Post by
IBCoupe »
https://forums.nicoclub.com/ibcoupe-u134097.html
Thu Sep 09, 2010 6:26 am
Abortion is an issue about competing rights. I'm sure most of you know that, but there are many who want to frame it as a matter of one right or the other, and the fact is that we can recognize both and still come to a conclusion: an individual has the right to not have their life extinguished by another person, and a person also has the right not to have the government inside their body.
I happen to come out on the left side of the issue in that I'm more eager to enforce limits on government's ability to restrict an individual's right than I am to punish individuals for limiting a probably-future-citizen's right. If abortion is murder and a sin, it will be punished in the proper jurisdiction.
Often we'll try to compare the two rights at stake: life or control of one's life. The former is often, by those opposed to abortion, given greater value than the latter, but I tend to see them as equal. Really, what's one without the other?
And so if we come to the conclusion that they are just about equally important, we have to then decide either who we like more, or whose power we like less. I honestly don't care - the mother and potential-child are worth the same to me (I really don't give a crap about either one of them), but individual and government power, on the other hand, have greatly differing values in my mind. I'm often suspicious of the application of the former, and I'm frequently scared of the application of the latter.
What bothers me is when people try to incorporate morality into the formula, to the extent that they want to say a certain behavior (besides the actual abortion) is bad. I'm talking about people calling for personal responsibility, for women to be more chaste, for people not to have sex unless they want a child, etc. In my mind, that's not something we ought to be considering when trying to craft a national policy.