Sorry, sir, that is a ridiculous concatenation of mismatched reasoning.

Anti-abortion is inherently religious because I have yet to hear anyone arguing anything for the sanctity of human life which does not, in some manner or another, fall down to a religious principle of the sanctity of life, ** from the moment of conception **

Not to suggest I disagree with that, per se. I just recognize that we can’t afford to use religion as the basis for Law. Period. If you do that, you lose all capacity to argue against Sharia, among other more subtle problems, such as, “Which religion makes the Laws?”

}}} it’s okay to murder people.

Aaaand here we see the problem, with someone sidestepping the point, even when it’s directly made to their faces.

Here, allow me to explain it with CAPS to emphasize it, since my previous statement was apparently too subtle:

THE QUESTION AT THE HEART IS, “WHAT MAKES A CREATURE ‘PEOPLE’?”

I will pretty much guarantee you that no one who supports abortion (I do not, I merely don’t agree with making LAW based on my beliefs, which is a very different proposition) agrees with the contention that a fetus is “People”.

}}} All one has to do is consider abortion to be murder and thus it’s not inherently a religious position.

ROTFLMAO.

This is called “Decision by fiat”.

No. I and many others — including many MANY perfectly moral people — reject your fiat.

You don’t even understand the basic question, so you can’t even argue for a valid answer. You just want to name it ‘x’ and make it the rule.

}}} Can you explain why that reasoning does not apply to say, six-week-olds or six-hour-olds?

Once again, this is because you fail to grasp the most basic question at the heart of this issue:

“What makes a creature HUMAN?”

I think you can very easily make the case that a 6h old is an actual human with feelings and thoughts and a comprehension of SELF.

I do not accept the notion that you can, without calling upon religion, make that same assertion about something which does not even exhibit its own brain waves. It may or may not qualify as a human by His standards. He has not seen fit to give us any way to PROVE it is a human. Let me know when that changes — when He offers us a scientific, not religious, means of testing for humanity.

}}} Those supporting abortions might ask themselves what Principle distinguishes between a 7-month fetus and a 7-month premature baby – making it legal to kill the first, but a crime to kill the second.

Aaaaaand, now we get the straw man argument.

While yes, there are liberal assholes who think anything up to birth is acceptable to abort, that is not in any regard covered by my own set of principles. We probably DO allow abortions during first trimester which fail my own positions, which is blatantly clear from even a casual reading of what I’ve said… and I would happily support revoking the power to abort anything which has an active brain independent of the mother’s. Prior to that, I believe it should be social opprobrium which discourages it, not LAW.

re: Lfl.org

“This domain is available for sale!”

ANNNK. try again. 😀

This is the website of the Libertarians for Life.

Those supporting abortions might ask themselves what Principle distinguishes between a 7-month fetus and a 7-month premature baby – making it legal to kill the first, but a crime to kill the second.

Can you explain why that reasoning does not apply to say, six-week-olds or six-hour-olds? Powerful arguments have been made by respected professionals, not to mention ancient traditions in living memory.

And if you poll atheists you will find virtually none of them saying it’s okay to murder people. They have their own reasons, not rooted in religion, and no one says that laws against murder are inherently based in religion and so are illegitimate.

All one has to do is consider abortion to be murder and thus it’s not inherently a religious position. Many religions and many cultures have come done on all sides of the question, so there’s nothing entailed by it.

A very simple illustration: suppose a law were proposed that made the sale and consumption of pork illegal. It might have the support of Jews and Muslims for religious reasons, but atheist animal rights activists could also support it for non-religious reasons.

It’s also highly subjective, on some levels.

Many of the common anti-abortion answers are specious when it comes to actual evidentiary basis.

I personally (as stated above) reject the notion of “it LOOKS human, so it must be”.

I assert (again, as above) that it is probably brainwaves that give us the best current notion of “what makes a human a human”, hence the brain dead may be euthanized**, and why around the first trimester is a very good point — I’d assert that using an actual EEG of the baby would be the best litmus test for whether or not a woman should be allowed to have an abortion — if the fetus shows independent brainwaves, it is now a life which is actually fully independent of the mother, and more than a clump of cells with the potential to become a human.

