People laugh at conservatives for their admittedly glaring hypocrisy that they are anti-abortion but also oppose most social programs. We should laugh at them: they deserve to be laughed at. But… well, I’ll just cut straight to the chase. We’ve already tackled gender identity, so why not tackle the other cultural lodestone?
In our society, abortion is a necessary option. From sexual assault to economic hardship, the reasons for why it’s necessary are too many to count. This article is not - let me repeat, not - about whether people should have abortions. This article concerns the socioeconomic structures that force people to consider this choice and how unbelievably cruel our society is to make women face the choice regularly.
The abortion debate usually focuses on whether it’s murder. While I don’t think it’s murder, casting the debate in those terms obfuscates the real problem. The real problem is that it’s harmful. No matter your political beliefs, it’s traumatic. It, plus a host of other practices such as assisted suicide, family disintegration, and the arguments against overpopulation, all act as opposing forces to life.
As it stands right now, religion and government cruelty are the two biggest reasons behind our high abortion rates. Religion for two reasons: it shames women from seeking birth control, and it allows for the exploitation of women at the hands of men. Government cruelty because the government has introduced economic inequality to such a degree that people can’t afford to have children.
None of this negates the fact that abortion is indicative of how sick our society is. We need to understand this. We need to be clear-eyed about the alternatives they’ve stolen from us.
In a healthy society, poverty wouldn’t exist. Men wouldn’t have the ability to coerce women into sex, let alone pregnancy. Women would know that if they got pregnant, they and their children would have full support. They’d be well-fed, educated, and have an opportunity to do whatever they wanted to do in life.
Similarly, women would trust their government to prosecute crimes, one of which would be violence against women. They’d be protected from ever having an unwanted sexual encounter that could lead to pregnancy.
And, the full weight of the scientific community would be thrown behind developing a non-hormonal, pain-free, fully effective birth control option.
Let’s imagine we live in such a society. Our children and mothers have unconditional economic and educational support, our women are protected, and we have access to safe, healthy, effective birth control. It should be a firm cultural expectation that you obtain birth control if you know you are going to have sex without wanting children. The fact that I even need to state this is insane, but there are a lot of religious and irreligious people who would disagree with me, albeit for different reasons.
The government should never be in the business of mandating health practices. It’s simply not their purview. However, birth control should be a cultural norm, mostly because of the extreme consequences of not having birth control. Abortion would still be an option, but it should come with a serious, empathetic conversation encouraging the person to get birth control.
Some people in the US freak out at the suggestion of a pre-abortion waiting period or ultrasound. This in itself is telling - if this choice didn’t come with profound consequences, would they fight so hard to keep people from engaging with them?
We are adults. If we are going to make a massive choice, we should be adult enough to accept its full reality.
We’ve discussed adults; now let’s talk about children. Robbing a child of their childhood is one of life’s most serious crimes. Children are sacred; they deserve to reach adulthood protected from the worst of life’s consequences. In support of that, our culture should expect parents to protect their daughters from youth pregnancies.
I don’t care how religious you are; as a human, you should recognize that the risk of your daughter engaging in premature sexual activity because of birth control is a far less damaging possibility than that of teenage pregnancy or abortion.
These are duties we owe to our women: to protect them from violence, support them in motherhood, provide safe options for them to be able to choose when they want to start a family, and treat them as the adults they are if they make a mistake with far-reaching psychological and spiritual consequences.
These are the duties we owe to our daughters: to protect their childhood, whatever it takes. To make sure they reach womanhood without ever having to encounter these trials.
Right now, women are forced into this choice. Our economic system disincentivizes motherhood. Our government policies tear apart the family. We have limited access to birth control, our religions shame women for exploring their sexual desires, and Western society venerates casual sex. In such a system, no one can blame anyone for the choices they have to make.
Comments