Well, to begin with, I should point out that your assumption that "murder" is merely a legal term is incorrect -- or rather, only half correct. It is
sometimes a legal term, yes; but it is also
always a moral term, a universal term. If it were not, then we could never accuse any government of "murdering" its own citizens, since their laws would not designate what they had done as "murder." Yet we do so accuse, and we feel we have good reason to do so.
What's more, you refer to "bloodless language," but I fail to see where "abortion" is bloodless. It strikes me as a descriptive term that only a fool would take to be "bloodless."
You and I are agreeing on that. Nevertheless, you will note that most public discussion of abortion prefers the bloodless language of "terminate" and "evacuate" over the accurate, descriptive language. And I think that that is because even to describe such an action accurately, biologically, frankly, is to induce horror in any moral human being. The only way the action can be rendered thinkable is in the bloodless terms, so the pro-abortion side opts for the bloodless.
We have both seen this linguistic strategy used before. This sort of downgrading of accurate description is quite typical of propaganda techniques, wherein the driving of people out of their villages is called something like "resettlement of populations," or the murder of six million is called "the solution to a problem." The propagandist converts the reprehensible truth to innocuous terms so it seems unobjectionable. So then it seems to become an "open question," an "option" a "reasonable alternative," whereas the moral situation is not actually unclear at all: something hideous is being excused.
You obviously consider choice on the part of the women to be of lesser moral "strength" than that of the life of the child,
No. I don't consider that "choice" is the real issue at all. That's downgraded language. The real issue is whether you can solve a problem by slicing up and vacuuming away a child.
It also plays into the strengths of the propagandist. For they wish you to think that you have some sort of a trade-off here, rather than two distinct morally-laden situations. The trade-off is used to extenuate the hideous action by means of the claim that unless the hideous action is committed, some other ill will necessarily be involved.
But THAT is really question begging. For "choice" is not the issue. Women have many choices, at many times in the course of life, and of a potential and actual pregnancy. The question is whether killing their child is reducible (by bloodless language) to a mere "choice," and whether that is some sort of necessity.
Now, before you (perhaps) jump on me for saying it's a child at all, remember that at some point every reasonable person is in agreement that it is. One second after the last toe leaves the mother's womb, any moral person knows it is a child. But what about one second earlier? Three seconds before that? And so on. Even if you think that at some point a child in the womb is not a child, it's very clear to everyone that at some point it is. Hence, the term murder is quite warranted.
The real question, then, is "When is it right to kill a child?"
[Now, there are a few people who try the "it's not a baby until it is socially-contributing," but I think we can see that that is both an excessively uninformative definition and an outrageously dangerous one. For it entail that they child was valuable only for its utility, and hence people without the specified utility would be said to have no value, no rights, no humanity. So I don't think such a definition can be rationally defended or morally sustained, and I have no thought that you would advocate it.]
Even your proposed choice between "baby" and "cluster of cells" raises logical and metaphysical questions that are, at least here, unsettled. So yes, it is question-begging.
Were you labouring under the delusion I invented these terms? These are the chosen terms of the pro-life and pro-abortion sides respectively. I am merely repeating their language. I am not saying I agree with their language. But what language am I to use? For the pro-choice side would have us describe nothing accurately.
Now, a few minutes ago you were indicting me for using bloodless language. But this is the language of the pro-abortion side, and they would insist upon us conducting the debate in those terms. They would say we should be speaking of "cluster of cells," "termination," "choice," "access," "evacuation," and "right to one's own body," for example. No babies. No blood. No sadness. No pain. No loss. No death. And no *other* choice.
And this is why the pro-abortion side does NOT want women informed. They do NOT want women to consider the moral implications of killing the same child which, under other circumstances, they would hail as a blessing. They do NOT want women to see what their in-utero child looks like. They do not want them to hear its heart beat. They do NOT want them to consider adoption. They do not want to help them take a different route. They want them to feel completely morally uninhibited about killing their unborn children, and getting that to happen means limiting their access to information, practical and moral, and their rational consideration of alternatives.
Now, THAT, I would submit to you, is truly question-begging.
