Abortion

This might help:

Facts on Induced Abortion Worldwide

October 2009

WORLDWIDE INCIDENCE AND TRENDS

• The number of induced abortions declined worldwide between 1995 and 2003, from nearly 46 million to approximately 42 million. About one in five pregnancies worldwide end in abortion.

• For every 1,000 women of childbearing age (15–44) worldwide, 29 were estimated to have had an induced abortion in 2003, compared with 35 in 1995.

• The decline in abortion incidence was greater in developed countries, where nearly all abortions are safe and legal (from 39 to 26 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15-44), than in developing countries, where more than half are unsafe and illegal (from 34 to 29).

• Most abortions occur in developing countries—35 million annually, compared with seven million in developed countries—a disparity that largely reflects the relative population distribution.

• On the other hand, a woman’s likelihood of having an abortion is similar whether she lives in a developed or developing region; in 2003, there were 26 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15–44 in developed countries compared with 29 per 1,000 in developing countries.

REGIONAL INCIDENCE AND TRENDS

• The most dramatic decline in abortion incidence occurred in Eastern Europe, a region where abortion is, for the most part, legal and safe: the rate fell from 90 to 44. The decrease coincided with substantial increases in contraceptive use in the region.

• Although abortion rates and ratios (the number of abortions for every 100 births) in Eastern Europe have fallen significantly in recent years, they remain higher than in any other region. In 2003, there were more abortions than births in that region (105 abortions for every 100 births).

• The estimated number of induced abortions in Africa has increased since 1995; however, the region’s abortion rate has declined because of an increase in the number of reproductive-age women.

• Induced abortion rates and numbers in Asia and Latin America show modest declines since 1995.

• The lowest abortion rate in the world is in Western Europe (12 per 1,000 women aged 15–44). The rate is 17 in Northern Europe and 21 in Northern America (Canada and the United States of America).

• Because the world’s population is concentrated in Asia, most abortions occur there (26 million yearly); nine million of these take place in China

http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_IAW.html

 

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@LG

As for this:

'The Personality of Godhead said: Under the supervision of the Supreme Lord and according to the result of his work, the living entity, the soul, is made to enter into the womb of a woman through the particle of male semen to assume a particular type of body.'

That only counts if you believe in that particular mythology. The Quran as Kira pointed out indicates that the soul doesn't enter the womb until its third trimester. That would mean that an 8 week old fetus in their mythology isn't yet a 'human being' with a 'soul'.

 

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I assume that you would have reservations about being pro-murder

fancy that eh?
they didn't just take a gander at what was floating the boat of the majority or what the do's and don't's of contemporary legislation dictated

actually you weren't talking about opinions, you were talking about "living by the values" ... which doesn't really resolve much since the entire length and breadth of societal/national dialogue/conflict is specifically about dealing with the contention caused by different people living by their values

just like bigots and racists were also pro-choice (just that certain minorities weren't granted a level playing filed in the choosing process)

we've been doing lots of things for a long time ... but its to the credit of industrial society to deliver it en masse which accounts for the sink hole we've currently landed ourselves into

if you want to talk of solutions, it has everything to do with it

sure, but not to life in the womb in your book

so you can't conceive of any alternative to instigating social reform aside from force?
Or do you find it more convenient to caricature your opponents to make for an easier argument?

the statistics also show that in terms of a child being safe in the womb, its better not to take an appearance within one who doesn't recognize it as an individual until several months down the track

Its got nothing to do with instincts

what you are playing up as some sort of regal drawcard for the handsome young men in your area will make them turn their eyes in horror or laugh in 30 years

Its got nothing to do with shame. Its just an assessment of the facts

 

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It was directed at iceaura who was insisting that there is no (religious) culture anywhere that deals with life from the point of conception in its social conventions

(btw if you want to move into inter-faith dialogue, you have to acknowledge that the word "soul" doesn't hold the same significance)

 

not sure what this has to do with interpreting the significance of the pumsavana ceremony ... but on a side point, its kind of interesting when you compare this to birth rates
.... especially if you start to incorporate them into life expectancy stats

 

It doesn't. It has to do with you asking Iceaura what he knows about other cultures and how they view the issue. If you check the whole link you will find your answer as to life expectancy etc. Which of course has nothing to do with the issue since you can only choose to have an abortion within specific ages and it is in the West (many can live longer) where abortion is in the decline. We are also having less babies. Asia and Africa you will agree are substantially more religious than we are in the evil secular liberal west and yet they seem unable to stay away from abortion clinics.

