The Gaming Den

What options does anyone in the US have anyway? You are born to work until you die for banks to make money, while you barely live.

With that in mind, women should want abortions to prevent bringing more people into the world to suffer what they are going through.

People interviewed on local news last night said they understand that there isn't enough to go around, but everyone still has to have kids, because someone will figure out how to make it work.

People already did figure out how to make it work, and it has been being screwed up since Regan.

Vnonymous wrote:I personally wonder why Tzor cares about this sort of thing because abortion availability is an issue that's never going to affect him ever at all.

WTF? Doesn't affect me? Fucking shit, ever since Roe v Wade, the Ponzi Scheme that is Social Security has been revealed for what it is and every damn supporter of my retirement has been killed. I’ll be working until I’m 83 thanks to these baby killers.

(OK I’m not really serious here.)

Better not be, for the last twenty years Social Security has been taking in more than it has been paying out.

So that basically means that the entire program 'cost' a tiny amount in real dollars at several decades' apart points over the last eighty years.



-Crissa

Vnonymous wrote:I personally wonder why Tzor cares about this sort of thing because abortion availability is an issue that's never going to affect him ever at all.

That line of reasoning doesn't really hold water, unless we are to become selfishly apathetic bastiches only concerned with our own personal rights.

Anyone should be able to object to an unjust law, even if it will never apply to themselves directly.

If I am not allowed to get upset at women being killed by the enforcement of anti-abortion laws, then it stands that I am also not allowed to get upset at the unconstitutional imprisonment of muslim americans as I would not be directly affected by those either.

You know, there actually are measures that reduce abortion rates. Making them illegal just isn't one of them. The thing that works best? Sex ed.

Sadly, those who are opposed to abortion have significant overlap with those who are opposed to sex ed.

Crissa wrote:Better not be, for the last twenty years Social Security has been taking in more than it has been paying out.

Yes, but that is only because in 1945 a gap in births caused by WWII was made up, with a gusto, by returning veterans who were given really good perks by a grateful government. This "Baby Boomer" generation drove the entire Ponzi scheme of Social Security. This was, however a short lived condition because it was followed by the conception generaion immediatey afterwards. These baby boomers are now reaching retirement age and they don't have a larger boom behind them. Bust is inevitable.

All that surplus went to the General Fund of the Federal Congress, who "borrowed" from the fund. Social Securtiy is filled with IOU notes from congress. As the late Senator Moyahan once called it, this is embezzlement, pure and simple and the only reason why congress isn't in jail is because it writes the laws so none of them actually apply to congress.

angelfromanotherpin wrote:Sex ed.

I have real serious misgivings over the current state of Sex Education. Then again, I have a lot of serious misgivings over the current state of education lately, so if includes that of sex education it should come as no surprise.

In one sense sex education needs to be a two pronged approach because it is the parents who are the first line of education and influence for children. Much in the same way that the best way to keep children from drugs also involves active parents who are open in dialogue with their children.

High school kids (and younger) are causing themselves more problems with tanning salon abuse than with sex, you need a holistic approach.

I really find the "stay away from drugs" drivel amazing.

tzor wrote:...but that is only because in 1945 a gap in births caused by WWII was made up...

Once again, you're an idiot. What, did people born in 1946 only start paying into Social security when they turned forty?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Sec ... _the_1980s

Idiot. Yeah, the surplus has been looted to make the deficit look better. But investment and high incomes are completely immune to payroll taxes (which is why the 10 million wage earner actually pays less % than the 100 thousand wage earner).

-Crissa

I like how Tzor made an entire post about sex ed in which he didn't even mention once that people should be taught sex ed, and in fact, pulled out that "Don't teach my kids in school, it's a personal matter" bullcrap too.

Haven't had any internets drama in while, so here are some fun facts:

--The World Health Organization (yes, the UN's WHO) estimates that 70,000 women die each year for lacking access to legal abortions.

--In the 24 years that Romania outlawed abortion, it is estimated that 2 million women died from attempting "home-made" abortions.

--There has been a strong correlation that shows that legalizing abortion reduces crime rates at a disproportionate rate, most likely because women least able to provide a nurturing environment are most likely to have abortions.

Basically, pro-life as a position is about promoting death. A woman can have a dozen abortions and still have a dozen kids (though unlikely), but they prefer that these women die instead of having children when they can provide a stable home for their offspring. Its a morally undefendable position.

The conservative movement loves hating abortion and hates health care because of the very reason that Tzor pointed out: more old people and not enough children in your society bones the very Ponzi scheme that is Capitalism, and conservatives are all about taking care of the rich and making sure that a few people are rich and most people are poor (and that's why no one respects them).

