Would you support it if the Civil Law Give Right for Husband to Consent to/ Forbid Wife's Abortion

[VanitasVanitatum]

I struggle with understanding how pro-life people don’t seem to get that there really are people in this life who feel that way about their own life.

This would at only work on a portion of the cases. I assume there would be some semblance to want to live and the best option should be to give them help. But, I don’t think this objection in itself is sufficient because it’s the special state of unawareness the embryo is in that actually matters.

 

[francisca.chapter3]

females are usually the primary parent when children are born in wedlock or out of it.

It’s clear that a fetus would need the mother more than the father, so by default it would have to follow the above principle at pregnancy and at early stage of life, I suppose.

As how to regulate the male parent, I always think that God the Father is a god who is faithful to Israel/ the church, as in opposition to the father of lies (John8:44) who— just as the nature of a lie-- is not faithful to his promise to the woman. So then a man who is married to the woman should be given a right to say whether he want the child. Whereas a man who is not married to her has no say even if there is possibility the child might be his DNA.

Our christan value does not see fatherhood by DNA. Rather, by the ability of a man to be faithful despite his wife may have betrayed him, he has the full right to decide whether he wants the child. And if he does, the full fatherhood right should be given to the husband, whereas the other man should go empty-handed.

When the child grow up, he may become curious to find out his DNA-father. But as long as it is still underage, it should be put under the right of the husband as his father regardless whose DNA.

This is my take of the biblical fatherhood: We all are God’s children by adoption. Only Jesus is the only begotten son of God. Whose DNA does not make a man gets fatherhood right if he refuse to marry the woman, he is no father.

If a man is married to a woman, naturally, he should spend time with his children.

I could imagine how would a child feel if both parents quarrels about minimum time spent on him. He may grow to become a person who always feel uneasy about himself/herself (probably low self esteem, depression) because of the behavior of the parents.

And I suppose these type of behavior happens because fatherhood is given to men who dont care. They only sprinkle their DNA everywhere by sweet talking women but has no desire to become a father to his children.

 

[MamaJewel]

It’s clear that a fetus would need the mother more than the father, so by default it would have to follow the above principle at pregnancy and at early stage of life, I suppose.

As how to regulate the male parent,

I don’t know if you are in the US, but in America, an adult and in some instances, a minor, has the right to privacy and to free association. We can’t make people parent their children. The court system can tell a father that he has to pay child support or go to jail, but the court can’t make the father have any kind of relationship with his child or face jail time.

Given this situation, what do you think happens with these children born to such fathers?
Where does this leave the mother of a child whose father who wants minimal time with his offspring?

 

[francisca.chapter3]

Given this situation, what do you think happens with these children born to such fathers?
Where does this leave the mother of a child whose father who wants minimal time with his offspring?

I suppose they may grow up not to their full potential. The mother have to raise the child alone. Some women can do this no problem, some they can’t.

 

[francisca.chapter3]

doesn’t mean it’s (the growing human) of any less value than the woman who carries it.

We cannot compare a sprouting seed to a 200year old tree that bear fruit where the seed came from (I use the tree lifespan instead of humans to get you imagine how incomparable the comparison of zygote to the mother who give it life)

Just because something is human, it takes more than mere DNA to call it a person. A dead person has human DNA too. But he being dead, no longer a person. A fetus has human DNA. It has potential to become a person, but not yet.

Having said this, I agree that we should assume a potential person as precious, and we should find a good way to get the good potential realized unto reality in a just way. To ignore justice for women is to push both mother and fetus to generations of marginalized life, and of sexual inequality, where humanity cannot find its own life meaning.

 

[MamaJewel]

The mother have to raise the child alone. Some women can do this no problem, some they can’t.

What if the child’s mother wants to spend the same minimal amount of time with her child that the father desires to spend with his child?

how incomparable the comparison of zygote to the mother who give it life)

Until just recently I held a firm pro-choice position.
Then a group of staunch pro-lifers here on this board argued a number of points for the zygote/embryo/fetus as human beings.
That led me to research the subject further.
In the foundation of human development and the progression of homo sapiens towards the generation of a new species, I would argue that both coding and non-coding DNA indicate that a human zygote is as important than the adult female who gestates it.

