Burnt Orange Report

Firstly, I just want to think you for the courage to bring this up and tell you that I'm gonna respect you no matter what.

Secondly, regardless of whether we assign any moral weight to the unborn or not, this is not exactly a fun experience for most women, and looking at this as a cost-benefit analysis, it would seem abortion would appeal to some women simply because we as a society have made the costs of birthing and motherhood too high. We're not taking care of our women the way we ought to be and we're not allowing them to take care of themselves. As a matter of rational maximization of utility, reducing abortions must go hand in hand with either supporting parenthood, economically and socially. Vastly increasing the pain of abortions (through criminalization etc.) would of course also reduce abortions but would likely be less effective (since people would avoid being caught) and of course would end up destroying utility.

Now, another way to approach this is from a deontological or natural rights standpoint. Accepting the premise that the unborn are people it follows that they deserve the same moral treatment. Moreover, accepting a retributivist justification for punishment, it follows that there is a duty to penalize women and doctors in the same way that one penalizes murder in the first degree.

Personally, I think that ethical theorizing over abortion has resulted in American society being inflicted with the "paralysis of analysis." Much like the weather, everyone complains about abortions but nobody does anything about it. Moreover, as someone who tends to be fair and balanced with regards to postmodernist philosophy, I think it's worth noting that there's a case to be made that the only thing at issue is the "ick" factor, with all rationalizations thereof leading only to obfuscation, confusion, and conflict.

That said, the debate (as you know) usually turns on person-hood. As I see it there are essentially two major schools of thought, a formalist and a functionalist one.

By formalism I mean, that a person is a person because it conforms to certain physical paramaters, e.g. has a certain flavor of DNA. This seems to be the dominant school on the pro-life side of the debate. My problem with formalism is that I question whether there is a clear bright-line separating human from non-human, with the upshot being that this supposeduly scientific definition essentially strikes me as being effectively like the pseudo-science of eugenics, albeit "very liberal" eugenics.

By functionalism, I mean the ability to "do" something, like think or move or whatever. This essentially does promote accepting differences based upon where one is in a developmental life-cycle, in the sense that development implies action.

Of course, one could argue that since a living being "is" in both the noun and the verb sense (it depends upon what the meaning of "is" is!), drawing such a distinction between formalism and functionalism may be questionable.

Then again, let us not forget the distinction between "living", "human", and "person." Conceptually they are not the same.

I really need to develop this more...

I'm not a philosopher, I just drink a lot (I'm not a playa, I just crush a lot).

The solution is simple--if you don't like abortions, don't have one.

This is a really tough issue, and I don't profess to have all the answers either. I do know that the absolutism express by many people on both sides of the debate has probably resulted in many more abortions in this country than otherwise would have happened.

I believe that your rationale that life begins at conception is probably correct, at least in the basic biological sense, but I don't think things are quite that simple if you take a broader look.

Recent research has shown that up to 75-80% of all conceptions will end in failure before or soon after implantation. Declaring that failure rate a catastrophe would be overkill since many of those failures are because the fertilization did not lead to a viable embryo. Would you regard these naturally rejected embryos as sacred (in the non-religious sense) and worthy of protection as those that pass this stage successfully?

Another way to look at such embryos is as potential human beings (yes, I know, this is not strictly biologically correct) and decisions we make, both before and after fertilization determine if their potential is realized. I say before and after because some people, Catholics for example, that even contraception is denying some child, some person, of the right to a life.

That doesn't mean I have all the answers. I believe that aborting a foetus the day before it's due is unacceptable unless there is some extraordinary circumstance like the baby will die and the mother along with it if nothing is done. But I also believe very early term abortions, within a few days or weeks of conception, are acceptable, since the potential human being is still just a clump of cells, with no personality, no nervous system, no brain, no self-awareness--nothing that we would recognise as something that a being would be deprived of if their life was terminated.

But, and this is where it gets fuzzy, at *some* point between a few days/weeks and full term the foetus begins to take on those attributes that makes us fully human. When that is, I am not qualified to answer. I do know that babies feel pain, they have a nascent personality, and they have basic thoughts, so at some point along the way they started acquiring them.

Currently in places where abortions are legal, they are only widely available up to about 22-24 weeks. After that they are much harder to obtain (or are supposed to be) - this is not something you here about from the hardliners on either side, by the way. I'm sure many people believe that abortion on demand is legal right till full term - and I'm sure this suits the pro-lifer just fine.

That 22-24 week limit, using the criteria I mention above is probably too late. At 24 weeks some foetuses have even survived premature birth. In my opinion that limit should be moved at least a few weeks lower, but I do not have the knowledge at hand to say exactly when.

You touch on the fact that making abortions illegal won't stop abortions. I agree. If you get the chance, go and see Vera Drake - a super film that addresses that very issue. Not only will making abortions illegal not stop abortions, it will unequally punish the poor since wealthy people will always find safer ways (both medically and legally) to circumvent the ban.

I agree that abortions should be as rare as possible, through sex education that is proven to work (not this abstinence-only crap), and by raising the living and educational standards for the poor. Since you mention the Netherlands, you should know that the abortion rate there is over three times lower than in the USA. Progressive states like Massachusetts, which have a higher standard of living, tend to have fewer abortions than poor states like Alabama and Louisiana. This is no conicidence.

Hilary Clinton has already begun to talk about the destructive nature of the current abortion debate, and pointing out that the abortion rate would be lower if everyone started working together on these issues. I think she's on to something, and it will be a big plus for her should she decide to run for President in 2008. Jim Wallis also has a lot of good stuff to say on this issue.

I'm glad you steered clear of religious issues in your piece. For me, the Religious Right's position against abortion is utterly illogical. The bottom line for such people is where you end up after you die - Heaven or Hell. So what is 70 years of life on Earth compared with an eternity in Heaven? Is it not better that these 40+ million innocent aborted souls went straight to Heaven rather than be born and run the high risk of ending up in Hell? Abortion doctors should be heros to such people. (Sorry, I couldn't resist bringing that up.)

Anyway, that's my take on the subject. I hope it helps in some small way.

Andrew, thank you for your well thought out and courageous post. There is much to respond to and I can't do it justice with a brief post, but can at least join the conversation.....

I think you are referring to the Groningen Protocol. In addition to the parent's consent, it also allows doctors to recommend euthanizing the children. Though, it is possible some of these doctors may do more than benignly recommend euthanization.

You also say "…women who would face serious repercussions for revealing the pregnancy should have a safe place to turn to". Building on this point, there is a thriving network of crisis pregnancy centers in this country. Locally, LifeCare Pregnancy Services, whom I financially and prayerfully support, provides amazing counseling and necessary material things for women with unintended pregnancies.

Finally, another angle I encourage you to explore more deeply is abortion’s effect on women. The centerpiece of the recent Texas Rally for Life was the testimony of 4 post-abortive women who gave first person accounts of the lifelong pain caused by abortion, as well as blessed restoration in the hands of Jesus.

Andrew, thank you for your well thought out and courageous post. There is much to respond to and I can't do it justice with a brief post, but can at least join the conversation.....

I think you are referring to the Groningen Protocol (see http://www.azg.nl/azg/nl/english/nieuws/45613). In addition to the parent's consent, it also allows doctors to recommend euthanizing the children. Though, it is possible some of these doctors may do more than benignly recommend euthanization.

You also say "…women who would face serious repercussions for revealing the pregnancy should have a safe place to turn to". Building on this point, there is a thriving network of crisis pregnancy centers in this country (see http://www.care-net.org/). Locally, LifeCare Pregnancy Services (see http://www.austinlifecare.org), whom I financially and prayerfully support, provides amazing counseling and necessary material things for women with unintended pregnancies.

Finally, another angle I encourage you to explore more deeply is abortion’s effect on women. The centerpiece of the recent Texas Rally for Life was the testimony of 4 post-abortive women who gave first person accounts (see http://austinvitw.blogspot.com/2005/01/he-snatched-me-from-spiritual-darkness.html) of the lifelong pain caused by abortion, as well as blessed restoration in the hands of Jesus.

