Would making Abortion Illegal help?

[casslean]

The problem is, now that it has been opened, this is a difficult box to close.

Women have had more than thirty years of conditioning to believe that they have “right” to an abortion. They have had thirty years of conditioning to believe that a pregnancy is a disease to be treated. If you yank away what they believe to be that “right”, of course it will lead to an upswing in illegal, unsafe abortions.

I think, honestly, that if change is going to come, it won’t be by campaigning to make abortions illegal (though if wishing made it so). It is by regaining the right to offer information about alternatives to women seeking an abortion. It is by taking steps to recognize the personhood of unborn children through other measures - like enacting other laws that would criminalize behaviour that threatens the well-being of an unborn child. Just like there was a steady campaign to desensitize society to the notion that an unborn child is a person, we need the same type of campaign to re-introduce the idea to society that they are persons and they do have rights.

 

[Hoosier_Daddy]

Through my study throughout the years I’ve come to the realization that making things illegal doesn’t always help the situation. In fact, sometimes the situation worsens.

For example, making guns illegal, doesn’t necessarily (and is quite evident in places like Japan) reduce homicide rate or suicide rates. In fact, those rates are much higher in Japan. And-not only that, but when making things like Guns illegal, it generally only hinders those that get them legally now and allows for criminals who get them illegal already, to flourish-especially in places like America where we have open borders. Filtering out guns on an island country like Japan is a little bit easier to do.

Drugs-is the same story. Since the War on Drugs, the statistics for the amount of drug users hasn’t reduced at all and drug cartels have only become more powerful.
I’m personally

However, the point in this thread is not to argue gun control or drug use, it’s to ask if whether or not making abortion illegal would help.

I see it on a completley different moral scale than the former mentioned issues, whereas we don’t make murder legal because it’s morally wrong. (I don’t think that people would go out and just start murdering, if it all the sudden became legal to do so. Although the legal and life changing consequences are most definitely a deterrant.)

If Abortion became illegal-I think that the issue is, that people would still go through with it-without the proper (as proper as you can get in this situation) medical setting to prevent infection etc. and we would see a lot more “Coat-hanger” abortions.

Let me know what you think.

Well, number one I don’t know where you are getting your stats, but Japan has an incredibly low homicide rate.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate
And I’ll wager more Drugs are consumed per capita in amsterdam than in the US.

But to the idea that the only reason to make something illegal is the effect it will have on the curbing of the action I ask you this. An infant 1 day old is killed by his parents. Murder. However, that same human person in an even more vulnerable state, and it is legal to hack it to death like a third world terrorist. What does that say not about the abortion, legal or not, but of what a society permits by law? How are we any more civilized or Holy of a society than a sharia law jihadist? Because there it is perfectly legal to hack a child to death outside of the womb…

 

[ChristRocket]

Well, number one I don’t know where you are getting your stats, but Japan has an incredibly low homicide rate.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate
And I’ll wager more Drugs are consumed per capita in amsterdam than in the US.

As I stated in the OP, it’s not my goal to make this about the drug or gun situations-take a look at Japan’s suicide rate though, as well as any of the Asian countries. It depends on how the country does it’s figuring.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate

“The reliability of underlying national murder rate data may vary.[1] The legal definition of intentional homicide” differs among countries. Intentional homicide may or may not include infanticide, assisted suicide or euthanasia.[2]

Intentional homicide demographics are affected by changes in trauma care, leading to changed lethality of violent assaults, so the intentional homicide rate may not necessarily indicate the overall level of societal violence.[2] They may also be underreported for political reasons.[3][4] Another problem for the comparability of the following figures is that some data may include attempts. In general the values in these lists should not include failed attempts except when mentioned otherwise."

 

[ChristRocket]

Also, Hoosier-

A world map of drug use statistics

Marijuana in the USA is 14% and Amsterdam is 7%

Cocain in the USA is 2.2% and Amsterdam is 1.1%

Pain Med Abuse in the USA is 1.8% and Amsterdam is .4%

I’m not saying that legality is the only factor here, obviously bordering countries have a play I’m sure as well. But, the numbers do speak-one place it is extremely illegal and the other, it isn’t, there you go.

Furthermore, I’m not necessarily all for making drugs legal-but Decriminalizing them is important I think. We don’t help anyone that has fallen into that lifestyle by throwing them in prison with theives and murderers.

 

[ChristRocket]

Back to Abortion-

Thank you everyone for your voices.
I agree, abortion is on a different par than either drugs or gun violence.
I also agree that suddenly making it illegal, after 30 years of the conditioning, to making it “morally acceptable,” would probably have catastrophic consequences.
We have to keep up the campaign for life to help change the perspective. I love the Walk for Life that is starting soon. I wish that I could participate.

 

[smichhertz]

Back to Abortion-

Thank you everyone for your voices.
I agree, abortion is on a different par than either drugs or gun violence.
I also agree that suddenly making it illegal, after 30 years of the conditioning, to making it “morally acceptable,” would probably have catastrophic consequences.
We have to keep up the campaign for life to help change the perspective. I love the Walk for Life that is starting soon. I wish that I could participate.

Hi again ChristRocket!

It’s a really important discussion so thank you for bringing it up.

To your last point first - yes, we DO need to change the minds and hearts of the people of this country. Changing the laws mean nothing if people still have a mentality that accepts a culture of death. However, I think you’re failing to understand how much the laws influence the minds and hearts of Americans.

Take segregation as an example. Society accepted it as just the natural way of things. When the Supreme Court struck it down and other courts started forcing the very unpopular notion of busing, there was outrage all across the country. However, after enough time people slowly began to shift their opinions.

So yes - it would be wrong to focus ONLY on the laws and ignore trying to help change people’s minds, but changing the laws will help in a big way to changing people’s hearts and minds.

In any case - thanks again for sharing your thoughts on the matter. Like I said, it’s an important topic that needs to be discussed.