theprequelsrule said:
There is only one question that should be asked when it comes to abortion: should a woman have the final say over the fate of something inside her?
I feel that the opposition to abortion, from the ancient world to today, is based on keeping women under control of men. And I am a semi-misogynistic male myself, so I don't usually take the Feminist perspective. I think if you agree with modern Western values, then you must automatically grant women the right to decide if the child they carry lives or dies.
I'm not saying we should throw a party when an abortion is performed or anything.
It is one of those funny issues right? Liberals and conservatives are often on the side of the issue opposite to what you would expect. Conservatives should want the decision to remain with the family, while liberals would be more likely for the government to interfere to "protect" the child.
Let me ask you the same question with a minor change. Should a prenatal woman have the final say over the fate of something inside her? Yes, remember, more than half of the world's aborted children are female, future women. If we're pro-choice, what happened to their choice? Think I'm not for women's rights? I'm certainly for a woman's right to live, just as I am for a man's choice to live. As Warbler stated and I heartily agree, if God (or nature for you non-believers) had given me and my sex the responsibility of carrying a child for 9 months, I would be equally pro-life, if not more so.
Modern Western values are more charitable towards human life than virtually any other society, past or present. How casually have humans been killed in the past, or how casually are they killed in many other cultures today (think Middle East terrorism, Chinese daughter drowning, etc.) Don't for a moment claim that Western values demand abortion. The only Western value that comes close to doing so is our tendency to avoid responsibility for our actions. I was ill prepared to raise a child when I first found out my wife was pregnant, let alone the twins it turned out we were having. But I learned to man up and be a dad. Perhaps if we better instilled this value in our society today, there would be no more excuse for wanting to abort a person.