Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site cmu-cs-cad.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxj!mhuxn!houxm!ihnp4!zehntel!hplabs!hao!seismo!rochester!cmu-cs-pt!cmu-cs-cad!mjc From: mjc@cmu-cs-cad.ARPA (Monica Cellio) Newsgroups: net.abortion Subject: Re: An abortion story Message-ID: <41@cmu-cs-cad.ARPA> Date: Mon, 3-Dec-84 18:19:12 EST Article-I.D.: cmu-cs-c.41 Posted: Mon Dec 3 18:19:12 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 6-Dec-84 05:36:09 EST Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI Lines: 43 Forgive me if a lot of what I am about to say is old; I'm new to this net. [Gerald Owens] > We normally restrict the criminal's right to control his >body to prevent him from harming others, for a fixed period of time, and >nobody objects. It's nine months of the woman's inconvenience vs. the >LIFE of another human being. Life is more valuable than property. If I have taken reasonable precautions (abstinense is not necessarily 'reasonable', though it is probably safe), I have done nothing wrong to cause me to become pregnant. Contrast this with a criminal, who has been convicted of doing some wrong and is thus being PUNISHED. Why should I be punished for something that might not be my fault? At least suspected criminals get a trial. As for the folks who contend that any pro-choice person is a raving murderer: If I am pregnant and don't want to be burdened with it (more on why this isn't merely an issue of 'convenience' in a minute), I feel I have the right to rid myself of the burden. Now, if you can devise some method of keeping the thing 'alive' after its removal, feel free to do so! If you can't, too bad. An unplanned pregnancy can do horrible things to a woman's life. In many cases her career is shot to hell, and if she's not married that probably means (1) she can't support the kid anyway (without a job) and (2) she may end up on welfare or some such in the process. All this without compensation for the time and work status she loses, compensation for the use of her body against her will, or indeed any effort whatsoever to repair the damage done by the government that would force her into the situation! Come now. Do you really think this is right? Is it any different from, say, telling a 16-year-old (either sex) that s/he has to give up everything and take care of baby brother because mom and dad died suddenly? (The person in question might do this anyway, of course, but what right have you got to force him/her?) When you're imposing your morality and causing harm in the process, you had better have better reasons than 'because I believe it is wrong'. -Dragon -- UUCP: ...seismo!ut-sally!ut-ngp!lll-crg!dragon ARPA: monica.cellio@cmu-cs-cad or dragon@lll-crg