# Pro-life Atheists: An Argument to Oppose Abortion **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 28, 2017, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094 "2017-10-28T21:25:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2017, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/41 "2017-10-29T23:23:24Z")
So long as nobody imagines it’s scientific, a bright-line on/off switch moment can be useful for legal purposes. Voting at 18, drinking at 21, you must be this tall to go on this ride, etc. That was actually one of the good things about Roe vs. Wade: it provided relief for all parties, via the compromise of the trimester division. It gradually increased protection for the fetus, bringing the government’s interest into play only incrementally. People who insist on the on/off moment being conception are hard to work with, because that is a viewpoint that admits of no pragmatic compromise. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2017, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/42 "2017-10-29T23:39:13Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > That’s a good point since no one knows what pregnancy entails. Oh, wait, we do! > > Nope. > > Objection overruled. 🙂 But what if the visitor was supposed to be kept in your foyer, blocked from the rest of your house by a membrane, but by accident he tripped and fell through and decided to take up residence? Yes, this argument is silly. ---
**Author:** ![nate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nate/32/13085_2.png) [@nate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nate)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2017, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/43 "2017-10-29T23:42:55Z")
If not conception, what is the most logical moment a fetus obtains personhood? ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2017, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/44 "2017-10-29T23:43:15Z")
> [@nate](#): > > To comment on the situation of the test tube fertilized eggs, my thoughts are that while growing humans in an artificial environment could enter the territory of being unethical, I don’t relate it to the situation on an implanted fertilized egg inside a womb. If sometime in the future we have created artificial wombs that can grow a baby to viability, I would equate that to pregnancy. If a fertility clinic implants 10 fertilized eggs into a woman hoping at least one will “take”, the ones that do “take” should be treated as persons, the others, including the ones left in the test tubes, are non-potentials. But they are non-potential due to chance alone. Just like a fertilized egg which does not implant is a non-potential due to chance, or an early miscarriage is a non-potential. We’ve made a gigantic effort to reduce infant mortality, since we all agree infants are people. If fertilized eggs are people, don’t we need a giant effort to reduce their mortality? I’ve heard of no such effort from pro-lifers, ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/45 "2017-10-30T00:33:15Z")
> [@nate](#): > > If not conception, what is the most logical moment a fetus obtains personhood? Take your choice. Birth is one. A person becomes a person once born. Onset of brain waves: hard to be a person with no brain. Physical viability: once you can survive on your own, you have some claim to autonomy. Quickening: before that, you’re just “tissue.” The beginning of the third trimester: it’s arbitrary, but since we’re talking law just as much as reality, why not? You can’t solve this problem with science. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/46 "2017-10-30T00:33:53Z")
Nate, there’s another issue here. Ok, so you’re a “pro life atheist”. Instead of arguing with your viewpoint, I’m going to put it this way : Do you feel your position is strong _enough_ that other people should be forced by the law to adhere to it. If _you_ get pregnant, fine, life starts at conception. But are you saying that we should force the police and the prosecutors and medical boards and all the other authorities in the United States to enforce your point of view on everyone. Going ahead and declaring that every deliberate loss of a fertilized egg is a murder (after all, killing a baby is murder, and you’ve said you consider a fertilized egg as the same thing). Sending women to prison for murder if they miscarry as a result of drug use or other deliberate acts. Or chemotherapy. All abortions would be illegal - if it’s really murder, that is what the law demands. Each back alley abortion is 1 murder charge. Taking abortion pills, another murder charge. Because that’s what “pro life” people actually demand. They want the police to enforce their point of view, and in backwards states, have been doing their very best to harass doctors who perform abortions, etc. I’ve attended a lecture where a medical doctor has made this argument. And I just can’t swallow it. It’s not murder. It’s a tragedy - I’m not saying we should be destroying fetuses without any care. And if we have to do it, we should do it as early and quickly as possible. I think it should be possible for women to get the abortion drugs without hassle and at cost early in the pregnancy, when the fetus is not even a fully differentiated ball of cells that hasn’t even formed into organs yet. And I think that methods of birth control that are effective and don’t require the user to do anything - IUDs, implants, etc - should be cheaply and readily available. They honestly should be paid for by the taxpayers as they are a huge net savings. But it’s not murder, and I do not feel we should be sending the police to arrest doctors who perform abortions, or empower medical boards or other authorities to harass them. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/47 "2017-10-30T01:23:40Z")
