Pro Life Arguments

Pro choice and pro life arguments are a hot 2008 election topic: a look at each side

The economy, fuel prices, war, education and the pro choice and pro life arguments are firmly entrenched in voter's minds. Senator McCain's choice of the pro life Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, has fired up the Roe vs. Wade issue. Senator Obama and his running mate, Senator Joe Biden, represent the pro choice segment of American voters. So who's right? Or is there a right or wrong answer? Naturally, it depends on your point of view. Let's take a look and see both sides.

The pro life arguments are diametrically opposed to the pro choice adherents. Senator McCain and Governor Palin staunchly support a great number of the Evangelical pro lifers, even to the extent of prohibiting abortion in cases of rape and incest.

This pro life argument is difficult to understand, from a humanitarian perspective. Rape is a violent crime. Should we expect that a woman who is raped should be forced to give birth to a child that may well be afflicted with HIV or AIDS? That unfortunate child might come into the world with medical conditions that cannot be cured, suffering misery no one would wish on their worst enemy. The mother, traumatized by such a violent event, may be psychologically unable to cope with the violent act which produced this child.

As for incest, it's well documented that the child of such a relationship is genetically disposed to Down's syndrome. The mother, also a victim of a criminal act, must carry this child to birth. This must surely be a horrific experience, adding to the psychological problems already created by the family member, who must surely be a disturbed individual. Some of the proponents of such pro life arguments even suggest that a woman who aborts this child should be prosecuted and jailed. This seems to me to be the epitome of cruelty and inhumanity.

The pro choice argument contends that the individual should be allowed to make this very personal decision and that this is a moral point over which society should not be the judge.

In either case, both pro choice and pro life arguments seem to insert a caveat, the question being the moment at which life begins. Some say it is at the moment of conception, while others say it is at birth. Herein lies the red herring of the entire issue. To adherents of each group, it appears there is a question to which neither has an answer: why are there no burials, religious services or cemeteries which contain aborted or miscarried babies? This being the case, we are by definition, discriminating against these persons. Now where are we, in all of the positions, whether they be pro choice or pro life arguments?

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