Oral; 'Abortion is synonymous with murder'

[anna.xo]

Hi,
I'm looking for some feedback and constructive criticism on my talk. Any help is greatly appreciated. Someone has told me that the subject is too weighted and I am not taking any particular aspect.

Have you ever thought about murdering anyone? Taking someone’s life? The life of someone so small they would not even have a say in such a decision. Someone so small they are considered unimportant. An unborn baby?

Abortion has recently been heavily debated in the media, due to the Napthine government’s involvement with independent MP Goeff Shaw in his push to adjust abortion laws. It was revealed that the Napthine government assisted Geoff Shaw in drafting and introducing a private member’s bill restricting current abortion laws in Victoria, which has sparked concern among the community regarding the future of women’s rights.

Abortion is the act of deliberately killing an embryo, thus with it destroying every chance of a happy and fulfilling future for a potential human being. The allowing of abortion makes me question the laws and penalties in place regarding murder. If a woman is able to legally murder her own child, why is the murder of another human being illegal? There are no legal consequences for abortion, so why do such severe penalties exist for murder? In a civilised society, the taking of a human life does not go without punishment, and abortion should be given the same treatment. In practice, the same outcome is being accomplished – the death of a human being. A commonly held belief is that a ‘baby’ isn’t really a human until a certain point in a pregnancy. Now, if this is true, then what is it? Think about it, what is it? The reality is that a baby is developing, and it will grow into a human being, a person...with feelings, sensations and thoughts. A human life begins at conception. Within just 12 weeks, your baby’s heart start to beat, its brain coordinates movement, unique and permanent fingerprints develop, it can smile, form a fist, suck its thumb and it is able to feel pain.

Even in the atrocious case of rape and other difficult circumstances, such as age or inability to provide proper care, there are alternative options that exist that can accomplish a better outcome for all involved. This child deserve the right to life, just as you or I do. Your baby is the victim here. Why should this fragile, developing life be ended because of your decision? You made a decision, and it is you who should bear the consequences of your choice. Adoption is one such option. Yes, you may not be able to provide this baby with the life it deserves, but that is not to say that someone else can’t. There is someone out there who has the ability and will to give your child a chance at life. There is someone out there that can offer it more than you can, and can give it a chance of having a decent future. With over 2 million couples waiting to adopt a child, there is no such thing as an unwanted baby. You cannot commit an act of evil and hope good will come of it. Is the birth of a child a blessing or a curse?

By siding with pro life, we provide protection for women from the impact of physical, emotional and mental scarring that can result as a result of abortion. Women who have had an abortion are six times more likely to commit suicide, with significantly increased chances of being diagnosed with depression, various cancers and drug and alcohol abuse. Those encouraging abortion are deceiving women by providing them with comfort, ‘that their problem will be fixed’. It is not just as simple as removing the baby, but also the guilt and pain that is experienced in the longer term, which can take years of various treatments – therapy, counselling and even medicines – as well as much mental preparation and inner strength to overcome. By refusing to allow abortion, this extremely damaging trauma can be prevented.

*Am struggling for a powerful conclusion*

Please note that this is the first draft only and I am open to all suggestions !

[Russ]

Yeah, so I'm just going to drop by on the ground floor of this and say that anna.xo wants feedback and CC on her English oral, not a discussion of the relative morality of abortion/murder. If you're going to post, keep this in mind

If you'd like to discuss said topic more broadly, please feel free to start a thread here and I'm sure there will be broad and intelligent debate, but this thread is for English assessment discussion only, please.

[Robert243]

For your conclusion you could say : "In conclusion it is clear that the abortion is  synonymous with murder . Everybody deserves a long , happy , and fulfilling life . It is a beautiful thing that we only get one shot at ."

I'd also think it'd be good if you had some more rebutting arguments you talk about rape and all that . But i think you need to rebut the issue of women's rights in it aswell. Overall it's a robust speech , but depending on your time limit , i think it can be a bit longer .

Good luck 

[walkec]

I think it is a good start for a draft, there is definitely heaps of potential for it to be an amazing speech 

If I was writing a speech for the prompt, I'd probably begin by comparing the definitions for murder and abortion itself. I think doing this would assist in connecting thought in your audience more and possibly increase the chance that they may agree/see similarities between murder and abortion (if this is the contention you are endeavouring to present)

I think it may be worth adding/considering that people who are murdered have just as much potential to still do great things with their lives, and so do unborn embryos or foetus'?

