You get to CHOOSE

Whoever managed to recast the abortion argument in terms of choice was absolutely brilliant. No longer are we talking directly about whether or not someone has the right to destroy an unborn child. Suddenly we are talking about “choice,” and not just any choice, but the choice “to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life,” as a late Supreme Court Justice has so eloquently and misleadingly put it.

Never mind that ALL debates on what rights that we have in free society are about choice. Never mind that there are millions of laws on the books – laws that are necessary for our society to function and operate – that directly impact our ability to regulate our personal body functions (drug and pharmaceutical laws, sporting licenses and anti-euthanasia laws being among the more benign). Never mind that the very debate begins (except in the cases of rape – for which pro-abortion arguments are overwhelmingly agreed to be in a completely different category) with a choice to become pregnant in the first place. Suddenly we have one debate that is no longer about the underlying substantive behavior, it’s now about the right to choose that underlying substantive behavior. Somehow this one debate gets the special distinction to be not about what its about, but about whether we can even talk about it.

And that changes everything. It allows the pro-abortionists to intellectually remove themselves from the bloody, gruesome and horrifying reality that is abortion. It permits those supporting the industry to tell people that it’s not about one’s responsibility to humanity and society, it’s not about human life or its potential, but rather about one’s personally liberty and autonomy. And, perhaps most importantly, it allows pro-abortionists to enlist among their ranks those who have uttered what are for me the most pathetic and tragic words of any conscripts to a cause: “Well, I would never dream of doing it myself. But I can’t take away from someone else the right to choose.”