Abortion: The CHOICE That Dares Not Speak Its Name
I recently heard a commentary on NPR by a disillusioned feminist known as Frederica Mathews-Green, who now writes for a Christian publication. Although she advocated the right to choose 30 years ago, she now bemoans the "oppression" that having the right to choose abortion has caused women.
Mathews-Green claims that following the Roe vs. Wade decision, she encountered many women who felt compelled to have an abortion when faced with an unplanned pregnancy. These women felt that they would only receive support from friends and significant others if they chose abortion, and would be condemned had they chosen to carry out their pregnancies. I suppose it never occurred to Mathews-Green, or to the women facing these choices, that the real issue was not having too many choices, but feeling pressured into taking one action over the other. Legally, both options were open to these women. There was no law in place mandating that every pregnancy end in abortion, or that any pregnancies end in abortion for that matter. The real problem was social pressure, pressure that compels many women to feel as if they have no choice. In fact, if any of these women really was being coerced into having an abortion by a significant other or anyone else with significant power in her life, then carrying out the pregnancy was not a choice, any more than a safe, legal abortion was a choice for any woman in the U.S. before Roe vs. Wade.
Obviously (except to Mathews-Green), it is the lack of choice, not the presence of it, that oppresses. It might be helpful for Mathews-Green to remember that Roe vs. Wade did not promote or mandate abortions; it merely allowed for them. This is quite different from a legal mandate or societal pressure to abort, such as exists today in China with its one child per family policy. If Mathews-Green's friends felt so compelled to go against their own judgment to end their pregnancies, it wasn't Roe vs. Wade's fault.
With any choice comes responsibility, and that can be scary. There are a number of women who seem to not want the responsibility that comes with having more decisions to make, having to stand up and take action instead of passively waiting to be rescued. But giving up the right the choose is giving away one's power. Which alternative is worse, having to agonize over a decision, or being at the mercy of others to make the decision for you? Making decisions and taking responsibility for our choices makes us more fully realized persons, in essence, more human.
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