Normative Ethics - Essay Example

Normative ethics Normative ethics Ending the life of another human being is not morally permissible. However, there can be someexemptions in some cases including in abortion. Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy due to various reasons. According to me, I feel that abortion should be morally permissible in some cases. Not that terminating of a pregnancy is a noble thing to do but there are some cases that abortion should be allowed. Only the mentioned cases should anyone conduct abortion.
In case, the health of the mother is at stake and there is no way the fetus can survive under those circumstances. It is unfortunate if doctors or other concerned individuals would allow the mother to die just because abortion is not morally permissible. The mother can conceive again and luckily enough give birth to a healthy child but if neglected to die, such acts would remain in the guilty conscience of those involved for a longer time. Such cases occur in the event that the mother is not feeling well, the fetus has some terminal illness that might affect the mother, or the fetus is dead. Removing it from the womb would be beneficial to the mother physically.
Most people nowadays especially the younger generations abort for the wrong reasons. Probably the individuals practiced unsafe sex resulting into unwanted pregnancies. Rather than keeping the baby and maybe giving it up for adoption after giving birth, the individuals decide to terminate the pregnancies. In other cases, married women decide to abort in the event that an unplanned pregnancy kicks in which they know their husbands would not approve. Others cheat on their husbands and abort when they get pregnant with the other man’s child. Such cases of abortion should not be morally permissible despite the justification such individuals try to make on the acts.
I believe that if the health of the mother is not at stake, individuals should just carry the pregnancy to term and give the baby out for adoption if they do not need it. Actually, some couples out there cry themselves to sleep since they can never conceive. Ironically, others carelessly abort even as many as seven times before settling down and getting serious with life. Such individual women may fail to conceive later in their lives since in the process of so many abortions, they could have damaged their womb. From there, guilty conscience starts to eta them up with lots. Therefore, individual women should be careful if they do not wish to get pregnant; they should refrain or use the various birth control methods in the market.
Kantianism is the normative ethical tradition that supports my argument. It states that all actions are performed according to some maxim, and each maxim is different thus, judging the morality of any action (Landau, 2014). It is true that abortion amounts to killing another human being, which is ultimately wrong. However, if the life of the mother is at stake, then the action can be morally permissible. We can also attempt to universalize a maxim and its action to see whether they are possible in the world we live in. for instance, we can make everyone follow the act of only allowing an abortion when the life of the mother is at stake and not in any other circumstance. Such actions could lead to the reduction of all cases of abortions worldwide.
References
Shafer-Landau, R. (2014). The ethical life. New York: Oxford University Press.
Shafer-Landau, R. (2014). The fundamentals of ethics. New York: Oxford University Press. Read More