Pro-life: This is an interesting term for anti-abortionists to use. Is there anyone out there who is not pro-life? Or, another way to put it, who is against life? Life is like motherhood and apple pie, we all are for it.
Here is my dilemma. To be for a women’s right to choose and make her own decisions, with her doctor, concerning her health and her body does not make one pro-abortion as opposed to pro-life. For most women, to abort a pregnancy is a difficult and painful decision. To be in favor of a woman’s right to make those decisions, without interference from others, does not mean you are for abortions. An abortion is a medical procedure to end a pregnancy and is something that should not be up for discussion. Nor should it be regulated by the government, the very government conservatives allege interferes too much in our lives.
And, quite frankly, to be pro-life does not mean one is in favor of letting others live. It appears that only the birth of a child is the cause of the pro-lifers. After that, they often do not appear concerned. The quality of one’s life seems to escape them as an issue for concern.
The pro-lifers tend to be more conservative and more religious, often taking positions that ignore and contradict their pro-life doctrine.
They are willing to murder and maim those who perform this medical procedure, who are living, breathing human beings with families, friends, and loved ones, in order to save, what in reality is a clump of undifferentiated cells. Dr. George Tiller, a physician from Wichita, Kansas, was the medical director of one of only three clinics nationwide to provide late-term abortions. Throughout the years, he was harassed and threatened by anti-abortion groups. In 1986, his clinic was firebombed and in 1993, he was shot in both arms. Finally, in 2009, Dr. Tiller was shot through the eye by Scott Roeder, killing him while he was attending church. It’s confusing because if Roeder was doing God’s work, how does he explain murdering the man in cold blood during a Sunday morning church service.
Many of these pro-life folks support U.S. military ventures into foreign countries, ventures that will result in the death of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of people.
Many of them support the death penalty where lives are officially ended by the state.
Many of them refuse to accept man-made climate change where hundreds of thousands of people are becoming more and more vulnerable to violent and deadly storms and flooding, while others may starve to death as a result of the lack of precipitation and food supplies.
What is missing in their argument is that if you honor the sanctity of life, then you honor all life and not limit yourself to fetuses.
At the same time, these pro-lifers express their revulsion at the thought of women aborting pregnancies, many have expressed opposition to the use of contraceptives to avoid these pregnancies.
You have a right to be born, but after that, you’re on your own. This seems to be their credo. As a result, they take positions against structuring a safety net for those in need. They object to the government sponsorship of welfare and food stamp programs as well as Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. They blame poverty on the impoverished. This is not difficult to do in a racist society where poverty and welfare is seen as a poor and Black phenomenon.
The reality is that those of us who support a woman’s right to choose have historically demonstrated a greater concern for life than have the pro-lifers. Most of us are more liberal or progressive and have fought against the U.S. involvement in its many wars; we have taken positions against the death penalty; we are in favor of a single payer health care system which will allow everyone, regardless of income status, to receive medical care; we are in favor of the extension of unemployment insurance for the unemployed; we support our troops by insisting they be brought home, out of harm’s way before they get killed; etc.
It appears that labeling themselves as pro-life is nothing more than a public relations scheme that provides them with a sense of righteousness and moral superiority. They can then also clothe themselves as doing God’s work. How can we argue against that? I guess they feel that if God wanted there to be abortions, he would have mentioned it when providing Moses with the Ten Commandments. On the other hand, if God were a she, she might have made an 11th commandment, “Let there be abortions.”
So, in examining the totality of the issues I ask, who is really pro-life?
Dave Alpert has masters degrees in social work, educational administration, and psychology. He spent his career working with troubled inner city adolescents.
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The effect of language
Posted on June 30, 2014 by Dave Alpert
Pro-life: This is an interesting term for anti-abortionists to use. Is there anyone out there who is not pro-life? Or, another way to put it, who is against life? Life is like motherhood and apple pie, we all are for it.
Here is my dilemma. To be for a women’s right to choose and make her own decisions, with her doctor, concerning her health and her body does not make one pro-abortion as opposed to pro-life. For most women, to abort a pregnancy is a difficult and painful decision. To be in favor of a woman’s right to make those decisions, without interference from others, does not mean you are for abortions. An abortion is a medical procedure to end a pregnancy and is something that should not be up for discussion. Nor should it be regulated by the government, the very government conservatives allege interferes too much in our lives.
And, quite frankly, to be pro-life does not mean one is in favor of letting others live. It appears that only the birth of a child is the cause of the pro-lifers. After that, they often do not appear concerned. The quality of one’s life seems to escape them as an issue for concern.
The pro-lifers tend to be more conservative and more religious, often taking positions that ignore and contradict their pro-life doctrine.
What is missing in their argument is that if you honor the sanctity of life, then you honor all life and not limit yourself to fetuses.
At the same time, these pro-lifers express their revulsion at the thought of women aborting pregnancies, many have expressed opposition to the use of contraceptives to avoid these pregnancies.
You have a right to be born, but after that, you’re on your own. This seems to be their credo. As a result, they take positions against structuring a safety net for those in need. They object to the government sponsorship of welfare and food stamp programs as well as Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. They blame poverty on the impoverished. This is not difficult to do in a racist society where poverty and welfare is seen as a poor and Black phenomenon.
The reality is that those of us who support a woman’s right to choose have historically demonstrated a greater concern for life than have the pro-lifers. Most of us are more liberal or progressive and have fought against the U.S. involvement in its many wars; we have taken positions against the death penalty; we are in favor of a single payer health care system which will allow everyone, regardless of income status, to receive medical care; we are in favor of the extension of unemployment insurance for the unemployed; we support our troops by insisting they be brought home, out of harm’s way before they get killed; etc.
It appears that labeling themselves as pro-life is nothing more than a public relations scheme that provides them with a sense of righteousness and moral superiority. They can then also clothe themselves as doing God’s work. How can we argue against that? I guess they feel that if God wanted there to be abortions, he would have mentioned it when providing Moses with the Ten Commandments. On the other hand, if God were a she, she might have made an 11th commandment, “Let there be abortions.”
So, in examining the totality of the issues I ask, who is really pro-life?
Dave Alpert has masters degrees in social work, educational administration, and psychology. He spent his career working with troubled inner city adolescents.