Ann Furedi's Consistent Views [Clinton Wilcox]

Ann Furedi is a British abortion-choice advocate who is the chief executive of British Pregnancy Advisory Service. I only recently became aware of Furedi’s existence when I helped Gregg Cunningham prepare for a debate with her a few years ago. As far as the abortion debate is concerned, I don’t think she’s really contributed anything to the ongoing discussion by academics. And her arguments seem to be mainly those I encounter from abortion-choice advocates on the street level.

A website called Metro reported on Furedi’s appearance on a talk show colorfully titled Loose Women, which after a quick Google search seems to be the British equivalent of The View. However, if you have spent much time engaging with abortion-choice people, then Furedi’s comments wouldn’t seem newsworthy at all.

The title of the article says that Furedi believes abortion should be treated as contraception, but that’s not technically accurate. Furedi did not say that a couple should forgo using things like condoms and the pill and just get abortions. What she did say is that abortion should be there as a backup in case the contraception fails. A subtle, but important, difference. And when asked her thoughts on sex-selective abortions, Furedi said that while she may disagree with the woman’s reason, it should be up to the woman to decide.

Furedi’s comments aren’t anything new or novel, but perhaps the women on this talk show aren’t used to having this discussion. I don’t know where the ladies who host this show fall on the question of abortion, but many abortion-choice advocates draw the line at using abortion as birth control. So Furedi’s position that abortion should be available as a backup if their birth control fails is understandably distressing to them. Many abortion-choice advocates also draw the line at sex-selection abortion, so Furedi’s unwillingness to condemn even those abortions would understandably seem extreme. The reality is, however, that if Furedi’s support of abortion is grounded in a woman’s right to control her own body, then Furedi is being consistent in her views. If a woman has a right to an abortion on the grounds that she should not be forced to remain plugged in as “life support” for the unborn child, then no matter what her reason is for having an abortion, while we might consider it downright indecent, it’s her right and we have no right to condemn her for that. That’s where bodily rights lead, and if you’re troubled by that, perhaps you should think twice about whether or not bodily rights actually do justify abortion.

Why Don't Feminists Fight for Bodily Rights?

I will have to admit, I have begun to reconsider what it means to respect the bodily integrity of individual women. During a  recent outreach at UCLA and Cerritos college, two students told me that I should respect the autonomy that women have over their bodies.

Now, setting aside that the unborn entity in question is not a part of her mother's physical body (if she was, then any pregnant woman would have four hands, two heads, and two genetic codes, which is absurd) but is a separate body that is growing inside her, and dependent upon her. This does not mean that they are one and the same human being, but two humans beings connected in the most intimate way possible.

Now, many I have talked to have espoused the view that because the woman is carrying the child within her body, and because the child is completely dependent on her mother's body for her immediate needs, her mother therefore has say over what happens within her body. Complete bodily autonomy for women is inalienable on this view. This is what pro-life speaker Trent Horn calls the "Sovereign Zone" view.

Now, if I were to embrace this view, and thus defend a woman's right to her bodily "sovereign zone", then that means that the following must also be fought for and legalized along with abortion:

1. Thalidomide A drug that was originally used as an anti-nausea treatment for women experiencing morning sickness, it was banned in the early 1960s for the effect that it had on developing children in utero. The drug would cause either the limbs of the child to fail to develop or the limbs would fail to grow to their full length, leaving only a hand where a full arm should be. (Langman's Medical Embryology, Thirteenth Edition, page xiii)

Keeping in mind the view that a woman has full rights to what happens within her body, even if there is another human body present inside of her, to be consistent one would have to argue that the drug should be legalized as an appropriate treatment for morning sickness. This would mean that if a woman took the drug knowing full well the effects it could have on her unborn child, and caused her child to be born without arms or legs, she would bear no fault. Some have responded that this couldn't happen because she broke the law; and yet, abortion also used to be against the law. Why aren't advocates of bodily autonomy fighting for a woman to have complete control over her body in this regard, and working to overturn this law?

