This week’s readings center on the abortion debate in the United States that began in the mid 1900s and is still of large concern today. Contested Lives: An Abortion Debate in the American Community by Faye Ginsburg is an ethnography that analyzes the conflict of abortion by utilizing Fargo, North Dakota as a microcosm of a larger American society. The second reading is a chapter excerpt from Hadley Arkes’s First Things: An Inquiry Into the First Principles of Morals and Justice and it explores the ethics behind the Roe vs. Wade decision in 1973 and its implications on society. Finally, the last reading, which was published earliest, is Judith Thomson’s “A Defense of Abortion” which explores the philosophy behind the right to life movement and argues against it. The readings this week encompass the moral reasoning and consequences of the pro-choice vs. pro-life debate in American society throughout the 1970s-80s.
From the onset, Ginsburg states her identity and any biases that might affect her work. She states, “I was concerned, initially, that being a young, unmarried, Jewish, and urban visitor from New York City might pose serious barriers to communication with Fargo residents (5).” She was extremely aware that she was about to enter a conservative and homogenous small city in the Midwest that prides itself for having the “highest rate of church attendance of any standard metropolitan area (4).” It was interesting that Ginsburg found her New Yorker identity the hardest identity to overcome when talking to Fargo residents. I believe this to be a testament to the divide in ideologies across the country and how reactions toward abortion differed even after the 1973 Roe vs. Wade decision. Thus, I appreciated that Ginsburg started off her ethnography with a couple chapters devoted to the history of abortion debate in the U.S., before delving into her findings in Fargo starting in Chapter 4. Unlike most ethnographic studies, she spends time acknowledging that there is a larger context of conflict that is occurring at a different pace outside of this small city.
Hence, I would like to discuss Thomson’s and Arkes’s works before analyzing Ginsburg’s conclusions because both works were published before Contested Lives and set the larger framework in which Ginsburg conducted her ethnography. Judith Thomson’s “A Defense of Abortion” defends the right of choice for a pregnant woman to control her own body. This moral philosophy paper was published in 1971 and spurred a lot of discussion and critiques from both sides of the abortion debate pre-Roe vs. Wade. Thomson operates under the assumption that “most opposition to abortion relies on the premise that the fetus is a human being, a person, from the moment of conception (47).” She calls attention to the issue that opponents of abortion do not “draw the line” from which a fetus is person to where abortion starts being impermissible.
Thomson uses the thought experiment of the unconscious violinist to explain her viewpoint. She sets a scenario of a famous violinist with a fatal kidney ailment who can only be cured by you and so the Society if Music Lovers kidnaps you. The next day, the director of the hospital informs you that “we’re sorry the Society of Music Lovers did this to you (48),” but to unplug yourself from the violinist now will kill him. Thomson questions “is it morally incumbent on you to accede to this situation (48)?” She then mentions the time frame and pushes the reader to determine if the decision would change depending on if you had to be plugged in for one hour (“be a good Samaritan”), nine months (equivalent to pregnancy), or nine years (a much longer time span)?
Thomson uses this thought experiment to walk through several scenarios from the extremist view of never aborting a child even to save a mother’s life to whether or not a mother has a special responsibility for the fetus from conception. At first glance, I found Thomson’s work to be very persuasive. The analogies used throughout the paper and moral reasoning resonated with me and I even found myself nodding my head as I read. I found myself proclaiming, “of course a woman should be able to save her own life” or “it is not her fault she was raped!” Nonetheless, after contemplation, I realized I felt prey to Thomson’s rhetoric strategy of simple analogies to explain the complex issue at hand. She successfully empathized with my identity as a female who hopes to have a child one day to get her point across.
Thus, it is important to put emotions aside and note several criticisms that should be addressed from either side of the abortion debate. First off, Thomson’s argument is solely based on the fetal right to life assumption. This assumption in itself only represents a portion of the larger controversy. Additionally, the violinist analogy obviously isn’t perfect and Thomson tries to remedy this throughout her reasoning. However, nothing can be changed about the fact that the violinist is a stranger to you, unlike a fetus inside of you, or that you were kidnapped in the scenario, restricting the abortion argument to extreme cases such as rape or imminent death for the mother.
