[ In certain circumstances, the war analogy makes sense. When a woman is raped, she has been attacked by an enemy. Her right to defend herself from further violation via abortion is analagous to "collateral damage" deaths during war. If pro-lifers find "collateral damage" deaths during war acceptable, then they don't have much of a leg to stand on when the topic is abortion for rape/incest. A similar analogy could be made for women who are being attacked by disease. Just because these are rare cases doesn't mean they don't exist. I'm against abortion on demand but I would reserve a woman's right to abortion under these circumstances.

Pro-lifers will say the baby isn't the attacker, but neither are the innocent civilians, including children and babies, who are killed during war. Babies who are killed during war are just as much "murdered" as babies who are aborted. ]

Nope, doesn't hold up at all. In just war, the collateral damage is unintentional, and the military actively tries to avoid it as much as realistically possible. They're not saying, "we're gonna specifically target this civilian, but for a good reason." In abortion, the baby is directly and intentionally destroyed.

Plus, you still have the problem of proportionality to deal with. In just war, the civilian deaths will hopefully be outweighed by a greater number of lives saved in the long run. Whereas the baby's death isn't at all proportional to the 9 months of pregnancy we're trying to avoid, as bad as it can be.

[ So because collateral damage is unintentional that makes it okay? You don't have a problem with thousands of innocent women and children being bombed to death? Gosh maybe the military shouldn't have been so risky. Maybe they should have abstained from war.

Plus, you can't measure how much hell 9 months of pregnancy + giving baby up for adoption could be. An unwanted pregnancy (even a wanted pregnancy) is life changing, whether you keep the baby or not. And it could affect many women in really negative ways that aren't worth it. Not to mention women who have been raped. They have to live with their rapist's collateral damage for 9 months? I don't think so. ]

Nowhere did I say collateral damage is "okay." I said it's an unavoidable reality when war is necessary. And in the interest of understanding just where your objection is coming from, please lay your cards on the table: are you a full-on pacifist, or do you accept that war is sometimes necessary, like in WWII? If you accept the concept of just war, then you are also accepting the reality of collateral damage, and therefore there's nothing to debate here.

Lastly, there's simply no debating with heartlessness that can describe an innocent human life as a "rapist's collateral damage".......