2. Abortions for Frivolous Reasons If a woman "Has the right to do whatever she wants with her body", then would it be wrong to kill her unborn child for any reason she wants to? In his book Abortion Practice, abortionist Dr. Warren Hern recounts a time where a woman came to his office seeking an abortion, as she was pregnant with a boy and wanted a girl child instead. Doctor Hern, ironically, expresses his misgivings about abortion in this case but he goes along with it anyway (Abortion Practice, page 85).

Dennis Prager also brings up an important point in this regard. Suppose in the near future we are able to determine through genetic testing the sexual orientation that a child will be born with. A woman finds out her son or daughter will grow up to be gay later in life. Using the "my body; my choice" reasoning, she gets an abortion so she won't be a parent to a gay son or daughter. Horrifying as this is, would we think she did something wrong in this regard? If we do think that this is wrong, then what about abortions for children who will be born with disabilities? Wouldn't that be wrong as well?

3. Abortions For Profit Two years ago the infamous Planned Parenthood videos were released by the Center for Medical Progress, which purported to show the organization illegally selling the bodily remains of aborted humans for profit. While many media pundits, political analysts, and Planned Parenthood themselves denied the accusation, it does raise an important question: Can a woman sell the bodily remains of her abortion for profit? Suppose a woman of child-bearing age, hearing that there is a market for fetal body parts and tissues, decides to become pregnant, then carries her child to term, and gets an abortion so that she may sell the body parts on the market. This may not even be legal, but why won't the advocates of bodily rights advocate for this kind of behavior, in the name of "Her body, her choice"? Why don't they fight to have this "right", and enshrine it in law?

4. Infant Starvation Philosopher Trent Horn also gives another category for bodily rights arguments that he calls the "right to refuse", where the advocate of bodily autonomy will argue that a woman has a right to refuse to sustain the life of her child in utero. During a conversation at UCLA recently, a student I talked to likened unwanted pregnancy to being forced to donate one's kidney in order to sustain another person's life.

However, in using this scenario, one has to remember that a kidney is only designed to filter the blood of the organism it belongs to. As Trent Horn notes, the uterus is an organ that is not designed to support the life of a woman, as a woman may go through her entire life without ever becoming pregnant, but is specifically designed to support the life of her very young son or daughter.

In applying this reasoning to the issue of bodily rights, suppose a woman gives birth to an infant who needs to survive on her mother's breast milk. Suppose further that baby formula is not readily available due to a health and safety recall, and it will take too long to put the child in a shelter or up for adoption. Since the mother is now the sole provider of the welfare for her child, even though this relationship is only temporary, can she exercise her "right to refuse support" for her child on the grounds that her child has no right to her mother's breast milk, even though her child will starve to death as a result? Is it a mother's moral and legal right to be able to "disconnect" for the sole purpose of starving her child to death? I think we would all agree that doing such a thing is monstrous.

In conclusion, it seems that an unwavering support for bodily rights for women can actually prove too much and be used to justify some very horrifying behaviors. Now, some will argue for bodily rights by giving reference to scenarios that are emotionally vexing, like poverty or hardship, but at best, this would entail that the right to abortion is extremely limited to the most extreme circumstances. And then one must ask why, even in these circumstances, is it fully permissible and morally acceptable to kill an innocent human being whose existence may cause hardship?

It is high time we stop playing games with human rights in order to justify the behavior that we want to ensure is accepted by society. We've been down that road before throughout human history, and it has never ended well. Instead, if we are going to defend bodily rights, no matter what that entails, we had better be ready to accept the consequences of that decision.

Is Bodily Autonomy Unlimited?

I would like to continue the discussion regarding the arguments from "Bodily Autonomy" by discussing another issue that needs to be addressed: If bodily autonomy is absolute, then we cannot limit it.

