Abortion: Responding to Body Autonomy Argument (A different take)

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I’m having a back and forth with someone, and he’s latched onto a different kind of body autonomy argument. His argument is not from dependency but body boundaries. To put simply, he believes no human has the right to reside inside another human.

Here’s his positions:
  1. Preborns are human and alive, and abortion kills a human.
  2. Roe v Wade’s reasoning is wrong and did not go far enough.
  3. While the mother’s actions brought the preborn person into existence, she does not forfeit her right to remove anything inside her.
  4. The skin is the boundary which determines if a person may be aborted.
  5. Refuses to address borderline cases, i.e. whether the person is 50% or 51% outside the mother during birth.
To him, abortion is akin to a property rights issue. On this side of the skin, you’re trespassing and can be killed.

I’ve been able to answer his many other points, but he seems stuck on this one.
 
Unless the mother was raped (which makes up less than 1% of abortions) , she allowed that child inside her body, by consensually having sex.
It’s like my neighbor suing me for trespassing if I went over to his house for a barbecue he personally invited me to.

If you have sex, you may get pregnant. It’s a fact.
 
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Interesting. I’ve heard this argument before. How does he feel about his own mother who allowed him to “trespass” inside her for 9 months?
 
Correct. When I mentioned that, he said even though she conceived the child, she has a right to evict the child. And the child should be thankful for the short life the mother allowed the child to have.
 
He would probably say he’s thankful his mom allowed him to reside inside her for 40 weeks, but he would hold no grudge if she aborted him. In fact, he would be thankful for whatever weeks of life she did give him.
 
Sure, but, in this case, eviction means murder , and unless we want to get into castle doctrine, which is a whole 'nother rabbit hole, that’s intentional homicide…
 
I tried to approach his point from this angle:

Would it be okay to invite a homeless man to your house for food and shelter and kill him after you get tired of his presence? He would say no because the homeless man is not inside the host’s body. He’s inside the house.

So he would make a distinction between property and body. And he’ll admit the government can force someone to donate their body, like a cotton swab or blood, it’s minimal (There’s a legal term.). Taking a child to term requires almost the whole body.

EDIT: In regards to murder, he would probably admit it’s killing but it’s justified killing, like in self-defense.
 
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Maximilian75 said:
Unless the mother was raped (which makes up less than 1% of abortions) , she allowed that child inside her body, by consensually having sex.
It’s like my neighbor suing me for trespassing if I went over to his house for a barbecue he personally invited me to

If you have sex, you may get pregnant. It’s a fact.
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This really is the crux of the whole problem. St. John Paul II was right. Before, women would usually wait for marriage to be intimate with someone, knowing it could lead to pregnancy.

But now, even though people know intimacy can lead to a pregnancy, they either think it’s a rare chance because of birth control, or even if it does, they have options to “take care of it.” The sense of personal responsibility is gone.

So is the sense of the sacredness of each individual life. Is your friend familiar with babies? Does he have kids or nieces/nephews? Sometimes I wonder if those who hold extreme views like this do so because they just aren’t exposed to babies in real life.

If they could hold a newborn for awhile, I wonder if they’re views would change.
 
Justified via what, exactly?

‘you’re annoying me with morning sickness, so i’m going to stick a pair of scissors in your skull and rend you limb from limb with a pair or forceps’
 
kamiller42 said:
Taking a child to term requires almost the whole body.
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Yes, but the mother invited the child into her body by agreeing to intercourse (putting rape aside for now). And the child has no other recourse. It is completely dependent on the mother fulfilling her “obligation” to the child. If she evicts the child, it is murder and gross injustice. The child did not ask to grow in her womb; she invited the child in because pregnancy is always a possibility.
 
This is a really interesting and nuanced argument, though. I’ve never heard of anything like it.

Barbara McGuigan, EWTN’s resident pro-lifer, may be able to help you more.
She has 2 slots- Saturdays, from 2-4 on her show The Good Fight, and then on Tuesdays from 3-4 on EWTN Open Line. The phone number for both is 1-833-288-3986
 
Justified via body autonomy.

He did bring up the discomfort and “trauma” angle. So I posed a scenario to challenge this.

I invited him to the edge of the cliff knowing he may fall. Indeed, he slips and falls. Before tumbling to his death, I grab him. He now needs my body to keep him alive. Holding him there and pulling him up will cause me discomfort and possibly injury. Is morally acceptable to drop him? He would say “No” because I would cause an unjustified death. The preborn person’s location, i.e. inside the mother, gives the mother the right to kill.
 
ShowersofRoses said:
If she evicts the child, it is murder and gross injustice. The child did not ask to grow in her womb; she invited the child in because pregnancy is always a possibility.
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Convincing him it’s murder and an injustice is the challenge.

He says the child did not ask for life. The mother gave it as a gift. Any life she allows him to live is a continuation of the gift, and she reserves the right to revoke at any time while the preborn is inside her.
 
My guy would say “No. They are not property. They are both human. However, the preborn is trespassing on the mother if the mother decides the preborn is intruding. ‘You’re welcome to stay as long as mom says it’s okay. Then, you can be killed. Be thankful for what life you were given. It was a gift.’”
 
kamiller42 said:
He says the child did not ask for life. The mother gave it as a gift. Any life she allows him to live is a continuation of the gift, and she reserves the right to revoke at any time while the preborn is inside her.
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I think the next step then is to debate this point here. The mother did NOT give the child life. God did. The mother opened herself up to the possibility of conception, and God gave the gift of life. So the mother has no right to kill (terminate, reject, evict, forfeit) the life that God chose to give.
 
I agree, but any religious based argument will fall flat.

Trent Horn touches on what I’m dealing with here… “[No one has the right to kill another innocent inside or outside body.]”


But he doesn’t provide an argument to back it up. My guy will say that is Trent’s opinion and he disagrees. I’ll listen some more.
 
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If a person was tresspassing on property you’d try to evict them. In an abortion the child is not simply evicted but deliberitely killed.

I believe that if unborn babies were simply deluvered and an attempt had to be made to keep them alive very few doctors would be willing to do abortions.
 
kamiller42 said:
I agree, but any religious based argument will fall flat.
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If he doesn’t believe in God then I think you’ll have a hard time making your case. Without God, life has no meaning or purpose. Human life has no special sacredness or value, so he will continue to believe that the mother’s rights trump that of the child’s. I find it difficult to argue the pro-life argument from a purely secular standpoint.

Are you sure that you’re not just casting your pearls before swine and wasting your time if he refuses to accept God into the argument?
 
So can you just leave an infant outside your door if they are “trespassing”? No that would be negligence…possibly negligent homicide. When your actions created a dependent human you must provide care until another person can.
 
I like your reasoning here, Monica.

The mother’s actions created a dependent individual. He seems to accept that life begins at conception. If that’s true, then can he accept the seamless transition from one cell to fully-formed infant?

If he can, can he also accept that abandoning a helpless infant after birth somewhere is morally wrong?

And if it’s wrong to abandon a helpless, dependent infant, why is it wrong to abandon that same infant earlier in its development?

According to him, the baby is trespassing, but we argue that the mother must bear the burden of sheltering that child until it’s born and someone else can take responsibility for sheltering the child if the mother wishes to give up the baby.

The argument is the same for a 2 hour-old infant as it is for a 2 month-old unborn child…it is the same infant and has the same right to food and shelter.
 
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