No, Abortion is NOT a 'Fundamental Woman's Right' - Here's Why
VFL commentator Holly Anne explains why abortion is NOT healthcare…
For decades, many women have been passionately advocating for abortion, calling it a fundamental woman’s right.
They claim that having the right to abortion is ‘women’s empowerment’ and a celebration of women and their potential, aspirations, and accomplishments.
But is it really? Or have these ‘supporters of women’s rights’ fallen into an ideological trap that will only result in more harm and suffering for women?
One of the most common pro-choice arguments boils down to the conviction that women have the right to choose.
This argument has three main aspects: the right to choose abortion is a woman’s right; women should be able to choose whether to have a child or not; pro-lifers are just a bunch of old men who want to take away women’s right to choose and keep them chained up in the ‘dark ages’.
Speaking as a young woman…
Whilst the first two claims have a much more understandable conviction behind them, the last claim is quite frankly absurd. As a young pro-life woman, I know it's safe to say that many, (and in my personal experience, most) pro-life supporters are women.
The pro-life movement is a movement that focusses on the value, dignity, and intrinsic worth of all human life.
Therefore, the inherent meaning of the pro-life movement is to ensure that all have equal protection, dignity, and recognition of their human rights, and this includes, and indeed focuses largely, on women’s wellbeing.
Thus, women and unborn children are valued by pro-lifers as these individuals advocate for the protection and dignity of women and their children, rather than simply trying to keep women ‘chained in the dark ages’.
To be pro-life is to be pro-woman, and the true mission of the pro-life movement is truly to ‘Love them Both’.
What are human rights?
Now, to discuss the first claim, that abortion is a woman’s right, we must understand what human rights intrinsically stand for.
The most basic rights include the right to life, the right to liberty, the right to free speech, the right to healthcare, the right to freedom of religion, the right to work, the right to marry, etc.
Each of these rights has to do with protecting the lives and dignity of humans and ensuring that all humans can live fulfilling lives in freedom.
And that is what distinguishes these primary rights; they are all to do with preserving, maintaining, and improving life.
However, the so-called ‘right to abortion’ has to do solely with enabling a woman to take another human’s life.
In advocating for this right to terminate the life of an unborn child, the staunch supporters of women’s rights are actively stripping away the dignity, safety, and rights of every unborn girl.
To support a woman’s right to choose over another’s right to life is nothing more than a blind and tragic breach of basic human rights.
The right to choose is undoubtably a noble and just cause, in moderation, but it is only a secondary right at best.
One’s right to choose must always come secondary to another’s primary right to life or liberty.
This isn’t about being forced to have a child…
The second aspect of this ‘right to choose’ debate is that “women should be able to choose whether to have a child or not”.
This is an issue that all pro-lifers should, and for the most part do, agree on.
No woman should be forced to have a child she doesn’t want.
However, the truth is that abortion doesn’t prevent a woman from having an unwanted child.
As from the moment of conception, that woman already has a child.
At six weeks old, when most women become aware that they are pregnant, that baby already has a beating heart and unique and identifiable DNA.
As from conception, a woman is carrying a new life inside her, and whether that life is ‘wanted’ or not cannot change the fact that it is still a life, and thus deserving of protection and basic human rights.
Therefore, abortion does not prevent unwanted pregnancies, it just kills the unborn child.
Abortion cannot erase actions or history; it cannot alter reality.
All that abortion can accomplish is to end the woman’s pregnancy by ending the life of her own child.
This places guilt on a woman who may or may not have been in control of the circumstances surrounding conception, but who could decide whether or not to save and protect the life of her unborn baby.
The pro-abortion indoctrination that has brainwashed our women and young mothers has made it incredibly difficult for them to know the difference between moral right and moral wrong.
If all these young women know is the pro-abortion arguments, the vague assurances that their baby is ‘just a clump of cells’, and the blatant celebration of this tragic violence towards defenseless unborn children, they are as much a victim of false ideology as their baby is a victim of abortion.
And this is why education, and the loving pursuit of truth are our greatest weapons in fighting for the rights of all, born and unborn.
Real choice is found is about empowerment to do what is good…
In combating these beliefs, we must remember to be compassionate, because seeking abortion is not the natural tendency of a mother.
To drive a woman to seek to willfully end her child’s life, there are most likely greater circumstances, grief, and suffering that have prompted her to make this heartbreaking decision.
We must remember that, although abortion is a grievous moral wrong, the way to fight it is by helping, protecting, educating, and caring for the mother, not alienating and villainizing her.
If we stand against injustice, and yet do nothing to enable the pursuit of justice, we have accomplished nothing.
And so, we best advocate for the lives of unborn children when we protect the dignity, freedom, and inherent value of their mothers, and enable those women to care for and protect their unborn baby.
By equipping them to choose life, we are enabling them to use their ‘right to choose’ in the best way possible.
