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Abortion: Good or Bad?

Abortion has been one of the most controversial topics for the past several hundred years

in this world. What is abortion? According to the Women’s Center for Health, “Abortion is the

surgical or medical termination of a pregnancy,” and “Nearly half of all pregnancies that occur in

the Unites States every year are unintended. Of these unplanned pregnancies, forty percent are

terminated by abortion…one in three American women will have an abortion by the age of 45.”

Even after the introduction of contraceptives, and how easily available they are to women, like

mentioned earlier, more than half of these pregnancies in the United States are unplanned and

about half of these are aborted which is why abortion continues to remain a controversial issue.

Today, the argument of whether abortion should be allowed or not is a constant back and forth

debate. There are several people who believe that abortion is more than just the termination of a

pregnancy, it’s the termination of a life that could have done good for the world. They think that

abortion is like committing a murder since it is killing a human fetus. While there are other who

thing that women should have the right to choose what they want to do with their body, and that

it is not murder until the baby is actually born.

For several years, before the law that allowed abortion, there were several people fighting

for the right for women to be allowed this medical action. It was finally allowed when “the US

Supreme Court's 7-2 decision on Roe v. Wade declared the procedure a "fundamental right" on

Jan. 22, 1973” (Procon.org). The side for Pro Choice has several organizations that stand behind

this idea, such as Planned Parenthood, the National Abortion Federation, the National

Organization for Women, etc. These specific organizations advocate that women should be

allowed access to abortion services no matter the circumstances. One of the most used arguments

that people for pro choice argue, is in the cases of rape and incest. They believe that “Forcing a
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woman made pregnant by this violent act would cause further psychological harm to the victim,”

(Lowen). When a woman is raped, they do not want to give birth to a child that will forever

remind them of the man that raped them. This causes psychological harm to the victim, because

if they could not have an abortion, they would be forced to be reminded of the rape every day.

Things such as the morning after pill, is usually ineffective in these situations because sometimes

the rape victim does not yet know that they are pregnant or does not want people to know what

happened, so they just keep it to themselves until it is too late. Also, some of the rape victims are

sometimes very young, as young as twelve years old or maybe even a little earlier. At this age,

they can get pregnant and for girls that are that young, people argue that they are not yet old

enough to have such responsibility when they themselves are still a child.

Although there are several people and organizations that support pro choice, there are

also several others who support pro life. Organizations that are for pro life, such as churches,

argue that abortion is murder no matter what week it is done, since you are taking a human life

even though they are not born yet. “Abortion is in direct defiance of the commonly accepted idea

of the sanctity of human life” (Lowen). This statement leads to the argument of what people’s

religious beliefs are, and how it affects their views on this issue. Because so many religions value

life so much, a lot of them strongly disagree with the idea of abortion. They believe that “infants

and young children are innocent in the sight of God because they cannot yet take responsibility

for their spiritual well being” (Thomas, 518). They believe that a yet to be born baby has to be

recognized as having the rights as any other normal human being. Additionally, pro choice

arguments also include certain legal reasons on why abortion should be banned. Since they

believe that is it murder, they make the argument that murder is legal, and that they should be

held accountable for that murder just as any other normal murderer. Another one of the legal
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reason is that of the fourteenth amendment. “The amendment was intended to imply ‘universal’

and to apply to ‘any human being.’ Fourteenth Amendment rights were intended not only to

‘pertain to American citizenship but also to common humanity’” (Brown). They mention that

although it is not clearly stated in the fourteenth amendment that unborn babies are to be

classified as one of these human beings, they say that it was indirect. Since abortion was already

illegal at the time that the fourteenth amendment was made legal, they did not feel the need to

make it clear in it that unborn babies were included and supposedly a “protected” class in the

United States.

