I just read this article on the "Quiverfull" movement where the idea is to have as many kids as possible and that "God is the only one who can open or close the womb". Some of these idiots have 12, 18 and 20 kids.

Dumb, dumb, dumb.

I'll just assume that everyone on this forum is intelligent enough to know the reasons why this is a really bad idea, such as our severely dwindling environmental resources, for one.

On a more mundane level, every time someone complains about a new development going up behind their house, or long lines at the supermarket, or horrible traffic, I feel like screaming "that's because people are having too many *bleeping* kids!

It makes me so mad that people are so dumb.

Their AIRFARE is free; that's an airline policy. However the government charges every PERSON--including those children--the tax.

So, now we have the IRS and the FAA saying that a fetus is not a person. What do you want to bet we can find more branches of our federal government which agree?

If someone murders a pregnant woman, they can be held for two counts of murder (or three if the woman was carrying twins). So let's see . . . in some cases, the LAW doesn't agree that the fetus is not a person.

Gadgetlady, the fact that you're not getting the "answer" you want just shows that there IS NO one answer to your question. The answer lies in the definitions, which change depending on the beholder.

If I choose to define a black person as 3/5 of a person, would you disagree? Would you defend that black person if I wanted to make him a slave or lynch him? I can define whatever I want that applies to my own life however I want to apply it. But when my definition impacts another person, I no longer have the right to do whatever I want.

A fetus is in no way equivalent to a grown human being. It just isn't, and science agrees.

Neither is an infant or a toddler. We are all developing human beings, some of us in the early stages of development, some in the later.

How does science agree?

gadgetlady: I absolutely, 100% agree with you!

In 1967, a group of medical professionals, biological scientists, and authorities in the fields of law, ethics, and the social sciences convened to determined when life begins and when an unborn child becomes a human being. This was their conclusion:

"The majority of our group could find no point in time between the union of sperm and egg, or at least the blastocyst stage [shortly after fertilization, when twinning might occur] and the birth of the infant at which point we could say that this was not a human life. The changes occurring between implantation, a six-weeks embryo, a six months fetus, a one week-old child, or a mature adult are merely stages of development and maturation."

These scientists decided by a vote of 19 to 1.

If I would define fetus to someone that had NO idea what I was talking about, I would say it is a group of cells that cannot live outside the mother's womb on it's way to becoming a baby. At 1 week, 5 weeks, or 10 weeks that's what it is. How many 5 or 10 week old fetus have lived outside the womb? I don't know, I'm asking for medical evidence here....anyone a taker on that one?

Sure, I'll take that one. The youngest baby to survive outside of the womb was at 20 weeks, although I thought I read a report recently about one surviving at 18 or 19 weeks. Abortion is legal through all 9 months of pregnancy. The babies were still human beings before that 18-20 weeks, though.

I've been following this thread very closely and I just wanted to say that I too, completely agree with all of the points you have made so far, Gadgetlady. You have been able to communicate it way better than I ever could...

I don't think people are wondering about being ridiculed.

Laurend specifically asked not to be attacked. I wanted to make sure she didn't feel attacked. That's why I said that.

Being pro-choice, doesn't necessarily mean that I believe that abortion is right (or the right choice for me).

Why don't you think it's right? I understand you're saying everyone should have the choice. But why don't you believe it's right?

Gadgetlady, thanks for those links relative to Nat Hentoff. I read them and appreciate his insights.

However, what I don't see addressed is that slippery slope whereby the lives of women are devalued by the pro-life movement. When the "rights" of the "unborn" conflict with the will of the women carrying them, who decides? Unless it is the women themselves, women become little more than state-owned incubators, imprisoned by biology and a medieval mindset.

Sorry. Not wanting to have an abortion oneself makes perfect sense for all the reasons you and Nat Hentoff talk about. You have my full support to not have one. And I would very likely not have one again if the issue were to arise. But it is MY DECISION. And that's what this is all about. Not where life begins or how it ends.

As to the pain that the unborn baby feels, at eight weeks the neuro-anatomic structures are present. To feel pain, ahuman being needs a sensory nerve to feel the pain and then send the message about the pain to the thalmus, and also motor nerves to send a message back to the area where the pain is being inflicted. All of those necessary requirements are present at 8 weeks.

Furthermore, if you stick an 8-week unborn baby with a pin in the palm of his hand, he opens his mouth and pulls his hand away, just like a newborn would do (of course, because the newborn is breathing air instead of amniotic Fluid, the opening of the mouth in the newborn is accompanied by crying or screaming). All of this is also accompanied by an increase in the baby's heart rate, and all of it is consistent with what happens in born infants, toddlers, adolescents, pre-teens, tweens, teens, adults, and the elderly.

And I would very likely not have one again if the issue were to arise.

