Gothatfunk’s Questions for Opponents of Abortion
I recently stumbled across Youtube videographer gothatfunk’s video “Questions for Opponents of Abortion.” I found it refreshing. Obviously I disagree with his pro-choice stance, but I can appreciate that he actually wanted to talk about the issue. He was not interested in demonizing me or calling me names. He wanted to know what I, as someone who is against abortion, think about several serious questions that would be issues of public policy should abortion be criminalized. He also wanted to know how abortion fit in the wider constellation of my sexual mores. These are fair questions, ones that pro-lifers should think about.
Gothatfunk invited video responses, but I don’t do those. I don’t know how and, to be honest, I thought I would come across very poorly onscreen. I am a much better writer than talking head. I find clips of the few times I have been interviewed for television very difficult to watch. Here is gotthatfunk’s video. I have transcribed his questions below not quite perfectly, but I think you’ll agree my edits don’t distort his meaning. (If you think I’ve made a mistake somewhere, kindly point it out.) It’s just that audio and written aren’t perfectly commensurable formats.
I have included my own answers which you may find interesting. Included in my answers are some questions of my own that I hope other pro-lifers might be able to help me with. Overarchingly, I am interested in hearing from people who have knowledge about countries where abortion is illegal. It seems to me that the first thing to do when asking questions about what it would look like if abortion were to be criminalized is to look at places where it is criminalized. I am no expert in that area and gothatfunk seems not to have considered it at all. Input here would be most welcome.
You are, of course, encourged to post your own answers to gothatfunk. I want to warn you, however, that I am going to keep this thread strictly on topic. We are talking about gothatfunk’s questions, not about the question of abortion generally or about which political parties are liars and which are dirty liars.
1. To what extent do you oppose abortion?
a) You oppose abortion under all circumstances.
b) You oppose abortion under all circumstance except where the life of the woman carrying the baby is in jeopardy.
c) You oppose abortion in all circumstances except where the mother’s life is in jeopardy and/or the pregnancy is a result of incest or rape.
d) You only oppose abortion after a certain period of pregnancy has gone by. (Pick your own number.)
I’m gonna say a) with a tiny side of b). Because I think an unborn child is just as much a human person as you or me, I personally oppose abortion in all circumstances. I recognize, however, that there are terrible ambiguous situations where innocent people die. I am not sure Catholics can try to pass a law that says, “In terrible situations where only one life can be saved, both must be forfeit.” We can practice that ourselves if we think it is true, but that’s a tough one to enforce legally. (In other words, I don’t find the claim that a foetus is a human person with inalienable rights to be a religious position that cannot be enforced on a pluralistic society. But it seems to me that the claim that the woman must forfeit her life in order to avoid killing an innocent person, even if that innocent person will die anyway, probably is a religious position that cannot be imposed on people who don’t hold it. That doesn’t mean I think it is wrong any more than it means I think the Trinity is a bad idea. It’s just not an idea you can enforce with the power of the state.) If the only abortions in a country were the ones that genuinely save a woman’s life, we’d be in a much better situation culturally than we are now.
I do recognize, however, that creating a “life of the mother” clause in abortion legislation can lead to rampant abuse of that clause. I would not want people who have no problem with abortion generally to be the ones making the decisions about which cases actually constitute a genuine threat to the mother’s life.
I know that there are all kinds of troubling things that arise here. But the world is a troubling place. Ambiguity is not a reason for complacence.
2. “The only surefire, guaranteed method of preventing an unwanted pregnancy is to abstain from sexual intercourse. The same is true for men as it is for women . . . Sometimes contraception fails, which is one of the reasons sometimes people get abortions.”
Amen.
3. Would you support laws that make non-procreative sex illegal? How could such a law be enforced?
No, I would not. For one thing, I don’t think it could be enforced. For another, it’s not clear to me that there is anything wrong with sex that doesn’t make a baby. I think we should culturally encourage people not to have sex until they are in a position to accept a baby, but that doesn’t mean making all sex that doesn’t make a baby illegal. You can have sex with your partner not intending a baby as long as, should a baby result despite your best efforts, you don’t kill it. After all, you were aware that sex leads to babies. You knew what you were doing.
4. Have you personally ever had sexual intercourse without the intention of causing a pregnancy?
At least twice. ;)
5. Do you think abortion is murder? Or do you think abortion is a crime in and of it’s own right but a lesser crime than murder? . . . Is it equal to killing a fully formed adult who has lead a life of whatever number of years? [And not manslaughter which is accidental.]
Objectively, I think abortion is murder. It seems to me that in most cases there will be circumstances that make it less than first-degree murder. This is the same, of course, as many killings of people outside the womb. Each case will have its own special set of circumstances to be sorted through by the legal system.
Objectively, I think it is the same as killing an adult. Subjectively, I think each killing of an adult is different, so I have no problem saying that an abortion will be subjectively different from killing an adult. In fact, I think each abortion will be subjectively different from each other abortion.
6. If you think abortion is murder, by definition, it would be premeditated and therefore it would be a first-degree murder. But who gets charged with the murder? The person who performs abortion or the woman who seeks an abortion?
It may well be first-degree murder in many cases, though, as I said above, I’m not certain it will be in every case. Many people who kill adults don’t get a first-degree murder rap for any number of reasons. I think the same would be true if abortion were illegal.
As to who gets charged, it looks an awful lot to me like hiring a hitman. I think that that would be a useful place to start. What kinds of laws do states have about hiring a hitman? I don’t know the answer to that, but I’d be interested to hear from someone who does. Maybe that wouldn’t be a workable solution for reasons I haven’t considered, but I think it’s worth thinking about.
7. Should the penalty for abortion, for whoever is determined to be the murderer, . . . be exactly the same as it is for first-degree murder? Potentially life in prison and/or execution?
If the abortion is determined by a court to have been a first-degree murder, then yes. If not, then no. I’m thinking now in terms of the actual killer, i.e., the abortion doctor.
However, I should add that I am totally opposed to the death penalty unless there is no other way to protect the public. I think an abortionist behind bars is no threat. Even once released, I think our society is perfectly capable of ensuring he doesn’t do any more abortions. There is no reason to kill another person.
8. Who is an accessory? Is the woman seeking an abortion an accessory to murder or is she the murderer? Is her doctor [not the abortionist] who knows she’s pregnant, who tells her she’s pregnant – and she says that she can’t keep the baby – is he now an accessory if he doesn’t report her? What about the partner, husband, or boyfriend or other family members or friends, if they don’t report her as intending to have an abortion, and she has one, do they become accessories to the murder?
I think that in a huge number of cases the partner/boyfriend/husband was so much an accomplice that the courts would not find the woman guilty of first degree hitman hiring. The pressure by men on women who wouldn’t want an abortion if the father was willing to support her and the child is a major cause of abortion. I would come down hard on men who could be shown to have coerced their partners into abortion. I’m not big on long prison sentences unless they are necessary to protect the public or can be shown to be a major deterrent. In this case, both those factors might come into play.
As for other accessories, i.e., people who knew the woman was going to have an abortion, I’ll admit that that is a very tough question. It seems to me that the doctor was just doing his job and should have the kind of immunity that a priest has in the confessional. As for friends and family who know about it and keep quiet, it seems they are accessories in some sense, though I don’t know enough about law to know what normally happens to accomplices in such cases. I would think that such ‘accessories’ would be in an extremely trying situation psychologically and are consequently often treated leniently by the courts. Anyone know more about this than I?
9. If you think that abortion is murder, should capital punishment be a possible punishment for that? If you think abortion is a crime in it’s own right but lesser than murder somehow, what punishments do you think would be appropriate for that lesser crime? What number of years incarceration would you find justified?
Again, I am against capital punishment. I don’t think that helps anyone. For the abortionist, I think that they should get the same as the hitman – the one difference being that hitmen are probably a lot harder to keep track of once their sentences are up than abortionists, but maybe I just watch too many movies. Maybe real life hitmen don’t all have the skill sets of ex-marines and international spies.
For the woman, I think there would be a huge range here. I think it would rarely be the case that a woman could be found guilty of first degree hitman hiring. I think that in most cases incarceration wouldn’t be much help. Most post-abortive women probably need to be cared for more than punished, though there may be rare exceptions. I would support the government giving money to groups (probably usually Church groups) to run programs, even homes, for post-abortive women.
I should note that this is in line with my thinking on criminal justice generally. Most criminals need care rather than punishment, white-collar crime being more exceptional here. There are cases where incarceration is needed to protect the public, but post-abortive women (especially one-time offenders) don’t strike me as one of those.
10. Would you say it would be reasonable to investigate women who have a miscarriage as possibly having had an abortion? Would it be fair to say that every miscarriage makes you an abortion suspect? If so, why? If not, why not?
Absolutely not. Miscarriage is so common it is not even remotely reasonable, let alone practical. I would not conduct an investigation on euthanasia for every terminally ill person who dies. So once in a blue moon someone gets away with an abortion (or euthanasia) because we cannot possibly investigate every death of a person who is in a very fragile state to start with? We live in a broken world. We’ll have to live with that.
On top of that, and maybe even more importantly, treating women who are already suffering from the loss of a child as potential criminals strikes me as inhumane.
11. Will you support forced sterilization for a woman who is convicted of having more than one abortion?
Absolutely not. She has been hurt enough. She needs to be cared for, not mutilated.
12. If women are unable to obtain a legal abortion, would you, personally, be prepared to adopt the unwanted baby if the woman was forced by law to carry it to full term?
Absolutely. My wife once had a coworker whose little sister was about to have an abortion. We decided to offer to adopt the baby if she would carry it to term, but before my wife could be in touch with her coworker it was too late. I told several friends about this situation and most of them said they would do the same thing. Others knew of infertile couples who would happily adopt the child. I don’t know how many children we could take in. Obviously I couldn’t adopt hundreds of thousands of kids, but 6 doesn’t strike me as impossible. I really don’t think this is a problem at all. I think the pro-life community could definitely make room for the millions of children who would potentially be up for adoption. I also suspect that many mothers would decide to keep their babies once they saw them. They might even decide to do so well before that.
13. If not, would you personally support the baby after it was carried to full term being put into an orphanage until such time as it was able to be homed by a family? If that’s the case, would you be prepared to have to pay extra taxes so that the government could fund the (abortion) orphanages?
I’m not entirely sure what the first question is asking, but since I didn’t answer “no” to the preceding question, maybe it doesn’t apply to me. In any case, I believe orphanages are better than morgues and families are better than orphanages.
I would happily pay taxes to provide for orphanages or support heroic families who adopt numerous children in this situation. I pay taxes for a lot of things that offend me far more than raising kids.
14. Similarly, would you be prepared to pay extra taxes to fund the extra prisons that we would need to house the doctors and the women and the accomplices who are convicted of being involved in an abortion? We’re talking about years of incarceration here, times multiple people for every abortion. We’re gonna need more prison space, and that money has got to come from somewhere. If it doesn’t come from your taxes, where should it come from?
I’d be interested in hearing what the expected costs here would be. There are numerous countries where abortion is illegal. What kind of legal and penal costs does abortion amount to in Ireland, Chile and Poland? Does anybody know?
In any case, I would be happy to pay extra taxes if they were necessary. But I suspect that once you got the few underground abortionists off the street, there wouldn’t be too many others to put in prison. If we spent more money on caring for women in tough situations, made coercing a woman into abortion illegal, and shut down the abortionists, I don’t think we’d need a huge amount more prison space. I don’t think we’d actually be incarcerating 3 people per abortion for multiple years at the current rate of abortion, which seems to be the premise of this question.
Brett Salkeld is a doctoral student in theology at Regis College in Toronto. He is a father of two (so far) and husband of one.
Comments are closed.
Brett,
Great answers to great questions. Do you have any idea about whether gothatfunk will ever see your responses?
I pretty much agree with your responses. One observation: he had a lot of questions about the criminal punishment for abortion. I know that many pro-abortion people bring this up as a criticism of the pro-life position, or as an accusation of hypocrisy. But I think it betrays a misunderstanding of the value of legal prohibitions in our society.
