Obama Told: Change Your Mind on Abortion b/c Unborn Children Feel Pain

[tammy57]

A contraceptive mentality combined with lack of moral training. No one has ever told them that extramarital sex is wrong, that it is hurtful to women and to children, who end up abandoned, aborted, deserted, or without fathers.

1. Many, many unplanned pregnancies occur when neither the woman nor the man is using a contraceptive.
2. I cannot believe that there have been fifty million women (not even counting the men involved) who have entered adolescence or adulthood with absolutely no moral guidance.
3. Not all women are deeply traumatized or “scarred for life” due to their abortion experiences.
4. Whose children are being abandoned or deserted? Those of the women having abortions? That doesn’t even make sense. Please explain how an abortion leads to abandonment of existing children. If anything, a woman’s refusal to have an abortion is more likely to lead a man to abandon an already-forming family.
5. Not all abortions are sought by women who are unmarried.

tammy57

 

[tammy57]

tammy57, what “choice” do you allow for the unborn child about to be killed, when nobody has asked what the baby wants?

I do not “allow” or “disallow” anything.

Have you ever asked a nine-week old fetus what it wants? How did you accomplish this remarkable feat? What did it tell you?

tammy57

 

[JimG]

1. Many, many unplanned pregnancies occur when neither the woman nor the man is using a contraceptive.
2. I cannot believe that there have been fifty million women (not even counting the men involved) who have entered adolescence or adulthood with absolutely no moral guidance.
3. Not all women are deeply traumatized or “scarred for life” due to their abortion experiences.
4. Whose children are being abandoned or deserted? Those of the women having abortions? That doesn’t even make sense. Please explain how an abortion leads to abandonment of existing children. If anything, a woman’s refusal to have an abortion is more likely to lead a man to abandon an already-forming family.
5. Not all abortions are sought by women who are unmarried.

tammy57

1. Exactly. But the contraceptive mentality led both women and men to engage in extramarital sex as a routine thing. Contraception was supposed to “solve” unplanned pregnancies. It didn’t. It just made extramarital sex acceptable and common and unplanned pregnancies more frequent.
2. I can. Moral guidance? Children in sex ed classes learn that sex is normal and to be expected, and so they think it is to be expected of them. They meet our expectations.
3. Many women are physically scarred by incompetent abortionists. Many are essentially denied a choice and forced into abortion by their boyfriends, parents, grandparents, teachers, counselors. As for emotional scars, I cannot speak from personal experience, but how can killing one’s own child not have an effect?
4. Divorce rate of 50% means a lot of children are being abandoned, that women are making poor choices, that many will sacrifice the well-being of their children just to get a man in their lives.
5. That’s true. Children have become so devalued in society that married as well as unmarried women may dispose of them at will.

 

[tammy57]

In my opinion, it’s disregard our culture places on womanhood and women’s role in the most fundamental unit of society, the family. Women are the fabric of society. They hold it together and our society will reflect the values of our women.

To at least my grandparents’ generation and their values.

I don’t know how old you are, so the reference to your grandparents is not helpful. If you took a trip back to the days of my grandparents, who lived from the 1880s into the 1950s and 1960s, you would be suggesting a return to Jim Crow, racial disenfranchisement, segregation, violence, lynching; denial of voting rights for African-Americans and for women; denial of the right for African-Americans or women to sit on a jury; lack of access to education and professional careers. Add to those the fact that women could not own wages, money or property.

My grandfather was a wealthy and powerful man in Montgomery, Alabama during this time, and his bride came from a cultured, proper family. They married in June, 1906. My father was born the following December, six months later.

tammy57

 

[tammy57]

1. Exactly. But the contraceptive mentality led both women and men to engage in extramarital sex as a routine thing. Contraception was supposed to “solve” unplanned pregnancies. It didn’t. It just made extramarital sex acceptable and common and unplanned pregnancies more frequent.
2. I can. Moral guidance? Children in sex ed classes learn that sex is normal and to be expected, and so they think it is to be expected of them. They meet our expectations.
3. Many women are physically scarred by incompetent abortionists. Many are essentially denied a choice and forced into abortion by their boyfriends, parents, grandparents, teachers, counselors. As for emotional scars, I cannot speak from personal experience, but how can killing one’s own child not have an effect?
4. Divorce rate of 50% means a lot of children are being abandoned, that women are making poor choices, that many will sacrifice the well-being of their children just to get a man in their lives.
5. That’s true. Children have become so devalued in society that married as well as unmarried women may dispose of them at will.

