“Logic fails us when we are not factoring in all the facts.
Fact:
No two rapes are alike.”
___________________
That is true, but how is it relevant to whether the resulting conception is:
A) a life?
and
B) innocent?
This is the problem which many appear to lose focus of. Or maybe the focus is shifted 100% onto the mother, and 0% on the baby. I understand the emotional pull to side with the mother, because that is the person to whom we as adults can best relate. But who is going to side with the innocent child — the one who cannot speak for or defend him or herself?
For purposes of example, regardless of HOW conception occurred, it has happened.
There is a living child in the womb.
How can we ignore or dismiss that child’s life, and that child’s right to live, based on… anything?
What circumstance, which led to the creation of the child, can be blamed on the child, and laid at the child’s feet, to justify ending that child’s life?
And if we can ignore that child’s right to live, then we can ignore yours and mine, too… right?
Is it not the same Constitution that guarantees and protects all three?

“Rapes range from consensual ‘Statutory Rape’ when the girl is under the age of consent…to gang rapes…to rapes so brutal that the victim is left clinging to life in a ditch.”
________________
Okay, but what does that have to do with the price of beans in China?
We need to understand the argument if we are to have any hope of defending our position.
Approaching the argument from the perspective of how the conception occurred is 100% emotion-based, but does not address the core issue of how the baby is responsible for how the conception occurred.
And if the baby is not responsible (not guilty) for how the conception occurred, and if the baby is a ‘life’, and if the baby is innocent, then how can that life be taken?
How can the child be punished for the deeds of another?
How do we rationalize and justify that, morally OR lawfully?
I’m not trying to be difficult, I’m just pointing out the logic problems with the argument.
Either those logic problems can be answered (logically resolved), or they can’t.
If they can be resolved, then we ought to do it now, here, where we can work these things out, so that we are prepared to address these arguments ‘out there’ in the world.
But if they cannot be resolved, then does intellectual honesty not compel us to reconsider our view based upon facts and logic?

“Fact:
We each ‘own’ our own genetic material.”
________________
A property rights argument.
Okay, does that fact not apply to the baby as well?
If the baby does not, then the argument is inconsistent, and therefore faulty.
And if the baby does own his or her genetic material, if we are consistent in our reasoning, then by what reason of logic or morality or Law does anyone deprive the baby of that right of ownership?
.
“A rapist is essentially stealing the genetic material of the victim and forcing it to be combined with his own.”
________________
So the rapist, by raping and stealing and forcing, has committed crimes which must be addressed.
But what crime has the baby committed?
And if the baby has committed no crime, then by what reason of logic, morality or Law is the baby to be punished and deprived of his or her life?
I’m not suggesting there are not valid, logical answers to these questions, I’m just saying that I don’t know what they are. We need to know what those answers are, if we are expected to be able to defend the position, yes?
.
“Does the victim not have the right to ‘repossess’ her own genetic material and dispose of it if she wants to?”
________________
I don’t know… does the act of repossession involve violating the rights of someone else, depriving another living being of his or her life, without due process?
If so, would that not be wrong?
If I remember correctly, it was Abraham Lincoln who said that no one has the right to do wrong.
How does one dispose of a human life — logically, morally or lawfully — according to ‘want’?
If ‘want’ is the qualifier, is that not the exercise of will, without consideration for others?
I may ‘want’ to punch someone in the nose… they might even deserve it… but does that ‘want’ bestow upon me the authority to commit assault and battery?
I do not see how ‘want’ can be a ‘qualifier’ that can withstand scrutiny.
.
“If the answer to this is ‘No’…then are we establishing the precedent that ‘We do not own our own genetic material’?”
_______________
Again, does the baby not own the baby’s genetic material, as surely as you own yours?
If the baby is a life, then it does.
If the baby is not a life, then it does not.
Which is it?
Does the answer to that question not answer your own question?
The precedent is that life is precious, it is valuable, and therefore Law has existed throughout time to protect life and to punish those who take the life of another unlawfully.
In order to lawfully take a life, there are clear conditions which must be met:
A) self-defense
B) due process, as in a crime was committed, the perpetrator was given a trial, the jury found him guilty, the sentence was death, and the life is terminated by the State
If there is another circumstance in which a life can lawfully be taken, it does not occur to me at the moment.
Which one applies to the baby?
It cannot be ‘B’, the baby has committed no crime.
It might be argued that ‘A’ is applicable, if complications from the pregnancy threaten the mother’s life, but that falls under the category of ‘health of the mother’, not under the category of ‘rape’.
.
“Scott, you mentioned “quicksand” in your opening remarks.
This whole subject of the Rape Exception is quicksand.”
________________
Very much agreed, which is why I am trying to be very careful in how I proceed.
.
“And as Wolf rightly said in our discussion below…it is a minefield as well.”
_____________
Agreed again, but we must successfully negotiate this minefield, somehow, in order to come out on the other side, yes?
I am trying to negotiate the minefield.
I am probing the ground, to see where logic prevails, and where emotion prevails.
Where I find emotion, I move laterally, and probe again.
Where I find logic, I move forward one step, and probe again.
How else shall we get through the minefield?