Vegan views on abortion

[brimstoneSalad]

Brimstonesalad. In your consequentialist mind, how can abortion possibly be better than giving birth to the baby and then giving him/her away for adoption?

Unless of course you are considering the probability that the baby will become a life long non-vegan?

Can you cite specifically a quote of mine you are referring to?

Are you anti-abortion, Jebus?

[Jebus]

the act of bringing an unwanted child into the world is likely more wrong than sparing the child the suffering of existing in that state

Apart from the obviously inferior option of giving birth and raising the unwanted child yourself, here are the options for couples who are pregnant with an unwanted child:

Option 1: abortion
Procedure is riskier to woman than child birth
Procedure is commonly associated with post operation depression
Abortion can be expensive

Option 2: Giving birth and giving the child away for adoption
Mother will be financially compensated from adoption agency
Child will most likely get loving parents and a financially secure home
The new parents happiness level will rise

Option 2 seems like a win win win situation to me

[brimstoneSalad]

the act of bringing an unwanted child into the world is likely more wrong than sparing the child the suffering of existing in that state

If a child is wanted by another couple, that child is no longer unwanted. This is, however, very rare. Particularly if the child is not white.

Option 1: abortion
Procedure is riskier to woman than child birth
Procedure is commonly associated with post operation depression
Abortion can be expensive

You're getting your information from anti-abortion sites. Don't do that.

Fact: Modern abortion is less risky than carrying a child to term and giving birth.
Fact: It's also much cheaper (not as cheap as it should be, but having a child is very expensive).
Fact: Depression after abortion has never been proved; it's an assertion of anti-abortion groups without any conclusive evidence despite decades of attempts. http://www.webmd.com/depression/news/20 ... there-link
Fact: Postpartum depression, after giving birth, IS a real thing, and is a serious issue.

Abortion before the fetus can feel pain is harmless. Now, the question of how much of a good it does to give your child to a loving family instead (IF the child is actually wanted), is another issue entirely.

Are people compelled to put themselves to inordinate expense and inconvenience to do a small good?
If this is the case, then any non-pregnant woman could be compelled to become pregnant to create more children to give to loving families without them.
It may be a good thing to do, but it's a small good, and it doesn't justify the cost nor demand that people do it against their wills.

Option 2: Giving birth and raising the child yourself
Mother will be financially compensated from adoption agency
Child will most likely get loving parents and a financially secure home
The new parents happiness level will rise

You mean Giving birth and giving the child up?

If you're giving birth to a purebred white baby, this may be an option.

Yes, sometimes the mother is compensated, but only for expenses. Children can not be purchased.
Yes, the child may get loving parents who are probably racists. This is questionable in itself, because I don't personally think racists should be raising children.
Yes, the new parents happiness level may raise slightly.

Again, small good (maybe, if multiplying the number of racists in the world is a good), and an inordinate cost.

This is very much like the issue of adopting a dog from a shelter as a way to do charity. It's unreasonably inefficient, and may or may not do any net good at all.

There are a lot of issues you aren't considering.

Again, I'd ask you for your biases here: Are you anti-abortion? Because that's where you're getting your mistaken facts from.

[Jebus]

[quote="brimstoneSalad"]You mean Giving birth and giving the child up?/quote]

Yes, thanks for pointing this out. It has been edited.

I will try to reply to your other points tomorrow when I have more time.

[Jebus]

If a child is wanted by another couple, that child is no longer unwanted. This is, however, very rare.

So why do so many countries have waiting lists for parents wanting to adopt?

Particularly if the child is not white.

Interracial adoption is becoming more and more common, particularly after some high profile celebrity adoptions. I'm pretty sure the percentage of white parents adopting white babies is lower than the percentage of black parents adopting black babies.

Fact: Modern abortion is less risky than carrying a child to term and giving birth.

Possibly, hard to get unbiased information on this one. Many argue that abortion complications are under reported.

Fact: It's also much cheaper (not as cheap as it should be, but having a child is very expensive).

OK, I stand corrected.

Fact: Depression after abortion has never been proved; it's an assertion of anti-abortion groups without any conclusive evidence despite decades of attempts.

Here is one study that seems to be unbiased :http://www.vozvictimas.org/pdf/document ... en2008.pdf.

Abortion before the fetus can feel pain is harmless.

