"Pro-Choice" is extremely popular (77%) in today's culture. After all, who could be against "Choice," right?
Let's take a quick look at where are we today as Americans on the issue of abortion. What do the polls say? We know that how poll questions are phrased makes a big difference in the outcome. When viewing poll results, it is important to also remember that the outcome is also affected by how well the person being asked has an accurate understanding of the issue itself. Here are a few polls which identifies the difference of opinions, and contradiction for that matter, many Americans have on this issue. As noted recently on Planned Parenthood's website, a June 7, 2019 NPR poll, showed that up to 77% of Americans said that they wanted to keep abortion legal. Plain and simple, that is a pretty strong "pro-choice" response that Americans do not want to see "Roe" overturned. But that same poll also said that a strong majority of Americans would like to see restrictions.
The NPR poll also found "contradiction among Americans" on the issue. This contradiction is reflected in earlier polling by the Los Angeles Times, the CBS/New York Times, and CNN/USA Today/Gallup, when they asked Americans about the "morality" of abortion. Surprisingly, the Los Angeles Times poll found that 57% of Americans believed abortion to be equal to "murder." Similarly, the CBS/New York Times poll, and a CNN/USA Today/Gallop poll, both reported that 48% of the public viewed abortion as "an act of murder." Of the 45% of the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll who did not consider abortion to be "murder," it is interesting to note that two-thirds (30%) of that same group nevertheless perceived abortion as "the taking of human life."
Approximately 70% of Americans view Abortion as "Murder" or "the taking of a human life."
What the CNN/USA Today poll tells us is that approximately 70% of Americans either think of abortion as murder or "the taking of human life," surely not a strong endorsement for "pro-choice," yet the NPR poll is saying 77% of Americans want to keep abortion legal. How can this be? Note: the CNN/USA Today poll said only 16% of Americans viewed abortion as nothing more than a surgical procedure for removing human tissue.
The division and contradiction people have regarding abortion is really brought to light in these polls. Of the Los Angeles Times poll which found that 57% of Americans who viewed abortion as "murder," more than half of that same group also believed that a woman should have the right to abortion. The CNN/USA Today poll showed similar results. When Sandra Smith, a pollster for VOX.com called Americans about their views on abortion, the first thing one respondent said was that he believed "Abortion kills a baby. But I am not saying that it is always wrong."
As "contradicting" as that VOX.com respondent appears to be, perhaps it is not really as contradicting as it seems? Polling shows that the main reason people want a woman to have access to abortion is due to possible life threatening situations to the woman. This is a very understandable reason, and those in the pro-life community have always allowed for this exception. It is safe to say that all major pro-life organizations believe both the mother and her unborn baby deserve the "right to life" if both can be saved, but if that is not possible, then such procedures are appropriate. At the same time, the pro-life community has been trying to pass other meaningful restrictions that the American people approve of (see list of restrictions Americans approve of here).
It is also note-worthy that, regarding "late-term abortions," it is extremely important to distinguish between an abortion (sometimes called an "indirect-abortion") which is done in an attempt to save the mother's life (and baby's life as well, if that is possible), and a "procured abortion," that is done for the sole purpose of "terminating" the life of an unborn baby. There's a big difference, and it is important to note that the pro-life community only wants to restrict procured abortions, and not those procedures to save a woman's life. Some pro-choice political candidates have been known to mislead the public about this, to make it sound like the pro-life community wants to eliminate even those procedures to save the mother's life. This is not true.
Serrin Foster, president of Feminists for Life, understands this issue well when she acknowledges that "late-term" abortion are never medically necessary...
This statement is collaborated by the American Life League, (ALL), which notes that...
"Since we are both pro-woman and pro-life, we refuse to choose between women and children. Thankfully, medical advancements continue to save more lives. Situations in which the pregnancy threatens the life of the mother are extremely rare. Late-term abortions are never medically necessary. Emergency C-sections are often the medically appropriate response to save both mother and child. Viability at this stage of the child’s development is generally very good, especially with advances in neonatal care. Babies who weigh just under a pound are surviving!" - Serrin Foster, President, Feminists for Life.
