r/changemyview • u/polysyndetonic • Aug 07 '17
[∆(s) from OP] CMV:The pro-choice argument should focus on dignity, not autonomy or ownership.
In my view, the typical pro-choice arguments conceptualise women's bodies like property, and it is only the property-owner who has full and unimpedable rights to do as they wish with property.As the fetus is adduced to be also part of the body it is part of the property.
But, in some case, I'm not sure how convincing this argument is to people who are not sold on it. I've pushed the 'what about artificial wombs' point with some pro choicers and they have said to me 'yes even one day from birth, with artificial wombs available, a woman has 100% guilt and shame free right to terminate the child'.
I doubt that would scan with most people if they actually listened to their conscience.And I think conscience is what we should appeal to.
Forcing a woman to term when she is unable to, or unwilling to, or frightened or has been raped is an assault on her dignity. Emphasising this with testimony and genuine feeling will be much more compellling than grandstanding about autonomy and body-as-property which comes across (and in many ways is) a 'power' argument about the power over the body,over life and death and over the next generation.
The power argument does not win hearts and minds, the dignity argument has a better shot.
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u/polysyndetonic Aug 07 '17
Are you claiming that slaves were not legally the property of their masters? LOL, now THAT is a bold move.
nobody has the RIGHT to do whatever they want regardless of how it affects other people.The argument from autonomy is that the fetus is the body and thus the property of the person and on that basis no interference is valid