Should Abortion Be Legalized in All Countries

SHOULD ABORTION BE LEGAL IN HONG KONG

There are many different views about legalization of abortion. This topic is a very argumentative one. But before I have my own points to make, we have to define abortion. Abortion is the deliberate termination of human pregnancy, in other words, removal a foetus from its mother’s womb before birth. In Hong Kong, Abortion is currently legal, with terms and laws. Abortion is virtually allowed on demand for girls under 16 years old. It also permits abortion if 2 doctors agree an opinion that the unborn child might be seriously handicapped. Also, abortion was allowed if 2 doctors certified that a woman would risk serious injury or her life by continuing the pregnancy. Abortion could also be available for victims of rape or sexual harassments, abortion is not allowed after 24 weeks of pregnancy. If the pregnant women’s request fits the laws above, they can perform abortion.

There are mainly two sides when discussing this topic, one is pro life and the other is pro choice. The first one supports the idea that we should not take away life under ANY circumstances. The second one supports the main concept of we should have a choice in whether the mother wants the baby to be born or not. And I, personally support pro-choice.

Now we have to ask ourselves one question. Should Abortion stay the same and be legal in Hong Kong with the same terms or should abortion be illegal? For me, I strongly believe that Abortion should be Legal in Hong Kong.
In my opinion, I think that if abortion is legal in Hong Kong, it will allow mothers with different personalities and religions to have a choice of whether she wanted to give birth to her baby or not. One example to support this is that if the mother's life is at risk and if she continues her pregnancy, would it be the best thing for the mother to lose her life to an unborn foetus? In that case, the woman should immediate get an abortion. However, there are also women who prefer to sacrifice their lives in favour of the foetus. Therefore, it should always been the pregnant women's choice.

But many will argue that the foetus should have equal rights to its mother because it is a life too. Now, this is not a good argument point since there are many different interpretations about when life begins. Many religious people see the conception point as the beginning of life. Sikh, Hindu’s and lastly Judaism’s population believe that the foetus is a life too and no one should ‘kill’ under any circumstances, UNLESS the mother’s life is at risk.
But many atheists might think that life starts at birth which naturally state that having an abortion would not be counted as ‘killing’
As for the statement about the unborn child having the same rights to its mother, I totally disagree with it. Why? Just think about the woman as an INDEPENDENT living. This woman does not RELY on someone else’s life to live. But quite the opposite, the foetus relies on its mother, so the mother is like the host of the baby. The mother should have total control of her foetus’ life.
So, to sum up, the mothers should always have more authority and rights than the foetus since it is the mother who is supporting the fetus' life , she should always be the one who cared for the foetus most.

Secondly, I strongly believe that every born child should live a happy, healthy life. For instance, using modern technology, we are able to see if the baby has any disabilities before birth and after the conception. There is a possibility that the mother discovers the baby would be born disabled while she is pregnant. If this happens, I can confidently say that if the mother doesn't want the baby or doesn't want to take care of a disabled child for her whole life, it would be a much better solution to have an abortion than adoption or abandonment. By having abortion, it will benefit both the mother and the society. Just imagine, if you were the disabled child and you were born, how you would feel if your mother and other people looking at you as if you were abnormal and has no hope in you. Would you be happy?

In addition to that, if you were born with a sickness, you would basically suffer your whole life if the disease you had is incurable, you might even die in a young age without doing much. Isn't it worse to live a life full of sufferings than to have no life at all? Hindus also believe that the foetus shouldn’t be born if there are any abnormality of the foetus.
Although, many people, especially Christians and Islams, will see this differently. For example, John Baptist Wu stated that "the unborn, whether suspected of a handicap or not, have the same right to life that you and I enjoy. If we ignore or deny this right, we discriminate against the weak and helpless. Such discrimination against unborn children not only denies that they belong to the human family, but also threatens our own humanity."

Yet to think, will the handicapped or the disabled be able to enjoy the world LIKE us? Is it human to let an innocent life to suffer from long term disability even when you know that they will not have a normal, happy life? And also, would letting the handicapped child being born stop people from discriminating or looking down upon them?

My last point will be abortion should really be legal in Hong Kong because there are many cases of which the baby wasn't meant to be conceived in the first place. Also, it also occurs to me that there are mothers who haven’t the ability to take care of their babies. What I mean is that, there are some cases in which the causes of pregnancy are sexually harassment and rape. This might cause emotional problems for the women and it is highly possible that the women themselves wouldn't want to take care or love the baby. Consider this, how can you possibly raise the child of a person who had physically and emotionally hurt you?

Back to the point, there are mothers who haven’t the ability, money or time to take good and proper care of their babies after they were born. For example, for girls under the age of sixteen, they really need to consider abortion, as they are not physically or psychologically mature enough to be responsible mothers.
Although most religions such as Islam, Buddhism believe that no life should be harmed or murdered and even though the woman is hurt and raped by the father of the foetus, the foetus did nothing wrong, it is innocent. It should be the father who receives the punishments, not the baby.
This point is arguable really. But I urge you consider if it is the best for a baby to be born just to be hated by its own family.

Different religions have different views on abortion. Most of them are really similar. For instance, Islamic, Sikhism, Judaism, and Hinduism teachings say that abortion should be taken place and can be approved if continuing the pregnancy would harm risk the mother’s life. But within the religious, there are different views too! For example, most Muslims believe that life begins at the conception point and having an abortion means killing a life, which is a great sin. They insisted that, besides the reason of the mother’s life should be harm, abortion should not be allowed at all under any kinds of situations. On the other hand, some Hindus believe that abortion should take place if the family doesn’t have enough money to feed the child, they believe that every person deserve a good, healthy life so they shouldn’t be born if they were just to starve to death.

Atheists have their own point of view too, obviously, and it really depends on how they view this issue and how they interpret the starting point of life. It all depends on the mothers’ personalities and how they see things.

In conclusion, I strongly think that abortion should be legal in Hong Kong as for Hong Kong is religiously diversified. We shouldn’t ban abortion just because one religion didn’t allow it. We should be fair to the people in Hong Kong and let them to have a choice. No one forces mother to have abortions. It is only fair for those who support pro-choice if abortion is legal. At least the choice will be available to everyone. Overall, I believe that all the decisions and choices should be made by the mother since the mother cares the most; the mother is the host of the foetus’ life. There are also no right or wrong answers. Everyone has different point of views, different religion and most importantly personalities. And these points only represent my own views. I believe Abortion should be legal in Hong Kong.