Abortion seems to be the pet project of feminists and the number one hot button for those political factions that seek the vote of feminist women.  However, there are two sides to the argument on abortion.  Obviously, abortion has been legal in the United States since the Roe vs. Wade decision in 1973, and yet the pro and con arguments on abortion wage on.

During the 1970s, pro and con arguments on abortion raged hotly as women struggled to find their identity and assert their equality with men.  Unwanted pregnancies hampered a woman’s opportunities in the workplace, but the pro argument for abortion was that if abortions were not legitimized and easy to get, then women’s lives were unnecessarily lost in seedy underground abortion clinics.  Pro-lifers, as anti-abortionists term themselves, normally opposed abortion for religious or moral reasons.

Pro and con arguments on abortion lead down many avenues.  A major group affected by abortion laws is teens.  Since teen pregnancy carries the stigma of propogating poverty, the pro and con arguments on abortion in these cases involve health, both emotional and physical, and perceived quality of life.  Fortunately for teens, the question is not either/or since adoption is a viable alternative.

No discussion on the pro and con arguments on abortion would be complete without the subject of Planned Parenthood.  This is an organization created under the auspices of caring for young women, when its real purpose is to profit from painful circumstances.  In the process, child rape and other such travesties go hidden from view.  And since in many states parental notification is not even required, many potential grandparents go unaware of the emotional trauma their daughters may be experiencing. 

For some, the pro and con arguments on abortion are black and white, but for others there is gray area.  Most severely, Roman Catholicism views even natural contraceptive measures within marriage to be unlawful, while middle-ground moralists consider contraceptive methods, such as an IUD,  that interupt the safe progression of a embryo as a form of abortion.  The morning-after pill is also certainly part of this group and part of the pro and con argument on abortion.