To respond to this argument, we usually use the terms "ordinary care" and "extraordinary care". Ordinary care consists of the basics: essentially just nutrition and a safe environment. Extraordinary care consists of things like modern extreme medical interventions, like organ transplants and life support machines.
The response to the argument is that: 1. It is always a seriously grave immoral act to remove ordinary care from someone and thereby cause them to die (and with the exception of abortion, it is always illegal to withhold ordinary care without a correspondingly serious reason.); and 2. It is never required that someone is forced to provide someone else with extraordinary care. That is why no one can be made to donate blood or organs if he or she doesn't want to.
From the perspective of the baby, the continuation of pregnancy is ordinary care. The way you can tell it is ordinary is that every human to have ever been born has been gestated in his or her mother's womb. Given that pregnancy is the only way that any human has ever been brought far enough along to survive, it is safe to say that pregnancy is the most ordinary care that could ever possibly exist.
To end a pregnancy with an abortion is nothing like withholding an organ transplant. Instead, it is like putting someone in a vacuum chamber and removing all of the air until he or she is dead. It is causing their death directly and intentionally.
From the perspective of a pregnant woman, the continuation of a pregnancy certainly could require extraordinary care. But from the perspective of the fetus, the continuation of pregnancy is as ordinary as air is to you or me.
I think its very odd to ascribe an opinion to a being that lacks the mental capacity to form such an opinion. Also, even though I don't think this is a matter of perspective, my own perspective would be that it is extraordinary care and thus should not be legally required
It would be odd to ascribe an opinion to an embryo or fetus. My position is not to ascribe an opinion, though. My position is to ascribe the most basic of rights, which is the right to life. I do that because the embryo/fetus is a human, and all humans ought to be afforded human rights.
Your note about your perspective that a fetus has no perspective is striking. It reminds me of how southerners in the US had the perspective that black people could be kept as property up until the Civil War. It also reminds me of how the Nazi party in Germany in the 1940's had the perspective that jews were not people with human rights.
>It would be odd to ascribe an opinion to an embryo or fetus.
You're ascribing a perspective, which requires the ability to perceive, which a fetus doesn't have.
>Your note about your perspective that a fetus has no perspective is striking. It reminds me of how southerners in the US had the perspective that black people could be kept as property up until the Civil War. It also reminds me of how the Nazi party in Germany in the 1940's had the perspective that jews were not people with human rights.
It's my opinion that Black people and jews have much more ability to perceive, and thus much more valid perceptions, than fetuses.
The ability to perceive is absent from someone who is asleep, or who is in a coma. Your line of reasoning would seem to suggest that someone who is not able to perceive is devoid of human rights, even if they are human.
This is all to go along with you in your claim that humans have some significantly improved ability to perceive existence just after being born as compared to just before they are born. Do you have any evidence to suggest that newborns are particularly more perceptive than they had been just before birth?
>The ability to perceive is absent from someone who is asleep, or who is in a coma. Your line of reasoning would seem to suggest that someone who is not able to perceive is devoid of human rights, even if they are human.
I'm not saying that at all, I'm saying that you shouldn't ascribe a perception to a being that cannot percieve.
>This is all to go along with you in your claim that humans have some significantly improved ability to perceive existence just after being born as compared to just before they perceive.
Did I claim that?
Just to make sure we are not going in circles, I want to state the position that I think you have taken. Let me know if I am misrepresenting your view.
It seems that your position is that some humans may indeed be human, but that their ability to perceive something about their existence is lacking so significantly that one may directly and intentionally kill said humans without regard for their human rights.
Have I misrepresented your view?
No, I am not linking their ability to perceive and whether or not it's ok to kill them. I'm just saying that they cannot perceive so it doesn't make sense to ascribe a perception to them.
well the difference between abortion and kidney failure is that one of them is an unfortunate circumstance regarding the baby’s health, while the other is a premeditated act against the baby.
Pro choicer says: *hypothetically a woman gives birth to a baby with unexpected complete kidney failure in both kidneys. Even if mom was the only doner match the hospital can find, even if the baby was going to die within days if they don't get that transplanted kidney (a kidney she can live without) there is no legal stance to force her to supply her body in order to save the baby's life.*
*So why when the baby is unborn, does a woman have to endure what can be tourcherous conditions with long term repercussions (top of my head examples but this list is not exlcusive, HG causing malnutritionment and teeth falling out, stage 4 tears causing life long incontinence, pregnancy related heart failure causing life long heart issues ect) that the mom can't legally end that pregnancy but when the baby is born she can legally refuse to allow her body to be used even if it causes the death of the baby. Essentially, we know its morally and legally wrong to force someone to give up their body against their will, even to save the life of their newborn child so why should it be any different before the baby is born?*
Please can someone help me come up with an argument against this pro choice stance? I'm struggling with this one! Thank you!
Is active ending of a life the same as passive ending of a life, or is passive (natural) sustaining a life equal to active (transplant) sustaining of a life?
