Researchers are getting closer to being able to do that. When it becomes available, how do you think such a matter should proceed?

@bingst

That will be the discussion when the time comes. There are too many factors that need to be addressed before any final decision can be made.

@Betty isn't that why the current appalling disregard for the rights of the child at the expense of the parent's hedonistic and narcissistic desires occurs?

@FrayedBear

That is a fight that will have to be addressed if and when the technology becomes available. It's not an answer I can give on my own. Women and men will have to make their case and hopefully, solutions will be fair for all concerned.

@MrLizard

Of course, her body her choice.

@Betty Who speaks for the unborn child? Obviously not selfish mothers and fathers.

@FrayedBear

Do you mean the fetus? The one who carries it.

@Betty Once coitus has occurred that right is forfeited.

@FrayedBear

No sir. Sex (we'll stick to consensual for the moment) is a natural bodily function that gives pleasure as well as relieves stress, procreation is "not" its only function. Humans are the only species that apply morals and rules to the act. To deny a woman control of her body is abuse. Just because a man plants his seed does not mean the woman can be forced to accept it. No one has the right to control another person's body.

@Betty LOL. Do you know of any other animal that can demand abortion having satisfied hedonistic urges?

@FrayedBear

No, I don't. I do know that praying mantis and black widow spiders will eat their mates after satisfying their hedonistic urges.

@Betty A wonderful system of child support - the mantis method. Are you advocating it for humans? If so a lot of pregnant vegans will be annoyed! LOL.

@FrayedBear

To get back on topic. A woman's body a woman's choice. I have no right or desire to control your body and you have no right to control mine. Once a man deposits his seed he loses control of it.

@Betty And who is controlling the life growing in your womb or has the right to terminate it?

@FrayedBear

The woman. No one else has a right to her body.

@Betty So she has the right to terminate a life that she has created because she is unthinking and selfish? Where I come from many consider it to be premeditated murder.

@FrayedBear

A fetus is not a child, only the potential of one.

With so much protection where you are from then, every child born is guaranteed a non-abusive (physical, emotional, psychological, and sexual) childhood and given every opportunity for a healthy, happy, productive life. If not, then your energy and resources are misdirected.

@Betty I do not dispute that it is an imperfect world. One step at a time rectification has to take place. When I see photos of the abominations resulting from the Allies depleted uranium atrocities in the middle east and think of the suffering caused to those civilians I can hardly take your argument seriously....but I do.

@FrayedBear embryos are not children. They have no rights that are not given to by the woman whose bodily resources they are using. You're also equivocating on the term 'a life'. A life can be a personal experience, or it can be the biological processes of a bacterium. Until the cerebral cortex develops, I cannot see it having personal experiences, and so I tend to think it has 'life" only in the sense of biological processes.

@Amy0825 are you saying life does not exist prior to development of the cerebral cortex? That up to that point it is merely a non-existent god magically replicating cells and introducing new varieties of cell to create new organs including the brain?
Perhaps you are saying that women are gods? Now there is a discussion thread to start!

@FrayedBear

You brought God/s into this. Well...we all know how God/s favored some and destroyed others so, in the end, you agree that abortion is a choice.

@FrayedBear

If you really want to go one step at a time, how about reducing these numbers to zero.

The 60,989 substantiations recorded nationally involved 45,714 children, which was a 7.7% increase from the 42,457 children found to be harmed or at risk of harm from abuse and/or neglect in 2014-15 (AIHW, 2016). Across the jurisdictions, New South Wales, Victoria, Western Australia, Tasmania.

Don't these children deserve the benefit of your voice? Do you really want to force women to have children they don't want? Wouldn't that just increase the numbers instead of reducing them?

@Betty @Admin
There appears to be something missing from your post or Do we have a hacker putting posts in in my name that I cannot see that result in this strange response of yours which appears to be heading of on an unreferenced tangent?

@FrayedBear

What is it you do not understand.

Children that are unwanted are often abused. Shouldn't effort time and resources be used to reduce the number instead of trying to control a woman's body?

@FrayedBear You're equivocating on the word "life". An embryo before the formation of the cerebral cortex has the kind of "life" a cell culture has--only biological processes. To have the kind of life that matters, personal life, a cerebral cortex must be present.