I'm sure you meant painless because it is definitely not harmless. A bullet in the back of the head immediately following birth is also painless so I don't see why that's relevant.

Yes, the child may get loving parents who are probably racists. This is questionable in itself, because I don't personally think racists should be raising children.

This one needs some clarification, especially since you referred to this three times in your post. Do you actually mean that most parents who want to adopt are probably racist?

There are a lot of issues you aren't considering.

Like what?

Are you anti-abortion?

Yes, mainly because of these reasons:
The option of abortion makes people less careful.
I don't see how killing an unwanted fetus is different from killing an unwanted born baby (apart from the convenience of a mother who was usually at fault for the pregnancy)
There are more wanting couples than unwanted babies evidenced by adoption waiting lists
I don't think any human or non human animal (born or unborn) should be killed because of the convenience of another human

[brimstoneSalad]

So why do so many countries have waiting lists for parents wanting to adopt?

This is largely a bureaucratic issue, but also one of the parents having very specific requirements for the child -- namely, being an infant, and usually white.

A healthy (with no disabilities) 'purebred' white baby can go pretty fast.

Otherwise, the government has to spend a lot more resources working to place the infants. Interracial adoption is not very popular.

I'm pretty sure the percentage of white parents adopting white babies is lower than the percentage of black parents adopting black babies.

Irrelevant.

Black parents should not be adopting white babies -- those babies can easily be placed in white homes. White parents really shouldn't even be adopting white babies. White babies are easily placed. Minorities are not. There is an ethical prerogative to adopt minority babies that would likely not otherwise be adopted (as well as special needs, and older unwanted children, who exist in huge numbers in the system).

Do you understand the concept of opportunity cost?
How about simply displacement?

If there are not 'ideal' babies available for adoption (that is, healthy, pure white infants), couples seeking to adopt would have to give up on that selfish and unreasonable expectation, and instead consider adopting a minority, or an older child who is even more in need of a loving home, or even a special needs child (there are many).

By having babies and sending them to be adopted, even in ideal cases, you displace an opportunity for an older or less desirable child to be adopted by otherwise racist parents who would need to rethink their attitudes.

Do you remember this thread?

http://theveganatheist.com/forum/viewto ... f=22&t=157

Some people might go to a breeder because they want a purebred puppy; that's the same reason people are on waiting lists. There are plenty of dogs and children waiting for adoption -- just not the ones they want.

If there were no breeders, people who wanted dogs would be forced to go to shelters and adopt 'mutts', and maybe even *Oh, the humanity!* a one or two year old dog.

Only when there are truly no unwanted children left in the system for your unwanted baby to steal an opportunity from by coming into the world, could it be ethical for you to produce a child you don't want for somebody else.

Making a wanted child only to cause another child to become unwanted is not beneficial.

It's not ethical to save somebody from having to settle for adopting a black child because they couldn't find a white one.

Possibly, hard to get unbiased information on this one. Many argue that abortion complications are under reported.

Many are ignorant activists with a political agenda and cognitive bias -- and without basic knowledge on science and medicine to know what they're talking about.

No, it's not hard to get unbiased information on. This is basic public health information.
Do you not understand that we're talking about over an order of magnitude here?

The risk of death associated with a full-term pregnancy and delivery is 8.8 deaths per 100,000, while the risk of death linked to legal abortion is 0.6 deaths per 100,000 women

http://health.usnews.com/health-news/fa ... udy-claims

There aren't a bunch of unreported complications hiding in the gaps there and making the danger of abortion more than 14 times higher than estimated by healthcare professionals. The pharmaceuticals are thoroughly tested for safety, and outpatient procedures have followups. There are no gaps large enough for those kinds of numbers to fall through.

In addition, the authors found that complications -- such as postpartum hemorrhage, infections and high blood pressure disorders -- were more common in women choosing to continue their pregnancies. This is, in part, because a woman with a full-term pregnancy has that much more time for pregnancy-related problems to develop, the authors said.

If you don't believe it, do the research yourself. This is public information. But this is also fundamental to the most basic knowledge of pregnancy and modern abortion. It's just how things work in biology. More time, more biological investment, larger fetus, more danger of complications.

These anti-abortionists are mainly religious zealots; un-scientific idiots almost by definition. Do you really trust their propaganda over medical professionals and healthcare organizations?

