Charles Anthony

I didn't say survivability, did I? I'm talking about physical dependence, which is totally different.No, they are not totally different at all. One follows the other. In the context of respecting individual rights and not-forcing-people-to-do-anything-against-their-will, they are inseparable. Nevertheless, forget survivability and I will stick to your "physical dependence" criteria. So what? If the mother does not want the child, the mother would still be burdened with the task of finding a foster parent. Anything else leaves her responsible for its death/abuse/neglect. The freedom of the mother is constrained by the pregnancy. Therefore, "survivability" goes hand in hand with your "physical dependence" criteria. Why bring it up? So what? The newborn infant can not survive on its own. Somebody has to make a sacrifice for its survival. What does "physical independence" mean to the newborn?? Does the newborn have any new rights? Does anybody have responsibilities to the newborn since it passes the "physical dependence" stage? No. Pro-choice is much more complicated than you say and you are stonewalling its more deeper ramifications. Pro-choice can be as callous as not wanting a kid with brown eyes and having a boy over a girl. They are not. Slavery. Is it not intriguing that the "obligation" of parenthood perpetuates humanity??? Correct. Mind you, I never said that I believe it is right to force anybody to do anything. Or have I?? Go sift throught the thread and let me know. I never said that but in keeping with this thread, I will go for an other spin because at least it is getting us to examine the arbitrariness of our right to life. I can not. You are right. There is no objective answer. To avoid being arbitrary you must choose an extreme. One of those extremes reminds me of The Lone Flea's Baggy "To be or not to be?" collective question. Correct. I understand that dilemma perfectly and I thank you for bringing it up because it is a corollary of the exact same dilemma that I posed to you: When does a person acquire the inalienable right to life and why that time?It is impossible for anybody to objectively answer those questions without being arbitrary whether they follow a non-aggressive code of life or whether they read from a little red "social contract" reference book. By examining the balance between: 1) the mother's right to control her body 2) the right to life of her child and by eliminating the arbitrariness (what I lump into the "religious" section for both abortionists and anti-abortionists) we are left with Motherhood and the Family presenting a paradox in a non-coercive society. Such a paradox is easily ignored/abused in any coercive society. It is with great reverence that I proudly say: the sacrifices of Motherhood and the responsibility of the Family are the only things that are more noble than Anarchy.

That is a cop out. The woman can only give up a child to someone else who is willing to take it. Hallelujah! Great example! In Brazil, the police kill street kids. Street Children: More and More Killed Everyday If we followed your line of thinking, morality depends on the government and charities and what else? That is ridiculous. A newborn child can not be given to ANYBODY but rather only to people who are willing to take it. No. The non-aborted-post-pregnancy-survived thing can not live alone in the same way as the non-aborted-pre-pregnancy-survived thing can not. Survivability is a stupid criteria. It legitimizes infanticide.Now, the question is: until what age do you accept infanticide??

I do not believe that is the only thing that matters. Since the government forces us to use their counterfeit (-- I mean, money), does the level of government borrowing or spending not impact the interest rates we face? Me too. However, even if the private shop was ineffective at meeting demand, I would still condemn the library. Which do you hold dear: the incentive structure or free enterprise?

I can suggest an example: government spending crowding out in a private market. Imagine yourself operating a video rental store. The library across the street decides to starting lending out VHS movies for free. You lose business and go bankrupt. Imagine yourself looking to renew a property rental lease. Your landlord gets an offer from the Federal Department of Job Creation, Waste and Basket-Weaving. You must match the unlimited financial pockets of the public purse to renew your lease. I do not know if the above should qualify as "incompetent" but they certainly exemplify HOW public spending could be irresponsible or harmful. Granted, there is the opportunity (I will let the freeloaders decide what it is) for a "government" to step into the private sector but it invariably crowds out something. I can not evaluate Alberta's government spending however, I will "hypothetically" pursue this issue further. Imagine the government entering into the private sector in a niche that is empty. There is a need (example: health care) but no private enterprise fulfills it to our satisfaction. The government steps in and we are all happy. The future may lead to the public service building up a dependency by making it IMPOSSIBLE for new private enterprise from entering the market and fulfilling similar demands. Thus, we remain in a stagnant level of mediocrity. It would be much better for a "government" to stimulate the creation of the specific market and step out of the market when private enterprise can take over. Unfortunately, such decision-making requires an immense amount of free-market forsight. However, selling off crown corporations is a start.

