Tag: Abortion
This is why you don’t argue with Ben Shapiro about abortion…
My favourite non-Christian defender of the pro-life position is, without a doubt, Ben Shapiro. In the clip below he artfully (and amusingly) tests the logic of his pro-choice interlocutor…
“Fetus” refers to level of development
A couple of nights ago, I was having a conversation about abortion and my friend seemed confused over the meaning of the term “human fetus”.
I explained that “human” denotes that the creature is a member of our species and “fetus” indicates the level of development of the aforementioned human, much in the same way we use the words “infant”, “toddler”, “adolescent” and “adult”…
He seemed to really struggle with the idea that “elephant fetus” simply means an elephant at an early stage of development. So, with that in mind, have you ever wondered what an elephant fetus looks like as it’s growing to maturity?
Abortion: Change my mind (1st Edition)
While I don’t always agree with everything he says, I’ve been really enjoying watching the Steven Crowder “Change my mind” segments. In these segments, he has a long-form discussion with someone who opposes his view on a particular subject and invites them to change his mind…
Shapiro and Rubin on Abortion
Shapiro and Rubin discussing abortion…and Shapiro kinda winning…
The Most Important Question about Abortion
It’s very easy to get distracted in debates about abortion. There’s an important question to which you must repeatedly return…
Pro-lifer caricature and the meaning of “pro-life”
I just saw this picture shared on Facebook…
What does it mean to be pro-life?
I responded by saying that, to be pro-life means to seek to end the killing of children in the womb because it is intrinsically wrong to kill the most defenseless, innocent human beings. Even IF the above caricature were true (which I would vigorously argue against), that doesn’t change one iota the morality of abortion.
What about a broader definition?
In response to this, one of my friends wrote that he thought “pro-life” has a wider definition. I said that he could broaden the term if he wanted, but the genesis of that term comes from the movement which was focused upon ending the killing of those in the womb. That is the stated goal of the pro-life movement.
I think this broadening of the term has been chiefly attempted by those who want to keep abortion legal and wish to discredit those who want to see it end. The argument is “You don’t get to ban abortion until an unspecified list of social programmes have been implemented to my satisfaction”. The beauty of this argument is, of course, it can never be satisfied…
The logic of the argument itself is nonsense anyway. Would someone object to me protecting a toddler from being killed by her mother because I don’t also support a programme for free after school babysitting? Of course not – a child’s life is at stake! So, if you don’t think that logic stands up when a toddler is involved, why would it stand up with a child still in the womb?
When Christians do it…
Now, I’m aware that some Christians also try to broaden the definition of pro-life. I’m sure they have good intentions and I have some sympathy with this attempt. However, I find that when this broadening happens, the term “pro-life” effectively becomes meaningless. When you broaden its meaning to cover everything related to human justice and flourishing, it basically ends up encompassing all morality! I mean, what moral choices would it not concern? At this point, “pro-life” simply means “moral”, and we already had a word for that…moral. All we’ve managed to achieve is to empty the term “pro-life” of its meaning.
When the argument changes…
I’ve spoken to many pro-choice advocates who have begun the conversation using an argument that we should provide comprehensive social programmes for the poor before we even consider arguing against abortion. However, I’ve noticed something often happens after continued conversation and the pointing out logical flaws with this approach. After a while, their argument degredates to something like this:
“My body, my choice”? “Abortion on demand, no apologies”? I would suggest that this shows that their objection to the pro-life movement has little to with care for the poor.
I see something similar when a pro-choice advocate wants to talk about abortion in the case of rape. Rape is presented as the reason we need abortion, although after further questioning it is revealed that they think abortion should be made available regardless of whether someone was raped.
The reason behind all this is that they see the the ability for a mother to kill her unborn child as a fundamental right. I would ask, if this is the case, wouldn’t it be more straight-forward to state that up front?