But I did find this. Its simply an excerpt and the piece is quite long so you would really have to read the whole thing. Feel free to respond to it later after you have digested it all.



If viññāṇa does not in any way subtend the karmic process from individual to individual and may even be completely episodic within the context of an individual life, then (1) I see no reason to interpret viññāṇa as anything other than consciousness or some such equivalent, and (2) Buddhism need not take viññāṇa to be present at any particular point in the process of embryonic development. That is, viññāṇa or consciousness is present whenever one would customarily say it is and that could be just as well at viability as at conception. In fact, we would generally hold consciousness to be present only when, minimally, the cerebral cortex develops and perhaps later. (13) Thus, even though a Buddhist would hold that consciousness provides the platform for mind and body, making any conscious being a living being worthy of moral consideration, it is not clear exactly when such a point might first occur. Furthermore, even if scriptural sources would locate this point early on in the embryonic process, a Buddhist could still coherently question any such time designation as potentially arbitrary mainly because, as I have argued, Buddhism lacks any comprehensive theory or deep-level principle that requires the presence of consciousness or an intermediate being at any particular point in the biological process of human development.

In fact, Keown admits that a Buddhist could hold the above position as the Buddha laid down several conditions covering ontogeny, some strictly biological and mainly regarding coitus and the mingling of sperm and, mistakenly, "menstrual blood." That is, even on Keown's analysis, Buddhism traditionally separates the biological basis for life from the individual life itself. Thus, a fertilized ovum is arguably a necessary but not sufficient condition for a new life. Rather, one requires the presence of the full complement of groups including viññāṇa to complete the development of an individual life. However, this allows "the material basis for life to arise on its own" (Keown 81), which Keown admits seems to contradict the assumption that the biological and spiritual basis must always arise together. Keown replies that if an unanimated conceptus is possible, its long-term survival is not for it is not "a new individual," and therefore "from the standpoint of Buddhist doctrine it would seem impossible for it to develop very far."

The justification for this claim is the Buddha's statement "that if consciousness were 'extirpated' from one still young, then normal growth and development could not continue" (Keown 81). Incidentally, this claim also forms the basis for Keown's view that PVS patients (those in a "persistent vegetative state") are still individuals worthy of moral protection and should not be ruled as dead, as some advocates of a higher-brain definition of death would allow. That is, their continued and stabilized biological existence (some can live on for decades) demonstrates the presence of viññāṇa and hence individual life.

However, a liberal Buddhist could claim that while the loss of viññāṇa might curtail growth and development, it is not clear that viññāṇa's never having arisen need affect the biological development of the material basis of an individual's life. Indeed, one might argue that (1) because "extirpation" of consciousness from one who already possesses it usually involves physical trauma, of course we would expect normal growth and development to stop; or (2) even though viññāṇa is essential to the life of an individual and its irretrievable loss signals the individual's demise, it doesn't follow that the mere biological platform and its growth and development signal the inevitable presence of viññāṇa. (14) That is, it doesn't follow that viññāṇa, however we interpret it, is essential to the life of the biological organism. Especially if, as Keown suggests, Buddhism allows the presence of the material basis of life without that of the gandhabba, then I don't see how Buddhism can rule out the possibility of simply a more extended existence of that material basis without viññāṇa. The biological basis of life may be organically integrated in the manner of a functional organism, but it is not itself the same thing as an individual life. I see no compelling rationale, based on Buddhist principles as articulated in the early scriptures, absolutely requiring the 'individual life begins at conception' point of view of radically pro-life antiabortionism.