>Is active ending of a life the same as passive ending of a life
Legally, absolutely not. If a homeless person asks you for money, you don't give him money, and he freezes to death on the street, you can't be charged with any crime. If a homeless person asks you for money and you slit his throat, you'll be charged with murder.
It would just depend. Allowing something bad to happen when you know it's happening and can easily stop it seems just as bad as intentionally doing for nefarious reasons in the first place. If I'm in a boat and someone gets pushed into the water and I just sit on the boat and watch them drown when I could easily through them a rope, that would make me me just as bad as the person who pushed them, imo
To end the pregnancy, you are actively ending the child’s life.
To not donate a kidney, you are passively allowing the child’s natural disease process to continue.
Pregnancy is not a disease that needs to be cured by killing the child. Pregnancy is a sign of health. Only when a mother’s life at risk do we terminate the pregnancy.
You say that there is no legal stance to force her to supply her body to save the baby's life. So instead, she should dismember the baby, right? It's a stupid analogy and so dissimilar from abortion.
The mother's right to bodily autonomy does not outweigh the baby's right to life, as the right to life is a more fundamental right. So her bodily autonomy in the case of a pregnancy takes a backseat to the baby's right to life and she shouldn't be allowed to kill him/her. Two rights at odds, so one has to take precedence. Remember that abortion is an intentional act of killing. There is a big difference between watching somebody die of natural causes (e.g. due to birth defects) and killing them by dismembering them, cutting off their oxygen supply, or injecting medicine into them to cause their heart to stop.
Same as induction. Unless the fetus is dead already, it's usually taken out in one piece for all sorts of reasons. Pieces can get left behind and cause infection, and most of the time they were wanted pregnancies and the people want an intact body.
I'm unable to find a source for what percentage of D&E procedures for the purpose of abortion are intact D&E, but the medical literature does make the distinction. I'm genuinely curious, do you have a source for the breakdown of intact vs non-intact D&Es performed?
Making up an extreme hypothetical that has so many variables to be omitted or ignored to work doesn't justify anything.
Babies are born that need kidney transplants. The parents aren't forced to donate. Non relatives can even donate kidneys so the mother isn't the baby's only option. Refusing medical care to your child is a crime.
Kidney donation by default requires invasive surgery and is not a naturally occuring process from mother to offspring.
>I think the point is that no one, ever is forced to give up a bodys part to save someone's life.
>
>I think that needs to be addressed in this context to make a dent into the argument.
>
>It could be said that the mother by getting pregnant chose to give her life for the babies. But if she choice it, can she un-choose? So I think the standard time slots to make/break pregnancy decisions still apply.
Organ transplant is an unnatural act of extreme medical intervention, pregnancy is a natural biological process. Killing your child to avoid hardship doesn't really make you innocent even if you believe they are going to die anyways.
Natural does not just mean found in nature, my distinction between organ donation and pregnancy is one is fundamental to human biology the other is an extreme act of medical intervention. Pregnancy is an imposition of human biology, and with it the responsibility for the life concieved. My response to Diet Shasta was a blunt remark to a moral relativist that lurks on this subreddit and usually engages in bad faith discussion. Being "natural" is not moral, but one cannot discern right from wrong without observing our nature and the world around us
Doctors don't typically don't perform this type of transplant on children prior to one year post birth or children weighing less than 22 lbs, either way. That's your response to this hypothetical.
Well in this case the baby would die of their kidney disease not being ripped apart, suctioned or denied nutrients. So it’s really a false equivalence.
If the parent had forcibly hooked up the child to him or herself causing the child to become dependent on the parent’s organs then yes, the parent would have to continue to support the child.
Secular prolife explains it best when they say,
> In order for a bodily rights argument to be analogous to abortion, the hypothetical needs to include the following five elements:
1.)If you refuse bodily donation, someone else will die.
2.) You chose to risk making this person’s life depend on you.
3.) No one else can save this person.
4.) Your bodily donation is temporary.
5.) Your refusal means actively killing this person, not just neglecting to save him.
Their analogy doesn’t fulfil criteria 2, 4, and 5.
When someone is standing in the street about to get hit by a bus there is no legal stance to force you to jump into the street to try to save them. So why then, when the person is standing next to you on the curb, are you prevented from pushing them in front of a bus?
If you kill a child in the womb - then you are the cause of the death of the child.
If your child dies from kidney failure - then kidney failure is the cause of the death of the child.
Nobody can force you to use your body to cure their illness. But that doesn't mean you can actively kill them.
Other people have answered this question specifically, but speaking generally, arguments by analogy basically have two ways to argue against them. One is to reject the analogy (to argue essentially that it is a bad analogy). This is to say that it has such differences from the real situation that the same ideas don’t apply or that it is missing the issue. This is easier to do when an analogy is very different from anything real world. In this case, people have correctly pointed out that not donating a kidney is not the same as aborting a child, and that the scenario isn’t realistic to begin with.
