Why I’m Pro Choice
Edit: whoa, it’s blog for choice day, apparently. Why didn’t I know this? You’d think someone who is a feminist pinko commie liberal and attends law school would know or care about the anniversary of Roe vs. Wade. However, I’ve been playing my Nintendo DS so much I’m lucky I know what year it is. Luckily I have brain age to tell me ever day. Anyway, I guess I participated unwittingly.
I was reading this post about stumping pro-lifers with one question, and I immediately realized this was not a good argument (I need to think more before I post, yeah not that it was a bad argument, that I’ve said this to people before and they did respond with “yeah let’s throw them all in jail” or “women who miscarry should be investigated as murderers. That’s all I meant). But anyway, I like any blog about thinking rather than just blindly practicing faith, in any case. The question that made me think about abortion, anyway, if you’re too lazy to read, was “If abortion was illegal, what should be done with the women who have illegal abortions?” For one, I have posed this question on more than one occasion to pro-lifers and they responded with visions of women who miscarry being under criminal investigation, and all sorts of horrifying things which seemed to me a Margaret Atwoodesque dystopia where women are chattle. I don’t think this question is a good way to stump someone in the forced-pregnancy camp.
I think there are a lot of arguments to be made that are difficult to refute. Something I’ve asked and never gotten a satisfactory response to, however, was how can one say abortion is murder, yet at the same time not be as adamantly calling for compulsory organ and blood donation?
The issue with compulsory organ and blood donation is one of bodily integrity. You can’t force someone to sit there with a needle drawing blood–you can’t force someone to give up his or her organs at death. Essentially, you can’t FORCE someone to sustain the life of another person, no matter how easy it would be for you to do so.
I think going through pregnancy is far more difficult than organ donation or blood donation, and yet no one is clamoring for laws making compulsory these things which would save millions upon millions of lives.
The idea of forcing people to be strapped down and have a needle shoved into their arms and blood withdrawn without their consent is horrifying. I’m not sure why with this one, but the idea of people having their organs harvested while they are brain dead leads to organ donation being a voluntary thing, despite the millions of lives it would save if everyone did it.
You truly can’t be “pro-life” without pretty much conceding that women are the one exception to a generally accepted idea that people have the right to do with their bodies what they please. Even if a fetus were a fully formed 30 year old in miniature form with a conscience, it doesn’t stand to reason that a woman should have to use her own body to sustain that of another person against her will. If a woman cannot legally stick stuff up her vagina if she wants to, or take a pill if she wants to while pregnant, or starve herself, or drink wine in a hot tub, she has effectively lost the ability to control her body in the same way a person who chooses to walk straight past the blood donation van does.
I’ve tried to anticipate arguments against this reasoning. The biggie, I assume, is “she chose to have sex,” and therefore agreed to create this life. This poses a problem when you mention rape victims, of course. If someone makes an exception then, for rape victims, they are essentially saying women should be punished for having sex, because if refusing to use one’s body to sustain another life in one instance is “murder” but it isn’t in another, I cannot see this as anything but punishment for having sex. I also don’t think choosing to create that life should obligate you to it in any case–we choose all the time to bring people in the world–yet are no longer responsible for their lives once they are out of the womb. You might say the 5 year old who needs a kidney transplant is not your responsibility, but collectively if each of us did check off the donor card and donate blood, we’d be saving those lives. Somehow an unwanted fetus is a different situation than selfishly retaining your useful organs after death when it could save lives.
I suppose you could say abortion is an active killing while withholding something from someone is a passive killing, but then you can passively kill a fetus as well by starving yourself, and I think this is an urban myth but hypothetically by sitting in a spa and drinking champagne. Should those methods of abortion be ok while more active means are not? Then again, i guess if you don’t eat, or you drink booze or too much vitamin C, or have a doctor perform a surgery on you, or take an abortifacient pill, you’re trying to *kill* the fetus right? Should you be forced to eat or go to jail? Forced to not drink certain things or go to jail? It’s all the same thing–when you force someone to use her body in a certain way, or to not use it in a certain way, you’re denying her rights that I’m pretty sure 99% of supposed “pro-lifers” find sacrosanct. Most of these people make a moronic argument that a 9 month inconvenience isn’t a big deal. I vehemently disagree with this–but for the sake of argument–even if it were–donating blood or organs is unequivocally easier. If your spouse needed a kidney to live, and you were a match, should you be forced to donate it? Is that not too a temporary inconvenience in order to save a life?
I don’t buy arguments like, the fetus needs a chance at life, or it’s “innocent.” Particularly the innocent part, because to say a fetus is innocent but a five year old needing a heart transplant isn’t can be nothing but forcing stupid fucking religion down my throat because I assume the only way someone could say that with a straight face is if they think someone needs to be born in order to find Jesus and a 5 year old is a-ok to die post baptism. I also bristle at the idea that someone who supposedly cares about “life” feels godly enough to be able to decide when someone has “lived” his or her life. I say a 60 year old who may only have 20 more years should not be tossed aside like trash just because selfish people don’t want to donate blood and organs.
So, in essence, I’m pro-choice because I think women are human beings and should never be put in a situation where their own bodies are subjugated in order to sustain another. I can’t say whether I’d have one myself because I’ve never been in the situation of becoming impregnated by rape and I have no idea how I’d react to it–but I think it’s incredibly important, even if you think women who abort are selfish assholes, to have the option NO MATTER WHAT because without it women are reduced to sub-human beings. I am not an “American factory,” and abortion is no more murder than refusing to donate blood or organs.
The one issue I’m conflicted about with this argument is whether abortion should be regulated post-viability. I think it should be, but I still don’t think a woman should have to sustain another being against her will. In this case I’d think it was VERY SELFISH to want a baby removed from one’s womb post-viability for no good reason, (I realize this would be rare upon rare and when republicans act like women abort at 8 months pregnancy for no reason as easily as purchasing a taco supreme they are full of shit) and I certainly think measures should be taken to keep it alive before putting it up for adoption (aka she shouldn’t have the right to make it dead when it would otherwise live). Then again it’s VERY SELFISH not to donate blood, bone marrow or your organs if you are able to. Just because something is asshattery doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have the right to do it.
If the answer to the above, for a pro-lifer, is something like “because god decides if people die of disease” or something, said person can go fuck a mite-infested cactus because “god” is a shitty argument and I will only entertain secular ones, although I suspect most secular anti-abortion arguments are incredibly thinly veiled.
Oh yeah, I’m also pro choice because roast fetus is DELICIOUS.
If I found someone who was vehemently in favor of compulsory blood and organ and bone marrow donation and was also pro-life I’d disagree still, but I’d at least have to give that person kudos for being intellectually consistent.
((I’d also like to point out that a lot of my arguments are like, “ok, assuming EVERYTHING YOU SAY IS TRUE, I’m still right.” This argument I make here is one of those. It’s “even if for some reason a zygote is a life on par with a post-viability baby.” I’m not saying I think that and I’m pro-choice anyway, this whole thing is, even if that were true, abortion should STILL be legal. I wish people had the mental capacity to realize they can lobby for “life” without wanting to take away women’s rights to bodily autonomy by trying to convince people to, you know, not abort on their own volition, and to be in favor of things like contraception and support for mothers without means to reduce the number of abortions)).