- Did you find Thomson’s argument compelling?
- Do you believe that Thomson’s use of analogies was an effective method of communication? If yes, do you think the violinist analogy is representative of getting am abortion? Can any analogy be representative of that decision?
- What do you think should be the role of a third-party in the mother’s decision to abort her child?
In the chapter titled, “The Question of Abortion and the Discipline of Moral Reasoning,” Arkes explores the interaction between morals and the law post-Roe vs. Wade decision made by Justice Blackmun. Arkes states, “Within the space of five lines, Justice Blackmun managed to incorporate three or four fallacies, not the least of which was the assumption that the presence of disagreement (or the absence of “consensus”) indicates the absence of truth (360).” The assumption referenced is that the judge’s decision was the answer to the dispute over when life begins. Arkes spends much of the chapter explaining that the judicial decision did not solve the dispute but rather added to the fuel because it brought to light even more ethical debates.
Arkes stresses the need for justification when making any moral decision. Arkes analyzes Blackmun’s suggestion that the “fetus becomes ‘viable’ somewhere between the 24th and 28th weeks, and he indicated that the state would have a stronger “’logical and biological justification’ to act at this point (376).” The next line is Blackmun’s clarification that “this justification would never be sufficiently compelling in any case to override the interest of the mother having her baby (376).” This judicial stance highlighted the importance of justification and also that the abortion debate by no means would end with Roe vs. Wade.
- Is it possible to create laws without taking morality into account? Is it justified to separate morals and laws?
- How does the need for justification change your viewpoint on the abortion debate from a mother’s, the fetal, and the physician’s perspectives?
- Do you agree with the Ann Landers argument presented by Arkes for a mother to have an abortion?
Finally, I’d like to return to Ginsburg’s work now that the other two readings for the week have set the national background under which Ginsburg was conducting her anthropological study. The abortion controversy that began once the abortion clinic open in Fargo in 1981 is a social drama. Ginsburg states it is a “sequence of phased conflicts typical of “social dramas”: breach, crisis, redress, regression to crisis, and eventually stabilization either through schism or reintegration (121).” There were many waves of strongholds on the pro-choice and pro-life sides throughout the 1980s.
In what she refers to as “procreation stories”, Ginsburg sought out life narratives from both sides of the argument. She found that pro-choice women found inequalities to be rooted in gender discrimination and choose economic and political remedies to solve the issue at hand. For pro-life women, “opposition to abortion, like other moral reform campaigns, is a gesture against what they see as the final triumph of self interest, a principle that represents both men and the market (216).” Thus, I found these overall findings to be interesting as they both point to abortion as an inherent feminism argument. All women interviewed thought that the underlying issue was with the definition of female gender identity and the placement of this identity in society.
It is important note that Ginsburg relays that there isn’t any large gap of socioeconomic class or other prominent identity that separates women on either side of the argument in Fargo. I think this is a remarkable statement because it actually highlights the intrinsic similarities between women on either side of the argument who are all trying to advance feminist values. It seems that it is the ideologies that are in opposition, not necessarily the women themselves.
Ginsburg’s goal in conducting her study was to “understand how this grass roots conflict shaped and was shaped by activists’ experiences of self, gender, family, community, and culture in a specific setting (6).” She was able to portray this inter-sectionality well, but concluded that the issue boiled down to a women’s place in society. She places a lot of significance on the role of nurturance in determining philosophical questions of either side of the abortion argument.
- After reading Ginsburg’s ethnography do you think that pro-life supporters are entirely different from their opponents, the pro-choice supporters?
- Ginsburg sheds a negative light on national media with ABC’s portrayal of the conflict in Fargo. An account is presented from a leader of the LIFE Coalition who is “disgusted and disappointed” because ABC “paid women money to interview anonymously and tell how their needs had not been met when working with the pro life groups.” Do you think the role of media has been positive or negative in the abortion debate today?
