Every blastocyst is sacred!
 

Every blastocyst is great! If a blastocyst is experimented on God gets quite irate! I think its a load of crap that the president says he's all for life and doesn't want to kill so other people benefit. This all coming from the guy who holds the record for most executions in modern politics, who used 9-11 for votes, who started two wars that have resulted in the deaths of over 40,000 people and the maiming and injury of countless. "Killing them over there so they don't kill us over here" is one of the Republican slogans. If only hypocrisy was fatal! Call me crazy, but I'd rather find the cure for debilitating diseases with blastocysts that are just going to the incinerator than waste them. First veto on this? Go to hell, Bush. Congratulations on handing Congress to the Democrats, you simian tool.

Seconded.

The federal government here is doing everything in their power to stop (or at least block funding towards) stem-cell research. Thankfully my state has stepped into the breach and is talking about funding it themselves. First good thing Bracksie has done.

I'm no religious man, but if god created excess stem cells like in the umbilical cord, then doesn't that seem like he intended for humans to put them to good use? I seriously don't get why some people view it as "unnatural."

I don't get it at all. 90% of our civilisation isn't natural! FFS! If we are such a dominant species, then why would it be wrong to improve ourselfs even more? Damn, the stupidity is killing me!

And I'm going to lay it on the line right now:
These things are not alive to me, they are living. You have to have the ability to think and sense and feel to be alive to me. This is all coming from the insane belief that life begins at conception, that fertilized eggs are the equivalent to the alive. Oh really? The vast majority of fertilized eggs never implant but I haven't heard the far right decry the average woman as a mass murderer yet. Its because you can't. People have the misconception that these are embryos, that they're itty bitty 24 celled mini babies. They're not. GIS Blastocyst and you'll see what I mean. By vetoing this bill the president has said he thinks blastocysts are more important than every other disease suffering person on the planet. Its a shameless bone thrown to the religious base of the conservative party, it has nothing to do with concern for life. Concern for votes, yes, concern for life not a chance.

I'm against this, but i can understand why people are for it. As i've said before, i'm one of these people who sees in the 'long-term', so if in the short-term we have to use dubious methods that will benefit us in the long-term, i'm all for it.

I'm against it, however, 'cos it's not 'natural', and by that i mean we need disease. If we leapt around curing every disease known to man, as many want us to do, we'd be f*cking ourselves with a loaded gun. And frankly, it's something i don't want us to come to. We're doing a perfect job of ruining the World as it is, without hindering Mother Nature's efforts to stamp us out.

It also gets me when they try and cure disabilitating illnesses, they shouldn't. Everything that harms us keeps us in check, if we got rid of natural killers (Cancer et al) then we'd have to be even more reliant on the wars to keep our numbers low.

I hope humanity dies out soon.

You're a bit of a misanthrope, aren't ya;
Anyway, I think this is just crap. You quite logically cannot support the death penalty yet and be pro life. Nor, for that matter, launch a fraudulent war that kill thousands of people and cost trillions of dollars. As for my beliefs on this, I think that stem cell research is not murder as the blastocysts and such are going to be destroyed anyway. Why not use them for good purpose? They haven't developed to embryo status in the womb and so aren't humans. They're amoeba, if anything.

Yes, but if we begin implementing stem cells into medical science, this could mean crushing every single disease that hasn't happened yet.

And I'm sick of this 'it's not natural' slop. We're in the Information Age. If god made humans to be able to adapt to changing times, then stem cell research would just be the next step on the staircase.

"Yes, but if we begin implementing stem cells into medical science, this could mean crushing every single disease that hasn't happened yet."

...yes. And then what? Short-term, the idea is fine! "Oh yes, we can cure Cancer and the like!! Huzzah! Get yer stemmies out! Whoop!" but what about the long-term?

Overpopulation.

Human's are the Cancer to Mother Nature's Cervix and if we phwart her attempts at getting rid of us for good, she's as good as dead.

"And I'm sick of this 'it's not natural' slop"

The only time i use that is when we're in danger of screwing the World up more. IVF is doing that now, with every infertile couple getting in on the act instead of doing what's right and adopting. And now we have old people having kids.

