In response to recent events, I have decided to meditate once again on the life issue. It’s funny, when you say it like that, one would think there is no issue at all – one would be hard-pressed to find someone who would argue against living, unless of course they were suicidal. But yet we have people who call themselves pro-life, as though there is anyone out there that is anti-life. It distresses me too, that on the issue of abortion, the two camps are called “pro-choice” and “pro-life”. Life sounds so much more important than choice, doesn’t it?
But of course the abortion issue is more complicated than whether or not we should allow a woman to terminate a pregnancy. The question also is, what happens to a woman’s life if she has an unplanned pregnancy? What happens to a baby’s life when it is born to a mother is not equipped to care for it and has no support from either her family or the state or even from society in general? What happens to the life of a society when it is increasingly made up of children raised without adequate parenting? These are important questions.
I do not like abortion. The thought of destroying what is made in our bodies as a result of our creative power deeply upsets me. I do believe that with every new life, there is hope, and that destroying that life before it even has a chance can be wrong. Moreover, such a procedure can be physically and emotionally distressing for those who undergo it. As a form of birth control, it is probably the least appealing option to anyone.
But sometimes it is the best option in a difficult situation. There are times in a woman’s life when there she is faced with deciding between the lesser of two evils. I feel at such times that it is important that there be as many options as possible available. That way you don’t find teenage girls hemhorraging in the bathroom as the result of a botched attempt at ending a pregnancy with a coat hanger or a knitting needle. That way we don’t continue to increase the amount of children in this country who are abused, malnourished, or in foster care. That way we don’t grow the number of unwed low-income mothers who are trapped in a cycle of poverty because they don’t have the adequate support to succeed.
Abortion should always be an option. Obviously, the best option is not to get pregnant unless one is ready and willing to accept a child into his or her life. There are so many, many ways to prevent pregnancy, be it abstinence, barrier methods, hormonal methods, or what have you, and all of these options are more affordable than an abortion, and infinitely more so than having a baby. That people are not using these options is a failure of our education system and our society.
But I don’t want to stop at abortion when talking about the life issue. One could easily take this dichotomy of “choice” or “life” and apply it to other decisions we make about who lives and who dies. Euthanasia for one – you can either support someone’s right to choose to die or support life at all costs. Perhaps predictably, in the Terri Schiavo case, many of the people often found in the “life” camp also called for “emergency” legislation to keep Terri from being taken off her feeding tube, while those more likely to be pro-”choice” believed she should finally be allowed to die.
But is “life” as a non-speaking, non-moving person really “life”? 200 years ago, would such a person even be alive at all? And is not death a part of life? Should we be preserving people’s lives at the expense of their having a quality departure from this world? Most people consider they way that they die a key part of the story of their life. To deny free, adult people their choice in death is stealing a part of their life.
Lesson: always have a living will to make your wishes known.
“Life” or “choice” could also be applied to the healthcare crisis in this country. Interestingly, this is where the traditional camps often jump sides. But essentially, we could say that those advocating “choice” in this instance would be advocating a private system where doctors can choose who they treat and where they work, insurance companies can choose how much they charge, and that patients should be treated as consumers and be afforded the maximum number of choices for their healthcare (provided they can pay). The “life” option would be to make certain that every person has access to decent, affordable healthcare whether or not they can afford to pay.
You could also take the “life” or “choice” issue to the environment. If you’re for “choice” you say that people should be allowed to drive their SUVs, consume the Earth’s resources at unsustainable rates, and overall live in whatever manor that they choose. “Choice” advocates would say that companies should be permitted to pollute at will, that they should not be compelled to protect the environment with legislation. Consumers and corporations alike should choose whether they wish to be green or not. The “life” argument would go that we all have to live on this planet, and the destruction that is being wrought on our environment must be halted at all costs, because without a healthy environment, all life suffers. Pro-”life” people would press for emmissions controls on vehicles, regulations on industrial chemicals, limits on consumption, and hefty penalties for polluting industries.
I could go on. I could take the “life” or “choice” question to economics: would you rather have the “choice” – the freedom to accumulate as much wealth as possible – or would you protect “life” by protecting the most poor and the most vulnerable of our population? I could take it smaller: would you choose “life” and promote an indoor smoking ban, or “choice”?
I think of myself as “pro-life.” But I believe that we must think about both the quality of the life we are living, as well as preserving as many lives as we can in as many ways as we can. I do not sit on the side of the political aisle with those who call themselves “pro-life” because I actually think they are misrepresenting themselves. I do not think they are for life at all – but rather, they are for themselves.