“Desperate people do desperate things,” he said to me. I was
a teenager in the early 80s at a meeting of my local Right To Life group, a
movement in which I was active and passionate about. I had just asked an
elderly man of Irish descent about his support for the Irish Republican Army, a
recognized terror organization who used bombings and killings as expressions of
political resistance to British occupation of North Ireland.
I was exploring
the moral justification of anti-abortion extremists who engage in the same type
of targeted violence and killing of people involved with providing abortion
services as a strategy of fighting a “war on the unborn”. Everybody else I knew
of in the Right To Life organization outright condemned the use of violence and
denounced such killing.
“Desperate people do desperate things.” He replied the same
way when I asked him about anti-abortion terrorists. He wasn’t condoning
killing people to prevent them from killing, was he? He was just stating a
reality of human behavior. I got the distinct impression that he sympathized
with the emotional feeling of desperation and it added a justification to
whatever desperate action ensued.
Flash forward.
The abortion debate continues. It has always been. From time
immemorial women’s lives have been consumed by unwanted or unintended
pregnancies. When are pregnancies so? Why would any person not want to be
pregnant? Why would they want to be? What conditions in their lives makes a
pregnancy and childbirth preferable or what conditions make it an
astronomically harsh burden?
The glaring paradox in the politics of the abortion debate
is that the lawmakers who claim to be pro-life are overwhelmingly against
policies that help women in difficult circumstances to give birth to and raise
a child. From quality health care access to food aid to pregnancy prevention
strategies to Head Start to higher education assistance, they consistently vote
against public policy measures that help women, children and families.
Lawmakers do not encourage women who find themselves in an
unintended pregnancy to give birth, by denying them practical support for that
decision. I have never been able to wrap my head around this stark reality.
The situation is further exacerbated by these same lawmakers
who make statements and support policies that shame women for their unintended
pregnancies, as though men do not bare any responsibility for unintended
pregnancy (even as it has to be 50 to 100%). The "legitimate rape"
talk and the proposals to re-define rape are the most demeaning and insulting
of all, and these come from self-described "pro-life" men.
Lawmakers should formulate public policy to encourage
effective education of both women and MEN in pregnancy prevention and to fund
programs that provide complete practical support for people in difficult
circumstances, including children AFTER they are born. Not everybody has loving
and capable family to help them. Indeed, unintended pregnancies do not
constitute the same magnitude of problem for women with loving, capable family
or financial security, whether ending by abortion or birth.
There is something deeper in the sociology of the abortion
controversy than is acknowledged in the political noise surrounding it. When
the underlying cultural values that cause abortion remain the same, laws that
restrict or criminalize abortion change nothing. They solve no problems because THE PROBLEM isn't the number of total abortions (which is always way WAY too many illegal or not), it's unintended pregnancy.
I empathize with the passion people on all sides of this debate have for it. I am interested in problem solving. Problems cannot be solved when the causes of the problems are misidentified or ignored. How do we change society to promote love, acceptance, understanding and real practical support for women with unintended pregnancies?
In the realm of politics, I say we start by taking politicians to task who talk out both sides of their mouths.
I empathize with the passion people on all sides of this debate have for it. I am interested in problem solving. Problems cannot be solved when the causes of the problems are misidentified or ignored. How do we change society to promote love, acceptance, understanding and real practical support for women with unintended pregnancies?
In the realm of politics, I say we start by taking politicians to task who talk out both sides of their mouths.
They do not want to prevent unintended pregnancies or rape.
They want to prevent women from having sex of their own, personal volition
without wanting to become pregnant.
When government imposes law that demands certain things of
people, government is responsible for the outcomes of those demands.
Government didn’t create abortion and government can’t stop it. Only a compassionate and understanding society can do that.
