Abortion is O.K in the very worst case scenario.

---Diseases--- First I'd like to talk about Pro's scenario. He says the baby is guaranteed to have serious birth defects which may include certain things. Of those things I'd like to talk about are Tay-Sachs[1] and Sandhoff[2]. In the case of these diseases, the baby only has a 25% to acquire one of them, and a 12.5% chance to acquire both. I bring this up not to nit-pick the scenario for the sake of nit-picking. I do it because the fact that neither of these diseases is a guarantee, which is important to consider when deciding what to do in this situation. ---Expenses--- The first mention Pro makes of expenses is in regards to the fact that Amanda can afford an abortion, but not the cost of giving birth. I have two arguments against this contention, one of which will be given later. The one that I am addressing right now is this: There are many anti-abortion groups who are aware of the monetary factors in the decision of whether or not to abort, and they are ready to help cover the costs involved in birth[3], in order to prevent an abortion. These groups may also help provide the costs for her surgeries that are required for unspecified reasons. According to the scenario, Amanda sounds pretty poor. Just because she cannot pay for the surgeries (the price of which has not been specified), does not mean the large anti-abortion organizations would be unable to cover, or at least help cover the costs. To an organization that puts life ahead of everything else, offering to spend money on a person's surgeries so they consider not getting an abortion doesn't seem unlikely. Even if the money was a greater concern than life to them, the scenario Amanda is in is so rare, that it is unlikely any financially harmful precedents would be set. I say her scenario is rare based on the rape related abortion statistics. Between .5% and 1% of abortions are related to incest or rape[4]. Take that into account with the odds of the defects the scenario calls for and there are now long odds that there are many cases like Amanda's. Now I shall need to address the odds in this scenario. Clearly talking about the expenses and the chances of acquiring a few specified diseases in not enough on its own to sway the decision one way on their lonesome. So, why should Amanda have to play the odds in this scenario? To answer that I'll need to take a step back to lay my reasoning against abortion, and then apply that reasoning to the question. So: ---Why Abortion Should be Treated as Killing--- Many abortion arguments center on whether or not abortion is killing. The Pro-Choicers attempt to show that an unborn baby is not a life, and Pro-Lifers attempt the opposite. I would submit that a conclusion on the question/argument does not need to be reached for one to decide to be opposed to abortion. When a person is killed, they die (I'm a genius I know), and their life that they had ahead of them is taken away. Let's just assume Pro-Choicers are right, and the fetus isn't a life. That means when an abortion occurs, nothing dies. However, the possibility for life in the future has been wiped out, just as in killing when the life a person was to have ahead of them is taken away. Abortion and killing accomplish the same thing: taking away one's future life. Whether or not life has started yet is immaterial, because the possibility for future life is still being wiped out. And since saying that abortion takes away the possibility for life in the future just as killing takes away the possibility for life in the future, the two should be treated alike, since they accomplish alike things. This follows directly into the next idea: ---Why Unborn Babies Should be Treated as Living--- I do not say that you should have to believe unborn babies are alive, you can think just the opposite and agree with the title of this section. For this argument I refer to the above section, and the idea of possible future life. Whether unborn or born, there are always possible future lives. As we sit here reading this, we have life with all its experiences waiting for us in the future. This is not different for the unborn, whether or not they are considered alive. They still have life experiences waiting for them in the future, same as us. If it is true that unborn and born both have possible future life experiences ahead of them, then both should be treated as alive, in order to preserve the attainability of these future life experiences. Before I get back to the question, I'll leave an example for the two above arguments. Is a construction project whose goal it is to become a house, a house? Or is it an un-built house? Does it matter? Will it be ok to burn down an un-built house because it is not yet considered a house? It shouldn't be, because of the destroyed potential for a house to exist. ---To the Question!--- So, why should Amanda have to play these odds? Because of the potential for life, and for the reasoning that requires us to treat abortion as killing and unborn babies as alive. No matter how long the odds, it is our moral obligation to make the attempt for life. It is immoral to decide that the baby probably wouldn't be happy with its life and take away the possibility for it. And yes, Amanda is likely to have her life's quality drastically reduced, but it will not be lost. And life lost is what must be combated against. The chances are worth it for the few babies who survive, and are happy, because the cost is not a loss of life, but rather a degradation of life, which, while not pleasant, is the lesser evil compared to the extinguishment of life entirely. Odds aside, the costs should not stand up to the reasoning presented in my third and fourth section, especially if Amanda receives monetary help from anti-abortion agencies. --------MESSAGE TO VOTERS-------- My opponent has used the scenario in a way that he never mentioned using during our discussion on what should be included in the scenario. I will not talk further on it because I don't want to start a second, and probably less civil debate right here. I would ask that anybody who plans to vote to please message me, or even my opponent if they wish, to hear what we have to say on what the discussion was on the scenario. I will be copying and pasting (via messaging) our discussion for anyone who wants to make a determination to see who, if anybody, was in the wrong at any point. I recommend this course of action especially if you're one of the voters TUF sent here. He believes you're reliable voters and I think this is an important thing to consider before casting a fully educated vote. Thanks. Sources: [1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov... [2] http://www.ntsad.org... [3] https://www.heartbeatinternational.org...