- What are your thoughts on Ginsburg’s final conclusion that any type of activist controversy “suggests a dynamic relationship between the construction of self and social action in (American) society (220)?”
This week’s readings resolved a lot of misconceptions I had about pro-life and pro-choice activists. I was startled by the fact that the types of people on both sides in Fargo belong to the same socioeconomic class, but even more importantly that they all know and talk to each other. There is not this large inherent divide that people like to imagine. The two sides may be arguing for different things, but they share a concern for the role of women in society. That concern just manifests in different ways. Ginsburg provides evidence against the notion that a pro-life activist is a religious anti-feminist woman while a pro-choice activist is a secular feminist. I liked how you started with the two articles we read because they capture some of the ideas rooted in either side of the debate. Regarding Thomson’s article, I disagree with the fact that her argument appeals to female emotions. While her examples definitely depend on imaginary situations where pregnancy lasts an hour or 9 years, I think they reveal the importance of weighing the right of a woman to her body to the right of an unborn child to life. They project the notion that just because an unborn baby has the right to life doesn’t mean it has the right to use a mother’s resources for that life. Perhaps she could have used more examples grounded in reality to explain her points however.
Hi Rachel– excellent point. What kinds of examples would have been helpful to you?
There is not many things in reality that can be compared to pregnancy. But perhaps organ donation is the closest thing we have to that, or conjoined twins.
I realized how hard it is to compare it to actual situations when we were in class, but I tried to come up with a few examples that might make the argument more concrete.
Rasika, I thought the layout in which you wrote your blog post to be both interesting and helpful! I enjoyed how you summarized the other readings and then came back to Ginsburg’s work. I felt as though it helped me more clearly understand the times in which each piece was written and all the readings kind of came together.
As you mentioned in your post, I found myself in a similar position after reading the violinist example posed by Thompson. At first, I thought the example illustrated a similar decision process one must go through when considering abortion. I thought ‘How could a women be forced to make such a life changing decision? She shouldn’t feel morally obligated to stay plugged in!’ But after taking a step back, I realized that the example did seem to oversimplify such a complex decision and I found myself question whether I agreed with Thompson’s argument or not. Regarding your question, I don’t think any analogy can be representative of a decision such as abortion. Not only is it a complex issue, but there really isn’t anything in this world that is similar to what one must go through when going through both the decision and the abortion itself. I would find it hard to summarize all of one’s feelings and I think simply putting it into an analogy might diminish the complexity of the issue at hand.
Also as you mentioned, I too found it interesting that Ginsburg found her New York identity to be the hardest to overcome while conducting interviews in Fargo. I hadn’t thought much about it, but I the identity you bring with you from the place you are from or grew up in definitely illustrates the ideologies of your local environment. I think the environment you grow up in shapes who you and and what you come to believe it and bringing that to a new area of the U.S. really helps put in to perspective the vastly different opinions found across our country. I appreciate that Ginsburg acknowledged this because, after thinking about it, I definitely think where you are come can heavily influence your beliefs and how you interpret others beliefs and ideologies as well.
Thanks Molly- well said.
Hello Rasika,
I enjoyed reading your blog, you fleshed out the highlights of the readings and brought up good points in your analyses.
I’m glad you brought up Thomson’s use of provoking thought experiments, I felt those to be good philosophical exercise. They achieve this as a classical experiment using a single variable to alter results. I found the Society of Music Lovers parallelism to abortion was a compelling comparison because it takes the bounds to the extremes of an hour and nine years, allowing for a deeper consideration, especially for those who never have to consider it on their own bodies (i.e. men). The analogy represents one facet of getting an abortion—the justifiability to “kill” for one’s own sake and one’s right not to have to take care of another. No analogy can be perfectly superimposed onto a woman’s experience with an abortion. Despite the direct comparative shortcomings of the analogy that have been highlighted, it remains a strongly footed one. Additionally, the assumption to fetal “right of life” underscores the Thomson’s work as a defense to abortion. An assumption to the contrary would miss the target audience who *wouldn’t* defend abortion. Thomson properly puts on a lens with which to persuade those who might have a different spectacle prescription.
