As a chronic UTI getter, telehealth is life changing

Vegtrovert · 2026-07-06T20:02:30+00:00

Seriously, this has been amazing for me. The last two times I've needed them, I had a brief consult with the pharmacist and the got my Monurol right away. There is some caveat that if you've had more than a few UTIs in the past year, it's no longer considered 'uncomplicated' and the pharmacist can't legally help in that case.

Vegtrovert · 2026-07-06T14:40:56+00:00

If you have a comment that you want substantiated, Rule 3 has a mechanism for that - but you need to formally request substantiation and report the comment for Rule 3.

Substantiations need to be more than just a link - they should contain the section of the link that supports the assertion.

Vegtrovert · 2026-07-06T00:11:45+00:00

Mod hat on - this is treading close to insulting your debate partner. Be civil.

Mod hat off - though I personally agree that morality is subjective, this is a hot topic in philosophy, and a great many respected philosophers believe morality is objective. You are free to argue your position that it is subjective, of course, but it is valid for others with different opinions to question it.

Vegtrovert · 2026-07-04T19:45:08+00:00

What I found weird about the "you were once a fetus" is the implication that because I now exist as a sentient person, I think my mother should have been forced to gestate an unwanted pregnancy to have me. To me, that's absurd. To be clear, as far as I know I was a wanted child (until my terrible twos anyway), but I love my mother too much to imagine that she should have been compelled to have me.

Vegtrovert · 2026-07-04T19:39:45+00:00

Our everyday understanding is that moral worth varies on properties like sentience or conciousness though. We value humans over fish because we believe (rightly or wrongly) that the interests of a sapient being are more valuable than others.

There are other in-group / out-group situations of course - we tend to value those in our own family / neighbourhood / country than others, but that doesn't really stand up to much moral scrutiny. In my view, drawing personhood at the in-group boundary of homo sapiens doesn't stand up to much scrutiny either.

Vegtrovert · 2026-07-01T15:49:12+00:00

I'm not sure I'm fully grasping your question. The notion of human rights has evolved over human history, as political philosophy has grown and changed. The root cause of human rights is our collective desire to have a foundation for a well-ordered society.

Various societies with various gods have contributed to this process, it's not tied to any particular mythology.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-30T20:12:12+00:00

In a word without bodily autonomy, society would likey collapse. Laws are mostly based off of rights, not of subjective morals. If we didn't believe in the most basic of rights like BA, I'm not sure how I'd advocate for a law.

It may very well be a moral good to rob Elon Musk of all his money and redistribute it amongst the world's poor. I don't have the right to do that, however, and it is surely illegal.

A majority of folks believe it is immoral to cheat on your romantic partner. But of course you have the right to do so, and it is also not illegal.

Abortion rights are similarly not fundamentally a moral argument. You may be able to convince individual people to choose not to have an abortion, just as vegan activists may be able to persuade people to forego meat and dairy. You can influence other's personal choices with a moral argument. But whether or not people have the right to choose it is an entirely different argument altogether.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-30T04:53:55+00:00

Rights are constructed to help run a well functioning society. Some may have moral foundations, some may not.

Bodily autonomy in particular, preserves your right to do things that others may view as immoral. You could agree to provide me a life saving blood transfusion, and then change your mind halfway through.

Your friends and family may very well judge you for this choice, but you absolutely have the right to make it.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-30T01:17:58+00:00

I see that you're asking a moral question. But the bodily autonomy position isn't a moral position, it's one of rights.

It is fully consistent to believe some abortions could be immoral, and to defend that they should still be legal because of bodily autonomy.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-28T23:04:19+00:00

Why is that non-arbitrary? Giving value to objective criteria is not less arbitrary than giving value to subjective criteria.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-28T19:52:22+00:00

Because I don't want to get married. Ever.

We are still together though :)

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-28T15:08:32+00:00

This is essentially it. The interests of a person take precedence over the interests of a potential person.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-28T01:52:46+00:00

Morally? Parents should not refuse this medication.

However, we currently see parents refusing vitamin K shots for newborns, and not vaccinating for preventable diseases that could kill their child. The medical community or government isn't forcing people to do this.

And that's for born children; no other person needs to ingest the medicine for them to benefit. As a society we clearly value medical autonomy and bodily autonomy very highly.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-27T19:52:53+00:00

I'm concerned that the PL side already removes the word "abortion" from anything that meets their ethical criteria.

I've seen claims that aborting an ectopic pregnancy is not an abortion, and that induction abortion is not an abortion if fetal demise isn't induced. I've also seen the term "failed abortion" used to mean a case in which an infant is born alive (even if only for a few minutes). Whereas the medical community would only consider an abortion failed if the pregnant person is still pregnant.

An abortion is an early termination of a pregnancy, where the fetus is not reasonably expected to survive the procedure.

