GOOD vs. TRUTH
GOOD vs TRUTH
Pro-Life vs. Pro-Choice
The killing of any 'human' life is a serious matter whether or not you consider it a person such as with a human embryo or a brain dead adult on life support. But the morality of such killing is sometimes questioned with arguments that run contradictory with cultural practices and perceptions.
A pro-life argument for example is that the embryo or fetus should have the rights of a person and that abortion is 'murder'. But as a culture in the U.S. there are no wakes or closed casket funerals for miscarriages of fetuses as there would be for an infant's funeral. The mourning of such a loss may be no less poignant but society still draws a distinction between the death of a fetus and that of an infant.
A pro-choice argument is that the embryo or fetus are just tissue and shouldn't have the rights of 'personhood' at least until development allows for viability outside the womb. But dependence on the mother's life support isn't a definition of personhood, it is an effort to delineate a minimum practical threshold of when the fetus could be considered no longer just a part of the mother and therefor to also have some rights as an individual.
Some use a religious definition for a person as life with a soul and that upon conception the human embryo has a soul and is therefore a person.
A secular point of view is that an embryo may be a 'potential' person but is not one yet. Personhood develops in stages and although at what stage a person is fully realized is debatable, birth has been accepted by society as the point for basic rights of personhood to be recognized.
What the argument really boils down to is the question if killing is worthy of absolution by society. The courts grant absolution for killing in self defense. Killing in State executions are absolved by the majority vote of its citizenry. In war countries absolve their soldiers of killing, even in cases of civilian 'collateral damage'.
Majority opinion absolves the wrong of killing, at least in the eyes of the majority's representatives. Therefore more contentious issues such as mercy killing, assisted suicide, embryonic stem cell research, and abortion may someday rise to the same level of acceptability as war and State executions.
Pro-Life vs. Pro-Choice
The killing of any 'human' life is a serious matter whether or not you consider it a person such as with a human embryo or a brain dead adult on life support. But the morality of such killing is sometimes questioned with arguments that run contradictory with cultural practices and perceptions.
A pro-life argument for example is that the embryo or fetus should have the rights of a person and that abortion is 'murder'. But as a culture in the U.S. there are no wakes or closed casket funerals for miscarriages of fetuses as there would be for an infant's funeral. The mourning of such a loss may be no less poignant but society still draws a distinction between the death of a fetus and that of an infant.
A pro-choice argument is that the embryo or fetus are just tissue and shouldn't have the rights of 'personhood' at least until development allows for viability outside the womb. But dependence on the mother's life support isn't a definition of personhood, it is an effort to delineate a minimum practical threshold of when the fetus could be considered no longer just a part of the mother and therefor to also have some rights as an individual.
Some use a religious definition for a person as life with a soul and that upon conception the human embryo has a soul and is therefore a person.
A secular point of view is that an embryo may be a 'potential' person but is not one yet. Personhood develops in stages and although at what stage a person is fully realized is debatable, birth has been accepted by society as the point for basic rights of personhood to be recognized.
What the argument really boils down to is the question if killing is worthy of absolution by society. The courts grant absolution for killing in self defense. Killing in State executions are absolved by the majority vote of its citizenry. In war countries absolve their soldiers of killing, even in cases of civilian 'collateral damage'.
Majority opinion absolves the wrong of killing, at least in the eyes of the majority's representatives. Therefore more contentious issues such as mercy killing, assisted suicide, embryonic stem cell research, and abortion may someday rise to the same level of acceptability as war and State executions.
posted by Michael Baribeau | 7:29 AM
1 Comments:
They do not know what they do...
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