I grant that the early Buddhist scriptures do seem to have a somewhat pro-life orientation. Yet, on closer inspection, I'm not sure the footing is there mostly because of the lack of a theory of ensoulment. Furthermore, had Buddhists of the time faced the bewildering medical possibilities of the late twentieth century, I'm not at all sure how doctrine would have evolved. For example, anencephaly, PVS and various other comatose conditions where patients exist in only the most minimal sense and on life support, not to mention transplant surgery, the advances in human genetics, and so on surely pose a challenge to traditional ways of regarding the human body. Many of these cases are, to my mind, simply waved aside by Keown (or his version of Buddhism). To claim that the pro-life stance of Buddhism simply means that PVS patients are fully alive (15) is not to do justice to the complexities of the cases or of Buddhism, both of which suggest that 'life' is an extremely complex 'dependently arisen' phenomenon. (16)

Either we are intentionally taking life or we are not, and if we are, then we violate Buddhism's First Precept. The response a Buddhist may make, such Ochiai Seiko's above, is in essence, "Yes, we should always avoid the ending of a life, no matter how insignificant it may seem." But 'life' is an ambiguous term, and the ending of one form of life in the service of others is not necessarily prohibited in Buddhism. And if one's intention is not so much to end a life as to rescue others, then we are not dealing with a simple case of intentionally killing. In other words, compassionate action will always involve weighing up the full range of circumstances that bear on a situation or action. On this view, the point of the First Precept is to disqualify intentional killing where the clear purpose is to end an individual life. Such an action can never be compassionate in Buddhist eyes. However, questions as to the status and nature of the lives one weighs in such tricky situations where interests clash are obviously relevant. If we are talking about the lives and interests of mothers and fetuses, fetuses and families, or fetuses and communities (such as in times of famine), then we are directly faced with the issue of the relative moral standing of different sorts of life. What I have argued here is that because Buddhism allows a distinction between the biological basis of life and its higher cognitive as well as affective aspects and insists that an individual human life requires the conjunction of all such aspects, no Buddhist need equate a presentient fetus with a sentient human. Thus, Ochiai's insistence that in dealing with the messiness of everyday living, abortion may qualify as a compassionate response need not contradict Buddhist principles. Especially if we are dealing with the material platform of an individual being before the point of cerebral development sufficient for the developed capacity for consciousness, then the moral seriousness of its claim to life may well be outweighed by other considerations.




http://www.buddhistethics.org/5/barnh981.html

 

I see free-will as a flaw because for 1 thang... it has lead to horrible sufferin for children... which you seem to justify dew to you'r desire for said "free-will"... an the fact that we (humanity) have done horrible thangs to children speeks for itself as far as the inevitability of such specific bad decisions bein included in All-knowin Gods creaton plan.!!!

Not everone rapes or has the desire to rape children... which is irrlevent to the fact that children have been raped by full growed adults... which is an exceptable trade-off to you in exchange for us havin free-will... but it ant exceptable to me... an un-like you... i had druther God not have created the universe if it ment that even 1 child woud suffer such horrors as rape/torure starvaton... ect... ect.!!!

Good for you... an i also dont find such thangs necesary... but unfortunately thats irrelevent to the fact that because of Gods plan lots of children are horribly abused on a daily basis.!!!

Clearly you'r adament about rationalizin Gods plan which made it inevitable that children woud be abused (but for God... no child woud have ever been abused)... but whats the pay-off... that you will eventualy get to live wit Jesus... an if so... what do you thank woud be so grate about it... which makes you seem oblivious to the suffern of children as long as you get what you want.???

 

sorry i didn't get back to you sooner, but to answer your question, no, i don't think it strange one bit. i know that you do since you have reiterated that many times, but i do not.

we're talking about the difference between ignorance and knowledge, and the difference between being a puppet and being accountable. you don't see the benefit of knowledge? the knowledge of good and evil? being able to see the difference? the effects? being given a choice between the two?

in a nutshell, i believe that in a spiritual sense, we all get exactly what we want. i think it's pretty clear from our discussions on this site, and what's evident in the world around us, that some of us want to be blind and choose to be ignorant and hard-hearted, so that we can continue to be evil (selfish, vain, greedy, lazy, lustful), and some of us choose to see the truth about these things because we want something better.

and ultimately, whether you like it or not, it works, and it makes a lot of sense.

