A Jurisprudence of Doubt

As with the presumption of innocence, given the degree of uncertainty that exists on all sides of the abortion/choice/life debate, as a society we have to decide what is the acceptable “fallout” from having to make a decision under circumstances of uncertainty. Where the abortion/choice debate is concerned, if we choose to protect a woman’s right to privacy in such a manner as would allow her to make the decision to terminate a pregnancy without government intervention, what we as a society are saying is the we are choosing to err on the side of protecting a woman from potential harm at the expense of protecting a potential life from definite and irreversible harm

However, the idea that we as a society may well have sanctioned the wholesale termination of millions of “lives” brings with it a cumbersome burden of societal guilt. So what do we do? We say THAT’S NOT THE ISSUE! The issue is a woman’s right to control her body. However, even if you fully support a woman’s right to control her body, do you not have to ask: control her body in what way and to do what with? If your answer is no, then the logical conclusion you would have to come to is that a woman has the right to terminate a pregnancy, without any governmental intervention, even up to the point of childbirth minus one day. I do not believe that there are many (if any) pro-choice activists that would support the right to terminate a pregnancy that is in its ninth month.

Moreover, the abortion debate cannot and should not take place in a vacuum. Every unplanned pregnancy does not result in an unwanted child. Unless and until we address and de-stigmatize the adoption process and provide full resources to foster and adopting parents, the abortion/choice/life debate will not move out of the political morass in which it is stuck. However, that is another aspect of this very complicated debate and will be addressed in a later post.