An Anti-abortion Argument Essay, Research Paper

Abortion in America is a controversial issue in which both

sides have valid arguments at face value. The pro-choice side has many

arguments to support it belief in keeping abortion legal. Many of these are

faulty, and argue points irrelevent to the issue as I will attempt to

illustrate, thereby eliminating the main pro-choice arguments.

The pro-life position has somewhat different ideas. The most

popular of these is: The unborn entity is fully human from the moment of

conception. Abortion results in the intentional death of the unborn entity.

Therefore, abortion can be defined the intentional killing of a human being.

This killing is in most cases unjustified, since the unborn human being has a

full right to life. If, however, there is a high probability that a woman’s

pregnancy will result in her death (such as tubal pregnancy, for example),

then abortion is justified. For it is a greater good that one human should

live (the mother) rather than two die (the mother and her child). Or, in

such cases the intent is not to kill the unborn but to save the life of the

mother. With the exception of such cases, abortion is an act in which an

innocent human being is intentionally killed; therefore, abortion should be

made illegal, as are all other such acts of killing.

One argument made by people in favor of abortion is an

appeal to pity. When one fallaciously argues by appealing to pity, one is

arguing that certain actions should be permitted or tolerated out of pity for

those performing them when in fact the basis for showing them pity is not a

legitimate basis for the action. For example, a woman who argues that she

should not receive a parking ticket because her child was crying and she took

her child to a candy store to cheer her up is appealing to pity. The

following abortion rights arguments are examples.

Anyone who goes to pro-choice demonstrations in the United

States will see on pro-choice buttons a drawing of a coat hanger. This is the

symbol of the pro-choice movement representing the many women who were harmed

or killed because they either performed illegal abortions on themselves

(i.e., the surgery was performed with a "coat hanger") or went to physicians.

That means, if abortion is made illegal, then women will once again be

harmed. This argument does sound true. Although the thought of finding a dead

young woman with a bloody coat hanger dangling between her legs is

unpleasant,and powerful, it does not make a good argument.

The reason this argument doesn’t work is because it is begging

the question. In fact, this lie hides behind a good percentage of the popular

arguments for the pro-choice position. One begs the question when one assumes

what one is trying to prove is correct.

The question-begging of the coat-hanger argument is very obvious: but only by

assuming that the unborn are not fully human does the argument work. If the

unborn are not fully human, then the pro-choicer has a legitimate concern,

just as one would have in overturning a law forbidding appendicitis

operations if countless people were needlessly dying of both appendicitis and

illegal operations. But if the unborn are fully human, this pro-choice

argument is the same as saying that because people die or are harmed while

killing other people, the state should make it safe for them to do so.

Even some pro-choicers, who argue for their position in other ways, admit

that the

coat hanger/back-alley argument is crap. Although statistics cant establish

a particular moral position, there has been arguments over both the actual

number of illegal abortions and the number of women who died as a result of

them before legalization. Prior to Roe vs Wade, pro-choicers used saying that

nearly a million women every year obtained illegal abortions performed with

rusty coat hangers in back-alleys that resulted in thousands of fatalities.

Given the seriousness of the issue at hand, these statements are more than

exaggerations, because several proven facts establish that the pro-choice

movement was lying.

Another argument by people in support of pro-choice say that

before abortion was legalized, rich pregnant women were able to travel to

other countries to get abortions. And this was unfair to the poor. This is

saying that Roe v. Wade has made the current situation fairer for poor women.

Therefore, if abortion is prohibited it will not prevent rich women from

having safe and legal abortions elsewhere.

This argument is false: it assumes that legal abortion is a moral good which

poor women will be denied if abortion is made illegal. But since the morality

of abortion is the point under question, the pro-choice supporter assumes

what he or she is trying to prove and therefore begs the question.

There are a number of examples to illustrate this point. For example, we

would consider it wrong if someone argued that the hiring of hit men to kill

one’s enemies should be legalized, since the poor do not have easy economic

access to such "professionals."

In the abortion debate the question of whether abortion entails the death of

a being who is fully human must be answered before the question of fairness

is even asked. That means, since equal opportunity to eliminate an innocent

human being is rarely a moral good, the question of whether it is fair that

rich people will have access to abortion if it becomes illegal must be

answered after the question of whether abortion in fact is not the killing of

an innocent human life is answered. This is like saying the benefits of the

wealthy are virtues simply because the poor are denied them. Sounds like bs

to me.

Although the abortion argument will probably go on forever,

eliminating faulty arguments will help people reach a reasonable decision on

the issue. When the pro-choice side argues such points as the ones above, it

tricks many people by playing on such things as peoples sympathy and

compassion wrongly. If each side was represented fairly, it is likely people

would become in favor of a ban on abortion when facts are the issue instead

of a false play to people’s emotion.