 

i have a question that i really would like an answer to from the pro-choice crowd. i have reiterated this as a suggestion many times and it always seems to be dismissed or blatantly ignored, but with all of this talk about "choices" and controlling one's body, why is that never applied to the decision as to whether or not to have sex?

i mean, we all know where babies come from right?

it seems pretty obvious to me that women make a conscious decision or choice to produce the embryo in their body. if you really don't want an embryo in your body, then why in the hell do you purposefully act in such a way that it's nearly inevitable?

why isn't celibacy ever an option? and why isn't responsibility and choice ever a consideration up front?

 

@Lori

You can answer those questions yourself.

Why wasn't celibacy an option for you? Why wasn't your responsibility a consideration? Didn't you know that you could have gotten pregnant? I mean its pretty obvious that if you have sex that it could lead to an embryo in the body. Why were you not celibate? Why did you have make the decision to have sex and then go about having an abortion after the fact?

 

because i was careless and irresponsible, and i just wanted the result of that to "go away". i've already stated that in this thread.

now how about an answer from someone else?

 

I haven't had an abortion but I would if I felt it warranted. I am sure that the answers would be anything from 'I was in the heat of the moment', 'I was too young', 'The condom broke' etc etc etc. ad infinitum

They answers are as wide in variety as the women who have had abortions.

Celibacy is not a way of life for most people and is an unrealistic expectation for the majority. The only reason why you resort to celibacy is because of your religious beliefs, note most people do not feel religious enough to give up their sex life. You also don't take into account that there are a many women who are married and have abortions for a variety of reasons. Most married couples are not going to live a life of celibacy.

 

i wasn't celibate because of religious beliefs. i was celibate because it made good common sense for me to be due to circumstance, not religion.

 

isn't it an unrealistic expectation for the majority because the majority is irresponsible and/or ignorant?

 

It doesn't amount to good sense for most. I would never consider celibacy when there are a wide variety of measure that can protect a woman against pregnancy. I think the celibate life is lame but to each their own.

 

No its unrealistic for the majority because sex is a pleasure most people are unwilling to live without. Also THERE ARE MEASURES ONE CAN TAKE TO MAKE SURE THEY DON'T GET PREGNANT THEY DON'T NEED TO RESORT TO CELIBACY. If you don't see this then it is you that is ignorant. And being celibate doesn't make you responsible it just makes you a prude.

Also I don't believe that your religious beliefs have nothing to do with your decision. I don't know of anyone who has become celibate because it 'makes good sense' save you. Most women I know who are celibate its not by choice but by circumstances; they haven't met someone they really like, they are working like crazy and don't have the time to date etc.

 

it's a lot better than the sub-standard bullshit that most people settle for.

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and i would argue that it's better than having to have your child sucked out of your womb, chopped into pieces, and thrown into a garbage can. i think so anyway.

and why doesn't celibacy amount to good sense for most? what are the reasons?

 

why does it make me a prude?

and i could have sworn we've been citing all over this thread that these measures fail, resulting in abortions. right??

it puzzles me when people arbitrarily accuse me of lying because they don't like, or agree with what i'm saying. you have absolutely no reason to call me a liar. you know that right?

i was celibate definitely by choice, and it had to due with circumstances, but a hectic schedule wasn't one of them. it's not hard to get laid...for me anyway.

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Ugh. Lori still appears in people's quotes...

Lori, I'm neither selfish, nor irresponsible with others' safety, or I'd get me a fucking motorbike and my Aspergery malfunctions be damned. So cut your moral judgements please. There are far nobler people out there than you who do a LOT for other people and still are neither celibate nor willing to have a child. What does that make them, then?

 

Originally Posted by cluelusshusbund
...does it feel a bit odd to you... to worship a God who intentionaly created us so flawed that we woud murder our children.???

Then you mus thank thers a good reason for God creatin us the way he did... what is it.???