The law has several functions, like restoring justice, or preventing harm. And one of it’s most important functions is as teacher. So it’s not hypocritical to say that something should be legally prohibited, but not have a punishment attached to it. Take, for example, suicide: in most jurisdictions, suicide (and attempted suicide) is prohibited by law. I think that is a good idea, because that type of behavior should be discouraged. But for those who attempt suicide, I don’t think that there should be any punishment — to the contrary, they need help, and not punishment. I think it’s similar with abortion. Women who choose it shouldn’t be punished, they should be helped. But that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be legally prohibited.
Count me and my wife as another couple who would take an unwanted baby.
Thanks Thales. I tried to post on Youtube to let him know about my response, but I couldn’t get it to work. If anyone else wants to let him know, that’s be great. Also, wish him well re: his Dad for me. I tried to do that too.
“he had a lot of questions about the criminal punishment for abortion. I know that many pro-abortion people bring this up as a criticism of the pro-life position, or as an accusation of hypocrisy.”
This is seen more and more in pro-abortion arguments. They seem oblivious to the empirical fact that before 1973, there was never a law outlawing abortion which mandated the prosecution of the mother for the crime. It’s a red herring. If Roe v. Wade is overturned, such prosecution will not be put into state laws outlawing abortion. In fact, there are numerous “trigger laws” already written which will be automatically enacted should Roe v. Wade be overturned, in none of them is prosecution of the mother at issue.
I did do some reading about Poland a while back, and they have virtually no people in prison as a result of their laws. They’ve never made a practice of prosecuting women for alleged abortions, and a small number of people have been fined for jailed for running illegal abortion clinics. There’s some controversy about how many abortions are procured by going to Germany or the Czech Republic (international pro-choice groups at the same time say the law is ineffective because of open borders and that it denies women choice) but most statistics seem to show that Poles have 80-90% fewer abortions than surrounding countries. As a matter of political pragmatism, I could see that as an acceptable level of success.
Also, I’d tend to note that (though I wasn’t able to see the video you linked to, and thus determine the tone) I generally find these questions coming from people who are not being notably fair to pro-lifers, and are not interested in their answers. When I’ve tried answering those questions to pro-choice friends in the past, it seems like it’s always been a ploy so that the pro-choice friend can either accuse me of being an anti-woman fascist (if I suggest any sort of strict enforcement) or of being a hypocrite who doesn’t really believe the unborn are human but just wants to restrict women to keep them down (if I suggest that the main thing is simply to take abortion off the table as a legal medical procedure, not to hunt down every person who has an abortion.)
Rape and incest intensely trouble me. Only through the Grace of God along with a tremendous support system can I imagine a woman young or older having the strength to follow through with the pregnancy. This reminds me of the women I saw on a 60 Minutes report who had been raped in the Congo and were being interviewed with their babies in their arms who were the result of this violence. Their obvious love for their babies brought me to tears. What Grace! I would say that in this particular case it is the woman’s choice, but, we as a society must offer her every possibility for carrying her child to birth.
Is abortion murder? If I promoted abortion as a method of birth control then for me it would be murder because I believe that life starts at conception and must be given the same opportunity to live as I have been given. Those who do not perceive a human being beginning at conception then would not view this as murder. Why? That is what needs to be explored. Hearts need to be explored first, rather than legislating something as murder.
I am 64 now and health is a factor but I would encourage my family members to adopt. I would pay whatever taxes are required to support the birth and future life of every unwanted child.
I am tired now.
I really can’t believe that a woman who seeks an abortion (if the law were to be changed and it became illegal) would not be held accountable for the one seeking the abortion. I find it hard to accept that only the abortion provider would be held accountable for the situation. Also, what if the woman decides to use the coat hanger trick? Then there would be no one else to blame, aside from the woman. It makes me envision a world where desperate women with all kinds of problems, would wind up in jail. I do think about this, and for myself, how could I only lay blame on the doctor? For the life of me, I can’t justify that, if the law were to be changed. Simply because it’s not just the doctor that desires this outcome. I feel a woman must be accountable for her actions. So I am very torn on how I personally feel about it. For me, I would never want to see a woman seek an abortion. At the same time, I really dont want it to be criminalized. I always find a hang up about the criminalization of women. I mean right now, you have groups that help women heal that have had abortions. Yet, if you really believe it should be illegal, then you would in fact be treating murderers. I think to put them in state penitentiaries with hardened criminals would be very hard to watch.
I can’t think of one serious advocate for prohibiting abortion who is also in favor of jailing women. In my experience, all those who are in favor of prohibiting abortion also think that jailing women is not what should be done. Women who feel like they need to have an abortion should be helped and loved, not jailed.
The legislators in Nicaragua would dispute your claim.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/27/AR2006112701577.html
M.Z.,
Let’s agree that we not take our standards for a justice system that respects the dignity of the human person, and our standards for a civil society that is aimed for the common good, from Nicaragua.
Dear Cindy,
The fact is that in American jurisprudence before 1973 (and likewise in other places even today where abortion is illegal or largely illegal), prosecution of the woman was and is rare. Indeed, most American states from the early Republic onward which legislated against abortion targeted both the abortionist and the pharmacist who sold abortifacients. While in a few jurisdictions prosecution of the woman was possible, it was not mandatory, and rarely ever occurred.
Now, some might worry that this legal framework, which more or less saw the woman as the victim of circumstances and pressures is at root misogynist, implying a lack of agency in women which we would not want to enshrine in law. However, we ought to remember that prominent feminists of the 19th century, notably Susan B. Anthony, argued just this very point, noting that while the woman who procured an abortion was guilty and would have consequences for herself in this life (physical, emotional, and spiritual) as well as the next, it was those who placed her in a plight where she felt abortion necessary or preferable who were far more to blame, far more culpable.
The goal of criminalization would be to make abortions less frequent in large part by taking it off the table as a legitimate response to pregnancy, and this is far more readily done by prosecuting doctors and pharmacists (or nurses, midwives, or an array of other trained persons) than the woman herself. Suicide, after all (as Thales mentions above) is generally illegal, but we are not prone to prosecute those who survive suicide attempts; we do not criminalize them even while we do criminalize suicide.
So, while I sympathize with your laudable concern that women not become victims of the machinery of the penal system, I also believe that history (and present practice in other parts of the world) demonstrate that your anxiety is not founded on any likely outcome of recriminalization.
Thank you for your comments Dominic. Here is another thing I was thinking about. We would be going from something that was legal in this country, to outlawing it and making it illegal. I would gather if this happens that you will have many angry outspoken people on the other side. So is it really that easy to look at post 1973 and how things were handled then? I suspect what you would have at first would be people getting them (abortions) in secret. (And probably a large mass of people helping to support them.) I would bet the mob (mafia) may welcome a surging come back in finding places for women to go. So I fear it will become such a known problem in this country that it would only be a matter of time, before some politician seeking to get elected or some prosicuter would come along and start using our court systems to enforce this. They could start with the doctors, but can we be certain that they wouldnt eventually go after women? I mean you had a senator or congressman (I can’t remember) from Mississippi (if I remember correctly) that wanted to investigate misscarriages. Not everyone in our country thinks as rational as you seem to. Our country can look like an angry mob at times. I see your points though, and I will think on them and try and reconcile my fears.
Suicide, after all (as Thales mentions above) is generally illegal . . .
Suicide is not illegal in the United States.
Also, abortion was criminalized in the United States largely because it was unsafe. Abortion was never considered to be the killing of a person. But now the pro-life movement is trying to get the unborn defined as a person. This is a new rationale for outlawing abortion. I agree that even if abortion is criminalized in the United States (which I don’t think it will be), women will not be prosecuted. But if abortion is really murder, letting the woman go free is unjust.
Also, abortion was criminalized in the United States largely because it was unsafe. Abortion was never considered to be the killing of a person.
I’m pretty sure that’s untrue.
Suicide is not illegal in the United States.
After some quick research, it looks like David is right, in that states have repealed statutory criminalizations of suicide. However, it may be still prohibited at common law in some jurisdictions.
Regardless, my argument stands: the law can prohibit things without having a penalty of jailtime.
After a little more research:
I think it’s pretty clear that historically, the prohibition of abortion doesn’t have to do with abortion being unsafe to the mother – it has to do with abortion being an act which kills the living or quickened entity inside the mother.
I’m not sure about attempted suicide, but for the most part, assisted suicide remains legally prohibited. And that is a good example of my point: laws against or in favor of assisted suicide “teach” a a certain moral perspective to society, regardless if jailtime is a punishment.
Well, there’s a simple solution to that: Behave exactly the way that countries which do outlaw abortion behave in outlawing the medical procedure and punishing doctor’s who perform it (mostly by fine and loss of license) but not go around throwing people in jail. Is this in some sense a less than perfect justice in that it involves the law not fully taking vengeance for a killing? Perhaps so. But it would result in far fewer abortions (unquestionably a good thing) and there are plenty of pragmatic reasons for supporting such an approach.
Why make a supposed perfect (which has never been the case in any country that I know of) the enemy of the good?
My feelings have changed on the question slightly as of late.
First, I’ve concluded (based on the theologian Vox Nova referenced defending the action in the Olmsted case) that “to save the life of the mother” NEVER actually poses a moral problem in cases where otherwise both would die, because it is never the death of the child, specifically, that is willed to save the mother. The “end of the pregnancy” or “removing the child” maybe, but those two things are not synonymous with its death as a moral object, even if that results as a side effect. Whether the child is acted on “directly” or not in the physical sense doesn’t really matter (albeit a lot of 20th century moral theology took an overly physical notion of the moral object). If their two lives are intertwined in a “one or both” situation like that, there is a good moral argument to be made that removing the child (even if it results unintentionally in its death) is not abortion in the moral sense, as the child’s death is not willed as an ends or a means, nor is one life chosen in preference to another.
This affected my view of how I see many mothers who seek abortions. I would guess that most of these women are seeking only “the end of the pregnancy” NOT the death of the child. If it were possible to remove the babies alive and put them into artificial wombs or whatever, at least if that meant the women would never have to deal with them again…I don’t think most women would object to this. They want to not have to death with the pregnancy, etc. Some may want the baby dead specifically (they don’t like the thought of their progeny running around in the world without their knowledge, etc). But most just want the baby “gone” from their lives. They don’t will its death specifically, though they accept methods that result in its death without any proportionate justification. So, some sort of “accomplice to unjustifiable homicide” maybe. But I wouldn’t charge the women with “hiring a hitman” inasmuch as the baby’s death is usually not the direct object of their desire. A unique category would probably have to be created legally for the mother, and one that I hope would involve more counselling or treatment than punitive measures.
As for the abortionist himself, though, yes, first degree murder. His goal is not just to “remove” the baby (dead or alive) but specifically to kill it. As, in some cases, the abortionist COULD remove the baby alive (I’m thinking partial birth and stuff) and nevertheless doesn’t, because he doesn’t want to have to deal with a Born Alive baby. So, for the doctor, the death seems directly willed at least as a means if not an end.
I am afraid you have rather deeply confused the moral object with the moral intention and with very unhappy results. The moral object is the act directly willed, not merely the basic goal for which the act is accomplished. This is why “end of pregnancy” is not the object of abortion, even if it is (one of the) ends pursued by the woman who procures the abortion. It does not help to not that she might happily make use of an artificial womb. The fact remains that she desires the killing of the life she carries as the means to end the pregnancy. This makes the killing directly willed, the willed object to carry out her end.
The situation to which you want to allude to has to be conceived differently. If the woman suffers from an actual, independent medical condition which, of itself, warrants treatment to save/preserve her life, but the means used to intervene on her behalf will inevitably but incidentally result in the death of the fetus in her womb, she can nonetheless morally pursue her cure. This would make the death of her child an effect, but not the object, of her actions. On the other hand, should she will the destruction of her child as the means by which she comes to health, or the means by which she is no longer pregnant, then she cannot be excused through a euphemistic, semantic transformation, e.g. calling the direct abortion the “removal of the child.”
