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From: twiss@stolaf.UUCP (Thomas S. Twiss)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Gerald Owens on Liz Allen's Story (long, sorry again)
Message-ID: <2234@stolaf.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 4-Dec-84 00:54:20 EST
Article-I.D.: stolaf.2234
Posted: Tue Dec  4 00:54:20 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 5-Dec-84 01:16:53 EST
Organization: St. Olaf College, Northfield MN
Lines: 80

>	Thanks, liz, for confirming the existence of that
>videotape that I had heard only rumors about.  It was about
>time somebody used modern technology to lay to rest some of the
>preconceived notions of what goes on in the womb that early.

	As we have been discussing, this narrative was anything but
objective.  It didn't destroy any preconceived notions, it merely
perpetuated a very subjectively defined set of them.

>I hope soon that somebody will couple the sound picture with an
>encephalogram (sp?) of the unborn child's brainwaves to decisively
>lay to rest the question of fetal pain (although if a fetus tries to
>scream in amniotic fluid and isn't heard, and someone then asserts
>that the fetus doesn't feel pain, then I guess we know where they stand
>on the old question of the tree falling in the forest with nobody to
>hear it.)

	How can you be sure that the encephalogram won't show
conclusively that the fetus is NOT feeling pain.  You have a
preconceived notion of fetal pain and you expect science to confirm it.
That's ridiculous.

>	However, what facinates me are the mental and verbal gyrations
>of the pro-choice netters.  If it wasn't so tragic, I would have requested
>that the postings be moved to net.jokes.  The complaint about the
>sensationalism of the posting (and indirectly, of the videotape that
>it was a report of), was conveniently absent during the vietnam years,
>when the faithful media brought the war to the 6 o'clock news.  My suspicion
>is that they know what would happen if actual abortions were given equal
>time with dead and dying GIs.

	Unfortunately I am too young to remember clearly the coverage of
Vietnam (uh oh, here come the flames saying that I'm too young to
comment responsibly!  Wait, let me get my asbestos on!!).  But I fail to
see the comparison.  Unless the news clips were equally
sensationalistic, then there is absolutely no comparison.  If they really
were unnecessarily sensationalistic, then you have admitted your own guilt by
saying that the abortion clip was as bad as the Vietnam coverage.  It
doesn't justify the abortion clip, it merely shows that it was indeed
sensationalistic.  Either way, your comparison is invalid.

>	We should, of course, consider ALL the consequences of showing this
>tape.  Recent discussions about a certain famine in Ethiopia, and how
>the children should be "taken care of", should alert us to the fact
>that the more successfully we present our case, the more we force SOME
>of our opponents to adhere more logically to their own arguments.

	You said it, I didn't!  If you want to accuse your opponents of
becoming more logical each time you present you case, then go right
ahead!  I proudly plead guilty!!!

>Especially
>when they haven't come up with a blockbuster of an argument like this
>videotape (Otherwise, they would have used it a long time ago).

	Of course we haven't come up with an argument like yours and
that's exactly the point - I wouldn't want us to.  I would rather
discuss the issue in an intelligent and rational manner.

>Remember,
>Shaeffer argued that a bad attitude toward the fetus, the weakest of humans,
>will develop into a bad attitude toward the weak.
>
>Gerald Owens
>...!{akgua,allegra,amd,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo,ut-ngp}!gatech!gitpyr!owens

	For once, I agree.  This is a very important issue and one that
we must be very conscious of.  But let's be realistic.  Can you really
imagine the US legislating a policy for the destruction of te weak?  We
aren't that backwards in this country!
-- 

Tom Twiss @ St. Olaf College
{decvax,ihnp4}!stolaf!twiss

"If the Paradox and the Reason come together in a mutual understanding
of their unlikeliness their encounter will be happy..."

						-Soren Kierkegaard