And what about those with Alzheimer's? They have no memories of what they've done in the past.. No idea who they are.. Who their families are.. Should they be killed as well? Some elderly people have to be nursed and looked after more than babies.. Should we just kill them?
You are simply taking things out of context now.
My job is related to health (those who know me, know what i do lol) and i assure you, once you are born, you are a person and you have complete protection in terms of the same rights as any other adult person.
Birth is in essence that: a person is born. Because if you start picking at that concept another question rises: If you aren't a person the moment you are born, when are you? at 3 years old? 2? What if the mother suffers from post delivery depression and kills her 3 month old baby? Since its not a person, doesn't she get punished?
The base line is that once you are born, you are a person. That is undeniable and can't be discussed as it would open up to many questions and exceptions.
Now, killing a new born baby is wrong obviously. Its murder and murder is wrong, regardless of the motives and what stems behind. Regardles of any justification, muder is wrong.
Now, is abortion murder? Is the fetus alive when it has 12 weeks of gestation? 20? Is abortion a viable option?
Honestly, i think only the woman who see themselves in a point where they consider that option or where that options seems viable can reply. I'm a man. I'll never go through something like that and it will be ridiculous for me to give my opinion directly on something that i'll never experience. Its a very personal question that each person may have an opinion but that only woman may have an intimate feeling towards.
I can understand (and i've seen it) that stress, pressure, problems, worries that come with an unwanted pregnancy. I know very well what a disabled child can do to a family. I know very well that in some cases, that child if born is going to be only one more in the statistics of child abuse or poverty.
In my country, the law allows voluntary abortion up to 12 weeks and up to 20 weeks for medical reasons (if i'm not mistaken). Birth control methods are free and handed out anywhere. Education exists. So, abortion is an option left only in 5th or 6th place and not as a viable first handed option. However, i also know that not all countries have this policy and i know that not all people have acess to birth control methods.
What i can be sure though, is that killing a child is wrong. And that is in essence what happens when you do a "after birth abortion" (so many things wrong with this term i almost vomit...)
A new-born baby is a person
by law. So, when the issue of after-birth abortion is raised, it is considered murder — by the law. But individual perceptions on when a baby becomes a
person are different; quite similarly to perceptions on when life itself is actually formed. To some people, the moment of conception is the beginning of new life. To others, it is the point at which a baby could hypothetically survive outside the mother's womb (with medical support). And to some people, it is the moment when the baby is delivered.
In my view, a new-born baby is -as the article states- morally equivalent to a foetus, and is simply a more developed form of a "potential person". Therefore, I don't view after-birth abortion as
murder, per se. As Scorps has rightly questioned above, this obviously depends on what one perceives a person to be; when does one become a person? What actually defines a person?
I personally am pro-choice, and I have no real prejudice against abortion. However, I find that the term should be used precariously here, because although I don't believe that after-birth abortion is murder, I don't think it classifies as "abortion" either; because to me, that signifies the riddance of a fetus still within the mother's womb. Infanticide is
technically the correct term for this act, but it suggests a much more motive-driven, psychopathic angle, so it seems like too strong a word to use, in my opinion.
Abortion (before and after-birth) is a question of one's own moral and ethical judgements/beliefs. I definitely don't believe that it should be the first option in what was a mere "mistake" — when people view abortion as an easy means of accepting their carelessness is when I would draw the line. The mother is pregnant with the baby for approximately nine months; nine months is ample time to decide you want an abortion. If the reason for abortion is a medical condition which was detected only in the final trimester of gestation, all options must be seriously weighed and after-birth abortion must only act as a last resort. It isn't the easy way out; and it mustn't be seen as an alternative, because then we would have homicidal lunatics running around maternity wards across the world.
After-birth abortion seems cruel, and it can also be a severe mental burden on the people related to the baby. The psychological effects of this can cause much more harm than just post-natal depression. Even if the parents are willing to abort their child, the realisation that they have lost not just a collection of cells inside the mother's body, but a living, breathing individual in its own right — that can be traumatising.
If the government did agree to allow after-birth abortion, at which point would it state that the acceptable period for after-birth abortion would end? When does it stop being legal; a week after delivery? Two weeks? Who would decide this? Under what circumstances would after-birth abortion be determined acceptable? Must it be a valid medical reason? If so, what medical conditions would be warranted appropriate?
There are too many if's and but's when it comes to this issue, and it really all comes down to what
you believe is right. The safer option would just be to let after-birth abortion remain illegal, but would it then be breaching our human rights..?
I apologise for the wall-text. I got carried away.