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Saturday, July 17, 2010

Pro-Life consistency

For the past couple years I've been struggling with my Pro-Life views.  The issue isn't whether or not the fetus is a child, but rather it's a problem I have with the Pro-Life movement. It's also the issue that zombie discussed in a recent post he made to PJTV:

I think both sides of the abortion debate are lying and have been lying since the argument first arose. Anyone who wants to forbid abortion “except in cases of rape or incest” is, frankly, full of crap. And here’s why:

If you truly are “pro-life” in that you believe abortion is murder because the unborn child is a full-fledged human being, then you wouldn’t so casually allow the child to be murdered simply based on its parent’s misbehavior.

Most people who are anti-abortion adopt the label “pro-life” based on the shared notion that the zygote/embryo/fetus, no matter what its stage of development, is an undiminished human being with full human rights. And that’s a principled position which I can respect — if you stick to it consistently. But if you start making expedient exceptions, then your dishonesty has been revealed. Because if you really and truly believed that an embryo was a full human being, then you wouldn’t allow it to be murdered simply because its father was a bad man.

Zombie starts his post out by saying that he's not going to make any friends by writing this, and I'm sure that more than a few people won't be able to stomach everything he has to say.  However his review of both sides, while harsh, is 100% accurate and something that long needed to be said.  At this point I'm going to recommend fully reading the article, which I'll go ahead and link again.

The Pro-Life movement has attatched an asterisk next to their platform.  

"A fetus is a life!*"
*: Except in cases of rape or incest.

In terms of political pragmatism, that asterisk makes sense.  Abortion isn't particularly popular in this country, but then again neither is the thought of forcing a woman, who was just raped, to carry the child of the man who raped her.  However this isn't an argument about what is politically pragmatic.  This is an argument about the intellectual, and principled consistency of the Pro-Life movement, and as zombie points out, the people who buy into and promote this pragmatism aren't really Pro-Life so much as they are anti-abortion, or anti-sex.  The main concerns of any Pro-Life person are in protecting an innocent Human life, not on what is going to be easiest to sell to the American public.  Looking at it from this perspective you inevitably reach the conclusion that there is no valid reason to punish an innocent person for a crime someone else committed, or as zombie puts it "Allowing a rape-and-incest exception to any abortion ban essentially means we are willing to punish the children for the sins of the father."

The argument may not be a winner, but if you truly believe that a fetus is a life, what other conclusion can you reach?  When innocent lives are at stake, principle needs to trump pragmatism every time.  The Pro-Life movement needs to drop the asterisk.

3 comments:

  1. I hate the terrorist who call themselves pro-lifers - hey pro-lifers, while you may feel a sperm/egg connection equated to life the real issue is an AMERICAN FREEDOM issue. Are you free? If you are then you have a right to PRIVACY. The right to privacy includes being allowed to have an abortion without anyone else knowing about it. This is why abortion is legal. It's a constitutional right to privacy.

    I support freedom - I support a right to privacy. Are you un-american and do not support a persons right to privacy? Be it a husband/wife or a sibgular woman - support their rights? By simply saying LIFE blah blah blah - your showing your ignorance on the issue of abortion.

    get out our faces pro-life hypocrites - you support war, yet dont support the victims of wars effects. You support less government, which in turn disenfranchises the needy - so much for being pro-life. You just want a win. You dont give a damn about circumstances - go to Indi or Russia and try your pro-life BS over their as you are not supporting americans witn your terrorism of blowing up clinics and yelling at women at a clinic. bunch of cowards is what you are.

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  2. The right to privacy has limitations. As Americans we are not allowed to commit any deed or action that we might desire simply because we commit it in our own personal space. I support freedom, I support the foundations upon which our country was built, I support our Constitution and the Bill of Rights. I do not support abortion nor do I support your simplistic claim that it is simply an issue of the constitutionally protected right to privacy.

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  3. Can you show me which clause contains the "right to privacy?" I'm just saying..

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