Roe v Wade is on deck

[Rhea]

In fact I would guess the majority of unwanted pregnancy abortions arise where no contraceptives were used.

NEWS RELEASE
JANUARY 11, 2018

About Half of U.S. Abortion Patients Report Using Contraception in the Month They Became Pregnant​

In 2014, about half (51%) of abortion patients in the United States reported that they had used a contraceptive method in the month they became pregnant, according to a new analysis by Guttmacher researcher Rachel Jones. This proportion represents a slight decrease from 54% of abortion patients in 2000, the last time these data were examined. The methods most commonly used by abortion patients in 2014 were condoms (24% of patients) and the pill (13%).

So no, in fact, the “majority” of abortions do not arise where no contraceptive is used.
Turns out you guess wrong.


Although we could take bets on what percent of the no contraceptive crowd are from fundagelical religions like baptist or catholic.

 

[Rhea]

“Abortion bans and restrictions have especially harsh impacts onindividuals with the fewest resources and who are already marginalized by the health care system. Those include people living with low incomes, Black and Brown communities and other people of color, young people, LGBTQ people, people with disabilities and those in rural communities.“

 

[laughing dog]

And I'm happy to remain ignorant

Good for you. The problem is most people are not happy reading your ignorance.

 

[Lion IRC]

But what about the woman’s life?

I'm pro life. The mothers life is equally valuable. You can't care about the value of life unless you have a justification. I have justifications.

Every single day that she is pregnant represents an increased risk to her life and health.

Well, in that case, like any threat to the unborn baby's life, we have a moral obligation to act.

Unlike some people, I don't think their pregnancy is none of my business.

The State does often but not always have the means to save lives. But it often decides that it has more important priorities. Some of which include neglect of basic human needs such as decent and sufficient t food and housing, education, health care, clean water and air. Among a few.

This is immoral in my opinion.
But that's because I think human life has intrinsic value and their welfare is not someone else's problem
Or "none of my business".

But this is the US. The state is us.

Yes. Im familiar with US history.

Not you or your bizarre interpretation of the Bible.

I dont remember invoking the bible.
But I will invoke democracy.
And in a democracy I can vote against abortion for any reason I like - secular or religious or BOTH.

In fact, this nation was founded on some basic principles including freedom of and from religion.

Exactly.
I cant be prevented from engaging in the democratic process even if I'm a militant godless atheist or if I'm a raving religious fundy.

There are a number of theocracies which much better support your world views.

On abortion? Good!

Iran and Saudi Arabia leap to mind.

Is abortion legal there?

I don’t think you could manage Afghanistan. You arent tolerant enough.

Sometimes stiff resolve is what helps you manage.
Tolerance uber alles is not necessarily a force to be reckoned with.

And neither are they. But I’m certain you could find some place more aligned with your ideology. But it’s not here.

I'm not looking for a place which is aligned with my ideology. This is the public square and its a contest of ideas. The world is run by whoever shows up.

 

[Lion IRC]

And I'm happy to remain ignorant

Good for you. The problem is most people are not happy reading your ignorance.

Strange how many people take my 'ignorance' as an affront to theirs.

 

[Lion IRC]

“Abortion bans and restrictions have especially harsh impacts onindividuals with the fewest resources and who are already marginalized by the health care system.

I would have thought helping people learn how to avoid the consequences of inintended pregnancy would be a good thing.

Part of the problem is foolish or uneducated people not understanding that procreation is a biological function where you are imposing responsibility upon yourself and on the State.

...not some carefree recreational behaviour affecting nobody but yourself.

Those include people living with low incomes, Black and Brown communities and other people of color, young people, LGBTQ people, people with disabilities and those in rural communities.“

...which again underscores the need for mandatory government intervention for these people (apparently) who can't help themselves avoid unintended pregnancy and unwanted abortion.

 

[laughing dog]

And I'm happy to remain ignorant

Good for you. The problem is most people are not happy reading your ignorance.

Strange how many people take my 'ignorance' as an affront to theirs.

Stranger how someone would think their ignorance is an affront to others.

 

[Toni]

But what about the woman’s life?

I'm pro life. The mothers life is equally valuable. You can't care about the value of life unless you have a justification. I have justifications.

Every single day that she is pregnant represents an increased risk to her life and health.

Well, in that case, like any threat to the unborn baby's life, we have a moral obligation to act.

Unlike some people, I don't think their pregnancy is none of my business.

