My abortion doubts

My fellow Liberal Conspirators want me to join the Coalition for Choice. I’m reluctant to do so, as I ’m not at all happy about defending the right to abortion. 
I say this because there are two secular arguments for thinking foetuses have value.
One is simple empiricism. Many women who miscarry feel something like bereavement, which suggests they regard a foetus as something like a living being - not as much so as an actual child, perhaps, but certainly more than just a bundle of cells.
The other is that a foetus can be regarded as a call option upon a human being. If human beings are valuable, an option on them must also have value - though again, less than that of a full human.
You don’t, therefore, need to believe in religious mumbo-jumbo to believe that an abortion destroys something of value. 
That said, there are arguments for allowing abortion. Not least is that abortions are often not so much a net destruction of life so much as a re-arrangement of it. There are people alive today who owe their existence to abortions.
This is because a major motive for a woman to have an abortion is that she is not yet ready to be a parent.  Having an abortion at 20, then, can be a way of clearing the ground so that she can be a good mother at 30. If this woman were banned from having an abortion at 20, the child she has at 30 might not be born at all - as she would feel unable to give it as much attention as she'd like.
Allowing abortion, therefore, helps ensure that children are brought up by better parents - with more chance of becoming good citizens. And banning abortion would merely further increase the number of ill-brought up yobs roaming the street.
My problem is, this argument - whilst appealing - is a close neighbour of some very ugly ones. It’s a form of liberal eugenics.
Now, I don’t want to reach a strong conclusion here. Instinctively, I'd much rather side with abortion rights' campaigners than with religious maniacs and evidence-manipulators. It's just that I can't trust my instincts.

Comments

[Chris Williams]

People mourn miscarriages, but they also mourn hysterectomies, and other interventions that will stop them having children in the future. I love my kids for what they are, but my love for them is also bound up with what they've done in the past and what they might become in the future.

Anticipation of what's (probably) going to happen can lead to intense sadness when it doesn't: and of all the possible courses of action to embark on, making another person is one of the most complex, absorbing, and long-term.

Losing a fetus in the first weeks can reasonably lead to sadness and grief over what might have been, without any of this implying that the fetus was an actually existing person.

[Dan]

I think you've missed the point about this one a bit Chris. It's not about whether or not something 'of value' has been lost in an abortion, it's about whether or not abortion should be forbidden. Something 'of value' is lost if I decide to throw my PC out of the window, but I shouldn't be forbidden from doing it. I'd also say that the moral calculus implied - murder as destruction of something of value - is wrong-headed from the start.

[Chris]

My support for the pro-choice position is one based on ownership of our bodies. Personally I'm anti-abortion, but this is a moral issue on which we should keep the state at arms-length. Giving powerful interests that level of control over womens' bodies is at variants with the liberal and libertarian concept of self-ownership. Of course it's a balance - we shouldn't be able to use our bodies to kill. But when it's the nature of gestation within us, the state (and the church) have no just jurisdiction.

[Joe Otten]

It is fair enough to hold that abortion, particularly after, say, 12 weeks, is at least a little wrong. But not everything that is wrong should be prohibited, and not every delicate balance of pros and cons should be judged by the state or the courts rather than the person on the spot.

[Planeshift]

There is also the practical argument that making abortion illegal will simply bring about the back street abortionist and thus cause more harm than good.

Its a little like hard drugs, I'm not interested in taking them and think that addiction destroys lives, but I'd support the legalisation of drugs because that would create a better situation than the current war on drugs does.

[Phil]

Joe - ITYM "not everything that is wrong should be *criminalised*". (Hands up everyone who thinks that making abortion illegal would result in no abortions taking place.)

Termination of pregnancy is the destruction of a potential future person, and I would be very concerned if I thought that choice was widely being taken lightly or without remorse. But
a) as a matter of fact, I don't believe this is currently happening
and, more importantly,
b) as a matter of principle, I don't think moral education should be entrusted to the police

[John A]

You also assume that human life has intrinsic value merely by being there and being created, whilst utilitarian and some other conceptions of life-value would prefer to attribute them value according to how they are lived and how much is gained by them.

[DRF]

Thank you for posting this.

So many people think that those of us who think that abortion should stay legal are horrible baby-killers or else they jump on the slightest wavering as "proof" that they're right. One of the upsides of this bitter issue is the beautiful complexity of the thoughts and feelings that it inspires in people.

We SHOULD look at abortion from many angles. We SHOULD question whether it's right or wrong. Even those of us who know we're better off with it legal should examine the reasoning behind it.

[Shuggy]

This is refreshing and comes closest to my own position, which - like yours - is somewhat uncertain.

On this...

"want me to join the Coalition for Choice. I’m reluctant to do so"

You're not going to make a *stand*? Good for you. The certain, on the other hand, they're *always* standing. I find it very tiresome - and in this case, frankly pretty nauseating.