There inherently exists morality in the creation of laws, but I fear the source of those morals (individual religions) leaking into the creation of law. Despite the multiple separations of church and state throughout the American (and European) history, the morality of religion (and often, one religion over another).
I had an issue with how you phrases the question of creating laws without taking morality into account. When morality seems absent in a law, I don’t think it’s because the creators didn’t take morality in account, but rather that their sets of priorities were different. For example, sometimes holding economic, social, and stability interests over a more moral or humanitarian interest.
The media is often a skewed perspective of the truth, regardless of political orientation, especially in the United States where it has become rather sensationalist compared to other countries. As we know, polar opinions on abortion have been taken up by the two major American political parties, and this dichotomy is reflected among corresponding news outlets. Therefore, many issues related to the media can be traced back to their capitalist need to get readers’ attentions.
I completely agreed with Ginsberg’s conclusion of a dynamic relationship between the self and social action in areas of activist controversy—it’s a fairly basic statement when you take a step back. There is a two-way street between how individuals see themselves and their roles, and the social action in American society that takes place in response in pursuit of a more moral, more perfect, or more just society.
Hi Ayman. I am glad to see how engaged you are on this topic. I do not at all share your belief that questions of morality can be definitively separated from religious worldviews nor even that they should be in our system of government. That is to say, the government may not favor a particular religion or any, but each citizen who joins in the process of public reason certainly has the right to bring to bear their own moral center of gravity. But they must find terms in which to defend it. Is there, from your point of view, a clear reason to distinguish fetuses from born infants such that infanticide should be disallowed under the law? I submit to you that religious traditions having made that distinction is the primary reason it seems natural and taken for granted in America today.
Rasika,
I think you did a great job summarizing the articles as well as including questions in between to help us evaluate our own opinions on the article. I also like how you not only summarized the articles but also evaluated the articles on their limitations and caveats. I suggest adding your own opinion along. With integrating in some of the readings from past weeks to add to this conversation on abortion.
To answer one of your questions, I think te media magnifies and tends to focus on the negative aspects of not sides of the abortion debate. The media is interested in being understanding of both sides but rather takes a stance on one side based on the media’s implicit biases. The media then uplifts their side of the abortion debate by attacking the opposing side and appealing to our emotions. It’s hard to peel away from that because a lot of our opinions can be based on emotion, but emotion is not the only thing that should be used when talking about abortion. Reason should also be used.
And what do you think reason suggests?
Unit 8 Response:
Rasika, I thought your blog post was well-written and detailed. Your use of quotations really helped me visualize your explanations. One example was when you mentioned Thomson’s thought experiment on the unconscious violinist.
I do want to offer some insight on your question regarding if there should be a third-party involved in making an abortion decision. In general, I believe a third-party should be allowed only if that third-party candidate is part of the family and if either of the two primary decision makers are not mentally fit to make the abortion decision. I feel this way because individuals outside the family may not understand the full emotions and circumstances surrounding a pregnant female and, as a result, will not have full understanding of the patient’s situation. In addition, having a mentally unfit decision-maker raises concern of the legitimacy of the person, which in my opinion is enough reason to include a third-party. This is an interesting question you brought up Rasika and I would be happy to discuss it more with you.
Thanks Petar. I think the question of third parties here is really asked with respect to the government or to legislation. The taking of life is not usually left to families to adjudicate in our society today.
Thanks so much! I thought this was a very honest and insightful account. How did you come down on the issues in the end?
Thank you for the article. Besides two commonly mistyped words, I thought you did a good job on first framing the three readings at the beginning and going through each one by one in a well set out order. You gave a great review of the first article will follow-up questions that worked well with the information presented. I only wish you could have given this for the other two articles as well.
I did notice you stated how you were going to “note several criticisms…from either side of the abortion debate” but then only found a series of critics towards Thomson’s side of the debate. You talk about how the “fetal right to life assumption” is only a part of the controversy but don’t give evidence or show anything else to add.
