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From: mrh@cybvax0.UUCP (Mike Huybensz)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: important distinction
Message-ID: <679@cybvax0.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 14-Aug-85 11:38:27 EDT
Article-I.D.: cybvax0.679
Posted: Wed Aug 14 11:38:27 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 18-Aug-85 05:31:11 EDT
References: <9754@ucbvax.ARPA> <186@pyuxii.UUCP>
Reply-To: mrh@cybvax0.UUCP (Mike Huybensz)
Organization: Cybermation, Inc., Cambridge, MA
Lines: 37
Keywords: life metabolism personality

In article <186@pyuxii.UUCP> tw8023@pyuxii.UUCP (T Wheeler) writes:
> What Brian has just told us, if I read him right, is that he feels
> that "life" (second kind) does not start until a week or so after
> birth.  My question is, then "Is it OK to just toss the newborn
> out with the trash since it does not yet have "life"?  What a
> wonderful concept.  Right away we can eliminate abortion, right?
> After all, if it does not have "life", then it must be nothing
> more important than the egg shells and coffee grounds in the trash
> and we can thus just throw it out.  Women can carry the fetus to full
> term and then pop it out and throw it away.  Other than a few months
> of discomfort, there is no problem, right?  No more abortion debates.
> 
> Really, Brian, is that what you are trying to tell us?  Life does
> not start until a week or so after birth?  I don't think the most
> vocal pro choicer would even believe that one.

Under certain conditions, infanticide is and has historically been
widespread, expedient, and perhaps moral.

In a society such as ours, where starvation is rare, where adoption and
abortion are widely available, where the worlds finest medical care can
solve many congenital problems, there is small need or desire for infanticide.

In other societies, life and death are more pressing.  A major family goal
is to produce successful children, who will have families of their own and
be able to provide for parents in their old age.  When resources are limited,
it may make more sense to destroy a deformed infant and bear another, normal
one; or to destroy an infant you can't afford so that older siblings won't
starve.

We live in an era of growth, where most people can choose to bear the
number of children they want, and usually can afford them.  So to us,
infanticide seems unnecessary or undesirable, except perhaps in rare cases.
A little bit of anthropology should help to dispell this parochialism.
-- 

Mike Huybensz		...decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!cybvax0!mrh