Howdy y'all! From the great city of Austin in the not-so-great state of Texas, I send you greetings.
In light of recent events, including most recently the slut-shaming of a 14 year-old girl, I thought I would take a few moments to recap my own approach towards a theory of abortion and abortion rights. Curiously enough, I expressed these ideas on a Facebook thread yesterday and woke up this morning to what I hope was a facetious death threat from someone I discovered was a cop. Interesting times.
Follow me below the fold for the arguments. I'd love to know what y'all kossacks think. Thank you!
Abortion is a very sad thing, very sad controversial, very controversial. But its implications for ethics and ethical theory are both subtle and profound. I want to explore these implications. And as an aside, I do not profess to be an abortion "scholar." This exploration will be conducting using ordinary language and common knowledge. It's how I roll.
During a Facebook thread I was commenting on, a pro-lifer asked, "When are you recognized as a human being with rights?" I replied that SCOTUS answered that question in Roe v. Wade. It's at the point of viability, usually around 24 weeks nowadays. But his question demands a clearer answer. Here is my answer: The question isn't "is the fetus a human life?" or "when does human life begin?" Of course life begins at conception. Even more, life is a continuum passed from egg and sperm to zygote.
However, and this is the rub, it's NOT an individual. What is an individual? Well, amongst other things, it's the inalienable bond between person and rights, which is the origin of the word. But it's also an organism that possesses biological integrity, i.e. can live without imposing a mortal or morbid demand upon another individual. A viable fetus can live outside of the mother's body, so it's an individual. And laws attach to individuals because that's where the law meets our rights, as well as our responsibilities. But a non-viable fetus cannot. It must remain connected to the mother's body to live (until we start removing and artificially incubating fetuses, ala Brave New World). Thus, the non-viable fetus is a PART of a pre-existing individual with inalienable rights, aka "the woman."
This brings up the second consideration in this matter, which is that pregnancy is always an inherent risk to the life and health of every pregnant woman. That risk can be minimized but not eliminated. Because of this, a woman ALWAYS has the right to self-defense in the face of her pregnancy, that is, as long as she can be said to "own" or possess her own body. I have an analogy that I call "the dangerous guest." Imagine that you invite someone voluntarily to your home. During this visit, the guest begins misbehaving and even becomes threatening. Do you have the right to defend yourself from your guest? Can you kick them out of your home? I think the answer is a qualified yes. Now imagine that the "home" becomes a woman's body and the "guest" is the fetus. Isn't a body an even more intimate and precious form of property than a house? I think so.
Finally, insofar as people should be free from domination, coercion, manipulation or obstruction, no individual or state can ethically impose or deny any other individual's mortal, or life-and-death, choices. Those choices don't belong to them. They are sacrosanct to that individual. To do that is to commit the most profound forms of domination against another individual. One pro-lifer responded by saying he would never impose his values on another. However, is he comfortable with the state doing this for him? I haven't received an answer yet.
Often pro-lifers attack pro-choicers by saying, "I bet you oppose capital punishment." I actually saw this comment on the thread I was contributing to. I replied this way: What pro-lifers are trying to say is that supporting abortion choice and opposing capital punishment, as I do, is inconsistent, if not hypocritical, because you're advocating for both life and death at the same time, and even worse, advocating for the death of the innocent and the life of the guilty. However, looking at this matter ethically, one sees that they're actually quite consistent. Supporting choice and opposing state murder coincide in that one opposes the state TAKING a mortal life-and-death choice away from women, which is a form of mortal domination, and also opposes the state MAKING a mortal choice for a convict by taking their life, which is ALSO a form of domination. The so-called "pro-lifers" never consider that to have their way they have to impose state domination at least, if not a theocracy. They simply do not believe in liberty or freedom, especially if it's a woman's sexual liberty or freedom.
It is worth while to remember that women's sexual liberty and freedom only came into widespread existence with the pill and other modern, more reliable modes of contraception, as well as safe, effective, legal and available abortion. This is a really new social phenomenon and a LOT of people are really uncomfortable-to-riled up about it.
Interestingly enough, the pro-lifers, through their "termination with extreme prejudice" campaign against women's mortal liberty and freedom, end up being in the same category as murderers, rapists, child molesters, people who neglect or abuse the young, weak or elderly, those who commit involuntary euthanasia, torturers, tyrants and dictators, those who withhold food from the hungry, shelter from the homeless, healthcare from the sick and others who take it upon themselves to make or take life choices from others, by action or inaction, commission or omission. These are the worst forms of domination that anyone can impose upon another. And all that I need for my argument to go through is the principle that the individual is the value, the fact that our bodies are our most intimate form of property that no other may rightfully own or control, and the observation that domination of others in general, and the mortal domination of others in particular, is a very bad thing. Q.E.D.
In conclusion, I believe this is a satisfactory resolution to the abortion issue. Of course, I may be wrong. That's what makes me reasonable. But the refutation of these arguments leads to some serious difficulties for pro-lifers. That's part of the beauty of this approach. Further, this approach has the added advantage of connecting abortion to a larger set of mortal choices and their ethical corollaries, which can be explored. If it is not clear already, the framework for these ideas is non-coercive philosophy, or philosophy compatible with freedom.
So, I offer this as a contribution to the discussion we're having in my state and around the country and the world. I believe the pro-choice side (actually, we should call it "women's liberty") is ultimately the most ethical and the most free and it is my desire that we should prevail. In that spirit, I close this work. Best effort and luck to us all.