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Although it came as somewhat of a surprise, JoT's message on this subject strikes a very deep chord with me. I am the father of a nearly aborted 9 year old boy. Many things in both my life and his would be much easier were I not his father, or were he not my son. I'm no role model, and like Charles Barkley, I have no desire to be one. The fact that I was going to become a father came as quite a shock to me. It was something that I wanted to happen very much, and something that at the time I wished to happen with the woman it did. I was willing to accept the possibility that this would come to pass, and was thinking about how I could best change my life to accommodate the presence of two others. My plans, however, were brought to an abrupt halt by the words that next came from the mouth of my beloved. "Don't worry about it; I'll take care of it." I was destroyed. A part of me died that day, and I'm not ashamed to say that I cried (in private, mind you) over the thought that this would happen to my child. I believe that to plan to take life is murder. It can be no other thing, and if the process used to abort a developing fetus were used on an adult human, the perpetrator would be classified as a heinous monster. The human body is a remarkable thing. It is a machine with millions of interconnecting parts. A colony of thousands of co-dependent lifeforms that have banded together for mutual advantage. The most remarkable thing about the human body is that it can reproduce itself. It is the primary function of the body, and the reason that they exist. The nature of the mind and soul is a discussion for another time. But the body is the same as that of any other animal. The body has a defense mechanism for an unviable fetus. If it cannot survive, it dies. There is nothing wrong with this. Sometimes it just happens. Society and technology have advanced to the point where a non-viable fetus can sometimes be altered to the point where it can become a functioning human being. There is also nothing wrong with this. It is a triumph of the spirit that we can care enough about life that we will do almost anything to save it. It is a black stain upon our species that with the same hand (often literally) such life can be arbitrarily ended. It is unconscionable, especially in a world where birth control is legal, as is voluntary sterilization and organized adoption. The mind allows us to not perpetuate the species. It does not give us a license to take life indiscriminately. In some ways, it is our responsibility as rational beings not to enter into sexual activity unless we are prepared to deal with the possible consequences of such an action. In many ways, it is a failure of our society that sexual behavior has been glamorized, and promoted as something that everyone should want to do, as soon and as often as possible. Do not take this as a condemnation of sex. Far from it. It is an activity that I as a rational being seek out, not only for its pleasure, but for the intimacy it creates between myself and those with which I choose to share it. But I will not, and cannot, engage in sex without either taking steps to prevent an unwanted pregnancy, or willfully disregarding such steps in hopes of creating a new life. My choice at the time was that the woman with which I was sharing myself was the one with whom I wanted to spend the rest of my life. I had already planned on marrying her, the situation simply brought about a change in timetable. Although she did ultimately decide to keep our child, her entire family had to intercede on his behalf. Things were never again the same between us, and during the pregnancy I discovered how incredibly wrong I was regarding my choice of life mates. Especially since she tried to do it again with drugs and alcohol later on in the pregnancy. But that is a different matter. I love my son. I love him very much. He is one of the only truly good things I have ever done with my life. Yet guaranteeing his birth was not up to me. The choice to kill him was made, and later reversed, entirely without either my consent or input. I was not allowed to choose, although the woman was. What would happen if my reaction had been the opposite? What if I were the one insisting that the pregnancy, the child, be terminated? I would then become the villain of the piece. I would be the unreasonable monster. But because the choice was made by an XX chromosome pair, it immediately became somewhat acceptable. And no societal guilt would have been assigned to the murderer of my child. As mentioned above, were he just two minutes out of the womb, his life would be sacrosanct, and protected by law. No law existed, or exists, that would have protected my child. Many laws exist to protect the mother's right to kill it. ---------- That having been said, there is a much more pervasive problem regarding abortion. It's not something that will happen to you involuntarily. As a pregnant woman, you must consciously choose to have it done. And that choice is completely foreign to every man on earth. I can rail about how awful it would have been were my son killed in the womb. I can understand the anger, and resentment I would carry for the rest of my life were that to happen. But for as long as I live, I will never be a pregnant woman. I can never understand (and hopefully never will) understand the choices and feelings necessary to make that decision. I cannot possibly hope to understand the emotional toil and pain that making such a decision causes. Some pregnancies are the result of violent assaults, another black stain upon our species. I can empathize with the plight of raped women, and of unwanted children born of anger and pain. I cannot hope to regulate the behavior of women in such situations. They must choose on their own what to do with the life that grows inside of them. It's not my call to make, legally or ethically. A group of 9 men made that choice in 1971. They were not unanimous in their decision, and they were not comfortable with it either. For the last 30 years, the State's right to regulate or deny a woman permission to abort a pregnancy has been one of the most hotly debated constitutional issues. Whether or not it is wrong is for God to decide. Whether or not I feel it is wrong is something that I must wrestle with. But however reprehensible I find it, the choice does not lie with me, and neither I nor anybody should seek to restrict that choice from the half of society eligible to make it. There are many people who could, and would take care of an unwanted child in this country. Nobody wants to take care of a dead baby. For the most part, people do not even want to talk about it. Strike Three. —Scott J. Magner top |
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