Couple leaves fate of unborn child to the internet.

[PrinceofLight2000]

*shrug* Nope; I'd just never heard of them before. No professional connection at all, AFAIK.

Really?

Edumacate yourself, brother.

4chan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Gwen]

All I know is that birth control pills can make it harder to have kids later on. Do they do more than that? I'm curious now.

reactions to them nearly killed my mother, my aunt, and my sister (all different ways). for that reason i've never taken them. i've heard living with a woman on the pill is like living with a woman who never phases out of PMS. i've had my hormones out of balance and i'd say anything that plays with the hormones should be used with caution.

that being said i still believe it's a better solution than an abortion. major medical procedures can cause long term damage that is uncorrectable.

[Wingnut]

All I know is that birth control pills can make it harder to have kids later on. Do they do more than that? I'm curious now.

They can make it harder, but they don't necessarily do make it harder. Other less-than-positive side effects, as shown from medical studies as well as anecdotal evidence:

• Rapid weight loss
• Rapid weight gain
• Mood swings
• Depression
• Charley horses
• Decreased sex drive and/or decreased natural vaginal lubrication
• Breakthrough bleeding
• Increased risk of DVT, pulmonary embolism, stroke, or heart attack
• Acne
• High blood pressure
• Breast pain

When your body undergoes extreme, unfamiliar, and -- at times -- scary changes because of synthetic hormones, then you can judge categorically whether or not a woman should take it.

My personal experience with the Pill was a negative one. I actually read this morning that it is estimated that 50% of women who start a combined oral contraceptive stop taking it by the end of the first year because of either weight gain or acne.

There are many positive side effects, too. Some women enjoy the weight loss. The Pill often decreases acne. It decreases the risks of several types of cancer. It regulates a woman's cycle (though admittedly it's a synthesized cycle). It is an effective treatment (not cure) for polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS).

But it's not a catch-all guarantee. I know you know that, and I know you weren't implying that it was. There's just a lot more to the Pill than you are probably aware of based on your experience with it, which I'm guessing is nothing at all.

[MarginOfError]

There's just a lot more to the Pill than you are probably aware of based on your experience with it, which I'm guessing is nothing at all.

Nonsense. I have it on good authority that PrinceOfLight has been taking the Pill faithfully since 2003!

[Blackmarch]

I'll post almost exactly what I said about this on another forum.

200,000 votes for abortion? I just lost faith in humanity.

This is an issue that hits very close to home for me. I was born three and a half months early, and I'm almost fully functional. I also have a good friend who's paralyzed after being born 5 and a half months early but he's fully mentally functional. We both love life despite our afflictions.

So the "kill the child out of pity because it'll suffer" argument goes out the window. Both me and my friend are proof that fetuses are more than just a bunch of undeveloped cells, and there's no way to know whether a visibly disabled or endangered fetus in the womb will be a miracle baby like we were.

I'll stick with the Church. Abortion should only be even crossing anyone's mind as a last resort and under these conditions: rape, incest, the death of the mother, or if there is a very high likelihood that the child won't survive birth. Although personally, the entire idea sickens me, for any reason.

343.3 k For abortion

226.4 k for birth

>.<

This is all sorts of sick.

[Tarnished]

I second Gwen on this, awhile back I looked into the effects of abortion on the mother. Not only can it seriously damage her physically but the emotional and mental effects it can have on her are also not to be overlooked. Which is why I mentioned on my previous comment that this will probably screw her up even more emotionally. If she chooses to have an abortion not only will she have the emotional issues of her past miscarriages to deal with but she will also have the emotional issues of having caused an intentional miscarriage, as well as knowing that she intentionally did something to murder her unborn baby.

"Wiggles" is what they are calling the baby on their blog. They have posted about their ultrasounds, and how the baby has been waving its arms and hands in the last ultrasound. The mother (I almost hate to give her that classification considering what she is thinking of doing) has been given permission to return to work. So it sounds like medical issues that could have caused problems for her giving birth are going away, getting better. And yet still their last post is about how the vote totals have changed drastically over the last few days, the totals leaning heavily toward abortion.