> [@nate](#): > > If not conception, what is the most logical moment a fetus obtains personhood? “Personhood” is a philosophical concept that we humans assign to other humans, not a biological characteristic. There is no “moment” in biological development at which a fetus instantaneously “obtains personhood”. The biological development during gestation of characteristics that we humans associate with personhood is a continuous process. So ISTM profoundly **illogical** to insist on pretending that there’s any one specific “most logical moment” to assign to an arbitrarily determined nonpersonhood/personhood transition. Legally speaking, we do need to put some kind of arbitrary timeline on the development process to assign **legal** personhood status. ISTM that the timeline used in most court interpretations of reproductive rights in the US, where elective abortions are prohibited after some time in the second trimester of pregnancy, is reasonable. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/48 "2017-10-30T02:09:01Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I object to the term “pro-choice,” as a euphemism for “pro-certain-dead-unborn-children.” > > So how about we refer to each side by the term they choose to use themselves? I can take a skin cell, convert it to a pluripotent cell, and then convert it to an egg cell. Following, I could extract DNA from a hair follicle, inject it, and grow a human in the womb of an orangutan. If every single component of my body has, by potential, the ability to become a baby, then how is it not killing unborn children every time I scratch or bang a toe? ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/49 "2017-10-30T02:27:01Z")
I will give it a shot, though not a Atheist, but one that knows God as my parent. Ending a life is generally morally wrong, though one ending their own life is would be acceptable. This is due to the importance of self determination. But there is a problem with ending one’s own life morally, if that life was of benefit to society. Though summarized a lot that is the crux of a atheistic abortion argument. A child is given into the care of his/her guardians who will make decisions for that child. But the principals remain, that of if that child would be of benefit to society. When ti comes to a in the womb child, the parents or mother must decide for that child, but morally must make the decision based on the needs of society. Just like ending her own life, she could decide to end life against societies well being, but the key difference is a mother is imposing that ability on a unborn child. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/50 "2017-10-30T03:01:38Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Trinopus** : > > You may disagree with it, but it is perfectly coherent. It’s my body, and you cannot act against it…even at the cost to your own body. OK, then, we’re agreed: You can’t act against the fetus’s body to have an abortion, even at the cost to your own pregnant body. > [@](#): > > If you break into my house, I get to shoot you. That’s absolutely coherent, no matter what your opinion is of its moral goodness. A fetus isn’t “breaking in”. The fetus finds itself in another person’s body as a result of that person’s actions, and will leave as soon as it can. To address some other points: We do know when life begins. It begins approximately 3.8 billion years ago. Likewise, we know when human life begins, some few million years ago. Neither of those is at all relevant. What is relevant is, as I said, when personhood begins. So let’s see if we can try to figure out when that should be considered to be. Birth is a poor choice, because there’s essentially no difference between a fetus just before birth and a newborn baby right after. Conception is an even worse choice, because then we’re forced to conclude that some sapient human organisms aren’t persons, due to identical twins, lab-grown clones, and the like. What we really want to address is, what is it about us that makes us consider ourselves “persons”? The precise answer to that is debateable, but it’s certainly something about our minds: It’s generally accepted that a cow isn’t a person, much less a tree or a rock, but if we ever were to meet Mr. Spock or ET, most of us would agree that they are persons. What do we, Spock, and ET have, but cows, trees, and rocks don’t? It’s something about our thought, and our thoughts occur in our brains. So if we’re going to draw a line for where we consider personhood to begin, it should be based on brain development. ---