It did not take me long to find it either. An easy way to search is to select any text for example "we do know what is best" and do a search for that exact phrase. I will spill the beans: http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index....ost&p=58397 Were you waiting all year for this? In all fairness, you are being quite trollish.... but in a good way! Considering who started this current thread, your troll-catch is priceless!

I will take a crack at them. It is only fair. First, the "what ifs" and eye color discussions make a point of forcing the abortionist to admit that abortion is wrong in some level which is natural but not logical. In that regard, I am comfortable saying that the abortionists must concede defeat and accept that there is some aspect which is "morally wrong" with abortion. Hunh?!?!? Forgive me but when you say "illegal" are you not saying that it is criminal anyway? Do you mean that there is a law on the books but the police do not follow through? My answer is easy: no because I do not favor any "legal" measures. Sometimes I wish you would simply make your point instead of beating around the bush.I understand. However, if I started off saying "I believe your right to abortion is the same right that a murderer has to kill you." everybody would just label me a pro-life nut. The whole thread (other abortion discussions do too) started off with what comes across as: Pro-lifers (religious zealots) versus Pro-choicers (progressive liberators) or something like that. I find that very disingenuous because both stances involve an arbitrary choice of a winner and loser. Anti-abortionists are always shouted down and categorically labelled as religious nuts. Nobody listens to them. Actually, to be more precise: I do believe we have inalienable human rights -- but I can not justify them logically. I believe it in a holier-than-thou manner. I do not care what my peers say, I believe everybody has the right to life and control over your body. For me, it is easy to say that because your right to life does not demand much responsibility on the part of anybody else. Between the right to life and the right to control one's body, inherently abortion presents a conflict which makes the unborn the natural loser. It is unfortunate, but it is natural and I accept that. The way that I reconcile accepting abortion is by revering the sacrifice of motherhood that much more. That is all that I can do. -- and I qualify endorsing abortion as a type of "religious" zealotry equal to anti-abortion. I adamantly object to the anti-abortion-ergo-religious label. They are both religious beliefs. Now, continuing with some more of "Your Religious Views on Abortion" I will take your advice and I will (again, shamelessly making more vehement enemies and) simply make an other point without beating around the bush. More of my opinions are: I see no difference between a religious anti-abortionist shooting abortion doctors and many other types of warfare. Our military soldiers sacrifice their lives to defend causes they believe are just and so do the religious anti-abortion shooters. We justify killing out of convenience and so do they. I honestly do not get surprised when I hear about local youth gangs swarming and kicking people to death on the street. I am dreadfully afraid but I am not surprised. We justify killing out of convenience and why should they not too? Youth gangs are convinced that they can get away with it and so they do it. I truly see abortion on par with the above: an horrifying disrespect for life. Here is a question: If you heard of an anti-abortion campaign specifically targetted at abortion based on sex of the child, would you lend them any little bit of support? [Let us say that they were strctly non-violent but mounting peaceful demonstrations or education campaigns comparable to what the Falun Dafa (dare I bring them up!!!) do to bring awareness of their abuse in (dare I keep going!!!) China.]

You watch "Sex In The City"? Does that make you a wee-man? I could not resist. Back to being serious... Along the same lines, we hear the same dramatic distinctions in radio advertizements: the clueless-doofus husband being mocked by his household-responsible wife. If the roles were reversed, it would be called sexual discrimination.

As much as I am skeptical about the algorithm of this test, we may as well refresh the thread.

Actually, the thought excersises do have real world application because abortion proves that our "right to life" is fictitious or of "religious" origin.

I will take a stab at this puzzle now! My opinion is that the original post is a hodge-podge confusion resulting from various things such as: kids being compelled by parents to study what the parents want them to study; reconciling the cultural phenomenon of pre-planned marriages and hence, the futility of dating; general teenage angst and jealousy; maybe toss in some sexual identity crisis to spice things up. To me, the original post just sounds like a final vent or a belittle-fest, i.e. a desire to criticize rather than a desire to discuss. The blog seems like a more realistic discussion of modern gender dynamics. Is it just me? What I find the most bizarre is that I do not ever recall caring to critically analyze any complicated gender issues when I was in school.

