Question

Abortion is one of the most difficult and controversial moral issues we will consider. Listen to both sides, even if it is difficult to do. Both sides have important moral insights, even if ultimately these insights are outweighed by the insights of the other side. The goal of this discussion is not to convince you to accept one position over the other, but to help you to understand both sides. As you consider this difficult issue, it is important to distinguish two questions: Is abortion morally wrong? Use RULE UTILITARIANISM to argue both sides with supporting evidence.

Answer 1

Answer: Before starting we should first know what is abortion?

Abortion is the ending of pregnancy due to removing an embryo or fetus before it can survive outside the uterus. Some people think that abortion is always wrong. Some think that abortion is right when the mother's life is at risk. Others think that there is a range of circumstances in which abortion is morally acceptable.

At various times some of the following have been allowed in some societies:

• abortion for the sake of the mother's health (including her mental health)
• abortion where a pregnancy is the result of a crime (such as crimes like rape, incest, or child abuse)
• abortion where the child of the pregnancy would have an ' unacceptable quality of life' such as cases where the child would have(serious physical handicaps).

For this reason, abortion is not a problem because it involves the health issue of the mother as well as a child. In some countries, particularly India there is a major problem with female foeticide - deliberately aborting foetuses that would be born as girls.

For sociological and economic reasons parents in some cultures prefer to have boy babies. When parents can discover the gender of the foetus in advance, they sometimes request the termination of a pregnancy solely because the foetus is female.These kinds of abortion should be banned and a strict action should be taken regarding this.