Friday, January 28, 2005

Ex Post Epiphany

A thought is bubbling in my brain and pushing on my fingers. What follows may be crap. I may be on a Bushian yellow brick road, I admit, but this just hit me:

The pro choice position is the only successful strategy available to the anti-abortion crowd.

What is the real objective for anti-abortion loonies?

Wait. That is just the attitude that stops dialogue in its tracks, huh?

What is the real objective of anti-abortion people? I used to think they didn't want women to have abortions, and I still think the majority of them believe that's their main goal. I also think a lot of careers have been made in the Anti-Abortion Complex (much like the Military Industrial Complex, etc). The institutionalization of protest makes it hard for some folks to go home when the game is over. What would some people do with themselves if they had to live a normal life?

But let's step aside from the loonies and the hatemongers. I want to speak to the rational anti-abortion person who sincerely wants to stop abortions out of some supposedly altruistic mindset. (full disclosure: I believe in abortion on demand, that a woman should not have to be pregnant under any circumstances if she simply does not want to be.)

In that event, pro-choice is the only anti-abortion position that works.

Women have had, do have, and will always have abortions -- because they really don't for some reason want to be pregnant . It doesn't matter if god will hate them, it doesn't matter if you will hate them. It doesn't matter. They will have an abortion. Or they will hide the pregnancy and become actual instead of theoretical murderers as they visit the Dumpster after delivery.

This last paragraph is a statement of fact, the same as "rain falls from the sky to the ground" or "Tuesday comes after Monday."

Women will have abortions.

Women will have abortions no matter what.

No matter what god thinks.
No matter what the law is.

No matter what the law is.

Women choose, whether "choice" is legal or not. Women choose.

You must stop fighting the fact that women choose. Too much energy and resources are used up in that fight, and what do you get from it? Smug mouthpieces guarding cushy talk-talk jobs is only a piece of it.

Embrace the choice! If you really care about what you say you care about, don't work for laws that say rain will fall up and Tuesday will come before Monday. Work for laws that support motherhood. Make the world a better place for mothers.

Make the world a place where pregnant women choose to become mothers.

It might be harder work. But you know what? It might not be.

Pro-Choice is the only Pro-Life philosophy that works.

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