Response from Lorraine Besser-Jones on August 27, 2008

It is true that abortion debates rarely, if ever, take into account the man’s perspective. People who oppose abortion believe that aborting a fetus is wrong regardless of whether the man (or woman) is in support of so doing. Most people who believe that abortion is morally permissible believe that it is the woman has the right to make the decision on her own – even if that decision conflicts with the man’s wishes.

Why do men get left out of the debate? Because it isn’t clear what rights they have that could outweigh the rights of the other parties involved. The central rights at stake in the abortion debates are the woman’s right to autonomy (which includes the right to decide what happens to her body) and the fetus’ right to life (or lack thereof). These two rights – the right to autonomy and the right to life – are generally to taken to be the most central of all of our rights, and neither the man’s right to autonomy or the man’s right to life are jeopardized by the prospect of an abortion. This is why men get left out of the abortion debate.

While some people believe there is a right of “procreative liberty”, which includes the right to reproduce, we wouldn’t want to say that the man’s right to reproduce overrides a woman’s right to autonomy, for (among other reasons) this would legitimize non-consensual sex. So, as your questions suggests, it seems that this is an instance where men are stuck: they bear responsibility for the fetus, yet do not have the right to make decisions about its future.