1. Contraception was never meant to “solve” unplanned pregnancies. It was meant to prevent them from occurring. Men and women today still do not know how to properly employ them. Operator error, and complacency that is a by-product of ignorance, are two of the main culprits.
2. I’m sorry, but sexuality and sexual activity IS normal. Even if parents opt out of sex education for their children, these kids will hear things, much of it misinformation, from other kids. Why are so many parents afraid to educate their children the way they want them to be educated? So many won’t hear of sex ed in school, but they never find the nerve to discuss sex and sexuality with their children. This is a grave error and a set-up for disaster.
3. This from guttmacher.org regarding Safety of Abortion: * “The risk of abortion complications is minimal: Fewer than 0.3% of abortion patients experience a complication that requires hospitalization.
   Abortions performed in the first trimester pose virtually no long-term risk of such problems as infertility, ectopic pregnancy, spontaneous abortion (miscarriage) or birth defect, and little or no risk of preterm or low-birth-weight deliveries.
   Exhaustive reviews by panels convened by the U.S. and British governments have concluded that there is no association between abortion and breast cancer. There is also no indication that abortion is a risk factor for other cancers.
   In repeated studies since the early 1980s, leading experts have concluded that abortion does not pose a hazard to women’s mental health.
   The risk of death associated with abortion increases with the length of pregnancy, from one death for every one million abortions at or before eight weeks to one per 29,000 at 16–20 weeks—and one per 11,000 at 21 or more weeks.”* This information was reported in May, 2010.

A reputable counselor would never, under any circumstances, “force” a client to abort a pregnancy. I agree that there are selfish individuals out there, in the form of “boyfriends”, husbands, parents, etc. who vigorously pressure women into having abortions. This, however, does not mean that these women must succumb to the pressure. You will hear this story from many young women who are ashamed that they chose abortion themselves and who want to lay the responsibility on another person to save face.

1. Women are NOT the only ones making poor choices. What a stereotype!
2. Children have ever been devalued; until they can work or produce they are expensive ornaments in the eyes of many adults.

tammy57

 

[beehumble]

Successful abortion is obviously never safe for a fetus or embryo. I’m sure you understand that the “safe” component of this little sound bite refers to an assurance of medical safety for the woman undergoing the procedure.

"Pain in the developing fetus is controversial because of the difficulty in measuring and interpreting pain during gestation. It has received increased attention lately because of recently introduced legislation that would require consideration of fetal pain during intentional termination of pregnancy. During development, sensory fibers are abundant by 20 weeks; a functional spinal reflex is present by 19 weeks; connections to the thalamus are present by 20 weeks; and connections to subplate neurons are present by 17 weeks with intensive differentiation by 25 weeks. These cells are important developmentally, but decline as a result of natural apoptosis. Mature thalamocortical projections are not present until 29 to 30 weeks, which has led many to believe the fetus does not experience emotional “pain” until then. Pain requires both nociception and emotional reaction or interpretation. Nociception causes physiologic stress, which in turn causes increases in catecholamines, cortisol, and other stress hormones. Physiological stress is different from the emotional pain felt by the more mature fetus or infant, and this stress is mitigated by pain medication such as opiates. The plasticity of the developing brain makes it vulnerable to the stressors that cause long-term developmental changes, ultimately leading to adverse neurological outcomes. Whereas evidence for conscious pain perception is indirect, evidence for the subconscious incorporation of pain into neurological development and plasticity is incontrovertible. Scientific data, not religious or political conviction, should guide the desperately needed research in this field. In the meantime, it seems prudent to avoid pain during gestation.
Semin Perinatol 31:275-282. © 2007 Published by Elsevier Inc."

Most abortions are performed on women at **12 weeks’ **gestation or under.

tammy57

tammy57, abortion is murder, the killing of innocents, plain and simple. You can try to convince yourself you are not killing a child, but you are killing a child. Over 4,000 children are pulled apart, limb by limb (literally), or subjected to chemical ‘warfare’ of some sort, EVERYDAY in the US alone.

And yes, they feel pain. To say one can kill a child because ‘it is my body’ is absurd. The body killed is not yours. To say one can kill the child in the womb because it cannot live on its own is absurd. Nor can a toddler - so we can kill them too? Nor can a mentally challenged person - so we can kill them too? To say it is not human ‘yet’ - is absurd. The only difference between you and a child in the womb is a relatively few years and a relatively few meals.

The position of killing children for whatever reason is completely untenable.

Jesus said our God is the God of the LIVING, meaning Jesus said our God is PRO-LIFE. Anyone who is not pro-life is not with God, is working against God, is not on the side of God. To be against God is to be on the side of Satan. Your support of death of children in the womb makes you a child of Satan. A tool of the devil. Hopefully you will see the error of your ways and change before you die and then stand before the God of the Living, and you are judged and end up FOREVER in the land of the dead, along with all other PRO-DEATH advocates.

