Resolved: Unwanted Pregnancy Abortions are unjust and should be banned in the US.

My opponent in his response completely misrepresented my position so I will quickly note make out our difference here. I completely agree with the following points: - Murdering people is wrong. - Murdering groups of people is wrong. - The state allowing people to be murdered is wrong. - Fetus are alive. My objection is purely that fetuses aren't people. My opponent never responded to my argument attempting to prove again one of those four points which I aptly conceded as true. His argument in round two (and round one) was trying to assume that there is an obvious connection between "murdering people is wrong" and a "fetus is alive". My claim is specifically that those two premises do not fit together. Life is not the sole criteria for personhood. ------------------------- I will also do a point by point rebuttal of my opponents counterarguments even though they missed the mark. There is only one point of contention. Your arguments all argue more or less that killing people is wrong. My point of contention is that a embryo/fetus/blastocyte isn't a person. >>1) Fetus is not living, therefore doesn't have rights. This is categorically false and a complete and utter farce. Do not lie about my position. A fetus is living. An ovum and spermatozoa are also alive even before conception long before implantation. All of these are alive. My contention is that a fetus isn't a person and therefore has no rights. Likewise, plants are alive... cows, birds, bacteria... etc. Life doesn't equate with rights. >>1) My opponent believes that a fetus isn't living. He doesn't agree to my point about implantation, so as my response I will do a science lesson. I believe that a fetus is living. I said this repeatedly. All living cells are alive and a fetus is composed of cells. My claim was that life doesn't equal personhood. That we give and honor the rights of others because they are sentient. Your "science lesson" is unneeded as my background in science is such that I understand that the entire process is conducted with living cells and tissue. I never argued that it didn't. Further, citing a bunch of nutty prolife professors hardly counts as "the scientific community has unanimously agree[ing]" -- Furthermore they don't. There's nothing special about implantation. A egg sticks to the uterine wall... that's it. And again, prior to sticking and prior to conception the egg is already alive in the biological sense. Life doesn't begin any of those places, from meiosis to fertilization to implantation to differentiation the entire process is alive. You cannot say here is non-life, here is life. My entire argument is predicated on personhood not life. Next you offer another argument for something that I again, never disagreed with. Although, here again there are massive mistakes. Embryos have no ability to respond via "nerve net" they are all undifferentiated cells and have no nerves. They obvious grow they are microscopic and need to be about 8 pounds nine months from that point. Point 5 and 6 of your second argument has an implication which is at the very least on target. We consider a cell human because it has human DNA but that doesn't make it a human, a person, an individual. The reason we have people and people have rights has nothing to do with the parts and everything to do with being more than the sum of those parts. People interact in a society and rights help a society to be civil. Simply having human DNA does not make that apply. The remaining points are also wrong but besides the point. Evolution isn't development or growth it probably refers to biological evolution which doesn't occur at the individual level and a couple cells is not homeostatic in it's body because it doesn't have a body... etc. >>You can drop my opponent's objection to the fetus isn't alive. (Unless he can provide evidence that life only occurs after birth. I never once objected to a fetus being alive. NEVER. In fact, I was far more open to the suggestion as there is no line between life and non-life. There is no non-life at any point. My contention is however that personhood occurs only after birth. >>Ok, my opponent seems to not understand what genocide is. >>Definition: The Systematic extermination of a group due to race, ethnicity, national or any other specific factor. That is exactly my point. Abortion doesn't specifically apply to a race, ethnicity or nationality. It would be okay to make the argument that abortion is democide or the less than systematic killing of large groups of people without specific racial, ethnic or national factors. My objection was again that fetuses don't possess personhood. The objection that you don't understand what genocide is was simply auxiliary. Planned Parenthood is not a devilish Nazi plot to wipe out black people. Planned Parenthood is an organization dedicated to reproductive freedom. There are certainly Planned Parenthood places in urban and suburban places but their doors are open to those who need them. Jesse Jackson was pro-life about 40 years ago. Now he is quite aptly pro-choice. He is not against abortion for that or any reason. The unborn are not a racial, ethnic or national group. Your libel about planned parenthood is sadly typical but completely inaccurate. >>3) Social Contract doesn't apply to fetuses. >>My opponent's whole objection is that he says fetuses aren't alive because its a bunch of cells. It's because they are cells, cells is defined as any living being, that they are living. My opponent has a clear misunderstanding on science. No. Please reread my original argument. All cells are alive. Life != person. Life != rights. >>Fetuses are alive, meaning they have the right to life. It's an inalienable/natural right, given to all people. Fetuses are alive. This does not mean they have a right to life. They are not alive in the sense that my mother is alive. They are not thinking, feeling, knowing members of society who engage in social aspects and give consent to be governed. A fetus is a living clump of cells but certainly not a person. >>My opponent brings up the rights of animals and plants. HA, these things have more rights then unborn babies. E.g. No. My argument concerning plants and non-human animals was specifically they are alive. By your argument without the distinction between being alive and being a person then your arguments likewise apply in those situations. Aptly then we can see that your argument is absurd and missing something. ----------------- Further allow me to point out once more that when dealing with abortion we are dealing with a person: the woman. She has the right to make her own choices about her own body and what she chooses to do with it. We have no right to force her to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term. Just as we have no right to force anybody to make medical decisions they do not agree with.