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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: The Status of the Fetus and Its Rights (Proof of Rights)
Message-ID: <1982@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 29-Oct-85 23:22:00 EST
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.1982
Posted: Tue Oct 29 23:22:00 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 1-Nov-85 23:57:19 EST
References: <429@cmu-cs-spice.ARPA> <1546@pyuxd.UUCP>
Organization: Whatever we're calling ourselves this week
Lines: 180

>> If indeed he is talking about "the right to do what you want to your own
>> body AND the right to prevent others from doing things to your body", then he
>> loses his argument for a second time.  Because this would give the woman the
>> right to prevent an "other" (the fetus) from "doing things to her body" (like
>> making use of her metabolism to survive) against her will.  [RICH ROSEN]

> We're getting closer to agreement here, believe it or not.  Yes, I give the
> woman *a* right (not *the* absolute right) to prevent the fetus from doing
> things to her body.  Then I weigh what the fetus does to HER body against
> what she would do to ITS body by aborting it.  In the case where the fetus
> would kill the pregnant woman, I go along with abortion.  Otherwise, the
> relative seriousness of the things done by another to one's body moves me
> to assert that the fetus's claim to life outweighs the woman's claim to
> be free from pregnancy. [ROSENBLATT]

Yet it is clear that at points preceding viability of the fetus, it does
not ipso facto have the rights to usurp a woman's body, any more than a
virus or parasite does, PRECISELY because it cannot exist autonomously.
Note how courts have consistently brought up the issue of viability when it
came to judging whether the destruction of a fetus was to be deemed murder
or homicide or not.

>>> [Assorted ad hominem insults & name-calling], followed by: [ROSENBLATT]

>>Odd that he asserts that there were "assorted ad hominem insults & name-
>>calling, but chose not to document any of it.  Why might that be?  Perhaps 
>>because this is an attempt at libeling me for something he has no evidence 
>>for [R. ROSEN]

> Nope.  It's because readers of the net can look up the article in question
> and decide for themselves what Mr. Rosen said, and whether they think it
> amounted to "ad hominem insults & namecalling."  Surely no one expects me
> to excerpt bad language about Matt Rosenblatt and reprint it!

But one WOULD expect (if you were a sincere debator and not merely a
manipulator) that you WOULD want to mention (and perhaps rebut) statements
regarding the bogus assumptions of your beliefs about things like feminism
(which is what that "name calling" actually consisted of!).  This technique
that Rosenblatt uses is a common one in use by fascist manipulators:  assert
the presence of "evidence" in a place where you hope people will not bother
to look.  And repeat the assertion often enough so that...  Etc.

>>                                                                 Equally
>>odd that that section contains statements about Mr. Rosenblatt's values
>>regarding values about the relative worths of men and women that he perhaps
>>felt should not be repeated.  [R. ROSEN]

> Any of you readers who don't know what Matt Rosenblatt thinks of materialism,
> liberalism, and feminism haven't been paying attention.

Or aren't interested in presumptive baseless opinions.

>> What I put a high value on, dear sir, is human dignity and freedom.  The
>> fact that you put labels on such beliefs that you don't like, calling the
>> simple belief that women have the same rights as men by a name like
>> "feminism" which you can poke your little stick at, shows us the emptiness 
>> of YOUR assumptions that lead to your values.  [R. ROSEN]

> If feminism is not that, then what is it?  There are labels for beliefs
> that I like, and labels for beliefs that I don't like.  How does "emptiness"
> follow from the use of a label?  Also, does Mr. Rosen admit the 
> possibility that "equal rights" and "freedom" might conflict in a
> particular case?  What about the 19-year-old gynecological surgery
> patient at Washington Hospital Center a few years back whose parents
> had to hire a private-duty nurse for her after the "equal-rights"
> hospital refused to honor her request for a female nurse?  And what
> if her parents hadn't had the money?  What would have become of her
> "human dignity and freedom" then?

By your reasoning they would have been equally obliged to "honor" her
request for a WHITE nurse.  "Freedom" to be bigoted, prejudiced, or hateful
is not covered under any list of freedoms I know, especially when such
"freedom" interferes with other people's lives.

>> You can call these beliefs "unwarranted assumptions", but
>> it is YOU who is making the claim that merits substantiation
>> (that women do not have such rights because they are somehow less than men,
>> or that any group is less deserving of such rights, or that the freedom of
>> the individual is preempted by the needs of society). [R. ROSEN]

> Starting with the last assertion first:  If the freedom of the individual
> could not be *limited* (not "pre-empted") by the needs of society, there
> would be no laws at all.  Captain Video fought for "Justice, Truth and
> Freedom throughout the Universe."  Superman fought for "Truth, Justice,
> and the American Way."  Disgusting behavior, such as running naked down
> Bloomfield Avenue, is banned because it is un-Ivy.

