What Passing Prenatal Personhood Doesn’t Mean

[rug]

By: Charles Camosy
Posted on November 7, 2011

By the end of the day on Tuesday we should know whether Mississippi has added the following to their state constitution:

"Section 33. Person defined. As used in this Article III of the state constitution, 'The term "person" or "persons" shall include every human being from the moment of fertilization, cloning or the functional equivalent thereof.'"

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However, even if the amendment passes, we will know little else of interest given that abortion, IVF, and certain kinds of abortifacients could all be theoretically justified even if prenatal humans have full moral and legal status. The law, for instance, permits one to kill a person in various situations (self-defense, for instance) and also to refuse to sustain a person even when they will die without support (all of us could save a life that would otherwise die by donating money to Catholic Relief Services), but the law has not had to think through the circumstances and implications of a person being inside another’s body, or a person being frozen in fertility lab, etc.

What this also means, however, is that insofar as it is less than clear that abortion and other like procedures would be banned under this law, it is also less than clear that his law will be found unconstitutional on the grounds that it conflicts with basic reproductive rights.

Bottom line: if this amendment passes, we will have far more questions than we have answers.

http://catholicmoraltheology.com/what-passing-prenatal-personhood-doesnt-mean/

[valerief]

1. Will it outlaw WAR and the Defense Budget? nt

[Old and In the Way]

2. What's the next logical step?

Bedroom monitors and mandatory pregnancy testing. You can't protect zygote citizens if you don't know they exist.

[Warpy]

3. Don't forget charging women who have miscarriages

with involuntary manslaughter. Throw all those irresponsible twits into prison, teach them a lesson!

[Old and In the Way]

12. We'll have to try God inabstentia, too.

After all, he's responsible for the vast number of spontaneous miscarriages.

[cleanhippie]

4. Another weak attempt to rationalize the forcing of religious beliefs onto everyone.

:puke:

[MarkCharles]

5. Indeed ! This is in a Catholic publication, too.

Will the sale of contraceptives, (which, among other processes, prevents a somehow accidentally fertilized egg from implantation upon the uterine wall)be banned in Mississippi?

Will fertility clinics be forced to implant ALL fertilized eggs into a woman's womb, (despite the known medical risks that would engender in the mother)?

Will woman actually have to go to court before they can be judged capable of having sex with their partner again once they have experienced a spontaneous miscarriage?

[rug]

8. "if this amendment passes, we will have far more questions than we have answers."

That's his precise point.

"This is in a Catholic publication, too." And?

[cleanhippie]

11. Perhaps his point should have been "why is this even on the ballot?"

More questions than answers, indeed.


Had the pious not been allowed to try and push their beliefs onto everyone, we wouldn't even be talking about this nonsense.

[rug]

13. Whining about it being on the ballot is no substitute for dealing with the reality of it.

Like it or not, this is a democracy not an echo chamber.

[rug]

7. By whom?

[MarkCharles]

15. By people with such strident religious beliefs that they have decided to

legally attempt to force every person (primarily every female of child bearing ability and their male associates, pharmacists, climicians, etc.)in the state to comply with those strict beliefs or face legal sanctions for not following those beliefs.

[MarkCharles]

6. Absolutely bizarre reasoning here: ...

"The law, for instance, permits one to kill a person in various situations (self-defense, for instance)"

How would anyone ever claim an abortion is "self-defense", other than in the rare instance when the life of the mother is directly threatened?

[rug]

9. He's referring to the principle of double effect.

Are you familiar with it?

[Iggo]

10. Fucking morons. (n/t)

[Jim__]

14. Great video on that page. A civil, rational discussion of abortion.

Michelle Goldberg raises some interesting question with respect to this law and IVF. I was surprised at Singer's position that this is not a basic right but something that should be legislated. We could use a lot more discussions like this.

[rug]

16. Yeah. His show is turning out to be pretty thoughtful.

[NMMNG]

17. Not very convincing

coming from the church that already goes out of its way to deny, in every way it can, women the right to control their own bodies.

[rug]

18. It;s not coming from the church. It's coming from an ethics professor.

[NMMNG]

19. A Catholic ethics professor

Not much difference AFAIC. He's coming from the same perspective.