During his debate on the UK radio show Unbelievable, LTI president Scott Klusendorf brought the following point up in response to the argument posed to him by abortion-choice activist Mara Clarke: She phrased her objection to the pro-life view by highlighting the rights that women have in regards to their own bodily autonomy. Scott responded by pointing out that if bodily autonomy is absolute, then it cannot be limited, even when it becomes clear that allowing a woman to do so will result in harm. Scott highlighted the dangers in taking thalidomide and the severe birth defects that have resulted from pregnant mothers taking the drug to alleviate their morning sickness. Given that we think the laws restricting the use of thalidomide are perfectly just, then it must be that even the "right" to do what one wants with their body isn't unlimited.

In his video on the subject of abortion, conservative thinker Dennis Prager asks several questions that further illustrate the problems associated with an "anything goes" mentality regarding bodily autonomy.

One problem that Dennis points out is that this view means that there would be no abortion that could be considered immoral. To cite one example: would it be wrong for a mother to have an abortion if she was carrying a girl and she wanted a boy? In his book Abortion Practice, Dr. Warren Hern, one of the leading abortionists in the United States, cites an example of when a patient came to him seeking an abortion because she was pregnant with a boy instead of a girl. Even Dr. Hern, who provides second and third trimester abortions, expressed concern at the idea of abortion solely because the child is the wrong sex. He writes, "Even though I had begun by being totally opposed to abortion for this reason, she persuaded me that, in her mind, abortion was the only choice she would accept for this pregnancy for her own mental health as well as for the welfare of her family." (Hern, p. 85). Many of the people I have spoken to at pro-life outreaches on campus have felt troubled by this idea and have shown strong resentment to the idea of allowing abortion for something as trivial as what sex the child should be.

One other example that Dennis gives is a hypothetical genetic test that can determine whether a child will be born either straight or gay. Dennis asks an important question: If abortion is solely the choice of the mother (or both parents), then would abortion of a child of an undesired sexuality be wrong? At what stage of life will it suddenly become wrong to terminate the life of that child because he may possess a characteristic his parents don't want him to have? Does it really make sense to allow the bodily rights of one person to supersede the right to live of another? It seems that issues of bodily autonomy aren't entirely relevant, then, to the issue of abortion, as many would agree that there would be times when abortion should not be tolerated.

Another Look At the Violinist

Recently, a common objection that I have been hearing from street-level advocates of abortion-choice is the bodily autonomy argument. While doing outreach and discussing the topic of abortion with students on the college campus, this idea would be brought up quite often. The argument has been used and popularized since Judith J. Thomson made it in her 1971 article "The Violinist". Some pro-life authors have given very detailed responses to the argument. Two of my favorites have been Francis Beckwith's Defending Life and Chris Kaczor's The Ethics of Abortion. For this post, I will briefly give a few thoughts that I have about the argument itself, and it's limits.

To summarize the argument, it goes something like this: You wake up one morning to find yourself attached to a famous, unconscious violinist, who has a kidney ailment. The society of music lovers has placed him there, saying that he will need to use your kidneys for the next nine months, until he has recovered from his kidney ailment enough to function independent of you. Thomson then asks, given the situation, are you obligated to remain attached to him? It would be very nice of you to do so, but should you? She goes on to argue that it is not morally wrong to detach yourself, thereby killing the violinist, since he has no "right" to your body unless you consent to give it to him.

The argument has a lot of force, and has been critiqued by numerous authors, both pro-life and pro-choice. The more common street level objection goes something along the lines of "I have a right to do whatever I want with my body. Even though the unborn entity can be a full human person, I am the one who must ultimately decide."

Bodily autonomy has been, for a long time, a major driving force among the pro-choice movement, and I think it will continue to become that, as the science of embryology continues to affirm the existence of human beings from the point of conception.

