What is the fundamental reason a person defends abortion?

[FaithfulServ23]

I wonder when I argue with someone about abortion if I am going towards the right direction. To state that the baby in the womb is a person who has a right to life and is no different than the baby who is going to loose his/her life from abortion. But I feel people who have gone through pregnancies and still support abortion have a different view. I wonder how much they value sex without responsibilities over an unknown person’s life? It seems reason and science can defend a baby from conception, but it seems that people are attached to a socially acceptable behavior no matter how destructive it is. With prayer how else are we to approach a discussion on abortion?

 

[Ponyguy]

What is the fundamental reason a person defends abortion?

Simple abdication of personal responsibility along with total selfishness.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

They just don’t agree that the fetus is a person. They see it as something like a tumor.

 

[dmelosi]

I wonder when I argue with someone about abortion if I am going towards the right direction. To state that the baby in the womb is a person who has a right to life and is no different than the baby who is going to loose his/her life from abortion. But I feel people who have gone through pregnancies and still support abortion have a different view. I wonder how much they value sex without responsibilities over an unknown person’s life? It seems reason and science can defend a baby from conception, but it seems that people are attached to a socially acceptable behavior no matter how destructive it is. With prayer how else are we to approach a discussion on abortion?

To ease their guilt for being married to a political party.

 

[freerf]

In order to support abortion one has to be 100% certain that unborn baby is not “a life”. If there is any doubt, one should side with caution. Even the slightest doubt means that there is a potential murder.

It’s like atheism. Most intelligent people are not athiest. The athiest foundation is easily deflated by pointing out that the athiest must believe there is not even the slightest, teeny-weeny, bit of a chance that God could exist in any form. Once they concede this, they are no longer athiest but agnostic.

Similarly, with abortion, the pro-choicer must believe there is not even the slightest, teeny-weeny, bit of a chance that this “fetus” is a human life. Because if the unborn baby is a human life, than abortion is. . .well, murder.

If the pro-choicer is not 100% certain, why take the risk?! Are we that barbaric a culture that we can simply hide our heads in the sand for the sake of “choice”?

 

[Hastrman]

Simple abdication of personal responsibility along with total selfishness.

Not always. There really are problems involved in childbearing, and abortion is seen as a way out. Yes, a little reflection would reveal it’s worse than any of the problems it purports to solve, but muddleheaded compassion is almost the opposite of total selfishness. It is fairly irresponsible, though.

Personally, I think coupling opposition to the death penalty with opposition to abortion is A) wrongheaded, since one’s not intrinsically evil and the other is, and B) a tactical error. It’s difficult to say one has no compassion for the victims of rape and incest (which is the best case they can make for abortion, think about it) if one is going to kill rapists and liquidate all their assets in perpetuity to their victims.

Though I suppose we could imprison them for life and liquidate all their assets in perpetuity to the victims.

 

[LifeIsAbsurd]

They just don’t agree that the fetus is a person.

Aye. Take a look at the difference in pictures between a six-week-old baby (abortion legal) and a thirteen-week-old baby (abortion illegal). The later looks like a person, the former does not.

babycenter.com/fetal-development-images-6-weeks
babycenter.com/fetal-development-images-13-weeks

I generally don’t care about abortion in the first 6 weeks, when the fetus doesn’t look like us–no eyes, nose, ears, genitals, separate fingers, etc–and has yet to mentally develop.

 

[StrawberryJam]

The question is simple. What is the fundamental reason a person defends abortion?
The question is worded in such a way that we must accept there is a fundamental reason to begin with, and that this reason would apply to anyone defending abortion.
So, the question is loaded.

 

[LifeIsAbsurd]

Simple abdication of personal responsibility along with total selfishness.

Your argument to me rings hollow because there are many who defend a woman’s right to an abortion, yet would never choose to have an abortion themselves.

They obviously aren’t doing so to abdicate personal responsibility nor out of total selfishness.

 

[Hastrman]

Your argument to me rings hollow because there are many who defend a woman’s right to an abortion, yet would never choose to have an abortion themselves.