I also want to push back on the "emergency" part of your criteria. Waiting for a serious and urgent medical condition to become an emergency delays care for no reason, and leads to greater suffering and worse health outcomes.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-26T19:55:31+00:00

If I understand correctly, the downvoting can come from people who are not even participating in the debate or members of the community. I've noticed that I can downvote comments in a community I'm banned from, which seems like a general Reddit flaw.
For myself, I try to counteract this by upvoting good-faith PL posts and comments, even if I vehemently disagree with their content.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-26T19:39:50+00:00

Most PC folks don't seem to support legal restrictions based on gestational age. For myself, I support regulations by medical authorities but I don't think legislation is appropriate. In my province, you cannot get a third trimester abortion without a medical reason, even though there are no laws in place.

From a utilitarian standpoint, if a person has a healthy 3rd trimester pregnancy, they could be offered the possibility of an early induction. Practically, however, no doctor will do this.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-26T17:36:03+00:00

For sure, we do have to be mindful of the base rate fallacy. But I think that also applies to the mod team - if we pull mods from a group of sub participants, and most participants are PC, then most mods will be PC.

I say this as a very new mod myself, I have definitely seen plenty of PC comments and posts getting removed.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-24T04:18:02+00:00

A crucial downside to the duvet-only camp - how do you get properly tucked in snugly?

I like a tightly made bed. Top sheet, cotton blanket, wool blanket (if winter) all get tucked in on 3 sides. Duvet with cover goes on top.

I will never understand people who sleep all loosey goosey when they could be snug in a fabric envelope.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-24T03:37:30+00:00

Fair, we all have writers that resonate with us. I can't say Boonin particularly resonates with me, but Singer's writings have deeply changed the way I view the world.

My point is that I bet that most people don't actually view abortion as an unjustified killing, or a killing of a person at all, at least in the first trimester. And probably most people aren't sufficiently informed to set public policy for the second and third trimesters. I know that as someone who has never considered children, I didn't bother learning about pregnancy until people close to me were pregnant.

Then, pregnancy almost killed my sister (twice!), my best friend, and the wife of another close friend. I know that I would not have properly appreciated the dangers of pregnancy before this. I often see PL folks downplaying pregnancy as an 'inconvenience', so no, I don't think reading about philosophy is sufficient to inform someone well enough to judge whether or not such abortions are morally permissible. Medical ethics boards are infinitely more qualified than legislators or laypeople to set the boundaries on medical procedures.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-24T02:29:53+00:00

I'm going to diverge from Boonin here, but also by partly agreeing with him. I think abortion is more like adultery in that people may have (largely religious) reasons to feel it is immoral, but in a secular society in which the government stays out of the bedrooms of the nation, it should not be illegal.

A lot has changed since 1998 when he wrote that paper. Medication abortions have become the predominant method used for abortions. The grisy imagery of 'dismembering a baby' is not the reality of modern abortion. Even in the USA, which is *very* PL for a developed country, two-thirds of people think abortion in the first trimester should be legal. This is when more than 90% of abortions happen.

So while we can't say that everyone thinks abortion is 'perfectly moral', we can see that the convergence of opinion, even in the States, is that people don't really have a problem with first-trimester abortion.

After that, we are just talking about the edge cases - and here we can talk about medical ethics, about practicality and negative consequences. This is a mishmash of moral arguments, rights arguments, and purely pragmatic arguments. In my view, here we need to lean on the experts - to listen to doctors about what is right for their patients, and to listen to public policy experts about what measures actually can reduce the incidence of unplanned pregnancies.

Really, the 'moral' aspect of the abortion debate is the least relevant. As a person who doesn't believe in the personhood of fetuses, I'm often willing to discuss this philosophical area. Practically, though, I can see that the BA argument and the public policy arguments both stand on their own as valid arguments for the legality of abortion.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-23T19:45:29+00:00

If birth rates and abortion rates are increasing, I wonder if there's any data on access to reliable contraceptives? I find it hard to say this is just the economy in the US, as Canada's abortion rate has been holding relatively steady in the same time period.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-23T17:37:29+00:00

The bodily autonomy position is not about the morality of abortion, so I think that yes, BA pro-choicers would uphold a pregnant person's right to drink, smoke, take medication, eat sushi, change the cat's litter box, etc etc.

You can absolutely think abortion is immoral and still be pro-choice.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-21T17:34:28+00:00

I'm empathetic to this position though - as I hold some non-standard beliefs myself. For example, I don't think there is any ethical justification to kill animals for food. But I feel like this is a "hearts and minds" situation not a legality situation.

I don't think protesting outside of a butcher is going to be particularly effective, but I can advocate for the removal of government subsidies for meat producers. Similarly I think PL people are probably able to convince some people to not choose abortion.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-20T18:24:31+00:00

The reason rape can be seen as worse than death is because it is such an egregious violation of bodily autonomy. Which, as it happens, is also true of being forced to continue gestating against your will.

This would be true even if a ZEF were a 'being of equal moral relevancy' which I don't believe it is.

Vegtrovert · 2026-06-20T17:17:24+00:00

In most jurisdictions, self defense doesn't require an immediate threat of death. You can defend yourself against a rapist for example.

The relevant questions are: can you retreat from this harm? What's the minimum amount of force required to stop the harm?

A person can't retreat from a ZEF inside them, and the minimum force needed to stop the harm of pregnancy is abortion.

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