Is Your Birth Control Abortifacient? It might be.

For pro-life women like myself, the issue of abortion is a major moral issue. Killing a human child in the womb is a moral evil that we strongly oppose. But while the very thought of having a surgical abortion is abhorrent, many of us may not know that many of the birth control options on the drugstore shelves or available at our doctor's office and touted as purely contraceptive can also kill babies. There are pro-life women who are popping a pill every day, have an implant in their arm, or are using an IUD to prevent pregnancy and may be unknowingly aborting their own children.

Which forms of birth control have this risk? The short answer is that all hormonal contraceptives currently available and all IUDs have the potential to cause early abortions by preventing a newly formed embryo from implanting in the womb. The baby then starves to death. Because there's no implantation, the woman's body never knows it was pregnant. She will never get a positive pregnancy test. She won't miss her period. But her baby died all the same.

Now, that's a very serious issue! I would certainly want to know if I were causing my children to die, and I'm sure you do too. So why isn't this commonly known? Shouldn't women be informed about all the risks?

If you ask most ob-gyns or other doctors, they will tell you that hormonal contraceptives and IUDs are purely contraceptive. They will say they don't cause abortions, and cannot do so. However, there's a very clever trick that allows them to say this. They don't count the first few days of a baby's life. Let me explain.

The evidence from science clearly shows that human life begins at fertilization. When egg and sperm join, the resulting single-celled zygote is a separate and distinct individual with all the genetic material of a complete human organism and the ability to grow and develop his or her own body into adulthood. This child is already either male or female. The hair and eye color and many other traits are already set. The zygote needs only nutrients and the right environment to enable him or her to grow, just like any other child does.

During the trip down the fallopian tube to the uterus, the zygote divides several times until it forms a small ball of cells called a blastocyst. Again, this blastocyst is a distinct human individual. The scientific terms like zygote, embryo, and blastocyst are just stages of growth that all humans go through just like infant, toddler, adolescent, or adult.

The blastocyst is the stage that implants in the womb. This process of implantation occurs from 6-12 days after fertilization. Implantation cannot occur unless there is a living human child present. It is the blastocyst that initiates implantation. The mother's uterus has a thick, highly vascular layer of tissue called the endometrium on the inside surface and the tiny blastocyst must burrow into this tissue and attach to a blood vessel to begin forming a placenta in cooperation with the mother's tissues. The placenta is the organ that gives nutrients to the baby from the mother's blood supply and produces the hormones that will tell her body that a baby is present so that she does not shed the uterine lining through menstruation and instead begins making changes to support her growing child.

Because the baby must travel down the fallopian tube and attach to the uterine lining before getting any nutrients, those first few days of life are a little rough. The egg must be large and have stores of nutrients in order to feed the growing embryo during this time period. By the time the baby gets to the uterus, he needs food. The implantation process is a time crunch to get connected in time, before precious stores of nutrients run out. 

Those first few days of life, before implantation, that baby is alive. Yet back in 1965, pregnancy was redefined to begin at implantation rather than fertilization. So there are 6-12 days when a woman's body contains her living child's body and yet modern doctors don't count her as pregnant because the baby hasn't implanted in the womb yet.

That seems misleading, right? Why would we count pregnancy as beginning at implantation rather than the creation of the child? In times past, pregnancy was synonymous with the old-fashioned term "with child." It meant a woman was carrying a child inside her. So if she's not pregnant, you would think that means there's no baby inside her. That's the way people tend to think about it. Yet with this change of definition, people have been misled to believe that there's no baby inside her during those 6-12 days before implantation.

The really startling fact about this change of definition was that it was intended to mislead people about how birth control works. You see, hormonal birth control - specifically the combination birth control pill - had just been approved for use as a contraceptive in 1960. In the 1950's, female hormones were available to treat menstrual irregularities, but not for use as a contraceptive even though it was known to work as contraception. With the advent of an effective contraceptive pill which could potentially prevent implantation also, it was argued that counting pregnancy as beginning at implantation would be helpful in encouraging the use of the new birth control pill among women. 

Even Wikipedia (not exactly known for its honesty on controversial matters) admits that this was the motivation:

"In 1959, Dr. Bent Boving suggested that the word "conception" should be associated with the process of implantation instead of fertilization. Some thought was given to possible societal consequences, as evidenced by Boving's statement that "the social advantage of being considered to prevent conception rather than to destroy an established pregnancy could depend on something so simple as a prudent habit of speech." In 1965, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) adopted Boving’s definition: "conception is the implantation of a fertilized ovum.""

Wikipedia "Beginning of pregnancy controversy" 

In short, it was considered "prudent" to tell women that the birth control pill only prevents pregnancy and not that it can end the life of a child. In order to do that, they defined pregnancy to begin at implantation so as to hide the fact that human children who had not yet been implanted could be killed by this new "contraceptive." If pregnancy has not yet begun because the baby has not implanted, then there was no abortion. Thus, preventing implantation is not counted as abortion on a technicality, due to this faulty definition of pregnancy, despite the fact that it does kill a human individual.

The potential for ending young human lives with hormonal contraceptives has been known for decades and covered up with misleading definitions. There are several other problems with hormonal contraceptives as well, but this is the most serious moral issue. The hormones in birth control make the uterus inhospitable for a baby to implant and thus can cause an early abortion by preventing implantation.

 
In fairness, this is not the main mode of action. There are three mechanisms by which hormonal birth control works. The main mechanism is to prevent ovulation. If no egg is released, there can be no conception. This mechanism is truly contraceptive by preventing conception. The secondary mechanism is to thicken cervical secretion to impede sperm motility. If sperm do not reach the egg, then no conception occurs. However, the third mechanism works as a backup in case the first two mechanisms fail (which they sometimes do). The uterine lining is thinned by the hormones and becomes less able to care for an implanting child. A thin lining means less blood flow and difficulty in connecting to a blood vessel. If an egg is released and fertilized, then the new child will usually fail to implant in the womb. The baby then starves and dies. There is no way of knowing which is happening each month for any particular woman.

Here are some secular health sites that discuss the mechanisms for hormonal birth control. It is well-known that the uterine lining is affected and may prevent implantation. In fact, one of the main beneficial effects they tout for birth control pills is that they thin the uterine lining and produce lighter periods or even none at all in some women. A thinner uterine lining means a baby cannot implant and get the nutrients he needs.

 

"The hormones in the Pill can also sometimes affect the lining of the uterus, making it difficult for an egg to attach to the wall of the uterus."
Kids Health

"Birth control pills contain synthetic hormones that work to prevent pregnancy. These hormones can stop ovulation and make it more difficult for sperm to enter your uterus. They can also alter your uterine lining, which can reduce the likelihood of implantation."

Healthline

"The pill also thickens cervical mucus so the sperm cannot reach the egg. It makes the lining of the uterus unreceptive to the implantation of a fertilized egg."

HealthyWomen

The abortifacient potential of the combination birth control pill is shared by all hormonal contraceptives because they all contain the same progestin hormone that thins the uterine lining. This includes the regular birth control pill, the mini pill, the implant, the ring, the patch, the depo shot, and hormonal IUDs. All of these have the same mechanisms. They all contain progestin. They all thin the uterine lining. They can all prevent a human embryo from implanting in the womb.

It's not just hormonal birth control that can be abortifacient though. The copper IUD (Paraguard) can also prevent implantation and thus kill children. There are two types of IUDs - hormonal and copper. The hormonal type works just like other hormonal contraceptives. The copper one is often chosen by women specifically because it doesn't have the female hormones, with their sometimes harmful side effects. Yet the abortifacient side effect remains.

The copper in the copper IUD does kill sperm as the primary mechanism, but it also inflames the lining of the uterus and makes it inhospitable to an embryo, if fertilization were to occur. It does appear that preventing fertilization occurs more often, but killing an embryo can occur on occasion. Again, we don't know how often each mechanism is occurring in any particular woman.

