I found your stack this morning and having read a few of your pieces I want to say that I really like your content. It is clear to me that you are honestly trying to think through things clearly and that's always something to be admired and respected.
I read this piece and felt compelled to offer a few comments where I think you're on shaky ground. Please know that there is no hate here and that these thoughts are offered in the spirit of good natured conversation. They are as follows:
The pro-life position is not irrational. You can be pro-life without believing in God. I was pro-life long before I converted. The position can actually be formed as a syllogism:
P1 - It is always wrong to end an innocent human life
P2 - Abortion is the deliberate ending of an innocent human life
C - Therefore abortion is always wrong
You may disagree with the premises but you cannot say that this position is illogical.
It is true that the unborn may not experience thoughts or feelings as we understand them but it does not necessarily follow from that that the unborn have no moral value or rights. Questions I would ask with regard to this idea:
Is your moral value tied to your memories and experiences?
Your emotional landscape?
Your ability to think rationally?
Or is it intrinsic to your nature, regardless of the status of all of those elements?
If moral value and rights are attached to the ability to experience emotion, memory, and rational thought, how does that function with age? Do we gain more moral value/rights as we age into adulthood? Do we begin to lose that as those same faculties are diminished with age?
You are correct in stating that a foetus is not a baby, neither is a toddler, a child, or a teenager. Foetus is just an earlier step on that same continuous chain of development that leads into fully formed adulthood.
Most people understand intuitively that life has an inherent value. Even lives marked with great pains, suffering and tragedy are also marked with beauty and love and while there is life there is hope and the possibility of renewal, redemption, and healing. The fact that we all understand suicide to be a tragedy points to this. If life weren't worth something, throwing it away with suicide or offering it up in a heroic sacrifice would mean nothing, but each and every one of us are deeply moved when we hear of such things. You do not need to believe in God to recognise this fact of the human experience.
It is obviously better is children are born into stable marriages and families and are wanted by both parents but the absence of this ideal does not mean that the next best option is death. I know some beautiful and inspirational people who have come from the most appalling upbringings. Violence, drug abuse, neglect, and yet they live bright and full lives in spite of the horrors they have suffered.
I think the main problem with the debate from the pro-life side is all of the focus is on banning abortion and not enough attention is being given to the provisions that should be provided in place of abortion. We need to take far better care of vulnerable young mothers and crisis pregnancies. We need better systems to take care of unwanted children, and we need far harsher punishments for those who violate and exploit women sexually.
Feel free to ignore me completely, I realise I'm just a rando on the internet.
I wish you the best of luck with all that you do and hope that the writing career is a great success!
Hi! I don't have a very strong and formed opinion on the subject yet. Anyway, time ago I found this great index of an atheist-led pro-life organization that respond to nearly all pro-choice arguments: https://secularprolife.org/index/
I think their responses are, at least generally, complemented with studies and articles. They have a YouTube channel as well.
You are right that banning it could have negative consequences. But it seems that some women are proud of it! It is seen as a divine right. It would be great if our culture started seeing it for what it is: a disgusting way to get a generally irresponsible woman or couple out of an inconvenience, and that inconvenience is a human life. At any other age the crime would be seen as murder. To use the current lingo, abortion is murder adjacent.
Abortion should be unthinkable for most people. And the way to achieve that is to end the insanity of the so called sexual revolution. A culture where sex is kept for marriage is far mentally healthier. Sex causes so many traumas for young women, and unwanted pregnancies are only one of them. Men who have a string of sexual partners come to despise women, and the same is true with the sexes reversed. Failed marriages cause deep emotional wounds in children, and also stuff up the lives of the adults involved.
Well there are women who have abortions because they already have lots of children and don't want more. It's not just single unmarried women who get abortions.
Society is not going to return to keeping sex within marriage because there is no way to culturally enforce that. That's an extreme position that would only work if people got married in their teens like in the old days.
Instead, women could stop having casual sex and just be intimate with men who have agreed to exclusivity.
Look at how attitudes have changed in way we could not have imagined in my childhood. I think it would be possible to raise respect for virginity again, if enough of the influential people made it seem cool. That's beyond me though.