In short, the desire, which is to say the situation for which one strives, is not the moral object, but rather the end or intention. For this reason, we must admit that the object of a procured abortion is the death of the child, whatever goods this is supposed or intended to bring about, and for this same reason your optimism about the moral quality of most abortions is radically misplaced.
Dominic, What are your perceptions about what influences women to get abortions? I believe this is the most important area to explore before we develop strategies to stop abortion.
Accepting the claims made by women themselves, the motives are quite wide and varied. Some seek abortions because of shame, either because they conceived out of wedlock or through an adulterous liaison (or somewhere between the two, e.g. had sex with someone who was not their unwedded partner), or perhaps with a man (often of an “out group” ethnically) whom they know or fear would not be accepted by parents and family, and they either seek to eliminate any remembrance of the affair or, more self-protectively, do not want their husband, partner, family, etc. to know what they have done. Some fail to associate sex with conception, i.e. they engage in sexual activity without any thoughts or plans about becoming a mother or else becoming a mother of another child, and abortion becomes a means of continuing in the previous behavior. Some have made decisions, either on their own or with a husband or partner, about family size, careers, etc., and turn to abortion when the child interrupts or disturbs those plans.
Some women are pressured into having an abortion, either emotionally and psychologically (by an unsupportive husband or boyfriend or, often the case with teen or collegiate-age pregnancy, by unsupportive parents/family), or even physically (e.g., by an abusive husband/partner, or in the case of prostitutes by their pimp). Indeed, some women who face abuse or either sort may seek abortion out even without the partner knowing in anticipation of abuse.
Some women turn to abortion as a result of trauma. This might be trauma arising from rape (by stranger, by acquaintance, or by family member), and the rape may have other aggravating circumstances (e.g. rape during wartime, or rape while a child but capable of conceiving).
Some women procure an abortion because of a problem on the part of the fetus. Apart from the extremely rare case of ectopic pregnancy, this more generally arises from the results of genetic tests which reveal likely defects in the child to be born. Abortion may also be part of “selective reduction” either arising from a defect in one of the fetuses or, without any fetus possessing a defect, to reduce the number to be born from several to one or two. In some countries, however, women may use abortion for sex selection, either from their own preferences or from the coercive power of the State.
Some women fear they will not be able to affor to raise a child, or another child, and so procure an abortion.
No doubt there are other motives.
What is clear to me is that one of the major factors influencing a woman’s decision to have an abortion in the USA and much of the West is its status not only as legal, but as (in many jurisdictions) a right and promoted as a regular option in the array of services available in women’s health care. While procured abortions did occur, and have occurred for centuries, indeed 1000s of years, it is also true that the developing of a consensus of abortion as an evil, not exclusively accomplished but nonetheless due in part to its criminalization, was a significant factor in the reduction of its occurrence in the past.
Why do I believe so? We can clearly see the dynamic work in the case of infanticide and child murder. The practice of infanticide, infant exposure, and child murder is ancient, even prehistoric, and for much of, e.g. Mediterranean culture, was acceptable, for many of the same reasons cited above re: abortion. The rejection of infanticide by Jews, by some of the philosophers, and by Christianity, helped to save many lives otherwise lost as well as, through its criminalization, reduce its acceptability. Of course, infanticide, exposure, and child murder still occur, but one would be surprised to find anyone worrying that this ought to mean their decriminalization. Indeed, what we find appalling in infanticide and exposure, earlier societies accepted even as our society has come, and quite rapidly, to accept abortion.
Obviously what she does is equivalent to unjustified homicide. But I still would think that “removal of the child” is most women’s moral object.
If only considering that whether the child dies OR NOT is totally INCIDENTAL to most women’s choice. They don’t really care about it’s death. They seek out a procedure that will REMOVE it. The procedure, one way or another, results in its death. There is no proportionate justification to allow its death, therefore this is still unjustifiable homicide.
But I would argue that if the same procedure would be preformed whether the child was alive or ALREADY dead (and surely these women would still want their pregnancy terminated even if the baby was already dead in the womb of natural causes and just proceeding on towards stillbirth) then the death of the child is, in itself, not part of the moral object, but only part of the circumstances/consequences.
Now, the circumstances/consequences are still one of the three “fonts” of morality, and if there is no proportionate justification for the death, it is still equivalent to a type of homicide. And, of course, human life being of infinite value and incommunicable, we can’t even choose to sacrifice one life in favor of the whole world. Only a “one or both” situation could justify it.
But, still, I would argue that the death is not part of the moral object because it is not willed as either an end NOR as a means to that end. You say the death is a means to the woman’s intent, but I think merely “removal” is because the woman would still choose that procedure even if the baby was ALREADY dead inside her and, likewise, even if the baby were to be preserved alive outside her.
The death of the child is, to the mother, moral relevant as a foreseen consequence, but is not intrinsic to the moral object.
But I would argue that if the same procedure would be preformed whether the child was alive or ALREADY dead (and surely these women would still want their pregnancy terminated even if the baby was already dead in the womb of natural causes and just proceeding on towards stillbirth) then the death of the child is, in itself, not part of the moral object, but only part of the circumstances/consequences.
He’s the rub, it seems. The procedure is different in se and not merely circumstantially whether performed on a fetus or performed on a corpse (i.e. the body of a what was a fetus but is now dead tissue). So long as we perform the act of abortion on what is, and what we know to be (or, minimally, what we could know to be if we availed ourselves of easily available information) a living human being, then the object in itself in necessarily different from the same material acts performed on dead tissue.
If I am on a raft which is sinking in deadly freezing water and I push an unconscious man overboard to stop the boat from sinking, the act is radically different not in circumstance but in object from the act of pushing the same man’s corpse overboard (i.e. presuming he is already dead). These are not two identical objects with different circumstances precisely because a corpse is not a human being in a specific condition. It is no longer a human being, but the remains of one, and so actions performed on or with regard to it are not merely accidentally (e.g. circumstantially) different, but specifically so. This is why the woman’s acts, procured or directly performed, as regard the fetus in her womb differ in object and not in circumstance from those performed, e.g., to remove the remains of a child who has died in utero.
I simply think that represents a very physicalist notion of the moral object that moral theology, one popular since Trent perhaps, but not actually traditional in the Thomist tradition.
Pushing the man off the raft to stop the boat from sinking does not have his DEATH in itself as either an end or a means. It is irrelevant to that act and why it is chosen whether he dies or not. It is “removing his weight from the raft” that is sought, and “pushing him into the water” that is the act chosen.
Of course, whether he is alive or dead is morally relevant when it comes to the foreseeable consequences (for example, in warm shallow tropical waters, maybe it would be more okay), but I would not consider it part of the moral object in itself.
Usually that wouldn’t matter. We still can’t choose one life in favor of another. After all, why should I accept the death of that man? Why don’t I myself jump in the water? There can be nothing but selfishness there. So usually, the point is a mere technical distinction, as the act is wrong either way, if not by intent or object, then by foreseeable consequences.
BUT, what if one man weighs a lot more than the other, and either he goes, or BOTH sink and die (ie, there is no “choice” between lives, the lighter man jumping wouldn’t stop the raft from sinking, the fatter man weighs enough by himself to sink it).
Then, I think, just as in a “one or both” life-of-the-mother case, it would be acceptable, yes, to push the fat man off the raft as long as his death itself (but rather, merely his removal from the raft) was the means to keeping the raft afloat.
There are “mountain climbers strapped together” analogies that seem to allow this. It’s just that, in the 20th century especially (as bioethics have become a big thing) people have insisted on weird mental gymnastics like “You can cut the rope, but can’t push the man’s hand off your ankle.” Really, that’s irrelevant. The “directness” spoken of in terms of the moral object is not about the mechanics of the physical act, but rather with what is directly WILLED. So, for example, I would believe that removing an embryo from a fallopian tube (even if death sadly results from the removal) is fine; there is no reason to require removing a salvageable fallopian tube (and arguing that it’s pathological) just to avoid acting “directly” on the child in a purely physical sense.
To me, this seems different than something like, say, cannibalism, where “death” is essentially connected to the idea of consuming someone for nutrition. But “removal from the raft” as long as the death is willed as neither an ends or a means…does not seem to involve the death as part of the moral object, but merely a foreseen but unintended side effect of pushing him in the water. And if it’s an “either him or both of us” situation which doesn’t require choosing one life in preference to another (which can never be done)…then it would seem acceptable to me, yes.
“Removal from the raft” is not the same as willing someone’s death as an end or a means, even if it is foreseen to result. And in rare cases, we can accept a foreseen death as long as the death itself is not willed as an end nor directly as a necessary means to that end. Namely in “either him or both of us” situations.
I simply think that represents a very physicalist notion of the moral object that moral theology, one popular since Trent perhaps, but not actually traditional in the Thomist tradition.
Gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.
To avoid namecalling, and since both of us are convinced that we are representing the traditional Thomist tradition, perhaps a more helpful approach in this conversation would be to seek a little more clarity. (For example, since Thomas does not allow for knowingly killing someone [directly, that is] in self-defense as a morally acceptable act, whereas you think the “either him or me” scenario allows us to toss a live person off a boat to certain death as an acceptable act, I could raise questions about your Thomistic bona fides.) So, as brothers in Christ, let’s take this to a different place, hopefully more fruitful not only for us, but also perhaps for those following this discussion.
You seem, if I understand you aright, to regard my error to be in reading object rather too strictly, too “physically” in the early modern sense, whereas I think you are confused about the difference between object and intention, and as a result treating differences in object as differences in circumstance. Since we seem to regard the other’s position as woefully inadequate and misrepresenting the tradition, let me see if I haven’t perhaps misread your argument.
I wonder what you understand the moral object of adultery to be. This is why I ask. It would seem, on my understanding of your interpretation of moral object, that in order for adultery to be a moral object, one must specifically will and have as his end sleeping with a woman not his wife precisely insofar as she is not his wife. Do you think this is so?
Surely such a view would, on my view, be odd and would mean that true adultery, though not impossible, would be altogether rare. Most adulterers are seeking sex or companionship, etc. Should a man argue that he was not committing adultery simply because he was on a business trip and would have happily had sex with his wife had she been there, but as she wasn’t he had sex with a woman he met in the hotel bar, we would laugh at him or regard him as profoundly morally confused. What is surely relevant qua object about adultery is not the end/intention, the reason for which he is having sex. That is, it is not only adultery if he has sex with someone precisely because that woman is not his wife. Rather, what counts as adultery is that he knows this woman not to be his wife and he has sex with her anyway. Said differently, the fact that this woman is not his wife and that he is married change not simply the circumstances of the act, but its species as well, precisely because of a difference in the moral object. What it takes for an act to be adultery in a morally relevant way is that a man should knowingly have sex with a woman not his wife knowing that she is not his wife. (What would be physicalism here would be the position, used as a thought-piece in Medieval discussions, of a man having sex with a woman thinking she is his wife, although she is not, while nonetheless accusing the man of adultery; even if we grant this is materially adultery, it not formally so.)
Now, I do not expect you disagree that the man in the scenario above (having sex while on a business trip, although ceteris paribus desiring to have sex with his wife) is actually guilty of adultery. If I am wrong, could you let me know on your understanding why he is not thus guilty? Indeed, if he is not guilty, then what would have to be the case for someone actually to be guilty of adultery? OR, if he is in fact, on your view, guilty of adultery, could you help me to understand why, on your view, this situation differs from the question of the moral object of a woman procuring an abortion?
I suspect that I am missing something that you are trying to teach me. Even though I regard your reasoning as mistaken, I don’t want to presume that I have not misread you, or even more that I could not have made an error. Please receive these queries in that spirit.
“since Thomas does not allow for knowingly killing someone [directly, that is] in self-defense as a morally acceptable act, whereas you think the “either him or me” scenario allows us to toss a live person off a boat to certain death as an acceptable act, I could raise questions about your Thomistic bona fides.”