Researching on the subject, I found that the transition from human zygote to embryo to fetus indicates a higher level of DNA activity in the developing human.

Trigger Warning!
http://www.bigbluewave.ca/2017/06/video-davenport-hookers-fetal.html

https://geneticliteracyproject.org/...ering-dna-different-expression-similar-genes/

https://www.eva.mpg.de/fileadmin/content_files/staff/paabo/pdf/Florio_Human_Science_2015.pdf

https://mentalhealthdaily.com/2015/02/18/at-what-age-is-the-brain-fully-developed/

But he being dead, no longer a person. A fetus has human DNA. It has potential to become a person, but not yet.

A dead human being is often called a dead “person”. A human fetus is a human being at the fetal stage of development, which doesn’t make it any less human than a neonate, infant, toddler, teenager, middle-age adult, senior, or dead person.

We fool ourselves as human beings to believe otherwise.

As human beings, how can we have justice for any group, if one group of human beings is deemed more valuable than other groups based on their age, development, or abilities?

If a woman can terminate her pregnancy, why can’t she terminate her chronically ill teen who says he would rather die than live with his newly diagnosed condition?

What’s the difference, if both conditions (pregnancy or the teen’s chronic illness) are going to lead to many sleepless nights and a severe decrease in the quality of life for the woman?

 

[Elf01]

Until just recently I held a firm pro-choice position.
Then a group of staunch pro-lifers here on this board argued a number of points for the zygote/embryo/fetus as human beings.
That led me to research the subject further.
In the foundation of human development and the progression of homo sapiens towards the generation of a new species, I would argue that both coding and non-coding DNA indicate that a human zygote is as important than the adult female who gestates it.

It’s great to know that these discussions are not fruitless.

Can you share some of the arguments that lead you to research please? I want to know what the most convincing arguments are.

 

[MamaJewel]

Can you share some of the arguments that lead you to research please?

The arguments are in previous threads.
That said, I’m truly amazed at the amount of RNA and DNA activity that occurs in human prenatal development. As an organism, the early human being is accessing and running the codes that literally make us human beings.

Scientists originally believed that “junk DNA” lacked importance. But now they are learning that non-coding DNA serves a serious purpose in gene activation and RNA transcription in the developing human. The non-coding DNA helps to regulate where genes turn on and off and it also forms telomeres at the end of chromosomes.

https://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/primer/basics/noncodingdna

Btw, I define a human being by DNA, while others define a human as a person capable of cognitive thought.

 

[Elf01]

The arguments are in previous threads.

I know, what I was wondering is which ones worked basically. The rest of your response seems to answer that.

 

[francisca.chapter3]

As human beings, how can we have justice for any group, if one group of human beings is deemed more valuable than other groups based on their age, development, or abilities?

I will add group gender to the above question:

As human beings, how can we have justice for any group, if one group of human beings is deemed more valuable than other groups based on gender?

It is rather difficult to believe in justice for the fetus through depriving justice for one of the parents, or both.

I especially do not believe in the great love for the fetus by depriving women of their privacy.

The right of woman privacy is a well defined justce. It can go both ways from here (depends on how the church teach us!). For now, we see it as if woman privacy is merely pro-abortion. Not true. Illegalizing abortion may go to the wrong direction too, especially in the porn culture where men are encouraged to exploit any sexual opportunity.

Just similar to what St. John mention in his epistle

1John 4:
20 Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen.
21 And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.

I find it hard to believe in religious people who has great concern for the fetus by pushing indiscriminate agenda towards women who are more visible than those fetus.

 

[francisca.chapter3]

A dead human being is often called a dead “person”.

I agree to this.

The reason why we have burial ceremony for our relatives, because their body was part of their personhood.

A fetus body will be a part of its personhood too, whenever it is viable.

 

[MamaJewel]

It is rather difficult to believe in justice for the fetus through depriving justice for one of the parents, or both.

I find it hard to believe in religious people who has great concern for the fetus by pushing indiscriminate agenda towards women who are more visible than those fetus.

Can you explain what you mean by these sentences?
I’m not sure how “justice” for a fetus deprives justice for one, or both parents.

