Yesterday, I wrote that “government-mandated childbirth is the essence of the pro-life position; if you don’t favor using state force to make pregnant woman give birth against their will, you’re not pro-life.”<\/p>\n
Obeah<\/a>, in the comments, wittily objected to this:<\/p>\n <\/center><\/p>\n Well, no doubt some pro-lifers are interested in “the injustices that often lead women to seek abortion” and so on, but that’s not the defining trait of the movement. You don’t have<\/em> to be interested in that stuff to qualify as pro-life.<\/p>\n The abortion debate is about one question: “Should the government force childbirth on pregnant women?” The answer to that question is what classifies someone as pro-life or pro-choice.<\/p>\n Everything else is extra; add-ons. An individual pro-choicer might be, like you, someone who dislikes abortion and wishes to reduce its incidence as much as possible (to make it “safe, legal and rare,” as the expression goes); she might be libertarian, or feminist, or anarchist, or vegitative activist, or whatever. The point is, it doesn’t matter<\/em> which of these things she is; knowing that she’s a vegan or a libertarian or whatnot won’t tell us she’s pro-choice. Knowing that she’s against state-mandated childbirth tells us she’s pro-choice.<\/p>\n Similarly, some pro-lifers are Catholics, some are atheists, some care about women’s well-being, some are pro-death-penalty, some oppose the death penalty, some are republicans, some are libertarians, some are democrats, and so on. Because<\/em> one can be any or none of these things and still be pro-life, none of these things can be said to be part of the core pro-life position.<\/p>\n So with due respect to Obeah<\/a>, I’ll stand by what I said. The essence of the pro-life position is advocating laws that force childbirth on unwilling pregnant women. All the rest is optional add-ons.<\/p>\n .<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Yesterday, I wrote that “government-mandated childbirth is the essence of the pro-life position; if you don’t favor using state force to make pregnant woman give birth against their will, you’re not pro-life.” Obeah, in the comments, wittily objected to this: … Continue reading