America’s abandoned morals — Abortion does not allow for morality, responsibility, or growth
It seems we elude morality and responsibility as much as possible in America today, especially where unintended pregnancies are concerned.I recently heard a commercial from a reproductive health organization offering contraceptive services, counseling and testing for unplanned pregnancies. They said they offered understanding, not judgment. I was astounded.
Out of curiosity, I looked up a well-known reproductive health organization, Planned Parenthood, to see what they said about pregnancies in general.
Their website stated, “It’s essential to know that if you’re pregnant, you have options.” One of the three options they offered was abortion. This did not surprise me, but it stunned me that abortion was considered one of the primary options in a pregnancy and not a last resort or an emergency option. There’s something wrong with that.
These messages seem all too common in our society. There is nothing wrong, of course, with counseling or testing in unplanned pregnancies, but when it goes in the direction of abortion or contraception, it is completely wrong.
Since the 1973 Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade, which declared the abortion laws of Texas and similar states unconstitutional as they apparently infringed on rights granted in the Ninth and 14th Amendments, it seems that abortion has become so deeply ingrained in our society that it is actually normal and acceptable. I realize abortion is not a new concept, but the fact that America — a country that stands for life, liberty and freedom for all — made it legal is disturbing.
What is wrong with America? What happened to our ideals on the value of life?
To be blunt, abortion is nothing but murder. It involves a human killing another human who has no say in the matter or a way of defending himself or herself. It also involves putting someone’s “rights” and feelings above a human life. Any way you slice it, abortion is a disgusting ordeal.
Abortion also invokes the idea of slavery. A famous claim of “pro-choice” advocates is that a woman’s body is hers to do with as she sees fit — which includes aborting children. That very claim suggests that a child is a woman’s to do with as she pleases. Is a child, then, owned by their mother? It would seem so, as the mother now has the legal authority to take their life without their consent while the child is still a part of their body.
Abortion is an evil we need to rectify in our society. It’s truly a disturbing reality — one that needs to be stopped before it’s too late.
Let’s start encouraging people to be responsible and do what’s right. Let’s restore America’s ideals and our own shattered morality. Most importantly, let’s stop trying to play God. We have no right to determine who lives and who dies.
Andrew Jenson can be reached at arg-opinion@uidaho.edu
Tags: abortion, America, planned parenthood
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The people (mostly men) who call women murderers will never understand what a woman is going through when she faces a difficult, often complex pregnancy decision. There is a reason that so many Republican wives are all pro-choice—from Betty Ford to Nancy Reagan to Laura Bush to current House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s wife, Diana Cantor. These women know that they cannot walk in another woman’s shoes and know what she and her family are going through.
Did you know that six out of 10 women that have abortions are already mothers? Mandating government interference in their medical decisions—or in a victim of rape or incest’s medical decisions—is far from the cry of family values these anti-choice people claim. If we want to talk family values, let’s talk about expanding birth control options and making contraception easy for anyone to obtain so we can actually prevent abortion.
In 1910, women were the possessions of their husbands, all methods of birth control and abortion were illegal and maternal mortality rates were at 15.4%, compared to 1% in 2005 (according to the US Census Bureau). Men were governed only by The Rule of Thumb, which stated that a man could not use any object larger than his thumb to beat his wife and children.
We have come a long way.
Since before the 1850’s in America, free thinking citizens have been fighting to establish and protect women’s rights; the right to vote, to protect themselves against domestic violence and to have medical control over their own bodies.
But in recent years, as being Politically Correct gained ground, women’s rights have lost it, and no one seems to mind. In fact, many citizens are fighting to rescind the rights we have fought for and won.
Being a strong, independent woman is now a stigma. Having an abortion is ‘murder’? How is it possible to murder a life form that, like a parasite, is unable to survive outside its host’s body?
No one should be forced to be a parent. Every child should be a wanted child.
If abortion is outlawed, only outlaws will have abortions. The practice will still exist. Women will visit back alley butchers and possibly die as a result. It is our responsibility to keep it legal, and therefore safe.
There are many reasons that women have abortions, not the least of which is rape. The day a sexual assault victim is forced, by law, to give birth to her attacker’s child is the day I will demand change in America.
The act of reversing a woman’s right to choose, aside from damaging lives and societal norms, will set a dangerous precedent toward the reversal of other rights.
