Reply #2: The thing to keep in mind with these religious right whackjobs [View All]

[Warren DeMontague]

is, they make absolutely no distinction -none- between a fertilized egg the second after conception, and a fully developed human being. The HLA plank of the GOP platform, as has been written for decades, advocates granting full rights under the 14th Amendment to single cells.

Fundies also believe the birth control pill causes abortions by interfering with the implantation of fertilized eggs. This is why the majority of "pro-life" organizations in this country consider use of the pill to be essentially equivalent to having an abortion. These organizations are, of course, generally opposed to ALL forms of contraception- this is why the SCOTUS decision they are really gunning for isn't Roe so much as Griswold- but they are particuarly vehement about the need to criminalize the pill.

Of course, granting 14th amendment rights to fertilized eggs opens up a whole box of bizarro potential realities: Women on the pill being charged with murder, Women with IUDs being prosecuted for having "concealed murder weapons", "protective custody" for pregnant women, or even all women of childbearing age. In essence, reducing women to passive breeding incubators, with absolutely no say over their own bodies and reproductive systems.

The mind boggles at the law enforcement and government apparatus that will be required to be sure that 150 Million women aren't committing acts of "murder" inside their uterii (There's your party of Smaller Government!)... and anyone who wants to write this off as wild hyperbole can just ask the women of El Salvador about their Forensic Vagina Inspectors.

The concept of life as a cycle, and as an unbroken chain stretching back 4 billion years, is way over their heads. They need to believe that the holy ghost flies down and plops a "soul" into the fertilized egg at the second of conception, turning two perfectly alive things with no rights into something with full citizenship. (irregardless of the rights of the body in which it must reside for months before extra-uterine viability) The notion that all life is one, and we're all related through our ancestry back to the first single-celled life forms.. that freaks 'em out, too. Real life, and the messy, chaotic universe from which it springs and as it actually exists is too complex and scary for them, which is why they try to forget about all those pesky bodily functions, like sex.

They'd much prefer that we were all cartoonish, two dimensional, sunday school creatures, preferably with no genitalia. Far easier to understand, and less disquieting.

Obviously, the sperm and the egg are alive before conception- and they each have half the potential and half the genetic material of the fertilized egg, just in two different places. But the fundies don't give a shit, or they realize from a public policy perspective that attempting to prosecute women for getting their periods, or men for the billions of sperm they kill on a regular basis, would be a stretch, even for them....at least until they burn all the books that aren't the bible, bring back the public stocks, and have everyone spot-welded into chastity belts and wearing fuckin' pilgrim garb, again.

The one thing which CAN and DOES reduce the numbers of surgical abortions is safe, effective, easily available birth control. And, wouldn't you know it, it's the next item in the "pro-life" crosshairs.
I posted a list of things which so-called "pro-lifers" could support to reduce the numbers of surgical abortions in this country:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1974777&mesg_id=1976077

Unfortunately, they're much more interested in things like trying to keep people from fucking, and throwing women in jail.