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Birth control or legal murder (Click to select text)
Approximately 1.6 million murders are committed legally each year. With the exception of laws in few states, the mutilated bodies of the victims are thrown into dumpsters like pieces of rotten meat. While these victims lay waiting in the infested dumpsters to be hauled off to a landfill, the murderers are in their offices waiting for their next patient-the accomplice to the murder. This is the murder of an innocent child by a procedure known as abortion. Abortion stops the beating of an innocent child's heart. People must no longer ignore the scientific evidence that life begins at the moment of conception. People can no longer ignore the medical and emotional problems an abortion causes women. People must stop denying the facts about the procedure, and start hearing the silent screams of unborn children. The argument by the pro-abortion side is that the unborn child is not truly a child. Many people who are pro-abortion justify their beliefs through the concept that a fetus is only a blob of tissue until it is born, or the statement: life begins at birth. Abortion is not as simple as removing a "blob of tissue" (as the pro-abortion activists put it) from a woman's body. Abortion is the destruction, dismembering and killing of a human life--an unborn baby. "But it is scientific and medical fact based on experimental evidence, that a fetus is a living, growing, thriving human being, directing his or her own development" (Fetal Development). A fetus is not just a blob of tissue, rather a fetus is Latin for "offspring or young one." Human life begins at fertilization, therefore it is wrong to murder the innocent child in the womb. At a US Senate Judiciary Subcommittee meeting, most scientists said that life begins at conception or implantation of the embryo. No scientist at the meeting claimed that life begins at birth (Factbot). Professor Hymie Gordon of the Mayo clinic stated "' . . by all criteria of modern biology, life is present from the moment of conception'" (Fetal Development). In a 1963 Planned Parenthood pamphlet entitled 'Plan Your Children' it states "an abortion kills the life of a baby after it has begun. It is dangerous to your life and health" (Factbot). Even though abortion is dangerous to a woman's life, and it kills her baby, Planned Parenthood still offers it as a safe solution. This statement contradicts what most abortion clinics say. It is not possible for abortion to be offered to women as a safe solution, when it not only puts her life in danger, but it also kills her child. Not only has science proven that a fetus is truly a human, the simple facts also confer abortion kills the life of a human being. Life begins at conception because of the fact that life in the womb does not change at birth. There are no special procedures or changes that occur during birth to magically change the fetus to a baby. It is already a baby--a human life. "If a fertilized egg is not by itself a full human being it could not become one, because nothing is added to it," said Dr. Jerome Lejeune (Factbot). Most of all the development also takes place before one is born. Of the 45 generations of cell divisions before adulthood, 41 have taken place before a person is born (Factbot). Fertilization is just the beginning of a long process of growing and maturing. "Life in a continuum. From the moment the egg is fertilized a new life has begun. All of the genetic information is present to construct a unique individual. Gender, physical features, eye color have already been determined. The baby's heart begins beating regularly at 24 days. Babies in the womb hiccup, cry, play, and learn" (Factbot). Life continues from the day of fertilization until death. Nothing is added to a person during a lifetime. "'Conception confers life and makes that life one of a kind,'" said Dr. Landrum Shettles father of in vitro fertilization (Factbot). Abortion is wrong because it ends the life of a human being. The day of conception marks the beginning of a new human life. "'The zygote is the first cell of a new human being,'" said Keith L. Moore. There is no way that the fetus is just a "blob of (Factbot) tissue." Scientific and medical facts prove that the fetus is living. They prove that the fetus is a person, a human, and functions separate from its mother. Abortion No other person has the right to take away the unborn child's life, no matter what the situation is. One must not sacrifice anothers' life to make one's own life better. Many argue that most of the babies that are aborted are unwanted babies. They believe that they would be abused and neglected. This is why abortion is okay to them. They believe abortion is saving the child from abuse. Abortion, however, is the most severe case of child abuse. The procedures are painful to the child and intentionally end in death (except in cases where the procedure results in a living child. "About once a day, somewhere in the US, something goes wrong and an abortion results in a live baby" (Factbot)). The fetus is alive and has the capacity to feel the painful abortion procedure. The US Department of Health and Human Services reported that after nine weeks unborn babies can feel pain, yet 48 per cent of all abortions are done after this point ( Fetal Development). The baby can feel all the pain put on it by the painful procedures. The ultra sound shows the baby struggling to survive. Abortionist doctors such as Joseph Randall admit that seeing the abortion ". . . of the baby on the ultra sound bothered me more than anything else. The staff couldn't take it. Women were never allowed to see the ultra sound" (Factbot). Women should be allowed to see this. They should see the struggling of the life they are killing. An early abortion takes about five minutes and is performed six to fourteen weeks after a woman's last period. The