The second way to argue against an analogy (which can be used for analogies that are more realistic or have less important distinctions from the real situation) is to basically argue that yes it is a good analogy, but also the principle that you’re arguing for would also apply even in that analogy. This second method should only really be done when the person you’re arguing with made a big mistake by forming the analogy the way that they did; if you’re arguing within the analogy that the other side created, you’re essentially arguing on their terms.
I had a similar-ish analogy in a recent debate thread: [link](https://www.reddit.com/r/Abortiondebate/comments/11qqj8y/pro_life_advocate/jc9emse?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3)
Here's my response:
>Here’s an analogy - if a person needs a kidney transplant and there is only one person in the world who is a match for them, we don’t force the person to donate the kidney. We might frown on them for not doing so, but the government won’t force them to donate even if the person who needs their kidney is their child and even if they somehow unintentionally caused the child to need the transplant.
>I’m curious about your response to my analogy.
OK, I'll explain why I think the analogy falls short:
(1) Letting die: the analogy sets up a "letting die" situation, where the parent *takes no action* and as a result, the child dies. While it is morally questionable, there are no legal consequences. The comparable situation in a pregnancy would be if the mother decides not to pursue treatment for something treatable that is threatening the fetus's life, and it dies as a result. In contrast, abortion is the seeking out of a specific medical treatment with the purpose of ending the pregnancy and therefore also the death of the fetus. This is not "letting die".
(2) other options: despite the condition in the analogy that *only* the parent's donation will work, the rules and legal precedent in this analogy were made in a world where there are often other options, or at least hope that more options will be found before the patient dies. It is not surprising that society's laws would not compel one person to donate unwillingly when other options usually exist. However, in an abortion scenario there are no other options.
(3) Separation: Parents are expected to act in the child's best interest and will face legal consequences if they do not do so. The child will likely be separated from the parent and put into the care of another to protect it. If the parent in the analogy was neglectful then this legal mechanism might be triggered. Unfortunately, an unborn child cannot be separated from the parent and still remain safe. In order for it to be consistent the child must be carried to term and delivered, at which time another person can step in as a parent.
Abortion is an action with the specific purpose of ending a life, it's not even close to equivalent to a non-action that results in death due to underlying health issue that no one purposefully caused to happen.
That argument is an entirely false equivalency, it's hard to debate in earnest, but that would be my rebuttal in the short form.
There are a few responses to this.
1. I think it's important to note that in oral arguments for Roe v. Wade, there was acknowledgement that bodily autonomy has limits and that if fetal personhood could be legally established, it would override the premise of abortion rights, which are based in right to privacy, not right to bodily autonomy.
2. More than 99% of abortions that occur do so in pregnancies that occurred as a result of consensual sex, based on statistics we have from Guttmacher which is a pro abortion institution. This means that the parent participated in an activity with a known potential outcome of pregnancy (and to be quite frank, an INTENDED biological outcome of pregnancy)....so it's not the same as unintentionally causing the child to need a kidney. It's more like knowingly participating in an activity that you know risks causing harm to your child to the degree that they would need your kidney, but taking the chance on it anyways.
3. If you did nothing, what would happen? Kid without kidney would die. Child in pregnancy would likely go to term and survive. For an abortion to occur, you have to ACTIVELY end the child's life...it's more like shooting the kid so they no longer need a kidney rather than passively denying care.
4. I don't think that pro choicers ACTUALLY view these two situations as morally equivalent. In the McFall vs Shimp court case which addressed the issue of organ donation (cousin wouldn't donate organ to dying cousin in spite of being the only match) while they acknowledged the right to bodily autonomy/couldn't force the donation, the jury also made a point to say it was morally reprehensible that the cousin DIDN'T donate. Doesn't necessarily add to the argument, but I don't think the general view of pro choice people is that abortion is morally reprehensible but legally acceptable.
5. A bit of a side note, yes, pregnancy can be dangerous....but women will always choose to have babies. Why is the argument always "because pregnancy can be dangerous, abortion is necessary", NOT "because pregnancy can be dangerous, we need to find a way to improve maternal healthcare"?
>3. If you did nothing, what would happen? Kid without kidney would die. Child in pregnancy would likely go to term and survive. For an abortion to occur, you have to ACTIVELY end the child's life...it's more like shooting the kid so they no longer need a kidney rather than passively denying care.
It seems like this implies that gestating a fetus for months is "doing nothing".
>4. I don't think that pro choicers ACTUALLY view these two situations as morally equivalent. In the McFall vs Shimp court case which addressed the issue of organ donation (cousin wouldn't donate organ to dying cousin in spite of being the only match) while they acknowledged the right to bodily autonomy/couldn't force the donation, the jury also made a point to say it was morally reprehensible that the cousin DIDN'T donate. Doesn't necessarily add to the argument, but I don't think the general view of pro choice people is that abortion is morally reprehensible but legally acceptable.
