Ethics

Moral and Ethical Issues

(or frequently asked questions which have no answers)

Most of this website is full of facts: questions which have definite answers and information that is accurate and up to date. This section of the site is different because it explores moral questions. Although people often believe that their personal view is right and the opposite view wrong, moral questions often do not have a simple or provable answer. Moral questions often lead to more questions.

Many people have strong views on the morality of abortion. These views may have been formed after a great deal of thought about abortion, or could simply be ideas picked up from friends, family, or media. Some people’s views on abortion are closely linked to their religious or political beliefs and for others connect more to their personal experiences or even just gut feelings.

People’s views on abortion are not necessarily set in stone for life. Like our opinions on many things, we can change our minds as a result of specific incidents, or just adapt with age and experience.

A spectrum of belief

People’s views on abortion range from those who believe that abortion is always wrong under any circumstances to those who believe that a woman should always be allowed an abortion for any reason and at any point in pregnancy. Most people’s beliefs fall somewhere between these two ends of the spectrum.

Some of the issues here are things people consider when deciding what they think about abortion.

Women’s rights or fetal rights?

Some people believe that the moment of fertilisation marks the beginning of sacred life and that from that moment the zygote/embryo/fetus has an absolute right to life. These people may believe that abortion is always wrong.

Some people believe that a balance must be struck between the rights of the fetus and the rights of the woman and that the rights of the fetus increase as it develops in the womb. These people may believe that abortion is acceptable in some circumstances, for some reasons and/or at some stages of pregnancy

Others believe that a woman should have an absolute right to decide whether or not to continue with her pregnancy. As it is her body and life that will be affected by pregnancy, childbirth and motherhood, no-one else should have the power to force her to continue with an unwanted pregnancy. Some of these people do not ‘like’ the idea of abortion and would not choose it themselves, but do believe that women should have the right to choose safe, legal abortion.

What do you think?

Isn’t adoption the moral solution?

For some women adoption is a good solution to an unwanted pregnancy. It may be a positive decision to bring a baby into the world, confident that it will be well looked after by adoptive parents; it may be the only morally acceptable option for her; or her pregnancy might have progressed too far to be able to access an abortion. 

Most people believe that women should not be coerced or pressured to continue with a pregnancy and have their baby adopted, but that adoption should be positively presented as one of her possible options.

However, some people say that adoption is the only acceptable solution to an unwanted pregnancy and that abortion should not be an option.

What do you think?

When does life begin?

Some religions and cultures teach that life begins at fertilisation – the moment that sperm meets egg - and that the fertilised egg is a sacred life, with as many rights as a baby, child or adult. 

Medical science tells us that a proportion of fertilised eggs do not become implanted in the woman’s womb and that a large proportion of those that do (estimates suggest around 25%) are lost naturally to miscarriage. So some people do not believe that fertilisation is a good point at which to mark the beginning of a sacred life.

Other people see the zygote/embryo/fetus as a developing life with rights increasing as pregnancy develops.

Other people believe that the end of pregnancy and birth of a baby marks its transition to personhood and is the point at which it attains rights.

What do you think?

When does a fetus become a person?

This question is important because we do not give human rights (such as the right to life) to all living things (plants, animals etc) but only to people. The earliest zygote contains the entire DNA code of the person that could develop from it, and some argue that its potential to become a person is enough to give it the rights of a fully developed person.

Others argue that a person is more than just the sum of its biological parts, and believe that a living person has characteristics that a fetus doesn’t.  These may include the ability to think and reason or the capacity to respond, to build relationships and to communicate.

Some believe that it is the ability of the fetus to exist independently of the mother that defines it as a person. They consider the fetus to have the right to life at the point where it is ‘viable’, meaning it can survive outside of the woman’s womb.

What do you think?

Is abortion murder?

Some people categorise abortion as murder at even the earliest stages of pregnancy. 

Others see this as an emotive term designed to stigmatise both the women who have abortions and doctors who provide abortions.

In the UK abortion is not legally categorised as murder. When specific criteria are met it is a legal medical procedure.

What do you think?

What about gender abortions?

Sometimes a genetic condition is carried only by the male or female gene so, after identifying the gender of the fetus, parents-to-be might opt for abortion in order to avoid passing on a genetic condition. Some people believe this is an acceptable reason to have an abortion.

Most gender abortions take place because there is a cultural preference for having a baby of a specific gender. In many parts of the world, for example, boy babies are more desirable than girl babies. This is normally a symptom of serious cultural and economic inequality between men and women in those communities. It might relate to the difference in men’s and women’s access to education, their earning power and status as well as traditions around marriage and dowries which mean that the parents and families of girl children are disadvantaged.

A common reaction people have to gender abortions is that they are very wrong. However, people also recognise that the pressure on a woman to have an abortion because of the gender of the fetus can be enormous. Some unwanted girls are killed after birth, abandoned or seriously mistreated and their mothers punished for their failure to produce boys. Under these circumstances many will not condemn women for having gender abortions.

What do you think?

Is women’s sexuality the real problem?

Although discussion of abortion in the 21st Century is largely focused on the issue of fetal rights, there are plenty of people whose objections to abortion are based on a much more traditional concern - the ‘problem’ of women’s sexuality. Often those who condemn abortion on the grounds of the right to life of the fetus also believe that the use of contraception is wrong.

For some, anxiety about and disapproval of women’s sexuality lies at the root of anti-abortion ideas. For them anything that facilitates fornication (sex without the intention or consequence of pregnancy) is morally wrong because the sole purpose of sex is to reproduce. These people believe that contraception and abortion allow women a way to be sexually active without having children, and therefore must be wrong.

What do you think?

Motherhood – the natural way?

Anxiety about abortion and women’s sexuality is often connected to the idea that a woman’s natural role and destiny is motherhood and that anything disturbing the progression between sex and motherhood is bound to cause a woman psychological problems or mental illness.

This idea was expressed by an American, Doctor Gouldstone, who, in 1958 said  ‘Woman’s main role on earth is to conceive, deliver and raise children…When this function is interfered with, we see all sorts of emotional disorders.’

Nearly fifty years later this view of women is still evident in some discussion of abortion. Some people believe that any woman seeking abortion must be unnatural or mentally disturbed or that any woman who has an abortion will become mentally disturbed.

These days many people choose to have small families or not to become parents at all. They do not feel that they are unnatural or disturbed, but are simply people making informed personal choices.

What do you think?