From: ejones@umassmed.ummed.edu (Erik Jones)
Newsgroups: talk.abortion
Subject: Re: Libertarian Party's offical views on abortion
Date: 17 Apr 92 22:03:54 GMT
	<1992Apr15.121631.11834@cs.yale.edu> <1992Apr15.194237.16141@ncsu.edu>
	<16851@plains.NoDak.edu> <1992Apr16.143110.5507@vax.oxford.ac.uk>
Organization: Umassmed Medical Center; Worcester, MA 01655

>Annan
   >>Curtis
   >>>Doug

   >>>Your argument above is that killing a fetus is "safer" and perhaps 
   >>>more convenient for the mother; I could argue that killing a person
   >>>to obtain their property is "safer" and more convenient to me than
   >>>any other method. 
   >>>
   >>>No amount of handwaving can change the fact that an abortion kills
   >>>the fetus.

Certainly it can, because I don't agree with the word "kill."  Something
has to be alive in order for it to be killed, and I do not believe a 
fetus is alive.  After all, I do not kill a wart, I remove it.  By the
same token, I do not kill a fetus, I remove it.  Simple.

>> The point is not to obtain the property of the fetus.  The point is that two
>> people (the futus and the woman) are competing for resources that belong to
>> the mother (her body).  She can choose to share those resources, or she can
>> chose to withold those resources, even if the fetus needs those resources
>> for survival.
>> 
>> In order to justify making abortion illegal, you must bestow rights upon the
>> fetus that other humans do not have.  No human has the right to force
>> another to be their slave.  No human has the right to use your resources
>> without your consent.  To say that a fetus has these rights is tantamount to
>> saying the unborn are a superior class of people to the born. 

   >So presumably, abortion should be legal up to 9 months, then? And perhaps
   >beyond? After all, we wouldn't want to suggest that a young baby is a
   >"superior" person to an older one (who has no rights to your resources).

We're going right back to the argument of when the fetus is alive.  Curtis
has a great point, in that all humans are created equal.  If one wanted
to go down that track of logic, we could see that no person has rights over
another person.  (For the sake of this argument, by the way, I shall call
the fetus a person, not because I believe it, but because you seem to, and
it makes arguing that much more effective.)  The fetus has entered the
woman and enslaved her, forcing her to keep it alive for nine months.  This
fetus therefore is proclaiming greater rights than its mother.  However,
if it is true that all people are equal, then this can not stand.  (Look
at how slavery was abolished, equal rights enacted, etc.)  For example,
if I were to invade your home and try to force you to feed me for nine
months, it would be your choice whether or not to do it.  If you knew
that the only way to make me leave was to call the cops and tell them to
come take me away, and that the cops would almost certainly kill me
because I wouldn't want to leave, it would still be your choice as to
whether or not to call the cops.  Therefore, you can take care of me,
or you can indirectly be responsible for my death.  But it's YOUR CHOICE.

The same can be said for abortion.  Even looking at it from your per-
spective, the mother has as many rights as the fetus.  Therefore, the
fetus can not enslave the mother, not if she does not wish to be
enslaved.  If the mother wishes to, she could call the doctor and ask
to have the fetus removed, and from this procedure the fetus might
very well die.  But the fetus is NOT a superior being to the mother -
all created equal, remember?  If we attempt to bestow upon a fetus rights
greater than those of a person, we break every moral and ethical code
this government was founded on.  For the only way that we can condone
this nine-month slavery is to say that a fetus is superior to the mother.
And if that is true, have fun feeding your next home-invader for nine
months, because anyone at any time can force you to do something by
bringing up the moral and ethical point that you have a RESPONSIBILITY
to keep that person alive.

Erik Jones