Chinese advertisements

[kirisutogomen]

The answer is the tag, rot13'd, but to save you the trouble, I'll tell you. First, the original ad before I mucked with it. (Yes, it was left-right mirrored like most people guessed. I'm still curious as to why among people who are entirely illiterate in Han characters the mirroring was blatantly obvious to some and not at all to others.)




And another for the same service from a competing provider:



These are ads for abortion clinics. Chinese abortion clinics advertise on prime-time television. They offer student discounts. Not sure if they have special holiday sales, nor if you get abortion coupons with your newspaper.

Now, unless you take the position that a fetus at any stage has the moral standing of a lintball but that magically at the moment the head crowns it suddenly becomes a full human person endowed with a complete set of inalienable rights plus a stylish carrying case, there's got to be a point at which you say, "Hrm. My liberal sensibilities tell me that I should advocate fiercely for a woman's right to choose, but I don't actually want people to treat abortion like a trip to the hair salon. What does my victory condition actually look like?"

And then there's the issue of sex selection, which really kicks over a Pandora's hornets' nest of other issues.

Comments

[rifmeister.livejournal.com]

Do you think it should be illegal for a woman to get pregnant after age 40? Do you think it should be illegal to carry to term a baby you know to have Down's syndrome?

[astra-nomer.livejournal.com]

I just want to say that I am fascinated that this vigorous debate is taking place between a bunch of men, most of whom do not have children.

Carry on.

[kirisutogomen.livejournal.com]

What about that fascinates you?

[twe.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that was kind of amusing.

[marcusmarcusrc.livejournal.com]

The latter is easy: no. I'd object to using a magic Down's syndrome wand to intentionally create a Down's syndrome fetus, but if the fetus already has the syndrome, then that's a pre-existing condition.

The former is, in that specific case, also easy - no, it shouldn't be illegal either - the risk isn't that large. (my own mom had me after age 40). However, see my answer to firstfrost below about there not being a clear bright line - as the probability of a behavior causes defects increases, and the severity of the defect increases, the justification for intervention becomes higher. I realize that some might argue that even behavior with 100% of causing a severe defect should be allowed, either because of right over your own body arguments or libertarian arguments, but my opinion differs...