Opinion: 30 years after Morgentaler, abortion shows no tangible gains for women
Anna Nienhuis
Jan. 28 marks 30 years since the Supreme Court struck down the
Criminal Code restrictions on abortion, effectively making abortion a
free-for-all in Canada. While limited abortion had been legal in Canada
since 1969, the landmark Morgentaler ruling in 1988 eliminated all
remaining limits from the law, although it notably did not institute any
“right” to abortion.
So where has that ruling gotten us?
To be clear, I write as a pro-life woman, and believe abortion is an unjustifiable human rights violation. But whether you are pro-life, pro-choice, or somewhere undecided, an important question is this: Has unrestricted abortion benefited women?
Women are the group most invested in the outcome — if we cannot count the pre-born children as a meaningful group — so if you’re going to promote abortion, shouldn’t you see some tangible benefits to women?
So, are we more valued or respected today? I would argue that the opposite is true. Look at the Women’s March, or the #MeToo movement. Women feel objectified, used, and disrespected. Many women are angry, hurt, or sad. Yet few would think abortion has anything to do with the problem.
We may argue that women are, in general, more equal now than 30 years ago, when pre-born life had limited legal protection. After all, the wage gap between men and women has decreased from 23 to 13 cents on the dollar — “considerable progress”, according to Statistics Canada. But is it always the childless women who are better off, or those who had children only when it suited them? There is no evidence that this is the case.
Are
we perhaps, as a country, taking better care of the children
that are born, since annually we have 100,000 fewer to look after than
we could potentially have? No — rather than placing more value on the
fewer children we do have, children have become a commodity to be
controlled by parents.
Society demeans care-giving roles and mothers are encouraged to use “affordable” daycare. That way, someone else can do the monotonous work of raising our kids while we contribute in the workforce.
I am a mother of five and work (paid work) only part-time, so perhaps these judgments hit me in a more sensitive place. But encouraging women to eliminate unwanted children promotes the view that children have value only to those who choose to give them value — that my kids’ lives have value only because I value them.
In addition, teaching your child the ethic of “choice” as it relates to their right to life will instill in them a sense of fragile self-worth based in the concepts of utility, ability, and convenience.
Unrestricted abortion access has also freed men from responsibility for their children. When a woman has sole decision-making power over whether a child lives or dies, it makes sense that a child is seen as her problem if she chooses not to abort.
When kids are sick, it is still women who take a sick day from work to care for them. Women in couples typically still do more housework than men, even when both work full time.
Mothers continue to face a higher expectation to be involved in their child’s school and social life than fathers, and are often the ones judged for how their children behave in public. Abortion, aimed at breaking down sexual inequalities, in fact perpetuates and solidifies them by putting responsibility for children squarely on women.
On top of all this, according to a recent U.S. study, women’s happiness is declining, and men’s is increasing. In relation to the study, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat writes, “American women are wealthier, healthier and better educated than they were 30 years ago.
They’re more likely to work outside the home, and more likely to earn salaries comparable to men’s when they do. …They enjoy unprecedented control over their fertility. But all the achievements of the feminist era may have delivered women to greater unhappiness. … In post-feminist America, men are happier than women.”
What many women refuse to recognize is that abortion should be understood as another form of patriarchy. Thirty years ago, three men went to court, advocating for the right to kill women’s babies without repercussions, for profit.
After hearing these three men, a judging panel of six other men, and only one woman, decided that the law as it stood was unconstitutional. Pre-born children now have zero legal protection and are not recognized as human beings, setting Canada apart from every other democracy in the world.
Thirty years after the Supreme Court decision in Morgentaler, unrestricted abortion has brought about no tangible gains for women. Many women have bought into the idea that easy abortion access equals greater control over their lives, but the evidence has not borne this out.
Women have an illusion of choice and control that is no choice at all: you can eliminate your children to get ahead, but there’s no guarantee or even likelihood that it will help you get ahead. Abortion asks women to be more like men, and no one is any better off for it.
Anna Nienhuis is the research and communications coordinator for We Need a Law, a national campaign advocating for pre-born human rights.
So where has that ruling gotten us?
To be clear, I write as a pro-life woman, and believe abortion is an unjustifiable human rights violation. But whether you are pro-life, pro-choice, or somewhere undecided, an important question is this: Has unrestricted abortion benefited women?
Women are the group most invested in the outcome — if we cannot count the pre-born children as a meaningful group — so if you’re going to promote abortion, shouldn’t you see some tangible benefits to women?
So, are we more valued or respected today? I would argue that the opposite is true. Look at the Women’s March, or the #MeToo movement. Women feel objectified, used, and disrespected. Many women are angry, hurt, or sad. Yet few would think abortion has anything to do with the problem.
We may argue that women are, in general, more equal now than 30 years ago, when pre-born life had limited legal protection. After all, the wage gap between men and women has decreased from 23 to 13 cents on the dollar — “considerable progress”, according to Statistics Canada. But is it always the childless women who are better off, or those who had children only when it suited them? There is no evidence that this is the case.
Society demeans care-giving roles and mothers are encouraged to use “affordable” daycare. That way, someone else can do the monotonous work of raising our kids while we contribute in the workforce.
I am a mother of five and work (paid work) only part-time, so perhaps these judgments hit me in a more sensitive place. But encouraging women to eliminate unwanted children promotes the view that children have value only to those who choose to give them value — that my kids’ lives have value only because I value them.
In addition, teaching your child the ethic of “choice” as it relates to their right to life will instill in them a sense of fragile self-worth based in the concepts of utility, ability, and convenience.
Unrestricted abortion access has also freed men from responsibility for their children. When a woman has sole decision-making power over whether a child lives or dies, it makes sense that a child is seen as her problem if she chooses not to abort.
When kids are sick, it is still women who take a sick day from work to care for them. Women in couples typically still do more housework than men, even when both work full time.
Mothers continue to face a higher expectation to be involved in their child’s school and social life than fathers, and are often the ones judged for how their children behave in public. Abortion, aimed at breaking down sexual inequalities, in fact perpetuates and solidifies them by putting responsibility for children squarely on women.
On top of all this, according to a recent U.S. study, women’s happiness is declining, and men’s is increasing. In relation to the study, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat writes, “American women are wealthier, healthier and better educated than they were 30 years ago.
They’re more likely to work outside the home, and more likely to earn salaries comparable to men’s when they do. …They enjoy unprecedented control over their fertility. But all the achievements of the feminist era may have delivered women to greater unhappiness. … In post-feminist America, men are happier than women.”
What many women refuse to recognize is that abortion should be understood as another form of patriarchy. Thirty years ago, three men went to court, advocating for the right to kill women’s babies without repercussions, for profit.
After hearing these three men, a judging panel of six other men, and only one woman, decided that the law as it stood was unconstitutional. Pre-born children now have zero legal protection and are not recognized as human beings, setting Canada apart from every other democracy in the world.
Thirty years after the Supreme Court decision in Morgentaler, unrestricted abortion has brought about no tangible gains for women. Many women have bought into the idea that easy abortion access equals greater control over their lives, but the evidence has not borne this out.
Women have an illusion of choice and control that is no choice at all: you can eliminate your children to get ahead, but there’s no guarantee or even likelihood that it will help you get ahead. Abortion asks women to be more like men, and no one is any better off for it.
Anna Nienhuis is the research and communications coordinator for We Need a Law, a national campaign advocating for pre-born human rights.
No comments:
Post a Comment