Author Archives: Matthew C. Martellus

Abortion is commonly defined as the “termination of a pregnancy” (or a “termination of a pregnancy prior to viability”).  This may suffice in certain limited contexts in which only the medical aspects of pregnancy are under discussion.  However, in the normal usage of the term, when the moral aspect of abortion is under discussion, this definition is inadequate.  The simple reason is that the moral aspect of abortion is not whether or not the pregnancy is terminated prematurely.  Rather, the question is whether or not the life of the unborn child was intentionally taken by the pregnancy-terminating procedure in question. Continue reading →

An objection commonly launched against those who oppose the practice of human abortion is “what about the life of the mother?” In this post, I examine this objection and provide a consistent response from within the abolitionist framework. Continue reading →

It is not uncommon for pro-choice advocates to make the claim that “consenting to sex does not entail consenting to pregnancy.”  The idea is that even though the woman takes responsibility for engaging in an act of procreation, she bears no moral obligation to take responsibility for the pregnancy that results.  In this post, I argue that the idea of “consenting to pregnancy,” per se, is logically incoherent, and that such claims, understood in a logically coherent way, ultimately do nothing to advance the pro-choice position. Continue reading →