Pro-choice vs. Pro-life; Could There Be Another Way?

I recently read an article by Naomi Wolf called “Pro-Choice Rhetoric: Our Bodies, Our Souls.” The article is about a need for a new pro-choice rhetoric that allows abortion to exist in a moral framework. While not advocating for any specific perspective, I found her approach to this incredibly controversial and sensitive subject refreshing, and I’d like to share.

The assumptions behind Wolf’s article are these: that we live in a patriarchal and male-dominated society in which women have historically lacked the freedom to take control of their lives and their bodies; and that still today, there are circumstances in which abortion can be argued as necessary. Rape, incest, dangers to the life of the mother, or the many cases of lower-class women who simply cannot afford another mouth to feed. However, Wolf deviates from the typical pro-choice approach and insists that these issues do constitute a moral decision: the decision to take a life.

Wolf disagrees with the rhetoric of the pro-choice movement that turns a child into nothing more than “material” within a woman’s body. This rhetoric arose out of legitimate concerns, during a wave of the women’s movement, that the pro-life movement was emphasizing the child at the cost of dehumanizing the woman. In response, the pro-choice movement swung to the opposite side of the pendulum, dehumanizing the child in order to preserve the humanity of the woman.

The abortion debate has truly turned into a competition into which side can most effectively diminish the importance of one life over the other, rather than a passionate conversation about what is truly merciful and just. It has become polarized into an “either, or” debate in which no one is truly heard because each side is striving only to gain ground, rather than to gain knowledge. On the pro-life side, this has meant an inability to hear the legitimate concerns of hundreds of thousands of women. On the pro-choice side, it has meant the inability to hear the legitimate moral outrage of hundreds of thousands of religious and morally conscious secular citizens. Wolf acknowledges this danger on her own side of the argument:

“The pro-life warning about the potential of widespread abortion to degrade reverence for life does have a nugget of truth: a free-market rhetoric about abortion can, indeed, contribute to the eerie situation we are now facing... Day by day, babies seem to have less value in themselves, in a matrix of the sacred, than they do as products with a value dictated by a market economy.”

I found it incredibly refreshing that Wolf acknowledged the short-falls of the attempt to make abortion into a medical decision, rather than a moral one. Consequences are already showing themselves, most obviously in the fact that our country has the highest rate of avoidable abortions among industrialized countries. Abortion has become, in some cases, a rite of passage for affluent young couples, or a quick way out for irresponsible partners who don’t like the feel of latex. “Fifty-seven percent of unintended pregnancies come about because the parents used no contraception at all. Those millions certainly include women and men too poor to buy contraception, girls and boys too young and ill-informed to know where to get it, and countless instances of marital rape, coerced sex, incest and couplings in which the man refused to let the woman use protection. But they also include millions of college students, professional men and women, and middle-and uppermiddle-class people (11 percent of abortions are obtained by people in households with incomes of higher than $50,000)—who have no excuse whatsoever for their carelessness,” said Wolf.

When it comes to the fight for abortion rights, these issues should not be masked over. Nor should the very true claim of the pro-lifers that a life is being taken during the act of abortion. The shocking, disturbing, and somewhat propagandic images used by pro-lifers to dissuade one from supporting abortion are often real, and must be acknowledged as so, no matter how awkward it is. “Free women must be strong women, too,” Wolf said, “and strong women, presumably do not seek to cloak their most important decisions in euphemism.”

Wolf brings a new vision to the argument. She uses the parallel of war to make her point. Many believe (not all-- this is an imperfect, but effective analogy) that war, while immoral and while most definitely evil, is sometimes necessary. Those that argue this necessity don’t frame their argument around an assumption that the young women and men who fight in our wars are simply  “cannon fodder.” No, there is a profound respect for the sacrifice of those who have fought in these evil and degrading, yet sometimes necessary, acts of men. If the problem of abortion is acknowledged in this honest and transparent way, there is room for dialogue:

“It was when I was four months pregnant, sick as a dog, and in the middle of an argument, that I realized I could no longer tolerate the fetus-is-nothing paradigm of the pro-choice movement. I was being interrogated by a conservative, and the subject of abortion rights came up. “You’re four months pregnant,” he said. “Are you going to tell me that’s not a baby you’re carrying?”

"The accepted pro-choice response at such a moment in the conversation is to evade... Had I not been so nauseated and so cranky and so weighed down with the physical gravity of what was going on inside me, I might not have told what is the truth for me. “Of course it’s a baby,” I snapped. And went rashly on: “And if I found myself in circumstances in which I had to make the terrible decision to end this life, then that would be between myself and God.” 

“Startlingly to me, two things happened: the conservative was quiet, I had said something that actually made sense to him. And I felt the great relief that is the grace of long-delayed honesty.”

Wolf suggests that the discussion be framed within the ideas of sin and redemption. Women faced with this enormous decision should have the freedom (and responsibility) of taking the reality of the situation into themselves, realizing the evil being committed, grieving, and moving toward healing and redemption. By framing the argument in rigid and amoral terms, unborn children are categorized and viewed accordingly: wanted or unwanted; life or genetic material. By incorporating spiritual language into both sides of the debate, healing can come an so can new ways to reduce the abortion epidemic in our country.

“Now imagine such a democracy, in which women would be valued so very highly... in which there is no coerced sex without serious jailtime: in which there are affordable, safe contraceptives available for the taking in every public health building; in which there is economic parity for women—and basic economic subsistence for every baby born; and in which every young American woman knows about and understands her natural desire as a treasure to cherish, and responsibly, when the time is right, on her own terms, to share.”

“In such a world, in which the idea of gender as a barrier has become a dusty artifact, we would probably use a very different language about what would be—then—the rare and doubtless traumatic event of abortion. That language would probably call upon respect and responsibility, grief and mourning. In that world we might well describe the unborn and the never-to-be-born with the honest words of life.”

“And in that world, passionate feminists might well hold candlelight vigils at abortion clinics, standing shoulder to shoulder with the doctors who work there, commemorating and saying goodbye to the dead.”

Could there possibly be another way to go about this? Could we perhaps be honest with each and with ourselves in saying, “Yes, this is complicated. Yes, this is evil. Yes, this is necessary.” Instead of demanding 1 of 2 inflexible and unrealistic options: legal or illegal, maybe we could accept the exceptions and acknowledge the “if”s and the “but”s, and start on a journey with each other toward a world in which there really are choices, and the majority of women are inspired, encouraged, and able to make the right ones. This issue should be about women coming together to create a better society for all of us... not one that divides those who need to be united in a society like ours. 


The Kingdom of God is a Kingdom in which all life is precious, not just the one that happens to be at the top of our agenda. And when His Kingdom truly does come, evil will no longer be seen as necessary...

A voice of one calling: 

“In the wilderness prepare 

   the way for the LORD; 

make straight in the desert 

   a highway for our God.

   Every valley shall be raised up, 

   every mountain and hill made low; 

the rough ground shall become level, 

   the rugged places a plain. 

   And the glory of the LORD will be revealed, 

    and all people will see it together.

            For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”

Isaiah 40:3-5

To read the full article, go here: Pro-Choice Rhetoric: Our Bodies, Our Souls
All quotes in this blog post are taken from  “Pro-Choice Rhetoric: Our Bodies, Our Souls.”