There’s a slight difference. If a fetus does not have a brainstem that connects to the spinal cord, I’ve got a very hard time saying that it’s got rights, even if medical technology advances (via, e.g., artificial wombs) to the point where it’s viable. On the other hand, a fetus who’s got a brainstem connected to the spinal cord–happens around the 24-26 week, IIRC–has got a much better claim at rights, even in situations or at times when there was no technology available to keep it alive outside the mother’s body.
Rights for me are all about existent personalities and capacities. If you lack both a developed personality (as a person in a coma has) and the capacity to think, feel, perceive, etc., then I’m unlikely to give you rights. If you’ve got at least one of those things, I’m much likelier to give you rights.
The viability issue only figures in if the fetus already has rights–it doesn’t convey rights itself.
A mother facing a tubal pregnancy faces imminent rupture of the fallopian tube. while the mother must respect both her life and that of her child, there is simply no treatment available that can guarantee the life of both. Under those circumstances, the operation to cure the condition is licitly done to save the life of the mother, and the unwanted but inevitable loss of the unborn child’s life is considered an unintended double effect, and thus morally permissible.
When a choice will likely bring about both an intended desirable effect and also an unintended, undesirable effect, the principle of double effect can be applied to evaluate the morality of the choice. The chosen act is morally licit when (a) the action itself is good, (b) the intended effect is good, and (c) the unintended, evil effect is not greater in proportion to the good effect. For example, “The act of self-defense can have a double effect: the preservation of one’s own life; and the killing of the aggressor. . . . The one is intended, the other is not” (Catechism, no. 2263, citing St. Thomas Aquinas).
I apologize for the “asshole” comment above. But I won’t withdraw the “ignorant” part, because it’s clear that you didn’t know what you were talking about. I hope that THAT condition is now cured.
I acknowledge that there are plenty of wonderful, kind, compassionate, thoughtful folks in the abortion prohibition movement (I like that term, as well as abortion legalization movement–I think I’m going to keep using them). However, my own personal experience with the movement has not always been sunny.
In 1996, I conducted on-camera interviews of some abortion protestors outside a clinic in Olympia, WA. Some of them were very nice, kind, warm people. But some of them were not. I remember asking one of them whether he believed violence was an acceptable tactic in protesting abortion. He grinned slyly at me and asked–I won’t ever forget this–“Who would you rather come home at the end of the day, the baby, or the doctor who makes his living killing babies?”
It chilled me. He was saying this in easy hearing of his two companions, and neither of them objected at all.
He was the scariest I interviewed. The nicest person I interviewed categorically and vociferously rejected violence as a tactic. There’s a whole range of folks out there.
But I have to say, that’s one of the few times in my life I’ve thought that I might be looking at a future murderer.
Thanks for the article… posting it in pro-choice site.
Putting a mother of 3 in jail for 30 years just goes against anything decent or logical. I hope the Catholic Church is giving Salvadorenhos something good in return for all this stupid suffering.
It is exceedingly rare that I respond to any post, let alone a black/white issue like abortion. I concede that your point is thoughtful and well put. I disagree.
Perhaps your wording “that should be considered” covers it, but to me the question is does the fetus have rights that trump the rights/wishes of the mother. Not rights, period. Rights that are more important than the rights or choices** of the mother.
Since I don’t think your rights are more important than mine, I’ll stay pro choice.
I have never had an abortion, have never performed one, have never counselled anybody to have one and would gladly accept any baby I help create into this world. However, I can imagine at least one situation where I would want an abortion performed. Since there is at least one situation where an abortion should be performed, I’ll stay pro choice.
In the future when an abortion doesn’t mean killing the fetus but will mean removing the fetus from one host and putting it into another, I will not volunteer to be the receiving host. Since I will not volunteer, I’ll stay pro choice.
KJ
**Since it is not illegal for a mother to choose to participate in any number of fetus threatening activities (smoking, drinking, etc.), I am using the word choices here. I hope that anybody facing a decision as important as abortion/life would make wise choices.
I’m not sure you do disagree–it may be that I just didn’t phrase myself carefully enough.
It is possible that, even if the fetus has rights, we will decide that in some or all cases the rights of the mother trump the rights of the fetus. I don’t deny that. I do say, however, that if the fetus has rights, the question becomes trickier.
If someone has a ficus that they grow tired of and they decide they want to leave it out for the garbage truck, nobody thinks twice about it: nobody (or virtually nobody) believes that the ficus has rights, and so there’s no balancing act to maintain.