Most on this issue take a dogmatic, one sided view. If the woman has the right to consider abortion and the child does not have the right to life, that is the end of the argument. If the child has the right to life and the woman does not have the right to consider abortion, that is also the end of the argument. I see validity in both of these propositions, and see the issue of abortion as a case of conflict between rights.

I find abortion to be, in a sense, like war: morally repugnant but sometimes necessary. I also find myself quite unqualified to tell a woman what she is allowed to do with her reproductive system, and I consider that if I could somehow be made pregnant against my will, I'd want to be rid of it. Further, I am of the sense that just because something is morally repugnant does not mean it ought to be illegal, and I remember the stories of what women had to go through when abortion was illegal.

In the end, I find myself in the pro-choice camp. However, I still have respect for pro-lifers such as yourself who truly respect life and are not of the sort who seem to believe that life ceases to be worth protecting after birth. A short while back, my co-blogger William raised a small ruckus by coming out against legal abortion. While I disagree with him, I still respect his opinion. I also find it interesting that the Democratic Party later did exactly what he suggested, replacing the pro-choice plank in their platform with a fewer-abortions plank.

Tangentially on the subject: a Netherlands friend of mine has his own strong words on the infant euthanasia laws, which he is in favour of.

Thanks for all of the posts.

Jim, you are freaking brilliant and your analysis is always welcome.

LC- you are regurgitating Lakoff, who I read long before he talked about politics (back when I was a communications major) and even then I regarded him as a hack. I'm curious as to whether you read the post, where I raised serious moral issues. If a fetus is a living human and someone ends its life, we all have a moral obligation to stop it if we are able- just as if you could prevent a person from being murdered, you should. So your argument holds not only no political weight (as those who oppose abortion aren't likely swayed by it), it holds only moral weight of the abominable kind.

Mike- Thanks for the scientific background. I wasn't aware that so many embryos fail to implant. In my studies I came across one school of biological thought that pointed out that since an embryo can still develop a conjoined twin (and thus two individuals) until about the 12th day after fertilization, many regard this to be when life begins. Still a rather philosophical worldview, but I suppose this is where philosophy and science necessarily meeet. As a result, before about the 12th day (earlier in some, later in others), it isn't "living" and thus those that fail to implant aren't the loss of lives, but something else entirely. While there are no "abortions" at the 12 day period- as few people realize they are pregnant by this point- this answers a lot of questions about morning after pills, which I would argue are not abortion per se.

Thank you for your kind words Travis, but I am reminded of a quote some brave man of one sort or another once said to the effect of "In matters where life and death aren't involved, a word other than courage should be used." I tend to agree. It wasn't courageous, it was curious. And while I respect your faith (and share it), I think that when discussing policy, religious standards aren't the best way to judge things. Conceivably, we could ban the killing of all animals as Jains believe all animal life to be sacred. I don't think we would like that restriction. We have to go beyond our religious differences and find bedrock principles- that is the purpose of this post.

And Cecrops, I think you make some good points, but I make the point in the post that a woman's reproductive system becomes subordinate to another's right to life. Of course, one has to ask if we have a moral obligation to trade freedom over our own bodies in order to save the life of another. Morally, I would say probably, politically I would tend to say no. And politics is what we are dealing with here (as you say, the immoral is often legal), so in that instance choice should be our policy. But when we consider that the fetus isn't a distant person, but in fact the woman's child, the obligations to one's family apply. The government can coerce people into giving up significant freedom and property in the name of supporting their children, even when they do not wish to do so. If we recognize the right of the government to prevent people from neglecting their children, surely we can recognize the right for them to compel people not to end their lives.

But finally, the points that have been made about the lack of honest dialogue on this subject are very valid and important. This issue is among the most important of the last generation, and will continue to be so until there is some ultimate empasse reached. We have to go beyond our old way of looking at these issues- "Jesus made that baby" vs. "Keep your laws off my body"- if we are too have a serious resolution. Abortion is an awful thing, and at the very least it must be reduced. But if it is snuffing out a human life, it must be ended.

Thanks, and I imagine there'll be more comments, and I'll respond to these as well.

Andrew,

Excellent post. As is somewhat commonly known, I come down on the side of being a pro-life Dem and the one thing that I think is most encouraging in your post is the still pragmatic question of how to get the number of abortions minimized while still respecting other aspects of a progressive foundation to society.

The issue is not a zero-sum, closed loop question of eliminating abortion and all will be well. Creating an incentive for women and families to choose life over a back-alley abortion is a necessary counterweight and one with no easy answer. But one can start with concepts that ought to be taken more seriously in public debate: that life begins at conception, that we can and ought to help build a society that respects and values life to the point where abortion is diminished as an alternative.

Parts of these problems are simple, good old fashioned economics: create widespread economic opportunities, especially for women ... and you've cut a little from the demand side, for example. Parts of the problem pertain to social policy: to what degree do we, as a society, accept various birth control options, what's the overall value of sex education, etc .... Beyond that, there's a range of issues that get more divisive: should there be a negative consequence for choosing abortion outside of situations such as rape, incest, or endagering the health of the mother. I tend to think there's a range of solutions there that neither the Coburn-esque type (death penalty for the doctors) nor the liberterian hands-off approach. But this is the realm that will always be more divisive regardless of where individuals fall on this issue.

I find it troubling that you are associating yourself with Pro-Life bullshit rhetoric. Pro-Life organizations want you to ask yourself "when does life begin?" and fail to realize that this is not the basic question in the abortion debate. Whats important is to ask yourself "Will making abortions harder to attain (the legislative goal of pro lifers) make abortions something that rarely happens?" and the answer is clearly no.
Lets look at how other Democracies in the world handle this issue...In Western Europe abortions are legal and fairly easy to attain and they have lower abortion rates than we do! Ristricting a woman's right to choose only hurts the poorest and youngest among women. Did you know that 40% of women in America have abortions?
Abortion is not more a horrific act than slaughtering a cow (do you eat meat?) when you think about how frequently they occur. Abortion needs to be viewed as a normal fact of life that had been with us for thousands of years. I guess its like homosexuality then because thats another thing a lot of people have trouble with accepting as a fact of life.
You should read William Saletan's book "Bearing Right:How conservatives won the abortion war". Its about how pro lifers have changed the way they talk about abortion and have masked their agenda behind moderate talking points.
In short....Don't buy into that pro life rhetoric because its based on hate, intolerance and preached by people with their head in the clouds.

P.S.
If men could get pregnant there would be abortion clinics on every city block - they would be like 7-11s.

What frustrates me the most about this issue is that the Republicans throw abortion around as though it is the only important moral issue of out time (and I think you may be falling into the trap also, Andrew, from want you said in your second post).

It's become a massive stick which GOP uses to bash Democrats over the head with and all too successfully drown out any of the other equally important moral issues of our time. In some ways I think the GOP would be quite happy for Roe vs Wade to continue as the law of the land. Again, I urge you to read Jim Wallis's new book.

It is *a* big moral issue, but it is not *the* big moral issue. Fighting poverty at home and abroad, cleaning up the environment, foreign policy (preemptive wars, etc), are all equally important (if not more so) and, in the long run will probably cost more lives than legal abortions if nothing is done to halt the slide in these areas that Bush seems to have precipitated.

I believe that Karl Rove has cynically used the abortion issue (and gay marriage) as a rallying cry to ensure social conservatives helped get Bush re-elected. Those people are feeling a little sore right now since Bush has done precious little to advance their narrow social agenda.

I'm English and lived there for 30 years before coming to Austin. While the issue of abortion does rear it's head from time to time - especially regarding the time limit for legal abortions - it has never been the headline hogger it is over here. For better or for worse, the large majority of people in the UK accept the current law without much objection. Of course, there are always the controvertial cases - last year a woman had a late term abortion because the baby would have had a cleft palate which would have been easily corrected after birth - the doctor should not have performed the abortion in that case - but these are the exception, not the rule.

But, back on topic, I'm curious that you say the morning after pill is okay. Is it okay because you believe that fertilization doesn't occur first? If so, I guess your stance is consistent, but if there's a chance that fertilization happened would that not be abortion at least in some cases?

I also see very little difference in whether the pill worked five minutes after the sperm entered the egg or five minutes before - the end result is the same, you have prevented a life from coming into this world (assuming the foetus would have been healthy). Yes, technically in one case you allowed the DNA to merge and cells to start dividing, but I don't personally believe that those few cells have yet earned the right to be considered a person.

