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            What’s grosser than gross?  A garbage can of dead babies.  To some, this dead-baby joke seems funny.  In reality, the idea of killing babies, like the act of abortion, is something that should not to be laughed about.  Many people just ignore the issue of abortion or agree that it’s okay because people should be able to do whatever they want with their own bodies.  What they manage to not see is that abortion is the action of terminating a life before it exits the womb, therefore, abortion is clearly murder.  This action not only harms an unborn child, but the woman making the decision to receive an abortion is both affected physically and mentally in several negative ways.  Abortion is not the right choice when a woman becomes unexpectedly pregnant; different measures can be taken before and after pregnancy to prevent any problems that may arise from the pregnancy for the woman, such as contraception and adoption.  Killing a child, even in the earliest stages of life, should never seem like the right and appropriate way to deal with the situation some women put themselves in.

            We consider humans to be living beings with a heartbeat, brain activity and all the works.  If a fetus develops a heartbeat and brain functions within the first two months of life that grow significantly as time goes, how can one not consider this a human life? In the first 6 weeks, a fetus develops eyes, fingers, toes, ears, and by the 7^th week, they begin to have significant movement for their tiny size.  In this period of time, they have developed their own individual fingerprints, and have had their very own individual DNA and gender since conception. The typical abortion occurs within the first 20 to 21 weeks after the moment of conception, so that means by the time a doctor terminates the fetus, it is basically a living thing that they are killing.  At about 20 weeks too, it is completely viable for a fetus to feel pain due to the already established brain and nerve fibers.  All living creatures experience pain, so this fetus is a living thing that is experiencing the biggest pain, death, before it even has the chance to live.  (nlrc.org) In the abortion procedure, the skull, pelvis and unborn child’s body in its entirety is crushed, scraped and vacuumed out of the woman.  Being crushed, scraped and vacuumed out of existence does not sound like something favorable that we as human being would like to endure, does it? (dailymail.co.uk) When the unborn child clearly shows signs of life, there is no doubt that this act of abortion cannot be considered murder.  Taking a child after birth and killing them is just about on the same level as abortion.  Either way, whether they are in the womb are not, they are being killed.

            The unborn child is not the only victim of abortion.  Women who decide that they want to receive an abortion go through years and year of consequences from making the one selfish decision for a process that takes less than 20 minutes to complete.  First of all, abortion takes a huge hit to a woman’s emotional health.  It is proven that women who go through an abortion are 154% more likely to commit suicide.  They come down with major levels of anxiety and depression caused by the guilt and regret they feel after they have realized that they have killed their own child; a piece of themselves are gone and it was their choice, no one else’s.  Many women become less confident, more shameful, develop eating disorders and insomnia, and have trouble in relationships, all because of the emotional strain their abortion has put on them. (afterabortion.org) In the physical aspect, there are also various negative effects from an abortion.  The biggest risk of abortion for the woman is death.  Women become 60% more likely to die of natural causes within the year after the surgery.  They can hemorrhage to death, or receive a highly deadly infection at the time of the procedure.  There are also many risks of cancers, including ovarian, cervical, and liver cancer.  Breast cancer is extremely common too due to the excess of breast cells that are made during pregnancy for breast feeding that are never put to use.  Women can become paralyzed as well if even the slightest thing goes wrong during the process, such as a puncture in the uterus.  Abortion makes it extremely difficult for a woman to have a child in the future when they actually are ready to have a child.  Every time a woman receives an abortion, her chance of having a child is cut down by ¼ each time.  (4abortion.net) Sometimes, abortion can affect the man in the relationship because they are the father of the child, so when the baby is killed, half of that child being killed is theirs.  They are also losing a part of themselves too and feel the pain and regret from letting their own offspring die before they can even see them.

            If peoplecan take the right precautions before having intimate relations, and after pregnancy,abortion would be completely unnecessary.  The main reason why contraception was invented, besides to protect from certain diseases was to prevent unwanted pregnancies.   If women made the right choice to go on the pill or make sure their significant other wears protection at all times of intercourse, they would not have to worry about the problem of becoming pregnant unexpectedly.  The best way to be 100% sure that one would never have an unexpected pregnancy is to be completely abstinent and refrain from sex until marriage. (howtoprevent.com)  If a woman does not make the right choice before sex, then the pregnancy is completely her fault and it is not humanely right to take her own mistake out on the life of an unborn child.  If a woman is pregnant unexpectedly, she should not panic if she does not want to be a mother.  Adoption is always the best alternative to anyone who does not want to have a child themselves.  There are also so many couples in the world who are not able to have children of their own, so by turning to adoption, a woman is not only saving the life of the baby but making the lives of a married couple in need of help. (gargaro.com)  The shame of being unmarried or too young and pregnant for 9 months can’t possibly be as awful as living with the shame of knowing you killed your own child for the rest of your life.

Because life begins at the moment of conception, there is no doubt that abortion can be coined as a type of murder.  As small as the life is, it has a heart, a heartbeat, body  and soul just as any person you know.  If killing a person is wrong, then killing a fetus should most definitely be wrong too.  The emotional stress from the guilt and regret of killing one’s own child can really ruin the life of the woman making the decision.  She can get rid of the baby, but the regret is something that she can never be rid of.  A woman can also put herself in more physical harm as well if anything goes wrong during the procedure, leaving more than just the baby’s life in harm’s way.  If more women paid attention to the choices they made before they got pregnant, then they wouldn’t have to worry about the choice of abortion.  If they are careful and use contraception, or straight up stay abstinent, they would be making the right choice before anything they regret happens.  Otherwise, they should deal with their consequences if they weren’t careful in the first place.  The option of adoption is also always out there as well.  No child in the womb could ever do anything wrong to deserve to die before they even can live.  The carelessness of the mother should not be taken out on the unborn life.  Any humane person would agree that killing your own child, whether they are unborn or not, is obviously something that is unimaginably cruel and wrong.  No civilized society accepts the taking of a life, and abortion violates that where all life should be considered sacred.  Abortion should never be the answer to a woman in need of help. (Beckwith, 3-17)


Sources:

Beckwith, Francis. "Defending Life: A Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice". New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007.

"Adoption: Choosing Life Instead of Abortion". http://www.gargaro.com/adoption.html

"The Emotional Effects of Abortion". http://afterabortion.org/1999/the-emotional-effects-of-abortion/

"Fetal Development from Conception to Birth". http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/facts/fetaldevelopment.html

"How to Prevent Pregnancy". http://www.howtoprevent.com/social/how-to-prevent-pregnancy/

"Physical Consequences after Abortion". http://www.4abortion.net/ingles/physical_consequences_after_abor.htm

"What Really Happens During an Abortion". http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-487377/What-REALLY-happens-abortion-One-surgeon-finally-tells-truth.html