Shameful deeds are almost always accompanied by shameless lies. Some members of Congress who shamefully voted against the prohibition of sex-selective abortions are shamelessly claiming (or permitting their spokesmen or surrogates to claim) that the proposed legislation was unnecessary because sex-selective abortions don’t occur in the United States or are so rare as to make legislation unnecessary. The National Right to Life Committee has helpfully provided a link to the most up-to-date (2011) research paper on the question.
This research was available prior to last week’s vote on the Penatal Non-discrimination Act (PRENDA). Everybody on Capitol Hill knew about it. It is true that sex-selective abortions are nowhere near as common in the U.S. as they are in places like China, India, and Korea. But they occur, and they are not so rare as to be insignificant. Those who claim otherwise are simply lying to cover their atrocious vote to permit the killing of children in utero because (let’s face the truth about what is actually going on in most sex-selective abortions) they happen to be female.
In my view, voting to protect a practice as vile as sex-selective abortions is disqualifying. Pro-life Democrats can say what they think should happen to the 161 Democrats who did that. In my view, the seven Republicans who joined them (one of whom was presidential aspirant Ron Paul) should be challenged in Republican primaries and driven from office. (Bravo, by the way, to the 20 Democrats who voted with 226 Republicans in support of the proposed legislation.)
Sadly and embarrassingly, many of those who voted to protect sex-selective abortions are self-identified Catholics.
June 6th, 2012 | 12:18 am
Since I do think that abortion is always justified (since the women is in no obligation to carry any other person inside her uterus against her will in any moment, pregnant or not, fetus or not) I fail to share the article´s author indignation. But even if I was anti abortion in any way, I will ask: How can you distinguish an abortion performed on “sex selective” grounds from one who is not?
June 6th, 2012 | 7:07 am
When I was pregnant with my son 15 years ago, we asked to find out the sex of the baby at our routine ultrasound. The technician was extremely disapproving and demanded to know why we wanted to find out! She only told us after we explained that we wanted to know whether to buy new baby clothes and things. Of course, she might simply have her own personal reasons for not wanting to tell us, but we were so surprised by her vehemence that we talked about it for quite a while afterward. We both thought people must have been asking so they could have abortions if they were not happy with the sex of the baby.
When I was liberal about abortion, I used to think that late-term abortions were rare (only a small percentage of all abortions) and not worth making laws about. One of the things that made me confront how shallow and confused my thinking about abortion was, was realizing exactly how many of those “rare” abortions were really performed. I’m sure it’s the same in this case. I’m from what was Steve Driehaus’s district — he is still suing the SBA List for calling him a liar about being pro-life. In the current Democratic party, party trumps everything, even life itself.
June 6th, 2012 | 7:23 am
The question is whether this was a serious bill, constitutional, enforceable, and honestly intended to prevent sex-selective abortion, or a political ploy.
One the one hand, a solid majority voted for the bill—246 (57%) in favor, 168 (39%) against, and 17 (4%) not voting. But . . .
May 29, according to The Hill:
And according to Dana Milbank in the Washington Post:
June 6th, 2012 | 8:03 am
I think the label “pro-life democrat” needs to be treated for what it is – the product of some poor fool’s self-delusion. There simply is no such thing and hasn’t been for decades.
June 6th, 2012 | 9:46 am
“In my view, voting to protect a practice as vile as sex-selective abortions is disqualifying. ”
How about voting against a law that is meaningless and unenforceable, and only makes a mockery of pro-life legislation?
June 6th, 2012 | 10:36 am
Sex-selective abortion is a topic we should keep hammering on. If abortion is a fundamental right, then sex-selective abortion must be OK. This point is a wedge to pry open the absurdity and heinousness of the ‘pro-choice’ position.