@Betty what substantiations are you talking about? Please explain yourself before I put the ass before u and me and think that you are using lettuce talk.

@FrayedBear

What a woman does with "HER" body is her business and none of yours. My position is clear. If you want to make a difference in this world look around at the abuses that children that are already here that may need help.

This is my last comment to you on this thread.

@Betty Please to do not give me this prevarication when I find the result of your nation and its allies atrocities in the photographs on the following link:
[uk.images.search.yahoo.com]

You hit the nail on the head! I think, once someone thinks they are ready to have sex, there is nothing awkward about talking about STD and pregnancy prevention. If they can't talk about it, then they are not ready for sex

@Blizzard I suggest that age 3 is not too early nor to start explaining the responsibilities of both male and female parent in the infants life.

@FrayedBear I agree. My kid knew a lot at that age already

@Blizzard

I totally agree.

Disagree @Rugglesby it is the foetus that has the rights.

@FrayedBear "rights" of a lump of cells trump the rights of a woman? You are a pro-birther, then. Doesn't matter if the child is wanted, or unwanted? Doesn't matter if the family can provide? Doesn't matter that the world we live in really didn't need any more people? Here is an old thought experiment. A building is on fire, there is a room with a crying child and there is a room with frozen fetuses. You can only save one. Do you mean to tell me, you would save the freezer of fetuses over a breathing, thinking, born child?

@Blizzard life requires cell division and replacement. Your frozen embryo is not alive when frozen.
Again post coitus excuse does not hold good for pre coitus stupidity. It was a fascinating mechanism that was developed to turn off use of the brain in order to achieve continuance of the race. I suggest that you are still substituting your organs - ovaries for brain?

@FrayedBear Interesting, do give me a citation on a paper where it says frozen embryos are not alive? How about spores of plants? Or perhaps microbial cysts? You cannot pick and choose definitions of what fits your view point; there is too much in the way you argue from the good ol' fashioned x-tian bible thumpers. Unless you back up your claims with solid proof, I am done conversing with you because more and more you appear to be a bitter troll with an agenda.

@Blizzard Perhaps you will explain with citations how something that is inanimate, like a frozen embryo, can be alive. I must say that saying that the way I argue is "from" old fashioned Christian bible thumpers is a statement that I can not confirm - I've never encountered such people. Not knowing what bible thumpers you have been influenced by prevents me from knowing why you make your observation. As for being bitter, if I am I may have reason to be however what I state is resulting from having seen the snowflake beliefs espoused by many arguing that an unborn child has no right to life and that women are the sole arbiters of that right. The accusation of being a troll is not unexpected when arguing against statements made by those living with selfish untenable beliefs. ... lol it is probably like trying to argue against god bothering christian bible, tanakh or koran thumpers.

@FrayedBear Is it "selfish" to want sexual pleasure and NOT want to give birth? Why? To me it's not any more "selfish" than wanting to take a road trip and NOT wanting to get killed in a wreck.

@Amy0825 What a fascinating belief system you have. I take road trips wanting to arrive safely at my destination. Thinking of that in the negative "not get killed" actually creates images of killing rather than safety because the killing has somehow got to be undone to return to life. This is leading to the suspicion that women think themselves gods who can overturn death. Wow. Hubris?

@FrayedBear Why should something that can't even think take precedence over a thinking, feeling person?

@FrayedBear
The survival rate of frozen embryos.
69% for thawed zygotes, 85% for D3 embryos

If they were not alive when frozen then they could not be transferred to a woman's uterus.

So now that has been cleared up which would you save...the crying baby or the freezer of frozen embryos?

@Amy0825 I suggest that you have answered that question yourself. Do you advocate the extermination of all wildlife on the same basis? Do you advocate that lesser intellects than yours be sent to the gas chambers?

@Betty Perhaps the questions that you should answer are " what right do you have to ask me to risk my life in a burning inferno? & Why are you not saving them?"

@FrayedBear Wow, you're just full of logical fallacies today! Now it's the straw man! (1) Many animals in the wild have cerebral cortices, and so do even the most intellectually disabled born humans. (2) Even those who don't, like jellyfish, play a role in the ecosystem. (3) I'm not arguing that all embryos be destroyed, only those that women don't want in their bodies. (4) A jellyfish does NOT take precedence over a thinking, feeling person. I would kill one if it would keep it from stinging me. (but it wouldn't,,,,even dead jellyfish can still sting)

@Amy0825 Now you are being wilful. G'day.