I’m not adamant about any of this, but I think it is approximately the correct balance between what evidence there is and people’s faith-based preferences.

THIS is where my own Faith lies — God will do what HE wants done — We should encourage people to listen to their heart, and to not take the decision lightly. If God wants to touch them, he will. If they want to seek his guidance, then this should open their heart to it, even if they aren’t really thinking “God” as the voice in their heads… it will still allow Him open room to reach in and guide them.

It’s what He does.

The issue I have with forcing people to do other than what they feel is right, here, is that we don’t have sufficient evidence to justify that force for many cases, and by forcing people we — seriously — drive them away from God, and give the Devil’s forces plenty of “oomph” to divide her and many others from Him.

The fetus does not need US to protect them, only to encourage the mother to consider what she is thinking to do. That is adequate to Him, to my faith, and the fetus’ soul, assuming it has one, will not suffer because she makes the wrong choice. I just don’t see HIM acting that way.

Appeal to reason, and to the heart, not to “emotion”. The latter is a lefty thing. The others are our gifts from God, that make us other than animals.

————————–
** And yes, this is a whole additional issue, but one with exactly the same question at its heart: “What makes a human life a human life, and not just ‘something that is alive, but not human, and thus not appropriate for the same protections’??”. This one has serious thorns, as it is at least as possible to do the Devil’s work, here.

NOTE:
Screwed up the previous one. The progression for 2) was supposed to be:

Ah, but what kind of measures does this take?

This is relevant, since you can keep a brain-dead body alive indefinitely. Is THAT a human? Questionable at the least.

Ah, but what kind of measures does this take?

}}} (3) The ideas that laws must be made with the agreement of 90% of the people is certainly not the way law has been regarded traditionally, and it certainly is not mounted for other types of laws. Roe was a SCOTUS decision, which even many of its proponents agree was not based on anything in the Constitution but on extrapolations from some idea of privacy that was never articulated in that document.

It, is, however the actual basis of the Law. This where Jury Nullification applies, it is supposed to be used to reject overreaching legislative actions.

The net affect of a 12-man jury (which is another thing they are attempting to remove, since the SCotUS has rejected challenges to it for the last 100 years, allowing only for the procedural limitation of not being able to tell jurors about those responsibilities) is that any law which does not have widespread support WILL be nullified by juries for the most part. It was how both Fugitive Slave laws AND Prohibition were defacto beaten down in many jurisdictions.

This is relevant, since you can keep a brain-dead body alive indefinitely. Is THAT a human? Questionable at the least.

A wax figure from madam tussauds looks like a human, too. Is it? Duh.

A horribly burned quadraplegic looks nothing like a human being… is it a human being? Duh, again.

More in a bit on your other points (i’m busy, this was a lull)…. but “Looks like a human” fails the litmus test.

Thanks for the heads up on Yang. I had heard a bit about that, but hadn’t bothered to follow up. I will now. I agree that Yang may have the personality to get a new party with some momentum going. I also think Dave Smith’s usurpation of the Libertarian Party is interesting. Although I like him, he’s way too honest to make major inroads, voting-wise, but he could really shake things up on a debate stage. He’s a stand up comedian very comfortable speaking to groups and crowds, even hostile ones, and he is extremely well educated in political philosophy and U.S. history.

Whether you like it or not, Roy, there is Right and there is Wrong.
Sociopaths know that but choose to ignore it, and just do what they want, sometimes murderously. Remember Ted Bundy?

I just noticed that Yang’s Forward site was up https://www.forwardparty.com/platform

IMO this is going to be a big deal.

Some polls show Independents to be larger than both old parties. I am reading Yang’s new book also titled Forward. He is no friend of the Swamp. He has the support of people like Elon Musk. He wants Term Limits. He wants to decentralize. He is savvier than Ross Perot.

I think he will split the Democrat vote and set a new dialog in play.