Debate Magazine

Do You Believe Life Begins at Conception?

Posted on the 25 October 2017 by Doggone
We all know the US anti-abortion movement is full of shit when they call themselves "pro-life" otherwise Sandy Hook would have been the US's Port Arthur (if the gun control mess was even able to become as bad as it is).
That said, science fiction writer Patrick S. Tomlinson tweeted this scenario:
Whenever abortion comes up, I have a question I've been asking for ten years now of the "Life begins at Conception" crowd. In ten years, no one has EVER answered it honestly.
It's a simple scenario with two outcomes. No one ever wants to pick one, because the correct answer destroys their argument. And there IS a correct answer, which is why the pro-life crowd hates the question.
Here it is. You're in a fertility clinic. Why isn't important. The fire alarm goes off. You run for the exit. As you run down this hallway, you hear a child screaming from behind a door. You throw open the door and find a five-year-old child crying for help.
He is in one corner of the room. In the other corner, you spot a frozen container labeled "1000 Viable Human Embryos." The smoke is rising. You start to choke. You know you can grab one or the other, but not both before you succumb to smoke inhalation and die, saving no one.
Do you A) save the child, or B) save the thousand embryos? There is no "C." "C" means you all die.
In a decade of arguing with anti-abortion people about the definition of human life, I have never gotten a single straight A or B answer to this question. And I never will.
They will never answer honestly, because we all instinctively understand the right answer is "A." A human child is worth more than a thousand embryos. Or ten thousand. Or a million. Because they are not the same, not morally, not ethically, not biologically.
They are lying to you to try and evoke an emotional response, a paternal response, using false-equivalency. No one believes life begins at conception. No one believes embryos are babies, or children. Those who cliam to are trying to manipulate you so they can control women
We can make this even more interesting by saying the embryos may not make it full term, whereas the child would grow up and make a significant contribution to society.
The reality is that we don't know if these viable embryos can actually make it to full term.  Doggone has said that god is the most prolific abortionist since quite a few pregnancies end in miscarriage (I'll leave it to her to explain all that).
All I know is that  foetus is not guaranteed to be born alive (or in perfect condition).  On the other hand, someone who is alive really has a right to life.

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