Fathers Don't Have Enough Say About Abortions

I recently saw a post online about abortion and I was really provoked into evaluating the situation further.

The post was doing the same old debate about how some people argue about abortion and the varying disparities in opinion of what constitutes "life," "rights," and "choice."

Ultimately, I think the main problem with any/all childbearing law is that exactly none of those three options are explored fully, and the laws are all unfairly kedged to popular media. Instead of looking at everything from a slanted viewpoint, let's evaluate the topic of abortion from these three standpoints and show a few different sides.

LIFE

In the arena of life, this can possibly affect all three parties involved. The mother's life is certainly changed and her life is significantly valuable. The father's life is very much also changed, not just financially, but emotionally, and mentally also. The child obviously has a stake in this category also.

Here are some basic statements that I think are true:

• At whatever point you call something life (conception/heartbeat/brain signals/etc), it should be entitled to whatever potential that life provides
• A mother has the right to decide what she wants to do with her body and her future
• A father also has the right to decide what he wants to do with his body and his future

If those are all true, the concept of life is a bigger picture than simply "when does a baby become a baby" or "is the mother or the baby more important" and it becomes something that is more complex. It's an evaluation of what this life has the potential of being, how that potential affects the lives of the people who conceived it, and how that triad plays a role in the community around it. 

So when you are speaking with people about "What Constitutes Life" please be sure to acknowledge that ALL of the lives involved with this are exactly that - involved. 

The argument comes in when people argue at what point actually begins. Some people argue that life begins when the full body of the baby is formed. Others argue at the first heartbeat. Others argue at conception. 

I think to really get at the heart of what the issue is, you need to get to the dirty and gritty truth of the question. The real question is, "at what point is is still okay to completely mangle something that may potentially become a human being and when is it no longer acceptable?"

In my personal opinion, I would argue that the question is rather superfluous, because nobody really wants to do that, but I would also wager that most people can agree that once something can FEEL it's morally reprehensible to do something so painful to something. At that point, I make the argument that the "life" point is when the zygote/fetus/baby/etc has nerves that can actually send signals.

If your argument is to the contrary, understand that you are saying you feel it's okay to intentionally mangle and liquify potential life while it is able to feel every moment. 

Current law doesn't take into thought AT ALL what the actual thing inside the mother FEELS. It is based on viability outside of the womb, but that's really not considering the LIFE inside her if you agree that being able to feel presumes life.

RIGHTS

On the subject of rights, let's talk about equality and making everything fair for everyone. I talk about it this way, because the general consensus is that everyone should have equal rights. There are again, three parties involved here. 

The Baby/Fetus/Zygote/etc. - Once this "thing" inside the mother attains the luxurious status of "alive" it now attains all of the rights that are attributed with that. Since people are consenting to this, the general argument is "when does life begin" - because nobody wants to be accused of ending a life, particularly a "young" life because it has potential. Personally, I would then question that even further and get to the idea that once something has potential for life it now has the potential for all of what is entailed by that also. Once something has "life" it has rights.

The Mother - the mother has all the rights of being alive, which carries the rights to her body, the rights to her future, the rights to her finances, and the right to make choices. Certainly a pregnancy carries a hefty physical choice along with mental/emotional and financial choices. 

The Father - The father should have all the rights of being alive also, carrying the right to his body, his future, his finances, and his choices. There is a very big mental/emotional and financial toll for him also. 

The problem with law currently is that it affords rights to the potential child only when it becomes viable outside the mother. It hardly affords the father any rights, and the mother has nearly 100% rights. Let's look at this in several situations:

1 - The mother decides she cannot financially support a baby (Potential child and father have no say): She can abort, give up for adoption, apply for government aid, etc.

2 - The father decides he cannot financially support a baby (Father and potential child have no say): Too bad. The mother can decide to keep a baby he may have used protection against and his finances, emotional, and mental futures are all altered without his own permission. 

3 - The baby has reached a point where nerves are present and working (father and potential child have no say): Too bad. The mother has 100% legal rights to blend those nerves up as much as she likes, even if she simply doesn't feel like she can financially support them.

In these three scenarios, the current laws are OBVIOUSLY neglecting both the potential child and the father. 

CHOICE

I think the main problem with the concept here is not what DEFINES choice, but more of a WHEN is the choice defined. Many times people say that the mother doesn't have a choice, the father doesn't have a choice, etc. 

Choice for childbearing is a two part decision and is fluid in my opinion. Simply, if a guy isn't using protection against it, then he is conceding that he is accepting to potential childbearing. If a woman isn't doing something to prevent it also (pill, implant, ring, female protection, etc) then she is equally culpable at that point in time. 

The true point of choice for a guy is always leading into the romance. Any situation after that is already outside of his control and thus outside of his ability to choose. For the gal, the choice making still has a few steps before there is even a third party. 

A woman could take a morning after pill, use cleaning methods, and other precautions to make pregnancy a less likely option by a vast margin. 

The law currently acknowledges only the mother's choices at the point where she is pregnant. It doesn't look at actions from the guy and doesn't look at preventive measures taken. 

WHAT IS THE FIX?

I don't think that I have a universal answer to the question. I do have a few ideas as to things that should rectify some of these questions. Here is a list of things that I think would help - maybe not fix entirely:

1 - Life should be defined as whenever something has working nerves. At that point it can potentially feel and morally and ethically deserves to not feel pain. 

2 - Men should be offered a parental rights and responsibility waiver once they are informed they are going to be a father. At that point, they should (prior to the child being aborted/adopted/birthed) be able to know, just as much as a mother is allowed to abort at any point before "viability," whether they want to and can support the child. At that point, they can make the decision and then definitively give the mother another piece to making her decision. 

3 - Women should be given a deadline (window of days) to announce to potential fathers that they are potentially a parent in order to facilitate the father's right to waive

I am not a chauvinist nor a feminist, but as I look at the current law it becomes more evident that the potential child and potential father are distinctly disadvantaged in this situation. Women, by all means, should have the right to control their own bodies. At the same time, that shouldn't come at the expense of the rights of the majority of everyone else involved. 

That's the way I see it.