Quote:
Originally Posted by peter12
So should we extend this way of thinking to the mentally handicapped or chronically ill?
|
Honestly, my libertarian streak says perhaps.
With mentally handicapped, it gets murkier, but if someone was to abort a child after finding through amniocentesis or other testing that it has severe mental/physical disabilities, is that wrong? Don't be so quick to say yes. That child will not have a full life, it may only live for a short painful time, that child will be totally dependent on its parents (until they die) and then society. That is a tremendous undertaking that a lot of people are simply not capable of. That doesn't make them evil people either.
As for chronically/terminally ill people, who are we to say they must stay alive until even the most modern technologies can no longer sustain them. Some American states are starting to recognize this.
When it comes to abortion, I'm somewhere in the middle, but I lean towards pro-choice. Abortion is rather ugly, but so is the consequence of bearing an unloved child, or a child of rape, or a child to unfit and unready parents. Women have a right to control their bodies... however, to me, once the baby gets to the point where it can sustain itself, the right to abort ends. Until it can sustain itself, it is not independent, it is part of the host.
Really, who are we to decide personal private acts like that. Unless the question is "Should Public dollars be used to pay for abortions?", or something like that, the public has no place in the disussion. SSM is a different societal debate because it asks for public recognition and to be attached to a preexisting social institution. The right to be homosexual is untouchable to me, they have every right to exist and thrive, largely because this is a personal private act.
Abortion is not public domain.