"During the first trimester, a fetus has no idea what is happening, as its brain is not developed enough for such advanced forms of awareness, thought and emotion."
We are all unaware of our surroundings for about one third of our life, of which infancy is but a small part.
"In the first trimester, a growing fetus cannot possibly understand what life is. It does not understand that it is being deprived of anything when an abortion is taking place."
Clearly pro-choicers don't understand that the fetus is being deprived either, or they wouldn't put forth such arguments, so do they not meet the conditions for termination?
"If my parents aborted my birth, I would not have been upset, as I could not have experienced any emotions during those early weeks of life. Although it could be argued that I would be missing out on future experiences, I would not have been aware of this deprivation and would therefore not have experienced this deprivation."
Yes, you would have missed out on those experiences.
All of them. This is inarguable. Whether the you perceive the deprivation
at the time or not, it still takes place.
The way I see it, abortion is acceptable in cases where delivery would be harmful to either the mother or the child. However, if the only reason for the abortion is because the mother-to-be has decided she doesn't want to be a mother, then I don't see any reason for that abortion to be performed.
I agree. That is, the reason given is insufficient. And the harm described better be bloody serious.
The reason many pro-choicers have an issue with pro-lifers boils down to infringement. In order to facilitate a "pro-life" society, we must infringe upon the rights of adults. Facilitating a "pro-choice" society only infringes upon the rights of an unborn fetus. Thus, it really comes down to how much of an infringement one thinks it is to terminate the rights of an unborn fetus.
The rights of the adults are not infringed upon, because it is not their right to take a life. Your freedom ends where another begins. Abortion is unacceptable because you're causing irreversible, all-damaging harm to another individual. Recognition of such harm and its corrosive effect on a moral society forms the conceptual bedrock of our ancient judicial traditions.
abortion should be treated as any other form of contraception, including but not limited to: condoms, morning after pills, birth control pills, and the diaphragm.
All the methods listed are just that, contraceptive. Once pregnancy takes place, contraceptive measures are useless. It's time to consider what the child will need, or else do something evil and dishonest ("Pfft, I can kill my unborn child. It's not like I could have a conversation with him or anything. Poor bastard doesn't even know what he's missing. That makes it okay to kill, right? I mean, it's not like ignorance is a necessary stage on the way to awareness and knowledge, particularly in the early development of a human being.").
the wiles, the outright cunning of nature to couple an act which humans are programmed to enjoy immensely with nine months of pain for one member and a lifetime of it for the other. this is no accident.
if raising a kid where intrinsically rewarding it would not need to be met with a volcanic rush of neurochemicals in mommy.
Birth may be violent, but it's also the only means of continuing the species. Everything "intrinsically rewarding" for us humans followed from birth.
i wonder if the views presented by female members differ chiefly from the views presented by male members (i'd look deeper but i don't actually know the sex of most of the members here). because, let's face it, a dude can never really know what it's like to have to face the reality of pregnancy and the decision to keep it or kill it. it's not easy, i promise.
Aye. Especially since the wrong choice is so seductive.
i personally am pro-choice for the fact that i believe in the rights of the mother over the rights of the unborn child, if for no other reason than the mother already has a life that could be more than "inconvenienced" by an unplanned pregnancy. what i seem to be reading into many of these posts is that people who make stupid mistakes don't deserve a second chance? because i have to tell you honestly, if i happened to say get insanely drunk and have unprotected sex with somebody (without really having the capability of saying no due to my inebriation) then i'd be fucking pissed if i conceived and then somebody told me NO YOU MUST KEEP THE BABY YOU IRRESPONSIBLE FOOL! i'd like to be able to consider things and then make a choice. i wouldn't want to be completely fucked on the results of one mistake. doesn't everyone deserve that opportunity?
You might like to be able to make that choice, but it's not all about you. Some reckless behaviors are more damaging than others, an example being driving drunk and killing a pedestrian. To me, abortion is far less responsible than whatever caused the pregnancy in the first place, because like the drunk driver, you have taken a life, except in your case you made a conscious decision to do so.
i suppose my viewpoint on abortion doesn't really consider the life of the fetus much, but as far as i'm concerned, an unborn life is simply not as important as a life already in the making. and babies really can ruin lives. think about it, would you want to be born to a mother that didn't want you?
A fetus
is a life in the making, though. And a life is utterly ruined when you terminate it so prematurely.
This is not utilitarianism, though my views lean in that way.
My focus is on acknowledging that morality is unreliable and trying to decide if an action is moral or not can be largely insignificant to the situation.
