Paul Ryan and the myth of pro-life

A pro-life stance is not always as benevolent as its name would suggest. At its most basic form, it is saying that abortions are almost never the best solution. I don’t think anyone can disagree that abortion is heinous. No amount of guilt-mongering abortion fetus photography campaign can increase my level of disgust towards the act. It is disgusting, and by an ordinary person’s standards, immoral. That does not mean, however, that the next logical step would involve the revocation of a woman’s option to abort an unwanted pregnancy. Too often, the pro-choice movement is painted as a pro-abortion movement. I cannot speak for every pro-choicer, but for me, it is absolutely possible to endorse a woman’s right to have an abortion, while electing to never have such a procedure myself.

The issue of pro-life vs. pro-choice extends beyond a woman’s ability to access safe and legal methods of abortion. The debate actually boils down to whether a woman’s ownership of her body is legitimate, and whether it can be justified that the heralded American values of freedom and liberty are suddenly discontinued when a woman defies nature and wishes not to birth a baby she has conceived.

“All these men without vaginas discussing abortion,” my roommate said today. She was mostly referring to Paul Ryan and Joe Biden, who squared off in the vice-presidential debate last night. Tucked in the final few minutes of the debate, the tone became somber as the debate reached the topic of abortion, specifically as it related to both Joe Biden’s and Paul Ryan’s Catholic backgrounds and intended policies. “I don’t see how a person can separate public life from private life, or faith,” Ryan began. He asserted that faith, reason, and science all contribute to his belief that women should only be granted abortions in the case of rape, incest, or if there is a threat to the mother’s life. It is a simplistic, borderline myopic view that does not account for the realities and diversities of the human experience. For example, what qualifies rape? Rape is likely characterized in people’s minds as a miscellaneous, violent act — maybe by a masked stranger in a dark alley. There is such a large spectrum in defining rape that it would add great difficulty to asserting this as one of the few exceptions to pro-life measures.

There are many things along these lines that make Ryan’s situational exceptions problematic. In a perfect world, every situation involving pregnancy would result in a healthy baby being born into a world of love and care, from two parents, biological or otherwise. There are those who oppose abortion because it is murder—and yes, it is. But as with any murder, legal repercussions aside, the emotional and mental consequences deflect largely if not solely onto the “perpetrator.” And this is not to suggest that women who have had abortions should carry around the guilt and regret of a cold-blooded killer; this is to say that if a woman has made the conscious decision that terminating pregnancy is optimal to her life, she lives with the decision. Regulating abortion rights in such a way that the Romney-Ryan ticket would may serve as an assault on women’s health, and more importantly, their sexual and reproductive rights. Unwanted pregnancies have been around since before there were lively television debates about our options for dealing with them, and there was a time where abortions were unprofessional, unsafe, and shoddily performed. Greater technology has transformed abortion into a relatively safe option for women with unwanted pregnancies, though safety in such a procedure is always debatable. However, the social stigma of even just the word “abortion” has outweighed the real matter at hand: women should not endure any additional restrictions that are not and cannot be extended to men, especially ones that invite others into the jurisdiction of their own bodies. The prevalence of teenage pregnancy in television media is just one signal that most people would prefer impromptu, uninformed parenting to the ghastly idea of an abortion. Indeed, abortion is an unpleasant procedure, but an approach like that of the Republicans sends a much broader message that women, specifically, are incapable of governing their own bodies.

There is no law that requires a man to be a father, and there should be none that requires a woman to be a mother, whether directly or simply as fact. There is no equivalent to childbirth for men; the closest thing is, well, childbirth. If a man so chooses, he can become a wonderful, involved father to a child, whether his or her birth was planned or unplanned. On the other hand, a man can just as easily choose to impregnate a woman and never have anything to do with her or the child. Men are afforded so many patriarchal privileges that are so standardized that they are virtually invisible. It is an accepted social fact that many fathers are simply absent. The single mother is a common character of society; the teenage mother is another that unfortunately has a large overlap. The unfit mother is another category that has infiltrated some of the previous categories, many times producing sad, horrific stories of abuse and even murder. Women’s situations during pregnancy and childbirth are obviously quite different from men’s. The woman walks around with the baby inside of her womb. The woman walks around with the stigma of being a pregnant teenager. The woman sleeps at night with the trauma and guilt of having an abortion. The woman feels the void of having birthed a baby she has given up for adoption, knowing she will never have that unbreakable bond with her child. There is so much more to pregnancy and childbirth than can be addressed in religious text, political debates, or academic textbooks. All the while, politicians are fervently debating the wombs of women they do not know and likely will never meet.

“Life begins at conception,” Biden said during last night’s debate, acknowledging his accordance with the beliefs of the Catholic church. But, he continued, that does not grant him the right to determine what the equally devout followers of other religions are able to do with their bodies. As a nation, we interfere with other countries’ problems, because we believe our power and strength as a nation warrants such behavior. Such is true with politicians who seek to control women’s reproductive rights: they somehow believe their opinion is of greater value than those of the millions of people their actions would affect.

It is easy to say that abortions are wrong and that no one should seek such a procedure, no matter what the circumstances are. It is easy to summarize a short list of situations in which abortion is okay, and outlaw all other instances. It is easy to stand outside of an abortion clinic and scream at the horrified women who probably debated tearfully about their decision. It is harder to actually accept the fact that as much as we might like, we cannot and should not forcefully impose our personal beliefs onto others, because we will only walk in our own shoes for the remainder of our lives. It is hard to accept that we are not always right, even sometimes when we believe we are. It is hard to set aside personal beliefs and standards to come to logical and practical conclusions that affect everyone. Conceding to the regulation of our bodies is one of the first steps towards imprisonment. If we are not free in our own bodies, then there is no limit to the liberties that can be stripped of us as women and as people.