Let's Think wrote:
The activity that this doctor was engaged in is clearly against the law and he should be punished accordingly. What most abortion doctors do is within legal limits and considered a medical procedure by the government. Appeals to emotion are not going to work on me, nor should they work on anyone, in the case of legal abortion. Again, if you truly believe that abortion should be outlawed, you need to demonstrate how this policy will lead to less human suffering than the current policy (hint: it will lead to more human suffering).
So now the government gets to decide what is right and wrong? Great, that's just what we need. I guess if the government decides it's okay to take our rights away, then it's right because the government said it. It's only apalling if it's illegal, I guess would be what you are saying.
I don't get it when people make a distinction between a life in progress and a life that already is. Once that baby is bound to have a life and it's only a matter of time, then why should we treat it as if it didn't have rights? Where is the distinction between a human being and a pending human being? The only consistent position is to define life as beginning at conception and that the rights we use to protect human beings also apply to that human beings.
It would be completely inconsistent to argue that it's okay if it was a rape victim because the rights of one human being don't trump the rights of another. Much of this is based on the fact that it's easy to not look at a fetus or not have to see it and say "that thing doesn't have rights". What if you knew what the human was going to look like 10,20,50 years later?
If a woman gets raped, then that's too bad, but it doesn't justify anything. Shit happens, and as mean as that sounds, everybody has to play the cards they're dealt, and you can't just make an excuse because shit happened to you.