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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Texas but not Virginia
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Josephine
Orthodox Belle
# 3899
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
quote:
Originally posted by Josephine:
Ender's Shadow, with respect, if you would answer one question, please:
Which goal is more important: Reducing the number of abortions, or ensuring that women receive the appropriate consequences for irresponsible behavior?
Of course reducing the number of abortions is the target.
Thank you.
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I've written a book! Catherine's Pascha: A celebration of Easter in the Orthodox Church. It's a lovely book for children. Take a look!
Posts: 10273 | From: Pacific Northwest, USA | Registered: Jan 2003
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
The data for the US as abortion was legalised paints a very different pictures
Live births data:
1970 3,731,386 18.4
1971 3,555,970 17.2
1972 3,258,411 15.6
1973 3,136,965 14.9
1974 3,159,958 14.9
1975 3,144,198 14.8
1976 3,167,788 14.8
1977 3,326,632 15.4
1978 3,333,279 15.3
1979 3,494,398 15.9
1980 3,612,258 15.9
source
and legal abortion figures
1970 193,491 52
1971 485,816 137
1972 586,760 180
1973 615,831 196
1974 763,476 242
1975 854,853 272
1976 988,267 312
1977 1,079,430 325
1978 1,157,776 347
1979 1,251,921 358
1980 1,297,606 359
source
So either American women weren't as clever as their African sisters are in getting illegal abortions, or this report is dubious. The data here is unambiguous - making abortions available legally cut the number of live births by hundreds of thousands, so clearly illegal abortions weren't very common.
Eh?
You've got abortions as legal from the very beginning of your data set in 1970. How can you possibly show the effects of legalising abortions if abortions were legal when you started?
If, as seems likely, you're attempting to show the effect of Roe v Wade, then Justinian is correct to point out that 1971 and 1972, before Roe v Wade, already shows a marked drop in the number of live births. And an increase in abortions for that matter.
I suspect what you're actually showing there is the effect either of increased access to contraception or of rapidly changing 'lifestyle choices' in the critical late 60s/early 70s period as women made more use of contraception. Either way, you're certainly not showing the effect of abortion law.
[ 05. March 2012, 02:41: Message edited by: orfeo ]
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
By the way, the source for the Wikipedia statistics clearly indicates that 1973 is the first year they even have proper nationwide data on the number of abortions. They started collecting data in 1969, but 1973 is the first time all jurisdictions were included. Since then it hasn't always included every jurisdiction, either.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
What DUTIES does a state have to to carry out with regard to parents. Specifically does the state HAVE TO provide as opposed to all the 'nice to have' things such as child health care / contraception / sex education. Part of the problem with the pro-choicers is that they offer a moving target: whatever provision is present, they always demand more, and excuse the murder of babies on the grounds that mothers can't be required to accept the consequences of their action because it's too onerous. My aim is to undermine that lie by denying that women have a RIGHT to these things. Yes they are DESIRABLE for state to provide, but their absence is NOT an excuse for having an abortion.
Thank you for that explanation. It makes your position much more understandable and humane.
It would have helped if your response had been on the lines "Yes, I support all/most/some of those measures to support women and families, but whatever political decisions a community might make on those issues to me that makes no difference at all to the wrongness of abortion" ; rather than (what I and I think many others took to be) an implication that you did not want the state to offer support in those ways. I'm glad that this impression was wrong.
quote:
Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
If you accept the traditional Christian teaching that a zygote is a human - as clearly indicated by the story of John the Baptist jumping in the womb when the newly pregnant Mary turns up at Elizabeth's house
I don't see that as a "clear" indication. The point of the story was that this was unusual - very probably miraculous. A foetus in the womb does not normally respond this way to anyone, and Elizabeth knew it, which is why she mentions it. The fact that John reacted so uniquely to Mary is evidence of the astonishing degree of grace given to Mary, and the lesser, but still enormously important, grace given to John. It is not evidence that foetuses routinely show spiritual discernment, or any discernment at all. You might as well use Balaam's ass as a clear indication of animal sapience. In both cases, God is using part of his creation to announce some truth, and the remarkable thing is that the creature used is normally dumb.
In any event, this story says nothing about the starting point of life. Even if it is read (as it could be, but does not have to be) as evidence that John at least was fully human at six months' gestation, it tells us nothing at all about whether he had that status from conception, or whether he was suddenly granted it at the point of Mary's visit, or at any stage in between. We are just not told that. It is certainly not obvious to me that there if a foetus at X days before due date is to be treated as human, it follows that a zygote is to be treated as human. I don't see that Christianity compels that conclusion at all.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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Laura
General nuisance
# 10
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Posted
ES: unfortunately, those "live birth" figures would also have gone down dramatically from the 70s to the 80s as reliable contraception became more universally available. I'm not saying the abortion rate didn't go up, but those figures can't tell the whole story.
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Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. - Erich Fromm
Posts: 16883 | From: East Coast, USA | Registered: Apr 2001
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