So, I was scrolling down my Facebook wall when a friend of mine posts this article from a website called “Mommyish.com”. The article was about abortion, namely “10 good reasons” to have one, oddly, it used cat pictures to illustrates the points which…I have no idea how the cats were supposed to illustrate the points the article writer was making since the pics had absolutely nothing to do with the “good reason” the cat picture was attached to. The cat pictures were rather superfluous with regards to the arguments. But that aside, I have to say, the logic of the pro-choice people never ceases to amaze me in its faultiness. Every single reason is absolutely flawed, and mostly based on the presupposition that the unborn child is not a live human. If you want the read the article for yourself, click here.
The only other Pro-Life blog post I’ve ever done on this website was called “Pro Choice is not the RIGHT choice” in which I gave a very simple syllogism in support of the anti-abortion position. I then proceeded to defend each of the premises of the syllogism in order to show that the conclusion was valid. Now, argument is as follows:
1: Murder is morally wrong.
2: Abortion is murder.
3: Therefore abortion is morally wrong.
In order to escape the conclusion you must either prove that either murder is not morally wrong or that abortion isn’t really murder. The 2nd premise is usually disputed by the pro choice advocate. Most liberals sincerely believe that the fetus is not a living human being. They believe that the fetus is just a clump of cells or something that WILL BECOME a living human being if left enough time to develop. People with this point of view, when shown that the fetus really is a living human being and that abortion kills him/her, these people change their position from adamantly pro-choice to adamantly pro-life because they follow the logic to it’s conclusion and therefore change positions since they’re not bad people and would never purposefully endorse murder. HOWEVER, there are some who believe both premises of the argument and the conclusion and still endorse abortion anyway. Now, it’s these people I have a problem with. It’s these people that make me angry. With the people who don’t know any better, who just believe the fetus is a clump of cells, I tend to not get too angry with those people because, after all, they don’t know any better. So I’m like “Forgive them Father, for they know not what they do”. But if you actually know that abortion is the slaughtering of unborn living children and you support it anyway, then you don’t need an argument, you need therapy.
Now, onto my critique of the Mommyish article. I have to say, I really wish she would have elaborated on some of her reasons. Some of these statements could be ambiguous and therefore misunderstood. In fact, because of that, it’s possible that I might misunderstand one of the assertions and commit the straw man fallacy. I don’t like committing logical fallacies, and arguments are only good if they refute the position your opponent actually holds. If I give a brilliant refutation of an argument my opponent does not hold, then all my talking (or typing) will have been all for not.
Reason No. 1: Having A Baby Would Endanger Your Life.
Yes, in some circumstances, going through with the pregnancy could endanger your life and end the life of either you, your child, or both you and your child. This is one point that pro choice sometimes bring up in their debates with pro life people. They ask if abortion would be ok under the circumstance that allowing the woman to give birth to her baby would cause the death of one or the other or both. There is no good answer to this one in my opinion. Because no matter how I look at it, in a circumstance where there are several complications, you have to forfeit one life in order to preserve the other. Life is lost either way. Either the mother dies, or the babies, or possibly both. It’s a moral delimma. It’s just like “Sophie’s Choice”. If I were the father in that position, I would feel terribly torn. On the one hand, I love my wife and don’t want her to die, but on the other hand, I love my child and don’t want him/her to die. I lose someone either way. So, abortion might be allowable under this circumstance. But I know of women who would willingly give up their life so that their children would live.
Reason No. 2: Your Birth Control Failed.
She wrote “For whatever reason, your birth control failed. It happens.” — Seriously? This is a good reason for a woman to have an abortion. There are several problems with this argument. The biggest is that it presupposes that the fetus is not a live human being. If the fetus was just a clump of cells, if the fetus really was just a POTENTIAL human being rather than an actual human being than this might indeed be a good reason for a woman to get an abortion. But this is the point, is the unborn child an actual human being. Now, I don’t want to go too in deph in this for fear that this blog post will get to lengthy, thus deterring some people from reading it (yes, I know some of my blog posts on this site are long, but I’m trying to make a habit of keeping them a maximum of 7 typed pages), so I’ll just get into only a few of the evidences that the fetus is a living human being.
