Estimated reading time: 3 minutes.

There are some good pro-life responses to bodily rights arguments for abortion. These two rejoinders don’t belong on that list.

I am convinced that most pro-abortion-choice advocates who go beyond basic rhetoric and slogans are partially grounding their position in some form of bodily autonomy arguments. If you’re somewhat new to arguments for abortion rights that admit for sake of argument that the unborn is a fully valuable person, please listen to this speech I gave at UCLA last month explaining them as well as offering some refutations.

Let me offer a brief summary of bodily rights arguments before getting to the faulty pro-life responses. Most pro-choice arguments either assume that the unborn are not valuable human beings, (“What about poverty?” “What if she will lose her scholarship?”) or they argue that the unborn are not valuable human beings. (“It’s not viable yet.” “It’s not sentient yet.” “It can’t feel pain yet.”) But there’s a third category of pro-choice arguments that admit (at least for the sake of argument) that the unborn are valuable human beings, yet the mother should still have the right to kill them because of her bodily autonomy. Her view is that if it’s in her body, she has the right to kill it, or at least take whatever measures necessary to refuse to have her body used as life support.

I’ve spoken on bodily rights arguments a lot, especially after helping write the De Facto Guardian paper. During Q&A, someone will often ask about a potential pro-life response that I didn’t include in the speech.

Here’s one I’ve heard several times in that context, and I’ve seen pro-lifers use it in blog posts as well:

“No woman has an abortion because she’s trying to protect her right to bodily autonomy.”