Take a look at these scholarly sources that verify that all IUDs can be deadly to a human embryo:

"All IUDs induce a local inflammatory reaction that disturbs the functioning of the endometrium and myometrium and changes the microenvironment of the uterine cavity. Moreover, these effects alter signaling between uterus and ovary. The entire genital tract seems affected, at least in part because of luminal transmission of fluids accumulating in the uterine lumen. Copper or progesterone-releasing IUDs may attenuate or accentuate the inflammatory response, disturb the physiology of the gametes in the female genital tract, or destroy the viability of the embryos or endometrial receptivity to implantation." (Emphasis added)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8972502/

"All intrauterine devices (IUDs) that have been tested experimentally or clinically induce a local inflammatory reaction of the endometrium whose cellular and humoral components are expressed in the tissue and the fluid filling the uterine cavity. ... In the human, the entire genital tract appears affected due to luminal transmission of the noxa that accumulates in the uterine lumen. This affects the function and viability of gametes, decreasing the rate of fertilization and lowering the chances of survival of any embryo that may be formed, before it reaches the uterus." (Emphasis added)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17531610/

Note that you have to read the fine print carefully on this issue because a lot of resources will tell you that IUDs are not abortifacient because the primary mechanism is to prevent fertilization. While it's true that the primary mechanism prevents fertilization, an occasional abortion is ignored, yet is very much an important moral issue that should be considered. They skip over that part on purpose in order to persuade women to use such devices. If you look at the scientific literature, they do admit that IUDs, including the copper one, can kill an embryo if fertilization does occur.

If we believe every human life is sacred, then we need to show that in our actions. I could never take hormonal contraceptives or use IUDs because of the risk of killing my child. There are other ways to prevent pregnancy that don't have this moral stain.

Now, it should be mentioned here that there are sometimes other uses of female hormones besides contraceptive use. The birth control pill and other female hormones are sometimes used to regulate a woman's cycle, treat PCOS, raise abnormally low estrogen levels, or similar medical uses. This is distinct from using these hormone treatments as contraception. It might be the same pill in a lot of cases, but the reason for use is very different. 

Still, these women need to be aware of the risks of causing an early child death when they use these hormonal treatments in order to make an informed decision. If the hormone treatment is needed, they may want to use a barrier method as a backup, to be sure to prevent fertilization. Or they may want to look at other options for treatment. If they're past childbearing age or otherwise infertile, this may not even be an issue for some women. But the information should be available so that they understand the risks. There's also a difference in the morality of taking a necessary medical treatment that has a small risk of causing an abortion versus taking hormonal contraceptives for their contraceptive purpose and taking on that risk of abortion when there is no medical necessity for the woman. These factors take some careful moral reasoning and should not be ignored.

There is one more objection that some will use to argue for these birth control methods. It goes like this. A large fraction - estimated from 10-40% - of human embryos will die naturally even without these birth control methods. In fact, they will even claim that since these methods prevent so many fertilization events, the total number of babies dying goes down. Yet this does not justify occasionally killing human babies. 

When deaths occur naturally, that's tragic, but we aren't responsible for them. People dying of natural causes does not make it okay to kill them, either intentionally or through negligence. When we intervene to control fertility by choosing methods which can be deadly to some babies, we are morally responsible for the outcomes in ways that don't apply to natural deaths. 

As an analogy, suppose there was a nursing home that cared for the elderly, but occasionally gave some of them a lethal injection. Yet the rest of the time, they such a great job at giving the rest of the patients excellent care that, compared to other nursing homes, their death rate was a little lower overall. Would you consider that a good facility? I would hope not. Saving some lives with great care doesn't mean they can now kill a few people. They don't have that right.

Using these abortifacient birth control methods is a similar situation with the statistics. They might prevent some natural deaths by preventing the fertilization in the first place, but they also cause deaths. And because we intervened to use the method, we are responsible for the deaths we cause.

Now, for many of you, you didn't know. You weren't intending to kill any babies. And you're probably upset that no one has told you this before. It's not right that this information is kept from women with sneaky definitions designed to conceal the truth. 

But now you know. You're now responsible for what you know and what you do with that information.

Playing God with Human Reproduction: The Immorality of IVF Technologies

Humans are sacred. The creation of humans is sacred. Children are designed to be formed from the act of sexual intimacy between a husband and wife. When you take the conception of the child outside the marital union and involve third parties (doctors, technicians, etc), you are separating things that God designed and intended to be kept together - sex, marriage, and children. Creating a child in a lab is as much a deviation from God's plan as creating that child through fornication or rape. The child, of course, is just as valuable, regardless of the circumstances of their conception. But we should recognize that an injustice has been done to the child in these cases. 

Every child is made in the image of God and has natural rights. But we violate the natural law when we take conception outside the marital sexual union. It is unfair to children, it treats them as property, and it misuses the sexual design God gave us.

Killing Children

The most serious and obvious problem with in-vitro fertilization is that it commonly results in the intentional killing of human children. We see a lot of dehumanization of embryos created through IVF. They only get implanted if they're judged to be healthy enough. Clinics discard embryos that have genetic defects or "extra" embryos. If too many embryos implant, the babies are "reduced" (i.e. some are killed). These are human children we are talking about, and it is common practice to create more than can be implanted or carried and kill the rest. It's not okay to kill a few babies to get one to hold.

The IVF process also provides opportunity for eugenics and further dehumanization of children. If you want a boy, they can discard the girls for you, or vice versa. "Extra" embryos are commonly frozen for later use (notice the wording - they are there to be used), which increases their risk of damage or death. So we are placing human children in dangerous situations for the convenience of adults, so they can be used as their parents see fit.

Freezing embryos is a risky process. Not only can the freezing itself cause damage or death to a human child in this way, but there's no guarantee that the parents will be able to gestate the child later or that they will choose to, even if they can. People most often freeze embryos in case their current IVF cycle fails, but it if doesn't fail, they may or may not ever implant those frozen embryos. There are currently nearly a million frozen embryos in storage. The vast majority will likely never be given a chance to develop and be born. Many are donated to science, to be experimented on as if they were not living human beings. Others are discarded directly. Some are "donated" like unwanted clothes or trinkets at a thrift shop. At least they get to live. But what are we doing to their psyche when they find out their own parents gave them away?

Eugenics

There has also been talk of genetic tampering with embryos to fix genetic defects or imperfections. This is currently something science is capable of doing. This is not decades down the road. We can do this now, with technology available today. In the very near future we may have designer babies that have been genetically modified to the parents' specifications. You may be able to pick your child's height, eye and hair color, athletic ability, intelligence, and so on. It will certainly be possible to eliminate children with genetic conditions like Down syndrome, Turner syndrome, Celiac disease, Autism or even just nearsightedness or hearing impairment. After all, if children are products designed to fulfill the desires of adults, the customer should be happy with their purchase, right? Nobody wants to spend all that money and get a broken child. This is the mentality that IVF leads to, and we are already seeing it today.

We have to remember that children are people, not a collection of traits designed to make their parents feel good. Treating them as products to be manufactured to specification or discarded when they are not wanted is dehumanizing. It's not a coincidence that people tend to dehumanize human children when they play God in creating them. None of this is possible without IVF first being accepted and normalized. 

Destroying the Family

IVF also allows for any number of further deviations from God's design for families. The biological parents need not be the parents who intend to raise the child, for example. The biological parents may not have even met one another, much less had love or a marriage covenant. With sperm or egg donation, the child is being deprived of their biological heritage on purpose. Homosexual couples use IVF in order to create custom children since their unions are naturally infertile. Surrogacy depends on IVF. 

Sperm and egg donation is immoral. Children have a right to know their biological parents. It actively harms children when we deprive them of their biological heritage. They need to know such things as whether diabetes or heart disease or cancer runs in the family because that's important to their own health care. They need to know whether the person they're dating might be a lost sibling with the same donor father or mother. But more than that, they need to know where they came from and who their parents are. They deserve to be loved by the people who gave them their nose and eyes and whose smile they bear. They need to hear how they look like their grandma or how they have daddy's chin when they are growing up. This gives children a vital understanding of who they are that is missing when their biological parents have been stripped from them. Many adopted and donor-conceived children feel this loss as an ache inside them to know where they came from and who their biological parents are. It is a tragedy when a child loses their parents to accident or disease or abandonment. Why would we impose that tragedy on them on purpose? We don't have that right. 

