Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

Traditionally, I watch on television and see the issue of abortion broken down into two polarized viewpoints: those with strong religious views on God’s power of creation vs. those with strong views for “women’s rights.” I view this sensationalized debate as a fallacy.

I will now attempt to make an argument against the legality of abortion, without evoking God in the slightest. In fact, I will argue that it is any modern government’s responsibility to ban abortion.

We must first examine the role of a modern government. In the most basic sense, its role should be to protect its citizen’s civil liberties and security. The government, in order to be impartial, must protect the civil liberties of all of its citizens. Encompassed among this phrase “all citizens” is the least among us – the poor, the disabled, and the unborn. In fact, if the government cannot protect the least among us, how can we have confidence in our government?

I know the argument is often made as to when precisely this mass of cells becomes a true human, but I find this argument irrelative. The truth is we just don’t know, and frankly, we don’t need to know. Having unprotected sex is a risk. It’s a risk that could produce a human, and that risk must be accepted, in fact, it is the responsibility of those engaging in unprotected sex to be aware of the possibility of a child – there is no excuse.

When a woman conceives – she is now not only in charge of her fate, but also the fate of an unborn human. This unborn human, being among the least of our citizens, must be entitled to his or her own destiny. Modern governments do not allow murder. Murder is a direct a violent compromise of one’s own destiny, and a violation of one’s liberties – this is abortion.

I will intentionally keep this brief so that we can continue the conversation with points left out, but allow me to also add a personal note. Have you ever seen an abortion performed? I have… thankfully on videotape. It is a horrible act. Murder.

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

What of those who used faulty protection, those stupid enough to consider "pulling out" a form of birth control, or those whose doctors prescribed placebos instead of an actual contraceptive?

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

Bond - That is wrong on so many levels, I'm very unimpressed and a little astounded that you would write that and believe it.

Really. Really? Really. Most modern birth control is around 98% effective, which I guess is the same as 100%. Women enjoy being raped, too, anyone who has watched enough porn related to that fetish knows that. They willingly partake in it and there simply is no excuse if they complain should they become pregnant.

It's embarrassing that someone with a thinking mind would call aborting a mass of cells not capable of thought as murder. A few weeks before my last school year was out there was a huge protest on campus of "pro-life" people, which all these pictures of "babies dying", and all these signs up saying "Warning: Genocide" ahead. They compared it to the holocaust. One of the professors at my campus, who is Jewish and teaches the Holocaust said to one of the people, "How dare you compare this to the Holocaust."

And did you even consider a situation where having the baby could kill the mother? If my girlfriend and future wife were to be in this situation, I would surely choose her over an unborn.

It is the woman's right to reproduce, and no one else has the right to tell her how to use her body, and force her into dying because something not even human yet should live.

And what if you know that the baby is going to be horribly defected at birth? Do they deserve to live a life worse than death?

The potential for life isn't life, otherwise every guy who masturbates or every woman that has a period should be labeled as serial killers.

If an unborn is a human, then why doesn't the census count them? Why don't they have funerals for miscarriages? For that matter, why aren't woman who miscarriage tried for accidental manslaughter? Why do people say "we have two kids and one on the way" rather than "we have three kids." They. Are. Not. Human.

And I don't see -you- ever having to face this choice. You'll never have to expel a 10 pound object out of a tiny orifice on your body, the difficulty of which could cause an aneurysm in your brain that will kill you. You're trying to make a decision for an entire group of people on a subject you can never fully understand. What if a group of women voted that you had to have your balls removed if you had sperm that could cause birth defects?

And what? Are you really going to argue that women should just "have the baby anyway and give it up for adoption"? Yeah, because foster homes and orphanages aren't already over crowded. And again, that's really easy for someone to say that will never actually have to do it. Sorry, but mine and yours part in the "miracle" of life is incredibly small.

Completely ridiculous argument.

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

Well, like I believe I said, I made my post intentionally very brief. I'll respond to your points after work tomorrow, but...

I honestly have no idea how to respond to your post. You raised about twenty different issues. Do you want to just pick a few and extensively discuss them or have a generalized discussion?

