The first amendment would create a new precondition for any women having an abortion to receive advice and counselling from an organisation that does not itself carry out terminations.

So presumably that rules out the NHS?

Can’t see why this should be any of the state’s business myself. But then again, I would say that wouldn’t I…

Frank Field? WHAT?

Why the need for a dramatic reduction in abortians in the UK? Or should I ask why the need for a dramatic increase in forced pregnancies?

@2 Ellie

It’s funny..that was exactly my reaction too!

I guess it just goes to show, you don’t have to be a Tory not to have a conscience… even if it helps…!

I like how Nadine Dorries has broadened to “[a] cross-party alliance of MPs” by the time the article starts. Looks like she isn’t quite the isolated crank that the title makes out.

(By the way, does anyone know how big the group of MPs proposing the amendment is?)

As for the proposals, I don’t really think of them as much of an “attack” on anything. Having abortion counselling services provided by abortion providers sounds like a fairly clear conflict of interest to me, and I don’t see why counselling and provision shouldn’t be separated. As for placing NICE in charge of abortion guidelines, I don’t know enough about the RCOG to comment, but the proposal doesn’t sound inherently ludicrous.

As usual with the brownshirts freedom is only for rich people to pay less tax.

When it come to social issues they never trust the individual.

If this silly cow wants abortion made illegal she should vote for that, and strop trying to do it a bit at a time.

@ 4:

“I guess it just goes to show, you don’t have to be a Tory not to have a conscience… even if it helps…!”

Either that, or they do have consciences, but just happen to disagree with you on abortion.

Wait, did I suggest that your view isn’t so inherently superior that people can’t legitimately disagree with it? Ignore that.

@ 6:

“the brownshirts”

Somewhat ironic that you should use that insult, given the Nazis’ fondness of abortions for “inferior” peoples…

Also, I’d just like to invoke Godwin’s Law, and inform you that you’ve now lost the argument.

Godwin’s Law don’t mean didly squat.

It is not a law anyway, it is an opinion, and opinions are like arseholes , everyone has got one, and most of them stink.

@ 7 XXX

I refer you to my previous answer: those attempting to make abortion harder for ideological reasons, and the nauseating Ms Dorries in particular, are quite free to disagree with me. I’m free to feel superior because I’m right.

@ 10:

“attempting to make abortion harder for ideological reasons”

Because clearly, only people who disagree with you are ideological. It’s not as if you both have ideologies, it’s just that these are different and therefore lead you to different conclusions.

” I’m free to feel superior because I’m right.”

What is it making you think that you’re right, rather than your opponents?

Having abortion counselling services provided by abortion providers sounds like a fairly clear conflict of interest to me

Well, okay, but under that logic shouldn’t anyone who wants a hip replacement be required to get advice from someone who is not a doctor nor a surgeon to make sure that they have independent advice? Maybe from an accountant, or a grocer. They don’t do much medical stuff. Big conflict of interest allowing the NHS to both recommend and carry out surgery, right? I mean, they might have everyone’s hips replaced to justify a budget increase.

“Abortion providers” (or “doctors”, as they are more commonly called in this country) do not have any particular interest (financial or otherwise) in maximising the numbers of abortions performed. There’s therefore no conflict of interest involved in them providing their own optional counselling services.

Meanwhile, and more importantly, what is wrong with just trusting that a person with a uterus does not lose their critical thinking skills simply through possession of such, and if that person wants counselling or advice on this or indeed any other matter, they can seek it out themselves from whatever provider they want. Compelling them to take advice and counselling from a specified provider whether they want it or not seems utterly disproportionate.

How is Dorries allowed to still be an MP?

@6 sally: “If this silly cow wants abortion made illegal she should vote for that, and strop trying to do it a bit at a time.”

Stop Press: Sally orders an end to transitional demands.

(Oh well, a few historians might get the joke.)

@13

Because she receives the most votes in her constituency.

It must be difficult if you are a Tory voter and have a prat like Dorries as your local candidate. I always vote for the party rather than the individual candidate.

15. Fungus: “I always vote for the party rather than the individual candidate.”

It hardly matters for Dorries. She gets half of the vote. She wins first count under AV.

To beat Dorries, you have to change minds. Paddy Ashdown spent ten years to get elected. Make people think. For a long time.

In parts of the home counties you can put up a pot plant, but as long as it has a blue badge it will get in. As fewer people join political parties the choice of candidate gets chosen by a bunch of nutters.

Has anyone read “Freakonomics” on the link between abortion and crime? It provides excellent arguments against conservative twats.

“Supporters of the amendments say that passing them would lead to a dramatic reduction in the number of abortions that take place in the UK.”

So where would they take place? Somewhere pleasant and comfortable in Europe for those able to afford to travel and recuperate in fin-de-siecle style (sc. the rich) or in a back street with a C21 coat-hanger for the rest (sc. the not-rich)? Or do Nadine and the supporters think their amendment will really reduce abortion? And how would they measure that meaningfully? “Are you here for an illegal abortion, mademoiselle?” “Sole purpose of visit, monsieur!”

This is child birth according to Nadine Dorries:
Warning graphic video (blood)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JehjqlzXwIQ

I wish I was joking, but the woman really thinks premature babies can burst out of stomachs.
If there’s a case for abortion, Nadine Dorries is it. (Too stupid to live, sort of thing)

If there’s a case for abortion, Nadine Dorries is it. (Too stupid to live, sort of thing)

As someone who is involved in the care of those “Too Stupid to live” I along with many others have noticed a steep decline of those in care with learning difficulties.
Most of these innocent children can be found in landfills and binbags outside the abortion clinics of England, Scotland and Wales. Your world would have no Vincent Van Goughs no Joseph Merrick no Christy Brown and no” Forest Gump .”
If Dr.Josef Mengele were alive today he would be jizzing his pants.
Auf Wiedersehen.

@20

If there’s a case for abortion, Nadine Dorries is it. (Too stupid to live, sort of thing)

Please don’t joke about that, I still have unpleasant memories of being directed to world net daily after Doctor George Tiller was murdered by a “pro-life” nut-case while attending church. Those posting at WND made hearty guffaws about how Tiller was now a “very late term abortion”, and thus being murdered was a fitting end for him.

Hmmm…Dorries. Milf.

@18 asquith

“Has anyone read “Freakonomics” on the link between abortion and crime? It provides excellent arguments against conservative twats.”

Only on the pragmatic level: basically it shows that if you feel neutral about abortion in itself, then you should support it because it has a very positive side effect in reducing crime. But if you think the foetus has a right to life, arguing that it’s ok to terminate it because it has a higher-than-average chance of growing up to become a criminal doesn’t really carry much weight. I was actually surprised that so many pro-lifers kicked off when Freakonomics was published (and annoyed that people think you can protest against factual data).

Back on topic: if the point of requiring women to get independent advice is avoiding conflicts of interest, and if said conflicts of interest actually exist, I can see the justification for this, although it seems a roundabout way of solving the alleged problem. However, it does seem likely that this is a stalking horse for ideological purposes.

There’s a tendency for pro-lifers to want women who want an abortion to have to get a second opinion (to make sure they make the “right” decision) and perhaps even have to watch an ultrasound of the foetus (to make sure they feel “appropriately” guilty) before having the operation. It’s patronising, and an obvious attempt to counteract the law.

Don’t be surprised by Frank Field, anyone paying attention knows he has been against Social Security, helping the poor or assisting the sick for years, too extreme a Tory even for the Blairites

“Only on the pragmatic level: basically it shows that if you feel neutral about abortion in itself, then you should support it because it has a very positive side effect in reducing crime.”

If you argue the case that a “criminal” foetus (Absurd) can be; let’s use the term “executed, ” in the womb. Then you can look forward to a future with no prisons. Imagine all of those “nasty” criminals, those to poor to pay their TV licences or their road tax or those occupying Masons. A world were Nelson Mandela would have been destroyed before he was born,ect,ect,ect. Before you have your first or next abortion think about this.Is he or she going to become the next Kennedy or Steve Hawkins? Regrettably the future will have no Kennedy because he had Addisons disease and neither would we have Hawkings for he has Motor-neuron disease. Most potential babies with these conditions are destroyed before birth through genetic screening. As I have said before Dr.Josef Mengele would have been delighted.

Richard/27: “Is he or she going to become the next Kennedy or Steve Hawkins?”

While I completely agree that the Freakonomics argument is – like many of those author’s arguments – rubbish, this isn’t a great argument either.

1) Or maybe they’ll become the next Hitler, or Mengele, etc.
2) Wouldn’t exactly the same argument apply to anyone, of any gender, who wasn’t actively trying to conceive as many children as possible? “That child that you didn’t have because you didn’t have sex on the night of the 27th – they could have grown up to be the next Kennedy. How can you live with yourself?” It’s a terrible argument there and it’s a terrible argument for abortion too.

I do, incidentally, agree that abortion as a “solution” to the “problem” of people with disabilities is a bad thing. The way to deal with that, though, is to change public attitudes so that disabilities are no longer seen as life-destroying, to give much better support to parents and potential parents so that they can make the necessary adjustments for themselves, to make changes to society so that disabilities stop being dis-abling, and so on. Restricting abortion is not only the wrong starting point, it’s wholly unnecessary: make those changes and the rate of abortion will fall anyway.

@27 Richard, it might have escaped your notice but raising a child is a rather costly and time consuming endeavour, and those women who do not wish to undertake such a task should not be forced to do so just because of designs of biology.
The point being gotten at regarding the pragmatism of abortion is not that the babies are committing crimes (as you oddly seem to think), it is the excessive deprivation caused by having too many mouths to feed with too little money and time to provide for them.

