Did you ever hear of Kitty Genovese? Her name became quite well-known even though she was just what Leona Hemsley would call one of the little people.
If you never heard about her let me first assure you she was not part of the Genovese Mafia family. She was a twenty-eight year old woman who managed a bar, working two shifts a day, saving money in the hopes of opening an Italian restaurant. She was coming home around 3:00 a.m. when she was attacked and murdered.
What gave her such publicity were the stories that popped up after her body was found outside her apartment building. She had been stabbed multiple times and sexually assaulted. The story went that while she was screaming for help during the attack on her that more than two dozen people watched it happen and no one did anything to help her.
People were outraged. How could it be that no one tried to assist this young woman during her attack? There was national revulsion. It would be studied for decades after.
One person noted, “It seemed to explain something about urban life — how neighbors in the cold, unfeeling city would watch someone die and make no effort to help.”
Have you ever wondered what you would have done in that situation? Suppose you were walking down a street and someone told you a murder was occurring in the building across the street. What would you do?
Or think of it this way. You know to a certainty that in a certain building in your city you believe premeditated murders are being carried out every day. What would you do?
We know of one person who believed that and took action. He went into two buildings and murdered two of the people involved in doing that. He believed he was stopping these murders and saving lives. His name was John Salvi. He’d be convicted of their murders, sentenced to prison where he took his own life.
What I’m getting at is that the murder of Kitty Genovese is not the same as the taking of life of a fetus. If in a clinic where abortions were taking place instead of abortions 28-year-old women like Kitty Genovese were being murdered our response would certainly be different.
I’m thinking of this due to the Roe defying unconstitutional legislation being enacted in Republican controlled states. These laws being passed in willful defiance of the Roe decision with draconian penalties seem to put the life of the fetus on par with that of a 28-year-old woman.
It would appear to be common knowledge that a woman who becomes pregnant baring unforeseen events will bear a child around nine months later. Also that any abortion within that time will prevent a child being born. Whether the abortion is after one week, five weeks, ten weeks, or whatever time period the result will be the same.
Why then are these new abortion laws allowing abortions up to a certain period but forbidding it thereafter. The allowed abortions take a life in the same way a disallowed one. Why is time a factor?
It’s seem to me if you want to ensure all pregnant women carry the child to delivery you’d have a blanket rule: no abortions. Other than that it seems these laws are being passed more for political reasons than as a concern for the life of the fetus.
If these states truly wanted to stop or seriously diminish abortions rather than grandstanding about it I make this humble suggestion: put a bounty on all children born in the state. Put out notice that hereafter any woman who brings a child into the world as a result of a pregnancy will receive one hundred thousand dollars and a sum of thirty thousand a year until the child reached 26-years-old.
I don’t think that will happen. You’ve heard talk is cheap – well so is passing legislation that cost nothing and will have no effect on the men voting for it.
1) Roe v Wade was based on bad “science,” or more accurately, lack of science at the time, which the opinion itself admitted
2) Roe v Wade itself defied the constitution – it was based on an invented “penumbra”
3) I used to date a girl named Penumbra
4) in typical liberal fashion, liberals invent rights in the constitution which are not enumerated or justified, and seek to eliminate rights which are enumerated
5) the woman who was the “Roe” in Roe v Wade came to oppose the decision because it led to abortion on demand, and not “safe, legal and rare,” as Brian Merrick’s comment points out
6) Henry Barth’s comment is part of what demonstrates the massive, massive number of abortions performed each year – again, not “safe, legal and rare”
7) lefties trivialize abortion by trying to portray it as a walk in the park – it’s not; it’s gruesome, and has nothing to do with trite phraseology such as “reproductive rights”
He’s gone, Abe . He’s gone .
How gone?
I read Death In Venice this afternoon. Anyone seen Tadzio around?
Cholera .
Kitty Genovese was a tough and resourceful girl. PBS did a great doc on this horrific event …interviewing people in her building and asking their reactions to what they did or did not hear as she was slaughtered in front foyer by guy who stalked her and killed her . No . She was not Carmello Soprano. But. Yes. She did know people as they say . And doc relates that she did take book at the local bar where she was Mama Boss bartender . For whom and for whatever reason one may speculate upon. She was a very solid customer. I remember this when it happened. And I am pleased she has not been forgotten here. Kitty Genovese RIP
Sounds good at first blush, but you cannot leave this up to the woman and her physician, because (1) there are physicians in this country willing to abort (kill) third trimester human beings (7,8,9 month) and (2) there are women who because of financial, emotional, social, “familial” reasons or they discover the unborn human being is handicapped, e.g. Downes or Thalidomide Baby, no arms, etc, are willing to abort (kill) the unborn human being they carry.
