From: zeus@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Mark Gansle)
Newsgroups: alt.activism.d,alt.fan.rush-limbaugh,talk.abortion
Subject: Re: "Snapple" Anti-Choice?
Date: 29 Sep 92 15:24:58 GMT
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX

In article <p39nk0j.bskendig@netcom.com> bskendig@netcom.com (Brian Kendig) writes:
>forgach@noao.edu (Suzanne Forgach) wrote (in article <1992Sep24.194350.29540@noao.edu>):
>>That baby is real life, bub.
>
>I don't know whether to be amused or annoyed at the pro-life
>movement's insistence on calling an unborn fetus a "baby", and thus
>making the pro-choice movement look like "a bunch of pro-abortionists
>whose only goal in life is to kill PoorSweetWarmFuzzyCuddly Babies (tm)".
>
>I think I'll just be amused for now, and ask: Why is it that you call
>all unborn humans 'babies'?  How is a fertilized egg similar to a baby?

There seems to me that there are four main positions on abortion:

1) Abortion on demand: abortion is always OK through all nine mos. of
pregnancy
2) Abortion until some arbitrary date (ie Roe v Wade) decided upon through
political consensus or compromise
3) Abortion until date of viability, ie ability of fetus to live outside of
womb
4) Abortion is always wrong (Note that this group has among it those who
make exceptions for rape and incest because they feel sorrier for the mother
than the child)

Let's examine these positions, shall we?

1)  I think none but the most calloused among us can seriously believe that
abortion up until live birth is acceptable, as this requires delivery to
be a prerequisite to humanity/life.  How can on argue that 3 inches separates
a child from rights and no rights?  (If anyone *does* support this position,
I'd *love* to hear the logic involved).

2) This is morally repugnant; how can the worth of a person be decided by
poltical debate.  This reminds me of the incredibly stupid (and extremely
immoral) Three-Fifths Compromise.  This also does not suffice to answer the
question of abortion.

3) This position is a bit slick, because it ties in science to morality and
makes the moral position seem rational.  But let me ask you this:  how do you
feel about having your morality determined immediately by existing levels of
technology, with the realization that you are necessarily morally inferior to
subsequent generations?  As technology improves, viability will become earlier
and earlier, and future moral leaders will look down upon us as neanderthals
for not realizing that a fetus could live and thus was life.  I have a big
objection to my morality being tied to scientific progress.

4) Which leaves us with the only alternative: the consistent belief that
the point of conception creates a genetically unique individual who is
deserving of protection of life.  Conception is the point when the DNA
involved becomes uniquely Other, and it is the point where life can begin
(there is no danger of protection of eggs and sperm since 1. they are not
unique as they are only one's own cells and 2. there is no chance a sperm will
gestate into a human child).  Either abortion is right, in which case it
is right all the time and enough about the indecision and trauma faced by
women having to make such a painful decision--it takes very little investment
to actually create life, so it's not like she's missing out on her only
chance--and quit pansying around with limits and restrictions.  Or else
abortion is wrong, in which case the fetus is a life worthy of protection
and shut up about "except..." or "after..."

If I've missed a position let me know!


+-------------------------+-------------------------+
|Cloud-gathering Zeus     |Think globally.          |
|                         |Act locally.             |
|zeus@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu  |Eat my shorts totally.   |
+-------------------------+-------------------------+