In this day and age it’s time we moved away from the knee-jerk desire for women who have and enjoy sex to face dire consequences, and have their freedom curtailed.

@ 27 Richard

cim has said most of the things that need saying here. However, I feel I should clarify that Freakonomics does not say that any foetus is criminal. That would indeed be absurd. Instead, it claims (and demonstrates) that allowing abortion reduces crime rates because foetuses that would have been aborted, were the mother allowed to do so, are statistically more likely to grow up to BECOME criminals. This is due to correlating situational factors, as they are more likely to be unloved, more likely to be poor, etc. It’s about trends, not judging someone when they’re still in the womb.

But like I say, it’s only a relevant point if you’re neutral about abortion. To a pro-lifer, the good you’d do by reducing crime would be far, far outweighed by the deaths of all those foetuses.

@ 29 Cylux

I agreed with the rest of your point, but your last paragraph is unfair. I’m sure there are pro-lifers who want women to suffer, but the one doesn’t prove the other. At base, pro-lifers are interested in saving what they see as innocent lives – the oppressive results are side effects that they consider worthwhile, not ends unto themselves. There is also no reason to assume that a pro-lifer is against women enjoying sex. It therefore seems very unfair to claim Richard has a “knee-jerk desire for women who have and enjoy sex to face dire consequences”.

@ cim,Hi cim I’m pleased that you at least agree with my concern over having people with disabilities disappearing from the face of the earth. I still however believe my first argument stands. The fact is that the vast majority of people in prison in the UK and the USA are people form poor backgrounds. It would amount to a genocide of the poor. Did you know that the majority of abortions are already performed on people who live below the subsistence line. In the states you are three times more likely to have an abortion if you are an African American! This statistic alone would suggest racial cleansing through poverty not to mention the fact that you are ten times more likely to face execution for being Black.
As far as Dr.Josef Mengele is concerned, we dont need him because the doctors and nurses of the NHS seem to have no qualms about taking life as well as saving it!
Regards Richard

@31 http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/anti-tales.html

@ 33 Cylux

Um, what does an article about certain pro-lifers being hypocrites have to do with you accusing Richard of misogyny?

@Cylux
“it might have escaped your notice but raising a child is a rather costly and time consuming endeavour,”

Wearing a condom is not!

@34 From the link:

Many anti-choice women are convinced that their need for abortion is unique — not like those “other” women — even though they have abortions for the same sorts of reasons… Some women insist on sneaking in the back door and hiding in a room away from other patients. Others refuse to sit in the waiting room with women they call “sluts” and “trash.” Or if they do, they get angry when other patients in the waiting room talk or laugh, because it proves to them that women get abortions casually, for “convenience”.

Now from our friend Richard:

It would amount to a genocide of the poor. Did you know that the majority of abortions are already performed on people who live below the subsistence line. In the states you are three times more likely to have an abortion if you are an African American! This statistic alone would suggest racial cleansing through poverty not to mention the fact that you are ten times more likely to face execution for being Black.
As far as Dr.Josef Mengele is concerned, we dont need him because the doctors and nurses of the NHS seem to have no qualms about taking life as well as saving it!

Now abortion is a voluntary procedure, that is a women has to make a decision to have an abortion in order to undertake one. Richard would have us believe that that access to abortion is some kind of cunning pogrom against the poor and racial minorities, but that would imply that women of these communities are willing conspirators in the extermination of their own people. That they are filicidal manics hell bent on murder and destruction for reasons he has yet to disclose. That every women who chooses to not bear their pregnancy is a cohort of Dr.Josef Mengele.

I would argue that calling women who seek abortions “sluts” and “trash” and doing so only for “convenience” is actually less misogynistic that what Richard has been throwing out into this comment thread.

@35 Condoms can split, and are surely the responsibility for men to wear. Given the furore with Julian Assange’s case it seems harsh to hold women responsible for the irresponsibility, and occasional duplicity of men.

36. Cylux@

“I would argue that calling women who seek abortions “sluts” and “trash” and doing so only for “convenience” is actually less misogynistic that what Richard has been throwing out into this comment thread.”

Hello Cylux you would seem to have and even lower opinion of myself as you do of unborn children. I have never in my life stood outside an abortion clinic to mock, insult or judge anyone. Saying that children are ” a rather costly and time consuming endeavour ” rings of someone who is bereft of love and puts their free time and bank balance ahead of their respect for life.You also talk about abortion being a choice and not an imposition on the woman. In reality it is an imposition, poor people are forced to have abortions because of their circumstances.

This is beyond parody that these cranks give a shit about ethnic minorities. Life begins at conception and ends at birth from their perspective. They claim to believe in limited government but not limited enough to keep government out of a woman’s uterus.
http://thinkprogress.org/2011/03/23/arizona-race-gender-abortion/

Dorries is just one of many who believes she knows better than the woman what she should do with her uterus. In other words, a control freak. The termination of a pregnancy should be entirely a medical decision without any role for the law stipulating when that can take place.

@39. Richard W

“The termination of a pregnancy should be entirely a medical decision without any role for the law stipulating when that can take place.”

I totally agree that an abortion should be based solely on medical grounds regarding the physical well-being of the woman. But being poor should never mean you should be compelled to have an abortion.

You also state that an abortion should not be subject to the law stating when it can take place…do you mean six months…perhaps seven or eight…or maybe even nine?
Imagine a child that is crowning and the woman has a right to kill that child at any time she pleases as long as it is in her womb, do you know the only method available would be “cranial lancing” i.e. sticking a spike through head child’s head. Not that the method makes any difference they all cause unimaginable suffering to the child. As for me not caring for the poor and ethnic minorities, I am an ethnic minority and have traversed the face of the rotten earth trying to save life. When you see death and destruction on a massive scale. Whether man made or natural you really get a feel for how precious life is.

@40 No women at 8-9 months is just going to suddenly decide, “ya know what, I can’t be arsed with this baby, kill it”. If your going to construct moral arguments at least try and keep them within the realms of reality.

@ 40

It is not a baby or a child but a foetus. Moreover, it is not your foetus and it is not your uterus. You should have no more right to tell a woman what to do with her uterus than you have to tell her when to clip her nails.

@42. Richard W

F*&k your a callous man!

@ 36 Cylux

“Now abortion is a voluntary procedure, that is a women has to make a decision to have an abortion in order to undertake one. Richard would have us believe that that access to abortion is some kind of cunning pogrom against the poor and racial minorities, but that would imply that women of these communities are willing conspirators in the extermination of their own people. That they are filicidal manics hell bent on murder and destruction for reasons he has yet to disclose. That every women who chooses to not bear their pregnancy is a cohort of Dr.Josef Mengele.”

No, you’re putting those words into his mouth. I have no truck with the conspiracy theory that abortion is racist, believe me. Nor the idea that it is an attack on the poor. But it’s you that appears to have made the leap from that to the idea that women who have abortions are murderers and ethnic cleansers. Richard attacked the abortion providers, not the patients.

Here’s what I think the problem is: if anyone criticises abortion, you can claim that this is an attack on women who have abortions, and then go from there to claim that this is misogynistic. It involves straw manning your opponent not once, but twice. The end result is “criticising abortion rights is sexist!”, which is every bit as ridiculous as saying “supporting abortion rights is racist!”

@Richard W

Dear Richard in your medical opinion at what point does a foetus become a baby. Your lack of biological knowledge must be legendary.

@ 43. Damion

Umm, I say a woman’s uterus is hers and hers alone. You obviously disagree and possibly believe it is also your uterus but she should carry it around for you because you do not have one. I am apparently callous for believing people own their own body? I have a term for people who believe that they should control another persons uterus, they are control freaks.

@ 45. Richard

Self-evidently at birth. However, I don’t need to have an opinion because it is not my body. Why is it so difficult for you to understand that people own their own body?

44/Chaise: “Richard attacked the abortion providers, not the patients.”

In theory, yes. In practice an attack on the providers ends up an attack on the patients. The providers are providing abortions to patients who have asked them to. Anything that makes it harder for the providers to operate therefore makes it harder for the patients. And it’s the patients, not the providers or the legislators, who have to deal with the consequences of any restrictions – whether that be being forced to give birth to unwanted children, or having the abortion procedure take longer or be more expensive than it needs to be.

In the USA, where the Dorries/Field approach of chipping slowly away at rights has been going on successfully for decades (because of the famous Roe v Wade decision that prevented an outright ban) it has got to the point where some states – areas geographically larger than the UK – have perhaps one or two locations where an abortion can be carried out; and after the assassination of Dr Tiller, there are I believe only two or three providers in the entire country of 300 million people who will carry out abortions after 24 weeks – which, at that point, are the ones where the fetus has fatal abnormalities, and/or the abortion is necessary to save the woman’s life – having discovered that it is medically necessary to end a wanted pregnancy, any further obstacles are just needless stress.

So yes, I’m going to call attacking abortion rights an attack on women (and indeed on anyone else with a functional uterus). Whether or not it’s intended as such, that’s what the end result is.

There are things that could be done that would reduce the number of abortions carried out without being an attack on women – I listed a bunch of them at comment 28, but in addition:
– more support to parents and potential parents in general
– reductions in poverty and deprivation
– research into improvements into the safety, reliability, ease of access and lack of side-effects of contraception
– more effective and efficient handling of domestic violence and rape cases
– better sex education for both children and adults.
There are probably more. All of these would have a “side effect” of reducing the number of abortions carried out without harming people who nevertheless need one.

