Why the focus on abortion?

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I see a major flaw with that objection, so try to figure out on your own, or should I just tell you?
 
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At the very least the scrutiny will render such a statement ineffectual.
 
Aquinas11 said:
Another massive contradiction - if the mother has the absolute right to decide to terminate any pregnancy, then any such conversation about criteria on whether she “needs” an abortion are irrelevant.
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No contradiction at all.

In the practice of medicine, the guiding principles are that a doctor’s first responsibility is to refrain from harming (non maleficence) the patient when treating the patient. The doctor must “do good” by providing care that gives benefit (good or beneficence) to the patient. Because most medical procedures involve some type of risk, the doctor must consider the possible harm and compare it to the possible benefit that the patient will receive from the treatment. The expectation in medicine is that the benefits (positive outcomes) will surpass any harm (negative outcomes) that result from the treatment rendered to the individual patient.

Competent patients can and do have the right to decide what they want to happen with their body. In medicine, that’s called autonomy and it means that the patient is considered to be the one who knows what is best for themselves. Which leads to informed consent, where the doctor must convey to the patient the different types of treatment available for their condition, how those procedures are done, the risks and benefits, and what can be expected during recovery.

But a doctor isn’t obligated to medically perform any procedure or treatment that a patient desires just because the patient has the right to autonomy and decides to have a procedure done .

First, a doctor is obligated to balance non maleficence with beneficence while considering the patient’s autonomy. And if a medical procedure/treatment directly affects another human being (like a fetus or conjoined twin), doctor’s extend the principle of non maleficence and other ethical principles (depending on the specific circumstances) toward the other human being as well. Challenging ethical and moral dilemmas occur in medicine when there is treatment of a patient’s body that has another human body attached to or within it.

So while a mother or surrogate has the right to terminate a pregnancy, it doesn’t mean a doctor is obligated to jump up and terminate her pregnancy for her.
 
vz71 said:
Killing is a violation to the right to life.
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For a violation of the right to life to happen, what occurs? What exactly is killed when a person’s right to life is violated? Where does killing start?
vz71 said:
Being declared anything implies a time when the condition did not exist.
Do you wish us to believe that whoever is declared a slave was not alive previous to that?

Given your admission that human zygotes are alive, is it possible that the zygote is a slave?
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I’m not wishing you to believe that whoever is declared a slave was not alive previous to that.

My point was that society disregarded an individual’s right to bodily integrity/ autonomy and that was the way they were able to say a slave wasn’t a person.

I’m not saying a slave wasn’t alive. What I am saying is that slavery was the denial of a person’s right to have his or her own “person” (meaning body/being) contextualize (self-determine) his or her lived experiences (the right to bodily integrity/ autonomy). The slave had no autonomy will because the master’s will governed the slave’s body/being.

In pregnancy, a woman’s body provides direct benefit (life support) to the developing “baby” which means that her body systems go out of the normal non-pregnant range of homeostasis and must adapt to the pregnancy to maintain her life and the baby’s life.

How can law mandate that a pregnant woman must set her bodily integrity/ autonomy aside to maintain the life of the fetus inside of her, especially if when woman does not want to be pregnant? Wouldn’t a law that says a pregnant woman must carry a living fetus because it has a greater right to its life than she (the pregnant woman) does to her own body, essentially reduce the pregnant woman to a body-donor/slave to the fetus? Why?

As far as human zygotes are concerned, whether they are alive or dead, they still have a right to bodily autonomy. I absolutely can see in the future where a living zygote could be declared a slave. Trust me, in the future it probably won’t be anywhere near a woman’s uterus when it is declared a slave and it likely will exist under some of the most horrific circumstances imaginable.

As far as a dead human zygote goes, it has a right to have its “body” intact and to be free from having some mad scientist’s primordial genetic concoction injected into its cells or split into its genetic code to form a new species of whatever.

Also, please, I’d like to see your sources that say homeostasis is not a sign of life.
 
virgo said:
So—why the almost fanatical obsession in our faith community? Maybe I’m just imagining it? Are there any other topics that Catholics should maybe focus on? Why the constant coverage of it on Catholic radio (preaching to the choir!) and not a host of other worthwhile topics? I just don’t get the preoccupation with abortion. There’s a part of me that wonders what the pro-life activists would do with themselves if abortion were wiped off the face of the earth? I almost feel like they’d just keep talking about it…
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Hi Virgo!
Former pro-life Catholic, now atheist here.

I think pro-lifers are fanatical about abortion because it is probably one of the most horrific violations of a human being’s right to bodily integrity/autonomy. Elective surgical abortion attacks a human body and obliterates it in the worst, most violent way. The way it destroys the fetal body goes beyond killing. If a person did that type of bodily destruction to another human being outside of the womb, they would be charged with a crime against humanity. The fact that the abortion procedure is done by doctors, those very people who are in a profession that vows to serve and treat human life with dignity, makes it more horrendous.

