Pro-life AND Pro-choice?

I mentioned the other day that I would write about my thoughts on a woman’s right to choose what to do with her pregnancy. I tread into very dangerous waters here, but in light of der Trumpenfuhrer’s memorandum reinstating a gag-rule known as the Mexico City policy, which blocks federal funding for any international family planning organization if it includes mention of abortion, I think it’s particularly pertinent.

In the world in which I grew up, abortion was a four-letter word. Planned Parenthood was pure evil. End of story. I joined my mother protesting outside an abortion clinic sometime during my teen years. I don’t have a clear memory of it, but do remember doing it. I also remember writing a paper in college comparing the pro-life movement to the Civil Rights movement of the sixties. (Yes, really.) I had no context in which to approach the issue from another angle.

My views are much more complex now. If you want a nice succinct phrase from me: “I’m pro-life” or “I’m pro-choice,” I fear I will disappoint you. In fact, I’m both. Because to me being pro-life is about so much more than whether I think abortion should be legal. I do think it should be, because, ultimately, I think that option needs to be available for women, and it needs to be available in a manner that is safe and accessible to all, not just those with money. Outlawing it won’t make it go away. It will just make women and doctors criminals for seeking or providing medical care and it will place lives at risk.

I also think abortion should be rare. And the only way to make it rare is to adopt a holistic pro-life stance, one that recognizes and supports thorough and clear sex education. One that makes birth control as readily available and covered by insurance as Viagra (and available free of cost for those who can’t access it through insurance.) A holistic pro-life perspective affirms the need for paid parental leave in the period leading up to and following the birth of a child. It requires having policies and laws in place that protect a woman’s job when she takes time off to give birth. It means providing adequate and affordable childcare options so that women (and men) can return to the workforce after having a child.

Anyone who has read the Republican platform or followed their words and actions knows that they support none of the above. They aren’t pro-life. They are anti-women. They want to return to a world in which a woman’s most natural place was in the home, raising her children and caring for her husband. I’m not opposed to that as an option for women. I’m just opposed to any policies, laws or attitudes that define this as the sole role for women, or make it difficult for women who don’t want to conform to this expectation. I’m not anti-motherhood. I am against defining motherhood in a single, narrow, traditional way.

I no longer think of Planned Parenthood as the great Satan. I understand now the important services they provide to women, services that in fact reduce the need for abortions. I support Planned Parenthood because I know women who would not have access to adequate, essential healthcare, without them. Unfortunately, I fear that Planned Parenthood’s services are going to become even more essential as the Republican patriarchy undermines the limited progress we made toward providing adequate healthcare coverage for all Americans. They refuse to recognize or admit, among many issues, that this coverage played a very important role in reducing the abortion rate, which in 2013 (the last year with compiled data) was at the lowest level since 1973. We didn’t get there by making it illegal. As one statement I read declared: Planned Parenthood has prevented more abortions than all the pickets, gory pictures, hellfire sermons and forced ultrasounds ever have.

I’ve come a long way since I stood on that sidewalk with my mother many years ago. I’m proud to stand in support of women’s right to choose. I would love to see a world where abortion was only utilized in rare circumstances, but I live in the real world and for now that’s often the best option some women have. And in the end, it’s each woman’s choice.