Every human has the right to autonomy. It’s a human right based on being human. A developing human embryo and fetus are definitely human. Ages and stages. Just because a human embryo and human fetus appear different than humans at other ages and stages does not mean that they aren’t human. A human fetus has as much right to be let alone as the human carrying it.

However, because fetal life is dependent on the mother, her right to life is primary over the fetus if the mother’s life is directly threatened by its presence. One human has the right to end another human’s life in self-defense, but the human whose life is threatened is expected to match force for force.

A human whose life is threatened by another’s presence can’t go and hack the perpetrator apart on a whim.

As far as pushing an agenda, women are the default parent. That is society’s expectation. The father can choose whether to be in the child’s life. If he only wants to see the child 25% of the time in a given month, that’s ok.

A mother does not have that same right. If she were to choose 25% of the time as well, that would leave the state caring for the child the other 50 % of the time. That is not how society currently operates. The woman is expected to be there.

Seems to me that society needs to do its share to prevent abortion by changing discriminatory laws against women who are mothers.

 

[MamaJewel]

A fetus body will be a part of its personhood too, whenever it is viable.

Viability has nothing to do with fetal humanity.
I miscarried twins who were early Carnegie stage embryos. They looked like little grains of rice with somites. Let me say this much. I wish I had been able to donate those itty bitty bodies to research because they were the embryonic age that the primitive endocrine system was developing.

Maybe their bodies could have given insight to a current family health dynamic and even prevented the onset of a certain chronic illness in some of their living siblings.

Scientifically, a healthy pregnancy is usually indicative of the presence of a developing human.

 

[francisca.chapter3]

The point I am trying to make is to give husband to choose what to do with the fetus just like St. Joseph, Jesus father chose to marry Mary. Just like prophet Hosea, whose wife commited adultery resulting in pregnancy. But by God’s mercy, the ‘unloved’ will be changed to become ‘loved’. (Hosea 1 & 2)

If husband choose to abort fetus from his wife’s adultery, he may have failed to choose mercy. But in doing so, he does not break any law.

A man who is not married to the woman, he has no right of say, because he is not united into one body with her, and remain separate from her, he is a stranger who has no right of say about her body/ her fetus in the eyes of the law.

If husband decide to allow wife to abort his own child, then it is too bad for him to do that. Perhaps the church has not teach him what it means to be a responsible father. Or, even after knowing Jesus, he still choose to do so to his own ofspring: nobody can help a fetus whose both parents desire to abort it.

At least the decision is not made indiscriminately by strangers (example by government/ court). Husband & wife decide what to do with their own house.

The church role is to teach fatherhood to each man, and motherhood to each woman. And to teach that God desires mercy not sacrifice (Hosea 6:6).

 

[MamaJewel]

One scenario is whenever the fetus is a result of adultery. Its existance offends the marriage and people within that/ those marriage.

Another scenario is if it is a result of rape.

Have you ever DNA tested your parents, Francisca?
I did mine. And one of my parents was not my bio-parent.
Adultery is the injustice, not the fetus. Fetus is a victim.
Rape is the injustice, not the fetus. Fetus is definitely a victim.

We don’t blatantly kill victims, because of an injustice against them (although may people today would prefer to).

Exploitation, adultery, prostitution, and rape are an injustice. Society and law need to create a system that stands against these injustices, instead of whitewashing the problem by killing an innocent victim.

I’m sure you will disagree with me, but if we tolerate killing a human victim at one stage of its being, it won’t be too long before we decide to terminate human victims at other stages of being.

I have personally read online and have heard some younger Millenials and older GenZs state that children in foster care should be euthanized because they are the result of trauma/dysfunction, are unwanted by parents/family, and are a burden on society. Literally, I have heard people say the words that these children “would be better off dead because nobody wants them”. I’ve heard similar remarks toward the disabled, drug addicts, mentally ill,
and seniors without family.

This is not ok.

What is the difference between a human fetus and these other groups? Certainly children in foster care are still developing as human beings. And the other groups I mentioned have declined or are declining cognitively or physically.

It’s a Brave New World and it won’t be long until other humans beside the fetus will be targeted because their inability to defend themselves.

Like I said before, a woman has the right to autonomy because she is human. The human fetus has its right to autonomy because it is human.