None of these are things supported by the particular strain of politics exemplified by Dorries and Field.

(Conversely, banning or heavily restricting abortion does not tend to actually reduce the number carried out: it just means that they’re carried out less safely)

One thing that troubles me about the current abortion rate is the unintended cultural effect it might have when we think about the significance of life and death?

To begin with (in ’67) abortion was framed very much as a humane intervention of last resort, since the act itself seemed to carry with it some sort of social significance that extended beyond those directly involved – whilst not exactly rare back then, abortion was far from the near industrial production line that we have arrived at today with nearly 200,000 terminations being carried out each year.

For some there is hardly any difference between choosing bathroom furniture and terminating a pregnancy – a realisation that apparently only hit home when it dawned on the mother that children are both hard work and expensive.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/caitlin_moran/article1645946.ece

Obviously one important factor contributing to this state of affairs is the fact that a fetus has no legal rights (while in utero) so it is not really surprising that abortion on demand soon became the order of the day.

What does an act on such a scale mean? – and will it, in the long run, hold implications for other groups who may be deemed unwanted, now that the culture of trivialising life and death has become so embedded?

I am not against abortion but I do think current trends pose one two difficult questions, and not just for the men and women who are part of this escalating statistic?

@ 48 cim

“In theory, yes. In practice an attack on the providers ends up an attack on the patients. The providers are providing abortions to patients who have asked them to. Anything that makes it harder for the providers to operate therefore makes it harder for the patients.
[...]
So yes, I’m going to call attacking abortion rights an attack on women (and indeed on anyone else with a functional uterus). Whether or not it’s intended as such, that’s what the end result is.”

Sure. In terms of the end result, it makes perfect sense to call an attack on abortion rights an attack on women. Banning or more heavily restricting abortion would obviously make life more difficult for many women. It would even kill some of them.

My objection to Cylux’s comments about Richard, however, is that they conflate the result with the intention. The fact that banning abortion harms women does NOT in any way prove that all pro-lifers are motivated by a desire to harm women.
Analogy: every time I drive my car somewhere, the resulting pollution harms the planet. Would you therefore say that the fact that I use the car proves that I actively desire to harm the planet – that I get in the driver’s seat thinking “Time to pollute the atmosphere, bwa ha ha ha”? I hope not. You might argue that I don’t care enough about the planet, but that’s a different thing.

I’m not pro-life, but it’s evident to me that pro-lifers are concerned about saving what they consider innocent lives. Some have other, less pleasant motives, but to ascribe those motives to ALL pro-lifers is irrational. There’s no point trying to argue with someone if you’re going to deliberately lie about their motivations from the outset. That’s not a debate, it’s a slagging match.

“There are things that could be done that would reduce the number of abortions carried out without being an attack on women.
[..]
All of these would have a “side effect” of reducing the number of abortions carried out without harming people who nevertheless need one.

None of these are things supported by the particular strain of politics exemplified by Dorries and Field.”

Obviously in some cases individual pro-lifers have reasons for not liking alternative methods of reducing abortion. Catholics generally don’t believe in contraception, other people have rather hysterical misconceptions about sex education and its aims. But I agree that if a pro-lifer shows little or no interest in ANY method of reducing unwanted pregnancies, that doesn’t say very good things about the motives of that pro-lifer.

@ 47. Richard W

That’s exactly the point we “own” our “own” bodies. The unborn child has his or her “own” body. But of course since you don’t accept that an unborn child is a life then if someone were to attack a pregnant woman and “kill” her unborn child in the womb you would not see it as murder because you cannot “kill” what has no life, since you are of the erroneous opinion that life begins “outside” the womb. If this were truly the case the a doctor could morally refuse to intervene to save an unborn child. This however goes against his Hippocratic oath which states that he “will protect and preserve life and do no harm”.
Despite this oath, it was broken on approximately 200,000 occasions last year in England alone!

Abortion is a difficult moral and ethical maze, a planned and wanted child will be given every medical assistance within the womb but once a fetus becomes ‘unwanted’ it is seen only as a bundle of cells.
But the 1967 Abortion Act signalled the begining of abortions carried out in a safe clinical environment, back-street abortions were quite common place for all ages and classes. @49 makes a good point, abortion appears to be regarded by some as merely another form of birth-control and does beg the question of whether our values are somehow skewed.
On balance though, I would rather that desperate women do no have to risk injury and death at the hands of a ‘butcher’.

A question to pro-lifers: If abortion were to be illegal tomorrow, what punishment should women who have illegal abortions face?

Since my first post on this subject at 10:37 last night to 18:00 this evening there have been approximately 110,000 legally performed abortions performed worldwide. In the western countries 1% were due to rape or incest. 6% were due to undesirable children i.e. handicapped. 4% due to risk to mother. The rest 89% for social reasons that is unwanted or inconvenient. Makes you proud to be human.

Unto Us by Spike Milligan.

Somewhere at some time
They committed themselves to me
And so, I was!
Small, but I WAS!
Tiny, in shape
Lusting to live
I hung in my pulsing cave.
Soon they knew of me
My mother —my father.
I had no say in my being
I lived on trust
And love
Tho’ I couldn’t think
Each part of me was saying
A silent ‘Wait for me
I will bring you love!’
I was taken
Blind, naked, defenseless
By the hand of one
Whose good name
Was graven on a brass plate
in Wimpole Street,
and dropped on the sterile floor
of a foot operated plastic waste
bucket.
There was no Queens Counsel
To take my brief.
The cot I might have warmed
Stood in Harrod’s shop window.
When my passing was told
My father smiled.
No grief filled my empty space.
My death was celebrated
With tickets to see Danny la Rue
Who was pretending to be a woman
Like my mother was.

While the above poem is nowhere near as annoying as “I Should Have Seen The Sun”, it’s still full of some pretty unreasonable accusations. The parents apparently feeling no emotion about the abortion. “Pretending to be a woman”. That sort of thing.

@ 56. Chaise Guevara

89% of abortions speak truth into this poem.

My objection to Cylux’s comments about Richard, however, is that they conflate the result with the intention.

I suppose I’d best refrain from further accusations toward Messrs Blair and Bush regarding the unintended results of the Iraq and Afghanistan war then.

@ 58

“I suppose I’d best refrain from further accusations toward Messrs Blair and Bush regarding the unintended results of the Iraq and Afghanistan war then.”

Are you now taking what I said to suggest that I don’t think people should comment upon intended consequences?

@53. Cylux

If I am pro-lifer does that make you an anti-lifer? Only in today’s society could anyone who would seek to see the end of child butchery be called a pro-lifer in a negative and radical sense. But c’est la vie !

Now that the anti abortion lobby in the USA is close to getting Rove VS Wade overturned, and as many right wing states have bombed abortion clinics out of existence they are now moving on to their next target…….. contraception.

When will people realise that anti abortionists have a much bigger agenda than just protecting foetuses. They hate woman, and they hate female sexuality, and they want to punish woman who have sex outside of marriage. The people funding the anti abortion movement are misogynists who despise females and female sexuality.

And please stop telling me about the morality of pro life. The most conservative states in the US have some of the worst mortality rates of new born babies because of the lack of health care cover. As soon as the baby comes out of the womb these people give not a shit about its life chances.

@53. Cylux

“If abortion were to be illegal tomorrow, what punishment should women who have illegal abortions face?”

If tomorrow abortion were made illegal I would imagine a huge increase in the uptake and proper use of contraception. Abortion should always be the exception never the norm.

62 “If tomorrow abortion were made illegal I would imagine a huge increase in the uptake and proper use of contraception.”

You need to pull your head out of your backside. The anti abortionists are already turning their fire on contraception. This not about life, but about a hatred of female power over their sexuality.

@ 50. Chaise Guevara

” My objection to Cylux’s comments about Richard, however, is that they conflate the result with the intention. The fact that banning abortion harms women does NOT in any way prove that all pro-lifers are motivated by a desire to harm women.
Analogy: every time I drive my car somewhere, the resulting pollution harms the planet. Would you therefore say that the fact that I use the car proves that I actively desire to harm the planet – that I get in the driver’s seat thinking “Time to pollute the atmosphere, bwa ha ha ha”? I hope not. You might argue that I don’t care enough about the planet, but that’s a different thing. ”

What the issue comes down to is those who actually believe in rights and those who pretend to believe in rights. A pro-lifer believes a human being does not have the right to control over their own body. The state has arbitrary control over their body. Moreover, this arbitrary control should only apply to women. That makes them anti-women totalitarians no matter what religious twaddle they try and wrap their bigotry up in. If the state passed a law saying driving a car caused pollution so car drivers should pay tax on fuel as compensation for the pollution. However, the law should only apply to half the population namely women. That would clearly be anti-women. Laws restricting abortion which only apply to women must be by definition anti-women. Since the state restricting abortion harms women because unsafe abortions will still occur. Therefore, pro-lifers are motivated by a desire to harm women by restricting their liberty over their own body.

@59 Richard knows full well that his stance will lead to a retardation of women’s rights, knows full well that he is declaring that a woman has no right to decide what does or does not happen within her body. How can he not know? It’s been pointed out here and will have been elsewhere.

That this rolling back of woman’s rights is merely an unintended consequence of his concern for the unborn does not excuse him from the accusation of misogyny. He will have weighed up the self-determining rights of a grown and thinking women, against the rights of a developing foetus, and come to the conclusion that she should be denied a choice, that she cannot be trusted to make the right choice, that she should be denied self-determination. That the rights of an actual human being when pregnant counts for less than the rights of a potential human being. Smells like misogyny to me.