Because if you do, there's a much larger issue here with regards to your judgement of others' credibility, and that's not something I can fix by citing more studies.

If you don't think anybody is credible enough for you, then do the research for yourself.

Here is one study that seems to be unbiased :http://www.vozvictimas.org/pdf/document ... en2008.pdf

Did you read the paper you linked me to? You should read it.

Our data suggest, then, that abortion is associated
with a heightened risk of depression among young
Norwegian women, but not among teenagers. We
also need to remember that several other factors
affecting the lives of women who have an abortion,
which it was not possible to control for in the present
study, could be implicated as increasing their
susceptibility to depression. We need to gather more
information on groups exhibiting a higher risk of
unwanted pregnancy and abortion.

They found the link reduced substantially when they added some controls, but didn't completely disappear -- however, this, as they admit, may be because they were unable to control for many factors.

Also, there's no reason to believe there's anything biological about it at all.

Reactions to abortion are, one may assume,
strongly coloured by the local sociocultural climate.
A sense of guilt, loss and lower self-esteem are
assumed to mediate between an induced abortion
and later onset of depression [21].

In other words, those who are upset about it are probably having trouble because other people are emotionally abusing them and making them feel bad, or for religious reasons.

Biologically, medically, there's no reason why abortions would be causing depression years after the fact.

It's people making these women depressed, if it's anything. And somewhere like Norway, where there are a lot of strong conservative anti-abortion sentiments? That's not too surprising.

Taking into account the actual facts, if you're really trying to make this argument, then the argument you're making is this:

"Abortion is wrong because it's harmful to women. Abortion is harmful to women because if women have abortions, I'll make them feel bad about it by judging them, and that will hurt them psychologically. I'll rightly make them feel bad about it because I believe it to be wrong, for the reasons I just mentioned."

Wait, what now?

Abortion before the fetus can feel pain is harmless.

I'm sure you meant painless because it is definitely not harmless. A bullet in the back of the head immediately following birth is also painless so I don't see why that's relevant.

No, I did not mean painless. I said and meant harmless. Fetuses at that stage are non-sentient. They can not be harmed, because they have no interests to be harmed. Much like a car or a houseplant can't be harmed; it can only be damaged.

Pain is not the only form of harm, but harm is only relevant to sentient beings, which are beings that can meaningfully experience pain in some sense (whether that harm is painful or not).

Later in the pregnancy, the fetus may or may not become sentient; it seems to toward the end. That's a different matter.

You're using the same bad reasoning that carnists use when they insist veganism is wrong for harming plants.

This one needs some clarification, especially since you referred to this three times in your post. Do you actually mean that most parents who want to adopt are probably racist?

Yes. Their attitudes on this topic need to change. I went into this more, earlier in this post. Also more into the reasons I didn't mention before

Like what?

I mentioned some of it. There are serious socioeconomic issues; costs to people, costs to the state, hormonal matters (like women who would have given up children for adoption not doing so after having the baby, and then proceeding to be incompetent parents), opportunity costs for other children, even those of the parents.

I could write a book about how many ways these anti-abortion arguments are absurd, but I really shouldn't have to.

Yes, mainly because of these reasons:
The option of abortion makes people less careful.

1. That's not really true.
2. Even if it were, how is that at all morally relevant?

I don't see how killing an unwanted fetus is different from killing an unwanted born baby

Really, you don't?
Because tell me if you really don't see the difference after reading this post.

(apart from the convenience of a mother who was usually at fault for the pregnancy)

How is her being "at fault" or not morally relevant?
You're trying to punish women by asserting they deserve something bad to happen to them (and it's not just 'inconvenience'), for doing something "wrong", when it's a victimless crime, or at the very worst only hurts themselves.

There are more wanting couples than unwanted babies evidenced by adoption waiting lists

I explained the problem with this.

I don't think any human or non human animal (born or unborn) should be killed because of the convenience of another human

1. It's not just convenience.
2. This is an irrational deontological standpoint.

I thought we already discussed why deontology is wrong? Maybe you should go back and read those posts on Francione again.

In consequentialism, that's irrelevant. We need to look at whether or not the consequences are harmful. And in the case of abortion, they are not -- they are much more helpful than harmful.

[Machle52]

Yeah dear, that is true and I will also go with the opinion of vegans. I am also pregnant and want to go for the diet routine of sexy vegans out there, who are also moms and look half of their age.