“Fetuses Have Become As Visible As Women”

I’m glad to see Joe Carter, one of the pioneers of the Christian blogosphere with his Evangelical Outposts, blogging at the First Things blog. In a recent post, he notes that pro-choicers are now articulating some of their moral qualms about abortion, citing some comments at Slate and Salon.com. (Follow the links.)

On matters of policy, the election of President Obama has been a decisive setback for the pro-life cause. On the rhetorical front, however, he may provide some indirect benefit. Because he promises to hold the line on the legal front, Obama provides a cover for pro-choice advocates to express their moral qualms about abortion. For example, both Slate and Salon.com have recently published articles by morally serious pro-choice advocates expressing reservations about the culture of abortion-on-demand.

Sample from the pro-choicers:

If you’re unhappily pregnant, you should look at an ultrasound of what you’re carrying. That goes for the potential father, too. Nobody can make you look, nobody should make you look, and you certainly should ignore bogus “information” scripts like the one concocted by a bunch of U.S. senators two years ago. But there’s nothing bogus about an ultrasound. It will make you face what’s growing inside you and the urgency of deciding whether to terminate it, even if termination is still the right choice. Otherwise, you risk sliding into the mentality of denial.

Another:

But tough questions come up more frequently than they did in the first years after Roe, as more is known about the choices some women and couples make, and fetuses have become as visible as women. Sex selection is only one of many tough issues. Abortion when the fetus has mild disabilities—or even when the fetus has no disability—is another. What about deaf couples who do not want a hearing child? Or as Ayelet Waldman reported on DoubleX, the woman in her support group who had an abortion because her fetus’ hands were deformed. These things should make us pause and think hard.

Another:

There’s always been a fear in the choice movement that if we deal with “morality” we are going to lose.

Joe comments: “The reason for such fear is well-founded. The choice movement—as even the name implies—relies on a rights-based rhetorical ploy that shifts the focus away from the morality of abortion to the legal question of individual autonomy. When pro-choicers are forced to deal with the morality of abortion they invariably lose—for even they know the practice is morally questionable. (This is why even the most ardent abortion rights advocate will claim that no one is for abortion.)

But while this shift in focus from rhetoric to morality will ensure that the pro-choice movement will lose ground, it does not necessarily mean a win for the pro-life cause. . . . The bar for what constitutes moral seriousness has been set so low for the pro-choice cause that people like Saletan and Kissling can admit that a viable fetus is a living human being yet still maintain that people should have the legal right to kill them.