Where to Start...

We might as well deconstruct this thing. What's one of the fundamental sticking points? Rights? Life? Money? (gasp!).

Well... I like to try and start where people can agree.

Unless they're just trying to be difficult, most people will agree that you can't kill another human for no good reason. It's only fair to state that the threshold for "good" and the definition of "reason" can change according to time and place. But if you look at the human experience as a whole, starting, whenever, let's say ten thousand years ago, life has been taken pretty seriously. Without getting into some of our more horrible historical idiocies (many of which continue in our day) murder is, and always has been judged a crime. You don't just kill someone because you feel like it. So, the premise is that murder is seen as wrong by every culture that I'm aware of. That's where I'd like to start. Personally, I'm not a fan of "morality by consensus," but I think it's the best we can do at this point in time.

Now, we don't get the same pan-human morality when it comes to killing animals, or plants. There is, undoubtably disagreement on that. And that's the point. Taken as an expiriment in statistics or whatever you want to call it, the inborn ban on killing other humans seems to be in a whole different realm of moral certitude than making hamburgers.

So it gets interesting when you observe that, throughout history, entire nations have adopted policies that seems to countermand that overarching directive against killing humans. Even more so, when it's not just a political power structure mainainting those policies, but that, in time, they come to be embraced by huge swathes of the citizens, regardless of what the government were to teach or preach after that point. You can basically fill in the blank for what policies I'm talking about here - there are endless examples. And every time something like this happens, we swear, as a country, or sometimes even as a world, that such and such a thing will never happen again.

With respect to the current stance on abortion, the conclusion that I've come to - and I think this is correct - is that we've been educated to draw the line of where a human life begins (and ends), wherever it happens to be convenient for the argument at hand. So, for example, if a pregnant woman and her unborn child are killed in a hit-and-run accident, the perpetrator is charged with two counts of manslaughter, or negligent homicide, or whatever the case may be. But, if that woman had been on her way to an abortion clinic at that very moment, she left home not only free from legal guilt of murder, but maybe even celebrated as a hero and congratulated for her bravery in the face of so many people who would trample her rights if they had half a chance.

So let's start the argument there. Obviously, I maintain that to request, procure or assist in an abortion is a terrible crime, because you are killing a person. Not only that, but a person who is totally free from guilt, who has never committed a crime, and who is utterly defenseless - a posture that, in most cases, elicits only the best of human sympathy. So where is the disconnect? What's the justification that makes it acceptable? Let's talk about that next time.

And, as I hope to always remind you, your baby would want to live.