Abortion is murder, but… [It's all about me!]

YNet ^ | Dec. 25, 2007 | Yael Mishaeli

[Alouette]

For some people, ending a pregnancy is the only way to keep on living

Yael Mishali Published: 12.26.07, 00:39 / Israel Opinion

Abortion is a type of murder; I have no doubt about that. In this context we can debate over questions such as the duration of a pregnancy and when exactly do several cells turn into a person with a soul, but I have no interest in doing that. I accept the universal assumption that as of a certain moment, we are talking about a real person, and “aborting it” is a type of murder.

And still, as a woman and a mother, I must reject the religious hypocrisy and politically correct attitude of the religious social discourse, and declare that I am in favor of abortions. I support the right of a woman (or parents) to decide to end the pregnancy because she feels it is impossible for her to proceed with it.

When a woman says “I cannot raise this child” I believe her, and I do not wish to force her (or that child) to embark on a life of distress of one type or another.

I am not talking about other women, but rather, about myself. Despite the regret inherent in this realization, I know that I would not be able to decide to raise a child with a serious defect. I would not have been able to find out during my pregnancy that my child suffers from Down syndrome or a similar defect and continue the pregnancy as if nothing had happened.

As a mother, had my daughter faced pregnancy at a very young age, I would strongly recommend that she terminate it rather than punish herself and the child throughout her life because of the mistake she made. Generally speaking, when a mother of five, or three, or two feels that this pregnancy is exhausting her and the only thing she can see in the future is growing mental (or financial) distress, I completely agree that it would be better to terminate the pregnancy and rehabilitate the soul before any future pregnancy.

A question of saving lives?

The Chief Rabbinate decided to act against abortions. They take it for granted that the vast majority of abortions are “not necessary” because the “life of the mother is not at risk.” I agree with them that if we are only talking about actual death, this is not a question of saving lives.

However, if they take the time to visit psychiatric wards at various hospitals and see the growing numbers of ultra-Orthodox mothers who can no longer bear the burden, if they meet mothers who are unable to love the children they did not want to have, if they meet women whose lives were stopped because of an early pregnancy that left them bitter, if they see children whose parents could not devote enough time to them because their siblings were born with a defect, perhaps then the rabbis would be able to expand the definition of “saving a life”.

When a woman says that for her the pregnancy is a matter of life or death, you rabbis (with all due respect) cannot tell her it isn’t so.

I, of course, admire and appreciate all of those people who are not like me. The ones who raise children with defects with great love, and who courageously face any mission God had tasked them with.

I feel the same about people whose daughter has no chance of becoming pregnant too early, or ones for whom a mental or financial difficulty has no meaning. But even those saints must realize that for us, the simple people, terminating a pregnancy is sometimes the only way to keep on living.

[stfassisi]

This is the true Daughter of Zion(our Blessed Mother).... Who has replaced Israel. She is the "type" of the Church-who has ALWAYS taught that abortion is child sacrifice

[Alouette]

Who’s going to take care of Yael Mishali when/if she becomes disabled?

Oh silly me, the Taxpayers, or course.

[Tabi Katz]

Apparently she already is disabled. She was born without a heart.

[8mmMauser]

Pinged from Terri Dailies

8mm

[Tax-chick]

Who’s going to take care of Yael Mishali when/if she becomes disabled?

The "Palestinians."

[Convert from ECUSA]

"Just put me in a room with Yael Mishali for 5 minutes. My, my 9 kids, and my 19 grandkids."

Right on, Alouette! God bless you!

[ItsOurTimeNow]

Our family is friends with another family who has a DS girl. She is the sweetest, most loving and tenderhearted teenager I’ve ever met. There’s a Godly simplicity in her that I honestly envy.

[Tax-chick]

It’s the least they can do, since she’s so helpfully encouraging Jewish people to kill their children.

[DieHard the Hunter]

I have an adopted brother and an adopted sister. Thank God that there were three women, back in the 1960’s, who were not as selfish as the writer of this article!

Thanks for posting this, Alouette.

[Jo Nuvark]

By denying life status to the unborn, the Supreme
Court has thus decided when life begins. That is
a religious matter and crosses the line into the
establishment of a state religion.

“For Thou didst form my inward parts; Thou didst weave me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to Thee, for I am
fearfully and wonderfuly made.... (snip) ... Thine eyes have seen my unformed substance...” (Psalm 139)

When the Supreme Court legalized abortion, it made
a moral (Defined: Good. Defined: Pious. Defined:
Religious) decision. A definitive intrusion of
Government into church affairs. Our Government
cannot force a religion on its citizens, yet by
its decision to legalize abortion, it has created
and sanctioned the state religion of sacrificing
our unborn to the gods of promiscuity.

I believe that Government is not to blame for this
wholesale slaughter of the innocent. Moral decisions
come from Bible-Torah literacy, (Psalm 139), not from
legislation. Roe v. Wade aside, we have not been
forced to kill our babies. Abortion statistics are
staggering because we (yes, I mean Judeo-Christians)
have chosen to murder our unborn.

I believe that liberals have used the abortion debate
to divide and conquer. We need to stop this naive
militancy. In Deuteronomy 11, God tells us clearly
how to raise moral people.

“And you shall teach them (God’s statutes and ordinances… V1) to your sons, talking of them when you sit in your
house and when you walk along the road and when you lie down and when you rise up.” V19.

Though separation of church and state cannot be
found in the Constitution, the following might be
a better way to view the concept… Morality (religion)
is nor Government business. We see the effects of
perverse immoral legislation in gay marriage and
climate change laws.

