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| A sign that says "Road blocked." Image source. |
[content note: "pro-life" ideology, pregnancy loss]
So... a lot of news stories recently about red states where abortion is totally banned, and how these policies lead to horrible situations where a woman with a wanted pregnancy needs an abortion because of some horrible health problem, and her unborn baby is not able to survive, but still she's not allowed to have an abortion, and this puts her life in danger. (See: Kate Cox, and Zurawski v. State of Texas.)
When discussing these news stories, the first thing I want to say is that it's really sad. These are real people's lives. I know how it feels to want a baby, and feel like you would do anything for your baby. I can only imagine how devastating it would be to find out that your unborn baby is not able to survive, and then to have to weigh the risks... wanting more information so you know for sure if your baby has a chance of survival or not... And then the red tape getting in the way, if you wait and do more tests, then what if you're past the cutoff point where abortion is allowed in your state? Or if you live in Texas and abortion is totally banned... it's just the worst thing, to find out your baby will die, and then the government makes everything so much harder. These women didn't want abortions- they wanted to have a healthy baby. But, tragically, it wasn't possible, and they came to the point where they realized they needed to get an abortion- and then the law said they couldn't. These women loved their unborn babies more than any Republican politician did. If there was a way to save the baby, they would have done it. And then some politicians- who don't know or care about the actual details of the actual situation- step in and get to claim that they care about "life" and these women don't. It's just so wrong.
And I read this post from Jessica Valenti: Of Course They Want Us Dead (January 4), about how Republicans really do want pregnant women to die. (Click on the link; it's worth reading.)
All of this has got me thinking about how these really high-profile, emotionally-charged news stories (like Kate Cox's story) are likely to have a big effect on public opinion about abortion. This is likely to get more people to come out and vote for pro-choice policies, because it's obvious that the "pro-life" laws got it so wrong in these cases.
And I'm pro-choice, so yes, I want to see these "pro-life" laws overturned. I want pregnant people in the US to be able to have access to abortion. (And also to have access to prenatal healthcare and other resources they need if they choose to keep the pregnancy. "Pro-life" policies have restricted obgyn doctors so much, that many doctors have left, creating "maternity care deserts." Not cool.)
But here's my concern: I can easily imagine pro-choice people saying "well it's so obvious that these laws are bad, how could anyone possibly continue to support them?" Like, expecting "pro-life" people ("pro-life" women in particular) to read about Kate Cox's situation and then immediately be convinced that Texas's laws need to change. Pro-choice people who can't possibly imagine any kind of logical argument to continue supporting these kinds of abortion bans, and concluding that "pro-life" people simply hate women and that's all there is to it.
I just want to say, it's more complicated than that, and unfortunately there is an argument that can be made on the "pro-life" side here. This sucks, but I'm gonna walk you through it because it's not good to just believe that people who disagree with you are simply evil or something- if you want to change their minds, you have to engage with their actual arguments.
Basically it goes like this: "Pro-life" people believe that the overwhelming majority of women who want to get abortions have "bad" reasons. So, they must be stopped- that's the whole point of "pro-life" policies. Women who get abortions later in pregnancy due to serious health problems (ie, a "good" reason) are just a very very small number of the total number of abortions. And, one might argue, it's not possible to tweak the law to really make sure that it allows people to get abortions for "good" reasons but not for "bad" reasons. Even though Kate Cox had a "good" reason to get an abortion, and in a perfect world the law would definitely allow it, there's no way to actually write a law that allows it for her case but stops all the other women who are trying to have abortions for "bad" reasons.
A "pro-life" person could argue, "You only see these high-profile cases where a woman was obviously in a tragic situation and was denied an abortion. You don't see all the babies who were saved by these laws- all the women who were pregnant with healthy pregnancies that were unwanted and were forced to continue the pregnancy anyway. The number of babies who were saved, quietly, in the background, not being reported on in the news, is so much higher than the number of pregnant women who might die because of these policies."
So, they could argue, it's sad for women who really do have "good" reasons for having an abortion, who then might die because they can't get one, but really it's just a question of doing the math. The number of lives saved is so much greater than the number of lives lost.
They could argue, if the laws were changed to allow abortions in some cases- even if it's simply a small change like taking a broader interpretation of "health of the mother"- well, you're going to get lots of women who want abortions for "bad" reasons, coming up with some far-fetched excuse for why "health of the mother" is at risk, and we can't allow that.
I'm pro-choice, so I don't believe in any of this judgment about whose reasons for abortion are "good" and whose reasons are "bad." I can definitely think of some hypotheticals where it would be obviously immoral to have an abortion- you're 8 months pregnant with a totally healthy pregnancy and then you just decide to have an abortion for no reason- but nobody would actually do that. I trust that people can make the decision that's right for them and their own life and their own body.
Let's be real- pregnancy is grueling. Pregnancy is awful. The nausea, back pain, heartburn, exhaustion... you know how people say that giving birth is the worst pain ever? Well women who are 9 months pregnant want that. They want to go through something that's "the worst pain ever" because afterward, they won't be pregnant any more. That's how awful pregnancy is. Nobody should ever have to go through that if they don't want to. Now, in my case, having kids is really important to me, so I chose to do this. And for me, it was worth it, because my son is just the most wonderful little sweetheart, really just an amazing kid, who knows a lot of facts about sharks, and really loves building things with legos.
