The biggest, most obvious flaw to this argument is, "where does the fetus' bodily autonomy fit in?".
You can only justify abortion if you believe a fetus is not alive or not human. If it is a human life, then it has all the rights of a human, and you should not be allowed to choose to end its life just because its life is inconvenient for you for 9 months.
Here's a couple of hypothetical scenarios:
1) Imagine a scenario of Siamese twins attached in such a way that separating them would guarantee the death of one but the full bodily autonomy of the other. Does the one who would get full autonomy have the right to choose to end the life of the other in order to achieve autonomy? If that's not enough, now imagine that in just 9 months, they would separate naturally. Does the one who would get full autonomy have the right to end the life of the other in order to get autonomy 9 months earlier than would have occurred naturally?
2) Imagine a bucket of glue falls on you and another person. The doctor says they could remove you from each other, but it would probably kill you. Alternatively, in 9 months, the glue will wear off, and you'll separate safely. Does the person glued to you have the right to separate themselves and kill you? If that's not enough, imagine that person is actually the one who accidentally dumped the glue on the both of you (after all, pregnancy is usually the result of consensual sex). Do they still have the right to remove you 9 months before the glue will wear off, when doing so will kill you?
I think most people would agree that in both those scenarios, they do not have the right to kill the other person for autonomy, especially if you would separate on your own in 9 months. So as I said... You can only really justify abortion if you don't believe a fetus is a living human.
Not only do they temporarily depend on you for their lives, but they are also in that situation because of your own actions.
Now whether or not a fetus is alive and human is a completely different debate and a difficult one. But I hate that people think they are morally justified in actively choosing to end a life just because they don't want to put themselves through pregnancy. Choose a different argument.
Even in the legal realm it's a tricky and inconsistent subject. Someone that murders a pregnant woman can be charged with double homicide. If a fetus is not a person, how can that be?
I usually don’t get into these topics because it never pans out well, but here we go.
I read your comment carefully and gave it a lot of thought. You have some good points — but my biggest problem is that you seem to think of pregnancy as easy and safe. It’s neither.
We’ll start with the mild “inconveniences” and work our way up:
For a healthy pregnancy, the woman must take daily vitamins, be mindful of her diet (no undercooked meats, no unpasteurized dairy, no deli meat, all fruits and vegetables carefully washed, etc), cut down on sugar and caffeine, and cut out alcohol. If a woman is on medications for her physical or mental health she may have to stop taking them to avoid serious defects in the fetus. In the 2nd and 3rd trimester there are activities she physically can’t do; depending on her career, she might not even be able to continue working — she might even be put on bed rest (which is awful). There’s also the classic constant peeing, aches and pains, poor sleep, and depression that are common.
Pregnancy is usually 38-42 weeks of constant dr appointments (including several invasive tests, not to mention the financial bourden). Many women face symptoms like nausea (that lasts longer than the first three months for many women and can be so severe it requires medication or result in the need for IV fluids), gestational diabetes, preeclampsia (life threatening), cholestasis (a common liver disease that only happens during pregnancy), to name a few. Pregnant women are also much more susceptible to infections.
Delivery itself, even with acess to pain medication, is still a painful and potentially emotionally traumatizing experience. Some women get PTSD from delivery, and many suffer from depression. Recovery takes many months, and since about 1 in 3 births in the US are c-sections, many women are permanently scarred physically as well.
No woman should be forced to experience pregnancy.
Yeah the fact that people are saying "killing a fetus takes action", well so does keeping it alive.
You can't just give birth at your house, you need to TAKE ACTION to ensure the baby does not die in child birth or in the womb.
Not to mention the money side of things, not everyone has insurance, and giving birth can literally bankrupt someone especially if a C-Section needs to be performed.
I read a lot of comments before I found one that mentioned the financial burden of having a child! At face value - it may seem shallow to reduce the life of a child to its effect on a families income. But it can also severely impact your opportunity to become financially stable or educated. We’re not doing the potential child any favours by letting them be born into a family that’s not mature or capable of properly raising it. This is one of things that keep families in poverty, especially in developing nations.
No one would ever say you are justified killing someone because they're a financial burden, right? I feel like the financial argument can only possibly apply if we're not talking about someone... So again, it comes down to whether there fetus is alive and human. You'd never justify killing an adult because they're a burden on your finances... I hope.
