Friday, May 17, 2013

Abortion Series Part 3: Pro-life vs. Pro-choice thoughts and Women's Rights

*Warning – this is a long one! J

The Year is 1861 and America is at war with America. Brothers are fighting against brothers and the North and South – side by side – couldn’t be much further apart. There was a lot more to the Civil War than simply the rights of the states and the rights of black human beings, but those are the two things I am focusing on for now.  There are two reasons I bring up the Civil war. One reason is because I believe there is a significant tie from the inhumane slavery done in our nation to the murder of millions of unborn babies.  Slaves in 1861 were viewed as property, not as individuals with rights. They were thought of by many to be less than human. Babies in 2013 are viewed as property as well – property of the woman who is pregnant based on the argument that the baby is part of her body. They are thought to be less than human because of the argument that they are only tissue or “potential” person until birth.  We’ve already discussed why a baby is not the woman’s body – part of her body in a unique way –yes, but her actual body, no. We won’t go over all that again now, so we’ll just assume you understand that fact ;) A second reason for bringing up the Civil War is the issue of rights. The southern states were not going to stay in a union where they would soon have to give up their way of life – slavery. They felt that the state had the right to decide for itself what was and wasn’t right in this issue.  The same can be said of a woman today in her “rights”.

Now let’s hash out the issue of “Women’s Rights”. I just happen to be a woman and I am very thankful that I have the rights I have as an American citizen and as a person. I have the right to vote, to work, to be treated with respect and dignity. This was not always the case. I believe the feminist movement, if I can call it that, began with very noble intentions. Women should be treated with equality in the right to vote, to have a say in things, to go to work if so choosing, to go to college and be educated to whatever level desired, etc….however, somewhere along the way women forgot that they are women and not men. We are very different from each other – beautifully so. Men and women have unique and distinct characteristics – physically, emotionally, and mentally.  We were created equal in some sense, but very different in another sense.  For example, my printer is a great machine – it has ink and it has paper. They are equally important, but they do very different things. Without the ink, the paper is blank and without the paper, the ink has nowhere to go. Or the sun vs. rain – equally important, but very different. It is the same with men and women. In our day, however, women seem to think that we aren’t just equal in our importance, but that we should be treated the same exact way – which I think is ridiculous. And actually it seems more and more that die-hard feminists seems to think that women aren’t equal, but better. Anyway, abortion supporters are constantly saying that if abortion is outlawed, women lose their rights. I don’t think so. What right do women have to kill another human being? Why do women feel that by having a baby they are losing their rights? Rights aren’t being lost; you are being given the opportunity to give life to another. And how many of those millions of babies are girls? That certainly seems ironic – she is losing her rights before being born, but where is the feminists’ outcry on that?  And I know someone is saying, yes, but what about the rape cases and the incest cases or when a woman’s life is in jeopardy? Well here are some very interesting statistics on those very concerns:  According to the CDC about 1% of abortions are due to rape or incest and about 3% are due to concern for the life of the mother.  This is an astonishing percentage to me considering how often these 3 concerns are brought up in arguing for abortion rights. And how many of the women who are in these percentages go through with an abortion simply because they’ve grown up being taught that a baby is only tissue anyway.  So if only 1-3% is for rape, incest, or to save the life of the mother, that means that 97% of abortions are for other reasons. What are those reasons? Here is a list from sources such as the CDC, planned parenthood, and Johnston Archive:  too young, too immature, not enough money, not responsible enough, would interfere with education, not good with relationships, pressure from parents or partner( very small percentage on this one), not married or don’t have a support system, too many children already, sex selection.  Every single one of these reasons can be answered by either not being selfish or by means of adoption. So in the end of all this feminism and pushing for women's rights, women actually end up on the losing end. We have turned ourselves into men - instead of embracing our femininity and actually being women, we try so hard to not be seen as women. (I could go into so much more on this topic, but that is for another post.)

