CreateDebate is a social debate community built around ideas, discussion and democracy.
If this is your first time checking out a debate, here are some quick tips to help get you started:
Arguments with the highest score are displayed first.
Argument replies (both in favor and in opposition) are displayed below the original argument.
To follow along, you may find it helpful to show and hide the replies displayed below each argument.
To vote for an argument, use these icons:
You have the power to cast exactly one vote (either up or down) for each argument.
Once you vote, the icon will become grayed out and the argument's score will change.
Yes, you can change your vote.
Debate scores, side scores and tag scores are automatically calculated by an algorithm that primarily takes argument scores into account.
All scores are updated in real-time.
To learn more about the CreateDebate scoring system, check out the FAQ.
When you are ready to voice your opinion, use the Add Argument button to create an argument.
If you would like to address an existing argument, use the Support and Dispute link within that argument to create a new reply.
Have you ever noticed how the ''Pro-choicers''have already been born? I wonder how they would have liked to have been flushed down into the sewers as embryos.
I have answered your question. I believe that life begins at conception. I think it is wrong to kill babies just because they have not reached a certain age.
No, you have not answered my question. I never asked when you believe that life begins, or if you believe that abortion is wrong. I asked you if sentience is important to you on this topic. Can you please just give me a yes or no answer?
It is not about age. You have spent years debating this topic and you still don't have the first idea. It is about the fact that the feotus cannot sense anything that goes on around it. It does not have a functioning brain. It is not conscious. It has no means of several without its mother. It is NOT about age.
Proaborts believe that you have to be a certain age to live.
This is nonsensical. Nobody is arguing about mandatory abortions for anyone. There is no abortion death squad rounding up pregnant women and forcing abortions on them.
Individuals who support legal abortion believe that the question is not as simple as life and death- rightly so- and that under certain circumstances the interests of the sentient mother supersede those of the non-sentient cluster of cells in her womb. Those circumstances vary from individual to individual, ranging from those who believe it is an acceptable form of birth control at any stage in a pregnancy, through to those who believe it is acceptable only to save the life of the mother.
Pro-life individuals, on the other hand, believe that the assumed interests of said non-sentient cluster of cells always supercede those of the sentient mother, regardless of circumstances.
Believing abortion is acceptable when the life of the mother is in jeopardy is NOT pro-life- it is pro-abortion under a very specific set of circumstances.
Prochoice is proabortion. Proaborts think it is acceptable to kill children. Abortion is ageist because proaborts think you have to be a certain to live. Fact: {rolifers can and often do make exceptions for the life of the mother or if the baby will die anyway True prolifers value all life, not just that of the child.
Proaborts think it is acceptable to kill children.
Fact: Neither a zygote, blastocyst, embryo, or fetus is a child.
As such, a pro-choice position says nothing regarding whether or not killing children is or is not acceptable.
Abortion is ageist because proaborts think you have to be a certain to live.
No. If this were the case, there would be backlash against expectant mothers who intend to carry their pregnancy to term, given that the fetus' in question may not be old enough to live.
Rather, they believe that the interests of the mother trump those of that non-sentient cluster of cells under certain circumstances (which again vary widely between those who are support legal abortion, ranging from those who support legal abortion as a legitimate form of birth control at any stage, to those who only support legal abortion as an emergency measure to save the life of the mother.
Further- as a developing fetus lacks sentience, self-awareness, etc, there is no individual to be subjected to discrimination.
Fact: [P]rolifers can and often do make exceptions for the life of the mother or if the baby will die anyway
Not a fact. Let me fix it for you: Some individuals support legal abortion only to save the life of the mother or if the fetus will die anyway. Some of these inappropriately refer to themselves as 'pro-life' (or anti-legal abortion) despite their support for legal abortion.
An individual who does this is not, in fact, pro-life- though they certainly could call themselves such, in a dishonest sense. To be pro-life is to be opposed to legal abortion; individuals who make such exceptions are not opposed to legal abortion, but rather support legal abortion under a very strict set of requirements. They are in the same spectrum as the most liberal of the pro-choice individuals, differing only in where they choose to draw the line. They are not a separate category.
I'm sure you'll call this a no true scotsman fallacy, but it isn't.
An individual who supports legal abortion, even if only to save the life of the mother, is still supporting legal abortion, and by necessity also supports the industry that creates the equipment used for abortions, the schools and clinics that train a physician to perform an abortion, etc.
