So, let's say that Roe v. Wade is overturned. . .

[xiphias]

Fundamentally, it seems to me that, while the right to privacy IS a vitally important issue, there's a more fundamental right that Roe v. Wade protects -- the right to control one's own body.

There is quite literally no right more fundamental than the right to do what you want to do with your own body, to the extent that it doesn't infringe on other people. And that sentence, right there, sums up the whole abortion debate in one sentence. If you think a fetus is a person, then restricting access to abortion is potentially justifiable, because you're weighing the rights of two people against each other.

However, f you think a blastocyst is in no reasonable sense a human being, as I, for instance, feel, then a restriction of access to abortion is simply an example of an abrogation of the most fundamental right a person can have -- the right to their own body.

Restricting access to abortion to a woman who wants one is therefore a way of forcing her to work on behalf of a third party -- the fetus (who may or may not have legal standing.)

Could you make an argument based on the 13th Amendment therefore?

For what it's worth: I think that that any law in reference to abortion is inherently a stopgap measure. The only reasonable solution is technological: artificial wombs.

Fundamentally, what should happen is that any woman who doesn't want to have her body used as an incubator for a parasite, for whatever reason, should be allowed to have that fetus removed and placed into an artificial womb in which it could grow to term.

If a fetus does have any sort of legal standing, such a step would protect its hypothetical right to existence, without removing the mother's non-hypothetical right to control of her own person.

Comments

[ckd]

It also raises the question of something like the "use eminent domain on Souter's house after the Kelo decision"...know someone who needs a transfusion? Is Alito's blood type compatible with them? After all, if he can force a mother to keep supporting a blastocyst, why can't someone force him to donate blood to them?

[holzman.livejournal.com]

There is quite literally no right more fundamental than the right to do what you want to do with your own body, to the extent that it doesn't infringe on other people. And that sentence, right there, sums up the whole abortion debate in one sentence. If you think a fetus is a person, then restricting access to abortion is potentially justifiable, because you're weighing the rights of two people against each other.

I'm afraid I'm not buying it. Even if you regard a fetus as a human being in every sense of the term, there is no legal or moral basis for requiring me to risk life and limb for the benefit of another -- which is why no one can require me to donate my organs even though a full grown adult (about whom there is no debate whether they are fully human and have legal standing) may very well die because I choose not to do so.

When anti-abortionists base their position on "a fetus is a baby," they're bullshitting you, themselves, or both of you. The only actual basis for restricting abortions that has ever been at the basis of any law against it is a belief that women should be punished for sex, and we should never let them off the hook for that position.

And if an anti-abortionist tries to tell you otherwise, ask them when they intend to pass legislation instituting a lottery for who gives up their lungs for a transplant. I guarantee fewer than one in a thousand will agree with this idea, and each of them will explain that pregnancy's different because the woman has to be held "responsible" by being forced to carry it to term.

As to the artificial womb approach, I'm curious what the relative cost and risks to the woman associated with such a process would be. If it increases either, then I can't see it as what should happen at this point in history.

[jehanna.livejournal.com]

For what it's worth: I think that that any law in reference to abortion is inherently a stopgap measure. The only reasonable solution is technological: artificial wombs.

Fundamentally, what should happen is that any woman who doesn't want to have her body used as an incubator for a parasite, for whatever reason, should be allowed to have that fetus removed and placed into an artificial womb in which it could grow to term.

If a fetus does have any sort of legal standing, such a step would protect its hypothetical right to existence, without removing the mother's non-hypothetical right to control of her own person.

I have to disagree. That's not quite good enough either.

Because you're still forcing the woman to become a mother, even if not a parent, if you follow. She may not then have to carry that fetus, but if you force her to allow that fetus to develop and then become a person, you have forced her to reproduce. You have also exposed her to the ever-growing likelihood that this unwanted child will track her down and want a relationship with her someday whether she does or not. There are any number of reasons a woman might not want any of these things happening.

In the end, nothing will do but the right to choose not to have anything to do with it IMO.

[ailbhe]

I like the uterine replicator idea. I always have.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Well, when I talk about an "artificial womb" I'm discussing a science-fictional device, and can therefore assign it whatever characteristics I want. I therefore postulate a form of terminating a pregnancy which is in no sense more traumatic than a current abortion, but which nonetheless maintains the integrity of the blastocyst or fetus, in such a way that it can be moved to the artificial womb where it can continue developing.

THAT'S actually the tricky part, rather than the developement of the artificial womb per se. . .

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

It would protect women who wanted to be parents, too.

[cheshyre]

I will say that those arguments are precisely ones Men's Rights Activists use to try to avoid child support payments and to have more control over the women upon whom they've fathered a child.

The man doesn't want to be a father, doesn't want anything to do with the kid, but because it's the woman's body, it's her choice to keep it if she wants, and he's stuck with it.
In their case, they want to be able to write off all rights/responsibilities/connection to the kid because they didn't want it. Judges usually throw this argument out of court on the lines of (a) if he didn't want it that badly, he shouldn't've given her sole responsibility for contraception, and (b) ruling on what's in the best interests of the child.

