Parential notification for abortion
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  Parential notification for abortion
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Author Topic: Parential notification for abortion  (Read 6850 times)
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« Reply #50 on: December 04, 2004, 12:14:59 PM »

Lives aren't sacred?  You can't equate a cow with a human.  If lives aren't sacred, then euthanasia of the elderly is okay.  And let's get rid of all the lunatics in the insane asylums.  And then those crazy fundamentalist Christians and Jews.


Zieg Heil!
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John Dibble
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« Reply #51 on: December 04, 2004, 12:32:57 PM »

In this particular abortion debate, I try to leave out the 'life' factor(which, I remind you, varies from person to person). I think it's irrelevant to this particular discussion - we're talking about a matter of parental rights to govern their children, not about abortion. As I've said before, the "it's their body" argument means that they should be able to do drugs with their body if they want, tatoo and pierce their body if they want, ect - and the fact is it always is their body, and that would mean such things would still apply to a five year old. Minors do not have the rights that adults do - they just are not generally ready for them. 18 is the age society has decided that the governing cord between child and parent is cut, and while it is a one size fits all that might not be the best, it has to happen. But before that the parents make the decisions.
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Avelaval
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« Reply #52 on: December 04, 2004, 02:20:15 PM »

Don't bother notifying the parents. Either they know it happened or they don't know it happened. If they know, great. If they don't know, then why risk pissing off the parents?

I feel the need to further comment. You are obviously not a parent, so this is probably an easy thing to say for you, but do try to consider something - if you were a parent, don't you think it would be in both you and your child's best interests to know if they are going to have an abortion? This isn't just a notification about having an abortion - this is about being notified that your child has been having sex. If your kid is having sex, and getting pregnant, you should know. If parents don't know their kids are having sex, then they might not know they need to have a serious talk about sex, responsibility, and all that stuff.

Further on the 'it's not their body' argument - if you use this argument, then you have to allow children to be able to make ALL their own medical decisions. That includes things like plastic surgery. Also, it's always their body, so they should be able to do it whenever they like - a five year old should be able to get a boob job without parental consent by your argument. Oh, and let's not forget tatoos, piercings, ect. Oh, and parents can't force kids to eat their vegetables anymore, because it's not their body to regulate. You getting my drift yet? Minors do not have the same rights adults do - they aren't normally mentally ready to make any of those decisions.

The girl will need medical care anyways if she's pregnant.

I submit that a 16 year old is every bit as ready to make decisions regarding her body as an 18 year old. Why do you think the age of consent is usually lower then 18?

If a girl is pregnant, there are two options: deliver the baby or abort the baby. Either way, it's not a pleasant option. Parental input is certainly helpful in a situation such as this, but if the girl isn't comfortable discussing it with her parents, there's probably a good reason.

I agree that if I was a parent I'd want to know, and to that end I'd create an envirionment where the child wouldn't be afraid to come to me for help.
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Avelaval
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« Reply #53 on: December 04, 2004, 02:23:19 PM »

Lives aren't sacred?  You can't equate a cow with a human.  If lives aren't sacred, then euthanasia of the elderly is okay.  And let's get rid of all the lunatics in the insane asylums.  And then those crazy fundamentalist Christians and Jews.


Zieg Heil!

I CAN equate a cow with a human, but that's beside the point. You haven't demonstrated to me that the fetus is human, and even that's an irrelevent argument. How many HUMANS have we killed in Iraq? Using the death penalty we execute about 100 HUMANS natiowide every year.
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Avelaval
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« Reply #54 on: December 04, 2004, 02:29:51 PM »

In this particular abortion debate, I try to leave out the 'life' factor(which, I remind you, varies from person to person). I think it's irrelevant to this particular discussion - we're talking about a matter of parental rights to govern their children, not about abortion. As I've said before, the "it's their body" argument means that they should be able to do drugs with their body if they want, tatoo and pierce their body if they want, ect - and the fact is it always is their body, and that would mean such things would still apply to a five year old. Minors do not have the rights that adults do - they just are not generally ready for them. 18 is the age society has decided that the governing cord between child and parent is cut, and while it is a one size fits all that might not be the best, it has to happen. But before that the parents make the decisions.

As I said before, there are two options for a girl when she gets pregnant: deliver or abort.

You are effectively saying that a parent should have the right to force the girl to deliver if she's under 18. That just plain cruel if she doesn't want to.

It is a different category then piercings, tattoos, eating vegetables, plastic surgery, etc. in that the parent is trying to save the child from pain and torment.

With a pregnancy, there's pain and torment either way, so let the girl decide. She can tell the parents about it if she wants to.
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JohnFKennedy
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« Reply #55 on: December 04, 2004, 02:33:08 PM »

As people seem to be talking more about parental CONSENT for abortion than parental NOTIFICATION, I will step in and debate (mainly for the sake of debating) that parental consent should not be  a necessity.