So I believe abortion is wrong and I believe women have a choice – the choice to give life, to allow an innocent child the chance at life. Who are we, as women, to say who does and doesn’t deserve that chance? That is not up to us. There is a simple cure, by the way, for women who feel they are too young to have a child. Don’t have sex. It is that simple for them. If you aren’t married, don’t have sex. Our culture thinks this is the most restrictive, old-fashioned thing to say, but what is so incredibly awful about abstinence? Nothing. Why do parents not only think their kids are going to do it anyway, but now they arm their kids with condoms and talks on how to be “safe” when (not if) they engage in sexual activity. (To me it is as crazy as not wanting your kid to go kill someone, but they will probably do it so we might as well teach them how to use a gun properly.) This is a ridiculous mindset. There was an article in the local paper not that long ago about this uproar over a local pro-life organization that was in the schools teaching kids about abstinence. One of the kids was excited about this concept and when he told his mother, she was up in arms – furious about it. What?! Are you kidding me? So parents WANT their kids to be sexually active? Besides avoiding pregnancy when it is not desired, you also avoid a myriad of STD’s and emotional baggage. Please – inform me of just one positive affect premarital sex has on our kids, on our families, on our society, because I can’t think of a single one.  There was a time when pregnancy was kept hush hush and sexual activity was not talked about. I am not naïve enough to believe it wasn’t happening, but there was a general disdain for it. Now we not only talk about it, we flaunt it – flashing our so-called “sexual freedom” in everyone’s face. There really ought to be a balance here.  Parents of the 50’s, for example, were ashamed of their pregnant teenager so much so that they would at times send her away - a “confinement” for the duration of her pregnancy – anything to hide the “shame”. I believe this way of thinking was a critical part of leading up to abortions being performed left and right. If you can just “get rid of it” then no one will be the wiser.  And we justify our actions with lies like “it is only tissue”; it isn’t really a “person”.  And this is so easy to do when the life inside is just that – inside. You can’t see it and we all know that seeing is believing. Which explains why ultrasounds are so very powerful!  So we went from a wrong attitude toward pregnancy in the 50’s (example, I realize there are other decades with the same attitude) to a just as wrong attitude in our current time. Now it isn’t a “shameful” or “disgraceful” thing to be pregnant. Not it is “inconvenient”.  And no wonder we don’t view the baby as a baby because we’ve spent years justifying abortion. The word abortion is a nicer word than what it actually means. Stop. Cease. End. Cut off. This is what abortion does – stops a beating heart, ceases to allow life to continue, ends a life  - cuts it off.

I know many are aware of President Obama’s recent speech supporting Planned Parenthood. He pledges that he will stand behind them and in very strategic rhetoric makes us believe that Planned Parenthood is in the business of giving “health care” to women. Baloney. They are in the business of killing babies – plain and simple. Sure, they provide health care to women, but what is being "backed up" isn't health care, it is the abortion aspect. Abortion is a multi-million dollar industry.  And like it or not, abortion has very much become a political issue. And even though President Obama asked God to bless Planned Parenthood, I am pretty sure that is not going to happen. God is pro-life and PP is not. How can we possibly think we can ask God to bless something completely and totally in opposition to His Word?? Don’t get what I am saying wrong. I am not trying to say that God will bring down fire on their clinics or anything of the sort, but simply that we can’t expect God to “bless” (meaning allow them to prosper and flourish) that organization as our President apparently expects. I would say God bless those who work there and show them the truth of what they are doing.

Anyways, I am going off on a bit of a bunny trail. The point of this entire post is to try to point out to you that women do have rights, but those rights should not interfere with another individual’s rights in the case of pregnancy. If you are pro-life, then speak up! Say what the truth is and do it in love. If you are pro-choice – well, this is America and (as my Dad would say) you have the right to be wrong.  ;) Just kidding.  If you are pro-choice I hope you will open your eyes and truly try to see the truth of the lives that are being snuffed out by the hundreds of thousands each year.  And one more thing – the Civil War, in the end, decided that state’s rights didn’t trump human life. A slave was a human being and needed to be treated as such. State’s rights were important – are important, just as a woman’s rights are important. But when it comes down to life, life wins.

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