[Not agreeing nor disagreeing, and I don't follow the MRA/Fathers' Rights movements as much as some, but it's something I've heard.]

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I was under the impression that a woman could carry a child to term, give it up for adoption, and then have her own records sealed so that the child could not track her down. I would say that something like that would have to be part of this theory, too.

[ailbhe]

It *does* mean that children the woman didn't want could be walking around out there, yes, but I think that might just be part of "life sucks". It would reduce women's burden of, um, *burden* as far as the whole parenting thing goes to much closer to that of men.

But I have been wondering how they'd manage the whole breastfeeding thing, for women who *did* want kids. Milk production is triggered by the delivery of the mature placenta.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Dunno. We're postulating an invention that would require a great deal more knowlege of human hormones and pregnancy than we currently have -- hopefully, the research that you'd have to do to get to that point would shed some light on breastfeeding, as well. . .

[msmidge.livejournal.com]

Adoptees can get the records unsealed, if they have a reason. I know someone who went to court to find out her birth parents' names because she needed to know their medical histories to help with treatment of her cancer, for example. She had no trouble getting the information.

[theletterelle.livejournal.com]

I think a more comparable idea would be a lottery to force someone to give up a kidney for transplant. It won't kill them, and it'll save a life.

But I agree, it's their "personal responsibility" theme applied here. Funny how personal responsibility never applies to corporations that poison water and air, or the people that make up those corporations.

[holzman.livejournal.com]

I think a more comparable idea would be a lottery to force someone to give up a kidney for transplant. It won't kill them, and it'll save a life.

Pregnancies have the potential to kill. Randomizing what body part is taken might be more comparable, but eliminating the risk of death is not.

[blackthornglade.livejournal.com]

In the state I was adopted in (Illinois, arguably one of the hardest and most controlled adoption states), sealed records remain sealed. The *ONLY* exception that I'm aware of is for a medical condition that is life threatening...as in you have to *have* it before you can go to the courts to request they be unsealed.

Illinois *does* have a voluntary matching database that will either release medical records only, assuming the parents have entered it/approved it, or, if *both* sides want, will release contact info. Those are the only two ways.

[nolly.livejournal.com]

Taking a single kidney also has the chance to kill -- it is a major operation, with risks from anesthesia, infection, etc.

[theletterelle.livejournal.com]

I'm generalizing with your standard, run of the mill normal pregancy. I suppose a kidney operation also has the potential to kill, if the donor has medical risk factors.

I still maintain that forcing a pregnancy to term, with possible risk of death, is more comparable to forcing kidney donation than forcing the donation of a pair of lungs, which will certainly kill.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Howabout the donation of a single lung?

[theletterelle.livejournal.com]

Is a single-lung transplant commonly done?

[jadasc.livejournal.com]

There is quite literally no right more fundamental than the right to do what you want to do with your own body, to the extent that it doesn't infringe on other people.

Suicide. Prostitution. Drug Use. Organ Sales.

Presently, in the United States of America, these are not choices you are legally able to make. Combine that with the idea of the draft, which puts your body at the service of the government, and I'm not certain that particular premise is actually a "right."

[jehanna.livejournal.com]

That is the theory, yes; but that is being challenged regularly. There are no guarantees. There are also other issues besides not being contacted. What if the woman was raped and doesn't want her rapist to have offspring by her, whether she ever had to meet them or not? What if she doesn't want to add to the human population of the planet? Personally, I think it's creepy to force her to yield up reproductive matter out of her own body to grow another person against her will.

[redbird]

While suicide is illegal, that's always been--and always will be--a difficult law to enforce (even aside from the Oregon exception in the case of the terminally ill). Prostitution is legal in Nevada. Alcohol is a drug, as are caffeine and nicotine. (Also aspirin and numerous other things, but I assume you mean "mind-altering drugs" here.)

[jehanna.livejournal.com]

Yes, they are the same arguments. And frankly, I agree with them too.

If a woman is pregnant by someone who she has no legal contract with (marriage, civil union, whatever) whereby she had an expectation of his assured presence and support, and he tells her when they find this out "Look, I don't want to do this", and she says, "Well, I want this baby and I'm having it anyway", I don't think it's right to force him to participate. She's been given fair warning; it's then on her to find the resources if she chooses to bear and keep that child.

So yes, I'm not one of those people who wants the knife to cut only one way. If it's the woman's body and the woman's choice, let the responsibility for the consequences be hers as well.

[yardlong.livejournal.com]

I agree that forcing the woman to become a mother is unacceptable. My view is that there is no "other person" with which to compete until birth, because birth confers personhood. I also agree with your view on the Men's Rights issue, inasmuch as the woman who makes the choice is responsible for her choice.

[navrins]

I think it is justifiable to assert that a parent has a responsibility to risk life and limb for his/her child, even in the absence of any such responsibility toward any other person. Not saying I agree with that claim, but it is not an uncommon belief.

[vvalkyri.livejournal.com]

maybe a portion of a liver would be better. Kidney leaves you vulnerable should you ever have a bad kidney.