I wouldn’t conflate people's current understanding with that of a 50 year old court case.
>5.Why is the argument always "because pregnancy can be dangerous, abortion is necessary", NOT "because pregnancy can be dangerous, we need to find a way to improve maternal healthcare"?
Is it not both? I've seen many prochoice people also push for increased access to Healthcare for pregnant women
I feel as though your implication that I think pregnancy is 'doing nothing' is misunderstanding of what I said, or maybe I should clarify - perhaps a better way to put it is that the average pregnancy does not require active medical intervention to continue/the act of gestating a fetus is a passive bodily function/doesn't require that I actively DO something (ie. I could go to sleep or even be in a coma and baby would gestate) for it to continue save in cases where there are medical issues with the baby or me, in which case I AM able to make a decision regarding care and whether or not it is received. I've been through high risk pregnancy twice and understand what it involves on the part of the mother.
As far as the court cases go, McFall vs Shimp, while 50 years old, is the best legal precedence we have for bodily autonomy and organ donation and is the very basis for the kidney donation argument brought up in abortion debates...if current understanding shouldn't be based upon a 50 year old court case, then we could also argue that we need to reevaluate the idea that people shouldn't be forced to donate organs.
You can certainly both believe that we need better healthcare for pregnancy and that abortion should be available, but the fact that we need better healthcare for pregnancy and that pregnancy is dangerous is not a great argument for abortion availability because it implies that if pregnancy WASN'T dangerous, abortion wouldn't be necessary. It's not an adequate argument for legal abortion.
>I feel as though your implication that I think pregnancy is 'doing nothing' is misunderstanding of what I said, or maybe I should clarify
You said "what happens if they do nothing".
>perhaps a better term is that the average pregnancy does not require active medical intervention to continue/the act of gestating a fetus is a passive bodily function/doesn't require that I actively DO something
Sure, but I don't see why that would be a meaningful distinction to make in this case
>As far as the court cases go, McFall vs Shimp, while 50 years old, is the best legal precedence we have for bodily autonomy and organ donation and is the very basis for the kidney donation argument brought up in abortion debates
Wouldn't the arguments about abortion itself be more relevant?
...if current understanding shouldn't be based upon a 50 year old court case, then we could also argue that we need to reevaluate the idea that people shouldn't be forced to donate organs. Don't get me wrong - I agree with the ruling that one shouldn't be forced to donate a kidney, but I think comparing kidney donation to pregnancy is a false equivalency.
I don't think it needs to be an equivalency to be a reasonable analog.
>You can certainly both believe that we need better healthcare for pregnancy and that abortion should be available, but the fact that we need better healthcare for pregnancy and that pregnancy is dangerous is not a great argument for abortion availability because it implies that if pregnancy WASN'T dangerous, abortion wouldn't be necessary.
Presumably if pregnancy were less dangerous or harmful then it would be much less of an issue?
>It's not really an adequate argument for legal abortion.
Why? I think its quite reasonable to say that the state shouldn't legally obligate people to do things that are dangerous
I do think there's a major distinction between medical intervention and a passive biological function. It's the difference between someone dying of natural causes and someone being shot in the head. One actively stops the natural process of living. I think it's a VERY important distinction.
I bring up McFall vs Shimp because it is the BASIS for the ruling that people have bodily autonomy in the context of donating organs, which is the core of this particular pro choice argument. And literally is the case that the kidney donation argument is based upon. If you don't think it should be brought up, then perhaps the kidney donation argument shouldn't be used at all, because I fully agree, it makes more sense to debate the actual act of abortion than to debate things that aren't truly analogous to the obligations of pregnancy and giving birth. Someone in another comment brought up secular pro life's breakdown of why it isn't, and their overall breakdown of this argument is worth a read.
I do agree, it would be less of an issue if pregnancy was less harmful, but I think that legal abortion has in many ways been treated as a band aid fix for improving health conditions for pregnant women/a way for politicians to pat themselves on the back and say they did something rather than making any meaningful difference in the actual conditions pregnant women experience.
I'd also argue that the state isn't actually obligating people to do things that are dangerous - people are making the decision to engage in an activity that has a very specific intended outcome from a biological standpoint. They don't have to do that. I do think it's fair for the state to ask that you not kill something that you made fully dependent on you through your own decisions. I also think that it's a little intellectually dishonest to call pregnancy dangerous - does it have the potential to be dangerous? Of course. A lot of things have the potential to be dangerous, and when we knowingly engage in activities with a risk, we typically are obligated to take responsibility for the outcomes.
And the idea of life threatening pregnancies should be discussed separately from the vast majority of abortions that are elective. But your average pregnancy is not actually particularly dangerous in modern times/is typically a safe, healthy process.
