Individual rights

[Admin]

When your government is incompetent as all democratic governments are having basic rights meaning limitations of government power does limit the damage an incompetent government can do. For this to work the rights has to be clearly defined and also respected. If you live in a democracy you should put effort into promoting certain freedoms to limit the impact of public stupidity.

Individual rights you have on paper will is not a good protecting if the government actually wants to harm you, if this is the case they can always find some way to hurt you or lock you up, the system can easily be rigged against you such that winning becomes practically impossible.

If you belong to the ruling class controlling a country trying to protect people from their own stupidity shouldn't be your priority and thus you want to grant people citizen rights they will have at least on paper. These rights will not really apply universally, there will be many exceptions to them and thus they only offer the people you are ruling over a false sense of security.

 

[Admin]

Circumventing individual rights
0. downgrade citizen status to one that has fewer rights or no rights at all.
1. find some crime to pin on the individual.
2. declare the individual mentally ill and thus incapable of making their own decisions.
3. government custody of young people due to socially destructive behavior (up to age 21 in sweden).
4. take into custody just for being suspected of crime, the individual will suffer a lot even if he or she is not convicted.
5. take children away from the individual into government custody as psychological torture.
6. let non government actors harm the individual without consequences.
7. selectively drafting people to dangerous wars.

A lot of government power is indirect, the government can use the mere threat of 0 to 7 to make people comply.

 

[Admin]

Medical autonomy

A: Freedom do undergo a medical inrervention such as taking fentanyl.
B: Freedom to reject a medical intervention.

These are not equivalent, without freedom B authorities will be able torture you easily, they could easily kill you too but dont get your hopes up for that.

Currently we enjoy freedom B except when you are viewed as incapable (too young, viewed as mentally ill, etc). An infant cannot say no and this allow for very harmful practices such as genital mutilations.

Usually with medical interventions it first has to be approved by FDA and later you, then you need to get approved for it by a gatekeeping doctor and lastly you need to approve it yourself. You do however have the option to move to another place or breaking the law to get access to the medical treatment you need, a lot of trans individuals just resort to buying hormones online due to gatekeeping and waiting times.

 

[Admin]

The right to bear arms
While you want this right for yourself you do not want the same for a lot of other individuals, you do not want people who wants to harm you do be armed. You having a gun yourself will not prevent anyone from killing you with a sniper rifle from a distance, a "good guy with a gun" (whatever that is) will very often die to a bad guy with a gun.

It is sometimes claimed that armed citizens is a safeguard against tyranny but that has already been tried in united states and it didn't work at all, it only makes vigilante 'justice' easier which is one of the worst forms of mob rule.

Having a gun does allow you to easily kill yourself or fight to the death, this makes it more difficult for the government to torture you.

The fair solution is to implement a licensing system where you need to pass a test to be allowed to use a gun, this test should be difficult enough to prevent the typical idiot from obtaining a gun. The unfair solution is to just give out powerful guns to people you like and disarm everyone else.

 

[Admin]

Free speech
It's a right you want for yourself and it's also a right you want to have for other people, at least to the degree that allows them to spread important information to you and to allow the spread of important information to voters as a whole.

But it's also in your interest to limit the spread of harmful information, if a competent and good judicial system is in place we do want people prosecuted for spreading false information, otherwise people will be allowed to do a lot of harm. Truth does not typically win over falsehood in the so called "free market of ideas" instead what tend to win is things that appeals to the emotions of people even if its wrong.

No country on earth have absolute free speech but a lot of countries still have something close to free speech since governments are unwilling to prosecute people over speech. You also have the option of simply hiding your identity online and there are services such as tor that can be used for this. Most censorship by far in western countries is due to private platforms such as reddit censoring people.

https://reclaimthenet.org/reddit-censorship-attract-advertisers/

 

[Admin]

Due process
What due process means is that you are not supposed to be punished unless you meet a criteria for that decided by the government. A lot of countries claim you have that but it's just a facade, you dont need to be convicted of a crime to be locked up, a lot of people are locked up just because they are suspected of a crime while waiting for a trial, they end up suffering even if they are eventually acquired, they will also have to go through the trauma and stress that come with having to go to court.

In the US a lot of people end up taking plea bargain even when innocent of what they are accused of https://abovethelaw.com/2018/07/innocent-people-who-plead-guilty/

It's the norm that the law is written in a such way that authorities can lock up anyone up if they really want to, there are just too many laws and often they are vague so you can always find a crime to pin on the individuals, otherwise there is always psychiatry where a different standard is used "danger to yourself or others".

Courts are often claimed to be independent even though they are really not, members of the US supreme court are appointed by the president and approved by the senate, it is political appointments where people are vetted before to make sure they will vote in a way people with power like. In addition congress have the power to impeach and convict members of the supreme court (removal from office) or to pack the supreme court with more members just by passing a law.

