Aborting to protect our bodies?

We hear a lot about bodily rights during the abortion debate. Moving beyond the abortion debate to society in general, I think it's clear that bodily rights are fundamental. It seems most other pro-lifers think it's clear too. You'll be hard-pressed to find a pro-lifer that says they'd be fine with laws forcing drivers to donate blood to people they hit with their cars, or even requiring parents to donate kidneys to their sick children.

Yet when we are discussing abortion, it seems to me a lot of pro-lifers tend to avoid the bodily rights argument. They brush off the "my body my choice" assertion as a cop out, a cover up for less noble justifications. I've seen many pro-lifers respond to the bodily rights argument with disgust or bewilderment, claiming it's a bunch of mental gymnastics, a twisted, desperate attempt to justify a horrible act. After denouncing bodily rights as a red herring, they see no reason to consider or discuss it.

Of course this doesn't apply to the entire pro-life movement; there are plenty of pro-lifers who try to explore the moral distinctions between pregnancy and allegedly analogous situations. Still, in my experience it seems too many pro-lifers haven't seriously considered--and in some cases refuse to consider--how much bodily rights do play into the abortion debate. Sometimes I'm surprised by this, because the issue of bodily rights weighs heavily in my consideration of my abortion stance.

I wonder if pro-lifers dismiss the bodily rights argument partly because it's not usually why women get abortions in the first place. While bodily autonomy is a commonly cited reason for keeping abortion legal, it's not a commonly cited reason for actually getting an abortion.

According to Guttmacher:

The reasons most frequently cited were that having a child would interfere with a woman's education, work, or ability to care for dependents (74%); that she could not afford a baby now (73%); and that she did not want to be a single mother or was having relationship problems (48%).

Not mentioned is a concern for bodily health, or a frustration or fear over sharing her body with another.

The Guttmacher report elaborates:

In a 1985 study of 500 women in Kansas, unreadiness to parent was the reason most often
given for having an abortion, followed by lack of financial resources and absence of a partner. In 1987, a survey of 1,900 women at large abortion providers across the country
found that women’s most common reasons for having an abortion were that having a baby would interfere with school, work or other responsibilities, and that they could not afford a child.

Again, the main reasons women choose abortion have nothing to do with their bodily autonomy.

Still, that doesn't mean bodily autonomy is irrelevant to these women. Guttmacher found that 12% of women cite concerns over their health as cause for an abortion, including "from chronic or debilitating conditions such as cancer and cystic fibrosis to pregnancy-specific concerns such as gestational diabetes and morning sickness."

Why is there such a divergence between the reasons people insist abortion should be a right and the reasons women actually get abortions? Does the difference matter? Are there parallel differences between the reasons people protect other rights vs the reasons people exercise those rights?

[Re-posted on Secular Pro-Life]

Pro-Lifers & Birth Control, Part II

So my last "Pro-Lifers & Birth Control" post was also posted on the Secular Pro-Life blog, and I was pleased to see a lot of points raised both on the blog and on the FB page that I hadn't necessarily thought about. I like it when that happens.

There were probably enough ideas to inspire several more blog posts, but for now I had one particular question:

Is it more important to talk about what people are doing or what people could do?

Many pro-lifers (including me) point out that if you can't handle a pregnancy in your life right now, you could refrain from intercourse. And many pro-choicers scoff in response, because we all know most people aren't refraining from intercourse.

Similarly, anti-contraception folks point out that women are getting pregnant while using contraception.* But contraception proponents insist the abortion rate could drop because women could use contraception correctly and consistently.

The common assumption (however questionable) is that pro-lifers tend to be anti-contraception and pro-choicers tend to be contraception proponents. So I think it's kind of funny that these groups focus on what could be happening in one case and what is happening in another.

To answer my own question, I'd say we must talk about both what people are doing and what they could do. How else can we figure out how to help people get beyond the "are" to the "could"?

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*According to Guttmacher, 48% of unintended pregnancies involve women who use contraception (5% from women who consistently and correctly use contraception, 43% from women who use contraception inconsistently or incorrectly.)