Seriously, do you really think that a man who can write the following:

Imagine a child that is crowning and the woman has a right to kill that child at any time she pleases as long as it is in her womb, do you know the only method available would be “cranial lancing” i.e. sticking a spike through head child’s head.

has any concern for women outside of how he can control them?

sally

” And please stop telling me about the morality of pro life. The most conservative states in the US have some of the worst mortality rates of new born babies because of the lack of health care cover. As soon as the baby comes out of the womb these people give not a shit about its life chances. ”

Sally in her own inimitable style speaks truth against hypocrisy. Life begins at conception and ends at birth in wingnut world.

@ 63. sally

” This not about life, but about a hatred of female power over their sexuality.”

Are you suggesting that female sexuality and abortions have something to do with each other ? I don’t see the connection. Sexuality defines what you are,not what you do. To say that…I am a woman…because…I can have an abortion is a slur on womanhood. Am I a man because I am free to have A vasectomy or circumcision ?

Once abortion is illegal you better believe that this will be the next step.

If tomorrow abortion were made illegal I would imagine a huge increase in the uptake and proper use of contraception. Abortion should always be the exception never the norm.

Unfortunately in the states the anti-abortion lobby and the abstinence-only lobby tend to be leaves on the same bush. As Sally says: “The anti abortionists are already turning their fire on contraception.”
Abstinence-only has managed to produce no reduction in teens having sex, but it has resulted in said teens being completely ignorant of STD’s and usage of contraception. It also has however been VERY successful in weeding out all the “bad girls” from the “good girls”. With the few girls who remain chaste being held up as examples of abstinence-only’s success.

@ 65 Cylux

“@59 Richard knows full well that his stance will lead to a retardation of women’s rights, knows full well that he is declaring that a woman has no right to decide what does or does not happen within her body. How can he not know? It’s been pointed out here and will have been elsewhere. ”

I’m not denying that.

“That this rolling back of woman’s rights is merely an unintended consequence of his concern for the unborn does not excuse him from the accusation of misogyny. He will have weighed up the self-determining rights of a grown and thinking women, against the rights of a developing foetus, and come to the conclusion that she should be denied a choice, that she cannot be trusted to make the right choice, that she should be denied self-determination. That the rights of an actual human being when pregnant counts for less than the rights of a potential human being. Smells like misogyny to me. ”

It doesn’t have to be. And you’re misrepresenting the position: pro-lifers (in general) don’t think the foetus has MORE rights than the mother, they just think it has the same rights: i.e. the right to life. Unless you can find any pro-lifers who believe that it’s ok to kill adult humans (not criminals or enemies, but that you should have the legal right to kill any adult you wish). The accusation of misogyny is again based on a straw man version of the argument.

This is important, by the way. All it takes for someone to be pro-life is to believe that foetuses have the same right to life as adults. By these lights, abortion should be banned because the right to life outweighs the right to less than nine months of improved freedom. If you accept the original assumption, it’s fairly logical.

In any case, we’ve wandered away from what you said, which is: “In this day and age it’s time we moved away from the knee-jerk desire for women who have and enjoy sex to face dire consequences, and have their freedom curtailed.” The reason I objected to this in the first place is that you’re inventing a desire on someone else’s part so that you can use it to demonise him.

Why do this? If there’s something wrong with what he says, why not address that instead of making up fake beliefs on his part that are easier to attack? The reverse equivalent is a pro-lifer claiming that whatever your purported reasons for being pro-choice, the REAL reason is that you just enjoy the idea of unborn children being killed. Does that sound like a reasonable assessment of your point of view?

“Seriously, do you really think that a man who can write the following:

Imagine a child that is crowning and the woman has a right to kill that child at any time she pleases as long as it is in her womb, do you know the only method available would be “cranial lancing” i.e. sticking a spike through head child’s head.

has any concern for women outside of how he can control them?”

There’s nothing in there to suggest that. Nothing at all. Describing a medical techique =/= not caring about women.

“Are you suggesting that female sexuality and abortions have something to do with each other ? I don’t see the connection.”

If a woman can’t have an abortion, and there are no contraceptives, (which many anti abortionist want to see. ) then having sex is a very risky thing to do if you don’t want to get pregnant. Many anti abortionists don’t like the power abortion has given woman over their sexuality. They preferred the old days when a woman who had sex, stood a very good chance of getting pregnant. They saw this as form of punishment to those that they believed where harlots and of loose morals. Sex, they believe is only for married couples, and the result should be for procreation of life. After all, it is only a 100 years ago that many men believed that woman got no sexual pleasure from sex. Now of course not all anti abortionists would go that far, but a lot of the Men, at the top of some of the major anti abortion groups do believe this very biblical view of woman. They are mostly inadequate men who have a deep fear of woman, and woman’s power over their own bodies.

You may not believe any of this, but you are aligning yourself with people who have a an agenda much bigger than you realise

65. Cylux

Abortions of children in the 24/28 week although illegal are going on in the UK http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1813838.ece.
If a doctor is prepared to destroy a child with a 90% chance of survival when it is an illegal act you seriously have to consider what they would do if it were legal. With out a shadow of a doubt 28 week and beyond abortions would become commonplace.

Also my wish to see an end to on demand abortion has has nothing to do with any desire to control women. The description of the abortion I gave is in fact what happened to the child in the Times piece above. You cast judgement on me for relating an actual example of abortion in the UK but fail to condemn the bastards who do it or support it.

Chaise/70: By these lights, abortion should be banned because the right to life outweighs the right to less than nine months of improved freedom.

That’s a possible ethical stance [1], but it’s not the general stance taken by “pro-life” people, who would generally feel uneasy or be outright opposed to:
– compulsory blood donation from anyone in suitably good health
– compulsory donation of non-essential organs
– compulsory donation of essential organs after death
or even, for a few without a direct violation of bodily autonomy but on the same principle
– requiring home owners to give long-term shelter to any homeless people in need (for up to, say, nine months per person per house)
all of which rely on the same type of value judgment to a greater or less extent. If that’s the principle they’re using they either have a whole range of other really unpopular ideas that they’re keeping quiet about or they really haven’t thought through the consequences of believing that.

[1] Though I think you rather gloss over the major temporary (and sometimes permanent) health consequences of pregnancy and birth when you say “nine months of improved freedom”, especially the consequences on one’s mental health of being forced to go through with it unnecessarily. (and then of course there’s either adoption – which has under-researched but anecdotally severe effects of its own on the birth mother – or looking after the resulting child for many years)

@ 71. sally

You seem to be for some reason obsessed with bringing religion into the equation. I have no interest in the opinions of religious groups or their reasons for opposing abortion. Nor do I think they could get access to the bedrooms or kitchen tables of Blighty lol.

Chaise, I think you’ve hyperventillated. Who are these non-women in posession of a functional uterus you write about? As a biologist it interests me.

While you may feel that you have the fine points nailed I’m afraid I have to agree with Cylux and others that Richard’s intentions are in no way noble. He typifies the anti-abortion enthusiast in simplifying a complex issue to suit his repressive agenda.

I don’t like abortion but I don’t like women being forced to carry through an unwanted pregnancy or risk an illegal abortion. Of course we should do as much as we can to reduce the need for abortion, and to ensure that if one is needed it is carried out as early as possible in pregnancy.

You need to recognise that Dorries, Field, Richard and there ilk are more in love with a non-existant sky fairy than they are with their fellow humans.

62
If tomorrow abortion was made illegal I would imagine that women would access abortions as they did prior to the 1967 Act, this would lead to injury and death for some.
The law in the UK and US view the fetus in different ways, in the UK, the birth mother is always considered to be the natural mother (registered on the birth certificate) however, in the US it is the biological mother who is registered. This can make it very difficult for women who have agreed to surrogacy and who have complications with the pregnancy, particularly if it becomes life threatening.
There is no ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ it depends on personal moral values, my stance is that protecting women from illegal and dangerous abortions is paramount.

My brother and I were both unplanned pregnancies. Our parents may have vaguely considered abortion but decided against it, despite being in quite severe poverty (they lived with my grandparents for years, then in a council house on a shit estate, only getting out years later).

Yet they followe through with the pregnancies because they decided they could provide a loving, supportive home, which they did. Now if they hadn’t, if they’d wanted an abortion but hadn’t been able to get one, who could possibly think it a good idea to force a mother to give birth to children she didn’t want? To resent her offspring, as many did in the “good” old days, for preventing her doing what she wanted to do in life?

People will say things like “I survived Roe v. Wade!” Yet in the vast majority of such cases, their mothers wanted to give birth to them. If they hadn’t, they might not have been so thankful to be alive.

And for those who talk glibly of adoption. Don’t know if this thought has ever crossed your mind, or ever would in a million years, but it’s fairly traumatic to have your children brought up by a stranger, often in another part of the world, with limited or no access to your own flesh and blood. This happened in the conservative glory days before all this immorality came along.

I don’t envy the lot of the Dr. Barnardo’s babies or their mothers whose lives were ruined by the attitudes of small-minded twats in their lovely close-knit local communities. Nor do I think it’s an especially good idea that so many in areas like this city grow up knoing no father but the state.

No sane person thinks abortion is a good laugh (and if these reports about women using as birth control are true and not bollocks, just ask yourself whether they’d be good mothers if they had children), just that the alternative is often even worse. Best of all to use effective contraception. Personally I hope some kind of viable male pill comes to market quite soon so it isn’t assumed to be the girl’s job.

