Pro-Life and Frozen Cells

[KingMerv00]

Most Pro-Lifers believe that a zygote is a human being and that life begins at conception.

This means that the frozen cells used in IV fertilization are alive.

Is there a big outcry to free these frozen human beings and forcibly implant them into the mothers who created them?

 

[Marquis de Carabas]

Is there a big outcry to free these frozen human beings and forcibly implant them into the mothers who created them?

Not that I've heard. Should we start one?

 

[Scot C. Trypal]

I know people who feel similarly and have actually “adopted” embryos. They did it instead of adopting children because they would rather “save a life” (and some want the intimacy of pregnancy).

But an outcry? Not that I know of. One could claim a couple cells are equivalent to a human being and weep over their destruction, but I’d imagine it’s a different story when you’re asked to take on the task of caring a fetus to term. A person might, for example, risk their life to save a drowning toddler, but I don’t suspect the same person, even the most ardent pro-lifers, would see a couple cells as having the same worth, worthy of the same risk on their part.

Edit: Oh, into the woman who created them, not pro-lifers out there saving babies by becoming pregnant with frozen embryos. Still, not that I’ve heard of.

 

[KingMerv00]

...but I don’t suspect the same person, even the most ardent pro-lifers, would see a couple cells as having the same worth, worthy of the same risk on their part.

Really? Doesn't the whole "life at conception" idea REQUIRE that all developing humans are equally important?

Seems like even the slightest give in on their part would imply that zygotes are different than infants.

I can see it now, Pat Robertson going to the Supreme Court to claim that those embryos are wrongfully imprisoned.

 

[Scot C. Trypal]

Really? Doesn't the whole "life at conception" idea REQUIRE that all developing humans are equally important?

I agree. I’d imagine, if I was a woman and thought destruction of these embryos was equivalent to shooting a man in the head, I’d be having babies from other people’s frozen embryos one right after the other. But this seems like a case where the problems of giving rights to and spending your personal efforts on a couple cells trumps the idealism of all human life being sacred. I mean, if a woman dislodges a 10 day old embryo by doing some heavy lifting, who’d want to charge her with manslaughter?

This belief though has lead to adoption agencies for embryos, and I’m glad the Christians are there running them. Even though I don’t believe the human life of a 4-celled embryo should be given rights, many people feel otherwise (or at the very least feel uneasy with casually killing human embryos) and it’s nice they have more palatable options. Like I said, I’ve known it to result in loving families where there was once an infertile couple.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Interesting column by Cynthia Tucker.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tm...=12&u=/ucas/20050213/cm_ucas/abandonedatbirth

In Georgia, GOP legislators have introduced a repugnant bill that would not only require a 24-hour waiting period for women seeking an abortion, but would also require medical personnel to give women scientifically dubious information -- that abortions increase the risk of breast cancer.

But the same Georgia Legislature, facing budget constraints, is also busy cutting or squeezing programs that would help a poor mother to raise her child if she decides against abortion. One example is the state's landmark PeachCare program, which provides health care to children of the working poor. Although the waiting list is long, Perdue himself has proposed curbing growth in the program, so it will accept few additional children.

Five years ago, political scientist Jean Reith Schroedel, a professor at Claremont Graduate University, published a book -- "Is the Fetus a Person?" -- that examined state policies throughout the country, comparing their restrictions on abortion to their support for poor children. She found that the states that imposed the most restrictions on access to abortion were also those that put the least money into health care or day care or housing assistance for poor children.

"Pro-life states are less likely than pro-choice states to provide adequate care to poor and needy children. Their concern for the weak and vulnerable appears to stop at birth," she wrote.

Suggests that the primary concern is making sure that life is seen by the law as Christian theology dictates, not in actually giving a damn about the individuals. I guess the principle is all that matters?