ONE NEW JERSEY CLINIC WAS PERFORMING 5,000 THIRD TRIMESTER ABORTIONS PER YEAR UNTIL THE STATE STEPPED IN WITH NEW REGULATIONS, upheld in Planned Parenthood case, as I recall.
SOCIETY HAS A DUTY TO PROTECT UNBORN HUMAN BEINGS
SOCIETY ALSO COULD DO MORE PROTECTING PREGNANT WOMEN, PROVIDING NEEDED MEDICAL AND SOCIAL SERVICES DURING PREGNANCY AND AFTER DELIVERY.
THE ANSWER IS NOT KILLING.
When should abortion be allowed? Under traditional principles of self-defense, a serious threat to the mother’s life or threat of serious bodily injury, or when the unborn human being has a defect/injury/disease so serious that it is incompatible with life outside the womb . . .in other words it would be futile to continue the pregnancy, e.g., an unborn human being with no head, no brain, other severe conditions incompatible with life outside the womb
The simple rule, again, is that the physicians and society should do everything within their power to save both human lives, the pregnant woman’s, and the unborn human being’s she carries.
At least Two Human Lives, Two Individual Human Bodies, are involved in every Pregnancy.
The unborn human being is the body of another human being, with its own unique genetic code, unique 46 chromosomes, never before duplicated in the history of the human race, and never again to be duplicated in the history of the human race.
In pregnancy, we are dealing with 2 human beings, 2 human bodies . . . if twins are expected, we are dealing with 3 human beings, 3 human bodies . . .
Your body, your choice . . .not really . . .two bodies . . . .as is said in Tort Law, the right to flail your arms ends an another’s body’s nose . . . you cannot flail your arms and drop the baby you are carrying in your arms . . .you cannot kill the unborn human being you carry in your womb, except when necessary to save your life, prevent grievous bodily injury, or that unborn human being has no chance of living outside the womb
THESE ARE ELEMENTAL PRINCIPLES OF MORALITY AS APPLIED TO WHEN HUMAN BEINGS MAY KILL OTHER HUMAN BEINGS . . .IN JUST WARS, IN SELF DEFENSE, and physicians/nurses may pull the tubes on the dying when continuing medical treatment is futile . . .
Just some additional ideas from someone who has been reflecting on these matters for a long time, at least since he took his first embryology course at BC in 1965 and who on of his 1966 Applications to Medical School wrote an Essay on “ABORTION” . . .that was the application to Yale Med, from which I received a rejection letter . . . .maybe they didn’t like my viewpoints back then, maybe it had nothing to do with it . . . .half the med schools I applied to I got rejected, half I got accepted . . . .I ended up at Georgetown Med for four years (I recall St. Louis and Connecticut accepted me, but Vermont that I flew up for an interview with Vinny a classmate grad who ended up at Tufts Med, and Cincinnati rejected me . . . .as best I recall.
Henry and Bill are both correct. Abortion in Georgia and elsewhere in this country is a racist practice. How much talent have we lost in this country because of the killing of the unborn? Stalin killed millions of Ukrainians but less than the millions of Americans that Planned Parenthood has.2. Roe was a total joke. Completely manufactured reasoning. A judicial invention.
Right on, NC, tersely stated, capturing the essence of the debate.
If you ran outside and shot and killed KItty Genovese attempted murderer you would be hailed as a hero.
If you ran inside an abortion clinic and shot the Doctor, you would be arrested, tried and executed yourself.
It is the same as if you ran into a Concentration Camp or Gulag to try to rescue the Inmates, you would be shot and killed.
WHY? because the STATE (The U.S., Nazi Germany) legalized the killing of the unborn and guards those who perform the killing.
EVERY BIOLOGY STUDENT IN THE 1960S KNEW WHEN AN INDIVIDUAL HUMAN LIFE BEGAN . . .the science of the zygote (single cell from sperm entering egg; fertilized), multiplying in to a ball of cells, implanting in the uterus, and growing through the embryonic then fetal stages, for all MAMMALS, was well known BEFORE ROE V WADE WAS ERRONEOUSLY DECIDED. Roe made a mockery of the science. It said “a person” born at 26 weeks, or even 22 weeks, in the Neonatal Ward was a human being fully entitled to all Constitutional Protection, but a human being of 40 weeks in the womb was not a person, not a full human being entitled to full constitutional protection, and so could be killed, even for financial reasons, for the economic well being (doe v Bolton; Roe’s companion case) of the mother.
RAISE YOUR VOICES TO STOP THE KILLING OF UNBORN HUMAN BEINGS, except when it is not possible medically to save both lives. THERE IS A LEGAL AND MORAL PRINCIPLE OF SELF DEFENSE, that undergirds the killing of even an “innocent” human being, e.g. ectopic pregnancy.
