Asymmetrical Information

Abortions for gender selection is easy. As wrong as it is, let them. As the ratio of females to males switches from the "natural" state of 50.2/19.8 (female/male) to less than 50/50, men suddenly find that is difficult to find a wife. Where before a dowery would be paid to take the girls off of the father's hands, now girls become a valued object. In fact, an abused woman can leave her husband, and find a new one! In other words, by artificially restricting the availability of women, the value per woman increases, thus helping to equalize the gender power differntial in that country.

However, this arguement does not work with regards to aborting a gay fetus. However, the only ones that would do this would be hypocrticial religious people. There is a correlation between being pro-choice and supporting gay rights, and vice versa. I would find a pro-lifer that aborted a gay fetus to be an object of ridicule, and very funny. In other words, I don't expect this to be a significant problem in the US. In fact, I suggest turning this question around towards the pro-lifers.

Fix 50.2/19.8 to 50.2/49.8

I did not mean to imply that women were objects, merely that their value would increase. And in societies that would abort girls because they were girls, they probably are considered to be objects.

"I suggest turning this question around towards the pro-lifers."

We would oppose aborting gay babies, for the same reason that we oppose murdering gay adults.

You got that right, Joel, and well said, too.

I think that this is the perfect illustration of why the pro-choice crowd is being so stupid in this conversation. They are making the same mistake that the pro-life crowd is. Both want to pretend that the fetus is just a pile of bio matter one instant then has full human rights the next instant. Lifers think that moment is conception where choicers think that moment is birth but it really is the same fundamental mistake.

In reality, as the baby develops and becomes more human its rights should be taken into account more. In the first trimester, the right of the woman to not carry a pregnancy to term trumps the rights if the undeveloped fetus. A week after the baby is due but before birth, the right of the woman to change her mind about having the child is trumped by the baby's right to be born.

Judged in this light, the choice of aborting a gay fetus is easy. The woman has already had the chance to abort the fetus, so if carrying the baby to term would be devestating for her she would had done that. Now the choice is the right of the fetus to be born vs the right of the woman to not have a child with a personality trait. This is an easy choice.

I don't know whether I am prolife or prochoice anymore. I think that I probably should be pro-choice because I support every woman choosing whether to have an abortion. However in nearly every recent vote on abortion (reasonable limits on late term abortions withing the framework of roe) I have sided with prolifers.

Bah.

Fetuses are animate property. Like all other property, they are completely at the whim of their owner - Slaveowners killed slaves on a whim, and a dog owner can kill their dogs anytime they want. So if a fetus-owner wants to kill a fetus because it's gay, what legitimate reason do you have for stopping them? Heck - why not kill the fetus because its a boy and you wanted a girl? Or because it's going to have brown eyes and you wanted blue. It's your property after all. I mean, you'd kill your slave or your cat if he got uppity, right?

I think Byna is incorrect in the assumption that the only people who would contemplate aborting a gay fetus would also tend to be pro-life. Even if the correlation between supporting gay rights and being pro-choice exists, I doubt it is a perfect one-to-one correlation. I've known a lot a people who don't like homosexuality who aren't the slightest bit religious.

Damon, you seem to be assuming that a genetic test for homosexualilty would not be practical until after the first trimester. That wouldn't necessarily be the case.

If you support unrestricted access to abortion at a certain stage in the pregnancy it is hard for me to see how you can be morally opposed to aborting a gay fetus at the same stage. You could condemn the motivation as anti-gay prejudice, but how could you convincingly argue against the act itself?

how do the militantly pro-choice pose a coherent objection to aborting a fetus because it's gay?

That's like asking "how do people who favor unrestricted free speech pose a coherent objection to calling black people 'niggers'". Just because you oppose limits on choice doesn't mean you think all choices are good, or moral.

Yes Dan, but most people who support free speech would argue strongly that people should be allowed to use such language, even if they personally find it reprehensible. Do you think that is the likely outcome in the scenario Jane describes? Would pro-choice activists speak out for the right to abort a fetus because it is gay even though they may be morally opposed?

Yup. I would certainly argue that Sean E.

If an abortion is performed in the first trimester, it is impossible to tell whether the choice was made because the woman just didn't want to be pregnant or because the baby was going to be gay. Because the state shouldn't be in the mindreading business, the right of the woman to not be pregnant should override the rights of the unformed fetus. The question changes once women have already decided that they want to have the child. And no I don't think that the woman has a right to change her mind indefinitely- there is no way to go back and change your mind if you chose to have the abortion.

