Abortion : The Morality, And The Issue Of Abortion

Abortion’s legalization through Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade, has allowed for one in three pregnancies to end in abortion. This means that 1.5 million abortions are performed in the United States each year (Flanders 3). It ranks among the most complex and controversial issues, arousing heated legal, political, and ethical debates. The modern debate over abortion is a conflict of competing moral ideas and of fundamental human rights: to life, to privacy, to control over one's own body. Trying to come to a compromise has proven that it one cannot please all of the people on each side of the debate.

One of the most frequently debated topics in bioethics is the morality of abortion, or the ending of a pregnancy without physically giving birth to an infant. Often times abortions are categorized into either spontaneous, a natural miscarriage; induced or intentional, which is premeditated and for any reason; or therapeutic, which albeit intentional, its sole purpose is to save the mother’s life. It seems however that moral conflicts on issue mainly arise when discussing induced abortions. In general, people universally agree it is morally wrong to kill an innocent person and in some people’s eyes induced abortions are the intentional killings of innocent persons, thus making them immoral. However not all individuals view fetuses as persons and consequentially argue it is not morally wrong to kill them.

There are many common pregnancy alternatives, but most often the resulting decision is abortion because it is effortless. Abortion is endings a women’s pregnancy by removing or forcing a fetus or embryo from the mother’s womb before it is able to survive on its own. Not all abortions are purposely done some are spontaneous like when a women that has a miscarriage. Rather abortion is done purposely or naturally it is a worldwide complication as to it being wrong or right. Abortion is an ethical issue that will be analyzed according to a personal worldview and Christian worldview. Ethical thinking will be examined by value-based decisions that address abortion from the perspective of a Christian worldview and comparing it to a personal assumption by addressing ethical dilemma, core beliefs, resolution, evaluation, and comparison.

Abortion and the morality of it has been a hot topic for years in the United States although it has been carried out for centuries in different cultures. Abortion is a medical procedure deliberately terminating a pregnancy. Abortions usually happen within the first 28 weeks of pregnancy and are considered an outpatient procedure. The first abortion laws were passed by Britain in 1803 and by 1880 most abortions in the U.S. were illegal, except for those that were performed to save the life of a woman. This exception to the rule gives insight into the battle that exists today and the ethical debate of abortion.

An ethical dilemma is a debate between two moral principles, where two sides can dispute about what is wrong or what is right. However, there is no real answer to an ethical dilemma. Is it a “simple” matter of what one believes in? The best answer would be, in ethics, it is not always simple. Ethics have a propensity to engage in moral reasoning, performing critical examination of different beliefs, in order to determine whether they should be accepted or rejected. Abortion is considered an ethical dilemma. It is examined by two different groups, which have two different perspectives; Pro-Life versus Pro-Choice.

Every culture and society does not allow or consider abortion as a rightful act, and abortion is a name of destroying human life. Now a days our society faces several types of issues Abortion is one of the complicated issue for both ways health and society that’s why abortion become a very controversial issue that’s become debatable in politics. In addition, these researches will describe the different issues of abortion, such as, legal laws on abortion, restriction of abortions, rate of abortion and consequences of the abortion.

The history of 'abortion ' in the United States is more complex than most people imagine. Abortion and issues surrounding abortion are involved in intense political and public debate in the United States, law varies from state to state with regards to state legislature of abortion. 'Until 1973, the control of abortion, was almost entirely in the hands of the government of the state. ' (Vile. M. J. C, 1999, P203) The focal legal debate surrounding the issue of abortion is whether a foetus has a basic legal right to live, which turns on to the question on when a foetus is potentially a person (when it becomes 'viable ') and therefore should be ultimately protected from this point. 'Pollitt identifies that to have the legal right to have an abortion, was a transformative event for women’s liberation: it saved women from death and injury; and enabled them to commit to education and work. It also changed how women saw themselves; as mothers by choice not by fate.’ (Kennedy. S, 2014, P56) This essay will critically discuss the role and variety of actors involved in the discussion of abortion in the United States, and the impact they have politically, socially and economically, by critically exploring relevant theory.

Abortion has always been a controversial topic in the United States for decades. Abortion is like taking the life of someone without their permission so it is technically “murder”. There is no such thing as an unwanted child, millions of families in the United States are always willing to adopt. On the other hand, there are circumstances where a woman can barely care and sustain herself so chances are that she will not be able to take care of her child. Or when a rape occurs, having an abortion is not as bad as when a woman has sex without protection and knows she has the chance to get pregnant.