A couple of questions do come to mind when it comes to bodily autonomy arguments for abortion:

1. To what extent is bodily autonomy unable to be restricted? Of course, women(and men) have very broad choices as to what they are able to do to their physical bodies, but even these choices seem to be limited when it comes to the rights of other human beings that may be infringed upon. Men don't have a right to sexually or physically harass women. No one has a right to driving under the influence, or to indecent exposure. Bodily autonomy is limited by the rights of other human beings, rights that spring from having a human nature(such as the right to not be unjustly killed). The only question then regarding abortion is whether there is a human being present in utero.

2. Would any abortions be immoral?
I have written a prior post on this topic, asking whether there would be times where a woman got an abortion for the sole purpose of selling the body parts of her unborn child for profit. What if another woman participated in a study where she was impregnated, carried the child to a later term, and then had an abortion so that doctors could learn how to develop safer procedures? Do we think that would be wrong? Many pro-choicers argue from hard cases, where abortion is considered to be a last resort. But why does that even need to be brought up? If bodily autonomy is virtually unlimited, why does it need to be just seen as a last resort? It must be because abortion really does intentionally kill an innocent human being, and doing so is close to impossible to justify.

To illustrate this, let's take another look at the violinist argument: Consider a woman who has a 20 year old son who happens to be a well-known violinist protégé(nicknamed "Young Stradivarius"). He becomes ill with a kidney infection, and his mother decides to donate the use of her kidneys until he makes a recovery(which will be in about nine months). Three months into the treatment, she finds out that her son has written a will in which he leaves all of his material wealth to his mother should he pass away. The mother, since she has given up the use of her body for a period of time, loses her job due to being unable to work, and is therefore being placed in a tougher financial situation. His mother, knowing that unhooking herself will kill him, now considers: Given that her "Bodily Autonomy" is absolute, she should be fully justified in unplugging, so she can get her son's money. If a person can choose to kill someone simply for being connected to them, but not wanting to be giving support, why couldn't we allow someone to use this justification for extremely frivolous reasons? But if it would be wrong to intentionally kill an innocent human being for reasons that don't justify doing so, then the majority of arguments for elective abortions collapse.

The Bodily Autonomy argument seems, at it's core, an argument based solely in selfishness. The idea that a person may make the choice as to whether their own son or daughter dies, and has the full "right" to do so if they feel inclined, is one that needs to be deeply reconsidered.

Given that this is becoming a common argument at the street level, I think pro-life advocates would do well to deepen their understanding of it, and the broad implications it has.

How the “Planned Parenthood Baby Part Scandal” affects Bodily-Autonomy arguments for abortion [Nathan Apodaca]

Recently, the abortion debate in America has taken a new turn, as it has begun focusing on the methods of abortion that are used to terminate the pregnancy. The undercover videos released in 2015 by the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) purported to show that employees of Planned Parenthood were engaging in the sale of body parts of human fetuses that had been dismembered through abortion procedures. The unveiling of these videos and findings drastically shaped the abortion debate, and has, in my opinion, done more to put the pro-choice movement on the defensive regarding abortion procedures and “rights”.

Given this development in the debate over abortion, I think the pro-life movement has been given a new opportunity to respond to an argument given in defense of abortion that is beginning to gain more popularity in lay-level discussions, the argument from bodily autonomy, or bodily rights.

To summarize the argument, defenders of abortion rights, such as David Boonin and Judith Thomson, argue that just as a woman would have no moral obligation to remain plugged into a human being for a period of time to whom she bears no moral responsibility, she would also not be obligated to carry an unborn human “person” to full term. The argument has been gaining popularity through many lay-level discussions in recent years.

The problem with the argument is that it proves too much about bodily autonomy in relation to pregnancy. The recent debate over the Planned Parenthood videos can help pro-lifers make this case. Even if the videos were “faked” or “deceptively edited”, they do bring up an important question: Is “my body, my choice” really applicable to the abortion of a human being?

