A Fallacious Argument Against Abortion

The fact that there are sound arguments for the humanity of the unborn and the applicability of human rights to those in the womb does not mean that there are no inept claims associated with a rejection of abortion.  One point that pro-life advocates might emphasize is that some women experience deep guilt following abortions.  Not only is guilt not a guaranteed outcome of getting an abortion, or engaging in any particular behavior at all, but even extreme regret is not an indicator that abortion is wrong.

This would amount to grounds for personal persuasion at best and falls far short of actually refuting any aspect of pro-choice ideology.  Now, pro-choice arguments certainly do reduce down to appeals to emotion (or some other kind of non sequitur), but such fallacies are still invalid even when used to argue for a sound position.  There is not necessarily a reason to even bring up the fact that women who have abortions could feel deep sadness or guilt as a consequence if one is trying to show that abortion is murder.

The reason for this should be apparent to any rational person.  Guilt establishes that guilt exists, and nothing more.  The presence of guilt is never a sufficient reason to take a moral stance on any issue.  At most, guilt can restrain individual actions in an effort to avoid subjectively unpleasant feelings, but it has nothing to do with moral epistemology.  It has no argumentative significance or authority, regardless of the subject in question.

Pro-life ideas are not rooted in the mere possibility that abortion might trigger guilt, moreover.  They are instead rooted in the fact that human rights, if they exist, are possessed by all humans, no matter their size, location, or stage of development.  The feelings of someone who supports abortion are just as irrelevant to the morality of the topic as the feelings of those who affirm the humanity of the unborn are.  Guilt does not prove that something is immoral, and the absence of guilt does not prove that something is morally permissible.