What do you think of people who abort their kid after they find out the sex is not what they want?Does any part of you find that disgusting?

I will take it one step further. How about somebody who works like a dog, pays money to Shawinigan before being able to make ends meet and can not even afford to take the time off work to go get "social services" sounds poor to me. It depends on how you look at things.

I agree. I think that explains the non-sensical naturally-reflexive doom-and-gloom fear-mongering objections to privatization. That is a valid question. There is more than one way to overcome the shortfalls. The private services can be added by paying private staff more for the same service. The extra pay will come from the patients who pay the extra fees -- not from the rest of the public. Staff that moved to the U.S.A. might move back if they were paid more in Canada. Other illustrations can be found currently within the healthcare system today. Think of pharmaceutical coverage -- a privatized health care. If your doctor gives you a prescription, you go and pay for it yourself. Some people get hand-outs for pharmacauticals paid by their provincial governments while some do not. Some people get re-imbursements from drug insurance benefits through their employers or through private plans while some do not. Think of chiropractic care. Some provinces cover the treatment and some do not. Some provinces only cover a certain number of visits and the patient pays for the extra vists. That is privatization.

I will simplify it for you: she has a burden that can not be ignored. I am not denying her freedom to deal with that burden as she chooses. She has to DO SOMETHING to overcome this burden. No. I am not talking about the burden of morality. I am talking about the burden of HAVING TO DO SOMETHING which she otherwise would not have to do if she was not pregnant. Does it ever acquire a right to life? Do YOU have a right to life?What I am getting at is that ultimately, whether you like abortion or not, you have to ARBITRARILY decide when you assign a responsibility or a right to life. The decision making or criteria for that arbitrary threshold is not objective and is equally valid as a religious opinion. Neither choice can be objectively deemed right or wrong.

Thank you for having the courage to examine the question. In your opinion, what does that inalienable right entail?The way I see the dilemma is in the context of me saying that "I have the right to freedom!" and "I have the right to food, clothing and shelter!" and "I have the right to universal health-care!" while being stuck alone on a desert islan.

Sure! I will go for a spin! This is starting to get fun! No. I am stating that the act of abortion is a crime against humanity. I am also saying that I loathe it more than any other crime against humanity. Easy. A crime against humanity is not a violation against a specific person. I could call the destruction of the Buddhist shrines by the Taliban a crime against humanity too. In my opinion, both acts are disgusting. Do you want me to explain to you how "war on terror" is not the same as war? You also spun and still have not answered my question: When does a person acquire the inalienable right to life and why that time? I have a challenge to you: do you believe that people have a right to life?

I have a few beefs with how the QUOTATION feature is often used and I would like to make suggestions. Generally, people quote too much. 1) Quoting an entire previous post and then adding very little original commentary. example: http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index....st&p=131073 After scrolling through pages and pages and pages of QUOTATION, I forget the title of the thread! My eyes hurt, too! 2) Being the 2nd poster of a new thread and quoting the ENTIRE first post. example: http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index....st&p=125340 Surely to goodness, as the 2nd post (and the very first reply) everybody can figure out that you are replying unambiguously to the original post. No need to quote the entire first post. Understandably, if you are highlighting a specific aspect of the original post, it makes sense to quote a small and focussed portion, such as: example: http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index....st&p=130856 This latter use of the QUOTATION feature cuts to the chase and makes the flow easier to understand. 3) Too many quotes. Quotes in quotes contained in quotes within quotes inside quotes in /quotes inside /quotes within /quotes contained in /quotes in /quotes. example: http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index....st&p=106511 4) Forgetting the hyperlink / jump tag of origin in the QUOTE feature. This next one is more technical and harder to grasp. I have to illustrate: The first example, the quoted text allows you to jump straight to the original post by clicking on the boxed arrow. The specific tags that must be included at the beginning of the quote are:[quote name='Greg' date='May 10 2005, 05:59 AM' post='52549']5) Avoid too much whitespace.In other words, start your reply on the same line as the opening quote tag. Again, looking at the two examples: Charles Anthony is too sarcastic!! Charles Anthony is too sarcastic!!In the first example, the reply follows a carriage return and starts on a separate line. In the second example, the reply starts immediately on the same line as the opening

I agree with that statement -- only if "the Left" wants control. I disagree. I doubt that "the Left" would bring anything except true regression and continue the illusion of democracy. Sounds like the perfect conditions for a Tory majority.

