I listened to a bioethicist's thoughts on this anniversary, and he had a few interesting points. From Scott Klusendorf:
The unborn differs from the newborn in four ways, none of which are relevant to its status as a human being. Those four ways are size, level of development, environment, and degree of dependency.
Size: the unborn are smaller then newborns, but since when has size had anything to do with the rights that people have? Men are generally larger than women, does that mean they deserve more rights? Is Shaquel O'Neal more of a person than feminist Gloria Steinem simply because he is larger? Clearly size isn't the issue.
Level of development: True, the unborn are less developed than newborns, but this too is morally irrelevant. A newborn for that matter is less developed than a toddler. A toddler is less developed than an adolescent. An adolescent is less developed than an adult. But we speak of all as equally human. Is a child of four, for example, less of a person because she has not yet developed sexually? It follows, then, that the ability to perform human functions is not a necessary condition for human personhood. Rather, a person is one with the natural, inherent capacity to give rise to personal acts--even if she lacks the current ability to perform those acts. People who are unconscious do not have the present capacity to perform personal acts. We don't kill them because of it. Nor should we kill the unborn.
Environment: True, the unborn is located in a different place, but how does a change in location suddenly change a non-human entity into a human one? Did you stop being human when you walked from your house to the car? From the kitchen to the den? Clearly, where one is has no bearing on who one is. A child in the incubator of her mother's womb is no less a child then the one being sustained by neonatal technology. Ladies and gentlemen, you don't stop being human simply because you have a different address.
Degree of dependency: If viability is what makes one human, then all those dependent on kidney machines, heart pace-makers and insulin would have to be declared non-persons. There is no ethical difference between an unborn child who is plugged into and dependent upon its mother and a kidney patient who is plugged into and dependent upon a kidney machine. Siamese twins do not forfeit their right to live simply because they depend on each other?s circulatory systems.
We can see, then, that the unborn child differs from a newborn one in only four ways--size, level of development, environment, and degree of dependency-- and none of those differences are good reasons for disqualifying it as fully human.
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Hippy, he spoke of a conversation he had recently with a woman who felt the way you do (assuming I am understanding your point of view correctly). She said that she felt that killing babies was wrong, and that she would never have an abortion herself, but she thought women should have the right to choose. He asked if he was hearing her right: she thinks that it is wrong to kill babies, but it should still be legal to kill babies? She realized that by calling it a 'choice', she had glossed over that small detail.
Any thoughts, comments, comebacks to any of the above statements?