A nation that murders its children has no future. - JPII

And the future for an unrepentant pro-death person is the second death, the lake of fire forever.

 

[tammy57]

tammy57, abortion is murder, the killing of innocents, plain and simple. You can try to convince yourself you are not killing a child, but you are killing a child. Over 4,000 children are pulled apart, limb by limb (literally), or subjected to chemical ‘warfare’ of some sort, EVERYDAY in the US alone.

And yes, they feel pain. To say one can kill a child because ‘it is my body’ is absurd. The body killed is not yours. To say one can kill the child in the womb because it cannot live on its own is absurd. Nor can a toddler - so we can kill them too? Nor can a mentally challenged person - so we can kill them too? To say it is not human ‘yet’ - is absurd. The only difference between you and a child in the womb is a relatively few years and a relatively few meals.

The position of killing children for whatever reason is completely untenable.

Jesus said our God is the God of the LIVING, meaning Jesus said our God is PRO-LIFE. Anyone who is not pro-life is not with God, is working against God, is not on the side of God. To be against God is to be on the side of Satan. Your support of death of children in the womb makes you a child of Satan. A tool of the devil. Hopefully you will see the error of your ways and change before you die and then stand before the God of the Living, and you are judged and end up FOREVER in the land of the dead, along with all other PRO-DEATH advocates.

A nation that murders its children has no future. - JPII

And the future for an unrepentant pro-death person is the second death, the lake of fire forever.

According to the best science we have on this planet, as of 2010, we have come to understand that a fetus is not developed enough to experience physical pain at 8 or 10 or 13 weeks. Let’s just put that down for a minute.

I support a woman’s right to choose. You would never attack me with your “unrepentant pro-death” junk if you understood that choice includes deciding to deliver the fetus and keep it or adopt it out to another family.

I do not support the death of “children in the womb”. I support standing back and respecting the decision-making ability of every pregnant woman. If she chooses to end her pregnancy it is none of my business, nor is it any of yours.

Note: you, too, will end up in the Land of the Dead. You have no choice.

tammy57

 

[TheTrueCentrist]

According to the best science we have on this planet, as of 2010, we have come to understand that a fetus is not developed enough to experience physical pain at 8 or 10 or 13 weeks. Let’s just put that down for a minute.

I’ve provided the source for this here:

Fetus Cannot Feel Pain Before 24 Weeks, Says Royal College Of Obstetricians And Gynaecologists, UK
medicalnewstoday.com/articles/193116.php

"A wide range of stakeholders were involved in producing these documents, including scientists, doctors, midwives and lay representatives. Pertinent international scientific studies published since the 1990s were examined by the respective working parties, as was evidence submitted to the Science and Technology Committee. This was followed by an online public consultation. The public was also invited to submit their views. Both reports were thoroughly peer-review by academics, ethicists and legal experts. "

 

[mark_a]

My grandfather was a wealthy and powerful man in Montgomery, Alabama during this time, and his bride came from a cultured, proper family. They married in June, 1906.
tammy57

How nice for them.

My father was born the following December, six months later.

As opposed to. . . . .

How nice for him. . . . and you!!

 

[tammy57]

From TheTrueCentrist, with regard to fetal “pain”:

"I’ve provided the source for this here:
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheTrueCentrist
Fetus Cannot Feel Pain Before 24 Weeks, Says Royal College Of Obstetricians And Gynaecologists, UK
medicalnewstoday.com/articles/193116.php
*
"A wide range of stakeholders were involved in producing these documents, including scientists, doctors, midwives and lay representatives. Pertinent international scientific studies published since the 1990s were examined by the respective working parties, as was evidence submitted to the Science and Technology Committee. This was followed by an online public consultation. The public was also invited to submit their views. Both reports were thoroughly peer-review by academics, ethicists and legal experts. "*

Please also see Post #7 on this topic.

tammy57

 

[tammy57]

How nice for them.

As opposed to. . . . .

How nice for him. . . . and you!!

What’s your point? I will address it if you can conjure one up.

tammy57

 

[RWMorris]

According to the best science we have on this planet, as of 2010, we have come to understand that a fetus is not developed enough to experience physical pain at 8 or 10 or 13 weeks. Let’s just put that down for a minute.

I support a woman’s right to choose. You would never attack me with your “unrepentant pro-death” junk if you understood that choice includes deciding to deliver the fetus and keep it or adopt it out to another family.

I do not support the death of “children in the womb”. I support standing back and respecting the decision-making ability of every pregnant woman. If she chooses to end her pregnancy it is none of my business, nor is it any of yours.