Damon, that's an a-priori assumption. You're just restating it, not proving it. In fact, there are genes that apparently correlate with male homosexuality; those would be detectable well before the second trimester if such tests became common.

As Jane points out, these issues popped up years ago with regard to sex-selection abortions, which have been feasible for years--I recall Dianne Feinstein landing in some hot water for saying she wanted to ban them--and sonagrams did more or less end the argument. The problem is that once the information exists to allow them, how do you stop them when the procedure that facilitates them is for all intents and purposes unregulated? The situation for potentially gay fetuses is inherently less self-regulating than for sex-selection--most people will see the problems inherent if a substantial majority of parents choose one gender over another (I recall reading a chilling short story where an unidentified Middle Eastern country had been using sex-selection abortions for the past twenty years, with the result that ninety-nine percent of the young adult population was male. Needless to say, things had gotten ugly). In the case of the potentially gay, such obvious problems won't be posed--the issue will have to be centered around the rights of the individual, and that's the very point that the pro-choice movement's choice to dehumanize the fetus prior to birth has devastated most thoroughly--if the fetus has no rights, it doesn't matter *why* it is being destroyed. The would-be parents might face social disapproval if their reasons were known, but if it's just a matter of looking at an abstract of a gene chart and telling a doctor yes or no without elaboration, where is the disapproval to come from?

Maybe I shouldn't FTT, but what the heck:

> Slaveowners killed slaves on a whim,

Not true; at least, not without legal sanction in most states.

> and a dog owner can kill their dogs anytime they want.

Maybe some decades/centuries in the past, but certainly not so now. The process is very highly regulated, and doing in the wrong way can literally land you in jail, not to speak of fines.

"But I'm having a hard time formulating a coherent pro-choice argument against them."

That's because there isn't one. If you accept that a woman's body is her own property, then you can't play Zoning Board and tell her which undesirable traits are approved criteria for disposing of it. Not wanting a child with gay genes doesn't strike me as any more or less frivolous a reason for abortion than not wanting one's fast-track law clerkship interrupted. It would pain me to see it happen, and if one of my women friends were on the fence and asked me in confidence what I thought, I'd certainly tell her so. But the fetus is never going to know that it was aborted, let alone why, so I don't see how hard its life may or may not be comes into it.

Whoops. That last sentence is, "...so I don't see how how hard its life may or may not be comes into it."

Boy Jane, this one is a real winner in terms of hot-button issues... abortion and homosexuality in the same question.

Now all you have to do is work in race and the in-field fly rule and you've got yourself the perfect fight-starter.

M. Scott, Actually, that country was India, or possibly China: both have the problem of an over-supply of males due to sex-selected abortions and out-and-out female infanticide. In parts of India, the birth sex ratio has actually dropped to under 400 girls/1000 boys. In China, very wrenching social "experiements" are being tried, from sharing a wife among numerous brothers, to abducting already-married women and impregnating them to at least have a child.

Muslim countries are not terribly supportive of abortion for any reason, though some will permit it for therapeutic purposes. Let's not let that anti-Muslim bias slip in carelessly, now!

To add a slightly different flavor to the argument, how about this:

Once a genetic test for "gayness" is developed, parents decide that "gayness" is a genetic defect and decide to have it "cured" in the womb. Any ethical problems with this? If so, on what grounds?

fetus is a fetus is a fetus. To say its gay is to say its human. You've just imported Aristotle's potentiality argument into the framing of the context. Which is exactly what pro-lifers always do. Other than that, it's a fine conundrum for pro-choicers.

My shorthand for when every woman has consciously decided that she wants to be pregnant is the end of the first trimester. Every woman has had the choice to abort by that point. Its juts an easy number to work with and I think is pretty reasonable.

If the woman finds out that the baby is gay during the 2nd trimester, she shouldn't be able to have the abortion because of it. Her right to not have a child with a personality trait doesn't come close to overcoming the rights of the fetus, and at that point it is clear that she has already a chance to abort.

If the woman finds out that the baby is gay during the first trimester the situation changes. While I think that the decision would be immoral, I think she should still be allowed to have the abortion. I don't think that there is any way to determine if the woman is having the abortion because she doesn't want to be pregnant or that she doesn't want to be pregnant with a gay baby. Its not like you are going to give the woman a checklist in the waiting room, and if she checks the wrong box in the "reason for terminating pregnancy" section then she can't get the abortion. Because it is hapening at such an early stage, the deciscions are indistingiushible to any 3rd party so her decision needs to be allowed. I think that it would be immoral to terminate a baby because it will be gay but it needs to be allowed because we aren't mindreaders.