Even though there is the legal argument that argues that the unborn baby has rights due to

the fourteenth amendment, the mother also has her own rights. It is the woman’s civil right to be

able to do with her body whatever she wants. “Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor

wrote in the 1992 decision in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, ‘The ability of women to participate

equally in the economic and social life of the Nation has been facilitated by their ability to

control their reproductive lives’” (Procon.org). This decision decides a woman’s whole future,

and if they are not yet ready to let a child be born into the world for them to take care of , then

they should be able to abort the fetus. To argue against what most people who want abortion to

be banned because of religious beliefs, there are some with a religion that still believe that it

should be allowed. These people’s faiths argue self determination, which is when “individuals

should be free to determine their own lives without coercion, should not have to do anything they

hate or believe to be bad for the, should make decisions about their own lives without being

forced, and should not be under anyone else’s power in things that matter deeply” (Harris, Mills,

139). This value is strongly argued from those who practice a religion and see that abortion

should one’s right, compared to those who just see the rights of the unborn baby.
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A couple of final arguments that the side of pro choice has made, is that women who

become pregnant, should accept the responsibility that comes with having a baby, and that

abortion causes psychological damage to the mother. One of the most common arguments, is that

women who decide to have sex, know the consequences of their actions, yet choose not use

things such as birth control or condoms, or even if they do they know that sometimes there is a

risk of still becoming pregnant. So if they get pregnant, they are going to have to deal with the

responsibility of having a child. The fetus should not have to pay for the mistake made by the

adults. When one gets an abortion, there is a high probability of them getting psychological

damage. Depression is one of the most common diagnoses among those who get abortions. “The

mean annual suicide rate amongst women who had an abortion was 34.7 per 100,000, compared

with a mean rate of 11.3 per 100,000 in the general population of women” (Procon.org). In some

cases, it is not just the women who suffer these conditions after getting an abortion, but also the

men. The ones who do not get a say or who wanted the baby but supported the girl anyway,

sometimes end up with depression just like the women.

In conclusion, through out several years in the United States, there has been a constant

debate on whether or not abortion should be allowed or not. It was not until the case of Roe vs.

Wade where they made abortion legal (in certain cases), when there was clear distinction made

that most people are for abortion. The pro choice side argues that women should be allowed to

do what they want with their body, especially in the cases of rape and incest, and that it is not

murder because technically the baby is not yet born. While the people on the side of pro life

argue that these unborn babies have their own rights too, and to kill them is murder no matter the

circumstance. There are many sides and arguments to abortion, and it is going to continue being
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a controversial issue in the United States, because there will always be a difficulty in determining

whether it is right or wrong.

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Bibliography

Brown, Kristi B. "Three Legal Reasons Why Abortion Should Be Banned” LifeNews.com. Life

News, 01 Apr. 2014. Web. 15 Nov. 2016. <http://www.lifenews.com/2014/04/01/three-

legal-reasons-why-abortion-should-be-banned/>.

Harris, Richard J., and Edgar W. Mills. “Religion Values and Attitudes Toward Abortion.”

Journal For the The Scientific Study of Religon 24.2 (1985): 137-154. Academic Search

Complete. Web. 15 Nov. 2016.

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Lowen, Linda. "10 Common Arguments For and Against Abortion." About.com News & Issues.

About News, 06 Mar. 2016. Web. 15 Nov. 2016.

<http://womensissues.about.com/od/reproductiverights/a/AbortionArgumen.htm>.

Nauser, Hodes. "Abortion: Abortion Facts." Center for Women's Health. Center for Women's

Health, n.d. Web. 29 Nov. 2016. <http://www.hodesnauser.com/abortion_facts/>.

"Should Abortion be legal?” ProConorg Headlines. ProCon.org, 03 June 2016. Web. 15 Nov.

2016. <http://abortion.procon.org/>.

Thomas, Dan. "Better Never To Have Been Born." Journal Of Religious Ethics 44.3 (2016): 518-

542. Academic Search Complete. Web. 15 Nov. 2016.

<https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=117191701&site=e

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