Life begins at conception.
I’ve heard this phrase a lot and it’s always bothered me because, if you were to ask me the question “when does life begin?”, my answer would be “life began billions of years ago.”
The salient point, which is not conveyed in the question, is “when does a new life begin?” The scientific answer is that a human zygote—a fertilized egg cell—is a distinct organism with a different genetic makeup than the parent organisms, and therefore a separate or “new” life.
There are fervent believers out there who insist that, at the “moment of conception,” this fertilized cell is now a human baby, and killing it is akin to murder. This is like saying that the bud on the branch of an apple tree is a fully ripened, edible apple. It’s not. It has the potential to be an apple, just as a human zygote has the potential to be a human baby. But an unfertilized egg cell also has the potential to be a human—only needing fertilization and attachment to a uterine wall. And every sperm cell has the potential to be a human as well. All of this potential at a size less than 0.15 millimeters across (about 6 thousandths of an inch)—too small to be seen by the naked eye.
Egg cells, sperm cells, zygotes—all of these tiny tiny potential sources of human life—die every day. If a human zygote does not attach to the wall of the uterus, it never becomes a baby. It, like any unfertilized egg cell, leaves the body and dies. Do we then call the mother of that unattached zygote a murderer? No, of course not. That’s ridiculous.
So my question to those who insist that “life begins at conception” is, when is that? Is it when the sperm enters the egg? Is it when the zygote is formed? Is it when the first cell division occurs? Is it when cell multiplication happens? Is it when it attaches to the uterus? When, exactly? When does the magic happen that transforms a single cell—or a clump of cells—into a human being?
I don’t care if you know the answer to this question or not. You are free to believe whatever you want about when the magic occurs. But the key point is that you believe it. And you can believe that a zygote has a soul. And you can believe that all abortions are the murder of babies.
But you can’t make me believe that.
Any law that criminalizes abortion does so on the belief that a fertilized egg is a human life, or a rapidly growing and multiplying cluster of cells is a human life, or a six-week-old embryo (which is about the size of a pea) is a human life. But to many people, even a nine-week-old embryo (about the size of a cherry) is a clump of cells. It has the potential to be a human baby, but its potential is the same as the potential of a single zygote.
And here’s the thing: You can’t make people believe what you believe.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Constitution of United States of America, Amendment I
Anti-abortion laws are unconstitutional because they side with a religious belief. They force a non-believer to believe, and that is not only against the written constitution, it is, at its core, un-American.
Please stop writing these laws. Please stop forcing your beliefs on others.
By they way, i’d like to point out that i have no right to an opinion on abortion because i can never have one. This is not an issue to be determined by any man.