Speaking a Universal Language for Life
[Today’s guest post by Shannon Morrow is part of our paid blogging program.]
Today’s world is truly global. The past hundred years have
seen incredible improvements in communication and transportation that have
allowed us to interact with people all over the world, from different
upbringings, backgrounds, religions, and cultures. We are interacting with
people completely different from us, with completely different ways of looking
at the world, in a way never before seen. This means we must change the way we
defend the pro-life cause.
seen incredible improvements in communication and transportation that have
allowed us to interact with people all over the world, from different
upbringings, backgrounds, religions, and cultures. We are interacting with
people completely different from us, with completely different ways of looking
at the world, in a way never before seen. This means we must change the way we
defend the pro-life cause.
This is
something I learned very quickly my first year at Harvard. I came from a very
conservative, Baptist town in Texas, and from a staunchly conservative,
Catholic family. In my town, even the liberals were pro-life and religious. My
family had a very strong voice in the pro-life movement, so I grew up hearing
the arguments for being pro-life. It was quite a culture shock moving to
Cambridge, Massachusetts, a town in which my freshman year almost the entire
city voted President Barack Obama into his first term of office, and to Harvard,
where the Harvard Right to Life group had to fight the administration for even
the basic right granted to all student groups to put posters around campus (if
not for our arguments, they would not have even let us put up “Smile, your
mother chose life” posters, much less of the stages of pregnancy). I was
surrounded by people who had grown up in rich, Liberal, well-educated, mainly
Northeastern-dwelling families who had had just as little exposure to the world
outside of that bubble as I had had to the world outside of my own. Thankfully,
my bubble had popped when I stepped foot outside of it, and since the people
around me had yet to step outside of their own bubble, I decided to make it my
mission to pop it for them. I did this by trying to take away all of their
stereotypes of the pro-life movement and argue for pro-life causes in a way
they could not dismiss.
something I learned very quickly my first year at Harvard. I came from a very
conservative, Baptist town in Texas, and from a staunchly conservative,
Catholic family. In my town, even the liberals were pro-life and religious. My
family had a very strong voice in the pro-life movement, so I grew up hearing
the arguments for being pro-life. It was quite a culture shock moving to
Cambridge, Massachusetts, a town in which my freshman year almost the entire
city voted President Barack Obama into his first term of office, and to Harvard,
where the Harvard Right to Life group had to fight the administration for even
the basic right granted to all student groups to put posters around campus (if
not for our arguments, they would not have even let us put up “Smile, your
mother chose life” posters, much less of the stages of pregnancy). I was
surrounded by people who had grown up in rich, Liberal, well-educated, mainly
Northeastern-dwelling families who had had just as little exposure to the world
outside of that bubble as I had had to the world outside of my own. Thankfully,
my bubble had popped when I stepped foot outside of it, and since the people
around me had yet to step outside of their own bubble, I decided to make it my
mission to pop it for them. I did this by trying to take away all of their
stereotypes of the pro-life movement and argue for pro-life causes in a way
they could not dismiss.
My experience has taught me the way that one can defend the pro-life movement to
anyone, anywhere in the world, with any background or religion. Of course, when
you are talking to someone with your own faith, with your own background, you
are welcome to argue based on that religion, and that is probably the most
effective way to do it, and I encourage you to do so. But when we take this argument
to the state or national level, or you are facing people who are not religious,
or who are of a different religion, or you just don’t know their background,
this is not the way to go. It will only reinforce stereotypes, cause people to
ignore what you are saying, and create enemies. You will never convince anyone
who disagrees with your religion to choose life for their child or to work to
change laws that allow others to choose not to, if you quote Bible verses and
say what God wants. There is no need for that! The pro-life movement can be
defended on a strictly scientific and philosophical level, which will gain us
much more ground both nationally and internationally.
anyone, anywhere in the world, with any background or religion. Of course, when
you are talking to someone with your own faith, with your own background, you
are welcome to argue based on that religion, and that is probably the most
effective way to do it, and I encourage you to do so. But when we take this argument
to the state or national level, or you are facing people who are not religious,
or who are of a different religion, or you just don’t know their background,
this is not the way to go. It will only reinforce stereotypes, cause people to
ignore what you are saying, and create enemies. You will never convince anyone
who disagrees with your religion to choose life for their child or to work to
change laws that allow others to choose not to, if you quote Bible verses and
say what God wants. There is no need for that! The pro-life movement can be
defended on a strictly scientific and philosophical level, which will gain us
much more ground both nationally and internationally.