Yeah if you keep accepting the broken system.

@FrayedBear what broken system are you taking about

@Blizzard A broken system that fails to educate from an early age the responsibilities of engaging in coitus, parenting and the inherent rights of the foetus to life and to be parented by both parents.

What on earth is forcing her to be solely responsible for a child post birth?

@DarkestDisciple [statista.com] [statista.com] [singlemotherguide.com] [wealthysinglemommy.com] [census.gov]
Here you go

@Blizzard

Yes, single motherhood is more common than single fatherhood.

None of these women are forced to care for their children at all, let alone forced to do it by themselves. There are options to opt out of parenthood for mothers and fathers.

Societal expectations and norms do not equal an application of force.

Try again.

@DarkestDisciple so in your opinion giving birth to a child then giving it away for strangers or a group home to take care of is so much better than having an abortion? You, sir, are something special. Many women are simply not able to do that by personal convictions. Many times what happens is accidental pregnancy occurs, "man" runs off into the sunset, she can't give the baby away for her moral convictions, societal pressure, whatever... She raised the child alone, suffering financially, emotionally and career wise. What happens to him? Nothing. He is free to live his life as he pleases. Pregnancy itself causes many changes in the life of a woman. So unless you know first-hand what are you talking about, which you don't because you have not experienced pregnancy and childbirth through your body, this argument is futile. You are of course entitled to your own opinion, but that didn't make your opinion a fact.

Firstly, I have not espoused an opinion at all. So essentially everything you just typed was for naught. You’ve constructed a set of straw men and then proceeded to assault them, all the while leaving my point entirely untouched.

FACTUALLY, these women are not forced to care for their children any more than I am forced to care for my oldest, who I’ve been the custodial parent of since his mother left while he was an infant. I’m not going to pretend I didn’t have agency in choosing to do so, and my only quibble was that these women have that agency as well. I applaud our shared convictions in providing care for our children - but misconstruing such as anything less than a conscious choice is a disservice to parents who make it. Doing so as part of an argument for a pro-Choice decision is a disservice to pro-Choice arguments - and there are many good ones.

I’ve said nothing about pregnancy, or if one solution is better than another. So... that was a rather useless soapbox to make a stand on.

@Blizzard

There is an app that might cover that.

[slate.com]

@Annaleda I am so glad that I am past all that!

@HippieChick58 You and me both, sister!

@HippieChick58 me too!

Yeah, the choice is no coitus without responsibility

Yep.

Now that is sensible.

Thought-provoking point.

The man has the option of using a condom. If he doesn't want to create a child he should actively prevent it.

HippieChick58 Using a condom is a woman's answer. Condoms reduce the pleasure of sex for men...that is why men do not use them if they can avoid it. By the same reasoning, it is the woman who gets pregnant...should she does not use birth control?

I see your point, but coming from someone who has actually gone through pregnancy it is way different than paying money. Pregnancy and birth are very grueling on the body and if someone was forced to go through that it could be traumatic. Not to mention I know lots of abusive men that would use an accidental pregnancy as a way to entrap their partner. It has to be the woman's choice.

I was thinking the same thing. He can easily give up parental rights to this child. If the mother wants to raise it alone, she can. And many do. Condoms are not fool proof, but it's better than nothing, and there are horror stories about stealthing, which men do by the way. If a man truly doesn't want a child he will do everything in his power to prevent pregnancy.

Who is responsible? The male and female parent, that's who.

Blizzard "He can easily give up parental rights to this child." What! Do you mean a man can walk into The Friend of the Court's Office and tell them he is giving up his parental rights and therefore not going to pay child support anymore? Here in Michigan, that guy would find himself in jail for non-payment. Where the heck are you from that a guy could get away with that?

@dahermit whoa, what's up with the attitude? A simple google search shows many instances of parents being able to voluntarily give up their parental rights. Yes, it varies state to state, and no, it's not easy. [info.legalzoom.com] and [m.lawqa.com].

