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In the aftermath of the unsuccessful Personhood Amendment
initiative in Mississippi, pro-life groups have much reason to reflect
on their overall philosophy when it comes to when life begins and how
much protection life should receive, matters that, as it turns out, are
far from settled. Rather than debate whether this Amendment failed
because of the MSM or Planned Parenthood or whoever or whatever; rather
than debate whether it would have been upheld by the Courts if it passed
and was (inevitably) challenged; let us take a moment and look at the
pro-life movement more fundamentally. There must be a consistently
intellectually honest view of life that underlies all pro-life efforts.
But it is clear today that there is not. We must recognize and rectify
it or the movement is lost because it will have no moral authority.
Keith Mason of Personhood USA, which backed the Personhood Amendment, said today: “A
personhood amendment, recognizing everyone as a legal person, is the
right thing to do. It is always right to protect our citizens. As
Martin Luther King Jr. said, ‘The time is always right to do what is
right.’”
He
is absolutely correct. However, there is a contradiction when he
says: “Our opposition’s most successful tactics were steeped in
falsehoods. Despite testimony from countless experts including the
Mississippi Center for Public Policy, numerous high-profile attorneys,
and board certified physicians and OBGYNs, Amendment 26 opponents
falsely claimed that the measure would ban in vitro fertilization (it
couldn’t), ban contraception (it wouldn’t), and give protections to
‘eggs’ (it didn’t).” And then also says: “In truth, Amendment 26 protected human embryos from the moment of conception.”
The Personhood Amendment debate in Mississippi and the comments of
its primary supporter, show a shocking, but all too common, truth about
the "pro-life" community as a whole. Even the proponents of the
Amendment go out of their way to say that this would not ban IVF and contraception.
As
a matter of philosophical consistency and logic, "Why not?" If they
are seeking to protect all embryos from the moment of conception and
define them as persons, how do you then exclude these two forms of
life-beginning-at-conception from the protection they say they want?
Are they not persons, too? How can you “protect human embryos from the
moment of conception” andnot ban IVF and at least those forms of contraception that can be abortifacients?
It is important to realize how the Supreme Court got to its decision in Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973), and its companion case, Doe v. Bolton, 410 U.S. 179 (1973). Together Roe and Doe
legalized abortion across all fifty states based principally on an
alleged “right of privacy” in the U.S. Constitution because the Court
had already decided Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965),
which is the all-too-often-forgotten case wherein the Court actually
found that “right of privacy” in the context of deciding that a
Connecticut law prohibiting the use of contraceptives was
unconstitutional.
There has been, from the very beginning, an inextricable link between contraception and abortion.
Up until about 1930, all Christian Churches condemned both
contraception and abortion and were united in support of life from the
moment of conception. The only Christian Churches to remain firmly
against both contraception and abortion are the Catholic Church and the
Orthodox Church. When the others changed their doctrines, they started
by relaxing their views concerning contraception. This clarity among and
within churches regarding contraception is no longer present and it has
without a doubt contributed significantly to the muddled pro-life
philosophy for many well-intentioned individuals. This link must be
made clear again, especially since it is now evident that certain forms
of contraception can lead to abortions. (And, not just the “Morning
After Pill,” but also certain forms of “the Pill,” IUDs, etc.) If life
begins at conception and the embryo is a person, then one cannot support
abortifacient contraception.
And,
what about the "selective reductions" after a successful IVF or the
destruction of unused embryos? The IVF-using couples who want a child
so badly pay (handsomely) for the procedure which most of the time
implants more than a one embryo at a time because so many perish in the
process. Most of the time, if the couple is blessed with more than one
or two of these embryos surviving, there is often the process of
"selectively reducing" the number of children alive and growing in their
mother’s womb. It is an abortion. For just one IVF doctor’s view of this process, where he makes clear that selective reduction is acceptable and advisable.
There
are some who might say that the Personhood Amendment was an attempt at
“incrementalism.” In the pro-life movement, there is a split among those
who support an “all or nothing” approach (ban it all or don’t bother
and we won’t support it) and those who support a “let’s do what we can, a
little at a time” approach, sometimes called an “incremental”
approach. There are merits to both arguments and the point here is not
to advocate for or against either one; it is beside the point. The
point here is that there is nothing in the language above indicating
this was an incremental approach. It seems that all that was intended
was protection and personhood status for some embryos, but not all.
As
such, there is a fundamental, but unacknowledged, inconsistency by the
proponents of the Amendment when they say the Amendment will “protect human embryos from the moment of conception” and “recogniz[e] everyone as a legal person” while simultaneously saying
the Amendment will not ban IVF and certain forms of abortifacient
contraception. By its proponent’s own comments, it allows for the
destruction of some of the very “persons” they claim to want to protect
based on how they came to be in existence. So, there is a massive
education effort needed – apparently within the pro-life community and
for the promoters of this Amendment as much as for anyone else – so that
the pro-life movement is consistently intellectually honest and has the
moral authority necessary to engage in this vital effort. Let’s get
started!
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I have not really written about IVF before, but the concerns with
it - and the reasons it is morally wrong - should be even more apparent.
Perhaps I'll write another post about it in the future. In the
meantime, I hope this helps show in another way why we cannot
support contraception that is even potentially abortifacient in the
pro-life movement.
- Kassi Dee Marks
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