You're not "saying it", but your proposal would hold him blameless nonetheless.

"maybe"? How magnanimous of you.

Because them's the breaks. Life ain't fair. The sexes aren't equal when it comes to procreation. Learn to deal with it.

So, I am pro-choice, but I would never want a child of mine to be aborted (to late for that, I think, but I guess I will never know for sure). I have two kids, the first's mother moved her a couple of hours away even though I had always been (and still am) a big part of her life. My son's mom bailed on him and hasn't done anything for him in about six years. We had already been broken up for a couple of years and I was with someone else. Another ex told me she thought she was pregnent, couldn't deal with having a kid, we got in an arguement a few days later about something else, and that was it. She never told me if she was pregnant or not. It seems to me that many people feel that men should be responsible for their kids, monitarily at least, whether the father wants them or not. But that men should not have the right to chose how or where they are raised, or whether they are even born at all. All of the responsibilities with none of the rights. It seems like such a huge double standard, but I'm sure most people won't agree. I realize there is no way to accurately or fairly give the father a choice when it comes to abortion, but I don't think the idea, in theory, is wrong. Most of the time, women have all the choices when it comes to children, and people wonder why so many men make the only choice that they are left with, which is to walk away.

you are assuming that all women are pro-choice.

I hate my state.

Totally! It's like... it's like... like somebody would actually repeal the writ of habeas corpus. Or actually defend the use of torture. Or... or... claim to a member of either the legislative or executive branch but not both at the same time; quantum government legislative/executive duality. Eat your hat indeed, sir!

<aside> Sorry, what? What was that? <pause> Oh.

I hope you have a lot of hats.

And in the land of gumdrop trees and lakes of whiskey, this might be a cogent idea.

Here in reality there are only two possible outcomes of unintended pregnancy:

Women can choose whether or not to have an abortion

Men can force women to have abortions.

Since A is retarded, we get B, which likewise leads to exactly two choices:

Children can grow up in single, or in many cases no income households and suffer for the rest of their lives as a result.

Men can pay child support.

It doesn't take a brain trust to figure out which is the most desirable outcome. Women get two choices, whether to have sex and whether to have an abortion. Men only get one. Don't like it, have a vasectomy, because its not your body.

You make an all too true point, I work in the construction industry, and I know guys in my union hall that will work untill the state catches up to them. Then they quit so they dont have to pay. They all say they have a reason, but if your the father and you dont pay, you're being a fucking douche to your child. Most women that dont seek child support t that I know dont want the father to have anything to do with the children.

what the fuck, ohio? sheesh.

I love you.

That catches up with you eventually. My dad did that with my younger half brother. I can remember him coming home and his check said something along the lines of .17 cents. It caught up to him to the point where the government said fuck it, we'll take it out before you get your check.

If you have a legitimate job in this country, you're traceable.

That is an interesting ethics question, I think. I would guess that if it were possible for the father to obtain the fetus at any stage of its development without inflicting any harm, e.g. pain, on the mother and let it gestate in his body, that nobody would have any problems with it. I would think that there would be very few people who would defend the woman's right to abort the fetus if this was more than science fiction or some kind of thought experiment. Of course, that is obviously not the case.

I wonder, for example, how would this situation change if the fetus was, for example, frozen in an embryonic state. Perhaps a willing surrogate mother could be found to carry the fetus to term. How would that affect the discussion? Which is exactly what happened in a court case in NJ in 1998.

What if the father wanted to have a say not only in whether or not the woman had an abortion but also how well she took care of herself during the pregnancy. Court order to not allow the woman to smoke or drink during pregnancy? Court order to not eat the wrong kinds of food, go horseback riding, etc.? Perhaps not to get out of bed or leave the house as it might endanger the fetus? Suicide would definitely not be allowed at least until the thrid trimester. I would think that there would be very few people would be in favor of pregnant women being confined to bed with a regimented diet and exercise such as medical doctors had determined was best for the health of the fetus.

