Posted on 12/28/2002 10:16:36 AM PST by Woahhs
For the past thirty years abortion advocacy has made its legal stand on a single, popular, concept; women should have the right to choose whether or not to give birth. This concept can similarly be summed up with one wildly successful slogan: my body, my choice. It's a very powerful claim, and has withstood thirty years of strident opposition.
With two generations of women brought up having this doctrine woven into the very fabric of their psyches, there is as much chance of eliminating abortion in America as there is of repealing the Second Amendment, and with similar consequences. The vast majority of the American people have made peace with the idea that human life begins with the first breath, and not before. Many despise this doctrine in word, but accept it in practice.
The pro-choice dogma is a tremendous windfall for unprincipled women. They gain the new privilege of deciding whether or not to accept maternal responsibility while retaining the old prerogative of compelling paternal responsibility, with both options codified into law and supported by the coercive power of the state.
At present there is no mechanism in place to cause women to modify their sexual behavior; which is the ultimate determiner of an unwanted pregnancy in a civilized society. To argue that abortions should be curtailed without accepting some abbreviation of women's current range of choices is to betray the preference of "choice" over "life."
It should be clear to any fair-minded observer, if abortions are to be curtailed through policy, it will be on the basis of a politically popular competing claim rather than a reversal of the existing policy. Furthermore, this competing claim should rest on the very same ideological underpinnings as pro-choice politics, thereby taking advantage of philosophical formulations the pro-choice advocates already approve.
"Choice for Men" is that competing claim. It is nothing less than the full repudiation of paternal responsibilities without willful, legal, acceptance of those responsibilities by the potential father. Of course such a notion will elicit horror and outrage from most women and not a few men, but recognize it is the exact mirror image of what women embraced thirty years ago, and have lived with quite peaceably since.
In very real terms, women have collectively repudiated any responsibility for bearing children unless they choose to, so denying the privilege to men is simple bigotry.
Many pro-life women will oppose "Choice for Men" arguing that it would encourage even more abortions as women who "thought" they would receive aid from the sperm donor learn they must shoulder the responsibility alone.
This is a specious argument. It assumes women should be under no obligation to modify their sexual behavior. Furthermore, it presumes the moral superiority of the woman, completely ignoring instances where the man convinces the woman to reject abortion as an answer.
Finally, putting forth such an argument is the worst sort of philosophical terrorism, because it gives respectability to one who would hold the child's life hostage unless certain demands for security are met.
When is this acceptance given, before or after sex? Before or after learning of the pregnancy?
Does "Choice for Men" force a woman to deliver if the father wants the baby but the woman doesn't? Is the woman legally required to tell the father?
If the father cannot stop an abortion, what kind of "choice" is this? Sounds like the only choice proposed by "Choice for Men" is the choice not to make child support payments.
This is a good start (for curbing out-of-wedlock births), but it needs to go further to curb abortions (ie. abortion only allowed upon consent of both parties, with DNA confirmation of the father).
It was called "marriage".
Marriage was a public act which entailed accepting responsibility for the children born to one woman.
No marriage, no responsibility.
If that were still the law, unmarried women would lack the power to compel men's financial responsibility for their poor choices.
That's the idea. As long as women are allowed to diffuse responsibility for abortion to who got them pregnant, they won't take any responsibility for those abortions. The fact is no one but a pregnant woman can choose to abort. No one.
The Choice for Men policy will return the dynamic in which women actually bore some responsibility for becoming pregnant. In the current landscape, the first thing women do is point at the men.
I agree completely.
That's right. If history is any indicator, women would again be much more discriminating about who and when they have sex.
How absurd. Do men have no control over their OWN bodies? This is just sexism in reverse.
If you want a world where a man needn't pay child support for his own children, you've got a lot of waiting to do.
Well in my estimation, "women" will never give up the "right to choice" so the obvious alternative is not get pregnant. We either go back (which I don't believe can happen), or we go forward. In the current atmosphere there is no incentive for anyone to change anything.
Sure they do. They just don't have the any measure of control over reproduction that women unilaterally exercise.
I'm not sure what I'd call it, but
when one side invests several minutes pleasure vs. the other side's 9 month pregnancy plus life-risking child birth, and
one side invests a monthly support payment vs. the other side's 24X7 care giving, I'd say one side has more invested that the other.
The greater the investment, the greater the say.
Oh I don't know. There are a lot of unscrupulous males who would find common cause with the victims of female choices.
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