June 6th, 2012 | 11:18 am
since the women is in no obligation to carry any other person inside her uterus against her will in any moment, pregnant or not, fetus or not
Except in cases of rape, the person is inside her as a result of her choice to engage in sex. Whether she intended to avoid pregnancy by using contraceptives is irrelevant: no contraceptive method claims 100% effectiveness, ignorance of this is no defense, therefore she and her partner took their chances. So, yes, she does have an obligation to carry this person inside her, as her own choice (to have sex) is the cause of it being inside her.
June 6th, 2012 | 11:34 am
How can you distinguish an abortion performed on “sex selective” grounds from one who is not?
Well, for starters, how about a woman who says “I don’t want it if it’s a girl.”
June 6th, 2012 | 11:43 am
Can’t a more federalist-oriented Republican like Ron Paul think that these issues are appropriately handled at the state level and so vote against federal legislation while remaining staunchly pro-life and horrified by sex-selective abortion?
June 6th, 2012 | 11:43 am
Jerry Beckett –
Just as a point of clarification – does that mean you accept that a woman has a right to choose abortion if she becomes pregnant as a result of rape?
June 6th, 2012 | 11:53 am
Since I do think that abortion is always justified (since the women is in no obligation to carry any other person inside her uterus against her will in any moment, pregnant or not, fetus or not)
By that same token, also has a corresponding obligation not to put any baby inside of herself, if she’s not willing to carry it.
This argument is no different from a man beating his wife – or drowning his dog’s puppies – by saying “it’s my home”, as if the dog and the wife were trespassers.
Always the left seeks to dissociate rights from responsibilities – keeping the rights for themselves, and delegating the obligations to others.
June 6th, 2012 | 11:54 am
Since I do think that abortion is always justified (since the women is in no obligation to carry any other person inside her uterus against her will in any moment, pregnant or not, fetus or not)
By that same token, also has a corresponding obligation not to put any baby inside of herself, if she’s not willing to carry it.
By the way, I am waiting for the day when some brave souls will try try transplanting these unwanted fetuses to surrogates.
Oh, how the feminists will howl when their right to kill becomes only a right to transplant – and by their own arguments, they become as liable for child support and expenses as the father is from the moment they “lose” the unwanted child.
June 6th, 2012 | 11:55 am
Just as a point of clarification – does that mean you accept that a woman has a right to choose abortion if she becomes pregnant as a result of rape?
We should transfer the child to a surrogate, or at least make a good-faith attempt to do so.
Anything less violates the idea that we are all created equal.
June 6th, 2012 | 12:05 pm
You seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding as to why many of the Republicans, particularly Ron Paul voted against PRENDA. Many, if not all of them, have been vocally opposed to abortion their entire careers (Dr. Paul, for example). But the question was not merely a straightforward issue of banning sex-selective abortion. It was much more complicated.
In his speech on the House floor, Dr. Paul said “Mr. Speaker, as an OB-GYN who has delivered over 4,000 babies, I certainly abhor abortion. And I certainly share my colleagues’ revulsion at the idea that someone would take an innocent unborn life because they prefer to have a child of a different gender. However, I cannot support H.R. 3541, the Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act, because this bill is unconstitutional.” Dr. Paul’s main concern was the fact that there is absolutely no constitutional justification for the government to pass this law. While yes, murder is a heinous crime that deserves punishment, this would be the government exerting arbitrary power which it has no right to do. Belief in the rule of law is a fundamental tenet of conservative belief, and PRENDA flies directly in the face of American law. This was by no means a conservative bill.
Congressman Justin Amash (R-MI) said “Republicans, and especially conservatives, should oppose abortion. Period. H R 3541 criminalizes the MOTIVE for getting an abortion. In other words, it keeps all abortions legal except those obtained for the “wrong” reasons. But ALL abortions are wrong. And criminalizing motive makes this simply another hate crime.” Minimizing the significance of the murder of the unborn is not typical conservative business. Let’s leave that to the liberals. He went on to say “I’m pro-life, and I think all abortion should be illegal. But Congress should not criminalize thought. And this bill won’t stop a single abortion if it becomes law. Every person seeking an abortion simply will sign a form stating her motive is not the sex of the baby. Those of us who are pro-life should demand more from Congress.” (See Dr. Paul and Rep. Amash’s full statements on the House floor at http://onesquarelight.wordpress.com/2012/06/01/ron-paul-justin-amash-prenda/)
There is absolutely nothing shameful about the choice that Dr. Paul and Rep. Amash made to vote against PRENDA; they’re both pro-life and understood that the bill had far greater consequences than its proponents acknowledged. It was a simple choice between passing feel-good legislation now or leaving the door open to save millions more lives in the future.
