The other day, Dr. Russell Saunders wrote about why he’s pro-choice. I was struck by this passage:
Sitting here now, the best way to describe my feelings about abortion is that I think it is tragic. Always. That is not to say that I think it is always wrong, but it is always grave and sad, even if it is not always treated as such. But for women who are pregnant and don’t wish to be, I do not see an option. One thing that I passionately wish were different, particularly as the adoptive parent of a son I adore, is that there is barely any mention at all of adoption in many (most?) adolescent health centers. [Emphasis added.]
Abortion isn’t always a tragedy. Aborting a much-wanted late term pregnancy because the fetus has lethal birth defects is a tragedy. But an elective abortion in the first trimester, which describes the vast majority of abortions, is not inherently tragic.
For some women, it’s a very difficult and sad decision — though I’d still stop short of calling it a tragedy. For some, it’s just a major inconvenience. Abortion is sad compared to not having an unwanted pregnancy in the first place. Which is why pro-choicers fight tooth and nail for birth control and sex ed.
Whether an abortion is tragic or even sad depends on how the woman feels about being pregnant. If there’s some part of her that wants to have a baby, it’s going to be a tougher decision than if she is absolutely sure she doesn’t want to be pregnant right now.
There’s a lot of social pressure on women to act as if they’re at least somewhat sad about having an abortion. That’s why I admire Marie Annelle so much. This young Canadian mother of two liveblogged her abortion. It’s a brave thing to go public with any abortion story, but it’s especially brave to come right out and say that you’re having an abortion and you’re not the least bit sad about it.
No pro-choicer is going to credit a first trimester embryo or fetus with personhood or even awareness. Unless you want to make an argument about the intrinsic value of the fetus, it is condescending to assert that abortion is always tragic regardless of how the woman feels about it. So, if a woman isn’t especially sad about the abortion, where does the tragedy come into it?
You can say that the embryo is a potential life, but that’s not enough to raise abortion to the status of tragedy in itself. A surprisingly large percentage of pregnancies spontaneously miscarry before the woman even knows she’s pregnant. Nobody thinks that’s intrinsically tragic.
I don’t see why adoption is intrinsically less from the woman’s point of view. Carrying a child for nine months and giving it up, even to an open adoption, has got to be a wrenching decision for most women.
Of course, the sorrow of the woman and her family will be offset by the joy of the adoptive family. Adoption can be a wonderful thing. Women who freely give babies up for adoption are heroes. They are going above and beyond what anyone should expect of them. They should be celebrated. But it’s not a tragedy when someone decides they’d rather just live their life and not be a hero.
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