I am prochoice becuase I beleive every woman should have the right to choose whether to be pregnant or not. This decision takes place early in the pregnancy. After they have decided not to have the abortion, the womans right to choose has been fulfilled and the rights of the fetus take a much larger role in decisions.

echoing steve on potentiality,
if you are militantly (and i take that part of the hypothetical seriously) "pro-choice" then you support the right to abortion, even if the person wanting the abortion is a complete homophobe doing it because they cannot stand the idea that the "entity" would be gay (assuming genetic determinism). since the "entity" is not human, by pro-choice assumption, its potential sexual orientation is not relevant to one's moral decision concerning abortion.

and i am uncomfortable with damon's reasoning--

"I am prochoice becuase I beleive every woman should have the right to choose whether to be pregnant or not. This decision takes place early in the pregnancy. After they have decided not to have the abortion, the womans right to choose has been fulfilled and the rights of the fetus take a much larger role in decisions."

after the first semester when i find out that our unborn child will be severely retarded with a syndrome that will painfully kill them before the age of 8, we terminate. for someone else, the trigger is a child's sexual orientation. how will you judge which reason is better?

"Her right to not have a child with a personality trait doesn't come close to overcoming the rights of the fetus, and at that point it is clear that she has already a chance to abort. "

why? for some folks, being gay would be a fate worse than death (literaly resulting in bad after-life implications). with so much at stake, how would you weigh a short life of apparent happiness against an eternity of damnation?

community standards are great, but what if your community does not have the same standard as mine for making these kinds of decisions?

Sometimes when people suggest that our society is inevitably going to accept gay marriage, etc., in a few years or decades, I inwardly think that it is more likely that in a few decades there won't be any gay people outside of the elderly. If homosexuality has any biological basis, whether genetic or hormonal, it is almost inevitable that we will find either a way to cure it or a way to test for it so as to facilitate abortions. I'm not saying that I favor this outcome; I'm just predicting that it will happen whether I want it to or not.

To me- the general rule is that Women should be given wide latitude in the first trimester to make there decisions. In the 2nd trimester you deal with distinct circumstances that would make cause the right of the woman to overcome the rights of the developing fetus. Health of the mother for instance. Whether the decisions about what to do in particular circumstances are made on a local level or a national level is irrelevant. If you have any exceptions to the rule (ie health of the mother or severe genetic defects) then some doctors will use those loopholes to give some women access to an abortion when it shouldn't be legal. Some doctors would even lie about how developed a fetus is in order to perform the abortion. I just want to make those abortions rare.

I just as Roe did, I would put these specific circumstances up for decision on the local level. The Constitution allows for immoral laws in many cases and I have to think this is one of them. I think that many places would pass laws making an exception for an abortion in the case of a genetic deformity. I have a hard time imagining a place that would vote in a specific exception allowing an abortion if you find out that your child will be gay. But if a community did have enough support for such a law, there isn't much that I could do about it except for trying to change peoples minds. In any case- these abortions would be exceedingly rare.

Russell: "Now all you have to do is work in race and the in-field fly rule and you've got yourself the perfect fight-starter."

I don't know anyone who has issues with the IFR.
The Designated Hitter rule on the other hand ...

Does anyone who's "militantly pro-choice" actually possess the opinion that aborting based on sexual orientation should be illegal? It's icky, but so are the rest of the reasons.

Personally, I am strongly pro-choice and I unabashedly support gays. I can also say without a hint of hypocrisy that, in my book, you should be able to get an abortion for any reason you wish. Want to kill your gay fetus? Be my guest.

I think that the apparent conflict here comes from the assumption that being supportive of gays implies supporting special protections for them. I think gays simply ought to be treated like everyone else.

I am pro-choice because I believe you have a right to abortion. Rights are not qualified by the phrase "...so long as you have a good reason". Your reasons are your business. I do not need a reason to own a gun, either. It's simply my choice to make.

Okay, what if the test only shows a correlation to homosexuality, not causation? In other words, what if it can never be proven that this fetus will or will not become gay, but merely whether or not it has a tendency to do so?
I guess that really doesn't change the nature of the original question: coming up with a position that rationally supports unrestricted right to abortion while simultaneously restricting rights to abort possibly homosexual fetuses.

So, when did you stop beating your wife?

This supposed conundrum assumes hypocrisy and then puts the onus on one side to justify a position that they don't hold. (At least, I know I don't hold it and none of the other pro-choice commentators here do either.) So, nice try, but it's basically a waste of everyone's time.