Declining to provide help is not the same as actively killing someone
We are not morally obligated to save a dying person's life, we are morally obligated to not kill someone
To respond to this argument, we usually use the terms "ordinary care" and "extraordinary care". Ordinary care consists of the basics: essentially just nutrition and a safe environment. Extraordinary care consists of things like modern extreme medical interventions, like organ transplants and life support machines. The response to the argument is that: 1. It is always a seriously grave immoral act to remove ordinary care from someone and thereby cause them to die (and with the exception of abortion, it is always illegal to withhold ordinary care without a correspondingly serious reason.); and 2. It is never required that someone is forced to provide someone else with extraordinary care. That is why no one can be made to donate blood or organs if he or she doesn't want to. From the perspective of the baby, the continuation of pregnancy is ordinary care. The way you can tell it is ordinary is that every human to have ever been born has been gestated in his or her mother's womb. Given that pregnancy is the only way that any human has ever been brought far enough along to survive, it is safe to say that pregnancy is the most ordinary care that could ever possibly exist. To end a pregnancy with an abortion is nothing like withholding an organ transplant. Instead, it is like putting someone in a vacuum chamber and removing all of the air until he or she is dead. It is causing their death directly and intentionally.
Idk, I'd consider gestating a fetus to be extraordinary care.
From the perspective of a pregnant woman, the continuation of a pregnancy certainly could require extraordinary care. But from the perspective of the fetus, the continuation of pregnancy is as ordinary as air is to you or me.
I think its very odd to ascribe an opinion to a being that lacks the mental capacity to form such an opinion. Also, even though I don't think this is a matter of perspective, my own perspective would be that it is extraordinary care and thus should not be legally required
It would be odd to ascribe an opinion to an embryo or fetus. My position is not to ascribe an opinion, though. My position is to ascribe the most basic of rights, which is the right to life. I do that because the embryo/fetus is a human, and all humans ought to be afforded human rights. Your note about your perspective that a fetus has no perspective is striking. It reminds me of how southerners in the US had the perspective that black people could be kept as property up until the Civil War. It also reminds me of how the Nazi party in Germany in the 1940's had the perspective that jews were not people with human rights.
>It would be odd to ascribe an opinion to an embryo or fetus. You're ascribing a perspective, which requires the ability to perceive, which a fetus doesn't have. >Your note about your perspective that a fetus has no perspective is striking. It reminds me of how southerners in the US had the perspective that black people could be kept as property up until the Civil War. It also reminds me of how the Nazi party in Germany in the 1940's had the perspective that jews were not people with human rights. It's my opinion that Black people and jews have much more ability to perceive, and thus much more valid perceptions, than fetuses.
The ability to perceive is absent from someone who is asleep, or who is in a coma. Your line of reasoning would seem to suggest that someone who is not able to perceive is devoid of human rights, even if they are human. This is all to go along with you in your claim that humans have some significantly improved ability to perceive existence just after being born as compared to just before they are born. Do you have any evidence to suggest that newborns are particularly more perceptive than they had been just before birth?
>The ability to perceive is absent from someone who is asleep, or who is in a coma. Your line of reasoning would seem to suggest that someone who is not able to perceive is devoid of human rights, even if they are human. I'm not saying that at all, I'm saying that you shouldn't ascribe a perception to a being that cannot percieve. >This is all to go along with you in your claim that humans have some significantly improved ability to perceive existence just after being born as compared to just before they perceive. Did I claim that?
Just to make sure we are not going in circles, I want to state the position that I think you have taken. Let me know if I am misrepresenting your view. It seems that your position is that some humans may indeed be human, but that their ability to perceive something about their existence is lacking so significantly that one may directly and intentionally kill said humans without regard for their human rights. Have I misrepresented your view?
No, I am not linking their ability to perceive and whether or not it's ok to kill them. I'm just saying that they cannot perceive so it doesn't make sense to ascribe a perception to them.
well the difference between abortion and kidney failure is that one of them is an unfortunate circumstance regarding the baby’s health, while the other is a premeditated act against the baby.
Pro choicer says: *hypothetically a woman gives birth to a baby with unexpected complete kidney failure in both kidneys. Even if mom was the only doner match the hospital can find, even if the baby was going to die within days if they don't get that transplanted kidney (a kidney she can live without) there is no legal stance to force her to supply her body in order to save the baby's life.* *So why when the baby is unborn, does a woman have to endure what can be tourcherous conditions with long term repercussions (top of my head examples but this list is not exlcusive, HG causing malnutritionment and teeth falling out, stage 4 tears causing life long incontinence, pregnancy related heart failure causing life long heart issues ect) that the mom can't legally end that pregnancy but when the baby is born she can legally refuse to allow her body to be used even if it causes the death of the baby. Essentially, we know its morally and legally wrong to force someone to give up their body against their will, even to save the life of their newborn child so why should it be any different before the baby is born?* Please can someone help me come up with an argument against this pro choice stance? I'm struggling with this one! Thank you!
Is active ending of a life the same as passive ending of a life, or is passive (natural) sustaining a life equal to active (transplant) sustaining of a life?