 

[Leucosticte]

Due process
What due process means is that you are not supposed to be punished unless you meet a criteria for that decided by the government. A lot of countries claim you have that but it's just a facade, you dont need to be convicted of a crime to be locked up, a lot of people are locked up just because they are suspected of a crime while waiting for a trial, they end up suffering even if they are eventually acquired, they will also have to go through the trauma and stress that come with having to go to court.

What can happen is, they detain a guy pending trial, and then find reasons to keep pushing the trial date back (e.g. in my case, they kept asking for more mental health evaluations, which stopped the clock on the constitutional speedy trial requirement); and then he figures, "Well, I've accumulated so much time served, plus I'm in such a bad position to be trying to contest my case since I'm in jail, that I might as well just plead guilty at this point." Then people say, "Well, it's not a big deal that we detained him because the fact that he ultimately pleaded guilty means that he actually committed the crime anyway so therefore deserved to be locked up; whether that was before or after he was adjudged guilty doesn't really matter."

If a defendant is in jail, it's harder for him to proceed pro se, or continue working at his job to pay the legal bills, or try to find witnesses who will testify in his behalf. A lot of defendants will say, "I have this guy's number in my cell phone, who was there when the shooting went down and can testify that I'm innocent, but I can't get to my phone because I'm in jail, and unfortunately I don't know his last name, and he doesn't have a fixed address because he was living on someone else's couch in the trailer park." A public defender is not necessarily going to go try to chase down that lead; he doesn't have time because he has too many cases, but it would be easy for the defendant himself if he weren't detained.

Now they're trying to get rid of cash bail, which means that even if you have supportive friends or family who would put up the money to help you get out of jail, it won't help, because your detention will be based on the judge's assessment of how dangerous you are, how much of a flight risk, etc. The point of cash bail was to give you an incentive not to jump bail, because your money, or your friends' or family's money, would be forfeited if you didn't show up. Now that incentive is gone.

 

[Admin]

The right to vote
While you want to have the right to vote yourself there are plenty of individual that you do not want voting in the election. More people being allowed to vote dilutes the value of your vote and thus the probability of your vote actually changing anything will be even smaller.

You being allowed to vote will incentivize politicians from trying to get your vote but you are only one of maybe 8 million people who can vote in a national elections. You only need to win a majority (such as 175 of 349 seats) to take power, the only reason politicians cannot ignore large parts of the population is because other people care about them, when that changes you will see that you never had any real rights.

The American government do put effort into taking care of their non-voting territories such as Guam, the fact that people there cannot vote in national election hasn't resulted in them losing any individual right relative to voting states, the impact has been mostly economical and even that is rather limited.

 

[Leucosticte]

The American government do put effort into taking care of their non-voting territories such as Guam, the fact that people there cannot vote in national election hasn't resulted in them losing any individual right relative to voting states, the impact has been mostly economical and even that is rather limited.

Btw, why does the U.S. hold onto Puerto Rico; is it for use as a military outpost or what? We got rid of the Philippines because it seemed like too much of a liability to allow Filipinos to enter the mainland U.S. freely (normally, colonial powers will extend that privilege to the colonized; e.g. Gandhi was allowed also to travel to London and spend three years there).

Puerto Ricans, being considered Americans, are welcome to travel to the mainland too, but do we really want that. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/09/26/yes-puerto-rico-part-united-states/703273001/

 

[Admin]

About conscription
Instead having a professional army incompetent government often directly force males to work for the so called defense of the country, this may seem to be cheaper but in reality the true cost of it is just hidden.

https://mises.org/library/conscription-and-other-draconian-taxes

It's far more efficient to pay professional soldier, this also makes war less costly politically and it rewards capable fighters financially.

Conscription does however allow the government to punish or even kill people viewed as undesirable, they can simply be sent to die in a war somewhere and thus we get rid of these individuals, this works even if they are worse than useless in said war. It can also be used as a punishment (dangerous forced labor) do deter undesirable behavior.

What actually wins the war is having good weaponary and also being able to use powerful weapons such as nukes.

 

[Admin]

Privacy
One significant limit to government power is difficulties monitoring citizens, technology is a significant factor in this.

Banning/restricting the government from collecting data may not help in practice if private companies can do the same, with internet it's easy to spread any information even if the government tries to bad it, efforts to stop piracy hasn't been very successful so far, what actually worked was providing easy and affordable legal alternatives such as netflix.

It's likely that it will be possible to also directly look into people thoughts in the future making it though crime laws enforce bile. this may lead to increased psychiatric abuse since you would no longer be able to pretend not to hear voices or think the government is targeting you.

 

[Admin]

Cruel and unusual punishments
By subjecting your citizens to cruel and unusual punishments you will be able to more efficiently control them and thus there will no longer be any need for expensive jails, few if any people will have to be locked up in institutions.

By having more tools of your disposal as a judge you will better be able to make an individual become a functional member of society, this may include forced feminization in order to drastically reduce their testosterone and allow them to live a better life as a female.