One of the easiest to understand evidences that the unborn baby is alive is that it has a heart beat. The unborn child has a heartbeat. We all know that non-living things don’t have heart beats. Only living things have heart beats. Foxes have heart beats, cats have hear beats, dogs have heart beats…and of course…people have heart beats. Rocks do not have heart beats, nor do computers, or tables or chairs. They don’t have heart beats because they’re not living things and they don’t have veins running throughout their body necessitating the production of blood from the heart to flow through the veins in order to keep them alive. People and animals DO have veins running throughout their body necessitating the production of
blood from the heart to flow through the veins in order to keep them
alive. While it’s true that not all living things have hearts (e.g bacteria and plants), it is also true that no non-living things have hearts. Not all living organisms have hearts, but everything that has a heart is a living organism. What’s astonishing is that this heart beat forms just 18 days after conception. Guess where the cut off time is for having an abortion? 24 weeks. The VAST MAJORITY of the time that the child has a heartbeat, it’s legal to terminate it.
So, we’ve concluded based on this scientific evidence that the fetus is
alive. But is it a live HUMAN? Well, that seems obvious. The fetus is a
result of the sexual intercourse between a man and a woman who are both
human beings. Even if you didn’t have the ability to test its DNA, you
could still conclude it’s human just based on common sense. After all,
we know that humans only produce other humans. You don’t see humans producing wolves or cows or sheeps. What else could it be? For further evidence, check out my previous pro life blog post “Pro Choice Is Not The Right Choice”
Given that we’ve establish that the unborn are living human beings and that abortion murders the child, the conclusion that abortion is morally wrong follows logically by the laws of logic. I see no need to defend premise 1 that it’s morally wrong to murder a human being since everyone seems to believe that unless you’re a moral relativist. Since both premises are true, the conclusion follows.
Now then, does it seem reasonable to believe that it’s morally acceptable to end the child’s life just because your birth control failed? Is it? Is that a good reason? I don’t think so. Now, I’m sympathetic to women who are raped and get pregnant by accident and who neither have the resources, the time, nor the desire to raise a child. But that still doesn’t justify killing the unborn child. What the woman should do in this situation is give birth to the child followed by putting it up for adoption as soon as he or she is born. I’m sure there’s a family who does have the time, resources and desire to raise the child. You don’t have to be stuck with a baby if you don’t to, but your desire to not raise a child is no excuse to kill that child.
1: Murder is morally wrong.
2: Abortion is murder.
3: Therefore abortion is morally wrong.
Reason No. 3: You Don’t Want To Have A Child Because Of Your Career.
The article writer wrote “You feel like having a baby, taking maternity leave, and caring for a child would harm your career opportunities.” — Another bad reason to have an abortion. Remember, abortion is murder. This is not an acceptable reason to kill an unborn child. Again, you don’t have to have a child if you don’t want to. You can go your entire life being childless if you want to. I don’t believe anyone should be forced to raise a child if they don’t want to. But again, whether or not this is a good reason all falls upon whether abortion really is murder, and I think there’s strong scientific evidence that it IS murder. Some of that evidence I’ve already described above. Your child should not have scissors jabbed into his/her brain just because you want to keep your job.
Reason No. 4: You Feel You Are Far Too Young.
Again, another bad reason. If you don’t want to raise the child, put him/her up for adoption. I’m sure there’s a family somewhere who would be more than happy to raise him or her instead of you.
Reason No. 5: You Feel You Are Far Too Old.
Another reason to put the baby up for adoption. You don’t want to raise a child? Fine. You don’t have to. But don’t kill him/her.
Reason No. 6: You Feel Strongly About Overpopulation.
This argument is usually propounded by people who know that abortion is the killing of the unborn, yet support abortion anyway. This begs the question: is the world overpopulated? No. Overpopulation is a Myth. The world is not over populated. New York
City has a population density of approximately 27,500 people per square
mile. Everybody on earth (7 billion people) could fit in the state of
Texas at a density of approximately 26,500 people per square mile
(that’s a population density 1,000 less than New York City).
There
are over 57 million square miles of land mass on earth. There is plenty
of room and there are more than enough resources for the development of
life. The world is not over populated.
Reason No. 7: You Are Worried About The Health Of The Baby.
And you think killing him/her will help the situation? I happen to think a human being is intrinsically valuable no matter what defects he or she might have. A person is not like a iPhone. You can’t just return it to it’s Creator if it has some defects.
Reason No. 8: You Want No Relationship With The Person Who Got You Pregnant
