Bourgeois pigs kill suicidal 16 year old boy.

[kandrathe]

Shall we then open murder investigations with miscarriages? Accuse mothers who did not take optimal care of their miscarried fetuses with criminal negligence causing death?

Maybe. Inflicting addiction to drugs, or Fetal Alcohol Syndrome seems to be abusive. It would seem the law makers are uncertain. It is against Federal Law since 2004 "Unborn victim of Violence Act" -- where that takes jurisdiction; since the criminal code is the States business we have another 50 variations possibly.

Should Pregnant Women be Subject to Criminal Prosecution for Activities that are Harmful to Their Fetuses? It probably does create a slippery slope, or opens Pandora's box -- that sounds wrong... I get what you are saying.

They're not puppies, but they aren't able to live by themselves, either.

The same is true of the elderly in nursing homes, the infirm, or human children.

I think they get their human rights at birth, and to move it back before that point is to dangerously conflate their lives with that of their mothers. (Or their embryonic vats, either way.) This is a value judgment, how I think the laws should be applied to best preserve justice.

I don't entirely disagree that being in a womb complicates the situation for both parties. We live in an age informed by science. It is time to set aside Aristotle, and thereby the medieval and common law understanding of "quickening".

In this age of safe and effective birth control, we should be able to entirely eliminate unwanted pregnancy. In my opinion, too much time and effort is spent fighting for and against abortion, whereas the better use of that effort and money would be in getting effective birth control to those that don't want to become pregnant.

But, my main point is that the society has a duty to protect all those we consider to be people. Parents don't get to kill their children, and we don't kill off the unwanted (whether they are mentally ill, infirm, too old, or whatever). I'm just not sure that being unfortunate to be unwanted and in a womb means you can be killed when you might otherwise survive outside a womb.

More succinctly perhaps, "The moral test of government is how it treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the aged; and those in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy and the handicapped." -- H.H. Humphrey, November November 4, 1977 at the dedication of the Humphrey building for Health and Human Services.