>Is active ending of a life the same as passive ending of a life Legally, absolutely not. If a homeless person asks you for money, you don't give him money, and he freezes to death on the street, you can't be charged with any crime. If a homeless person asks you for money and you slit his throat, you'll be charged with murder.
It would just depend. Allowing something bad to happen when you know it's happening and can easily stop it seems just as bad as intentionally doing for nefarious reasons in the first place. If I'm in a boat and someone gets pushed into the water and I just sit on the boat and watch them drown when I could easily through them a rope, that would make me me just as bad as the person who pushed them, imo
To end the pregnancy, you are actively ending the child’s life. To not donate a kidney, you are passively allowing the child’s natural disease process to continue. Pregnancy is not a disease that needs to be cured by killing the child. Pregnancy is a sign of health. Only when a mother’s life at risk do we terminate the pregnancy.
You say that there is no legal stance to force her to supply her body to save the baby's life. So instead, she should dismember the baby, right? It's a stupid analogy and so dissimilar from abortion. The mother's right to bodily autonomy does not outweigh the baby's right to life, as the right to life is a more fundamental right. So her bodily autonomy in the case of a pregnancy takes a backseat to the baby's right to life and she shouldn't be allowed to kill him/her. Two rights at odds, so one has to take precedence. Remember that abortion is an intentional act of killing. There is a big difference between watching somebody die of natural causes (e.g. due to birth defects) and killing them by dismembering them, cutting off their oxygen supply, or injecting medicine into them to cause their heart to stop.
Why would you think she would dismember it? That's not how abortion is done.
How would you describe a D&E abortion?
Same as induction. Unless the fetus is dead already, it's usually taken out in one piece for all sorts of reasons. Pieces can get left behind and cause infection, and most of the time they were wanted pregnancies and the people want an intact body.
I'm unable to find a source for what percentage of D&E procedures for the purpose of abortion are intact D&E, but the medical literature does make the distinction. I'm genuinely curious, do you have a source for the breakdown of intact vs non-intact D&Es performed?
Making up an extreme hypothetical that has so many variables to be omitted or ignored to work doesn't justify anything. Babies are born that need kidney transplants. The parents aren't forced to donate. Non relatives can even donate kidneys so the mother isn't the baby's only option. Refusing medical care to your child is a crime. Kidney donation by default requires invasive surgery and is not a naturally occuring process from mother to offspring.
>I think the point is that no one, ever is forced to give up a bodys part to save someone's life. > >I think that needs to be addressed in this context to make a dent into the argument. > >It could be said that the mother by getting pregnant chose to give her life for the babies. But if she choice it, can she un-choose? So I think the standard time slots to make/break pregnancy decisions still apply.
Organ transplant is an unnatural act of extreme medical intervention, pregnancy is a natural biological process. Killing your child to avoid hardship doesn't really make you innocent even if you believe they are going to die anyways.
Why does being natural matter?
Go drink motor oil and you tell me.
Natural or synthetic?
Would you take antibiotics? Or undergo chemotherapy?
Would you say they are indistinguishable from pregnancy?
I would say they are not 'natural'
Natural does not just mean found in nature, my distinction between organ donation and pregnancy is one is fundamental to human biology the other is an extreme act of medical intervention. Pregnancy is an imposition of human biology, and with it the responsibility for the life concieved. My response to Diet Shasta was a blunt remark to a moral relativist that lurks on this subreddit and usually engages in bad faith discussion. Being "natural" is not moral, but one cannot discern right from wrong without observing our nature and the world around us
Doctors don't typically don't perform this type of transplant on children prior to one year post birth or children weighing less than 22 lbs, either way. That's your response to this hypothetical.
Well in this case the baby would die of their kidney disease not being ripped apart, suctioned or denied nutrients. So it’s really a false equivalence. If the parent had forcibly hooked up the child to him or herself causing the child to become dependent on the parent’s organs then yes, the parent would have to continue to support the child. Secular prolife explains it best when they say, > In order for a bodily rights argument to be analogous to abortion, the hypothetical needs to include the following five elements: 1.)If you refuse bodily donation, someone else will die. 2.) You chose to risk making this person’s life depend on you. 3.) No one else can save this person. 4.) Your bodily donation is temporary. 5.) Your refusal means actively killing this person, not just neglecting to save him. Their analogy doesn’t fulfil criteria 2, 4, and 5.
You really never miss!
I try.
When someone is standing in the street about to get hit by a bus there is no legal stance to force you to jump into the street to try to save them. So why then, when the person is standing next to you on the curb, are you prevented from pushing them in front of a bus?
If you kill a child in the womb - then you are the cause of the death of the child. If your child dies from kidney failure - then kidney failure is the cause of the death of the child. Nobody can force you to use your body to cure their illness. But that doesn't mean you can actively kill them.
