Preview

Abortion - Never Ending Debate

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1476 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Abortion - Never Ending Debate
Abortion is one of the most controversial issues around, and is an issue that will never be agreed upon. By bringing morals into the question of whether it should be legal to have abortions, this issue has been elevated to a higher level. By some people, it is no longer looked at as a question of choice but as a question of morality, and these concepts have led to a full-blown debate over something that really should not be questioned. Every woman in America has the right to decide what to do with their bodies. No government or group of people should feel that they have the right to dictate to a person what path their lives should take. People who say that they are "pro-life" are in effect no more than "anti-choice". These pro-lifers want to put the life and future of a woman into the hands of the government.
At the time, which the fetus is aborted, it is not a being with personality. Anyone would agree to the fact that it is alive and human, however, it is also true that it is no more a person than a tree would be. Though the fetus may be a large grouping of human cells, with the potential to become more than that, at the state of development which the fetus has reached at the time of abortion, it is not a person and therefore should not be looked at as such. W hen does the fetus become a person? Though the legal moment at which the fetus is looked at for the first time as a human being is deemed to be at the instant that it is born, the difference between an eight- week premature infant and a 24-week-old fetus is virtually nonexistent. So should the fetus be regarded as a person, or should the premature baby still be regarded as a fetus? Thus arises the statement by the pro-life side of the argument that should not the fact that we are unable to pinpoint with absolute certainty the precise moment when a fetus suddenly develops a personality means that we ought to do away with the process until such a time that we are able to ascertain that persons are

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Better Essays

    When a fetus gains moral status, or when the fetus becomes a person, is an unclear point that…

    • 1337 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Mary Anne Warren Thesis

    • 1518 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Mary Anne Warren in the chapter “On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion and Postscript on Infanticide” discusses her views on pro-abortion. Warren explains how a fetus has not reached enough development to be considered a person. In order for a being to be considered a person they must have a list of five traits. The first is “consciousness”, specifically the facility to feel emotions externally and internally, such as pain. The second is “reasoning”, the capability to finding solutions to any difficult insistences, or situations. “Self-motivated activity” is the third trait, it consists of “activity which is relatively independent of either genetic or direct external control” (pp). The fourth trait is communication, “by whatever means, messages with an indefinite variety of types, that is, not just with an indefinite number of possible contents, but on indefinitely many possible topics” (pp). The final trait is “self-awareness and self-concepts” (pp). These five traits are what ultimately identifies humanity or personhood, and a fetus does not apply to these descriptions, therefor, a fetus is not considered a person – rather the mother of the fetus is, she has the right to decide whether to terminate the fetus or not. “A pregnant…

    • 1518 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    The goal of Judith Jarvis Thomson in her defense of abortion is to sway the ideas of those who are against abortion by challenging the arguments they give for thinking so. She begins by stating a premise. “For the sake of the argument” a human embryo is a person. This premise is one of the arguments most opponents of abortion use, but as she points out, isn’t much of an argument at all. These people spend a lot of their time dwelling on the fact that the fetus is a person and hardly any time explaining how the fetus being a person has anything to with abortion being impermissible. In the same breath, she states that those who agree with abortion spend a lot of their time saying the fetus is in fact not a person. Either way, no argument is really formed. No reasons are given. For sake of challenging an actual argument, she is disregarding this issue. With this premise out of the way, she addresses the basic argument the pro-choice campaign believes. “Every person has a right to life. So the fetus has a right to life. No doubt the mother has a right to decide what shall happen in and to her body; everyone would grant that. But surely a person’s right to life is stronger and more stringent than the mother’s right to decide what happens in and to her body, and so outweighs it. So the fetus may not be killed; an abortion may not be performed.” The remainder of her paper is a series of analogies meant to challenge the basic argument mention above. When looking at the analogies separately, they are in no way related to the abortion topic, but the conclusions drawn from each can be applied. Because these examples aren’t directly related to the debate, our emotions won’t necessarily be involved and we can clearly think about what is the “right” thing to do for each specific scenario.…

    • 1957 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The first argument and the most basic question on any discussion of abortion is whether the fetus, or unborn child, is a human person or not. On the pro-life side, people argue that the fetus is "a human within a human". In the context of biology, a fetus is “alive” as it grows in the mother’s womb by time to time due to the cell division. On the pro-choice side people tend to argue that a child can only be consider…