You are not forced to choose only between the Canadiian system and the American system. There are many other choices starting with more privatization.

No. You singled out Arab and Islam. You could have said: "We make a list of all countries that allow gang-raping of women, or those that don't let women vote, or those that don't allow women to feel the sun shine on their face...ever." and "All people who treat women like beasts deserve the harshest form of colonization until they get it right." but your racism got the best of you. Colonization has more to do with coersion which is a violation of human rights more than anything else.

That is such a bizarre condition to make. The point of the cluster bomb is to detonate in the future. Are we supposed to NEVER have civilians step foot on land that was once a battle ground???

Punishment? Worse crime? Who is talking about punishment?? Justice is a bizarre thing. The anwser to such a hypothetically coercive dilemma is simple: it depends on what makes the individuals involved happy. It also depends on how cruel or unusual their peers happen to be. Implicit in your question is the assumption that both individuals should be punished. Can you explain why you suggest that the post-abortion-rape-victime should be punished? You are missing the point. I suspect that I may not have been clear at all -- too many long sentences. With respect to the balance of freedom between the non-aborted-thing and the pregnant mother, the mother's freedom is being limited already. She is not free. It is analogous to me tying a wounded man to your hip and telling you to drag him to the nearest hospital otherwise he will die. You are not free. To free yourself, you either have to cut him off and let him die or drag him to the hospital. Either way, there is an imposition upon you. Interestingly in the case of the abortion, the mother is physiologically responsible for the creation of the imposition but it is not always wilfull. I do not see why not. It only makes sense. Why should it be treated differently from building a house? I can hire one carpenter. He can do it all himself or hire subcontractors. I can build the house myself. Are you asking if it should have state regulation? or should the state stay out of it like the running-shoe industry? Correct and it is only out of practicality: there are is no choice. The only way that you can oppose abortion in reality is through the use of violence and that is a fight that can not be won. If such a fight could be won, I would still object because I do not trust The Watchmen. I know where you are coming from. Imagine three buckets: good, bad and neutral. In my own mind and how I judge my peers, I would toss both abortion and murder and suicide in the same bucket. I would also toss American sit-coms in that same bucket however, I would not act upon it. It reminds me of a Muslim friend of my mine who explained that not only is it wrong for him to eat non-halal food but it is also wrong to sell it. However, he is not required to go to war against all of the non-halal food merchants. There are two ways of looking at this dilemma. 1) make an exception: sanction someone to kill ONLY in an abortion 2) Who cares? we sanction killing all of the time now anyway. That is the problem with conventional minarchism: you accept some level of coersion. You are stuck with a further dilemma of justify why that small level of coersion and why not more/less coersion. In fact, I can turn the issue around and identify our current political set up here in Canada as minarchism anyway. For you, we might have too much government wheraas raging-freeloading-socialists, they say that we have too little government. People do have different definitions of child abuse. Such a problem is inevitable regardless of the political set-up or balance of power. I would venture to say that the mechanics of how we deal with child-abuse today would resemble closely what anarchists would do: ganging up and overpowering the abusive parent. I agree but not through anarchist justification. My belief is metaphysical (as is the belief by abortionists that it does NOT affect other people) and thus I do not bother defending it. What if that person consumes what he stole? You can never get it back. What if the thief pays you compensation? You can still never get it back. In my example above, you are asking for the burned up rare art to be replaced after a fire: you can be compensated financially, but it is still gone. Any aesthetic value of the loss is gone and can not be replaced. Forgive me but this is where you are gravely missing the point with respect to rights over one's body. True justice does not happen in abortion regardless of what side of the fence you sit. You must understand that it is fair to say that HAVING AN ABORTION is still an imposition upon the woman (both physically and mentally) as is GOING THROUGH THE PREGNANCY happens to be. In my example above, you are asking for the burned up rare art to be replaced after a fire: you can be compensated financially, but it is still gone. Any aesthetic value of the loss is gone and can not be replaced. Yeah, most of my beliefs are un-original particularly with the history of the MapleLeafWeb forum or illogical. Generally, my beliefs are a complement of anarchy and a belief in the super-natural. Abortion is easy: I treat it as if it were a decision to go to battle with only ten men against a thousand men. The choices are limited: 1) give up 2) die fighting 3) let your ten men mutiny and join the opposing side Stopping abortion is impossible. It (or at least its demand) has always existed in some form or an other. The only power you have to change world views on abortion comes from how you raise your children (and being arrogant in discussions!). Personally, I am comfortable with only that. The neat thing about abortion is that it cuts to the very core of identifying human rights and the right to life. I think it forces adopting a "religious" (in other words, a subjective or blind-faith-based or illogical) stand point from both sides. Pro-abortionists ultimately take a religious but opposing view too. The issue of abortion makes it impossible to objectively determine exactly when and how a non-aborted-pregnancy-survived-thing acquires a right to life. It becomes a subjective choice.