Suppose, based on the idea that fetal body parts can generate a pretty good profit, a woman becomes pregnant for the sole purpose of having an abortion. Using the slogan “my body, my choice”, she obtains an abortion and sells the fetal remains to the highest bidder. Would that be an acceptable action? Suppose it goes a step further, and a market is created for body parts of unborn human beings. Using the “my body, my choice” euphemism, human fetuses are conceived to be dismembered, have their organs and tissues divided up and sold to the highest bidders.

Many advocates of abortion choice would say that this is unacceptable. But why? If it's justifiable to eliminate a human being who is attached to another human, why not “connect” human beings so that they can be justifiably killed, and have the aftermath used for whatever purpose the woman desires? Given that a person can willingly donate a body part, such as a kidney, to those in need of an organ, then what would be wrong with allowing women to conceive human fetuses for the sole purpose of killing them and then harvesting their organs or tissues to treat other illnesses?

This is an absurd position to hold. In fact, since the videos were revealed almost two years ago, many pro-choice defenders have shied away from defending all elective abortions. I think the videos shed further light on the problems with the bodily rights argument, as that approach would mean that the only thing wrong with the sale of fetal body parts scandal would be that the woman wasn't notified about the use of the aborted remains, and thus missed out on potential profit. Incidentally, I had a conversation recently where someone said that the most horrifying aspect of the entire scandal was the idea that abortionists made a profit of the sale of body parts, as opposed to the methods used to obtain the body parts in the first place. This is ridiculous.

On Bodily Rights and Personhood [Clinton Wilcox]

In my recent debate with Matt Dillahunty, he made a claim that bodily rights arguments "include" arguments from personhood. This apparently means, to him, that he doesn't have to make a case against unborn personhood, it just means that whether or not the unborn are persons because of bodily rights abortion is permissible because no one has the right to use your body against your will. I believe this to be mistaken, and I will explain why bodily rights arguments don't "include" arguments from personhood; in fact, bodily rights arguments assume unborn personhood. This will be my last article written about my recent debate, but I feel that this is an important point to make. The debate is already over, so I'm not trying to score additional points with my articles. Debates are won or lost based on what is argued in the debate. I am here just explaining this topic in greater detail.

The reason that bodily rights arguments don't "include" personhood arguments is simple: if I make a case that the unborn are persons, then arguing bodily rights does not address personhood arguments. Bodily rights is not a defeater to the personhood argument; it doesn't even address it. If I make a case for unborn personhood, and you argue bodily rights, you've completely avoided the argument and the argument goes through. If I make the case that the unborn are persons because they don't differ from adults in any morally relevant way, and it's our inherent capacities, not our presently-exercisable capacities, that ground our personhood, then going to bodily rights arguments does not address these. In order to address my argument from personhood, you must show that the unborn actually do differ from us in morally relevant ways, or that our presently-exercisable capacities, rather than our inherent capacities, are what ground our personhood.

So Matt apparently thinks I was lying when I said he didn't address my arguments, but an honest listen to the debate will exonerate me on this point. He refused to address them because he didn't respond to them. Arguing from bodily rights is not addressing personhood arguments, it is avoiding them. But even Thomson, in her famous essay "A Defense of Abortion," understood this. She wrote, "I propose, then, that we grant that the fetus is a person from the moment of conception. How does the argument go from here? Something like this, I take it. Every person has a right to life. So the fetus has a right to life. No doubt the mother has a right to decide what shall happen in and to her body; everyone would grant that. But surely a person's right to life is stronger and more stringent than the mother's right to decide what happens in and to her body, and so outweighs it. So the fetus may not be killed; an abortion may not be performed."

Thomson then went on to give her famous violinist thought experiment, in an attempt to show that by granting the major premise of the pro-life position, that the unborn are full human persons with a right to life, abortion is still permissible. Bodily rights arguments, again, do not "include" personhood arguments, they assume the personhood of the unborn. If the unborn are not persons, there is no need to argue bodily rights because if the unborn are not persons it is not seriously wrong to kill them. Or if the unborn are a mere part of her body, then abortion would literally be no different than having a tooth pulled or a mole removed. But as I indicated in my last article, several times during our debate, Matt actually assumed the unborn are not persons, which is not an option a proponent of bodily rights has open to them, especially if their debate opponent made a case for the personhood of the unborn.