Great, more humans(!) That's exactly what we need right now!

"You quite logically cannot support the death penalty yet and be pro life. Nor, for that matter, launch a fraudulent war that kill thousands of people and cost trillions of dollars."

Was that directed at me, or just people in general? 'cos i don't support the Death penalty, nor would i say i'm pro-life.

You're missing the point here; there aren't enough stem cells coming from umbilical cords for research. Scientists want to research on unused IVF embryos (which have been frozen not long after fertilisation) which would otherwise be destroyed.

Curing diseases is all fine and dandy, but that leaves us in the compromising position of suffering new age-onset diseases that are in our genes that previously we never lived long enough to experience. Fine, we can use gene therapy to get rid of these diseases too. Because if we don't, we are ringing our own death nell. We can treat those unfortunate enough to suffer genetic diseases, so they are able to live as long as anyone else (mostly), and have children, who may well inherit it. Without natural selection keeping the frequency of such genes in check, we may find ourselves utterly dependant on our healthcare just to survive on a daily basis. Then, should civilisation end, which is disturbingly likely given the recent popularity of the Republicans, we won't survive the first winter. If we are to cure our siseases and disorders; and let's face it, that's what we will continue to do; then we need to cure those hidden within us as well, despite what some people say, stem cell research is an important part of this.

Then we must also at least make some attempts to stem the flow of Earth's lifeblood from the human race-shaped wound in her side. We are inherantly selfish, in that anything we can do to survive and be comfortable, we will do. That is how we, and all other species, evolved, but unfortunately Nature drew the ol' Go Straight To Jail card, and became lumbered with us. Whoops. And if we are going to live longer lives, then we will have to fix the world. Before the wound heals on its own and we are eradicated by the planet itself.

I see your point. I suppose I would just like to see a world where Africa isn't a disease infested slab of land.

Humanity just pisses me off so much and the annoying thing is, is that even though Mother Nature is throwing every anti-septic cream she's got at us to wipe us out, we're continuously avoiding extinction.

...like some kind of 'Rambo' Crab nestled in her groin.

The purpose of all life forms is too maintain their species' existance on this Earth as long as possible. Humans will be gone, eventually, along with everything else, but I would like humans to survive long enough that there is overall world peace, little poverty, etc.

But once we're wiped out, that doesn't matter anyway. I must say I'm edging on agreeing with Jacob and Bullet Magnet. I haven't got myself a donor card or given blood precisely because, as an environmentalist, I don't think helping more and more humans to exist is a good thing (and also the National Blood Service are prejudgemental morons).

But on the other hand, what you call looking at the long term I would identify as a slippery slope argument. You're talking of time scales we can't accurately predict. Besides, not preventing human death now doesn't actually address the rising birth rates. We should tackle the problem at the source instead of just raising these imperfect levées around the flood.

p.s. To address the question, I agree that putting embryos above living humans is silly and designed to appeal to popularity.

"Besides, not preventing human death now doesn't actually address the rising birth rates."

True, but i don't think anything can be done about that. Even now they've got yet another way to make infertile people have children, which annoys me highly.

"that there is overall world peace, little poverty"

This side of Never, perhaps?

From what i've read on Vehement Human Beings are practically invincible, and short of some kind of Chemical designed to wipe out Humanity we're going to be around for...ever.

It's so irritating when the Media gets it's wet on over the "next big thing" in terms of disease. First it was BSE, which was "mutating" to attack humans and that could DESTROY us all!! Then it's Bird Flu, which would be utterly devastating!!

*Shock-Horror*

Some people are even known to be immune to AIDs.

Ugh.

Hang on - since when is there a rising birth rate in the Western World? It's gotten to the point in Australia that the government is virtually bribing people to have more kids. IVF could definately help on that count.

Holy shit, enough of this slippery slope baloney. Its not like we'll go from curing Parkinson's to cloning people to work on the Moon.
Anyhow, the reason that the blastocysts needed to used is that they can turn into any sort of cell, something teeth and umbilical stem cells cannot do. While better than nothing they don't have the same potential that the blastocysts do. And yeah, that is what they are, I don't want to read any of this embryo garbage for as long as I live. Its wrong and intellectually dishonest.

