https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0aNxzF7MAk
The abortion debate is back in the news, as I’m sure it will be intermittently in perpetuity, given the nature of the subject. Nonetheless, I have to hear about it constantly, and like most issues, the conscientious opinions are buried in a morass of terrible arguments delivered at a loud volume. There are, like on any issue, a handful of reasonable arguments on either side of the issue. I actually don’t really care one way or the other. I have no horse in the race. I’m just sick of hearing the same stupid arguments over and over.
The issue is actually a fairly recent one, going back to the 1960’s and 70’s. In the States, landmark Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade made so-called “on demand” abortion legal nationwide (that is, abortion outside cases of rape or medical necessity). Prior to that, it was basically illegal everywhere, although a few states granted exceptions. Legislation in Europe started legalizing the practices around the same time. The Swiss being Europe’s only constitutional confederacy, I’m assuming it was a legally smoother process over there. Actually, the UK still does not currently allow on-demand abortions. Most European nations only allow procedures to take place within the first trimester, and many require counseling beforehand, or other such regulations. Roe v. Wade used insanely tortured legal logic, citing the 14th Amendment, which was passed to ensure that civil rights could no longer be denied to black people, a number of whom had been slaves up until then. It was argued that abortion laws constituted an abridgement of the right to privacy, which is mentioned in the 14th Amendment (specifically, a recapitulation of the 4th Amendment). I don’t care what side of the abortion debate you come down on, but that was a nonsense legal call. The right to privacy means the government can’t barge into your home or search your stuff without a warrant (it’d be nice if the courts were as diligent as enforcing this in clear-cut cases, but I suppose that’s another issue), and abortion has nothing to do with that. The sheer inconsistency of how the privacy law is applied is mind-numbing, but in fairness, government inconsistency is in fact another argument. It just doesn’t help that the US’ legal precedent for legalizing abortion was really stupid from a constitutional perspective.
The fall-out from this change of pace was not handled maturely by Americans, and I suspect the media and politicians made it a thousand times worse. I wasn’t alive/aware for a lot of that time, but I’m not giving them the benefit of the doubt…. According to these people, there are two sides to the debate: you are either okay with abortion in all cases (pro-choice), or against it in all cases (pro-life). “Well, what about people who are okay with it in some circumstances but opposed it in others?” You’ve got a lotta nerve, mister! This is American political discourse; there can be no compromise, no in-between, no moderation. Pick a side! You have to!
Except you don’t have to, nor should you if that’s not your actual stance. Even most anti-abortion people would probably be okay with exceptions in the event that the mother’s life is in danger, and I’d wager a good number of them would allow for exemptions in the event of rape. According to a Gallup poll, 60% of people who identified as “pro-life” would allow abortions in at least some circumstances (http://www.gallup.com/poll/183434/americans-choose-pro-choice-first-time-seven-years.aspx). On the other side, I’m sure many people who think it’s acceptable to keep abortion legal might go in for regulations such as requiring counseling before making the decision to terminate. Then there’s the ambivalent people who wouldn’t be super opposed to limiting terminations to the first trimester, where around 90% of abortions are performed anyway, or banning third trimester abortions, where only a fraction of a percent are performed (www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.html). Or any number of different specifics one could get into. But we don’t allow for these kinds of debates in the public discourse; it’s all or nothing.
So instead of spending time debating the issue as a whole, we waste a bunch of time squabbling over two sides that do not represent anything approaching every option in the debate. People feel forced to pick the side they are “closest” to, and moderates can just shut up and go find something else to do (like be undecided voters). The left has laid claim to the pro-choice side, and the right the pro-life. So abortion becomes another piece of ammo in the left-right war that exists way more as a figment of media and political imagination than it does as reality. Most voters don’t actually lean far left or right. But they are duped into thinking they have to. The media and the politicians thrive off of this image of division. So everyone is lumped into a side, and the sides are treated as strawmen, which are easier to argue against than people with nuanced opinions.
