Date: Fri, 30 May 1997 20:41:50 -0500
From: Yoshie Furuhashi <Furuhashi.1-AT-osu.edu>
Subject: Morality? (was Re: M-FEM: (fwd)Abortion - whose rights?)


To Boddhisatva (and others who may share his view):

What makes you say, "Of course abortion is a moral issue," with such
confidence? Marxists should examine how certain questions but not others
become "moral" (as opposed to political) issues. Your confident "of course"
suggests that you have yet to approach abortion from the
historical-materialist perspective.

Let me recommend Max Horkheimer's "Materialism and Morality." (The essay is
in _Between Philosophy and Social Science: Selected Early Writings_.)

"Only in nonessential, private affairs are people occasionally given to
examine their motives conscientiously and to apply their intellectual
powers to the determinations of aims." (16)

"Idealist moral philosophy purchases the belief in its own unconditionality
by making no reference whatsoever to any historical moment. It does not
take sides." (17)

"Materialism sees in morality an expression of life of determinate
individuals and seeks to understand it in terms of the conditions of its
emergence and passing, not for the sake of truth in itself but rather in
connection with determinate historical forces. It understands itself as the
theoretical aspect of efforts to abolish existing misery. The features it
discerns in the historical phenomenon of morality figure into its
consideration only on the condition of a determinate practical interest.
Materialism presumes no transhistorical authority behind morality. The fear
which moral precepts--be they ever so spiritualized--still carry from their
origin in religious authority is foreign to materialism. The consequences
of all human actions work themselves out exclusively in the spatiotemporal
world....Even the splendor in which philosophers--as well as public opinion
in general--cloak 'ethical' conduct, all arguments by which they recommend
it, cannot withstand the test of reason." (32)

You should read the entire essay, but the point is clear enough.

Historical materialism asks, regarding abortion and its moralization: When
and how and to whom does a "fetus" become a human "individual" endowed with
"rights"? Since a fetus, even when it is said to be "viable," possesses no
autonomous human agency to exercise its so-called "rights," who (or what
interests and ideology) is using a fetus and its purported "rights" to
exercise his (or their) *power*? What does it mean to say a fetus is
"viable"? (We all know that even healthy babies are not "viable" in the
sense that they could live on their own, independent of caregivers.) What
historical forces are asking women to regard our control over our own
bodies as "morally" questionable? Who benefits from making abortion a
"moral" issue? Does "man" value life above death? Under all circumstances?
Whose life is valued? How much?

Yoshie


>		To whom...,
>
>
>
>	Of course abortion is a moral issue.  To say otherwise undermines
>the concept that man values life above death.  The reason that the left is
>losing the debate is that the "medical" argument is completely
>insufficient and essentially a dodge.  It is a question of one being's
>right to self determination and self-protection versus another being's
>right to live.  Much as we like to think otherwise, the reality is that
>pregnancy uniquely puts these rights in conflict.  The solution to the
>dilemna is to decide on concrete bases for a fetal right to live:
>sentience, viability, etc., and then weigh them against a woman's right to
>avoid injury, to control her body, and to determine the course of her own
>life, without undue legal, social and psychological burdens, keeping in
>mind that the two individual beings (who are not by implication equal)
>cannot be considered as if they were separate.  Then one must decide what
>concepts create absolute limits.  If abortion after the point of sentience
>is unreasonable, the time is very much debatable.  If abortion ofter
>viability is unreasonable the time is fairly certain and quite early.  If
>a woman has a complete right to protect herself from the danger of
>childbirth, then that is another clear limit.  All of these limits may be
>subject to such ethical considerations as necessity, negligence,
>competency, and possible rights of third parties.
>
>
>
>	Unless your argument can deal with these realities (and there are
>others) clearly and consistently, you do not have an argument about what is
>distinctly a moral issue.  That the answer may be clear to you does not
>mean that you have not made a moral choice.
>
>
>
>
>	peace,
>
>
>		boddhisatva
>
>
>
>
>p.s. - My own inclination is that a woman has an extremely compelling, if
>not absolute, right to protect herself from child bearing.  Around the
>time of viability, however, there begins a moral, if not legal,
>consideration concerning the relative necessity of the abortion.  That
>consideration grows from viability until the end of gestation, but I am by
>no means clear about how one defines "necessity".