anonemouse

How the heck did you somehow imagine that I was talking about you? I'm not fingerpointing. I wasn't talking about anyone here in particular. In fact, I tried to edit my post to say that it was just an observation, but couldn't. How the people around me raise their kids does affect me. Are they little barbarians or little angels? Do they think it's okay to torture animals? Do they think it's okay to throw an all-out temper tantrum in the middle of a movie theater? Do they think it's okay to spit or hit other kids? You get the picture. And I doubt that the courts would think it's okay if I ignored my neighbor beating his kids because, hey, it's not my business.

Don't get me wrong, I believe that people should be allowed to own guns. I just think that there should be strict regulations on it. What exactly would be the need for 10, 20, 100 guns, except in the case of rare gun collectors? One or two guns, I can see. Dozens? Come on. I think every member of a gun-owning household should be required to take safety courses. I think safe storage should be mandatory (whether that is a gun safe or storing the gun with a trigger lock). I think assault weapons should be banned from private ownership. I think there should be a limit on the number of guns that a single person can own. I think all states should make parents responsible when their kids manage to get a hold of one of their guns and injures or kills someone. I think there should be national laws concerning guns, instead of leaving it up to the states.

I can tell you right now that I would rather have an abortion that give a child up for adoption. I don't want to carry what's basically a parasite for 40 weeks. I don't want the social stigma of being pregnant and not having a baby to show off. I don't want to have to take time off of my work as a field biologist because I can't do my job. I don't want a child and I don't want to take the risk of becoming emotionally attached to it. I don't want children. I don't like children. I wouldn't go so far as to say I hate children, but I really, REALLY dislike them. In fact, the more kids my family members have, the less I want to be around my family members.

Where exactly did I say that I didn't say that counselling is "unethical if it did not pose both sides of the argument"? I don't see where I said that. If you are referring to where I said "That is NOT what I said", I was referring to this statement by you: She still didn't scam you, because a scam results from misleading someone. She didn't mislead you. She was very upfront about the fact that she was talking you into abortion. She didn't trick you. I am not defending her actions. I think they were despicable. She was wrong. But the fact is, she DID NOT SCAM YOU. She didn't lie or mislead you. Your failure to fully research what you were doing does not a scam make. Again, I'm not pretending that she was acting in a proper manner, but I'm not going to play the "oh, you poor, poor thing, getting scammed by the big, bad abortionist" game. The fact is, she is not at all to blame for your actions. The way you come across is that you feel guilty and you are trying to deflect on to other people as much of the "blame" for your abortion as possible. If you tell yourself and other people that "she scammed me" or "she manipulated me" or "there were ringers", you don't have to take all the responsibility. The fact is, you made this decision all on your own. You left the clinic and came back. You had to sign consent forms. No one forced you to do this. No one scammed you into it. No one told you that you were consenting to a basic pelvic exam and then aborted your fetus. If "profiting from manipulating the actions of a vulnerable and confused person" is a scam, just about every single business out there is a scam. Weight Watchers is a scam. WLS is a scam. Plastic surgery is a scam. The fact is, business people profit off of other people. It's life.

No, it isn't. It's the act of committing a fraud. You weren't defrauded. That nurse was unprofessional and she was unethical, but she wasn't running a scam. It's fairly obvious to me that as much as you say you are accepting responsibility, you still blame the nurse for you having an abortion. When it is found to be happening, it is stopped. That obviously happened in this case, since the nurse was fired. Not concerning your physician, there isn't. You either keep the baby and require their services, or you don't. Whether you decide to keep your child or have it adopted doesn't concern them. And that's not the responsibility of the doctor's office. That's the woman's responsibility. That is NOT what I said. I said that I thought women should have ALL options presented to them. That includes keeping the child, adopting it out, AND abortion. I don't give a damn whether or not they choose adoption or abortion. I just think they should have that CHOICE. No, I'm not. I'm not currently sexually active and I've never been pregnant. And I have very little tolerance for what I feel is "woe is me" attitudes. I'd be more likely to tell them to "grow the hell up", to be honest, because there isn't any point in crying over spilled milk. What's done is done. You can learn from what you've done or you can cry about it. And rural Kentucky doesn't have many abortion clinics.