For pro-lifers, the fact that the developing human has played no part in the predicament it is in and its mother is the one initiating such a terrible fate on it is unbearable. Even if the mother argues that the pregnancy forces her to be a body donor to a fetus and that its a serious threat to her health, the circumstances don’t give her a pass to use more force than required to remove the threat. And the force used in surgical abortion is beyond excessive for any type of self-defense.

If her pregnant body is healthy, and the pregnancy is healthy, and the fetus is healthy, how great is the immediate danger to her? Is it fair or just to obliterate another human being because their presence poses a threat? Even when the presence of another human being is a serious threat, it doesn’t give us automatic license to violate their bodily autonomy by excessively maiming or killing them.

A human embryo/fetus may arguably not have the right to life support from the mother’s body and even if it poses a health threat to the mother by its presence, the fetus is still human, in and of itself. That gives a human fetus has just as much right to its bodily integrity/autonomy as every other human being at any stage of existence. Which, ultimately, protects the fetus’ right to life. And pro-lifers get this, especially Catholic ones, and maybe even ones that are avowed atheists. 😉

That said, I’d venture to say that once abortion is wiped off the face of the earth, pro-lifers will get to work on other serious issues that involve the right to bodily integrity/autonomy. After all, the right to bodily integrity/autonomy is the cornerstone of a human’s right to life.
 
MamaJewel said:
while a mother or surrogate has the right to terminate a pregnancy, it doesn’t mean a doctor is obligated to
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Wow ok so women only have right to terminate their own pregnancy. In which case the harm will far outweigh the benefits. Clearly you haven’t thought this through
 
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This may have already been said, but I think the focus on abortion in some of the CAF forums is used as a way to shut down conversations when someone doesn’t like the direction that conversation is going. It is often used like the “when did you stop beating your wife” question.
 
virgo said:
I don’t know if I just never noticed it growing up in a Catholic home in the 1970s/80s, but it seems to me like there is a strong component within the Catholic community that is 24-7 focused on abortion. As much as it’s a terrible thing, I don’t see the same obsession over genocide, children starving and needy in our communities, or a million other ways that human beings are killed every day.
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I am not sure how true this observation is, but I will assume it is true for the sake of providing a reasonable answer. I think a few things are in play here. First, abortion is a violent act against literally the most vulnerable among us. So naturally, it would evoke strong emotional responses. Next, both sides of the abortion debate are extremely fanatical, for different reasons. Pro-life advocates rightfully have strong emotional ties to this argument for the reason stated above. The violence of abortion against the unborn, those who are the most innocent among us is shocking to those who understand the full impact of what is going on in the abortion clinic. To Pro-Choice advocates this is also an extremely emotional issue because at the heart of their argument is the right of absolute autonomy, which has become essentially a religious virtue in our individualistic society. When you have two very motivated and emotional sides, the stakes are high for both sides. Third, I am not sure that people who are pro-life are as unconcerned as you assume about other injustices such as genocide or poverty. Those who engage in pro-life causes frequently recognize the link between socio-economic status and the temptation to use abortion as birth control. Pro-life clinics and other services frequently purposefully locate themselves in low income areas for just that reason. With regard to genocide, well, it is hard to be focused and active in a wide number of causes. Most people pick social causes that are close to them sentimentally (so maybe a family member went through an abortion which makes me much more concerned about it), or even geographically (I am not confronted on a daily basis in the US with Genocide, whereas if I lived in Sub-Saharan Africa, maybe this would be much more an in your face issue).
 
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WillPhillips said:
To answer your question, if someone considers it obviously murder and makes no attempt to try to understand or empathize with other views, then you get fanaticism, as you are seeing.
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Empathize with their views? That a baby in the womb isn’t human and thus it’s okay to kill “it”.

Your definition of fanaticism (you don’t want to be one of those, do you?) is for one to state the obvious, that Tutsis are human and shouldn’t be murdered rather than to see it from the Hutu POV as to why Hutus say Tutsis aren’t people and should be killed? But the Hutus murdering and supporting the murder of Tutsis are definitely not fanatics… because fanatics are bad.
 
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MiserereMeiDei said:
Empathize with their views?
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Yes. It means to try to understand someone’s viewpoint and argument (not agree with it).

Your bad analogy aside, how would you lay out a pro-abortion cogent argument? Are you informed enough to do so? (and no, a cogent argument is not “it’s obvious” as to why half the US population supports baby murder and only 20% support banning all cases)
 
You claim that trying to stop murder is fanatical while the murderers are not fanatics because it’s fanatical not to empathize with murderers.

We all know fanaticism, being ultra-anything or fundamental are all words given negative connotation in the media and consequently in the culture at large and have been buzz words for decades. I’m not interested in taking the side of murderers in order to satisfy you (although your satisfaction is more likely in my refusal) and am quite happy to have someone such as yourself call me any of the above. Empathy doesn’t require me to argue on their behalf, but I suspect you know that.
 
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