Funny how you are the one to ask that "thought provoking" question, while in some of your previous comments you said "I have found condoms to cut down so much on the sensitivity that I would exit a relationship where the woman insisted on using them. Sex with a condom is not worth the effort...there HAS to be a better way. On the other hand, I have no problem with submitting to medical testing." from this thread [agnostic.com]. So, here is an idea, if you don't want a pregnancy, wear a freaking condom Unless of course, you had vasectomy performed. But hey, no one canceled STD's yet either

@MindAtWar And I’ve known abusive women who use pregnancy as a means to financially tie a man to themselves. Not that I’m actually arguing the pro-Life point - I’m not - but that specific argument is a bit nonsensical. Assholes will be assholes.

Given the ready availability and efficacy of modern birth control methods I suggest that the woman has equal responsibility for ensuring that pregnancy does not occur.

@FrayedBear I never said anything about equal responsibility for contraception. However, neither party should ever assume the other is going to be responsible. That said, birth control does fail, with more frequency than most people believe. Being on the pill is no guarantee of pregnancy being avoided. If pregnancy does occur, seeking an abortion is a perfectly reasonable option for terminating a pregnancy that the woman was trying to avoid in the first place. My point was that any man who knows he would be against his partner terminating an unwanted pregnancy has the responsibility to actively do his part to prevent the possibility of that from even happening.

@KKGator Agreed and at this point in time I have conflicting opinions on the so called morning after pill. Particularly as a high number of pregnancies do naturally abort / miscarry.

"If any man doesn't like that, they should think about it BEFORE they have sex and behave accordingly." If any woman does not want to get pregnant, THEY should use birth control BEFORE they consent to sex and behave accordingly. Men cannot get pregnant...it is the woman who gets pregnant...therefore SHE should use birth control BEFORE trying to saddle some guy with 18 years of child support.

@FrayedBear The morning-after pill is just another option women have to avoid unwanted pregnancies. I'd rather see the morning-after pill utilized than have a woman have to wait and see if she's pregnant, and then have to obtain an abortion. Spontaneous abortion (miscarriage) cannot be counted on to occur, and adds unnecessary emotional and physical stress. I fail to see where anyone has the right to weigh in on any woman obtaining a LEGAL medical procedure. It's no one else's business.

@KKGator And yes "Don't engage in coitus".

@dahermit If men know the risks going in (no pun intended), they have an obligation to protect themselves against the possibility. I'm tired of hearing that bullshit "argument". Women don't get pregnant by themselves. If men don't want to run the risk of getting saddled with child support for 18 years, either get a vasectomy, or wear a condom. Stop passing the responsibility off onto women. The sperm originates with men. Can't get pregnant without it.

@FrayedBear Agreed, and that goes for both parties. However, unintended pregnancies do occur. Women are the only ones who should be determining whether they'll proceed with any pregnancy. You know, since they're the only ones whose bodies are being used as incubators.

@KKGator that fails the equality test. You cannot say the man is responsible for 25 years, not 18, of child costs (As occurs here if the child goes onto higher education) but has no say as to whether the baby be carried to term.

@FrayedBear Take that up with your legislators. I don't give two shits about the "equality test" when it comes to personal autonomy. Further, you're falling back on that argument of "if she can get knocked up and make me pay, why can't I force her to have the kid if I want it?" If you don't want to get held up for child support, put on a condom or have a vasectomy, or don't have sex. Those are YOUR options. Quit whining about how hard it is to be a boy.

@KKGator I'm not whining about it being hard to be male and you will note I have not deviated from the time/crime meme used by me all through this thread. You may not give "two shits" because you are simply proving your narcissism? The option of no coitus applies to both sexes. Furthermore unlike you I am not using capitals to indicate that I am shouting in the hope of justifying such selfishness and failure to recognise equal responsibility.

@FrayedBear Not "shouting", simply emphasizing. You can think I'm a narcissist all day long, that doesn't make me one, nor does it matter to me. I haven't deviated from my position either. I absolutely recognize equal responsibility as it pertains to contraception. However, your position that abortion is selfish really doesn't mean a thing. No fetus, in the history of pregnancy, has ever been guaranteed the "right to life". People are going to have sex, there is no way that will ever stop. Sometimes, unintended pregnancies will occur. Those are simple facts of life. Your position on abortion is your own, and you are entitled to it. Abortion will always be a necessary option for some women. Whether it's legal or not won't ever stop it. It didn't before it was legal, and it won't stop if it becomes illegal again. My concern is with the lives of women who are already here. Personal autonomy should always supersede whatever "rights" anyone would attempt to put on a fetus. Your moral judgments of me, or any woman who chooses to terminate any pregnancy, really aren't going to matter one iota. You will never be faced with the prospect of having to decide whether to gestate a pregnancy. You will never be faced with the toll it takes on your body. You don't get to determine whose reasons are valid, and whose are not. It's simply just not your call.

