Pro-choicers vs Pro-Lifers

This is in response ot a piece on www.wangle.com.au today which had a real go at Peter Abetz MLA, I was moved to respond:

Always a dangerous topic, especially for a man but I think your challenge to “conservative” men is fair enough, in part at least: it is impossible for a man to really know how it is for a woman with the excruciating decision ahead of her in the context of considering abortion or indeed the aftermath.

A couple of things intrigue me though. Many embryos do not implant and thus do not become a foetus. But at what stage does a foetus become a baby? At what stage does a feotus become a human being? I truly don’t know the answer to this question but it always disturbs me when proponents of choice use words euphemistically to divorce that which is being aborted from humanity. Perhaps pro-lifers err in that same way at the other extreme.

Another issue that disturbs me is the question and language of “birth control.” Certainly abortion is birth control in the sense that a live healthy baby is not the result. Without getting into all the highly-argued and mostly-valid arguments re rape and dangers to the physical or mental health of women I think there is a need to limit the use of the term “birth control” and use something more akin to “pregnancy control.” Language is very powerful and a closer attachment of the consequences of unprotected sex at the outset might change some mindsets. Not much hope I know because of the very human aspect of getting carried away in this context.

And therein lies my challenge to the writer. I would hazard a guess that a substantial number of abortions are a function of it just not being the right time, not convenient just now and possibly not the desired father to have a baby just now. Where is the responsibility of one’s own action there?

If I may quote two of the paragraphs of the Wangle contributor:

“It is obviously not concern or compassion for women who experience an unintended pregnancy and it is obviously not personal experience of an unintended pregnancy!

Why can’t they trust women as autonomous, intelligent and competent human beings to make a decision about something as important as whether or not to terminate a pregnancy?”

Sure it obviously take “two to tango” but I don’t think is is a lack of compassion for women by Peter Abetz and those of similar thought but I do think that they also have a very real compassion for the unnecessary loss of life because so-called “autonomous, intelligent and competent human beings” (both men and women) have not been that smart after all as to “tango” without thought or responsibility for their combined actions resulting in “unintended pregnancy.”

Undoubtedly women get the toughest yards here, both physically and emotionally but many a man has also been devastated by the abortion of their child.

Between the “Pro-lifers” and the “Pro-choicers” I am bound to make no friends at all on either side and whilst I do not pretend to have the answers I am sure there is a middle ground in there somewhere.

Cheers, Jonathan.