mother Teresa of Calcutta, to address the problem sensibly, claimed she would take the unwanted babies and raise them. This is in direct contradiction to ideas espoused by U.S. religious fundies who offer no such resolution to the problem. Fundies appear to be fetus-only pro-lifers. Most are all for capital punishment and war. (See Sister Joan Crittenden’s {sic} opinions on this.) Third, races and ethnicities, considered inferior by virtue of their wealth or abilty to survive without help (third world people, etc.) see family planning by condom or abortion as eugenic, facistic attempts to eradicate their tribes, cultures, societies.
What is the sane, humane solution to this problem?
well said. (even if you just explained the problem 
)
Fetus-only pro-lifers are probably the worst advocates of anti-abortion because they don’t provide a solution, only their point of view (religious more often than not).
I am a firm believere that if the woman in question is completely capable of giving birth then adoption should be the best option. I’m not all for forcing young kids to have children (dangerous) or rape victims, but i think that if a young adult or middle aged woman is activley having unprotected sex, establishing an orginisation which relieves the responsibility of the risk of getting pregnant can only lead to a negative slope…
Not only is it in some ways, killing a child, but it is usually done so out of greed (both the father and the mother).
My solution is this: If you get pregnant, and it’s your own fault (comdon breaking included) and are in perfect health, and don’t want to keep the baby, give it up for adoption…
The only problem to this is that adoption is hardly an attractive option…
So my second solution is make an oprganisation that finds children of all ages good homes…
What a wonderful idea…
Let’s add to the growing number of kids being supported by care homes.
Let’s forget that the amount of kids waiting to be adopted is greater than the amount of families willing to adopt.
Let’s add huge costs to government spending to look after these unwanted kids.
If only it were as simple…
abortion will only lead to an increase of abortions… people will lose respect for sex, and when abortions become unavailable the population will explode.
Do people have respect for sex just now?
Hell, should people have respect for sex? The Church put the fear into sex, and can’t keep it there.
Abortions will always be available, just maybe not legally. Why force people to attempt a botched job themselves in a backstreet?
I don’t have statistics so I may be wrong, but I would image few women who experience an abortion, go through it again.
What we need is education.
thats the beginning of the entire problem, as i ahve said in previous threads…
science put fear into it for me… should people fear sex? i don’t know, do they fear children? what if abortions didnt exist?
that’s an obvious downside… my answer is really that if we educate people enough we can minimize this occurance…
But i could contrast your example by saying, why let rapists rape in dirty back alley streets? lets provide a safe haven for them to rape
We have an accord
Sex exists primarily to reproduce. But it is also a very pleasurable act. If it wasn’t people wouldn’t do it. At least not unless they wanted children.
Now clearly contraception, condoms, the pill, etc., can be used, and have been used since possibly the beginning of recorded history, to stop conception.
Sex shouldn’t be about fear, it should be about passion, love, or very least enjoyment.
I don’t know if people fear children, but in my opinion it’s more responsible to realise that you can’t support a child and take action on that before it is born.
I think a lot of pro-lifers like to think that women, and couples, take the decision to terminate a pregnancy lightly. The majority don’t. However to force them, and even worse the child, to live with the consequences is not fair.
That’s not really the same and I think you know it’s not.
Indeed we do. Education is always the key on issues such as these. Sadly people forget that, and want to make up others minds for them. Prime example is scaring high school kids into abstinence. If only more people focused on what they both thought was right, and took it from there.
I take issue with the claim in the OP that “abortion [is] a matter to be resolved between a woman and her doctor.” As long as there is sperm involved in the creation of a fetus, men should be involved in the choices regarding its destruction.
How do you figure?
The sperm was a gift… it was once yours but now it’s hers… you can’t just come back and reclaim your rights to it after she manages to turn it into something more… Unless of course you made an agreement with her in advance…
Take it to Judge Judy…
Or maybe Judge Joe Brown…
I completely agree, sadly men have little say in the matter. I would be raging if my baby was aborted without my permission, but in the eyes of the law there’s nothing I can do.
Maybe a woman should only be able to have an abortion if both she and the father consent. In cases where no father is present, or the woman does not know who the father is, then the woman has the say. If however the father does not consent to the abortion, then he and he alone is responsible for the child when it is born, the mother paying child support as fathers do currently.