The State does often but not always have the means to save lives. But it often decides that it has more important priorities. Some of which include neglect of basic human needs such as decent and sufficient t food and housing, education, health care, clean water and air. Among a few.

This is immoral in my opinion.
But that's because I think human life has intrinsic value and their welfare is not someone else's problem
Or "none of my business".

But this is the US. The state is us.

Yes. Im familiar with US history.

Not you or your bizarre interpretation of the Bible.

I dont remember invoking the bible.
But I will invoke democracy.
And in a democracy I can vote against abortion for any reason I like - secular or religious or BOTH.

In fact, this nation was founded on some basic principles including freedom of and from religion.

Exactly.
I cant be prevented from engaging in the democratic process even if I'm a militant godless atheist or if I'm a raving religious fundy.

There are a number of theocracies which much better support your world views.

On abortion? Good!

Iran and Saudi Arabia leap to mind.

Is abortion legal there?

I don’t think you could manage Afghanistan. You arent tolerant enough.

Sometimes stiff resolve is what helps you manage.
Tolerance uber alles is not necessarily a force to be reckoned with.

And neither are they. But I’m certain you could find some place more aligned with your ideology. But it’s not here.

I'm not looking for a place which is aligned with my ideology. This is the public square and its a contest of ideas. The world is run by whoever shows up.

The world is run by those who are allowed a place at the table. It is no longer run only by white Christian males.

One may be as concerned for anyone else!’s medical conditions as one likes. That does not give you the right to assert your opinion over their medical care. You do not get to make medical decisions for anyone but yourself or perhaps your own minor children, in conjunction with their other parent and medical practitioners.

People make serious, important, life altering decisions every single day. They choose to marry it divorce, go to school or drop out, take this job or that. They decide to cut their hair or let it grow abd wgat cltubg they wish to wear and who to be friend with and what music to listen to and how to invest their time and money. They make choices about their health every day, even when the choice is to neglect their health.

Abd none of it is my business, no matter how vegenctjy u disagree with their choices.

And it’s not your business either.

You do not recognize abortion as a legitimate choice except under circumstances you approve of. Good for you. But someone else’s choice is their choice. Not yours. It is frankly none of your business what someone decides to do with their body.

 

[Lion IRC]

In fact I would guess the majority of unwanted pregnancy abortions arise where no contraceptives were used.

NEWS RELEASE
JANUARY 11, 2018

About Half of U.S. Abortion Patients Report Using Contraception in the Month They Became Pregnant​

In 2014, about half (51%) of abortion patients in the United States reported that they had used a contraceptive method in the month they became pregnant, according to a new analysis by Guttmacher researcher Rachel Jones. This proportion represents a slight decrease from 54% of abortion patients in 2000, the last time these data were examined. The methods most commonly used by abortion patients in 2014 were condoms (24% of patients) and the pill (13%).

So no, in fact, the “majority” of abortions do not arise where no contraceptive is used.
Turns out you guess wrong.

Not so fast.

Firstly, 24% condoms plus 13% pill equals 39%
Where's the other 61% ? Long acting methods?

A vasectomy "sometime last month" isn't meaningful.
Starting on oral contraceptives "sometime last month" isn't meaningful.

Secondly, this (self-reported) anecdotal data of "almost half" is HUGELY at odds with the statistical empirical data showing contraceptive effectiveness of > 95%

How can this gap be reconciled?

Although we could take bets on what percent of the no contraceptive crowd are from fundagelical religions like baptist or catholic.

That would be an argument in support of my contention that most people having abortions are NOT trying to avoid pregnancy by using contraceptives.

 

[Lion IRC]

It is frankly none of your business what someone decides to do with their body.

That's the argument right there in a nutshell.
Not only do I think it's my business to argue against abortion, I think it's my moral obligation.

 

[Derec]

Secondly, this (self-reported) anecdotal data of "almost half" is HUGELY at odds with the statistical empirical data showing contraceptive effectiveness of > 95%

They are not at odds at all, much less HUGELY.

How can this gap be reconciled?

By understanding how probability works. In particular conditional probability.

First, >95% is on a yearly basis, so for a month it's more like 0.5% failure rate.

That means that in any given month, if 10,000 women are sexually active and using said contraception, ~500 are expected to get pregnant. So if a total ~1000 women who conceived that month decided to get an abortion, the 50% figure would be accurate.

