Thank you for your response. You pose a great question, and I agree, it would have been difficult for me to sleep at night had I voted for Trump — with or without a MyPillow.
You also bring up two often-used arguments in support of abortion that I would like to address. The first is under the condition of rape. Some people include incest in this argument as well. To say rape is a horrible and traumatic circumstance is an understatement. The downstream consequences of such a despicable and criminal act must be halted immediately. The unborn child of a victimized woman must be protected from becoming a second victim. Although it doesn’t fully remove the difficulties of the situation, having the option to place an unplanned child in adoption care is a key alternative to abortion especially for a rape victim. Continuing a pregnancy to term is not without cost or sacrifice, and as I mentioned in the article, it’s vital that governments, organizations, and individuals take action to support women who find themselves in such a circumstance.
The other argument you pose is a classic straw man. I attend deliveries for high-risk pregnancies on a regular basis, and my role as a pediatrician is to assess and resuscitate newborns when necessary. Can you name a medical condition in which it is necessary to destroy a fetus in order to save the life of a pregnant woman? Certainly, there are a number of situations where the delivery of an unborn child is necessary to ensure the health of the mother. These may include pre-eclampsia, extrauterine pregnancies, intrapartum hemorrhage, or HELLP syndrome. In these situations, the infants are indeed delivered — often via c-section — without regard to their gestational age if the mother’s life is threatened. Such an act is not an abortion. Though delivering a fetus before it is of viable age will result in his or her death, it is not the same thing as actively killing a newly birthed child. I’ve seen a lot of scary situations in the delivery room, but thankfully, I haven’t seen zombie babies that have to be put down immediately before they attack their mother. Medical providers don’t try to keep fetuses alive if it will result in the mother’s demise. It does an unborn child no good to have a deceased mother. Hopefully, this explanation makes sense, and arguments like this can be put to rest.