We're very different, you and I. To a moral being, morality never truly falters in its reliability, instead changing when it becomes irreconcilable with itself. In fact, morality dictates the worth of everything else. Whether those "morals" are truly theirs is another matter, but, well, anyway, carry on.
If the motivation behind an action(i.e. abortion) is reasonable, I consider it okay and free from the concept and constraints of morality.
In my opinion, the concept of morality is inherently flawed, for it seeks standardize itself through consistency, which is dehumanizing, not to mention impossible, to uphold.
Your post both proposes and demonstrates an alternative to moral consistency: nonsensical immorality.
Personal value is the arbiter of what is reasonable (follows from valuing logic, and whatever purpose you are using that tool in service of, provided it's more abstract than physical needs) and what is dehumanizing (follows from valuing humanity, whatever you consider that to be).
Again, if the motivation behind abortion was, for example, that the mother would die otherwise, then the situation has been reasonably considered and is justified, in my opinion. Morality is irrelevant. The qualification of an action should not be subject to the concept of morality, which deals with too many arbitrary factors to actually be a valid system.
Your system is far more arbitrary. If morality was not a part of making this decision, we can just as easily decide to keep the baby, or kill them both. Your position changes nothing.
The reason pro-choicers claim that there is a right involved with an abortion is because of the impact to a woman's body and life in order to go through with a pregnancy. That isn't something to be taken lightly.
I'll take it more lightly than clear-cut issues of life and death.
Things always sound better when you phrase them with passion, emotion, and bias, right? How does a handicapped person infringe upon the rights of another person? A better analogy would be murdering a conjoined twin. Of course, the difference in that scenario is that each twin has as much right as the other...
I already encountered something similar (see my fifth cluster).
At any rate, I'm also going to bring up the "do we really need more babies in this world?" argument, as well. I mean, seriously...there are a lot of people on this planet :\ .
Great we just we need to kill a convict every time a baby is born. After all, we already take all kinds of rights away from them as retribution for their criminal choices, right? Of course not. Denying others life, and keeping your own, in accordance with what you believe to be the greater good may be the greatest expression of arrogance (see "A Modest Proposal", by Jonathan Swift).
To make abortion illegal would be in a sense to tell all females that the biological fuctions of their bodies are of higher worth than their own sentient existance or anything they could contribute to society with it, including their own intelligence over whether said biological function is something they wish to have happen to them.
A human life is not a biological function, and pro-lifers do not all want females to go through with pregnancy, even if it kills them.
I believe abortion should be discouraged, mainly by means of pregnancy prevention education, but always allowed without the need to prove necessity (i.e. prove one was raped).
I disagree obviously, for reasons already stated.
A second argument can be made towards it being legal when the actual medical aspect is considered. Making abortion illegal will not cease it from happening and people who choose to abort shouldn't have to resort to risky and/or shady means that would not only endanger them but also encourage exploitation of people in vulnerable situations.
I would argue that people shouldn't choose to abort at all, but of course that's very idealistic. No doubt abortions would still take place were the act illegalized, but this does not mean legalizing would be the solution.
The are the first couple of logical arguments that come to mind. I think the entire topic is one that is rife with emotion on both sides, one problem is both sides are arguing different points, one arguing for the rights of the baby, the other arguing for the rights of the woman, and neither is able to bend.
If we accept that the baby has rights at all, the pro-choicers lose because none's rights extend to infringing upon another's. The disagreement comes from people who think babies are worthless because they haven't yet demonstrated their potential to become mature, intelligent humans like you and I.
Now... in order to extend my life do I have the right to use someone else's body against their will to accomplish that end? Why no, I damn well do not. If there is a conflict between my right to life and someone else's right to control over their own body I am out of luck.
What if it's *their fault* I'm in this situation? Let's take it to the most extreme unlikely condition... Some idiot hit me with their car, I need a blood transfusion (fust a freaking BLOOD transfusion, a little damn prick in their arm!!!!), the jackass that hit me is the only compatible donor that can be located before I'm going to bleed out.
They say no.
Guess what? Too bad for me. I STILL don't have the right to force them to use their body in *any way whatsoever* against their will, even to save my life. NO person has that right.
So if the fetus is a person, so what? People don't have the right to use other people's bodies against their will. Not to do a tiny ittle thing like draw blood, sure as HELL not to use their body as an incubator for nine months. The end.
