Why I am Pro-Choice

Originally posted on Cafemom, then LiveJournal, then Facebook. Facebook date February 26, 2011.

I wrote this several years ago, some of you may have seen it. I could probably put it more eloquently now, but I figured I'd just post it and re-edit it later, before the blog I have it on gets rid of it as being too old a post.

After sitting quietly and simply responding to the abortion debate that is raging here on Cafe Mom, I realized that I and many of my Pro-Choice compatriots spend more time responding to the bashing of organizations like Planned Parenthood and the act of abortion in general than we do spreading our message. I wondered if we should take a more proactive stance on being pro choice, but realized that would be counter productive to our message. The reason for this is clear, we're pro choice, and that means that we feel free to allow others to make their own choice, granted that they allow us to make our own. When we find ourselves embroiled in debates about abortion, it isn't because we are in favor of abortion or favor "not taking responsibility for ones actions," or even worse "getting rid of the little buggers" as one pro-lifer recently accused me of. It is because we do not want to see people bamboozled and mislead by false and biased information. We don't want anyone taking away our or other women's choice in the matter, and feel that allowing biased information with an obvious agenda to be put about without challenge is wrong. We feel that every person has the right to make an informed decision based on their own opinions from information that is truthfully presented to them.

But why am I personally pro choice? What made me decide to let others do as they will?  Part of it is logic. Will outlawing abortions stop them? No. The proof is behind us, in our own history when abortions were preformed in back alleys and cheap motel rooms, under horrendous conditions and without proper medical care or emotional consideration for the women having them. Even when they were illegal, they were done. The proof is with us now in South America, were abortion is illegal in most nations and yet an estimated 50,000 women a year die of complications from illegal abortions. If 50,000 die from illegal abortions, how many have them and yet live? Is there really any way to stop a woman from aborting a child she does not want to carry, if she is truly determined to abort? No, nothing short of locking her in a room or strapping her to a bed for her entire pregnancy.  

So when I made the decision to be pro choice, I made the decision to fight for the rights of other women who decide to have abortions to do so with medical care and support, with as little risks to their lives and safety as possible, weather or not I agree with their decision. Personally, I have several moral and ethical issues with abortion, but to quote a friend "the decision to terminate a pregnancy is between that woman, her doctor, and her God." It is not my place to judge her, or tell her how to live her life. If God has a problem with that, he and I will discuss it on the day of my judgement. Personally, I believe that any child God wants to be on this earth will be here regardless or not of if his mother has an abortion. I don't believe everything in life is predestined, but I think in the end, the will of God will prevail.

But it goes deeper than that. Reading responses on an abortion debate, it really struck me that when I think of a woman having an abortion, I think of the woman who is scared and sad, who knows she cannot care for a child but could not bear to give up a child that grew in her body for ten months, and knowing that, felt that abortion was the best option. I think of the woman who has a family that is already complete and decides that having another, who was unplanned and unexpected, would do more harm than good. I think of the woman who screwed up once, and now has to make a painful choice over weather or not having a child will ruin her life, or if having an abortion will. I'm more concerned with the living than those who have yet to live outside the womb. I care more about the life of a woman who has an established history and life than a child who is not yet fully formed. I care more about the QUALITY of the lives already on this earth than the QUANTITY.

When Pro-lifers think of a woman having an abortion, they think of a selfish woman who went out and slept around without protection, doesn't want to handle it, and sees abortion as an easy option, maybe even something they've done before. This is a fallacy, it is not a decision that any woman comes to lightly. They see a woman that they villainize, who is everything they hate. A woman who values her freedom and her lifestyle more than human life. They don't see the women I see, they see this woman, and to them she is pretty much every woman who has an abortion. When you bring up rape and incest victims, they pull out examples of women who were raped or became pregnant from incest and kept the child as proof that it is possible. This sets a dangerous precedent, the same way the canonization of women who fought and were killed rather than be raped did, telling victims that it was their own fault if they were raped, they should have rather died than suffer it. It victimizes these women yet again by casting them as villains who are at fault instead of innocents facing a terrible decision.

There are other reasons too, that lead me to be pro choice. I don't feel qualified to tell other women what to do with their lives, their bodies, and their children. If I start telling women they HAVE to have the children they conceive, then I am telling them what to do in their lives, and I don't want others doing that to me. Who am I to dictate how to live to others? I feel people who do are self serving and think they are better than others. Self righteous.  Legislating away a woman's right to choose weather or not to have an abortion also legislates away her rights to have a pregnancy. It sets a precedent that others can control what happens to a woman's body. It tells women that they don't know whats best for them, so the government will step in and take charge. These are women, many times adults or on the cusp of, who have minds of their own. They aren't drug addicts taking mind altering substances or mentally unstable, they are pregnant, and facing a difficult decision.

This is a dangerous precedent, because in the beginning, it's "You have to birth every child you conceive." then it's"We get to decide how many kids you can have," then then it's "We get to decide who gets to conceive." Yes, this is a slippery slope argument, but it's already happening with the limitation of family size in China. It could scarily happen here. I hear people say all the time, "Oh, they have HOW many kids? Someone should stop them!" or "They should never have been allowed to breed, there should be a test you have to take to be a parent." Often times their meaning is well, but when they start discussing making it a law, it becomes dangerous. It becomes an infringement on my personal rights, my right to live my life without interference and without hurting anyone else. It becomes a danger to the children of people who would otherwise be deemed, for economic, lifestyle, moral or other reasons, "unfit" to have children.

Often times as a pro choicer I find myself refuting attacks made on Planned Parenthood and other organizations that offer abortion services and the morning after pill. I find myself contradicting obviously biased information and often times personal attacks that I support "baby killing" as well as "hating babies" or "hating God". These are direct quotations. My goal isn't to stir up arguments, but to stop the spread of false information. One of the main arguments I run into against Planned Parenthood is that some offices have been known to "push" abortion as a choice. I haven't heard the tapes made by the people who infiltrate PP for this purpose, but I know that there is good and bad, right and wrong, in any organization. Some PP offices may have counselors or doctors who seem to push abortion, which is wrong, but saying ALL PP offices should be shut down because of it when they offer many other worthwhile services is the same as saying that some churches have been the location of children being molested, so all churches should be shut down. It's ignorant and wrong. These offices need to be reformed, the counselors retrained, but not all of what PP does is abortions. Lots of Pro Lifers want to claim PP is all about abortions and only abortions, when that is obviously not true.

I'm pro choice for many reasons. The choice for me so far has been no. If I were to become pregnant with a child who would have serious health problems or not survive birth, that could change. Birth defects run in my family on both sides, though thank goodness Jericho's side is clear and free. My mother had as sister still born with Spinal bifida. Another aunt and my own brother bare the tell tale patch of hair thick at the base of their spines, a mark of how close they came to having Spina bifida themselves. If I were to become pregnant and it endanger my life, I cannot say what we would choose. Would it be worth it to me to potentially leave my SO without a wife, my son without a mother, and my family without a sister and daughter, to bring a child who might never know me into the world? The idea of having an abortion makes me weep, but would it be fair to them to risk taking away someone they love because it would hurt me so much to make the choice?

In the end, when I stopped and looked at my morals and what I believe, the answer to me was clear. With what I feel and believe, about myself, pregnancy, other women, about the law, and about God, supporting other women's right to chose and maintaining my own rights were the only way to go. I hope that this post will maybe make some folks stop and examine why they believe what they do, really stop and think about it. And I hope it opens a few eyes, so folks will see what a person who supports Choice really believes and why.