June 6th, 2012 | 12:54 pm
Blake –
Not a single thing about that idea has become more workable since we discussed it over a year ago:
http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2011/04/07/fifteen-states-considering-banning-abortion-after-20-weeks-of-pregnancy/
June 6th, 2012 | 1:04 pm
“Since I do think that abortion is always justified (since the women is in no obligation to carry any other person inside her uterus against her will in any moment, pregnant or not, fetus or not) I fail to share the article´s author indignation.”
Here it is yet again, the latest development of thought among the “pro-choice” crowd—the belief that the unborn child is a parasite.
Your own offspring, a parasite. It is easy to kill a parasite.
Keep your eyes open to this pro-choice belief, I have been seeing it a lot recently.
What a way to view life. What a degradation of mind and soul.
June 6th, 2012 | 1:11 pm
Mr. Ingles:
does that mean you accept that a woman has a right to choose abortion if she becomes pregnant as a result of rape?
My above argument served to dismiss the “she has no obligation” argument for abortion. Those making this argument can be agnostic about or even grant the conceived child’s right to life, but see the woman’s “right to control her own body” as taking precedence. However, as a woman’s choice (to have sex) is the cause of the presence of the child in her body, she cannot then cite its presence in her body as justification for destroying it.
Obviously, if a woman becomes pregnant as a result of rape, then her pregnancy is not a result of her choice/action. So is it then permissible to destroy the unborn child?
Morally, no, due to the underlying principle behind all pro-life arguments: the child is human being who has a right to live. At conception, a human life has begun. Logic demands that whatever the circumstances under which the child was conceived does not diminish the reality of the unborn child’s right to live. A child is no less a child because he/she was conceived in rape. Ergo, he/she is entitled to all the rights of a human being which includes being protected from murder. Therefore, while rape is an abominable act, this does nothing to diminish the humanity of the conceived child. Thus advocating the aborting of the unborn children is only possible when one refuses to see the conceived child as a human being.
June 6th, 2012 | 1:41 pm
As I tried to say before, I think the anti abortion arguments of Blake and Jerry are answered by Judit Jarvis ( here : http://spot.colorado.edu/~heathwoo/Phil160,Fall02/thomson.htm ) and some commenters of her work (here: http://mises.org/journals/jls/20_4/20_4_3.pdfed ). But even if I thought most of those arguments were valid, I still do not accept the premise that early stages of the fetus are a person, so I will still be supportive of abortion on demand at least in the first trimester (where most of the abortions occur, if not wrong).
June 6th, 2012 | 1:51 pm
Jerry:
Just out of couriousity. Do you support the right to abort when the woman life is jeopardized due the pregnancy?
June 6th, 2012 | 1:53 pm
“Well, for starters, how about a woman who says “I don’t want it if it’s a girl.”
Yes, then you can prove to your, my, and most people’s satisfaction that she opted for the abortion because of the child’s sex.
What you can’t do is prove beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law that she didn’t also decide right around the same time that she didn’t want to give birth because it might mess up her hairdo, which is a perfectly legal reason to have an abortion, which according to Roe v. Wade, must then be allowed.
IOW, all someone has to do is testify that her inner thoughts about wanting the abortion were not restricted to matters of the child’s sex, and there’s no possible way to convict, because you can’t disprove someone’s testimony about what she was thinking, and the burden of proof is on the prosecution anyway.