I found your stack this morning and having read a few of your pieces I want to say that I really like your content. It is clear to me that you are honestly trying to think through things clearly and that's always something to be admired and respected.
I read this piece and felt compelled to offer a few comments where I think you're on shaky ground. Please know that there is no hate here and that these thoughts are offered in the spirit of good natured conversation. They are as follows:
The pro-life position is not irrational. You can be pro-life without believing in God. I was pro-life long before I converted. The position can actually be formed as a syllogism:
P1 - It is always wrong to end an innocent human life
P2 - Abortion is the deliberate ending of an innocent human life
C - Therefore abortion is always wrong
You may disagree with the premises but you cannot say that this position is illogical.
It is true that the unborn may not experience thoughts or feelings as we understand them but it does not necessarily follow from that that the unborn have no moral value or rights. Questions I would ask with regard to this idea:
Is your moral value tied to your memories and experiences?
Your emotional landscape?
Your ability to think rationally?
Or is it intrinsic to your nature, regardless of the status of all of those elements?
If moral value and rights are attached to the ability to experience emotion, memory, and rational thought, how does that function with age? Do we gain more moral value/rights as we age into adulthood? Do we begin to lose that as those same faculties are diminished with age?
You are correct in stating that a foetus is not a baby, neither is a toddler, a child, or a teenager. Foetus is just an earlier step on that same continuous chain of development that leads into fully formed adulthood.
Most people understand intuitively that life has an inherent value. Even lives marked with great pains, suffering and tragedy are also marked with beauty and love and while there is life there is hope and the possibility of renewal, redemption, and healing. The fact that we all understand suicide to be a tragedy points to this. If life weren't worth something, throwing it away with suicide or offering it up in a heroic sacrifice would mean nothing, but each and every one of us are deeply moved when we hear of such things. You do not need to believe in God to recognise this fact of the human experience.
It is obviously better is children are born into stable marriages and families and are wanted by both parents but the absence of this ideal does not mean that the next best option is death. I know some beautiful and inspirational people who have come from the most appalling upbringings. Violence, drug abuse, neglect, and yet they live bright and full lives in spite of the horrors they have suffered.
I think the main problem with the debate from the pro-life side is all of the focus is on banning abortion and not enough attention is being given to the provisions that should be provided in place of abortion. We need to take far better care of vulnerable young mothers and crisis pregnancies. We need better systems to take care of unwanted children, and we need far harsher punishments for those who violate and exploit women sexually.
Feel free to ignore me completely, I realise I'm just a rando on the internet.
I wish you the best of luck with all that you do and hope that the writing career is a great success!
Thank you for your positive words.
Hi! I don't have a very strong and formed opinion on the subject yet. Anyway, time ago I found this great index of an atheist-led pro-life organization that respond to nearly all pro-choice arguments: https://secularprolife.org/index/
I think their responses are, at least generally, complemented with studies and articles. They have a YouTube channel as well.
Thanks for your work!
You are right that banning it could have negative consequences. But it seems that some women are proud of it! It is seen as a divine right. It would be great if our culture started seeing it for what it is: a disgusting way to get a generally irresponsible woman or couple out of an inconvenience, and that inconvenience is a human life. At any other age the crime would be seen as murder. To use the current lingo, abortion is murder adjacent.
Abortion should be unthinkable for most people. And the way to achieve that is to end the insanity of the so called sexual revolution. A culture where sex is kept for marriage is far mentally healthier. Sex causes so many traumas for young women, and unwanted pregnancies are only one of them. Men who have a string of sexual partners come to despise women, and the same is true with the sexes reversed. Failed marriages cause deep emotional wounds in children, and also stuff up the lives of the adults involved.
Well there are women who have abortions because they already have lots of children and don't want more. It's not just single unmarried women who get abortions.
Society is not going to return to keeping sex within marriage because there is no way to culturally enforce that. That's an extreme position that would only work if people got married in their teens like in the old days.
Instead, women could stop having casual sex and just be intimate with men who have agreed to exclusivity.
Look at how attitudes have changed in way we could not have imagined in my childhood. I think it would be possible to raise respect for virginity again, if enough of the influential people made it seem cool. That's beyond me though.