Tuesday, 21st October 2008
Double standards on the death of unborn children
Why does Peter P. Dingli of Australia (October 17) find the killing of an innocent unborn baby any less outrageous than the murder of holocaust victims at Auschwitz? Is the beating heart of a defenceless baby in its mother's womb less precious than that of a concentration camp inmate?
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Hitler killed the Jews because he wanted to rid the world of the great conspiracy; mothers kill their unborn children to rid their personal world of unwanted responsibility. Neither can be morally justified or morally permitted.
I shall quote John Paul II, not because I want to give a religious tinge to this discussion, but because he said something truly valuable, which should touch the hearts not only of believers but also of unbelievers and agnostics: Let us not accept "the culture of death."
One can find a million excuses to kill - like Raskolnikov in Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment, and like every petty muderder in Colombo or in Murder She Wrote, if you wish - but life is always a better value than death.
One could argue that nature has imposed on the woman to bear the unborn human being in her womb while the man defends them both from danger. I shall not enter into that argument – but shall only ask whether it could be valid, after all, and thus pregnancy could be viewed as being shared by both sexes, psychologically and emotionally.
The comparison with taking care of the sick, old mother is actually not odd, but taken directly from one particular philosopher. I shall not venture into that direction, however.
I shall quote Ms Ferstl, who says. “If she is not able to take care of the mother herself, she can pay others. And if she is not able to pay, the state will take over, or not?”
I agree 100%. Similarly, the State should help the unborn, by protecting it from a mother who wants to kill it. Just as the State helps those close to death, it should help those close to birth.
The example I gave of a woman taking caring of her mother could obviously have been made using a man as the subject. But I wanted to keep the analogy as close as possible to the case of abortion.
It is nature that has ordained that man should not have pregnancies. If you want to complain against Nature, please feel free to do so...
The point is, man canNOT whereas women CAN have pregnancies. Is it unjust? I don't think that something which is imposed on us by nature can have any inherent quality of justice/unjustice ascribed to it. Justice pertains to the realm of human activities, not the impositions of nature.
Was the tsunami unjust? The question is nonsensical. Similarly, the question whether the fact that only women can have pregnancies is unjust, is a nonsensical question.
This position obviously leaves out the clergy, since it is they who have to explain the justice or lack of it of natural things - given that natural could be understood as God's will.
But from a non-religious point of view, ascribing justice to natural facts is nonsensical.
This brings to abortion.
"If a woman finds that her mother is so ill, she has to take care of her 24 hours a day..."
1. Why "a woman"? (Just wondering.) Unlike pregnancy and birth practically all burdens can be shared between both sexes, no?
2. What an odd comparison. NOBODY but an embryo ever depends from one and only particular person. If she is not able to take care of the mother herself, she can pay others. And if she is not able to pay, the state will take over, or not? So what?
Right, in the same way a child can be adopted by somebody else. BUT only after 9 whole months of carrying it in your own body. I admire every woman who doesn't feel able to accept a child and nevertheless accepts not to interrupt this process. BUT I just don't think that those of us who have not gone through it (or even can't, i.e. especially men and all the Catholic clergy!) should judge others so easily.
Anyway, the question was not whether abortion was a great thing (NO!), but whether it can/may be compared to one of the worst atrocities in history.
Nobody is trying to impose anything on you or me. Weitze and Ferstl are expressing their opinions, contrary to you, who has missed the point completely and contributed nothing to the argument.
The point, as raised by F. Saliba, is that an abortion of an embryo is as outrageous as the suffering, humiliation, cruelty and murder committed on the victims of the Holocaust. You shouted out that abortion is murder, but ignored completely the catastrophe of the Holocaust.
@Maria Ferstl
You must appreciate that in Malta we also have our fair share of bigots, xenophobes, fanatics and downright cretins.
If you feel I insulted you, I humbly appologize.
My comment was meant as a RESPECT FOR LIFE and not as a personal insult.
Canada
I do not think your English is awkward: your thoughts are being clearly conveyed.
The problem is with the thought process!
Let's apply your logic analogically. If a woman finds that her mother is so ill, she has to take care of her 24 hours a day, and she decides to kill her mother not because she really wants to kill her but because she is not ready to assume that responsibility - of having to take care of her, or having her instituionalized and having to visit her often etc etc
Is that ok, because of the intention?
Of course, matricide is even worse than homicide, because there is a blood relationship. Similarly, the killing of one's own off-spring is even worse than simple murder: there is a moral aggravation because the person whose responsibility it is to take care of that child not only refuses to assume the responsibility, but kills the (unborn) child she should be taking care of! It is not a diminuition of moral liability: actually it is an aggravation!
Nobody is trying to impose anything onto you or your nation.
On the contrary: I stated, that it is an absolute waste of time.
It is a waste, since certain people, who consider themselves to be mature adults, cannot keep a discussion on a decent level, but have to attack others personally and kick below the belt, which is not very polite.
High time that these people learn that
a) life has a whole spectrum of colours - not just black and white and
b) one can also agree to disagree about certain subjects WITHOUT insulting other parties!
@ Maria Ferstl
Told you so ;0)
I would be glad if I could have children. Please stop your personal insults.
@Richard Borg
Oh, yes, only those who can propagate their DNA deserve those capital letters... :p
@ALFRED CAMILLERI
"Fortunately, most people in Malta do not share the views held by the recently deceased Austrian politician."
The comments posted here on both the Austrian elections and Haider's death made me doubt that.
@l Galea
"You are trying to impose your beliefs on us in our own country."
What do I impose to whom? I would never want an abortion, and I frankly don't care if other people have abortions or not. It's you wishing to see more women dying from backstreet abortions and being imprisoned.
