Abortion should in most cases be illegal

1. in every structured debate I've ever seen (with the exception of policy debate) has been structured so the second speaker addresses their opponents arguments in their first speech after stating their own case. But it doesn't really matter. Moving on. My opponent states that because a fetus is alive, and a sperm cell is alive, that unless we want to grant a sperm cell the same rights we would grant to a person, that a fetus should not be granted rights. However, this argument falls under the fallacy colloquially known as "apples and oranges" or drawing comparisons between events or sets of circumstances that seem to share a common denominator but are in fact distinct from one another by virtue of having occurred during different time periods, in different places, under different socio-economic conditions, to different groups of people, etc., can lead to the incorrect assumption that, just because something is true under one set of circumstances, it will necessarily hold true for all circumstances of a similar sort. The act of making such comparisons is sometimes referred to as "comparing apples and oranges."(1) as a sperm cell is not a fetus one of the main differences being that a sperm cell only contains the haploid number of chromosomes and is as a result, not human. as opposed to the fetus which contains the diploid number of chromosomes and as such, has a complete human genome. (I cite the same source I used in my first case.) the fact that a sperm cell can survive outside of the body and a fetus cannot is irrelevant and inconsequential. This same fallacy has been applied to the next point about plants being alive. Next, my opponent states that my point about giving things that aren't people rights is invalid for a few reasons. 1. they are living things. as I stated in my previous statement, the fetus is alive Scientifically. The fetus is human scientifically. Therefore, that argument holds no sway due to the fact that the fetus is also alive. The fact that they are already born is irrelevant. Life does not begin at birth. 2. they represent an entirely different set of challenges from children. the challenges that my opponent speaks of would be either pregnancy or childrearing. Since it's probable that she meant both, I will address both challenges. For the challenge of pregnancy, I would point out that you shouldn't have had sex if you weren't willing to carry a child. Sex is not for pleasure. Sex is for reproduction. If you partake in an action the biological purpose of which is the survival of a species through reproduction and don't expect to reproduce you have made a drastic logical error. We cannot strip something that is scientifically both alive and human of the right to life simply because two people made a mistake. For the difficulties of raising the child, I would point out that raising the child yourself is not required. You could put them into foster care, you could put them up for adoption, you could even just leave the baby at the fire station and they would take care of everything no questions asked. Next, my opponent addresses another one of my points without actually talking about the point itself. Yes, women have the right to control their body. But the fetus is not a part of their body. they are IN their body. as for the point that the fetus cannot make decisions or think as a person that the mother can eliminate it at her discretion. scientific studies have shown that true self-awareness does not even begin to develop until around 15-24 months. Long after the baby has been born.(1) does this mean that if a child somehow threatens the liberty of the parents after being born that killing them should be legal as their right to life is inferior? this seems to be the case as my opponent has ceded that the fetus will be considered a person and as such should be treated as a person would. Perhaps, my opponent meant simple consciousness? if this were the case, then they would have to recognize that what we would call consciousness does begin in the womb. (2) One should also consider simply the logical and very real consequences if a "person" is defined only in terms of the actual exercising of "rational attributes" or of "sentience." What would this mean for the following list of adult human beings with diminished "rational attributes": e.g., the mentally ill, the mentally disabled, the depressed elderly, Alzheimers and Parkinsons patients, drug addicts, alcoholics and for those with diminished "sentience," e.g., the comatose, patients in a "vegetative state," paraplegics, and other paralyzed and disabled patients, diabetics or other patients with nerve or brain damage, etc.? Would they then be considered as only human beings but not also as human persons? Would that mean that they would not have the same ethical and legal rights and protections as those adult human beings who are considered as persons? Is there really such a "split" between a human being and a human person? this is, of course dealing with legal rights. For my opponents argument regarding sex, yes people have it. and yes sex is natural. A natural way of ensuring the survival of a species through reproduction. Having sex for any reason other than to reproduce is illogical. As for the statistic that 45% of pregnancies are unintended. that doesn't change the fact that in the vast majority of cases two people consented to have sex, and because sex is the natural process through which reproduction occurs, they reproduced. We cannot as a moral society strip away a right to life because of that error. My opponent states that a fetus doesn't have rights because they are called 'a prenatal human between the embryonic state and birth.' Nowhere in there does it state that the fetus is not a person that label recognizes humanity as it is a scientific definition, but once you get into personhood you branch away from science and move towards philosophy. Because of this, this label is not sufficient evidence to show that the fetus is not a person and therefore does not have the right to exist. My opponent also states that abortion is not the same as homicide. In an abortion, you are ending the existence of a fetus. if someone were to kick a pregnant woman's womb, they would also be ending the existence of the fetus. society and its laws view the fetus as a person and would prosecute whoever killed the fetus with homicide if and only if the mother decides to confer personhood and rights on to the child. So we can establish that abortion could, in fact, meet the definition of homicide if abortion were to be made as illegal as killing the child through any other manner. My opponent also states that the fetus is usually mostly undeveloped when an abortion usually occurs. That doesn't really matter. Simply because the fetus doesn't look human doesn't mean it's not. they have the diploid number of chromosomes and a complete human genome. scientifically, you are ending the existence of a human being even if an abortion occurred the moment of fertilization. My opponent states that a newborn baby is different from a two-week old fetus. the only scientific difference is the level of development which is irrelevant to humanity. The only difference that really matters in the abortion argument is that society won't let you kill a newborn. If you want me to attack arguments, they have to be in your case. I have things to do. I'm not going to not only attack your case but then analyze all of your sources and attack every single one of their arguments too. I wouldn't expect that of you either. my opponent has stated that a fetus' life should not have equal value to a living human person's life. well. they are living. and they are humans. Those are scientific facts. next, my opponent calls my solution harsh and authoritarian. My proposition is no different from how we deter all crimes. We don't want people stealing so we make the penalty outweigh the benefits. We don't want people giving themselves dangerous and illegal abortions, so we make the penalty outweigh the benefit. it's logical. My opponent also mentioned self-injury, if you look back at my initial statement, I am opposed to abortion as long as the pregnancy does not endanger the life of the mother. if the mother is genuinely suicidal, then she may have an abortion. For the details of that argument, see my previous post. Underage sex if it was consensual falls under my previous argument. Rape accounts for an insignificant minority (less than one percent) (3) so I suppose we can allow abortions then in order to save the other 99.9% of children. And again my opponent fails to recognize the scientific humanity and the infinite potential of the fetus. and I'm out of characters.