This isn't a quality up for debate. Pro-life is, quite literally, the stance that abortion should not be legal. Making a single exception to this is essentially stating that abortion should be legal, even if it comes with strict requirements. The individual may well consider abortion morally wrong, but pro-life is not a moral stance- it is a political stance specifically regarding the legality of the procedure.
Prolifers value all life, not just that of the child
And evidently also not that of an individual who performs abortions, given clinic bombings. Lumping them in with the entire pro-life movement is exactly the same type of fallacious reasoning you use to lump all pro-choice individuals together, by the way.
Fact: The presence of genetic code is irrelevant as a point of consideration.
Fact: The skin and hair I shed, as well as clippings from my toe and fingernails share my genetic code. My urine and feces also contain cells sharing my genetic code.
Fact: An individual who is brain-dead after receiving a severe injury has the same genetic code that he or she had prior to said injury.
No... no you didn't. Not in this thread, at least. And I don't disagree that biological life begins at conception either- But I also don't believe that biological life is necessarily a relevant factor.
So am I not going to get an answer from you as to whether or not sentience is important on this topic? I am genuinely curious as to what your opinion is on the significance of sentience here.
I am going to repeat myself: I did not ask when you believe life begins. I know when you believe life begins. I am asking you if, in your opinion, sentience has any significance and importance within this topic. Do you know what sentience is?
I have answered your questtion, you just do not like my answer. You are like a nagging wife. I think sentiance is important, but that is not as important as when the genetic code is formed. This is the very last time I will answer your question.
I think sentiance is important, but that is not as important as when the genetic code is formed. This is the very last time I will answer your question.
That is the First time you mentioned sentience even once, or actually responded to what I asked. Each and every time I asked about sentience, you responded with when you believe life begins, which is not an answer.
Now if you believe that sentience is important, how important do you believe it is? In a previous conversation, you had said that because a brain dead individual is not sentient, you think it would be okay to pull the plug on him. Do you still believe that? (And no, I am not going off topic, I am asking this to try to establish an opinion of yours so I can ask you a follow up question)
When you kill someone, why is killing them wrong? What makes the act of murder so appalling and one of the worst crimes one can commit? The answer is simple.
When you kill someone, you aren't just denying them that point in their lives, you are denying them a future. You're taking their lives and consciously cutting it off immediately.
If you understand this, you will understand how abortion is morally wrong. You can hide behind the definition of life, or the difference between a zygote, fetus, and baby, but you can't hide behind the basic reason why murder is wrong, and how this applies to someone before and after birth.
An abortion should only occur when it's the life of the mother in question and when there are no alternatives. When such a situation happens, the child should be given every opportunity possible to survive the ordeal just as we do for the mother.
Here is an example of someone who survived an abortion attempt, was abandoned by her mother, and is here to tell the tale. Abortion is never good, folks, not even in response to a rape.
i think so too. but it is more than that. the woman should be able to choose whether she will spend the next 20 years and about 200,000 dollars raising children she may or may not even be responsible for conceiving. birth is an arbitrary milestone. the real matter is sentience (ignoring the potential to be human) and aborting the fetus is better than killing the child. in addition to this the fetus is dependant on the mother and (ignoring the potential to be human) the fetus is little more than a parasite. then there is the scenario where the child is abandoned by the parents. there aren't enough families to take up kids, otherwise, there would be far fewer abortions.
If a woman does not want a baby, she needs to use contraception. Abortion kills a living child. The child is not part of the mother's body. What about the child's right to choose?
i agree with that, the least messy way is to avoid it entirely; contraception. however you are forgetting cases of rape or even just mistakes.
and yes, the child is not a part of the mother's body, but it is dependent on the mother's body. as i said before this is exactly like a parasite, and all the parasite has going for it is that it has the potential to be human, which is still enough for moral coverage, but also is the next 20 years and huge funds going into raising an often unwanted child.
child's right to choose? the child is not sentient, choice is not really the issue.
I don't think banning something helps express why the thing is being banned. I think education add to why abortions are wrong and how to avoid situations that end in abortions helps explain the why.
If abortions are banned many people would still have them it would just occur on some backstreet meaning they would not be safe. It is better people are just allowed to have them safely.