Though
many of you know this, I want summarize some of the pro-life stereotypes that
must be combated. The people I met in Massachusetts automatically assumed that
pro-life people had to be religious, had little education, were male and didn’t
care about women’s rights, had no justification for their arguments outside of
“superstition,” and/or just disregarded scientific evidence that didn’t prove
their point. It doesn’t help that most politicians they see arguing for the
cause are male, rich, and wrap their arguments in religion rather than science.
They don’t take into account that being male and rich is true of a vast
majority of national-stage politicians of any party, and religious arguments
are what appeal to the conservative audiences they are addressing. Since those
politicians, and religious groups protesting outside abortion clinics based on
“God’s will,” are all they see of the pro-life movement, they have no reason to
change their belief in that stereotype.
many of you know this, I want summarize some of the pro-life stereotypes that
must be combated. The people I met in Massachusetts automatically assumed that
pro-life people had to be religious, had little education, were male and didn’t
care about women’s rights, had no justification for their arguments outside of
“superstition,” and/or just disregarded scientific evidence that didn’t prove
their point. It doesn’t help that most politicians they see arguing for the
cause are male, rich, and wrap their arguments in religion rather than science.
They don’t take into account that being male and rich is true of a vast
majority of national-stage politicians of any party, and religious arguments
are what appeal to the conservative audiences they are addressing. Since those
politicians, and religious groups protesting outside abortion clinics based on
“God’s will,” are all they see of the pro-life movement, they have no reason to
change their belief in that stereotype.
So how
do we combat all of this? When you are talking to someone who is pro-choice, I
want you to ask them one question: “What is the exact day in development that a
fetus becomes human?” If one is to terminate a pregnancy, one would have to
know this, otherwise they might be killing a child. If it is at birth, what is
the difference between the baby one day before or one day after? The child
could survive on its own if you took it out of the mother – would still have
the same thoughts and emotions, same capabilities. These days most people see
something wrong with partial-birth or late-term abortions. At this point the
baby is starting to look too much like a baby, and it is getting hard to pretend
that it isn’t human.
do we combat all of this? When you are talking to someone who is pro-choice, I
want you to ask them one question: “What is the exact day in development that a
fetus becomes human?” If one is to terminate a pregnancy, one would have to
know this, otherwise they might be killing a child. If it is at birth, what is
the difference between the baby one day before or one day after? The child
could survive on its own if you took it out of the mother – would still have
the same thoughts and emotions, same capabilities. These days most people see
something wrong with partial-birth or late-term abortions. At this point the
baby is starting to look too much like a baby, and it is getting hard to pretend
that it isn’t human.
But if the cut-off is at six months, there is still the
same question: what is the difference in that baby one day before and one day
after? Or at three months? How can you make a law saying that someone is not
human and someone else is with no justification? How can a law say that someone
has a right to kill (for no one can honestly debate whether the fetus is a
living thing) one of these sets and not the other? What exactly is it that
makes fetuses human on the 6th month, or 5th month, or whatever date you choose,
that no fetuses the day before that have? I have never debated anyone who has
been able to answer this question, so how can a wide-sweeping law be made allowing
the death of this fetus/baby?
same question: what is the difference in that baby one day before and one day
after? Or at three months? How can you make a law saying that someone is not
human and someone else is with no justification? How can a law say that someone
has a right to kill (for no one can honestly debate whether the fetus is a
living thing) one of these sets and not the other? What exactly is it that
makes fetuses human on the 6th month, or 5th month, or whatever date you choose,
that no fetuses the day before that have? I have never debated anyone who has
been able to answer this question, so how can a wide-sweeping law be made allowing
the death of this fetus/baby?
The
second thing I will ask you to do is to leave religion out of your argument.
Unless you are talking to someone who has your beliefs, do not mention God, the
Bible, or praying. Just don’t. We will never get laws passed across the nation
protecting these babies until we get everyone to see that they are babies.
Stick to the science, something everyone can agree on and debate in a coherent
and intellectual way. Stick to the philosophy of basic human rights, which
almost everyone, at least in the United States, can agree on. Once we have
scientifically shown that this baby is just as much a human as one that is
already born, which I feel is a very easy argument to make, then everything
will change. As Justice Harry Blackmun said in the Roe vs. Wade decision,
“The appellee and certain amici argue that the fetus is a ‘person’
within the language and meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment. In support
of this, they outline at length and in detail the well-known facts of fetal
development. If this suggestion of personhood is established, the
appellant’s case, of course, collapses, for the fetus‘ right to life
would then be guaranteed specifically by the (Fourteenth) Amendment.”
second thing I will ask you to do is to leave religion out of your argument.
