Being Fair and Offering Both Sides of the Abortion Debate

Opinion page editors, it seems to me, could stand to publish more of the argumentation by people who support abortion. No, that wasn't a mistake; I truly do mean those who support abortion. Consider a piece by Glenn Woiceshyn, of the Ayn Rand Institute, in today's Providence Journal:

"Partial-birth" abortion, most commonly known as intact dilation and extraction (D&X), is designed primarily to be used in the case of five- and six-month-old fetuses that are dying, malformed, or threatening the woman's health or life. The procedure involves pulling the fetus from the womb, except for the head, which is too large to pass without injuring the woman. The head is then collapsed to allow removal. This procedure is designed for the maximum protection of the woman.

The late-term alternative to D&X, one that doesn't require partial removal, involves dismembering the fetus in the womb before extraction -- a much riskier procedure.

The astonishing thing is that Woiceshyn believes touching up the procedure with tortured, passive language like "the head is then collapsed" will make people see it in a neutral fashion. Sorry, Glenn, but no description of what partial-birth abortion actually entails will be able to avoid placing the reader's mind in the womb. Body out; head in; crush head. Does it squirm? Can the doctor feel the child's muscles moving?

Woiceshyn wishes to push the term "D&X"? Fine by me. It sounds, to my ear, like something sinister out of a sci-fi story. Death and... X. At best, it sounds like a pesticide, which might actually be what Woiceshyn intends:

If a woman has no right to her own body, then by what logic does a fetus (which, by definition, is a biological parasite) have a right to the woman's body?

If only all supporters of abortion would be so clear! Legal, safe, and... rare? Why? It's only a biological parasite, after all. But let's stress that that's "by definition," you understand; we're being clinical here. We don't want folks thinking — or imagining — back to their own biological parasite days. We don't want to fall for the pro-lifers' trick:

"Fetal rights" are a gimmick to destroy a woman's individual rights. Tragically, many "pro-choicers" have conceded the "partial-birth" debate to the anti-abortionists and accept a ban as a compromise (and merely quibble about its scope). Such "pro-choicers" have apparently been hoodwinked by the anti-abortionists' strategy of emotionalism and evasion designed to disguise their deeper purpose.

Ah yes, emotionalism and evasion. Interesting aversions to put forward in an essay that has the following as its second paragraph:

When abortion was illegal in America, many women died or suffered serious medical problems from either self-induced or illegal "back-alley" abortions. Women streamed into emergency rooms with punctured wombs, massive bleeding, and rampant infections.

Even in his recourse to emotionalism — which readers will spot, even if he denies its existence — Woiceshyn lobs the ball. The more accurately he describes the terms of the debate, the more he contributes to its resolution in life's favor. Pro-lifers, he correctly explains, see a partial-birth abortion ban as a point of leverage from which to further limit abortion. If one rejects dilation and extraction, how can one possibly accept dismemberment and extraction? Woiceshyn's fear — which we on the other side can only hope proves true — is that the people of America will follow the logic of their emotional reaction to infanticide through to conception.

Pro-abortionists' answer, therefore, is to apply the ol' D&X to emotion itself. Pro-lifers' "professed compassion for the fetus apparently leaves no room for considering the woman's health and happiness." And Woiceshyn's response to this falsehood is to leave no room to consider the fetus's very life. It's a stark choice between life and "health and happiness." To choose the latter (vague) goods, one must conclude that the life is of no more than incidental value. If it is given any value at all, there will emerge some degrees of health and happiness that do not supercede it. And if we grant that what it is determines the value of an unborn life, rather than Woiceshyn's preferred attribute of where it is, then we must admit that it is what it became at conception.

I have to say that Mr. Woiceshyn's piece has granted me more optimism about the future of this issue than anything I've read in a while. The struggle to maintain an impossible argument — impossible if one is intent on denying its evil — is manifest. The more people read such pieces, the less they'll be able to ignore what both logic and emotion lead them to conclude.