I also agree with bullet in saying that some rebuttals would be good. Also remember that the average rate of speech is 120 words per minute, so use that as a guide as to how long your speech should be (depending on your time limit)

yeah I'm tired and that's all I can think of for now. Hope it makes sense..

[WonderBunny]

Wow, this is very passionate! Anyway, you might want to address the opposing arguments about the right to bodily autonomy. Pro-choice arguments don't solely rest on the humanity of fetuses, there are other arguments you will need to rebut. Also you might want to work on the implied baby= punishment for having sex part, it leaves you open to accusations of slut shaming and sexism.
   The 2 million people want to adopt figure might need to be clarified. Is that the figure for Australia? Perhaps you could draw a comparison with the abortion rate. 
  Check the sources for the harm caused by abortion statistics you cite. These are not medically accurate. Did they come from a biased source? Were they on an anti abortion website? This may not be the best source for this kind of information.
Anyway, good luck.

[anna.xo]

Thankyou all for your feedback. I will try to get back to this a bit later tomorrow when I have some more time, but all your help is appreciated

[Vermilliona]

Since this is an issue that most people have heard quite a bit about before I think it would also be good to ensure that you make mention of the (hopefully credible) sources this research comes from - that way your audience will see that you're not just making unsubstantiated claims. So if any of your sources have reputable names, or you have statistics on how many doctors agree that life begins at conception, maybe mention these - otherwise it's too easy for your audience to immediately dismiss your claims.

[nerdmmb]

I'd also incorporate the causes of abortion and WHY the government should illegalise it.

Please, as tempting as it sounds, do not ever write/say in conclusion - it's wayyy too mainstream. Try something innovative that appeals to the audience.

Also try asking more rhetorical questions and suggesting some alternatives for abortion

Overall great job.

[Professor Polonsky]

(I'm doing my absolute best here to critique the writing without bringing my view in. Also, please excuse me for any errors/mistakes of any kind in my critique, in my defence I'm on my phone on fairly crappy hotel wifi.)

The weakest part of your speech is that it does not rely very much at all on logic and facts, rather being a purer emotional appeal. While an emotional appeal can strengthen your argument, the first thing that it needs is a solid foundation.

Your entire premise is equating abortion with murder. However, the only evidence brought forward is that

Within just 12 weeks, your baby’s heart start to beat, its brain coordinates movement, unique and permanent fingerprints develop, it can smile, form a fist, suck its thumb and it is able to feel pain.

If you don't mind me saying so, that is rather flimsy and thin to base your entire argumen on. The thought immediately conjured in my mind is "animals' hearts beat too, and it can also do most of these things... where's the difference between an abortion procedure and how the chicken got to my plate for today's dinner?"

As others have stated, you'll also need to rebut the bodily sovereignty argument. To force a raped woman to carry her rapist's child to conception (taking the most extreme case), when it was not her doing at all, the trauma that will inevitably result from having brought to the world a being via the act of violating you in the worst possible way, and the inevitable difficulties in any pregnancy... Weighing that against a clenched fist and a heartbeat, I don't see how those can win.

Seeing that you have not convinced the audience (i.e. me, an incredibly harsh and sceptic critic as I'm trying to push you to the next level with your argument), that the fetus has any more ethical value than a chicken on its own merit, I don't see how the argument that it has the "right to live" any more than it. As for its potential to develop into a baby - so does sperm. The same argument, I think, can be then applied to birth control.

The figures you've cited regarding women who had an abortion being more likely to suffer from diseases, depression etc. is a relatively stronger one. There are two potential issues with it that I could see, but I'm being quite nitpicky here. Firstly, you've presented a vast collection of statistics on the issue, without citing any source or making any further attempt at making them sound credible. I could contend that there could be other reasons for this correlation other than the abortion itself (the socioeconomic status of women who have undesired pregnancies, the trauma caused by the pregnancy itself, et cetera), and I think that may indeed be the case. Secondly, it does not consider the potential trauma you might be causing a woman by prohibiting her from terminating an abortion, which I've already mentioned. I presume you've taken these figures from pro-life sources - I assure you that if you did your research on pro-choice websites (say Planned Parenthood), you'd find statistics showing quite the opposite. (It's funny how we manage to spin the same truth in so many different ways, to suit our beliefs.) Oh, and thirdly, there's again the bodily autonomy argument. Eating Macca's or smoking cigarettes is bad for you, and yet they're not outlawed. We generally let people make their own minds up on those decisions.