Un-Ivy?  "Disgusting"?  Thank you for showing whose beliefs and moral codes
are based in reason and whose are based on "likes", "dislikes", prejudices,
and baseless opinions.

> As to the other assertions:  If two people are different, WHY are they
> different?  I realize this makes sense only to those who believe there
> is some purpose to existence.

Assuming a purpose means assuming an intender who created purposefulness,
and that is of course an unwarranted assumption.

> If the purpose of life is to ENJOY, then the fact that two people are
> different might indicate that they are to enjoy different things.  If the
> purpose of life is to GET ALL YOU CAN, then differences are important to the
> amount you can "get."  And the same goes for nobler "purposes" that one can
> hypothesize for our existence on Earth.  And one of us doesn't have the right
> to decide for another what the other's "purpose" is, by killing him.

That's called non-interference morality.  Pure and simple.

> So one extreme position could be that any difference whatever
> between two persons should cause a difference in their rights.
> But I see no warrant for this extreme position.

Yet you use it at every turn, to justify anti-feminism, anti-abortionism, etc.

> The same goes for the other extreme, that differences among people should
> be ignored when society makes up rules and responsibilities.  Do we want
> the same standard of care applied to a surgeon as to a paper-hanger?
> Do we want to eliminate father-son dinners and mother-daughter teas?
> Do we want a born foreigner to have the same right as a native
> American to become President?

Why not?  Care to elaborate?

> Rather than posit equal rights as an absolute principle, and Devil take
> all other values that we cherish, what we ought to do is look at each
> case with a view toward what equality in that case would mean.  That's
> why it's easy for me to support equal employment opportunity, and also
> easy for me to reject abortion on demand as a means of ensuring that
> a woman has the same right as a man to conceive a child and avoid
> responsibility for it.

It's easy for you to hold a lot of your positions, Matt.  Coming from the
assumptions that you come from.  You don't "like" what equality would "mean"
(it cuts into something you want or like), so you dismiss it.  How quaint.

>>> I hope that once you
>>> see the hurtful consequences that can arise from blanket acceptance
>>> of these values, you will scrutinize much more carefully any argument
>>> that rests on them.  [M. ROSENBLATT]

>> I can't.  But since you can (??) why not document these "hurtful
>> consequences", and see if maybe it is YOU who is making the assumptions
>> (perhaps about the "hurtfulness" of the consequences?)  I am most anxious
>> to hear these "hurtful consequences". (Hurtful to whom?  Society?  The
>> status quo?  Whom?)  [R. ROSEN]

> Document the hurtful consequences of liberalism, materialism, and 
> feminism!  In net.abortion, yet!  WHOLE BOOKS have been written
> about this topic, of which two of the best are: ... ... ...

Anybody can name a book to support their position.  Because books have
been written to support just about everything, because publishers will
publish just about anything they think will make money.  So your naming
of books is irrelevant.  Especially in light of the fact that you failed to
state what knowledge you learned from those books that led you to your opinion
(or did your opinion lead you to the books?).  Did you just read the conclusion
and say "Ah, the author has great insight!"?  You show no reason to think
otherwise, judging from your lack of response to the questions asked.

> Go read the books and find out who is being hurt?  LITTLE CHILDREN, THAT'S 
> WHO -- victims of feminism.  THE POOR -- victims of liberalism.  THE
> PEOPLE OF BOLSHEVIK RUSSIA AND CHINA AND THEIR SLAVE EMPIRES -- victims
> of dialectical materialism.

Let's try to look at this ranting in a serious way.  Children suffer because
of feminism.  NOT because their fathers go to work, but because their mothers
do.  By Matt's reasoning (in which you can state that someone isn't "equal"
if doing so causes you harm), we can simply claim that women "shouldn't"
be treated equally, because doing so would cause problems.  NOT because
they're not equal, mind you, no need to mess things up with facts.  Solely
because doing so would cause problems.  The way denying that black people
should be kept as slaves (and treated unequally) would be wrong because
of the problems it would cause to do this.  The vestiges of that horrible
"liberalism" (and whatever else Matt doesn't like).  Matt's is the battelecry
of those who say "go back to the old ways, not these new ways that are more
equitable and fairer but cause problems for the status quo, which must
change to adapt to the termination of unequal treatment for some classes of
people".  And a vacuous and empty battlecry it is.
-- 
"Wait a minute.  '*WE*' decided???   *MY* best interests????"
					Rich Rosen    ihnp4!pyuxd!rlr