Comment on Is the right to abortion a "negative right" or a "positive right"?

Nibodhika@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

When it comes to abortion however, I do believe that it’s a tricky situation ethically. I’m pro-choice, but I say that with difficulty, because considering both sides it’s not an easy position and I see it as much more ethically complex than the issue of unnecessary animal exploitation. That’s because I think you can make the argument that either forcing a person to undergo pregnancy, or terminating the life of an (admittedly unconscious, undeveloped) fetus, are in both cases breaching a sentient (or would-be sentient) individual’s negative (protective) right.

I’m going to answer this, because if we remove the ethical dilemma you have everything else is meaningless.

The right to bodily autonomy is essentially absolute in most people’s moral compass, let’s give an example: imagine a fully grown adult was in a car accident, completely out of his control, he lost a lot of blood and his kidneys were damaged, you are a match to him, and he will 100% die unless you donate blood and one kidney, in that scenario: should the government be able to force you to donate your kidney and blood?

There is no question that the person will die if you don’t, there is no doubt the person is a human being, there’s no doubt you’ll survive the procedure and live a normal life afterwards, yet the vast majority of people would agree that the government should not be able to force you, because we recognise that a person’s right to their own body triumphs over other people’s right to that person’s body. Applying the same logic to a Fetus is straightforward, even if it was a person, it wouldn’t have a higher right to your body than you do, there’s no moral dilemma there just like there isn’t one in the kidney situation.

In the unlikely event that you think the government should in fact be able to force you to donate your kidney, it means you value life above bodily autonomy, the logical next step is that as long as it saves more than one life it’s okay for the government to kill you, e.g. if your heart and lungs are compatible with two people who will die without them, then it should kill you to get them because obviously saving two lives is better than saving one.

source
Sort:hotnewtop