Unless you are talking to someone who has your beliefs, do not mention God, the
Bible, or praying. Just don’t. We will never get laws passed across the nation
protecting these babies until we get everyone to see that they are babies.
Stick to the science, something everyone can agree on and debate in a coherent
and intellectual way. Stick to the philosophy of basic human rights, which
almost everyone, at least in the United States, can agree on. Once we have
scientifically shown that this baby is just as much a human as one that is
already born, which I feel is a very easy argument to make, then everything
will change. As Justice Harry Blackmun said in the Roe vs. Wade decision,
“The appellee and certain amici argue that the fetus is a ‘person’
within the language and meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment. In support
of this, they outline at length and in detail the well-known facts of fetal
development. If this suggestion of personhood is established, the
appellant’s case, of course, collapses, for the fetus‘ right to life
would then be guaranteed specifically by the (Fourteenth) Amendment.”
Let’s
change people’s opinions of what a baby in the womb truly is in a way that
everyone can see. So keep the stages of development posters and bracelets! But
as soon as you start quoting the Bible, a wall will come up with anyone who
does not believe the way you do. So tear down those walls! Show that you
respect other people and argue with them on an equal playing field.
change people’s opinions of what a baby in the womb truly is in a way that
everyone can see. So keep the stages of development posters and bracelets! But
as soon as you start quoting the Bible, a wall will come up with anyone who
does not believe the way you do. So tear down those walls! Show that you
respect other people and argue with them on an equal playing field.
The abortionists (pro choice) are not amenable to scientific or rational discussion. They are the "religious" fanatics who cling to clichés in the face of all evidence.
Nevertheless we must seek by untiring effort to fully inform a new generation of women and men of the cold scientific realities and eventually establish the rights of unborn children through conversion of those whose votes will mould our society.
As a Northeasterner, and former pro-abortion advocate, I can tell you that the non-religious arguments have been made to almost all these people but they don't want to believe them. They want to keep us in a religious bubble because that is where their comfort is. Keep up the good work – hopefully in college some people will be open to your arguments.
Another thing to add to this would be the fact that guesses on gestational age are not fool-proof. A doctor may guess that the child is only so far along, but they're actually 2 or 3 weeks beyond that.
Keep up the great work Shannon; facts and logic are on our side, and you expounded on them beautifully above. The left always like to criticize the right as supposedly "anti-science"; but despite the fact that science has given us ultrasounds and other tools that allow us to visualize the humanity of babies in utero, the pro-abortionists blind themselves and pretend that it is the 1950s and we can't see what is happening in the uterus; in so doing, they can comfort themselves with arguments along the lines of "it's just a clump of cells" or a "growth." Keep up the great work, and open one person's eyes at a time.
I wish you success with the scientific (and even religious) arguments for saving the unborn. I can't argue either however. I'm not an expert in either field, and those who support abortion will cite experts who disagree. I want the unborn protected for the same reason I want my life protected: Not because I can be theologically or scientifically defined as "human." I want my life protected because of what I have the potential to be and do — things animals don't have the potential for, but for which unborn humans have the same or more potential than I have. Progressives oppose the old "mommy track" idea of educating young girls, and support equal educational opportunities for girls in early grade school because they have the POTENTIAL to become the same things boys do. Well, the unborn also have that potential. (Love how they say the unborn are ONLY potential life, yet potential is so important in every other case.)
It is also ironic that progressives would use the viability argument against the unborn. Progressive policy is based largely on the premise that none of us is "viable" without considerable protection from government. How long would those who progressives seek to help last if government didn't provide education, health care, retirement, welfare programs, etc?
Pro abortion "progressives" often say conservatives are hypocritical because they oppose government intervention in private business, yet want government to tell women how to run their own bodies. There may be some truth to that charge when aimed at conservatives…but it's strange they don't see how the argument works even better against themselves. I support laws that prevent employers or landlords from deciding protected classes can find their employment or housing opportunities elsewhere, and force those employers or landlords to offer equal opportunity for as long as they own their business or building. How would I not be hypocritical to then say a pregnant woman should have the right to prevent an unborn baby from finding opportunity anywhere, and require that she support that the unborn's opportunity for only as long as it takes to give them up to an agency?