What if the father was a rapist or the child was the result of incest but the father was willing to take the baby and raise it 100% Or what if some man ran around intentionally raping women in order to be able to force them to bear his children? I would not think that many people would support laws which would allow for such things to happen.

Would it make a difference if the father was an alcoholic, drug addict, homosexual, republican, or a child molestor? <laugh> I would love to see the look on this bill's sponsor's faces if the first father to use it happened to be gay. Would it make a difference if the woman had not been raped at first but then later found out that the father was a child molestor? Or perhaps she was in love with the man but later found out that the child had been conceived on a night in which the man and drugged and raped her?

I think that far too often the rhetoric of the question is used to try and suggest an answer which is the one which most agrees with the views of the person asking the question. It seems to me that your question, focusing only on the circumstances of the fathers desire is attempting to lead one to be sympathic to his case. I would also imagine that your imaginary father is an all around decent guy who just really happens to love his unborn son or daughter. Perhaps this framing of the question supports your own personal point of view or perhaps you're just playing devil's advocate. However, I think that the larger context of any such ethics question can greatly effect the answer.

One of the problems that I personally have with all of these proposed laws to prohibit aborting fetuses is how "black and white" is the law on paper compared to how gray and chaotic is the world it is meant to legislate.

Personally, I am also bothered with how many of the "religious persuasion" seem to want to pick and choose their science. For example, before advances in understanding of biology, etc., no one understood the nature of fetal development from a single cell, cell divisions and specialization, DNA, RNA, etc. However, now that this is known, they claim to understand life as the moment that sperm meets egg. I'm not sure if this is generally thought to be from the moment the head of the sperm touches the outter edge of the egg's cellular membrane or only after it had managed to mingle its DNA with that of the egg. Or does it matter how much of the two double helixes have had a chance to cojoin? Or what if scientists discover a way to activate some kind of dorment genetics in humans which is the reason that other species can reproduce asexually? Surely the bible says nothing about anything approaching a kind of cellular theology.

I'm sure that anyone reading this rather long ramble can guess were my sympathies lie in this issue. And how I never really attempted to answer JunkyardAngel's question. I don't really think I know the answer, to be honest. But that definitely means that I don't think I know how to answer for anyone else. And so, I suppose I finally have answered after all. I personally don't like telling people what to do with themselves and their lives if I already know that I don't know what the answer(s) is/are. But if I think that I know or even know that I know, I'm a real asshole. And, of course, anyone who thinks that they think that they know or even thinks that they know that they know are the biggest assholes of all. Kurt Goëdel even managed to show mathematicians that even mathematics has some corners which can not be proven either true or false. And those guys are some of the biggest "we know about objective true" assholes on the planet. Well, them and the pope.

That is a delicious Freudian slip.

You don't know much about inbred middle america, huh? of course something like this could pass. let's hope it won't but it could.

Regarding the earlier child support issue, males who are going to be irresponsible enough to not use birth control when they are with someone other than their chosen life partner and co-parent aren't the type who would pay support anyway. you know who i mean.

I respect women and there rights more then anyone after all i want to be one but i can't just sit back and say that the fetus life means nothing because it does in my eyes. Just think about it if your mother decided to abort you before she carried you to term you wouldn't be here that goes for all of us. Whose to say that we aren't aborting the next albert einstein or issac newton or leonardo divinci or the next abraham lincoln or FDR i could go on forever.

Lets not forget that we all know sex makes babies even with birthcontrol and condoms we know its a possibility that the woman could get pregnant. And most babies are from consensual sex which means the potiental mother agreed to an act that legally she knows could result in her getting pregnant. so i think that asking people that are agreeing to sex to agree that they are taking a risk that they could become parents and have to deal with the repercussions.

And last but not least i think it must be really nice to have that right to chose. I want more then anything in this world to become a mother of a child i carried and gave birth to but i don't believe that will ever happen for me because i was born with a Y chromosome and as a result unless science figures it out in the next 10 to 15 years i doubt i'll ever get a chance at that and that makes me very sad.