They obviously aren’t doing so to abdicate personal responsibility nor out of total selfishness.

That’s why I argued that it’s merely somewhat muddleheaded compassion (though it does have an irresponsible “just make the hard situation go away” element, I think).

 

[Debora123]

You can explain to them how/why an unborn baby is still a human being.

When a sperm and an egg join together and conceive a new life, in that instant a brand new set of DNA is created that exists nowhere else in the world.

Everything about that new life is contained in that single cell…gender, hair color, eye color, allergies, talents, weaknesses, favorite foods, intelligence. From that point on, that life will be constantly changing until it is ended. Conception and death are the only fixed points on the continuous line of a person’s life.

The idea that we can somehow assign an arbitrary point during development where that new life becomes person-like enough to magically “becomes a human” is almost medieval in its naivete and simplicity. We now have microscopic cameras that can see the miraculous process of that one new cell becoming two, becoming four, becoming eight.

If someone wants to call it a “ball of cells,” they can, because we are all balls of cells. Is it the number of cells, then, that qualifies as a human or not? That too is naive and petty. Whether it’s a single cell, or a 32 cell embryo, or a million cell fetus, or a multi trillion cell adult, it’s still a human life, entirely mapped out!

 

[Reservoir_Dog]

If someone really wanted to understand why there are pro-abortion proponents, asking for opinions here isn’t going to get anywhere.

This is a problem with the pro-life movement, because to defeat abortion, you have to know the abortionist arguments. But that takes effort, much more work and less satisfying that asking for strawmen and caricatures, who you can always beat in a debate and feel smug about later.

start with Planned Parenthood v Casey This is not easy reading, but winning the war against abortion isn’t easy either (in the real world, that is).

Saying that “abortion is murder” isn’t going to convince anyone who isn’t already convinced already.

 

[teachccd]

Aye. Take a look at the difference in pictures between a six-week-old baby (abortion legal) and a thirteen-week-old baby (abortion illegal). The later looks like a person, the former does not.

babycenter.com/fetal-development-images-6-weeks
babycenter.com/fetal-development-images-13-weeks

I generally don’t care about abortion in the first 6 weeks, when the fetus doesn’t look like us–no eyes, nose, ears, genitals, separate fingers, etc–and has yet to mentally develop.

So if a person is crawling on all fours and has a blanket shrouded over him I can shoot and kill him because he is not a recognizable human? This is the most absurd of all arguments for abortion. Mentally develop? Then we can kill al of those who are mentally challenged and cannot think for themselves? Now I beg this question: Since conception is not what you propose as being the start of a human’s existence, at what EXACT moment does this composition of cells become a human? I mean at what exact moment does this fetus “look” like a human? Or is there a window of gray area whereby we really don’t know if we killed a human or a glob of cells?

Obviously your mother didn’t share your opinion or at least act on such a bizzare concept.

 

[teachccd]

Your argument to me rings hollow because there are many who defend a woman’s right to an abortion, yet would never choose to have an abortion themselves.

They obviously aren’t doing so to abdicate personal responsibility nor out of total selfishness.

Any woman who would defend another woman’s right to have an abortion and yet never choose to have one herself is a hypocrite. This has to be true because any reason that someone would have for the abortion would have to be deemed unreasonable by the woman who would never choose to have one. So, yes, anyone who advocates abortion is supporting women who abdicate personal responsibility and display total selfishness…

 

[LifeIsAbsurd]

Any woman who would defend another woman’s right to have an abortion and yet never choose to have one herself is a hypocrite.

Does your name-calling have any merit?

Hypocrisy - The practice of professing beliefs, feelings, or virtues that one does not hold or possess; falseness.

No, because usually (and at least sometimes) when someone says they wouldn’t have an abortion but would defend another’s right to have one, they actually mean what they say. Ergo, no hypocrisy is involved in making such a claim.

A similar non-hypocritical case: “I don’t agree with what you say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.”