Note that if a woman is on birth control, she is more likely than women in general to seek an abortion, because using birth control means that she wants to avoid pregnancy. I.e. conditional probability P(abortion | birth control) > (and most likely >>) P(abortion).

Whether or not 50% of women seeking abortion used birth control or not is not dependent on the 95% reliability rate of birth control. A lot of other variables go into it. What percentage of women used birth control? What is the conditional probability I referenced above? And so on.

 

[Lion IRC]

Secondly, this (self-reported) anecdotal data of "almost half" is HUGELY at odds with the statistical empirical data showing contraceptive effectiveness of > 95%

They are not at odds at all, much less HUGELY.

How do you figure an alleged/anecdotal 50% contraception failure rate is not a huge difference when compared with an empirically verified >95% success rate ???

How can this gap be reconciled?

By understanding how probability works. In particular conditional probability.

First, >95% is on a yearly basis, so for a month it's more like 0.5% failure rate.

WUT?
Wouldnt it be harder to hit the jackpot failure in just 1 month as opposed to having 12 attempts to fail over an entire year.

That means that in any given month, if 10,000 women are sexually active and using said contraception, ~500 are expected to get pregnant. So if a total ~1000 women who conceived that month decided to get an abortion, the 50% figure would be accurate.

We aren't talking about ALL sexually active women whose contraception failed. We're only talking about the ones who decided to have an abortion.

...and who decided to answer a survey.
...asking whether they (think they) used contraception (correctly) sometime in the month before they (amazingly) got pregnant despite their (diligent) efforts not to get pregnant

This is vastly different to the empirical evidence based clinical studies into 95%+ effectiveness of contraceptives.

Note that if a woman is on birth control, she is more likely than women in general to seek an abortion,

WUT?
Women on birth control are MORE likely to get pregnant and seek an abortion? Since when?

...because using birth control means that she wants to avoid pregnancy.

YA THINK?

I.e. conditional probability P(abortion | birth control) > (and most likely >>) P(abortion).

Thats not systematic.

Whether or not 50% of women seeking abortion used birth control or not is not dependent on the 95% reliability rate of birth control.

I didnt say it was.

l'm asking how these outlier women managed to hit the statistically improbable pregnancy jackpot that other women on (95% effective birth control) somehow avoided by using the exact same birth control.

A lot of other variables go into it. What percentage of women used birth control? What is the conditional probability I referenced above? And so on.

Those aren't 'variables' those are irrelevant red herrings.

Answer me this.
How do you reconcile the (Baysean) gap between such a small number of survey respondents and such a large number of deliberate abortions each year?

 

[bilby]

It is frankly none of your business what someone decides to do with their body.

That's the argument right there in a nutshell.
Not only do I think it's my business to argue against abortion, I think it's my moral obligation.

And you could not be more wrong.

This is an excellent demonstration of how religion is utterly and irredeemably immoral, to the point of almost inspiring me to use a word I generally resile from - Evil.

The Roman Catholic Church has taken a handful of highly dubious moral philosophies, and weaponised them into a justification for people to abuse, even kill, innocent strangers.

And the cunts who do this have the brass balls to feel good about themselves and their actions.

As did the guys torturing heretics to death, and those who identified, tried, and hanged witches.

For fucks sake, go do whatever crazy shit your religion says you should do, but leave the rest of us the fuck out of it.

You would have a very tenuous case for your interference if your God actually existed. But it doesn't, and so you don't. So fuck off out of our lives. And keep fucking off, until you reach a sign that says "no fucking off past this point", and then ignore that sign, and fuck off some more.


Let me guess; My empassioned plea can be rejected without consideration, because I used some words you don't like. And yet, you just love evil. That word is just fine by you. Amirite?

 

[Ford]

It is frankly none of your business what someone decides to do with their body.

That's the argument right there in a nutshell.
Not only do I think it's my business to argue against abortion, I think it's my moral obligation.

So let's follow your argument a bit farther, then.

You've proudly announced that (in your perfect world) a woman would have no choice over her own body. She should be forced to be given contraceptives, or alternately forced to give birth. It's pretty clear that you - as the man - assert the right to make such a choice for her, but why stop there?

If you meet a woman you fancy, and think "gosh I'd like her to bear my children," what do you do when she spurns your advances? According to your "reasoning," she doesn't have the right to do that. She must submit to YOUR choice over procreation. Do you do the classic "knock her over the head and drag her back to your cave" thing? Do you drug her drink and have your way with her? Or do you simply tell her she's a stupid woman and just hold her down right there and take what you feel is your right?