Giving out these unusual punishments will provide value in the form of entertainment for everyone else, the purpose is humiliation for public amusement and deterrent.

 

[Admin]

Consequences of successfully limiting government power
By promoting libertarian vaues you will be able to weaken the ability of a government to excess social control and this will make it easier for you to yourself gain control, you do however run the risk of the current rulers losing power to people even more problematic instead of you gaining control.

The vintologi power law dictates that while you can enjoy freedom for some time eventually it will have to come to an end.

 

[Admin]

Inclusion criteria for individual rights
Individual freedoms cannot apply to everyone. At the start of your life you will be in a state of helplessness and you will depend completely on people around you, they have to make good decisions for you, in addition you may find yourself later in life where you are incapable of proper decision making.

More clear critera for getting certain rights will make it more difficult for authorities to take freedoms away from people they view as problematic. Mental health criteria are ideal for arbitrarily depriving people of rights, if the individual disagree with his diagnosis that is a sign he lack insight in his illness and this can justify involuntary psychiatric treatments. Things such as IQ-tests are more scientific and less subjective and thus less appealing to rulers.

'human rights' are supposed to apply to all humans but it's not clear exactly what counts as a human and these things will not actually be respected by governments.

 

[Admin]

Are cis/trans female rights in danger?
The obvious answer is yes but it's not exclusive to them, no matter who you are you are never fully safe in society, bad things can happen to you.
example: most murder victims are male.

What you can do however is to live a good life until something unforeseen/unavoidable take that away, you will die one day, there is no avoiding that. Most people alive today will probably die from old age or disease rather than being killed by government or criminals.

In terms of government oppression what usually happens is that a small number of people are targeted, governments generally do not want to go after some strong group. People viewed as mentally ill are particularly at risk since many of these are not capable of properly fighting for their rights.

https://vintologi.com/threads/psychiatry-horror-stories.267/
Young people are also at risk since they are not allowed to vote and often parents want to control their children (they are the ones allowed to vote).
Things like draconian abortion laws can only take place in a democracy if a significant portion of the female population wants that (such as due to believing in christianity).

 

[Admin]

Societal survival of the fittest
Unfortunately there is one big problem, societies are in constant competition between each other. Often states want to expand their authority beyond their current borders (this very often resulted in war).

The competition against other societies/states will push governments to implement inhumane policies in an attempt to gain the upper hand, this can be outright conscription or draconian taxes (or at least very limited welfare) in an attempt to push people into military employment. Governments might resort to eugenics, involuntary medical experiments on humans, genocidal warfare, sacrificing their own civilians in wars, etc.

It's also likely that some countries will implement draconian policies for raising the birth-rate, this in particular will endanger the rights of fertile female but of course nobody is safe (infertile females can be useful as government sex-slaves, males can be forcefully transitioned to female).

A big reason for the recent pushback against letting children transition seem to be the fact that many are AFAB and there isn't any way to preserve female fertility while transitioning (surrogacy is expensive, often illegal, often viewed as immoral). Another issue with FtM transition is that it makes the incel problem even worse.

If forced impregnations become reality (which it probably will in some countries) it will probably be limited to a minority of the female population to reduce the negative economic impact and the number of people directly negatively effected (this is possible in a democracy since you can just convince enough of the ones not subjected to it).

In general "societal survival of the fittest" is a process hard to predict but it will continue until we have a single world government in firm control over the entire planet.

 

[Admin]

Trans rights in the UK
The highest judicial power in the UK rests in the house of lords which isn't a democratic institution. New legislation technically also has to be approved by the queen but this is mostly ceremonial at this point (if legislation is stopped/changed by her it will be at an earlier stage).

Because of the limited role of democracy the judicial system will be able to limit the negative effects of the current anti-trans hysteria being spread in the UK (to a large extent by transphobic media).

While the official healthcare system is very dysfunctional for trans people it's still possible to access HRT by buying it online without prescription https://vintologi.com/posts/1808

Generally we can trust undemocratic institutions far more when it comes to trans rights since they do not have to constantly put effort into pleasing their ignorant voters https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-supreme-court-declines-hear-transgender-school-bathroom-case-2021-06-28/

One big issue in the UK unfortunately is that the undemocratic institutions tend to generally support democracy and go along with bad ideas because a majority was in favor of it (such as brexit) https://vintologi.com/threads/elite-rule.24/page-2#post-5436

We also do not know how long institutions such as the house of lords will last, their power has already been weakened (they can no longer fully veto legislation, just delay it).

 

[Admin]

Extreme libertarianism and abortion
If you are going to be consistent with "my body my choice" you would have to apply it to everything such as

1. Someone intentionally infecting themselves with AIDS
2. Suicide clinics where they kill people who want to die
3. Letting quacks con people into having harmful treatments while making money from them.