And FWIW, if this was debate team and you forced me to defend a pro-choice and anti-sex selection position I would choose a utilitarian rationale and claim that unbalanced sex ratios would be bad for society. I could probably weasel out some similar justification for outlawing gay abortions to, although the case would be a lot weaker.

A quick quibble with those who think the "conundrum" is easy to resolve because once a right (to abortion) is recognized, it is improper or impractical to inquire into a person's reasons for exercising that right. We do it all the time in other contexts. For example, even if I have a right to fire a terminable-at-will employee on a whim, for no reason at all, I still don't have a right to fire him because of his race or her because she's a woman.

I do agree that as long as our legal regime regards first-trimester embryos/fetuses as non-persons despite their possession of a human genome, it doesn't make sense to regard such a non-person as gay just because it possesses a gay gene.

For example, even if I have a right to fire a terminable-at-will employee on a whim, for no reason at all, I still don't have a right to fire him because of his race or her because she's a woman.

Yes, but this is only because the law provides special protections for minorities and women.

If one were to support such special protections for gays, than I agree you'd be caught in a bind here. The bind goes away if you just want to treat gays like everyone else.

I'm trying to think of another example where the exercise of a right requires an examination of motives, but I'm drawing a blank. Sounds like an interesting topic, though.

I'm not looking at the legal question, but the moral one.

Most pro-choice people, I think, believe that in some sense abortion is not morally wrong. They want to refrain from passing judgement on a woman who decides to have an abortion.

Yet most would, I think, pass judgement on this, even if they wouldn't make it illegal. Yet the desire it expresses, to have a heterosexual child, is fairly common among heterosexuals, and doesn't have to be bigoted per se; most parents want children who are like them in most important respects, and this one's pretty important, besides which it's very hard to be gay and no one likes their children to suffer. We don't, by and large, pass judgement on the desire to have only heterosexual children. So something in our repulsion has to do with the act of abortion, not the desire that motivates it. Yet, we refrain from judging people who have abortions for reasons that are at least as trivial, such as fear of embarassment, or motivated by essentially the same desire to perfect one's brood, such as aborting children with non-fatal birth defects.

Jane, your whole argument is based on the faulty premise that it would be possible to determine the future sexual orientation of a fetus. But since there is no indication that sexual orientation is determined by one's genes (as opposed to being influenced by them), this is not the case. Therefore the "conundrum" does not exist. It looks like an argument that someone came up with to allow anty-choicers to indulge in one of their favorite pastimes--feeling morally superior to others.

But people abort children now because there's a probability that they will be born handicapped; I see no reason to believe that parents wouldn't choose to do the same with a fetus that had, say, a 50% chance of turning into a homosexual child. You're dodging the question.

"I suggest turning this question around towards the pro-lifers." Posted by Byna

"We would oppose aborting gay babies, for the same reason that we oppose murdering gay adults."
Posted by Joel

>>Um, Joel... most of the people who advocate stoning gay people to death are religious fundamentalist... today they are mainly Muslim fundies... but even in America today Mike Savage can be fired from NBC for suggesting that gay men should get sick and die... so is it just that they are babies that you wouldnt advocate their destruction? (I know, I know, that was bombastic, but think about it, the contradiction implied by Byna does indeed exist).

"Just because you oppose limits on choice doesn't mean you think all choices are good, or moral. -Posted by Dan "

A very good response Dan.

Also, people in this here debate are apparently accepting the idea that being gay is a) radicaly different from being straight b) is pre determined geneticaly and c) is constant and permanent.

However, much research, and some simple personal honesty (with out all the religious baggage), reveals that sexuality is not an either or proposition, or a constant, or a purely personal biological situation. In fact, many people experience erotic responses to a wide range of images, touches, scents, sounds, etc. These responses change over time and in different circumstances.

If I took any given man and put him in prison... well, the suggestion is obvious. Or a girl in cheerleader camp after a string of failed boyfriends. Or a woman after childbirth, or menopose, or...

Genetics may pose a predisposition in some people, but simply by aborting such babies you would not likily eliminate the propensity... it would have to be a recessive trait (or it wouldnt be passed on by straight parents) and thus is carried in seceret by the most macho of men (and feminine of women).

So this entire discussion is moot (but still ugly).

-S

It is clear that, in the modern world at least, a disproportionate number of society's most creative and artistic individuals are homosexuals. It would thus be a shame to allow their numbers to be diminished.

Jane, again: does anyone actually possess this opinion?

Comments are Closed.