Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site watmath.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!bstempleton From: bstempleton@watmath.UUCP (Brad Templeton) Newsgroups: net.women,net.politics Subject: Abortion is three issues, not one. Message-ID: <5475@watmath.UUCP> Date: Sun, 3-Jul-83 13:26:34 EDT Article-I.D.: watmath.5475 Posted: Sun Jul 3 13:26:34 1983 Date-Received: Sun, 3-Jul-83 23:50:30 EDT References: <415@umcp-cs.UUCP> Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario Lines: 42 I don't know if we want to go into this again, but I get tired of people thinking of abortion as a single issue. It is three distinct, and almost indepependant issues. The first one "Pro Life vs. Anti-Life" is really a non-issue. Just about everybody will say they are "pro life". Of course, just about everybody isn't purely pro-life since they (if they are still alive) believe it's ok to kill lower forms of life for food. Thus they draw a line somewhere. Then there is the pro/anti choice issue. That's the real issue if you want to talk about "Should abortion be legal?" In my opinion, no matter what the opinions are on the third issue I will list, the fact that there are large bodies of people for either side indicate that this is not the sort of thing you put into law. The issue is 100% a religious one (because it revolves on the "is human life sacred" question) based on intangibles and thus shouldn't be in law. The final issue is pro/anti abortion. This is the real issue if you want to talk about "Is abortion right?" If you want to talk morals, fine, but don't confuse them with law. Although most people will claim they are pro-life, the other two issues are somewhat independant. For example, you can be pro choice and pro abortion, in which case you think that abortions are ok and people should have the right of choice in religious issues. Likewise you can think that people should have the choice, but that abortion is wrong and not for you. Further we have a fairly small group of people who don't believe in rights but think abortion is ok. Finally there are those who think that abortion is bad and should be illegal. While two of these camps are large the pro-choice/anti-abortion camp is fair sized as well, but just not that vocal on the issue. This should show people that there are several issues here. As to the morals debate? We've taken this dead horse and draw, quartered, hung, burned and flogged it into its component atoms. Nobody gets convinced by this and almost everybody has heard the arguments. Let's not get into it again. -- Brad Templeton - Waterloo, Ont. (519) 886-7304