**Author:** ![nate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nate/32/13085_2.png) [@nate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nate)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/51 "2017-10-30T04:24:24Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > Nate, there’s another issue here. Ok, so you’re a “pro life atheist”. Instead of arguing with your viewpoint, I’m going to put it this way : > > Do you feel your position is strong _enough_ that other people should be forced by the law to adhere to it. If _you_ get pregnant, fine, life starts at conception. But are you saying that we should force the police and the prosecutors and medical boards and all the other authorities in the United States to enforce your point of view on everyone. Going ahead and declaring that every deliberate loss of a fertilized egg is a murder (after all, killing a baby is murder, and you’ve said you consider a fertilized egg as the same thing). Sending women to prison for murder if they miscarry as a result of drug use or other deliberate acts. Or chemotherapy. All abortions would be illegal - if it’s really murder, that is what the law demands. Each back alley abortion is 1 murder charge. Taking abortion pills, another murder charge. > > Because that’s what “pro life” people actually demand. They want the police to enforce their point of view, and in backwards states, have been doing their very best to harass doctors who perform abortions, etc. Yeah, there are a lot of problems with enforcement. I don’t agree with the consensus of the pro-life crowd, I just think intentional ending of a human life is wrong after birth and before birth, but I don’t agree that pregnant women should have special laws regarding their behavior because of the fact that they are pregnant. How do I reconcile a pregnant woman taking some concoction with intention to cause a miscarriage? Well, I wouldn’t spend any resources prosecuting her although I think it is morally wrong. And maybe that’s where I differ from the pro-life and pro-choice positions. I think it’s wrong to intentionally end a potential human life and I think a modern society should collectively find it morally repugnant… not for some religious reason but for a logical, perhaps scientific reason. So I guess my solution would be more of a massive honest PR campaign against abortion rather than law enforcement. ---
**Author:** ![nate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nate/32/13085_2.png) [@nate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nate)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/52 "2017-10-30T04:41:06Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > “Personhood” is a philosophical concept that we humans assign to other humans, not a biological characteristic. There is no “moment” in biological development at which a fetus instantaneously “obtains personhood”. > > The biological development during gestation of characteristics that we humans associate with personhood is a continuous process. So ISTM profoundly **illogical** to insist on pretending that there’s any one specific “most logical moment” to assign to an arbitrarily determined nonpersonhood/personhood transition. > > Legally speaking, we do need to put some kind of arbitrary timeline on the development process to assign **legal** personhood status. ISTM that the timeline used in most court interpretations of reproductive rights in the US, where elective abortions are prohibited after some time in the second trimester of pregnancy, is reasonable. Yeah, I mean “personhood” in a moral sense. Meaning, when should we declare this fetus is a “person” in that it would be morally wrong to end their life? If development is continuous, even outside the womb, wouldn’t it make sense to declare this a person as soon as it has the potential to become a conscious human? ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/53 "2017-10-30T05:04:13Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > The _basis_ of your “belief” is that some magical divine spark happens at the moment of conception. If you are really atheist, you must know there is no evidence for such a spark, and therefore, if you can kill livestock…or a plant…you can kill an early term fetus. No, an atheist is simply someone who doesn’t believe in _God_, or in other deities. You can still be an atheist and believe in souls (some Buddhists fit into that category, as well as quite a lot of none-of-the-above Americans that I know). It’s entirely possible to believe in a soul based on philosophical reasoning rather than on religious reasoning. ---
**Author:** ![Delicious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@Delicious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Delicious)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 8:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/54 "2017-10-30T08:23:58Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > I can take a skin cell, convert it to a pluripotent cell, and then convert it to an egg cell. Following, I could extract DNA from a hair follicle, inject it, and grow a human in the womb of an orangutan. > > If every single component of my body has, by potential, the ability to become a baby, then how is it not killing unborn children every time I scratch or bang a toe? Can you perfect cold fusion while you’re at it? Or maybe just teleport unwanted babies into the uterus of infertile women who want babies ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 9:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/55 "2017-10-30T09:03:23Z")
> [@Delicious](#): > > Can you perfect cold fusion while you’re at it? > > Or maybe just teleport unwanted babies into the uterus of infertile women who want babies > **[Induced pluripotent stem cell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_pluripotent_stem_cell)** > > Induced pluripotent stem cells (also known as iPS cells or iPSCs) are a type of pluripotent stem cell that can be generated directly from a somatic cell. The iPSC technology was pioneered by Shinya Yamanaka and Kazutoshi Takahashi in Kyoto, Japan, who together showed in 2006 that the introduction of four specific genes (named Myc, Oct3/4, Sox2 and Klf4), collectively known as Yamanaka factors, encoding transcription factors could convert somatic cells into pluripotent stem cells. Shinya Yamana [https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/05/15/scientists-convert-human-skin-cells-into-embryonic-stem-cells](https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/05/15/scientists-convert-human-skin-cells-into-embryonic-stem-cells) > **[Interspecific pregnancy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interspecific_pregnancy)** > > Interspecific pregnancy (literally pregnancy between species, also called interspecies pregnancy or xenopregnancy) is the pregnancy involving an embryo or fetus belonging to another species than the carrier. Strictly, it excludes the situation where the fetus is a hybrid of the carrier and another species, thereby excluding the possibility that the carrier is the biological mother of the offspring. Strictly, interspecific pregnancy is also distinguished from endoparasitism, where parasite o It ha... With today’s technology, I would expect it to take a large number of attempts to succeed, but this is not speculative technology. It’s something we are already doing today. But even if we ignore the fact that this is already possible, for philosophical discussion just the fact that it’s theoretically possible is sufficient. If you want to make declarations on when life is and isn’t created, you have to deal with the fact that biology isn’t as cut-and-dried as “poof, hand wave, look it’s a baby!”. Hell, random molecules strewn through the dirt and in the air are all _human in potentia_. If we split carbon atoms in a nuclear reactor, are we destroying their potential to ever be part of a human baby? Is that infanticide? No matter what, abortion is about deciding what constitutes life and what constitutes human life, and deciding what arbitrary point on those lines to place a dividing line. _Human in potentia_ is a ridiculous dividing line. By that standard, everything in the universe is up for grabs. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 9:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/56 "2017-10-30T09:13:41Z")
Improved second link: [Science | AAAS](http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/10/mouse-egg-cells-made-entirely-lab-give-rise-healthy-offspring) ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/57 "2017-10-30T18:30:52Z")
> [@nate](#): > > Yeah, I mean “personhood” in a moral sense. Meaning, when should we declare this fetus is a “person” in that it would be morally wrong to end their life? If development is continuous, even outside the womb, wouldn’t it make sense to declare this a person as soon as it has the potential to become a conscious human? The trouble is that there isn’t one single neat and tidy moment where “it” (what “it”?) **starts** to have “the potential to become a conscious human”. A sperm or ovum cell has the potential to become a conscious human if it joins with another cell of the right type in the right way at the right time. (This potentiality is a chief factor in the Catholic Church’s prohibitions on birth control and masturbation, for instance.) A fertilized ovum has the potential to become one or more conscious humans if its cells divide in the right way at the right time. An individual fetus has the potential to become a conscious human if another fetus in the same uterus doesn’t receive too many of its resources and subsequently absorb its tissue into itself (and if a whole lot of other circumstances also break right, natch). At all these stages, none of these entities have the capabilities that we associate with “being a person”. There’s no meaningful reason to award them “personhood” status just because they have some level of **potential** to become a person. As **Sage Rat** notes, “potential” is a vague and murky concept that could to some extent apply to all forms of life or even matter. I get that you really really want to assign “personhood” status to a fertilized ovum, and if that’s how you personally feel about it, that’s fine with me. I know parents who thought of their long-desired baby as a person since well before it was even conceived, and I know people who assign some form of personhood to their pets or even inanimate objects. People are entitled to their own individual feelings and moral beliefs about the concept of personhood. Where you’re going off the rails is in trying to claim a superior level of “sense” or “logic” for your beliefs about the assignment of personhood. You may find it satisfying or appealing to declare that personhood begins at the moment of fertilization, but there is nothing uniquely meaningful in a logical (or biological) sense about that moment. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/58 "2017-10-30T18:42:11Z")
> [@nate](#): > > Yeah, there are a lot of problems with enforcement. I don’t agree with the consensus of the pro-life crowd, I just think intentional ending of a human life is wrong after birth and before birth, but I don’t agree that pregnant women should have special laws regarding their behavior because of the fact that they are pregnant. > > How do I reconcile a pregnant woman taking some concoction with intention to cause a miscarriage? Well, I wouldn’t spend any resources prosecuting her although I think it is morally wrong. And maybe that’s where I differ from the pro-life and pro-choice positions. I think it’s wrong to intentionally end a potential human life and I think a modern society should collectively find it morally repugnant… not for some religious reason but for a logical, perhaps scientific reason. So I guess my solution would be more of a massive honest PR campaign against abortion rather than law