Week 20 looks to be the last week they could legally kill their baby, week 20 was when we found out the gender, it was around the time when I began to first feel our baby move. It so saddens me that they are even considering something like this considering that it will probably not fix the emotional problems she is dealing with.

[Wingnut]

I second Gwen on this, awhile back I looked into the effects of abortion on the mother. Not only can it seriously damage her physically but the emotional and mental effects it can have on her are also not to be overlooked. Which is why I mentioned on my previous comment that this will probably screw her up even more emotionally. If she chooses to have an abortion not only will she have the emotional issues of her past miscarriages to deal with but she will also have the emotional issues of having caused an intentional miscarriage, as well as knowing that she intentionally did something to murder her unborn baby.

>snip<

Week 20 looks to be the last week they could legally kill their baby, week 20 was when we found out the gender, it was around the time when I began to first feel our baby move. It so saddens me that they are even considering something like this considering that it will probably not fix the emotional problems she is dealing with.

Before Elphaba jumps down your throat, allow me to point out that not every woman who aborts a fetus has emotional fallout from it. It's not a moral issue for everyone. In the case of this couple, the situation and the fact that they are vacillating on the issue would suggest that they do have qualms about it. Also, the concern is being able to emotionally handle having a baby in the wake of three miscarriages, which also suggests that there would be fallout. (Their logic makes no sense to me anyway.)

But there isn't universal guilt.

[zippy_do46]

Bless this "little one" who has to" live or not live " with people who would do this.

[NeuroTypical]

Hmm. So, now I'm starting to wonder if this isn't the next round of "silly people going to sensational lenghts to get their own reality show"...

[PrinceofLight2000]

Nonsense. I have it on good authority that PrinceOfLight has been taking the Pill faithfully since 2003!

Hahahaha. Aside from the fact that I'm not a woman, I hadn't hit puberty in 2003. I wonder what it would have done.

[MarginOfError]

Hahahaha. Aside from the fact that I'm not a woman, I hadn't hit puberty in 2003. I wonder what it would have done.

Your mom has been crushing up the pill and putting it in your apple juice every morning. And that's why you are the man you are today! But don't tell your mom that it was me that told you.

[TL10]

343.3 k For abortion

226.4 k for birth

>.<

This is all sorts of sick.

That's because /b/ is involved, and have been spamming in the polls for days now for abortion. When /b/ gets involved, things go crazy.

Point of case:

The "random" board, /b/, follows the design of Futaba Channel's Nijiura board. It was the first board created, and is by far 4chan's most popular board, with 30% of site traffic.[24][25] Gawker.com's Nick Douglas summarized /b/ as a board where "people try to shock, entertain, and coax free porn from each other."[3] /b/ has a "no rules" policy, except for bans on certain illegal content, such as child pornography, invasions of other websites (posting floods of disruptive content), and under-18 viewing, all of which are inherited from site-wide rules. The "no invasions" rule was added in late 2006, after /b/ users spent most of the summer "invading" Habbo Hotel. The "no rules" policy also applies to actions of administrator and moderator, which means that users may be banned at any time, for any reason, including no reason at all.[26] Due partially to its anonymous nature, board moderation is not always successful—indeed, the site's anti-child pornography rule is a subject of jokes on /b/.[13] moot told The New York Times, in a discussion on the moderation of /b/, that "the power lies in the community to dictate its own standards" and that site staff simply provided a framework.[27]

The humor of /b/'s many users, who refer to themselves as "/b/tards",[27][28] is often incomprehensible to newcomers and outsiders, and is characterized by intricate inside jokes and black comedy.[28] Users often refer to each other, and much of the outside world, as fags.[13] They are often referred to by outsiders as trolls, who regularly act with the intention of "doing it for the lulz": a corruption of "LOL" used to denote amusement at another's expense.[27][29] Douglas said of the board, "reading /b/ will melt your brain", and cited Encyclopedia Dramatica's definition of /b/ as "the asshole of the Internets".[3] Matthias Schwartz of The New York Times likened /b/ to "a high-school bathroom stall, or an obscene telephone party line",[27] while Baltimore City Paper wrote that "in the high school of the Internet, /b/ is the kid with a collection of butterfly knives and a locker full of porn."[13] Wired describes /b/ as "notorious".[28]

moot (the founder of 4chan,/b/) estimated /b/'s post rate in July 2008 to be 150,000–200,000 posts per day.

