Abortion has become a simplistic catchall term for a wide variety of health care procedures for women, many of which don’t involve the removal of a healthy fetus. Yet the anti-abortion activists would have you believe that any intervention involving a woman’s uterus or reproductive system is against God’s will.
They imply that all abortions are undertaken merely for selfish reasons. That the woman is too lazy or immature to prevent pregnancy through the use of contraceptives or that she simply views pregnancy as inconvenient.
These are intentionally simplistic narratives that have been carefully crafted to invoke emotions. The activists want you to believe that all abortion is murder. That all women who consider terminating a pregnancy are evil. And that all doctors who come to their aid are “baby killers.” To that end, they pass laws giving the unborn the same constitutional laws as fully developed humans who are no longer connected to an umbilical cord.
To make their point, they inundate you with images of smiling babies and healthy fetuses along with (usually false) information about when a fetus’s heart begins beating. And when it is capable of feeling pain.
Given the misleading information, it’s easy to see why so many people recoil at the notion of ending the development of such sweet innocent “children.” But would they feel the same way if the anti-abortion activists told them the fetus was the result of rape or incest? Would they feel the same way if the activists showed images of unviable fetuses developing without lungs, without a digestive system, without brains, without skulls, or without other body parts necessary to sustain life? Would they feel the same way if shown images of a festering mass of dead cells that endangers the life of the woman?
Would they feel the same way looking at images of ectopic pregnancies? Of zygotes, blastocysts, or molar cysts? Would they feel the same way if they were told the only chance for a fetus to live is for the woman carrying it to die?
The answer to most of these questions is no. Maybe that’s why 61 percent of Americans say abortion should be legal in all or most cases according to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center.
Nevertheless, a minority of Americans (mostly men) believe they know better. They tell you that life begins at conception. And that any intervention with that life is against God’s will. They tell you that even the use of the morning after (aka Plan B) pill is murder. Some even go so far as to claim that any form of contraception is also interfering with God’s will.
For me, such beliefs raise some obvious questions: First of all, how do they really know what is God’s will? Which God? It’s only some Christian denominations that have taken official stances against abortion. Yet there is no mention of abortion in the Bible. In fact, the Old Testament tells us that life begins with the first breath.
Moreover, if you use the anti-abortionists’ logic, would not invitro fertilization (IVF) be against God’s will? Shouldn’t that be banned? And for the arrogant men opposed to abortion, what about ED? Isn’t the use of boner pills also against God’s will?
Using the anti-abortionists’ same flawed logic, wouldn’t most forms of health care treatment be against God’s will? If a micro-managing God controls every aspect of life on Earth as many suggest, aren’t most ailments, diseases, and accidents deigned by God? So, why not ban all other types of health care along with abortion?
The truth is abortion – all abortion – is health care. Nothing more. Nothing less. No religious or government body should meddle with it other than to ensure its safety. Such health care decisions should only be made by the patient with advice and assistance of a physician. Not by fascist politicians.