How? I think the notion of self-defense helps my case. As Thomas does allow something like “hitting a person over the head with a 2-by-4″ as a moral object for self-defense, yes even to certain death, as long as the death itself is not intended as an end nor willed as a means for the self-defense but merely as an unintended side-effect of something like “physical incapacitation to stop him from killing me.” Force foreseen to be fatal IS allowed for self-defense as long as the fatality in itself is not a means, merely the physical incapacitation.
“I wonder what you understand the moral object of adultery to be. This is why I ask. It would seem, on my understanding of your interpretation of moral object, that in order for adultery to be a moral object, one must specifically will and have as his end sleeping with a woman not his wife precisely insofar as she is not his wife. Do you think this is so?”
No. Because the moral object includes the chain of direct means willed to obtain the end. In this case, the proximate end is surely something like “sexual pleasure,” but the means used to obtain the sexual pleasure is sleeping with a married woman. Hence a disordered moral object. The fact that she’s married can’t be said to be a side-effect of some other act. It is within the direct chain of means. It needn’t be her married-status which is specifically appealing.
This is different than a case where the means to “stopping the boat from sinking” is “pushing the fat guy off” which does not intrinsically imply his death, which is foreseen, but a side-effect (ie, the death itself is not within the direct chain of means, it is incidental).
“What is surely relevant qua object about adultery is not the end/intention, the reason for which he is having sex.”
I have nowhere said that the intention/proximate end is the same as the moral object in itself. What I’m saying is that the moral object is not primarily the external event, it is what the will assents to as the means to its end.
As JPII says in Veritas Splendor:
““By the object of a given moral act, then, one cannot mean a process or an event of the merely physical order, to be assessed on the basis of its ability to bring about a given state of affairs in the outside world.”
“Rather, what counts as adultery is that he knows this woman not to be his wife and he has sex with her anyway.”
Yes. Because there is no sense in which his marriage to someone else is a side-effect.
“What would be physicalism here would be the position, used as a thought-piece in Medieval discussions, of a man having sex with a woman thinking she is his wife, although she is not, while nonetheless accusing the man of adultery; even if we grant this is materially adultery, it not formally so.”
What I’d consider to be a “physicalist” example would be something like the proposition that the mere juxtaposition of genitals in itself
“OR, if he is in fact, on your view, guilty of adultery, could you help me to understand why, on your view, this situation differs from the question of the moral object of a woman procuring an abortion?”
Because the baby’s death is not within the direct chain of means, albeit its an unjustifiable disproportionate side-effect of things that are.
The mother’s intended end is, usually I’m pretty sure, to simply “not be pregnant” anymore, rather than the death of the child specifically. Furthermore, the direct chain of causes of “removing” the child to achieve that does not conceptually require its death.
For example, Grisez speaks of the case where a craniotomy (acting “directly” on the baby in a physical sense) is needed to save the mother, or else both die. He says:
“The proposal can be simply to alter the child’s physical dimensions and remove him or her because, as a physical object, this body cannot remain where it is without ending in both the baby’s and the mother’s deaths. To understand this proposal, it helps to notice that the baby’s death contributes nothing to the objective sought; indeed, the procedure is exactly the same if the baby has already died. In adopting this proposal, the baby’s death need only be accepted as a side effect.”
I think that’s the important part, “the baby’s death contributes nothing to the objective sought.” We could imagine a child being “removed” alive, and likewise we can imagine an already dead child being “removed” to end the still-pregnancy.
The end is not brought about BY the child’s death in itself in the sense, say, an end of “satisfying vengeance” or “getting my inheritance early” might be. In those cases, the death in itself is chosen directly a cause/means of the proximate end intended.
For the abortionist, the end of “not having to deal with a Born Alive child” is probably achieved, specifically, through its death. So I’d argue his moral object DOES include the child’s death directly (the means for not having to deal with it alive is its death). But if the woman merely wants the child “removed,” and wouldn’t care if the doctor then preserved it alive in an artificial womb or something like that, then the death seems like part of the foreseen consequences, not part of the object.
In the case of adultery, however, the end of sexual pleasure is brought about by sex with a married woman, which is an evil in itself (like death is). Her married state may be incidental to the end or pleasure sought, but sex with her is not, and her marriage is not separable from that (ie, the fact of her marriage can not be considered a “side effect”…it is a circumstance relevant to the object itself, not just the consequences). However, “death” is separable from “removal” and is relevant, instead, as a consequence. The death of the child is an unjustifiable consequence of something like “removal” (let’s say, for this hypothetical, the child is removed whole), but it is not in itself relevant to the removal as an object, as there is nothing wrong in itself with “removing a child from the womb,” alive or dead, like there is with “sex with a married woman.” What’s wrong with it is whether death is foreseen to result or not. But “foreseen” and “to result” imply it’s part of consequences, not object.
I would ask you, in turn, in order to clarify your position…whether you believe that in the case of ectopic pregnancy it is okay to simply remove the embryo (again, to simplify, let’s say it is removed whole rather than dismembered)? Or do you think that in order to make the death “indirect” we have to act on the fallopian tube and not the child? If so, why? Is there something wrong, in itself, with the object “removing a child”?? Or is the wrongness of the removal contingent on the foreseen consequences of that removal??
I don’t fully follow the debate between Dominic and a Sinner. But about pushing a man off a raft: My first gut reaction is that pushing the man off the raft to a certain death is never morally permitted — but I think “a sinner” was questioning whether this was the case. If there is debate about whether this is morally permitted or not, I have one small observation: abortion is more than simply “pushing someone off a raft”/”pushing the embryo out of a position of safety to a place where it will die not from my direct action but from the elements”. Abortion techniques generally involve direct killing: tearing limb from limb; injecting with saline solution; suctioning up into a vacuum. To make the raft example similar to abortion, I think it should be “killing the man and then throwing his body overboard.”
Tearing limb from limb, however gruesome it may be, is not necessarily “direct killing” as the “direct” referred to morally is a question of what is directly willed, not what directly results. As Grisez (known to be an orthodox theologian even if you disagree with his interpretation) says about the craniotomy, the proposal in dismemberment could just be “changing the dimensions of the child in order to remove it.” If the death itself is irrelevant to the objective sought, it is, in the causal chain chosen by the will to obtain its end, a SIDE effect, not a direct effect. I’m not saying this makes abortion okay or even not homicide. But the death is relevant, for most women at least, as a foreseen consequence, not as part of the intent or the moral object.
Killing a man to throw him off the raft I doubt would be chosen. Doing “something” to make him unconscious in order to throw him off the raft might be, and that something might be foreseen to be fatal (as long as the fatality was irrelevant to the end; ie, morally a side-effect). Again, remember, we’re not talking about a circumstance where I could sacrifice myself to save the man, where we have to choose between two lives. We’re talking about a case where either we both drown or freeze to death, or only he does. It’s no worse than a mountain climber attached to another mountain climber cutting the rope in a situation where otherwise they BOTH fall to their deaths. That in one case the rope is acted on and in the other a human body is acted on “directly” in a purely physical sense…is morally irrelevant I think, and moral theories that think it is are highly confused and materialistic in their conception of the moral object.
I’ll add a contrasting example re: the raft analogy.
Let’s say, instead of me and the fat man being on one raft, we’re on two rafts tied together. My raft, by itself, is fine, would float with me on it. His raft would not, because he weighs too much. His is thus sinking, and inevitably going to pull mine down with him because they’re tied together. Albeit, mine might be adding some buoyancy to his somehow, but I don’t think most people would object to me cutting the ropes so that, when he sinks, I don’t sink too. Even if this hastens his sinking.
My argument about intent vs moral object vs consequences is that this situation is absolutely equivalent to pushing him off a single-raft sinking due to his weight. The fact that in one case you cut a rope and in another case you push a body is completely irrelevant except according to a very, yes, physicalist notion of the moral object which in either case is removing his weight from your raft.
Now, this is why I believe that in, say, an ectopic pregnancy…requiring that a perfectly salvageable fallopian tube be removed in order to remove the child inside it, rather than just removing the child alone…is silly. And demonstrates a very materialist conception of what constitutes “direct” vs “side effect” morally.
In terms of abortion, then, I’d venture to guess that for most women, the child’s death is incidental. It is not the end sought, nor even the means. The end sought is “ending the pregnancy,” the means sought is “removing the child.” This results in death as a consequence, and this is still some form of homicide since “convenience” is not proportionate to outweigh death (in fact, nothing can be; human life is of infinite value and non-transferable. Only if the child’s death is a foregone conclusion either way, like in a child-or-both fatal pregnancy, could it be accepted as a side-effect).
My point is just, the Law seems to recognize First Degree Murder only when the death is willed as an ends or a means. Not just when it is accepted as an unproportionate side effect. For the latter, we usually term it “manslaughter”…morally equivalent, perhaps, but legally different.
For example, if I do something manifesting extreme indifference to human life…but do not will a death itself specifically as an ends or a means (even if I foresee that it is very likely to result, and “very likely” is all we can ever be about any consequences)…likely I’ll be charged with something other than first degree murder.
How? I think the notion of self-defense helps my case. As Thomas does allow something like “hitting a person over the head with a 2-by-4″ as a moral object for self-defense, yes even to certain death, as long as the death itself is not intended as an end nor willed as a means for the self-defense but merely as an unintended side-effect of something like “physical incapacitation to stop him from killing me.” Force foreseen to be fatal IS allowed for self-defense as long as the fatality in itself is not a means, merely the physical incapacitation.
Actually, no, Thomas does not allow for the scenario as you have described it, and the part to which he would object is the condition yes even to certain death. On Thomas’ view, while violent force is permitted in self-defense, lethal violent force knowingly used is not. That is, while Thomas admits that one may use force in self-defense against an unjust aggressor, who is himself using disproportionate force. One may even knowingly use moderate force knowing that such might result in the aggressor’s death. However, Thomas clearly notes that one may not intend to kill a man in self-defense. (This is all in ST II-II.64.7.) In your 2-by-4 example, I might rightly club the man, even so far as he might be rendered senseless, and indeed I may lawfully do so even knowing that I might cause his death as a result. What I may not do is shoot him in the head, stab in in the heart, etc. as the means to defend myself. Likewise, I could not shove him off a cliff to certain death, justifying my act in claiming that what I was intending was “removing the offender from my presence”. Said differently, force one foresees could be fatal is licit, force knowingly fatal used as a means even in self-defense is not, i.e. if you want to agree with Thomas (not all moralists do, of course).
This is different than a case where the means to “stopping the boat from sinking” is “pushing the fat guy off” which does not intrinsically imply his death, which is foreseen, but a side-effect (ie, the death itself is not within the direct chain of means, it is incidental).
However, “stopping the boat from sinking” is not a moral object, but an end or intention, as it is too remote from any concrete moral act to be considered such. This means that “pushing the fat guy off” is the moral object of my pushing him, and pushing him into a necessarily lethal situation is hard to imagine not to be knowingly to kill him. My pushing him off to certain death the precisely the direct means I have chosen (the object) to achieve the end I desire (stopping the boat from sinking).
What I’m saying is that the moral object is not primarily the external event, it is what the will assents to as the means to its end.
What’s lovely here is this is exactly what I am saying as well!
What I’d consider to be a “physicalist” example would be something like the proposition that the mere juxtaposition of genitals in itself …
Ditto. This is why raising the specter of physicalism here is not helpful, as neither of us is asserting it.
For example, Grisez speaks of the case where a craniotomy (acting “directly” on the baby in a physical sense) is needed to save the mother, or else both die.
This helps, since it explains to me something of the moral perspective you are taking. I, and not I alone, find Grisez, et al., powerfully mistaken in their analysis of this case, and those like them. So, it is not surprising that we find ourselves in disagreement here.
I think that’s the important part, “the baby’s death contributes nothing to the objective sought.”
This has been part of our conceptual disagreement. The “objective sought” is the end or intention. It can mitigate or alter qualitatively the moral object, but does not change it entirely. That one of the bodies in question is a living human being and, in the other scenario, the dead tissue of what was once a living human being changes the moral object of what we do to the one or to the other in this case.