Can't argue that. But it brings us back to the impasse of all the comments in this thread. At what point is it unethical to make that choice. I can't say... At what point is it more humane to abort a fetus if it means your living children can eat.
It seems like you are describing a kind of "trolley problem" type moral dilemma... That whole "Is it wrong to pull a lever that will kill one person if it means saving 5 others" moral dilemma.
If it fit that bill, I'd say there's no clear cut answer, but in this case, I feel like pulling the lever would be wrong... In the case of a baby, you usually have options such as adoption, welfare, etc., at least in the U.S. Some third world countries might legitimately have to make that decision for feeding their other children, but still... I feel it would be morally better to attempt to raise the child. You never know what good things the future might hold.
(This is all again assuming you consider a fetus alive and human.)
It is absolutely a dilemma... I can't really add anything else to this. I appreciate your outlook though. I have a close friend who is a struggling single mom, and while she may have had an easier more comfortable life had she not had her boys. She loves them immensely and the family shes made. I don't think if given the choice she would change a thing.
Thanks for your respectful and intelligent replies. Good to know there are civil people out there
They called pregnancy “inconvenient” and compared it to a bucket of glue...
Edit to add: both scenarios just described being passively attached to someone for 9 months with no lasting effects (hence the “safe and easy” comment in my reply). That just isn’t what pregnancy is like.
I may have misunderstood your initial comment, I thought you were asking why I said they thought pregnancy was safe/easy.
I said what I did because I believe the anologies used are hugely flawed and that in no way pregnancy/delivery can be compared to simply being glued to another person for 9 months where “the glue will wear off, and you’ll separate safely.”
I've been with my wife through 3 pregnancies, and although they were healthy pregnancies, I still know being pregnant is not easy...
I'd like to think being glued to a stranger for 9 months would not be easy, either. But regardless... I don't think it changes the argument. Are you saying it makes it okay to kill someone glued to you if the situation is highly inconvenient, potentially life-changing, and has a small chance of death?
I wouldn't think the person glued to you would agree that that means you can kill them.
As I said to another comment... It's not the same scenario. The fetus is already attached and dependent on the person through no choice of its own. Assuming the woman did not choose to become pregnant either, then the best analogy is that an accident attached two people together (going off the premise that a fetus is a person) and that removal will result in the death of one unless they wait / struggle for 9 months. Hence my glue analogy.
If the woman did choose to become pregnant, the morality of it gets worse - then it is more like they ran up to someone, glued themselves to them, decided they didn't want to be glued after all, then killed the other person to remove them.
You just can't compare it to being obligated to save someone's life through organ donation because it's not the same thing.
“You can’t compare it to being obligated to save someone’s life through organ donation because it’s not the same thing.”
Ok, you can’t compare being pregnant to being glued to someone, because it’s not the same thing.
Also, “On average, 20 people die every day from the lack of available organs for transplant.”, so, even though you aren’t physically attached to the dying person, they are still going to die because you chose not to help them. In most cases, it’s not the patient’s fault they need an organ and are depending on someone else to replace it. My comparison is just as valid as yours.
Ok, take out the word "glue." An accident caused a child and a woman to become temporarily attached to each other, through no choice of their own. Doctors estimate it will last about 9 months before they will safely separate on their own. They can be removed from each other before then, but it will result in the death of the child. If they remain attached, it will likely take a toll on the woman's body, but the child will probably live. Does the woman have the right to choose to kill the child to end the attachment early, in order to avoid the toll it might take on her body?
There - now I have exactly described pregnancy, again assuming a fetus is alive and human. I've also pretty much exactly described my glue scenario, but I removed the word glue because that apparently distracted from the point.
What I have NOT described is an obligation to donate an organ to a stranger.
There you go again with “safely separate on their own.” Let’s remove that, too. Also, it will take a toll on the woman. If you need a reason why those things are important please refer to my first response. For the record, your use of the word glue did not distract me from the point, it was your implication of safety and your inability to recognize the physical, emotional, and financial damage to the person in your analogy.
This has actually happened to me, personally. Exactly one time in my life, I have become attached to a child. Ichose to remain attached to that child. I’m thinking about doing it a second time, too.
