Abortion Revisited

Inter-Galactic Memo


To: The usual
Fr: Leavitt
Re: Roe V Wade, redux

I apologize at the outset. It is not my intent to offend anyone. This debate is never going to go away, but some of us just can’t leave it alone. I am sincere when I ask for someone else’s viewpoint. If you consider yourself to be a “radical” feminist, you might want to pass this one by. I assure you, it’s nothing personal.

I’ve been reading a lot of stuff on Moveon.org recently, hoping to find some insightful information, opinions, or ideas contrary to my own—or at least new to me. I was reading a list of “Ten Things you need to know about John McCain”. In this bulleted list, they label Senator McCain as opposing a woman’s right to choose, which is accurate, but disingenuous. McCain has stated that he unequivocally opposes Roe v Wade and believes it should be overturned. At Moveon, no one ever says someone is pro-life. They say a person is anti-choice, painting the Senator as a Neolithic throw-back to patriarchal chauvinism.
This is knowingly skewing what pro-life people are about. We call that Spin. John McCain does not oppose a woman’s right to choose and neither do I. What we oppose is abortion. But the liberal left has done a good job of making people believe we hate women, want to make them chattel again and deprive them of their unalienable rights.
Any woman should have the right to choose an abortion if she is that selfish, weak, afraid, lazy, ambivalent, depressed, terrified, strong, independent, arrogant, or indifferent to life. That isn’t the issue. The issue is this: The fact that a woman may choose to abort her unborn offspring (see how I’m doing some spinning of my own here? I could have just said fetus and changed the whole tone of my point) does not obligate the government to facilitate that choice. Period. This is the difference between “Rights” and “Entitlement.” A woman has the right to chose, and to seek assistance. The government has no obligation to ensure that assistance; but only to see that the choice is not trifled with. A doctor has the right to assist or not to assist. The government’s job is not to facilitate the practical exploitation of rights. Its job is to see to it that those rights are not denied, and that the application of those rights is equitable, and that’s all. In other words, to stay out of the way.
Reversing Roe v Wade would have no affect on a woman’s right to choose. None. (Unless abortion was made illegal again, which I do not believe is likely or necessary.) That idea, inculcated by the more strident Feminists and the liberal left, is specious. Such a reversal might affect the convenience of getting an abortion, and the cost, but not the choice to have one. The two are not the same. The choice is the purview of government; the procedure is up to the individual and her physician. Abortion, as ugly and inhumane as it is, should not be illegal (at least not until we grow up as a people and see the error of our ways). But it should certainly not be guaranteed and funded by government. Such a position is outrageous and detrimental to the orderly continuation of society. If such were the case, there would be plenty of doctors willing to do the procedure, for a fee. Limited access to the procedure in no way inhibits the right to chose, as long as access is legally available. And let’s not even talk about the supposed “unfair advantage” this places on women, or the “unfair disadvantage.” The fact that an individual woman might not be able to afford the procedure and might have to go ahead and have her baby has nothing to do with anything. She should literally have thought about that before she had sex. Sex isn’t a right either, by the way, in case someone was under the erroneous impression that such was the case. We are guaranteed the “pursuit of happiness,” not happiness itself. Now that I think of it, we are guaranteed “life” as well. It seems a reasonable and practical matter that the life of an unborn fetus would fall under that guarantee.
The real issue here is a woman’s choice. And many of us are determined to keep that choice pure and unfettered, even at the cost of sacrificing another life. But I have never understood why this particular choice is so important to women. Seriously. What is it about it that makes the entire subject so intense, the debate so passionate? I understand the “we have the right to make decisions about our own bodies” argument, and I agree. But at the cost of another life? Really? I would love it if someone—preferably a reasonable someone—would email me and explain the fundamental aspects of this—the way it really is. The why. What’s at stake.
Sometimes I feel like Roe v Wade is the result of an inferiority complex; that women were kept in thrall for so long that they reacted without really thinking this through and realizing all the ramifications. I could be wrong . . . Maybe as a male I just don’t get it. Apparently some men do, right? Or at least agree with the principle. But I would never try to limit or restrict a woman’s right to choose. And that declaration is in no way incompatible with finding Roe v Wade a poor decision.
And of course, as I have claimed before, the real choice a woman makes (and a man) is to engage in that activity by which a human female becomes pregnant. That is where the actual morality of the situation lies. Once she (and he) have elected to have sex, it is clearly incumbent on them to accept responsibility for the (biologically inevitable) outcome.
The position of the Bloogers at Moveon, and the morally-bankrupt feminist movement is strictly political. They purposefully ignore the existence of the fetus, making the entire debate about the woman and her “rights”. But having access to government-funded abortions is an entitlement, not a right. And I haven’t said a word about the rights of the fetus, while clearly running logical rings around my opponents.