On Monday March 22 Obama introduced a new HealthCare Amendment which grazed the highly controversial issue of abortion. Obama announced that this new amendment would enforce the law that prevents the use of taxpayer dollars for abortion except in cases of rape, incest and cases of pregnancy threatening the life of the mother. Pro-life advocates are outraged that this amendment is not doing enough towards abolishing abortion and pro-choice advocates are enraged this amendment is an extreme invasion of privacy and a crime against our core civil rights – leaving President Obama in a sticky situation. Obama has acknowledged that abortion is an issue that needs be addressed; now it’s merely a matter of taking a clear stance on the issue.
To make a clear decision on this issue President Obama does not need to reference any further back than our own horrific history of slavery. Slaves were deprived of the same rights that are denied to an unborn fetus. Slaves were treated as property to their owners, and these unborn children are being stripped of their most basic right: life. Though many may argue that they are not technically “living” in the womb, scientific research tells a different story.
In the first hour of conception the child is already given every aspect of his or her genetic inheritance from eye color to height. About twenty one days after fertilization the heart starts to beat. When a person’s heart stops beating it is a clear sign of death, thus a heart beat is a clear indicator of human life. At week 6 the brain emits measurable brain impulses, and by 8 weeks every organ is present and the child has 90% of the structures found in an adult. Breathing motions are occurring, skin is thickening and the brain accounts for almost half of the fetus’ total body weight: If a child has developed this much in a matter of 8 weeks then abortions are murderous acts justified by no actual evidence, re-enforcing the argument that a fetus is a human being.
Abortion hands over the core rights of this child to the mother and by doing so enforces the core principle of slavery: a more powerful being has the rights to oppress a weaker one. Abortions imply that the mother and her life are “superior” to that of her unborn child; thus she has complete power to dispose of her child at her will. By allowing a child’s life to become dispensable we are inadvertently suggesting that one life-form takes precedence over another; unleashing the horrific mindset that fuels genocide.
Abortion is to our time what slavery was to the 19th century: a controversial and nation-dividing issue, evoking strong emotions and heated debates. Though many have reduced the issue of abortion to a religious view where crazy Christians try to thrust their moral values upon you in the form of preaching pro-life arguments, it is much more than that. It is a matter of freedom. From the beginning of time America has fought for individual freedom. We fought for freedom from religious persecution in England, we fought for the rights of African-Americans, we fought for Women’s Suffrage, and we continue to fight for the freedom of other nations, yet we refuse to acknowledge the fact that we are openly denying freedom to a child. A child who does not yet have a voice to fight for the freedoms, that under our constitution, they are entitled to: life, liberty and property.