The death of the child is an unjustifiable consequence of something like “removal” (let’s say, for this hypothetical, the child is removed whole), but it is not in itself relevant to the removal as an object, as there is nothing wrong in itself with “removing a child from the womb,” alive or dead, like there is with “sex with a married woman.” What’s wrong with it is whether death is foreseen to result or not. But “foreseen” and “to result” imply it’s part of consequences, not object.
No doubt this is the crux of our disagreement. For the sake of anyone reading along, it is probably helpful to see here that both of us assert that the death of the child is an unjustifiable consequence. So, in an important sense, we agree on the moral analysis of abortion considered as a whole. Let’s not lose sight of when we agree!
It’s the rest of the claim that I find problematic. If I claimed that I just wanted to remove someone’s head, I think it would be too much of a stretch to assert that my object was its “removal”. To claim that I am not willing the death of the person whose head I want to remove is just odd (presuming I know anything about anatomy). Willing any of these as objects, given what we know about the body and about medical science, just is to will their death. The death of a decapitated man is not only a consequence of this removal, it is part and parcel of what it means to will the removal of a living man’s head. Indeed, the removal of a living man’s head is thus different in species from removing the head of a corpse. So, likewise, given the actual nature of fetal life and the actual nature of its removal from the womb, willing its “removal” cannot be separated from willing its death, and not just as a consequence, but as what it actually willed.
I would ask you, in turn, in order to clarify your position…whether you believe that in the case of ectopic pregnancy it is okay to simply remove the embryo (again, to simplify, let’s say it is removed whole rather than dismembered)? Or do you think that in order to make the death “indirect” we have to act on the fallopian tube and not the child? If so, why? Is there something wrong, in itself, with the object “removing a child”?? Or is the wrongness of the removal contingent on the foreseen consequences of that removal??
I do not see that removing the embryo in the case of ectopic pregnancy is morally licit (although I know others, quite knowledgeable than I and equally committed to the moral teaching of the Church have argued otherwise), although I do accept that acting on the woman’s behalf to respond to a pathology in her body, knowing that such will result also in the death of her child, can be morally licit.
Again, “removal of the child” is too vague an object and looks rather like an end. Given the actual character of life at the embryonic phase, we cannot pretend that this is a morally neutral object, viz. the moving of some physical thing from one place to another, with unhappy consequences. This is why I reject the question as posed, viz. “Is there something wrong, in itself, with the object of “removing a child?”
In light of this basic disagreement here at the meta-ethical level, I wonder if it would not be best to leave our discussion in charitable disagreement.
I commend Dominic and A Sinner for their discussion. I know that I’m piping in from the outside, so feel free to ignore me. I just wanted to say that I disagree with Grisez’s craniotomy, as I understand it.
Consider my favorite hypothetical: the mother and child stuck in a cave but with only enough food for one person before the diggers rescue them — if both eat, they will both die before the diggers get there; if one eats, that one will survive. Suppose that there is a small hole in the cave that leads to safety, but that the child can’t fit through the hole. Grisez’s craniotomy seems analogous to the mother not intending the child to die and wanting the child to live, but tearing her child up limb by limb, or crushing his head, and then stuffing the body that now fits through the hole. Doesn’t seem morally permissible to me. (But maybe the analogy with Grisez is wrong.)
“However, Thomas clearly notes that one may not intend to kill a man in self-defense.”
Intent is different than foreseeing an unintended consequence! Aquinas admits this first thing in the very article you reference. That’s the whole point of double-effect. I can hit someone in the head with a 2-by-4, and as long as my intent is simply to “stop him from hurting me”…I can proceed even if I foresee (but do not intend) death will result as a side-effect (“side” in the sense that it is not directly integral to the causal chain of defending myself) as long as that amount of force is proportionately justified.
“What I may not do is shoot him in the head, stab in in the heart, etc. as the means to defend myself.”
No, you can.
THIS is the sort of physicalism regarding the moral object I’m talking about. As long as you choose these actions with only the intent of “disabling him from hurting me”…and the death itself is incidental, foreseen but not intended (in fact, once he’s disabled, you will even call the medics for him, and perhaps he’ll survive), there is nothing wrong with the moral object of “putting a knife in someone’s body” as if that mere physical event has a moral character.
This interpretation may have been popular especially in the 20th century, but I’d argue a traditional and holistic Thomist understanding would think making a distinction between hitting someone to block them from hitting you…and shooting someone to stop them shooting at you…absurd. The two acts are morally equivalent, the difference is merely physical.
Of course, you should stab or shoot in the legs if possible. Only proportionate force should be used. But if for some reason shooting in the head or stabbing in the heart are necessary to disable an aggressor, then as long as death is not intended it can certainly be foreseen and the act can remain moral.
“Said differently, force one foresees could be fatal is licit, force knowingly fatal used as a means even in self-defense is not, i.e. if you want to agree with Thomas (not all moralists do, of course).”
Where does Aquinas say this? Not in the article you cited. He said you can’t intend the death. You can certainly foresee it as a consequence of your disabling action. Describing some actions as “intrinsically fatal” and others not is a false distinction. Aquinas makes no distinction between “could be” fatal and “will be” fatal in his discussion of foreseen consequences.
As long as the death itself is incidental to the disabling causally considered, is not intended, and is proportionately justified…it is separate from a disabling act even if it results as a side-effect.
No mere physical act is “intrinsically fatal” morally speaking as, morally, the sin comes in Death being part of what is willed as an ends or a means. If the death is in no direct way part of the will’s choice, then it is not part of intent OR object.
“However, ‘stopping the boat from sinking’ is not a moral object, but an end or intention, as it is too remote from any concrete moral act to be considered such.”
True, it’s an intent. The act is the choice to push, or cut the rope.
“This means that ‘pushing the fat guy off’ is the moral object of my pushing him, and pushing him into a necessarily lethal situation is hard to imagine not to be knowingly to kill him.”
First, he’s sinking already, either way, let’s remember.
Second, “knowingly” doing something that causes death is different than intending the death. Doing something with a foreseen consequence is not intending.
“My pushing him off to certain death the precisely the direct means I have chosen (the object) to achieve the end I desire (stopping the boat from sinking).”
No. You pushing him off is the direct means. Period. His death is incidental. Whether he survives or not (even if that would take a miracle) after that has no effect on the causal chain of achieving your desire. His death considered abstractly in itself is not instrumental to the achievement of your desire, and it is thus not an object of the will. It is, morally, a foreseen side-effect rather than part of the moral object. Albeit death can only ever be accepted as justified as a foreseen side-effect in very rare situations.
“This has been part of our conceptual disagreement. The ‘objective sought’ is the end or intention. It can mitigate or alter qualitatively the moral object, but does not change it entirely. That one of the bodies in question is a living human being and, in the other scenario, the dead tissue of what was once a living human being changes the moral object of what we do to the one or to the other in this case.”
Not if the death itself is not instrumental to achieving the desire. The moral object is the act chosen, the chain of causes chosen to be initiated to be instrumental in achieving the intent. If the death is incidental to the causation chosen towards the intent, it is not part of the moral object. It is a relevant circumstance, but as a foreseen consequence rather than as part of the moral object in itself.
“both of us assert that the death of the child is an unjustifiable consequence.”
If you admit it’s a consequence, I don’t understand how you can consider it part of the moral object too. Consequences are the third font of morality, not the second.
“To claim that I am not willing the death of the person whose head I want to remove is just odd (presuming I know anything about anatomy).”
You aren’t, though. It isn’t odd. The death is FORESEEN to result, but it is not an object of the will directly if it is not sought in itself, nor as instrumental causally to what you are seeking. If you would be perfectly happy if the person somehow survived too miraculously, then the death in itself cannot be said to be a direct object of the will, because the will then has no active desire for the death considered in itself. It’s a foreseen consequence, and so still very morally relevant inasmuch as the will’s indifference or willingness to accept it may be immoral. But the death isn’t being directly willed as an ends or a means.
“The death of a decapitated man is not only a consequence of this removal, it is part and parcel of what it means to will the removal of a living man’s head.”
I disagree. The two are abstractable conceptually and thus morally. For example, someday technology may enable removing a man’s head without killing him. That’s not possible yet, but to me the very hypothetical proves it is clearly a consequence (however immediate, currently), not “part and parcel” with decapitation if the death in itself is not instrumental. We may some day be able to revive people from any level of dismemberment (or at least can imagine it conceptually).
Now, “eating someone” may have their death as part and parcel with it, I’ll give you that.
“we cannot pretend that this is a morally neutral object, viz. the moving of some physical thing from one place to another”
That’s all it is as an object. It has grave foreseen consequences, but the object itself, the act, would be very literally just a spatial transfer.
“Consider my favorite hypothetical: the mother and child stuck in a cave but with only enough food for one person before the diggers rescue them — if both eat, they will both die before the diggers get there; if one eats, that one will survive. Suppose that there is a small hole in the cave that leads to safety, but that the child can’t fit through the hole. Grisez’s craniotomy seems analogous to the mother not intending the child to die and wanting the child to live, but tearing her child up limb by limb, or crushing his head, and then stuffing the body that now fits through the hole. Doesn’t seem morally permissible to me. (But maybe the analogy with Grisez is wrong.)”
Before answering this, let me lay out some things to remember:
First, an evil itself can never be willed directly as an ends or a means. We could never intend a death or choose a moral object that made death instrumental. If an evil man said, “If you don’t bring the president DEAD, I’ll blow up the world”…we could not kill the president to satisfy the villain’s desire and save the world. In that case, death in itself is chosen by the will as the means to an end. That can never be.
IF, however, the villain rather said, “My condition for you not blowing up the world is that you pull the trigger of this gun” and the gun happens to be aimed at someone…under my understanding of the moral object, we could do this, I think, as long as we did not intend the death that resulted, and as long as we were sure the villain (let’s say it’s an evil robot which can’t lie) truly has as its condition merely “pulling the trigger” whether the [very likely] death follows from that act OR NOT. In other words, if we pull the trigger and the person somehow survives, the robot still won’t blow up the world (ie, the death in itself is not instrumental, is not chosen in itself as an ends or a means by us, merely the act of pulling the trigger). Then that is a case of a side-effect.
Still, the second point that must be emphasized in accepting death as a side-effect is that “proportionality” is different for death than it is for mere harm or some other evil. Human life is of basically infinite value and is non-transferable. Ideally, we should not choose one life even in preference to the whole world. If 10 people are in a cave and there is only enough food for 9 to survive until the rescuers reach them…choosing not to feed simply the weakest person, or the one closest to death, etc…is problematic.
Nevertheless, in most cases like this…we are stuck between a rock and hard place and may have to accept (though we can never directly choose) the lesser evil, inasmuch as a choice “not to act” may be equivalent to choosing someone else by default. Merely being passive in the physical sense does not somehow exempt us morally. If there is a case where, rather than the baby-or-both dying, it really is a case of either baby OR mother (but never both), where if we let things be, the baby may survive but the mother will die (say, forgoing radiation needed immediately for cancer), but if we save the mother, the baby will die…”not choosing” is equivalent to choosing the baby. At that point, then, we can also make the active choice. It’s a choice we “should” never have to make, as only God can ultimately weigh which life will be more valuable staying alive in His eyes, but in a tough situation…we can consider factors (like, maybe the mother has 10 small children at home and really is needed for their well-being) and pick one or the other. Usually in such cases either choice can be acceptable given the real impossibility of the judgment about the relative value of lives. Those are always tough situations, though.
As for your cave analogy and Grisez’s craniotomy, let me modify it a bit, as I don’t quite understand what pushing the baby through the hole (resulting in its death) has to do with the amount of food. So let me change the analogy to one of lack of AIR in the cave, rather than food.
A mother and baby are in a cave. An evil villain (maybe that robot from above!) put them there and knows there won’t be enough air if both keep breathing until rescuers can get there. The only opening the villain has left after sealing the cave is a tiny opening attached to an air-lock, so (if you can fit it in) something can be put outside the cave, but no air can come in.
In “limited air” scenarios, the problem is not people living so much as people BREATHING. You may say that’s a trivial distinction, but I think it is a crucial one morally.
