Abortions
Abortion is an issue which refuses to die. ``Pro-choice'' supporters take the view that women alone should decide whether they should carry on with a pregnancy; ``pro-life'' supporters view the fetus (even at the one- or two-cell stage) as human, and suppose that it has the right to live inside the mother.
Nobody can argue that a fetus isn't alive; obviously it is. Is it human? Perhaps; is an oak seed an oak tree? This question is less important than it might at first seem.
What is clear, is that there exist accidental pregnancies or this essay would be unnecessary. Disallowing people the opportunity to correct mistakes (such as getting pregnant) by making all abortions illegal is clear insanity and leads to people killing themselves with sub-standard abortion attempts [disturbing]. From a purely pragmatic perspective, it doesn't make sense to deny abortions outright, or after only a few weeks when it's not clear if you're even pregnant or not. No matter what the law, abortions will happen; whether they are safe or not depends solely on the legality of the procedure.
An (extremely loose) analogy might be made to getting sick: one can reasonably expect to get sick by being around sick people, but this doesn't mean that person should be denied medical care if they do get sick. Somewhat similarly, most people don't want to get pregnant when they are having sex; sometimes, however, they do and many people wish to correct this mistake. Who are we to deny them?
Anti-abortionists might say, ``too bad for them; if they didn't want to get pregnant they shouldn't have been having sex.'' Do we deny people injured in traffic accidents medical treatment? They could have easily prevented getting injured by not driving. Obviously, a broken leg and a pregnancy are two vastly different things yet many people in both circumstances seek medical attention to correct the mistake they've made.
Now, many people will say that the fetus is a baby; a human being with the same rights as you and me. Is one of those rights to live inside someone else? No. As medical technology advances, we are able to keep fetuses alive at earlier and earlier points in the pregnancy. My view is this: if a mother wants to remove a fetus from herself, it is her right to do so, however I also think that if she wants to do this, then she no longer has any claim over the fetus and as such someone else can nurture the fetus if they like.
If the fetus is ``adopted'' by someone else then it will live, but we have no claim over the wombs of others and cannot force women to provide a home there, just as we cannot force people to provide homes for anyone else. Certainly, some people may think there is a moral obligation to provide such a home -- and they are entitled to their opinion -- but this doesn't translate into a legal right. For example, one might claim the we have a moral obligation to care for the poor members of society (I agree) but does this mean that we can say, ``you, sir, must provide a home for this poor person here''? No, it does not.
Additional objections to abortions come from opponents of late-term abortions. The same rules should apply (that is, if it is medically feasible to remove the fetus without killing it and give it to someone else, then the original mother can't say she'd rather kill the fetus). However, when one considers the possibility of late-term abortions, one must ask, ``How many doctors would abort a healthy 7 or 8 month old fetus?'' I would be extremely surprised if any licensed doctor would perform such a procedure.
[Thanks to Jenny forcomments.]