 Welcome to Teens On Topic. I'm your host Emma Arnson and today I'm joined by Eric Eagler, Issa Shake, Sam Sheridan, I'm Andy Knox and I'm Caleb Hart. On our final episode of this season we are covering a topic that is on a lot of people's minds. So let's see what the Dulse of Davis have to say about it. In light of recent state bills what's your opinion on abortion? Well more so than anything I'm interested to see what the Supreme Court does with it. Looks like the states that have banned it, not banned it but heavily restricted it are really looking for a way to make the Supreme Court reevaluate abortion law which they haven't done in almost 50, 60 years now and to see what they decide to do with current abortion law will be interesting. I trust their judgment they're all really smart people up there I hear. So you think that like if abortion went to the Supreme Court they'd make like a good decision that I don't think that when you're dealing with an issue like abortion that's so controversial that you could get an opinion or a change in the law that satisfies everybody but they're all definitely you know very prudent legal scholars every single one of them and to see if they decide to change or maybe even not to change to uphold current law that'll probably have a really big impact on public opinion as it always does and that might settle the issue at least for another 50 years before we start debating it again. I feel like it should go both ways I feel like it should be a vote like because some people try to find the easy way out with abortions and I feel like some people they have like they need the easy way out basically like if you're not doing good for yourself then maybe you need to just have an abortion you know I mean I'm not too big on abortions but I feel like the person that's carrying it should definitely be the one that control rather it should be a border now honestly but then I understand why they don't have it like that because a lot of probably a lot of abortions would be going on right now. I think that unless you're going to take care of the baby after it's born then you might as well let them abort it because otherwise it's going to be in like foster care or somewhere with a bad parent or can we cuss on this with a bad parent. Thank you guys awesome. I have a joke about that no I'm just kidding I think that abortions should be accessible and legal and heavily subsidized by the government even late term abortions but again special circumstances things like that but I agree and I think that it's really wrong to trap women in circumstances that are beyond their control and sets up families and individuals for a lot of trauma and that's not something that our society needs anymore of so true you need to heal. Personally I'm not in favor of abortion but if they you know if they're going to outlaw then they need to have resources for people that have babies that can't take care of them so they need to step forward in that aspect of it. So you think the government should have like child support in place for people like who can't support a child but can't get an abortion. Abortion needs to be safe and legal for all women. What do you think would happen if the government banned abortion in these states? I think women will always get abortions it's just going to depend on whether they're going to be legal and safe or if they're not but that's what history tells us is when women don't want children they find a way to get an abortion sometimes tragic and lethal consequences. I mean my opinion is if you take away abortion what's actually going to happen is the number of safe abortions is going to drop while the number of abortions is going to drop very minimally and what you'll actually happen is women dying. I agree yes. So you think like the government should keep abortions? I think it needs to be protected if only because it's dangerous to I think it's actually dangerous to criminalize them. Criminalize it. For sure. Thank you. Awesome. Well it sounds like people had generally the same opinion on this so what do you guys think about what they had to say? Well you know I feel like it makes a lot of sense that a lot of people would share the same opinion on this issue. I mean we do live in Davis I think one thing we kind of tend to do when we live in such a bubble of Davis is kind of like tend to homogenize these opinions of people in the United States and I you know I don't really feel like it's of course it's not a representative sample. But to the point of abortion I'll just y'all start out with one thing. I am very unsure about my own stance on abortion. I feel like there are a lot of good arguments on both sides. I feel like one thing kind of rhetorical device that's used a lot in the abortion debate is that you know you shouldn't have like a bunch of male politicians be deciding what a woman can do with their body. I kind of disagree with that premise polls show that women and men have very similar like by percentage opinions on abortion. Like your gender doesn't really affect your opinion on abortion. I feel like that shouldn't really be a factor. I feel like the main factor should just be you know do you think that it's a life? Do you think you know that it is a life as worth protecting as a woman's life? I feel like that should be the main goal. And I feel like the abortion debate gets wrapped up in a lot of rhetoric. I absolutely agree with that statement about how like because you can just talk about this. This is a way that can go on for hours and hours and hours about like different aspects of the abortion debate. But I personally think for me is that the woman and the should be able to make the decision that she thinks is best for her. But she should also be provided with all of the information necessary. So it shouldn't be held back anything like about like maybe like emotional trauma that this will cause or like pain or confusion like that shouldn't be that information shouldn't be held from the woman. She should be given all sides and all aspects of like this procedure before she decides to go through with it. And then if she does that's her choice and that should be her. So I mean like at what point do you think kind of the cutoff should be? No I don't really know too much about abortions. I can say like exactly when I think the cutoff should be. Do you have anything? No I mean it's something that I feel like should be you know answered fairly scientifically. I feel like it should generally be about brain development. You know I definitely think you know aborting a fetus that's like the moment after the sperm meets the egg isn't really functionally different from just deciding not to have a baby in the first place. But I think when I think about my own life I just think I'm really glad that I'm alive. And I feel like it is good to give people the opportunity to live. But I think a lot of times I guess an abortion really is the same as just deciding not to have a kid at some earlier point. So I don't know it's a really difficult issue for me to form the stance on. I definitely kind of disagree with like the premise of that like the cutoff point is just when they when they exit the woman's body. I feel like it should be more focused on the fetus than the woman herself at least in terms of like when is the fetus alive. I think you touch on a great point which is that we've seen these slogans know my body my choice more recently no uterus no opinion that this is a part of the woman's body which is really where the two sides of the debate are at a rift right. So some people will say that the fetus is a part of the woman's body. Others will say that according to biology no that's an individual person that's its own body and your rights don't include the right to end another life. And I think it's really compelling not necessarily that I agree with it but the fact that these bills a lot of them in states like Louisiana are