Respect for Life, But Whose?

It is however, a term generated by the anti-abortion movement to shift the focus away from the rights of women to the rights of fetuses, thereby chipping away at the very basis of Roe versus Wade. In their zealousness to respect fetal life, the justices forgot to respect the reason why many women get second-trimester abortions. This can include conditions that threaten the health of the mother and fetal anomalies that do not appear until later in a pregnancy and will most likely result in serious infant defects or death.

Perhaps most disturbing is the idea that by banning this form of abortion, the justices are actually helping women. They are claiming to protect us from the “severe depression and lack of self esteem” that follow an abortion, even though there is no medical evidence to prove that these ailments occur. (See “Is There A Post-Abortion Syndrome?”) And, because women may be so burdened with emotional baggage prior to getting an abortion, they are protecting us from a procedure which we may not really understand, and later come to regret.

“It is self-evident that a mother who comes to regret her choice to abort must struggle with grief more anguished and sorrow more profound when she learns, only after the event, what she once did not know: that she allowed a doctor to pierce the skull and vacuum the fast-developing brain of her unborn child, a child assuming the human form.

The sneaking paternalistic tone in this statement assumes little respect for a woman’s ability to make an informed choice and a “father knows best” morality that can negatively affect a woman’s health and well-being. (See “When Plan B Isn’t Available, What’s Plan C?”)

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, writing for the four dissenters, noted that in prior cases, the Supreme Court established that the ability of a woman to realize her full potential is intimately connected to her ability to control her reproductive life. “Thus,” she writes, “Legal challenges to undue restrictions on abortion procedures do not seek to vindicate some generalized notion of privacy; rather, they center on a woman’s autonomy to determine her life’s course and thus to enjoy equal citizenship stature.”

Equal citizenship? Control of one’s destiny? There is no greater form of respect. If the justices were really out to protect the sanctity of life, perhaps they should start with ours.