Contemplations Along The Way

So, in between a life of much too busy, I hap­pened upon a news cast which, for lack of a bet­ter word, decried a cer­tain Super­bowl ad by Focus on the Fam­ily (in coop­er­a­tion with CBS, appar­ently. At least, accord­ing to this news cast). The news­cast seemed to give the impres­sion that any­one who pro­motes an anti-abortion posi­tion (i.e. “pro-life”) does not: (1) trust and value women (specif­i­cally, moth­ers) and girls, (2) respect fam­ily, (3) respect the rights and auton­omy of women. A planned par­ent­hood ad was shown in which it is said that the super bowl was the “per­fect time to honor both sports and fam­ily” (this ad being a response). The news­cast goes on to dis­cuss whether the ‘other side’ should be allowed their own adver­tise­ment advo­cat­ing abor­tion. How­ever, this is irrel­e­vant given that first few min­utes of the news­cast are spent poi­son­ing the well (against the pro-life posi­tion), as the fal­lacy is called. At this point peo­ple aren’t going to care whether or not the oppo­site posi­tion is shown; they are going to care that pro-lifers hate, abuse and mis­trust women.

What I don’t under­stand is why abor­tion is being advo­cated if we’re respect­ing women, girls and fam­ily. I’m sure we’re also respect­ing chil­dren and babies; why not fetuses? Albeit I’m ask­ing from a per­spec­tive which believes in the sanc­tity of human life. Though regard­less, if we can’t answer the meta­phys­i­cal ques­tion what is a fetus? (which is what I hear con­stantly, espe­cially from virtue-ethicists) Then why are we allow­ing the poten­tial mur­der of devel­op­ing — invested with rights — human beings? Even if we don’t know whether or not a fetus is a human being, why are we tak­ing the risk?  The only way I’ve ever seen abor­tion jus­ti­fied also jus­ti­fies infan­ti­cide (and beyond), yet no one is will­ing to take the argu­ment that far. It just seems ter­ri­bly, ter­ri­bly inconsistent.

Any­way, seems typ­i­cal of the media.

Related posts:

1. on Abor­tion
2. Book Review: Three Approaches to Abortion