>Not a person? Last time I saw a 4 month pre-term, it sure looked like a human to me.
>So a human life is at the whim of someone's desire to keep them or not. This is great.
>So when does a baby/fetus become a human worth saving?

>Abortion is as premediated as you can get. Using your logic, it's murder.

4 months pre term is not abortion anymore. ussually it is up to 12 weeks. Often much earlier than that. There are definitions about when abortion is legal. Even up here you cannot do a 4 month pre-term termination, but there are some countries where this is allowed.

To me as one working in the fertility field, I know there are a huge number of different circumstances where abortion is allowed. You seem to think in black and white, but it seldom is.

First of all there is no clear definition of what is a human beeing?? If there is a fetal heartbeat? the point of fertilisation? 26 weeks? at birth? There is no consensus from that.

If at fertilisation. In IVF many embryos (actually to be more correct: pre-embryos) are fertilised, but only a small percentage will become a human beeing. Of those transferred (put back into the uterus or fallopian tubes) only a portion will implant and grow into a real embryo. Then the rest might be frozen and actually never used for reproduction (e.g. research).

Also in IVF, a lot of american clinics put back as many as 10 embryos (or more). If they all implant a woman will carry 10 babies. It is not hard to imagine an reduction (aborting one or more embryos, but leaving at least one) is neccesary. Esspecially in multiples a reduction might increase the succesfull birth of the remaining embryos and reducing the medical complications of the mother (and reducing the tax payers money who have to pay for the consequences).

Then there are also medical reasons (both mother and child) to do a termination. The child could suffer from a serious medical condition without any prospect to have a viable file (again this is subject to debate where to draw the line), but terminating an embryo that does not have any brain function or any other severe condition that will not survive birth or die shortly after is often practised. Also if the mother is not going to survive birth (eg. illness) a termination of the pregancy might be considered.

Now reading you might consider IVF to be something that should be done either, but OTOH, IVF is about producing life and as with failures in the process (as in nature). Abortion is something that comes with the field in preventing medical complications etc.

Dragan already outlined the social aspect as well.

>>Are you saying you'd rather have a 15-year old girl who was raped have a child? You'd trust her to be able to overcome the trauma of rape, the trauma of being forced to have a birth against her own will and without having a say in the matter, the trauma of having a child at an age when she's completely unprepared for parenthood - or the trauma of separation if child is given for adoption... she's somehow supposed to handle all that? It's only 6 years before the law would trust her to handle a glass of beer.

>Sixteen year olds? How about twenty-five year olds (and older)?
>Number of abortions due to real health reason is so miniscule compared to the main reason.
>Again I know there are some situation where it has to be done.

The are social reasons to where abortion is desired. When childs are raped and get pregant and are not able (emotionally and economically) to support the child. As a sidenote in the nineties there was a huge crime rate drop in the US that according to the experts is due to the legalisation of abortion in the 80-ties or late 70-ties, simply because less childs without a future were born. (remember the elvis song: In the getto).

I think you are referring to the abortions where a couple feels they are not up to a child because they still have to make carreer and a child does not fit in the planning. That up here is also a debate. It is simply difficult to draw the line.

One might think that we up here should have high abortion rates because of our liberal position. But actually the Netherlands have about the lowest abortion rates of the western world. This probably is because of the open sexual education culture we have up here (many teenagers do carry condoms or are on oral anti conception). In the US where often the victorian sex-code still rules it has actual the opposite effect. If children are not educated they will experiment and accidents (getting pregnant) will happen. More accidents will happen if they practise a do-it-yourself-abortion. If we are pro-life, let us at least be sure those abortions are done safely to prevent both mother and child to die.

Walter,