Surrogacy 

Let's talk a little bit more about surrogacy as well. Surrogacy compounds the dehumanization of the child by also treating women as mere incubators for growing a child. It is bad for both women and children. Gestation is not just a biological process. It is highly emotional and spiritual as well. The bond between mother and child that develops during gestation is completely ignored in surrogacy. At birth, a baby already knows the mother's voice and heartbeat and needs her specifically. I have seen this for myself at the births of my own children who knew and were soothed by the sound of my voice, above the voices of others in the room, when they were mere minutes old. They knew me. They wanted me. No one else would do. Studies have shown that babies learn in the womb. There's a sacred bond between mother and child that develops during gestation. Yet with surrogacy, the child is taken from the only mother she knows at birth. This is highly traumatic for an infant. It has been termed "the primal wound." We should not be intentionally causing trauma to babies so that adults can obtain a child on demand.

There is also a very serious problem that no one wants to talk about when we give children to people who are not their natural parents. There's a certain connection and investment that happens with natural parents that tends to help prevent child abuse. While it is certainly possible for natural parents to abuse their children, it is actually fairly rare. Most abused children are abused by boyfriends or girlfriends of their parents, step-parents, more distant relatives, or unrelated caretakers, not their natural parents. In fact, the mere fact of biological relatedness is not necessarily protective if the child was not created in the natural way and raised by those biological parents. This is a major reason that we carefully screen foster parents and adoptive parents (or at least try to) to be sure they are capable of caring for the child properly and will not be abusive. We don't generally just hand children to strangers without any sort of vetting process. One major exception to this is with surrogacy.

As it stands now, almost anyone can buy a child through surrogacy, with no one checking to be sure they aren't neglecting or abusing that child. There have been a number of cases in recent years where children were being harmed after being obtained through surrogacy. In one notable case, a mentally handicapped man who was not married and was already caring for elderly parents alone had obtained several infants within a short period of time through surrogacy and could not care for them adequately, but little was done since he was their biological father. In another case, a disabled child who had been obtained via surrogate was being denied life-saving medical care by the biological parents who did not want to raise the child while the surrogate who carried him wanted him and was being denied the chance to save his life. There have been multiple cases of biological parents demanding that surrogates abort a disabled child before birth or abandoning them once they are born. Again, we see dehumanization because they're treating the child as a product to be manufactured to specification and they want a product that is not defective. It is also common practice to hand children over to homosexual couples or single parents through surrogacy and thus intentionally deprive them of a home with a mother and father.

There is also the problem of the rights of surrogates being trampled. Many are poor women in countries like India who carry a child for money. This womb-for-hire commerce has some serious problems. If a natural mother plans to give up her infant for adoption, she has every right to change her mind after the birth. Women often change their mind when their child is born because there is a strong emotional bonding that takes place during childbirth. Yet a surrogate is usually not given this option. She can be strongly bonded to the child, yet the child will be taken from her to be given to people she often does not know and cannot be sure will care for the child properly. In several cases, surrogates have been pressured to abort a child for developmental problems and refused and then are required to hand that child over to the same parents who wanted that child dead. In some cases, the intended parents refuse the child due to developmental problems and leave an impoverished surrogate with a child she can't afford to raise, but yet she hates to give up to a foster system. If a surrogate accidentally becomes pregnant with her own child during the surrogacy process, this may not be realized or, if it is, she may be forced to hand her own biological child over to the commissioning parents until the legal issues are worked out.

Clinic Mistakes

There are so many serious problems with surrogacy and other uses of IVF technology. Even when a married couple intends to produce and gestate their own biological child and they don't kill extra embryos, mistakes can occur and the wrong egg or sperm can be used. What do you do when your wife is carrying another man's child because of a mistake like this? You don't have this problem with the natural delivery method.

Health Problems

There is also the issue of health concerns for children. Babies produced by IVF also have a higher rate of embryo death and a higher rate of birth defects or other health problems. More than half of IVF cycles fail. So they're creating and implanting babies that we don't know can be carried successfully. They may be implanting those babies in a womb that cannot care for them. Of course, babies can also die from natural causes when IVF is not used. Some couples have repeated miscarriages, for example. But that's not something we humans are causing. It's a natural outcome. When we take it on ourselves to control the process of conception and implantation, we also own the outcomes in ways that don't apply to natural processes.

Financial Concerns

In addition to the above concerns, there is the issue of money. Not only is IVF extremely expensive (and therefore difficult to justify given the number of existing children who need homes), but that money is given to doctors and reproductive clinics who are discarding embryos, sending them to be experimented on, or freezing them until some future date that may never come. Even if a couple does not discard their extra embryos and does not freeze their children for a later date, they're still funding an entity that does. The money they pay for their "ethical" IVF is keeping the doors open for clinics that mistreat other embryos.

The Root of the Problem

The problems of IVF go beyond these more obvious issues into the depths of what sex and procreation mean. I don't think God ever intended for us to separate the creation of children from the marital act and involve third parties like doctors and technicians. I understand that it is a natural and good desire to want your own biological children, but good desires cannot be rightfully fulfilled outside God's rightful means. It's a good desire to want sex, but we have to fulfill that good desire only in marriage because that is the proper way. It is the same with bearing children. We have to stick to God's way. The tragedy of infertility does not justify taking matters into our own hands or inflicting harm on children. Children are a gift from God, not an entitlement. 

Sex and Reproduction are Sacred

Sex, marriage, and childbearing are all an interconnected web by God's design. They are sacred because they mean something more than just the sheer biological facts. Sex isn't just a pleasurable rubbing together of body parts as our society claims. It has meaning. A sacred meaning. Similarly, the creation of a new life is not just a matter of two cells merging to start a new life. It has sacred meaning. We tamper with that at our peril.

Part of the sacredness of procreation is the mystery and symbolism that God gave us in sex itself and how it is meant to bring husband and wife together to become one flesh and through that union to create new life. The union of husband and wife symbolizes Christ and the church, as we know, but I think we often fail to understand how deep the imagery goes. During the marital act, the husband gives, emptying himself into the wife, and she takes what is given and gives back the fruit nine months later. Similarly, Christ emptied Himself, pouring out His life on the cross. We, the church, take what is given, and bear fruit - not only in our own lives, but in others we bring to Christ. Our biology means something much deeper than we realize. Christ creates new life that will last forever by unity with us just as we create new lives that will last forever through our marital unity.

When we create children in a petri dish, without sex and that union between husband and wife, we are destroying the pattern God gave us which points to Him. We are taking that which is sacred and treating it as if we could re-design and re-purpose it for our own ends, in violation of the Creator. We are treating the physical as the only reality, and ignoring what it means.

The Tragic Results of Violating God's Plan

It's no surprise that when start playing God with our reproduction, lots of evil results. That's why we have hundreds of thousands of frozen embryos - human children - stored in freezers around the country with little hope of ever having a life. That's why we have embryos discarded as "extras" with no regard for their intrinsic value as human beings who bear the image of God. That's why doctors can so casually suggest a "reduction" if too many embryos implant. That's why it's such a mess when doctors inadvertently use the wrong sperm or mix donor eggs with donor sperm and create a child with biological parents who have never even met and who will not be raising the child together. That's why we have children born from donor sperm who will always wrestle with the heart-rending question of "Why did daddy not want to know me?" That's why we have people commissioning a child through surrogacy who think nothing of aborting or abandoning their biological child when he's "defective."

Ignoring the sacredness of reproduction means denying the sacredness of our humanity and treating the physical as all there is. When we deny that we are more than physical beings and think we can manipulate human creation to our own ends, we deny the intrinsic value of ourselves and our children. This leads to many abuses, but most commonly the children are the ones most harmed. Keeping the God-given connections between sex, marriage, and children means valuing humans as made in the image of God and therefore designed to be created according to God's plan. The mentality of IVF is that humans are not sacred, but only flesh that can be manipulated and repurposed as we desire.