June 6th, 2012 | 1:57 pm
Here it is yet again, the latest development of thought among the “pro-choice” crowd—the belief that the unborn child is a parasite.
peg,
I don’t think “parasite” is exactly fair, but there is an argument (the Famous Violinist Thought Experiment) that a person is not obligated to provide “life support” for another person, and consequently, even if an unborn baby is acknowledged to be a full person, a pregnant woman is not obliged to provide life support.
Interestingly, Peter Singer (of all people) disagrees. He feels if you wake up hooked to a famous violinist who needs you as “life support” for the next 9 months (as the thought experiment goes), the sacrifice you have to make to save his life is worth it, and you may not disconnect and let him die. Singer also thinks Roe v Wade was wrongly decided, and such matters should be decided by legislatures (representing society) and not judges.
June 6th, 2012 | 2:18 pm
In my view, voting to protect a practice as vile as sex-selective abortions is disqualifying.
Chris,
I am impressed with what you have told us about Ron Paul and Justin Amash. In my opinion, this was a bill mainly intended to make anyone who voted for it look bad and be subject to the kind of denunciation Robert George provides above. For pro-life Republicans to cast principled votes against it, especially knowing it was going to fail no matter what they did, shows real integrity.
It is my guess that none of the people who voted against the bill did so “to protect a practice as vile as sex-selective abortions.” Surely Congressman Amash was correct when he said, “[T]his bill won’t stop a single abortion if it becomes law. Every person seeking an abortion simply will sign a form stating her motive is not the sex of the baby.” I don’t doubt that many who voted against the bill were motivated by a desire to protect abortion rights. But I just don’t believe they thought that—if sex-selective abortions actually were being performed—this bill would prevent a single one.
June 6th, 2012 | 3:11 pm
“Interestingly, Peter Singer (of all people) disagrees. He feels if you wake up hooked to a famous violinist who needs you as “life support” for the next 9 months (as the thought experiment goes), the sacrifice you have to make to save his life is worth it, and you may not disconnect and let him die.”
Why a famous violinist? What if Peter Singer wakes up hooked to a fat and boring old housewife who needs him as life support for 9 months?
And I think the “unborn child as parasite” perfectly describes the attitude of an increasing number of pro-abortion.
June 6th, 2012 | 4:11 pm
Why a famous violinist?
Peg,
The “famous violinist” thought experiment was invented by another philosopher, not Peter Singer. He’s just commenting on it.
I was I was giving information that I believed supported and went farther than the view you were expressing. There is a philosophical argument put forward by those who are pro-abortion designed to demonstrate that if an embryo or fetus is more than a “parasite,” indeed is an actual person with a right to life, abortion is still justified. It is actually a very famous and powerful argument. I was pointing out that even Peter Singer—who believes infanticide may be morally justifiable—doesn’t buy the argument. I was making a point on the pro-life side, but you tried to shoot it down anyway.
June 6th, 2012 | 5:30 pm
” I was making a point on the pro-life side, but you tried to shoot it down anyway”
I am aware that the Famous Violinist is not Singer’s creation. Even thinking it is worthy of discussion is base. It all smacks too much of the materialism underlying the pro-abortion argument—-a person’s worth determined (by other people) by such attributes as their usefulness or guesses about their “quality of life”. I dislike Singer and his ilk, so forgive me if I discount his opinions including any apparently nice ideas (i.e., “it is real bad to kill someone who is temporarily dependent on us”) that occasionally emanate from him.
June 6th, 2012 | 10:46 pm
Sergio @ 1:51, You’re not big on nuance are you Sergio? “Aha! You believe in an abortion exception for the mother’s life! GOTCHA, you hypocrite!” Actually, there is a powerful argument to be made that abortion to save the life of a mother is a special case akin to killing in self-defense or collateral damage in a just war. In addition, the need to abort to save the mother’s life is a rare circumstance, and hard cases make bad law. Thanks for playing, though.