Oh, sorry for the double post but my lousy wireless abomination of a mouse broke. I can't believe mom bought this piece of shit mouse. So no, I'm not going to be editting my posts. Every blasted one of them will be a quasi-coherent typo riddled mess until I can buy a new one on Tuesday.
The tab button will be abused tomorrow, oh yes it will be.

Who was limiting their scope to the West?

The British government is also encouraging people to have children so that there are more people to service the increasingly elderlycentric population. They don't seem to realise that they are accelerating the problem. No, that's giving them too much credit; they just don't care about it. Anything that has consequences beyond the next four years doesn't need to be addressed.

If all this procreation really does have to be encouraged, the least they could do is wait until they've sorted the education system out. That should give us a few decades without babies crying on every bus you go on. And that's when buses show up.

Well most of the forum's population lives in the West, for one thing.

And seeing as you were objecting to medical help and IVF; you'll only get them in industrialised countries so your point is moot.

"the least they could do is wait until they've sorted the education system out."

Is education really that bad?

'cos i'm of the belief that the Education system is quite fine, but it's the masses of scum that are breeding and don't have respect for themselves, others or their education that bring the quota down.

Obviously, i'm bias 'cos i'm of the Homo-Superior Hierarchy, but everytime i hear something about crime and the like, they either describe some disillusioned Black youth or some mentally abused Chav.

Ha, education is t3h sux0rz in America. 40% or something of American kids my age don't know what North Korea is. Or something like that.

And clear some pm space Jacob.

I see your Python influence. :p

It is a load of crap that people are so damned upset about stem cell researching. What's the problem with "unnaturalness"? Isn't it unnatural to take mold to cure illness (a la Penicillin)?
Its acceptance for me depends on if they're growing fetuses for that purpose, or if they're already dicarded. They can also get them easily from a discarded umbilical cord.

"Ha, education is t3h sux0rz in America. 40% or something of American kids my age don't know what North Korea is. Or something like that."

That baffles me SO much.

How can you not know those things?! I s'pose it's a case of asking the question "Is it the Education system not doing it's job? Or is it a case of the kids being f*ck-c*nts and not listening and playing their role in education".

Also one has got to ask where it all went wrong, and if you come to the conclusion "When teachers lost their ability to excercise authority", then you have gots to ask yer sens how do you put that back.

PM space cleared.

Maybe not the formal education system specifically, but children's educations generally.

Not really. Wherever such treatments are available, the world's total population is increasing dramatically.

At what point is human behaviour natural, and at what point is it unnatural?

Because honestly, you could say that anything other than a pre-language cave man way of life is unnatural, but equally you could say that anything we do is natural, since we evolved to use our brains to better our lives. The whole unnatural argument falls flat on its back the moment it rears its ugly head.

Then again, you can say that about all arguments in the world, ever.

:rant:

"The whole unnatural argument falls flat on its back the moment it rears its ugly head."

Hmmm.

But our reproduction is dictated to by Nature. So if we meddle with that, then that's unnatural. A woman over a certain age isn't a-okay to have kiddies.

I heard somewhere that some PC peeps are on aboot messing with the legislation to do with IVF so that Lesbians and Single women can have kiddies, now, we could preach on about "Rights" and the like, but it isn't the right to have a child, it's a gift, and the fact of the matter is a Lesbian/Single woman cannot have a child without a man involved.

...hmm, i don't know the full story, as is probably evident from this post. But i'll just end this with 'It's not natural'.

There.

Ehh, I don't really agree with that.

I don't see why just because you favor the 'wrong' sex means you can't have children. Every human, homo or hetero, has a raging instinct deep down inside of them to care for a child. It's practically part of the meaning of humanity to raise a child (or children).

Saying lesbains shouldn't have a child unless there's a man involved lies almost along side saying that hetero women should get abortions.

Homosexuality is more of a corruption (not in a bad way) of the flesh, not of your reproductive abilities. Women were made for birth giving. I believe they should serve that purpose if possible.

Unmitigated ranting claptrap. And that's aside from anything I may or may not have 'got'.

