‘After Birth’ Abortions?

Liberals Debate To Introduce ‘After Birth’ Abortions Because Newborns ‘Are Not Persons’

According to Alberto Giubilini from Monash University in Melbourne and Francesca Minerva at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at the University of Melbourne, “circumstances occur after birth such that they would have justified abortion, what we call after-birth abortion should be permissible.”

The authors continue on to say that “abortion” should be considered in instances where a newborn is putting the well-being of the family at risk. Giubilini and Minerva argue that if a family can be “socially, economically or psychologically burdened or damaged by the newborn” they should be able to seek out an after-birth abortion.

“Both a fetus and a newborn certainly are human beings and potential persons, but neither is a ‘person’ in the sense of ‘subject of a moral right to life,’” the authors write. “We take ‘person’ to mean an individual who is capable of attributing to her own existence some (at least) basic value such that being deprived of this existence represents a loss to her.

“Merely being human is not in itself a reason for ascribing someone a right to life. Indeed, many humans are not considered subjects of a right to life: spare embryos where research on embryo stem cells is permitted, fetuses where abortion is permitted, criminals where capital punishment is legal,” they conclude.

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