The abortion wars: Why the Pro-Lifers will win!

rv581 · Newbie Alert Joined: 09 Dec 2002 Posts: 4

from www.laststory.com

“The Abortion Wars: Why the Pro-Lifers Will Win”

Few topics of public discourse carry the emotional baggage of abortion, sans, of course, arguing over which girl was right for TV’s “Bachelor.” What makes abortion such a tantalizing topic is that it combines all the taboos of society: sex, religion, money, morality, and politics. Everyone thinks they are right and nobody thinks they are wrong. The purpose of this piece is not to rehash the same, tired arguments regarding abortion (“It’s my body and I can do what I want!” “It’s a baby not a choice!”), but rather, to move in a direction the media seldom dares to tread—trying to determine which side will ultimately prevail. And in fairly and unemotionally analyzing the subject matter, the answer is a no-brainer: The Pro-Lifers will win. Furthermore, since the victors write the history books, the Pro-Choice movement will find itself atop the ash-heap of historical villainy, demonized along with the other evils of recent memory, such as communism, Nazism, slavery, and disco. It’s inevitable, and we’re just starting to witness the first signs of Pro-Life’s eventual victory.

What gave the Pro-Choice movement such strength will also become its undoing: technology and demographics. The advent of the birth control pill gave rise to the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s. For the first time in human history, sex without biological consequences became a reality… and willing participants weren’t difficult to find. This was the 1960s—and the baby boomers were dropping acid rather than fiber pills, having hot orgies rather than hot flashes. The Sexual Revolution lead to a greater openness and appreciation for libido-related practices, sex before wedded bliss became the norm, and perhaps more importantly, religion’s old puritanical notion of celibacy beyond the institution of marriage was bathed in a napalm shower. The Pro-Choicers let the genie out of the lamp, never to return again. Or so they thought.

Technology is a curious, unpredictable thing; within the past 15 years, computers have gone from a number-crunching mechanical device to the greatest tool for mass communication ever created. Few predicted this in the 80s… it just sort of evolved in a direction even the experts never foresaw. Likewise, technology’s growth spurt didn’t end with the birth control pill, but instead redirected itself into fetal care, precautionary medication, and advanced imagery. Before, the fetus was an idea, an abstraction. Aside from unpleasant ailments and digestive problems, the mother felt only a theoretical kinship to the being within, at least until she felt the fetus “kick.” Now, the emotional connections come quicker and quicker, with cameras that provide vivid snapshots of the unborn entity—and you know what? The fetus looks uncomfortably similar to a newborn, even in the first trimester. And technology will undoubtedly continue to progress, allowing the fetus to survive outside the womb at successively earlier intervals, allowing mothers an option other than abortion or painful delivery. When such a time occurs, the option of abortion will be viewed more as an act of destruction than a matter of convenience, particularly with the long waiting list of childless parents seeking adoption.

But the biggest threat to abortion is to become meaningless. If technology reaches the point where unwanted pregnancies become a rarity, will abortion still be tolerated? Part of its popularity is the “What-If” factor—that reasonable people can imagine a scenario where an unplanned pregnancy could occur. Without this component, the Pro-Choice camp is stripped of its saliency and primary bargaining chip. Abortion’s strength is in its great numbers, as was slavery. Now, I’m not making a moralistic comparison between slavery and abortion, since there are more differences than similarities, but slavery existed for as long as it did because it was so widely utilized. If only a few hundred—or even a few thousand slaves lived in the South, the institution would’ve been bloodlessly terminated with a pen stroke. If abortion occurred rarely, in numbers closer to the hundreds than millions, its death knell would soon echo throughout the land, for abortion’s enemies stand entrenched in religious positions and are unlikely to yield. Abortion’s existence is directly linked to its demand, and the only way the demand will be reduced, since the days of abstinence are gone for good, is for technology to provide affordable, durable, and widely distributed forms of birth control. And such a day is not as far removed as we might think, for technology, given enough time, always follows demand.

Of course, some religions, most noticeably Catholicism, view any form of birth control as an unmitigated sin. In their eyes, even a birth control system that eliminates abortion is an abomination in the eyes of God. In all probability, these pious objections will fall upon deaf ears. If the Catholic Church couldn’t prevent the widespread distribution of the pill, condoms, diaphragms, and others, its efforts to dam the walls of reproductive progress will also prove seedless. Besides, even most of the Pro-Life Catholics want some way to control their rate of procreation, short of sexual abandonment.

Another dilemma for the Pro-Choice camp is the aging population. As society gets older, abortion becomes less relevant. Regardless of how a man or woman might have felt in their youth, the bottom line is that a senior citizen playing with his grandchild is not going to view abortion rights as a necessary component to his political ideology. Humans are selfish by nature, and when not directly affected by the outcome of an issue, we tend to lose interest. It’s probably not a coincidence that the Pro-Life movement has gained strength in recent opinion poll, as compared to years past—the baby boomers are in their 50s. And it will only become darker for the Pro-Choice camp when the baby boomers hit their 60s.

This is not a necessarily bad thing for the Pro-Choice moment, for their agenda was never about the practice of abortion, but rather, what abortion represented. And as long as these interests remain viable through advancements in technology, their loss is minimized. But the true devastation will occur when the history books are written. A historian from the future, never having lived in a time when abortion was widespread, needed, or legal, will look unkindly upon a medical procedure that lead to the destruction of over 42 million fetuses in the United States alone—as well as its proponents. For the final chapter in the abortion debate won’t be written by those alive now, but by those well into the future.

And right or wrong, we already know who the villains will be.

Ryck · Lion King Joined: 05 Dec 2002 Posts: 1094

Interesting post. Thanks for sharing that.

Da Blonde Bombshell

Seems like wishful thinking on his part. Too many people have daughters.

Tony Campolo stated research on women who have had abortions reveals 20% of them identify as evangelical Christians.

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"Entreat me not to leave you, or to turn back from following after you, for wherever you go I will go; and wherever you lodge I will lodge; Your people shall be my people; and your God my God." (Ruth 1:16)

Phinehas