The fact is that puritans might want us to live without sex, but most people who don’t get laid lose out as a result. Celibacy was only ever for a minority. It is about finding ways around that and not being slaves to biology.

@ 71 Sally

“If a woman can’t have an abortion, and there are no contraceptives”

The thing is Sally there is abortion. And access to contraception is world wide even in the most deprived communities, and almost everywhere it is free even the USA ! You say that a woman should have full control of her body. I agree if I were a woman I would protect myself against unplanned pregnancy just as I protected myself from becoming a father,my mantra to my son is ” if it’s not on it’s not in.” When you consider that modern contraception is 99% effective for the pill and 98% for condoms not to mention subcutaneous implants. The figures scream out at you most people resorting to abortion failed to take any form of contraception whatsoever !

@ 75. Cherub

“You need to recognise that Dorries, Field, Richard and there ilk are more in love with a non-existant sky fairy than they are with their fellow humans.”

You seem to have selective reading syndrome. I distinctly remember writing I have no interest in the opinions of religious groups or their reasons for opposing abortion.)
If you want to insult the beliefs of others go tell someone who gives a fuck.

@ 75 Cherub

“Chaise, I think you’ve hyperventillated.”

Well, I’m not exactly ranting here, but irrational mudslinging annoys me.

“Who are these non-women in posession of a functional uterus you write about? As a biologist it interests me.”

Um… where did I write about that?

“While you may feel that you have the fine points nailed I’m afraid I have to agree with Cylux and others that Richard’s intentions are in no way noble. He typifies the anti-abortion enthusiast in simplifying a complex issue to suit his repressive agenda.”

Richard’s arguments have changed somewhat since this conversation began. Originally the attacks seemed to be made solely on the basis of his being pro-life. When you say he “typifies the anti-abortion enthusiast”, does that mean that you would agree there are non-typical pro-lifers? What criteria would you use to determine which was which?

In any case, your assessment of him does not seem to support the idea that pro-life = sexist, which is what I’m arguing against here.

“I don’t like abortion but I don’t like women being forced to carry through an unwanted pregnancy or risk an illegal abortion. Of course we should do as much as we can to reduce the need for abortion, and to ensure that if one is needed it is carried out as early as possible in pregnancy.

You need to recognise that Dorries, Field, Richard and there ilk are more in love with a non-existant sky fairy than they are with their fellow humans.”

Preaching to the choir on both counts. What I won’t do, however, is assume all pro-lifers share the same characteristics beyond being pro-life. It’s entirely possible to be a non-sexist, atheist pro-lifer. In fact, I’d say sexism and religion are only really relevant to the pro-life movement because they represent common and bad reasons people have for objecting to abortion.

@ 73 cim

I agree that, in my experience, most pro-lifers are not consistent with their non-religious arguments for banning abortion (for the record, I also admit to a certain amount of glossing-over on the “nine months of reduced freedom thing”. I did it for sake of brevity, so I’m not denying that the other issues exist).

However, failings found among many pro-lifers, or even among most pro-lifers, cannot automatically be ascribed to every pro-lifer you meet. Which is my whole point. While I don’t doubt for a second that religious intolerance and misogyny correlate strongly with pro-life views, that’s absolutely no reason for assuming that every single pro-lifer is a sexist religious fanatic. I counted myself as pro-life when I was a teenager, and at that time I was more fervently anti-sexism and pro-atheism than I am now.

More hypocrisy by the freedom-loving tea party. Life begins at conception, ends at birth.

Ask them if the state has responsibility to look after someone from the cradle to the grave and the answer would be no. Then the state also has no right to compel them to be born.

” Smell The Freedom

Kate Sheppard reports on the latest liberty-enhancing measure from the freedom-loving tea party:

Anti-choice state senators in Arkansas passed a bill on Thursday that could limit access to abortions for women in the state by subjecting clinics to the same standards as outpatient surgical centers.

That bill would have the anticipated impact of making non-surgical abortions much harder to obtain in a state where it’s already fairly difficult. The law would force clinics or doctors that provide women with abortion pills like RU-486 or Mifeprex to follow more stringent rules applied to outpatient surgical centers. The bill’s Republican sponsor dubbed it the “Abortion Patients’ Enhanced Safety Act”—creating the impression that the bill is only designed to protect women.

I especially like the way this takes the specific form of an overreaching government takeover of the health care system. Meanwhile, from Andrea Nill I learn that at least five babies have died in Nebraska since they started denying prenatal care to undocumented mothers. Life, after all, begins at conception, ends at birth, and doesn’t count if you’re from Mexico. “

@ 82. Richard W

” More hypocrisy by the freedom-loving tea party. Life begins at conception, ends at
birth.”

I seem to have lost the train of your argument . Why are you banging on about right
wing extremists and religious theology? I am no more right wing than Tony Ben or religious as Richard Dawkins.

Before I retire for the night I just want to say:

ABORTION IS LIKE KILLING A BABY.

The post was general information and was not specifically addressed to you. I don’t particularly believe that right and left labels have much meaning. What people actually believe and the consequences of that belief is much more relevant as far as I am concerned. Anyone can apply a label to themselves but the label itself is meaningless. You believe that you have agency over a woman’s uterus whether she wants you to have agency or not. That makes her not an independent person but an entity subject to your will. The natural order for a woman before religion, law or the nation state evolved was that she was free to do whatever she wanted with her own uterus. Fast forward to the present day and the likes of you say no she is not free, I want to control the cells in her body. If you can’t even accept that people own their own cells, why would anyone expect you to expect any other respect any other rights? That makes you a totalitarian.

85. Richard W

You seem to contradict yourself at every turn. First you say that labels are meaningless then you go on to label me as totalitarian.
I am of the opinion that abortion is wrong other than saving a woman’s life. I am also of the opinion that a child inside the womb has as much a right to life as the woman who’s womb it is in. Are you really saying that a woman as the right to decide who comes into the world or not ? You keep stating that it is a woman’s choice. How many boyfriend’s force there girlfriends into having an abortion because the facility is there to do it ? How many young women have been forced into abortion by the narcissism of their parents ? In India 87% of abortions are of unborn girls. Most women never get to be born in India ! You label me a totalitarian control freak for having the utmost respect for the unborn child.
Let me remind you that the three most totalitarian states in the world Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia and China all encouraged,promoted and enforced abortion.

Are you really saying that a woman as the right to decide who comes into the world or not ?

I am. Till we leave the womb we are nought but parasites which a woman can choose to accept for nine months or deny and expel from her body. End of.

I said I did not believe in left and right labels. I see many people under the left label who are really conservative in their views. Folks on the right who witter on about liberty, but would deny people liberty over their own body. So labels do not impress me other than their usefulness in exposing hypocrisy. What people do is more important than what they claim to believe. No one is denying you the right to believe whatever you want to believe. However, you have no right to tell someone with a womb what to do with it. I label you totalitarian because you believe that you have the right to tell another person what they should do with their body. Forced abortions in totalitarian regimes is obviously wrong just as banning abortions is equally totalitarian.

@Cylux

” I would argue that calling women who seek abortions “sluts” and “trash” and doing so only for “convenience” is actually less misogynistic that what Richard has been throwing out into this comment thread.”

Cylux you seem to have pulled the above words out of your ass. Please state to were and when on this site I called women seeking abortions sluts and trash ? It is a pity that yourself and Richard W always base your arguments on erroneous supposition, and personal slurs and down right lies.

Again if you can supply the comment number were I called these women sluts and trash I would be most cordially obliged otherwise I will have no problem pointing out to people that you are a fucking liar !

Back of the net Richard lol.

@89 Er I didn’t write that you had called women sluts or trash, that was from anti-abortion women in the link I provided @33, what I did write, which you included in your post, was that what you were saying was actually worse than that.
So before you accuse me of being a fucking liar you might wish to gain some reading comprehension.

86 Richard

“Are you really saying that a woman as the right to decide who comes into the world or not ?”

Yes, that’s exactly what those opposed to your view are saying. Whether your objection is religious or not, the overwhelming majority of people no longer support your view. If you think a “child inside the womb has as much a right to life as the woman who’s womb it is in..” who makes the decision which one dies in those cases where the mother’s life is in danger? You? The doctors?

Even if you could answer that question to the satisfaction of those of us who oppose your view, do you have so little compassion that you would deny abortion to the victims of rape or abuse?

You claim you have the “utmost respect for the unborn child”, and use the examples of boyfriends pressurizing girlfriends, and parents pressurizing daughters… but do you think that in either case, illegal abortions will somehow not happen?

Your stance isn’t tenable, and has been (thankfully) been rejected by the majority of people because it is absolutist, and elevates your principle of “utmost respect” for the unborn child over the rights of the woman carrying the child.

I am happy to say Galen10 that it is you who are in the minority a 12% minority.

2008 UK BMA FUNDED POLL RESULTS ( ALL FEMALE POLE )
41% favored making abortion illegal with a few exceptions.
24% favored making abortion always legal
19% favored making abortion legal most of the time.
12% favored making abortion totally illegal.
Margin of error ±3% percentage points

” who makes the decision which one dies in those cases where the mother’s life is in danger? = I have made it abundantly clear when I stated in post # 40 “I totally agree that an abortion should be based solely on medical grounds regarding the physical well-being of the woman.”….. So wrong again.

To continue you state…..”but do you think that in either case, illegal abortions will somehow not happen?”….. NOWHERE DO I STATE THAT ILLEGAL DON’T HAPPEN….For a third time in one post you just like cylux and richard w have to revert to lies to justify your minority opinion.

@93. GRANDMALL

Who the FUCK said YOU could post pretending to be me TWAT !!!

