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HIRAM-1381633

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Member Since: 10/2009  Last Seen: 5/16/2012

Abortion Ethics

Mon Jan 23, 2012 5:48 PM EST
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By Hiram-1381633
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   My views on abortion are well known to those who have read my writing son the Vine. I believe that every life from conception has the God given right o life. That being said I have noticed as the political climate becomes more narrowed as our choice of candidates becomes fewer that the specter of abortion has again risen in politics. President Obama standing up and defending the rights of women to choose, in his recent speech on the anniversary of Roe s Wade. As we consider this right to choose we must also consider at what point does this right to choose become unethical and wrong.  There will and is rapidly coming a storm that cannot be ignored and I feel needs to be addressed.

  Women get abortions for many reasons, ranging from it will inhibit their personal growth and careers, to the inability to afford a child, to rape, to fetal anomalies they cannot emotionally handle. However there is in recent times a more what I feel insidious reason appearing more and more. These are women or married couples who have planned a pregnancy, they have al the means needed to care for the coming child and that child that is coming is for all appearances healthy. So why abort it? Because it is not the gender they want it does not fit their wants or desires. It truth what is being done is nothing short of eugenics. We destroy a normal viable pregnancy because we did not get what we wanted. The ethical implications of continuing down this path are enormous. As science is improving our ability to understand and decode the DNA to determine traits in each and every one of us at some point what is there to stop us. To stop us from discovering that the child will have brown hair and we wanted a blonde, it will have brown eyes and we wanted blue, it will 5feet 6inches and we want it taller. Where do we draw the line at choice? When does it become unethical to abort a fully viable pregnancy for no other reason that self – centered satisfaction.

H

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Hiram-1381633

I know this is a hot topic so the CoH will be adhered to by all. The question before us is when does abortion become unethical even in the eyes of those that are pro-choice ? At what point do we say enough?

H

  • 1 vote
Reply#1 - Mon Jan 23, 2012 5:50 PM EST
Shannoscubie

The question before us is when does abortion become unethical even in the eyes of those that are pro-choice ? At what point do we say enough?

As someone who is adamantly pro-choice, I personally still have serious ethical problems with sex-selective abortion. However, at the gestational age where sex can be reliably determined via ultrasound, most states already have restrictions in place against them. And, as I understand it, genetic testing is available via CVS or amniocentesis, but those tests also carry a risk of miscarriage. I believe there are also simple blood tests a mother can have VERY early on in pregnancy (7wks or so) that are purported to be able to determine the sex, but they're not 100% reliable, either.

For those reasons, I don't believe that sex-selective abortions, at whatever stage of pregnancy, are pervasive enough in this country to warrant a concern over eugenics just yet, nevermind be cited as a reason to place yet more legal restrictions on abortions in general. I think more could be accomplished to reduce sex-selective abortion by focusing on the cultures which devalue girls and women to the degree that they're willing to engage in this practice. Which, by the way, is so ingrained that even in countries such as India which made it illegal in 1996 for a physician to reveal the sex of the fetus, sex-selective abortion has continued to rise.

Having said all that, even though I believe it's unethical to have a sex-selective abortion, I also believe it's unethical to place legal restrictions on sex-selective abortions due to how it would have to be enforced. If abortion before X stage of development is legal, there should be no panel or other authority in place to require a woman having an abortion to reveal her reasons for it with the goal of approving whether or not she will have one. That goes directly against the whole concept of pro-choice.

  • 2 votes
#1.1 - Tue Jan 24, 2012 10:49 AM EST
Hiram-1381633

Shannoscubie-

Thank you for sharing your thoughts I appreciate the way you made your point. I understand the need to change the culture of those that subjugate women and hold the male child to be more of a blessing thana female. The problem with me lies in statistics that even those out side the culture are following suit. For instance a family that has three girls and wants male child might selectively abort several female fetus before they have a male. That by definition is eugenics and is unethical.

