It's a sentimental question.

In an over-crowded World, abortion is an ugly necessity.

I do not believe life begins at conception. I have not had an abortion but I fully support abortion rights. The mother has rights too!

"a god to answer to" ... and in that tiny statement rests the entire problem with abrahamic religions and most conceptions of religion in the west.

Not all spiritual beliefs involve some judgmental being on high punishing those who don't meet his (usually) lofty moral standards. In some the word god is a pronoun vice a proper noun and such a mythical being is little more than a role model people try to emulate for success in life. For example - if you desired to play QB 100 years from now then Tom Brady might be a god. Or if you are an officer of the law maybe Wyatt Earp. Or if you're a lumberjack then Paul Bunyan. In many cultures of the east this is the concept of a god. Not someone who looks down on you for lapses in judgment according to some standard they set.

By that same token life is viewed different elsewhere for many also. This idea that 2 mortals copulate and somehow instantly produce a being with an eternal soul is a mythos of Abrahamic origin as well - dwelling mostly in the minds of westerners. Much of the world views our inner selves as consciousness that exists before human conception and extends beyond the life of this frail shell. To them that is part of science more than part of religion. It just happens to be science we have yet to comprehend. We see and conceive the concept of consciousness and believe we have found bits and pieces as "proof", but in the end we have no concrete evidence of either an Abrahamic soul or an eastern self. So both views are a matter of conjecture and both, as such, are equally ephemeral and carry equal weight as theory.

I leave you with all this to say that I believe in the eastern view on consciousness and as such abortion is just a lost opportunity to know another person. That is what is lost, not some eternal soul. To that extent it's sad as in a potential lost friend or relative. But the extreme condemnation from moral judgment isn't relevant to me. I find it silly.

The only opinion I have is it is a woman’s choice.

Neither I nor anyone else should dictate a woman's body and what they choose to do regardless of what I feel

I believe it is a personal choice. I don't take it lightly and have not have to make the decision.

I'm not from a religious background - I was raised very much aware that there was a such a thing as religion and that I am Jewish (I still consider myself to be Jewish, despite also being an atheist), but also that science has provided far more convincing explanations of how the universe came to be. I do not believe that a foetus has a soul; nor do I believe that any other person or living thing has a soul, because I do not believe that souls exist. However, I understand that women who don't share this opinion might well find undergoing an abortion to be far more morally problematic than I would, and I feel for them.

According to the god nuts, a baby gets a free pass to heaven, right?
So an aborted fetus (if you can call that a 'baby'--I don't) would go directly to an eternity of bliss. No living a life with all its temptations, so no risk of going to hell.
So we'd actually be doing all these "babies" a favor by aborting them.
We should be aborting MORE babies if that's the case, not fewer!
We have a terrible overpopulation problem.
I'm for asking pregnant women to volunteer for the heaven-assuring procedure. This may only apply to Jews, Christians, and Muslims, but that's still a lot of souls being saved from the dangers of actually living a life full of sin and depravity.
Abortion "problem" solved.

I'm not sure "when life begins". As a man I couldn't say if I would ever have one or not. I helped pay for a friend's abortion in highschool because a football player took advantage of her when she was passed out (I had just been given some money from my bio dad who left before I was born - we were always desperately poor back then). I support abortion rights just because I'm not sure what I would do and I don't feel it's my place to make moral judgements for others. I also think too often questions like "when life begins" don't have any objective meaning. I'm sure "life" in this usage is not the scientific definition (i.e. life processes - nutrition, respiration, reproduction, movement, etc) or at least not to most. Perhaps if we were more careful with our language and less emotional then abortion doctors would not be killed. But it's human nature to respond to emotionally charged rhetoric and also to assume that things with correct syntax that aren't obvious nonsense must have some meaning (it's also kind of how language evolves). As for your other questions, I've never seen a "soul". If you mean something like "consciousness" we'd need to define that as well. If you mean "self awareness" I would lean towards "no" but I don't see how that could be answered definitively.
In the end I guess I'm pro choice just because it is such a complicated issue to me.
And as for feeling guilty, if it were possible for me and I did I would probably feel guilty but let myself off the hook after a while. And I have no idea what it would take. I certainly would never presume it meant someone who had one was any better or worse a human being than anyone else.