I suppose it's a good thing that my personal viewpoint on this matter is opposite to yours, as it allows me to make suggestions and find potential issues much more easily than had I agreed with you. You've made a very strong start on this, so please don't think your oral is awful or anything - it's really far from it! I'm only trying to help you achieve even better.

[vox nihili]

Hi,
I'm looking for some feedback and constructive criticism on my talk. Any help is greatly appreciated. Someone has told me that the subject is too weighted and I am not taking any particular aspect.

Have you ever thought about murdering anyone? Taking someone’s life? The life of someone so small they would not even have a say in such a decision. Someone so small they are considered unimportant. An unborn baby?
Abortion has recently been heavily debated in the media, due to the Napthine government’s involvement with independent MP Goeff Shaw in his push to adjust abortion laws. It was revealed that the Napthine government assisted Geoff Shaw in drafting and introducing a private member’s bill restricting current abortion laws in Victoria, which has sparked concern among the community regarding the future of women’s rights.
Abortion is the act of deliberately killing an embryo, thus with it destroying every chance of a happy and fulfilling future for a potential human being. The allowing of abortion makes me question the laws and penalties in place regarding murder. If a woman is able to legally murder her own child, why is the murder of another human being illegal? There are no legal consequences for abortion, so why do such severe penalties exist for murder? In a civilised society, the taking of a human life does not go without punishment, and abortion should be given the same treatment. In practice, the same outcome is being accomplished – the death of a human being. A commonly held belief is that a ‘baby’ isn’t really a human until a certain point in a pregnancy. Now, if this is true, then what is it? Think about it, what is it? The reality is that a baby is developing, and it will grow into a human being, a person...with feelings, sensations and thoughts. A human life begins at conception. Within just 12 weeks, your baby’s heart start to beat, its brain coordinates movement, unique and permanent fingerprints develop, it can smile, form a fist, suck its thumb and it is able to feel pain.
Even in the atrocious case of rape and other difficult circumstances, such as age or inability to provide proper care, there are alternative options that exist that can accomplish a better outcome for all involved. This child deserve the right to life, just as you or I do. Your baby is the victim here. Why should this fragile, developing life be ended because of your decision? You made a decision, and it is you who should bear the consequences of your choice. Adoption is one such option. Yes, you may not be able to provide this baby with the life it deserves, but that is not to say that someone else can’t. There is someone out there who has the ability and will to give your child a chance at life. There is someone out there that can offer it more than you can, and can give it a chance of having a decent future. With over 2 million couples waiting to adopt a child, there is no such thing as an unwanted baby. You cannot commit an act of evil and hope good will come of it. Is the birth of a child a blessing or a curse?
By siding with pro life, we provide protection for women from the impact of physical, emotional and mental scarring that can result as a result of abortion. Women who have had an abortion are six times more likely to commit suicide, with significantly increased chances of being diagnosed with depression, various cancers and drug and alcohol abuse. Those encouraging abortion are deceiving women by providing them with comfort, ‘that their problem will be fixed’. It is not just as simple as removing the baby, but also the guilt and pain that is experienced in the longer term, which can take years of various treatments – therapy, counselling and even medicines – as well as much mental preparation and inner strength to overcome. By refusing to allow abortion, this extremely damaging trauma can be prevented.

*Am struggling for a powerful conclusion*

Please note that this is the first draft only and I am open to all suggestions !

Before I actually give any feedback about the speech, for the purposes of transparency, I disagree completely with what you're saying in this speech and quite frankly find what you've said in this speech vile.

I do however, love to see people enter the debate though, and for that I'll give my two bobs.

The major thing you need to do with your speech is work on the structure. At the moment, it feels like you're kind of floating through ideas. You need to have clear and distinct ideas to present (which you do). At the moment though, you haven't made use of those distinctions. You present your ideas as a flow of thoughts and I think your audience will find itself drifting off a bit. So a way to do that would be to write somewhat of a mindmap, what are your key points. Then when you rejig your speech, ensure you've separated your points. This seems like useless advice, but believe me, it works.
You've got your keys already:
-there are alternative options
-murder is illegal, abortion is murder
-life starts at birth

To me, these are your key points.