K wrote:--There has been a strong correlation that shows that legalizing abortion reduces crime rates at a disproportionate rate, most likely because women least able to provide a nurturing environment are most likely to have abortions.

My wife told me she read something similar somewhere. The book noted a noticeable drop in crime something like 15-20 years after abortion was made legal. The idea was this time period would have been when another wave of unwanted kids would be becoming teenagers and getting into trouble.

The conservative movement loves hating abortion and hates health care because of the very reason that Tzor pointed out: more old people and not enough children in your society bones the very Ponzi scheme that is Capitalism, and conservatives are all about taking care of the rich and making sure that a few people are rich and most people are poor (and that's why no one respects them).

The aforementioned oligarchy I was speaking about. . .
If not capitalism then what? Communism fails for the same reason...

All of these things fail for the same reason... human greed.
Which seems to be an ni-infinite resource.

Kaelik wrote:I like how Tzor made an entire post about sex ed in which he didn't even mention once that people should be taught sex ed, and in fact, pulled out that "Don't teach my kids in school, it's a personal matter" bullcrap too.

Sometimes I forget to say the obvious because it is obvious. People should be taught sex education in school. There is a question of the nature of sex education and the scope of sex education. Because there is a moral element to sex education and because the parents are still the legal guardians and the primary supervisory force in their lives so the parents need to be involved in this education as well. (This doesn’t just apply to sex education by the way and it applies from Kindergarten to High School and the only reason why it doesn’t apply to College is because the kids are living in a dorm and not at home.)

I remember when I first had sex education, which was probably a little too early for me. We were given a film to watch along with a parent (boys had their fathers, girls had their mothers … but this was back in the middle 70’s). We were also allowed to view the film for the opposite gender. Both my father and I agreed that the presentation film for the girls was much more informative. (But still lacking in real information.)

Biology is not a “personal matter,” ignorance is not always bliss (which is why you do teach your children early not to play with matches and what the proper uses of matches are and how to safely use a match). The problem comes into the field of morality, some parents raise their kids to become boy scouts and others don’t. (I’m still using the match analogy here as boy scouts are more likely to use matches … to ignite a fire starter to slide down a rope to the pile of logs doused in all manner of horrid petroleum products, and non boy scouts probably use electric candles for romantic encounters. You have to consider both sides.)

K wrote:--The World Health Organization (yes, the UN's WHO) estimates that 70,000 women die each year for lacking access to legal abortions.

Well, it’s well known that the WHO is just a puppet of the UN designed to … I’m digressing aren’t I?

First and foremost, I think I’ve mentioned that I live in New York, the abortion capital of the United States. My attitude towards abortion is therefore different from others. We are so far pro-abortion that the happy medium seems like a distant unreachable horizon, never mind anything distantly reasonable.

Second, I never guess, I look it up. WHO: Pregnancy links

Every minute, at least one woman dies from complications related to pregnancy or childbirth – that means 529 000 women a year. In addition, for every woman who dies in childbirth, around 20 more suffer injury, infection or disease – approximately 10 million women each year.

Five direct complications account for more than 70% of maternal deaths: haemorrhage (25%), infection (15%), unsafe abortion (13%), eclampsia (very high blood pressure leading to seizures – 12%), and obstructed labour (8%). While these are the main causes of maternal death, unavailable, inaccessible, unaffordable, or poor quality care is fundamentally responsible. They are detrimental to social development and wellbeing, as some one million children are left motherless each year. These children are 10 times more likely to die within two years of their mothers' death.

Yes that 70,000 seems a lot (they said “unsafe” not “illegal” on their page) but it does reflect only 13% of all the deaths per year.

The WHO Department of Making Pregnancy Safer (MPS) helps to improve maternal health, assists countries to ensure skilled care before, during and after pregnancy and childbirth and strengthen national health systems in order to achieve Millennium Development Goals 4, 5 and 6. The main goal is to reduce newborn mortality and maternal mortality significantly by 2015.

There is far more to the problem than the question of the legal status for all types of abortions. (For the record, I oppose the illegalization of abortion for any reason with the same fervor that I oppose the blanket above the law constitutionally sacred attitude that we currently have in New York.)

The Conservative Moment (not to ever be confused with religious conservatism because they can't move themselves out of a paper bag) is and has always been centered upon personal empowerment, while the Progressive Movement is and always been centered upon collective empowerment through the collective hierarchy. Thus the former is always bottom up in empowerment while the latter is top down in empowerment.

It has nothing to do with the rich or poor. It is all about empowerment and at what level that empowerment occurs.