Also:

Internet attacks

According to the Washington Post, "the site's users have managed to pull off some of the highest-profile collective actions in the history of the Internet."

Users of 4chan and other websites "raided" Hal Turner by launching DDoS attacks and prank calling his phone-in radio show during December 2006 and January 2007. The attacks caused Turner's website to go offline. This cost thousands of dollars of bandwidth bills according to Turner. In response, Turner sued 4chan, 7chan, and other websites; however, he lost his plea for an injunction and failed to receive letters from the court.

KTTV Fox 11 aired a report on Anonymous, calling them a group of "hackers on steroids", "domestic terrorists", and collectively an "Internet hate machine" on July 26, 2007. Slashdot founder Rob Malda posted a comment made by another Slashdot user, Miang, stating that the story focused mainly on users of "4chan, 7chan and 420chan". Miang claimed that the report "seems to confuse /b/ raids and motivational poster templates with a genuine threat to the American public", arguing that the "unrelated" footage of a van exploding shown in the report was to "equate anonymous posting with domestic terror".

On July 10, 2008, the swastika symbol (卐) appeared at the top of Google's Hot Trends list—a tally of the most popular search terms in the United States—for several hours. It was later reported that the HTML numeric character reference for the symbol had been posted on /b/, with a request to perform a Google search for the string. A multitude of /b/ visitors followed the order and pushed the symbol to the top of the chart, though Google later removed the result.

Later that year, the private Yahoo! Mail account of Sarah Palin, Republican vice presidential candidate in the 2008 United States presidential election, was hacked by a 4chan user. This followed criticism of Palin and other politicians supposedly using private email accounts for governmental work. The hacker posted the account's password on /b/, and screenshots from within the account to Wikileaks. A /b/ user then logged in and changed the password, posting a screenshot of his sending an email to a friend of Palin's informing her of the new password on the /b/ thread. However, he forgot to blank out the password in the screenshot. A multitude of /b/ users attempted to log in with the new password, and the account was automatically locked out by Yahoo!. The incident was criticized by some /b/ users, in that most reports on the hack focused on 4chan, rather than Palin's violation of campaign law. One user commented, "seriously, /b/. We could have changed history and failed, epically." The FBI and Secret Service began investigating the incident shortly after its occurrence. On September 20 it was revealed they were questioning David Kernell, the son of Democratic Tennessee State Representative Mike Kernell.

The stock price of Apple Inc. fell significantly in October 2008 after a hoax story was submitted to CNN's user-generated news site iReport.com claiming that company CEO Steve Jobs had suffered a major heart attack. The source of the story was traced back to 4chan.

In May 2009, members of the site attacked YouTube, posting pornographic videos on the site. A 4chan member acknowledged being part of the attack, telling the BBC that it was in response to YouTube "deleting music". In January 2010, members of the site attacked YouTube again in response to the suspension of YouTube user lukeywes1234 for failing to meet the minimum age requirement of thirteen. The videos uploaded by the user had apparently become popular with 4chan members, who subsequently became angered after the account was suspended and called for a new wave of pornographic videos to be uploaded to YouTube on January 6, 2010. Later the same year, 4chan made numerous disruptive pranks directed at singer Justin Bieber.

In September 2010, in retaliation against the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Association of America hiring of Aiplex Software to launch cyberattacks against The Pirate Bay, Anonymous members, recruited through posts on 4chan boards, subsequently initiated their own attacks, dubbed Operation Payback, DDoS'ing the website of all three companies. The targeted websites usually went offline for a short period of time due to the attacks, before recovering. A number of law firms associated with the anti-piracy industry were also affected, most notably the UK law firm ACS:Law, who had their web host account suspended multiple times due to the excessive traffic caused by the attacks. In retaliation for the initial attacks being called only a minor nuisance, Anonymous launched more attacks, bringing the site down yet again. After coming back up, the front page accidentally revealed a backup file of the entire website, which contained over 300 megabytes of private company emails, which were leaked to several torrents and across several sites on the internet.