These many serious problems I have outlined arise, not as occasional, unrelated bugs in the process, but as intrinsic features because of the wrong worldview. There are systemic problems with IVF technologies because the underlying worldview is false. The fruit of IVF is rotten because the tree is rotten. 

Top 5 Reasons NOT to Use Hormonal Birth Control

Hormonal birth control is extremely common today and many people, including many Christians, take it without a second thought. But there are some important reasons to avoid hormonal contraceptives. Here are my top 5 reasons not to take hormonal contraceptives, in reverse order.

#5 - Hormonal birth control can produce mood swings and even depression in some women. We all know our female hormones can make us moody at certain times of the month. There's a reason we say we're "hormonal." The hormones in birth control can do the same thing. Many women report an increase in feelings of being down, depressed, anxious, or angry while on hormonal birth control. Some women do not seem to be affected in this way, but some are. It can be especially important that women with existing depression or anxiety watch out for a increase in symptoms if they take hormonal contraceptives.


#4 - Hormones in birth control can kill a woman's libido. They have even been known to affect her attraction to her husband. A woman's normal cycle is intended to have a period each month where her libido naturally rises and she desires sex more strongly. Hormonal birth control prevents her natural cycle and this natural increase in desire. The estrogen and progestin in hormonal birth control also lowers testosterone production. While many people believe testosterone is a male hormone, even women produce some. In women, testosterone is one of the major factors that controls the sex drive. Without enough testosterone production, a woman's libido can drop greatly. In some women, it can take away any desire for sex and greatly reduce pleasure during sex. A lot of women go on birth control before becoming sexually active and thus don't have a normal baseline for comparison, so they may think they don't like sex when in fact birth control is destroying their sexual desire and enjoyment.


#3 - Hormonal birth control carries a risk of blood clots. This can be especially dangerous for those with a family or personal history of blood clots, high blood pressure, or various other circulatory problems. The early birth control pills were solely estrogen and killed a number of women due to blood clots. The more recent combination pills, patches, shots, and rings have much lower doses of estrogen, but there is still a risk of blood clots, especially for those with other risk factors.


#2 - Hormonal birth control increases the risk of some female reproductive cancers. This link is especially strong for breast cancer. There is some indication that ovarian and endometrial cancers may have a lower risk while taking hormonal birth control. However, breast cancer risk may increase up to 20% while taking hormonal birth control and for 10 years after stopping. Not only does the pill increase the risk of breast cancer directly, but delaying childbearing can also increase the risk of reproductive cancers. Having children young and breastfeeding them protects against breast cancer.


#1 - Hormonal birth control can be abortifacient. The hormones in birth control make the uterus inhospitable for a baby to implant and thus can cause an early abortion by preventing implantation. In fairness, this is not the main mode of action. There are three mechanisms by which hormonal birth control works. The main mechanism is to prevent ovulation. If no egg is released, there can be no conception. This mechanism is truly contraceptive by preventing conception. The secondary mechanism is to thicken cervical secretion to impede sperm motility. If sperm do not reach the egg, then no conception occurs. However, the third mechanism works as a backup in case the first two mechanisms fail. If an egg is released and fertilized, then the new child will fail to implant in the womb. The baby then starves and dies. There is no way of knowing which is happening each month for any particular woman.

Because of the potential for causing a human child to die, hormonal birth control is not only a health concern, but a moral concern as well. The birth control advocates will tell you that hormonal contraception does not interrupt a pregnancy, but what they don't tell you is that the definition of pregnancy was changed a few decades ago to begin at implantation rather than fertilization so that they could claim hormonal birth control does not cause an abortion. Yet human life begins at fertilization, not implantation. Ending that life is a very serious moral issue.

If we believe every human life is sacred, then we need to show that in our actions. I could not take hormonal contraceptives because of the risk of killing my child. There are other ways to prevent pregnancy, if you must. There are many good reasons to say no to hormonal contraceptives.

What Does the Bible Have to Say About When Life Begins?

Biologically, every human being starts life at conception. That's just scientific fact. But some Christians who want to support abortion try to pretend they have Biblical reasons for questioning when a baby becomes a person and often refer to "ensoulment," when the soul enters the body, as being the point at which it would be wrong to take a life. Some point to the Bible's mention of the "breath of life" when Adam was created as proof that until a baby takes a breath, he has no soul and can be killed. Others think ensoulment happens at implantation, viability, when the heart begins to beat, or at some other point during embryonic development.

Of course, the idea that there can be a biological human without a soul is complete imagination. Nowhere does the Bible indicate or even hint of this. Nor does it follow that even if there were no soul, that humans would be allowed to kill such a soulless human. We were given dominion over the animals and plants, to use them for our good and even to kill them, but not over other humans - soulless or not. Thus, even if the soul were given at some point after conception, we have no authority to end that life merely because it has no soul yet.

It also makes no sense to argue that not knowing for sure if a human embryo has a soul means killing them would be permitted. It would be wrong to shoot a gun into the bushes or tear down a building if there could be a person inside. The Bible gives penalties for even the accidental killing of another person. It is our responsibility to ensure that we do not kill other humans, and thus if there could be a person there, we must err on the side of caution. If we are unsure of whether or not a woman's womb contains a human person, we must refuse to abort. The doubt does not give justification to proceed with an abortion. It requires just the opposite.

The breath of life argument is similarly flawed. The first man, Adam, being created from dust and then being turned into a living man by the breath of God is how humankind first began.

Genesis 2:7 And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

However, the claim that one doesn't have a soul or personhood until the first breath does not follow from this verse. Not even close. For one thing, this isn't how people usually come to exist. This was a one-time act of creation. Adam was never in a mother's womb at all, nor was he a zygote or fetus. But in addition to that, this verse isn't talking about taking a first breath of air. The breath of life refers to the breath of God, not air. And the verse says a man newly created is a living soul. It doesn't say Adam became living, then became a soul. It sure sounds like a living human is a soul, with no point at which he is living, but not a soul. So if there's anything to learn from the creation of Adam, it can't be that abortion is okay until the first breath.

The Bible also has many things to say about the identity of the child in the womb. For example:

Jeremiah 1:5 Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.

Psalm 139:13-16  For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother's womb. I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them. 

The Bible indicates in multiple places that humans exist as persons in the womb. God knows them. They're people. It even says that John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit in the womb and leaped for joy when Mary, pregnant with Jesus, arrived to greet his mother Elizabeth because he recognized the Savior while he was still in the womb.

But that's not all. The Bible also indicates that conception is the defining point at which the existence of a new person begins. For example, Psalm 51:5 says "Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me." Here David says, through inspiration of the Holy Spirit, that it was him that was conceived, not some biological entity that became him.

This sort of assumption that it is a person that is conceived is all through scripture. But even more direct is what the Bible says about Jesus' conception.

Luke 1:31 And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS.

Matthew 1:20 But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.

Jesus wasn't incarnated by entering a fetus in Mary's womb. He was incarnated by being conceived. That's what it says. God taking on flesh and becoming a man had to start at conception because that's where humans begin. Jesus was a zygote. The Creator of all the universe became a zygote. Let that sink in for a minute. Then try to tell me you can kill a human zygote or embryo because it's not a person. You can't.

Of course, the question of whether abortion should be legal is not solved by referencing the Bible. Not all wrong things should be illegal. To answer the question of abortion's legality we must look at what government's purpose is and the biological facts of human reproduction.

But the Bible does tell us about the morality of abortion. It is immoral to kill innocent people. A child in the womb, from conception onward, is an innocent person. Therefore, abortion is immoral. It's really as simple as that.

Abortion is Not Compassionate

In discussing abortion with someone who is pro-choice, it doesn’t take long to realize that they consider supporting abortion to be a compassionate choice. They know that a lot of women have very bad situations and aren’t prepared to take care of a baby. So in sympathizing with these women, they want to offer them the choice to abort.

But abortion is not really compassionate. It’s false compassion that is more about making people feel better, not addressing the underlying issues in their lives and really helping them.

Here’s a hypothetical scenario.

