here we go again...

[poetry_writer]

Fine. But in that case, an external ultrasound will give an adequate image. To mandate a transvaginal ultrasound for this purpose is nothing more or less than intimidation - it really does feel very akin to rape to have this test, very invasive and highly uncomfortable as well.

i once worked at a crisis pregnancy center (free pregnancy tests, help with parenting classes, baby clothes, doc visits) They got an ultrasound machine and gave people the choice to see it. you do NOT have to use a vaginal ultrasound to see the baby. Most who see it choose to not abort. In any other situation people demand that women "be informed!!!" ..but in this case.....people seem to prefer "ignorance is bliss". Pretend it doesnt look like a baby and call it a zygote. Of course the ultrasounds show otherwise which leads to a dilemna for those who are abortion minded. Its a fully formed baby with a beating heart that is often aborted.

[poetry_writer]

And maybe that is the crux. The right of some to dictate the choices of others. On the one hand, many think it perfectly all right that if an adult woman becomes pregnant ,either from failure of contraception, even rape, etc., although said woman has free access to all information about pregnancy and childbirth, she should be forced to......... Undergo counseling, wait for 24-48 hours, undergo an invasive probing of her vagina, complete with showing her the pictures of the zygote, complete with listening to its heartbeat, in order for her not to make a "wrong" choice, etc. Yet many of the same people who want to make sure women have ALL the information before they choose to complete a pregnancy, seem cheerfully willing for large numbers of already born children to make important choices that will affect their entire lives after being systematically prevented from experiences and knowledge THEY would need to make an actual informed decision.

Maybe it the ludicrous quality of this that stymies me.

To make an INFORMED choice maybe they need to see what it is they are carrying inside them. And no you do not have to use a vaginal ultrasound. INFORMED means just that..informed. What if a woman has an abortion without being informed and later comes across a picture of an ultrasound of the perfectly formed baby she has aborted? How do you think she feels then?

[Lainey]

poetry_writer: "...without being informed.." you're not her mommy or daddy. A woman, or man, get to make their own decisions in their lives. Whether they are happy with their decisions or regret their decisions, that's all on them.

[poetry_writer]

poetry_writer: "...without being informed.." you're not her mommy or daddy. A woman, or man, get to make their own decisions in their lives. Whether they are happy with their decisions or regret their decisions, that's all on them.

Indeed it is all on them. Thats why it needs to be a truly informed decision.

[redfox]

Pregnant women know what's inside of us. Doctors can give us whatever information we ask for. Each pregnant woman decides what she wants to know, from whom. It's called privacy & the right to decide for oneself. If a pregnant woman wants a TV ultrasound, she can ask her PCP. If she wants a religious opinion about her pregnancy, she can go to her trusted faith leader.

Maybe these menfolk who are all up in our business, and I mean that as it sounds, need to get legal permission to use their giggle stick when & how they want to. After all, they are half of the baby making process last time I checked.

Seriously time for a Lysistrata.

[bae]

I am as pro abortion as anyone, and as supportive on the far end continuum scale of life as anyone here, but I agree with you that there is an odd lack of balance on this website. It's IS ludicrous that no one speaks of the other lifeform, for lack of a better term, that looses in the abortion deal. There is a baby/zygote/mass of human cells/a life or whatever term you want to use, that is wiped out.

I am pretty much against abortion as a routine matter of course.

Also, I believe in considering the interests of all parties involved in a moral decision. In this case, both the mother and "fetus".

I'm also perfectly happy calling the "fetus" a "human" or "child" from the very instant of conception, for the sake of argument. And equally considering its interests in any analysis of its fate.

However, I think the mother's interests clearly outweigh those of the child until pretty darned far along in the gestation process, so I'm OK with the mother deciding that abortion is the way to proceed if she wishes. I'm fine with calling it killing, of a human being. It is regrettable IMHO, but not necessarily wrong. And in most cases, I wouldn't presume to decide when exactly it is wrong, or right, that's a decision best left up to the mother.

(Furthermore, I don't see a moral difference that allows me to treat a child's fate differently depending on the circumstances of its conception: rape, incest, birth control failure, unprotected sex, ... Its interests do not hinge on those circumstances, and I think they have no place in the analysis except as a distraction or excuse or rationalization.)

[poetry_writer]

I am pretty much against abortion as a routine matter of course.

Also, I believe in considering the interests of all parties involved in a moral decision. In this case, both the mother and "fetus".

I'm also perfectly happy calling the "fetus" a "human" or "child" from the very instant of conception, for the sake of argument. And equally considering its interests in any analysis of its fate.

However, I think the mother's interests clearly outweigh those of the child until pretty darned far along in the gestation process, so I'm OK with the mother deciding that abortion is the way to proceed if she wishes. I'm fine with calling it killing, of a human being. It is regrettable IMHO, but not necessarily wrong. And in most cases, I wouldn't presume to decide when exactly it is wrong, or right, that's a decision best left up to the mother.

(Furthermore, I don't see a moral difference that allows me to treat a child's fate differently depending on the circumstances of its conception: rape, incest, birth control failure, unprotected sex, ... Its interests do not hinge on those circumstances, and I think they have no place in the analysis except as a distraction or excuse or rationalization.)

You are fine with killing you said. What can one say to that?

[loosechickens]

I know a lot of prochoice people, and I am prochoice myself, but I have never met a single person I would describe as proabortion. Most people in the prochoice group would prefer abortion to be as rare as possible while remaining legal, by reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies, so it would seem if someone is truly appalled by abortions, they would be moving heaven and earth to prevent unwanted pregnancies themselves. Instead, many seem to put as many obstacles in the way as possible, from depending on abstinence only sex education for teenagers, which has proven to be ineffective, except in early teenaged years, DNA having a strong desire to replicate, and hormones being what they are, and preventing easy access to birth control, family planning education, etc.

Ideally, I think MOST of us, of whatever view, would like to see abortion unnecessary. And the way to reduce abortions is to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies. Why not work together with that for a goal.

It still comes down, poetry_writer, to you wanting women to have a "fully informed" choice, because you have a dog in the hunt and a specific decision that you want to see them make, and seem willing to enlist government into making sure that your view is forcefed those women. Informed choice IMPLIES choice, and women, as adults, are fully able to make their own decisions about informing themselves. They have access to all the information they need or desire without politicians and religious zealots forcing it on them. They don't need (mostly men) passing laws forcing intimidating and unwanted procedures and difficulties between them and their right to make decisions about their own reproductive lives.

To be willing to force unwanted procedures on adult women to make sure they have "all the facts", one must surely want young people in closed, religious sects that prevent them from having full information about the world to have "all the facts", too, so THEY could make informed decisions, right?

If it is the government's place to force information on some, then it must be appropriate for information to be forced upon others. You don't really get to pick and choose. Either you believe in personal freedom or not.

Of course abortion is a serious decision. I've always been grateful that it was a decision I was never forced to have to contemplate, and I've never known women to have taken it lightly. Every woman that I've known who has made the decision to abort considered long and hard, weighed competing rights, their own life situation, etc., and it was a wrenching decision.

[poetry_writer]

You certainly put plenty of words in my mouth loosechicken. In every other situation on the planet you DEMAND women be allowed to be informed. In this one, you shrivel up like its a dirty word. Every woman has to live with the choices she makes. Information is always good. Isnt it? only when you dont want to be informed cause to be so makes you very very uncomfortable. Better to be informed ahead of time than too late, isnt it.

[iris lily]

You are fine with killing you said. What can one say to that?

I agree with everything bae said, that's pretty much my position as well. It is killing, it is what it is.