(Note after triple checking this I realized I didn't put the 't on can't)

Happy medium? What the fucking hell?

Let me tell you a story. Today we had pathology, which meant that we went into the autopsy room and went through the bodies we had there. And today we had four bodies to look at, which is high, normally we only have one or two. And one of them was from a late term abortion. Seriously. The body of a 39 week old fetus was being examined and today I got to examine it some as well.

Here's what happened: the fetus got kinked in its own umbilical cord and died from hypoxia a little more than a week before the mother was due. Which meant that instead of delivering a healthy baby, she had dead tissue inside her that was starting to go off. So the pregnancy was aborted.

Got that? When you bitch and whine and moan about late term abortions, that is the kind of story where you are questioning the morality of the potential mother and the doctors involved. That is the face of late term abortion, you unfeeling monster. Not some crazy hypothetical scenario involving people growing a healthy fetus for eight whole months just to stab it for Satan at the final moment.

There is no happy medium or middle ground. People who are asking for late term abortions are doing so because they are in the middle of a fucking tragedy, and the last thing they want or need is to have some evil fucking "pro lifers" call them murderers while they are going through that. Abortion needs to be on demand. No exceptions. No weaseling. No nonsense. No compromise. It's a fucking medical procedure, and if you get in the way you are a fucking monster.

Frank

tzor wrote:(For the record, I oppose the illegalization of abortion for any reason with the same fervor that I oppose the blanket above the law constitutionally sacred attitude that we currently have in New York.)

Mind if I probe into this a bit, Tzor? In your opinion, when is it OK to have an abortion? I recall you mentioning rape in the past, and also - I believe - incest. Am I remembering correctly? I also recall you tossing out "health of the mother" in the past. Is my memory good there? My hunch is we're all in agreement here, and that these are viable reasons.

OK, so... does "health of the mother" include Frank's scenario? Putting Frank's scenario in more generic terms: if it can be medically proven that the fetus is already dead, is it - in your opinion - OK to abort, even if the pregnancy is well into the 3rd trimester? My hunch here is that we're again in agreement.

What if the parents (mother and father) have been educated on the side-effects of abortion and alternatives such as adoption, but still make the choice that abortion is right for them? This is, I think, where we're going to digress. But I'd like to verify that.

Frank, you are the one in fucking hell, and you should fucking know better. You cite a single case as though it was the fucking norm, as though all late term abortions are done on brain dead or already dead fetuses.

Late-Term Abortions are Never Necessary: Former Abortionist

Referring to a statement by Ron Fitzsimmons, executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, who admitted in 1997 that the vast majority of partial-birth abortions were performed on healthy mothers and babies, Dr. Davenport explains that "contrary to the assertion of abortion rights supporters that late- term abortion is performed for serious reasons, surveys of late abortion patients confirm that the vast majority occur because of delay in diagnosis of pregnancy. They are done for similar reasons as early abortions: relationship problems, young or old maternal age, education or financial concerns."

I’m sorry, but if you are going to start insisting that all late term abortions are done only on already dead fetuses, you better put up or shut up.

FrankTrollman wrote:It's a fucking medical procedure, and if you get in the way you are a fucking monster.

A Lobotomy is a fucking medical procedure also.

Zherog wrote:Mind if I probe into this a bit, Tzor? In your opinion, when is it OK to have an abortion? I recall you mentioning rape in the past, and also - I believe - incest. Am I remembering correctly? I also recall you tossing out "health of the mother" in the past. Is my memory good there? My hunch is we're all in agreement here, and that these are viable reasons.

OK, so... does "health of the mother" include Frank's scenario? Putting Frank's scenario in more generic terms: if it can be medically proven that the fetus is already dead, is it - in your opinion - OK to abort, even if the pregnancy is well into the 3rd trimester? My hunch here is that we're again in agreement.

What if the parents (mother and father) have been educated on the side-effects of abortion and alternatives such as adoption, but still make the choice that abortion is right for them? This is, I think, where we're going to digress. But I'd like to verify that.

First of all, if it can be proven that the fetus is already dead, then there is no moral dimension to the question whatsoever. It becomes a technical question of which procedure is the least harmful to the woman. If it can be proven that the fetus is brain dead, the same argument could be applied as well. This is the exception, not the norm.

Rape and incest are special cases, but they are special cases because of the psychological trauma involved (like any abortionist actually cares … but I digress). I am not convinced that the first thing such a traumatized person needs is a highly invasive medical procedure. It also goes right to the argument that no one should be punished for the crimes of their parents. Just because your biological father raped your biological mother is no reason you should be sentenced to death without appeal. I would be more willing to accept these conditions as long as there is reasonable effort made to come up with better alternatives.

The “health of the mother” is an easily abusable term. You need to have serious and significant repercussions to the woman’s health, stretch marks, for example, just won’t cut it, and more importantly, there can be no other viable alternative that could save the life of the preborn. If both a c-section and a partial-birth-abortion procedure are both viable, the choice is a no-brainer.

If the parents (particularly the woman) is educated about all aspects of the pre-born, the procedure and all alternatives and after careful consideration (not being pushed to make a rash decision) chooses abortion; that is still a moral wrong. All things considered, given the nature of reality and the real world, that is a scenario that is far better than what we have today in New York.

Tzor, if you're right and I had been aborted, I'd be in Purgatory right now. Instead, I get to look forward to an eternity in hell. Why is that better?

Since the majority of all people are going to hell, abortion is kind of a 'get out of jail free card'. Sure, the doctor goes to hell, but they're sacrificing their soul for the greater good of all those babies--any martyrdom is a great Christian tradition. Some people even believe that aborted babies go to Heaven, in which case it's obviously the kindest thing to do; in fact, every child should be aborted. Anything else would be unchristian.

tzor wrote:The Conservative Moment (not to ever be confused with religious conservatism because they can't move themselves out of a paper bag) is and has always been centered upon personal empowerment, while the Progressive Movement is and always been centered upon collective empowerment through the collective hierarchy. Thus the former is always bottom up in empowerment while the latter is top down in empowerment.

It has nothing to do with the rich or poor. It is all about empowerment and at what level that empowerment occurs.


(Note after triple checking this I realized I didn't put the 't on can't)

I'm sorry, but you don't know what you are talking about. Do a quick poll of the issues that conservatives care about, and you'll find that they overwhelmingly help the rich.

Here's three:

--Public option health care: not having it hurts the poor, and helps the rich who own stock in health insurance companies (one of the last few blue chips in the market).

--Taxes. Lowering taxes helps the poor very little, but helps the wealthy immensely. Sometimes, conservatives just skip the poor entirely for trickle down economics and just cut the taxes on the rich.

--Sex and education: conservatives are against sex ed, abortions, and want religion to be a major part of school education (creationism as an example). Combined, these policies promote a stable underclass of people too poor and too stupid to advance. (And yes, wealthy people can afford to get their abortions in more enlightened nations).

But yeh, self-empowerment as a personal philosophy is merely selfish and shallow, and it puts you in the same boat as Satanists (the real ones, and not the Christian boogie-men).

As a political philosophy, it is actually Evil with a capital "E". Welcome to Team Evil, Mr. "I don't care if 70,000 women a year die because its just a statistic."

Good grief. Lifesite news spoutings from 1997? WTF?

Can you get anything from a reputable source? No? Why am I not surprised?

Look, it's very simple: research moves faster than politics does. Charges of medical misconduct can be made on anyone, and people familiar with the subject judge the merits of those allegations. Dr. Tiller was accused of misconduct by the anti-abortionists, and the medical boards investigated - and found that Tiller had indeed acted reasonably. The system works.

What doesn't work is asking the legislatures to approve individual procedures on a case by case basis. Senators are not medical practitioners in the majority of cases, and even the ones that are are out of the loop and unfamiliar with the latest research data. You don't make laws that medical procedures are illegal except in specific instances that the legislature has thought of and written down - the future is a big place, and they have no idea what is and is not going to be medically advisable.

If we left it to legislatures to decide what medical procedures we do in individual cases, lobotomies would still be common practice. As is, lobotomies are still used, just very rarely and as part of ongoing epilepsy treatments. The fact that lobotomies are rare is not a legal issue, it's a medical research issue. We in the medial profession have decided based on evidence that performing lobotomies is in most cases a bad idea. And if someone took it upon themselves to perform one over something as stupid as behavioral problems, a medical malpractice board would be very wroth.

But the problem with your argument tzor, is that medical malpractice boards aren't on board with your "don't let people do abortions" plan. Because: get this: abortions are not malpractice. Get that through your head: we do abortions. People who have studied the issue very carefully and looked at all the data perform abortions. And then other people who look over their data and their work nod approvingly. And you know why? Because it has been demonstrated to have positive outcomes you fucking monster, that's why!

-Username17

tzor wrote:

Zherog wrote:Mind if I probe into this a bit, Tzor? In your opinion, when is it OK to have an abortion? I recall you mentioning rape in the past, and also - I believe - incest. Am I remembering correctly? I also recall you tossing out "health of the mother" in the past. Is my memory good there? My hunch is we're all in agreement here, and that these are viable reasons.

