Dear abortion rights supporter…
Can we talk? May we engage in a cool-headed dialogue in mutual respect about this crucial issue? I am strongly pro-life but I don’t condemn you nor think of you as evil. Some of you are my family, friends, and co-workers, and I am actually quite fond of you. But when I hear or see some of the things you say regarding abortion, I grimace and sigh and shake my head, and sometimes I want to scream. This is usually followed by discouragement as I think to myself, if they can’t see what is so obvious to me, what hope is there for changing their view? But here is where I catch a glimmer…when I remember that when one feels heard and respected, change is possible.
But as you have certainly already discerned, the change I seek and hope for would require you to admit you’ve been wrong. And that’s not easy for anybody. Can you admit that it’s possible you’re on the wrong side on this? If not, have a nice day…I still respect you. But if you can, please carefully consider the following, and join me in the dialogue. I welcome your comments.
The pro-choice argument I hear most often is that restricting abortion is infringing on a woman’s right to control her own body. This comes across to me as conveniently and intentionally side-stepping the obvious fact that when a woman is pregnant she is no longer one body but two. It’s how we reproduce…the two become three, or four, and sometimes more. So controlling her body is one thing; controlling the body within hers is quite another.
I’m really not sure how you can defend this argument. You would have to somehow show that the living, growing mass of cells within the uterus is part of the woman’s own body, or that it is an alien invader with no more right to live than a cancerous
tumor. Any honest evaluation of the living zygote must conclude that it cannot belong to the woman’s body if only for the fact that it is often the opposite sex. And it also must conclude that the living being is decidedly human with its own unique DNA. It is a separate and distinct, living, human, being. How can you simply dismiss that as of no consequence in your insistence that this is all about the woman’s body?
If the zygote/embryo/fetus hasn’t the same right to life as you, when does it gain that right? Would you really try and defend the position that it doesn’t until it is outside the womb? Is location the determining factor? And if you allow that it’s earlier than that, what criteria do you use? Is there any point in the development of the cluster of cells into the more recognizable human form where it is truly safe to say that before then you are not killing an innocent human being in the process of growth?
If you are supportive of abortion rights and you are still reading….please make your case for this argument. I really want to hear it. I recognize that personhood is not easily defined, and I have no easy answers to the conundrum that biotech advances like frozen embryos present. So you might actually be able to influence my view of very early life.
There are other abortion related issues I would like your input on, but I will leave them for subsequent posts. This is enough to grapple with for one day.
As a woman that is as thoroughly pro-choice as you are pro-life, it is impossible for me to imagine what argument you could make to change my mind. It has nothing to do with the fear of admitting I am wrong, but has everything to do with my inability to determine whether or not others are wrong or right.
As a mother that has gone through IVF, frozen embryo transfer, an incredibly short pregnancy, and ultimately adoption, my definition of when life begins is surprisingly foggy. I have no idea when life begins. I did not see a child when I looked at the photos of our embryos. I did not feel the surge of life within me during my brief flirtation with pregnancy. I don’t know when life begins and I have a great deal of experience with the very beginnings of life. I have no idea when the transition from the potential of being a child to actually becoming a child happens. Because I am unsure, I have a hard time stating that others are wrong/right and I find it impossible to support laws that would dictate what the correct answer is.
My experience with infertility has taught me that not having control of your reproductive future is a horrible thing, and I simply couldn’t get pregnant. I cannot imagine being pregnant as a result of rape or incest. I can’t imagine staying with an abusive partner because you are pregnant. I can’t imagine being forced to carry a pregnancy to term knowing the child within you will not survive when born.
In order to convince me that abortion should be banned, I need proof of when life begins, and that sort of proof is all but impossible to obtain. I am not saying you’re wrong, but I’m not convinced you are right. Cultures all over the world have strong beliefs about when life begins…It ranges from conception to months after the actual delivery occurs. Who am I to make the ultimate decision for someone else?
While I don’t have suggestions for how you and I might come to the same conclusion, I do have some suggestions for how we might maintain an open dialog: don’t send me photos of aborted fetuses, don’t donate money in my name to Pro-Life organizations, and don’t pray for my soul. I do my best to remain respectful of other’s beliefs, and I as that you do the same for me.
