In the 2010 midterm elections a large amount of “Tea Party” Republicans took seats in the House of Representatives. The effects of this change in power have been discussed ad nauseam in the media since then. However, during those elections a similar amount of Tea Party Republicans took over state level positions and they have quietly begun to pass legislation which will ban abortion and severely limit birth control. This process will not be detrimental only to women but to society in general.
With any discussion on abortion the first argument to arise from the anti-abortion movement is that abortion is murder. Judith Jarvis Thomson wiped away this argument in her famous 1971 article “A Defense of Abortion” which appeared in the first issue of Philosophy and Public Affairs. In it she wrote:
“It is concluded that the fetus is or anyway that we had better say it is, a person from the moment of conception. But this conclusion does not follow. Similar things might be said about the development of an acorn into an oak trees, and it does not follow that acorns are oak trees, or that we had better say they are...A newly fertilized ovum, a newly implanted clump of cells, is no more a person than an acorn is an oak tree.”
Thomson’s argument nicely shows how ridiculous it is to assume that a zygote or a fetus is the same as a human being. No one considers an acorn or a seed to be a grown plant. Why is it then different in humans?
After Thomson’s article many in the anti-abortion movement claimed her argument did not work because a zygote and a fetus can feel pain and is thus different from a seed or an acorn. However, research shows that a fetus cannot feel pain until the third trimester. In an article in the Journal of the American Medical Association titled “Fetal Pain” by Lee, Ralston, Drey, Partridge and Rosen concluded:
“Consequently, the capacity for conscious perception of pain can arise only after thalamocortical pathways begin to function, which may occur in the third trimester around 29 to 30 weeks’ gestational age, based on the limited data available.”
With the understanding that a zygote or a fetus cannot be equated to a child and that it cannot feel pain until the third trimester it becomes increasingly questionable as to why abortion should be banned.
The only remaining argument against abortion is that it is detrimental to the woman’s health both physically and mentally. Saying that abortion is physically dangerous is a ridiculous counterattack as pregnancy is also physically dangerous and carries great risks with it. The argument that abortion might cause long term mental issues might sound slightly more likely bit it, too, is incorrect. A Danish study published in January 2011 in the New England Journal of Medicine found that not only does an abortion have no long lasting dangerous psychological effects, it is actually likely that a pregnancy carried to term will have long lasting psychological effects.
With it now clear that abortion is not murder nor is it exceptionally dangerous, it becomes clear that the conservative legislation attempting to ban it is a mistake yet it is one that continues. For example, Mississippi tried to pass a personhood amendment during the 2011 elections which would define a fertilized egg as a human being. Presidential hopefuls Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney supported this amendment even after Mississippi voters voted it down. According to Anu Kumar of Ipas, in the first half of 2011 80 pieces of legislation were passed in various states which aimed to restrict abortion. Perhaps most disturbing is a bill, HR 358, which passed the House of Representatives and is currently in the Senate. This bill, obscenely called the Protect Life Act, would allow hospitals to forego saving a pregnant woman’s life if an abortion was necessary.
There are a number of reasons for which abortion must remain legal but it is this last one that makes it imperative. As talked about above, pregnancy can be incredibly dangerous and there are circumstances where the mother’s life might be at risk if an abortion is not performed. Since it has already been shown how the fetus is not a human being, an abortion is not some sort of horrible decision here. It is not a situation where it is a choice between a mother’s life and a baby’s life. No, it is a choice between a fetus and a human being. To have that choice taken away is abhorrent as it is directly endangering women who are having difficult pregnancies.
While not as important as saving the life of a mother, there are other reasons abortion must remain as an option for pregnant women. Bringing a child into the world when the mother does not want to will be incredibly hurtful not only to the mother but also to the child. Contrary to popular belief, there’s no such thing as “motherly love” that automatically appears when a child is born. If such a thing existed then no one would ever put their child up for adoption. So imagine for a moment a situation where a child is born and the mother did not want it but had no choice because abortion was not an option for her. Both child and mother will now be miserable; the mother because she has a child she did not plan for and the child because it is going to be raised by a mother that does not want it.
A common rebuttal to this is that the mother could just put the child up for adoption or place it in foster care. However, not all babies who are put up for adoption get adopted right away. Those that are not are placed in the foster care system which is far from a loving and caring system. More often than not there are many children in the foster care home and the foster parents barely have time to deal with all of them.
Finally, as it has been proven that a fetus cannot be considered a human being it becomes imperative that a woman have a choice as to whether she will keep the baby or abort it. It goes uncommented upon in many debates that the fetus is inside the woman, and is essentially parasitic in nature. If a woman does not want to subject her body to this then she should not feel pressured to. In society there is the expectation what everyone can decide what to do with their own body. That should be no different when it comes to pregnancy.
