The Anti-Life Movement

Dear Editor,

I would like to submit a response to the article by Christian Beenfeldt entitled “The Anti-Life Movement”.

[Original article at http://www.aynrand.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=12633 ]

As a woman, I am totally committed to a pro-woman, pro-child position in regards to the issue of abortion and take objection to Christian Beenfeldt’s insinuation that banning abortion equals untold misery to women or turns them into breeding mares.  I consider it an absolute fallacy to frame this debate as pitting the woman’s rights against the rights of the unborn.  Rather the proper framework for the abortion issue is championing women’s and  children’s rights above the schemes of exploiters and the profiteers of the abortion industry.  It is an issue of justice.  Many women have abortions because they are coerced by lovers, partners, parents,  and those in the abortion industry, or because they lack financial or emotional support.  Many women have abortions because they perceive they have “no other choices”.  This is hardly the face of the empowered, liberated woman of the 21st century victorious in attaining her rights “over her body”.  In fact, according to a report by Women’s Forum Australia, recent research reveals how much abortion harms women.  It also reveals substantial evidence of psychological harm associated with abortion.

While abortion may offer a short-term ‘solution’, the research shows 10-20% of women suffer severe negative psychological complications, and many more women experience emotional distress, such as feelings of sadness, shame and guilt as well as depression and anxiety.  Women who have experienced abortion are also at greater risk of substance abuse and self-harm as well as psychiatric problems.  Therefore, I propose that supporting the legalising of abortion does not address women’s real needs but rather allows men to escape responsibility for their own sexual behaviour, surrenders women to pregnancy discrimination, and legitimises the oppression of the weak by the powerful. Where is the genuine concern for human life here?  In the face of this well documented evidence, how can one rationally state that:

“Clearly, anti-abortionists believe that such women's lives are an unimportant consideration in the issue of abortion”   as Beenfeldt does in her article.

Clearly, women need to be supported and because after all, it is only the mother who can nurture her unborn child.  All that the rest of us can do is to nurture the mother.  But a woman’s “right to choose” means nothing without a corresponding “right to know”.  Women should be afforded proper counselling, and be fully informed about all the facts such as abortion risks, alternatives, and fetal development.  That is the very least we can do to enable women to make an informed decision.

Secondly, on what authority can Beenfeldt say that an embryo is not a human being? Quote:  “ Because, they claim, the embryo or fetus is a human being--and thus to abort it is murder. But an embryo is not a human being, and abortion is not murder.”
So, at what point, and who determines when a human life becomes valuable and worthy of protection and respect?  Who can make a morally arbitrary decision as to when human consciousness kicks in?  We can call a fetus a human life not just because it contains the DNA blueprint which determines the physical development of the organism from then on, and not just because of the potential inherent in it, but also because it and it alone can claim to be the beginning of the spatio-temporal-causal chain of the physical object that is a human body.  It is morally arbitrary to use any date other than that of conception to mark a human life.

The embryo is not a piece of tissue in the process of developing into a human being, but a human being in the process of developing.  It is not another life form but a human being in another stage of life.  And finally, birth is not the beginning of human life but merely the first of many breaks away from parental care that a human being will experience throughout his or her life. 

If one is ever a human being, one has been human since conception, and furthermore, being human is the morally relevant criteria for a right to life on which the edifice of Western civilization is erected.  If we choose to tear this pillar down, that edifice will crumble and eventually collapse.  The abortion issue is not about some religious dogma but is an issue of universal justice.

Sandra Godde  B.A.  L.L.B.(Hons)
Brisbane, Australia.