Are foeticide laws compatible with pro-choice views?

Darat said:
My mother has always said post natal abortion should be available. No idea why.
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Should also add

Anything as massive as abortion law would be done by govt bill anyway.

Not a one off court case.

Though that may have input into writing whatever the new law is.

And I might be wrong, but I think you can't just rule judgments wrong in the past like people try to do with US ones.

Unless it's on appeal from the guilty within the restraints of appealing rulings
 
Darat said:
Not sure where a contradiction comes into it. One is voluntary, one isn't therefore can't see why in principle they should be treated the same.
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See my post on destruction of property. Obviously, voluntary and someone else doing it is treated differently. But the penalty for destruction of property is limited.
 
BobTheCoward said:
See my post on destruction of property. Obviously, voluntary and someone else doing it is treated differently. But the penalty for destruction of property is limited.
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A foetus is a very special type of "possession" and is thus treated differently by the law, but the exception for voluntary destruction still applies. Simple really.
 
I can choose to donate my kidney to someone else. That does not mean I can be forced to give my kidney to someone else.

Foeticide laws are not only compatible with the pro-choice position, they are kind of inherent to it.
 
pgwenthold said:
I can choose to donate my kidney to someone else. That does not mean I can be forced to give my kidney to someone else.

Foeticide laws are not only compatible with the pro-choice position, they are kind of inherent to it.
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The issue is the severity of the punishment, not the existence of the law.
 
BobTheCoward said:
The issue is the severity of the punishment, not the existence of the law.
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Why? The severity of punishment in any given case is ultimately arbitrary. Why is first degree murder considered 20 times worse than negligent homicide (I'm pulling the numbers out of my ass, but you get the point). Why isn't it 30 times worse, or just 15 times worse? It's because society, legislators, courts, etc. have decided that it is, and society can also decide that foeticide deserves a severe punishment while giving women the right to abortion. I don't see any inconsistency.
 
Olmstead said:
Why? The severity of punishment in any given case is ultimately arbitrary. Why is first degree murder considered 20 times worse than negligent homicide (I'm pulling the numbers out of my ass, but you get the point). Why isn't it 30 times worse, or just 15 times worse? It's because society, legislators, courts, etc. have decided that it is, and society can also decide that foeticide deserves a severe punishment while giving women the right to abortion. I don't see any inconsistency.
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Is your position that no set of laws in a country can be inconsistent?

Ironically, these threads are really about the positions of individual posters here, a group with no power. Pointing out laws here is to establish shared points of reference, and not a social observation about the law itself.
 
Simple explanation.

An individual has a toothache, makes an appointment with a dentist and has the tooth pulled.

An individual has a toothache, makes an appointment with a dentist and on the way to see the Dr. is assaulted and their attacker yanks the tooth in question from the victim's mouth.

One is a crime, one isn't.
 
BStrong said:
Simple explanation.

An individual has a toothache, makes an appointment with a dentist and has the tooth pulled.

An individual has a toothache, makes an appointment with a dentist and on the way to see the Dr. is assaulted and their attacker yanks the tooth in question from the victim's mouth.

One is a crime, one isn't.
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Catch up to a few posts back.
 
If pro-choice means no restrictions on abortion from conception to birth, then fetucide laws* don't make much sense. If you are not an ideologue and you allow for some limits towards the end of pregnancy, then you can support some fetucide laws that do not conflict with your pro-choice stance.

If the fetus is just a part of the women carrying it, then its more akin to some form of severe assault. Like cutting off an arm or what not. I assume most nations have laws that consider the severity of assault.

*this is assuming that fetucide laws regard killing a fetus as akin to murder and not merely more severe bodily damage.
 
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I'm more concerned with the inconsistencies underlying the reasoning for the laws. Let me try to be more clear:

1) Abortion is legal in California up until 24-26 weeks. It is not considered "killing" an individual.

2) Foeticide can be prosecuted in California for the unlawful "death" of any fetus after 8 weeks old.