@KKGator
Yes we can agree to disagree.
My grandmother whelped 15 children over 30 years. In an anecdote that I relate to BucketlistBob in this string I mention a young woman who had twelve or thirteen abortions. I recommend that you read it And find out what happened to her. The corollary is that some 25-30 years ago abortion clinics here started refusing to carry them out on women there for their second or third abortion. I learnt this through holding the hand of my at the time partner who was pregnant because she was copulating once a week behind my back with the police officer tasked to find her 13 year old daughter from her second marriage who had run away. I now simply ask how do you react to someone who savagely attacks a woman in late term causing fatal miscarriage? I call it murder. Perhaps you call it the assailant's "personal autonomy" - defending themself against apprehension?

@FrayedBear

Mixed feelings about the morning after pill? You do understand it prevents ovulation, and is NOT an abortifacient, right?

@FrayedBear It's clear you have too much emotion wrapped up in the subject to be objective. Your personal anecdotes are irrelevant to the topic.

@KKGator Lol.That must be because I live in a real world of people emotively arguing their believed rights exclude others right to life.

@d_day Now that is indeed news to me but I have never needed to take one. You are totally correct in that I thought it an abortifacient and I fail to see the logic of bolting the door after the ovum has fled the ovary. It must be because I live in a world ruled by emotions.

@FrayedBear

So you're admitting then that your opinions are uninformed. Got it.

@KKGator

Well said. I agree.

I liked the last sentence.

@Srijith I am sure I wasn't parent material to every woman in my life.

What about giving the child a say? Doesn't s/he have the right to life and being parented by father and mother?

@FrayedBear That all depends on when you believe life begins. When was the last time you heard a fetus express their wishes. Your statement is ridiculous.

@steve148 no Steve I suggest that your narcissistic belief is a problem preventing you from properly valuing life.
Let me turn this around and ask if your partner is happily progressing with the pregnancy of your planned and eagerly awaited child and is now into the 8th month. During that month your partner is savagely kicked by a purse snatcher which then results in the fatal miscarriage of the fully formed baby into your arms as you arrive on the scene. Are you going to demand the death penalty for the murderer of your unborn child?

@FrayedBear You set up a hypothetical scenario that's absurd. Then you make an assumption about how I would react. Your rebuttal is very weak

@steve148 If you carefully read what I have written you will see that I ask a question for you to respond to. You decline to respond preferring to opinionate and divert from the topic. So again I will ask you to consider your reaction in the following situation:
" if your partner is happily progressing with the pregnancy of your planned and eagerly awaited child and is now into the 8th month. During that month your partner is savagely kicked by a purse snatcher which then results in the fatal miscarriage of the fully formed baby into your arms as you arrive on the scene. Are you going to demand the death penalty for the murderer of your unborn child?"

@FrayedBear no

Bob I had a neighbour whose youngest son agreed to marry a woman on the basis that they would not have children. She agreed, they married and she then deliberately became pregnant and when it looked like the foetus was irrevocably developing turned on him telling him that he "would keep her in the style she wanted which is what her mother had done to her divorced father" and that she now wanted divorce. The husband on asking her to terminate the pregnancy was told that was not possible as it was against her religion. It was then discovered that she had aggressive cancer and so the baby was born two months prematurely to enable cancer therapy to commence. The baby survived, the mother died in three months leaving the father with a baby son he did not want. It was held that the probable cause of the cancer was the fact that the mother had already had a dozen abortions prior to conning the father into marriage.
This may be something singular to Australians but I doubt it.
On a final note the baby will now be a young man in his thirties but as I haven't had contact for 20+ years I do not know of his current circumstance. I hope that it is one filled with Health, Peace and Fulfilment.

totally with you.

You are advocating discrimination. Both parties know the possible consequence of their coitus.