A friend posted this article about the abortion debate. The only reason I chose to create a response to it was because the Gospel (or referred here as the religious view) was incorrectly represented. In addition, there were many false assumptions that I aim to correct here. This was the original article:
For the purposes of this paper, I am referring only to the abortion that affects the majority of the women who get them. I am not referring to the very small percentage of women that were raped and decided to not have the baby, or even the small percentage of young girls that have sex and have a baby very early in their lives and choose not to have it. Thank you.
“Third, talking about sex as a natural thing (not some act that needs to be punished … sheesh).”
I’m not so sure about this comment, but if it were referring to the Gospel, then I would response by saying read Song of Songs where it beautifully (and graphically) talks about sex as a natural thing and in no way indicates punishment. God created men and women and He created a way for them to procreate, and not only that, but have fun while doing so! Sex is not just for making babies, it is also a beautiful, intimate, and fun way to connect with your spouse.
“Because let’s also be honest, the religious view behind the anti-abortion movement has nothing to do with protecting “life”.”
If abortion takes a life, and anti-abortion tries to stop taking a life, then rationally, anti-abortion would be trying to protect life.
“If it did, why wouldn’t the movement care more about protecting kids once they were born? Why wouldn’t these people be in the streets fighting for pre- and post-natal care or reducing the infant mortality rate (the U.S. ranks last in the world among the 27 most developed countries in infant mortality)? Why wouldn’t they be fighting just as aggressively for education?”
This is a straw-man argument (see pre- and post-natal care, reducing infant mortality rate, and education) that tries to associate one theme with another that is not connected at all (If they were really pro-life they would care about XYZ). It is also creating a false assumption in that “the movement” has to care, or be in the know, or currently be active, in all other social issues in order to be relevant to the main topic (abortion).
“No, the issue is religion and control. The religious view is that sex out of marriage is immoral and that babies are an appropriate punishment for this act.”
Read Psalm 127:3, children are not a burden they are a blessing. In all actuality, wouldn’t abortion promote the idea that children are a burden? If children were not a burden, why go to such lengths to legally kill them? If the abortion advocates felt that children were a blessing, then they would advocate keeping them or giving them up to adoption, correct?
“Women need to be disciplined and deserve the consequences of their immorality.”
This only makes sense in the correct light, and here it is trying to show chauvinism and power over women, but to someone who understands the Gospel (or as it is called here, the religious view) it doesn’t make sense. The truth is that we are all bad and make mistakes in this life, those mistakes or intentional wrongdoings (both referred to as sin) which separates us from God. Sin = both Spiritual and Physical death (see Romans 6:23). So any sinful action is deserved, because you chose (or unintentionally chose) to do it. Even if it is unintentional, you have at some point in the past or in the future will, intentionally sin. This places everyone in the same boat. Everyone sins. So this sentence could be changed to “Men need to be disciplined and deserve the consequences of their immorality” and still hold true. The other point is that discipline = correction, not punishment. Stubbing your toe on the nightstand will take discipline to stop you from doing it again the next time. It is not punishment, or a negative reward for wrongdoing, it is corrective. Because of sin, because we all sin, we need God to help us (correct us). But we can’t get to God because sin separates us from Him, that’s why we have Jesus – to bridge the gap between us and God, and bring us back to Him. But to get back to this statement of false implications, no, it is not the woman’s fault and that they need to be corrected, or punished, or taken care of, because they had a baby out of wedlock. We all make choices, good and bad, and unfortunately in a broken world (because of sin) there are consequences of those actions, whether negative or positive. Stub toe? -> feel pain. Get a gift? -> feel happy. Have sex -> Get a baby. Is a baby a blessing or curse? It is a blessing from the Lord, even if you do not want it.
“The people behind the anti-abortion movement play an attacking game because they actually have a weak moral position.”
You just lumped everyone in the same category, and that category is “they play a game that attacks” and “they have a weak moral position”. Don’t abortion advocates and well, everyone else on the planet, do the same? I’m not saying it is right, but you can’t say “Look how bad they are, we would never do that” when in fact other people do.
“Avoid the framing of fetuses as “babies”.”
This is the major issue with the abortion debate. If fetus = baby and baby = human, then killing a fetus would mean killing a human. But if we call it a different name, like tissue or cells, then fetus does not equal baby or human. A sperm is not human, an egg is not human. Sperm have 23 chromosomes, eggs have 23 as well. Humans have 46 chromosomes. So when an sperm (23) attaches to an egg (23) you get a fetus (46), the same number of chromosomes that a human has (46). Even if a small minority of humans had an extra (or one less) chromosome due to genetic instability or variance (such as XXX, XXY, 45 chromosomes, etc…) they are still human, statistically this will occur in any species, but the majority of the human population has and will continue to have 46, the same number that a fertilized egg has.