This could be expanded to any number of people, by the way. Let’s say there are 10 people in the cave, and only enough air for 9 to survive to the end.
There is a right way and a wrong way to solve this. What is NOT permissible is killing someone in order to stop them from breathing. Stabbing, shooting, poisoning, etc someone to get them to die in order to get them to stop breathing in order to make sure there is enough air in the cave (notice the causal chain there) is wrong. In that case, death itself is chosen as the means to stop the breathing/use of air by that person.
However, if you preformed an act on a person (again, choosing “who among us?” makes it more problematic, but let’s say there is someone who uses so much air that he wouldn’t survive either way, but I could if he stopped using it) that had as its objective merely “stopping them from breathing” (with the death, inevitably, resulting from that) that might work morally. Because the death itself is not willed as an ends or a means. Unlike a case where we KILL a person in order to get them to stop breathing (and thus the death is in the direct chain of means causally), a case where we physically stopped them from breathing to save the air, but wouldn’t care if somehow they miraculously survived (as long as they weren’t using external air)…does not have death directly chosen, and may be okay.
Now, your example is different. Instead of suffocating the baby (which may sound “intrinsically” violent, but is really no worse than passive starvation as long as it is the saving of resources, not the death, which is intended)…the mother wants to remove the baby from the cave. The goal is “removal from the cave” in order to stop the baby from using air. So the mother squeezes it through the hole even to the point of, yes, dismemberment (like in the craniotomy).
In such a case, I couldn’t argue with the choice. It’s a situation we hope no one is ever in, of course, but the mother does not intend the baby’s death nor choose it as a means. She chooses “changing its dimensions” (Grisez’s term, not mine) to “get it through the hole” to “get it out of the cave” to “stop it from using air” to save her own life lest they both die. The death that results almost certainly from “changing its dimensions” is foreseen but unintended, and judged proportionate rather than them both dying. The death itself, however, is not instrumental. If the baby somehow miraculously survived the effect would be the same, so the death-in-itself cannot be considered part of the direct chain of means, because the death itself has no causal role, but rather is a side-effect (albeit an immediate one).
A Sinner, I replied below in a new comment – this thread was too long.
A Sinner, I agree with what you have written. I have known several women from my generation and my parents’ generation who went through with their pregnancies in Catholic boarding homes for single pregnant women and I know that they have grieved not seeing their children that they have brought into the world. However, their grieving is soothed by the fact that they gave them life especially in a time when there was a whole lot of shame associated with being pregnant and single within society and the Church at that time. I am sure it was their faith that helped them to endure this choice between life and death. I read somewhere that there was a higher rate of abortions in the mid to late 1800′s than there is now and what decreased the rate of abortions in the early 1900′s was the development of compassionate care programs for women in crisis.
Concerning the medical profession, it seems that there needs to be intense discussions about when to apply the “do no harm” ethic. When is a newly developing human being considered a developing human being? Krishnamurti once asked “Does intelligence end the life of another human being?” He also asked “What is intelligence?”
Also, I will point out something someone just pointed out to me on another website:
“In the US it was impossible to prosecute abortionists if the woman were considered an accomplice to a crime, because her testimony would require her to incriminate herself.”
So that’s another reason not to prosecute the women, even as accomplices, and yet a legal one that doesn’t make it look like we’re soft or inconsistent on abortion.
Sorry. This doesn’t hold water. One of the ways law enforcement gets the bigger fish is to make deals with the little fish (accomplices) to testify in exchange for immunity. If women who use the services of an abortionist have no legal responsibility for the abortionist’s crimes at all, why should the women testify against the abortionist?
“If we accept that a mother can kill even her own child, how can we tell other people to not kill each other? Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but to use any violence to get what they want.” — Mother Teresa of Calcutta
Holding those who perform abortions criminally responsible while not holding those who procure them responsible makes very good sense from a political point of view, and maybe even from a law-enforcement point of view, but morally it’s nonsense. In canon law, the woman who procures the abortion is the offender, and the abortionist is the accomplice.
This is how I view it morally, and again, I still can’t get past the idea of a woman not being responsible for serving jail time. I know that you and others feel it wont happen, but for the life me, I can’t see it as just. If she is a murderer, then why would her punishment not fit the crime? I mean raelly? I really can’t get past that idea. If we in fact do state that the unborn in this country are protected, that would make anyone harming that fetus (at any stage) a murderer. So I dont know. Morally it’s not just, and legally it is not just if she isnt accountable. Now politically and for those that seek any means to change the law, they will say anything to see that the law is changed. I personally just have a hard time believing that the woman is not accountable and can only be considered the ‘victim’ here.
No one is saying that the woman isn’t MORALLY culpable for the abortion to some degree. But not everything immoral has to be ILLEGAL. The civil law should be whatever best protects the unborn. If not punishing the mothers makes protecting the babies more feasible or practical, then there is no reason to punish them. Punishing the one who preforms it should be enough legally to stop much of it. The Law is under no obligation to punish all sinners.
I was thinking some more about suicide and I realized it may be a more apt analogy that I first thought.
Suppose a Kevorkian-type doctor who is assisting suicide in a jurisdiction that prohibits assisted suicide, but not suicide, which is most jurisdictions, I think. Suppose there is an attempted suicide via Dr. Kevorkian’s machine, but the suicide fails. The jurisdiction could prosecute Kevorkian for attempted assisted suicide, but wouldn’t prosecute the person who was trying to commit suicide. That doesn’t seem to me be a bad scenario, even though the person trying to commit suicide was trying to kill someone (himself), which is a grave moral evil. And the jurisdiction wouldn’t try to prosecute the person trying to commit suicide as being an accessory to the felony committed by Dr. Kevorkian – and similarly, that doesn’t seem bad to me either. The person trying to commit suicide needs love, not the iron hand of justice.
So could that be applied to abortion? What about sanctions against a person who assists in having abortion but not against the person who has an abortion?
Sorry for the rambling thought — just wanted to share.
Dominic, I haven’t had the energy to reply to your perceptions on what may influence women to choose abortion. There is so much informantion that is missing about interpersonal neurobiology and especially in the field of epigenetics that sheds critical light on what influences human behavior presently and transgenerationally without gene mutation. Changing the law does not solve the core problems of human behavior. Changing the beliefs and behavior of those of us who make moral judgements is the key to influencing women and physicians to not choose abortion.
It is critical to have the correct understanding of the effects of violence on human development and that this violence is the core influence for women to act as you have noted above. If we underestimate human interpersonal biology then we will never have the correct solution for aboriton.
As David noted above when he quoted Mother Teresa, “Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but to use any violence to get what they want.” Abortion is the result of violence and that violence influences all of us to be self-absorbed and walled off from self and others.
What we need is heroic actions on a massive scale and not voluminous works of logic. We have all the logic we need. We need heroic acts of sacrificial love, otherwise, we are all responsible for all of the deaths of the innocents who are the victims of our passivity.
I would give you a detailed explanation of interpersonal neurobiology but I am not concise enough to explain it clearly. If you want you can look up mirror neurons for starters. Does free will exist without love?
Holding those who perform abortions criminally responsible while not holding those who procure them responsible makes very good sense from a political point of view, and maybe even from a law-enforcement point of view, but morally it’s nonsense.
“Morally it’s nonsense.” So what? Though the law is linked to morality in some ways, not every immoral act should be proscribed and not every moral act should be compelled (See Aquinas’s Treatise on law). Lying, adultery, being spiteful, contraception, etc. are immoral things which I think shouldn’t be proscribed by law – there are several good reasons for not proscribing these evils, such as it would bring the law in greater disrepute.
And what about acts of grave immorality, but where the law recognizes that there may be mitigating circumstances which make the actor not fully culpable and so not deserving of jailtime? Even a murderer sometimes does not receive jail time if he is deemed insane. And what about my example of suicide? Trying to commit suicide is a gravely evil act. But both Catholic morality and the law recognize that there are most likely circumstances that mitigate the culpability of the person who attempts suicide. Just as it’s reasonable to not have jail time for a person who attempts suicide, it’s reasonable to not have jail time for a woman who seeks an abortion.
But they would be murderers. I mean I have a friend, who had an abortion. She got pregnant at age 30. She had a job, and definitely could have provided for her child. She had the Papilloma Virus and she did need to treat it, as they told her it could lead to cervical cancer. Yet she got pregnant. I pleaded with her not to do it. She had her mind made up. My thought was that she could have provided for the child. She was mostly ashamed. She did not want to tell her family that this happened. Turns out, she married the man that she was just dating when it happened. Now they have two more children. I dont know why, but it took me a long time to get over what she did. I just felt it was such a grave wrong, because the fact was, she could have made this work. She had a job, her own place, she ended up marrying the man. But shame. Shame is really what did her in. Now is that someone that desearves our pity? Certainly, because our society and how we view women and how we live in a society that judges, and worries more for a families good name than we do for what is really important. The decisions you make in your life, define who you are. At the same token, she wasnt in a situation where she was battered. She wasnt in a situation where the guy would have abandoned her. She just was new to the relationship and it happened, and she didnt want to deal with it. Purely selfish reasons. Which many of them are. There are plenty of reasons, some of them more forgivable than others. This for me, was a situation where I didnt have a lot of empathy. So say you have a similar situation in the future, but this time it’s from a woman who comes from a lot of money. She will find her way to get what she wants done, and her money will provide her the avenue to do it. So if someone like that is caught, can you really only hold the doctor accountable? I dont think so. Many people are not insane or in grave situations. It’s sort of poor reasoning to think that all women would be viewed as victims, and it’s poor reasoning on the flip side to think that many women are not destitute. Many are, and many are not. There are going to be countless situations and once the news stories on them begin to circulate, perspectives will in fact change. Women will end up being prosecuted. It’s different than an insanity plea. If people are not convinced of the crime, then how can they be convinced to make it outlawed or illegal? I’m begining to wonder if I’m just some pesimist or someone that is only looking at the downside to it?To be honest it will not effect me. I would never obtain an abortion, so whether the law stays as is, or becomes outlawed, it ‘s not going to change anything in my life. Something tells me though, that women will end up being prosecuted one day if the laws changes. Again, I’m not saying this because I have an agenda. It will not effect any outcome in my life. I’m just trying to be honest with how I see it. Another question I have if you would maybe help. Has there ever been a time in our country, where a law like this was overturned, viewed entirely different and time was sort of reversed? Can we really go there as a society? Countless women have had abortions. Maybe I need to understand Poland a little more.
Cindy,
In my original post I suggested that women could be prosecuted, though it struck me that in many cases there would be mitigating cricumstances. It seems to me that someone in this situation should be prosecuted. On the other hand, it seems to me that if abortion were illegal and most of the underground abortions had been put out of business and/or into prison, many of these kinds of abortions simply wouldn’t happen.
Do you think your friend would have gone through with an abortion in her situation if it were illegal? Do you think her abortionist would have done it for her if it were illegal?
It seems to me that once abortion is illegal, the stats turn much more heavily in favor of only the truly desperate seeking them out.
Thales,
Of course canon law and civil law are different. Heaven forbid that all of Catholic morality were translated into civil law! But so many pro-lifers argue not just that women should not be prosecuted for abortion, but that they really aren’t responsible. They don’t understand what they are doing, or they are in such tough spots that we can’t hold them responsible for their actions. That is just moral nonsense. A lot of people who commit murder are in desperate situations and see no other way out. But they are still tried, and only very rarely does a jury buy a defendant’s excuse in a murder trial.
Pro-lifers are generally conservative politically, and they are opposed to “coddling criminals” and trying to “understand” why people do bad things. Such pro-lifers are being grossly inconsistent or hypocritical to argue that women who procure abortions aren’t responsible for their actions.
The Church excommunicates women who procure abortion. Please point out to me any other instance in which the Church imposes the penalty of excommunication where good and faithful Catholics would argue that the person upon whom that penalty is imposed is, in general, not really responsible for their actions.
Pro-lifers again and again make the point that morally, there is no difference between abortion and infanticide. Yet I have never heard any pro-lifer argue that a woman who kills her “post-born” children should not be prosecuted.