DELETE

"I don't see why just because you favor the 'wrong' sex means you can't have children. Every human, homo or hetero, has a raging instinct deep down inside of them to care for a child. It's practically part of the meaning of humanity to raise a child (or children)."

No, no, that's what i mean, that's why i trailed off towards the end. I can't remember the full story, but it was something like men not getting involved.

I'm all for Lesbians/Queers bumming children out if they're in a loving relationship, but this was somewhat different. Like...the guy wasn't involved. Or...it was a randomers Sperm. Or...something. Which i found myself thinking "Well, Lesbians wouldn't get pregnant like that naturally, so..."

...then again, Lesbians wouldn't get pregnant whatsoever.

I'm going to have to try and make my face remember it.

Gosh.

EDIT - Mutual posted his post seconds before mine, apparently and he's taken my post the complete wrong way.

*Applauds*

Well done, Champion.

Double-post! Yes. But i laugh in the face of the rules!

Hah!

I found what i was on about! Basically it's the law changing so that Lesbians and Single women could get IVF, which i don't agree with.

I'm all for Lesbians in loving Relationships getting themselves knocked up! Fine! Fantastic! We may be Queer but we can still have kids et al!

Yeh.

It's basically just another "Naturality" thing for me. And if i'm going to stand up and say "IVF shouldn't be available for Hetero women" i'm not going to be a hypocrite and say "Oh, but what now? You munch on something other than a penis? Excellent! Get yer legs a-open! Let's give this another go!"

So yeh, i don't agree with the single women getting it either.

Yeh.

Haha Jacob, as interesting as you argument is; please don't double post. Now... Continue.

- Rexy

I prefer your pre-edit.

Ack, I knew someone would get confused by my remark. To address your remark, what I meant was that homosexuality shouldn't have anything to do with having children because, in my beliefs, the urge to parent a child, or children, resides much deeper in yourself than your sexual preference. I see homosexuality more as a mental thing, as opposed to the urge to parent which is instinct.

It makes me into a fool. While nobody else says anything about Jacob's obvious, subversive idiocy (for whatever reason), and talk to him as if he is a reasoned person, me ranting away is just pathetic. I said to myself (aloud) that I'd never enter into another conversation with Jacob, ESPECIALLY a political one. It's just pointless.

Oh look, I'm talking about something that no longer exists and still doing what I delete the ****ing material for in the first place. This must make CRACKING reading. :rolleyes:

I got confused because it was worded terribly. Really terribly. And I'm still kinda confused... most people would recognise that homosexuality is not a lifestyle choice, that's it's a mixture of social, psychological AND genetic factors. I know that isn't what you're talking about here (you're saying the parenting instinct overrides whatever form of sexuality, yes - that is kind of an obvious point, without sounding rude :)), but I'm addressing the idea of it being a "mental thing."

Tis all.

Bah, you're unsolvable.

I don't feel like delving into details about what I meant, so I'll just sum it up: To me, homosexuality exists on a more shallow level than the urge to parent. Therefore it shouldn't matter whether you're gay or not if you want to parent.

Take your British rantiness and join the House of Commons or something. Ack!

But... but... I just said exactly that and agreed with you.

You can't win for trying, can ya? :(

I meant I didn't want to have to go into small details like the causes for homosexuality and stuff that you were going into in your post. Anyway, like the Hollandia of the Dutch East India Company, we're steering off course at a mighty rate, so let's just end this sub discussion or keep talking on pms.

"that's it's a mixture of social, psychological AND genetic factors"

I don't get what you're saying there. Are you saying all Homosexuals are Homosexual because of that, or that some Homo's are genetic, some psychological etc.

The latter being the more reasonable. The former being drivel.

Nobody really knows what makes somebody Gay, but new evidence suggests it's to do with anti-bodies fighting off the testosterone (or something like that, for instance after every male child a woman has, the chances of the next one being Gay rise 33%).

Out of intrigue, which category would you fit in? Are you a Nature Gay? Gay 'cos of an absent Male role-model? Or because you were bummed by a male relative?

I'm saying it's a mixture of factors.

As the last two do not apply, I guess that makes me a Nature Gay, which sounds more interesting than it probably is.

"I'm saying it's a mixture of factors."

On what grounds...yadda?