There are good reasons to consider the unborn to be persons. I also believe there are good reasons to make abortion illegal. But we must take care to be logically consistent in our arguments. Not only did I make a case that the unborn are persons, but I also made a case for why, in light of bodily rights arguments, a discussion of personhood is important. We are all persons from fertilization and because of this, we also have our basic rights from fertilization which includes a right to life.

Bodily Rights and Adoption [Serge]

I'm now going to address some of the objections to my obligatory parental provision argument detailed in this post.  One line of argument is to deny that obligatory parental provisions exist.  Due to the fact that a mother has the right to give her child up for adoption, all parental provisions are in some ways voluntary.  Since a mother after a child is born can voluntarily refuse to provide for her child by exercising her right for adoption, a pregnant mother should be able to do the same prior to birth.  Unfortunately, since the only way the mother can exercise this right is to procure an abortion, this should be allowed.

How do we respond to this?  I believe the answer lies in the nature of the adoptive process itself.  In other words, why does the process of adoption exist in the first place?  Does adoption protect the right of mothers to not provide obligatory care for their children, or is there another reason why adoption is tolerated if not promoted?

The answer is clear: adoption exists because our culture recognizes that although it is ideal for a child to be raised by their biological parents, situations do exist whereby that does not occur.  For that reason, and for the mercy and beneficial care of children, we allow parents to gift their child for adoption.  When a mother allows her child to be adopted, she is not exercising any "right" that she has to not provide for her children.  Such a right does not exist.  Instead, our society has developed a system (although imperfect) to provide for children whose parents are unable or unwilling to care for them for the benefit of the child.

We cannot use a system that has been developed for the benefit of children that may not be desired in order to justify the intentional killing of a child that may not be desired.  In fact, the opposite is the case.  The process of adoption shows that our society can make a system to provide and care for children when their parents are unwilling or unable.  Does this support a mother's right to kill her offspring?  Absolutely not.

More Thoughts on the Bodily Rights Argument for Abortion [Serge]

A few years ago I wrote this article in the Christian Research Journal regarding the the bodily rights argument for abortion rights.  After discussing this issue with a friend, who is seeing this argument being used more frequently on campus, I wanted to give some more thoughts about the issue.

In short, the bodily rights argument states that even if a human fetus is a full fledged member of the human family, a mother has the right to kill her offspring due to the fact that she has control over her own body.  Please see the article for a more detailed explanation, but one of the more popular ways to illustrate this argument is by mentioning that the state does have the right to make a mother donate an organ or donate blood to her children even if not doing so would result in their death.  It would be considered a moral good if she choose to do these things, but the state cannot compel her by force of law to use her body in this way even if her child dies as a result.  Likewise, a mother cannot be compelled to continue a pregnancy, which also uses her body, even if discontinuing a pregnancy results in the death of her child.  Thus abortion should remain legal.

Before I get into answering this argument, one thing needs to be emphasized.  The strength of this argument from the pro abortion rights side is that is would allow abortion to remain legal regardless of the moral status of the human fetus.  For that reason, before we continue, the abortion rights advocate needs to acknowledge at least for the sake of argument that the fetus in question is a human individual with human rights.  So-called "personhood" arguments cannot be brought in at any point if they are arguing from bodily rights.

Now we've established that fetus has full moral status,and is in fact a child of the mother in question, let's move on to the issue of parental provisions, or things that parents provide for their children.  Many, if not most parental provisions are good, but not legally required.  For example, yesterday I drove my kids to soccer and violin lessons.  Few would argue that these provisions that I provided for my children were not a moral good, but are certainly not a legal obligation.  I can cease to give consent to these provisions at any time (and if there are a few more 40 degree rainy soccer games that might actually occur).  I would argue that most of the provisions that my wife and I provide for our children fall into this category.