"The Mother’s Life. This excuse for allowing abortion sounds reasonable. If the pregnancy is threatening the mother’s life, it would seem that lethal force—an abortion—would be a permissible form of self-defense. The child is not really “attacking” the mother, but his presence puts her at risk. It sounds like a good argument, but it simply isn’t true.
Hundreds of doctors have a signed a statement that puts the situation in perspective. In part, the statement reads:
There is never a situation in the law or in the ethical practice of medicine where a preborn child’s life need be intentionally destroyed by procured abortion for the purpose of saving the life of the mother. A physician must do everything possible to save the lives of both of his patients, mother and child. He must never intend the death of either."
(- Read entire statement here)
Many abortion "clinic" counselors will tell pregnant women that all they will be doing is removing a "clump of tissue" during an abortion, especially in the first trimester. As for later second or third trimester abortions, Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers never talk to the mother about her unborn developing baby, whether or not the unborn baby can feel pain, and they will never show the mother an ultrasound of her baby. Doing so would be bad for business.
They will also claim that they only do an abortion late in a pregnancy for grave "medical reasons," but the "Results" from a report from "Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health" ( a pro-abortion leaning publication) on their findings of women who have had abortions at 20 weeks or later, nothing is mentioned at all about "medical" or "life threatening" conditions. According to the authors...
Exactly why do women chose abortion? The answers appear to be mostly "career" and "financial" related reasons.
"Most women seeking later abortion fit at least one of five profiles: They were raising children alone, were depressed or using illicit substances, were in conflict with a male partner or experiencing domestic violence, had trouble deciding and then had access problems, or were young and nulliparous."
Statistics also show that in 2014, just over 72% of all women who had abortions were in their later teens and 20s, (with the biggest group being in the 20-24 age group), so is it possible that a lack of maturity may also play a role for some of these younger women in waiting until late into their pregnancies to decide to abort? This is not to say that these young women took this decision lightly, or that it wasn't a stressful decision for them to make, but when you consider the results from the research noted above, the reason a typical woman chooses to have a "late-term" abortion is not to "save her life" (or even health reasons), but rather likely because she is a single-mother, possibly depressed or using illicit substances, in a possible conflict with their male partner, who had difficulty in making the decision, and who is young and lacks the experience of giving birth to a child.
It is also alarming to know that 50% of all women who have an abortion, have had a previous abortion. Do some of these women who have "repeat abortions" use abortion as a form of "back-up" birth-control? All of these women (late teens and in their 20s), have lived their entire life under "Roe," which has resulted in easy access to basically un-restricted abortion. To many people, if something is legal, "then it must be okay."
But isn't abortion really done mostly for "health care" reasons? For the most part, and for the reasons most abortions are done, the answer is clearly "no." Most people will agree that the term "health care," in the context of abortion, should refer to only those instances where the pregnancy, if carried to term, would result in harm to the mother's physical health or life. A report by the Guttmacher Institute shows that only a very small number of women said that they decided to have an abortion due to reasons for "Physical problems with my health" (see chart - but please note that the "12" highlighted in yellow does not represent 12%, but rather the "weighted average" of approximately 3%, due to the median number of reasons given from each of the 1,160 women who took part in the survey was four reasons).
There are numerous reasons women chose abortion, and all of them can be extremely overwhelming and stressful to the woman who feels that she may not have any other alternative, but to say that abortion is "health care" when women choose abortion because having a baby will interfere with her career, education or financial reasons (highlighted in green), or simply, "Don't want people to know I had sex or got pregnant" (highlighted in red) is not what most people would consider as being truly "health care."
See close-up of chart here.
The real problem may be the lack of understanding about the “Life” issue itself.
It would be good to first understand a few facts about the original Supreme Court's "ROE" decision, and what the Court said (or didn't say), to better understand how we got to where we are today. What many people may be unaware of is that on January 22, 1973, when the Supreme Court legalized abortion, there were actually two separate abortion-related Supreme Court decisions that day. In the well-known “Roe vs Wade” decision, the Supreme Court Justices, by a 7-2 vote, basically removed all restrictions to abortion across the country. At the time there were four states that had already allowed abortion in some circumstances, but the Courts' decision removed all restrictions to abortion in all states. The Court's basic argument was that a woman should have the right to access abortion, per the "right to privacy" found in the Fourteenth amendment.
