Fleshing Out Evictionism:
Fleshing Out Evictionism:
In 2009, while still an undergrad, I was first introduced to Blocks theory of evictionism. Although I found it an intriguing and creative approach to the topic, I disagreed with the proposed compromise since it carried the baggage of forced positive obligations a mother had to an unborn child. I viewed this baggage as a break from libertarian views on nonaggression...as a type of forced-charity...a contradiction. I wrote a long, mostly unintelligible, blog responding to the idea (even though I should have been dedicating that time to my multivariate calc midterm) before shelving the topic. Over the years I have enjoyed the various discussion had in journals and articles surrounding the theory of evictionism and although I still disagree with the theory, I have come to respect the theory as being worthy of the title "A Principled Compromise" (as Block calls it).
In this piece, I would like to offer an objection to the theory, followed by a potential Band-Aid to my objection.
Preliminaries:
For the sake of argument I grant Block that at the point of conception the fetus is categorically human and thus is embodied with all the negative rights (i.e. freedoms from aggression) that every other human is granted.
A Working Model of Trespass:
It is my contention that In order for someone to be deemed as trespassing on private property the following three criteria must be met before additional action can be taken by the property owner.
The person must be prompted to leave
The person must be granted a path in which to leave
The person must be granted an interval of time proportional to the path in which to leave
I would argue that the majority of the arguments for/against evictionism can be rooted in one of the three criteria above. Even if you were to claim that a fourth criteria should be added to the basis above
4. The person must possess the ability to leave
This would only push the argument back to one of the first three criteria. You would simply be using the inability case to justify why the interval of time should be increased or why evictionism is the only path proportional for the trespassing fetus to leave.
My Objection:
I also have objections to evictionism that fall into one the above categories but the purpose of this entry is slightly different. My objection is not the positive obligation of evictionism forced onto the mother of the unborn child but instead to the disproportional amount of positive obligation rendered to the mother of an unborn child as opposed to the mother of a born child. I cannot imagine the libertarian giant Walter Block, author of Defending the Undefendable, my mentor, defending the forced charity of my wife to donate say oxygen, blood, tissue, etc to save the life of one of our two beautiful boys and yet he asks this obligation of the mother to the unborn baby? Why such asymmetrical standards? I don't get it.
The Band-Aid:
I assume it could be argued that since the fetus lacks the ability (both spatially or temporally) to leave the womb once it has been deemed a trespasser it must therefore be assisted. For example, if a guest (either invited or uninvited) in your home is no longer wanted. You have asked them to leave, showed them the door and gave them 60 seconds to grab their coat. However, during the commotion, the guest passed out. At this stage, if you want the guest to leave your home you must assist them by dragging or carrying them out the door. The process of such assistance cannot cause additional harm to the unwanted guest but the removal process is warranted. An evictionist might argue that the donation of oxygen, blood, tissue, etc by the mother during the eviction process is analogous to assisting the unwanted comatose guest by dragging them out the door. In fact, the evictionist might even argue that the unborn fetus cannot be expected to leave the womb since it (technically) has not understood the directive to leave asked of it by the mother.
I leave it to the reader to flesh out the rest