Exterminating fetuses : abortion, disarmament, and the sexo-semiotics of extraterrestrialism

This paper considers the New Right's cult of fetal personhood and a 1968 science fiction film, 2007: A Space Odyssey (by Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke) as aspects of an ideological apparatus which addresses extinction fears only to distract us from the exterminist practices of the military-industrial complex. The film is read as part of the debate on reproductive politics, while the pro-life position is understood in relation to science fiction culture. The paper also aims to find arguments to counter the charge that it is morally inconsistent to condone abortion - the termination of individual pregnancies- while opposing nuclear weapons, which could bring about extinction, defined by Jonathan Schell as the death of all unborn generations. The perspective forwarded here rejects this death-oriented moral absolutism in favour of an ethics of reproduction which accords different moral weights to the scales and types of reproductive choice which are exercised by corporations as well as individuals. Abortion maintains reproductive potential in individuals and populations, and is of far less consequence than nuclear war, which would represent an irrevocable choice against life's continuance.