We have a weird
double standard going on in our culture,
which is this:
We collectively consider news stories about pregnant
woman being hurt or killed horrific. I was going to say more horrific than
a regular murder, but we have all become so desensitized to violence that “regular”
murder rarely makes a blip on our radars anymore. Run-of-the-mill assaults or
car crashes don’t even have a radar to blip on.
But when a pregnant woman is
involved in one of these things, it suddenly becomes a monstrous occurrence.
Men who beat their wives: bad. Men who beat their pregnant wives: monsters. Random
knifing… unpleasant. Random knifing of a pregnant woman’s stomach: Horrendous.
Car accident: run-of-the-mill. Car accident that involves pregnant woman:
terrifying. We even see this echoed on TV shows. How many dramas have used the “pregnant
woman in danger” scenario to increase tension? We are re-watching Lost and came
to the episode where Ana-Lucia is shot. You find out at the end that she was
pregnant… shortly before she kills the shooter. And you want to cheer for her, which
is, I’m sure, what the writer’s goal was. You think “You go girl! He killed
your baby! SHOOT HIM!!”
We find these things to be
heart-wrenching, even sickening. And they are. But if the same woman chose to
get an abortion in order to not bring that child into an abusive household, we’d cheer
her on. If that lady made it through that assault or car crash and into the
planned parenthood to “terminate the fetus,” she’d be a champion for women’s
rights. If the same character on Lost had a storyline about choosing to kill
the baby that she was murderous over, we’d be proud of their feminist stance.
Here’s the problem: What does
this say about us?
It says that a person’s value and worth, even their basic
humanity, is dependent on how much someone wants them.
We are horrified by the
first set of stories because we know they parents are horrified; that was their baby that they were planning for and naming and loving already. We accept (or
even cheer) the second set because the babies were unwanted and it was the
woman’s choice.
If you are wanted; if you are
loved, you are valuable.
If you are a burden; if you
are an inconvenience, you are worthless.
It’s funny, because it’s very
anti-American at its core. Our core values tell us that people have value
because they are people, and that it doesn’t matter who your parents are or
where you come from--- in fact, a vast majority of our laws are built to
protect those in society that are unwanted or unloved.
But our abortion laws tell us
just the opposite. They say that the ONLY thing that matters is who your
parents are and where you come from. Your entire future is based on who you
will (or will not) be born to. Your worth as a human is completely reliant on
and determined by your DNA.
We’ve had this in the past---
frequently--- and we find it abhorrent to look into the periods in our own
history (both human and American) where people were judged based on their
social class, their ethnicity or the color of their skin. They are probably the
biggest blemishes IN human history--- these decisions to oppress (or destroy)
entire people groups because they were deemed invaluable, or worthless, or
because they had the wrong DNA. These decisions to deem people "less than human" because they are unwanted or a hindrance, or because their presence makes someone else uncomfortable or less prosperous.
I wonder how history will look
at us…
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