Threats of violenceOn October 18, 2006, the Department of Homeland Security warned National Football League officials in Miami, New York City, Atlanta, Seattle, Houston, Oakland, and Cleveland about a possible threat involving the simultaneous use of dirty bombs at stadiums. The threat claimed that the attack would be carried out on October 22, the final day of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Both the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security expressed doubt concerning the credibility of the threats, but warned the relevant organizations as a precaution. The games proceeded as planned but under a higher level of security awareness. The threats came to light in the national media after Jake Brahm admitted to having posted the threats on 4chan and repeating them on other websites approximately 40 times. Brahm did not expect the message to be taken seriously since he "would never take anything posted on 4chan as fact"; an FBI official was quoted as saying the "credibility of [the threat] was beyond ridiculous". As a parody of the incident, 4chan temporarily added "Don't mess with football" as an additional rule for /b/.

On October 20, 2006, Brahm turned himself in to federal authorities, and was charged with fabricating a fake terrorist threat and taken into custody. On February 28, 2008, he pled guilty to the federal charges. On June 5, 2008, he was sentenced to six months in prison, six months' house arrest, and ordered to pay $26,750 in restitution.

Around midnight on September 11, 2007, a student posted photographs of mock pipe bombs and another photograph of him holding them while saying he would blow up his high school—Pflugerville High School in Pflugerville, Texas—at 9:11 a.m. on September 11.

"Hello, /b/. On September 11, 2007, at 9:11 A.M. Central time, two pipe bombs will be remote-detonated at Pflugerville High School. Promptly after the blast, I, along with two ther Anonymous, will charge the building, armed with a Bushmaster AR-15, IMI Galil AR, a vintage, government-issue M1 .30 Carbine, and a Benelli M4 semi auto shotgun."

—The Pflugerville threat.

Users of 4chan helped to track him down by finding the perpetrator's father's name in the Exif data of a photograph he took, and contacted the police. He was arrested before school began that day. The incident turned out to be a hoax; the "weapons" were toys and there were no actual bombs.

Jarrad Willis, a 20-year-old from Melbourne, Australia was arrested on December 8, 2007, after apparently posting on 4chan that he was "going to shoot and kill as many people as I can until which time I am incapacitated or killed by the police". The post, accompanied by an image of another man holding a shotgun, threatened a shopping mall near Beverly Hills. While the investigation was still open, Willis was charged with criminal defamation for a separate incident but died before the case was heard.

On February 4, 2009, a posting on the 4chan /b/ said there would be a school shooting at St Eskils Gymnasium in Eskilstuna, Sweden. 1250 students and 50 teachers were evacuated. A 21-year-old man was arrested after 4chan had provided the police with the IP address of the poster. According to the police the suspect said it was a joke and he was released after they found no indication that the threat was serious.

~Wikipedia.org

The couple running the site have been aware of this, and as such, their final descision may not be dependant on the poll results.

[mightynancy]

Just a quick note: I loved being on the Pill! I had less PMS, clearer skin, lost weight (less PMS carboloading, LOL), and lighter periods which meant less anemia. Alas, with my creeping-up blood pressure and my *gasp* age, I can't be on it anymore. While it's not great for everyone, it can be a good thing.

[TL10]

MASSIVE IMPORTANT UPDATE RELATED TO THE TOPIC!!!

Good news everybody!

Details here.

[belledame2]

I was appalled at all the votes for an abortion. The voting is closed but I would've voted for her to have the baby.

[TL10]

I was appalled at all the votes for an abortion. The voting is closed but I would've voted for her to have the baby.

I'll direct you to post #37 as the reason for so many votes for an abortion.

Edited November 29, 2010 by TL10

[Just_A_Guy]

MASSIVE IMPORTANT UPDATE RELATED TO THE TOPIC!!!

Good news everybody!

Details here.

Good on the individual level, though disappointing that this guy stooped to misdirection--first, because it's wrong per se, and second, because the mainline media appears to be tut-tutting about the lie rather than engaging in real introspection about why a quarter of a million Americans have demonstrated such a bloodlust in favor of abortion--not choice, but abortion.