It never sat comfortably with me that women who were raped must be doubly victimized by carrying a resultant pregnancy to term.
It also didn’t sit comfortably with me that some women purportedly
use abortion as a casual form of birth control or family planning. (I say “purportedly” only because I’ve never personally
known anyone who has.)
And 40 years later, that remains my muddy position on abortion. Whenever the topic comes up among my friends
who identify passionately with one side or the other, I begin to search furtively
for the nearest exit.
My problem is that I love and respect many women who are
staunchly pro-life. I imagine them
bristling at my rape example above, because they believe every conception must
be protected.
I also love and respect many women who are staunchly
pro-choice. I imagine them cringing at
my use of the word “casual,” because NO woman, they argue, ever makes that
gut-wrenching and intensely personal decision casually. And even if a woman ever did, it was
her body and her decision. Period.
The truth is, I admire any woman who
holds a conviction stronger than my own.
When I taught Freshman Composition, my students were
required to write 10-page research papers on a “controversial topic”. Many chose abortion. In their initial drafts, they submitted what I called “middle ground” thesis statements. I’d sit down with them and try to explain why
a strong thesis statement must adopt a definitive stance and a clear point-of-view. If you can’t choose a side, I’d tell them, pick
something else to write about.
If only they knew what a hypocrite I was. And still am.
Because despite my spineless position on the topic I’m going
to offer a tentative thesis: What troubles
me most about the current debate is an increasing sense that my pro-life and my
pro-choice women are screaming at one another from opposite sides of a fence,
without realizing they’re all being stealthily enclosed in the same pen.
Let me explain.
Remember the dystopian novels we read as schoolchildren, the
ones that seemed so farfetched and surreal but now feel eerily prophetic?
It’s not too difficult to imagine a dystopian future
in which abortion is mandated by law. Here’s the scenario: climate
change leads to decreased food production and availability, which in turn leads
to a government-enforced limited-population policy. We’ll call this Dystopia “A”: compulsory abortions in observance with a “one
child per family” mandate.
It’s far easier to imagine a not-too-distant future
when Roe v. Wade is overturned by an increasingly conservative slate of Supreme
Court justices. Dystopia “B”: no access to legal abortion.
Now given your own stance on the topic, one of those as-yet-fictional
scenarios may strike a more chilling chord than the other. But for a moment, consider the outcome most
terrifying for someone who thinks differently than you do. Imagine, in other words, putting yourself in
your opponent’s shoes. It goes against our natural instincts, right? But that’s the key to writing good research
papers, and it turns out it’s kind of the key to being a decent human
being.
As part of that composition course I used to teach, I required
my students use the Rogerian strategy in their papers. We studied Carl Rogers, a 20th
century American psychologist and one of the ten people I’d want around my
dining room table for that “if you could invite any ten people living or dead” dinner
party. Rogers believed the most
effective means for reducing conflict and advancing civil discourse is to begin
by establishing some bit of common ground with your opponent (not by abandoning
your position, mind you, but by “acknowledging the partial validity of your
opponent’s position”). It sounds almost
quaint nowadays to imagine two people on opposite sides of an argument acknowledging
that neither is entirely wrong.
Or stupid. Or ignorant. Or a baby-killer or a bible-thumper.
When it comes to civil discourse, we are woefully out of
practice.
But let’s try it, anyway.
Imagine, regardless of your true convictions, that you are unfalteringly
pro-life. (My pro-choice friends
whose brains involuntarily autocorrected to “anti-choice,” please work with me
for a minute.)
Now, imagine you are pro-life and we are living under the
one-child-per-family mandate and you find out you are pregnant. You already have one child. The law says you must abort. How would you feel?
You might be terrified and angry. You might think, “But this is MY body!” You
might choose to break the law, but quickly learn no doctor will put herself at
risk to help you. You might be forced to
take medical matters into your own hands and endanger your own life in the
process. And you might wonder how it
EVER became the government’s right to decide something like this for you.
Now let’s shift gears.
We’re all pro-choice, for the sake of this argument. We’re in “Dystopia B.” Roe V Wade was successfully
overturned and you are raped and become pregnant. The law states you must carry the pregnancy
to term. How would you feel?
You might be terrified and angry. You might think, “But this is MY body!” You
might choose to break the law, but quickly learn no doctor will put herself at
risk to help you. You might be forced to
take medical matters into your own hands and endanger your own life in the
process. And you might wonder how it
EVER became the government’s right to decide something like this for you.
Right.
Being stripped of your consent and forced to act against
your will is terrifying, no matter which side you’re on. And no matter which way the future tilts,
this will be life inside the pen as long as we keep screaming at one another over
that fence and drowning out the sound of stakes being hammered into the ground
around us.
I’ll probably lose respect from some of you for my middle-ground
position on abortion. I deserve as
much. But I will say this with
conviction: I am staunchly
anti-pen. I don’t want women to become so
distracted by our differences in opinion that we allow anyone to strip us of
the right to have one.
If you have convictions stronger than my own, keep shouting over the fence. Your voice deserves to be heard. I'll just be standing knee-deep in the mud, keeping a watchful eye on the perimeter.
Bravo Kara. Bravo
ReplyDeleteThank you, “Millz.” (I don’t know who you are!)
DeleteI am actually in a similar situation to you in regards to abortion. After looking at my children and helping them grow to "almost maturity", I cannot imagine having an abortion. That said, I've never conceived a child as a result of a rape, nor has my life ever been endangered as a result of a pregnancy. I am extremely thankful for all of that, but unwilling to judge all women who have abortions because I don't know their situations. Unfortunately, I do know one person who voluntarily got pregnant with her partner, then decided to go back to an ex and had an abortion before doing so. She is no longer a friend and I did judge her (and still do) harshly.
ReplyDeleteMy problem with this issue (and several others) is that it pits the rights of the mother against the rights of the child. Therein lies the rub... (Shameless Skakespear reference - always looking for the A!) If the lack of abortion would kill the mother, I'd prefer her to be able to make her owm decision with her doctor. If she dies giving birth or going through with the pregnancy, I feel that would possibly be more traumatic than the abortion. If she's just looking for an abortion for simple birth control, I feel that is more harmful to the child. When it comes to rape, that's a real tough one because forcing her to have the child could be catastrophic emotionally for both her and the child. Or it may not. She may, by some miracle end up feeling a connection to the child. There is no one perfect answer to this dilemma. So I will continue to listen and talk with others. And pray that they don't overturn Roe v Wade.
Annnnnddd I spelled Shakespeare wrong. Doh! Sorry for the crazy long response...
ReplyDeleteHey, he spelled it several different ways, including yours! xo
DeleteYou really hit the nail on the head here and I thank you for writing this. I plan to use the "I'm anti-pen" argument going forward when confronted with this debate.
ReplyDeleteI want to meet the 10 people you would invite to your table. I appreciate the two sides you took and defended what they meant. No one will ever be satisfied with this topic. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteI saw him at Toyota Oakdale about 10 years ago. He was wonderful. Entertaining; great clothes; and told many great stories of his career. Loved it. Thank you again Kara.
ReplyDelete