And I’ve got to confess that I didn’t know Leavitt’s argument. I’d suspect the fall was more complex though than that those women are “mostly trash.” At current rates, over a third of U.S. women will have had an abortion by age 45. Since pregnant women are actually more likely to suffer domestic abuse, I imagine fewer unwanted pregnancies contributes to the fall in crime rates. And when people don’t feel desperate, I think they tend to be less likely to commit a crime… And when children are raised because they’re wanted rather than forced… etc.

If you limit abortion rights to those women who you think “deserve” an abortion because they actually meant to “keep [their] legs closed,” you’re basically using pregnancy as a punishment for having had sex. Very pro-children attitude, indeed!

My right to an abortion means my right to exert control over my body if something happens beyond my ability to prevent while still, you know, having a healthy life with my partner. (I completely reject, for the record, the idea that people shouldn’t have sex unless they want to become pregnant. I think most people in a committed relationship understand this. Birth control — in my opinion — is a moral good. It makes for less conflict in marriages when one partner wants sex and the other doesn’t want to be pregnant for the 10th time but does want the intimacy that comes with, and sustains, a marriage. It means spacing children in a way that allows us to better care and rear them.)

Woodroe: I’m not sure I understand your question. As for the right under the law, I’d love to know how you propose to punish those who attempt to take their own lives. As for some sort of “natural rights,” I don’t see how we can compell someone to live who does not want to do so (physically speaking, for example, short of locking them up in a straightjacket, which I can’t say I’m totally on board with unless the person is clearly not in his/her right mind). I can imagine situations in which a person might choose to terminate his/her life in the face of extreme pain, no cure, and doctors’ predictions of little time left. In those sort of cases — and as an Oregonion thinking of legislation we’ve tried to pass — I don’t see why the state should interfere in an individual, family decision. Of course safeguards must be in place (doctors, second/third/fourth opinions, family consent, etc.), but I do believe in leaving these sort of decisions to the private sphere.

As for the idea of murder in the case of abortion: Is it also murder to refuse someone a kidney? To refuse to donate blood when you know it’s needed somewhere else in the world to save a life? To pay taxes when we’re at war?

Apologies if this seems overly didactic, but I fail to see why women are being labeled as murderers for refusing to use their bodies to create a life, when many people on this forum are pro-war, pro-death penalty. Women are capable of making moral decisions based on their own understanding of their situation. Some women might choose an abortion because of financial situations, or because, if they’re going to have only one child at some point in their lives, they would rather wait to have that child until they’re able to care for it (in which case do you consider it “murder” that the later child wouldn’t be conceived/born later if the first pregnancy IS carried to term?).

What it boils down to, for pro-choicers, is that women deserve to make their own decisions as to how they use their reproductive capacities. I don’t see abortion as murder for the same reason that I don’t consider it murder when one person refuses to donate a kidney to another person in need of it. I respect the fact that women can make moral decisions as to what is best for their own mental, physical, and emotional health, as well as the well-being of their already existing families (ie, some women might choose not to risk a pregnancy if they have health problems, are already financially strapped, and already have children to care for).

Sorry this is inordinately long, but I don’t think abortion is such an easily black and white situation. Which is also why I don’t think the state should get involved in reproductive choices. Which, by the way, is why I think this Italian judge was entirely out of line.

William: Yes, I do find it rather offensive. Because you have no chance of ever finding yourself in the situation of being pregnant against your will, so how exactly can you judge for me what is mentally/emotionally/physically damaging? Also: Feminists for Life is not a fact based, reality based organization. They openly attempt to claim things that are simply not proven, such as a link between depression and abortion, a link between breast cancer and abortion (I don’t feel like doing the research for you, but if you’re interested, Feministe has excellent breakdowns of where more fact-based science has ruled on both issues. For an abortion link, there simply isn’t conclusive evidence in recent studies. For a depression link, you often have women blaming abortion for their depression when they have other issues that also contribute (e.g., drug use, past sexual abuse, etc.))

I don’t really want to get into another abortion debate here, as it’s rather counterproductive. My point was simply to provide a better counterexample than the one annonymous69 offered.