enforcement. You haven’t actually said whether or not we should be sending abortion doctors to jail. Or at least revoking their medical license. Should women who take RU-486 be prosecuted for murder and potentially subject to the same penalties all other murderers face, up to and including life imprisonment and execution? Because if you don’t feel that way - if you’re ok with licensed physicians performing abortions under the same framework as today, you just find it distasteful - you aren’t “pro-life” and you’ve been wasting our time arguing with you. Pro-life means “pro-prison” and “pro-penalizing doctors”. Those people feel so strongly about the issue that this is what they have been asking the government to do for 50+ years. This is why they sometimes kill abortion doctors and bomb clinics - from their perspective, this is an ongoing policy of mass murder. I would feel sad if a fetus died, and I wouldn’t want to participate in abortions if I were a doctor, and I would rather use practical birth control so that an abortion doesn’t need to even be considered. But I see the grim necessity of doing it, and in no way do I want the State to restrict abortions further. I think the State should make long lasting birth control free for all women\*, since this is a net savings for the taxpayers and it also would greatly reduce the number of abortions that need be performed. \*and men to, if this new method of an injection into the vas deferens turns out to be safe and effective. ---
**Author:** ![nate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nate/32/13085_2.png) [@nate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nate)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/59 "2017-10-30T21:59:21Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > You haven’t actually said whether or not we should be sending abortion doctors to jail. Or at least revoking their medical license. Should women who take RU-486 be prosecuted for murder and potentially subject to the same penalties all other murderers face, up to and including life imprisonment and execution? > > Because if you don’t feel that way - if you’re ok with licensed physicians performing abortions under the same framework as today, you just find it distasteful - you aren’t “pro-life” and you’ve been wasting our time arguing with you. > > Pro-life means “pro-prison” and “pro-penalizing doctors”. Those people feel so strongly about the issue that this is what they have been asking the government to do for 50+ years. This is why they sometimes kill abortion doctors and bomb clinics - from their perspective, this is an ongoing policy of mass murder. > > I would feel sad if a fetus died, and I wouldn’t want to participate in abortions if I were a doctor, and I would rather use practical birth control so that an abortion doesn’t need to even be considered. But I see the grim necessity of doing it, and in no way do I want the State to restrict abortions further. I think the State should make long lasting birth control free for all women\*, since this is a net savings for the taxpayers and it also would greatly reduce the number of abortions that need be performed. > > \*and men to, if this new method of an injection into the vas deferens turns out to be safe and effective. I think elective abortion is one of those things we look back on 1000 years from now and wonder how we were so barbaric. I don’t think it would be practical to make it illegal as there would have to be exceptions for the health of the mother and that would ultimately be a subjective decision. I do think using abortion as a form of birth control should be illegal. In order to get an abortion, there should be a doctor involved in the process that will vouch for the medical necessity of it. So, yes, I’d like it to be illegal but with exceptions. Edit to add: I completely agree with you on the state providing free birth control. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2017, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094/60 "2017-10-30T22:23:17Z")
> [@nate](#): > > I do think using abortion as a form of birth control should be illegal. In order to get an abortion, there should be a doctor involved in the process that will vouch for the medical necessity of it. So, yes, I’d like it to be illegal but with exceptions. > > Edit to add: I completely agree with you on the state providing free birth control. What type(s) of birth control? Would you include IUDs, contraceptive pills, and the so-called “morning-after pill”, for example? All of those (which are the most effective and reliable widely used birth control methods) work by not only decreasing the chances of fertilization but by preventing uterine implantation if fertilization does occur. Since you insist on assigning full human personhood to a pre-blastocyst from the moment of fertilization onward, how would you justify supplying free birth control via methods that would inevitably sometimes kill such “persons”? Or would you ban the use of such birth control methods, as you advocate banning elective abortion? If so, how would you counteract the loss of available contraceptive effectiveness and the inevitable increase in unwanted pregnancies? Neat and tidy abstractions about arbitrary assignment of personhood to cells have real-world consequences if you apply them consistently. You can’t duck the consequences by just wistfully imagining some future millennium when all the problems will hypothetically have been solved. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-life-atheists-an-argument-to-oppose-abortion/800094.md?page=4)