heartbeat bills so you're really trying to see you're really trying to find where this human life starts and you're making the case that if it's beat its heart is beating that means it's a life right you're really defining what abortion is which is ending a life right whether you think that's all right or not it's ending a life. And I think I just concur with the whole thing about how no uterus no opinion is a thing right where men cannot make a stance on abortion I think I know it sounds weird because we are young men talking about abortion. But from where I come from I think it's not with a woman's purview to say that I can murder right so it's the same thing as saying no if you're not Burmese you can't talk about the Rohingya crisis right because this is something that a woman has the power to do if they go see an abortionist and frankly I think it's a moral evil. Okay yeah so you would like would you like say you're pro-life. Oh yeah. So does it would you say that it starts when the sperm meets the egg like that's when it should be illegal to get an abortion. I don't think so no I'm definitely I'm persuaded by the heartbeat argument I think at this point none of that matters I think as the pro-life movement we've been increment list for a while. When you have people who are allowed to abort at 23 weeks where we've just seen studies there was an article in the New York Times about how babies born at 22 if they're given proper support will live. I think the fact that we as a developed country don't have a 20-week ban in this country is it's frank it's kind of crazy because you do see premature births at that point and you do see those babies living or those fetuses living right clump of cells living and I think at that point I mean definitely we should move from there but I I don't think conception is necessarily where you're going to talk about although the fact is that the entire genetic makeup of that child is decided at conception I think that's that's a way from now. I would you agree when the about the heartbeat being the point where a human life starts do you actually like there's plenty of different I mean all animals have heartbeats right but is there something particular that defines when something when a human life is actually worth keeping because I'd say that's probably the brain the brain is what separates us from all the other animals and when the heartbeat shows up the brain has not developed yet almost at all as far as I'm as far as I'm away so I feel like that's a bad measurement of when a life is suddenly important or a human life is suddenly important because I wouldn't say it's a human life yet. I mean that then you're saying that it's alright to kill senile people right because their brains aren't functioning at a human as at a normal level and yet their heart is still being right. Well I mean if there's a there's if I'm remembering correctly for for the brain so undeveloped that it isn't functioning at all as in like a an undeveloped fetus you can pull the plug on those right? I mean as far as I'm aware. With senile people, I don't know exactly not just senile it's just mild. I don't feel like it's an accurate equivalence between like someone with Alzheimer's versus someone like a baby who's been in the womb for six weeks. I don't think I mean let's be clear. Obviously the the brain development is not going to be anywhere near the same between those people. So let's be clear. And senile people have tons of sorry. No no go ahead. I feel like they've already they've had a long life and they they have a lot of connections with people and I feel like you know some of what makes a person important is how is how meaningful they are to other people. Maybe I shouldn't have brought that example in but at three weeks is when you start seeing hearts for usually people don't even know they're pregnant at that point right. So then by the time that people have noticed the heartbeat which is around three weeks later on sometimes six weeks is when you start seeing brain waves. When you detect a pregnancy most likely there will be brain waves because at six weeks is usually around the time when people will start finding out they're pregnant. Right. Yeah I feel like there's also like another thing that we're not looking at right now which is like if people are having like unprotected sex and there is like the option or opportunity for them to get pregnant like what responsibilities do they have to think before they act in the sense of like oh I'm making sure that I'm using like the right protection or something like that. Like I feel like that's something that people don't talk about as much as they should when they're in the abortion audience. I think another aspect of that is what you're talking about is also sex education. A lot of times people won't properly understand how to use birth control in places where they teach absence only sex education so I think that's another aspect of it. Those people who don't understand how to properly prevent a child I think they aren't always necessarily equipped to have a child and give birth. I definitely think that the people who are pro-life on the side airing against abortion tend not to be the people who think of a lot of kind of alternatives things that would prevent abortion that are not just direct outlaws and I think that that's definitely something that they should talk about more. Yeah, sex education that is not absence only and open conversation between people too I feel like is key. I think culturally a lot of pro-life people do come from religious standpoint where they do think that education like that in schools is just if not encouraging normalizing what is it, premarital sex? That makes them uncomfortable and I think that's understandable. I think not only does that make them uncomfortable but I think generally in Christianity I'm not an expert on this but generally the rules are the rules and you're not supposed to participate in anything that's wrong so if sex education is wrong then I think according to Christianity you should not practice it and you shouldn't try to make that calculation on your own. I feel like we're all very fortunate because we had really solid sex education growing up in Davis and so but I think that is something to speak on for like the rest of the country might not have had that same level of education that we have and so yeah we're coming from a place of very much like in the beginning of a bubble where it's like there's a lot of people who have the same opinions who have also had the same background and so I think it's hard for us to really have fully formed opinions especially since we haven't really gone out into the world yet and been able to speak with other people on this issue. Eric do you have any thoughts? Yeah I think during the moment like I think the couple just trust each other normally think about what they're doing so they'll just decide not to have protection but later on they realize like the partner's pregnant and they'll really know what to do and they're like you know their first choice is like abortion but like you know Yeah and I thought about this a lot like people say like as a woman I don't think as a woman it really has like anything to do with my opinion but I think that even still it should be the woman's choice to have that abortion even if I like wouldn't in this situation that she was in I think it still is like her choice. I agree The question is like going back to it is like when in the pregnancy? I definitely think it would create a pretty unhealthy kind of power dynamic for like a husband to just be allowed to like veto his wife's decision to have an abortion. Yeah Well thank you for joining us on our last episode of the season this was a really insightful conversation and I think that this is a conversation that will continue to go on and it'll be interesting to see what happens in this discussion. Thank you for watching