And don't you see how contraproductive all this fuss about abortion is? As for myself, I now live in a country where abortion is considered the easy solution, an absolutely normal thing, and I'm disgusted. But should I ever move to Malta (well, possible, as I would wish to improve my Maltese) and happen to be bothered with plastic embryos every day, I might see it in a more positive light...
Don't understand your logic... If one thing is considered much worse than another, why should that imply that the other thing is desirable?!?
@Dr Francis Saliba
"Holocaust victims were murdered by their enemies."
So, no German citizens in Auschwitz?!?
@K. Pullicino
"Are you saying that people who suffer from congenital insensitivity to pain do not have a right to life because they cannot feel pain?"
Of course not. Nor does the value of a person depend on his/her "usefulness".
Well, perhaps my English is awkward... Anyway, what I meant: Abortion kills, but at least it's performed at that early stage of life IN ORDER to prevent pain. The AIM IS NOT to kill, but "just" to get rid of a responsibility the person doesn't feel able to take on. On the other hand the AIM of Auschwitz WAS to wipe out millions of lives + to cause pain and humiliation, to destroy a whole people's achievements. (The Jews were killed BECAUSE OF their achievements, not due to the lack thereof!) The gravity of a deed mostly depends on the intention. Now, do you seriously mean to say those are deeds of the same gravity?!?!?
Maria Ferstl
You are both trying to impose your beliefs on us in our own country.
Had your parents decided to abort you, both of you would not have been able to write your opinion which you are trying to impose upon us.
Abortion is MURDER.
It's a pity that there are those who can even entertain the idea of equating these misadventures, however tragic they both are and were.
Ms Firstl, don't wonder. Haider would not have made many inroads in Malta's political life. Fortunately, most people in Malta do not share the views held by the recently deceased Austrian politician.
I wonder if you have ever been pregnanat? Or, God forbids, if you had ever experinced an abortion where you had obviosly been convinced by some sellfish person of your believes that an embrio has no feelings what-so-ever.
How can that be if EVERY part of you is alive?
Remember how painful a tiny thorn in your baby finger from a pricly pear is?
There is only one right. The right to live.
Also, animals do not know the meaning between life and death, do not have any achievements and neither do they feel any grief. Yet funnily enough, they have more rights than a human embryo.
And finally, if we were to take a person's "usefulness" as to whether he/she should have a right to life, then that takes out a lot of many people.
A human embryo is a living human being. Calling it otherwise and making exceptions is just ignoring facts and being discriminatory.
A born child (as opposed to an unborn child) does not know what life and death are, and probably is not aware of fear as yet, or grief for that matter. Then why don't we kill new-born babies?????
There once was a story about a chap who thinks that an old woman, a pawnbroker, is just a worthless parasite on society, and that killing her is morally just... That chap, Raskolnikov of course, commits the transgression because he divides humanity into ordinary and extraordinary people: she was ordinary, he was extraordinary. Needless to say, Raskolnikov's theory is not relevant to us: what is relevant is this idea that certain humans have worth, and certain others do not. In Ms Ferstl's view, unborn children have no worth because they have not contributed to the world as yet.
I believe that all theories which somehow denude a human being (whether born or unborn) of his intrinsic worth as a human being are very dangerous, and are to be avoided at all costs. Every individual, whether born or unborn, whether a just or an unjust person, has got an intrinsic value or worth because he/she is human.
There should be much more Richard Borges - those, who really do care - in this world!
If it had, then abotion could have a chance of becoming a thing of the past.
Unfortunately - and more often than not - men do not get into that bodyguard mode, that you have experienced.
Nowadays, many of them just want to have fun without getting into commitments. They expect women to take care of contraception and should there - nevertheless - be "a little accident" , they run.
Values don't seem to be important any more and making love has become just another sport, whereby one can loose some extra calories.
Who said that it was "ok to kill someone during his sleep"?!?
I think the topic rather was if it was "ok" (or morally acceptable) to downplay a genocide by such a tasteless and ridiculous comparison, or am I wrong?
You will never manage to make people like Mr. Saliba understand the way you and I are thinking. In such cases it is best to simply shake your head in disbelieve and leave it to the Maltese to fight this matter.
You will remember, that in our countries the fight for the right of abortion started in 1971:
WE HAD AN ABORTION! ....
... was the headline of the German Stern on the 6th of June 1971 - showing the faces of 28 prominent women on the front page of the magazine.
It was a campaign, whereby 374 prominent and non-prominent women stated publicly, that they had an abortion and thus breeched the law. The oldest woman who signed this statement was 74 - the youngest 14!
The campaign was initiated by famous women activist Alice Schwarzer, following the example of 343 French women, who made the same statement on the paper Le Nouvel Observateur one year before.
I am now wondering how long it will take around 300 Maltese women to step forward and do the same. Let us wait and see!
"For heaven's sake, an embryo during the first 2 months does not feel any pain for sure."
"An unborn child...does not feel any fear and any grief."
So you are saying that it is ok to kill someone during his sleep because he "does not feel any fear and any grief?
For heaven's sake, an embryo during the first 2 months does not feel any pain for sure. (The too late abortion limit in some countries is another story.) This point alone already means to extremely downplay the Nazis' cruelty. Those people were tormented and humiliated to death over a long period of time, and they were perfectly conscious of what was happening! An unborn child does not know what life and death means and thus does not feel any fear and any grieve. You really see no difference?!? An embryo is potentially as precious a person, but only potentially, as it has not contributed to the world yet. Can it ever be the same not to let develop such a potential being and to destroy a life of decades, together with all its experiences and achievements?!? Not to forget all the social relationships being cut off, creating immense pain to others, too!
In my country (Austria) they've just buried a politician I was ashamed of and who happened to call Auschwitz a "penal camp". Wondering now what his career would have been like in Malta...