Only in the first days after the pregnancy (i.e. the morning-after pill)
12
Before the second trimester
48
Before the third trimester
19
At any point prior to birth
36
Only when the mother's life is in danger
51
Never; I oppose abortion in any form
35
Other; describe in your comment
31
Here's the twist. You actually have to [i]defend[/i] your vote. Back it up with actual reasoning. Explain to me how you arrived at your particular choice.
Otherwise, you are either allowing others to choose for you without critical thought, or you are making a choice based on nothing.
I believe abortion is acceptable only when the mother's life is in danger. The debate really comes down to whether you believe a fetus constitutes a human life with rights. I believe it does. I believe this is a self-evident premise & that cut-off points advocated by supporters of abortion are chosen in an arbitrary way. Therefore, it is not acceptable to end the life of a human being. If the mother is inconvenienced by her pregnancy, too bad. That does not give her the right to kill another person just to alleviate her own burden. Maybe she should have not gotten pregnant in the first place.
However, abortion is acceptable when the mother's life is in danger because (obviously) the mother is a human being too, and therefore she has the right to defend her own life. It is my moral and ethical position that all people have the right to defend their own lives when threatened against any assault, using any means necessary. In this case, it becomes a "survival of the fittest" scenario, and the mother gains the right to exercise her fitness as a fully grown, mature human being over the undeveloped fetus leeching away her life force.
See? I stated my position and made a logical argument supporting it. I made my premises clear and explained how they led me to my conclusion. Why do abortion advocates have such a hard time doing this in a logically consistent way?
There's a reason murder is such a bad crime... you're ending the life of someone who wants to live (if they don't, it's assisted suicide). They know they are alive and want to keep it that way. Many people have emotional attachment to them and would be deeply saddened by their loss. A fetus has no clue that it's alive, nor that it ever will be. No one besides the mother will have a real emotional attachment to it. Family members who wanted a niece/nephew/grandchild/etc might not be happy about its loss, but they wouldn't be saddened by its loss the way they would the loss of a 10 year old they'd actually gotten to know. So, no one would truly miss them, and they don't actively wish to live, nor are they even aware they exist or that they ever will. So, I see no problem with abortion, be it out of necessity or convenience.
To add to this, there are 2 alternatives and neither are good. The first is to be kept after birth. If the mother just didn't want the baby in the first place, it's likely they would not be happy about having to put up with it. Its life would be full of resentment from its mother (and possibly by it's father). This, at best causes a terrible childhood. At worst, it comes down to abuse and lasting mental disorders and scarring. The 2nd option is adoption. Who the -blam!- knows how long it would take to get adopted, let alone if it would get adopted into a good family. At best, it gets adopted into a good family and always wonders why it's original family got rid of it. Mental shit could easily arise from that knowledge. At worst, it gets adopted by abusive people and either gets stuck with them forever or gets sent back, then has to be adopted once more. Whether this next family is better or worse than the last remains to be seen. Mental scarring and other issues would definitely arise from this. Now, while either of these options are hell, if I - right now - was given the option of death or going to the adoption agency, it would be an easy choice. But, for a fetus, that has no clue that it's alive or ever will be, is it not better to save it from all of this?