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

You can pick and choose whatever you want to discuss. But honestly, the only thing you could possibly say that would hold any validity would be

"I invented a way to make pregnancy not last 9 months, be completely painless, not leave the woman's body disfigured, guarantee no birth defects, guarantee the complete health and safety of the woman, and at the same time ensures that the mother will have enough money to completely take care of the child or it will definitely have another family that can take care of it, guaranteed."

And I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you can't say that.

Seriously, there's a reason I was able to come up with about 20 points in under 10 minutes, and all you're able to say is, "I think it's wrong."

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

Abortion is such a crazy topic to discuss. Abortion becomes, in my opinion, dumb to talk about from a religious platform. Here is why:

(foetus aka fetus - The medical term for the baby from eight weeks after conception until the birth.)

and, a simpler definition of an abortion:

and, here is wikipedia's quick summary of an embryo:

I figure these are important, factual biological terms that need to be understood to have this argument.

I bring up what science defines as an "abortion" for two reasons. One, abortions occur in nature, a lot. It's a natural thing and in many cases a good thing. There are reasons why a woman's body might expel a fetus, and many of them involve reasons like she is not prepared to have a child or the fetus is not in an environment that would promote healthy and good growth.

Then, there's the birth control pill. It seems, to me, that where people stand on the pill plays a fairly important roll in determining where they stand on the subject of abortion. In some regards, the pill does induce "natural" abortion effects. At least, one could argue, the pill could cause an abortion. Long story short, one thing the pill does is change hormonal levels in a female so that implantation cannot occur aka the fertilized egg never implants and it gets aborted via her period. Or, it can cause the fertilized egg to immediately be expelled after implantation, sort of like a "natural" miscarriage controlled by a change in hormone level induced by the pill. Of course, that is if the pill fails to accomplish step 1 and step 2, which is to suppress ovulation and to thicken the woman's cervical muscles so that sperm cannot reach the egg.

The only logical way to tackle abortion is to lay down some moral guidelines and to go from there. It's not a political issue at all; it is a science thing.

Some questions to ask are;
"when does life start? at DNA fertilization? when the embryo becomes a fetus?"
"what about nature causing natural abortions?"
"if you believe the pill is not morally reprehensible, can you logically oppose abortion?"

I'm going to try to tackle these in reverse order, and then offer my overall opinion on the subject. I don't believe there is an answer for the abortion question. I think people are complacent about birth control, and that's good enough for me. However, I think if more people knew that the pill could theoretically induce an abortion in the biological sense, I wonder if they would continue to use the pill. Asking this very question to a Christian-America strongly conflicts with my beliefs; there are enough stupid people breeding, we do not need any more. The pill is the answer and solution to teenagers and sex. It works. However, I wonder if some of the more intelligent people would draw the connection to nature and go, "well nature is a cruel thing, and if abortions occur on a pretty regular basis naturally, why not risk using the pill which has 2 steps before it which would prevent a "natural" induced abortion."

Personally, I do not feel that using the birth control pill is morally reprehensible. To me it does not really violate any moral guidelines (save for pseudo-ones invoked by the religious establishments). The odds of the pill inducing an abortion are very slim. Furthermore, the abortion induced would be very similar to the ones that occur naturally. A religious person might argue that there is no "natural" abortion, and that it is at the mercy of God, and by taking the pill we begin to play God. I always want to ask, "where does the naturally aborted embryo go, heaven?" I would like someone here to answer me this, according to Christianity, when does life begin? Or, I should say, when are we born into original sin. See, I always figured you couldn't go to Heaven if you didn't have original sin and if you didn't except God and Jesus. That's what they preach at my church. So, I figured in order to "be born" into original sin you need to be born to begin with. I don't understand what happens to a mesh of DNA that doesn't make it because nature didn't feel the woman was healthy enough for implantation.

That's all I will touch on for question one right now, I would like some info on the religion thing and maybe some feedback.

I guess I sort of answered question two as well. By the biological definition of an abortion, nature delves out a lot of abortions. However, the definition of abortion that biology gives does not preceed the one that we traditionally think of; which is some sort of medically induced procedure that goes on during pregnancy. At what point do I think abortion is morally permissible? Only when it occurs when a woman is taking the pill. I believe that while using birth control a woman is doing no more than tapping into something that occurs naturally. If a woman premeditates having an abortion during the first trimester it is still premeditated and wrong. She is taking the potential for life and destroying it. In my own mind, life begins at DNA fertilization, and I believe once implantation has occurred that embryo or fetus has the right to life.

