Posted by
Satya on Monday, December 01, 2008 12:36:58 PM
I am so tired of the anti abortion stance being branded as simplistic and provincial. My personal repugnance for abortion is not something based on misogyny or a lack of sophistication. At what point does a baby in the womb begin to feel pain? A question that is not easily answered, it seems. Yet that is the question that looms in my mind when I consider what abortion is. Purposefully, knowingly causing another being pain and suffering goes against everything a civilized society stands for. Slippery slope arguments for abortion are an attempt to bury or ignore the fact that at some point that baby develops enough to be able to feel pain. And at that point, tearing him/her out limb by limb becomes an unacceptable and barbaric form of torture. To ignore that is shameful. We wouldn't be able to take an admitted child rapist/murderer, place him in a vat of liquid, introduce a corrosive element to said liquid and then systematically tear apart the rapist/murderer piece by piece through a small hole cut into the side of this container. We agree not to treat even the worst, most heinous members of our society with such cruelty.
I cannot ignore the fact that women need reproductive freedom. I do not ask all members of society to agree upon when life begins, to agree upon what is considered sacred. Is there an area of this issue upon which we of differing opinions may come to an agreement? Perhaps chemical abortions performed only in the weeks of pregnancy where doctors and scientists can agree that the baby does not have the neurological development necessary to feel pain? Abortions performed with thought put to eliminate the suffering of the baby? I have solid reasons for being opposed to abortion used as birth control and I grow weary of being treated like an under educated simpleton because of my opinion. I ask that we better understand the implications for us as a society if we cannot treat the most helpless among us with humanity.