Surprisingly, "Roe" did not answer the question as to "when does life begin?."
The original "Roe" decision spoke extensively about abortion, and how history viewed the developing unborn fetus over the years, but it is surprising to note that the Court failed to come to any consensus on when human life began, at least to the extent whether or not that life should be protected by law. They spoke a lot about the subject, but were vague, at best, with their reasoning, and came to no concrete decision on that fundamental question.
Those who were arguing for Wade (against abortion) that day before the Court said that human life was present at the moment of conception, that prenatal life was entitled to protection under the constitution, and that the states has a legitimate responsibility to protect the health and safety of all citizens, including the unborn. Surprisingly, in the end, the Court brushed aside those concerns and concluded that "We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins" and that they were "...not in a position to speculate as to the answer." Chief Justice Harry Blackmun wrote the majority opinion. As noted at PHSchool.com, "Approaching the matter of when life begins, Blackmun was clearly hesitant to commit the Court to any position."
"Roe" headlines Confusing and Misleading.
The headlines that made the national newspapers the next morning after the Supreme Court's "Roe" decision was mixed. The New York Times front page headline read that the Supreme Court legalized abortion (only) in the first three months, followed by a sub-headline that said abortion could only be restricted in the last 10 weeks of pregnancy, followed by the main article itself that said (once again) a woman had the right to abortion only in the first three months of pregnancy. The Los Angeles Times front page article the next morning after "Roe" was a little more accurate, reporting that the Supreme Court ruled women had a right to abortion in the first six months of pregnancy. In all fairness to the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, the Supreme Court "Roe" decision itself has been described as "confusing," so it is no surprise for the mixed reporting, but what is important here is what was not reported.
Ramifications of "Doe" Decision.
What was missing from those headlines was that the Supreme Court, on the same day, decided under their “Doe vs Bolton” decision, that.. "...the medical judgement (to allow abortion - editor's note) may be exercised in the light of all factors - physical, emotional, phycological, familial, and the woman's age - relevant to the well-being of the patient. All these factors may relate to health." See page here of that particular section of the ruling.
In the most simplistic terms, what the court basically determined was that a woman has a constitutional right to abortion throughout the entire nine months of her pregnancy, and for any reason (or no reason at all). When you read the "Roe" decision, the Justices do mention that the states may have an interest in protecting "potential" human life in the third-trimester, but the subsequent "Doe" decision turns right around and strips away any such possible protection mentioned in "Roe." What we were left with then is unrestricted abortion through all nine months.
Most people, to this day, are unaware of the "Doe" decision, or simply cannot believe that the Supreme Court legalized abortion for all nine months of pregnancy - but this is exactly what they did. This fact is acknowledged in an USA Today opinion piece written by Clark D. Forsythe. In his book, "Abuse of Discretion," Forsythe, noted that, ""Health" in abortion law means emotional well-being without limits. Any potential emotional reservation a woman has about being pregnant can be deemed, at the discretion of the abortion provider, as a threat to her "health," and thus a reason to ignore any abortion prohibition after fetal viability."
(To be clear, the ruling means that an abortionist (who, by the way, profits financially from preforming abortions - editor's note), deems the abortion necessary to preserve the "health" of the woman, the abortionist can not only preform the abortion, but can do so even late in pregnancy after the unborn baby is viable (being able to live outside the womb). Today, a woman no longer needs to give any reason for obtaining an abortion. All she needs is just enough cash (always paid up front) or some other means of financial or insurance coverage.
Whatever the reason may be that the media doesn't report more about the serious ramifications of the "Doe" decision, the important thing to remember is that, from the very first day of national "legalized" abortion, the real significance and understanding of these abortion decisions were not fairly or accurately reported.
But this is not the first time that an extremely controversial story has been inaccurately reported about by the media.
The "2 Live Crew" Controversy.
