Thread: ABORTION: Where do you stand?

Damn, the thread ballooned to 4 pages already. I wish I could have inserted this comment in the OP...

Most discussions of abortion issues are completely plagued by people mixing up two separate issues and failing to realize it. Most of these discussions (although not all of course) could be avoided entirely if people just kept these issues straight. On the one hand, there is the issue of whether one thinks that abortion is morally wrong. On the other hand is the issue of the degree to which one thinks abortions should be legal. Let's make this clear: These are separate and dissociable issues! It would be perfectly logically consistent to be "pro choice" in the legal sense (and note that both commonly discussed positions are referring to the legal issue rather than the moral issue) despite personally viewing abortion as morally wrong; it simply means that you don't feel compelled to impose your own sense of morality on the rest of society. Not only is this perfectly consistent, but polling data indicate that a very large portion of people fall into this category. It's a fact that in recent years the "pro choice" position has become easily more common than the "pro life" position, despite that people remain significantly more divided on their moral opinions on the matter--presumably precisely because people have been moving into this category.

So please... argue way, but just be clear what it is you're arguing about.

Originally Posted by DuB

Damn, the thread ballooned to 4 pages already. I wish I could have inserted this comment in the OP...

Most discussions of abortion issues are completely plagued by people mixing up two separate issues and failing to realize it. Most of these discussions (although not all of course) could be avoided entirely if people just kept these issues straight. On the one hand, there is the issue of whether one thinks that abortion is morally wrong. On the other hand is the issue of the degree to which one thinks abortions should be legal. Let's make this clear: These are separate and dissociable issues! It would be perfectly logically consistent to be "pro choice" in the legal sense (and note that both commonly discussed positions are referring to the legal issue rather than the moral issue) despite personally viewing abortion as morally wrong; it simply means that you don't feel compelled to impose your own sense of morality on the rest of society. Not only is this perfectly consistent, but polling data indicate that a very large portion of people fall into this category. It's a fact that in recent years the "pro choice" position has become easily more common than the "pro life" position, despite that people remain significantly more divided on their moral opinions on the matter--presumably precisely because people have been moving into this category.

So please... argue way, but just be clear what it is you're arguing about.

I'm with you DuB. I don't care to debate the legal standpoint, but some people keep throwing it in there.