Expanding the Public Sphere through Computer ... - ResearchGate

APPENDIX A. TALK.ABORTION: AUGUST 9, 1994 130
>first woman kills her baby, she will be charged with murder. The
>second woman walks away.
>
>How can you justify this from a medical standpoint? What is the difference
>between the first and second baby? Place of residence? I admit that
>3rd trimester abortions are rare, but they are legal. In most states,
>abortion is legal up to the moment of birth. How can this be justified
>medically? No one on your side of the issue has addressed these perfectly
>legitimate medical questions. They just say that the unborn child is
>not human, offer nothing to prove it, and then go on to talk about
>reproductive choice and mysogyny. This may wash with some people, but
>I never bought it. These issues have never been fully explored. If,
>it can be proven that unborn children are human, we have not choice but
>to make abortion illegal. We simply cannot tell people that it is OK
>to kill children.
>
You are using words "person" "child" and "human being" quite
confusingly. Your question "when does a person become human being" does
not make a sense to me. You should ask "when does a human being become
a person". One can say that a fetus is a human being, at east in some
meaning of the word, from quite early. However, it does not become a
person, an entity that is self-conscious, until after the birth. For
legal purposes the birth is a good line though.
Lets consider these two babies. Lets assume that the second woman did
not abort but had her child in time. They babies grow up and after 18
years there comes an election. For some reason the one who was born
pre-maturely can vote, but the one who was born in time cannot. Our
society simply uses the birth as the starting point where the ages are
counted.
Your last statement:" it can be proven that unborn children are human,
we have not choice but to make abortion illegal. We simply cannot
tell people that it is OK to kill children." does not make any sense.
If the fetuses are "unborn children", as you state, then they are
"children" no matter if they are human. Why is being human relevant. How
can just being a member of one species be important, in itself.
Also What you can tell people is not the issue here. You can tell them
that abortion is wrong if you wish. The problems become when you think
you should be able to tell them what they should do.
You conveniently completely ignore the woman. It is really easy to
support banning abortions when one thinks the woman is a "place of
residence". When you consider if the fetus is a person, remember that
the woman surely is one.
>
>
>
>--
>=============================================================================
>Robert Huck
rohuck@rs6000.cmp.ilstu.edu
>"That’s 6-4-3 if you’re scoring at home and even if you’re by yourself."
> Keith Olbermann