A Win for Those Opposing Abortion

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Of course not. You believe that's true, I believe that's true, and many other believe that's true. However, allow me to reiterate my previous point:

EDIT:

Who knows? That's the question that nearly everyone faces with the abortion issue. Unless you think that abortion should be banned in all instances or if you feel abortion should be on demand as after-the-fact birth control, you're going to run into this wall eventually. And that's why we have the debate going on. Hardly anyone is on one extreme or the other, but the problem is where between the two extremes do you want to draw the line? - and a very blurry line at that.

[ April 18, 2006, 21:42: Message edited by: Aldeth the Foppish Idiot ]

 

Actually, a lot of people are on both ends of the extreme.

 

^In terms of absolute number, yes, there are probably millions on one extreme or the other. However as a relative percentage of the population, I'd like to think that they probably represent no more that 1/4 or 1/3 of the total population. Meaning, by contrast, 2/3 to 3/4 of the population (or 2 to 3 times as many) are somewhere in the middle.

 

NOG: there are less at the extremes than you think. There really aren't very many people getting worked up about 3rd trimester abortions. Most people feel it's wrong, whether pro-life or pro-choice. Few people are getting worked up about the morning after pill because, at the stage it is used, the body is actually more likely to reject than take the embryo as it is. The morning after pill just hedges the bet. Most people, if asked about abortion in the first month of pregnancy, have a harder time getting worked up over it, since we know that the developing child has no brain function whatsoever. For most people this issue is very grey.

 

It just sounded like he was saying the extremes were small enough to discount, but they are far from it.

 

I didn't mean for it to sound that way. Obviously, every individual should have equal say in this issue. However, for me, it seems like the people at the extremes are the ones that are talking the loudest, so I think they get more attention than their actual numbers should indicate they get.

It's what Drew is saying - how many people support 3rd trimester abortions? Probably less than 5% of the population. Likewise, I don't think there's many more than that who oppose the morning after pill.

 

Perhaps more moderate people in the debate don't concernthemselves enough to talk about it, so we on the extremes would gladly take up their unused time on the issue.

Even in rape and incest, those decisions would be made one way or the other long before that point.

 

I think the number of people opposing the morning after pill, while a minority, is much higher than you think. Catholics, for example, are typically opposed to all forms of birth control. While most American Catholics yawn about the use of most birth control by members outside of the church (since it actually stops conception instead of terminating it), they have a tendency to view the morning after pill as something different (since it causes the body to reject what could have been a viable embryo). Catholics likely make up a large percentage of pro-life activists.

 

While I agree that many pro-life activists are Catholics, it's really only the hard core ones that have a problem with really any kind of birth control - regardless of whether it stops implantation or prevents conception. My wife's family is Catholic too, and all of her married sisters use birth control - it's not even an issue. So yeah, if you walk to party line, if you're Catholic you're not supposed to use birth control that prevents implantation, and also not use the morning after pill, but for most Catholics that I'm aware of, we really don't care what the pope says on the issue.

Still I will concede that the percentage may be over 5%. While Catholics are by no means a majority in the U.S. (Protestants are) their number are certainly way larger than 5%.

Agreed. For rape and incest, if you want an abortion, there's no need to have to wait until the 3rd trimester.