Many times in arguments on abortion, it has been brought up that because we believe that abortion kills a human life (the embryo or fetus), that masturbation must kill millions of human lives.
The people making these arguments are either ignorant of human biology, or are using hyperbole to troll a point.
If the amount of sperms that died by masturbation (between 200 million and 600 million) was represented by “x”, then the amount of sperms that died during sex resulting in fertilization would be “x-1”. Essentially, the same amount of sperm would have died via sex and via masturbation, of course minus one. Ethically, in regards to sperm death, there is no difference here. If individual sperm cells were humans, the results of “human death” from masturbation and sex would be indecipherable. And if sperm cells are considered humans, it would only be logical to say that eggs in the female body are also humans, in which one would be killed each month through menstruation. This is obviously ludicrous.
Moreover, sperm cells and egg cells are haploid (having a single set of chromosomes), while the human resulting from fertilization is diploid (having 2 sets of chromosomes).
Sperm cells will always be sperm cells and will never be anything else but sperm cells unless a single sperm cell fuses with a single egg cell.
This fusing and a combining of the two separate sets of chromosomes into one single set of chromosomes is what begins the new human’s life.
From the point of fertilization, cleavage, cellular reproduction, growth, and cell differentiation begins in such a very short time span. This is evidence of a new human organism. Sperm by itself will never do that.
If you make the abortion/masturbation comparison, stop.
It’s ridiculous and nonsensical. If you want to make the argument that a zygote/embryo/fetus is not a human, that’s fine. Wrong. But fine. Make that argument. But the abortion/masturbation argument is disingenuous.
Thomas White
Vice President
Pro Life Man