You said, " You want to punish a Mother by forcing her to become a parent."
First, A Mother is already a parent.
Second, In my mind, Conceiving a child correlates to becoming a parent.
Third, I do not correlate becoming a parent as punishment for having sex.
I used to think somewhat like you Musso, in my younger days, didn't have much of an opinion either way.
As I grew older and have read and heard many opinons and have studied a bit about the human fetus, I guess you could say that
I have saw the light and believe that a fetus with a heartbeat pumping blood through it, made up of cells, all working in conjunction with
each other, to form an unborn life, much like you and I and everybody else.
I could be very wrong about this, but, by your writings, it seems like you may be trying to justify something that may have happened in your
life somewhere along the line, or perhaps a son or a daughter's.
When a woman becomes pregnant I consider her a
mother in a strict biological sense. But she becomes a
parent when she begins parenting. Perhaps I could have made my earlier point by saying it this way: "You want to punish
a woman who regrets her pregnancy by forcing her to become a parent."
Becoming a biological mother or father requires only a few minutes. However, the mother or father may not become or even remain the child's parent. Lots of circumstances can disrupt the progression from mother/father to parent: miscarriages, stillbirths, loss of custody, death of mother/father before birth, etc. I don't know anyone who has experienced a miscarriage or stillbirth who would also say they have been a "parent" to the lost fetus. Conversely, being a child's parent doesn't mean you are the biological mother or father. Lots of people become parents through adoption, but they would never equate their role as parent with also being their child's biological father or mother. Many of us know of mothers and fathers who are derelict in their parenting duties. We might say they don't "parent" their children. Simply put, the requirements for being a mother or father are far fewer than being a parent. Parenting requires duties beyond childbirth.
Again, as you see from my earlier posts in this thread, I don't disagree with your assessment of a fetus. I just think calling a fetus a human being doesn't automatically force you into the position of calling for the state to force parenthood on people who don't want it or who cannot perform the responsibilities.
Answer me these questions:
Would you also force a handicapped or disabled woman who became pregnant to carry her fetus full term and become a parent?
Is it murder to pull the plug on someone kept alive by life support medical devices when it becomes too costly?
How would you want the government to handle the crime of murder committed by conjoined twins, but by only one of them?
Lastly, unless you're a psychological genius, your evaluation of me is very wrong LOL. I'm not trying to justify something from my past. I do know people who have had miscarriages, stillbirths, special needs children, and pregnancy/childbirth complications. I know only one person who has chosen an abortion, although perhaps I know more but they've kept it secret. I'm a long time member of this board, but I've been inactive for a while. Any old-timers here might remember how much I enjoy debating. So don't read too much into my verbosity. I enjoy testing my opinions out on others who I know will disagree. I think debate makes us all sharper, more well-rounded, and more understanding of the "other."
I really do think conservatives miss the mark on their abortion stances. If you value the family and think it's central to civilization, then how can you cheapen it with fabrications and false copies? If you think parenting is critical to creating productive and responsible citizens, then why force parenting upon unprepared or unfit people? Conservatives and progressives alike succumb to the same tendencies to make the world better through government activism while actually making the world worse. Progressives are generally worse than conservatives, but it's useful to see the similarity when it applies. Progressives think they can make some people richer by redistributing wealth by government fiat, but in doing so they initiate a cascade of negative externalities that result in a poorer society and greater wealth inequality. This result feeds the conditions that progressives say they need to fix! On the other hand, conservatives think they can improve society by making irresponsible and unfit people into proper parents by government fiat, but the result is a net negative burden on society by increasing the number of anti-social youth, school dropouts, which leads to criminality, and more births out of wedlock. In both cases, it's a self-perpetuating feedback loop. At the end of the day, progressives need to accept that baseline poverty will always exist as long as people are free to make mistakes in their careers and finances, but freedom produces less total and lasting poverty by increasing economic opportunity and rising living standards for even the poorest. Similarly conservatives need to accept that some family planning mistakes and abortions will always exist, but if people are free to correct their mistakes with all options available to them, the families that remain who are raising children will be more stable and better incubators for future generations. The fewer broken homes and fewer single parent families, the stronger our country will become.