Someone recently (it could even have been you) was talking about the law as a teacher. Well, what does the law teach when it says someone who performs an abortion has killed a baby, but someone who has her baby killed is not to be held responsible?
Cindy, You said your friend had the Papilloma Virus, got that treated and then became pregnant through her relationship with her boyfriend who is now her husband and they have two children. You stated she was selfish and ashamed. What was she afraid of? Did she view the abortion as killing her baby or as something else? What prevented her from going to her parents in this situation? Did her boyfriend know at the time? What intrapersonal and interpersonal dynamics would lead her to choose abortion? What was so overwhelming for her?
Ron,
She had the virus. Went to the gyno, and they wanted to treat it by scraping the vaginal walls and inside of her. But they would not do the procedure because they found out she was pregnant. So if untreated, they told her that this could lead to cancer. At the same time, she was single, worked at the same company that I did. She was a very unhappy person at the time in her life. I think she was lonely and honestly Ron I would even say that she didnt deem herself worthy of love. She met men, but they would use her and recently before that the man she was dating and she thought that she loved, cheated on her with her best friend. So she was very sad. Then she met this guy (her husband now), and it was new and he was very nice (he still is) and very into her. She wasnt interested in him all that much,but they went out and I guess you see what happened. She flipped out, refused to tell her family and used her condition as her excuse or reasoning behind what she did. (if she didnt treat herself she could develop canncer). The treatment being the abortion. The husband went with her and stayed by her side through it. They got married, he changed her heart (by offering her love) and now they are married, really happy, and have 2 children. Yet if she just would have decided to have the 1st child, they could have still ended up married and still had the life they have now. I also think she didnt want to feel like he would have stayed with her only because she got pregnant. Again Ron, purely selfish reasoning. I can remember talking with her and pleading with her telling her that she shouldnt do it. Yet she made her mind up. Afterwards I knew what happened, I became so angry with her. I really did. You see, I was only 18yrs old when I became pregnant. I had nothing. Super Catholic parents who would not accept the situation, no job, just out of High School and moving to another state where I didnt know a soul. Yet, I tried to hide it as long as I could and evenutally I had to tell and I knew I was having this child. I was in a much worse situation, but I would never have chosen what she did. I was so angry I guess, because I know she had the ability and the means to care for this baby. Now my situation is that I am married to my son’s father (High School sweethearts) and I have a 22yr old son who I am glad I have. But to answer your questions Ron. I think she was afraid of the shame. Her own pride. Her feeling of this isnt the life I envisioned for myself. I dont want the single mother role. Did she view the abortion as killing the baby? Prior to that, we had talks in the bar of where life started. At conception she always said. She was in agreement with me. She votes hard core Republican and she is a professed conservative. She felt prior to that that life began at conception and that abortion was the taking of a life. The inter personal dynamics I would say were that she felt alone. Unloved. Unworthy of love, because she had such unsuccess with men. She was a bit of a drunkard. Came from a self righteous conservative family. She lived in her own place alone with her cats for over 12yrs. She was really lonely and wanted love, but always seemed like she was on the outside looking in. Just never finding it for herself. I mean her friends had to yell at her, and wake her up to her husband now. She had this very nice guy interested in her, and she really wasnt even interested. Now she’s changed and loves him to death. But I notice that people can always say what they will say about abortion and how they view it. Up until the gun is at their head and they find themselves in circumstances that maybe are not all the desirable. It’s your decisions that define who you really are.
Thanks for your reply Cindy. I have met women who are afraid and have very little sense of self-worth. Your friend’s emotional state was so complex. Shame and fear go hand in hand with poor problem-solving skills. To guard against that primitive defenses take over which attempt to prevent feeling vulnerable and when that happens the person closes off to not only others, but the vulnerable self. Alcohol serves to numb oneself to what is unwanted. Analysts call this type of identity formation the “basic fault”. This occurs when there is a loss of a rewarding attachment to one or both parents who may have strong narcissistic traits and they attempt to have the child meet their perceived needs rather than nurturing the child’s developmental needs. Consequently, this leads to a feeling of emptiness, isolation and fear. The child develops her or his identity on this foundation and psychological defenses are constructed to prevent self and others from perceiving that she or he is made wrong. You see, she does not think that she has some sort of neurosis but actually believes that she is made wrong. That is tragic and it affects every relationship until there is a breakthrough of some sort. It it is difficult for her to feel like a valued human being then how could she feel value being pregnant and view that child as real and having value? It is interesting that she is conservative now.
Brett,
I would probably say she would not have sought it out. Of course that is my speculation. As it’s all a hypothesis as to wonder how available it would be or not be. I would think that doctors would not want to lose their licenses to practice. Yet, one person said that only an abortionist or someone that is pro abortion says that they think women would go to jail. If this law were to ever pass, I suspect you are going to have very strong opposition to it at first. I suspect that there even could be an underground movment and ways to obtain what you want in secret. So much so that the government would have to work overtime to stop it. That is why I think you would find women in jail. Also, look at that crazy doctor that they busted down in Philadelphia. His business right out in the open. Took them years to find out what he was really doing. I just feel that if the law is changed, the government is going to have to use a lot of resources to control it, and stop it from going on. They will have to make examples of people. Otherwise, how would you stop it? It would take some time and examples to be made, before you would really get it clamped down. Considering how long it’s been legal. Do you think I’m foolish to view it that way? I just think over 30years is a long time for it to have been legal for it to curb out of society in a fast manner.
Can you imagine the media frenzy with our 24hr media cycle just blowing these stories up when they come to light. All of America watching some neighbor of theirs being prosecuted. Or worse yet, your Charlie Sheen of a women movie star getting caught. The media would love it.
David,
I think it’s pretty clear that many women having abortions aren’t morally responsible for them. To be morally responsible for the grave sin of abortion, under Catholic teaching, you have to commit the sin (1) with full knowledge and (2) with deliberate consent. I think for many women, perhaps even a majority of them, they don’t have full knowledge of what they’re doing or are making a fully free choice with deliberate consent regarding the grave evil they are committing. So no, they wouldn’t be morally responsible for their acts.
You bring up excommunication. Similar to what I said above, for a person to be excommunicated, there are a whole host of extra conditions besides simply having an abortion: you have to be more than 16, you have to know it’s an excommunicable offense, you can’t lack the use of reason, you have act with being compelled, etc. I doubt that most women having abortions are satisfying the requirements of being excommunicated.
But let’s ignore all the women who aren’t morally responsible; let’s consider only those women who are completely guilty and entirely morally responsible for their abortions from the perspective of the moral law. So what? I still don’t think that they should receive jail time. I similarly don’t think that those who are entirely morally responsible for lying, adultery, contraception, being mean, and a host of other evils should receive jail time.
Why? Because the purpose of law in society is not simply to punish moral transgressions. That’s not even the primary purpose of law. A more important purpose of the law is to further a society where citizens have the freedom to flourish. And therefore, the law shouldn’t punish many moral transgressions, because it would result in greater evils – such as bringing the law into disrepute. That means that there is no ultimate objectiveness to what should be the law and what shouldn’t and how infringements should be punished — these things can change depending on the conventions of society.
Consider a society like the U.S. during its early years with slavery. I think capturing an escaped slave in another state and transporting him back to his master under the Fugitive Slave Act is the moral equivalent of kidnapping. Morally, I see no difference. Do you agree? Now if someone did that today, I’d have no problem with prosecuting him for kidnapping and giving him jail time. But if someone did that during slavery’s legality, I don’t think that he should be jailed — after all, it’s legally approved. And if I was arguing in favor of abolition, I wouldn’t argue that all slaveowners should get jail time – that would be counter-productive, obviously.
Today, we live in a society where abortion is not only legal, it’s accepted as a morally-neutral, or even positive, act by the members of society. Imposing jailtime on those women who are morally responsible for abortion would be detrimental to our society and it would do nothing to further the real goal of pro-lifers — and that goal is not to punish people who have already had abortions, but to discourage them from choosing abortion in the first place.
I think it’s pretty clear that many women having abortions aren’t morally responsible for them.
Thales,
I hope what you mean is that they are not morally responsible for them fully. It may be that the conditions for mortal sin (or excommunication) are often not subjectively met when a person does something that is objectively a mortal sin or an excommunicable offense, or both. But that is true of every kind of wrongdoing, including molesting children and infanticide. I am sure that wives who murder husband or husbands who murder wives or women who drown their children are not fully culpable. But they are culpable. And as I understand it, the reason for excommunication in the case of abortion is to make it crystal clear that what may appear to some as not being the taking of a life is indeed the taking of a life.
I am not the one who argues that abortion is murder. It is you who support the pro-life movement. Why you would want to tell women that abortion is the murder of their children but they are legally free to do so as long as they can find an abortionist who has not been put in jail is a complete mystery to me. If you charged that abortion was something less than murder, I suppose I could understand. But the point of the pro-life movement is made again and again that killing an unborn person is morally equivalent to killing a “post-born” baby or even an adult. If the message you want to send to women is that it is legal for them to murder their babies, and they probably aren’t really culpable for it anyway, because they are not competent to understand what the Catholic Church is saying, then I guess I can’t convince you that to those of us who aren’t a part of the pro-life movement as such, it looks wildly inconsistent, hypocritical, and insulting to women, then I guess I should stop trying.
David,
I don’t understand your comment – maybe we’re talking past each other. All along, I’ve been saying that abortion should be made illegal. All along I’ve been saying that abortion is the moral equivalent of murder. Yes, many women probably aren’t fully culpable for aborting their babies, but I’m not shying away from the fact that many of them are fully culpable — I said as much in my last comment. I just don’t think that jail time for women is an appropriate and productive law to impose in our current society, just as I don’t think jail time for adultery is a good idea, or jail time for attempted suicide.
It’s not hypocritical to think that a person who with full will and knowledge attempts suicide is fully culpable of grave moral evil, while thinking that attempting suicide should not have a penalty of jail time.
Thales,
How would you feel about a woman who keeps her pregnancy a secret, gives birth, and strangles the baby? If law enforcement finds out about such a thing, should the woman be arrested and criminally prosecuted?
David,
Yes, this woman violated the current law on infanticide. I would say that she should be criminally prosecuted. What do you think? Do you agree?
One thing to keep in mind: our laws are general rules that inevitably cover many cases, including the difficult ones. The woman in the hypothetical has violated the same murder law as Jeffrey Dahmer. Though both should be prosecuted for murder, the specific circumstances of each case can affect how the prosecutor and judge proceed at sentencing.
Actually, it is not a hypothetical case. There was a teenage girl (Melissa Drexler) in 1997 who hid her pregnancy, went to her high school prom with her boyfriend, had the baby during the prom, strangled it, and continued dancing at the prom. She was charged with murder, plea bargained down to aggravated manslaughter, was given the maximum sentence (15 years), but served only about 3 years.
A Sinner,
I agree with you at “First, an evil itself can never be willed directly as an ends or a means. We could never intend a death or choose a moral object that made death instrumental.” But you lost me at the end. (By the way, your air hypothetical is fine — I was thinking of a situation where the resources in the case, whether food or air, are limited for 1 person, and salvation for the second person is found outside the cave.)
I lost you when you seem to be saying that the mother can act in a way which causes certain death, as long as she is not intending the death but some other good. It makes no sense to me to be able to actively cause certain death, but not intend death. It makes no sense to me to have someone say “I intend for you to escape this cave and live and to stop using my food/air, and I don’t intend your death, but in order for that to happen, I have to dismember you and decapitate you as I “change your dimensions” and fit you through this hole to safety.” I don’t see why this isn’t “an evil willed as a means”.
“I lost you when you seem to be saying that the mother can act in a way which causes certain death, as long as she is not intending the death but some other good. It makes no sense to me to be able to actively cause certain death, but not intend death.”
Again, we have to define what you mean by “actively cause.” There is no “active/passive” distinction, really. There is a “direct/indirect” distinction.
But the directness refers to the MORAL directness, not the physical directness. Sometimes an act has two effects. In the physical sense, both are directly caused. But morally speaking, the effect is only “direct” which is instrumental to achieving the end.
