As reported last August, medical personnel at present, can detect the sex of a baby in 7 weeks via the mother’s blood sample for fetal DNA. Currently, media sources and health agencies have discussed the fear of this becoming a mechanism to abort babies. Abort due to if the parents do not want that specific gender i.e. China. Or, if a gender is more prone to a disease or disorder, abort then based on gender-related illnesses. Or, simply a couple may have wanted one sex over another.
But I ask will this “7 weeks” scientific breakthrough soon become the Anti-Choices’ new ammunition?
Ammunition in which pushes a once 13-week fetus into becoming a 7-week him or her embryo. Our time of calling it, it, has been shortened 6 weeks.
And, must I say, what great ammunition this is to have, if I were on their side. This recent discovery, greater supports their stand “…if an egg engulfs a sperm and if a stick turns positive…” then it is a human being. At 7 weeks, we are no longer dealing with an it, an embryo and forget about fetuses. We now are dealing with a boy or a girl, at the seventh week mark of a pregnancy.
Hypothetically if the Anti-Choice movement were, let us say quick-witted enough, to find this supports their principles, why now? After years of disclaiming, ignoring, and denying science- if it were to so happen, why to utilize science now?
Convenience.
Over time, whether in the creationism versus evolution, vaccination versus non-vaccination, abortion versus no abortion debacles, science is disregarded until further needed. When the Anti-Choice Movement resists urges to peak over the fence, when scientific studies’ results favor differently from their original beliefs. However, when the time comes, when the stars align, when science is no longer out to get them, that is when the Anti-Choice Movement hears its calling. When harsh realities become convenient to employ as evidence, that is when the Anti-Choice Movement will not silence, not disclaim or slander, science.
This new scientific breakthrough has been addressed lightly ever since its appearance in August. Yet, what do I expect to come? I expect a slow upsurge of opposition over the subject in the not so distant future, how every abortion battle comes in to play.
I am a proponent for science and don’t look down on the quest of science, in the least. However, the intention of this blog was to not have a discourse over abortion in itself. Ultimately, as many feminists would say when it comes to every woman’s life, it’s her life so let her choose. What I am suggesting is that the length of time to choose will be evermore shortened, due to this new scientific innovation. It may in fact cause no differences in this debate, but I am hesitant in writing that with true confidence. Yet, what I am asking is the Pro-Choice Movement be aware of what this discovery could potentially unleash.
ShoutOut! James Madison University 