Why I Am Pro-Life
Thomas L. Friedman October 28, 2012
Correction Appended
HARD-LINE
conservatives have gone to new extremes lately in opposing abortion. Last week,
Richard Mourdock, the Tea Party-backed Republican Senate candidate in Indiana,
declared during a debate that he was against abortion even in the event of rape
because after much thought he "came to realize that life is that gift from
God. And even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape, that it is
something that God intended to happen." That came on the heels of the Tea
Party-backed Republican Representative Joe Walsh of Illinois saying after a
recent debate that he opposed abortion even in cases where the life of the
mother is in danger, because "with modern technology and science, you
can't find one instance" in which a woman would not survive without an
abortion. "Health of the mother has become a tool for abortions anytime,
for any reason," Walsh said. That came in the wake of the Senate hopeful
in Missouri, Representative Todd Akin, remarking that pregnancy as a result of
"legitimate rape" is rare because "the female body has ways to
try and shut that whole thing down."
These were not slips
of the tongue. These are the authentic voices of an ever-more-assertive
far-right Republican base that is intent on using uncompromising positions on
abortion to not only unseat more centrist Republicans - Mourdock defeated the
moderate Republican Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana in the primary - but to
overturn the mainstream consensus in America on this issue. That consensus says
that those who choose to oppose abortion in their own lives for reasons of
faith or philosophy should be respected, but those women who want to make a
different personal choice over what happens with their own bodies should be
respected, and have the legal protection to do so, as well.
But judging from the
unscientific - borderline crazy - statements opposing abortion that we're hearing
lately, there is reason to believe that this delicate balance could be
threatened if Mitt Romney and Representative Paul Ryan, and their even more
extreme allies, get elected. So to those who want to protect a woman's right to
control what happens with her own body, let me offer just one piece of advice:
to name something is to own it. If you can name an issue, you can own the
issue. And we must stop letting Republicans name themselves
"pro-life" and Democrats as "pro-choice." It is a huge
distortion.
In my world, you don't
get to call yourself "pro-life" and be against common-sense gun
control - like banning public access to the kind of semiautomatic assault
rifle, designed for warfare, that was used recently in a Colorado theater. You
don't get to call yourself "pro-life" and want to shut down the
Environmental Protection Agency, which ensures clean air and clean water,
prevents childhood asthma, preserves biodiversity and combats climate change
that could disrupt every life on the planet. You don't get to call yourself
"pro-life" and oppose programs like Head Start that provide basic
education, health and nutrition for the most disadvantaged children. You can
call yourself a "pro-conception-to-birth, indifferent-to-life
conservative." I will never refer to someone who pickets Planned
Parenthood but lobbies against common-sense gun laws as "pro-life."
"Pro-life"
can mean only one thing: "respect for the sanctity of life." And
there is no way that respect for the sanctity of life can mean we are obligated
to protect every fertilized egg in a woman's body, no matter how that egg got
fertilized, but we are not obligated to protect every living person from being
shot with a concealed automatic weapon. I have no respect for someone who
relies on voodoo science to declare that a woman's body can distinguish a
"legitimate" rape, but then declares - when 99 percent of all climate
scientists conclude that climate change poses a danger to the sanctity of all
life on the planet - that global warming is just a hoax.
The term
"pro-life" should be a shorthand for respect for the sanctity of
life. But I will not let that label apply to people for whom sanctity for life
begins at conception and ends at birth. What about the rest of life? Respect
for the sanctity of life, if you believe that it begins at conception, cannot
end at birth. That radical narrowing of our concern for the sanctity of life is
leading to terrible distortions in our society.
Respect for life has
to include respect for how that life is lived, enhanced and protected - not
only at the moment of conception but afterward, in the course of that life.
That's why, for me, the most "pro-life" politician in America is New
York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. While he supports a woman's right to choose,
he has also used his position to promote a whole set of policies that enhance
everyone's quality of life - from his ban on smoking in bars and city parks to
reduce cancer, to his ban on the sale in New York City of giant sugary drinks
to combat obesity and diabetes, to his requirement for posting calorie counts
on menus in chain restaurants, to his push to reinstate the expired federal ban
on assault weapons and other forms of common-sense gun control, to his support
for early childhood education, to his support for mitigating disruptive climate
change.
Now that is what I
call "pro-life."
Correction: October
28, 2012, Sunday
This article has been
revised to reflect the following correction: A phrase in this version of the
article has been changed to "every fertilized egg in a woman's body"
from "in a woman's ovary."
