The immorality of abortion is an argument often raised against abortion. It premises that for a woman to choose to have an abortion she is making an immoral choice because the fetus has a right to life. This right to life is premised on the fact that life begins at the moment of conception. Consequently, the right to life for the fetus is viewed as being more important than the mother’s right to her own body. This paper seeks to defend that abortion is immoral, only because the sanctity of life of the fetus is greater than the right to autonomy.
Ms Thomson argues in the book “A Defense of Abortion” that the often used argument against abortion; the immorality of it, is not truly justifiable. The issue as stated is that from conception a fetus can be deemed to be a person. In which case, morally, all persons have a right to life and thereto the infants right to life as it too is a person. The woman also has a right to choose what happens in her own body. However, the proponents of this argument strongly believe that the right to life supersedes the rights of the mother. To oppose this argument, she gives the example of the violinist. A famous violinist has a fatal kidney ailment and the only way he may be treated is by having his blood circulated through the kidneys of a healthy person. The process will clear his blood of the toxins it contains. The Society of Music Lovers search and find that only a single individual would be able to solve this problem. The said individual is you. Upon waking up you find yourself attached to the violinist. A doctor informs you that you cannot unplug yourself from the violinist as if you do the violinist will die. The process will be over in nine months and only then may you leave. Thomson explains that even though you have every right to be unplugged from the man, the person’s right to life outweighs your own rights and consequently you must stay there. Your individual response would be to look at this outrageous situation and claim that it makes little if no sense and unplug yourself. By unplugging yourself, haven’t you made the immoral choice by letting the violinist die? The author argues that the decision to abort is based on the woman's perceived right to her body. The argument is therefore, guided by the equality of the right to life.
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The decision not to commit abortion is led by a simple principle of wrong or right. Termination of a pregnancy is killing. Pro-life activists, therefore, argue that all life is equal. Moral intuition is therefore expected to apply in this case because the killing of a fetus is equivalent to the killing of an adult. According to the violinist's story, both circumstances require great sacrifice for nine months. The person giving the sacrifice could choose to be a hero and sacrifice their time and body. They may also choose to be the villain and only pursue self-interest.
This raises logic as the main grounds for objections. Objections to this would be what and who is allowed to decide the compelling reasons and how compelling would the reasons need to be to justify killing.The violinist and the pregnant woman are both trapped in a similar situation. They are in a situation that caught them by surprise and neither wants to participate. Additionally, the sacrifice that is expected of them comes at a price of freedom for 9 months. Neither of the two circumstances should be carried out under compulsion. Logic demands that heroism and sacrifice be voluntary deeds. Therefore, every person should remain in full control of their body.
The argument supporting pro-life stands. This is decided by the fact that in cases where the person does not desire to live, such as the suicidal or terminally ill desiring euthanasia, we are still unable to decide what would be justifiable reasons for killing. If we cannot, therefore, justify killing for these groups of persons then we cannot justify the killing of the fetus. My argument is not undermined by the objections above. The person seeking an abortion is not always forced to conceive. They voluntarily take part in activities that could result in pregnancy. They should, therefore, invest in prevention to avoid the resultant dilemma. In the case of rape or failed prevention, the woman is in a similar situation to the violinist's story. However, she can manage this too through alternative methods that do not result in killing.
In a nutshell, the tale of the violinist seeks to prove that a person’s body is autonomous and therefore the healthy person can unplug the violinist and let him die. However, the sanctity of life for the infant far outweighs the autonomy of the woman.
References
Thomson, J. J. (2003). A defense of abortion. Raisons politiques , (4), 3-24.
