In continuing with female rights, abortion is another innovative process that has allowed women to take control of their reproductive systems. This controversial practice has provided women with an alternative when it comes to unwanted pregnancies; it has given them control of their own bodies.
Before abortion was legalized, women virtually had no choice when it came to giving birth once the child was already conceived. Victims of rape and incest had to accept the outcome regardless. And in cases where the mother did not have the means to care for the child, the two suffered alike. Although unfair to the child, abortion became a viable choice which women did not have in the past.
But to this day abortion continues to be taboo and is spurned by society, oftentimes viewed as homicide. Although it empowered women by giving them a choice, it also made them subjects of public controversy. Legality and ethics clash in this ongoing debate between the individual’s rights and what is morally correct.
Certainly the medical advances that enabled these changes to reproductive options were by instrumental standards, that is, functioning as designed, a success. However, they individually and collectively have created entirely new sets of complex social concerns and pitted social groups holding marketed different views against one another.
ReplyDeleteOf the three, abortion sparks the most heated debates. In earlier times these disputes centered on the potential dangers of the procedure. Today, the debate has shifted to differences about when life occurs, accrues moral status and is subject to protection as well as the balance of rights between sentient persons and entities that have the potential to become a person.
This issue will never be resolved as a matter of conflicting values. However, advancing bio-medical technology may render the moral debate moot if it could sustain the life of early stage fetuses outside a mother's body.