Re:South Carolina bill outlaws websites that tell how to get...
by giraffe_lady on Friday July 22, 2022 @11:37AM
(#32193131)
Even if you consider it murder-more-or-less, the hard dependence on another person's body puts it in a different category of transgression.
Consider:
You watch someone die in front of you while you hold in your hands the thing that could save their life, but refuse to give it. Is that murder? Maybe, possibly, there's an argument that it's something else but I'm comfortable with this. Should a person be allowed to do it? Again maybe, but I'm ok with no, that's a bad crime, they shouldn't be allowed to do it.
You watch someone die in front of you while the thing that could save them comes from your own body. A blood transfusion, say, or whatever, a fingernail clipping, it doesn't matter really. This is morally the same transgression as the first example. But in this case we have clearly and consistently decided that you are allowed to make this choice. It may be evil but it is not a crime.
If you don't allow the second choice, then you open the door to things like medical experiments on nonconsenting people and organ harvesting. The boundary around bodily autonomy needs to be firm or you permit atrocities.
Abortion may be murder! You can believe it is. But the fact that the life depends on the body of another person means they have the choice not to render aid.
Consider:
You watch someone die in front of you while you hold in your hands the thing that could save their life, but refuse to give it. Is that murder? Maybe, possibly, there's an argument that it's something else but I'm comfortable with this. Should a person be allowed to do it? Again maybe, but I'm ok with no, that's a bad crime, they shouldn't be allowed to do it.
You watch someone die in front of you while the thing that could save them comes from your own body. A blood transfusion, say, or whatever, a fingernail clipping, it doesn't matter really. This is morally the same transgression as the first example. But in this case we have clearly and consistently decided that you are allowed to make this choice. It may be evil but it is not a crime.
If you don't allow the second choice, then you open the door to things like medical experiments on nonconsenting people and organ harvesting. The boundary around bodily autonomy needs to be firm or you permit atrocities.
Abortion may be murder! You can believe it is. But the fact that the life depends on the body of another person means they have the choice not to render aid.