Abortion Should Be Legalized

Before I begin my arguments, I’d like to apologize for my delayed response. I’d also like to note that I’ve opted to devote this round to only arguments and not rebuttals, in favor of incorporating some questions I’d like to address in my rebuttals that I’d like my opponent to answer in his following round: Why should raped women be forced to carry around a baby, deal with the pains of pregnancy, and then be forced to financially support the child of a rapist who she does not love or want for twenty years of her life because she was raped and impregnated? Should women who have a high risk of death during birth be allowed to have an abortion? If the pregnancy put the life of the mother at stake, should she be forced to give birth? Should fetuses with a high risk of painful defects – such as HIV or Cerebral Palsy – be aborted? Should stem cell research – research that saves thousands of lives every year – be discontinued because they use human embryos? Finally, before I begin my arguments, I’d like to note that this debate is based on the legality of Abortion, not the morality. Therefore, my opponent cannot simply rely on moral arguments if I can demonstrate that it is necessary to legalize abortion. 1) The fetus is not the equivalent of a person. It is evident that there is some boundary between when a fetus is just a blob of cells and when a fetus actually acquires its personhood – it’s the same reason why we don’t regard freshly planted acorns as trees. It’s not enough for a being to have human cells and be conscious; otherwise, zombies would be considered persons. Because this debate is specific to abortions within the first trimester as defined in the first round, it is important to understand that what’s essentially being aborted is a clump of unconscious, undeveloped cells. Therefore, the destruction of the fetus has neither the same moral nor legal consequences as murder. 2) It’s better for women to terminate an unwanted pregnancy/reduces crime rates. The lifelong regret that my opponent describes during his second point is ironic – it’s almost as if he’s describing the lifelong regret that comes with teen pregnancies. In his arguments, my opponent continuously deflates the ramifications of childbirth and inflates the value of a cluster of cells – what needs to be stressed here is how much commitment it takes to raise a child. Raising a child is a tireless, full time commitment. A kid needs to be nurtured – he/she demands money, time, and attention. Now imagine that you were a teen girl who lived in the slums (since that is the demographic that is most likely to seek an abortion), and you became saddled with a baby because “you were young and lacked the life experience to understand what you were getting into”. The father leaves you and you’re left with a kid that requires you to drop out of school and work full time as a waitress in order to support him/her for twenty years. I firmly believe that it is better for women to terminate the pregnancy rather than forcing them into the example above. Not only does this harm the mother and essentially hands a death sentence to a teenage girl who made a minor mistake – it causes indescribable damage to the child as well. Imagine being raised in the slums by a mother who doesn’t love you, and regrets giving birth to you. This kind of childhood neglect and abuse is what creates monsters like Hitler and Stalin, as well as serial murders like Paul Bernardo and Charles Manson, all of whom have been neglected as a child. It is also why crime statistics have been proven to drop upon the legalization of abortion. 3) Abortion would exist anyway, with or without legalization. Even before the landmark Roe v. Wade, abortions were relatively commonplace. The only difference is that the abortions were performed in dirty closets with copper coathangers and unsanitary procedures rather than in the hospital, resulting in up to 100,000 deaths (of the mother as well as the baby) annually. This kind of desperation, which goes to show how many women would choose a potential life of vaginal scarring, infertility, and even death in order to avoid being saddled with a child is proof that even if abortion was made illegal, it would only serve to drive abortion underground to more dangerous conditions, similar to what happened with the prohibition of alcohol during the 1900s. 4) The rights of the mother trump the rights of the fetus. In most developed countries, there exists a constitution that promises its citizens liberty and the right to self ownership. With this in mind, the legalization of abortion should be considered unconstitutional. The fetus is the equivalent of a parasite that latches on to your body and feeds off of you for several months. You’re forced to carry it around, wherever you go. If a hobo came up to you and latched himself onto you, followed you around, and forced you to feed and shelter him as well as causing you morning sickness and childbirth pains, the government cannot charge you for kicking him out. This is because the government cannot force you to sacrifice your body and freedom to carry around a parasite even if removing it means its death; it’s a violation of your right to liberty! The mother’s (who the cluster of cells is completely dependent on) right to a choice supersedes the right of the fetus even if the fetus could be considered a human being. Which it isn’t. Conclusion: As I am running out of time, I will respond to my opponent’s points on medical complications in the next round, as well as provide a more detailed and factual case. I hand the stage back to my opponent.