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Your remarks are a good summary of pro-choice arguments. There are also credible pro-life arguments. The 14th amendment's Equal Protection clause is arguably p

Your remarks are a good summary of pro-choice arguments. There are also credible pro-life arguments. The 14th amendment's Equal Protection clause is arguably provides the strongest legal basis for banning abortion: "nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." So the legal question is whether a baby that hasn't yet been born is a person - if so, their life ought to be protected by state laws in the same way they protect anyone else's life. It's a pretty straightforward question - is this baby an individual human being or not? I for one can't accept that I wasn't me while I was yet inside my mom (we know scientifically that after fertilization, I was a distinct human from my mom and dad) - and I see no reason to deny that personhood to fellow people. Answering in the affirmative, and various reasons for such an answer, forms the basis of the pro-life view. Zooming out a bit, pro-life people see abortion as a modern analog to slavery in the US (where enslaved African-Americans were viewed as 3/5 of a person), except that unborn babies are viewed as not a person at all -- and this framing is used to justify killing them, not merely enslaving them and denying them the right to vote.

quantified 4y ago
If you’re attached by an umbilical cord and that dependent on the womb’s environment, you are in no way individual. If I hadn’t made it out alive, I wouldn’t care about a thing, same as I won’t care 70 years or so from now. Would have been fine with not experiencing the life I’ve had.
- rayiner 4y ago
  > If you’re attached by an umbilical cord and that dependent on the womb’s environment, you are in no way individual A newborn is completely dependent and isn’t meaningfully any more of an individual. Also can be killed at will?
  - dredmorbius 4y ago
    A newborn is dependent on society. Anyone willing to take on its care can do so. A foetus is dependent upon its mother. Specifically. One person to whom it is biologically attached. Not society generally. Technology is advancing, but costs of transferring care are extraordinarily high, and outcomes quite uncertain.
  - quantified 4y ago
    Missing the umbilical cord. Feeds via mouth, not via nutrients taken from someone’s blood. Breathes air, not oxygen taken from someone’s blood. Physiologically separate. Didn’t kill mom in childbirth.
slg 4y ago
>Zooming out a bit, pro-life people see abortion as a modern analog to slavery in the US (where enslaved African-Americans were viewed as 3/5 of a person), except that unborn babies are viewed as not a person at all -- and this framing is used to justify killing them, not merely enslaving them and denying them the right to vote. I would argue the better slavery analogy is taking away the bodily autonomy of one individual and forcing them to go through an unwanted and dangerous process for the sole benefit of another individual. That would be like making it a legal requirement for us all to regularly donate bone marrow. Even if we acknowledge the fetus as a person, my rights over my body should still supersede anyone else's rights over my body.
- leereeves 4y ago
  Parental responsibility doesn't stop there. Parents can be jailed for failing to take care of their children; imprisoned for life if their children die through neglect or abandonment; or almost literally enslaved, told what jobs to take and have their earnings confiscated. I haven't heard anyone seriously challenging the extent of parental responsibility, only when it begins.
  - slg 4y ago
    Except we don’t force this on people. We give parents the opportunity to opt out through adoption.
    - leereeves 4y ago
      Only if that's considered to be in the child's best interests. For example, older children can't be given away without their consent, fathers generally can't terminate their responsibility without the mother's consent, and it must be done in a manner that protects the child (not simply abandoned).
      - slg 4y ago
        >Only if that's considered to be in the child's best interests. I don't have to argue against you. I can just point to the leaked draft that argues against you. It specifically cites safe haven laws which allow people to anonymously put their child up for adoption. These laws have no consideration on what the child's life would be like with their biological parents or after they become a ward of the state. The mere existence of those laws is legal precedent that it is acceptable to abdicate care over a child post-birth. Why shouldn't that be possible pre-birth?
zaccusl 4y ago
"So the legal question is whether a baby that hasn't yet been born is a person" That's not the important question. The question is can one person be compelled to use their body to sustain another persons life. We can't even force DEAD people to use their body to sustain life (i.e., a person has to consent to donate organs before they die).
- leereeves 4y ago
  - tragictrash 4y ago
    It's people like you that make the world hell to live in. You have no business telling anyone what to do with their body. What about your supposed encroachment of our freedoms? Does that not apply here? Oh, right, when it's the CDC making public health recommendations that's your freedoms being eroded, but when it's the government limiting a woman's autonomy, your all for it. You are insufferable.
- TimTheTinker 4y ago
  > That's not the important question. This debate hinges entirely on a disagreement over which moral question is the most important.
  - shkkmo 4y ago
    It isn't really about which is "more important" morally. Both sides agree that infants have some legal rights, the questions are whether one of those legal rights is having their mother to bear them to term against their mother's will and if so, when that right begins and how much risk the mother can be required to accept in doing so. Edit: One thing I don't see mentioned is how a ethically consistent Pro-Life stance seems to require support for state sponsored healthcare. Requiring people to bear the costs of pregnancy to achieve the state's moral obligations seems unreasonably cruel and counter productive if the infant's well being is the priority. Banning abortions without covering pregnancy costs seems more interested in imposing culture than in protecting the helpless.
Maursault 4y ago
The problem is, even if a fetus is a person, by all philosophical definitions of a person, pregnancy is only an ethical arrangement if the mother consents to the pregnancy.[1] If she does not, the fetus is, perhaps ironically, violating her human rights. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Defense_of_Abortion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Defense_of_Abortion

quantified 4y ago

If you’re attached by an umbilical cord and that dependent on the womb’s environment, you are in no way individual. If I hadn’t made it out alive, I wouldn’t care about a thing, same as I won’t care 70 years or so from now. Would have been fine with not experiencing the life I’ve had.

rayiner 4y ago
> If you’re attached by an umbilical cord and that dependent on the womb’s environment, you are in no way individual A newborn is completely dependent and isn’t meaningfully any more of an individual. Also can be killed at will?
- dredmorbius 4y ago
  A newborn is dependent on society. Anyone willing to take on its care can do so. A foetus is dependent upon its mother. Specifically. One person to whom it is biologically attached. Not society generally. Technology is advancing, but costs of transferring care are extraordinarily high, and outcomes quite uncertain.
- quantified 4y ago
  Missing the umbilical cord. Feeds via mouth, not via nutrients taken from someone’s blood. Breathes air, not oxygen taken from someone’s blood. Physiologically separate. Didn’t kill mom in childbirth.

slg 4y ago

>Zooming out a bit, pro-life people see abortion as a modern analog to slavery in the US (where enslaved African-Americans were viewed as 3/5 of a person), except that unborn babies are viewed as not a person at all -- and this framing is used to justify killing them, not merely enslaving them and denying them the right to vote. I would argue the better slavery analogy is taking away the bodily autonomy of one individual and forcing them to go through an unwanted and dangerous process for the sole benefit of another individual. That would be like making it a legal requirement for us all to regularly donate bone marrow. Even if we acknowledge the fetus as a person, my rights over my body should still supersede anyone else's rights over my body.

leereeves 4y ago
Parental responsibility doesn't stop there. Parents can be jailed for failing to take care of their children; imprisoned for life if their children die through neglect or abandonment; or almost literally enslaved, told what jobs to take and have their earnings confiscated. I haven't heard anyone seriously challenging the extent of parental responsibility, only when it begins.
- slg 4y ago
  Except we don’t force this on people. We give parents the opportunity to opt out through adoption.
  - leereeves 4y ago
    Only if that's considered to be in the child's best interests. For example, older children can't be given away without their consent, fathers generally can't terminate their responsibility without the mother's consent, and it must be done in a manner that protects the child (not simply abandoned).
    - slg 4y ago
      >Only if that's considered to be in the child's best interests. I don't have to argue against you. I can just point to the leaked draft that argues against you. It specifically cites safe haven laws which allow people to anonymously put their child up for adoption. These laws have no consideration on what the child's life would be like with their biological parents or after they become a ward of the state. The mere existence of those laws is legal precedent that it is acceptable to abdicate care over a child post-birth. Why shouldn't that be possible pre-birth?

zaccusl 4y ago

"So the legal question is whether a baby that hasn't yet been born is a person" That's not the important question. The question is can one person be compelled to use their body to sustain another persons life. We can't even force DEAD people to use their body to sustain life (i.e., a person has to consent to donate organs before they die).

leereeves 4y ago
- tragictrash 4y ago
  It's people like you that make the world hell to live in. You have no business telling anyone what to do with their body. What about your supposed encroachment of our freedoms? Does that not apply here? Oh, right, when it's the CDC making public health recommendations that's your freedoms being eroded, but when it's the government limiting a woman's autonomy, your all for it. You are insufferable.
TimTheTinker 4y ago
> That's not the important question. This debate hinges entirely on a disagreement over which moral question is the most important.
- shkkmo 4y ago
  It isn't really about which is "more important" morally. Both sides agree that infants have some legal rights, the questions are whether one of those legal rights is having their mother to bear them to term against their mother's will and if so, when that right begins and how much risk the mother can be required to accept in doing so. Edit: One thing I don't see mentioned is how a ethically consistent Pro-Life stance seems to require support for state sponsored healthcare. Requiring people to bear the costs of pregnancy to achieve the state's moral obligations seems unreasonably cruel and counter productive if the infant's well being is the priority. Banning abortions without covering pregnancy costs seems more interested in imposing culture than in protecting the helpless.

Maursault 4y ago

The problem is, even if a fetus is a person, by all philosophical definitions of a person, pregnancy is only an ethical arrangement if the mother consents to the pregnancy.[1] If she does not, the fetus is, perhaps ironically, violating her human rights. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Defense_of_Abortion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Defense_of_Abortion