If you choose to believe that some form of ensoulment happens at the point of conception then maybe the equation is different (yet that can bring up all sorts of other thorny issues you are wise to want to avoid at this point!)

When I first meet you you were making your way around from being a socialist who celebrating the nasty and brutal(and also overtly anti-religious) communist revolution in Russia. You decided you were a Green apearently then a liberal democrat. you then moved from being a moderate to a conservative democrat. You have pretty much come full circle to a conservative republican(regardless of what you call yourself). Its clear you have no moral principle, so its no surprise that you are now a man of faith who is anti choice. That anyone would ever bother to expalin to you why you are wrong means they dont know you enough to know that they should just stand back and let move on to nazism. Then slowly make your way back from German camps to Russian ones.

Auto correct my poor spelling and gramar as you read... I'm dysexic or maybe just illiterate, whatever you wanna call it.

This past July I was 5 months pregnant, excited for my ultrasound appointment so I could learn whether I was having a boy or girl. Sadly we learned that my baby's head was so deformed he would not survive outside the womb. There was no hope whatsoever. So my choice was to wait until I was full term, have a c-section and wait for my baby to die or terminate the pregnancy. My husband and I chose the latter. We made the best decision we could for our unborn son, for our 2 yr old daughter, for our family. It was devastating.

Because of Texas laws signed by George W. Bush, if we had found out 1 week later, I would have had no choice. There was no risk to my health. I was not raped.

I never thought I would have an abortion. I certainly never thought I would have a late term abortion. But I did, and it was the right thing to do.

( this comment has been edited due to its lack of meaningful content on any level )

I'm not sure whether to congratulate Andrew on being courageous or to scoff at him for being foolish. Abortion must be the numero uno Internet subject where folks love to talk but not listen. And it doesn't take long before someone drags out a gratuitous comparison to Nazism. (Thanks a lot, Julian.)

One of the big problems here is trying to force fit the facts into our meager terminology and our preconceptions (sorry!) and then sit back in triumph as though all were settled. The common pro-life stance assumes that there is a distinct moment that marks the beginning of human being. Most pro-lifers define conception as this boundary point. And why not? It's conveniently distinct. Also, it's reasonably safe (in the sense that a human being almost certainly does NOT begin any earlier than the union of egg and sperm).

But there are lots of problems with equating a fertilized human ovum with a human being. When asked to justify this equation, I've heard folks offer lots of arguments and handwaving about potentiality and genetically completeness and such. Granted, the product of conception is human, is living, and is genetically distinct. But that does not answer the question of why it must be considered to be a human being.

Furthermore, the "personhood begins at conception" thesis leads to some paradoxes. In the case of identical twins, there is one conception but (apparently) two persons. When did the second one begin? In the rarer case of chimerae, there are two conceptions that fuse into (apparently) a single person with two distinct set of genes. And I think that scientists have evidence of a single conceptus dividing into twin embryos and then reuniting into a single fetus. In each case, is there one person or two? Why?

Let me offer an alternative. To define the beginning of personhood it only makes sense to study how we determine the other end, when a person dies. Our best understanding today is that brain activity is essential for a human life to exist. After all, you can take away any other organ of the body and the remainder will still be a human being. Without a brain, however, it's not, even though it may breathe, eat, excrete, reproduce, and otherwise resemble a complete person.

If we accept that personhood is inextricably tied to brain activity then one could argue that a fetus really becomes a human being sometime during the second trimester of pregnancy. Oddly enough, that roughly corresponds to the Roe decision which allows states to impose firm restrictions after the second trimester. True, this point of development is not as easy to identify as conception. That's unfortunate. But it does fit better with our understanding of what is a person, from all sorts of standpoints-- legal, scientific, and practical.

I appreciate how Andrew has addressed this subject, without the venom and hateful name calling that one often sees in discussions about abortion. I'm a Christian who firmly believes that human life is sacred and that it deserves our respect, starting well before conception and continuing beyond the final breath. But I'm also pro-choice, humbly recognizing that the real world presents us with difficult choices that should be left to the individual.

I do not believe the abortion issue should focus on 'personhood' at all. It should focus on the question of whether or not a woman has a right to autonomy over her own body. There are many instances in life where one person needs something from the body of another person in order to survive. However there are no laws which force anyone to donate a single drop of blood, bone marrow, skin, or an organ to keep another person alive. Even a corpse has rights in this regard and must leave permission in advance or permission must be obtained from a family member in order for any part of that corpse to be used to benefit or preserve the life of another.

If a child needs a bone marrow or kidney transplant and a parent or sibling is a perfect match, the parent or sibling must freely CHOOSE to use their body to preserve the life of the person who needs them.

A pregnant woman should have no less right to choose than a corpse.

Last year over four million women chose to use their bodies to bring a new life into the world and to support that life until it could support itself. I am all for promoting conditions that will encourage more women to make that choice. I also strongly support programs to effectively educate young people about the responsibilities of sexual activity including how to prevent unplanned pregnancies. But I can never support legislation that would take away a woman's right to autonomy over her own body.

Susan Culp

I'm not camparing the anti-choice movement to Nazism, I'm simply commenting on Andrew's fickle movement through political ideologies. It's simply to tell you that posts that attmept to make an intellectual argument against his not-so-intellectual claim (and Jose you tried really hard to be intellectual) are a waste of your time. Anyone that can go from being a communist to a conservative republican and everything in between has no principle. I was only half joking when I said he was on his way to nazism (he has already celebrated Russian communism and its death camps [hence his AIM name]). Andrew's posts are not courageous so much as they fit in with his ever-continuing quest to be louder and more obnoxious then before.

I believe life is inextricably bound to its environment. Therefore, fundamentally no fetus is "alive" to a mother who refuses to give it birth or refuses to care for it after it is born. Any woman determined (even to the point of suicide ) to see that her fetus or infant does NOT live WILL find a way to end that life in 99.99% of the time.

Would I force my belief on others, though? Machine gun down anti-abortion rights activists? Assassinate Frank Corte? Of course NOT! I can compromise and accept restrictions in late term abortions for the sake of social peace and welfare.

Likewise, the vast majority of anti-choice folks do not support assassinations of abortion doctors, fire bombing of clinics, etc. This is a tacit acceptance on their part that the personhood of the mother is fully developed, whereas the personhood of the fetus is not -- and that reasonable compromises must be made for the sake of the public peace and welfare.

The problem is that most anti-choice folks have never thought this out completely and come to that understanding. They are distracted and deluded by religious issues which can never become effective law. They need to be asked the hard questions -- but unfortunately no one asks them these questions because the pro-choice crowd has been too "nice". We have to be much more aggressive.

Whenever I discuss abortion rights I always start out by asking, “Was John Brown was justified in his attack on Harper's Ferry. Did the personhood of black slaves justify his violence? Did the personhood of the slaves justify the slaughter of our civil war?”

If my listener says, "yes", then I ask them if the personhood of a fetus justifies the killing of abortion doctors or other violence against abortion providers. If they say "yes", then I ask them if they wouldn't mind listing their name and address at www.revenge.com. They look at me oddly, and then I tell them that there is a website where people with such views are listed so that disgruntled women and families who have suffered from their policies can target them for retribution. When then tell me I'm crazy, I say, "Well, they hanged John Brown, didn't they? And our southern brethren killed hundreds of thousands of righteous northern soldiers, didn't they? What makes you think your advocating violence will not have personal repercussions?"

In the vast majority of cases, of course, my listener says that they do NOT advocate violence against abortion providers. In that case I allow them to agree with me that indeed the personhood of the mother holds precedence over that of a fetus – and that all everyone is looking for is a reasonable compromise on this issue. I immediately follow-up with, “What REALLY irks us liberals, though, is how the radical right has all you so called “pro-lifers” so tightly bound to them by the abortion issue that you turn a blind eye to all the conservative policies that actually INCREASE the number of abortions, etc., etc.”

Then I start asking them other questions such as:

What do they plan to do with the extra children? While we force women out of welfare roles, where are these children going to go? Is it foregone that they must give them up to "good Christian homes"? Group homes? The streets? Or will we begin to see many more women and children living in cars?