    • 1268 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The topic of abortion is a highly controversial issue in today's society, and various views are held concerning the morality of the procedure. Some people feel that abortion is simply cold-blooded murder, because it is their opinion that a 'foetus' is a human being from the moment of conception. However, others would argue that a foetus is merely insubstantial matter, dependant entirely on its mother's body for survival, with no real life of its own. It is for this reason that pro-abortionists support the woman's choice to undergo abortion. After all, why should something so small and insignificant, which is not yet human, be entitled to the same rights and privileges a real human has"…

    • 1652 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    It is an arbitrary choice and can be given no good answer. With it being so unclear, and the arguments very poor, Thomson does not deny the fetus as a person. We are inclined to agree that at some point the fetus has become a human person long before birth. By the tenth week it has already developed arms, legs, a face, and has brain activity. She also denies the premise, the fetus is not a person at conception.…

    • 1676 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Pro-Choice of Abortion

    • 460 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Nearly all abortions take place within the first trimester of the pregnancy. Within that time, the fetus cannot exist outside of the mother’s tummy. It is attached by the umbilical cord, and therefore depends on the mother’s health for survival. If it cannot survive on its own, the fetus is technically not a person yet, and being a living person is very different from the concept of human life…

    • 460 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    There are a mass amount of controversies when the word “abortion” is brought into awareness. This dispute has brought about both positive and negative affects on society. Abortion plays a major role in the everyday life of a human. People base their political parties, and even the jobs they choose to work at, all depending whether the host is pro-life or pro-choice. I personally am pro-life. I have made the decision of being pro-life based on multiple observations. Some of these observations include you are murdering your own child, you need to face the consequences of your actions, and to give people who are not able to have their own offspring a chance to be a mother/parent.…

    • 673 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Although this collection of cells begin to organize rapidly into the brain, nervous system, circulatory system, muscles, and skeletal structure, the appearance for many weeks is grotesque, not even resembling human form. The point at which I think the life can be considered human is when brain signals can be detected and the fetus has taken on a human appearance. This occurs around 12 weeks. Until this point I do not consider abortion to be the taking of a human life. However after 3 months, abortion, is not justified unless there was a great danger to the mother's life. In fact, this is the point at which the embryo (a swelling) changes its name to be a fetus (meaning young one or…

    • 726 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Imagine a young child at the playground, slipping down a slide, swinging on the monkey bars, and laughing with glee. When a mother decides to get an abortion, that entire image goes away with a blink of an eye. What that mother might not know is her child might be the next person to cure cancer or be the greatest movie star of all time. The public is divided on this issue and they do not know if one should be pro-life or pro-choice. People that believe in pro-choice think the decision should be up to the mother. It is the mother’s body and she should have the right to decide what happens to it. However, every life matters and the child should not be in the cross fire of the mother’s decision. Abortion violates the child’s right to live and…

    • 1161 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    pro life abortion paper

    • 501 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Her article focuses on where to draw the line on when a person becomes a human being, is it right when you are conceived, or when you are born, or at a certain stage in the womb. In her article, she says that once the fetus is conceived, it is a person, and starts to grow humanlike qualities in the mother. Judith says that it would be arbitrary to choose a point in the pregnancy on when the fetus becomes a human being. She says that the fetus is a human being from the moment of conception.…

    • 501 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Abortion Controversy

    • 3149 Words
    • 13 Pages

    The Specht (1990) article looks at social work in a negative way. Social work practice has to deal with people on the Macro level. Social workers look at the whole picture when working with the elderly, homeless, abused and neglected children, mentally ill, poor, people who are addicted to drugs and alcohol, and AIDS. By working in the field with many different clients, you have to help one client at a time. When you help clients on an individual basis, you as the worker build a rapport with the client and you get a better sense of their…

    • 3149 Words
    • 13 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    For centuries, abortion has been one of the most controversial and debated topics. Abortion is generally seen as very black-and-white; people tend to have very strong opinions on the matter. Neutrality is rare due to the nature of the issue. Either to allow abortion or not. Currently, many countries worldwide have either straight-up banned it, or allowed it. There aren’t many neutral countries (I.e. allowing certain cases of abortion).…

    • 348 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Abortion is a topic that many feel is controversial. It can not be easily agreed upon for many reasons. The fight for pro-life has to do with religion and the morality of taking a life. On the other hand, pro-choice involves women’s rights as well as a woman’s well being. These two ideas make abortion a subject that is…

    • 883 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Panel of judges, Abortion should be legal if the babies are not persons. What is the difference between a baby in the womb and a 2 year old? There are 4 basic differences; they are the size, level of development, environment, and degree of dependency.…

    • 396 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays