But you see, we can't be laissez fair about the life of the smallest, weakest, most needy and vulnerable of us, and have any hope of regarding ourselves as a civilized society.
And my honest question is why we should respect the opinion of anyone who says, "Yeah yeah, sure: different DNA, heartbeat, brainwaves, human child -- but I still want to kill it, and to do that I have to not care about the rest, so... I don't care about the rest!" Seriously, why should we respect that opinion any more than we would respect the opinion of someone who says "I personally believe as an article of religious faith that any fourteen year old who eats too much and has a surly attitude is, by definition, not human, and so, since he's as much a part of my body as he was at 4 months, I believe I have the right to 'terminate parenthood' [i.e. kill him]."
We wouldn't respect that viewpoint. It's meritless, and clearly invented for the indulgence of the would-be parenthood-terminator. Just like the pro-abort position!
Dan
Personally, I completely agree with you. I do not respect their decision either. However, that is not at issue. The issue is should the police power of the government be used to keep a person from depriving another person of their life when the definition of a "person" has no answer? In the latter example, virtually everyone recognizes that we are talking about killing a living person. In the former, we will debate it until Kindom Come.
Honestly, I have no answer. I know what I believe but that is different from many. It is the sole issue with the libertarian philosophy that I have been unable to reconcile.