Will we establish a miscarriage police? And what about the right to privacy between a doctor and patient? If we lose confidentiality in regard to abortion, then will we have all of our medical records accessible by the courts?

Shall rape victims be imprisoned and forced to give birth? Is a husband bound to support a child that is a product of a rape? Does the rapist retain parental rights?

Are parents of teenagers forced to raise grandchildren in their retirement years? Can they recoup losses from the family of the teenage father?

Should women be placed at risk of lost wages, livelihood, rental status, or health-related risk while she is pregnant and is it lawful to write any laws that place put any burden on pregnant women?

If each miscarriage is investigated, how many innocent women will end up in jail or prison?

Are the poor and downtrodden, the independent, and the uneducated to become babymaking machines for this new vision of America? For the Evangelical masses, for a new "Christian government?" Are their forgone offspring to be given up into the glory of a new super Army, for a war without end?

Can we presume to protect the rights of one woman who may die if she continues a pregnancy, and not protect the woman who acts out of irresponsibility?

If we suspend the rights of one, don’t we in error suspend the rights of all?

Julian - Please remember that early adulthood is a time when a lot of people spend time re-evaluating their positions on things. It's a time when a lot of people have knowledge but not wisdom. I have to say that statement applies to myself.

Thanks for getting my back, Jim. Indeed, I once believed in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. I grew to question those positions and changed them. People grow, particularly when they are in their early 20s and are learning a lot more about the way the world works. As for being described as "fickle", it certainly beats being an ideologue. I don't make any choices based on pure ideology- I based them on what the evidence suggests would be best for our society as a whole. If abortion is in fact murder, then it must be outlawed.

I think that some of you have neglected to read what I said- first off, I didn't say that I am now pro-life. I am just starting to ask questions, and have been for some time. I wanted to get your take on things so I could make a more informed decision. Those of you (not Julian) who have said something substantive have helped.

Secondly, I said very clearly that we must couple this policy change with a support for greater social services for young mothers and children. Please read everything (I know its long) before attacking me for things I already said I don't agree with. Most of you are still making great points.

Thirdly, for those who say it isn't a matter of "life" it is a matter of "choice", I think that that is pretty disgusting. If it is a life, and we allow people to electively end a perfectly healthy and innocent human life, that is repugnant. If it isn't "alive" but merely a biological feature of a woman's body, you make an excellent point- it is choice. But the primary question must be "is this alive?" and the subsequent answer will then decide the debate. That's why I asked the questions, to understand what I should think about this.

Finally, I went out of my way to avoid pro-life rhetoric. I am trying to dive into this intellectually. And to the woman who had to make the awful choice, I understand where you come down and I understand your thought. I'm not going to argue with your choice and I respect you and your choice. God bless you and your family.

So thanks for the comments (with a few exceptions) and let's keep the debate going.

I am curious about your stance on the death penalty. If we are talking about abortion and its legality, then what about killing that is not only legally supported by our government but actually enforced? Like I said, I'm just curious, not trying to send this into an unrelated direction.

Andrew - I too have evolved in my position on abortion. When I first developed a postion on the issue, I opposed abortion except in the cases of rape, incest or life of the mother. I have since greatly increased my understanding and respect for women, and have come to realize that I, as a man, will never be able to understand the moral questions that a woman will face - something that has led me to a 100% pro-choice position. For that reason, I've decided that what a woman will do regarding her pregnancy is not a question for me -- it is a question for her, her partner, her doctor and her God.

Having said that, I agree with the phrase that abortion should be "safe, legal and rare". Too often, Democrats forget about the latter - taking steps to make abortion as rare as necessary. While I oppose anything that would punish women for having abortion, I do think that incentives should be given - perhaps educational or housing incentives for women who choose adoption. Furthermore, sex education programs should stress proper use of contraceptives and conditions that promote unwanted pregnancies (notably poverty, etc.) should be addressed seriously.

Unfortunately, for all their talk against abortion, Republicans have little to show for their talk. What has the Republican government of the past years done to actually reduce abortions? In reality... just about nothing. They talk a lot about it, but rarely do Republicans actually promote policy that tries to prevent pregnancy or discourages pregnant women from choosing abortion. Democrats can obviously do better on this topic, but Republicans clearly deserve the most blame. They do almost nothing to decrease unwanted pregnancies and abortions yet win so many votes on the issue. It's a disgrace.

First of all, I would like to say that everyone should think about abortion as much as you have and should do as much research as you clearly did. Nothing annoys me more than people who jump into the debate with no more information than “the Bible says it’s wrong.” or “it’s my damn right to an abortion.” That being said, I have to say that I come down on the side of pro choice.

I believe that sex ed programs should be altered to include better information about the various forms of contraception in order to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the first place. I believe that women considering abortion should try their level best to find a way to keep the baby or to put it up for adoption before choosing to have an abortion and that more government money should be spent in providing information and services to these women to help them find ways to keep the baby or find an adoptive home for it. Everything should be done to help these mothers see that abortion is not the only or easy choice.

However, I don’t think that the government should pass any stricter laws than the existing ones to regulate abortions for the following reasons. One, the current laws that limit abortions to the first two trimesters unless the mother’s life is in danger fall in line with when the fetus’ brain has a recognizable EEG pattern. Without a recognisable EEG pattern, a patient is considered dead. This makes a very logical line for the state to draw in when a fetus is considered alive and when it is not. One can debate when a fetus becomes alive in God’s eyes, but I am a firm believer in separation of church and state and do not feel that the debate about when a fetus becomes alive in God’s eyes has a place in the debate about abortion legislation. I believe that it is up to the mother, not the government, to reconcile her decision about whether or not to have a an abortion with her faith.

Two, like you said, if abortion were to be made any more difficult to obtain, the practice would simply go underground and without government oversight to maintain standards more women’s lives would be at risk and some attempted abortions would instead result in simply damaging the fetus so that when it is born it is less likely to survive and more likely to have injuries or defects that would hinder its life. Personally, I would like for women under 18 to be able to get abortions without their parents’ permission or notification of their parents for this reason. If a young girl is scared that her parents may turn her out or otherwise harm her if they find out she is pregnant or had an abortion, she may turn to unsafe methods of aborting the fetus which would put her life in jeopardy as well.

Third, like it or not, the burden on the mother is far greater than the burden on the father. Laws may mandate that the father pay child support, but if the father does not live up to other parenting responsibilities, there is little the mother can do about it. The judicial system does not force a criminal to serve both his and his accomplice’s sentence if the police are unable to find his accomplice. It’s unjust to force one person to bear the sole responsibility for two people’s mistake, which banning abortions would effectively do in many cases where the father abandons the mother and new child.

In relation to my previous point, there is no punishment for mothers that endanger their baby’s health by drinking alcohol, doing drugs, smoking, or otherwise engaging in behavior that could harm the fetus. If you’re arguing that a woman should not be allowed to terminate her pregnancy because the fetus is a human life, how do you justify not punishing the mother for other behavior that might endanger the fetus. Also then, would it be fair to only impose these restrictions on the mother (not drinking, not smoking, etc) when the father is just as responsible for the existence of this fetus? Ultimately, by enacting further abortion legislation, you start heading down a slippery slope. Where do you draw the line on laws to protect the fetus? Do you impose legal restrictions on the behavior by the mother that may harm the fetus? How exactly do you hold the father to the same standards that a mother faces when he does not actually carry the baby? It’s not practical or even, in my opinion, possible.

Finally, I believe that the woman must ultimately weigh all the factors such as her faith, her ability to keep the child, the possibility of adoption, and medical conditions that may threaten the life of the fetus or the woman and make her own decision and then deal with the ramifications of those choices.

But let's keep talking about it. There's a temptation to say that abortion is a silly debate because (for many people) it is highly symbolic and often disingenuous. And I think there's a tendency among many progressive liberals to not want to talk about something that isn't purely an economic or "public sphere" adjudicatory right. Afterall, goes the logic, if Thomas Jefferson didn't talk about abortion, why should we?

That has tended to be my view, but I have come to regard it as wrong. First, because of what essentially amounts to the critical feminist critique of liberalism - glossing over issues like this does a disservice to women by ignoring the differences between men and women.

