Philosophy Now Forum

Fetal Rights and Citizenship
Citizenship presumably begins at birth for the simple reason of the child being obviously a separate person at that point.
We have more advanced knowledge today of fetal development.
A person needs to be defined by its development and possession of faculties, and the foetus is indeed a person at the stage at which it has actual feelings of pain and wellbeing. Sentience with the beginnings of sapience – in a wide use of that term. The feutus aware of itself as a being of feeling.
Citizenship should begin at that stage, with gradualist rights thereafter through to birth, and then through childhood.
To emphasise this the child should qualify for its name to be registered prenatally.
Religion may have views about the ‘soul’ and if this simply meant cognition, it would be a way of referring to sapience. As a vague item of supposed immortality, it cannot be measured and be used for any social purpose.

as long as fetal stem cell tissue has monetary value, that ball of tissue will never be a person

-Imp

An unborn child is a potential person by definition of personhood, and as such, has potential rights. A person is one who has self-awareness, sentience and sapience, feelings of pain and well-being. among other faculties, as well as freedom from dependence on a placenta. Personhood occurs at birth.

If what is meant by citizenship is inhabitance or residence, citizenship begins at birth.

If a citizen is taken to be one who is entitled to the rights and privileges of a person who acts as an independent agent, then, inasmuch as minors are entitled only to limited rights and are not independent, citizenship is not fully granted until the age of adulthood or when emancipation is granted. Partial citizenship begins at birth.

Whenever there is a disparity between the potential rights of a fetus and the actual rights of a pregnant female, actual rights outweigh potential rights. This includes not only the right to life but the right to self-determination of that life.

Just as importantly, if the rights of women and the rights of men differ over pro- or anti-abortion, the rights of women, who are the greater stakeholders in the matter, supersede.

All this is to say that when the right to life of the unborn child is in conflict with the right to choice of the pregnant woman, the woman’s best interests take precedence, if my logic and opinion are acceptable to women.

I think one of the biggest mistakes that has come out of the pro-choice movement - an argument that will undoubtedly come back to bite them from an interpolation that it lends itself to - is the assumption of value once the fetus has reached a status of 'person-hood', whatever that might actually mean. Of course what you seem to be talking about is less about what a fetus is morally worth, and more about a practical implementation of rules to demonstrate that worth. A very boring response, but I think the system in place for most of the developed world is fine where it is, that someone has 'citizenship', from the moment they're born. I'm of the opinion that even a fetus in a third trimester pregnancy is of lesser importance than the desires of the woman having the child, so I definitely wouldn't want to see a progressive adaption of rights, because anything should be trumped at the woman's call.