Reproductive Rights : Pro Choice And Pro-Life

Abortion is the expulsion of the products of conception before the embryo or fetus is viable. If anything happens before the 28th week of a pregnancy, it is known as an abortion. Most people do not get the whole picture about abortions and how they work and why they should be able to happen. If the pregnancy risked the mother’s life, would you still have the child? This is why abortions should be allowed because of serious situations like this. No other person can tell you what to do with your body so why would you tell someone to have a child they do not want? Think about it. If you really thought about the situation at hand, you would comprehend the other point of view we are trying to make. Just because certain people view abortions as something that is against humanity doesn’t mean that state laws should make it illegal.

The topic of women’s reproductive rights has become a major, controversial issue in today’s society. Grounded in a history of opposition for religious, political, and moral reasons, reproductive rights have only legally been around for a short period of history. Specifically, the landmark case Roe v. Wade was the major stride that this country took towards enforcing women’s reproductive rights. The ruling for this case determined that reproductive rights are legal rights women hold, inclusive of the right to have abortions. However, many laws today are made in an effort to prevent abortions, acting as “undue burdens” that aim to create obstacles for women who seek this type of medical procedure.

January 22, 1973 is a day that, in the eyes of many modern feminists, marked a giant step forward for women's rights. On this date the U.S. Supreme court announced its decision in Roe v. Wade, a verdict that set the precedent for all abortion cases that followed. For the first time, the court recognized that the constitutional right to privacy "is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy" (Roe v. Wade, 1973). It gave women agency in their reproductive choices; no longer were they forced to succumb to second rate citizenship as a housewife, a single mother, or a mother in poverty on account of pregnancy.

Out of the United State’s hefty population of about 320 million people, only about 68 percent of its citizens meet the voting age requirement. On the other hand, recent voting statistics indicate that only 146 million people are registered to vote, and even fewer of them make it to the polls. As a registered voter, it’s imperative to educate yourself through comprehensive research about the candidates, their views, and how they intend to run the country. Additionally, many sources confirmed my preconceived candidate choices by asserting Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders as the top contenders due to our similar ideals. However, further research shows that for some issues, such as raising the minimum wage, Clinton’s plan of action proved too disadvantageous for my liking. For this reason, coupled with many others,

Abortion is never an easy decision, but women have been making the choice for thousands of years. It has become a large dilemma since 1973, when the U.S. Supreme Court passed a law making the procedure legal, and an even larger controversial issue. The controversy is divided into “Pro-Choice” and Pro-Life” views. Pro-Choice supporters believe that the woman should have to choice whether to abort or not. Pro-Life supporters believe that it should be illegal to abort and preformed. However, there are many ways for this procedure to be performed. Abortion still remains today a controversial issue, by who should determine if it is the right thing to terminate a pregnancy or not and by how the procedure should be preformed.

Out of all modern social controversies, perhaps the most heated controversy is that of abortion. In today’s society you are either a Pro-life or a Pro-choice, there is not a middle ground. Pro-life are individuals who believe abortion is immoral and should be stop for the wellbeing of women and unborn babies. In contrast, the Pro-choice individuals do not necessarily promote abortion, they just believe women should be the ones to make decisions over their bodies and health. Although the two main sides of the abortion debate have concerns for human life, pro-life activists worries more about the fetus and morals, a clear difference from the pro-choice that worries more for the women and their rights. Based on the points I explored, the pro-choice arguments are stronger than pro-life arguments. Most of both groups arguments comes from peer-reviewed researches from well-known sources to support each individual concept. Effects on women,socio-politics, and fetus are some of the main point of conflicts between the pro-life and pro-choice advocates.

The restrictions and the debate that surrounds the issue of abortion has changed dramatically throughout the course of history and it continues to change until this very moment. All around the world and in every known society, women have used abortion to control their reproduction, regardless of it’s legality. Abortion used to be exercised freely in the United Sates, up Until all the states started to ban It and place a lot of restrictions on it. They stated that a woman can not abort except in extreme cases in which the mother’s life might be in danger. After the restrictions caused a lot of health issues and raised concerns on women’s health, The Government abolished all the restrictions. In this paper I will analyze and discuss three main positions on the issue of abortion. First, there are those who associate themselves with the title “pro-life”. These individuals are anti abortion, birth control, embryo research or anything that can control or cause any harm to the fetus. Second, there are those who at the other end of the spectrum who firmly believe that if a woman decides to abort, then it is her constitutional right to do so without any interference from the government. Third, are those who believe that if a woman is raped or her life is in danger, then abortion should be completely and solely up to the woman, but other than that, abortion should be illegal. This group of individuals are also for birth control and do not oppose educating

Abortion divides many Americans, it is one of the many controversial issue in today’s society. There are two major viewpoints that receive the most attention. One point of view is pro-life which is the belief women should not abort a human life. On the other side, is pro-choice which is the belief women may decide whether to carry a baby to full term or abort it. Abortion is known as the act of removing a human embryo or fetus from the uterus of a pregnant woman prior to the completion of the full term of pregnancy. There are very strong opinions for and against this issue, but no one can deny the vast gray area of abortion. Not everyone falls into the specific camp of pro-life or pro-choice. Many Americans find a comfort level in the gray area where there are restrictions, but abortion is not illegal. 1 A person’s stance on the situation is often determined by how they view the fetus: a part of the mother’s body or as a human being.