A woman has a boyfriend who has a minimum wage job, drinks to excess sometimes, and hates kids. She wants to get married and have a family someday, but the current guy isn't husband and father material, nor is he in a position to take care of a family. But he's what she has for now and she doesn't really expect it to be permanent. Or maybe she's hoping he'll come to his senses and see what a perfect match they are and marry her. They live together and have a 2-year lease. They share phone and utility bills. She's finishing up a degree and working nights. All the sudden, she finds out she's pregnant.

Of course she's panicked because she was definitely not planning on this. Her boyfriend is mad when he finds out and tells her to get rid of the baby. She knows she can't afford a baby now and couldn't afford to pay the rent and other bills by herself if her boyfriend leaves. She doesn't want to be a single mother, but her boyfriend is showing no interest in marrying her or raising a child. She feels trapped and scared. "If only there were no baby," she thinks. If only there was a quick fix, an undo button. A baby will ruin everything.

So she considers abortion.

This is a VERY common scenario. Lots of women find themselves in this very situation or one very similar. They’re pregnant at a time when they truly are not prepared and having a child would be tremendously problematic. And it's very sad.

It’s also totally avoidable.

While I am all for helping this woman learn about adoption possibilities or find financial help and childcare services so that she can continue to work and go to school and keep her child, wouldn't it be better if she had avoided the situation all together?

The thing is, this woman chose to get herself into this situation. She chose a boyfriend who wouldn’t commit to marriage and she chose to have sex, even though she knew that she was in no position to take care of a baby. There is no quick fix or undo button in real life. Actions have consequences, and sometimes you have to live with them. Killing an innocent unborn child to take away the consequences of your own bad choices is not the right answer.

Wouldn’t it be better if she had chosen another path – one of abstinence and logical choices? Why can’t we advocate that women avoid sex when they know they aren’t in a position to have a baby. After all, conceiving a child is a very real possibility whenever you have sex - even if you use contraception! That’s just a fact of life. And it’s better to face the facts than to live in denial, only to have a rude awakening when the unexpected happens and you’re totally unprepared and terrified.

What we’re currently doing, as a society, is encouraging women to live in denial about the consequences of sex. And then we wonder why they end up in such bad situations where they feel trapped and scared and are desperate for someone to tell them they’ll make it all go away. It’s not a much of a choice when they feel so desperate and everything is screaming at them to take the easy road and kill their baby.

I want women to have the information to make good choices and avoid getting into bad situations in the first place. Advocating abortion as a quick fix is not only wrong, but it keeps us from finding a real solution to this kind of difficult situation.

The truth is that it’s not okay to kill a baby in order to make a woman’s life better or easier. It’s not okay to make bad choices that lead to the creation of a child at a time when a pregnancy would be catastrophic and then get out of the consequences by ending an innocent life. If you’re going to engage in activities that make a baby, you have to live with those choices. Making the baby pay the price for her parents’ bad decisions isn’t fair or right.

Offering abortion as a “solution” to women like this is not only wrong, but it’s not helping them either. It’s enabling their bad decisions. It’s preying on their fears and hardships. And it’s killing their children. Abortion is NOT compassionate.

Note: This post is a reblog from my other blog, The Rational Abolitionist.

Should We Avoid "Controversial" Topics?

Have you ever had a conversation with someone about some topic, maybe a Bible doctrine or a political topic or a moral position, and they dismissed your argument by saying that the topic is “controversial?” I have. Lots of times. Apparently, pointing out that something is controversial is supposed to mean that nobody knows the answer, or maybe that there isn’t a right answer at all, and thus everyone should just be quiet about it. If they can’t be quiet, they should at least avoiding taking a strong stance on it one way or the other. After all, it’s controversial.

But is it really true that controversial things don’t have a clear right answer? Not necessarily.

Controversy: strong disagreement about something among a large group of people

Controversial: relating to or causing much discussion, disagreement, or argument

According to these definitions, a controversial topic is simply one on which many people disagree. In some cases, this may be due to the topic being merely opinion. If you are asking which ice cream flavor is the best or which sports car is the best or which season of the year is the best, these are all matters of opinion and there is no right answer. There is no absolute truth in these cases because the inherent question is about what people prefer. Different people prefer different things.

But in spite of the fact that there is a lot of disagreement on the best ice cream flavor (vanilla, in case anyone was wondering), we don’t usually try to shut people up when they express an opinion, even if it differs from ours. And we usually don’t call these opinions “controversial.” In fact, I have never heard anyone refer to ice cream flavors as a controversial issue. (What a conversation that would be. “I like vanilla best.” “Oh, don’t talk about ice cream flavors because they’re so controversial.”)

When people talk about something being “controversial” they usually do it when it’s not just a matter of opinion, but they want to believe it is. They want to use the disagreement out there to avoid taking a side on an important topic.

Sometimes they don’t want to take a side because it’s unpopular. If they take a side, the people on the other side might not like them.

Sometimes they don’t want to have to put the effort into studying the issue. Laziness makes them avoid finding out which position is the correct one.

Sometimes they don’t like the implications involved in taking a position. What if believing one way or the other means they have to change something about their life? Perhaps give up something they enjoy or do something they don't like?

Sometimes they have the mistaken idea that a “controversial” topic doesn’t have a correct answer and thus neither side should be dogmatic.

Some see taking a side on something that evokes a lot of disagreement as somehow “divisive” or “polarizing” and therefore bad.

Whatever the reason, these people want to stay “neutral” and not take a side. And, often, they don’t want to hear anyone else’s position on the matter either.

The problem is, some things that are labelled “controversial” are very important and have distinct right and wrong sides. Just because a lot of people disagree about it doesn’t mean there is no right answer.

Let me give an example. In the years preceding the Civil War in the US, slavery was a very controversial issue. Roughly half of the country believed it was acceptable while the other half believed it was not. It doesn’t get a lot more “controversial” than that. Not only were there radically differing positions, but they divided communities, families, and ultimately, a country. People took up arms to kill each other over this issue. That’s a very heated controversy indeed. But surely no one today would claim that the issue of slavery should have been ignored or that there was no correct side. Slavery was one of the most systematic violations of human rights in the history of this country – a black mark against us that we may never live down. There most certainly was a right side. Those who stood for abolishing slavery were right while those who wanted it to remain were in the wrong. Broad disagreement does not mean that neither side is correct. It may mean that many are wrong, but it does not mean that no one is right.

In today’s world, there are many issues that receive the “controversial” label that are actually issues of great importance and should not be ignored. One of the most important of these is abortion. While legal abortion is most definitely “controversial” – with many people on both sides of the issues who hold their position ardently and vocally – this issue does have right and wrong sides. There is no right to kill an innocent human child in the womb, regardless of the many who believe strongly that there is. Strong belief does not make something so.

Of course, there are many other issues that also evoke strong disagreement and yet contain a right and wrong side. Political issues, theology, morality, religions in general – these things are among the most hotly contested areas of human thought. Yet to suppose that there is no right answer in these areas is to greatly misunderstand the nature of man and the nature of truth. Having disagreement on these topics means just that – disagreement – and nothing more. It says absolutely nothing about the truth in such cases.

So, while there's nothing wrong with noting that something is controversial, one cannot logically conclude that controversial topics have no right answer or that they should be avoided. Sometimes controversial things are just issues on which a lot of people are confused. But how many people believe something has nothing to do with whether or not it is true. Controversy may prove that many people are wrong about a topic, but it doesn’t prove that no one is right.

Next time someone dismisses your position as being "controversial," as if that means that you can't be right or should not take a stand on it, point out that controversy just means people disagree. It doesn't have anything to do with whether or not one side is right or whether that issue is important or whether or not people should take a stand for it. Controversial topics are not inherently bad to talk about and we need to reject the idea that they are. After all, we need more people to take a stand for what's right on important issues, not more people silenced.

My New Blog

My husband and I recently started a new blog to discuss abortion from a logical and scientific viewpoint. We call it The Rational Abolitionist. You can read our About page for more about the name and our vision for the blog.