Note: you, too, will end up in the Land of the Dead. You have no choice.

tammy57

What does feeling pain have to do with whether abortion is moral or not? It shouldn’t enter the discussion because it determines nothing.

I refuse to respect any woman’s right to choose to end her child’s life because that right does not exist under natural law (it is not in the US Constitution either, regardless of what 5, or 5 million judges think). What part of the right to life do you not understand?

 

[tammy57]

What does feeling pain have to do with whether abortion is moral or not? It shouldn’t enter the discussion because it determines nothing.

Take it up with juliee, the person who originated the post. I’m responding, not creating the question.

I refuse to respect any woman’s right to choose to end her child’s life because that right does not exist under natural law (it is not in the US Constitution either, regardless of what 5, or 5 million judges think).

Then it’s a good thing that no woman’s right to choose depends upon your respect.

What part of the right to life do you not understand?

I understand that my Creator gave me life, along with free will, which I intend to experience and exercise without hindrance or interference from you.

tammy57

 

[JimG]

I’m sorry, but sexuality and sexual activity IS normal. Even if parents opt out of sex education for their children, these kids will hear things, much of it misinformation, from other kids. Why are so many parents afraid to educate their children the way they want them to be educated? So many won’t hear of sex ed in school, but they never find the nerve to discuss sex and sexuality with their children. This is a grave error and a set-up for disaster.

Having grown up in the dark ages, we had no sex education whatsoever, from kindergarten through high school. And parents tended to be rather closed mouthed about the whole thing. Condoms, when available, had to be requested from the pharmacist who kept them behind the counter. We were woefully ignorant. Still, in my own high school, we had an out of wedlock pregnancy rate of zero percent, which was about the same for most nearby schools.

Now, the national average for out of wedlock pregnancy is 42%. That’s the average; in some areas it’s a lot higher. Let’s see, 42% vs zero percent. I can see that we were woefully undereducated when it comes to sex.

 

[tammy57]

Having grown up in the dark ages, we had no sex education whatsoever, from kindergarten through high school. And parents tended to be rather closed mouthed about the whole thing. Condoms, when available, had to be requested from the pharmacist who kept them behind the counter. We were woefully ignorant. Still, in my own high school, we had an out of wedlock pregnancy rate of zero percent, which was about the same for most nearby schools.

Now, the national average for out of wedlock pregnancy is 42%. That’s the average; in some areas it’s a lot higher. Let’s see, 42% vs zero percent. I can see that we were woefully undereducated when it comes to sex.

What are you suggesting? That if schools, parents, counselors, churches (!) all keep their mouths closed on the subject of sex, then perhaps within three generations we can be restored to the fear-based, shame-based, secretive ways of the 40s and 50s? Or shall we go back further, maybe to the turn of the 20th Century?

You can’t un-ring the bell, the cat is out of the bag and has been for forty years. It is what we do with the information, and how we guide children in growing into healthy sexual beings, that should be the focus now. There’s certainly a place for discipline, but I don’t see a place for shame and fear.

I had one out-of-wedlock pregnancy in my high school. She was my best friend. I know how devastating the situation can be. But for better or worse (and I know how you feel about it), times have changed. We either change with them (not necessarily changing our principles, but our methods and our willingness to be frank and honest) or it will just get worse instead of better.

tammy57

 

[RWMorris]

… We either change with them (not necessarily changing our principles, but our methods and our willingness to be frank and honest) or it will just get worse instead of better.

“frank and honest” … ummm … unless our willingness toward frankness and honesty causes you “hindrance or interference.” But fortunately a “woman’s right to choose depends” just as much upon my respect as it does upon “your respect” and I am determined to exercise my right to fight for children’s right to life and against any woman’s right to kill her children.

 

[JimG]

What are you suggesting? That if schools, parents, counselors, churches (!) all keep their mouths closed on the subject of sex, then perhaps within three generations we can be restored to the fear-based, shame-based, secretive ways of the 40s and 50s? Or shall we go back further, maybe to the turn of the 20th Century?

You can’t un-ring the bell, the cat is out of the bag and has been for forty years. It is what we do with the information, and how we guide children in growing into healthy sexual beings, that should be the focus now. There’s certainly a place for discipline, but I don’t see a place for shame and fear.

I had one out-of-wedlock pregnancy in my high school. She was my best friend. I know how devastating the situation can be. But for better or worse (and I know how you feel about it), times have changed. We either change with them (not necessarily changing our principles, but our methods and our willingness to be frank and honest) or it will just get worse instead of better.

tammy57

I’m suggesting that “sex education” as a formal curricula is a fairly recent phenomena, and the results seem in many ways to have been counterproductive.