As an example, a public controversy erupted back in 1980's when Florida record stores outlawed albums from the rap group “2 Live Crew” because of the the offensive lyrics of their music. (Remember now, this was back in the 1980's). The media gave a great amount of attention to the story, which actually helped the group's popularity due to the publicity they received, but the media never went any further than to say that the group's lyrics were “explict” and “controversial.” The media never actually exposed the lyrics themselves, which was the sole reason for the controversy in the first place. The public never really got the whole story.
To his credit, George Will, in a Newsweek article, July 30, 1990, was the first journalist to accurately expose the group's controversial lyrics.
As George Will reported, (warning, these lyrics are extremely offensive):
2 Live Crew's "Put Her in the Buck" lyrics:
“To have her walkin' funny we try to abuse it, a big stinking p_ _ _ y can't do it all, so we try real
hard to bust the walls.”
George Will explained that the “walls” in the lyrics were the walls of
women's vaginas. “2 Live Crew's lyrics exult in busting women -almost always called bitches-in
various ways,” Will reported, “forcing anal sex (and) forcing women to lick feces.”
He went on to say, for instance (the lryics):
“He'll tear the p_ _ _ y open 'cause it's satisfaction. Suck my d_ _ k, bitch, it makes you puke.”
“I'll break ya down and d_ _k ya long, bust you p _ _ _ _ y then break your backbone.”
More importantly, had community groups that fight against sexual-violence and abuse, and even parents, knew of the violent nature of those lyrics, they would of had the opportunity to make the public aware of how such lyrics incite violence against women, and demean and disrespect women. There likely would have also been public outcry to ban the album outright, as well as possible protests and boycotts against the band and the record label itself, but the band got a "free-pass" because the media did not report the complete story.
"The National Endowment for the Arts" Controversy.
In another example, a similar controversy arose when it was discovered that The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), which was being funded by US tax-dollars, was preparing to exhibit at Washington DC's Corcoran Gallery of Art, a series of “homoerotica (photographic) art" by Robert Mapplethrop, who had already received $30,000 in NEA funding from an exhibition in Philadelphia. In this case, it's true that the photographs were so offensive, that it's fair to say that the media could not have responsively shown them, but they could have either shown "censored versions" of them (as we do in links below), or they could have at least described them, both of which they chose not to do. The result was that the true impact of the story was not understood by the general public, which allowed those who create such “art” to continue having their "works" being made available to the public at public tax-dollar expense.
The public was insulated from the reality of the story by the media. Photographs of the “art” included (warning, we have censored these images, but the descriptions of these photographs are extremely offensive): a little girl exposing her genitals, adults and children lying naked together, a man urinating into another man's mouth, men having anal sex with each other, a man with a bullwhip sticking out of his rectum). The public never got the whole story, or even the descriptions of the photographs. More importantly, had the public heard or seen what their tax dollars were actually promoting (through the "Endowment"), they would of most likely contacted their legislative representatives and demanded to withhold their tax-payer funds from financially supporting anything to do with promoting such "art," but that didn't happen, and the NEA got, shall we say, a "free pass" by the media.
Abortion: Today's Controversy?
Many people believe that, just like the "2 Live Crew" or the "NEA" controversies, abortion is also a subject that the media, as George Will described in the "2 Live Crew" reporting, has flinched "...from presenting the raw reality of the issue." It's true that the media does report on many different aspects of abortion, whether that be legislatively, politically, judicially, statistically, etc., everything that is, except the actual reality of abortion. Just as the lyrics of “2 Live Crew” and the descriptions of Mapplethrop's homoerotica "art" were extremely controversial and objectionable to many, the reality of abortion also falls into this category.
Some "pro-choice" groups will also claim that "pro-life" people try to demonize women who have abortions, and abortion itself, by showing graphic images of aborted fetuses, but what all these pro-life individuals are really trying to do is to show the humanity of the unborn child, because they know for sure the media has not been willing to do that. In reality, the majority of the "pro-life" movement are women who want nothing more than to save other women from making a terrible mistake, some that have made the same terrible mistake themselves. To be honest, the reality of abortion in America is so harsh that the real story is almost unbelievable (warning, these images are extremely offensive). As telling as images can be, there is also a landmark Esquire Magazine essay written by Professor of Surgery, Dr. Richard Selzer, titled "What I Saw at the Abortion" that speaks volumes as to what an abortion is.