This has to be true because any reason that someone would have for the abortion would have to be deemed unreasonable by the woman who would never choose to have one.

That doesn’t follow. We don’t have to deem a choice unreasonable to never make that choice ourselves. For example, I will never play the banjo, but I don’t consider playing the banjo unreasonable. I would never paint my house pink, but I don’t consider painting a house pink unreasonable. I doubt people who take a vow of silence, chastity, or poverty generally deem others who don’t to be unreasonable.

So, yes, anyone who advocates abortion is supporting women who abdicate personal responsibility and display total selfishness…

Since your premise is flawed, your conclusion is flawed, too.

Your name-calling is groundless and doesn’t have a place in civilized discussion.

 

[LifeIsAbsurd]

Obviously your mother didn’t share your opinion or at least act on such a bizzare concept.

Indeed, my mother does believe abortion should be legal.

Calling names and interjecting my mother into the discussion. Why is this somehow reminding me of grade school?

 

[teachccd]

Does your name-calling have any merit?

Hypocrisy - The practice of professing beliefs, feelings, or virtues that one does not hold or possess; falseness.

No, because usually (and at least sometimes) when someone says they wouldn’t have an abortion but would defend another’s right to have one, they actually mean what they say. Ergo, no hypocrisy is involved in making such a claim.

A similar non-hypocritical case: “I don’t agree with what you say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.”

That doesn’t follow. We don’t have to deem a choice unreasonable to never make that choice ourselves. For example, I will never play the banjo, but I don’t consider playing the banjo unreasonable. I would never paint my house pink, but I don’t consider painting a house pink unreasonable. I doubt people who take a vow of silence, chastity, or poverty generally deem others who don’t to be unreasonable.

Since your premise is flawed, your conclusion is flawed, too.

Your name-calling is groundless and doesn’t have a place in civilized discussion.

It’s only name calling in a relative world where objective truth doesn’t exist. Playing a banjo and having an abortion are two very different situations. Any woman who advocates another woman’s decision to have an abortion could never adhere to the fact that abortion is murder. It’s a “what’s good for you is not necessarily what’s good for me” ideal. However in the understanding of objective truth rather than relativism we would know that abortion is not bad only if one were to believe it but that it is murder regardless of ones beliefs.

So now if I knew that playing a banjo results in loss of life then even though I may not enjoy playing a banjo I would go to my death upholding the fact that anyone who plays a banjo is a murderer. This may sound a bit out there but it parallels with your analogy.

Now, do we really want to discuss what is civilized? Murdering human beings at their most vulnerable stages of life is the utmost uncivilized act imaginable. My premise is flawed? Pehaps you need to ask yourself where you would be today if your mom aborted you at six weeks gestation. I think that the flaw sits in your arena.

Thank you for sharing your beliefs but you will never convince anyone here that abortion is like playing a banjo or that if the fetus doesn’t look like a human being it can be destroyed. That premise is flawed and you have no conclusion since without objective truth any conclusion will do.

 

[turtle18]

A very high number of people who are pro-choice have had an abortion or been involved in an abortion in some way. It is their way of justifying what they did was right even though their conscious is telling them otherwise.

 

[kbwall]

It’s difficult to argue with pro-choice people because they’re completely unreasonable. They refuse to admit it’s a human being for some unknown reason, and their reasons are stupid. Just because it doesn’t quite look like a human being doesn’t mean that it isn’t one. And mental capacity should never be a reason to kill somebody. Why should their point in mental devlopment matter at all in regards to murder?

Ah, and yes, that word. They always get their knickers in a twist when you call abortion precisely what it is.

 

[commoncents]

Simple abdication of personal responsibility along with total selfishness.

lol, there are a whole lot of people that defend abortion that have never had an abortion and will never be in a position where themselves or their partner would get one. So this answer is just wrong.

I believe a fundamental reason many people defend abortion is a woman’s right to her body. Pro choicers really stress the right that a woman doesn’t have to keep a baby in her body if she doesn’t want to do so and I think that is probably the most fundamental argument for choice.