How is abortion not the taking of a life when feoticide is during the same age range? I would assume a portion of the underlying rationale in support of abortion is that the fetus is not a living being inside of the womb that can be "killed", but the foeticide laws are in complete disagreement with this line of reasoning.
 
Because absolute slavish devotion to moral consistency isn't a virtue when we're using arbitrary terms and categorizations, often used in different contexts.

The reason an outside 3rd party causing the death of fetus* isn't the same as the mother causing the death of the fetus is the same reason a mother

Because it's a bundle of cells that is completely dependent upon your body for biological survival, you get more say in what happens to to it.

No, I am not going to go through every single law concerning the unborn to look for "inconsistencies" before I care about what is being done now that has actual real world consequences.

*And yes pedantics among us I am fully aware that it's only a fetus after the X so and so week and if it comes for a specific reason of Southern France otherwise it's Sparkling Embryo until it enters the atmosphere and then it's a zygote but I don't care...
 
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Crawtator said:
I'm more concerned with the inconsistencies underlying the reasoning for the laws. Let me try to be more clear:

1) Abortion is legal in California up until 24-26 weeks. It is not considered "killing" an individual.

2) Foeticide can be prosecuted in California for the unlawful "death" of any fetus after 8 weeks old.

How is abortion not the taking of a life when feoticide is during the same age range? I would assume a portion of the underlying rationale in support of abortion is that the fetus is not a living being inside of the womb that can be "killed", but the foeticide laws are in complete disagreement with this line of reasoning.
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Wouldn't a legal abortion between 8 and 24 weeks be a lawful death, and therefore not prosecutable as foeticide?
 
Crawtator said:
I'm more concerned with the inconsistencies underlying the reasoning for the laws. Let me try to be more clear:

1) Abortion is legal in California up until 24-26 weeks. It is not considered "killing" an individual.

2) Foeticide can be prosecuted in California for the unlawful "death" of any fetus after 8 weeks old.
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Why is the word "death" in scare quotes?

Crawtator said:
How is abortion not the taking of a life when feoticide is during the same age range? I would assume a portion of the underlying rationale in support of abortion is that the fetus is not a living being inside of the womb that can be "killed", but the foeticide laws are in complete disagreement with this line of reasoning.
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I'm alive. You are alive. Every spermatozoon in your ejaculate is alive (if ejaculate production is something that you do —I wouldn't want to assume your gender). Your pet planaria (if you have one) is alive. Vegetables in your refrigerator are alive.

I'd think that the severity of a penalty would be more relevant in this discussion than the fact that a penalty exists at all. I'd also consider that one could build a legal framework built around an offense happening against the person carrying this fetus rather than against the fetus itself.
 
The word foeticide sounds like the victim is the bundle of cells.

It sounds like most here argue the victim is the mother.

Are the cells ever the victim? What about at 39 weeks?
 
Crawtator said:
This is somewhat of a spinoff from the thread in US Politics discussing different state laws concerning abortion. I've long been concerned with what I perceive are inconsistent approaches among states concerning what is murder of a fetus. There are a few states in which it is perfectly legal to have an abortion and the fetus does not seem to have any absolute right to life. Some of the same states also have laws against feticide (or foeticide) which criminalizes the wrongful death of the fetus, whether the mother or outside perpetrator.

I've noticed quite incongruous statements made about this and have never understood why the dichotomy of opinions. Can it be rationally claimed that there is a right to abort a fetus and still have feticide laws on the books in the same state? Or are these two positions irreconcilable?

FTR, I really haven't made up my mind and was looking for input from everyone. I really just can't wrap my head around these statutes existing in the same jurisdiction.
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The right to abort is perfectly correct and the idiot side is totally wrong. Hope this helps !!!!! The woman involved should be the only one deciding.
 
fuelair said:
The woman involved should be the only one deciding.
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Is that really what you believe?

Most pro-choice folks seem to agree that the state should also be involved in deciding when the choice is even available to the mother. First trimester? Sure. Second and third trimesters? The state has the final say.

Are you saying that the woman involved should be able to decide up until the moment of birth?
 
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