I'm not being flippant. You've openly embraced your ignorance, so let's see how deep it goes.

 

[Lion IRC]

You've proudly announced that (in your perfect world) a woman would have no choice over her own body.

I don't remember announcing that.
Try the quote function.

 

[Ford]

You've proudly announced that (in your perfect world) a woman would have no choice over her own body.

I don't remember announcing that.
Try the quote function.

Ah... gaslighting.

 

[Rhea]

As did the guys torturing heretics to death, and those who identified, tried, and hanged witches.

For the record, no one ever tried or hanged a witch.

They identified, tortured, tried and hung WOMEN.

 

[Rhea]

In fact I would guess the majority of unwanted pregnancy abortions arise where no contraceptives were used.

NEWS RELEASE
JANUARY 11, 2018

About Half of U.S. Abortion Patients Report Using Contraception in the Month They Became Pregnant​

In 2014, about half (51%) of abortion patients in the United States reported that they had used a contraceptive method in the month they became pregnant, according to a new analysis by Guttmacher researcher Rachel Jones. This proportion represents a slight decrease from 54% of abortion patients in 2000, the last time these data were examined. The methods most commonly used by abortion patients in 2014 were condoms (24% of patients) and the pill (13%).

So no, in fact, the “majority” of abortions do not arise where no contraceptive is used.
Turns out you guess wrong.

Not so fast.

Firstly, 24% condoms plus 13% pill equals 39%
Where's the other 61% ? Long acting methods?

A vasectomy "sometime last month" isn't meaningful.
Starting on oral contraceptives "sometime last month" isn't meaningful.

Secondly, this (self-reported) anecdotal data of "almost half" is HUGELY at odds with the statistical empirical data showing contraceptive effectiveness of > 95%

How can this gap be reconciled?

Although we could take bets on what percent of the no contraceptive crowd are from fundagelical religions like baptist or catholic.

That would be an argument in support of my contention that most people having abortions are NOT trying to avoid pregnancy by using contraceptives.

So this is interesting. Really very interesting.

Firstly, 24% condoms plus 13% pill equals 39%
Where's the other 61% ? Long acting methods?

I honestly do not know if you are saying this because you truly do not have any idea what the other methods are, or if you are playing a game pretending you don’t know.

You don’t appear to make any effort to find out what the others are, you just make a statement that seems to mock the data as bad, and tries to discredit it by implication.


So what’s the story? Do you REALLY not know what the other 61% might be? You don’t know about sponges, diaphragms (even though I mentioned those right in front of you just here in this thread), gels, spermicides, vaginal rings, internal condoms, patches, shots, and cervical caps?


Then you write this:

Secondly, this (self-reported) anecdotal data of "almost half" is HUGELY at odds with the statistical empirical data showing contraceptive effectiveness of > 95%

And you write it with this wide-eyed “I’m shocked!” All caps, as if you are utterly ignorant of the things that change the effectiveness of birth control, again, even though it’s been mentioned right here in this thread.

Are you actually utterly ignorant of all the factors that change the “when used perfectly” statistics? Genuine question, not snark.

Were you, for example aware of the example I gave earlier that antibiotics decrease the effectiveness of hormonal contraceptives like the pill? Did you know that or not know that? Genuine question. DO you know all the ways each method is described as being “as directed”?

Do you know that the birth control pill needs to be taken at the same time every day, so if you are inconsistent because of a swing shift at work or a travel across time zones or being sick and sleeping late that everything changes?

From the way you post, I gather that you have very little knowledge of how birth control works. Yet you make all caps statements about the ignorance of others and your expectation that not getting the full % effectiveness is some big lie perpetrated against your case.


The world is real. And your sense of entitlement in micro-managing all hours of every woman’s day is utterly unrealistic. Do you realize that a large number of abortions are married women with kids who don’t want more and who have failed birth control, but still expect to live in a world where they are allowed by you to have sex with their husbands!?

 

[Derec]

How do you figure an alleged/anecdotal 50% contraception failure rate is not a huge difference when compared with an empirically verified >95% success rate ???

Because the 50% is not "failure rate". It is the share of women who used contraception among all the women who had abortions. These two proportions measure two very different things, so I do not understand why it is a surprise that there would be a "huge difference" between the two.

First, >95% is on a yearly basis, so for a month it's more like 0.5% failure rate.