She sounds like a bad soap-opera actress reading from a cue card and wearing contact lenses for the first time in her life. I know of only two ways to eliminate such an arbitrary line: one great big state or no state at all. Choose your poison.

Indeed! and I will fight your little government with as much fervor as I would fight any other tyranny! En garde! I am not sure I understand your question because my answer is obvious and simple: whoever a pregnant woman asks to perform the abortion has the authority. Is that what you are getting at??? What I meant was that the topic gets side-tracked by both sides of the debate with discussions of things other than the right to one's own body. I must preface my answer with the following: I am presuming that you say "policy" to mean something that is enforced by a state. Unlike some morally-flexible or confused anarchists, I will not give the state any legitimacy. Nevertheless, I will bend and choose the lesser of the evils to answer your question. As a policy, I can only let the pregnant woman control the rights of her non-aborted-thing. Similarly, I would only let the parents control the upbringing of their children. Likewise, I would see the parents as being responsible for the upbringing of their children. Finally, I would make parents responsible for the actions of their children. CAVEAT: In the event of child abuse or neglect or parents wanting to give up a child, it makes sense to have a "policy" whereby children are adopted. As policy, no. For various practical reasons: 1) the non-aborted-thing technically qualifies as a parasite inside the pregnant woman, the woman's right to control her body takes precedence 2) too many people believe abortion is right 3) people will do it anyway, possibly escaping detection 4) forcing people to believe something never works Therefore, it makes no sense to consider the rights of a non-aborted-thing at all in policy unless it is more convenient to do so. Most of what we have as "policy" is just the result of a balance of competing forces. Currently, abortionists win. It is as simple as a war of ten non-abortionists against a thousand abortionists. The non-abortionists should just give up. I will be frank: banning abortion or abortion policy poses a dilemma because it implicitly requires a state. It is physically impossible for me to say that I believe in restricting abortion unless I have the power of a state. Therefore, I do not believe in such a policy. I have a religious belief in respecting freedom to the extreme -- or at least as much as my intelligence can manage. (I admit that I am not the smartest nor am I infallible at making decisions of how to choose freedom.) Part of respecting freedom involves accepting people doing things that do not affect other people. In the case of abortion and reproduction, the concept of respecting freedom between the woman and non-aborted-thing does not apply because the woman's complete freedom does not exist or her freedom to NOT be pregnant has already been lost. To put it in common anarchist terms: one person's right to swing his fist does NOT stop in front of the other person's nose because not only has it already struck the other person's nose but the swinger can not be faulted for having struck the other person. It is comparable to determining punishment after an arsonist burns down a house and asking for the lost collection of rare art to be returned. Outside of policy (and here is where I will shamelessly create the most vehement enemies possible): I abhor abortion more than any other crime against humanity that has ever been perpetrated or can be imagined.

Just a practical (and smart-aleck) question: banned by whom? Who has the authority to ban an abortion? Quite the contrary: the debate stops. The debate stops in front of a brick wall created by diversions: deliberately incompatible but equally "religious" definitions of human being or when life begins and the debate goes nowhere.