The conservative media is going nuts over Planned Parenthood supposedly selling organs from aborted fetuses, or wishing to do so. This seems to be missing the point, even if technically illegal.
Terminating a human life involuntarily is murder and abortion does terminate a fetus without its permission. Since abortions are legal (the Supremes say they are), the law must hold a fetus isn't human. Arguably Planned Parenthood selling fetal parts is no different than a barber selling swept-up hair trimmings. Or a manicurist selling fingernail trimmings, icky but not horrid.
If a fetus isn't human, then it is similar to hair or fingernails. Something grown by a human which that person chooses to have severed and disposed of. Whether it be incinerated or dumped in a landfill or used in research and/or medicine shouldn't matter very much.
That we don't feel the same about fetal parts is that we recognize their incipient humanity. The real argument is when does humanity begin? At conception, at heartbeat start, or whenever?
This question poses a slippery slope. If you pick "at conception" several forms of birth control become unlawful as they prevent a fertilized egg from implanting on the uterine wall, causing it to die.
I don't have an answer to when life begins but I believe how to dispose of fetal tissue is the wrong question. For that already dead, never-independently-human-in-the-eyes-of-the-law tissue the decision is essentially irrelevant.
