http://courses.ats.rochester.edu/nobis/papers/abortion_and_animals.html

["Matthew Waterhorse" <matthewwaterhorse@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

http://courses.ats.rochester.edu/nobis/papers/abortion_and_animals.html

Abortion and Animal Rights:

Related, but Importantly Different, Issues
In a recent letter (August 2001, p. 5), a ?Veg-News? reader asked why she 
does not see the vegetarian and animal rights communities taking a stand 
against abortion. She said it seems to be a "great contradiction" to respect 
animal life, but to not equally respect human life by opposing abortion. She 
asked that this issue be addressed. I would like to do so.

Those who challenge the status quo regarding our society's consumption and 
treatment of animals do this from a wide variety of moral and philosophical 
perspectives. But all within the movement agree on this: a fundamental evil 
of animal agriculture and a diet and lifestyle that involves animal products 
is that they cause pain, suffering, and early death that is totally 
unnecessary, for both animals and humans.  The conviction that evils like 
these should be opposed and that we should bring an end to them is what 
motivates and unites many people in the vegetarian and animal rights 
community.

Should these people also be motivated to oppose abortion? Unfortunately, the 
safest answer seems to be this: no and yes. The answer is not simple because 
abortions affect two importantly different kinds of fetuses: those that can 
experience pain and those that cannot.  Scientific evidence suggests that 
early fetuses, those in the first trimester and slightly beyond, cannot 
experience pain since they lack the necessary neurological development.  
Although reliable data is hard to come by, most fetuses that are aborted are 
early fetuses.Since they cannot experience pain in the procedure, the 
vegetarian and animal rights advocate's opposition to unnecessary pain and 
suffering does not apply here since there is no pain and suffering to 
oppose.  There is no "great contradiction" here.

While most abortion providers will not perform abortions past the fourth or 
fifth month (check your yellow pages under ?abortion?) and so there are 
relatively few later-term abortions, there are strong reasons to oppose 
later-term abortions due to the fetal pain and suffering. While probably no 
abortions are taken lightly, these definitely should not. The vegetarian and 
animal rights advocate should find these abortions morally troubling, 
considered in themselves.

We might, however, suspect that in many, if not most, cases of later-term 
abortion that the woman's health or safety is in question, or that the fetus 
is aborted to prevent a very unfortunate future from befalling it due to 
disease or serious disability. While the pain and suffering of the fetus is 
very bad (although it might be preventable with anesthesia), these cases of 
later abortion might be permissible, given the complications of the case and 
that others? interests are at stake as well.Later-term abortions done for 
trivial reasons (if abortions are ever done for trivial reasons) are likely 
to be morally inexcusable from many vegetarian and animal rights 
perspectives, since they cause serious pain and suffering without adequate 
justification or need.

There are other arguments for and against abortion that I can only briefly 
address.  Some ask, ?How would you like it if you had been aborted?? 
suggesting that this shows that abortion is wrong.But one can ask right 
back, ?How would you like it if your parents had used birth control?? Since 
most don?t view birth control as immoral and the arguments are parallel, 
this shows this anti-abortion argument to be weak.

It is often said that "all fetuses have a right to life," but this is just 
another way of saying "it's wrong to kill fetuses.  "If it's wrong to kill 
fetuses, why is this so (and which ones)?Unfortunately, groups that oppose 
abortion tend to not address these questions and, when they do, fail to 
realize their best answers imply that living beings that are more conscious 
and sentient than human fetuses -- animals -- have a "right to life" as 
well.  Since anti-abortionists tend to be opposed only to the ending of 
fetal lives and indifferent to the tragic lives and brutal deaths of farm 
animals and fur-bearers, it's a serious misnomer to call them "pro-life."

On the other hand, pro-choice groups tend to refuse to admit that some 
choices of abortion result in intense pain and suffering for some fetuses.  
They stubbornly uphold a woman's right to choose to abort at any time and 
for literally any reason (or none whatsoever), no matter the consequences 
for the fetus, including late-term ones.Anyone convinced, as vegetarians 
are, that causing unnecessary pain and suffering is seriously wrong cannot 
accept an unconditional pro-choice position, one that gives infinite moral 
weight to a women's right to choice so that fetal pain counts for nothing, 
morally-speaking.

However inadequate most debate of the morality of abortion is and however 
muddled most common arguments for and against abortion are, at least it is 
an issue that there is public debate over and that most people believe is 
important.  Politicians' fates can be sealed by their views on abortion.  
Will there ever come a time when a "litmus test" for a candidate's viability 
is whether he or she believes that animals have the right not to be eaten, 
worn, or experimented on?  Will there come a time when campaign 
contributions from the meat industry will be viewed with as much suspicion 
as those from "Big Tobacco," as they both peddle products known to be 
harmful to human health?Vegetarian and animal rights advocates hope that 
their work makes it all the sooner that the answer to these questions is, 
?Yes.?

Many vegetarian and animal rights advocates have likely been asked why they 
don't spend their efforts on supposedly "more important" issues, such as 
abortion.This question, of course, presumes that abortion is a ?more 
important? moral problem.  I have argued that since most aborted fetuses are 
not conscious and so cannot feel pain, the two issues?abortion and animal 
rights?are importantly different and so indifference to some kinds of 
abortions is consistent with a commonly-held motivation for advocating 
vegetarianism and respecting animals.

For those fetuses that can feel pain, this is a serious issue, one that 
should not be dismissed. However, the number of these fetuses is tiny, 
compared to the tens of billions of animals slaughtered each year and the 
vast numbers of humans who unnecessarily suffer as a consequence of eating 
them.  Also, there already are a large number of defenders of these fetuses: 
whether they will be able to convince a critical political mass might depend 
on their substituting reason for their current rhetoric.

Since abortion already is a public issue, the best thing vegetarian and 
animal rights advocates can do is continue striving to make their issues a 
common topic of public debate and scrutiny.  We do this by educating people 
about the horrors of factory farming, the utter lack of necessity for any of 
its products, the unreliable of animal-based medical research and product 
testing, and the health benefits of a vegan diet.  Given the huge numbers of 
animals and humans that are harmed by this system and whose lives would 
change for the better were it abolished, it?s not clear that there?s 
anything ?more important? to be done.

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