WUT?
Wouldnt it be harder to hit the jackpot failure in just 1 month as opposed to having 12 attempts to fail over an entire year.

"Wut" yourself. That's why I set the monthly failure rate (0.5%) at 1/10 of the annual failure rate (~5%). I did not bother with 1/12 or binomial distribution or anything because this is just a proof of concept, so rough calculations are ok.

We aren't talking about ALL sexually active women whose contraception failed. We're only talking about the ones who decided to have an abortion.

Sure. But the latter is a subset of the former.

...and who decided to answer a survey.

I do not care about the survey part. Sampling and surveying doesn't enter into my argument, because I am doing a (rough) population modelling to show that there is no contradiction between saying that contraception has e.g. a 95% success rate while 50% of women who chose to have an abortion had used contraceptives. In fact, for the purposes of this discussion, I do not even care if the 50% figure is anywhere near true. I just care to show you that it is feasible that it would be true and that there is no contradiction between these two proportions that are measuring very different things.

...asking whether they (think they) used contraception (correctly) sometime in the month before they (amazingly) got pregnant despite their (diligent) efforts not to get pregnant

Nothing amazing about that.

This is vastly different to the empirical evidence based clinical studies into 95%+ effectiveness of contraceptives.

Because they measure vastly different things. Duh!

Women on birth control are MORE likely to get pregnant and seek an abortion? Since when?

A woman on birth control is more likely to seek abortion IF she gets pregnant.

Thats not systematic.

What do you mean?

l'm asking how these outlier women managed to hit the statistically improbable pregnancy jackpot that other women on (95% effective birth control) somehow avoided by using the exact same birth control.

They may be different reasons for failure. User error (the old "perfect use" vs. "typical use"). Rhea already mentioned antibiotics, but there can also be intrinsic variances in how different bodies respond to things like exogenous hormones. There is the mechanical failure of barrier methods, and lastly, sheer luck of the draw.
But the point is, that if many women use contraception, there will be many women, on aggregate, whose contraception fails. 0.5% of a million is still 5,000 women. If 40% of them choose to abort, that's 2,000 abortions. If, at the same time, 200,000 sexually active women do not use contraception, maybe 10,000 will get pregnant. If 20% of them choose to abort, that's also 2,000 abortions. 50-50 ratio, despite very effective birth control.
These numbers are just examples, of course.

Those aren't 'variables' those are irrelevant red herrings.

They are not red herrings, they are highly relevant, as I shall show.

How do you reconcile the (Baysean) gap between such a small number of survey respondents and such a large number of deliberate abortions each year?

Oh, you've heard of Bayes. Good. Then let me elaborate.
B = birth control
A = abortion
G = pregnant for "gravida"

P(B|A) - this is the probability the woman was on birth control, given that she had an abortion. This is the 50% figure.
P(G|B) - this is the probability the woman gets pregnant if she is on birth control, in this case over the course of a month. This is the 0.5% figure.

As you see, these are very different variables, and so it should not be surprising that they have very different values. So much is trivial.
These variables are connected though. What connects them are other variables (not red herrings) such as prevalence of birth control P(B), the likelihood a woman would abort if pregnant P(A|G) or even the likelihood that a woman will get pregnant in a given month P(G).

The way all these variables are related is Bayes' Theorem.

P(B|A) = P(A|B) * P(A) / P(B)

As you can see right away, the higher the prevalence of birth control use in a population, the higher P(B|A) will be.

Probability of abortion P(A) can be calculated by P(A)=P(A|G) * P(G) / (P(G|A). But since P(G|A)=1, it simplifies to P(A)=P(A|G)*P(G)

So our variables are nicely connected.

P(B|A) = P(A|B) * P(A|G) * P(G) / P(B)

You can continue going. For example, P(G) = P(G|B) * P(B) + P(G|¬B)*P(¬B). I.e. likelihood of a woman getting pregnant is dependent on prevalence of birth control use, birth control failure rate P(G|B) and also the likelihood of pregnancy if no birth control is used P(G|¬B).

You can do the same analysis for P(A|G) and P(A|B). This is left for you as a homework exercise.

 

[laughing dog]

It is frankly none of your business what someone decides to do with their body.

That's the argument right there in a nutshell.
Not only do I think it's my business to argue against abortion, I think it's my moral obligation.

What a curious moral obligation it is to place the future of a potential human over the future of a living girl or woman.