When you tell a toddler that they can’t have a cookie, even though they initially did not care about whether or not they could consume the cookie, suddenly they cannot stop thinking about that cookie they can no longer have. This is natural human response occurs in adults as well as children. So as you would expect, although 47% of women have declared themselves pro-choice (Saad "Americans Misjudge U.S. Abortion Views"), according to a study in 2011, only 1.7% of women aged 15–44 had an abortion (Jones and Jerman "Abortion Incidence and Service Availability In the United States, 2011"). These statistics show that even though most women who support the pro-choice movement are unlikely to have an abortion, they still believe that those women who choose to have an abortion should have the right to make a decision for her own body. A woman should have the right to make choices for her own body because separation of church and state prevents religion from being used as a way to limit women 's rights and no one, especially not men or the government, is as qualified as a medical professional when it comes to making medical recommendations and diagnostics. Even though there could be an argument that fetal personhood is subjective based on religion as to whether or not abortion can be considered murder, philosopher, Immanuel Kant can dispute that argument with his moral theory on what makes someone human.

The ethical dilemma regarding the “Pro-choice Vs. Pro-life can be answered by the Deontological ethical theory. The Deontological theory is also called the duty-based ethics. To explain, Deontological theory states that the righteous of an action or a deed is determined by the principal motivation of doing that particular act ("BBC - Ethics - Introduction to ethics: Duty-based ethics", n.d.). In addition, according to Immanuel Kant, the philosopher who introduced this belief, the justification of an individual’s every action should be based on one’s own reason and mental analysis rather than analyzing it based on traditions (Kurtz & Burr, 2016). Furthermore, Kant’s work titled, “Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Moral, explained that human beings

Abortion has been one of the biggest controversies of all time. Many people believe that women should get to decide what she would do with her body. The definition of abortion is; “The termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo prior to being capable of normal growth”. Abortion is one of the most controversial topics today. Although there are two sides of the debate pro-choice and pro life, arguments are mainly centered around the Roe v. Wade decision, women’s rights and state restrictive laws.

Women have a history of fighting for their rights. Women reached a huge stepping-stone when they were granted the right to vote in August 26th in 1920, by the passing of the 19th Amendment. However, there are still many issues unsolved and unspoken by many, such as women’s health issues. If we go back in history, when Margaret Sanger did the “unspeakable” in 1916 and opened the first U.S. birth-control clinic in Brooklyn, New York and that moment became chaos. Despite her courage, she was arrested ten days later and her clinic was shut down. However, Margaret Sanger did not give up on what she believed was her rights and reopened the clinic in 1923 in New York City. This was the first time a woman set out to find “justice” in women’s health. Margaret Sanger took this further and founded the American Birth Control League, which later on in 1942, becomes into what we know it by today, Planned Parenthood Federation of America. In 1960, the Food and Drug Administration approves birth control, for one of the methods women could use to avoid being/getting pregnant. Then in 1973, after the results of the Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade, women were granted the right to safe and legal abortions. Afterwards, in 2006 the Supreme Court bans the “partial-birth” abortion procedure, stating by Justice Anthony Kennedy, “The act expresses respect for the dignity of human life”. Finally, on June 27, 2016, the Supreme Court overturns the Texas law on abortion clinics, stating that it was

Abortion is a constitutional right of a woman in the United States and therefore should not be outlawed. Certain instances prove an abortion justified and blanket legislature against such useless, such as rape and incest and the health of the mother, and a simple fact that the practice would continue, only less safely and with more casualties. In 2012, 346,830 women were raped. According to medical reports, the incidence of pregnancy for one-time unprotected sexual intercourse is five percent. By applying the pregnancy rate to 346,830 female survivors, The Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network estimates that there were 17,342 pregnancies as a result of rape in 2012 (Rainn.org/statistics).

One day in class, the topic of abortion and pro-life arose, concerning the issue of whether a woman should possess the right to decide to keep or obliterate her baby’s life. I remember one girl candidly asserting her beliefs that this significant right belonged to the woman concerned and she should be able to make this choice because after all, it was her carrying the child and subsequently going to be accountable for such a substantial responsibility. Several other adolescents joined in agreeing with her point, some adding support, and others bringing up various examples. Listening to my classmates’ arguments, I could not help but disagree with several of their direct statements concerning this issue, leading me to question them if the power to keep or take away life from a powerless, defenseless human being unable to speak up for itself lies really in our hands, leading to the commencement of other arguments several taking my side while some still disagreed.

Feminists and woman’s rights organizations have made great strides within the past century and a half. There was Susan B. Anthony, a now highly respected woman’s rights activist, who was famously arrested and charged in 1872 for voting as a form of activism for women’s suffrage. Then women’s rights groups in the 1960s successfully gained equal pay by advocating to end workplace discrimination, leading to the enactment of The Equal Pay Act of 1963. While there are many women around the world who still need these women’s rights organizations, these organizations instead focus on achieving what they say are “women’s rights” in America. A large portion of their efforts goes to what they call Reproductive Rights which are access to “safe abortions” and birth control.