People naturally take issue with these things because we have something called compassion. This is especially the case with people genetically close to us (Hamiltons Law). For example if you have made a female pregnant you will naturally care for that unborn child at all stages of development.

But letting all people make medical decisions for themselves also creates other issues, what about children? what about people who cannot currently make decisions for themselves?

Well in an extreme libertarian society you would have to reduce children to parental property (such as of the mother) so then if a mother wants to use her child for some medical experiments there would be nothing stopping her, you could also sell your child you own to someone else to be abused. As we see this does not really need to freedom since the children who are just the property or parent/parents wouldn't have any freedom/rights at all.

Furthermore it's not in the interest of the wider society to allow for free abortions (no restrictions) when the fertility is well below replacement.

Extreme libertarianism is very unlikely to be a viable ideology for multiple reasons:

You do need to control people to a degree to have a functional society and maintain control over society, if the state would disappear other people (such as criminal gangs) would gain power instead. The nazis were able to take power because the government before them didn't stop them (they were given political freedoms).

Extreme libertarianism also goes against human psychology, most people do not want to just see poor people die because there isn't any welfare. We do not want to see people die because they got conned by some quack. Even if ax extreme libertarian policy would work better overall people would still oppose it because it feels very wrong.

 

[Admin]

Why are so many people so passionately pro-choice with regard to abortion?
I personally was pro-choice for a while because i don't trust governments to make these decisions but i later realized that we shouldn't resort to needlessly killing babies because we cannot trust over government, what we need is better governance.

By "needless" i refer to abortions where there is no proper medical reasons(s) to perform it and there are someone who would be willing to raise the child (such as the biological rather).

I only got one decent 'answer' so far

Women through history have been impregnated to control and weaken them

That of course is not true. The actual reason was that they and males back then actually wanted to have children.

In cases where females have been brutally controlled it's the other way around, they are controlled because they are valued for sex/reproduction (ISIS used to kill the males and take the females as sex-slaves, etc).

Of course having children may interfere with your career but the solution to that is not killing children in the womb. The whole "career" thing is to a large extent a scam pushed by companies to motivate people to work hard in pursuit of promotion (rather than getting paid in cash or having ownership over the company).

Another motive can be anti-natalism, the notion that we should commit civilization and cultural suicide in an attempt to save the planet (resulting in countries who don't care about the environment taking over instead).

Bodily autonomy

Most people in favor of abortion don't actually support the right to freely have medical treatment, most would probably not want to get rid of FDA. A lot of pro-abortion people are even in favor of forced medical treatments (vaccines, etc) so the argument so it does not seem like this is their actual reason for being pro-choice when human life is at stake.

If a drug has a side effect of sometimes killing a fetus shouldn't it be banned?

Furthermore most pro-choice people think teens should be able to consent to abortion while also claiming they lack the maturity require to consent to sex.

The fetus isn't a human life worthy of protection

If someone would stabb a pregnant female in the stomach killing her child in the womb isn't that murder?

Surely you would want the perpetuator to be sentenced for murder?

 

[Admin]

The case against rape-exception for abortion
It's incorrect to examine legislation purely from a theoretical moral perspective. We have to consider the actual results of the legislation for society as a whole.

The general issue with prosecuting rape is difficulty knowing what actually happened (when there is no recording or third party observers) so in a lot of cases you end up with one claiming that he/she was rape and another denying the allegation.

Having a legal rape-exception would encourage false rape allegations and this is the last thing we want,.you do not want to incentivize for society bad behaviour.

If you only allowed it in cases where it was clear that she was indeed raped then most females getting pregnant from rape would not actually be able to abort, if you instead just take her word then females can lie and in most cases it would not be possible to prove that she did indeed lie.

A potential compromise is have a short time-window for abortion (such as 6 weeks) or something like a heartbeat law so actual victims of rape can have an abortion while people who get pregnant in other ways will usually not make that window forcing them to give birth instead.

You could also argue that young children/fetuses are entitled to special protections (especially your own biological children. For example the biological father is currently expected to pay child-support even in cases where he didn't even want the child and in the case of child-supports, this can be the case even if the he didn't even consent to the sex, the view is that the best interest of the child should take priority.

 

[Admin]

Regarding the violinist argument for abortions in the case of rape-pregnancy
You wake up in the morning and find yourself back to back in bed with an unconscious violinist. A famous unconscious violinist. He has been found to have a fatal kidney ailment, and the Society of Music Lovers has canvassed all the available medical records and found that you alone have the right blood type to help. They have therefore kidnapped you, and last night the violinist's circulatory system was plugged into yours, so that your kidneys can be used to extract poisons from his blood as well as your own. [If he is unplugged from you now, he will die; but] in nine months he will have recovered from his ailment, and can safely be unplugged from you.[4]

Thomson argues that one can now permissibly unplug themself from the violinist even though this will cause his death: this is due to limits on the right to life, which does not include the right to use another person's body, and so by unplugging the violinist, one does not violate his right to life but merely deprives him of something—the use of someone else's body—to which he has no right. "f you do allow him to go on using your kidneys, this is a kindness on your part, and not something he can claim from you as his due."

