Originally Posted by
MintCat
I very much agree with Hyde on this one. It is not just the woman's body when a baby is involved, she has the responsibility to maintain the life of what she's created. Whether it was a roll in the hay, to complete incompetence, she has the moral obligation of having the child whether she likes it or not because that child is entitled to life just like everybody else, and to say otherwise is hypocrisy.
There's this bit here, and then obviously there's all of Hyde's "accountability" stuff too. And the only thing I can seriously ask you both is:
why? Why is she obligated? Maybe she
ought to, but why would she be morally obligated to do so? Is the potential life the same as an actual one? Where do
you draw the line on that one, if you value the potential of the fetus so highly?
When people say that "it's a woman's body, she has the right to choose" they are saying that there is nothing that obligates you to preserve a potential life, that you may choose to privilege your real lived existence over the potential consciousness of another. The decision to abort differs from murder of a day-old fetus because it is necessary to achieve the bodily autonomy these people are talking about.
There's a weird moralistic tone to a lot of the arguments centered on "responsibility" or "accountability." Hyde's "contract" is a weird embodiment of this, enshrining socially constructed ought's into some kind of pseudo-objective "real, tangible concept" that trumps the lived experience of people involved. The emphasis on education/ignorance is admirable, as it is true that abortion can be a pretty difficult process and so preventative measures are always good. However, the fixation on responsibility and the judgement against people he sees as flouting it makes me feel somewhat uneasy given the classist dimensions to reproductive education and contraceptive access. The reality is that even in an optimal world with perfect reproductive education and access, there would still be abortions. Are you going to moralize at those people or help them out?
Edit: And I should add, I see this as more of a public health discussion than anything else. The title question is "Should abortion be illegal?" and the answer to that question is a resounding "no".