To question number three..I believe life begins at DNA fertilization. After that point it doesn't matter what scientific term you want to describe the baby as. Yes, the baby. It will develop into a baby...from an embry to a fetus to a baby it is a living thing at that point.

So, I think that permitting the use of the pill is okay and actually great, because it essentially does what nature does if it has to; which it shouldn't, because it has 2 steps in place to prevent having to worry about it.

And actually, to cement the goodness of the pill, I read some studies that say that a fertilized egg does not implant 30%-60% of the time; so, if a woman was on the pill it would be hard to determine if it was nature or the pill preventing implantation.

However, once a girl is pregnant she knows she is pregnant and there is a living thing in there. And, if she decides to get an abortion, technically she is taking the potential for life away from someone.

Now, I am pro-choice. Why? Because I'm not a woman. Also, because if my girlfriend got pregnant I would be very conflicted. I don't know if I would want to have to worry about 9 months of pregnancy. I do believe that we should only allow first trimester abortions, particularly up to 8 weeks into pregnancy. After that the developing fetus starts to have brain impulses and it can feel pain. So, not only does abortion become murder but it kind of becomes cruel. I wish we could set up a system where if a woman does not abort in the first 8 weeks she gets locked into an adoption. You see, adoption is really a great solution to an unwanted pregnancy. What a lot of people don't know is that there are parents out there who do want kids but they can't have them. Making babies in a lab has a crazy failure rate. It is very difficult to have successful implantation of an egg into a woman who is having birth problems and have that egg stay planted.

There are exceptions, of course. If the health of the mother is compromised I feel that we should offer her the chance to have an abortion during later trimesters. Please note I said offer. I believe that choice should be up to the woman. I did read a heartwarming story about a mother who gave birth and died during birth to save her babies life. Now that's the type of mom that deserves admiration. Unfortunately, there is no way to set up a system that won't be abused that only allows first trimester abortions for everyone, and second and third trimester abortions for people who need it for reasons that are undeniable.

However, premeditated, unnatural abortion = morally reprehensible.
But, I am pro choice.

Weird, huh?

I hope I gave you guys some new perspectives and some new thoughts to wrap your mind around. I've taken a few philosophy classes and a few biology classes, and I'm actually intrigued by abortion. It is one of the few topics worth debating but one that I avoid debating because so many people are either uneducated or ignorant to different viewpoints on the subject.

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

Thats kind of what Bond is saying... I think.

And I think women should be able to get and abortion if they want to. Having a child is life changing thing, and if you can get rid of it with the false hope of "its not alive yet", then why not?

But what a woman gets raped? Shouldnt they have the choice of not wanting a complete strangers baby? Its not their fault someone sexually assaulted them and planted their seed.

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

I don't understand what you're getting at. I don't believe I advocated rape? I apologize if that was the misconception.

We are talking about the mass of cells that creates a human, correct? When do you think this mass of cells becomes a human? A month? Two months? Three months? ... ?

I didn't compare abortion to the Holocaust?

Just because I didn't address this scenario doesn't mean I didn't consider it. As I stated, I intentionally kept my post brief. If the baby threatens the life of the mother then the baby is infringing upon the woman's life. This is a unique scenario which requires a unique course of action.

I agree that it is a woman's right to reproduce, but along with that right comes a responsibility. The right of reproduction is tandem to the responsibility of producing life. For every right we have as humans we also have a responsibility. And again, you are using a unique scenario. If you would like to discuss unique scenarios that is fine, but we can't generalize from those unique scenarios.

In the question you are implying that there is a life worse than death - which is debatable. What is life? What is death? Wonderful philosophical questions.

That's actually not what I said. I believe I stated engaging in unprotected sex creates potential for life, not masturbation. Not sure if this was a misunderstanding or something else?

If a pregnant woman is murdered, why is the murderer charged with double homicide?


------------------------

After rereading your post, I can't help but think you took my post as a personal attack against you. In fact, I could feel the anger in your typing as I read. I hope you don't feel this way, as my intention was not to personally attack you, but rather to raise a discussion concerning abortion.

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

I'm just curious as to what reaction you are trying to evoke out of this statement. Nothing personal, it just sounds kind of like a jab. But, I'm probably misinterpreting it :p.