[Shuggy]

"Its a little like hard drugs"

No it isn't - it's nothing like it. Drugs harm the user. Certainly abortion harms the user too but the issue in question is whether it is right to kill the unborn or not.

[Brooks]

FYI, There is a GREAT analysis & discussion of this topic here: http://swordscrossed.org/node/1736

[ad]

"(Hands up everyone who thinks that making abortion illegal would result in no abortions taking place.)"

I think that it would result in fewer abortions taking place. Is this not the relevent point, when discussing a ban?

"You don’t, therefore, need to believe in religious mumbo-jumbo to believe that an abortion destroys something of value."

Chris, I think that eating an apple destroys something of value (eg. they look quite nice in a fruit bowl), but I don't want to ban the consunption of fruit on those grounds.

[Christina]

"There are people alive today who owe their existence to abortions."

My two younger brothers owe their lives to the fact that my older brother died in a freak accident when he was six years old. Does this mean that parents shouldn't try to prevent accidents, since there was a net gain of two children?

When a woman remarries after becoming a widow, any children she has with her new husband owe their lives to the death of the woman's first husband. Does that make the man's untimely death a good thing?

Just because people can have good things in their lives after tragedy doesn't make the tragedy any less horrible, and is hardly an excuse for actually COURTING tragedy.

[Sunny]

Chris,
this is an interesting discussion but I disagree for various reasons (leaving Shuggy's snidey comments aside).

"I say this because there are two secular arguments for thinking foetuses have value."

I don't think anyone has argued against this.

You end with:
"My problem is, this argument - whilst appealing - is a close neighbour of some very ugly ones. It’s a form of liberal eugenics."

The thing is that you're firstly bringing this all down to a matter of a lifestyle choice. Its not always - what about women who get raped and want to abort on that basis?

My view is simple - what is more illiberal: letting women have the choice over their own bodies or not?

Taking that further, there's no proper reasons for why the 24 week limit should be revised downwards....

[Christina]

According to then-Planned Parenthood Medical Director Mary Calderone, and prochoice researcher Nancy Howell Lee, 90% of pre-legalization abortions were done by doctors. A further 8% were done by nurses or other people with medical training -- the very people the abortion lobby says should be allowed to do abortions now. And of the 2% done by people with no formal training, many were done by people like the Jane syndicate in Chicago, that had doctors provide equipment, medications, training, and aftercare. The proverbial coathanger abortions were typically seen in women with mental health issues and a history of self-mutilation already. Legalizing abortion could never help that -- but it did mean that these women's issues got brushed aside as a political matter when it is in fact a psychiatric one.

I know of three "back alley butchers" who never had a patient death blamed on them when they were doing criminal abortions, only to go on to kill two women after legalization took away the fear that they'd face murder charges if they killed a patient: Jesse Ketchum, Milan Vuitch, and Benjamin Munson. Legalization didn't do Margaret Smith, Carole Schaner, Wilma Harris, Georgianna English, Linda Padfield, or Yvonne Mesteth any favors. They'd probably have been much safer in these guys' "back alley" practices.

[Christina]

DRF,I know that there are a lot of prochoice people who really, in all honesty, want what the abortion lobby advertises as their goal -- making abortion SAFE for those few women who, in consultation with their doctors, conclude that abortion is the best thing in their particular case.

Most prochoicers that I've spent any time talking to are (or would be) pretty appalled by what actually goes on -- the five-minute assembly-line abortions, the sales pitches disguised as impartial and honest counseling, the quackery. But they're never appalled enough to try to change things. They leave it up to the prolifers. And we are powerless, because anything we say gets dismissed as "Well, of course YOU say that! You're against abortion!" Without anybody looking to see if the REASON we're against abortion is that the things we say are actually TRUE.

If prochoice citizens stopped trusting the abortion lobby, I'd bet that abortion could quickly be reduced by up to 80%. But instead they take what the abortion lobby says at face value without questioning it, and let the abuse and quackery continue. And it's really frustrating.

[Christina]

Chris, you said,"My support for the pro-choice position is one based on ownership of our bodies."

Which is also a reason to *oppose* abortion. That's not the woman's body that goes in pieces to the pathology lab. It's *somebody else's body*.

Does ANYBODY have the right to decide that somebody else gets taken apart limb from limb and tossed in the incinerator like so much trash?

[Christina]

Sunny,you said, "My view is simple - what is more illiberal: letting women have the choice over their own bodies or not?"

Would that it was that simple. My friend Ashli had severe hyperemesis gravidarum -- constant vomiting to the point where she'd lost 20% of her body weight and was so dehydrated that her brain started to malfunction and she was hallucinating.