We have several posts already up and we still have so many ideas. Our limitation is only on time to write them up. So stay tuned for lots more in the coming weeks and months. We hope to eventually make this a comprehensive collection of pro-life arguments. We also give commentary on current events related to abortion.

Here's our first few posts:

The Right to Life Argument Based on Science and Logic
The Need for a Secular Argument Against Abortion
15,000 Aborted Babies Incinerated to Heat Hospitals in the UK
Should Abortion be Illegal Simply because the Bible says it is Wrong?
Texas Abortion Regulations Upheld in Federal Appeals Court
Mississippi to Ban Abortions After 20 Weeks

That should give you an idea of what we're writing about. There's going to be a lot more. We plan to talk in-depth about personhood, the science of pregnancy and birth, embryonic development, why fetuses are not parasites, consent to pregnancy, inalienable rights, bodily autonomy, and many other issues related to abortion. So bookmark the blog or follow us to keep up with our pro-life arguments.

What is Personhood?

What is humanity? What is personhood? What makes a human being so uniquely a human being? Are all human beings equal? These are questions we must answer.

Not answering these questions – as individuals and as a society – means we have no way to apply the law equally to all human beings. If we don’t know who is a human, how do we know who has human rights? If we don’t know what a person is, how can we tell if we are mistreating one? There has to be a conclusive answer and we have to find it. It’s not good enough to say that no one knows and leave it at that. If it’s really true that no one knows, then we are guilty of criminal ignorance because we have not answered this extremely important question. How can we even pretend to have a just law or any measure of equality if we can’t even determine who it is that is supposed to be equal?

Of course, that doesn’t mean that it’s an easy question to answer. Defining personhood is difficult. But not because it’s too complicated or esoteric or unanswerable. It’s difficult because we don’t like the obvious answer. We want to make it more complicated so we can avoid the question or relegate it to the realm of unanswerable mysteries. The implications of the obvious answer are as profound as they are unsettling.

The simple truth is that all living biological organisms with human DNA are human persons, regardless of their race, ethnicity, age, stage of development, location, gender, disability, or any other characteristic. Those things are only ways of describing a person. They don’t define one.

The problem is that we humans are really good at ignoring or denying this simple fact. We have a really bad track record when it comes to how we treat other humans. We’re very good at rationalizing our prejudices and bad behavior. One way we rationalize this mistreatment of each other is to deny that the other person IS a person. We tend to explain away the humanity and worth of our fellow humans so as to justify treating them differently. We say we want equality, but we really mean “equality” for people like ourselves.

History is full of examples. Trying to separate humanity and personhood, as if they were different things, has been done throughout the ages by those who wish to trample on the rights of others. In Nazi Germany, it was the Jews, the physically and mentally disabled, and the gypsies (among others) who weren’t “persons.” In US pre-Civil War times, it was the African Americans who weren’t “persons.” Even women were once considered less of a person than men. And those are just a few of the more recent examples. But every time we have tried to separate humanity and personhood, we have been wrong. And it has led to horrific crimes against other people.

On this side of history, we see the mistakes of the past and we wonder how anyone could think it was okay to murder, rape, and enslave other human beings. Couldn’t they see how wrong it was? And yet we still haven’t learned our lesson. We still try to define personhood as some esoteric property that some humans do not possess.

I’m referring, of course, to abortion. The murder of the unborn.

We aren’t as enlightened as we think we are. We’re still trying to pretend that some humans aren’t people so we can justify mistreating them. We just changed the criteria. Rather than looking down our noses at people of another skin color, we are ignoring the rights of the youngest and weakest among us. Why? Well, they look different. Same argument, different wrapping paper.

Not only do we ignore the rights of the unborn, but we pat ourselves on the back for our cleverness in defining personhood in the process. We’re so proud that we’ve given up defining personhood by superficial characteristics like skin color or gender. We have better criteria now.  Personhood has to do with self-consciousness. Or maybe it’s about being able to survive outside a womb. Or maybe it’s a heart beat. Or brain waves. Or eating chocolate. Ok, maybe we aren’t sure. But we are sure that those unborn children aren’t the same as us. The details aren’t important. They don’t have whatever it is that makes us a person, so it’s not like it’s murder to kill one. Until they develop that property – whatever it is – it’s okay to end their lives.

The problem with this argument is that “human-ness” or personhood – this elusive quality that makes us uniquely valuable and gives us human rights – is an either-or proposition. You either have it or you don’t. You either are a person or you aren’t. There are no gradations of humanity. We can’t be partially human or almost human. We don’t have some people that are more of a person than others. We have people that are bigger or older or more developed. We have people that are richer or poorer, taller or shorter, more or less capable. But we’re all equally human and equally valuable. We don’t gain our humanity by gaining any physical or mental abilities; nor do we lose it if we lose those abilities. We have this personhood attribute when we begin to exist and we have it for as long as we exist. There is no in-between.

Since development is a gradual process, taking tiny steps of growing ability, it cannot bestow humanity. Personhood must be gained all at once – going from “not a person” to “person” in one giant leap. It cannot be achieved gradually because there are no gradations of humanity or personhood. You can’t gradually develop personhood as you gradually develop consciousness or body functions.

In the end, we see that all attempts to separate humanity and personhood fail. Race doesn’t provide a logical basis for denying personhood. But neither does development. We have to face the facts, no matter how uncomfortable we find them.

The ONLY event that objectively and categorically produces a new human being where there wasn’t one before…

The radical event that we can all point to as the beginning of life…

The time when development starts and a new and unique individual is formed…

…is fertilization.

Only fertilization meets the criteria for an event that creates a new human life. All humans must be persons. Fertilization creates a human. So at fertilization we achieve our humanity and our personhood. The two cannot be separated.

Nothing else makes sense.

 

"Pro-Choice" means Pro-Abortion

When I discuss the issue of abortion, I usually refer to the other side as “pro-abortion.” They like to refer to me as “anti-abortion” and it seems appropriate to identify the sides of the issue using terms that clearly spell out what they are for or against. But for some reason, the pro-abortion side doesn’t like that term applied to them. They consistently reject the term and substitute “pro-choice.”

However, the distinction they are trying to make between pro-abortion and pro-choice doesn't really exist. The reason they like the pro-choice label is because it sounds better. It’s a euphemism. And, like most euphemisms, it’s designed to cover up the reality of the topic being discussed by framing it in more palatable terms. We use euphemisms to refer to things we find distasteful or embarrassing. We use euphemisms for sex and sexual organs. We use them to refer to a death. We use them to make crimes and bad choices sound better. And we use them to obscure the reality of horrendous acts like abortion.

Not only is “pro-choice” a euphemism, but it isn’t even accurate. The “pro-choice” liberals aren’t talking about being for choice in every regard. They’re usually against school choice and school vouchers, for example. They’re typically against the choice to own guns. They don’t want women to choose to stay home with their children and home school them. They don’t want parents to have the choice of what their kids eat for lunch at school. They don’t want choice in health insurance. The only time they trot out the “choice” rhetoric is when the topic of abortion comes up. So what is this choice they are so adamantly in favor of?

They only apply this issue of choice to a woman’s pregnancy. But it can’t be the choice to have the baby they’re talking about. Everyone agrees that a woman has a right to choose to have her baby. It can’t be the choice to put the baby up for adoption. No one disagrees with that choice either. So what is the choice that differentiates the two sides? What choice is it that the "pro-choice" crowd is in favor of? It's the choice to have an abortion. The fundamental issue is that "pro-choice" people think it is okay to make the choice to abort, and that makes them pro-abortion.

As an analogy, let’s look at some other topics. If you think a person should have a legal choice to take someone else’s property if he so chooses, you’re pro-theft. If you think parents should be able to abuse their children if they feel like it, you’re pro-child abuse. If you think it's okay for a man to choose to rape a woman if he wants to, you're pro-rape. You don’t have to think every man should rape every woman to be pro-rape. All you have to do in order to be pro-rape is think that rape is a legitimate choice a man has a right to make. So, by the same token, if you think it is okay for a woman to choose to abort her unborn child if she wants to – in other words, if you think that’s a legitimate choice a woman has a right to make – you're pro-abortion.