Alexandra, I appreciate your calm, even-keeled input in this discussion. It's hard to respond to some people when they don't present legitimate points of discussion, but rather are condescending, bigoted, and attempt to belittle rather than rationally explain their position.

Can you tell me why you would very likely not have an abortion again?

In saline abortions, the baby is burned from the inside out (from swallowing the poison injected into the amniotic sac) and delivered, entact, just dead (or at least that was the goal; some of them survived). Further, the women having saline abortions felt every flailing movement of the baby as it was dying.

Oh my gosh, that's horrific!!!! And heart-breaking!!! And infuriating for that matter!

When I was newly married, I had a miscarraige. When I could not get pregnant again, we tried to adopt but found the cost too high to afford. When we got pregnant with my son, we almost lost him. When we had him we were so happy to see that little face and could not understand how anyone would not want to bring a life into the world. It does not matter to me who raises the child, as long as it is loved and cared for.

There are idiots out there that do not need children. Selfish, stupid people have no business holding a life in their hands. Unfortunately, these same selfish, stupid idiots do not think about the others out there that would love that precious baby. Like myself, and my husband.

We have since lost another baby, and I cry when I think of the two babies that will be lost to me forever. Babies that I wanted. Now there is no hope for another child in my life besides adoption. Will there be any babies to adopt if people keep killing them????

Overpopulation, abortion, whatever. If your "higher power" deems you worthy to have a baby, to keep or find a home for, you should treasure that gift.

This whole thread makes me sad.

Poodles- I am sorry this makes you sad and bring memories to you. One of my best friends had 11 misacarrages (two D & C) before having two beautiful little children. I know it was hard on her but she got what she wanted.

I am also sorry that adopting a baby is so hard and expensive. There are SOOO MANY children that are aging in the system waiting for a home. It saddens me that the red tape is so bad that the children become difficult to adopt...everyone wants the baby.... just like puppys... no one wants the 5 yo dog... they want the puppy.

I hope you get what you want. A child of your own,strong and healthy or an adopted child of your own also strong and healthy. Good luck.

:girl_hug:

Oh my gosh, that's horrific!!!! And heart-breaking!!! And infuriating for that matter!

Abortion is a particularly brutal surgical procedure. Those in favor of abortion generally don't want to talk about it.

Saline abortion is extremely painful for the baby. And the mother is generally unaware what she will be going through, until she starts to feel the thrashing about of the baby as he or she is drinking the saline solution and being burned to death. Here is a full description for you:

"Saline abortions may be given after the 16th week and must be given after the 20th week. A large needle is inserted through the abdominal wall of the mother and into the baby's amniotic sac. A very concentrated salt solution is then injected into the amniotic Fluid. The baby breathes this in through his mouth and nose. It enters his stomach. He begins struggling and convulsing. The salt burns the skin all over his body so badly that it becomes an ugly red. His nostrils, mouth, throat and gastrointestinal tract are burned by the salt. All this terrible suffering lasts a full hour. If not successful in killing the infant, another injection of salt is given. If successful—the baby is expelled as a still birth. The mother goes into labor about a day later and delivers a beet-red baby that was scalded to death by salt. Any nurse who works in an aborting hospital can tell you of a significant number of these babies that were born alive. Then the doctor has a problem what to do with them. He may choose to strangle them to death, but most of the time they are thrown into a nearby pail and kindly permitted to cry themselves to death. The suffering they have endured throughout the experience is terrific. The salt had not killed them, but neglect in the pail soon does. There are records of infants who have survived saline abortions and spent the first weeks of their life outside the womb in intensive care."

Of course, the other methods of abortion are no less gruesome. I encourage everyone who supports this procedure to read up on how the whole thing works and on fetal development. Look at pictures of unborn babies, both in utero and after abortions. Watch "The Silent Scream", an ultrasound video of an actual first trimester abortion, where the baby tries to dodge the suctioning machine over and over; his heartbeat doubles in rate as he tries to do this, and when he's finally caught and is being dismembered, his mouth opens wide in a silent scream (silent because without air in the uterus -- he breathes amniotic fluid -- his screams cannot be heard).

Abortionists regularly talk about making sure they have retrieved all of the "products of conception" after an abortion. Even after a first trimester abortion, they do this by counting. Two arms, two legs, a torso, a head. Amazing little "blob of tissue" that it is, it has two arms, two legs, a torso, and a head.

I know a woman who has 3 sons and desperately wants a daughter but is done bearing children. She aborted her first child. I also know a man who has 4 daughters and desperately wants a son but his wife is done bearing children. His wife aborted their first child. He regularly tells me with much sorrow that, "I killed my boy." But the saddest situation of any is when a woman aborts and from the abortion becomes sterile (yes, it happens). In that case, she killed the only child she ever had.