Kako shvatamo abortus

Jedan od načina da sistematizujemo teorije koje se bave problemom abortusa je da ih podelimo na one koji abortus definišu kao prekid trudnoće i one koji abortus definišu kao prekid života fetusa. Kada bira abortus, žena pravi dva različita izbora: prvo, ona odlučuje da prekine trudnoću, odnosno da ukloni fetus iz svog tela; i drugo, ona bira da prekine život fetusa. Trenutno, prva odluka (odluka o autonomiji) nužno sa sobom nosi i drugu (reproduktivna odluka). Upotreba veštačkih materica omogućila bi donošenje ovih odluka zasebno. To nas tera da razmotrimo način na koji se abortus shvata u etičkoj teoriji i da li je takvo shvatanje adekvatno, s obzirom na to šta abortus kao praksa podrazumeva. U svakodnevnom životu, kada razmatraju da li da abortiraju, žene ne razmatraju samo da li žele da budu u drugom stanju već i da li žele da budu majke.
One way to classify theories that deal with abortion is to divide them into those that define abortion as the termination of pregnancy and those that define abortion as the termination of the life of the fetus. When deciding whether to have an abortion, at least in some cases, a woman actually makes two different choices: first, she chooses to terminate her pregnancy, that is, to remove the fetus from her body; and second, she chooses to end the life of the fetus. Currently, the first decision (the autonomy decision) is inseparable from the second one (the reproductive decision). The use of artificial wombs would enable these decisions to be made separately. This forces us to examine how ethical theories define abortion and whether such definition is adequate, given what abortion as a procedure is. Cannold's research shows that there is a big gap between what ethical theories say about abortion and what abortion really is for women who make that decision. In everyday life, when deciding whether to have an abortion, women not only decide whether they want to be pregnant, but also whether they want to be mothers. Therefore, we cannot define abortion as merely a termination of pregnancy.