There are many different social issues being debated by our society today, one of the most controversial being the issue of abortion. There are many people who are passionately involved with this issue, both those who are pro-life and those who are pro-choice. I believe that abortion is the taking of a human life, and thus is wrong. For this reason, I believe that our Federal government should make abortion illegal.
Before I explain why I believe abortion should be made illegal, I want you to understand why I believe it is wrong. The disagreements between pro-life and pro-choice advocates can be boiled down to just one question, is an unborn child alive? If a pro-choice advocate believed that an unborn child is alive, then they wouldn’t agree with abortion. I believe that an unborn child is fully human, fully a person, and fully alive from the moment of conception. Dr. Maureen Condic, an Associate Professor of Neurobiology and Anatomy at the University of Utah, says that embryos are living human beings "precisely because they possess the single defining feature of human life that is lost in the moment of death - the ability to function as a coordinated organism rather than merely as a group of living cells." She goes on to say that “Embryos are not merely collections of human cells, but living creatures with all the properties that define any organism as distinct from a group of cells; embryos are capable of growing, maturing, maintaining a physiologic balance between various organ systems, adapting to changing circumstances, and repairing injury. Mere groups of human cells do nothing like this under any circumstances.” (1) Clearly, from a scientific point of view, an unborn human is alive right from the moment of conception, so abortion, the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy (2), kills a human being. This is why I believe abortion is wrong.
Now that I have established why abortion is wrong it is easy to understand that I believe it should be illegal because it takes a human life. The Federal government does not make things like drunk driving legal, which sometimes kill a human, so how can it make abortion legal which always kills a human? Similarly, I believe the Federal government needs to be the one who makes abortion illegal, not the individual states. Individual states were not allowed to determine whether or not slavery should be legal within their borders because slavery is always wrong, no matter the circumstance. Abortion is just as wrong in Texas as it is in New York and every other state, so it makes sense to that the Federal government should be the one to make it illegal.
One issue that pro-choice advocates bring up when pro-lifers say that abortion should be illegal is, what should happen to the mother? Should she be treated as a murderer and sent to prison? I don’t believe a woman who has an illegal abortion should be treated as a criminal. Many women who are considering an abortion feel it is their only choice and can’t see the other options that are available. They do not have an abortion because they want to kill their baby, they have an abortion to fix what they consider a problem that has no other solution. For this reason, I believe that instead of being treated with hate, a woman who has an illegal abortion should be treated with compassion and love. Sending her to prison will not fix anything. I think a woman who has an illegal abortion should be given counseling and help with whatever made her decide an abortion was her only option. After all, just as the mother is not more important then the unborn baby, the unborn baby is not more important then the mother and so the mother should not be forgotten.
The issue of abortion has been debated for many years, and no doubt will continue to be debated for many more. But I believe that eventually, because of the scientific evidence, abortion will be seen for what it really is, the taking of a human life and our Federal government will take action to make it illegal.
(1) http://www.caseforlife.com/evidence.asp
(2) New Oxford American Dictionary
I completely agree with the view point taken concerning abortion in Kelsey's blog, The Case for Life. The case she argues has a very unique perspective and brings about many thoughtful points.
ReplyDeleteWhile time is taken to briefly consider the opposing side's point of view, more time is spent on developing an argument of her own, even using evidence to back up her beliefs. I thoroughly enjoyed how Kelsey develops her argument from start to finish, leaving no room for doubt or misunderstanding.
Most of all, I believe that it represents a side of pro-life arguments that the media does not portray - not all people who are pro-life are woman-haters and violent protestors. Rather, there are many of us who just have the honest conviction that embryos are humans and killing them at any stage is murder. Furthermore, we by no means hate the women who decide to take this route or think any less of them - we just think abortion is wrong. As Kelsey states, "They do not have an abortion because they want to kill their baby, they have an abortion to fix what they consider a problem that has no other solution."
I find it encouraging to see an argument that is not only pro-life, but is also written by a person wise enough to have compassion towards those who have abortions, not just wanting to lock them all up, but rather, get them whatever help they may need.