June 6th, 2012 | 10:57 pm
Sergio@ 1:41, I’m amazed that even you fall for that old chestnut. Nobody “wakes up” pregnant. Let’s make the analogy a bit more accurate, shall we? Through a choice YOU make, knowing full well what the consequences of that choice could be, YOU cause that violinist both to be in the condition he’s in _and_ to be connected to you. In addition, you only _have_ to be connected to him for nine months, after which, there are many people who would consider it a blessing from God to take him off your hands. Changes the picture a bit, doesn’t it?
June 7th, 2012 | 12:16 am
Fred:
Well, I asked the question because I have found conservatives in the past who sustained such opinion (and dared to call the unwilling sacrificial mothers “selfish”). Just wanted to know what ground I am touching.
Regarding your other comment: have youa actually read Jarvis article? Or just the first paragraph? She actually adresses that concern (her counter example of the flying seeds).
I posted the URL of the other article with a mistake. Here it is again: http://mises.org/journals/jls/20_4/20_4_3.pdf . I found it very clear and well argued.
June 7th, 2012 | 8:18 am
Jerry Beckett –
Which doesn’t apply to rape. Note that a large number of people who oppose abortion still make exceptions for threat to the life of the mother, incest… and rape. (Personally, I don’t think incest is particularly relevant, BTW.) So that argument doesn’t go quite as far as you’d seem to like. In fact…
Hmm. I know that parking a car on a street takes a nonzero risk of theft. I can lock the car and put in an alarm system, but if the car (or just the radio) gets stolen, do I have no cause to complain?
In the end, it comes down to:
It is possible to disagree with this assessment.
June 7th, 2012 | 8:27 am
Fred –
Isn’t it possible that bad law makes hard cases?
June 7th, 2012 | 11:26 am
Why are we worried about sex-selective abortion? That seems rather like worrying about whether serial killers commit traffic violations in the course of their crime. The problem isn’t that abortion discriminates against women. The problem is that it discriminates against children.
June 7th, 2012 | 1:49 pm
Not a single thing about that idea has become more workable since we discussed it over a year ago:
It doesn’t matter if it’s not workable.
Putting aside the obvious (that it is not workable because nobody is doing it), there is an important ethical distinction between deliberately killing someone vs. trying to save them and failing.
Rape victims already have enough troubles without being responsible for the deliberate death of their own child. They would be better off if they were given the option of giving the child to a surrogate – whether or not the child survived the attempt.
June 7th, 2012 | 1:50 pm
And I think the “unborn child as parasite” perfectly describes the attitude of an increasing number of pro-abortion.
Yes, those babies are just things that crawl into your womb out of who knows where.
Certainly the woman isn’t in any way responsible for its being there.
Really, the more they talk, the less I see the difference between a woman who murders her baby vs. a man who uses the “my home is my castle” argument to justify beating his wife to death.
June 7th, 2012 | 2:20 pm
“And I think the “unborn child as parasite” perfectly describes the attitude of an increasing number of pro-abortion.”
I think this is a complete misunderstanding of the issue. The question is more if women, as the rest of human beings, have completle and unalienable control over something as their bodies (which cannot be equated to any other form of property). Anti abortionists do not seem to agree.
June 7th, 2012 | 3:57 pm
Professor George’s opening sentence is pungent and memorable–would that more defenders of traditional values can write like this.
Everybody is ignoring self-deception. The “self-identified Catholics” that Robert George refers to can fairly be described as self-deceived. The possibility of self-deception is a neglected part of current moral disagreements. What self-deception obscures or distorts is reason. That is why the possibility of self-deception should be part of the debates about what is rationally or reasonably best for individuals and society. and given the insularity of liberalism, this is bound to help the defenders of traditional values.
June 7th, 2012 | 4:49 pm
It’s just so convenient that I can choose to define someone inconvenient to me (or society) as a non-human or non-person. Seems like people in history have made some awesome power-grabs by denying whole categories of “people” their “personhood.” Or granted remarkable power by allowing a thing’s personhood (vide 1 U.S.C. §1).
It would be terrible if a possible outcome of my behavior is loss of control over my body. (Which I strangely don’t recall asking for or creating myself, but hey, I’ll take credit for self-creation so someone else can’t. Happy DNA-donor’s day, Dad!)