Secondly, because given the historical perspective and the stakes involved, this is actually a more substantive issue than many of the debates in America's history. Regardless of whether you disagree with the proposition, opponents of legal abortion can argue that abortions have killed millions of unborn children. Overblown? You decide. But even a questionable claim to millions of lives ought to recognized as an assertion that the stakes in this debate are much, much higher than the stakes over, say, prohibition of alcohol, which was a major social debate for 100 years, resulted in two Constitutional amendments. Or freemasonry, which actually was a major political issue in the early-to-mid 1850s. I'll even go so far as to say the stakes in the abortion debate are higher than those in the gay marriage debate.

Many millions of people think abortion is an important topic, and given the sort of things Americans have thought relevant in the past, it definitely is.

I hear a lot of people say "all human life is sacred," but almost no one behaves as though they actually believe it.

If you support the death penalty, you don't believe life is sacred. If you support the Iraq war (or really, any non-defensive war), you don't believe life is sacred. Not really. Not in any way that actually matters. Such a sentiment routinely gets tossed out the window the first moment it's convenient. File it under the category of "lies we tell to ourselves."

Scott - A more accurate phrasing would be, that "human life is inviolable." Death-penalty supporting anti-abortionists (the pro-death pro-lifers), get around the issue by adopting a retributivist scheme for justifying capital punishment. In other words, the question isn't about the inviolability of life but over the justification of killing. We execute people because they deserve it, so goes the logic of that camp.

But that said, most people are probably in favor of justification and/or self-defense as an affirmative defense to murder.

Justification, moreover, plays a role in permitting the "rape, incest, life/health of the mother" exception that more moderate anti-abortionists espouse.

You could say that pro-choicers are essentially in the same boat ("it's justifiable if the woman thinks it's justified!"), but have allowed the exception to swallow the rule. At least for those who do believe abortion is killing a valuable human life (not all pro-choicers do).

Again, justification creeps in because there's a difference between holding life as sacred (which I take to mean "generally worthy of veneration"), which might be considered a rebuttable-presumption that life cannot be taken; and inviolable, which is an absolute assertion of unassailability. For what it's worth, I am drawing a distinction which I think is useful in understanding the politics of abortion, not one which you will necessarily find in the dictionary; Merriam-Webster's says "sacred" and "inviolable" are synonymous. My contention is that the terms are not synonymous when they are actually used in this context.

One of the problems with defending the "pro-choice" position is that there is no one, single, pro-choice position. As suggested above, ultimately for me, this comes down to a gut-check/"blink" decision that abortion ought to mostly be legal, at least in the first few months of pregnancy. There's a case to be made that this is sometimes the best way to come to a decision (See for example this book.).

I put up my take on the abortion question a while back. I had come to similar conclusions, with more detail.

It's the detail which gets to you.
My article.

It's intellectually brave to think out loud like this on such an important question.

I'll leave the longer comments directly above alone. Just want to underline the fact that, as you can see, it all depends on your premise. If you believe human life begins at conception, all of your conclusions will flow from that point.

If that's the case, this position makes no sense:

The solution is simple--if you don't like abortions, don't have one.

Yet if I threw this commenter off the top of a building, it would not be satisfying to say "If you don't like murder, don't commit one."

There is virtually no difference in the value or status of a fetus whether it's five seconds before or after birth. That being the case, stretching back into time, there is only one way to make sure you are not, shall we say, accidentally killing an innocent person. And that's to recognize human life as beginning at conception.

My only other comment is about the role of religion. Fortunately our Constitution spares us from the travesty of a state-run church--but in the public square, religion has neither fewer rights nor more than any other worldview. Religion is not required to be silent in such a discussion, certainly not in the political sphere, though you personally may find secular or strictly scientific arguments to be the most valid.

Good luck.

I learned to do my US dating,etc at an abortion clinic.Although not an Ob/gyn I probably did a few hundred deliveries in med school and residency;so I have a good background on the subject.I'm not competent to address whether Roe v. Wade was good law ,so I won't comment on it,but some of the pro choice people do strike me as about as intelligent as the creationists.Specifically,with regards to the partial birth option.Sissela Bok,a philospher at Harvard posited a tmie frame during which abortion was legal and acceptable-which she felt could be arbitrarily set as the time the fetus could survive ex utero.(I think this was without mechanical support;i.e. a ventilator).Most screening US's are done at 20 weeks,so gender can be identified if the parents want to know.If we take 28 weeks as the time a preemie can survive ex utero(and a neonatologist would need to give an expert opinion) that leaves plenty of time for an elective proceedure if desired.But,and it's a big but,I can think of no medical reason ,in terms of health why a partial birth should.More to the point,neither can my father and a colleaue of his who have 15-20,000 deliveries between them.When I took medical ethics we were taught to differentiate between fundamental and absolute rights.While I think choice is the former ,it is not the latter(and please don't trot out the tired canard abiut the patients mental health being better if the abortion is performed.Since that is an unmeasurable statement it is about as scientifically rigorous as "phlogiston" or "cultural bias".Anyway here is my position on Ab's.

This is a commendable intellectual journey you are taking, Andrew, no matter what conclusion you ultimately obtain.

In my opinion, any decision about abortion rights must be founded on a solid decision about what consitutes the personhood of the fetus: that is, under what conditions should the fetus be considered a separate human being with rights equal to that of the mother? For convenience I will call that state of equal rights "personhood."

For a fetus that obtains personhood, the question of abortion is equivalent to the question of murder: it should be legal only under the same circumstances under which it is legal to kill another human being (e.g., self defense). And it also justifies the intrusion of society upon the pregnancy process, because the fetus is entitled to basic protection of its life and general health that we give to all children. Just as we do not permit parents to physically abuse or kill their born children, we would be compelled to extend that protection to unborn persons as well. It is no longer just "the mother's body, the mother's decision"---there is another person involved.

Now to be sure, pregnancy is a unique circumstance, indeed. But again, once the fetus is given equal rights, the perspective is fixed, if not the answers. For example, once a fetus obtains personhood, even the justification of abortion in cases of rape and incest go away. Both are wicked crimes to be sure. But what gives the victim of any violent crime to intentionally kill an innocent bystander? As callous as that may sound, it is indeed the only logical conclusion if a fetus is to considered a fellow person. And it also means that we as a society would truly need compassionate maternal care and, if desired, adoption support in such cases as an alternative to the status quo.

On the other hand, before a fetus obtains personhood, the mother's rights as a person necessarily trump the rights of the non-person fetus. This includes her right to seek any sort of legal medical treatment, including abortion. It is still a separate life, and we may want to insist that abortion be done in a "compassionate" way (e.g., by anaesthetizing the fetus), but that need not be feared as an erosion of the abortion mindset---we have no difficulty demanding such compassion for animals, after all.

But one cannot assume the conclusion without establishing the premise, and all too often that is exactly what pro-choicers do. I see it in this thread: it doesn't matter whether the fetus is a person, it matters whether a woman should have control over her body. Well, the answer to the latter depends on the former! All pro-choice arguments are irrelevant if the fetus is a person of equal status, so first it has to be credibly established that it does not. That doesn't mean you have to convince the other side with your views on personhood, it's just that you have to actually address it.

When that is done, the only difference between an intellectually complete pro-choice argument and an intellectually complete pro-life argument is the disagreement about when personhood begins.

As for me I find myself largely, but not completely, pro-life. I say that because I do not believe that personhood begins at conception, so I don't find myself concerned about such things as anti-implantation contraceptives, IVF, etc. But I do feel that fetuses become persons far earlier than we are willing to acknowledge as a society.

Well, when I took the same approach, I came to the conclusion that, as things stand now, the best definition I could come up with was the reverse of the standard for death. If the fetus has brain waves, then it is indeed alive. This typically occurs, as far as I could find, near the end of the first trimester which gives a "window" when, again IMHO, abortion would not be killing a human being.

At the other end of the process, I'm strongly against abortion in the third trimester save for dire necessity (mother's survival, etc.). This is rooted as much in this male's personal experience as anything, I was eight weeks premie back in 1951 and I know of folk born twelve weeks premie and living.

