The unborn child's existence is not the "act" that is being judged from an ethical standpoint. The invitation analogy is applicable because the ethical dilemma is not rooted in the guest’s choice, but in the conscious choice of the “host” who extended the invitation. The “rightness” or “wrongness” of the action comes when the host chooses to call the Nazis or to shelter the refugee. (Similarly, the primary ethical decision comes not from having sex or not, but should the women bear the child or kill it.)
In both of instance, the person moves from making a moral choice for themselves (having sex or disingenuously offering refuge) to having another human being killed. Your comments imply that a Jew seeking refuge made an ethical choice to seek shelter, when in fact, their plight places them in a position where they are not making anymore decisions than a baby in the womb. That is why abortion is so heinous — the innocents are completely vulnerable at the time of aggression.
Would you honestly hold a refugee responsible if someone duplicitously turned them into the SS? Would you hold a baby responsible for abortion simply because they exist?
Your name seems appropriate.
Actually, it is, but not for the reasons you think.
The unborn child's existence is not the "act" that is being judged from an ethical standpoint.
But this is the problem I was trying to point out. Those who support abortion sometimes make this the crux of their argument. I have debated others (on the old =usenet= newsgroup related to this topic) who imply that it is somehow the "fault" of the child for implanting itself in the woman's womb against her will. I hold that this is absurd. The unborn child undertakes no proactive decision to come into being, but those who support abortion seem to argue that it does. I reject that argument for the reason that the guest/intruder analogy is inappropriate. There is no choice active on the part of the child.
The invitation analogy is applicable because the ethical dilemma is not rooted in the guest’s choice, but in the conscious choice of the “host” who extended the invitation.
This is what I was saying, and was an entirely plausible interpretation of the analogy as presented. The problem with unrestricted abortion is that it imposes a moral position upon the unborn child where none was possible or existent.
The “rightness” or “wrongness” of the action comes when the host chooses to call the Nazis or to shelter the refugee. (Similarly, the primary ethical decision comes not from having sex or not, but should the women bear the child or kill it.)
In both of instance, the person moves from making a moral choice for themselves (having sex or disingenuously offering refuge) to having another human being killed. Your comments imply that a Jew seeking refuge made an ethical choice to seek shelter, when in fact, their plight places them in a position where they are not making anymore decisions than a baby in the womb. That is why abortion is so heinous — the innocents are completely vulnerable at the time of aggression.
Would you honestly hold a refugee responsible if someone duplicitously turned them into the SS? Would you hold a baby responsible for abortion simply because they exist?
Again, you have badly misunderstood my position, and honestly, I don't see how my comments could be construed as suggesting that I would hold an unborn baby responsible for its own abortion. I would do no such thing. To place some kind of moral culpability upon an innocent person simply because of their natural circumstances is absurd, and I find it hard to believe that you would so badly misinterpret my position. Abortion requires a proactive decision by an entity capable of making such a decision, and thus possible to hold accountable for such an act. An unborn is clearly incapable of this, and it would be illogical to suggest otherwise.
There are many, many ethical arguments that support the pro-life position and oppose the pro-abortion position. My response was simply to point out that the analogy presented in the original post (for which comments were solicited), could have been reasonably understood as not capturing precisely or approximately the moral issues presented by abortion.