Symbiotic
Abortion is generally not the problem in need of our attention. In most cases, abortion is one result of a number of related problems; abortion is wrapped up in intimate ways with attitudes about sex, living wages, access to good jobs, healthcare, childcare, education, and so on....[via AlterNet, HT: grrrl meets world]
Girls from conservative homes like mine do not need lectures about the shame of sex, but about the beauties and dangers of sex, and ways to avoid the dangers. They must learn to love their bodies, draw appropriate boundaries, and know what precautions to take when they are ready for sex. Hatred of women and women's bodies in the Christian tradition are abortion issues.
Women from all walks of life must make a living wage so they can support children when they are ready to have them. If two-thirds of all women who seek abortions say they cannot afford a child, improving economic conditions by providing viable job opportunities for both men and women should greatly decrease the number of abortions. Raising the minimum wage is an abortion issue.
Women everywhere must have affordable health care for themselves and their children, so they can bring healthy children into the world and keep them healthy. Affordable universal healthcare is an abortion issue.....
To engage in productive dialogue about abortion, we must account for justice and equity; we must strive to make our country one where laws, practices, programs, and attitudes nurture women and allow them the opportunity to bring babies into the world when they can support them, provide them excellent healthcare, send them to college without putting themselves in massive debt, and promise them truthfully there are living-wage jobs waiting for them.
Come to think of it, if this isn't a genuinely pro-life position, I don't know what is.
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I think the article was disingenuous. "Pro-life" is synonymous with "fetal rights" and any position that does not acknowledge fetal rights is not genuinely pro-life. It's a bit of rhetorical sophistry.
ReplyDeleteOf course, because we all know that being "for-life" only can be defined in ONE way.
ReplyDeleteSuzanne, does this mean a supportive economic and social environment for women and children is "anti-life" then? The author seems to articulate the limitations of fetal rights and abstract empowerment.
ReplyDeleteBecky, the issue is not about where one defines things here. (Both visions attempt to capture an ideal of integrity, good or bad.) It is more about how the various aspects of life work together to create a better outcome. Isn't that what the processes of pregnancy, birth and parenthood are all about?
Um, Jadon, I was responding to Suzanne's assertion that "'pro-life' is synonymous with 'fetal rights'..."
ReplyDeleteHence, my sarcasm. You know my position on how I define being pro-life, and yet in favor of reproductive choice.
Yes Becky, I know. What did the sarcasm achieve though? Both you and Suzanne define things differently here, so your response reinforces a negative perception of your position. Is THAT what you want from your detractors?
ReplyDeleteSuzanne was responding to the last sentence. However, she has not considered whether or when fetal protection is at the expense of viable living conditions for both children and their mothers. This makes her focus rather fuzzy and invites criticisms of myopia.
So neither comment was truly satisfying but rather predictable. (Yawn!) Such dialogue is hard to take seriously.