A Female's View on the Right to Abortion

Includes citations as well as a full source list. It is also important to remember that I do not argue this issue from a religious standpoint.

The issue of abortion has been at the fore of American politics and moral discussions for over three decades. Today’s movement has split into two opposing alliances: pro-life and pro-choice. Each side of the discussion has provided valid, substantial reasoning for their position in the debate, but the pro-choice movement seems to be the most realistic to the American values upheld today. The pro-choice movement is not only supported by the judicial branch of the United States, but also by women everywhere who fight for gender equality, protection against the results of sexually violent crimes, and free will and choice as intelligent beings.

Historically, abortion has been a little-studied subject until the debate began in the 1960’s, and until more women began to enter into scholarly research. Abortion can be traced back to the Egyptians and the Greeks, complete with ancient methods of terminating a pregnancy. Such methods were not usually surgical like today; ancient methods usually consisted of herbs or abortifacients that could chemically induce a miscarriage. These methods were deemed acceptable yet taboo in certain societies, even by certain religious factions, until the middle to late 1800’s. During the Victorian era it became increasingly noticeable to the government that such methods of birth control seemed to be corroding the size of societal growth and changing the facets of the American female’s life.

These historical factors led to the changing legality of the abortion practice. Abortion was deemed illegal in 1861 by Britain, and the United States soon followed suit. Unfortunately such laws hit the political arena at a bad time; the women’s movement began gaining its momentum around this time and women fought until 1920 for their freedoms. With the winning of women’s suffrage came a new host of women’s activists, such as those who advocated legal birth control methods. This fight was won in the 1960’s, and soon the fight for abortion took the world by storm.

Roe v. Wade is the Supreme Court case that changed the way the United States looked at abortion (Findlaw). The case, argued in the early 1970’s, stated that the then current laws against abortion “violated the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which protects against state action the right to privacy, including a woman's qualified right to terminate her pregnancy” (Findlaw). Abortion became a legal medical process, and the fight for rights ensued.

Since the legality of abortion was decided in the 70’s, different advocate groups have gone to great lengths to make their opinions known. The Pro-Life movement consists of a group of people, primarily human rights advocates and fundamentalists, that believe in the fetus’ right to life separately from the mother’s right of choice. They view abortion as a form of murder and have gone to great lengths to stop the practice, including violent crimes. The Pro-Choice movement consists of people who believe that the courts are correct, and that abortion is a natural right to women for many different reasons. This group considers a woman’s right to choose as a fundamental right and the many ways that abortion can improve society as a whole.

One large consideration of the Pro-Choice movement is gender bias. Many laws and opinions regarding abortion as a crime are reinforcing older gender stereotypes that have no place in the modern culture of America (Siegel and Blustain 22). Women in the last century have fought for the equality of the sexes, and abortion laws seem to push women into the same religiously-defined prescriptions women were expected to follow in the 1800’s. The proposed South Dakota ban on abortion, for example, argues that women must be “protected;” these laws seem to view woman as a creature that is wholly emotional and weak, needing guidance in maternal matters instead of viewing them as strong, adaptable creatures that have proven they can do anything they put their minds to (Siegel and Blustain 22). The South Dakota laws do not even include considerations on behalf of women who are victims of sexual crimes.

Many women who use abortion as a means of pregnancy termination do not do so merely because they have an unwanted pregnancy, but because they have been a victim of rape. Emotionally, rape victims are left scarred and traumatized for years; some rape victims never recover and constantly find themselves dealing the aftermath when trying to lead a normal life after the attack. So why would any person not deem it acceptable for a woman to terminate a pregnancy brought on by such an act of violence?

Imagine a young woman who has been raped and now finds herself pregnant with the child of that rapist. Should she raise the child and deal with the psychological issues that will present? Should she deal with a long pregnancy only to give it up for adoption, or maybe have the baby and tell that child who its father was later in life? What will she do if the rapist father ever finds out and decides he would like visitation rights? What if the female is young, maybe 13 instead of a mature adult that can raise a child? Not all women can face these issues after such a traumatic event. Abortion can provide a way of escape for these women so that they can focus on getting their lives back on track instead of trying to raise a child they might resent or harbor emotional turmoil because of (Edna 22).

Alternately, what if the woman fears for her life for some reason because of the pregnancy? The Women’s View discusses a woman who was raped by her husband, but she feared his anger if he was to find out she was pregnant (Edna 22). Kimberly, the woman in question, had been going through a turbulent divorce with her husband at the time and his drug use made him very unpredictable (Edna 22). She was already a mother to two, and she was making a choice for not only herself but for the improvement of her family.

Kimberly is one example of how abortion can be used to cure many of society’s larger issues in regards to family size, teenage pregnancy, and poverty. The feminization of poverty is one description of society’s largest problem: women are considerably more likely to have morecare responsibilities for the children in society, and usually women gain custody of children when a family is broken up but they also have less income than men as a whole (Edna 22). Millions of single mothers and young mothers have to cope with working and trying to provide for their children without fathers to help them do so.

Instead of these young mothers or these single mothers having to literally fight to survive, they can choose abortion. A young teenage girl can choose to abort an unwanted pregnancy and go to college to get a good job and participate actively in society instead of having a child at 16 and dropping out of high school to support herself and her child. The second choice most likely leads to low income and harsh circumstances for the small family. Some suggest that abortion legality has led to a decline in crime because of such choices being presented. A child raised in an environment with little money and little education is more likely to turn to crime for financial support than a child whose parents were able to provide a good, stable income and home environment along with better educational opportunities. Many Pro-Choice supporters argue such reasons as their motivation for the continued legality of abortion (Edna 22).

The Pro-Choice movement can be summarized by saying that Pro-Choice represents a group of people willing to make the choice of abortion for continued gender equality, women’s right to privacy, the better psychological health of sexually abused women, and the advancement of society through family planning options and choices leading to better lives. Those who favor abortion are not immoral murderers but people who realize that sometimes right and wrong are not clearly defined. They want the choice to make a better life for those who already exist on this planet instead of bringing another life into a desperate situation. Pro-Choice is mature and understandable if more people in the world would look at abortion in this manner and not just from an ideological standpoint.

Works Cited

Edna, Jodie. “The Women’s View; The Pro-Choice Movement Has Seen Moral Complexity as Its Enemy. But Moral Complexity is Exactly Why Choice Must be Saved.” The

American Prospect April 2005: 22. Academic Universe. LexisNexis. Dean B. Ellis Lib., Arkansas State University. 5 Nov. 2006 http://web. 5 Nov. 2006 .

Reva, and Sarah Blustain. “Mommy Dearest?” The American Prospect Oct. 2006: 22+. Academic Universe. LexisNexis. Dean B. Ellis Lib., Arkansas State University. 6 Nov.

2006 http://web.