@93 Grandmall

You obviosly have a problem with reading and comprehension, but also (from the way your post is put together) psychological problems too, since you appear to be trying to answer for Richard.

I’m with the 83% majority which supports a woman’s right to chose.

http://www.abortionrights.org.uk/content/view/218/106/

@ 93 Grandmall

Galen10 in a 12% minority? Read your survey results again. I think you’ll get a surprise.

95. Galen10

Yes Galen I am part of a non politicly correct minority. But women have a voice unborn children don’t.
Abortions today are extremely casual affairs. The proposed amendment to the abortion laws calls for a three day period between the woman being referred for the abortion and receiving it. It in no way or anywhere states that a woman’s right to choose be removed.
Abortion is a shocking experience both for mother and child.Surly contraception is by far the easiest way to deal with unwanted pregnancy.
Abortion should always be the exception.
Would you not agree with me that contraception is a better option than abortion ?

@97 Does your enthusiasm for contraception extend to the morning after pill? One of whose functions is to prevent the implantation of a fertilised egg.

@97 Richard

Yes of course I would accept that contraception is better than abortion.

However, the fact that I and most people in the 83% that support the availability of abortion would probably agree that it shouldn’t be used as a bith control method, doesn’t mean that we’re going to agree with proposals put forward by deeply unpleasant characters like Nadine Dorries, or others who hide an abolitionist agenda behind measures to tighten exiting regulations up.

You are a self confessed opponent of abortion in all but cases where the mother’s life is in danger, so forgive us if we are suspicious of the motives of someone who puts the rights of a blastocyst on the same level as those of a woman.

You say that “abortion should always be the exception”, but few people now agree with you. Indeed, even you don’t think it should ALWAYS be the exception, since you are prepared to countenance it in situations where the mother’s life might be at risk.

If you are prepared to agree to it in that situation, why would it be wrong to agree to it in instances of rape or abuse, where the mental health of the victim would be impacted by being forced to carry the foetus to term?

@ 99 Galen10

If he’s ok with abortion in cases where the mother’s life is in danger, that makes it pretty clear that he rates her rights higher. Possible loss of mother’s life is rated as more important than definite loss of z/e/f’s life.

@Galen10

“do you have so little compassion that you would deny abortion to the victims of rape or abuse?”

You seem to be obsessed with constructing a fiction around my honest and forthright argument. You will nowhere find that I said victims of rape and incest should be denied abortion. It’s not really an issue anyway as all victims of rape are offered the RU486l pill which is effective within hours of administration.

” Till we leave the womb we are nought but parasites which a woman can choose to accept for nine months or deny and expel from her body. End of.”

You must have shared the same biology teacher as Richard W gestating children are not parasitical. You obviously have an extremely low opinion of life when I see a pregnant woman I marvel at the beauty of pregnancy and womanhood and the child that is within. YOU SEE A FUCKING TAPEWORM OR TURD I will keep my morality and you can maybe go and find one !

100 Chaise

Well, no doubt Richard can speak for himself, but it would seem to me that his attitude to her rights depends on the situation, no?

Her rights are deemed more important than those of the z/e/f’s life only where her life might be considered in danger (and by the way, who decides in such cases if an abortion is allowable where there is some dispute as to the medical evidence…..?).

Otherwise in Richard’s view the rights of the z/e/f always over-ride those of the mother, including cases of rape and abuse, or presumably where tests showed that the z/e/f was suffering from e.g. an incurable and debilitating genetic disorder.

@ 101 Richard

“You will nowhere find that I said victims of rape and incest should be denied abortion. It’s not really an issue anyway as all victims of rape are offered the RU486l pill which is effective within hours of administration.”

Stop dodging the question; in situations where the morning after pill is not available, (there are lots of less developed parts of the world where it isn’t) would you still be arguing that a pregnancy could not be terminated in cases of rape or abuse?

“You obviously have an extremely low opinion of life when I see a pregnant woman I marvel at the beauty of pregnancy and womanhood and the child that is within. YOU SEE A FUCKING TAPEWORM OR TURD I will keep my morality and you can maybe go and find one !”

On the contrary, I have the highest regard for life. I think we can judge by your response what a piece of work you are Richard…. I’m certainly not about to be lectured in morals by someone like you. I just don’t believe that a fertilized bundle of cells automatically acquires rights. Whether you accept the Papal definition of when life begins for religious reasons or not is immaterial to me, but thankfully it is an argument you have comprehensively lost.

@ 102 Galen

“Her rights are deemed more important than those of the z/e/f’s life only where her life might be considered in danger (and by the way, who decides in such cases if an abortion is allowable where there is some dispute as to the medical evidence…..?).”

Good question, that.

“Otherwise in Richard’s view the rights of the z/e/f always over-ride those of the mother, including cases of rape and abuse, or presumably where tests showed that the z/e/f was suffering from e.g. an incurable and debilitating genetic disorder.”

Sure, but I don’t think it’s strange to consider the right to life as being more important than most other rights. Obviously this only applies if you think the z/e/f has a right to life in the first place.

@Richard passim:

Just picking up on a few points:

“Not that the method makes any difference they all cause unimaginable suffering to the child.”

Nope; the vast majority of induced abortions take place before the fetus is in any way aware.

“Wearing a condom is not [a rather costly and time consuming endeavour]”

“Abortions today are extremely casual affairs.”

“If tomorrow abortion were made illegal I would imagine a huge increase in the uptake and proper use of contraception.”

These quotes are where Richard’s misogyny comes through. He’s quite happy with a woman having sex – he’s not going to trash-talk her; but if she gets pregnant, whether because contraception fails or wasn’t used it is a simple fact that it is the woman who has to carry the child to term – and as pregnancy is far more dangerous to the woman than an induced abortion, that is more than an inconvenience; for some (c7-7.5/100,000) that is a death sentence. So it becomes the woman’s – not the man’s – responsibility to ensure contraception is used and effective.

“Abortion should always be the exception never the norm.”

The vast majority of abortions, of course, take place before the mother is even aware she is pregnant; and the vast majority of conceptions (75+% of them) end in abortion.

102. Galen10

“Richard’s view the rights of the z/e/f always over-ride those of the mother, including cases of rape and abuse,”

In my previous post before you wrote the above I categorically made the statement below.You have again constructed a fiction to bolster your weak case. Is it because you want to ” fit me in ” to your preconceived idea of what a pro-lifer is ?
I have no problems with pro-choice but I do have a huge problem with pro-abortion they are not one and the same thing.

“You seem to be obsessed with constructing a fiction around my honest and forthright argument. You will nowhere find that I said victims of rape and incest should be denied abortion. It’s not really an issue anyway as all victims of rape are offered the RU486l pill which is effective within hours of administration.”

I like to debate, but keep it real.

@Richard #101:

“You seem to be obsessed with constructing a fiction around my honest and forthright argument. You will nowhere find that I said victims of rape and incest should be denied abortion. It’s not really an issue anyway as all victims of rape are offered the RU486l pill which is effective within hours of administration.”

The morning after pill takes effect after conception but prevents implantation. If you believe that the human being begins at conception – do you? – then it is an abortifacient.

If you don’t believe that the human being begins at conception, then when does it begin? Was this leg [part of] a human being (don’t click if you’re squeamish):

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/12/17/tumor.php

Here’s the post that photo is linked to:

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/12/awesomely_horrible.php

@ 106 Richard

If I misrepresented your views, then I retract; but from your earlier posts it was a reasonable assumption given that you said abortion was wrong except to save the mother’s life. Your point about the RU4861 pill is not convincing; as noted above victims of rape or abuse are not invariably going to have access to it.

I have no pre-conceived notion about what a pro-lifer is, other than the fact they are in the wrong of course.

Since giving birth is potentially dangerous, whilst abortion is much less risky (I haven’t checked, but considering it is an out-of-hospital operation, it is presumably it the safest type of operations), if someone argues that abortion should only be allowed if the mother is at risk, is there not therefore an a priori case that abortion should always be allowed – by the time that pregnancy becomes an obvious potential danger to the mother in most cases, abortion (in terms of the normal procedure) is not an option, and invasive procedures would have to be used.

So, as long as abortion is safer than giving birth (which is likely, unfortunately, to be always…) then you cannot logically argue that a woman could not ask for an abortion simply because it is less dangerous.

103 Galen10

“I have the highest regard for life. I think we can judge by your response what a piece of work you are Richard”…this piece of work does not condone the maceration of living children within the womb…You Do. But of course they are ONLY parasites.

You have just stated that you have the utmost respect for life if you do why do you describe unborn children as parasites:

“we are nought but parasites which a woman can choose to accept for nine months or deny and expel from her body. End of.”

Imagine any woman reading your ascorbic comments who has lost a child. I would very much doubt that she felt she had got rid of a bunch of cells or parasite

Your above statement clearly shows that you have no respect for unborn children whatsoever. How you can reasonably expect people to believe that you have any respect for the institution of pregnancy when you regard children as parasites.

@ 109 Richard

I’ve never described them as such: you are attributing someone else’s comment @ 87 to me.

I support abortion, as do 83% of the population. I’d like to see it at the lowest possible levels, and carried out at the earliest possible point. I’m even prepared to entertain the notion that the number of weeks at which abortion is permitted should be reduced.

Waht I’m not prepared to do is take lectures from a pro-life ultra who can’t even be bothered to read up-thread to ensure he is ranting at the correct person.

