Abortion – call it what it is

Killing a fellow human being is not new to us.  We already accept killing in war, capital punishment and self-defense.  Society has made a distinction between murder and killing.

So, if we already accept killing a fellow human being, why do we soothe our conscience trying to prove abortion is not murder or killing?  For 35 years pro-abortion experts have failed to prove that the fetus up to a certain point in pregnancy does not have what is needed for legal protection – personhood – claiming it is acquired at some unknown time later in pregnancy.

Further, beyond not being able to determine when it is gained, the experts cannot even agree on a definition of personhood.  They expect us to just accept their convoluted logic on faith alone.

Beyond this, physicians who perform late-term abortions claim the baby does not have personhood until it is born, allowing them to abort so late in the pregnancy that a live, healthy baby could have been delivered.  They claim if they kill the baby while in the uterus it is legal; but if they deliver the same baby, the same day, and then kill it, it is murder.  Is it the birth canal that grants personhood?  On one end of the birth canal it is a legal abortion but on the other end it is murder?  Is this logic or hypocrisy?

Unintentionally countering these late-term abortionists, pro-abortion experts agree the fetus does have personhood later in pregnancy.  If so, how can they defend late-term abortions when they occur after the time they believe the fetus has personhood?  With their conspicuous silence they are supporting late-term abortion because they fail to denounce aborting babies with personhood.  In other words, abortion is not murder unless the baby escapes the mother’s body before it is killed.

The reality.  From conception to death, regardless of what you want to call “it” at any given stage of growth, “it” is a human being, a person.

I wonder how easily the Supreme Court could be persuaded to sanction abortion had they known what we now know about the embryo, the fetus, the baby.  I wonder if they could still be convinced “it” is not a human being, not something with personhood.  I wonder if they could be persuaded the fetus only has the potential of personhood, falling short of any legal protections.

Of Roe v Wade, Supreme Court Justice Blackmun wrote, “If this suggestion of personhood is established, the appellant’s (counsel for Roe’s) case, of course, collapses, for the fetus’ right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the (14th) Amendment.”  In other words, the Supreme Court ruled that until proven otherwise the baby is assumed to not be a legal human being.

Wouldn’t it be easier to just tell the truth that the baby is a human being throughout pregnancy, but we have assigned a lesser value to its existence just as we have to those we kill in war, capital punishment and self-defense.  We could legislate that up to a certain gestational age, killing the baby is acceptable.

But the risk of admitting this truth would be the reversal of Roe v Wade, requiring new legislation sanctioning this killing, which would probably face Supreme Court challenges.

So we pretend the early fetus does not have personhood, therefore no value or legal rights.  And we also pretend the late term fetus does not have personhood, despite pro-abortion experts who claim otherwise.

American writer, Bernard Malamud said, “I for one believe that not enough has been made of the tragedy of the destruction of 6 million Jews.  Somebody has to cry — even if it’s a writer, 20 years later.”  To paraphrase him, “I for one believe that not enough has been made of the tragedy of the destruction of 50 million babies.  Somebody has to cry — even if it’s a writer, 35 years later.”

We pretend.  We pretend.

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