Just a bit on the religious perspective. There is a very interesting passage in the Bible that is relevant to the personhood question. It is Ecclesiastes 11:5. The NIV versions says,

"As you do not know the path of the wind, or how the body is formed in a mother's womb, so you cannot understand the work of God, the Maker of all things."

Now, as this was originally written in Hebrew, the English is not a perfect translation, and there is a footnote for this verse that clarifies the meaning of the italicized portion: "how the life (or the spirit) enters the body being formed in the mother's womb."

Other translations capture this nuance. For example, the Amplified version states "how the spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a pregnant woman".

Anyway, I've always found that fascinating, because of its insight into the Judeo-Christian notion of a separation between spirit and body, and how it suggests that the formation of a person is indeed a process and not an event (conception).

I admire your piece on abortion. But your arguement loses credibility when you state that "sex education should start in the schools" Pardon me? Why is it that Democrats think that the morality of the pledge of allegiance should be outlawed in schools, but yet somehow the morality of sex education is fair game? Sex education should start and END in the home.

1. (to earlier person) If you don't like slaves, don't have one. If you don't like infanticide, don't do it. Etc.

2. I was there when my child was aborted. If I were a politician, I would never vote on abortion, pro or con. I do beleive it is an issue that should be settled by legislators. But I don't have the right to be involved any more.

3. Sometimes I have these wierd thoughts. Is murder really "wrong"? Animals kill each other. and we are animals. If you don't beleive in God, maybe that is the way it should be. And lying is ok too if you get away with it. But I struggle. sometimes I feel the reverse and think I should be a vegetarian and that eating meat is murder.

----

These things are hard...

For the previous post: If murder "isn't wrong", why do we feel bad when it happens? Why do people feel guilty after they have commited it?

To go further, why do women feel guilty after they have had an abortion? If they don't believe it is murder...then why the guilt?

"... life begins at conception ..."

This is a slogan, unconnected to scientific reality - but probably not in the way you think I mean it.

Life in the womb does not suddenly come into existence when two non-living things get together. The egg is alive, the sperm is alive, and the fertilized zygote is alive. Life does not begin at conception: it was there before conception and it continues after conception.

In other words, I think both sides are arguing from a false premise. More science, please.

"Safe, legal and rare."

Think about that. If we believe they should be safe and legal, why should they be rare?

Isn't that a tacit admission that, way in the back of our minds, we think there's something wrong with having one?

"If you don't like abortions, don't have one."

Great. If you don't like slavery, don't own one.

Congrats, Andrew, for figuring out that this is a moral issue. There's nowhere else to go with it.

This is a wonderful discussion. I had thought our society had lost the ability to have civil, reasoned discourse. Maybe there's hope.

I respectfully submit that there's a whole branch of science that has been omitted from the discussion so far, and that is forensics. I think we can agree that few abortions happen minutes after conception. They tend to happen at four months, and forensics has a lot to contribute at that stage. The "entity" which is the target of the abortion has, at four months, not just DNA, but fingerprints, ethnicity, gender, height, weight, blood type and hair color. For those of us who watch "Law & Order", "CSI" and "NCIS", that is enough to establish identity. We can be certain that whatever we want to call the "entity" at that stage, it is forensically distinguishable from the Mother. The rubric that a woman has a right to do what she wants with her own body, which I fully support, clearly does not apply to the "entity", which is forensically "someone else's body".

Bottom Line: If we take forensic science into account, we are not discussing a woman's right to choice about her own body; we are discussing the right of Mother to kill Not-Mother.

Other than the occasional moronic soundbite from some of the commenters, this is one of the best discussions of this issue I've read in a long while.

Science will never finally answer the question of whether life begins at some point before birth, because whether life has "begun" is inescapably an issue of what we value. And figuring out what we value only gets us half-way through the analysis. The rest of the puzzle is: what is the proper function of government? It's a singularly thorny issue - as issues of intense moral significance usually are.

All around a fine piece, Andrew, and a superb discussion by thoughtful people of goodwill on both sides of the issue.

[i]"Think about that. If we believe they should be safe and legal, why should they be rare?

Isn't that a tacit admission that, way in the back of our minds, we think there's something wrong with having one?"[/i]

Very glib, Dave, but wrong. Abortions are often performed when a woman gets pregnant by mistake. All but the most ardent pro-choicers would agree that it would have been better for those women not to have become pregnant in the first place. Just because someone thinks something should be safe and legal, doesn't mean that person believes it should happen all the time.

Oh and congrats Dave on completely missing the fact that we [i]are[/i] all treating this issue as a moral one already. Do you really think that anyone who is a pro-choicer is completely incapable of seeing that?

It's your kind of argument that is responsible for the deadlock in the abortion debate that has lasted for decades. I guess for you the principled stance against all abortions is more important than getting abortion rates down to the level they are in Europe (i.e. up to 3 or 4 times as rare).

"... life begins at conception ..."

This is a slogan, unconnected to scientific reality - but probably not in the way you think I mean it.

Life in the womb does not suddenly come into existence when two non-living things get together. The egg is alive, the sperm is alive, and the fertilized zygote is alive. Life does not begin at conception: it was there before conception and it continues after conception.

In other words, I think both sides are arguing from a false premise. More science, please.

A person does not exist until a sperm is united with an egg. Nor can it--there are only nearly countless possible persons until then. Every human being consists of the union of a sperm and egg, but nothing less than that.

You can read "life begins at conception" as "human life begins at conception," but since it is human life we are concerned with, I think the shorthand is fair.

Andrew, I am noticing a dominant theme in these posts. And that is "WHEN DOES LIFE BEGIN?" The pro-life crowd believes life begins at conception. That is and has always been their position for decades. To me that stance is quite clear. However, the pro-choice crowd has never stated when they think life begins. They don't have a position or have chosen not to take one. It seems to me that if want to be a part of the abortion debate, shouldn't you comit to a belief on when life begins? The pro-lifers have stated their position on when they think life begins. I challenege the pro-choice crowd to come to a unified stance on that crucial issue. Until they do, no rational debate on abortion can move forward.

Science will never finally answer the question of whether life begins at some point before birth, because whether life has "begun" is inescapably an issue of what we value.

I agree, except for the terminology. I do believe that science is basically unanimous that life begins at conception. There really is no disputing that a new, unique organism comes into existence within a small interval of time surrounding fertilization.

Having said that, I agree with you that we must decide what it is about life that we value, and therefore what constitutes what we call "personhood." We seem to have an easier job of having that debate on the other end of the life timeline, Terri Schiavo notwithstanding. We are all reasonably comfortable with the notion of "brain death", for example. If we were not, then we would have a great difficulty in allowing doctors to proceed with organ harvesting for transplantation once a person has entered that state---would we be taking their life?

So I would agree with your statement 100% if you would replace the term "life" with "personhood." Indeed I think that some efforts to claim that we don't know when life begins is an attempt to obscure the biological fact of it, as if out of fear that this would make it harder to win a debate about when "personhood" begins. (Though I am not accusing you of that here.)

The rest of the puzzle is: what is the proper function of government? It's a singularly thorny issue - as issues of intense moral significance usually are.

Hmm, but indeed, you make it sound like that's a large piece of the puzzle, when it is but a small part of it. Deciding when the government recognizes personhood is really the largest challenge. If we decide that a fetus is a "person" in the same sense you and I are after a certain number of weeks, then frankly the governmental role falls into place, for the most part. That person must now be granted the same rights as, say, a post-born child. That includes a certain bit of parental autonomy but excludes physical abuse or murder.

I don't see what is "thorny" about the question of government involvement---that is, once the personhood question is settled. Perhaps an example would be helpful.

Offered without comment, except to disclaim any endorsement of Peter Singer whatsoever.
Abortion, by Peter Singer

I essentially agree with Mike Walker's take on the subject, way back up there in the comments. It's interesting that the policy prescriptions that flow from this newfound absolutism touch on peripheral issues: sex-education, the desirability of adoption, etc., but fails to address the coercive element of the equation.

Namely, if protected life begins at conception, and any extinguishing of that life, will women who secure and use a day-after pill be prosecuted for manslaughter or murder, and doctors/pharmacists who acquiesce be treated as accessories? After all, terminating a one-day old pregnancy would have to be treated the same as terminating a 28-week pregnancy, since the viability argument (glossed over with a strawman in the initial argumentation) no longer applies.

