I’m going to make what may initially seem to be contentious statements, so read the post to contextualize:
If the unborn is not a person, then abortion is morally permissible, and it doesn’t matter what you do with the unborn.
If the unborn is a person, then abortion is morally impermissible, and the unborn must be protected.
Note that these statements are conditional, marked by the word, “If.”
Why would I make these statements? Simply because I want to clarify the issue that is at the heart of the abortion debate. Namely, the status of the unborn.
Consider the following arguments in favor of the pro-choice position:
We shouldn’t bring unwanted fetuses into the world. It’s better to abort fetuses than force a woman to have an unwanted child.
If a mother can’t afford to have a child, she shouldn’t be forced to continue her pregnancy.
Women’s rights are at stake: it is a woman’s body we’re talking about!
Now, let’s contextualize them. Rather than debating the viability of these arguments, suppose we plug in the case in which we all agree there is a “person” involved. Suppose in place of the “unborn” or “fetus” we put “toddler” into the argument. In that case, the arguments would be:
We should kill unwanted toddlers. It’s better to kill them than to have them live in homes where they are unwanted.
If a woman can’t afford to feed her toddler, we should kill it.
Women’s rights are at stake! Think of the drain toddlers place upon their mothers!
These arguments are clearly absurd. Why? Because we all know that we can’t just go around killing children because their families don’t want them. We can’t kill toddlers because their families can’t afford to feed them. But that’s exactly the question these types of arguments beg: what is the unborn?
And so we return to the statements at the beginning of this post. Suppose the unborn is, in fact, just a cluster of cells, no different from a wart or growth. In that case, I would agree it is perfectly permissible to discard of the unborn whenever a woman desires.
But then, what if the unborn is, in fact, a “person”? What if the unborn is a baby after all? Well, in that case, it is certainly not permissible to discard of the baby.
The fact is, many arguments raised in favor of the pro-choice position are made from a position where one simply assumes that the fetus is no more than a clump of cells. But that’s exactly what the debate is supposed to be about! If the fetus is no more then a clump of cells, the debate is over. But if the fetus is indeed a person, then the arguments raised in favor of the pro-choice position are just as shoddy as those arguments with “toddler” substituted in for “unborn” or “fetus.”
Thus, arguments like this must always be contextualized. The heart of the abortion debate is the status of the unborn. Once that question is answered, the answer to the question: “Is abortion permissible?” becomes crystal clear.
For arguments against abortion, check out my Pro-Life Page. Specifically, one can find my arguments for the personhood of the fetus here.
Scott Klusendorf does a simply phenomenal job of centralizing this issue and pointing out how most of the issues which cloud the debate can simply be dropped in favor of debating the status of the unborn. The arguments presented here are based upon his tactic “trot out the toddler” which one can find in his book, The Case for Life or in his lectures in Ethics at the Edge of Life (found in the links here).
SDG.
Good article. I do take one bit of contention, though. At the beginning, you mention that the unborn is a “person,” but I think you need to take it even one step back to whether or not the unborn is *human* (which, of course, biologically she is). The heart of the abortion issue isn’t whether or not the unborn is a “person,” but whether she’s “human” or not (which is what Scott talks about when he says to centralize the issue, and what trotting out the toddler helps to show). Before we can decide whether or not to kill something, we must first ask what that something is. If it’s not a human being, then no justification for abortion is necessary. If it *is* a human being, then not justification for abortion is adequate.
I must disagree. I think there is pretty decent consensus that the fetus is alive and is an independent human. Most argue from the fact that the fetus can’t feel, think, be viable, etc. My experience, anyways.
Actually, there is consensus that the unborn, from fertilization, are living human beings (as the experts, embryologists, constantly agree). That’s why pro-life arguments have such explanatory power. But that’s the central question we have to bring the issue back to, is What is the unborn? (This is the whole point of Scott’s trot out the toddler example, which the author here alluded to.)
Now, there are differing opinions on what constitutes a “person,” and that has even been abused in the past (Jews, Africans, women, and multiple other groups of humans have been deemed sub-human and/or non-persons) to legally discriminate against other groups of humans. So it seems that a discussion of what constitutes a “person” is not usually very helpful, since many people have different definitions of what a “person” is. So it seems the best way to argue for the pro-life position is just to argue from human equality, that all human beings by virtue of our inherent nature as rational, moral agents, all equally have a right to live.