What Pro-Life and Pro-Choice really mean

I'm sure we have all seen the images on the news and in the papers over the last ten years of this not so silent war. From slogans on t-shirts, bumper stickers, and picket-signs, to the smoking wreakage of the women's health clinic in Austin, Texas, it prevades our culture. It is a battle fought not in the trenches, but in the minds of the people, and it is because of this battlefield, the two sides have altered their titles to obfuscate what they are really fighting over.

The conflict over abortion is simple, and if you are on a particular side, you WILL be offended, as many people are when a speaker is blunt. The great Penn Jillete had it half right when he said "Everyone is pro-life AND pro-choice. It's for or against abortion that's the issue." However, it's a deeper issue than that. Pro-life people aren't faceless authoritarian slaves dragging pregnant women into the ranks of mindless drones, and pro-choicers aren't members of a shadowey death-cult intent on bringing about the end of humanity by abolishing births. It really boils down to this. Pro-life activists are operating from a religious background where reproduction is a deity-mandated instruction to every person on the planet. To them, to it is of vital importance to allow the birth to happen so as not to anger the great YHWH. Pro-choicers are motivated by a need to be 100% in control. It is a growth of the women's liberation movement based on the assumption that being pregnant is a matter of servitude to the patriarchy.

That is all bullshit of the highest caliber. These people needn't hide behind the issue of unborn children, that's not neccessary, they can argue their points elsewhere and understand that abortion is just that, abortion.

Abortion is the practice of removing an undeveloped infant from the uterus or fallopian tube of the mother. The crux of the argument is this: Is that lump of cells alive or not? Rational deducters can look at the facts and come to the conclusion. I will be using an imaginary opponent as a foil to illustrate the facts of the case.

The "It's My Body" Argument: This is flat out wrong. It is a seperate entity growing inside of the uterus. It shares half of the genetic code of the mother, as well as copies of the eukaryotic organelles of the mother (The structures in the cell that have DNA seperate from the person, e.g. mitochondrial DNA). However, it also contains plenty of genetic material from the father, and that makes it very definately a seperate organism, rather than a growth like hair or fingernails. The difference in genetic code is one of the things we hold, legally, as a 100% proof that the identities of two samples are from different people, not the same body.

The "Ok, So You Think It Isn't Ok To Remove Tumors?" Argument: This is a bit of a strawman; the fact that it does not share the mother's entire DNA does not put it in the same category as a cancerous growth. For argument's sake though, a tumor is a shapeless mass of cells replicating out of control, there is no order, no sense to it. It is at best, a non-issue to the patient's health, and at worst, fatal. The tumor has no future, it will never become a writer, a scientist, a politician, a worker, or even a homeless drug addict; but most of all, it cannot survive outside of the host and never will. (The first time a tuor pops out of a person and demonstrates intelligence... then we can talk)

The "Ah HA, A Fetus Cannot Survive Outside The Mother Either" Argument: This is true, however,  a newborn, or a toddler, or many adults with neurological disorders cannot care for themselves, and will perish of exposure, starvation, or dehydration. Surely this cannot be the acid test.

So she's out of factual arguments here.  Before any Pro-lifers get giddy at the prospect of a vocal member of their cause, let me burst that bubble with this pinprick:

At this point she falls back to the only valid argument in favor of abortion "You have no right to force me to do this." And she is right. Not because of any of the above reasons, but because it's not my right to tell her what to do.

The Pro-life arguement can ony stem from YHWH's instructions to Noah "Be fruitful and multiply" If these nutjobs really cared about biblical exhortations, surely "Thou shalt not kill" carries more weight than a simple invective to reproduce a once-empty world. Life is anything but sacred to them, if it was, they would be running orphanages and being foster parents instead of shooting doctors. I do not mean to generalize, but the sort of people who tend to be pro-life also appear to be the type of people who tend to oppose social support programs. It does sound like these sort of people only care if you ive or die before you are born an after you are a senior citizen.

It very simple boils down to this; an unborn fetus is a person, pure and simple. They have cellular functions, they proccess ATP to ADP and are fissioning cells and growing; so they are alive. And they have human DNA so they are human. It is also acceptable to kill those people. Euthensia is a mercy in many cases, and an unwanted pregnancy will ruin the lives of both parents and child. To force a child into that is unforgivable. To force a woman into it is unconscionable.

I want to make it absolutely clear. This is a very sensitive issue. I am not providing "Proof" for anti-abortionists. I am firmly pro-abortion and pro-women's rights. I would never dream of forcing a girl to carry a child to term out of some "life is sacred" bullshit.

On that note, less than ten percent of Americans are professed atheists. That means that 90% of Americans are religious. If you believe that life is sacred, how can you oppose free/low cost healthcare for everyone? Does life stop being sacred when you draw your first breath?