Abortion_Legalized

Abortion Legalizes Even though abortion has been one of the most controversial subjects in American history both socially and politically. The fight between pro-life and pro-choice supporters has been long and brutal. It has caused countless deaths and several violent confrontations by each side. Both sides have their points that they stand on. Therefore the question still remains, should abortion be legal' Abortion is the termination of the pregnancy before the baby is born thus, creating the death of the fetus. Abortions can happen naturally through miscarriage due to numerous reasons. Other abortions are induced. Abortions that are induced are intentional abortions usually due to an unwanted pregnancy or health reasons. Consequently, that question arises again; should abortion be legal' Though people disagree on this subject, legalized abortion is the only option to protect the lives of American citizens. If we turn back the time clock of history we will see the results of prohibiting abortions. The violence currently due to pro-choice and pro-life conflicts is very minimal compared to the hundreds of thousands of women that did not have the choice of abortion, which led to either self-inflected or back room “professionals” which resulted in horrible cases of infection, massive blood loss resulting in death, and permanent physical disfigurement. It is much better now that women have a choice with places to go where abortion can be executed professionally with minimal health risks. Legalizing abortion is the right thing to do no matter which side of the issue you stand on. Women have the right to do what they think is good for them to live life as they wish, no matter how anyone else feels. Abortion has been around our world for thousands of years. It has been accepted as a means of preventing suffering of both women and potential child. It has been a part of our lives and practiced widely in every culture for many different reasons such as, overpopulation, famine, poverty, war, and personal choice (Whitney 40). Back then people did not question this topic so aggressively. Only God should have the right to judge what a women does to her body. This all began to change around the mid 1800’s. This was considered the era of change and people views were changing in another direction, the fetus. People than considered abortion to be cruel, inhumane, and downright murderous. Overwhelmed with this new sense of purpose with this fresh new righteous cause to uphold the new sense of morality people were swept up like a tidal wave riding across our great nation. Though abortions were still happening they were kept silent and were now considered a very shameful act to be frond upon. Over several centuries all over the world in many different cultures, there is a rich history of women helping each other with abortions. Western Europe and the U.S. provided abortions and trained other women to do so, without legal prohibitions. By 1880 abortions were illegal in the U.S. unless a life threating situation arose (www.feminist.com). Abortion has become a crime and a sin for several reasons. A trend of humanitarian’s reform in the mid-19th century broadened liberal support for criminalization, because at that time abortion was a dangerous procedure done with crude methods, few antiseptics, and high mortality rates (Linda Gordon’s 1990, Women’s Body, Women’s Right,rev.ed.New York: Penguin Books, 1990). During these times, male doctors were trying to tighten their hold on the medical field. Doctors considered midwifes, who attended births and performed abortions as a part of their regular practice, a threat to their own economic and social power. The medical establishment actively took up the antiabortion cause in the second half of the nineteenth century as part of its efforts to eliminate midwives. “Over the next hundred years, public sentiment for the fetus continued to rise until the inevitable happened in America during the early 40’s. Abortion was made illegal” (Cohen 17). The pro-life supporters had won the war and were congratulating each other. Why not' They saved the lives of thousands and thousands of innocent babies that would have never seen the light of day. The perfect law has just been past, or had it' History shows us that if we are told we cannot do something (prohibition) we will create a new underworld to fulfill women’s needs for abortions. Our Government has now through regulations, created a need that will be fulfilled by the ruthless and lawless of the underworld of our society. Doctors at this point fearing jail would not be able to meet the needs of women seeking abortions. Women would then turn to the underground for abortions in less than perfect conditions. If they could not afford it they perform the act themselves with coat hangers, poisons, and other disgusting methods. These back yard clinics were popping up everywhere. These backyard clinics were in dirty, filthy, and disease ridden places. These want to be doctors or inexperienced butchers would use crude and terrible tools to perform their dirty deeds doing irreparable damage to the poor women that had no other choice. A definition of abortion could be stated as “The induced termination of a pregnancy before it is capable of survival as an individual” (Frohock 186). Humoring this interpretation, at the time of most abortions, the fetus is not yet developed enough to be considered an individual. One should consider the stages of development of the fetus. Most abortions occur soon after the woman has confirmed that she is pregnant. This is usually around the twelfth week which is called the first trimester. The fetus is around three and a half inches long and around 15 grams in weight at this point. At around twenty weeks in the second trimester the mother can sometimes notice motion. Also the brain has been developing significantly. The third trimester is from 24 weeks to birth which is close to 40 weeks. “When making the conscious decision to terminate the life of the fetus one must take into account the development of the fetus. One approach might be that of assessing the neurological development. It is logical that the more complex the neurological system the more likely you are to induce pain or end a sense of self if in fact the sense exists prior to birth” (Frohock 28). You can almost compare it to pulling the plug on someone in a coma. But this is considered being humane and not murder in some instances. The abortion debate will never be solved rationally. Reasonable people will continue to disagree about abortion, and then the claim is surely true. However the claim that abortion cannot be settled rationally is often taken to mean more than this. It is often taken to mean, as on writer has put it that “each side of the abortion debate has an internally coherent and mutually shared view of the world that is…completely at odds with the world view held by their opponents,” and that “the two sides share almost no common premises” (Luker 1984: 159, 2). On this view moral status of abortion is so far removed from any other moral question about which the two sides agree that neither side’s position can be shown to be more reasonable than the other’s on terms that the other side can accept (David Boonin 2003). In conclusion, my research leads me to believe that, while abortion must be legal, we should give these women the information they need to make a rational decision. We have been battling over this issue for way to long. Hence, the question arises again, should abortion be legal' References Whitney Catherine (1992). Whose Life' New York William Morrow and Co. Cohen Marshall (1978). The Rights and Wrongs of Abortion. New Jersey; Princeton Press. Boyer, Mark (1992). Abortion; The Straight Facts. Boston: Houghton Mifflan. David Boonin (2003). A defense of Abortion. www.feminist.com/resources/ourbodies/abortion.html Linda Gordon’s (1990) Women’s Body, Women’s Right. Retrieved (New York: Penguin Books). Frohock, Fred. Abortion. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1989.