by Lauren Schwartz

Created on: December 03, 2008

For those who wish to outlaw abortions: where does it end? Many pro-choice advocates can agree that abortion should not be used as a form of contraception; that abortion is appropriate if the woman's health, or even life, is at risk and when pregnancy results from rape or incest.

There is a giant flaw in the pro-life proponents' argument to ban abortion rights: The spectrum of pro-life support ranges from opposing late-term abortions to contraception and even health education. When adolescents are denied the proper education regarding sexual protection, to the extreme of teaching abstinence-only, the anti-abortion argument fails to provide a logically solution to avoid the need for abortion.

Pharmacists and insurance companies around the country are now allowed to refuse contraception based on their personal morals. Adding insult to injury, those who do know about preventing pregnancy are then unable to acquire means for preventing it? It's really amazing that a pharmacist, who is medically trained, can actually be against birth control. Birth control is not a form of abortion; it's not even in the same category.

Then there are the family planning centers that exist as "an alternative to abortion". Many of these centers will literally lie to a pregnant woman about how far along the pregnancy is, which can have serious adverse effects to her health. Promises of help raising the child result in no financial support after birth. There are laws nationwide because young mothers, that feel they have no where to turn (lack of education and resources), end up abandoning their infants which often result in infant mortality.

Biologically, a fetus does not have a heart beat until at least the 10th week after fertilization, which is when abortions are performed. Without a heartbeat, the argument that an abortion takes "a baby's life" is empty since life can not exist without a heart beat. The brain of a fetus doesn't grow much until the third trimester, when cognitive brain functions are viable. Brain functioning is key in defining a living person.

By denying a woman the right to have a choice when it comes to reproduction is not only intrusive, but selfish. Physiology aside, religion is the largest factor of the pro-life argument. It is one thing to have faith in a religion and have values that are parallel with a God you believe in. However, assuming that God deems abortion as an abomination is assuming every other person's beliefs are the same as yours, which is hardly the case. It is a person's choice to believe in God, have faith in a religion and abide by instilled morals. But that is you're choice to do so, and another's choice not to do so. Pro-choice supporters allow pro-life supporters to maintain that right, without any desire to ban such a choice.

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