First off we do not necessarily have to have the same rights for adults as we have for fetuses, we can have special rules for fetuses that are different from the rules we have for humans.

You may also be in favor of parental ogligations, currently for example males are required to pay child-support even if they didn't even consent to the sex where she became pregnant. What's viewed as good for the children is often prioritized over what would be fair for men.

Being pregnant simply doesn't cause inconvenience enough to justify killing a human.

The best refutation
Even if you grant people the right to discontinue any medical intervention at any time that doesn't grant the right to abortion since the pregnancy will likely progress even if no medical intervention is made.

The actual equivalent situation is someone needing a medical treatment to maintain the life of a fetus.

 

[Admin]

The case for forced abortion-reversal (when possible)
People who follow the law should have the right to refuse a medical treatment (provided they are not under the guardianship of someone else).

Criminals however should not have that right. If you for example illegally destroy/remove a kidney someone has we are justified in forcefully taking a kidney from the perpetrator to rectify that. The state shall have the power to use forced medical treatments in a response to behaviour that severely violate the law.

People who have tried having an illegal abortion should be strictly monitored and will not have any say in what medical treatments that are given to her in an attempt to maximize the chance of the child surviving.

For some reason people who claim to be pro-choice (rather than pro-abortion anti-natalist) frequently deny that abortion pills can be reversed but after looking at actual studies it become fairly obvious that the effect of an abortion-pill can indeed be reversed in a lot of cases.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30831017/

https://www.ajog.org/article/S0002-9378(19)32762-0/fulltext

The only people who have a motive to lie about this are people who are pro-abortion and don't want females to be able to reverse that decision (because they want to kill children in the womb).

A recent trial was stopposed supposedely due to side effects but 2 of the 3 were in the placebo group so progesterone was very unlikely to blame for that.

https://archive.ph/IymPc

 

[Admin]

Dealing with miscarriages
One big issue is that people who have had an abortion can claim it was a miscarriage and then if she is convicted she will cry out in media claiming to be innocent.

Due to the difficulty in prosecuting these cases we should demand that women get pregnant again in the case of miscarriage to reduce the incentive of illegally seeking an abortion.

We also need to hunt down the people illegally providing abortions to other people. And severely punish females who even attempt illegally having an abortion.

 

[Admin]

I will try to summarize the arguments I hear from the pro-choice side. Note that this is about abortion-at-will, not about abortion to save a life (when the mother is in an unhealthy pregnancy).

Undervalue
This is simply believing that human lives a mere biological instance and don't have intrinsic value. While it is a rare argument that is openly put forward by pro-choice, in my opinion it is the most consistent and powerful argument they have. And it lies underneath most of their common arguments.

The reason they don't make that argument is that they know it would invalidate all arguments about human rights (including the rights they claim to defend).

When it is put forward though, you would have to go beyond politics and enter the religious/moral world to discuss this. But ultimately, you cannot convince someone to value anything, and if they decide to reject the value of human lives, discussions are likely a lost cause. Only pray, preach, and vote. Always be peaceful.

Dehumanize
Many pro-choicers claim fetuses are either not humans at all, or not humans enough. It is an unfortunate feature of humanity - believing those who do not look like us are not as human as we are.

It can come in the form of acknowledging fetuses as humans but with no rights to exist in the womb, or simply denying that fetuses are humans. Obviously fetuses are biologically humans, so it should be easy to refute arguments that deny that - just point to a biology book. Here are some of the arguments I see often:

• "Fetuses aren't humans. They are just clumps of cells" - Not much to say about this one. If two humans reproduce, their offspring is by definition a human. And all humans are clumps of cells.
• "Fetuses are humans but parasites" - While not many pro-choicers like saying this, it is how the pro-choice ideology treats fetuses. This indicates that because a fetus is living inside its mother
• "Life starts at birth" - Birth doesn't add anything to the fetus' life... it just makes it independent. This goes back to believing only independent humans can be valued and considering other humans as parasites.
• "A fetus has no right to the uterus" - This can be a bit difficult to understand if a generation has lost its sense for rights and responsibilities. Yes, a fetus doesn't own the uterus. However has a right to remain alive in the uterus because it was brought into it by the contribution of two humans. They bear responsibility to keep it alive.
• "Exceptions for rape and incest" - I believe the only legitimate discussion in regards to abortion is the cases of rape. Even then we shouldn't question the humanity of the fetus, but we can discuss who should be held accountable for the rape, the pregnancy and the abortion (if it takes place). Incest isn't a valid reason to evade the responsibility of keeping the child alive.
• "Not a [person or other labels]" - The labels could be "person", "baby", "child", etc. This is more of a way to create a class of humans by using arbitrary label. Ok, if the definition of that specific work doesn't include fetuses, so be it. But arbitrary labels should not matter when we discuss about human rights.