procedure is called a suction aspiration. It is like a vacuum cleaner. "'A hollow plastic tube with a sharp edge is placed into the uterus. The suction tears the baby apart, and the sharp edge is used to scrape the placenta from the wall of the uterus. Everything is sucked out into a bottle'" (Whitney 94). The other common method is dilation and curettage. "'A curette, which is a loop-shaped steel knife, is inserted into the uterus, and the baby and the placenta are cut into pieces and scraped out. Both procedures are usually done under general anesthesia, so they're not painful for the mother. Of course we know the child feels pain'" (Whitney 94). Another method that is not performed much anymore is the saline injection; a long slow death process of poisoning the baby. The saline injection was developed in the Nazi Concentration Camps (Factbot) The most controversial form of abortion is the partial-birth abortion. Using an ultra sound the abortionist grabs the baby's legs with forceps and pulls them out into the birth canal. The abortionist then delivers the entire baby except for the head and continues by jamming scissors into the baby's skull. The scissors are then opened to enlarge the hole. The scissors are removed and a suction is inserted. The baby's brains are sucked out causing the skull to collapse. The dead baby is then removed ( Partial). It has been proven that babies can feel pain in these procedures. The fetus can feel pain because it is alive and growing like a human. Something that is not living cannot feel pain. If one crushes a pop can as the abortionist crushes a baby, the pop can feels no pain because it is not living. The baby feels pain because it is a living human being. Abortion is wrong because it deprives the baby of rights and happiness because of the suffering it must go through during the abortion. Women who have these painful abortions suffer emotional stress, and years after having the procedure they discover that they destroyed a human life. The women finally realize after many years of emotional stress the cause of it. "After 5-10 years 54 per cent of mothers choosing abortion had nightmares and 96 per cent felt they had taken a life" a from study by Dr. Anne Speckhard of the University of Minnesota. People need to listen to the women who have had abortions in the past to hear what they are really about. From them people can learn much more than a clinic can teach. After having an abortion, many women can tell a person the true facts--abortion is murder. "'Recent evidence indicates many women harbor strong guilt feelings long after their abortions. Guilt is one important cause of child battering and infanticide. Abortion lowers women's self-esteem and there are studies reporting a major loss of self-esteem in battering parents,'" said Dr. Philip Ney. There are places that give abortion counseling. However, many of these places do not give accurate information Accurate information is needed so women, and men, know that abortion will take away a human life. Ninety-five percent of women who had abortions said their Planned Parenthood counselors gave ". . . little or no biological information about the fetus which the abortion would destroy." Where 80 percent of women who have had abortions from Planned Parenthood said little or no health information was given to them about potential health risks (Factbot). Women need to be told the true facts of abortion. They need to see the fetal monitors. In many clinics they are not allowed to see the ultra sound. The doctors do not want a woman to see that the baby inside of her is alive. This is wrong because it not only denies the child the rights such as the right to be heard and seen, it denies women the truth. The truth must be told and shown. Shari Richard, an Ultrasonographer, said, "'In fact many women will come to me considering an abortion, and I have been personally told that I am to turn the monitor away from her view so that seeing her baby jump around on the screen does not influence her choice'" (Factbot). Abortion clinic staff members are taught how to sell abortions, told never to give alternatives, and told to tell the women how much trouble a baby is. Women are not told the facts. It is obvious from the ultra sound that the baby they are carrying is alive, and abortion kills the baby. If the clinic can clearly see that the baby is alive, the mother should also see. Abortion is described as a decision between a women and her doctor. Yet over 90 percent don't even see the doctor until he appears to abort their baby. This should not be the case. The clinics are hiding and withholding the true facts. Clinics need to shape-up and tell the truth to women: Abortion is wrong. Abortion is one of the key issues facing the human race today. This issue, like many, forces people to take sides against each other, and is one of the main factors people look at when voting. In a 1973 court ruling, known as Roe v. Wade, abortion became legal. Since this ruling the number of teen pregnancies has increased from 4.94 per cent in 1972 to 9.92 per cent in 1990. The number of teen abortions has doubled from 19.9 per thousand teenagers in 1972 to 43.8 per thousand teenagers in 1990 while the number of teen births has increased from 22.8 to 42.5 per thousand. The number of births to unmarried women has increased 7.3 per cent during the years from1972 to 1990 while the number of abortions increased 11.7 per cent during those years (Factbot). Abortion should no longer be legal. It is rapidly becoming a form of birth control. No longer must women worry about protection, if they should conceive a child, they can choose to take its life. One-third of all babies (Planned Parenthood) are aborted, which entitles the abortion industry to $500 million a year in income in the United States (Factbot). Abortion is the most frequent surgical operation in the US, and the leading cause of death in Minnesota (Factbot). Currently there are two million couples waiting for adoption in America, yet there are 30 abortions for every one adoption (Factbot). These statistics are true. Abortion needs to be stopped. There are arguments against the stopping of abortion. However, there are solutions. Many say abortion should be legal if the woman's life is in danger. Only three percent of all abortions are done for the mother's health, where 40 percent of women who have abortions will have more than one, and 50 per cent use it as their sole means of birth control (Factbot). As for the argument that women will do them illegally in the back alleys endangering their lives, 72 per cent said they would definitely not have sought an abortion if they were illegal, and death happens during a legal abortion too; maternal death rates for first trimester abortions are 61 per 100,000 cases (Factbot). Abortion is clearly the taking of a human life, an action that is wrong under the United States constitution. Women must stop being denied the facts and start being told the truth. The people of the US must start standing up for the rights of all people, born and unborn. "Abortion concerns not only the unborn child , it concerns every one of us." said former President of the United States Ronald Reagan (Factbot). Abortion concerns all of us. People need to start caring for the women who are hurting as a result of an abortion, an women who are struggling over the decision. People must tell them the facts, and work at making the conditions better for women, because 84 per cent would keep their babies under better circumstances (Factbot). America needs to open her ears to the screams of the 1.6 million babies murdered each year. It has been said that patients abort their child believing it is not alive until it is born, but they are wrong. "Physicians, biologists, and other scientists agree that conception marks the beginning of the life of a human being--a being that is alive and is a member of the human species" (D.C. Metro Pro-Life/Events Line, FactBot Database). So, if life begins at conception, then how can abortionists say that abortion is not murder? An abortion is the intentional killing of an innocent child. I say that is murder. But, it is often disputed that the fetus is not a living being until it is born. Now, if the fetus has all of these developing parts: a heart that beats, lungs, circulatory system, nervous system, then how can it NOT be called a living being? (D.C. Metro Pro-Life News/Events Line, FactBot Database). The controversy spreads throughout society, especially into the various religious denominations. Their main defense, The Holy Bible, has proved very effective in their conflict with pro-choice activists. Exodus 20:13, a very familiar verse which most every American has seen: "Thou shalt not kill"; and Jeremiah 1:5, "Before I made you in your mother's womb, I chose you. Before you were born, I set you apart for a special work..." are two Bible verses that pro-life activists are using to clearly state that abortion is wrong, and are two verses I firmly support (The Inspirational Study Bible). I know everyone does not know about God and what He has done for us, but He created every person and knows all about us before we are even born. And, like stated in Jeremiah 1:5, He has set us apart for a special work. If God knows the child in the womb and has a special work set aside for that child, why do abortionists feel they can "play" God? How can we let the 27.5 % of the pregnant women who have abortions each year know that they are, in fact, committing murder in the eyes of man and God? Think about it. In the past year, over 1,500,000 abortions have occurred--2,000 of which were partial-birth abortions (1995 Information Please (TM) Almanac, 844). And, in the five or ten minutes it has taken you to read this essay forty more children were born and thirty were aborted, three of which by a partial-birth abortion (Morgan, Christianity Today, 66). Somewhere amidst the abortion debates of the last quarter century, the real issue has been lost. The focus has become too religious for a country that has separated church and state. Therefore, I won't again argue the religious rights and wrongs of abortion. No answers can be derived until we focus on what the law and our citizens do value, because this is how laws are changed. American laws hold sacred the value of human rights....but when do a woman's end, and a child's begin? The saving grace, and ultimately, the great flaw of the Constitution is it's variability. Our founding fathers created it as an open door, to allow future generations to correct their mistakes, but also to make them, and to contradict themselves ethically and morally, on the whim of a generation. As a nation, we have always attempted a degree of morality in our laws, a shared belief in what is right and wrong that is enforced by the law. We assert that to harm another intentionally or otherwise is wrong and deserving of punishment. Our laws condemn murderers and shun drunk drivers, charging involuntary manslaughter in the case that he/she inadvertently kills another in an accident. There are severe repercussions for rapists and assault of another person. We also often assert that to harm oneself intentionally or in a way that could have been prevented by our own precaution is wrong. These examples include the seat-belt and helmet laws and the ingestion of harmful drugs. In keeping with our common and lawful morality that is careful to protect human life, the legality of abortion appears incongruent. An important question of this issue is of the point at which the life conceived inside a woman's body is considered a life, rather than her personal property. After conception, is there such a point that "the right to choose" can be exercised as an alternative to a condom or pill to prevent the said conception? Pro-choice supporters will continue to argue