From your hysterical reactions, I wouldn’t take anything you said at face value, particularly not your assessment of how women would feel about abortion. As I said above, I don’t much care whether your opposition is based on a made up religion, or just on your own personal code. It is however some comfort that your views are so out of step with society as a whole.

“Your point about the RU4861 pill is not convincing; as noted above victims of rape or abuse are not invariably going to have access to it.”

Again you construct a fiction. Please read the following words carefully the words I posted in # 106 :

“You seem to be obsessed with constructing a fiction around my honest and forthright argument. You will nowhere find that I said victims of rape and incest should be denied abortion.”

Now let me make this absolutely clear for the last time:

I BELIEVE VICTIMS OF INCEST AND RAPE SHOULD HAVE FULL AND UNRESTRICTED ACCESS TO ABORTION.

I hope this is a clear statement of my belief in cases of rape and incest.

@108. Watchman

Contraception is safer than abortion.

@111 Richard

I wasn’t constructing a fiction at all; you were obfuscating and avoiding the issue until called out for it. A simple statement earlier on would have sufficed.

110. Galen10

“I support abortion, as do 83% of the population.”

83% Are pro-choice not pro-abortion there is a huge difference. Where did you get your figures ? I would like to point out that I never use anti-abortion or pro-life data to source my figures.

Can point me to your data that says 83% of the population supports abortion or did you pull them out of your ass.

Er yeah Richard, it was me who compared foetuses to parasites (using the common technical understanding of an organism that impairs and feeds off of another organism) which if the pregnancy is unwanted they most certainly are.

If they are wanted however, that is a completely different story, even more so if the pregnancy was intended. But then, I think you already knew that.

Richard,

Contraception is safer than abortion.

Indeed. But since contraception is not 100% effective, and since you cannot ascertain whether a pregnancy is from failed contraception or simply lack of precautions, what relevance does this have? Unwanted pregnancies (i.e. those where the woman does not want to bear the risk of child birth) will always happen, because no system is infallible (all contraceptions require humans to act rationally and often require remembering dates or actions undertaken earlier – just what happens in the throes of passion). So the question of abortion is nothing to do with that of contraception – even the occaisionally heard opinion that abortion is a form of contraception is clearly wrong (and stupid) since for abortion is not undertaken to stop conception, but as a consequence of it…

110. Galen10

” I’ve never described them as such: you are attributing someone else’s comment @ 87 to me.”

Sorry Galen my whole rant was mostly a reaction to Cylux’s sick post calling unborn children parasites. I retract every unkind and untrue comment attributed to you;
again my profound apologies Richard.

I’m off to take a chill pill .

@114 Richard

I’m trying to find the original source for the 83% figure; in the meantime however whilst looking I found the following YouGov poll from May-Jun 2010, which gives figures of 46% believe abortion should always be legal, 46% beleive it should be legal in certain cases (92% in total) and 5% believe it should always be illegal.

http://today.yougov.co.uk/sites/today.yougov.co.uk/files/YG-Archives-Life-Abortion-03.06.10.pdf

This poll from 2005 gives a total of 85% (page 1) in favour of abortion, with 6%
thinking abortion should not be legal at all:

http://today.yougov.co.uk/sites/today.yougov.co.uk/files/YG-Archives-lif-dTel-AborEuthCloning-050830.pdf

The 83% figure was an NOP poll carried out in October 2007, reported in the Guardian here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/oct/24/politics.topstories3

I’m trying to find the original link via NOP without much success at present.

118. Galen10

No problem Galen the weight of figures is in your favour.
regards Richard.

119.@ Richard:No problem Galen the weight of figures is in your favour.
You are wrong richard the first survey says that 48% of people are against abortion not for it.Only 41% are for it and 11% dont know.Acording to galen10
YouGov / Daily Telegraph Survey Results
Should Abortion be free on demand in NHS
41% YES
48% NO
11% DON’T KNOW
galen says above show 89% in favour abortion***i make it 41% in favour
YouGov Survey Results
Sample Size: 7266
Fieldwork: 26th May – 1st June 2010
46% believe abortion should always be legal
46% beleive it should be legal in certain cases (92% in total)
5% believe it should be illegal
3% don’t know
galen says above show 92% in favour***i make it @ 46% he has added two different ansers and count them as one.the last is not survey it is a news artical and it says 83% in favour of choice it doz not say 83% in favour of abortion.

It’s the good old cross party Christian coalition at work again.

@ 6 & 7

With regard to Godwin’s Law, remember that this “law” was invented by an American whose intent was to try and show how serious Nazism was. He thought that people shouldn’t make jokes or casual references to Nazism because it was in poor taste. The clue is in the word “American” – our transatlantic cousins have a very different idea of humour to us – no American would ever have dreamed up Allo Allo, or the Fawlty Towers episode “The Germans”. Remember this next time “Godwin’s Law” is invoked.

@ 120 Damion

“Should Abortion be free on demand in NHS
41% YES
48% NO
11% DON’T KNOW
galen says above show 89% in favour abortion***i make it 41% in favour”

That’s people in favour of free abortion on demand, not just abortion. The “free” bit is very relevant here – that 48% against will include those who do not want abortion banned or restricted, but do resent it being funded out of taxpayer money. Pretty much anyone against socialised medicine is going to tick “no” there, regardless of their stance on abortion.

“YouGov Survey Results
Sample Size: 7266
Fieldwork: 26th May – 1st June 2010
46% believe abortion should always be legal
46% beleive it should be legal in certain cases (92% in total)
5% believe it should be illegal
3% don’t know
galen says above show 92% in favour***i make it @ 46% he has added two different ansers and count them as one.”

The phrase “46% beleive it should be legal in certain cases” is too vague to be much help either way, TBH.

“the last is not survey it is a news artical and it says 83% in favour of choice it doz not say 83% in favour of abortion.”

What do you mean by “in favour of abortion” here? I don’t think Galen’s saying abortion is a good thing, I think he’s arguing that keeping it legal is better than banning it. Which would make him pro-choice rather than pro-abortion.

Also, “pro-abortion” is often used as a derogative term for “pro-choice”. So I suspect most people use the terms synonymously (although they may prefer one or the other).

@ 121 Damion, rather

@121 Damion

In the June 2010 YouGov poll, it IS correct to say 92% of people polled supported abortion being legal (46% in all cases, 46% in certain cases). Only 5% felt it should always be illegal, and 3% didn’t know. So your claim that it is not valid to add the two together is false. I’d agree with Chaise that the wording “in certain cases” is more ambiguous than it could be, but the two 46% figures are for either/or choices, so a 92% figure is quite valid.

Your comment about the figures from the second poll is (as Chaise points out) not an indication that people are against abortion, it is that they are against it “on demand on the NHS”.

The NOP poll figure “showed 83% of the public believe it is a woman’s right to decide to have an abortion, with only 13% saying they thought a woman should not have this right”. I haven’t been able to find the direct NOP source, but it was widely reported at the time, and is used on the Abortion Rights website (naturally I would hardly expect pro-life or anti-abortion groups to be happy with that source, but they did commission the survey).

It might be a bit off-thread but is there a conflict between safeguarding the rights of a woman to terminate an unborn child. But condemning or objecting to state termination of people sentenced to death ?

@126 Richard

I don’t believe there is (although I would sy that wouldn’t I?).

The termination of an unborn child is not, as far as most who don’t oppose abortion are concerned, the same as executing an adult for a crime.

I would suggest there is more of a conflict for those who support the death penalty, and yet oppose abortion, particularly those who oppose it under any circumstances. I’m not saying that you hold that view, but the 2 often go hand in hand, particularly amongst born again right wing Americans.

@ 127 Galen

Meh. Pro-choicers justify being against the death penalty because keeping the felon alive doesn’t mean seriously restricting someone else’s right to self-determination, and possibly also because they don’t see the z/e/f as a being that is entitled to rights. Pro-lifers justify favouring the death penalty because the felon, unlike the z/e/f, has committed a serious crime of their own free will. I don’t think either side has to explain themselves here, both views are pretty logical.

@127

To see any parallel between a foetus in the womb and a born human being sentenced to death, you have to over look one rather significant factor: the will of the sentient woman whose body is sustaining the foetus’ existence.

Since a woman is not merely an incubator in a dress, it’s probably a good idea not to overlook this. It’s a dilemma, but in the end one that has to be resolved in favour of a person’s right to control their own body.

Sorry, that should have been @26.

@Richard

I grew weary reading through all the comments but one thing that struck me was your mention of the RU486l. Would victims of rape not be offered an emergency contraception rather than an ‘abortion pill’? I am no expert on biology (I think you and I are in the same boat there!) but I would have thought for the RU-486 to work it would need the embryo to have formed and been implanted.

Also, you dismissing the description of a foetus as a ‘parasite’. A parasite is: “An animal or plant that lives in or on a host (another animal or plant); it obtains nourishment from the host without benefiting or killing the host.” I think that is an apt description.

Having 4 children myself agreeing to the above doesn’t mean I love them any less, which seems to be what you have implied…..

131. Dave

As for your first point regarding the use of RU486 I have as I have stated soooo.. many times before I have no issue with a victim of rape or incest recieving RU486 or indeed an abortion as I tried to make clear in post # 112:

“Now let me make this absolutely clear for the last time:
I BELIEVE VICTIMS OF INCEST AND RAPE SHOULD HAVE FULL AND UNRESTRICTED ACCESS TO ABORTION.
I hope this is a clear statement of my belief in cases of rape and incest.”

I don’t think it could be any clearer !

As for a child being a parasite:

“A parasite is: “An animal or plant that lives in or on a host (another animal or plant); it obtains nourishment from the host without benefiting or killing the host.” I think that is an apt description.”

