Abortion? I'm not a fan; I'll start with that. But then I suppose nobody is a fan of abortion; not really. No human. Moreover I'm not at all a fan of mortality; the fact that a number of those whom I love will be gone someday. I'm not a big fan of the next time I will have to move my bowels, whenever or wherever that might be. Oh and while we're speaking scatalogically I'd better drop some Bob Heinlein on the subject of life's sometime unpleasantness: just because an evil is inescapable doesn't mean we term it a good. No one ever said we had to enjoy it. Abortion is not about enjoyment, or about joy; abortion is about necessity. And privacy. And, most of all, about the freedom-of-choice given to every conscious human being by genetics and/or blind luck.
I don't know what my goals are with this. I'm just sick and tired of this whole freedom-except-for-when-God-doesn't-like-it thing. Every time I hear about the legislative pen, under pressure of course from those of the faith, purporting to EVER have the authority to withhold the basic human freedom-of-choice it just makes me go GRRRR!! It's the damned Inquisition all over again; fucking Galileo being forced to publicly renounce his science in order to keep his head.
It must stop.
It must end
somewhere, somewhen.
Not just with women, either; but that's one for another diary. And besides, mankind's eons-old disdain for womankind has always been both self-defeating and simply stupid.
Logic will defeat it. It will, I know. Just recently this insidious beast has been routed, and it is now cornered; so now, while we all know what a danger a cornered beast can be, we need to finish the job, and we will. Certain I am that this too shall pass, in time. The problem is that this passage needs to happen NOW. These people need to put their damned Book down as anything more than a loosely followed and responsibly interpreted moral guide, or, if putting down the book is impossible for them, at the very least they need to start looking at women as members of the same species instead of as semi-sentient though often sexy ovens.
I don't know, maybe this will get through, maybe not. To me what follows below the squiggle is a logical, responsible and moral way to start and end this argument. I suspect some will disagree.
Our idyllic motives:
Genetically speaking there is only one (1) event in the development of an adult human which constitutes change; conception. From that event forward this bundle of cells contains within his/her person a brand new strain of homo sapien; a member of our species; but not yet out of the egg, months of work ahead for mom before that is even possible; and long years of fledging ahead also before even the first flight. However, the daisy-chain continues and the new identity is unalterably laid down upon conception. A new being is created then. In the court of genetics it is my opinion that this new being is the sole property of the entire human species. What exactly this means, I'm not certain. What is certain is that from conception forward the genetic identities and futures of these two beings are entirely seperate.
Our pragmatic womb:
Now that is all just fine in principle; good things to remember. There is, however, an issue of trust and responsibility bestowed by those same genes on mom; mom of course being a fully conscious human. No matter how deluded one's point of veiw; it is fundamentally obvious that mom has absolute control over her own body and all things living in/on it to the extent that her consciousness is capable. I'm not talking morally or legally in some sort of imaginary court either; I'm talking about the practical situation on the ground; on mom's two tired feet. The whole thing is set up, the whole fucking rig is designed, if I may use the term, so that ALL decisions regarding the human being in utero are the sole responsibility of mom.
Pregnancy is a delicate business; one has to tread lightly, eat the right things, not eat other things. Although light exercise is a good idea, heavy exercise can be disastrous; after a certain amount of time, the first 8 weeks or so I think, any type of severe over-stress or trauma on mom's body can trigger a miscarriage.
At all stages except one a human being has genetically built-in defenses; hell even the spermatozoa have a tail. Babies have their cry; even newborns can be deafening when they really need to be. They are meager sometimes, to be sure, but these defense systems are there, grown to order; save in one stage only. Obviously there is only one defense system for a human being in mom's womb, mom.
These utter dependencies, indeed these submissions, illustrate the genetic modus operandi of mom's body. The uterus and the female body and brain to which it is attached are built to risk survival-of-mom for survival-of-tyke if and only if said tyke has any chance at all of performing, without mom's umbilical assistance, the arduous and unconscious business of keeping oneself alive in this merciless universe. A business that becomes more difficult and cumbersome for both with each passing day of pregnancy.
Our debate; the question and the answer:
Before birth, during mom's term, while the US politicosphere continues to rage about the extent of her obviously total stewardship; she hears all the thunderous debate of Roe v Wade as nothing but a whisper compared to the thunder in her own head.
All the lofty arguments possible about "the property of the human species" or "new genetic strain" or "unique creation which can never ever ever be precisely duplicated";
weighted against any or all of these more grounded possible arguments: "incest", "rape", "the unusual dangers in homo sapien birth", "the normal dangers in any kind of birth", "the utter helplessness of babies and the incredible commitment needed to fledge them properly", "7 billion humans on a small blue rock" and of course "what am I supposed to do?" and "This is Fucking Terrifying!!" are a tiny glimpse into the only debate on this subject that is of any importance whatsoever. That being the debate that takes place within mom's own body and brain and can take place nowhere else.
Any and all other debates on the subject besides that one are nothing to it in either the moral, the practical or the genetic sense. And due to the fact that this hidden debate is taking place between 1) unpredictable and vague forces driving mom's body through no conscious process; and 2) mom's fully conscious and survival-geared brain; I think there can be no question that the decision, genetically speaking, rests entirely with mom.
How could anyone possibly think otherwise?
How could anyone who claims to respect a woman's right to be a member of the human species think otherwise?
The idea of continuing the pregnancy or forcing the pregnancy to continue once mom has made up her mind that it should end would be laughable if it wasn't so incredibly draconian.
Go ahead, think about it
What are you going to do, fucking chain her to a tree?
Anything less than complete freedom for mom to control what goes on in her body is a direct assault on her freedom to make decisions in any capacity; and this assault shadows a mistrustful misygony that goes back to the dim beginnings of our species. In a supposedly free society, a description that is ironically well-vaunted and well-worn among the GOP, such an assault on the decision-making freedom of one of its members cannot be tolerated.
I know I know, logic is a great tool for convincing people only when those people do not have a dusty switch set to off somewhere in their frontal lobes. My argument is simply this: while the off's may yell louder, with hope the on's are the majority.