Others have different points ofview
Home alone due to my body rebelling, so a cheery subject no doubt...
There’s a lot of talk about abortion and rape recently, mostly due to the idiots who compose the extreme right of politics in the USA.
Part of the problem then, is the terms used in the discussion, reducing all points to a matter of “pro choice” and “pro life”.
In the case of “pro choice”, a number of different reasoning lead to the exact same results. This is less problematic.
In the case of the pro life groups, a number of differing ideologies and principals lead to subtly different positions. The result of this is an apparent alliance between different groups with radically different goals and methods, owing to them all bearing the “pro-life” label. This then leads to undue support being attributed to a proposition, owing to its pro life branding.
So, the actual positions (not exhaustive no doubt), with accurately descriptive names that can be reasonable used in a discussion:
Pro Choice
This group believes for a number of reasons that the rights of the mother outweigh the right of the club of cells she carries. Abortion is still undesirable though, a last resort, and so pro-choice people support comprehensive sex education and easy access to family planning.
Pro Life
This group believes that human life is sacrosanct and that the clump of cell she carries is a human life, and thus that the rights of the mother are outweighed by the right of the rights of the child. They will allow abortion in cases of non-viable pregnancy and the life of the mother. They further recognise that simply banning abortion will lead to back-street abortions and thus want to reduce the necessity for it, and thus support comprehensive sex education and easy access to family planning. It should also be noted that as a result of their support for all Human life, they would be against the death penalty and war, and for social safety net programs for the poor and needy.
Reproductionists
This group believes that sex is only for the purposes of reproduction. They thus ban all contraception (since it isn’t needed, as you only have sex if you want to get pregnant), and all sex that can’t lead to pregnancy. They will allow abortion only in cases of rape (since it wasn’t the woman’s choice), non-viable pregnancies, the life of the mother, etc. They also support abstinence-only sex education.
Some also believe the pro-life argument about human life being sacred and thus they ban all abortion, save for the life of the mother
Some further support the pro-choice principal on the sanctity of all Human life, they would be against the death penalty and war, and for social safety net programs for the poor and needy.
Pro-shame
This group believes that sex is only for the purposes of reproduction, and that it is dirty and shameful. They thus ban all contraception (since it isn’t needed, as you only have sex if you want to get pregnant), and all sex that can’t lead to pregnancy. They will not allow any abortion, since the after effects are the woman’s punishment for having sex. They also support abstinence-only sex education. Note that they justify the banning of rape-related abortion on the grounds that rape is the victim’s fault in some way (likely as a result of what they deem to be shameful behaviour).
It is also worth mentioning that some people subscribe to the non-scientific notion of life starting at fertilisation, rather than implantation, and thus consider certain contraceptive methods to effectively be abortions. This confuses the problem a lot.
Now, you might note that the group I labelled Pro-Life has most in common with the aims of the pro-choice movement. Indeed, studies have shown that those given comprehensive sex education have the highest incidences of both abstinence and contraceptive use, and the lowest incidences of STIs, un-planned pregnancy and abortion, and that pro-life-styled social programs lower the incidences of abortion. Since these two groups combined make a majority in most places, the argument should be about what programs work best to reduce the amount of abortion.
If people want to hold reproductionist view-points, fine, but their position is not the same as those who are pro-life. Repodcutionists must first successfully argue that sex is ONLY for reproduction before they can logically make their arguments about contraception and abortion.
The pro-shame groups also need to make further arguments to support their even more extreme positions.