Firstly, let's look at something that Nation raised. A friend of his was thrown out of the house for having an abortion when her parents discovered. If we require parental consent for abortions, and thus require parental notification, this is the sort of thing that will happen. The reason for this is that those children in a stable and supportive family will already discuss issues such as abortion with their parents if such an issue were to arise. So a requirement for consent/notificatiion of parents would not really affect these people.

So, who does it affect? Weill, it affects those children who are in a family that is generally unstable and as such unsupportive of the child. This means that these children will either a) be forced into a confrontation with their parents over the issue of abortion, b) be forced to run away to escape the problems that could arise, c) try to hide the pregancy from their parents and d) perhaps the most dangerous of all, be forced into a backstreet abortion.

If the children cannot rely on their parents for support, if they know they will be abused by their family for either a) getting pregnant or b) wanting an abortion, what are they going to do? They are going to turn to illegal methods of pregnancy termination and this causes serious problems. If children go in for a backstreet abortion they are putting themselves at serious risk because those performing such methods are generally untrained and generally botch the jobs. As this is the case, the whole idea of requiring parental consent or notification leads to more young deaths as children seek alternative ways to terminate a pregnancy, rather than face an unsupportive family. The other possiblity here is that the girl attempts to carry out an abortion herself (there have been cases of such issues arising) which is even more dangerous than a backstreet abortion. All parental consent/notification for abortion does, is cause problems for children that women had before abortion was legalised.

Not only on these potential grounds would parental consent cause more harm to the mother. Parental consent takes time to obtain and the more time it takes, the more dangerous an abortion becomes. The longer a pregnancy lasts, the more dangerous the abortion becomes so by requiring parental consent, we force the mother to wait for an abortion and as such put her into more risk than she would otherwise face.

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Having debated this issue a few times in formal debates (although strangely always on the other side of the table) I have a general idea of the arguments for and against this.
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John Dibble
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« Reply #56 on: December 04, 2004, 02:44:12 PM »

As I said before, there are two options for a girl when she gets pregnant: deliver or abort.

And you ignore the fact that I said before that the girl should still be able to adopt out the baby without parental permission.

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1. Outside of rape or incest, it's her own damn fault for getting knocked up. It's hardly cruel to make her deal with the consequences of her actions. Children need to learn that their actions have consequences, not that they can just escape them easily.

2. As I said, she can adopt the baby out.

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Once again, you ignore that the parents still have to deal with the consequences if something happens. And don't go on that ridiculous 'they can sue' crap. No amount of money would satisfy me in that case.

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See above. And if the parents are not notified, they don't know she's been having sex - they don't know that she has been making irresponsible, possibly life-threatening decisions. If you were a parent, don't you think you'd have the right to know your child is doing such things - that your child is having unprotected sex!?
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JohnFKennedy
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« Reply #57 on: December 04, 2004, 02:47:57 PM »

Is the age of consent for sexual relations 16 or 18 in the USA because here it is 16 so if the girl is having unprotected sex at 16 or 17 it is entirely her choice and her right to do so.
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nclib
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« Reply #58 on: December 04, 2004, 03:36:50 PM »

I agree that if I was a parent I'd want to know, and to that end I'd create an envirionment where the child wouldn't be afraid to come to me for help.

Well said.
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Avelaval
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« Reply #59 on: December 04, 2004, 03:39:16 PM »

I do not ignore the option of adoption. Adoption requires delivery of the baby.

Getting an abortion is facing the conseqences of her actions. A parent forcing their daughter to deliver is cruel if she doesn't want to. A parent forcing their daughter to have an abortion is cruel if she wants the baby.

The parents will have to deal with consequences anyways. If she decides to abort, the parents have to deal with it if something goes wrong. If she decides to deliver, the parents have to deal with it if something goes wrong.

Sorry about that 'they can sue' comment. I meant that as a tongue -in-cheek comment, and it seems not to have been taken that way.

There are situations when it's better that the parent NOT know, particularly if the parents are abusive. If I was a parent I'd like to know if my child was pregnant, but I don't think it's my 'right.'
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John Dibble
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« Reply #60 on: December 04, 2004, 04:09:18 PM »

A parent forcing their daughter to have an abortion is cruel if she wants the baby.

Here I agree with you. The daughter should be able to have the baby if she wishes. I'm not so sure about aborting it though.

I realize this isn't a situation where a cookie cutter solution would be ideal(one reason it should be a state issue) but unfortunately a cookie cutter policy is really all we can do in this case.

Consent I MIGHT be willing to compromise on(especially if the pregnancy has a high chance of resulting in death), but I think the parent should be notified in all cases. You say that parents might be abusive about it, which may be possible, but they also might provide much needed support in a time of emotional trauma, not to mention have an apparently much needed talk about sex and responsibility. Like I said, cookie cutter isn't ideal, but I think notified parents would be more likely to have a positive effect than a negative one. You might risk the child getting kicked out, but in some situations you must admit that could be an improvement. Perhaps we could make an exception if the child could prove a case for abuse, but otherwise I see more positives in notification than negatives.
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