It is now nesessary battle those who would take away the rights our ancestors have spent their lives fighting for. We must look out for ourselves because no one else will do it now.
On the other hand, we could retreat back into the simpler times of wasp waists and the joys of being an object, a genteel time when the average woman had 8 children and died by her 30th birthday. How hard can something the width of a thumb actually hurt?
As a feminist, I agree with you that the treatment of women in previous generations was terrible and reform was badly needed. But as Sidney Callahan said, “We will never climb to equality over the dead bodies of our own children.” Compounding violence with more violence is wrong. I know of one rape victim who had an abortion, and said that the abortion was like a second rape, and that it would have been easier to endure nine months of pregnancy than 17 years of regret. Also, only 1-3% of abortions are performed because of rape, incest, or a threat to the mother’s life.
It does not follow that in order to be a feminist, one must be pro-abortion. Some of our most revered and well-known abolitionists and suffragettes, who fought tirelessly for women’s rights, have been anti-abortion. Susan B. Anthony said of abortion, “No matter what the motive, love of ease, or a desire to save from suffering the unborn innocent, the woman is awfully guilty who commits the deed.” Elizabeth Cady Stanton called abortion “the murder of children.” Alice Paul, the author of the original Equal Rights Amendment, said, “Abortion is the ultimate exploitation of women.”
Did you know that Margaret Sanger, the founder and direction-setter of Planned Parenthood, believed that light skinned people were superior to dark skinned people? Did you know that she was a proponent of eugenics and said it would “assist the race toward the elimination of the unfit”? Did you know she believed people with disabilities should be sterilized and segregated? Did you know that she called the poor and minorities “a dead weight of human waste” and “a menace to the race”? She didn’t want them to reproduce because it would “render them to a menacing degree dominant.” She was not exactly an advocate for human rights.
Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers make huge profits from abortion. They have as much invested in making women believe the fetus is nothing more than a “blob of tissue” or a “parasite” as Monsanto has invested in convincing us GMO food is safe. Using dehumanizing language has always been a strategy used by those who seek to justify their oppression of others.
I would ask you this: when does the fetus become a person? Would you agree that before that point, abortion is not murder, but after that point, it is? So, when, exactly, does the killing of a developing baby become murder? Is it when he or she exits the mother’s womb? Is it when he or she becomes viable? If there is any doubt about when the fetus becomes a human being, shouldn’t we err on the side of caution and not kill it, lest we commit murder?
The date of viability has changed with technology. Does that mean that the fetus becomes a human being earlier now than, say, in the 1950s because we can keep her alive outside her mother’s body earlier now? And anyway, is even a newborn really viable? After all, she is still dependent on others for her survival. Is someone on life support a human being?
Viability is somewhat of an arbitrary concept. You could just as easily say the fetus becomes a person when developing a heartbeat, brainwaves, or pain receptors. Even in the earliest first-trimester abortions, the fetus has a beating heart and brainwaves. Technology has shown that by eight to ten weeks after conception, the unborn child is sensitive to touch and can feel pain, a fact to which medical authorities have testified.
Size and stage of development have no bearing on the personhood of human beings. If that were so, than a newborn would be less human than a toddler, who would be less human than an adult.
I agree with you that no one should be forced to be a parent. That’s why we should have easy access to affordable contraception, and why adoption should be encouraged for women who choose not to parent the babies they have conceived. However, our feelings are not what make us good parents or otherwise. Our sense of duty, responsibility, and selflessness determines that.
Women still die from legal abortions, and the fact that illegal abortions would happen anyway if abortion was outlawed is not a good argument for keeping it legal. We could just as well say robbery should be legalized because a robber might get hurt running from the police. Abortion is never completely safe, and it’s definitely not safe for the victim.
Outlawing abortion will not force women to retreat back to the conditions of the 1800s. Giving unborn babies basic protections under the law is not going to condone domestic violence, take away the right to vote, or prevent women from entering the workplace. Mothers can, and do, participate fully in a democratic society. In fact, it is profoundly demeaning to women to think of pregnancy or motherhood as some kind of disability. And again, for those who choose not to parent the life they have already created, adoption is always an option.
The day millions of defenseless human beings are forced, by law, to be ripped violently limb by limb from their mothers’ wombs, is the day I demand change in America. Or we could just leave things the way they are. After all, how much can decapitating scissors and a vacuum suction tube actually hurt?