They [the male and female] should be entitled to reach a decision before the end of the first trimester and decide if they want to have an abortion or go through with the pregnancy. What they should not do is have an unwanted child and attempt to raise it in a chaotic environment. If the choices are
A) abortion
B) adoption
C) raise the kid in an unloving and abusive environment

I would personally prefer B) on my own moral grounds, but would accept both A) and B) as a better alternate to C).


If it were up to me they should be sterilized too; as people who have unprotected sex on a whim without considering the consequences are the type of people that perpetuate mass stupidity on this planet.

This is a semi-satirical critique. Don't quote me on that.

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

Honestly, just trying to get discussion going. I have a habit of making sentences which sound like jabs I suppose.

I read your post KG, and I agree with the majority of it, but I do have an issue I would like to raise with you. I believe you stated that you believe human life begins at the impact of DNA fertilization. So then you would consider the "mass of cells" after DNA fertilization to be a human, correct? So, if this "mass of cells" is a human, then don't you have to afford this human rights? Isn't this human entitled to liberties?

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

I have to ask, what is the difference between a 1-year old and a 15-year old? The 1-year old is less developed, so certainly it is less entitled to life than the 15-year old, right? You haven't clearly stated where you stand on when life begins, but at DNA fertilization a human is indeed conceived. Maybe it's not called a baby yet, but it still has life or life potential. Killing that baby may not seem as squeamish as killing a man, but you essentially remove the potential for future life from that living thing, which is morally reprehensible according to MANY people, not just religious folk (I inject the religious folk thing because some people associate morals with religion, however many moral codes have absolutely nothing to do with religion. I just wanted to clarify that). However, by adding the "Holocaust survivor" bs to your statement, you are simply sensationalizing it in an effort to evoke some sort of sympathy out of your argument. It's a clever ploy but it's not going to work on me. I don't really give a rats ass what your professor did or what horrible suffering he went through, that has very little bound on the topic at hand, which is abortion.

Edit: It sounds like you got suckered into your professor's clever sensationalism too. Abortion, by some definitions, is comparative to ending a human life. Your professor has an easy topic to work with; the Holocaust was terrible, so certainly it must be worse than abortion. Your professor completely negated to have an argument. I hope your professor teaches a math or a science and not an English or philosophy or psychology class.


If the abortion is premeditated, that is to say, if the mother knows she is killing the baby, by many moral codes this is reprehensible. It is morally wrong. You are thinking in terms of reactions, not moral standards, and in a sense you are actually missing out on a great argument.

This is a sensationalist argument, but certainly one that has some truths. I agree, if a woman has to choose between her life or her unborn child's she should be able to make that choice. What I can't agree with is that if she chose to abort that child that it would be morally permissible.

You aren't in a position to answer that question because you aren't deciding if you want to live or die. I can't answer that question either. But, I would hope that a parent would not make a morally reprehensible decision to abort their child because they found it it will be born with down syndrome. There is such a thing as adoption.

Edit: I am playing devil's advocate with this point, as I already stated in response to Bond that I put slightly different values on human life at certain times. However, it still remains morally reprehensible to have an abortion in my mind. I'm mainly trying to stimulate a reaction or argument from you, as I'm curious to where you stand and I think if you give some more thought into your statement you might write out a more interesting response.

This is absolutely NOT TRUE. Read the biology stuff I posted.

Again, read what I posted about abortions in nature :p


****

I don't want to nitpick, but if this is the path down which future arguments will go in this thread, I foresee this quickly heading the direction of our last politics thread.

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

This is a good question. You actually pinpointed the very flaw in my stance on abortion, which is that I believe a woman should be entitled to make the decision to have an abortion during the first trimester, but that it is morally reprehensible in my book. It is a contradiction. I even suggested that if my girlfriend got pregnant I would want her to get an abortion, but I can't answer that honestly because she's not pregnant. If at all possible I would maybe strive for the adoption.

But yes, I believe "human life" begins when DNA fertilization occurs. How could it not? Picking an arbitrary point during development and saying that at this point life begins is, to me, a non-logical argument. Humans continue to develop and grow until they are 21, or so most doctors would say. But, in reality, we continue to undergo biological changes until we die. Our cells constantly grow and die and replace themselves with new cells. To me, DNA fertilization marks the beginning of life in the sense that we know it as.