I’m pretty sure she claimed abortion was one of the greatest evils in the world or largely responsible for them. She was a crazy old bitch.
I’m not sure how much water that argument holds these days. Certainly, a particular man’s sperm isn’t necessary anymore. Beyond that, technology to create human beings is on its way to not requiring the egg-and-sperm paradigm altogether. So, in fact, the concept of abortion (at least as it exists now) is slowly evolving into mootness. And the ‘choice’ could belong to whomever wants the child, regardless of gender, and regardless of whether it’s one person or multiple persons.
So we’re stuck in this back alley 20th-century argument, but the ethical discussion needs to advance way beyond that.
Wow… I can’t believe you people are saying this sort of thing…
So the woman has to carry around a baby, puking and braking her back for 9 months, go through all sorts of pains in delivering a baby for no other reason than “the man said so!” ???
How on earth is that fair?!?!?
Simply because she slept with you means that she somehow “owes” you the favor of having your child?
explain the fairness of that from the woman’s point of view…
I’m well aware of the things a woman’s body goes through during pregnancy, I don’t envy it at all. Women have my complete sympathy on this matter.
Indeed that is probably why the law is on their side.
But without my sperm, that child wouldn’t be there. When it is born I’m legally oblige to provide for it, at the very least financially, but before it is born I have no rights what so ever? How is that fair?
But weigh it up. 9 months of uncomfort and pain, compared with a lifetime of knowing you could have had a child, that you wanted that child, you would have provided and cared for that child, but it was aborted because it’s mother didn’t.
As far as I know, most fathers, where involved, are usually behind their partner’s decision. But where they are not they haven’t a leg to stand on.
Oh I certainly agree… That’s not fair at all… If the father expresses a wish NOT to have the child in time for an abortion, but the mother decides to have it anyway… it’s not fair at all for the guy to be responsible for it…
But two wrong’s don’t make a right you know…
Oh please! Are you seriously appealing to the anguish of an unrealized expectation/hope/dream in order to counterweigh real pain??
If so it’s not fair for a company to reject my job apllication because it was my dream job… are you serious?
If no woman wants to have your child… well… that’s tough… the universe does not owe you the realization of any of your expectations… and neither does anyone else, UNLESS there be an agreement about it…
And that’s how it should be… her body… her choice…
I’m opposed to forcing a woman to do anything, but that wasn’t my suggestion. Rather I find the view that the man’s opinions count for nothing to be simplistic. Ingenium, men are still physically involved in the vast majority of pregnancies. Where they aren’t, they can clearly be disregarded. But in most cases, they are, so their thoughts are relevant.
The solution is complicated, and the best I’ve come up with is unsatisfying: Absolve men of their financial obligations if they make it clear that they do not want the child. I think the woman will always bear the brunt of the decision, because pregnancy and abortion take a huge physical and emotional toll on them. They simply cannot be compared to male desire for the child; hormonal effects alone make any appeal to emotion impotent. And yet, as HGIR said, it’s unfair for a man to be forced to pay for a child he knew he was not ready for, and one he did not want.
Possible other additions might include the right for a man to claim a fertilized embryo for implantation in a surrogate, or the ability for the man to bring a civil suit against the woman if she aborts, translating the nine months labor she avoids into dollar compensation for the man who would have taken the child. Both are questionable, but I think they are worth exploring.
Cy, I can’t believe you said this! The problem is so much more complex than are anyone’s religious prejudices. Show me any religious leader who has offered support for “unwanted” children! Mother Teresa can call it as she sees it so long as she offers a viable solution to the problem.
About the male considerations–a man would have to be responsible enough to see that what his sperm helped to make deserves all of life’s possibilites, to help insure the baby’s most favorable development, to really give a damn about the woman he impregnated. In many instances (incest, criminal rape, etc.) this is not the case. There are no male rights in these instances.
Good discussion here. The problem is complex. The solution, therefore, cannot be simple!
But in the case where a man doesn’t want a child, and the woman decides to carry it to term, the man shouldn’t be bound to it. A man should have the equal right, in a sense, to abort his responsibility and influence over the child’s life.
do you base that on the fact that women get to make the choice for abortion? i would argue that in having sex they both agree to rear the child, or atleast carry it to term