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| Chief Justice Roberts tried to find reasonable, middle ground. But nobody is being reasonable,. |
It's hard to put into words how much the abortion issue's impact on our country is bothering me. This morning, after one of my usual middle of the night trips to the bathroom, I simply couldn't get back to sleep. I kept going over and over and over in my mind how on both sides of the issue, unbudging, absolutist, idealogues are the only voices being heard in the public world of debate. Even in my own world, attempts to find a reasonable position have failed. Choice to term and total prohibition seem to be the only options up for discussion.
In this opinion piece in today's WSJ (by an abortion/choice advocate), Chief Justice Roberts' attempt to find a reasonable, non-extreme, non-absolutist solution is detailed. I could support his idea, easily. The all or none camps on both sides, which I have to say includes some of you reading this today, friends, is a game of win/lose where there will never be an end to the game declared. He describes how the other five conservative leaning justices chose not to decide something based on viability, as they felt it would leave us no better off in terms of settling the debate one way or another than Roe did.
The thing that rankles me most in this debate is the premise that as a man I have no right to an opinion on the matter. Hogwash! The only way the argument that men have no say has any validity at all is if we stipulate that all abortions are morally acceptable. Is this not the crux of the entire debate, whether or not abortions are moral or immoral, and therefore to be legal or illegal? Many other immoral acts are illegal. I'll only cite murder as an example. Why is murder illegal? Because society sees it as morally repugnant and unacceptable. Should we state further that all men who murder can only be tried by men and only judged by all-male juries? And women who murder, likewise, only judged by female judges, prosecutors, and juries? As I've said before, and I'll say again: this business that men have no say in the matter is the least compelling argument of all. If all abortions are okay, then maybe. But if I don't accept the proposition that all abortions are morally acceptable, therefore I damned well have a right to express my opinion and to have my vote registered in elections, too.
A thought on the flawed position of left extreme, the one not examined in this WSJ piece (presumably because the author is a lefty himself): If you support abortion all the way to term, please put it under the "health of the mother" or "severe birth defects" banner. When you put those type late term abortions under the "choice" umbrella, you include the abortions that alienated me so badly that I supported a ruling striking Roe v. Wade in the first place. Why? Because even if small in number, if you are using choice as the absolute all the way to term, you're advocating birth control abortions of babies no different from healthy happy children we see in our world every single day. Can we not distinguish late term abortion as legal when necessary whereas those earlier in a pregnancy are subject to the "choice" of the mother, or is the absolute choice-to-term position which abandons my support the only way you can abide?
Yes, this has gone back to the states. Some states, as they already have, will go too far and make all abortions legal, others will go too far the other way and prohibit all abortions. Perhaps some states will find the kind of reasonable balance Chief Justice Roberts sought and by which I can abide. I really do find myself upset at the whole mess. I don't have better answers, not better answers anyone seems to care to be interested in anyway. I guess I know how the Chief Justice feels.
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