By Natalie Forster
Over these past two weeks, the need for this article has become very clear to me. Starting with a question at the All Bonaventure Reads event, the debate on abortion has spiraled out of control.
The argument over abortion has always been around, and I am not ashamed to take a stance and say I am pro-choice. No, that does not mean I support abortion in any right. Pro-choice means I support women’s decisions on what to do with their own bodies.
When women get their drivers’ licenses, they decide whether to be organ donors. If they choose not to, harvesting their organs would be illegal, even if the organs can save lives.
This concept is called bodily autonomy, and it is a basic human right. It means that each person has control over what happens to one’s body and when it may happen.
Because a fetus needs a woman’s body to survive, pregnancy falls under bodily autonomy. Therefore, if a woman denies consent to the fetus, she legally has the right to get rid of it.
Saying a fetus deserves the right to a woman’s body grants fetuses more rights than the living and gives pregnant women less rights to their own bodies than the deceased have to theirs.
This is only one example of injustices in today’s society and there continues to be many more against women. As a woman, I do not hate men, nor do I think women are better. However, women are still given less rights in some ways.
If we get knocked up under the age of 20, it is assumed that we are horrible people. If we do not get pregnant by 30, we are judged. Society does not consider our own opinions. Society just expects certain things from us.
Women can get pregnant from rape, and some men purposefully have made unknowing women pregnant by punching holes in condoms. While these occurrences happen less often than conceiving on accident, how can we treat all circumstances the same?
How can someone look into the eyes of one of these women and say it was a good thing that she got pregnant – that God wanted her to get pregnant and that the child is a miracle? How can a woman be expected to be okay with reliving the moments of her rape when looking into her daughter’s eyes?
The problem with this issue is not men, but rather the idea that women have had little say for far too long. Government representatives still remain predominantly male, and women do not have as big of a vote for their own freedom. We still have men voting over something that does not concern them at the end of the day.
I refuse to say that abortion is the right option, but, for some people in some cases, it is. At the end of the day, each person should be able to choose what happens to his or her body. You do not get mad at customers ordering different food than you, so why should you be mad at someone choosing to do something else with her body?
forstena17@bonaventure.edu
