Salient. Official Newspaper of the Victoria University Students' Association. Vol 44 No. 5. March 30 1981
March 31 International Abortion Action Day — Is abortion murder?
March 31 International Abortion Action Day
Is abortion murder?
Anyone who has seen an anti-abortion march organised by SPUC will now be familiar with their main statement of belief, namely that 'Abortion is murder', that 'Abortion kills'. It seems such a fundamental and basic statement that many people are momentarily stunned by it. We all have a horror of murder and violence, and so we react to such a statement with emotion. 'Murder of the unborn child', increases this feeling since it is directed at our feelings of love and sympathy for children. We should look carefully at the arguments behind these statements because they expose the way in which antiabortionists manipulate our emotions, and exploit our real feelings towards children.
The basis of their argument is the assumption that a foetus can be equated with a human being, since murder is defined in our society as 'the unlawful killing of a person' (Oxford Diet). Certain biological and social facts deny that the foetus is a human being; for at least six months it lives off the body of the pregnant woman, and cannot exist independently. It has no contact with the outside world, or with human society, and therefore it cannot be said to have human thoughts or emotions. The distinction between the potential humanity of a foetus, and the full humanity of a person is recognised by both Church and State. Governments issue certificates confirming date of birth not conception; pregnant women's passports acknowledge only one travelling, not two. When a miscarriage occurs neither the legal profession or the medical profession consider that a human death has occurred, and no death certificate is required. The abstract nature of this equation between foetal life and human life becomes increasingly obvious when we consider the vast numbers of miscarriages that occur.
Catholic Church Attitudes Contradictory
The Roman Catholic Church in particular, insists on calling a foetus 'an unborn child', a human being complete with legal rights from the point of conception onwards, and yet shows up the contradiction in its thinking by denying that the foetus has a 'soul' and refusing to bury it in consecrated ground.
We would never deny that the foetus is potentially a human being, but that does not mean we should lose sight of the difference between our rights as women and the potential rights of the developing foetus. The humanity it has is abstract, and cannot be compared with that of the pregnant woman without devaluing her life, her needs and aspirations.
Horror Pictures to Deliberately Distort
This imagined humanity of the foetus has to be deliberately concocted in our minds by anti-abortionists. They show pictures of six month old babies together with horror pictures of aborted foetuses in their publicity material, because they know that unless they do this, it would be difficult for us to really see the foetus as a human being in miniature. That is also why they always attribute human movements and emotions to what can only be considered as the normal physical movements of any animal embryo.
There is nothing abstract about the humanity of the pregnant woman, however, who wishes, in the interest of her own life to make the decision herself, as to whether or not to continue her pregnancy. We never hear anti-abortionists talk about women's needs - the main aim of all their attempts to 'help' pregnant women is to save the life of the 'unborn child' - in fact many of them deny these needs altogether by saying that foetal life must always take precedence over the woman's life whatever the consequences. The Pope said in 1973 that every pregnancy must be brought to term, even when it is known in advance that a birth will cost a woman her life.
No Concern For Women
This adulation of basic foetal life is surely just another way of telling us that our lives are worthless, except in so far as we carry out one 'historic' purpose as the breeders of the next generation. To equate our lives in worth and value with that of the unborn foetus is to reduce women to the status of non-thinking, non-speaking, non-communicative entities. The nature of our lives as women is hardly touched upon by anti-abortionists. They never mention battered or unwanted children, or the fears and despair of women faced with unwanted pregnancy. They do not mention the inadequacy of contraceptive methods, and the lack of a really safe, universally acceptable contraceptive. Our real concern that children should be wanted by their parents, that they should have decent living conditions to grow up in, is turned on its head to reveal a mythical picture of women as the destroyers of human life. It is because masses of women throughout the world know the value of life that they take the control of their bodies into their own hands, and demand the right to have abortions.
Women want the right to abortion because it matters very much to them to be able to make decisions about their own lives, their work, their education and their contribution to society.
Conscience and the Right to Choose
We recognise that some people sincerely believe that abortion is morally wrong. Some women for religious or other reasons would never consider abortion for themselves and we respect their right to make that conscious choice. But, no-one should have the right to coerce another into acting against their will and the dictates of their conscience. Anti-abortionists have no right to force their brand of morality onto the rest of the population. To deny women the right to choose whether or not to have a child is merely to reinforce and bolster the entire social repression of women.
Denese Black
Women's Rights Action Committee NZUSA