No, I'm not. But Funny, you were not scammed! You knew she was taking you to an abortion clinic! What did you expect was going to happen, the doctors getting down on one knee and begging you to make a different decision? I can understand you thinking you were scammed if you thought she was taking you to an OB/GYN to have an ultrasound or something, but you knew she was taking you for an abortion. She did not scam you. There are obviously only two options when it comes to a pregnancy. You either have the baby, or you don't. That's freakin' obvious. No one needed to tell you that. Doctors don't care whether you decide to have the baby and give it up for adoption or have the baby and keep it. It isn't any of their business, it's a personal decision for you to make. Passing blame for your decision off on the nurse, by telling yourself "but she manipulated me into it" is crap. She could have told you anything, but at the end of the day, the decision was 100% up to you and you alone. She had no bearing on it at all.

Yes, it did. But you could have said "stop" at any time. She may have manipulated you into going to the abortion clinic, but she had no impact on you going through with it. And yet you still push responsibility off on that nurse. The fact is, you were an adult. You had the responsibility to educate yourself about the options that were available to you. You didn't, and now you regret the action you took. Is that the fault of the nurse? No. And I am a firm believer in counseling women in all options available to them, whether or not you agree with those options. Who knows, abortion might be the best decision for one of them.

Really? Do you advertise as specifically "pro-life"? Or do you advertise (like most pro-life agencies I've seen) as "pregnancy counseling"? And just like these women supposedly know and acknowledge that they are calling a pro-life counseling service, you knew you were going to an abortion clinic. So I guess you weren't as manipulated as you want to believe.

I have to ask whether you include abortion as a plausible alternative when you counsel women. If not, I don't consider your actions any more ethical than the nurse's. In both cases (if you don't include abortion), you are taking advantage of a woman's emotions and confusion over what the appropriate actions are. To me, demonizing abortion to a newly pregnant, confused girl or woman is just as bad as manipulating her into have the abortion.

I said this in another thread, but I'll say it again here. I find it ironic that many of the people that are supporters of limiting a woman's right to choose an abortion yell about their reproductive rights when someone talks about limiting the number of kids that they can have. They talk about not wanting another person to make a reproductive decision for them, yet many want to make the same reproductive decisions for other women. To me, you can't have it both ways. Either you believe in a woman's right to choose her own reproductive behavior, or you don't.

To be honest, I don't care. I won't cry for "millions of babies" because I believe the woman takes precedence over a clump of cells.

Because I don't think the right of every citizen to carry a handgun is spelled out in the constitution. The right to free speech is. Last time I checked, we don't need a militia anymore. "Evil guns", IMO, include any that have a primary purpose of killing. What good's an AK-47 except to kill? Who the hell needs a fully automatic pistol or rifle, other than possibly a cop? The only purpose for those guns is death.

Not in all states, there isn't. Take Virginia, Alabama, Alaska, etc., for example. You don't have to pass a safety exam to get a CCW.

No, it wasn't, which is why she got fired. I think it is abundantly clear that she acted inappropriately. I also believe that something like that happening is relatively rare. Of course, it happens, but I believe the vast majority of abortions are done professionally. You got suckered in by someone that wasn't professional. That sucks, but it's no reason to outlaw all abortions. And she may have manipulated you (which I think is a little too strong), but at the end of the day, you were the one responsible for the decision. She couldn't have forced you into a taxi and taken you to have an abortion. You were willing. At any time, you could have changed your mind and left, but you didn't. It was your responsibility as a sexually active adult to know the options and the consequences of those options.

I agree. This girl could have left at any time, if she was so upset. You can't legally force someone to have an abortion in this country. And Gadgetlady, I wouldn't say that there was no one supporting her in choosing life. From the way it sounds, there were plenty of people outside that would have supported and praised her if she decided not to have an abortion. There are organizations out there that are specifically aimed at helping women who don't want to keep their babies, but also don't want to have an abortion. I hate it when people try and blame other people for a decision they made. No one forced her into this, or at least, I'm assuming her husband didn't force her because she still married him. Yes, she had an abortion. She knew that, it's why she went to the clinic. She could have walked out of that clinic at any time. When they sent her home, she could have not gone back to that clinic. She could have had the baby and given it up for adoption. Stop blaming these so-called "ringers" (if they existed) for her deciding to go through with your abortion. Whether or not they were there, she is the only person responsible for her decision.