What I, or any other woman, decides to do about our own reproductive lives,
is no one's business but our own.
It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks of it, they don't get to interfere or
inject their opinion, unless they are specifically asked.

There is no "right to life". Never has been one, never will be one.
Each woman is absolutely entitled to her own reasons, and no one else has
any right to pass judgment on whether her reasons are valid.
No pregnancy, in the history of pregnancy, has ever been guaranteed to
result in a live birth. Never has been. Never will be.

No gods. No soul.
No one's business. It doesn't matter if they think it is their business, it's not.
And it never will be.

As a male that isn't in the medical proffession I can assure you that abortion is none of my business.

Souls don't exist and I imagine guilt would come from others who want to make an intensely personal choice a public affair - probably because they're serious assholes.

I feel about abortion much like you do. I don't think guilt would help a woman to live life. Who knows maybe she'd wish to carry child to term during better circumstances. I think it best to not abort, but in bad conditions, a child brought into that kind of environment would not fare well, and neither would the mother, if she'd see the deprivation the child would experience, and then be heartbroken about not being able to provide a better life.

It is a choice for the pregnant woman to make. I would support her whichever way she decides.

Let the woman decide after consulting her doctor. I see nothing wrong with an abortion for any reason the pregnant woman choses. For me, it comes down to the idea that the fetus is using the woman's body. The woman has the right to bodily autonomy. The woman gets to decide how her body is to be used.
There is no credible evidence for the existence of a soul, so that is a non-issue.

If you don’t believe in life after death, the whole idea of a soul is kind of mute, isn’t it?

In a perfect world there would be no abortions, spontaneous or otherwise. Every pregnancy would be wanted, every fetus would develop normally, and no woman's life would be put at risk by her pregnancy. But, this is not the nature of things. There are many reasons why a woman makes that difficult decision; and, the choice should be hers.

When I believed in the bs I thought it was ok to have a abortion. It depended on the situtation and I don't think there would have been any guilt. Now as an Atheist I have no problem with it. It's the womans choice. Plus I don't want children and the planet is over populated. If women stopped haveing babies for 5 years it would help the planet alot.

In my catholic days I would have felt guilt and would most likely not have one. As an agnostic, I would not feel guilt at all. I am choosing to remain childfree and were an accident to happen the thing is getting aborted. Getting pregnant would take for me to make that decision. The soul is a religious concept. There is no scientific evidence for a soul. We do not even have a proper definition or conceptualization of a soul to be able to study it. I believe personhood does not begin until birth, however, barring health complications, I do not think 3rd trimester abortions should be common. In the 3rd trimester the fetus' brain and nerves are developed so much that the fetus can feel pain. Prior to that, it would not feel a thing.

In a perfect society birth control would be taught in schools as part of health classes and parents would also counsel their children in birth control. Also birth control medicines and other contraceptives would be available to everyone. They aren't because the christian right doesn't want that type of stuff either taught or available. Just say no to both drug use and sex. On the other hand they are long gone after the baby has been born. I have yet to see them out there begging women to have the baby so that one of them can adopt it. And I've also had experiences with some of the people who are totally against abortion until their daughter ends up getting pregnant - the story changes quickly then....well at least for them because well you know there were extenuating circumstances. I believe none of us are in any position to judge another.

I think, religion aside, abortion is still a very personal topic. I personally have no objection to (or guilt about) abortion before there’s a fully functioning brain and nervous system; at that point, there is the sensation of pain. So that’s my personally established boundary.

I also believe in exceptions even to this for extraordinary reasons, and those reasons should be decided by the woman and her doctor — and no one else.

Well - if I had an abortion I'd be rather surprised, actually. Being a man and all.

Abortions should never be done lightly. There are some women who never want children and there are some who should never have any. For I would guess 99% of women do not take having an abortion lightly. It is something they have to live with the rest of their lives. The same with giving birth you have to live with it the rest of your life. A woman needs to think it out. Can they afford children at this time in life. Can they take care of the child during pregnancy. I have heard of some who are drug addicts and keep having children and most come out with a disability because they will or can not stop using. I am against forcing any woman to have a child.

I have a Catholic background where everyone takes ownership of people's private life. Very crazy. Women's body issues and decisions belong only to them.

I say go for it.