There is another category of provisions that the state requires us to provide. These are admittedly more rare, but are quite important.  I am legally required to feed my child.  I am legally required to provide my children a safe environment.  If the authorities come to my house to find that my children have died because I did not feed them, or died because I did not them back into my house after they were playing I would not merely be considered a moral failure - I would be criminally prosecuted.  This seems very clear.

We could make a list of parental provisions that are optional and ones that are legally obligatory.  We would also include on the list of optional parental provisions the notion of providing an organ or a blood transfusion to a sick child.  This would be a parental good but we do not legally compel mothers to provide this to their children, even if the child dies as a result. 

Two question need to be answered here.  First why, why are blood transfusions and organ donation optional?  Second, and the big question is whether pregnancy is more consistent with the set of obligatory provisions or with the optional ones. 

I do agree that the state has no right to demand blood transfusions or organ donation from parents.  The reason, however, is very important.  The state should not obligate these parental provisions because the child is in a state of illness, and no one has the right to demand the use of another person's body to cure their disease state.   That, unfortunately, is the nature of disease.  If a young child dies of leukemia even though his mother could have donated her bone marrow to treat him, he doesn't die because of a lack of maternal bone marrow.  He dies because of his leukemia.  Although as a culture we do everything we can do mitigate the effects of disease, we still acknowledge that no one has the "right" to their health.  Thus the mother is not legally obligated to provide her organs or blood.

Compare this to the set of legally obligatory provisions.  In the case of feeding and providing safety for their child, we do legally compel parents to provide what is needed for the continued good health of their child.  If the child is otherwise healthy, the parents have an obligation to do a minimum to not cause a child to become sick or die.  Thus they are required to provide food and a safe environment for their child.

So what about pregnancy?  Is it closer to the set of obligations that are good but optional or closer to the obligatory provisions of providing food and safety for a child?  Another way to ask the question is to ask is the state of pregnancy one of health or one of disease?  If a pregnancy is considered a state of health for the child and mother, it seems the provision of pregnancy would be obligatory.  "Continuing a pregnancy" would be amenable to continuing to provide what is otherwise necessary (nutrients, oxygen, a safe environment) to support the child's good health.  If pregnancy is a disease state for mother and/or child, then the child has no right to demand the continued use of the mother's body, and withdrawing such support through abortion would be legally permissible and consistent with other optional parental provisions.

Clearly, the status of the vast majority of pregnancies is one of complete health for mother and child.  In fact, the consequences of considering pregnancy a pathological state would be widespread and disastrous.  For example, I have two pregnant women working for me at this very time.  Should I be allowed to send them home because they are "sick", and return only when they are "better"?  For this reason, the bodily autonomy argument fails to convince us that the parental provision of providing what a pregnant mother provides to her child is merely optional.  Just like a parent has a moral and legal obligation to feed their child, a pregnant mother has a legal and moral obligation to support the good health of her child during pregnancy.

There are a few objections to this line of reasoning that I plan on addressing in future posts.  These include:

1. Since pregnancies are not without risk, and some argue that continuing a pregnancy is safer than abortion, then a mothers provision is not legally obligatory because of the risk.

2.  The fact that the child is dependent and connected to the mother is more important than the obligatory provision that the mother provides food and nutrition during pregnancy.

3.  A mother can choose not to provide the obligatory provisions if she doesn't wish to by ways of adoption.  Since she cannot place a fetus up for adoption, by means of the child's dependency, she should be allowed to discontinue the pregnancy via abortion.

My Body, My Choice? [Scott]

The latest 5-Minute Pro-Lifer is up.

Main points:

1. The alleged parallels between a woman being unnaturally hooked up to a total stranger and her natural connection to her own child fail to persuade.

2. If the right to bodily autonomy is absolute, no limits on abortion can be justified. This leads to horrific consequences.

Read the whole thing here.