The other thing I would also point out is that you start talking about Napthine. I would change your angle. Don't mention this at all, because at first, it appeared to me that you were going to talk about how these laws will have a negative impact, not in support of those laws. You really, really need to delete this. All it does is invoke all the reasons why what you're saying is total crap, and that's not what you want to do. There are actually some good and sensible arguments against abortion, or at very least, some good sentiments. You've invoked a lot of them, so stick to that.

I've pointed out what I don't like, but I'll say briefly I do like the murder approach. It is the tried and tested approach to the pro-life approach to abortion and will work for you again. You've also kind of used it like those pirating ads (you know the ones: would you steal a handbag? Would you steal a car? then why would you steal a movie?). I like that. It's a very effective rhetorical technique and serves your speech well.


Lastly, if you have a feminist teacher or any back and forth with the class you'll get killed on these points:

• Life doesn't begin at conception. By the same reasoning, every time a woman menstruates she kills a baby and every time a man ejaculates he kills 100s of millions of babies, even if he's trying to make one! (fyi: it's commonly held that life begins at syngamy, google it)
• Most of all though, your last point about suicides is a very loose one. I like that you've mentioned a statistic like that, but I'm pretty sure even Blind Freddy could see that the circumstances leading to an abortion will compound an individual's mental health issues. This I think you will need to work on more than my previous point, it's a bit too open!

[slothpomba]

Life doesn't begin at conception. By the same reasoning, every time a woman menstruates she kills a baby and every time a man ejaculates he kills 100s of millions of babies, even if he's trying to make one! (fyi: it's commonly held that life begins at syngamy, google it)

I believe you're mistaken about the term conception.

It's not really scientific to begin with but in most peoples minds (i assume class + teacher) it is usually taken to mean fertilization or syngamy. Conception certainly doesn't mean preparing an egg or sperm though as it seems to be implied in your post.

Your entire premise is equating abortion with murder. However, the only evidence brought forward is that If you don't mind me saying so, that is rather flimsy and thin to base your entire argumen on. The thought immediately conjured in my mind is "animals' hearts beat too, and it can also do most of these things... where's the difference between an abortion procedure and how the chicken got to my plate for today's dinner?"

I guess that rests on whether you think its OK to kill animals either (but im just a hippie).

A good point is made with the heart beat; I'll add a little onto that. In the lab you can make an isolated heart "beat", its hard to explain but it has its own mini electrical system. Similarly, in brain dead patients, the heart still beats. All the important parts of their brain, the parts where memories, feeling, personality and emotions are, basically what makes them who they are, are mush. The brain is destroyed in such a way you can never recover it. Some residual parts may remain (which may explain the beat) but who that person was and could be is totally wiped out.

Another thing to think about is the parallel with the death penalty. Many people are against the death penalty, particularly in Australia. A large subset of these are from the political left, the same  kind of people who are often pro-abortion. I know one of the reasons i think the death penalty is wrong is because you're taking a life and life is sacred and important. I've often asked myself (and came to my own conclusions, not important here) why i don't do the same for abortion. You were going down a similar path with the murder thing, it might worth be exploring it further.

Lastly, the current problem in the philosophy thread is related to this issue (it was actually derived from a book about abortion). Is there a difference between killing and letting die? You could argue for abortion you are simply letting die, denying the things it needs to live sure but not actually and actively killing it. Your position on this may help shape your argument. Theres plenty more philosophy to be gotten into if you want to go down that route too. [Yes, i'll take any opportunity to shamelessly plug the thread, we need more people to join in, did i mention everyone is welcome?]


Here are a few tables. I have plenty more material but just due to the effort of posting it i didn't bother. If you want more stuff like this and think it'll help you, PM me and i can give you some more. I stopped at 6 months because abortions are pretty rare after that and it'd probably just be useless to you. There was also a table before this one dealing with the earlier stages but a lot of it was pretty technical and i have my doubts if it could have helped you.

[psyxwar]

ok, I really don't think this is a topic you should give a speech on. If you're assessors disagree with your view point then you're not going to do very well at all.

