Should Abortion be Legal?
The landmark Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade was supposed to settle the question of abortion’s legality once and for all, but the Court’s ruling has instead become a fulcrum of debate. Placed squarely at the intersection of civil rights, health, religion and law, abortion is one of America’s most heated controversies.








Anti-Abortionists' Claim to Being "Pro-Life" is a Classic Big Lie
- From Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights
By Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights - Advancing Objectivism
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Anti-abortion's big lie
Don't want an abortion? Fine. Don't have one. However, don't use government power to force everyone else to live by your biblical edicts. That is immoral. America isn't a democracy. It is a constitutionally- limited republic. That means the limits are on the government, not the people.
Today's conservatives hate America and America's founders, because they're incapable of living in a "free" society where everyone is capable of making choices for themselves.
Pro-life means pro Human life. Those that are already living. Not an embryo nor protoplasm.
- Secular Foxhole
September 3, 2008 7:28AM
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"Unencumbered by the facts"
So is a human in development, also known as an embryo or fetus, among other names depending upon point of development, not human? But they are. No real scientist or doctor would deny that. Well, are they not beings? Do they not exist? Are they not real? Are they not present? Then how can you physically remove the imaginary?
Now, to the middle part; the issue is about the rights of two human beings: a mother and a child. That's not even debatable since any doctor worth their degree must admit that the child is a living human being from the beginning. It's high school biology.
To the beginning, giving birth is not a sentence. It is a consequence, but a deserved one (as all true consequences are). And of course, being pro-life refers to the actual, real quality of life; not the whimsical, transitory one as in: 'get a life'; though we are pro-that as well.
Now, where the birth of a child actually threatens the actual life of the mother, almost no one believes abortion shouldn't be considered. But it still must be treated as any other killing.
Interestingly, in the Declaration of Independence, the three mentioned inalienable rights are listed in a peculiar order: almost as if there's a priority. [understated] For if one's happiness takes precedence over your property, right to speak freely, or even life, I can see why there might me a little mix up at the courthouse.
- JKM121
September 6, 2008 5:03PM
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A lie?
I don't think asking someone to assume responsibility for her actions is too much to ask. In the end, it only takes nine months to carry a child and give it up for adoption. You are saying it is OK to kill the child so that the mothers "life" isn't thrown away? Please -- Nine months of putting a kink in a social life is hardly comparable to being put to death by dismemberment. Abortion is being used by people as a way not to pay the piper. If you don't want children now, don't make them!
- Fr Fenton
October 8, 2008 7:33AM
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No one is pro-abortion.
There are three choices: birth control, babies , or abortion . For the pro-life side the first choice is babies. For the pro-choice side the first choice is birth control. Nobodies first choice is abortion.
- mike1948
August 6, 2009 10:13AM
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Abortion IS wrong.
I can prove it. (Before you reply, read the entire post)
1st do you think murder is wrong? If yes, continue reading. If no, go away.
The unborn are human. Proven by the law of Bio-Genesis- Living things reproduce only after their own kind. Its impossible for humans to produce offspring that are not human, but later become human.
You say, they are human, but their not persons.
The only differences between us, and an unborn: Size, Level of development, environment , and degree of dependency.
Size: Large people are not more human than small people
Level of Development: a 4 year old is no less human than a 40 year old because of development
Environment: A newborn in an incubator is not less human than a child elsewhere
Degree of Dependency: People on insulin are less viable but no less human
That shows that the unborn are people
- MatthewF22Fan
December 14, 2009 11:15PM
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Personhood
The argument for abortion on the basis of non-personhood is valid. Personhood requires the ability to understand and act under a moral code. Embryos are not persons. The problem with this arguement is that you cannot hang the fate of a human on personhood. To do so, you must then also accept the killing of the mentally deficient, infants through (in many cases) teens , coma patients, etc. Further you would have to ask if you meet the qualifications for personhood if you are drunk, asleep, unconcious, or otherwise mentally impaired. Should it be legal to kill someone as long as they are sleeping? You are not able to understand or act under a moral code when you are asleep, so you cannot have personhood at that time. You will presumably re-gain the qualifications of personhood upon waking; so maybe that counts as close enough. Now you violate the arguement. If potential personhood is now the requirement, any human must be presumed to have the status of person until presented with evidence to the contrary with no hope of ever achieving personhood. Under this requirement, abortion is wrong because it kills a potential person. Arguements about killing other groups of non-persons is omitted as irrelevant to the current issue.
The real issue of abortion, is at what point does the right of the baby (fetus, tissue, potential person, growth, whatever you wish to call it) to live impinge on the basic rights of the mother that carries it significantly enough to warrant the denial of the baby's (qualified as above) right to life. I agree with hierarchal Life, Liberty, Persuit of Happiness and further assert that conflicting rights can only be weighed on equal tiers. ie. the right to life of the baby can only be challenged by the right to life of the mother. In such case, the mother would have the moral right to choose to live and extinguish the life of her child . In all cases it is killing another human being ( murder ), but killing another human being (murder) is not always morally wrong.
- Massa
January 23, 2010 3:06AM
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