I can also understand your desire not wanting to put stricter regulations on abortions. I do not agree wiht abortion , howvere I do understand your concern. Then the question has to be asked. Do we compromise our ethics, do we avoid doing what we think is right because it might limited something we think is wrong? The problem with adjusting our thinking to accepting the lesser of two evils or wrongs is that we are still endorsing wrong or evil. The time to draw the line is going to approach and far faster than we think so where do we draw the line. What happens if people do not abort because they are told it is a male and a mistake is made and it is female? Can they sue the doctor? Who is responisble for the child if it is not wanted becasue of gender? It seems to me that in this type of situation the child has been reduced to nothing less than a commodity to full fill our own selfish desires.

H

    #1.2 - Tue Jan 24, 2012 11:09 AM EST
    Reply
    Knotthaid

    Personally, I lean rather precariously toward pro choice, at least for pregnancies in which I was not a causative factor. However, any opinion I conjure up should be considered moot since I am of male gender and biologically unable to become pregnant.

    Abortion is not, in my opinion an issue to be addressed or in any way influenced or regulated by mealy mouthed politicians of either gender or any self righteous religious zealots.

    • 5 votes
    Reply#2 - Mon Jan 23, 2012 7:54 PM EST
    Grisham

    Abortion is a hard topic for me to come to grips with for a variety of reasons. However, I think it should be up to the woman and trying to limit it doesn't do anything anyways because women will just have it done regardless. I'd rather they went to a medical professional rather than a guy with a dirty coat hanger.

    • 3 votes
    Reply#3 - Tue Jan 24, 2012 12:11 AM EST
    Hiram-1381633

    Grisham

    I agree with the need for medical professionals, being one myself. The question is though at what point does it become unethical or is there no point that it does. We are head in a direction where these questions will need to be answered that I have asked. Is selective abortion to meet the desires of the parents when it comes gender acceptable or does it create a society where eugenics becomes the norm ?

    H

    • 1 vote
    #3.1 - Tue Jan 24, 2012 12:16 AM EST
    Dennis Kemmerer

    Hiram-1381633 wrote:

    The question is though at what point does it become unethical or is there no point that it does.

    If you haven't already, you might want to pick up a copy of Carol Gilligan's In a Different Voice.

    Although it's a bit dated (some of her 1982 writings reflect a bit of "men are from Mars, and women are from Venus" stereotypes) and, in my opinion, doesn't have quite enough empirical data to be conclusive, she presents, without any partisan rhetoric, a very interesting, enlightening and compassionate treatise on one particular woman's ethical difficulties with her own abortion decision.

    • 2 votes
    #3.2 - Tue Jan 24, 2012 3:36 PM EST
    Hiram-1381633

    Dennis

    Thank you for the recommendation

    H

    • 1 vote
    #3.3 - Tue Jan 24, 2012 3:52 PM EST
    Reply
    PonGoad

    Hi Hiram-1381633

    Most of the time I feel abortion should be pro-choice, but to abort a baby just because he-she doesn't have the right color hair, etc, doesn't sit right with me, especially when there are so many couples out there looking to adopt babies. Personally, I feel, abortion for this reason it is out-and-out murder for selfish reasons.

    Pon

    • 1 vote
    Reply#4 - Tue Jan 24, 2012 4:54 AM EST
    ERich-356044

    I know this is an opinion, but do you have proof about the idea that women are aborting due to "I wanted a blond but the child is a brunette" idea?

    What are the statistics?

    I don't think women are that flippant over abortion. Being female myself, I just don't see it.

    • 3 votes
    Reply#5 - Tue Jan 24, 2012 9:52 AM EST
    Hiram-1381633

    Erich

    There was a few recent articles about women having abortions because they wanted a boy and it was a girl. Most of these are because of culture belies, however there was an small but increasing number of abortions by people not immersed in such a culture. A Canadian physician even suggested that people not be told the sex of the fetus until at 30 plus weeks to avoid having such abortions based solely on gender. if we continue on that same path and have abortions based soley on gender then the next logical progression as we are able to decipher the DNA better and better would be selective abortion based on far many more attributes. It is only a hypothesis based on available data, we have yet to reach that sucustication in determining what the fetus will look like.

    H

      #5.1 - Tue Jan 24, 2012 10:02 AM EST
      Reply
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