_ STRICTLY PERSONAL »

SO FAR as the abortion
debate i is concerned, all I can
say is, there | goes ‘the high |
ground! © ‘>

When people start taking lives,
or frying to, in the name of saving
‘lives; you know we are slipping
back into the jungle.

“It becomes tooth and claw, when
we should be more careful than‘
ever to play. it by civilized rules.

If we'don't play by’ those rules, :

we go backwards...
Crazies who shoot at doctors

: should be hunted down and locked:

vay for good: "*:
Yet the fact that there aye seri-

sly twisted people out there who__
would pick up a gun to cut down a"

doctor performing abortions should
hardly be surprising to anyone,
We'live in an era of such wildly
conflicting value systems; all mixed
together i in a_volatile stew of opin--
ions, morals, and beliefs, that what
mazes me is just how civilized we.
inanage to be; at least heie in”
Canada: At least until now. :
On mn bee issues is there such a.

¥y¥_more.: the Se biologrcal fact of -
life’ is that there is'no precise
‘ threshold® you cross‘which, with:

“one massive click, signals the tum;

ing of.you from protoplasni into a
. human being, except for the =’
moment of conception. Everything. .
unfolds from there until your death. °
‘4 The interlude in the womb may
bea prelude to’ your existence out-.
side the womb, but it is every bit as.
inuch a part of your life as any

“If rate ‘of. growth fs taken as the,

measure of time spent in vital
activity, the early minutes, hours
and days are the most dynamic, the
most critical.

There is a point of taw that turns
on this scenario: You push someone
off a building. As he.is falling,
someone else shoots him, so that he
is dead before he hes the ground.
You are not guilty of murder, are
you? You had intent, but someone
else did the actual deed.

As this example is used in the
insurance industry, you, the first
party, are unsueable because you

- are not the one who caused the

death.
In the real world, society seems

. eager to let the individuals involved

in an abortion off the hook, using
something like this sort of argu-

- ment. Who did the pushing can be

viewed as either the mother or the
father, but the abortionist is always
the one who pulls the trigger.

Yet there is no getting off the
hook. You may dream up any legal
definition of when it is OK to ter-
minate a fetal event that you like,
but it cannot have any true basis in
science. Life is simply not biologi-
cally discontinuous. I don’t think it

_-is emotional, or a wacko religious
: position, to argue that the only

valid, that is, physically real begin-.
ning of human (or any other) life is
the phenomenon that occurs upon

- fertilization, called conception.

The most forceful arguments in,

’ favor of legalizing abortion were
“the stories of young women bleed-

ing to death in back alleys. |

It was to save them, the most
desperate and downtrodden, that
the jegal barriers against “terminat-
ing” fetuses were torn down —.a
political act of compassion that has,
from the point of view of any rea-

"sonable moral expectation of that

time, had virtually the opposite

~- effect. That is, we have raised a
generation of young men and ° :
women for whom abortion is just a:

: handy form of birth control.

The initial arguments in favor of
‘legalizing abortion, I recall, were.
that it would hardly ever be resort.

ed to. This sounds eerily like the 7
“nonsense spouted to defend the
Supreme Court’s infamous’ ruling.

on the drunk rape defence. Sure.

Hardly ever... And what happened

_ two weeks later? Someone used it.
Soon; everyone will. That's

: exactly what happened with abor-;"
tion. A bad political call based on

. giving in to pressure groups. A bad
legal cali, probably based on the *
political failure of nerve.

‘And now we ‘have the gruesome

spectacle of a kind of holocaust of
the fetuses routinely going on
before our eyes, or rather, behind
closed doors at a “clinic,” but with
us all knowing about it.

I'm the same guy who couldn't

stand the sight of the slaughter of

‘seal pups on the ice. Is there any
- parallel? In my mind. There is.

The premise —- which assumes
the right to destroy — is almost

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exactly the same. And if 4, a quite
calm, rational, mature, reasonably
well-read, humor-loving, secure,
sane fellow, find myself thinking in

such apocalyptic terms about the

practice of mass abortion, imagine
what is going on in the mind of a
psycho!

 & SON

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