that a woman has a right to do with her body as she chooses including termination of an unwanted pregnancy. However, nature has decreed the bodies of the same women as indispensable protection for a life too vulnerable to survive outside of this sanctuary. Should this biological right create a parallel between the human gestation period and a 1-month trial run. Whether not abortion is morally acceptable, it is in many cases replacing conventional birth control and postponing women's decisions as to whether they desire a child. Factors such as inconvenience, financial stability, and bad relationships have become grounds for abortion. These feelings should be evaluated before a women begins to engage in the very act that promotes pro-creation. The necessary precautions can then be taken to prevent the otherwise inevitable, rather than trying to reverse a life already brought to existence. Abortion was legalized at a time when women burned their bras and demanded to be liberated, mainly from men. Somehow this movement shocked a generally conservative government into giving these women what they wanted: absolute freedom from men. Today, with their demands fulfilled, perhaps women in the government alike have taken a moment to look at their handiwork and wonder, "What have we done?" In Roman times, abortion and the destruction of unwanted children was permissible, but as out civilization has aged, it seems that such acts were no longer acceptable by rational human beings, so that in 1948, the U.S, along with most other nations in the world signed a declaration of the United Nations promising every human being the right to life. The World Medical Association meeting in Geneva at the same time, stated that the utmost respect for human life was to be from the moment of conception. This declaration was re-affirmed when the World Medical Association met in Oslo in 1970. Should we go backwards in our concern for the life of an individual human being? The unborn human is still a human life and not all the wishful thinking of those advocating repeal of abortion laws, can alter this. Those of us who would seek to protect the human who is still to small to cry aloud for it's own protection, have been accused of having a 19th Century approach to life in the last third of the 20th Century. But who in reality is using arguments of a bygone Century? It is an incontrovertible fact of biological science - Make no Mistake - that from the moment of conception, a new human life has been created. Only those who allow their emotional passion to override their knowledge, can deny it: only those who are irrational or ignorant of science, doubt that when a human sperm fertilizes a human ovum a new human being is created. A new human being who carries genes in its cells that make that human being uniquely different from any and other human being and yet, undeniably a member, as we all are, of the great human family. All the fetus needs to grow into a babe, a child, an old man, is time, nutrition and a suitable environment. It is determined at that very moment of conception whether the baby will be a boy or a girl; which of his parents he will look like; what blood type he will have. His whole heritage is forever fixed. Look at a human being 8 weeks after conception and you, yes every person here who can tell the difference between a man and a women, will be able to look at the fetus and tell me whether it is a baby boy or a girl. No, a fetus is not just another part of a women's body like an appendix or appendage. These appendages, these perfectly formed tiny feel belong to a 10 week developed baby, not to his or her mother. The fetus is distinct and different and has it's own heart beat. Do you know that the fetus' heart started beating just 18 days after a new life was created, beating before the mother even knew she was pregnant? By 3 months of pregnancy the developing baby is just small enough to be help in the palm of a man's hand but look closely at this 3 month old fetus. All his organs are formed and all his systems working. He swims, he grasps a pointer, he moves freely, he excretes urine. If you inject a sweet solution into the water around him, he will swallow because he likes the taste. Inject a bitter solution and he will quit swallowing because he does not like the taste. By 16 weeks it is obvious to all, except those who have eyes but deliberately do not see, that this is a young human being. Who chooses life or death for this little one because abortion is the taking of a human life? This fact is undeniable; however much of the members of the Women's Liberation Movement, the new Feminists, Dr. Henry Morgentaler or the American Medical Association President feel about it, does not alter the fact of the matter. An incontrovertible fact that cannot change as feelings change. If abortion is undeniably the taking of human life and yet sincere misguided people feel that it should be just a personal matter between a women and the doctor, there seems to be 2 choices open to them. (1) That they would believe that other acts of destruction of human beings such as infanticide and homicide should be of no concern of society and therefore, eliminate them from the criminal code. This I cannot believe is the thinking of the majority, although the tendency for doctors to respect the selfish desire of parents and not treat the newborn defective with a necessary lifesaving measure, is becoming increasingly more common. (2) But for the most part the only conclusion available to us is that those pressing for repeal of the abortion laws believe that there are different sorts of human beings and that by some arbitrary standard, they can place different values on the lives of there human beings. Of course, different human beings have different values to each of us as individuals: my mother means more to me than she does to you. But the right to life of all human beings is undeniable. I do not