But yes, I also believe (especially after experiencing it first hand) that no matter what I would do, a woman should have the right to avoid the physical, emotional, and financial hardship of “being attached and separated.”
You do know most pregnancies are safe? My wife and I have 3 children - all were delivered safely. You cannot assume it will be a horrible pregnancy just because there's a risk that it will be. Obviously, remaining glued to someone would be difficult and carry risks as well. Good luck driving - or doing much of anything - with someone glued to you. I'm even willing to bet if you were glued to someone for 9 months, most people would rather endure pregnancy again than that. So I am not ignoring the difficulty, neither in my analogy nor in my mind.
But does it change anything if there are risks? I'd say it doesn't - you still wouldn't have the right to remove the person and kill them, assuming the most likely scenario is that you will both be okay afterwards.
Let's say that remaining glued to an adult human means that you will definitely have uterine prolapse but removing them will result in their death. Do you now have the right to choose to kill them? I'd argue that you still don't, because the other person has bodily autonomy too, so what about their bodily rights? What about their right to life?
Again, abortion can only be justified if the argument is that you're not killing a living human. Any other argument means the fetus also has bodily autonomy and a right to life, because the situation is (in best case for your argument) neither one of their faults.
Edited to fix a typo
Edit 2: Let me clarify that last paragraph... I meant in a healthy pregnancy, an abortion can only be justified if you're not killing a living human. Obviously it changes things if the pregnancy will likely kill the mother, and I think most pro-lifers concede that. Same as it would change things if remaining "glued" would result in both of their deaths.
But I hate that people think they are morally justified in actively choosing to end a life just because they don't want to put themselves through pregnancy.
Actually it is. It is okay for a person to choose not to go through a traumatic physical experience if they can choose not to.
Lol. The person separating from glue and the siamese twin magically being separated after 9 months is not the case with women. Learn some anatomy. Go and actually talk to women about their pregnancies. If those examples were more real and related to pregnancy - one of the siamese twins would barely be a mole on the other's back. The person glued to the other would be a little lump that does and thinks nothing.
If the siamese mole or the glued lump got bigger and the other person or twin became progressively weaker, sicker, in pain and if the 'separation' resulted in the twin or the person having their body torn and bleeding and possible dying - or if they ended up having to take months to recover you know you'd get rid of that mole or that lump. That's a closer example and experience to pregnancy.
The twin with the growing mole and the glued person with the growing other person at best recover in a week. More likely they can't walk or sit or shit right because of all the stitches they have for say, a month. They are incontinent for years or a lifetime perhaps. Parts of their body hurt. They are disfigured. But yeah, it's okay because that mole and that lump have a 'right' to the twin and the person's body.
The Siamese twins 'separate' and the glued people 'separate' after 9 months. Lol. That is not how it goes in pregnancy.
Imagine the separation process lasting hours and days and the twin or the man moaning and crying in unbelievable pain as their skin is slowly stretched and torn to separate the other. These a reason why OBGYN is its own speciality. Women have died in millions giving birth in history. The toll it takes on the body is hideous. Choose it if you like, but fuck off trying to force others to live it.
The day you are willing to have your body forcible torn, blood taken out, made ill, hurt, have your career hurt to give a person life when you do not want to is the day you tell a woman she can be forced to carry a child to term and give birth to it.
Shit on abortions as much as you want. Say its bad and curse it and curse the people doing it.
When you get pregnant and carry the kid and suffer and are physically cut into or torn open from it - choose it. Choose it and be happy.
The fetus doesn't have a right to use the mother's body. It has exactly the same rights to survive as anyone else, in that someone else cannot be forced to give access to their body or organs to keep it alive.
It's like this...
Does a two year old toddler have a right to its mother's or father's kidney? Can you force a parent to give up a kidney, liver, spleen, to keep that toddler alive? Whether they CAN or SHOULD do it is a completely different discussion - this is only about forcing that person to give up an organ to support that toddler. If the answer is "no", then you are trying to grant SPECIAL rights to a fetus that no other human has. If you say, "yes", then I can take your organs when I choose to, because I deem that your organs are more important to me than to you, and you don't have anything to say about it.