Even in the atrocious case of rape and other difficult circumstances, such as age or inability to provide proper care, there are alternative options that exist that can accomplish a better outcome for all involved. This child deserve the right to life, just as you or I do. Your baby is the victim here. Why should this fragile, developing life be ended because of your decision? You made a decision, and it is you who should bear the consequences of your choice. Adoption is one such option. Yes, you may not be able to provide this baby with the life it deserves, but that is not to say that someone else can’t. There is someone out there who has the ability and will to give your child a chance at life. There is someone out there that can offer it more than you can, and can give it a chance of having a decent future. With over 2 million couples waiting to adopt a child, there is no such thing as an unwanted baby. You cannot commit an act of evil and hope good will come of it. Is the birth of a child a blessing or a curse?

Sorry, what decision? Getting raped? Grouping 'being raped' with other reasons for abortion like 'an inability to provide care to the child' is a bad idea. You can't generalize "solutions" that apply to both, because they're two entirely different problems: bearing the child of someone who raped you, traumatized you; having to go through the pain of pregnancy to bring something into this world that'll only be a reminder as to how you were violated, versus being unable to care for a child that was a product of consensual sex for whatever reason.

On another note where does this '2 million couples waiting to adopt a child' statistic even come from, and where does it apply to? ie. is it talking about 2 million Australian couples, or two million couples worldwide?

[Starlight]

Just changed some of the wording from the original. Added some points. Only looked at the first parts of what you wrote though

- "Someone so small they are considered unimportant". This is an assumption, and is not always true. Often it's incredibly difficult for a woman to have an abortion.

- Abortion hasn't been recently debated. It has been debated for a long time as far as i'm concerned.

- Repetition of Napthine government and Geoff Shaw, replaced subsequent use with the government (because they will know who you are referring to) and Shaw.

- "sparked concern in the community" - Not all people in the community, just some.

- "Happy and fulfilling future". Who is to say that they will be happy with their life when they are older?

- "Legally murder her own child". Most would argue the foetus is not yet a child.

-"Now, if this is true, then what is it? Think about it, what is it?" This just confuses me

-"human life begins at conception" You have already stated that others would disagree, this is your opinion only.

- "Have you ever thought about murdering someone?" A bit bold

Have you ever thought about what constitutes taking someone’s life? Taking the life of an unborn baby for instance?
Abortion is constantly debated in the media. A recent example is the Napthine government’s involvement with independent MP Goeff Shaw in his push to adjust abortion laws, where it was revealed that the government had assisted Shaw in drafting and introducing a private member’s bill restricting current abortion laws in Victoria. Consequently, this has sparked concern amongst many people in the community regarding the future of women’s rights.

Abortion has been defined by numerous sources as the act of deliberately killing an embryo, and in turn denying the possibility of it having a future. To allow abortion makes me question the laws and penalties in place regarding murder. If a woman is able to legally terminate her pregnancy, then why is the murder of another human considered illegal? For an abortion, there are no legal consequences but existing are severe penalties for murder. In a civilised society, taking another's life does not go without punishment, however the act of abortion does not receive same treatment. Today, many state that a foetus is not a human until a certain point in  pregnancy or even after birth. The reality is that a foetus develops, and it will eventually grow into a human being, a person...with feelings, sensations and thoughts. So isn't it plausible to argue that human life begins at conception? Within just 12 weeks, an unborn baby’s heart start to beat, its brain coordinates movement, unique and permanent fingerprints develop, it can smile, form a fist, suck its thumb and it is able to feel pain.

[vox nihili]

I believe you're mistaken about the term conception.

It's not really scientific to begin with but in most peoples minds (i assume class + teacher) it is usually taken to mean fertilization or syngamy. Conception certainly doesn't mean preparing an egg or sperm though as it seems to be implied in your post.

My mistake, I didn't think about conception properly or at least technically, though I wasn't trying to imply that preparing an egg is conception (reprod was a weak point, but not quite that bad! haha), I was trying to imply that the argument that a fertilised egg is a living organism is equal to saying that a sperm cell or an ovum is a living organism, that oughtn't be killed. Thanks for pointing out




Following what slothpomba has said, syngamy is still the beginning of life. Conception, if taken to mean fertilisation (which I think it does in most cases), does not mark the beginning of life. In any case, I think it's been pointed out that it's not the strongest counter argument and gets bogged down in technicalities.

So I'll say this, which I don't think does: a fertilised embryo is in many ways similar to a sperm cell or an egg cell in that it merely carries the potential to become a living organism, though is clearly not. Following that example, it's completely reasonable to make the connection between a sperm cell or an ovum and conception.