The pro-choice side plays up the rhetorical talking point that abortion is about a woman’s right to choose what she does with her own body. This completely dismisses the very legitimate point that the fetus is a distinct organism inside a female body, but is not the female body itself. So the “choice” side rhetorically shifts the discussion off to the moral dilemma as to whether or not it is acceptable to end the life of a fetus and on to women having control over their own bodies, which is a much easier conversation to win. Because this is about winning, not convincing people of the merits of an argument. Surely, women have the right to control their own body. Only fascist misogynists would argue otherwise! Those Bible-thumping Republicans and their war on women! It’s entirely possible that there are misogynists who oppose abortion. I’m sure there are some. But to dismiss everyone who is uncomfortable of the idea that people can legally terminate the life of a fetus for any reason whatsoever as a dyed-in-the-wool misogynist is asinine. “Why are men deciding what women do with their bodies!?” Goes a common battle-cry. Again, completely missing the point that it’s about the distinct human life inside the women’s bodies that the men are concerning themselves with. If there were major calls to defund organizations that provide hysterectomies or ovarian surgery, sure the claims about controlling the female body might be warranted, but it’s next to impossible to justify re abortion. More spurious still is the suggestion that an abortion is a basic healthcare “right”, akin to polio vaccination. In the event that the mother’s life is threatened, sure, but that is obviously not the major intent behind “on demand” abortion laws.
The pro-life side at least seems to recognize that the fetus is a distinct entity, but rhetorically, it is dismissive of the very legitimate quality of life argument that lies at the heart of the (sensible) pro-legal-abortion side. Abortion is likened to the holocaust, which is monstrously dismissive of the significant difference between living, sentient beings suffering in agony for long periods of time, sentenced to die out of malice, and an incognizant entity being snuffed out quickly before it can know a life its mother thinks will be filled with pain and suffering. The murder argument is at least semantically tenable, because human life is being terminated, but it’s absurd to disregard outright the notion that the context and manner of execution matters. Blithely insinuate do they that everyone who would not support laws banning abortion, which would therefore lead to arresting mothers and or doctors who would otherwise go through with the procedures, is a callous, indifferent murderer.
The pro-choice side fires off that the pro-life side is composed entirely of hypocrites who genuinely revel in human misery the second the child escapes from the womb. For they all want the government to spend profligately on war but not one red cent on medicine or social programs. As if that is a fair assessment of the ideology and intent of even the most rabid right-winger. As if that has anything at all to do with the issue of abortion itself, that is, the ethical dilemma of terminating the life of a fetus. Then of course, if everyone who affiliated with the pro-choice side were consistent about women having the absolute right to do as they wished with their bodies, the Libertarian Party would have at least some seats in the US Congress right now. Do women have the right to shoot heroin? Sell their kidneys? Prostitute themselves? Now, certainly, there are committed civil libertarians going “yes, indeed” to these answers, but the pro-choice side overall does not seem to turn around and clamor for all these things with equal intensity. I don’t see too many pro-abortion folks talking about how the Democrats hate women for keeping heroin illegal (again, perhaps excepting the libertarian minority). Nor should we expect them to; none of these have anything to do with abortion.
Hypocrisy detection is a great American pastime. If your opponent is a hypocrite, that means you get to completely ignore the argument they happen to be making at the time. Except that this is a lazy and stupid attitude to take. Hypocrisy does not mitigate any given argument. Calling it out is an intellectual cop-out. Even if your opponent is the world’s biggest hypocrite, calling them out on that does not make your argument right, nor will it ever.
In the abortion argument, the major ethical dilemma is whether or not it is ever acceptable to terminate the life of a fetus, and if so, under what circumstances, and where will the line be drawn? There is then the ancillary matter of how the justice system should react should the law be violated. This is a fairly difficult issue to wrestle with. There’s a lot you can bring in to the conversation to arrive at your decision. But there’s a lot of arguments that are irrelevant, and they are getting way, way more attention in the debate than I find acceptable. Broader arguments about the superiority of the left or right, or progressivism, liberalism, or conservatism, or any other political sentiments are not germane to the conversation. Shifting the issue to women’s rights, or government healthcare, or whatever is not actually addressing the issue of abortion; those are separate matters, and if you want to address them, do so, well, separately.
Moreover, insinuating that people who disagree with the issue are necessarily monsters in some way is also completely unhelpful. Of course everyone wants life to be protected, in general. And in general, everyone thinks women should have autonomy over their body. But abortion is one of those areas, like many others, where good people can have legitimate disagreements. Either have the argument directly, or get off my newsfeed.