Please, before throwing the corrupt Roe v. Wade decision at your audience again, consider telling them that the Supreme Court once upheld Separate as Equal, and also once held that “moving pictures” were not Free Speech. The latter of course was in the early part of the Twentieth Century when Movies were just coming out. Of course, the Supreme Court has correctly held that nude dancing is free expression protected by the First Amendment. Somethings the Courts get right, some wrong. Roe v. Wade was an abomination, and anyone who cares about human life should do everything in their power to challenge it, change it, rather than defending it and perpetuating the WAR ON THE UNBORN . . . .one million killings per year of healthy unborn human beings being carried in the wombs of healthy women . . . .over 90% of abortions even today are for convenience, not when the pregnancy threatens the mother’s life or seriously threatens her health, or the unborn human being has severe fetal defects incompatible with life.
TRY USING THE PHRASE “UNBORN HUMAN BEING” instead of human fetus, and it may allow you to raise your voice in defense of human life and against Roe.
Read my book, “One LIfe: How the U.S. Supreme Court Deliberately Distorted the History, Law and Science of Abortion.” praised by Notre Dame Law Professor Emeritus Charles Rice, and Mass Supreme Court Jurist Joseph R. Nolan, among others, and self-published about 2000 by Westlaw. On one site with over 300 reviews it got an average 4.5 stars out of 5.
Matt and most liberals will not lift a finger nor raise their voice to save the life of one unborn human being.
Matt and most liberals treat the defective Roe v. Wade decision as if it were INFALLIBLE.
The simple scientific facts are spelled out with photos (graphics) on my Facebook page. Connolly, Bill (Billy) . . .it has a picture of me as a sixteen year old and another picture of me standing with five other B.C. High Football players, one of whom, Skip Sviokla, became a Harvard Medical School Physician and is today a practicing psychiatrist in Mass. Skip wrote an excellent book, From Harvard to Hell and Back, A Doctor’s Struggle with Opiate Addiction, which inspired me, in part, to pen my latest book, Spiritual Glue, which also discloses my own trials with alcohol and drugs, in part.
Perhaps you needed to take course in Embryology (which I took in college) and Obstectrics and Gynecology, which I took in Med School, to understand that sometimes when it is not possible to save both lives (ectopic pregnancies, fetus with no head, no brain) an abortion is medically warranted. In most instances, the medical profession can save both human beings, the pregnant woman and the unborn human being she carries.
As far as giving $$$$ to continue a pregnancy, Charities like the Catholic Church and Evangelic Church and others have many parents without children waiting and eager to ADOPT.
KILLING THE UNBORN IS NOT THE ANSWER.
,
TRY USING YOUR VOICES TO SAVE SOME HUMAN LIVES.
Correction, my book ONE LIFE was self published by XLIBRIS, not by Westlaw.
Wow! I remembered Kitty Genovese, but I couldn’t figure out how a first paragraph including Genovese and Leona Helmsley could lead to a discussion of abortion. You are certainly dating yourself.
The “why?” In the story is easy. The answer is Harry Blackmun’s badly reasoned Roe v. Wade opinion involving his former cliebts’ Medical opinions and trimesters, which O’Connor, Souter and Kennedy tried to salvage with a rewrite about “undue burden“ in Casey. It’s what happens when the Constitution is misused to set social policy.
My own distaste for abortion is entirely emotional not religious. When my then-wife lost twins at 5 months, they looked like a couple of little guys to me. I don’t like the loudmouths at either extreme of the issue. I figure a woman and her doctor will make a better decision in nearly all cases than a state legislature or judges. I think most Americans agree it should be “safe, legal and rare,” even if the Clintons don’t say “rare” anymore.
We do have a declining birth rate problem. Your proposal is interesting but I can think of a number of unintended consequences. I also think about half the proposed one-time and annual payments would do the trick.
Black genocide
“When Stacey Abrams lost her bid for Georgia governor last November, she explained away her loss with the common liberal talking point that racism deprived her fellow African-Americans and other minorities of their fundamental right to vote. Her campaign was largely focused on turning out the minority vote.
In contrast, her silence was deafening concerning a far more potent factor holding down the black vote: namely, the staggering number of abortions in the black community. The inconvenient truth of “black genocide” significantly decreased the potential black population of Georgia over the past fifty years. According to recent Centers for Disease Control (CDC) statistics, while African-Americans constitute 32.2 percent of Georgia’s population, 62.4 percent of abortions in Georgia are performed on African-American women. By contrast, whites constitute 60.8 percent of the Georgia population, but only 24.7 percent of abortions were performed on white women. Even pro-abortion groups like the Guttmacher Institute admit that “black women are more than 5 times as likely as white women to have an abortion.”
https://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2019/02/48594/
What is old is new again.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/01/opinion/sunday/clarence-thomas-abortion.html
https://www.frc.org/op-eds/margaret-sanger-racist-eugenicist-extraordinaire