Abortion is Generally Immoral

I will begin my rebuttal by stating that Con has not undermined the Substance View at all, and has not proven pregnancy to be a supererogatory action from woman to fetus. On PersonhoodI actually hesitate to use the term “person” in a debate on abortion because “person” is just a legal term that has been used to discriminate against groups of humans in the past. For example, in the United States blacks were once considered sub-human; they were 3/5ths of a person for voting purposes only. In modern America, corporations are even considered “persons. ” As such, it proves nothing about the moral worth of the unborn whether we consider them “persons” or not. Therefore, the pro-life case is the more solid, because personhood is not granted at some arbitrary time in human development (e. g. birth, viability, etc. ). It is the inclusive view, including all humans as persons. The Scourge Con asks us to imagine a case of a “scourge,” implying that the substance view is false simply because of its ramifications regarding natural embryo loss. But this is fallacious. Something is not true or false despite its ramifications. One might easily take this case and apply it to pre-Civil War times, when blacks were not considered persons. Say white slave owners started losing black slaves to a new disease that only targeted Africans, due to something in their biological make-up. It would be much easier to say “obviously blacks aren’t people, otherwise we’d have to spend all this time and energy into preventing this new disease that is taking their lives. ” What Con is arguing is that the Substance View fails because it is easier to consider them non-persons. Then we don’t have to trouble ourselves with preventing their deaths. Instead, all Con has proven is that if the unborn are persons (or, human beings), then we should take a greater interest in the fact that we lose so many of them to miscarriage and other factors. Also, this does not mean we would have to spend all of our resources on preventing natural embryo loss to the detriment of these other diseases. After all, we have many organizations fighting all kinds of diseases (e. g. AIDS, cancer, malaria, etc. ). They are not just concentrating on Earth’s biggest killer. Nor would we only have to concentrate on natural embryo loss. Finally, just because we do lose embryos through miscarriage and natural process, does not give us the right to kill them intentionally. People die of natural causes but this does not justify murder. Many people simultaneously die from natural disasters (e. g. hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, etc. ), but this does not justify nuking countries. Con has done absolutely nothing to undermine the Substance View. Bodily Rights Con’s reformulation of the violinist analogy is, indeed, stronger – but it is subject to the same fatal flaws as the original. First, abortion is not merely unplugging from the unborn, you must actually kill the unborn to remove it. This is equivalent to having to stab the violinist in the heart in order to unplug yourself. Philosopher Frank Beckwith points out, “Euphemistically calling abortion the ‘withholding of support’ makes about as much sense as calling suffocating someone with a pillow the withdrawing of oxygen. ” [1] Stephen Schwartz gives the following analogy: I return home to find a stranger in my house who will die unless I take care of him. Assume that I have no duty to give my support. May I then throw him out even if it means tossing him off a high cliff or into a deep lake where he will drown? Of course not. That I throw him out in the name of withholding support does not mean that I don’t do something else – kill him. That the woman throws the child out in the name of withholding support does not mean that she also does not do something else – kill the child. [2] Second, even though in this reformulation the woman gave her consent, there is still a fundamental difference between the analogies. In the violinist, the person is unnaturally connected to the violinist, whereas in pregnancy the man and woman (in the vast majority of cases) are responsible not only for the child’s creation, but for creating a naturally needy child. She bears a responsibility for the needy child. In short, you are not responsible for the condition the violinist finds himself in; you are responsible for creating a naturally needy child. As such, carrying the pregnancy to term is not supererogatory, but morally obligatory. Third, and perhaps less important than the first two, pregnancy is not a prison bed. Whereas you will have to stay connected in bed to the violinist, most pregnant women are able to move around, go to the store, even continue working until a couple of months before the due date. As Dr. Bernard Nathanson points out, “Few pregnant women are bedridden and many, both emotionally and physically, have never felt better. For these, it is a stimulating experience, even for mothers who did not originally want to be pregnant. ” [3] To briefly reiterate, Con’s objections do not undermine the Substance View, or the fact that women bear a responsibility to the child that they create. I look forward to our next round. [1] Beckwith, Francis, Politically Correct Death: Answering Arguments for Abortion Rights (Grand Rapids: MI, Baker, 1993), p. 133. [2] Schwartz, Stephen, The Moral Question of Abortion (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1990), p. 118. [3] Bernard N. Nathanson and Richard Ostling, Aborting America (New York: Doubleday, 1979), p. 123.