Just because the fetus requires a host body does not mean that the woman is obligated to host the fetus. An abortion is the termination of a pregnancy. What do you call the termination of a pregnancy at 40 weeks by cutting open the woman and removing the fetus? A Cesarean.
That's not the same scenario though. The fetus has no choice in the matter here. It is already attached and dependent whether it wants to be or not. Let's assume that the mother had no choice either (because that helps your argument). To make a proper analogy, then, we therefore need an accident to cause these two to be stuck together in such a way that one is dependent on the other for life for 9 months - hence my glue accident analogy. Neither had a choice, but one depends on the other for their life. In the case of two adult humans who get accidentally stuck together, the choice seems clear - sorry, but you'd have to wait 9 months for the dependency to end itself. In the case of a fetus - what makes it different? If anything, I have to assume it's because people don't think a fetus is alive and/or human.
Then you are granting SPECIAL rights to a fetus that no one else has. This isn't about equal rights, or about right-to-life, because you are saying that the fetus is more important than a grown adult,nthen a toddler, than a just-born child
You are telling a woman that they have fewer rights than a corpse. You are telling a woman that she is worth less than a man, because aan cannot be in this situation.
Don't make assumptions, because you make an ass out of you and umption, because you cetainly aren't going to make an ass out of me. No one has ever said that a fetus is not alive. It is a human-on-potenti. Until it is born, it's not a person. It has no social security number, no namebon a birth certificate, no sense of individuality, no memories to create a sense of self from.
Your glue analogy is stupid. It's a ridiculous hypothetical that can be dismissed without further comment. Instead, let's say the woman was raped. She was violated against her will and is now pregnant. This happens all the time and is not a hypothetical situation. Women have to deal with this every day. What now? She did not make a choice. She was RAPED - do you now violate her body atonomy yet again? Where do you stop?
The toddler who needs a kidney is a perfect example of your special pleading. The toddler will DIE unless he gets a kidney from a parent, and has no choice in the matter, exactly like a fetus. The parent can still refuse to give them an organ, and
the toddler will die. That toddler has no right to anyone else's body, no matter how pressing, no matter how cute. Even though the toddler cannot survive without that organ, he has no more right to get it than you or I do.
I'm saying that a fetus is exactly the same as the toddler in terms of rights, and the woman is in exactly the same position. She can decide to discontinue a pregnancy, and the fetus has no more right to her body than the toddler does.
I am consistent in applying equal rights and body atonomy across the board. What aren't you? I will say this - if you give special rights to one group, others will want those same rights. If you take away body atonomy from one group, others will have it taken away as well. You aren't nearly as valuable as that rich guy's kid... So we'll just take your lungs... Because your body atonomy is now gone.
How do you read my hypothetical in my previous comment and conclude that I'm giving a fetus special rights, when I used a child, not a fetus, in my hypothetical? In the glue analogy, I used an adult. That means I am definitely not giving a fetus special rights. That means your 1st, 2nd, 6th, and final paragraph are all irrelevant, because you failed reading comprehension.
As for your 3rd paragraph, I never argued that a fetus is a person. My whole point was that abortion can only be justified if they are not. I feel like I have made it clear over and over again that whether or not a fetus is alive and human is a separate debate. I only assumed it was the case because the original post did the same.
And then I explained why it can only be justified if they're not alive and human - because you are giving the WOMAN special rights if the fetus is alive and human - as my "glue" analogy demonstrated in that we would not allow a woman to detach from an adult if it would kill the adult, when they would most likely separate safely 9 months later.
As for your 4th and 5th paragraph, all you said is that my glue analogy is ridiculous, with no arguments on the merits, and then substituted it with DIFFERENT hypotheticals of your own (a la straw man argument). Problem is, neither of your hypotheticals described the same situation, and I already demonstrated how my glue analogy DOES by removing the word "glue" and showing we were left with a perfect description of pregnancy.
No one said anything about rape, it's completely irrelevant here, but nice misdirection.
Did you even read my posts? Or are you not capable of reason? Or am I arguing with a bot with canned responses? I have nothing left to say to someone who argues without reason - it is clear we are getting nowhere. Your last reply was one huge straw man argument.