I did find Thompson’s agreement to be compelling and well thought out, especially since she walks the reader through various scenarios to show the balance of one’s right to live versus one’s right to your own body. You also try to argue how the “fetus inside of you” wouldn’t be a stranger like the violinist but where is the evidence that a woman feels a connection to a grouping of cells inside of her? When would this even occur?
Yes, the violinist analogy is not perfect, no analogy ever can be, but it still drives the point that a pregnancy can be something resulting from a sexual assault or potentially harmful to the women. While I wish it weren’t true, it is possible for a pregnancy to be something a woman didn’t ask for, didn’t expect, and does not wish to follow through to the full term.
In addition to all of this, the argument for the life of the fetus seems to only go until birth; where are the support groups for the life and health of the fetus once it is born? For the born fetus to have a home, an education, a health care plan? I find it hard to support the argument to potentially bring more children into the world when there are already so many waiting to be a part of a “forever family” through adoption.
Hi Rasika,
I really liked the way you structured your blogpost and ‘set the stage’ before you discussed Ginsburg’s research more extensively. As a side note I’d like to say that I thought it was really interesting that Ginsburg thought that her being a New Yorker made her work/live in the Midwest the hardest. As someone from a comparatively smaller European country I still think it is extremely interesting how people with the same nationality within the same country have such different opinions and point of views on so many issues like abortions. I think this is fascinating.
I thought Thomson’s reading was very interesting and very provoking. To answer your first question, I believe that some of her arguments are compelling, but others are not. First of all I think the assumption that a fetus is already a human being is not a good assumption. While of course many pro-life supporters believe this, others do not, and may not be convinced by her arguments. This is also why I don’t necessarily agree with the violinist example. Of course a person has to withdraw their kidney support, especially if the treatment will take 9 months, but this is an extreme example where the person is alive and healthy persons can survive without such treatment. A fetus even if considered a person needs a woman’s womb to grow for nine months even if healthy and all fetuses need that kind of support. Apart from that the fact that the person is kidnapped would equate the pregnancy equivalence to a rape case, which only addresses an extreme case. I think the example of the growing child inside the house also only addresses an extreme case and is thus hard to use to argue for abortions in a generalized fashion. While I don’t think the first two examples are good examples to make a case for abortions I think the example with the window and the screen are good examples. Many unwanted pregnancies happen through consented sex, sometimes even using protection. I think the last example Thomson uses exemplifies exactly that and is thus a good and convincing way to argue pro-choice.
Furthermore I really liked that the Thomson addressed the role of a third person in abortions. I agree with Thomson’s argument that the fact that some doctors are willing to perform abortions and others aren’t, takes away many rights of a woman. Maybe a doctor or society cannot decide whether the (to continue the analogy) child growing inside the house or the woman living and owning the house should die, but since the woman ‘owns the house’ she should be able to make the decision to continue her life, even while killing the child growing inside her body. While I certainly agree with the message Thomson tries to send, I think some of her arguments are not broad enough, because they only cover rare/ extreme cases of pregnancy and might simplify cases of abortion a little too much.
Hi, Rasika!
I really enjoyed the way you presented the information from the readings within your blog post for this week. I found it to be helpful that you discussed the readings in the order of their publication, as it increased the awareness of the timeline regarding the abortion debate in America.
To answer your question regarding Thomson’s “A Defense of Abortion,” I, too, found that her use of analogies within the writing to be a persuasive method to discuss the debate surrounding abortions. Considering that this piece of work was written in 1971, I found it to be a good foundation to understand the “right to life” movement that was prevalent during that time. Her example using the violinist was an interesting way to discuss the topic of abortion, especially because it can be interpreted in may ways. While it can be used to signify abortion, in the sense that it is the removal of support to a life, I found the argument to be not fully representative of abortion. There are many other factors that differentiate the violinist from an unborn fetus, mainly that the violinist is already an established person within society. The fetus, on the other hand, needs to rely on the nutrients from the mother’s womb in order to be born and then needs to establish itself within society. While this example is an extreme hypothetical situation, it is interesting how it can be interpreted in different ways to support the views of individual readers.