I have never made it a secret that for a lengthy period of time in my life, I identified as pro-life. For a time, it was a decision related to the Catholic faith I was raised in.
Later, even after leaving Catholicism behind, I maintained my position on something resembling a well-meaning but simplistic ethical basis. I say this with no hint of pride or irony: when I was fourteen, I had an extended argument with a friend explaining that I didn’t kill insects on the basis of their right to live, and that I didn’t support abortion for the exact same reason.
Unlike some very astute fourteen-year-olds whom I’ve had the pleasure of meeting and discussing politics with, I was not terribly educated on the issue. I had never spoken with anyone who had ever told me they had gotten an abortion, though I know now that likely had more to do with their lack of desire to mention it than anything else. After all, twenty-one percent of pregnancies in the US in 2011 ended in abortion (no longer the famous “one-in-three,” thanks in large part to increased access to contraceptives).
Around a quarter of the 1.06 million abortions that year were decisions made by women identifying as Hispanic. About 28 percent identified as Catholic. Both of those demographics make up a lot of people I’m related to and love dearly, but who probably weren’t going to be exactly vocal about it in front of the people at the family holiday parties.
I came to a pro-choice position gradually. First it was as a convert for personal autonomy — part of the “I support the right, but would never get one myself” crowd, a valid stance as long as the first half is as sincere as the second — then as an empathetic person. I have come to know people whose lives have been saved by abortion. I’ve met others who’ve been able to give their children wonderful lives because they had access to abortions that prevented other, more poorly timed pregnancies. And I’ve met many who don’t speak to the experience at all simply because it’s no one’s business, and that’s just fine.
It is not their responsibility to share with me their experiences. It is, however, my responsibility to defend with every ounce of privilege I have their access to safe, legal, and affordable abortions and birth control.
More Radical Reads: What Happens if We Lose Roe v. Wade: An Interview with the Abortion Doulas
Why Cis Men Should Use Their Privilege to Support Reproductive Rights
One often-stated question, even among fairly liberal cis men, is: why should (cis) men defend reproductive choice when it supposedly doesn’t affect us, that is, since we can’t physically become pregnant?
I have never understood this thinking, even back when I was pro-life. There is no such thing as a human pregnancy that does not involve (at least) two individuals. Even from a purely selfish, “not-wanting-to-deal-with-a-child” line of reasoning, maintaining access to reproductive freedom is a sensible desire for cis men.
Cis men often occupy a space in public discourse above women on this issue, as on many other issues. Women are constantly excluded from discussions impacting them, including on reproductive justice, while cis men position themselves as the only arbitrators in the debate.
Consider back in 2014, when the all-male House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice discussed a bill that would effectively strip insurance providers from offering abortion coverage in their standard plans. While that bill died in the Senate, it still passed in the House and is still cited and drawn from in current efforts to continue stripping away reproductive rights and defunding Planned Parenthood. The recent abortion bans in multiple US states offer more examples of the disproportionate power of anti-choice men’s voices.
The problem here is that cis men are failing to act on behalf of the 50%+ of the population capable of becoming pregnant. As individuals committed to justice and progressive values, it is always our responsibility to elevate the voices of the marginalized. We do this with privileges afforded to us in whatever capacity we have them. Our voices and platforms are given more weight. Our wealth and labor often are as well. As men existing in a patriarchy, ours are the valued perspectives. One of the most direct ways we can use this is to amplify the efforts for reproductive rights.
When women and people of all marginalized genders are able to control their bodies, both as consensual sexual participants and safe decision-makers, they are able to more freely participate in society. Access to reproductive planning and services are in many ways a major basis for this freedom.
More Radical Reads: Why Access Matters: What’s Missing from the Conversation on Reproductive Justice
There are also economic reasons for supporting reproductive freedom. Even in the UK, where maternity leave is far more widely available than it is in the United States, women taking time away to have children are often left in professional lurches that take years to recover from, if they can at all. Combine this with the noted trend that economies grow and grow faster when women are more evenly integrated into the labor force, and we’re left destroying our own best measures to improve our societies.
Family Planning in the 21st Century
Consider this: my paternal grandparents raised six children. My maternal grandparents raised ten. By the standards of their time period, ethnic and geographical culture, and religious imperatives, these numbers were pretty standard. In contrast, my parents had two children, a number they had settled on some years prior. Most of their siblings had around that number. And now many of my cousins are having children of their own, with most of us quite happy with somewhere between zero and three.
Some of us take this for granted. Some of us look back to our forebears and chastise the rough manner in which they treated their bodies, the lack of control they exercised or were capable of exercising. Some of us forget how recently the idea of zero children was made an option.
This has been especially true of my male relatives, many of whom don’t like to talk to their partners about their birth control pills or refuse to discuss emergency contraception or abortion. We grew up under our fathers and mothers who decided that it was not important for us to concern ourselves with this, but too many aren’t aware of the burden we impose through our ignorance.
This is why we must unabashedly support reproductive rights. Our efforts forge the future we hand to our children and godchildren, our nieces and nephews. As a result of our fight, they’ll hopefully be a little better off, with most of this figured out, and they can turn their attention to newer, less obvious questions.
(Featured Image: Photograph of a man with light skin, short brown hair, and glasses standing in the midst of a rally alongside other protesters, his mouth open as if in mid-cheer. He is wearing a black t-shirt and has one arm raised up with his pointer finger in the air. His arm is decorated with tattoos. A city building is visible behind him. Source: Pexels]
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