Right to Life
The passionate clash and clamor of “pro-life” versus “pro-choice” provides a dramatic, emotional stage for the players and has the added benefit of obscuring pesky character issues that are dull and boring. Rallying for a cause is exciting. The bracing speeches, the righteous indignation, the exhilarating sense of purpose- it can be quite fun, really.
But, putting on a show doesn’t solve any problems.
The fix isn’t in the fun. The fix is in everyday choices of what is said, what is done and what is rewarded. No one marches for responsibility, but it is the crucial element in every life choice. The understanding that each person is responsible for the consequences of his or her actions is fundamental to any resolution of the pro-life/pro-choice debate.
Like prerequisites for advanced courses, embracing a pro-life or pro-choice designation should also have requisites. No one gets to wave a placard without proof of personal responsibility. No man who tells dirty jokes or allows them in his presence gets to judge pregnant teenagers for their behavior. Parents who have raised sons that don’t know or don’t care about contraception, don’t get to lecture young girls about their rights - or their morals. Anyone who can’t keep his or her own pants on, doesn’t get to preach.
A surprising number of men take an active role in the pro-life movement, visiting congressmen, manning booths, passing out literature, organizing protests. Men should have a role in the pro-life/pro choice debate, a major role, the role of a lifetime. It should be a role of example, of life lived responsibly, of words and deeds filled with obvious respect for women. Whatever else is on the agenda, that must be first. Every man -and every woman- can contribute to the cause by refusing to glorify celebrities who rape, hurt or degrade women. Positive role models are one of the most enduring and successful contraceptives, for boys and girls.
Nature ensures that girls ultimately bear the responsibility of a pregnancy. But there is a boy or man equally responsible for that pregnancy. What if parents of underage fathers and mothers were legally responsible for child support? Would parents defend “boys will be boys” if they had to pay monthly support for the privilege of allowing it? Would Mom and Dad take a different view of sex education if their social security savings might be impounded to cover living expenses for a stranger’s child?
In school and at home, responsibility must be an integral part of the curriculum. Pregnancy is not a punishment for girls who have sex. It is a life affirming, creation of another human being, the result of a deeply ingrained primal force by which humanity survives. In a culture that unrestrainedly promotes women as sex objects and chastises the misbehavior of men with a universal wink, brochures and billboards are unlikely to prevent a single pregnancy.
Accidents happen and contraceptives fail, but most unwanted pregnancies are testament to a failure of another kind.
The cure is in treating the underlying condition, not the symptom.
The cure is in each of us taking responsibility for every action and every word. The consequences of what is said, what is done, are always there. The responsibility never goes away. The message isn’t exciting. It isn’t righteous. It is fundamental.
Pro-life or pro-choice, we need to be steadfastly pro-responsibility. The first responsibility is to stop allowing women to be treated or portrayed as objects of ridicule or prey.
Countering those impressions can take a lifetime, and that is too late. The consequences are destroying the future of too many children, right now.