And by the way, even a cadre of "air marshals" won't make a damned bit of difference if these people aren't breaking any laws until they snap. Cho never broke any gun laws until he went on his rampage. You can't arrest people that aren't breaking the law. And what are you going to do? Plant "air marshals" in every single building and along every walkway on every single campus or in every single public building (because of the CNN shooting, etc.), period? By the time they would be able to do any good, people would already be dead. The only solution I see is prevention. And if that prevention comes by the limitation of my right to bear any type of gun I want to, so be it.

Yes, I do. I feel a heck of a lot safer with only law officers carrying guns on campus than I do a lot of yahoos whose only qualifications to carry a concealed weapon is ownership. As many people that are out there with anger problems, giving them no limits on where they can carry their weapon is lunacy. So I'd rather have one nutjob firing at me on campus than have a thousand prospective nutjobs carrying lethal weapons, especially if I'm likely to get caught in the crossfire, and especially if they aren't required to pass a class on basic safety. Or how about this? We set laws and we actually enforce them, instead of having organizations like the NRA trying to block any and every form of legislation, even when it would make us safer? Not everyone should have the right to own an AK-47. People should be required to take safety courses in order to buy a gun and carry it. I'm sorry, but when just about any yahoo that isn't a felon can buy a gun, my safety (or yours) isn't exactly ensured.

I should make this statement in the other thread, but I don't feel like trying to find it. It really burns me that they (meaning pro-lifers) are trying to tell us that we have to have a child and don't see anything wrong with it, but the minute someone suggests that they might want to limit the number of children they produce, they all scream about having their reproductive rights infringed upon. And they don't seem to see the hypocrisy!

Yeah, I do. Make more restrictive laws. The same could be said for any law. Why have laws against drugs? People that are going to use them are going to use them, regardless of the drug being illegal. Why have laws against drinking and driving? People that are going to drive drunk would do it, regardless of the legality of it. To me, it's simple. If the current laws can't prevent things like this from happening, then the current laws need to change.

That's the point. There should have been a way to refuse to sell him a gun. Legally, there wasn't. To me, if Cho could legally buy a gun, that means Virginia's criteria for legally buying a gun is way the heck too loose. People KNEW he was crazy. He's even been institutionalized. There should have been a way to stop him from legally buying a gun. I'm sorry, but not everyone in this country deserves the right to be able to buy a gun. You seem to think that all involvement from the government is bad. I don't. In fact, I think that when your right to own a gun could get me killed, I think the government has every right to interfere.

My whole point is that if laws were being followed, which they were in the Virginia Tech case, and something really bad still happens, maybe we do need new, more restrictive laws. You can't really say that Virginia has "poor legislation" when it comes to gun laws (not saying anyone was, just making a statement). Virginia has no legislation when it comes to gun laws. In that case, I argue that we do need more legislation.

I have a set of sheets that I am in love with. They are literally the softest sheets I have ever felt. I got them at TJ Maxx, and they had been repackaged, so I have absolutely no idea what brand they are or what the thread count is. I am going to be so sad whenever I can't use them anymore, because they are the BEST.

The sheets have to be nice and chilly, though. There isn't much I hate more than a warm bed, because it just gets warmer. I love having a cool bed.

You seem to be missing the fact that I quoted you exactly. It's hard to misunderstand what you said. In other words, why have laws when people who are likely to break them are not going to follow them? You did not say "some laws". You did not say "new laws". You did not say "existing laws". You said "laws". Period. And by the way, I never said that I thought you said "all laws should be abolished". But your statement in the above quote does bring an interesting argument to the table: Why have any laws? The people that are likely to act in a way that is "illegal" aren't likely to go and check to see if what they are wanting to do is against the law. So why inconvenience "law-abiding" people with burdensome laws when it is other folks that are likely to act in an inappropriate manner, in the first place?

So wait, we shouldn't have laws because those people that would do wrong would ignore them anyway? Makes a ton of sense, Jack, a real ton. Using your logic, there would be no laws about anything at all, because everyone would be doing whatever they wanted in the first place. The same way we get anyone to follow laws. We punish them and make examples of them, so that anyone else thinking of doing the same thing will think twice.