But it should always be a choice, not something you're forced into.
So yeah, in my opinion, simply not wanting to be pregnant is a good enough reason to get an abortion.
Anyway, I think the real crux of this issue is to what extent you believe that people are having abortions for "bad" reasons.
I personally don't think people are having abortions for "bad" reasons. I think people know their own life and their own situation, and they're able to make the decision that's right for them. Therefore, I don't think the government should interfere with this at all. (This is the pro-choice position.)
But if you think that most of the time when people have abortions, it's for "bad" reasons, then you would want the government to step in and stop them. (This is the "pro-life" position.)
So in the debate over abortion rights, it can't just be about hypotheticals. It can't just be asking the question in a theoretical realm, "Which reasons for abortion should be legally allowable, and which reasons should not be?" Sure, we could all make lists of what we think are the "good" or "bad" reasons. Like I said, I'm pro-choice but sure I can imagine hypotheticals where someone is having an abortion for an obviously "bad" reason. I don't think there should be laws banning that "bad" reason though, because it's not something that actually would happen in real life.
This debate can't be over theoretical questions, it has to be about what is actually going on in real life. The actual reality of what it's like to be pregnant, the actual reality of who is getting abortions and why, the actual reality of how easy or hard it is to access prenatal healthcare, the actual reality of how expensive daycare is, the actual reality of women being at a higher risk for domestic violence during pregnancy, the actual reality of prenatal testing and finding out your baby is at risk but there's still uncertainty about how bad it will be and you have to make decisions anyway, the actual reality of risk to the mother's health if she has too many C-sections, and so on, and so on. It doesn't do any good to sit around and imagine what might or might not be a bannable "bad" reason for abortion, especially if you're a cis man and/or have no idea about what pregnancy is really like.
For "pro-life" people, because they believe the majority of abortions are for "bad" reasons and need to be stopped, the whole thing is an exercise in how *exactly* to draw the line to make sure all the "bad" reasons are illegal and the "good" reasons are legal. But the reality of pregnancy is complicated- it's impossible to draw a line that really accomplishes that.
If you want to make exceptions for rape, well, how exactly do you define rape? Is it when someone is forced to have sex because of physical violence, or does it also "count" if they are pressured into it with threats and coercion? Would a pregnant person only be allowed to get an abortion if they filed a police report? There are all sorts of reasons that people don't feel safe reporting rape... If you want to make sure those "bad" women who want to get abortions for "bad" reasons can't use the rape exception, then you have to have answers to these questions. You have to judge whether a complete stranger's trauma "counts" or not.
If you want to allow abortion before some certain cutoff point, some number of weeks of pregnancy- well what if they wanted to get an abortion earlier but were delayed because of the financial cost, or the logistical challenges of making an appointment and taking time off work? Or what if it's a wanted pregnancy but testing shows that the baby might have a horrible health problem, but it's too early to know for sure, so the pregnant person wants to wait until they can do more testing, still holding out hope that their baby can survive?
If you want to allow exceptions for the life or health of the pregnant person, where do you draw the line for that? How much of a probability of dying do they need to have, before it "counts"? What if the pregnant person has a health condition that's definitely going to get worse and maybe become life-threatening if the pregnancy continues, but it hasn't gotten to that point yet?
For "pro-life" people, they believe that most people are having abortions for "bad" reasons and must be stopped, and so the law really does need to have answers for all these messy questions. Can't just let people figure it out for themselves- people who are actually in the situation and actually know what's going on- because tons of people will choose "wrong," ya know.
And if I believed there were lots of people aborting 8-month fetuses for no reason, or something obviously immoral like that, then I would also have to think about what policies to put in place in order to stop it. Where to draw the lines to separate the "good" reasons from the "bad" reasons. Fortunately, that's not happening, and fortunately, pregnant people can be trusted to know their own situation and what's best for them, so we don't need to "stop" them.
So... my point in all this is that seeing emotionally-gripping news stories of women who obviously should have been able to get abortions, but couldn't, isn't necessarily going to change "pro-life" people's minds. The reality of being "pro-life" is you *need* to draw the lines to judge other people's personal lives and if their reasons for abortion are "good" or "bad", and inevitably you can't draw those lines perfectly. But you have to try, you have to at least draw it somewhere- you'll save so many innocent babies, and only a few "good" pregnant women will die. Do the math.
I'm very concerned about what's going on with abortion rights in the US. I'm also concerned about hospitals closing their maternity departments because these abortions restrictions make it impossible for obgyn doctors to just do their normal jobs- so pregnant people don't have the resources they need to support them with a wanted pregnancy. I want everyone to be able to make their own decisions about their own personal lives- and I don't need to interfere with it or judge them, because I trust that pregnant people know their own situation and can decide what's best for themselves. In contrast, "pro-life" ideology is based on the idea that most people are having abortions for "bad" reasons and must be stopped- and when you're working from that ideology, if you really want to stop all the "bad" ones, inevitably you have to create policies where women die.
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Related:
What Pregnancy Taught Me About Being Pro-Choice
"Life's Work" (read this book and become even more pro-choice)
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