If someone has an infant that they grow tired of and they decide they want to leave it out for the garbage truck, we are revolted to our core. The infant has rights, and the rights of the infant must be weighed against the right of the parent.
Are fetuses, rightswise, more like a ficus or an infant? I say that prior to brain-spine connection, they’re closer to a ficus; after that, they’re not full-fledged infants, but they’re edging much closer. As such, the fetus has rights that must be weighed against the mother’s.
Again, some folks conclude that the mother’s rights always outweigh the fetus’s. Some folks conclude that they never do. I take a middle position: in some cases they do, in some cases they do not. But I think that we need to figure out first when those rights are established.
Oh–and I’m glad to draw you out of lurkerdom! I hope my last post doesn’t sound like I’m trying to bicker; I really do expect that we’re pretty close on this issue (again, I’m very, very pro-legalization of abortion).
Which, of course, explains why Concerned Women for America takes a hard pro-life stance. And why the president of the National Right to Life Committe is a woman. And why the vast majority of crisis pregnancy center employees and volunteers are women.
I would like some light shone on that as well. Perhaps this comes under the Hand of God nonsense?
Oy, this whole topic makes me glad I am looking at religion in my rearview mirror.
I can see that the argument that the fetus may have rights is an appealing one, but like Killerjoke -I remain pro-choice because of the possibilities for rape, incest, congenital defects etc. If one category is OK, then the choice must be there for all, IMO. Keep it legal, safe and work on making it rare by supporting women, child care, contraception and education.
I don’t understand this at all. There are situations in which we’re allowed to kill beings with rights, e.g., adult human beings. These categories are clearly defined: self defense, for example, or acting as a soldier during wartime, or (in some states) euthanasia.
When we’re dealing with adults and the occasions when we’re allowed to kill adults, we don’t say that “if one category is OK, then the choice must be there for all”: because those adults have rights, we balance those rights and we decide when the rights of the killed are outweighed by the rights of the killer.
If fetuses (or, as I’d argue, some fetuses) have rights, why can’t we create similar distinctions for fetuses?
Bricker, I still have trouble wrapping my mind around the fact that the Catholic church will allow a segment of the fallopian tube containing the embryo to be removed, but won’t allow the more fertility-sparing procedure of opening the tube, removing the embryo, then repairing the tube.
Or not allowing the use of MTX to do a “chemical surgery” to achieve the same ends non-invasively.
The mental gymnastics needed to rationalize such hair-splitting seems to me to be a disservice to the patient. IMHO.
I believe that you’re thinking about the ‘general well being’ of the patient, ie, their physical health, their future desires etc. whereas, if I interpret correctly, the focus of the Catholic Church would be the eternal well being.
I’m aware of that; I still consider it mental gymnastics. To think that god disapproves of opening a fallopian tube to remove an embryo which has no hope of surviving to save the life of the mother, yet god approves of taking part of the tube out with the embryo in it to save the life of the mother, strikes me as silly.
well, me too. but it seems to me that a position which can include “can’t do that until it’s at critical mass” is inherently flawed. My rejoinder to all of that type of stuff is that if you believe in the deity, they also gave you a brain, I’d suspect w/intention to use it.
Wow, twice in one thread! You are correct, I must have misread your earlier post, we do seem to be much closer aligned than I had thought.
I do not want to answer for eleanorigby, but the answer to your question from my point of view is simple.
If I walk into the clinic/hospital/whatever and have to prove that my fetus meets the appropriate criteria for abortion, then there exists a possibility that my proof will involve divulging information I may not want to or be able to divulge.
Perhaps rape is one of the cases where abortion is justifiable. How does one prove rape? Does there have to be a police report? What if the only local cop was the rapist? Does there have to be evidence of a rape? What if the abortion was decided on only after the evidence had healed? If the victim is forced to have the child unless N number of criteria are met, who determines N and who determines the criteria?
I hate to be a one trick pony, but until the solution is crystal clear, I prefer to remain pro choice.
Perhaps, but I’d humbly suggest that you and the Church are not approaching the analysis with the same set of postulates. It’s not hair-splitting; it’s the appropriate analysis of the health and safety of both human beings involved.
I hope my last post doesn’t sound like I’m trying to bicker; I really do expect that we’re pretty close on this issue (again, I’m very, very pro-legalization of abortion).