How Much Time? The Contradiction in the Anti-Choice Position
If abortion were illegal, how much jail time should a woman serve for obtaining one?
That’s the question being asked of anti-abortion protesters in a fascinating mini-documentary posted on YouTube. Taking place outside of an abortion clinic in Libertyville, Ill., these series of interviews highlight an aspect of the anti-abortion crusade that in retrospect seems so glaringly obvious that I’m chagrined to admit it’s one which I myself hadn’t considered before. But I’m definitely not the only one — upon being asked how much time women should serve for obtaining hypothetically illegal abortions, protesters in the video appear taken aback, many of them stammering while admitting they’d never given it much thought. When pressed for answers as to the punishment such a crime would warrant, the ones given range from “counseling” to “pray for them.”
If you believe that abortion is murder then it follows that you should endorse severe punishment for women who undergo the procedure. However, most of the protesters seem to shy away from such a position and my guess is that most people in the broader society who identify as pro-life would as well. This logical contradiction — it’s unreasonable to argue abortion is murder but should go lightly punished — illuminates the highly emotional aspect of the abortion debate for anti-choicers: it’s a moral issue, not a rational or even practical one, and who cares about the consequences of a ban? Perhaps if we in the pro-choice camp can begin demanding answers to these sorts of very practical questions we can begin to get anti-choicers to at least consider their position more rationally, if not moderate their stance.
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After reading the article in the current issue of The Humanist magazine by Thomas Clark regarding a secular basis for banning abortion, this subject has been on my mind. I would like to play the devil’s advocate for a moment. Would it be possible for a pro-life lawyer to argue that the unborn fetus is life at all stages of its development? If it is not life at its earliest development as the article implies, then the punishment for the woman should be less for an early abortion. The conventional definition of life as indicated in Wikipedia is at least a place to start the argument. If the fetus is viewed as a parasite from the moment it attaches to the uterus, it meets six out of the seven listed conditions for the definition of life. Is the lack of the seventh condition (response to stimuli) enough to deem the zygote lifeless? In an interesting twist, the lawyer could argue that a newborn baby only meets six out of the seven conditions since it is incapable of reproducing for many years. But no one in their right mind would consider a baby anything other than a human life. By adding a “time to acquire” clause to the growth condition of an organism, the lawyer can argue that the baby needs the time for growth to acquire the seventh condition but is considered a form of life from birth by human experience. Therefore, the zygote also needs the time to acquire the seventh condition and should also be considered a form of life even if it is parasitic in nature. Similar arguments could be used to determine the sentence of a woman accused of having an “illegal” abortion.
The issue brought up by the original posting is only one more to add to all the issues that are tied together in the social knot we call abortion. If there is a ban, will the sentnece be extended to rich women and girls who fly out of the country to have their abortions? If there is a ban, will the legislature step in to protect an individual’s (man or woman) right to contraceptives? “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” It is interesting that condoms are touted as an excellent device for preventing the spread of HIV, but I don’t see any manufacturers using the market ploy of helping to prevent an abortion.
What do we as Humanists believe about the definition of life? Does what we stand for on an issue agree with what we say we believe in? Recent comments on other posts refer to the psychology of Humanism. How much autonomy can be applied to a scientific truth? If we bend a scientific truth to meet the need of the moment, are we in danger of creating a “religion of convenience”? I think we are facing a ban and we need to be ready for it.
Discussion merely of “life” confuses the issue of abortion. Life alone does not qualify biological tissue for protection by society. The category “human life” includes living tissue that we dispose of - cancer tumors, warts, wisdom teeth, appendices, tonsils, etc. Being alive and being human by themselves are not enough to invoke the law to protect them.
What the law rightly protects is PERSONS. Persons have rights and privileges and obligations in society. What constitutes a “person”? That is decided by society. Not by the Pope, not by preachers. Society defines personhood, and the definition changes as knowledge and general convictions change with time.
Thus we no longer count Native Americans as fractions of persons, or slaves as non-persons. We extend the rights of persons progressively as maturity is achieved.
So you can become president of the United States at 35. You can drink in a bar at 21. You can vote at 18. You can drive a car at 16. The attainment of all that is involved in being a person in the eyes of the law is gradual and it is society, not religious leaders, which decides the rate that is appropriate for the good of society.
Any claim that personhood is achieved at the moment a spermatozoan enters an ovum is absurd. And the law does not exist to protect alleged “rights” of anything which is not a person. It is not enough to say that a potential person exists. An acorn is not an oak tree.
Logically, the absolutist position that all life is “sacred” (a religious, not a scientific, term) doesn’t hold up. If a fertilized ovum deserves the protection of the law because it is human life (which it is) rather than because it is a person (which it is not), then abortion protesters should be waving gruesome signs showing bleeding tumors mercilessly torn from the organ of the patient where they had been warm and safe.
On the other hand, if you insist that every fertilized ovum is a person, then abortion protesters should be demanding that we give the vote to every embryo. The DMV must grant driver’s licenses to fetuses.
Seriously, all these issues are well discussed by James Prescott and Edd Doerr in their book “Abortion ‘rights’ and Fetal Personhood.” This book used to be sold by the AHA, and it may still be available.
re your statement:
If that were true we’d also have to give two and three year olds licenses and the vote in order to argue that we shouldn’t be allowed to kill them.
I’m pro choice but I don’t think by just taking an extremist position or trying to force anti-abortionist into extreme positions we move the conversation that much forward.
I think discussing the actual realities of “What if abortion was illegal?” might do more to make people realize the actual implications of what they’re advocating for. There is no such thing as a law without punishments and no one talks about that aspect of abortion laws much. I think this could open up some needed dialogue between the two communities if treated with respect.
The issue of interventional termination of pregnancy has become a techno-modern issue whether we like it or not. I cannot perceive a world where a woman or a man cannot make an intellectual choice as to whether to keep the tissue or terminate it, especially when life on earth so easily comes and goes in poverty, disease, or violence. To rely on nature is to say that all that we know as people in this century is evil, because we have through our ancestry all fallen victim to its indiscriminate felling. I would more happily join a revolution that advocated food for all than a placard board parade against a woman who is free to make a choice whether to bring a child into this world or not. Why? Because I beleive the latter would not be an issue should the former be successful. Ha! I don’t believe in abortion as contraception you see. That is frivolous and irresponsible. We diminish the power of the human choice by offering it over to an unseen ghost. Challenge the monster of posession and power that stalks your fertile lands with guns and clubs. Is there a way of unarming America? I wonder sometimes what your country would be like without bullets.