Sorry, when I referred to my "previous hypothetical" and removing the word glue, it's because I thought I was responding to someone else who tried to argue the glue analogy was ridiculous - here is what I sent them:
*Ok, take out the word "glue." An accident caused a child and a woman to become temporarily attached to each other, through no choice of their own. Doctors estimate it will last about 9 months before they will safely separate on their own. They can be removed from each other before then, but it will result in the death of the child. If they remain attached, it will likely take a toll on the woman's body, but the child will probably live. Does the woman have the right to choose to kill the child to end the attachment early, in order to avoid the toll it might take on her body?
There - now I have exactly described pregnancy, again assuming a fetus is alive and human. I've also pretty much exactly described my glue scenario, but I removed the word glue because that apparently distracted from the point.*
I thought I was responding to someone else so I was a little harsher in my response, but your post was still one big straw man argument.
I'm not sure what argument you're trying to make, but if you're trying to say that it's not about being alive and human but about being conscious and sentient, I'd say that changes nothing about my argument because I never tried to argue that a fetus was any of the above - I just set that was a whole separate debate.
However, I'll give you some food for thought:
Obviously, it's not about being conscious, or it would be okay to kill unconscious people.
And if it were strictly about sentience, then why is it okay to slaughter animals but not humans? And, again, why is it often not okay to kill unconscious people? Just like a fetus, they are not sentient at the moment, but will very likely be in the future.
Why do dead human bodies have rights? Obviously, there is some human factor involved.
Also, an arm is not a human but a piece of a human... Thought I'd throw that in there...
Really? Lol. When I say, “consciousness” I’m talking about being a self-aware, being with a highly developed mind, not just being awake. Nice equivocation though.
As for non-human animals, people do debate the ethics of slaughtering them, in contrast to say disinfecting a countertop, which despite being a bacterial holocaust, nobody would think twice about.
Finally, in regards to the arm. That arm is composed of living, human cells, which seems to meet your criteria, for being worthy of moral consideration. Obviously, the arm isn’t, because the arm is not a person, neither are fetuses.
It was not an equivocation - if you are unconscious, you are no longer self-aware.
Now, having a "highly developed" mind is a completely different thing - but again, I don't think it's the characteristic that gives you human rights. After all, "highly developed" is subjective, so you would need to define your specific criteria. Also, you can have a highly developed mind but, for example, be dead... Hence why I threw in the "and alive" part. So far, you actually seem to agree with me that you need to be both human and alive... :). I guess you think I should have said "human, alive, and self-aware," but that brings us around again... What about humans who are not self-aware (unconscious people or the severely mentally handicapped)? Do they not have rights? I still think "alive and human" was a pretty good description.
And I never said that a fetus was either of those - I said that was a separate debate and a much harder one to make. My original argument assumed the fetus met those criteria, because so did the original post.
I personally feel a healthy fetus could be likened to a person in a coma that you know will recover from that coma in about 9 months. Sure, they don't have the brain function for self-awareness now... But they will one day, if you don't pull the plug.
The point of the bacteria was that it’s not simply about things being alive. Having a sufficiently developed brain is what is actually relevant. The arm was another example of that.
Honestly, It really doesn’t seem like your putting much effort into understanding what I’m saying.
I had thought up some responses to this, but ultimately getting into a debate about consciousness, unconsciousness, sentience, etc., is completely irrelevant to the argument at hand.
The point I was trying to make in my scenario was that if a fetus meets whatever definition you have to make it worthy of human rights, then you cannot justify abortion on bodily autonomy alone, because the fetus then has the same bodily autonomy and human rights that the woman has, and they are both in the situation through no fault of their own. The woman cannot choose to kill the child any more than the child should be able to choose to kill the woman. The only difference (if you assume the fetus has human rights) is that the fetus doesn't have the luxury of choice.
The "murder" in the original post equated a fetus to their younger sister. My scenarios were built off their premise that a fetus is equivalent to a child or adult in human rights. Whether that is true or not is a different debate, and a harder one, as I mentioned in my original post.
Sorry, I know your post was 16h ago, but I'm just now seeing your responses to the other guy.
Pregnancy is an incredibly dangerous process for the body to go through. Complications can be lifelong and fatal. Go ahead and google uterine prolapse-- women are literally walking around with their internal organs protruding from their genitalia. Pregnancy reshapes bones and shifts internal organs. Your teeth can fall out. Your abdominal muscles can become so stretched they permanently tear. And speaking of tearing, do you know what an episiotomy is?
