First, thanks to those who defended my stance on this issue. Puddleglum, I have two comments: First, I originally objected, in general terms, to your categorization of people into two categories: those who share your anti-abortion stance without any cavil, and those who, not agreeing in every particular with you, you designated as “pro-abortion.” I used my own stance, which is nuanced from yours as regards the morality of some abortions, and which stands in opposition to making abortion illegal as an overall concept. I gave you my moral grounds for holding that stance.
Since you chose to completely disregard my point, I then argued with yours as, apparently bigotedly, one of imposing your view of morality on others through the law. You quite validly rejoined that we do indeed impose certain moral stadards on each other through the laws. I do concede the truth of what you say.
Again, you draw a black-and-white scene. Assume I go into a restaurant and order Chicken Parmagiana. The waiter brings to me a scrambled egg with a dollop of pasta sauce and some grated cheese on top of it. I think I would be justified in complaining about this, even though that egg, if permitted to hatch, would have produced a chicken whose meat would have satisfactorily filled my order.
By your definition, the moment fertilization of an ovum occurs, a new human being comes into existence. This is indeed the stance held by many conservative Protestants, the Catholic Church as an institution, and many others of differing or no religion. It is, however, not the sole possible stance other than your antithesis that the embryo is “just a bunch of tissue in the mother.” I would suggest to you that there might be other legitimate positions one might ethically hold, such as Thomas Aquinas’s view that the fetus becomes “ensouled” and in consequence a person at “the time of quickening” – when the unborn child begins to make motions of its own in the womb, or my own position that prior to viability, the fetus has the potential for personhood but has not yet become an independent person. Compare the chicken/egg analogy above.
Or contemplate the following:
A young woman is the sole child of her deceased mother and her bedfast father, who requires 24/7 care, and who does not have insurance paying for nursing home or in-home care. I think that you and I would agree that her proper moral duty is to provide the care without which her father would die, but that a judge would be completely out of line in ordering her to do so. It must be her uncompelled choice to provide him that care.
Notice that we have not deprived the father of personhood, but have placed him in a position where he requires what deprives his daughter of her freedom to live her normal life.
I see this as a direct analogy to my stance on abortion. She is morally obligated to give another the care he requires to live, but by her own decision, not by compulsion from another.
Finally, I would suggest to you that the parallels to murder and theft work only on the acceptance of your view that the pre-viable fetus is a full-fledged human being with all appurtenant rights. Our nation’s stance seems to be tacitly defined as: You have the freedom to do what you wish, except when what you wish to do deprives another of the same freedom. (Other exceptions, such as the subjection of the child to the parent’s good judgment, etc., will come into play, but the general principle holds.)
Jodi’s point is quite valid: You or I or anyone else has the right, beyond the principle of equality of freedom defined above, to dictate what one is morally obliged to do.