In general, while there is a legitimate discussion in cases of rape, under no circumstance is the fetus not a human or less of a human. Therefore, a fetus has inalienable human rights, including the right to remain alive.

Manipulate
Where should I start? In my experience in debating/discussing abortion, the unfortunate reality was that far too many arguments settle for manipulation instead of logical reasoning.

Politics has always been full of lies, so it's not surprising to see so many bad arguments packaged nicely and influencing the public opinion. But most of it is not even difficult to refute.

Some of these arguments, I admit, take more work, patience and knowing the root of the narrative and the hidden agenda behind them. I have my own thoughts of why people argue a certain way and what the narratives they use can cause in the long term. But that's a separate topic.

It's difficult to list these arguments but here are a few:

• "Pro-lifers don't care about humans after they are born" - While this is obviously false, the proper response should be that it's irrelevant. The only group of humans who are currently legally killed while innocent are fetuses. Framing this as if pro-lifers care only about fetuses is one manipulation that pro-choicers use often.
• "Pro-lifers shouldn't support the death penalty" - The death penalty can be discussed, but the subtle fallacy here is false equivalence between killing someone while innocent vs. after conviction of crime. You will hear arguments about false convictions... as if pro-lifers are OK with killing humans who are falsely convicted. It takes patience to untangle all these fallacies and refute them.
• "Being pro-life should mean approving universal healthcare" - Again while healthcare, taxes and other financial policies can be a discussion, having an opinion on the economic policies does not imply what you think about actually killing a human while innocent.
• "Pro-lifers simply want to subjugate women" - This comes from the perspective of thinking natural feminine features like pregnancy and motherhood as inferior to masculinity. It is an important part of convincing girls and women that to be a fulfilled human, they should be able to call shots on the life of their unborn child. But simply, it's false. Holding people accountable for killing a life has nothing to do with subjugating them.
• "Pregnancy is a medical emergency" - Going back to considering natural femininity to be inferior, this argument often rears its head when discussing the exception a medical emergency. They say all pregnancy is a medical emergency in an effort to justify abortion.
• "It can't be murder if it's legal" - This is one disturbing argument I sometimes hear. Mentioning the Holocaust should suffice. If the debate goes beyond that it's probably a lost cause.
• "No uterus, no opinion!" that's not how any system of governance works. It should be about merit, not which body parts you happen to have.
• "Banning abortion increases unsafe abortions" - This isn't false (while I am not sure about the numbers, I give it the benefit of the doubt). But it doesn't mean anything. All banning of crime is bound to increase risk for those who want to do it. People should be expected to follow the law, they shouldn't complain about bad things happening to them because they were obsessed with illegally killing their own child.
• "Banning abortions won't stop abortions" - Obviously. The law is in place to set a standard, and hold people accountable by that standard. All crimes that currently take place are not taking place because they are legal but because people refuse to adhere to the law.
• "Don't force your religion on me" - This isn't always manipulative, as some pro-lifers make the mistake of using their religious beliefs as the reason they oppose abortion legally. But mostly people are programmed with the narrative that Christians are the enemy (which is an important topic to address in the Western politics in general) and even when pro-lifers mention that religion is not the reason they oppose abortion, the response is emotionally directed towards the religion.
• "The Bible approves abortion" - This is tied to the narrative that Christians are always behind opposing abortion for religious reasons. The effort here is to manipulate them into becoming pro-abortion because the bible is supposedly cool with it. I won't go into whether the claim is true or false, but it's interesting that most people who say this are against using the bible as the foundation of legal discussions.
• "Don't want an abortion? Don't have one!" - This is like saying "don't want rape? Don't commit it!" trying to sway people away from legally banning a violation of human rights. No, some acts should be legally banned and are beyond personal preference.
• "Pro-lifers shouldn't eat meat" - This is simply a result of seeing human life as equally valuable as animals. Not many pro-choicers say this, but I believe they don't see a problem with the argument because devaluing human life without directly saying it is convenient for pro-choicers.
• "Pro-lifers should be against gun ownership" - This argument usually comes after some mass shooting tragedy. It's an emotional manipulation used by politicians to justify confiscation of guns, which is not only unconstitutional, but clearly against the human right of self defense. It's another version of trying to convince pro-lifers to support unrelated issues using the word "life".

There are many others obviously, and I might add as remember, but these are the usual horrible arguments I see repeatedly.

The pro-life response isn't alway good, unfortunately. Some pro-life politicians have said things that I think empower the pro-choice accusations. We should always remain logical (always check if your own logic is sound first),

Abortion is the heart and mind issue of our time so the responses should be focused, refined and patient as well. And, again, peaceful.
I will try to summarize the arguments I hear from the pro-choice side. Note that this is about abortion-at-will, not about abortion to save a life (when the mother is in an unhealthy pregnancy).