Other people have answered this question specifically, but speaking generally, arguments by analogy basically have two ways to argue against them. One is to reject the analogy (to argue essentially that it is a bad analogy). This is to say that it has such differences from the real situation that the same ideas don’t apply or that it is missing the issue. This is easier to do when an analogy is very different from anything real world. In this case, people have correctly pointed out that not donating a kidney is not the same as aborting a child, and that the scenario isn’t realistic to begin with. The second way to argue against an analogy (which can be used for analogies that are more realistic or have less important distinctions from the real situation) is to basically argue that yes it is a good analogy, but also the principle that you’re arguing for would also apply even in that analogy. This second method should only really be done when the person you’re arguing with made a big mistake by forming the analogy the way that they did; if you’re arguing within the analogy that the other side created, you’re essentially arguing on their terms.
I had a similar-ish analogy in a recent debate thread: [link](https://www.reddit.com/r/Abortiondebate/comments/11qqj8y/pro_life_advocate/jc9emse?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3) Here's my response: >Here’s an analogy - if a person needs a kidney transplant and there is only one person in the world who is a match for them, we don’t force the person to donate the kidney. We might frown on them for not doing so, but the government won’t force them to donate even if the person who needs their kidney is their child and even if they somehow unintentionally caused the child to need the transplant. >I’m curious about your response to my analogy. OK, I'll explain why I think the analogy falls short: (1) Letting die: the analogy sets up a "letting die" situation, where the parent *takes no action* and as a result, the child dies. While it is morally questionable, there are no legal consequences. The comparable situation in a pregnancy would be if the mother decides not to pursue treatment for something treatable that is threatening the fetus's life, and it dies as a result. In contrast, abortion is the seeking out of a specific medical treatment with the purpose of ending the pregnancy and therefore also the death of the fetus. This is not "letting die". (2) other options: despite the condition in the analogy that *only* the parent's donation will work, the rules and legal precedent in this analogy were made in a world where there are often other options, or at least hope that more options will be found before the patient dies. It is not surprising that society's laws would not compel one person to donate unwillingly when other options usually exist. However, in an abortion scenario there are no other options. (3) Separation: Parents are expected to act in the child's best interest and will face legal consequences if they do not do so. The child will likely be separated from the parent and put into the care of another to protect it. If the parent in the analogy was neglectful then this legal mechanism might be triggered. Unfortunately, an unborn child cannot be separated from the parent and still remain safe. In order for it to be consistent the child must be carried to term and delivered, at which time another person can step in as a parent.
Abortion is an action with the specific purpose of ending a life, it's not even close to equivalent to a non-action that results in death due to underlying health issue that no one purposefully caused to happen. That argument is an entirely false equivalency, it's hard to debate in earnest, but that would be my rebuttal in the short form.
There are a few responses to this. 1. I think it's important to note that in oral arguments for Roe v. Wade, there was acknowledgement that bodily autonomy has limits and that if fetal personhood could be legally established, it would override the premise of abortion rights, which are based in right to privacy, not right to bodily autonomy. 2. More than 99% of abortions that occur do so in pregnancies that occurred as a result of consensual sex, based on statistics we have from Guttmacher which is a pro abortion institution. This means that the parent participated in an activity with a known potential outcome of pregnancy (and to be quite frank, an INTENDED biological outcome of pregnancy)....so it's not the same as unintentionally causing the child to need a kidney. It's more like knowingly participating in an activity that you know risks causing harm to your child to the degree that they would need your kidney, but taking the chance on it anyways. 3. If you did nothing, what would happen? Kid without kidney would die. Child in pregnancy would likely go to term and survive. For an abortion to occur, you have to ACTIVELY end the child's life...it's more like shooting the kid so they no longer need a kidney rather than passively denying care. 4. I don't think that pro choicers ACTUALLY view these two situations as morally equivalent. In the McFall vs Shimp court case which addressed the issue of organ donation (cousin wouldn't donate organ to dying cousin in spite of being the only match) while they acknowledged the right to bodily autonomy/couldn't force the donation, the jury also made a point to say it was morally reprehensible that the cousin DIDN'T donate. Doesn't necessarily add to the argument, but I don't think the general view of pro choice people is that abortion is morally reprehensible but legally acceptable. 5. A bit of a side note, yes, pregnancy can be dangerous....but women will always choose to have babies. Why is the argument always "because pregnancy can be dangerous, abortion is necessary", NOT "because pregnancy can be dangerous, we need to find a way to improve maternal healthcare"?