One reason for that is that we give information with no judgment, because judgment is bad, isn’t it? My own generation may have known less about the mechanics of sex, although I doubt it, but we did know about the morality of actions. We knew that conceiving a child out of wedlock was not a moral action, and was bad for the child, the mom, and the families involved. We knew that growing into “healthy sexual beings” involved marriage first, sex second. We didn’t view 15 year old’s having sex or babies as normal or as the desired result of education, any more than we viewed the use of sterile needles by 15 year olds as a desirable result of drug education.

Many kids engage in sex today simply because no one has told them it’s wrong, unsafe, and unfair. But they’ve been told how to do it, and how to use condoms, so they figure it must be OK.

 

[tammy57]

“frank and honest” … ummm … unless our willingness toward frankness and honesty causes you “hindrance or interference.” But fortunately a “woman’s right to choose depends” just as much upon my respect as it does upon “your respect” and I am determined to exercise my right to fight for children’s right to life and against any woman’s right to kill her children.

By “frank and honest”, I mean giving children the facts about their sexuality and how their bodies work without feeling or imparting shame or anxiety. Now, what you do with those facts is your business: if you choose to cloak them in the prohibitions of Catholicism, fine - they’re your kids. But they are entitled to understand the physical workings of their reproductive systems. Again, once your beliefs get all over my kids, I consider that hindrance and/or interference.

Any woman who is pregnant and does not want to be does not need our respect or permission to have the baby, raise it, give it away, or terminate the pregnancy. I stand back and respect her privacy and her right to exercise free will, a gift from God to her, not from God to her and YOU, or from God to her and ME.

What are you doing to fight for the right to life?

tammy57

 

[thirdworld]

It doesn’t matter whether the fetus feels pain or not. I saw on Oprah awhile ago that a girl was born with a condition where she cannot feel pain. She almost caused herself to go blind because of it. Is it ok to kill her because she can’t feel pain? Of course not.

Abortion is wrong because it is the murder of a human being, plain and simple. There is never an excuse for it.
Not in the case of rape or incest. Not if the mom doesn’t feel fit to be a parent. Not because the mother’s life is in danger. Not because the child has Down’s Syndrome. No excuses!

Murder is murder. Whether the fetus feels pain or not does not change that.

 

[sojo]

OK, here’s my story. I had several miscarriages, and the docs finally discovered I had a auto-immune disorder. They were pleased to announce they had an experimental treatment that would give me some chance to maintain a pregnancy. Unfortunately, they also announce my biochemistry was such that I was virtually infertile, and the treatments required to overcome that were not within our reach.

Then 30 days later, I was pregnant. So we started the (then) experimental treatment and the pregnancy remained. Our miracle baby!!! Then we found out our child would have Down syndrome. The medical community just assumed we would abort, so they didn’t even bother to tell us his sex and we had to wait 2 weeks to drag that information out of them.

My pro-life brother and his wife, both fervent evangelicals never called or wrote or offered any support. It was just too awful for my East Coast, highly intellectual family culture to even think of having a relative with mental retardation. I guess since their “official” view was pro-life, but their personal reaction was horror, they just stayed silent.

My mother and all other relatives of Pro-choice not only pressured for abortion, but made it out to be the “only” logical and rational choice. We were too old and certainly couldn’t afford to bring a disabled child into the world. My cousin, a special education teacher was positively horrified and had her mother call my sister to implore us to abort.

The ONLY support I received was from this same sister, a Nurse Practitioner, and radically pro-choice atheist. She said she lived her life telling women they had a CHOICE, and if my choice was to keep my child with DS, then she was damn-well behind that choice. She told my aunt and cousin such in pretty strong words. When everyone was against me, including so-called Christians, it was my pro-choice, atheist sister who supported me, my choice and my child. She also flew out to help us when the baby was born and adored him just like a regular child - floppy body, delays and all.

She is now the only relative to really give a darn about us and my son. My own mother’s response to any indication that life with my son is not anything but glorious is, “well I TOLD you to have an abortion, it was your choice.”

I heard through 3rd sources that my brother and his wife were pleasantly surprised and happy to hear that we kept my son and didn’t abort. But very little contact, no support (and boy, could we have used some help with medical needs and therapy – did I mention he’s extremely wealthy to the tune of millions?). Our “choice” – as happy as they were with it – was also to leave us to our own devices.

So considering our only support for our “choice” was a pro-choice atheist, I just don’t have it in me to attack the pro-choice movement. It isn’t as simple as pro-choice is bad, and pro-life is good. I learned that the hard way.