Abortion is the termination of pregnancy before birth, resulting in, or accompanied by the death of the fetus. ("Abortion," Encarta 98). In 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade, dramatically changed the legal landscape of American abortion law. The result of the ruling required abortion to be legal for any woman; regardless of her age and for any reason during the first seven months of pregnancy, and for almost any reason after that. ("Status of Abortion in America"). In the Roe v. Wade case, Roe (Norma McCorvey), had claimed she was gang raped and attempted to have an abortion in Texas. ("Roe and Doe"). After hearing the case, the Supreme Court ruled that an American’s right to privacy included the right of a woman whether or not to have children, and the right of a woman and her doctor to make that decision without state interference, at least in the first trimester of pregnancy. ("Celebrating 25 Years of Reproductive Choice"). The moral issue of abortion—whether or not it is murder—has been debated since it was legalized in 1973. Roe v. Wade has been one of the most controversial Supreme Court decisions of the 20th century. ("Roe No More"). More than two decades since the Supreme Court first upheld a woman’s right to abortion, the debate over the morality and legality of induced abortion continues in the United States. ("Abortion," Encarta 98). Abortion is one of the most divisive and emotional issues facing United States policy makers today. ("Economics of

“On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion”, an essay written by Mary Anne Warren, defend abortion in any stage of a woman’s pregnancy (pg 468). Warren argues that the potential to become a human being is not the same as being human and deserving the same right to life (pg. 468-472). This essay asserts that in order to be human, one must possess five particular traits (pg. 470). These trait are consciousness, reasoning, self-motivated activity, the ability to communicate, and awareness of oneself (pg. 470). Warren claims that since a fetus has not yet acquired all of the traits, then that fetus is not human and therefore does not have the right to life (pg. 470).

Abortion is a controversial issue in many countries all the time and there are always two sides of abortion. Pro-life supporters believe that abortion is immoral, so they argue that it should be illegal because an unborn baby is life. However, they do not figure out that woman who is on the inevitable situation such as infection, rape, or extreme poverty would still have the abortion even though the abortion is illegal. Many women die due to unsafe abortion, which is illegal and performed by uneducated people. Therefore, the abortion should be legal to protect the life of ‘alive women’ because women’s life is equal to human’s right. I would like to provide more affirmative bases to support abortion in this paper.

Patients are now enabled to make autonomous decisions about their own healthcare or their minor child’s healthcare, sharing the decision-making responsibility with doctors. Consequently, practitioners face challenges of how to respond to dilemmas concerning their best medical advice and patients’ religious or cultural concerns. In other cases, a doctor's conscience or beliefs can influence him to refuse to perform a service or procedure despite the patient's wishes. Many believe that physicians who refuse to comply with legally-accepted medical treatments are “not qualified to fulfill the role of a medical professional” and should be asked to “find a more suitable profession or medical specialty with no threat of conscience dilemmas”. Mississippi

A statistics reveals that twenty-one percent of all U.S. pregnancies (excluding miscarriages) end in abortion (AGI). Referring to a provided data, a controversial debate regarding a morality and legality of abortion has been raised among society. The different perceptions towards abortion have been expressed by two groups, such as: pro-choice and pro-life. The abortion’s opponents believes that unborn babies are humans from the moment of conception and, therefore, abortion is immoral and effectively killing innocent human beings. The abortion’s supporters claims that there should not be any government’s interfere in women’s right to privacy. A relevance of a moral status of a fetus can be observed in determining whether the abortion is justifiable or morally wrong. An article «On the Moral and Legal status of Abortion» by Mary Anne Warren provides with a reasonable arguments that proves a point, in which the fetus does not consider to be a person.

Abortion has been around since a lot of years in every inhabited corner of the globe. It has always been accepted as a means to prevent the suffering of both woman and potential child. It has been practiced widely in every society for many reasons including famine, war, poverty, overpopulation, or simply because a woman felt she was not ready for a child (Whitney 40). No one ever questioned a woman’s right to this procedure till the 1800’s. During this era of change people began to turn their attention in a new direction, the fetus. They began to protest abortion as cruel, inhumane, and murderous. Abortionists who were once revered and depended upon were scorned and threatened. Though abortions still happened with regularity, they were kept silent and seen as a matter of shame. “Over the next hundred years, public sentiment for 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 succeeded in saving the lives of innocent babies who would have been slaughtered for the convenience of selfish, ignorant and irresponsible women. This new law had made women actually settle down and raise families or give birth to beautiful children. We all know that, it has been proven time to time throughout history that the human spirit will not allow prohibition. Something inside us feels the need to strike out at that, which restrains us and holds us from the

Abortion as an Ethical Issue In recent years, abortion has become one of the world’s most discussed ethical issues. This has made a huge impact on both men and women’s lives. There are many different views on abortion dating back from the Old Testament to the present day. I intend to show you all of abortion’s conventional arguments.