You know, this is a great example of the Right's disconnect with reality, and Democrats purpose and view of the world.

Dave says, "Congrats, Andrew, for figuring out that this is a moral issue."

This type of dumbspeak used to amaze me.

Andrew:

I was impressed with your essay until I came upon this statement:

Democrats must take the lead, as only Democrats can protect life before it is in this world and after it is born. It is time for politics to leave this discussion and for level-headed and honest people to debate the issues with themselves and others in a respectful way.

What a bunch of crap.

You go on and extol, quite rightly, the fact that the abortion debate should be centered on the rights of the nascent child, but then follow it up with that damnfool statement.

First: If it is true that only "Democrats" can protect life before birth and after, then you have ipso facto injected politics into the discussion. However, your very next sentence asserts that it is "...time for politics to leave this discussion." Pick one and go with it, bub.

Second: Are there no Republicans or Independents or Libertarians whom you would consider "level-headed and honest people?" Remember - you used the capital-D "Democrats." That says politics to me. Further, you assert that only "Democrats" can discuss this issue in a level-headed and honest and respectful fashion.

With all due respect, sir, you've been in Austin too long.

I respect you for publicly writing your thought process on it - it is, so far, fairly well-reasoned, but it is still filtered through the Donkey-colored glasses that you continue to wear. Not every Republican is what you see and hear under the Dome. Nor is every capital-D Democrat capable of discussing abortion with themselves or with others in a respectful fashion.

Keep at it. Maybe, just maybe, you will get your enlightmentment sooner than you think.

I agree with the previous post by Gloria. Why haven't the pro-choice advocates ever commited to a position on when they think life begins? Isn't that the main issue of this debate? How can you argue a point that you're not even sure of yourself?

The difference between pro-life and pro-choice coudn't be more drastic. It is about nuance. Listen to a pro-choice advocate defend abortion and you will hear someone disect reason into a thousand pieces. Witness the previous post that now believes that "life" isn't the point anymore....it is now about "personhood"...whatever that means. Next, they will tell you that "personhood" is bogus and claim some other definition. They will "nuance" an arguement to death until they don't have to defend themselves anymore. Stick to the point. Please.

To "a REAL [sic] feminist":

"Did you know that 40% of women in America have abortions?"

You are conflating miscarriages - medically called spontaneous abortions - with elective abortions.

Andrew opened the original post with allusions to the Groningen Protocol in Holland, a policy developed by physicians that allows doctors to perform infant euthanasia if they see fit. The following two posts discuss this awful policy in more detail:

• The Groningen Protocol Revisited by medblogger CaliforniaMediceneMan, chronicling a doctor's point of view on this issue.
  
• Euthanasia for Newborns--Killing in the Netherlands posted March 14 at crosswalk.com goes in to detail on the Groningen protocol and its 'slippery slop' potential.
  

First, great post. If more people on both sides took a look at the actual science, we'd at least have a rational debate.

Secondly, as someone on the right, I find it hard to believe that such a rational examination of the issue can be followed by some of the ridiculous comments you made politically. Only Democrats can behave rationally? Only Democrats care about the well-being of their fellow Americans? I understand we disagree on many issues, but that doesn't make all Republicans reptilian, greedy, heartless bastards, anymore more than being a Democrat automatically makes someone a secular blame-America-first pacificst.

As for the idea that teaching abstinence is fundamental to reducing the number of abortions, I agree whole heartedly. I'm glad you're a democrat saying that, because if you were a republican, the Howard Dean wing of your party would be laughing at you for saying the word abstinence. For that matter they probably are, while they process the paperwork to throw you out of the party for your pro-life stance. Ask Roemer about the prospects for a pro-life democrat. Nevertheless, I hope your willingness to examine such a controversial issue signals a change for your party. It's a better country with two strong parties debating the issues.

Mike Walker says the religious right is illogical. Abortion doctors should be heroes to these people because the aborted souls went straight to heaven. I suppose a murderer should also be a hero to "these people" if he were to kill Mike or me today on the assumption we would end up in heaven. (Let's say a very optomistic murderer.)

But I don't think Mike or I would feel it was entirely fair if it was about to happen to either of us, no matter what the "religious right" would think. Maybe that's why God mentioned that suggestion about not committing murder. (One of the Ten Commandments, I think.) That one trumps our well-intentioned desire to hasten someone else's journey to heaven, whether an adult, a new born, or even someone just about to be born.

Andrew, if you're interested in hooking up with other pro-life liberals, you can check out:

The Consistent Life coalition - http://www.consistent-life.org/

Democrats for Life - http://www.democratsforlife.org/

Pro-Lifers for Peace and Justice - http://ppj.bravehost.com/

LeftOut - http://prolife.liberals.com/

I also have some discussion of liberal pro-life issues on my blog - http://lamom.blogs.com

When I was younger (I'm now 57) there used to be lots of unwed mothers' homes run by Catholic nuns who not only took care of the mothers but found homes for the babies.

I've always said I'd feel better if pro-life folks were for life after birth as well as before. Then they wouldn't be so anxious to execute people or would be interested in providing a quality education and health care.

And I'm tired of being accused by, I assume Republicans, of behavior because I'm a Democrat. Just as I'm sure Republicans are tired of being caricatured as unfeeling robots.

Let's try to keep the conversation civilized.

For the record, I chose to have an abortion many years ago because emotionally, financially, and spiritually I couldn't afford to raise another child. My regret isn't the abortion but that it was the only realistic choice open to me.

Having said that, I agree with you that we must decide what it is about life that we value, and therefore what constitutes what we call "personhood."

Actually, the pro-life position is a lot easier to defend than proving personhood. Logically, if you want to take some sort of irrevocable action, you must accept the burden of proof to establish that the action is an acceptable one.

In other words:
1) It's simple fact that human life begins at conception.
2) It's also a fact that each of those newly-conceived embryoes will eventually become a "person" if allowed to survive (i.e. not aborted or miscarried).
3) Therefore, it's logical to assume that personhood must be attained at some point during the born/unborn child's life.
4) If we cannot be sure when personhood is attained, then we should err on the side of caution and not kill any possible people.
5) Since personhood could be attained at any point back to the moment of conception, it is logical to start protecting life at that point.

In other words, if you are pro-choice, you should be required to prove conclusively that the unborn child is not a person at the moment of abortion.

We would prosecute a deer hunter who shot another hunter because he "thought he was a deer".
We oppose the death penalty when there is any possibility that an innocent person could be executed. (For me, that means I oppose the death penalty all the time.)
We expect our military to exercise great care to avoid killing any innocent non-combatants.

Yet, somehow, we are expected to accept the killing of a possible person simply because we can't prove that he/she is a person yet? 40+ million dead so far, and we're still not sure.

I've always said I'd feel better if pro-life folks were for life after birth as well as before. Then they wouldn't be so anxious to execute people or would be interested in providing a quality education and health care.

Well, feel better. Lots of pro-life people (including me) are also opposed to the death penalty.

We also care for the child after birth. Admittedly, there are different ways of doing this:
* Progressives push for a stronger public education system; I advocate school vouchers, so that our schools improve through competition.
* Progressives advocate an increase to the minimum wage; I support cutting taxes and letting a growing economy increase everyone's wages.
* Progressives advocate a range of government programs to help the poor and downtrodden; I support charities and community action to do the same thing.

Conservatives want to help people just as much as progressives do, we just don't think that more government is the solution. Don't impugn our motives just because you disagree with our policy ideas. Don't confuse mainstream conservatives with Ayn-Rand-worshipping Objectivists.

It is good to hear someone who has come to understand the truth about life. Forget all those hateful comments from the pro-abort/murder/death lovers.

A couple of thoughts:

First, one can protect life and support the death penalty. The fact that the leftists can't see that makes my skin crawl. (I can be one who loves fruit, but destroy a bad apple out of a bushel before it corrupts and destroys all the other apples.)