think this is negotiable. It is easy to be concerned with the welfare of those we know and love, while regarding everybody else as less important and somehow, less real. Most people would rather have heard of the death of thousands in the Honduras flooding disaster than of a serious accident involving a close friends or favourite relatives. That is why some are less disturbed by the slaughter of thousands of unborn children than by the personal problems of a pregnant women across the street. To rationalize this double standard, they pretend to themselves that the unborn child is a less valuable human life because it has no active social relationships and can therefore, be disposed of by others who have an arbitrary standard of their own for the value of a human life. I agree that the fetus has not developed it's full potential as a human being: but neither have any of us. Nor will any of us have reached that point: that point of perfect humanness, when we die. Because some of us may be less far along the path than others, does not give them the right to kill us. But those in favour of abortion, assume that they have that right, the standard being arbitrary. To say that a 10 week fetus has less value that a baby, means also that one must consider a baby of less value than a child, a young adult of less value than an old man. Surely one cannot believe this and still be civilized and human. A society that does not protect its individual members is on the lowest scale of civilized society. One of the measures of a more highly civilized society, is its attitude towards its weaker members. If the poor, the sick, the handicapped, the mentally ill, the helpless are not protected, the society is not as advanced as in a society where they are protected. The more mature the society is, the more there is respect for the dignity and rights of all human beings. The function of the laws of the society, is to protect and provide for all members so that no individual or group of individuals can be victimized by another individual group. Every member of American society has a vital stake in what value system is adopted towards its weak, aged, cripple, it's helpless inter-uterine members; a vital stake in who chooses life or death. What really is the truth about the lasting effect of an unwanted pregnancy on the psyche of a woman? Of course there is a difference of opinion among psychiatrists, but if unbiased, prospective studies are examined certain facts become obvious. (1) The health of women who are mentally ill before they become pregnant, is not improved by an abortion. In fact in 1970 an official statement of the World Health Organization said, "Serious mental disorders arise more often in women previous mental problems. Thus the very women for whom legal abortion is considered justified on psychiatric grounds, are the ones who have the highest risk of post-abortion psychiatric disorders. (2) Most women who are mentally healthy before unwanted pregnancy, despite a temporary emotional upset during the early weeks for the pregnancy, are mentally healthy after the pregnancy whether they were aborted or carried through to term. Do we accept killing a human being because of a temporary, emotional upset? All obstetricians and gynecologists know of many cases where the mother, be her single or married, has spoken of abortion early in the pregnancy and later on, has confessed her gratitude to those who have not performed the abortion. On the other hand, we have all seen women what have been troubled, consumed with guilt and development significant psychiatric problems following and because of abortion. I quote Ft. John L. Grady, Medical Examiner for Florida State Attorney's Office, "I believe it can be stated with certainty that abortion causes more deep-seated guilt, depression and mental illness than it ever cures". We used to hear a lot about the risk of suicide among those who threatened such action if their request for abortion was refused. How real is that risk - it is not - in fact, the suicide rate among pregnant women be they happy of unhappy about the pregnancy, is 1/4 of the rate among non-pregnant women in child-bearing years. An accurate 10 year study was done in my home country, England on unwed mothers who requested abortions and were refused. It was found that the suicide rate of this group was less than that average population. In Minnesota in a 15 year period, there were only 14 maternal suicides. 11 occurred after delivery. None were illegitimately pregnant. All were psychotic. In contrast, among the first 8 deaths of women aborted under the liberal law in the United Kingdom, 2 were from suicide directly following the abortion. Are there any medical indications for abortion? Is it valid for a doctor to co-operate in the choice for abortion? The late Dr. Guttmacher, one of the world leaders of the pro-abortion movement, has stated: "Almost any women can be brought through pregnancy alive unless she suffers from cancer or leukemia, in which case abortion is unlikely to prolong her life much less save it." As an opponent to abortion, I will readily agree, as will all those who are against abortion, that pregnancy resulting from rape or incest is a tragedy. Rape is a detestable crime, but no sane reasoning can place the slightest blame on the unborn child it might produce. Incest is, if that is possible, even worse, but for centuries, traditional Jewish law has clearly stated, that if a father sins against his daughter (incest) that does not justify a second crime - the abortion of the product of that sin. Such that 'two wrongs most certainly don't make a right'. The act of rape or incest is the major emotional physical trauma to the young girl or women. Should we compound the psychic scar already inflicted on the mother by her having the guilt of destroying a living being which was at least half her own?
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