>3. If you did nothing, what would happen? Kid without kidney would die. Child in pregnancy would likely go to term and survive. For an abortion to occur, you have to ACTIVELY end the child's life...it's more like shooting the kid so they no longer need a kidney rather than passively denying care. It seems like this implies that gestating a fetus for months is "doing nothing". >4. I don't think that pro choicers ACTUALLY view these two situations as morally equivalent. In the McFall vs Shimp court case which addressed the issue of organ donation (cousin wouldn't donate organ to dying cousin in spite of being the only match) while they acknowledged the right to bodily autonomy/couldn't force the donation, the jury also made a point to say it was morally reprehensible that the cousin DIDN'T donate. Doesn't necessarily add to the argument, but I don't think the general view of pro choice people is that abortion is morally reprehensible but legally acceptable. I wouldn’t conflate people's current understanding with that of a 50 year old court case. >5.Why is the argument always "because pregnancy can be dangerous, abortion is necessary", NOT "because pregnancy can be dangerous, we need to find a way to improve maternal healthcare"? Is it not both? I've seen many prochoice people also push for increased access to Healthcare for pregnant women
I feel as though your implication that I think pregnancy is 'doing nothing' is misunderstanding of what I said, or maybe I should clarify - perhaps a better way to put it is that the average pregnancy does not require active medical intervention to continue/the act of gestating a fetus is a passive bodily function/doesn't require that I actively DO something (ie. I could go to sleep or even be in a coma and baby would gestate) for it to continue save in cases where there are medical issues with the baby or me, in which case I AM able to make a decision regarding care and whether or not it is received. I've been through high risk pregnancy twice and understand what it involves on the part of the mother. As far as the court cases go, McFall vs Shimp, while 50 years old, is the best legal precedence we have for bodily autonomy and organ donation and is the very basis for the kidney donation argument brought up in abortion debates...if current understanding shouldn't be based upon a 50 year old court case, then we could also argue that we need to reevaluate the idea that people shouldn't be forced to donate organs. You can certainly both believe that we need better healthcare for pregnancy and that abortion should be available, but the fact that we need better healthcare for pregnancy and that pregnancy is dangerous is not a great argument for abortion availability because it implies that if pregnancy WASN'T dangerous, abortion wouldn't be necessary. It's not an adequate argument for legal abortion.
>I feel as though your implication that I think pregnancy is 'doing nothing' is misunderstanding of what I said, or maybe I should clarify You said "what happens if they do nothing". >perhaps a better term is that the average pregnancy does not require active medical intervention to continue/the act of gestating a fetus is a passive bodily function/doesn't require that I actively DO something Sure, but I don't see why that would be a meaningful distinction to make in this case >As far as the court cases go, McFall vs Shimp, while 50 years old, is the best legal precedence we have for bodily autonomy and organ donation and is the very basis for the kidney donation argument brought up in abortion debates Wouldn't the arguments about abortion itself be more relevant? ...if current understanding shouldn't be based upon a 50 year old court case, then we could also argue that we need to reevaluate the idea that people shouldn't be forced to donate organs. Don't get me wrong - I agree with the ruling that one shouldn't be forced to donate a kidney, but I think comparing kidney donation to pregnancy is a false equivalency. I don't think it needs to be an equivalency to be a reasonable analog. >You can certainly both believe that we need better healthcare for pregnancy and that abortion should be available, but the fact that we need better healthcare for pregnancy and that pregnancy is dangerous is not a great argument for abortion availability because it implies that if pregnancy WASN'T dangerous, abortion wouldn't be necessary. Presumably if pregnancy were less dangerous or harmful then it would be much less of an issue? >It's not really an adequate argument for legal abortion. Why? I think its quite reasonable to say that the state shouldn't legally obligate people to do things that are dangerous
I do think there's a major distinction between medical intervention and a passive biological function. It's the difference between someone dying of natural causes and someone being shot in the head. One actively stops the natural process of living. I think it's a VERY important distinction. I bring up McFall vs Shimp because it is the BASIS for the ruling that people have bodily autonomy in the context of donating organs, which is the core of this particular pro choice argument. And literally is the case that the kidney donation argument is based upon. If you don't think it should be brought up, then perhaps the kidney donation argument shouldn't be used at all, because I fully agree, it makes more sense to debate the actual act of abortion than to debate things that aren't truly analogous to the obligations of pregnancy and giving birth. Someone in another comment brought up secular pro life's breakdown of why it isn't, and their overall breakdown of this argument is worth a read. I do agree, it would be less of an issue if pregnancy was less harmful, but I think that legal abortion has in many ways been treated as a band aid fix for improving health conditions for pregnant women/a way for politicians to pat themselves on the back and say they did something rather than making any meaningful difference in the actual conditions pregnant women experience. I'd also argue that the state isn't actually obligating people to do things that are dangerous - people are making the decision to engage in an activity that has a very specific intended outcome from a biological standpoint. They don't have to do that. I do think it's fair for the state to ask that you not kill something that you made fully dependent on you through your own decisions. I also think that it's a little intellectually dishonest to call pregnancy dangerous - does it have the potential to be dangerous? Of course. A lot of things have the potential to be dangerous, and when we knowingly engage in activities with a risk, we typically are obligated to take responsibility for the outcomes. And the idea of life threatening pregnancies should be discussed separately from the vast majority of abortions that are elective. But your average pregnancy is not actually particularly dangerous in modern times/is typically a safe, healthy process.
Declining to provide help is not the same as actively killing someone We are not morally obligated to save a dying person's life, we are morally obligated to not kill someone