This is just an oportunistic political move ahead of next year's elections. The government doesn't really care about abortion. Source: Argentinian living in Argentina.
"Net positive" means here that despite negative effects, the end result is still preferable to other outcomes.
(While not quite applicable here,) the easiest example to explain this is when the pregnancy threatens the lives of both mother-to-be and unborn child. An abortion will end the life of the child but the mother gets to live. In the other case both mother and child would die. So an abortion would be "net positive" because only the child dies and not both of them.
The example was meant to make clear what "net positive" means. Do you actually believe that women get abortions because "they want them"? That there are no real reasons?
Not because untimely offspring might throw them and their family into poverty again? Not because the partner might be unsuitable for raising children and they would be left on their own with them in short order?
> Karina Marolla, a 49-year-old opponent of the law, said: “What was voted for today is the death penalty for the most innocent. Today in Argentina there’s no law giving the death penalty to rapists or murderers. So we’re feeling sad, to put it lightly.”
It's buried toward the bottom, but I'm genuinely surprised that opponents got the appearance of a fair shake in The Guardian.
Which are also countries where overpopulation and destitution are most prevalent. Improving access to education, contraception, and abortion for women worldwide should be our #1 foreign aid objective. We should target this in place of food aid.
If you want to hear an opinion that argues not from a moral standpoint but takes the view of someone who actually has to make such a decision, I can recommend listening to the very concise (< 2min) and thoughtful argument Pete Buttigieg makes:
Buttigieg's argument supposes that the question is if the government dictates the outcome or the woman does. It's true that at the end of the day someone is going to decide if a pregnancy is carried to term or not but Buttigieg is sweeping so much under the rug in a rush to get to a question that he feels comfortable with. He's avoiding things like:
Is abortion a good thing or not?
Should the government (and by extension people who don't support it) be paying for it?
Should the government treat it as neutral - there are a raft of instances where we let people make decisions but we absolutely let government push a desired outcome. Don't smoke. Get exercise. Have kids. Get married. Don't be a bigot. Be patriotic.
The annoying thing to me is that virtually everyone agrees that there's a space short of government dictating that abortions don't happen and not caring at all if they happen. Whne B. Clinton said "Safe, Legal and Rare" the question that people should have asked is "Why rare?" and "How do you want to make it rare?"
I just wanted you to know that I share your sentiment mostly, and that you are not alone in your opinion on this on HN.
When is a life, a life? I was born very prematurely, as far as those things went back then. How can someone claim to be moral, yet be in favour of legalized murder of those babies in similar situations today?
Certainly I do not think that the fetus is a person or a life (whatever that means) at four weeks, nor at conception. At best, abortion could be a necessary evil to save the life of the mother at later stages of the pregnancy.
> How can someone claim to be moral, yet be in favour of legalized murder of those babies in similar situations today?
It is not possible for that person to claim a moral high ground. It is a sign of a gravely malformed conscience.
I think that most of those people haven't formed their own opinions, though, and mostly just regurgitate party platforms. It's not that they started from any reasonable base of knowledge and arrived at the wrong conclusion. It's just ignorance. While they could have been studying the ethical philosophers who made meaningful contributions on this topic, instead, they allowed social media and mass media to form their opinions for them.
You are evil!
This is a woman's body. This is woman's health. This is a woman's life. This is her decision. Nobody can decide for her.
Not a fucking government! Not any fucking religion! Not fucking you!
The users of this site express negative value judgments all the time, and frequently about each others' life's work. If that isn't inflammatory, I don't know what is.
Other people doing bad things is no excuse for you doing them. That's a recipe for a downward spiral.
That reference is distorted, in any case. "$foo is evil" is a trope of standard internet hyperbole, that gets applied to things ironically. That is not at all the same thing as what you posted.
I don't mean to suggest that a bad action justifies another bad action. I mean to suggest that making a value judgment (directed against a thing, not against a person) is not a bad action. It's a normal part of discourse. Offense is in the eye of the beholder.
If you don't like abortion then you don't have to get one...but don't come crying about human right violations or poverty when the answer is in front of you.
To put it simply if you don't agree with contraceptives, preventives, and abortion you are wishing doom on millions of adults anyway as the world becomes populated to the point of unsustainability.
Fuck it maybe it is murder, but it's the death of a mind barely sentient vs the slow bitter painful agony of a long and desperate life.
24 comments
[ 4.8 ms ] story [ 121 ms ] thread(While not quite applicable here,) the easiest example to explain this is when the pregnancy threatens the lives of both mother-to-be and unborn child. An abortion will end the life of the child but the mother gets to live. In the other case both mother and child would die. So an abortion would be "net positive" because only the child dies and not both of them.
No one who advocates for life believes that there aren't any mitigating circumstances.
People who advocate for life believe that there aren't any mitigating circumstances that justify murder.
It's buried toward the bottom, but I'm genuinely surprised that opponents got the appearance of a fair shake in The Guardian.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a5/Abortion...
Which are also countries where overpopulation and destitution are most prevalent. Improving access to education, contraception, and abortion for women worldwide should be our #1 foreign aid objective. We should target this in place of food aid.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKOoWYfIzIw
I approach moral decisions from moral principles. Letting your emotions run you is a recipe for disaster and a mark of immaturity.
Is abortion a good thing or not? Should the government (and by extension people who don't support it) be paying for it? Should the government treat it as neutral - there are a raft of instances where we let people make decisions but we absolutely let government push a desired outcome. Don't smoke. Get exercise. Have kids. Get married. Don't be a bigot. Be patriotic.
The annoying thing to me is that virtually everyone agrees that there's a space short of government dictating that abortions don't happen and not caring at all if they happen. Whne B. Clinton said "Safe, Legal and Rare" the question that people should have asked is "Why rare?" and "How do you want to make it rare?"
When is a life, a life? I was born very prematurely, as far as those things went back then. How can someone claim to be moral, yet be in favour of legalized murder of those babies in similar situations today?
Certainly I do not think that the fetus is a person or a life (whatever that means) at four weeks, nor at conception. At best, abortion could be a necessary evil to save the life of the mother at later stages of the pregnancy.
It is not possible for that person to claim a moral high ground. It is a sign of a gravely malformed conscience.
I think that most of those people haven't formed their own opinions, though, and mostly just regurgitate party platforms. It's not that they started from any reasonable base of knowledge and arrived at the wrong conclusion. It's just ignorance. While they could have been studying the ethical philosophers who made meaningful contributions on this topic, instead, they allowed social media and mass media to form their opinions for them.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
The original post is itself flamebait and is not HN-worthy.
Your comment stood out in a bad way. When X is an inflammatory topic, entering with "$X is evil" is just exploding a bomb. That's not ok here.
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22is+evil%22+site%3Anews.yc...
That reference is distorted, in any case. "$foo is evil" is a trope of standard internet hyperbole, that gets applied to things ironically. That is not at all the same thing as what you posted.
Your point is taken, though. I'll watch it.
To put it simply if you don't agree with contraceptives, preventives, and abortion you are wishing doom on millions of adults anyway as the world becomes populated to the point of unsustainability.
Fuck it maybe it is murder, but it's the death of a mind barely sentient vs the slow bitter painful agony of a long and desperate life.