OK, so... does "health of the mother" include Frank's scenario? Putting Frank's scenario in more generic terms: if it can be medically proven that the fetus is already dead, is it - in your opinion - OK to abort, even if the pregnancy is well into the 3rd trimester? My hunch here is that we're again in agreement.

What if the parents (mother and father) have been educated on the side-effects of abortion and alternatives such as adoption, but still make the choice that abortion is right for them? This is, I think, where we're going to digress. But I'd like to verify that.

First of all, if it can be proven that the fetus is already dead, then there is no moral dimension to the question whatsoever. It becomes a technical question of which procedure is the least harmful to the woman. If it can be proven that the fetus is brain dead, the same argument could be applied as well. This is the exception, not the norm.

I'll skip your last statement, because I'm not well-versed enough in the statistics to know if it's accurate, and I lack the time and energy necessary to delve into it via Google. The bottom line is that in this scenario you're OK with terminating a pregnancy, even if it technically causes the death of the fetus.

Rape and incest are special cases, but they are special cases because of the psychological trauma involved (like any abortionist actually cares … but I digress).

Don't digress, you only end up painting a whole class of people with broad brush strokes when you do.

I am not convinced that the first thing such a traumatized person needs is a highly invasive medical procedure.

While I get the point you're trying to make, I'll counter with what I said earlier in this thread: it's not your decision, it's the woman's. She's the one who has to carry the baby, not you. She's the one who has to be reminded of the violence against her with every check up at the ob-gyn, not you. She's the one who has to suffer morning sickness as a result of the parasite living in her uterus, not you. If her decision is to terminate the pregnancy, I'm totally down with her making that decision - because it's hers to make.

It also goes right to the argument that no one should [not] be punished for the crimes of their parents. Just because your biological father raped your biological mother is no reason you should be sentenced to death without appeal. I would be more willing to accept these conditions as long as there is reasonable effort made to come up with better alternatives.

(I'm pretty sure you intended the word "not" to appear there. If not, let me know and I'll remove my edit from your quote. )

I think it's probably fair to say that every woman knows there's three basic options:

1) Keep the baby
2) Give birth and give the baby up for adoption
3) Abort the pregnancy

Even with the three basic options, I think it's reasonable for a counselor working with the rape victim to bring up all three choices. But again, you or I don't get to decide what she chooses. Because we have penises rather than vaginas, we'll never know (thankfully) what the situation is like. We have no way of knowing the stress, the hate, the shame, and whatever other factors weigh on an individual.

The “health of the mother” is an easily abusable term. You need to have serious and significant repercussions to the woman’s health, stretch marks, for example, just won’t cut it, and more importantly, there can be no other viable alternative that could save the life of the preborn. If both a c-section and a partial-birth-abortion procedure are both viable, the choice is a no-brainer.

I think any doctor who attempts to argue that stretch marks are a serious threat to the mother's life should have his/her license revoked and his/her head shoved up his/her asshole. That's a ludicrous statement. We've also already set aside cases where the fetus is dead. So that's a non-issue.

Now, my personal viewpoint is that if the choice is "C-Section or abort" I'd want the woman to choose C-section. But I'll say it again: in my opinion, it's not my choice to make. It's the mother's.

If the parents (particularly the woman) is educated about all aspects of the pre-born, the procedure and all alternatives and after careful consideration (not being pushed to make a rash decision) chooses abortion; that is still a moral wrong. All things considered, given the nature of reality and the real world, that is a scenario that is far better than what we have today in New York.

So, in the end, what you really favor is better education. I can get behind that. Give the patient the facts and let her decide is a grand plan. Unfortunately, it's not the plan of most pro-life folks, who seek to remove abortion as a legal option.

tzor wrote:Frank, you are the one in fucking hell, and you should fucking know better. You cite a single case as though it was the fucking norm, as though all late term abortions are done on brain dead or already dead fetuses.

Late-Term Abortions are Never Necessary: Former Abortionist

Referring to a statement by Ron Fitzsimmons, executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, who admitted in 1997 that the vast majority of partial-birth abortions were performed on healthy mothers and babies, Dr. Davenport explains that "contrary to the assertion of abortion rights supporters that late- term abortion is performed for serious reasons, surveys of late abortion patients confirm that the vast majority occur because of delay in diagnosis of pregnancy. They are done for similar reasons as early abortions: relationship problems, young or old maternal age, education or financial concerns."

Again, those reasons and justifications are totally acceptable because fetuses aren't people and don't matter in comparison to the wants and needs of the woman carrying them.