Saturday, October 11, 2014

The Irrationality of the Pro-Choice Mindset [Clinton Wilcox]

The Blaze has reported on a woman on Reddit who has posted an open letter to her unborn child, a young person which she is going to have aborted next Friday. You can read the letter here.

Let's be clear about something, first. I am sympathetic to her position. I know it can be difficult to raise an unborn child when one is not ready to be a mother. The people in her life should be rallying around her to help her through this difficult situation and help prepare her to be a good mother for this child. I just don't see that this is adequate grounds for anyone to kill their child, to say nothing of the fact that the choice of whether to become a mother is before the procreative act of sex, not after. Once the child is conceived, you are a mother and have obligations to care for your offspring, whether or not you feel ready for them.

The Blaze has called this letter "heartbreaking." But what's heartbreaking about this situation is that she's bought into the pro-choice mindset. Abortion is often touted as a "religious issue," but the religious underpinnings of the pro-choice mindset are often ignored. In this letter, she acknowledges that this is a child, yet she seems to believe in a form of reincarnation, that the child she kills now will come around again when she's ready to be a mother, and this time she'll keep the child. But this doesn't line up with reality. The child she kills is a unique life that will not come around again. Once she kills the child, the child is gone for good. Here's an article from Secular Pro-Life that talks more about the religious underpinnings of the pro-choice movement.

If this letter had been written by a parent wanting to kill her toddler, this would not be seen as "heartbreaking." This would be seen as appalling, and rightly so. Yet because this is an unborn child, and pro-choice people tend to have a subtle reincarnation mindset, it's not seen as appalling because she can just try again when she's ready and this same child will come around again. This does not correspond to reality, but I can see how it would help some people sleep better at night.

She also claims that she wants her child to be happy. I hear this a lot from pro-choice advocates, and it seems a good way to justify this act of abortion. But this claim seems a little hollow when you understand that the choice is between giving your child life, or killing your child in abortion. How does your fear that you won't be able to give your child a good life justify killing the child through a gruesome procedure like abortion (or at all)? You can't claim you love your child and subsequently claim that killing her is the best thing for her.

The unborn is a unique individual right from conception. As a unique individual, once their life is snuffed out there is no coming back. We need to address the irrationality of the pro-choice mindset if we're going to see abortion made illegal again.

7 comments:

  1. Although I feel better now (I'm in my 60th decade), for at least 50 decades, I wished my parents had had an abortion. I was an unwanted child, born at a time when abortion was uncommon. I spent my life in shock from the constant rejection, being shuffled from one relative to the next, orphanages, experiencing abuse because of neglect, and being a total burden on whoever had most recently been tasked with 'minding me'. I am anti-abortion, but where is the system that provides for the babies born to people who don't want them? I am so confused by the apparent neglect of the question 'what happens to the baby after it is born?'. Save a Jewish Baby is an organisation that helps pregnant people in financial difficulty by providing practical assistance for the first year of a child's life. We need that sort of thing worldwide,

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    1. Thank you for sharing your story. I agree that the foster care system needs to be revamped. I don't usually write about children who are already born because that's not the focus of my articles. Everyone agrees that we need to help children who are born and in need of a family. Not everyone agrees that abortion is immoral and should be illegal, so that's where the focus of my articles is. There are many pro-life organizations that do help born children in need, such as Compassion International, not to mention the Catholic church, which is not only the biggest pro-life organization on earth but also the biggest charitable organization. I'm not sure how to help giving practical assistance overseas, but I'm open to suggestions.

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  2. "If this letter had been written by a parent wanting to kill her toddler, this would not be seen as 'heartbreaking.'"

    I completely agree. And people also wouldn't be saying things like "I am sympathetic to her position. I know it can be difficult to raise an child when one is not ready to be a mother. The people in her life should be rallying around her to help her through this difficult situation and help prepare her to be a good mother for this child."

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    1. I honestly can't tell if you're trolling sometimes. There's a big difference between saying "this letter is heartbreaking" and saying "I empathize with people who are not ready to be children; but this doesn't justify killing them."

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    2. I didn't mean anything against you -- I hope it wasn't taken that way. It was just a comment on our society and how little we value the unborn compared to the born, and that includes pro-lifers almost as much as 'pro-choicers'. Consider the case of Justin Ross Harris, who is accused of killing his 22-month-old son in a hot car in order to have a "child-free-life". If convinced Harris's actions were deliberate, you can't find a person in America who doesn't believe he should be severely punished by our judicial system, either by a lengthy prison sentence or even the death penalty. But let's just change the scenario and say the 22-month year old was instead a "fetus", who was deliberately aborted by his mom. That's changes everything. All of a sudden you have people empathizing with the killing parent, asking questions like, "shouldn't we be more supportive of parents who don't want to be parents" or "let's help the parent out with this difficult decision instead of judging them".

      Scott Klusendorf, a prominent intellectual and leader in the pro-life movement brought us the SLED test, which is great and something I've used myself. A pro-life leader needs to bring us the Justin Ross Harris test.

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  3. "But this claim seems a little hollow when you understand that the choice is between giving your child life, or killing your child in abortion. How does your fear that you won't be able to give your child a good life justify killing the child through a gruesome procedure like abortion (or at all)?"

    It is always interesting how much how we frame this issue says about us and how little it really says about the full stakes at hand. PCers, IMO, are wrong when they just dismiss the reality of what abortion is. But, again IMO, PLers are equally wrong when the do the same with regards to the reality of robbing someone of their autonomy. But, I suspect, that wonderful feeling of righteousness is a large part of what motivates people to engage on this issue (perhaps all issues) than any real concern for other people. Empathy can be painful and our personal mental tranquility trumps all other concerns. So we emphasize with one side, (maybe) say we empathize with the other, and pat our selves on the back. Go us!

    And both seem to think that Pilate had it right when he washed his hands. Treating abortion as being just a free choice that an individual makes ignores the fact that this particular choice is largely constrained by the legal rules and societal obligations (or lack thereof) that we've decided to live by. But hey, its not my fault...

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    1. Pro-life people aren't trying to rob women of their autonomy -- just the opposite. Pro-life people recognize that bodily autonomy is important. But it's not so important that we can rob someone of their life to uphold it. Your bodily autonomy doesn't excuse you killing someone who wrongs you. In the case of pregnancy, there are two rights that are in conflict -- the rights of the woman and the rights of the unborn child. Preventing a woman from taking the child's life means that her right to bodily autonomy will be temporarily suspended. Allowing a woman to take the child's life means that the child will permanently lose their life, as well as all the other rights that the child enjoys, his basic human rights, by virtue of being human. Allowing abortion is a greater harm than preventing it.

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