However, personally, I reserve some unique situations in which human life becomes less valuable. For instance, in the case of Terri Schiavo, I believe that the decision to pull the plug was an okay one. She was in a vegetative state where she felt no pain, had no conscience thoughts, and was essentially a vegetable. She was alive only by the definition that she was breathing and needed food. In my opinion, if the embryo does not have brain impulses and if it cannot feel pain (during the first trimester or most of it), it because slightly less morally reprehensible to abort than after the point at which it develops into a feeling, conscience being. You are still removing the potential for life from that embryo. Hence why it would fall into the category of being morally reprehensible. However, the embryo knows not of living in the sense that it is not a conscience being with brain impulses, so one could argue that it is "less bad."

I try not to bring terms like "less bad" into arguments, because that is a fool's argument. But, that's where I stand for now.

I feel that my gender puts me at a disadvantage to say "NO!" to all abortions. That's another part of it. I think, if I was a woman, I would feel more comfortable taking a stronger stance against abortion. I feel that everyone has their own moral plate, and they should be able to make some of their own decisions. They can live with their own moral guilt.

However, I am only 20, I am fairly liberal, and I'm still learning things everyday. I'm sure I will have different viewpoints in a year, or 5 years, or after I have kids and a family of my own.

But I do enjoy the positive argument you are facilitating, I hope more people contribute to this thread :).

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

I know how to solve this problem!

We just have to wait for The Combine to take over and put up a Suppression Field or until Salarians create the Genophage and use it on use. Thus solving the problem once and for all.

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

I see what you're saying, but...

Isn't saying it should be legal for women to have an abortion only during the first trimester putting an arbitrary timeline on the legality of abortion?

I very much so understand your contradiction, but I think we have to view this issue as a principle. If we can agree that human life begins at DNA fertilization, and we can agree that after DNA fertilization a human is created, I believe we have to protect that human's liberties. As I stated in my first post, it is essential for a government to protect the least among its citizens, including those who can not protect their liberties for themselves.

So, if after DNA fertilization we are considering this "thing" a human [terminology when talking about abortion is always tricky, haha], then how can we not refer to abortion as murder? It's also important to point out that mothers and doctors are legally responsible for unborn children. If one has to be legally responsible for this unborn child, then the unborn child is a legal entity - it has liberties.


Positive arguments with a goal of mutual agreements for the win!

Re: Legal or Illegal: Abortion?
 

Well, from a moral standpoint I believe a first trimester abortion is not good. It is bad and it compromises the value of that embryo.

And, even from a legal, or strictly from a dictionary definition, aborting the embryo would indeed be murder.

I guess I'm saying in a way I'm pro-advocating murder, only with moral reprehension? That sounds horrible! haha.

But, again, the question I ask is does the value of this living thing change in certain situations. For instance, how do you feel about Terri Schiavo?

I don't think there is a perfect way for the government to tackle abortion. The government does not exist to debate moral issues. So, if I had two choices;
A) Allow all abortions
or
B) Do not allow abortions

I would vote for option B). However, by denying the right to have an abortion at all, the government is essentially denying the right to some mother's life. We can agree that some pregnancies will compromise the life of the parent. At which point, isn't the government essentially violating its own goal of protecting the right to human life?

What we really need is a judicial system for abortions, one that has a judge and jury that exist without bias, where they make decisions based on the unique situations presented to them. However, that will never happen, right?

As far as "liberties" go, the main one I'm concerned about is the right to life. That seems to be the only real applicable one to discuss, correct?

Edit:
By the way, if this has any value to you, if I was in a vegetative state where I was unconscious and I wasn't coming back, like Terri Schiavo, I would want my family to terminate my existence. I would not want to be that burden nor do I feel that my life would, at that point, have any value. I wouldn't even want to be frozen indefinitely until a cure was discovered, what value would my life have if I woke up hundreds of years later without my loving family? I bring this up as an example of me supporting that situation. Now, I wouldn't want to be aborted if I was in the first trimester of a mother wanting abortion. However, since I would not have had knowledge of my very existence in the first place, nor would I have felt pain, to me now as a living thing with a waking conscience it seems like a big loss, but the reality is it would not matter as much.