And as for supporting the full cycle of life. The leftist arguments are equally as foolish. You are not leaving one to the "wolves" if you support conservative ideas. Progressive ideas are freedom denying. Enslaving the masses to do some seemingly good things for the few is progressive, but it is not good. Laws that apply to all equally and fairly across society is just. Special laws for this group, whether persecuting some through higher taxation, or setting up others for whatever reason (past grievances, economic status, skin color etc.) is patently and by definition unjust.

The fact that the leftists can't see that is a testimony to their blindness to what is good, right and just.

Frankly, it shows spiritual blindness.

Anyway, I encourage you to keep reasoning about the merits of progressive policy vs. conservative policy and I am confident that you will also see the truth in the future.

Signed,
Glad to find a thinking leftist.

The thing that I found shocking when I was on the Left was that although people all spoke about choice, when a woman got pregnant there was only one choice. No one spoke about adoption, or regarded it as a serious option. It was assumed that one would abort.

And because of this culture, prospective parents who want to adopt domestically rather than seeking babies overseas often have to wait 1-3 years to become parents.

Meanwhile, young women have abortions because termination is the "only" choice.

The NARALs of the world have pretty much completely abandoned the argument that a fetus is not a life. The argument has prety much completely shifted to a woman's autonomy. This is not without reason as medical science has exposed Roe v. Wade for the tortured piece of logic that it is. Even many people who are pro-choice acknowledge what a horrendous piece of judicial legislating it was. The reason pro-choicers will never stake out a position on when life begins is becuase it would argue for a limitation on abortion at some point, a position which is totally untenable with absolute sexual autonomy.

As for whether this is an issue for legislators and government, is there any issue that is more crucial than protection of life? The entire working theory behind liberal democracy is basically that when we leave the "state of nature" (or whatever you like to refer to it as)that government's first job is to protect life.

I may have missed something along the way, but it doesn't seem that the issue of sex has come up much. Abortion results from sex (and rape though it accounts for a minsiscule number of cases). Is it completely unreasonsbale to suggest that people not have sex if the possibility of a resulting pregnancy looms? The hard line feminists who support abortion on demand believe that sexual autonomy for women is the most important issue in the world. It is the only thing that "levels the playing field" with men....the lack of consequences from promiscuity. It is also why almost all of them are atheists, otherwise they would have to blame God for the difference between men and women. Curious that they believe that the worst trait of men is something to be emulated among women.

Also, you should not feel conflicted about whether this makes you a "real" Democrat. I get the same shit as an anti-death penalty, anti-war Republican and it is nonsense. The day you resign to let any political party do your thinking for you is the day you should give up entirely.

At the very least, this post should be instructive that Americans have much more to agree on on this issue than suggested.

Late to the party, but just had to say this, from another former liberal turned much less liberal:

Anyone who is confused as to why the Democrats are fading away just needs to read Julian's posts and "REAL feminist". Shrill? You betcha. Ignoring the thoughtfulness of the advanced argument and focusing on name-calling? Yep. Says way more about the writer than about the target of the post? Oh my, yes.

As a mother, I can tell you that there is nothing in this world that is anywhere near as precious as a child. As a christain, I can say that I am absolutely outraged at your own moral corruption. You sir, claim to have great faith, and you are a hypocrit. How can you proclaim the sacredness of all human life, and claim to be a man of faith, yet continue to say that when an adult wants to end his/her life, It is your opinion that it is their right. That sir, is morally repugnant.
No man or woman, has the right to take their own life for any reason. If you were a man of faith as you have clearly stated several times,you would know that suicide is a sin, not to mention selfish and, well, stupid. I will pray for you sir, because you need some clarity.
I will continue to say that if a woman chooses to have an abortion, it is not the buisness of anyone other than her and whomever she wishes to tell. I respect your opinion on this matter sir, but as a man, I do not respect you. You do not speak with wisdom, you instead speak with criticism.
I put it to you sir, to inquire as to why some women choose abortion, instead of manning the picket lines and pushing the fences. You may learn something. I am further, in no way, justifying abortion or criticising it. I am merely expressing an opinion, with the knowledge required to announce it.

"LC- you are regurgitating Lakoff, who I read long before he talked about politics (back when I was a communications major) and even then I regarded him as a hack. I'm curious as to whether you read the post, where I raised serious moral issues. If a fetus is a living human and someone ends its life, we all have a moral obligation to stop it if we are able- just as if you could prevent a person from being murdered, you should. So your argument holds not only no political weight (as those who oppose abortion aren't likely swayed by it), it holds only moral weight of the abominable kind."

Yadda, yadda, yadda...I have no idea who this Lakoff person is. By the way, where's the moral outrage against GUYS who think it's okay to pressure girls into having sex with them??? It takes two to create these embryos, y'know, and until MEN learn to take some responsibility, abortions should be safe & legal.

"P.S. If men could get pregnant there would be abortion clinics on every city block - they would be like 7-11s."

You're so right, Real Feminist! Safe, legal and available 24/7 on a corner store near you! :)

I'm a former leftist/liberal. (It was a long time ago.) I supported a woman's right to choose abortion because I didn't think a fetus was a person. One of my arguments was that you don't see people having funerals for miscarried fetuses.

I now see how shallow that thinking was. I agree completely with Naaman that one should have to prove conclusively that unborn children aren't human before sanctioning abortion. And I see no way that can be proven, since there is no way of determining at what point we become human. Surely the burden of proof should be on the killers rather than the defenders of the victim.

Like others who have posted I also have some reservations about using the death penalty because of the possibility of executing an innocent person.

As a mother, I can say that there is nothing more precious than a child. As a christian, I can say that I have never been more outraged at a fellow "believer". You sir, are clearly confused. You stated several times that you are a man of faith, but you sir are a hypocrit. Being a man of any faith, you would believe that a person who willingly takes his own life, is a sinner and therefore condenmed. You would not believe that suicide is ever ok, as you stated and I quote: "If a grown person seeks to end their life rather than suffer a terrible illness and the subsequent loss of dignity, it is my opinion that such is their right." This sir, is morally repugnant and corrupt.
Furthermore sir, you speak only with criticism and opinion, but you lack the knowledge required to state such an opinion. Therefore I put it to you sir to speak to women who have had abortions. Ask them why, and keep an open and clear mind, something which I can forsee as rather difficult for you. You may learn something.
For the general public and all others who will read this notice, I am in no way criticising or supporting abortion on any level. I am simply speaking with understanding and compassion for all people. I further apologize to any offended readers.

If you don't like abortions, don't have one.

If you don't like murder, don't commit one.

If you don't like pollution, don't pollute.

If you don't like logic, don't try to engage in it.

*cough* LC *cough*

I grow weary of the "slippery slope" argument regarding moral issues like the death penalty and euthanasia, especially if the start of that slope is considered to be the putting to death of minors.

Give people more credit than that. The only time there has been the danger sliding down such a slope was in totalitarian regimes like Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia where there were no checks and balances on what those in power could do. Such problems are extremely rare to non-existant in democratic countries.

Take cloning, for example. Theraputic clone has been permitted by some governments after much soul searching, yet reproductive cloning is firmly banned by all, and is likely to remain that way for the forseeable future.

Another example. A woman in the UK recently had late-term abortion because her child would have been born with a cleft palate It was illegal because the deformity is not serious enough and would have been fixable. There was a huge outcry about it in the press, and calls for the arrest of the people involved approving in the procedure. Abortion has been legal in the UK for nearly 40 years - where's the slippery slope? If there is one then the slope is barely noticable.

The list goes on. A number of American scientists in the past performed highly unethical experiments on mental patients. Do we see research labs stocked with such unfortunate individuals today? Of course not. The violations were uncovered and stopped.

In general people, religious and non-religious alike have a much better moral compass than you seem to realise. Only in societies where a few deviants can operate with impunity will you see any form of slippery slope that a whole nation is likely to fall down.

Being a man of any faith, you would believe that a person who willingly takes his own life, is a sinner and therefore condenmed. You would not believe that suicide is ever ok, as you stated and I quote: "If a grown person seeks to end their life rather than suffer a terrible illness and the subsequent loss of dignity, it is my opinion that such is their right." This sir, is morally repugnant and corrupt.

Er, people end their own lives all the time, quite legally and, in my opinion, quite morally. Many ALS sufferers choose not to go on a ventilator when they can no longer breath unassisted. They are