Doctors refused to help her. They'd just tell her it was all in her head, that maybe she didn't *really* want the baby, or that she just wanted attention. Finally, desperate to get people to realize how dreadfully sick she was, she threatened to get an abortion. They all hopped on THAT bandwagon! It wasn't what Ashli wanted -- it was what they wanted. She got so sick she gave in.

She told them at the abortion clinic that she didn't want an abortion, that she wanted medical care but couldn't find anybody willing to provide it. They just told her, "You can always have another baby."

It wasn't until AFTER her abortion that she learned about the medical options for treating the HG and helping her get through a pregnancy.

It was NOT a matter of letting Ashli choose. It was a matter of everybody around her being too freaking lazy to care.

And Ashli is hardly alone. My friend Debbie's daughter Marla was browbeaten into an unwanted abortion by a social worker. The quack used an antiquated technique, botched it, and managed to kill Marla, too. Allegra Roseberry got pressured into an unwanted abortion -- she was lied to, told that being pregnant would disqualify her from cancer treatment and that the baby was "doomed" anyway. They were lying on both counts. Allegra got an infection from the abortion and died.

I've done litigation support for abortion-injured women. What I've seen would appall anybody who really cared about women. But because I oppose abortion, I get dismissed out of hand as "having an agenda". As if the guy who makes his living selling the abortions has no agenda! As if the professional activists whose livelihoods depend on abortion have no agenda!

If I could get prochoice citizens to really investigate for themselves, to stop trusting NOW and NARAL and NAF and Planned Parenthood to tell them the truth, I'd be dancing in the streets.

Fat chance of that.

[Chris Williams]

Looks like normal service has been resumed with the arrival of 'Christine'. Still, it was nice for a bit.

[Brooks]

FOLKS -- the abortion issue is really just about one thing: what is a person.

If you think abortion should be legal in all or some circumstances, and at all or some stages of fetal development, ask yourself if you think a mother should have the right to kill a newborn baby in those circumstances. If the answer is "no", then to be logically consistent, you MUST have as your premise that the fetus is NOT a person. Otherwise you are contradicting yourself.

If you think abortion of even a blastocyte should be illegal because that blastocyte is a person with a right to life, on what basis (other than religious) do you consider that blastocyte a person. What makes a person a person. Obviously it has something to do with the fact that we have thoughts and emotions, which a blastocyte obviously lacks. So what makes it a person.

The "potential person" argument is so weak that it quickly falls apart under scrutiny when faced with even light challenges, so I won't bother with it.

OK, so what matters is "Is it a person" and what makes us "persons" is something involving our thoughts and emotions. Which means the onset of personhood is a function of brain development and cognitive activity. So clearly a blastocyte is not a person and has no "right to life". And if a newborn baby IS a person, a fetus one hour prior to delivery is a person, too. Somewhere in between a non-person organism becomes a person, and at that point that person has a right to life under any circumstances short of (arguably) self-defense, meaning to save the life of the mother.

[John Meredith]

"Does ANYBODY have the right to decide that somebody else gets taken apart limb from limb and tossed in the incinerator like so much trash?"

No, but equally nobody has the right to use my body for their survival. I may want to extend that right to them (although I am not quite sure what that would look like, perhaps letting a starving man eat my amputated leg?), but they cannot assert it against my wishes. The same is true of pregnant women. They do not 'kill' feotuses (pace Shuggy above) they remove them from their bodies which means that they die. If we do not have ownership of our bodies what other rights can we meaningfully be said to have?

[angel]

i think that abortion is truely wrong and i want America to see that there killing a life...and that if they didnt want a baby then they shouldnt opened their legs...

my opinion....

[angel]

i want to start a protest on abortion....who's with me...i maybe young but i can voice my opinion

[ad]

"They do not 'kill' feotuses (pace Shuggy above) they remove them from their bodies which means that they die."

Really? I was under the impression that the foetus was killed and then extracted. Think of the trouble in the US over "partial birth" abortion.

"No, but equally nobody has the right to use my body for their survival."

You have a right to kill the foetus because it is guilty of theft? Are you willing to extend this right to thieves who have been born? If not, it all comes down to the question of whether you regard the unborn as people. I do not know the answer. But I do know the question.

[Brooks]

John Meredith,

Re: "nobody has the right to use my body for their survival"

Let me ask you a hypothetical question. It's unrealistic, but please indulge me. Let's say someone somehow, without my consent, shrunk me down and inserted me into your body, and I would be stuck there for one hour, doing no harm to you physically, and after that hour I would somehow automatically leave your body and be un-shrunk and resume my life, UNLESS you chose to have me removed before the end of that hour via a process that would cause my death.

Should the law allow you to do that if there was no physical threat to you, simply based on the absolute principle that no one has the right to use your body for survival?