Undervalue
This is simply believing that human lives a mere biological instance and don't have intrinsic value. While it is a rare argument that is openly put forward by pro-choice, in my opinion it is the most consistent and powerful argument they have. And it lies underneath most of their common arguments.

The reason they don't make that argument is that they know it would invalidate all arguments about human rights (including the rights they claim to defend).

When it is put forward though, you would have to go beyond politics and enter the religious/moral world to discuss this. But ultimately, you cannot convince someone to value anything, and if they decide to reject the value of human lives, discussions are likely a lost cause. Only pray, preach, and vote. Always be peaceful.

Dehumanize
Many pro-choicers claim fetuses are either not humans at all, or not humans enough. It is an unfortunate feature of humanity - believing those who do not look like us are not as human as we are.

It can come in the form of acknowledging fetuses as humans but with no rights to exist in the womb, or simply denying that fetuses are humans. Obviously fetuses are biologically humans, so it should be easy to refute arguments that deny that - just point to a biology book. Here are some of the arguments I see often:

• "Fetuses aren't humans. They are just clumps of cells" - Not much to say about this one. If two humans reproduce, their offspring is by definition a human. And all humans are clumps of cells.
• "Fetuses are humans but parasites" - While not many pro-choicers like saying this, it is how the pro-choice ideology treats fetuses. This indicates that because a fetus is living inside its mother
• "Life starts at birth" - Birth doesn't add anything to the fetus' life... it just makes it independent. This goes back to believing only independent humans can be valued and considering other humans as parasites.
• "A fetus has no right to the uterus" - This can be a bit difficult to understand if a generation has lost its sense for rights and responsibilities. Yes, a fetus doesn't own the uterus. However has a right to remain alive in the uterus because it was brought into it by the contribution of two humans. They bear responsibility to keep it alive.
• "Exceptions for rape and incest" - I believe the only legitimate discussion in regards to abortion is the cases of rape. Even then we shouldn't question the humanity of the fetus, but we can discuss who should be held accountable for the rape, the pregnancy and the abortion (if it takes place). Incest isn't a valid reason to evade the responsibility of keeping the child alive.
• "Not a [person or other labels]" - The labels could be "person", "baby", "child", etc. This is more of a way to create a class of humans by using arbitrary label. Ok, if the definition of that specific work doesn't include fetuses, so be it. But arbitrary labels should not matter when we discuss about human rights.

In general, while there is a legitimate discussion in cases of rape, under no circumstance is the fetus not a human or less of a human. Therefore, a fetus has inalienable human rights, including the right to remain alive.

Manipulate
Where should I start? In my experience in debating/discussing abortion, the unfortunate reality was that far too many arguments settle for manipulation instead of logical reasoning.

Politics has always been full of lies, so it's not surprising to see so many bad arguments packaged nicely and influencing the public opinion. But most of it is not even difficult to refute.

Some of these arguments, I admit, take more work, patience and knowing the root of the narrative and the hidden agenda behind them. I have my own thoughts of why people argue a certain way and what the narratives they use can cause in the long term. But that's a separate topic.

It's difficult to list these arguments but here are a few:

• "Pro-lifers don't care about humans after they are born" - While this is obviously false, the proper response should be that it's irrelevant. The only group of humans who are currently legally killed while innocent are fetuses. Framing this as if pro-lifers care only about fetuses is one manipulation that pro-choicers use often.
• "Pro-lifers shouldn't support the death penalty" - The death penalty can be discussed, but the subtle fallacy here is false equivalence between killing someone while innocent vs. after conviction of crime. You will hear arguments about false convictions... as if pro-lifers are OK with killing humans who are falsely convicted. It takes patience to untangle all these fallacies and refute them.
• "Being pro-life should mean approving universal healthcare" - Again while healthcare, taxes and other financial policies can be a discussion, having an opinion on the economic policies does not imply what you think about actually killing a human while innocent.
• "Pro-lifers simply want to subjugate women" - This comes from the perspective of thinking natural feminine features like pregnancy and motherhood as inferior to masculinity. It is an important part of convincing girls and women that to be a fulfilled human, they should be able to call shots on the life of their unborn child. But simply, it's false. Holding people accountable for killing a life has nothing to do with subjugating them.
• "Pregnancy is a medical emergency" - Going back to considering natural femininity to be inferior, this argument often rears its head when discussing the exception a medical emergency. They say all pregnancy is a medical emergency in an effort to justify abortion.
• "It can't be murder if it's legal" - This is one disturbing argument I sometimes hear. Mentioning the Holocaust should suffice. If the debate goes beyond that it's probably a lost cause.
• "No uterus, no opinion!" - An empty slogan. Not many pro-choicers say this though and most of them actually publicly oppose it.
• "Banning abortion increases unsafe abortions" - This isn't false (while I am not sure about the numbers, I give it the benefit of the doubt). But it doesn't mean anything. All banning of crime is bound to increase risk for those who want to do it. For example, sex with underage people is (and should be) illegal, but people find risky alternatives to do it. Hopefully no one argues to legalize it to make it safe.
• "Banning abortions won't stop abortions" - Obviously. The law is in place to set a standard, and hold people accountable by that standard. All crimes that currently take place are not taking place because they are legal but because people refuse to adhere to the law.
• "Don't force your religion on me" - This isn't always manipulative, as some pro-lifers make the mistake of using their religious beliefs as the reason they oppose abortion legally. But mostly people are programmed with the narrative that Christians are the enemy (which is an important topic to address in the Western politics in general) and even when pro-lifers mention that religion is not the reason they oppose abortion, the response is emotionally directed towards the religion.
• "The Bible approves abortion" - This is tied to the narrative that Christians are always behind opposing abortion for religious reasons. The effort here is to manipulate them into becoming pro-abortion because the bible is supposedly cool with it. I won't go into whether the claim is true or false, but it's interesting that most people who say this are against using the bible as the foundation of legal discussions.
• "Don't want an abortion? Don't have one!" - This is like saying "don't want rape? Don't commit it!" trying to sway people away from legally banning a violation of human rights. No, some acts should be legally banned and are beyond personal preference.
• "Pro-lifers shouldn't eat meat" - This is simply a result of seeing human life as equally valuable as animals. Not many pro-choicers say this, but I believe they don't see a problem with the argument because devaluing human life without directly saying it is convenient for pro-choicers.
• "Pro-lifers should be against gun ownership" - This argument usually comes after some mass shooting tragedy. It's an emotional manipulation used by politicians to justify confiscation of guns, which is not only unconstitutional, but clearly against the human right of self defense. It's another version of trying to convince pro-lifers to support unrelated issues using the word "life".

There are many others obviously, and I might add as remember, but these are the usual horrible arguments I see repeatedly.

The pro-life response isn't alway good, unfortunately. Some pro-life politicians have said things that I think empower the pro-choice accusations. We should always remain logical (always check if your own logic is sound first),

Abortion is the heart and mind issue of our time so the responses should be focused, refined and patient as well. And, again, peaceful.

 

[Admin]

Women being denied abortions are going just fine
Turns out people who end up having to give birth instead are doing just fine

Women who were denied an abortion, in particular those who later miscarried or had an abortion elsewhere (turnaway no-birth group), had the most elevated levels of anxiety and lowest self-esteem and life satisfaction 1 week after being denied an abortion, which quickly improved and approached levels similar to those in the other groups by 6 to 12 months.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2592320

This study is actually cited often by people pushing for abortion access but as we see abortion is not a medical treatment women actually need (except for rare medical exception).

So while there is some temporary hardships from being denied abortion this is something women can get through just fine and it's very often worth it to save a human life. People who we save from abortions can become valuable members of our society.

Most women end up raising the child themselves rather than giving it up for adoption.

A minority of women denied abortions (n = 231; 14%) were considering adoption at 1 week after denial. Of participants who gave birth (n = 161), most (91%) chose parenting.

https://www.whijournal.com/article/S1049-3867(16)30348-6/fulltext

This shouldn't come as a surprise. Of course women are perfectly capable of giving birth and raising children, otherwise humanity would have died out a long time ago.

thelifeinstitute.net/blog/2021/study-96-of-women-who-couldnt-access-abortion-dont-regret-that-after-5-years

 

[Admin]

We should ban abortions and brutally enforce it
0. Elective abortions should all be banned without exception.
1. We should hunt down remaining illegal abortion providers by undercover agents, etc.
2. Abortion providers should be given the death penalty (such as burning or feeding them to lions).
3. Women who had a miscarriage should be expected to get pregnant again (to eliminate the incentive to illegally have an abortion).
4. women who try to have an abortion should be severely punished and lose the right to deny a medical treatment (such as attempt to reverse the abortion in a way that risks the death of the mother).
5. People who advocate for abortion should be severely punished and all such we shall aggressively censor any pro-abortion propaganda.

 

[Admin]

The fact that many people have to go through hardships doesn't justify abortion
One common dishonest talking point is "you are not really pro life unless..."

The fact that someone disagrees with you politically (such as preferring having tighter school security over gun restrictions) doesn't mean that they want people to die after they have been born.

Would you abstain from saving the life of an adult because he is poor and the government is corrupt?

We shouldn't resort to killing children in the womb because our politicians aren't willing to support parent's enough.

Pain and hardships is a natural part of life, overcoming hardships can be a great aspect of your life that you are proud of. Why not give people a chance to live rather than just killing them because they would be poor or that they would risk dying later?

There will always be issues we face as a society. Giving up on human life before it's even born isn't the answer to that. We can do better as a society.