Pro-lifers consider abortion to be murder. To them, you're basically saying that ''It's dangerous for murdererrs to kill their victims. We should make it safer for the murderer.''
So what if abortions wouldn't be safe? There is nothing bad about making murder harder and more dangerous for the perpetrator.
So you're saying that women who have abortions deserve to be at risk of dying? The life of an actual, breathing, mature human being is more important than the so called life of an embryo.
Abortion is no more murder than killing a plant. The embryo/fetus is insentient. Regular EEG does not occur until around week 25. You cannot murder something that is plantlike in terms of sentience.
And this is where pro-lifers fundamentally disagree with pro-choicers. You consider the fetus to have no rights, because it is not sentient etc, whereas prolifers think sentience is irrelevant to whether human beings have rights. So, the main crux of the issue is whether the fetus has rights or not.
Your original argument won't convince any pro-lifer, because the argument sees the issue purely from a pro-choice perspective and is based on pro-choice assumptions that pro-lifers simply do not agree with. It's these assumptions (that the fetus is not morally equivalent to born human beings) that you'll have to argue for.
Well, for one thing, these studies examine third world countries, which for obvious reasons cannot be compared to western countries. Mostly because of low enforcement of law, lack of resources and shabby reporting.
Secondly, both cited studies primarily deal with unsafe abortions. What they're saying is that illegalizing abortions causes the number of unsafe abortions to go up, but the net amount of abortions still goes down.
Well, for one thing, these studies examine third world countries, which for obvious reasons cannot be compared to western countries. Mostly because of low enforcement of law, lack of resources and shabby reporting.
Or, in other words, the abortion rate has completely dependent on the population and had nothing to do with the law, again you make the pro choice argument and claim it is the pro life argument.
Secondly, both cited studies primarily deal with unsafe abortions. What they're saying is that illegalizing abortions causes the number of unsafe abortions to go up, but the net amount of abortions still goes down.
I clicked on the Africa stats which said the abortion number was unchanged and the Columbia one that said it went up, so I don't know what you are talking about.
- The capability to actually enforce the law in a consistent and effective way;
- Poverty level;
- The education and mobility of the population;
- Quality of the abortion services (if there are any);
- Expenses
- Size of the population
I clicked on the Africa stats which said the abortion number was unchanged and the Columbia one that said it went up, so I don't know what you are talking about.
Can you find that part for me?
And Columbia's abortion rate went up after banning it? How the hell does that make sense?
Oh, cool, a list that doesn't involve the law. You sound pro choice.
And Columbia's abortion rate went up after banning it? How the hell does that make sense?
People engage in unsafe sex because they aren't taught about the consequences. Abortion only occurs in pregnant women. If you try to prevent pregnant women you can prevent abortion. If on the other hand you ignore the factors that lead to pregnancy and ban something that only happens after an event you didn't try to stop, it won't matter what the law says.
Oh, cool, a list that doesn't involve the law. You sound pro choice.
Did you miss the part about the capability to enforce laws? Obviously, if a country can't enforce it's own penal code, then people won't be mind breaking those laws given there is no threat of retribution.
People engage in unsafe sex because they aren't taught about the consequences. Abortion only occurs in pregnant women. If you try to prevent pregnant women you can prevent abortion. If on the other hand you ignore the factors that lead to pregnancy and ban something that only happens after an event you didn't try to stop, it won't matter what the law says.
Whether abortion is legal or not has absolutely no bearing on the pregnancy rate or the quality of sex education. Making abortions illegal won't make people get pregnant more, making it illegal also won't necessarily decrease the quality of sex education.
Also, can you link me that part in the African paper that said that the net abortion rate hasn't changed and isn't contingent on laws.
Whether abortion is legal or not has absolutely no bearing on the pregnancy rate or the quality of sex education. Making abortions illegal won't make people get pregnant more, making it illegal also won't necessarily decrease the quality of sex education.
Another pro choice argument used to defend your pro life stance. A law doesn't affect the pregnancy rate thus it doesn't help lower abortion rate. Advocating for a law to be passed is a waste of time.
Also, can you link me that part in the African paper that said that the net abortion rate hasn't changed and isn't contingent on laws.
You've given me the paper, but you haven't given me the specific part of the paper that says that. I read it and didn't find it so I was hoping you could tell me on what page that information is?