I do not think physical directness is important to the moral object, only moral directness.
For example, the logic of those who would require that a whole fallopian tube (that might otherwise be salvaged) be removed in order to deal with an ectopic pregnancy seems to be that if we just “removed” the child, death would be a “direct” result of the removal (even if not the end the removal was chosen for), but that if we remove the fallopian tube, then this is “indirect” because there is, as it were, an “extra step” in the causal chain; the removal of the fallopian tube causes “directly” only the removal of the child, which then causes the death, but they apparently think this extra step is what ensures that the death is an “indirect” effect.
However, they are confusing “direct” effect with IMMEDIATE effect. “Direct” effect vs “Indirect” side-effect is a question of what is the causal path of means that the will takes to its proximate end. “Immediate” effect is more a question of the purely physical order.
To invoke Double Effect (and almost any moral situation involves it), the bad effect must be indirect, in other words…that evil in itself cannot be a means to the end, must be incidental; the end sought cannot be dependent on that evil happening in-itself, even if it is dependent on something that ALSO leads to the evil incidentally.
However, the evil (side-)effect CAN be immediate. There is no need, morally, for the mental gymnastics of inserting an extra causal step. If the evil is not sought by the will as an ends or a means, but merely as a second result of something that (for other reasons) is an ends or means…that’s enough to render it a “side-effect” and (if unintended) “indirect.” It only needs to be a side-effect, not a side-effect OF a side-effect, as the “you must remove the whole fallopian tube” physicalist vision of moral object would propose.
“I don’t see why this isn’t ‘an evil willed as a means.’”
Because how is the death relevant to the means? Is the baby dying relevant here, as long as it gets out of the cave so as to stop using air? No. The death has no causal role in all this. It results from the means used to “get him out of the cave” perhaps, but not directly. It is a side-effect inasmuch as the death itself is incidental to the causation of the end sought. If the baby somehow survived, the effect would be the same. So the death itself cannot be said to be within the direct chain of means towards the end.
What I can’t see is how anyone can then turn around and support a view that would say something like, “To get down to the other people in the cave, we can light some dynamite that will also cause some rocks to collapse on a guy whose leg is already trapped beneath a boulder.”
Morally, this is no different than a method which would involve blowing up a fat guy who was stuck and blocking the entrance.
The only difference is purely physical. In the former case (the dynamite), the death is a “side effect of a side effect” (ie, not immediate). The dynamite causes rocks to fall which in turn cause death. So it’s a step removed. But “not immediate” like this (ie, a step removed) is not the meaning of “indirect” or “side-effect” morally. The addition of an extra causal step along the unintended side-chain of events is irrelevant morally. The unintended side effect can indeed be immediate.
Morally what’s important is that the death itself, even if it results immediately from some means, is not in itself an ends or a means. So if we have to blow up the fat guy to unblock the entrance, as long as we don’t intend his death (and who would unless they had a secret grudge?) and as long as the death in itself is irrelevant to the end sought (and it is; what’s relevant is MOVING him, his death in itself adds nothing essential to the causation)…this is no different morally than a case where the side-effect is an extra step removed in terms of physical causal immediacy.
A Sinner,
Your moral principles are different from the ones I’m familiar with. I don’t follow all of your analysis, but the little I do follow doesn’t sound right.
There is no “active/passive” distinction, really. There is a “direct/indirect” distinction.
I thought that the principle of act vs. omission is a valid one in moral analysis. Letting someone die can be permissible under certain circumstances– actively killing someone is not.
So if we have to blow up the fat guy to unblock the entrance, as long as we don’t intend his death and as long as the death in itself is irrelevant to the end sought…
I don’t think this is correct. In fact, it doesn’t make sense to me: I don’t understand how one can rationally say “I don’t intend to kill you, even though I intend fully to cut off your head/blow you up with dynamite.” And you seem to be saying that directly killing someone is the same as doing an ordinarily harmless act that may have as a secondary side effect the unintentional death of someone (ie, blowing someone up is the same as blowing up some rocks, which may or may not fall on someone). And that can’t be right.
David, Was there any psych testing?
“I thought that the principle of act vs. omission is a valid one in moral analysis. Letting someone die can be permissible under certain circumstances– actively killing someone is not.”
Again, these situations are ones of direct vs indirect. Not “active vs passive” in the physical sense. Death can be accepted (never intended) as the foreseen SIDE-effect (ie, indirect) of either an act OR omission. Morally speaking, omissions are choices too. And sometimes, we are in a situation where being “passive” is equivalent to a choice to enable some other evil through foreseeing it as a consequence of choosing not to act.
“I don’t intend to kill you, even though I intend fully to cut off your head/blow you up with dynamite.”
You misunderstand “intent” then. Intent is the end sought by the will. In the case of the fat man in the door of the cave, it’s not his death you want, it’s to unblock the entrance of the cave. If acting on his body to move it from the entrance just so happens to cause his death (even immediately), that is unintended as long as the death itself is not what you want or why you’re doing the act, and is merely an “indirect” side-effect in terms of moral object if the death itself is incidental to the causal chain of means (ie, isn’t willed in itself as a means to the end either).
“And you seem to be saying that directly killing someone is the same as doing an ordinarily harmless act that may have as a secondary side effect the unintentional death of someone (ie, blowing someone up is the same as blowing up some rocks, which may or may not fall on someone). And that can’t be right.”
Again, you are the one who is confusing “direct” with “immediate” in terms of effect. Lighting the dynamite that blows the fat guy out of the entrance to the cave…may have as an IMMEDIATE effect his death. This effect is in addition to/parallel with the other immediate effect of clearing the entrance to the cave (which, in itself, is not causally dependent on “death” considered abstractly. If he survives the explosion somehow, the effect is the same, just as its the same if he is already dead).
The death is not a “direct” choice, morally speaking, if it is not desired as an end in itself (ie, intended) nor directly causal in the chain of means (ie, the object). It is at that point morally relevant as a foreseen consequence/side-effect only.
The example with the rocks is not a “may or may not” case. The rocks WILL fall on someone without a miracle in that example, just the embryo inside a removed fallopian tube WILL die.
You are the one insisting that the death has to be a “secondary” side effect (what I called “a side effect of a side effect) but that is nowhere in our moral teachings. For double effect to apply, it merely has to be a side effect, even if it is a primary or immediate side effect. How much of a “game of mousetrap” distances it from the act itself doesn’t matter. What matters is that it is not willed directly as either an ends or a means.
A Sinner,
I think where you’re going wrong is where you seem to be saying that an act is permissible solely due to its intention. (If I’m misstating you, my apologies.) But there are 3 components to the morality of an act: the object chosen; the end in view or the intention; the circumstances of the action (Catechism, 1750). And consider 1756:
“It is therefore an error to judge the morality of human acts by considering only the intention that inspires them or the circumstances (environment, social pressure, duress or emergency, etc.) which supply their context. There are acts which, in and of themselves, independently of circumstances and intentions, are always gravely illicit by reason of their object; such as blasphemy and perjury, murder and adultery. One may not do evil so that good may result from it.”
Based on this, I don’t see how you can cut the head off of an innocent person who is stuck in the only escape hatch. Your intention may be good (dislodging the body, so that one can escape) but the object of your act is to cut the head off of an innocent person. And I don’t see how that object is good.
“I think where you’re going wrong is where you seem to be saying that an act is permissible solely due to its intention. (If I’m misstating you, my apologies.)”
You are very much misunderstanding me. I am not saying only intent matters. I am just saying that “moral object” is defined as the means chosen by the will to obtain its intent, not some physicalist notion by which the nature of acts are defined by their consequences as mere material events.
There are cases where death is not the intention, but where it is made instrumental, and thus is wrong. My intention may be simply “to get my inheritance,” that may be the proximate END that I intEND. But if I choose bringing about a death in order to accomplish this end, that is still wrong by way of object. That’s the thing about including death in the moral object: it has to be an “in order to” sort of thing. If the death itself is foreseen but unintended and incidental to the causality, then it is to be considered as part of the consequences, not the object.
“There are acts which, in and of themselves, independently of circumstances and intentions, are always gravely illicit by reason of their object; such as blasphemy and perjury, murder and adultery. One may not do evil so that good may result from it.”
Yes, but you are defining “acts” as external things defined physically. In reality, it is that certain acts of the WILL are wrong in terms of what they choose (albeit what they choose is externally). “Murder” (ie, choosing a death as an ends or a means) is the intrinsically disordered species of moral object, “decapitation” is not, as decapitation may NOT be murder if death is not chosen as an ends or a means and accepting it as a side-effect is justified.
“I don’t see how that object is good.”
That object in itself is neutral. You are the one mistakenly defining the object by the external event of the physical order “cutting off a head.” But to be morally relevant, the object must still be defined internally, in terms of what is being chosen by the will in order to achieve its intent. Does the chain of means include any evil directly? Is the man’s death or even disfigurement logically necessary to achieve the end? No, though “changing his dimensions” may be. The same act would be preformed if the person in the escape hatch was already dead, so his death or mutilation is not in itself within the direct chain of means. He is being acted on (by the willing actor) as an object blocking the way. He is not being attacked as a human being with death or injury willed on his person as either an ends or means. In this case, his status as a living human is irrelevant to both the intent and the moral object. We would act the same way on a mannequin blocking the hatch as what is relevant here in terms of what the will is choosing as ends and means is that “something is blocking the hatch.” That the “something” is a human being is morally relevant to side-effects/consequences (and all effects that follow must be proportionately justified), but it is not relevant to the actual end sought (the intent), nor to the means used (the object).
Another example:
Let’s say the hatch is actually big enough for any human being to fit through. The man’s body itself could fit through the hatch. But, he is inside an exploratory pod with thick metal walls. It turns out that, due to poor planning, the pod itself can not fit through the hatch. So, now, the escape hatch is being blocked by the pod (and the man is trapped inside the pod).
Now, there’s an emergency and people need to get out through the escape hatch, but this thick-walled pod with the man inside is blocking the way. The only way to get the pod through the hatch is to use this machine to crush it until it is small enough to fit through the hatch. However, because of the thickness of the walls, it is not possible to just crush it down to that size without crushing the man inside.
Maybe if the walls were thinner, it could simply be crushed “around” him, leaving him alive inside, and then he could be extracted alive once the pod went through. But no, in this case the volumes are such that to get the outside wall of the pod small enough to fit through the hatch, the inside volume will correspondingly be made smaller than a human body.
Do you think it is permissible to act (in the physical sense) on the POD, with the intent of “changing its dimensions so that it fits through the hole” even though this has as an immediate effect crushing the man inside the pod??
People who would accept this but then not the crushing of the man’s body “directly” in the case of a smaller escape hatch his body couldn’t fit through…are making a distinction that doesn’t exist morally. In either case, the intent (end) is to “unblock the escape hatch” and the moral object (act/means chosen to achieve that end) is to “change the dimensions of the thing blocking the hatch.” And the consequences in both cases are that a death results.
The only difference I could see morally is that in the former case, changing the dimensions of the human body is not a means (the body itself could fit through the hatch), merely the result of the means of changing the dimensions of the pod, whereas in the latter case changing the dimensions of the body is a direct means. But the death or injury is itself irrelevant as a means (though must be considered, morally, as a consequence). Unless you’re going to argue that “changing the dimensions of a body” is in itself an evil.
The case is analogous to the ectopic pregnancy one: removing a fallopian tube with an embryo inside and just removing the embryo itself…are morally equivalent. That the physical object immediately acted upon is a surrounding tube or pod rather than a body directly is as irrelevant morally as whether I use gloves to strangle someone or not. In both cases, the intent is to save the life of the mother, and the means is the “removal of the embryo” (neutral in itself as an object), and the consequences are that the embryo dies of exposure. That in one case you act “immediately” on a fallopian tube, and in the other “immediately” on the embryo in the physical sense…is morally irrelevant. At that point, all the fallopian tube becomes, then, is an instrument of transport for the removal. But unnecessarily so.