From: suzych@swcp.com   
      
   In article <3FA131E9.4A87@YAHOO.COM>, CHESSRL2002@YAHOO.COM wrote:   
      
   > Lets make this topic more simple.   
   >   
   > - Is a fetus a life form capable of becoming human? Yes or No?   
      
   Yes.   
      
   > Who cares   
   > if it is only a few months away? The process is Alive and started.   
      
   Many processes get started in Nature that do not reach fruition for   
   various reasons.  So what?  Nor is "alive" something sacred in itself,   
   as the vast amount of natural death that afflicts the planet at all   
   levels of biology clearly demonstrates; death is in fact the "process"   
   that *begins* with conception and ends whenever it is that the body dies.   
      
   > -Every woman has a right over everything what happens in her body? Yes   
   > or no? Swallow a diamond or drugs and it is her body property? Tell that   
   > to the law.   
      
   There were once laws that required Blacks and Whites in the American   
   South to drink from different fountains, among many other loathesome   
   "legal" expressions of prejudice and stupidity.  The law is no better   
   than the thinking that goes into it.  Dumb laws create dumb, painful,   
   and destructive situations.  Honor the law where it makes sense, but   
   where the law is stupid people go round it when you must.  Intelligent   
   people are smarter than a dumb law and can rightly refuse to be hobbled   
   by it.   
      
   > -Is a fetus an extension of the mother or another life inhabiting her   
   > body? Are the genes the same? Is the life blueprint the same? Or are   
   > they of different people?   
      
   The mom is a person, grown and conscious and full of the vast investment   
   of love and resources that family and society have already committed to   
   her over the years it has taken her to reach physical maturity (at   
   least, one hopes they've been vast).  The fetus is a potential person   
   incorporating some of her genes and some of the father's.  If the fetus   
   is born alive, it is a person.  Otherwise, it's just a potentiality,   
   billions of which are casually tossed away every moment in and by Nature   
   in every species of every living thing.   
      
   > -A fetus can smile months before its born. What does that tell you?   
      
   Nothing.  A fetus twitches and grimaces in utero, as do the fetuses of   
   other large mammals.  A dead body also can twitch, grimace, and even   
   emit sounds, but it's still not a live person.  You can only make   
   this an argument by denying the complexity of physicality, or by   
   believing the films deliberately faked up by anti-abortion fanatics to   
   convince you that a fetus has full human consciousness rather than a   
   functiongn autonomic nervous system.   
      
   > -If you can take away a life which the mother thinks it will be a burden   
   > to her by labeling it non-human then why condemn Hitler who took away   
   > the lives of Jews inside Germany who he labeled as non-human and thought   
   > they would be a burden for other Germans? After all, it is the same   
   > style of thinking isn't it?   
      
   No.  "Not yet human" is not the same thing as "untermensch" or sub-   
   human, the latter being something that is by its nature not human and   
   never could be, which was precisely the argument of Nazism -- that   
   even though German Jews looked and acted just like ordinary German   
   citizens, they were actually untermenschen and thus required extermin-   
   ation lest they go on to pollute the physical gene pool and high culture   
   of the human Germans.  "Not yet human" implies a potentiality the   
   fulfillment of which is anticipated in the future.   
      
   > A pro-choice Jewish doctor might say the Jews were fully aware of dying   
   > and that was the horror. I bet when you stuff the life out of anything   
   > physically alive, there is a buried struggle to stay alive   
      
   There is doubtless a physical, cellular struggle to avoid extinction,   
   but it exists as much in the tree you cut down and the chicken to you   
   kill to eat as in the fetus of a human being.  Nature exists by consuming   
   itself bit by bit.  We are part of Nature, much as you wish to deny this.   
   That is, our bodies are.  Our souls, our spirits, come here to experience   
   physicality and learn from it.  For obvious reasons -- having to do with   
   the viccissitudes of being a mom carrying a fetus -- the connection   
   isn't clinched until the first breath is taken, at which time the soul   
   is inhaled with the air of earth, and the life of the new person begins.   
      
   > a slient horror.   
      
   The earth is jammed with silent horrors, Nature is full of them.  That's   
   one of the lessons of physicality, and a very hard one to learn.   
      
      
   > But one, not voiced. Pro-choice advocates should sign a paper, I   
   > will not blame Hitler for his killing, because I believe the same,   
   > signed below - _____________ name of unfeeling asshole.   
      
   This is pure, if passionate, nonsense; see above.   
      
   > Steve S. wrote:   
   > >   
   > > It's been my impression (as a   
   > > man) that some significant percentage of women struggle with their   
   > > decision to have had an abortion for many years afterwards.   
      
   Instead of relying on your impression, you might check reported facts,   
   and not from anti-abortion sources.  A much more significant percentage   
   do just fine, although the ones that get all the attention are,   
   naturally, the people who do suffer from regrets and other sorrows as a   
   result and go for help or talk about it.  Women who have no such effects   
   tend not to turn up in the literature because they don't complain of   
   effects that they don't feel; so they get discounted as non-existent,   
   whereas in fact they are the vast majority.   
      
   > > Partly the whole issue is   
   > > confused because of lack of knowledge about reincarnation, i.e., when   
   > > it is   
   > > that the person in their subtle body enters the developing fetus.   
      
   I agree.  As nothing has been proven, I'll go for the old Jewish   
   assertion that it begins with the first breath, because that affords   
   both woman and child the most freedom and dignity, IMO.  In the absence   
   of proof, why choose a definition that cancels the autonomy of the fully   
   developed, functioning member of society -- the mother -- in favor of   
   the potentiality of the fetus?  I think choosing against the mother   
   demonstrates a low-level but persistent cultural bias against women and   
   their sexuality and their power to create life, and a way of trying to   
   punish them and keep them "in their place".   
      
   > > However, there is still   
   > > the link of the mother to the incoming person and the destiny and   
   > > relationship cut short (at least temporarily), and that's an issue to   
   > > be taken seriously, as well. It would be something like arranging for   
   > > an old friend to visit you from a far country, and they get half-way   
   > > there and you cut off their funding. There could be good reasons for   
   > > that but it wouldn't be something to do lightly.   
      
   It's not a choice that most women make "lightly", no matter what bullshit   
   propaganda anti-abortion loonies put out there.  There are published   
   interviews with actual women about their abortions which clearly   
   demonstrate the broad spectrum of reasons women have to terminate a   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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