I believe that the Government is a business and
should be run as a business. We should elect a fiscally
conservative leader. We should elect a military
leader. We should elect a Godly leader. Moreover,
we should be informed and not easily swayed by an
anti-American agenda disguised as “concern”. It is
nothing but pathetic, alarmist rhetoric. Abortion
and terrorism are both wars against humanity. But
the battleground for the unborn should be (and should
have been) waged from the home (church), not the
Supreme Court!

Jo -— CHAMPION OF CIRCUMSTANCE

[Scotswife]

That sums it up very well.
Children are looked at as burdens, and at times they can FEEL like burdens.
But in the end - they are the ones who have given us the greatest gifts.
They’ve taught us unconditional love, patience, and kindness, and the value of self-sacrifice.

[Zionist Conspirator]

When a woman says “I cannot raise this child” I believe her, and I do not wish to force her (or that child) to embark on a life of distress of one type or another.

That sounds like every life that's ever been lived.

[ThorSinger]

You know what i did to avoid having a child that i wasn't up to caring for? i DIDN'T HAVE SEX. It's not that hard. i went without it for 23yrs. And, it's a lot less traumatic to you and your body than an abortion. With the added bonus that you don't kill another human being at any point! Currently, my Husband and i use FAM (fertility awareness method) to avoid pregnancy. If more women took personal responsibility over their sexual habits, abortion would become mööt. How about less expediency and more personal responsibility?

[steadfastconservative]

This woman does not believe that all human life is sacred. She is advancing a consequentialist argument, in which only the consequences of the abortion are considered, not the morality of the act itself. In her opinion, the consequences of continuing an unwanted pregnancy are worse than the consequences of ending it. Therefore, abortion is justified. While she acknowledges the humanity of the unborn child, she does not believe that the child’s right to life is absolute or that it trumps the mother’s “right” to a problem-free life or her right not to suffer the consequences of her own behavior. Unfortunately, this kind of thinking has become very widespread in our society.

[Sloth]

The pro-abort movement has been shifting this direction for the past several years. The argument is no longer when life begins — biology settled that decades ago, and only a few pro-aborts persist in fighting that issue. Now the pro-aborts acknowledge that the fetus is alive, but either argue about metaphysical concepts like “personhood” & “the soul” (who’s the one codifying religion in law, here?), or they take this writer’s stance that killing a child is not only tolerable but downright noble. It’s refreshingly honest, albeit vile & diabolical.

[melsec]

I wonder is she quite ready to accept that should she kill an unborn child that she is a murderer and will in due time receive punishment. I also wonder whether she is willing to accept that by promotion of infanticide then she already is aiding and abetting murder and is just as guilty of muder in God’s eyes.

Maybe the I’s and ME’s will seem ever more imperative when it is judgement time.

Mel

[melsec]

Oh and BTW to this b*tch- my nephew has Down’s Syndrome. He is a person who has Down’s but he is far more than the Syndrome. Joseph is a wonderful gift from God - to treat a any child as anything less is sick!

Mel

Sorry bout the language but people like this make my blood boil.

[Das Outsider]

By denying life status to the unborn, the Supreme Court has thus decided when life begins. That is a religious matter and crosses the line into the establishment of a state religion.

Perhaps. If opposition to abortion is merely an article of faith, as Monsignor John Kerry once suggested, then why isn't support of a constitutional right to abortion equally religious in nature?

I know the answer. Let's see if you can guess it.

[Jo Nuvark]

[... why isn’t support of a constitutional right to abortion equally religious in nature? ...]

Hmmmm.... knowing you, this could be a trick
question, so I’ll just answer from my gut.

Deciding when life begins and when it ENDS is
appointed by God. When a person or the Supreme
Court makes that decision, they are playing God
... establishing religious tenets.

[Das Outsider]

Hmmmm.... knowing you, this could be a trick question, so I’ll just answer from my gut.

Certainly not a trick question.

Deciding when life begins and when it ENDS is appointed by God. When a person or the Supreme Court makes that decision, they are playing God ... establishing religious tenets.

This is true, but not the answer.

The original question was: If opposition to abortion is viewed as merely a religious matter, i.e., not up for public debate, then why is support of the right to abortion not given the same treatment?

Answer: A couple of reasons.

Support for the right to abortion is always couched in terms of public health and medical necessity. In other words, a sort of utilitarian imperative which ultimately resorts to an argument from pity. After all, are you going to tell all of those unwed teenage mothers, wholly unfit to raise children, that they have no choice but to carry the child to full term? Wouldn't their lives be better without having to bring an unwanted child into the world; one that they can't possibly provide for? And what of the child?

Now, you may be asking, "What about the so-called child?" This is the moral dimension. In today's society, morality is much like politics and religion at the dinner table--when one does bring it up, it's best relegated to small talk, generalization, and denial. Personhood has quite literally become a subjective matter--much like everything else in post-postmodern America: a matter of one's personal interpretation. There is no true scientific measure of when one acquires "personhood," and that being the case, it's a subject of neverending debate for the philosophers and theologians, i.e., the dreamers and idealists. Not a matter for an objective, historically prudent body such as the Supreme Court to ever resolve, or so we're told.

The problem with erring on the pro-abortion side of the debate, from a legal standpoint, is much like arguing in defense of the man who shot his mother:

1) It was late at night.

2) He heard an intruder.

3) He was afraid.

4) He loaded his shotgun and fired, not knowing just what--or who--he was firing at.

If I were to sum it up, I would say that Satan once told our first parents that they could be like God--and we've believed it ever since.