Arguments against “Personhood,” Amendment 62

Ari Armstrong and Diana Hsieh, PhD have written a position paper against  “Personhood” movement:

The ‘Personhood’ Movement Is Anti-Life
Why It Matters that Rights Begin at Birth, Not Conception

This is relevant to Colorado politics because the proposed Amendment 62 is about this issue (details).

Here’s the table of contents, which links to each section of the analysis.  There’s also a version in PDF format.

Contents

• Introduction

• The ‘Personhood’ Movement
  • “Personhood” and the Abortion Debate
  • Colorado Campaigns
  • Campaigns in Other States
• The Destructive Effects of ‘Personhood’
  • A Legal Quagmire
  • Harsh Legal Penalties
  • Bans of Elective Abortions
  • Abortions to Protect a Woman’s Health
  • Abortions for Rape, Incest, and Fetal Deformity
  • Bans of Common Birth Control Methods
  • Bans of Common Fertility Treatments
  • Bans of Embryonic Stem-Cell Research
  • Amendment 62 Is Anti-Life
• Individual Rights and Abortion
  • The Compromise of Roe v. Wade
  • Today’s “Pro-Choice” Rhetoric
  • The Core Arguments for “Personhood” Laws
  • Rights in Pregnancy
• The Morality of Abortion
• ‘Personhood’ and the Separation of Church and State
• Amendment 62 Is Not a ‘Message’
• Notes

American election choices: theocrat or socialist?

Writes Ari Armstrong on why Libby Szabo lost his vote for Colorado’s State Senate District 19:

In races across the country, voters face terrible choices, with theocrats on one side, socialists on the other.

Nearly a year ago, I sent a letter to various candidates asking them to endorse the separation of church and state. While I never got around to sending the letter to the state senate candidates,  Szabo has made it clear that she strongly endorses faith-based politics. Which is why I strongly oppose her.

I have been arguing for months that a major reason Republicans have killed themselves in Colorado is their unflagging commitment to faith-based politics. …

Maybe someday Colorado Republicans will learn that the Interior West leans toward liberty and away from faith-based politics. There are some hopeful signs. Until then, I guess I’m a Democrat by default, as much as that sickens me.

Read the whole post here.

Colorado Amendment 48: Fertilized eggs are not people

From the Colorado-based Coalition for Secular Government:

Colorado’s proposed Amendment 48 — the ballot measure that would grant full legal rights to fertilized eggs — would usher in disastrous government controls on abortion, birth control, medical research, and in vitro fertilization. It would violate the rights of real men and women — based on the faith-based fiction that a fertilized egg is a person with the same moral standing as a born infant. Yet the biological facts of pregnancy show that the embryo/fetus becomes a human person with rights only when born.

Find out more by reading a new CSG issue paper by Ari Armstrong and Diana Hsieh:
Amendment 48 Is Anti-Life: Why It Matters That a Fertilized Egg Is Not a Person