Abortion: A Pro-life Argument

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Abortion: A Pro-life Argument

Ellen Willis’s “Putting Women Back into the Abortion Debate” (2005) is an argument that supports women’s rights and feminism in terms of allowing all abortions to occur. She discusses abortion with the perspective that women’s rights are the issue, not human life. This argument is not accurate. Abortion is almost completely about the rights of every human being. People who are for abortion need to know a fertilized egg is just as important as someone already living, that an unborn child cannot control its need for someone to rely on for survival, and that they must accept the gender they were given without thinking it eliminates rights. Excluding rape and incest, abortion should not be allowed. Abortion is an issue of human life being endangered, not of whether women are allowed to live their lives with some rights that may be denied through childbearing.

The first minor claim made by Willis in support of abortion is that abortion is an issue of feminism, not of human life. She wants people to think women are forgotten in the debate about abortion. She states that “women and their bodies are merely the stage on which the drama of fetal life and death takes place” (Willis, 2005, p. 514). A woman and her unborn child are both considered more worthy than Willis is making them sound, which is the reason abortion is an issue that causes much concern for the human life of both the mother and the child. In order to compare these lives, it must be shown that both the mother and child are living. By Willis’ definition, the woman is alive because she has physical, emotional, and historical ties to the outside world. However, Willis’s definition is not the definition of human life. Accord...

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...int, so others need to stand up the child’s rights and not allow abortion.

References

Gargaro, C. G. (2002). Abortion violates human rights. In Williams, M. E. (Ed.).

Abortion: opposing viewpoints. (pp. 36-44). San Diego: Greenhaven Press, Inc.

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Willis, E. (2005). Putting women back into the abortion debate? In Barnet S., & Bedau H.

(Eds.). Current issues and enduring questions: a guide to critical thinking and

argument, with readings. (pp. 514-520). Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s.

Zugibe, F. T. (2004). The code for human life [electronic version]. E-forensic

medicine. Retrieved March 6, 2005. <http://e-forensicmedicine.net/code.htm

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