Don’t believe in abortion? Don’t have one. Leave my rights alone.
Many people regret life CHOICES they make. Does that mean we take away their right to make decisions? What women do with their bodies is no ones business but their own.
As a pro-choice mom with a pro-choice mom I value each and every one of my rights, regardless of whether I choose to use them.
Try originality next time. Stealing my lines is a little thing known as ‘plagiarism.’ This can be damaging to your academic and future career, particularly when you glean from a columnist.
A dictionary may come in handy as well. “Murder” is a word with a precise definition. You seem to be ignorant of it.
Plagiarism is taking another’s words or ideas and passing them off as your own, rather than giving credit to the original author. If I took that final paragraph and used it in a different context as though it was my original thought, that would be plagiarism. But that’s not what I did. I repeated your words back to you with a sarcastic twist to illustrate a different perspective. It would be obvious to anyone reading this that I used your words in a subversive manner to make a point. I made no attempt to conceal that. The reader’s not expected to believe those are my original words, since I was replying directly to you, nor would I ever use that final paragraph in another context.
Saying, “Don’t believe in abortion? Don’t have one” is like saying, “Don’t believe in rape? Then don’t do it, but let the rest of us do with our bodies what we please.” The problem with both rape and abortion is there’s another human being involved.
My Merriam Webster dictionary defines murder (verb) as 1: to commit a murder; also: to kill brutally 2: to put an end to.
Hmm, does abortion kill brutally? Yes. Does it put an end to a human life? Yes, it’s a scientific fact that human life begins at conception. Is it committing a murder? Well, let’s find out.
The same dictionary defines murder (noun) as 1: the crime of unlawfully killing a person.
Abortion in 1972 was killing a person unlawfully. Just two years later, in 1974, it was lawfully killing a person. Did two years transform abortion from murder to not-murder? Is the truth that subjective? I would argue it’s not. It was murder then, and it’s murder now.
Let’s look up the definition of “person.” Merriam-Webster defines person as 1: a human being 3: the body of a human being.
Well, that’s problematic, isn’t it? Surely if we were all in agreement that the fetus is a human being, we wouldn’t be having this argument, would we? It’s inconceivable that one person would think it morally expedient to kill another human being simply because they’re not wanted, right? (Note the irony.) Since we are using the dictionary as the ultimate reference, let’s look up “human” and “being.”
The definition of human is 1: of, relating to, being, or characteristic of humans 2: having human form or attributes. The definition of being is 1: existence; also: life 2: the qualities or constitution of an existent thing.
Is the fetus human? Yes, he or she is certainly not another species. Is it alive? Yes. Does it exist? Yes, and if it didn’t, abortion wouldn’t be considered necessary.
We may disagree, and you may not like my rhetoric, but that does not make me ignorant. Attacking me personally was uncalled for. Let’s stick to the issues.
I am a woman and a mother. I have a life-threatening condition and went through an incredibly difficult unplanned pregnancy. I still firmly believe abortion is murder. Having been pregnant, it is very hard for me to understand how fellow women who are mothers could have an abortion. I knew my daughter was a human being and could feel her spirit within me from the very beginning. I would rather die than abort a child and commit a murder. My wanting or not wanting her did not determine her humanity. She was a human being from the moment she was conceived – a fact medical textbooks testify to.
Having said that I am ardently pro-life, I must agree with apstyle that we need to expand access to contraception. I will never understand why some of my fellow prolifers argue against contraception, religious objections notwithstanding. Contraception prevents pregnancies – and abortions – while abortion violently takes a life. Using contraception is a personal choice, while abortion is a choice that kills another human being, making it no longer just a personal choice. Those of us who are against abortion need to focus our efforts on helping women – like me – who have found themselves facing a difficult or unplanned pregnancy with few resources. We need to support – not oppose – expanded access to contraception.
Great article Andrew! It continues to anger me and break my heart that innocent lives are destroyed based on a calendar date. I hope I live to see the day when this heinous law is reversed and lives are held precious once again. We are such a “through away” society. If we don’t want something and it doesn’t fit into our lives, just get rid of it. I’m sure if this law were reversed, people would once again be more careful and morally upright. We all know how pregnancies happen. I look forward to the day when the constitution’s rights, the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness applies to all humans!
Amen! That’s an interesting insight about this being a “throw away” society. So sad but true.