This isn't even touching the immediate life threatening issues that can stem from giving birth like pre eclampsia or postpartum hemorrhaging. Women die from pregnancy every day.
I guarantee you know women in real life who are still dealing with health issues stemming from pregnancy. Not wanting to go through pregnancy is a completely valid reason to get an abortion. Choose a different argument.
Not wanting to go through a life-threatening pregnancy might be a valid reason to get an abortion.
But you are weighing the risk of a complication or permanent injury against the guarantee of death for a fetus. Again, go back to my hypothetical scenario of becoming glued to another person. Does it change anything if being glued to you carries a small risk of uterine prolapse? They then have the right to kill you?
We are weighing the SUBSTANTIAL (look up the rates of C-Section, the rates of birth defects, the rates of gestational diabetes, permanent hormonal changes for life) risks of a complication or permanent injury against the guarantee of death for a clump of living human tissue with no brain.
So your hypothetical scenario is probably a 75% chance (or higher) for a life altering condition (gestational diabetes, scarring. body disfigurement, PTSD, PDD, hormonal imbalances), to unglue yourself from a clump of cells.
But you see... You are calling it a clump of cells... Not a living human. That was my point... An abortion can only be justified if you don't consider a fetus alive and human... Or whatever criteria you use to determine something has human rights.
Whether or not a fetus is alive and human is a different debate from the one I presented and one that is much more difficult to argue about. You have to draw a line somewhere between "clump of cells" and "baby" - but what criteria do we use? That's tough - who decides where that line is? I certainly don't know.
It's a completely different scenario... It would change things if the person you're glued to has already died, or if remaining glued will result in the death of you.
Who said nobody is saying that? Do you mean just in this comment thread? If abortions are band there are cases where women are forced to bring their pregnancy to term even if the baby is 100% dead. Even if the dead fetus isn't killing the mother it is still a very cruel and 100% unnecessary thing to force them to go through.
Yes, I meant why are you talking about it if nobody here is talking about it? I mean there's nutters saying everything, that doesn't mean you just bring it up every time you're talking about anything.
So it goes back to
What is the point you're making? That you can think of a bad thing?
And when abortions are banned, that wouldn't affect removing dead fetus because that's not an abortion, is it.
There are a lot of reasons to choose abortion other than just not wanting to be pregnant. I'm not going to list them out because there are plenty of stories out there if you just look for them.
52
u/mis-Hap Sep 11 '18 edited Sep 11 '18
The biggest, most obvious flaw to this argument is, "where does the fetus' bodily autonomy fit in?".
You can only justify abortion if you believe a fetus is not alive or not human. If it is a human life, then it has all the rights of a human, and you should not be allowed to choose to end its life just because its life is inconvenient for you for 9 months.
Here's a couple of hypothetical scenarios:
1) Imagine a scenario of Siamese twins attached in such a way that separating them would guarantee the death of one but the full bodily autonomy of the other. Does the one who would get full autonomy have the right to choose to end the life of the other in order to achieve autonomy? If that's not enough, now imagine that in just 9 months, they would separate naturally. Does the one who would get full autonomy have the right to end the life of the other in order to get autonomy 9 months earlier than would have occurred naturally?
2) Imagine a bucket of glue falls on you and another person. The doctor says they could remove you from each other, but it would probably kill you. Alternatively, in 9 months, the glue will wear off, and you'll separate safely. Does the person glued to you have the right to separate themselves and kill you? If that's not enough, imagine that person is actually the one who accidentally dumped the glue on the both of you (after all, pregnancy is usually the result of consensual sex). Do they still have the right to remove you 9 months before the glue will wear off, when doing so will kill you?
I think most people would agree that in both those scenarios, they do not have the right to kill the other person for autonomy, especially if you would separate on your own in 9 months. So as I said... You can only really justify abortion if you don't believe a fetus is a living human.
Not only do they temporarily depend on you for their lives, but they are also in that situation because of your own actions.
Now whether or not a fetus is alive and human is a completely different debate and a difficult one. But I hate that people think they are morally justified in actively choosing to end a life just because they don't want to put themselves through pregnancy. Choose a different argument.
Edit: Fixed typo