You are claiming that laws don't work to stop other crimes as a reason to have a law against abortion. I tell you that the law won't stop abortions and you disagree because rape laws and murder laws don't stop rape and murder. It is really odd.
I dislike the division of this debate into "prolife" and "prochoice" because neither describes my perspective. I am an advocate of legalized abortions consequent to a utilitarian consideration of the inefficacy of abortion prohibition laws. I think the important question is not choice or life, but the minimization of unwanted pregnancies. When we debate abortion we are entertaining the issue far too late in the game, which is why abortion prohibition is largely ineffectual and just pushes most women off the medical grid for their abortions.
The most effective way to reduce abortions is not to ban them, but to prevent them from occurring in the first place. This means addressing more difficult issues such as poverty, education, access to family planning resources, human trafficking, etc. Too many people have become distracted by the successful bipartisan campaign to distract voters from the deeper issues in our society by pitting them against each other on a highly polarizing and inevitably dead-locked issue. Way to go sheeple, way to go.
It's same it's pro-choice a woman has the right to choose whether or not to go for it;sometimes on the doc's consult she goes for it being fully aware of the risks involved in not going for abortion
Stop arguing about this! It's none of anybody's business what a woman chooses to do, it is 100% their choice what they decide and you need to respect it.
I think even if you don't think abortions should happen, you should be pro-choice, for the simple far that it is impossible to get rid of abortions completely. Pro-choice simply means the option should be available, which means the options will (hopefully) be safely available.
If you make abortions illegal, women will still get abortions. They will simply get them in more dangerous circumstances, endangering more lives than if abortions were legal.
You fundamentally do not understand the pro-life position. If you did, you would not make such an argument.
For pro-lifers, the unborn is a human being with the right to life. To them, abortion constitutes murder. What you're essentially saying is that ''Well, people (mothers) are going to murder others (unborn) anyway. So, we might as well make sure that at least the murderer doesn't get hurt.''
There is nothing wrong about making murder more difficult and dangerous for the perpetrator. In fact, it is a very good deterrent.
So, why are you on the side that says murder laws do deter murderers? Plus, you were claiming that the risks involved with unsafe abortions are a deterrent, not the law itself. Isn't it bad that you don't understand your own argument?
Well, with abortion being legal not everyone gets abortions, so the main goal of the pro life movement is to make sure that there is a deterrent in place that will work to make most people not have abortions. Congratulations, you have already won.
Because murder laws do deter people, but clearly they do not deter everyone since murderers still exist.
Do they really deter people, though? It's hard to imagine that someone who is in a place where he or she fully intends to end the life of another person would pause for a moment and think "Wait, I could go to jail and/or get the death penalty for this if I'm found out," changing his or her mind altogether based on that.
Remember that self-defense is a thing and that a significant portion of the American population is armed. If the potential for being shot and killed by the would-be victim isn't a sufficient deterrent, it's hard to imagine that the threat of the same (or less, in jurisdictions without the death penalty[1]) by the government would be. Particularly considering that, unlike the self-defending victim, the government has to conduct an often lengthy investigation, (a significant portion of which never successfully identify the murderer!) then convict you in court, (where getting off on a technicality is a possibility, given the frequency of misconduct by the police) before finally assigning a sentence that may not even be a huge deal at all (Virginia's minimum sentence for Murder 2 is only 5 years).
[1]-to be fair, some would consider decades to life in prison to be a worse fate than death.
So a guy is robbing someone's house and gets caught. The robber now goes through a quick cost/benefit analysis - if I kill the homeowner (get rid of the witness), it won't worsen my legal situation in any way and actually increases my chances of getting away with robbery. Since robbery nets me a nasty punishment (8-15 years in my country), I now have an incentive to kill the homeowner in order to increase my chances of avoiding justice.
However, if there are murder laws, the robber knows that if he kills the homeowner, his legal situation worsens dramatically. What's worse? 12 years of prison or life imprisonment? Should I gamble and murder the homeowner and hope I get away with? Maybe I should just run away? Thus the robber could, ideally choose the optimal solution, which is to run away.
Murder is one of the few things that is illegal pretty much everywhere. If the robber was in an area with no laws against murder, it's not likely that there are laws against robbery either, which more or less invalidates the 'chance of avoiding justice' scenario. Unless you're aware of such a location?
I gave you a scenario, where laws can deter people from committing certain actions. As I understand, you don't disagree with the argument, but you don't like the scenario.