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I just re-read this, and it sounds like I am speaking directly to you in that last paragraph. I apologize. Every Christmas I seem to receive anti-abortion messages and letters confirming donations made in my name from a variety of people. It has always struck me as disrespectful. I would never donate to Planned Parenthood in another’s name without explicit permission and I would never send graphic photos to anyone uninvited. It has always surprised me and offended me when others feel it is OK to do so. Again, I’m sorry if that came off as a personal attack.
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Thank you for your comments, Kim, and for your openness and honesty. Thanks, too, for the clarification, though I understood that you were not addressing me specifically. And for the record, I agree that sending photos and donating to pro-life groups in the name of someone who does not support them is counterproductive.
I feel for you in your struggle to conceive, as I know I would have been devastated had I not been able to. And I imagine if I had been shown my embryos, I would have been hard-pressed to see them as children also.
You ask, “Who am I to make the ultimate decision for someone else?” regarding when life begins. Are you saying that this is a subjective thing…that it could be different for different people and depends on what you believe? I realize that there are and have been cultures that practice(d) infanticide, but wouldn’t you agree that we have the moral capacity to make a judgment about whether allowing or causing an infant to die after birth is right or wrong? And if we do, aren’t we in fact morally obligated to do our best to discern when the new life in the womb deserves protection under the law?
I believe we are, and because it is such an indeterminate point or occurrence, especially when you include the spiritual component (and I recognize not everyone would allow for that), we should err on the side of life instead of allowing abortions up to the very moment of birth, as it is in some states.
And I believe when the facts are clear, as they are concerning how many bodies are affected in an abortion, we should not intentionally misrepresent them.
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Just a point of clarification, when I said “who am I…” I was not talking about cultures in which infanticide occurs, I am speaking of cultures in which infant mortality is so high that they don’t count the life until several months after the baby is born. In China, for example, babies in times past were not named or considered members of society until 100 days old due to infant mortality rates. We are so fortunate to live in a time and culture in which we don’t only count babies 100 days old as alive.
If we could establish the point at which a clump of cells became a baby, I would consider changing my stance. How do we do so? Medically? Biblically? Point of viability outside the womb? I don’t know. I do know that I would have to have scientific and spiritual consensus. If you we’re to ask me, point blank, what my opinion is, I would say 21 weeks…the ultimate earliest point of viability. But that is just a guess. I don’t know.
As far as late-term abortions go, I’m not sure that they have been properly characterized. I did some serious research some time ago and, while I don’t remember the specific stats, I believe they account for less than 2% of all abortions and that they are virtually always done for medical reasons.
I feel that if an honest conversation is going to be had and a consensus reached we need to focus on the facts. Not scare tactics, graphic images, or exceptions. I don’t feel that conversation happens most of the time.
And, no, I don’t believe that we should err on the side of banning all abortions just to be safe. I think, instead, we need to have thorough and early education about sex and preventing STDs and pregnancy. I think we need to have birth control available to young people. I think we need to have sex be less of a taboo subject. I think we need to sexualize our young people a great deal less than we do. I think that we can lower the rates of abortion, unwanted pregnancy, and STD transmission by recognizing that sex happens outside of marriage. Honestly, I find it ironic that many of the people I know who are pro-life are also anti-birth control and anti-sex education. I have never been able to figure that one out.
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I am pro-life. That said, I had an eye opening conversation last week with a woman who is pro-choice. She said a few of her pro-choice friends were furious with her when she said she is not in favor of abortion. As a pro-life person, I had always thought pro-choice means pro-abortion (as your title states too.). My friend said she thinks to terminate a pregnancy must be one of the most agonizing choices a woman would make and have to live with. That is why she is not in favor of abortion. That said, she doesn’t believe her viw should be forced on someone else, hence her stance on pro-choice. It did not change my view, I still consider myself pro-life, however I have a better understanding of how many pro-choice people may think. Words are powerful. Not every pro-choice person is pro-abortion.
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Thanks for your input, Elisa. I think it’s great that you, and the other woman, were willing to have that conversation. I know that if we had more of them, in a calm and reasoned manner, we’d understand each other much better.
But I find it very difficult to accept the position that one is personally against abortion but doesn’t believe in restricting it for anyone else. To me, that’s like saying, I don’t believe in dumping my full-term infant child in the trash, but we shouldn’t have a law prohibiting others from doing it. It sounds like a cop-out to me.
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