Amendment 62 Arguments Get Stranger and Stranger

Robin Marty

"Fertilized egg" is now a slur?  So says Personhood USA.

Colorado Personhood is pushing hard in the last weeks of its campaign to confer the full rights of a human being on a fertilized egg.  And as the campaign continues, the news that comes from Colorado just gets more bizarre.

First the Amendment 62 people announced that not giving personhood to eggs was akin to slavery.  Now, the rhetoric has been upped even higher, as the leader of the movement states that using the phrase “fertilized egg” is as derogatory as a racial slur.

Via KRDO Colorado Springs:

“I think it’s important to note with the term fertilized egg, that’s the same thing as using the N word for an African American,” said [Keith Mason, the President for Personhood U.S.A.] “Because it’s a dehumanizing term and it’s not based in science. The term would be a zygote, or an embryo, speaking of a unique individual.”

Meanwhile, a Colorado newspaper headline claims that opponents of giving legal rights to fertilized eggs are only against it because it would “kill romance.”

TOWN SQUARE: Personhood foes say measure would kill romance

Foes of Amendment 62 were in Colorado Springs on Thursday with a new take on an old amendment.

Backers of the “personhood” measure say they’re fighting abortion by “protecting human life from the beginning of biological development.” To do that, the amendment would change the state constitution to define fetuses as persons.

Opponents say that method to fight abortion, though, would ban most forms of birth control, causing couples to choose between more diapers or less cuddling.

The opponent’s theory: IUDs and some common birth control pills stop fertilized eggs from attaching to uterine walls, making them illegal if that egg is constitutionally defined as a person.

Why yes, I know my biggest issue with the idea of giving non-implanted, fertilized eggs the same rights and equivalency as a fully formed, born and active outside of the womb human being is that I am concerned that it will be more difficult to get in the mood.