I'll kick his ass! That person has a responsibility to give you the damn blood transfusion. Sort of like how you're obligated to help a police officer make an arrest if he needs/requests your help. The danger to him is infinetecimal compared to what will happen if he doesn't help you. A prick in the arm <<<<< death in terms of severity, and it's not some huge stretch of his capacity for empathy. I thought this went without saying.
I have yet to hear any convincing or rational argument for making abortions illegal. It's a total non-issue as far as I'm concerned.
Abortion isn't murder, it isn't killing a baby, it's preventing a bunch of cells from reaching their potential to become an independent human life.
You say it's not killing a baby, but when you describe it it sounds the same.
There are enough people on the planet already, why not keep child birth for those that are ready for it and want to become parents?
Because it doesn't politely wait at the door.
I was eating an egg for breakfast today and the thought of abortion came to mind. I mean, you are by somehow inhibiting that egg from becoming a living creature. In abortion you destroy the embryo instead of the zygote - It's a matter of when live "begins". A curiosity: In some asian countrys, Balut, an boiled egg with an embryo inside is considered a delicacy.
The finest chicken specimen is a prizewinner at the fair at best. The greatest human can change the world.
I'm a pro-choicer mostly because I value having the opportunity to make a choice over strangers making a law and then forcing me to follow it. It's way to personal and situational a decision to make a blanket law for it.
Laws in the United States are supposed to protect the rights of the people. I believe this includes undeveloped fetuses, as they will develop into a mature human. Heck, development never ends.
I'm pro choice.
The entire debate rests on two questions:
(1) - When does jizz'n'egg become life with intrinsic value?
(2) - How do the rights of an unborn child compare against those of the unwilling mother?
(1) - When they combine and become a multi-celled organism. Conception.
(2) - Closely. Not to mention the fact that 100% of abortions result in the death of the former.
I personally think that a person's life is only worth something once they are capable of fearing losing it.
That's almost as arbitrary as the Islamic "four month rule." Why not accept those people who are alive and possess the genes of their progenitors as having worth?
Furthermore the distinction between people and animals is our intelligence, so if a human is as intelligent as an animal then their life is worth as much as that animal's. The zinger being that if a baby is not more intelligent than a monkey, I sincerely believe that the monkey is worth more at present.
This belief also supplies my answer for the second question: the mother's rights are more important than those of the unborn child.
This again? That monkey will never be as intelligent as a full-grown human. To value it the same as a human baby is incredibly short-sighted.
This is more of a general post.
I don't understand the argument about possibility and potential. Anything is possible. But that that does make it probable or likely to happen at all.
Every time we eat there's a possibility would could choke and die.
Every time we get into a car, there's a possibility we could crash and die.
None of that stops us from eating or going to our desired destinations.
The child might become a brilliant scientist who benefits the mankind in many ways. Although, how many people accomplish that in reality? How likely is that to happen? Not likely at all in my opinion. I can't say that for sure, because I have no way of knowing, but if the current trends have any validity to them, then I think that decision has at least some merit over just saying "I don't know."
It hasn't. You can speculate as to what a child will become until the cows come home, but in the end, you won't know, and to say pro-choice gets the benefit of the doubt starts the debate all over again. Why not just kill that one guy from high school that became a junkie gas station attendant in the middle of nowhere? His future is far less prom- oh wait, I forgot. You approve of murder.
I'm not sure why people mostly feel a greater moral obligation and attachment toward human life but they are willing to indiscriminately destroy the lives of other species.
I think we've had the sanctity of genetical and familiar bonds hammered into our heads enough. Not all parents love their children. They may often feel like they have to love them, but they don't always come through in reality. Another big tripping stone in this discussion is what happens to the child after it is born.
Wanting people to live isn't the same as promising them that life will be perfect, or even pleasant for most of it. They say life is short, but there's more to experience in this world than familial relationships.
The mother could easily be abusive to the child - and I wouldn't blame her, if the child did effectively ruin her life. By which I mean, ruined her dreams, education, perspectives, relationships. It could have drove her to depression, misery, poor financial quality of life. Huge amounts of stress. She could blame and guilt the child its entire life, and it would end up just as miserable, depressed and will probably carry the scars for the rest of its life. A lot of time the childhood experiences can have long lasting detrimental effects on our lives.
There are other options besides raising the child yourself though. Not ideal, but certainly not worse than death or a life being ruined. Detrimental effects, maybe, but you'll still have a life.
I would say it's a lot different to have an abortion versus killing a human being of any age outside the womb, experientially as well as in terms of practical ramification.
Dictators can order the deaths of thousands without feeling remorse or exerting themselves. It isn't the experience, nor the method that makes it killing. It is ending a life.