Really, the “pro-abortion” term is already a sanitized version. Abortion is such an innocent sounding term to describe such a horrific reality. We’re tearing an unborn baby limb from limb, crushing his skull, or burning him alive with a strong saline solution. We’re taking the life of an innocent human being in some of the most inhumane ways possible. But we don’t talk about that. We refer to it as “aborting,” like we do when we start a computer program and need to stop it before it completely loads. It sounds like just an “oops” we need to fix. Just something we started and decided not to finish. No big deal, right? We describe it as anything but the reality of what it is: the gruesome and purposeful murder of the smallest and most needy among us.

For the sake of clarity, I’ll give them the pro-abortion label, even though I would rather call them pro-murder, pro-torture, and pro-death. But I won’t refer to them as pro-choice any more. The millions of unborn babies sacrificed in the name of “choice” deserve better than to have me euphemize their deaths and disregard their lives like that. Ending their lives isn’t just some innocent choice and I won’t pretend that it is.

Not only does the pro-abortion side euphemistically label themselves “pro-choice,” but they label their opposition as “anti-choice.” Like their own self label, this one is inaccurate. I’m not against choice. I think people should have a lot of choices. Remember all those choices I mentioned above that liberals don’t want you to have? Well, I’m in favor of them. I think people should have the freedom to make any choice that doesn’t harm another person or otherwise infringe on their rights.

As for pregnancy, I think women should have a choice of whether or not to be pregnant. But a woman exercises that choice when she consents to sex. Once her choice to engage in sex creates a child, the time for choice is past. A new human being exists and she shouldn’t have the choice to murder him. So, I’m all for choices, including reproductive choice. But once conception has occurred the choice to reproduce has already been made. The only choice remaining is whether or not to kill the child. I don’t think anyone should have that choice.

As for the term “anti-abortion” that is often applied to my position, I really don’t mind that one. I know it is usually used as a put down. It’s supposed to paint me in a negative light by pointing out what I’m against rather than what I’m for. But in this case I don’t mind being described by what I am against. Yes, I’m against abortion. I’m proud to be against abortion. I’m also anti-rape, anti-theft, and anti-child abuse. Nobody thinks those are bad labels. I lump abortion right in there with the rest of those crimes. So I’ll wear the anti-abortion label with pride. All the pro-abortion people are welcome to call me that.

Linked up with WLWW.

Abortion and the "Hard Cases"

I received the following comment on my post entitled "Demolishing Pro-Choice Arguments."

"If raped you feel the woman should be forced to carry to term? If an 11 year old is raped by her father or other relative, she should also carry to term? If prenatal testing identifies gross anomalies, the fetus should still be carried to term even if it will die shortly after birth? If the mother of that poor fetus is carrying her second or third child with gross anomalies and says she will kill herself if forced to watch another infant die, she should be forced to carry to term anyway?

Your world view doesn't work for all of us. I've been pro choice (not pro abortion) for decades. Judge not lest ye be judged."
 

I responded there, but I thought I would also respond (with a few modifications) in a separate post because these kinds of questions are often asked by the pro-abortion crowd.

First of all, I'll point out that her distinction between "pro-abortion" and pro-choice" doesn't really exist. I use the terms interchangeably because they mean the same thing. If I said that I thought a man should have a choice of whether or not to rape a woman, I would rightfully be charged with being pro-rape. In the same way, to be in favor of allowing a woman to choose whether or not to abort means being in favor of abortion.

In discussing the rest of her post, keep in mind that this type of question is often asked as a "gotcha" question. The pro-abortion advocates seem to think these cases "prove" that it is okay to kill an unborn child in at least some cases. The cases mentioned are all referred to as "hard cases." These are the troubling stories that make some people, who would otherwise be pro-life, start to waffle and sweat. They think of how difficult it would be in that situation and their emotions make them want to offer such woman a way out - to fix her situation with an abortion. However, when you apply logical principles to these cases, they aren't as hard to solve as you might think.

Before I talk about these cases specifically, it should be mentioned that even IF abortion should be allowed in these difficult cases, that does not mean that abortion should be allowed for all cases. The vast majority of abortions do not involve rape, incest, or deformities of the child. These cases do not provide any reason to think that a woman should be able to kill a perfectly healthy unborn child, who resulted from consensual sex, simply because she doesn't want him.

In addressing the hard cases, we should do so by applying the same facts and logic that we apply in all other cases of pregnancy. As I have written elsewhere, science tells us that the unborn child is a separate and unique human individual who must, logically, have the same rights that all other human beings have. Applying this knowledge and some additional logic to the hard cases clears up a lot of confusion.

In cases of rape or incest, any child produced is still just as human as any other unborn child. There is no difference between a child conceived in rape and one conceived through consensual sex. And, of course, the child is innocent of any wrong doing. It isn't the child forcing himself on the woman - it was the rapist who forced her. So killing the child isn't the right or fair thing to do. The child doesn't deserve to die for the crime of his father. We don't consider those born from rape to deserving of death, so why give a death sentence before birth for those same children? Nor does having an abortion un-rape the woman. Two wrongs don't make a right, so killing the child is not the answer.

Oddly enough, the incidence of abortion is actually low among women who have been raped. Many rape victims have testified that giving birth has helped them to see themselves as overcomers who found a way to make something good come from their terrible ordeal. They may not have had a choice over what happened to them, but they can choose to do what is right after the fact and give life. On the other hand, having an abortion has been described by some as being raped all over again. Of course, these experiences of women do not determine what is right in these cases, but they do show that an abortion isn't the easy fix for rape that it is thought to be.

As for children with terrible birth defects and other issues, that would be a very difficult situation to be in. But to cut the life of these unborn children even shorter than it already will be seems the opposite of compassion. We don't kill people because they are going to die anyway. We make their short lives as comfortable as possible until natural death. That's what we do for people who are born and it should also apply to those unborn, because they are human beings too.

In cases where the mother threatens suicide or other self-harm, the baby still doesn't deserve to die. A woman who is threatening to harm herself needs help. If someone threatens suicide if you don't kill someone else, you don't for that reason kill the person they want dead. That's insane. You treat the one threatening suicide.

While these hard cases are often fraught with emotion and tough situations, the right thing to do is not dependent on how difficult or emotional it is. Emotion is not a valid basis for making decisions, especially when talking about the life of an innocent human being. Applying logical principles shows that the right thing to do is always to protect the unborn child.

Linked up with WLWW.

Are Embryos People?

Pro-aborts often claim that "Embryos are not people." They claim that the unborn are somehow different from those who are born, and that only the born are worth protecting.

However, that is merely a statement of opinion - an opinion which is contradicted by science, by the way. Scientifically, a new human individual comes into existence at fertilization. Embryos are just as much human beings as any other person. Embryos are smaller, weaker, less developed, and more dependent than other human beings, but we do not use these criteria to allow the killing of those who are smaller, weaker, less developed, or more dependent among those who are born. Thus, the distinction they are trying to make between the born and the unborn is not based on any objective criteria. They are just trying to arbitrarily create a division between the born and the unborn so they can feel it is okay to kill the unborn. They're assuming what they're trying to prove. They're making the choice of where to draw the line based only on what they want it to be, not on facts or logic.

The thing is, people have been trying to make arbitrary divisions between those who are "worth" protecting and those who aren't for centuries. In the past, for example, those who were white and male were considered worthwhile and those who were female or black were not considered "persons" under the law. But this distinction between who was and was not considered a "person" was totally arbitrary and was only there to allow discrimination against certain groups. In other words, there wasn’t any evidence that females or blacks were any different or had any lesser worth. The same thing happened in Nazi Germany where the Jews were not legal “persons” under the law simply because the rest of the society didn’t want to consider their rights. In all these cases, the distinction was simply made because the people who made it wanted it to be true. I think we can all agree that these false distinctions, which denied legal "personhood" to some human beings, was wrong. Females and blacks and Jews have always been persons because they are human beings. In fact, EVERY time in human history where one group has claimed that another group of human beings are not “persons,” they have been wrong and this false distinction has led to many injustices.

