By: Catherine Phillips, Students for Life of America’s 2012 Missionary for Life
Prolife-prochoice discussion is all about the language. Those against abortion are called “anti-choice,” by those who support it, and they call abortion supporters “anti-life” or “pro-abortion” instead of “pro-choice.” I choose to respect what each side wants to be called, generally “pro-life,” and “pro-choice,” because calling names isn’t going to get us anywhere. But in fact, the language of the divide goes much deeper than just name-calling. Activists on both sides of the debate are guilty of painting the other side in the worst possible light, and sometimes sounding like extremists writing for a propaganda team.
For example, I admit that I get at least a little irritated when I read statements like these: (taken from NARAL, Pro Choice America’s website) “Anti-choice groups attack [women’s] right to choose at every opportunity. Anti-choice people want to outlaw abortion, regardless of the woman’s situation. They will stop at nothing to make it harder for women to access abortion#.”
Yes, we “anti-choice” people do want to see abortion end; but we are not vicious and heartless beings that have no compassion, especially for a mother who finds herself in a crisis pregnancy. Do people really think that I, a 21-year-old woman, am spending valuable time for the pro-life movement just to “spread lies to scare women,” (also from the website) and to limit essential freedoms of the very demographic to which I belong? Why in the world would I do that, just for the fun of it?
Please. You cannot tell me that my pro-life generation is solely motivated by the idea of hurting women and restricting their freedoms. And if that’s not what we’re motivated for, which is what the pro-choice side wants you to believe…then what is it that motivates us?
I am motivated by truth, logic, and compassion.
I am motivated by the truth that a fetus, from the moment of conception, is a living human being. (an accepted scientific fact that NARAL foolishly tries to deny, by the way#)
I am motivated by the inherent human logic that I believe we all possess that tells us that a pre-born human being deserves to be protected, not to be killed in his mother’s womb—this inherent human understanding that killing is wrong, regardless of how convenient it may be.
I am motivated by compassion for the voices of thousands of women who courageously speak out about how they regret their abortions, and have been damaged by them both emotionally, spiritually, and sometimes even physically.
I am motivated by the many young women in my generation who find themselves pregnant and scared, and who need someone to tell them they have other options than the very unnatural “choice” of killing the baby inside them that their very body is preparing for them to nurture.
I am pro-life, and I do stand for women’s rights. If you don’t believe me, or don’t understand me, then talk to me about it. But don’t call me anti-woman, and don’t tell me that I don’t support women’s freedom. I support women’s freedom to the same extent that I support the freedom of all Americans—but when freedom comes to mean the “freedom” to end the life of someone else, well, that is no longer freedom.
Right now, women are free to make the choice to have an abortion. Is that a freedom that the Constitution protects? I don’t think so. But there is one freedom of choice I hope women are exercising: the freedom to choose which language to trust. The language on the side that makes business and money off their apparent “victimization,” or the language of the side that has no other reason to defend life than the motivation of truth, and the desire to see a nation freed from the lie that abortion is good for women.
