The USFG should ban abortion

== Rebuttal == 1. I accept that the fetus is a human. 2. Human Rights Pro points out that the right to a person's life is protected under the Constitution. The Constitution has been amended 17 times since its inception and interpreted innumerable times by the Supreme Court, meaning the law as-written is not necessarily the way the law has/ought to remain. SCOTUS decided in Roe v. Wade that a right to privacy under the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment extended to a woman's decision to have an abortion, but that this right must be balanced against the state's two legitimate interests in regulating abortions: protecting women's health and protecting the potentiality of human life [1]. The government does not disregard the fetuses' rights all-together, but rather establishes criteria for when their right to life trumps the mother's right to privacy and bodily autonomy. The Court decided this right begins with fetal viability - that is when the fetus can live without it's mother's body. The Supreme Court has ruled many times that people have the right to bodily autonomy and the right to their own person. For example in Cruzan v. Missouri, the Court ruled that people can refuse to seek medical treatment even if it would lead to their death [2]. Indeed we can use our body however we see fit regardless of other people's preferences. If I want to tattoo my body or have a baby, I have that right whether other people believe I should do those things or not. Pro writes, "Murder is the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought." However compare this to euthanasia which is the practice of intentionally ending a life in order to relieve pain and suffering. Ending a life in and of itself is not necessarily murder, and Pro has not proven as such. Consider why only killing humans is considered murder whereas killing animals does not qualify. This is because animals do not have the level of sentience that humans do. While fetuses have the potential for sentience at some point, until that point, they do not and should not have the same rights as those who have already achieved this criteria. We do not grant rights based on potential. We do not give 16 year olds the legal right to drink just because they have the potential to turn 21. We base rights as/is, which is why some fetuses have the right to life and some do not. In my contentions, I will be arguing the right to life ought to be based on a level of sentience, even for human beings. Pro notes, "Whenever rights are limited, the most common and justifiable reason is when the observation of one right infringes on more important rights of others." He posits that the unborn baby is due for protection under the law including the right to life, and that this right is more important than the mother's right to privacy. But indeed the mother's freedom and right to bodily autonomy is what's also in question. Privacy refers to a woman's decision to keep it personal and none of anybody else's concern or opportunity to regulate. Pro writes that females waive their right to bodily autonomy by consenting to sex. That is manipulative rhetoric. If I consent to sex, it's not consent to aggressive sex or all sexual acts. If I consent to sex and contract an STD, it would be ridiculous to suggest I must be forced to live with this STD forever (or for a certain period of time) against my will. Instead I should be able to treat it however I would like, because it's my body and therefore my choice. If the STD had achieved a level of sentience, that would be different. But until then it would just be an unintended consequence of my actions. "When women are compelled to carry and bear children, they are subjected to 'involuntary servitude' in violation of the Thirteenth Amendment... Even if the woman has stipulated to have consented to the risk of pregnancy, that does not permit the state to force her to remain pregnant" [2]. == Arguments == 1. Individuals have the right to bodily autonomy. This means we should be able to make decisions about our own bodies, especially if they affect our health risks. Abortion should be a legal choice for women because it is risky and directly involves their body and health. More than 70,000 girls ages 15-19 die each year from pregnancy and childbirth [3]. No other person has the right to control how we use our bodies, especially as adults, though this inherent right ultimately extends to all fully conscious persons.2. Other people do not have the moral or legal authority to govern our bodies, even if someone else's life is on the line. For example if someone needs me to donate organs, blood or plasma, I cannot be legally forced to use my body to save their life -- even if it's my fault they need help (say my drunk driving caused a car accident, and their lives are now in danger because of my choices). Women have the right to determine how their bodies are used. There is no other circumstance in which any person's body is forcibly used to keep another human being alive against their will. 3. Criminalization will not stop abortions. So-called "back alley" abortions will still occur that put women at risk. If it does not serve as a meaningful deterrent, criminalization is not effective and does more harm than good. Legal abortions are generally safe and provide women with reproductive choices that do not needlessly make them criminals [4]. Criminals are those who infringe upon other's rights, whereas women who get abortions do not infringe upon an entity that has any legal rights. 4. Women who are raped or victims of incest should not be forced to carry out a pregnancy. These people should not be forced to carry out a pregnancy from such an invasive and traumatic violation. Even if it's a small percentage of pregnant women, the law exists to protect minority populations. 5. The abortion rate is declining while abortion remains legal [5]. You can combat abortion by providing meaningful sex education and access to birth control. This includes contraception that prevents the fertilization of an embryo. 6. Both IVF and abortion involve the destruction of fertilized eggs that could potentially develop into people. However the push to criminalize abortion and not those who need fertility treatment, proves the contention is less about protecting human lives, and more about controlling women's bodies. Indeed most people who are "pro life" do not support legal measures to protect life when it comes to caring for the sick and impoverished who need care in order to survive. And anti-choice organizations have avoided targeting IVF, even as they’ve sought radical restrictions on abortion access. The point here is that protecting every human life does not seem like a serious or consistent contention. 7. Fetuses that aborted still have lived that are used for good. "All embryonic stem cells are undifferentiated cells that are unlike any specific adult cell. However, they have the ability to form any adult cell. Because undifferentiated embryonic stem cells can proliferate indefinitely in culture, they could potentially provide an unlimited source of specific, clinically important adult cells such as bone, muscle, liver or blood cell... Embryonic stem cells are of great interest to medicine and science because of their ability to develop into virtually any other cell made by the human body. In theory, if stem cells can be grown and their development directed in culture, it would be possible to grow cells of medical importance such as bone marrow, neural tissue or muscle" [6]. This can be useful at treating disease and saving other human lives - the lives of those already sentient. 8. Reproductive choice can be the only thing that stands between a woman and poverty or death. While adoption may be a viable option for some, particularly in the U.S., in other parts of the world that is not necessarily the case. However Pro's standard of the right to life means women who are in specific danger due to restricted medical care or resources (especially in Africa and South East Asia) will be forced to birth children, even if it means that they are likely to die and that there babies will die or be uncared for. 9. Fetuses are often terminated before sentience, so they are not very conscious beings. We legally kill living things that are more cognizant, such as pigs that are as sentient as toddlers. Therefore simply being alive (or even being conscious) does not determine the "right to life" in society. Fetuses arguably do not have the right to life, specifically as it pertains to mandating the use of the mother's body to survive. We do not recognize the right to life in other humans such as those in vegetative states, etc. The reversibly comatose, momentarily unconscious, or people who are asleep are once functioned and/or are currently functioning as sentient beings, even if they are temporary state of non-sentience. The pre-sentient unborn, however, were never sentient and once they qualify as sentient obtain the right to life. It is the capacity to be sentient which provides this distinction. This standard is important and useful because it accounts for the essence of personhood beyond being alive or arbitrary speciesism. Why don't plants have the right to life despite being alive? It's the ability to feel, think, perceive, and be self-aware amongst other things that makes this important moral and legal distinction.[1] https://en.wikipedia.org...[2] https://en.wikipedia.org...[3] http://amplifyyourvoice.org...[4] http://thinkprogress.org...[5] https://www.guttmacher.org...[6] http://news.wisc.edu...