It is the same with the unborn. There is no evidence that the unborn are any different from all other human beings. The distinction is merely made through wishful thinking. Those who claim there is a difference, that born human beings are persons and the unborn aren’t, only do so because they want to discriminate against the unborn. They want it to be true so they can justify killing unwanted unborn children. But, as with every other time that this kind of claim has been made, this distinction is false and has led to many injustices. It must stop.

Note: I have discussed this issue elsewhere on my blog as well. I have made a secular case against abortion as well as demolished some of the most common arguments for abortion.

Linked up with Time-Warp Wife, WLWW, and WFMW.

Why We Need A Secular Argument Against Abortion

Many pro-life advocates use the Bible in making their arguments. While the Bible does have a lot to say about the unborn and about the value of human life in general, the use of Biblical arguments in the discussion of abortion’s legality is often well-intentioned, but misguided.

You see, laws in this country are not based on religion. In fact, our Founding Fathers specifically planned to create a nation where religious freedom was protected. In order to do that, one must have a secular country based on logical principles, not a theocracy. 

History has shown that government based upon religion inevitably persecutes those who disagree with the religion in power. Many, if not most, of those who came to America and founded this nation came to escape religious persecution. They knew firsthand the dangers of living in a church state. They wanted to ensure freedom for all, so they set up a secular government and laid out basic principles to limit the government’s power and prevent oppression of the people. Their principles were based on the concept of inalienable rights – rights that are innate in every human being and which government cannot grant or take away. These rights include the right to life, liberty, ownership of property, religion, a fair trial, and many others – all developed from basic logical principles. And, in this country, laws are to be made by the people, but only in accordance with these principles so that no one's rights will be violated.

Of course, these logical principles are quite consistent with a Biblical worldview – and not by accident. The concept of inalienable rights, for example, comes from the view that mankind is the product of a Creator who has endowed them with these rights. Religious freedom is also consistent with the Bible. After all, even God Himself does not force Himself upon anyone, but gives all people the free choice to choose Him or not. But one cannot enforce every doctrine from the Bible in a secular society. There are things that are wrong, according to the Bible, which cannot be made law. How would one, for example, make lust or coveting illegal? And while the Bible commands us to remember the Sabbath day, one cannot enforce this on all people within a society without violating their freedom of religion. Thus, not everything that is wrong should be illegal.

How does one decide, then, what should and should not be legal in a secular society? The answer lies in applying these basic logical principles and in protecting the human rights of all the people. Thus, murder should be illegal – not because the Bible says it is wrong, but because such a behavior violates the inalienable right to live of the victim and because allowing such behavior is bad for society. Similarly, theft should be illegal – not because the Bible says it is wrong, but because theft violates the right to own property of the victim, and because theft is bad for society.

If we hope to make abortion illegal we must use these same basic principles and develop a secular argument for the rights of the unborn. It is this secular argument we MUST be making if we are to succeed. Many of us who are pro-life are Christians and have religious reasons to believe that abortion is morally wrong according to the Bible. However, that does not mean that abortion should be illegal in a secular society. We have to make the right argument if we are going to produce change.

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So here is a secular argument that abortion should be illegal.

To begin our argument we must first show that the unborn are living human beings. After all, only humans have human rights. To do that, we use science.  

Science uses criteria such as growth, responsiveness to the environment, movement, and metabolism (using food for energy) in order to distinguish life from non-life. Living things, including a single-celled human zygote, show these characteristics and non-living things do not.

So, it’s quite obvious from science that the unborn are living things. What kind of living thing depends on what the parents are. Obviously, the offspring of human parents is human. This is confirmed by the presence of distinctly human DNA and a human pattern of development. Thus, it is clear from science that the product of human sperm and egg is alive and human.

Of course, even sperm and egg cells show characteristics of being alive and they have human DNA, but they are not separate organisms. A sperm or egg cell is simply a piece of an adult human’s body that is essentially broken off and on its own (just like a skin cell can be removed from the body and stay alive for a little while). So sperm and eggs are alive, but not capable by themselves of being anything more than a piece of the body they came from. But once a sperm and egg meet, a radical event takes place that forms a completely new entity. This new cell, a zygote, has a complete and unique set of human DNA that lays out the entire plan for its whole body.

Individual cells that are part of a larger body work to grow and preserve the larger body and are not important in themselves. All that matters is that the body survives, even at the expense of some of the cells. Thus, each cell works for the goal of supporting the body, not preserving itself. Once a zygote is formed, however, this new individual now works as a separate unit toward the goal of growing, preserving, and developing himself. He no longer functions as a part of another body, but forms a new body all his own. The zygote is in fact a new individual, different from both parents, that is already either male or female and which follows the distinct pattern of human development. It just takes time for him or her to grow. But all the information for building the adult body is there from the beginning. The development of the organs and organ systems is just a matter of time, but the instructions are already in place in the zygote, as is the ability to function as a separate entity. This is all well-understood science and can be found in any introductory biology textbook.

So, it is very clear from science that a zygote is a separate, living human individual. The argument that a human zygote is not alive or is not human has already been thoroughly debunked by science.

The newer argument put forth by the pro-choice bunch is that a zygote or embryo isn’t a person (which is a question of value, not science, and thus can’t be answered by science). Basically, the pro-choicers are trying to claim that not all humans are people, which is a very dangerous thing to claim.

The million-dollar question is, if not all humans are persons, then how do we know who is a person? When does personhood begin? Some say at birth. Some say at viability. Some say when the heart begins to beat. Some say when they’re self-conscious. So who gets to decide which definition of personhood is right? And what if they’re wrong? What if they’re allowing real persons to be killed? History says that’s what happens when you try to separate personhood and humanity. We’ve used other definitions of personhood in the past – definitions that excluded some members of the human race. But every time we have claimed that some human beings were not persons, we have been wrong.

At one time, our country claimed that blacks were not persons. Thus they were enslaved and mistreated as their inalienable rights were ignored and denied. The same thing has been done throughout history. Certain groups have been denied legal personhood in order to ignore their innate rights. In Nazi Germany, for example, the Jews were not legal persons, and thus the Holocaust, in which 6 million were slaughtered, was completely legal. It’s very convenient to claim that those you wish to kill or exploit are not persons. Thus, it’s a very common rationalization when one wishes to ignore the rights of others.

Every time we have claimed that some human beings were not persons, we have been wrong. Every time. And it led to horrific results. What is happening now is that we are saying that the unborn are not persons. And, not surprisingly, their rights are being ignored and they are being slaughtered.

But it’s not logical or right to claim that a human being must be born in order to be a person any more than it is to claim that a human being must be white or male or non-Jewish in order to be a person. Logically, all humans must be persons. To deny that is to use some arbitrary criteria for what constitutes a person and thus exclude some humans from that definition. Historically, that has always been wrong and has led to terrible tragedies of justice. What needs to happen is that we recognize and protect the inalienable rights of ALL human beings, born and unborn.

In claiming that the unborn are not persons, what the pro-choice side is really arguing is that we, as a society, decide who has rights. But rights don't come from society or from government. If government grants them, then government can decide, arbitrarily, to take them away from anyone they please. This country was founded on a different proposition – a radical idea that people have innate rights that are not dependent on government. That it is fundamentally wrong for anyone, even government, to violate these rights. These are known as inalienable rights – innate rights of all humans that cannot be taken away for any reason. It is on this fact – this higher law – that our case for the rights of the unborn rests. And it was this higher law on which our Constitution was built.

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The truth is, the unborn do have inalienable rights. They are human beings with the same rights as all other human beings. And those rights should be protected in a secular society just as the rights of all other humans should be. This can be demonstrated with science and logic and can convince even those who do not believe the Bible. More importantly, this is WHY abortion should be illegal – not because the Bible says it is wrong, but because abortion is a violation of basic human rights. All people should be in favor of protecting the rights of all human beings, regardless of their religion.

Linked up with Time-Warp Wife, NOBH, WLWW, and WFMW.