Locations like those are ripe in history, especially where people were divided into classes. If an aristocrat murdered or beat a slave or some lowly peasant, nobody bat an eyelid. It was okay. And such cases were not uncommon at the time at all. In many countries, especially third world countries, it's still the case.
You seem to imply that laws in no way affect our behaviour. Are you trying to say that if there were no laws, nothing would change in human behavior?
I gave you a scenario, where laws can deter people from committing certain actions. As I understand, you don't disagree with the argument, but you don't like the scenario.
You asserted that the law is an effective deterrent to murder. An actual, in-practice, real deterrent. When I called that into question, rather than provide a real-world example demonstrating such, you instead concoted an extremely unlikely hypothetical scenario that lent some credit to the idea that the law could potentially be an effective deterrent to murder under a given circumstance that would largely be limited to said hypothetical scenario.
This does nothing to actually back your assertion that the law is, in fact, an effective deterrent to murder. A hypothetical scenario can be constructed to any end, and the argument was never whether the law could potentially deter murders under the right circumstances, but rather whether the law does, in fact, deter murders.
Locations like those are ripe in history, especially where people were divided into classes.
No, they really aren't. If there is a law against burglary, there is a law against murder.
If an aristocrat murdered or beat a slave or some lowly peasant, nobody bat an eyelid. It was okay. And such cases were not uncommon at the time at all. In many countries, especially third world countries, it's still the case.
If that aristocrat instead robbed the slave or peasant of his or her property, nobody would bat an eyelid either. These are not example cases where burglary is illegal, but murder is not.
Can you provide a single location where the same criminal would face a legal penalty for burglarizing a victim, but would not face a legal penalty for murdering the same victim?
You seem to imply that laws in no way affect our behaviour. Are you trying to say that if there were no laws, nothing would change in human behavior?
I imply nothing of the sort. My objection is specifically to the idea that laws against murder, in practice, actually deter potential murderers, who would otherwise remain undettered by all of the other factors. You have yet to provide any actual backing to that claim.
Because murder laws do deter people, but clearly they do not deter everyone since murderers still exist.
Based on what? Those who murder are not doing so in consideration of the laws, and those who don't murder are not walking around thinking to themselves "You know I'd love to go kill people but those darn laws are stopping me!".
One of the functions of criminal law is to make sure that crime is unprofitable - that the potential costs far outweigh the potential benefits. So, for the deterrent to work, the laws must be enforceable and there must be a very good chance that the perpetrator will be caught and punished - and the perp knows that. Murder laws are just one example - you can take any penal provision.
While criminological theory can be weighed and criticized, it is obvious that criminals do at least some elementary level cost/benefit analysis. A mugger probably won't restrain himself and is willing to inflict far higher degrees of violence if he knows that it won't make his legal situation any worse. Or take rape for example and assume that there were no murder laws - the rapist can then reason that there really is no downside to killing off the victim. It won't make his situation any worse and actually increases the chances of him getting away with it - in this case, murdering someone only benefits the rapist.
Are you implying that penal laws do not deter anyone? That if we got rid of them overnight, nothing would change?
The embryo/fetus is a parasite. If something is inside your body, attached to it and feeding off it then you have a right to remove it. It is your body after all.
Thank you for your support. I believe that life begins when the fetus has brainwaves. Scientifically, brainwaves are how you tell if someone is alive. Brainwaves stop when someone dies.
Does a woman have the right to an abortion under the U.S. Constitution? If someone is a strict constructionist who interprets the Constitution word for word, the sanction for abortion is given under the Fourteenth Amendment.
The Fourteenth Amendment of our U.S. Constitution defines a citizen “a citizen” at birth. If a woman is carrying a fetus in the womb, the U.S. Constitution does not designate the fetus as “a citizen.” It would take an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to declare a fetus a citizen. You have to be born in order to be recognized as a citizen. Therefore, a woman does have the right to choose. A fetus inside the womb is not designated as a citizen according to the U.S. Constitution so by default is not entitled to life, liberty, or prosperity. You have to be born in order to be endowed with those privileges. To conclude, neither the Federal government nor any of the States can deny a woman the right to choose.
If abortion is murder, abortion would have been terminated years ago due to the cruel and unusual punishment clause under the Eighth Amendment. Again, proof that a fetus is not recognized as a citizen of the United States of America.