Even worse if people expected me to be, like, responsible for bodies I created, like they might punish me if I mistreated them or something. Because then I definitely would have no inclination to engage in behaviors that caused them to exist, right?
Hey, you think I could profit off a “non-person” body instead? Since I can choose to deny they have a body deserving protection (though remarkably biologically “human-like”…) by defining them as “nonhuman/nonperson,” I can claim this material belongs to just me. As though I self-created it. Like a toe-nail or tumor I can snip or an extension of my expendable self, which I could donate or sell. I’m sure people would be down with that if they agree with me.
People rent their uteri, why not sell what is clearly just an anomaly inside it? It’s not like the body there has a distinct, unrepeatable genetic code with the ability to grow as a unique individual, given the same kinds of goods without which I too would perish, like appropriate food and shelter.
I’m glad I lived long enough people can’t do that to me now. It would have been just awful if I’d never had the opportunity to have complete and unalienable control over my own body.
June 7th, 2012 | 6:05 pm
“The question is more if women, as the rest of human beings, have completle and unalienable control over something as their bodies (which cannot be equated to any other form of property). Anti abortionists do not seem to agree”.
It isn’t the woman’s body, it is that of the unborn child that concerns me. Even though I am a woman, I have no right to kill myself, let alone someone else.
I have actually been pregnant before. I have been told “your pregnancy test came back positive. Do you plan to terminate the pregnancy?” “It” became “he” just on my word! Such power and control, because I am Woman! Well, actually, nothing had changed, just the politics in the room. The fetus was exactly the same, in real life. I will not fool myself.
And anyway, it is a fantasy (typically American) that anyone has “complete” control over their body. No wonder we have such trouble dealing with death and sickness.
June 7th, 2012 | 7:32 pm
It’s just so convenient that I can choose to define someone inconvenient to me (or society) as a non-human or non-person. Seems like people in history have made some awesome power-grabs by denying whole categories of “people” their “personhood.”
Thomas Paine:
“He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.”
June 7th, 2012 | 7:35 pm
I think this is a complete misunderstanding of the issue. The question is more if women, as the rest of human beings, have completle and unalienable control over something as their bodies (which cannot be equated to any other form of property). Anti abortionists do not seem to agree.
Yes, we believe that thing the woman wants to kill is not HER body – it’s some other person’s body, and that other person has the same rights that the woman has.
By the way – let me phrase this as a direct question – do you reject the idea that with rights come responsibilities?
That is, if one has a right over one’s body, does one not also have a corresponding obligation to refrain from using that body in ways that cause harm to other people and/or their bodies?
June 8th, 2012 | 9:46 am
Blake –
Er… yeah, it does. A lot. It’s why we test medicines, even in cases where people will probably ‘die anyway’.
You’re engaging in Politician’s Logic: “Something must be done! This is something, so it must be done!”
No, it’s not workable because it’s not workable. As I told you before: Placentas are elaborate, complex organs. The vascular systems of the mother and child intertwine, come that close, close enough for oxygen and nutrients and wastes to exchange… but do not actually splice together. They form – and require – sophisticated interfaces with both mother and child. Someday we may be able to mimic or recreate those interfaces. Not today, and not for many years. If you can find actual obstetricians who will tell me differently, please do so. Until then, it honestly strikes me as you willfully blinding yourself to medical reality. I’m sorry, but that’s how it looks to me.
I’m actually quite in favor of more research along these lines. It wouldn’t just (perhaps) allow fetal transfer (someday), but even before that became remotely workable, I’d bet a lot of money that better knowledge of the placenta would prevent a large number of miscarriages.
But until that research is actually done, what you’re talking about is no more warranted – and would be no more effective – than this. Or, as I noted before, this (are you going to volunteer?).
June 14th, 2012 | 10:01 am
BTW, minor point – a shift in sex ratios at birth may have other explanations than sex-selective abortions.
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