Do they actually teach biology in the UK ? A parasite is a animal of one species living as a host on another species. To say otherwise is not only incorrect but an insult to every pregnant woman out-there who by default your are saying they have contracted a nine month parasitical infection.
Also the worlds most prevalent parasitical infection does kill its host, Malaria !

I have children to and I would never look upon my daughters unborn child as a parasite !

127. Galen10

I would agree with you Galen, anyone who regards life as sacrosanct as I do should also on the same argument support the abolition of The Death Penalty or State Murder as I prefer to call it.
If anyone would like to help please go to the following Amnesty site and sign some on-line petitions and perhaps write some letters.

http://blog.protectthehuman.com/death-penalty-report/?utm_source=pure&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=death_penalty&utm_content=DP_blog

Richard,

Do they actually teach biology in the UK ? A parasite is a animal of one species living as a host on another species.

Richard, the definition of parasite nowhere requires another species – for example, newborn marsupials are classic parasites, being dependent on their mother. So by that logic all unborn children are parasites, if you consider that they have a right to live separate from their mother’s desires. It is only if you consider them part of the mother (and therefore her business, not yours) that you can argue they are non-parasitical.

It’s not nice or emotive language, but it is true. Sometimes the truth is a bit brutal you know…

http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Parasite
Parasite
Definition
noun, plural: parasites
An organism that obtains nourishment and shelter on another organism.
Supplement
Parasites can cause harm or disease to their host. They are generally much smaller than their hosts. Examples of parasites are tapeworms, flukes, lice, ticks, etc.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/parasite
: an organism living in, with, or on another organism in parasitism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasite
Parasitism is a type of symbiotic relationship between organisms of different species where one organism, the parasite, benefits at the expense of the other, the host.

http://www.answers.com/topic/parasite
Biology. An organism that grows, feeds, and is sheltered on or in a different organism while contributing nothing to the survival of its host.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/parasite
1. (Life Sciences & Allied Applications / Biology) an animal or plant that lives in or on another (the host) from which it obtains nourishment. The host does not benefit from the association and is often harmed by it

My favourite parasite is the toxo virus, whose main host is cats, but infects other mammals. In mice and rats it makes them suicidally brave when confronted with markers, like urine, that indicate a cat is nearby (the virus wants to get back into a cat, mouse getting eaten…).
In humans however it attempts the same brain reconfiguration but only succeeds in making the host generally reckless. Hence why hi-speed motorcycle accident victims tend to display toxo virus markers in their liver. If your the shy cloistered type, getting infected with toxo will make you a lot more bolshy and outgoing.

Yeah. Off topic.

The only reason I can see for referring to an unborn child as a parasite by those who are pro-abortion is that it dehumanises the unborn child as an object that is of little value or benefit. Lets not forget the populations of the US & UK are growing older every year. The effect of abortion not only has social,political and ethical consequences it has a huge demographic and economic ones. We have lost 6.8 million citizens to abortion in forty years not to mention the children that they would have produced over the past forty years. It can then come as no surprise to anyone that the only populations growing in the western world are those that actively discourage abortion…Islam. We are already facing 70 as a retirement age because of an ageing population. What will the future hold for our children ? How many of you would argue that messing about with GM crops is going against the order of nature ? We are the only high order species which actively and deliberately destroys our children in the womb and the only reason that it is done in the womb is because outside the womb it becomes a crime.

. It is no more entitled to life than a tick or tapeworm

136. Cylux

Toxoplasmosis does of course cause still birth and death in children !

@ 136 Richard

“How many of you would argue that messing about with GM crops is going against the order of nature ?”

Not me. If GM is against the order of nature, then so is fire, beer and penicillin. There isn’t actually some wonderful order of nature that must not be meddled with.

@136 Richard

“…. It can then come as no surprise to anyone that the only populations growing in the western world are those that actively discourage abortion…Islam.”

I’m not sure you can argue that Islamic attitudes to abortion are the reason (or even a very significant part of the reason) that their population is growing. The muslim birth rate is likely to decrease as the level of education amongst muslim women, and the general level of wealth in their community, increase.

@136 Richard

“How many of you would argue that messing about with GM crops is going against the order of nature ? We are the only high order species which actively and deliberately destroys our children in the womb and the only reason that it is done in the womb is because outside the womb it becomes a crime.”

Although many people are against GM, many others are not; human history has involved a lot of genetic modification of plants and animals to suit our purposes – the difference now is the ability to apply advanced science to the process. There are quite a few species that will re-absorb developing embryos in times of stress or food shortage, and others which will abort them; these aren’t conscious actions… but then we aren’t talking about the same level of sentience either.

Even those in favour of the right to abortion set some limit to it; there is in the eyes of most people all the difference in the world between aborting at an early stage, and doing it very late. Few (including even many convinced Catholics) now accept that the moment of conception represents the start of a life and is therefore sacrosanct. You obviously do think so, even if not for religious reasons, which is rather unusual…. but you are swimming against a very strong tide.

@137 It does, which is why if your going to deliberately infect yourself with it try not to be pregnant while doing so.

Richard,

The only reason I can see for referring to an unborn child as a parasite by those who are pro-abortion is that it dehumanises the unborn child as an object that is of little value or benefit.

To participate in the piecemeal destruction of your last post…

You are using the phrase unborn child. A foetus is not an unborn child, because it would not be a child if taken from the womb but a foetus (which without technology which is far more unnatural than GM crops would certainly not survive; even with it it is dependent on technology in a way children are not). Even if my use of parasite is designed to have an effect (in fact I use it, not being able to speak for others here, because it emphasises the unwilling relationship between foetus and host), so is your use of unborn child, which is to be honest much more emotionally effective.

But it might make you happy to know I do consider foetuses not to be human (yet). So maybe I am dehumanising. But only because I want to know what justification there would be for a human (if you consider a foetus as such) living off the efforts and resources of another human who has committed no crime but is still punished by having to support them.

Unless you consider getting pregnant a crime of course, when you could consider pregnancy as a punishment…

141. Galen10

“but then we aren’t talking about the same level of sentience either”.

If by that you mean we consciously destroy life as a deliberate act of the will then I agree.

” Even those in favour of the right to abortion set some limit to it; there is in the eyes of most people all the difference in the world between aborting at an early stage, and doing it very late.”

So many if not most of the pro-abortion views on this thread have stated un-equivalently that it is a woman’s choice as to if and when an abortion can take place. At what point do the unborn child’s rights begin, at 24 weeks. If you have a child born at 23 weeks it has a 68% chance of survival. Most hospitals in the UK are forbidden by law to save a child at 23 weeks. And the reason for this is that If we begin to save children at 23 weeks the pro-abortion lobby could not argue that life is only viable at 24+ weeks.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1211950/Premature-baby-left-die-doctors-mother-gives-birth-just-days-22-week-care-limit.html

Amillia Taylor born at 21 weeks and now five years old and very healthy. She was under seven ! inches long weighing in at just over 200g, Yes she was Very small but still Very Human.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1021034/The-tiniest-survivor-How-miracle-baby-born-weeks-legal-abortion-limit-clung-life-odds.html

Richard,

The pro-abortion consensus on this thread seems to be absolute, not time limited (which is anyway a concession to anti-abortion types). I would allow that after a certain point the child should be delivered if doctors thought it likely to be viable, but the parent should still be able to get rid of it when wanted. It is the mother’s own body, and if she does not wish to use it to be a mother, who are you to tell her different?

To return to my off topic moment, I feel I should also mention that the US military was and indeed is very interested in the discovery that the toxo virus causes humans to be significantly less fearful and more willing to put themselves into danger.
I can’t think why…

145. Watchman

“but the parent should still be able to get rid of it when wanted. It is the mother’s own body, and if she does not wish to use it to be a mother, who are you to tell her different?”

The word “parent” would seem to be a very tenuous use of the word here as is the word “Mother.” And of course with very few exceptions contraception tends to obliviate the need for abortion.

Ab obice saevior ibit…

141. Galen10

Genetic crossing and Genetic modification are two entirely different things.

Lion DNA & Tiger DNA = Liger ( Can be done in nature and still a cat )

Cabbage DNA & Fish DNA = GM Cabbage (Cant be done in nature. Ever seen a goldfish fuck a savoy ?)

@147 Don’t forget:
Tiger DNA & Lion DNA = Tigon. (Tigon is boy tiger and lioness, liger is boy lion and tigress)

@ 147 Richard

“Cabbage DNA & Fish DNA = GM Cabbage”

Wouldn’t that combination of DNA create a werefish? I’m pretty sure I read in the Mail that it would make a werefish.

@149 A werefish that causes and prevents cancer!

150. Chaise Guevara

Not falling for it Chaise lol

Slugs and snails never eat fish. They isolated the gene in the fish that repels slugs and spliced it to the cabbage. It has since been discovered that these cabbages offer
none of the anti-carcinogenic properties of regular cabbages. It also makes the cabbage subject to fungal infections it was previously immune to. Still on sale in the US though.

@ 150 Cylux

“A werefish that causes and prevents cancer!”

The way I remember it, the werefish feeds on little old ladies and war veterans. The state pays ex-cons £100,000 a month to catch the fish and turn them into halal werefishfingers. Which we hand out free to immigrants.

@135 Just noticed*, it’s only the Wikipedia description that makes a point of saying different species, the rest all say “different organisms” which a woman and foetus surely are.
And it is casual slips like that, that make Wikipedia somewhat unreliable as a definitive source.

*the links will have held the comment up in moderation.