Leonard Pitts Jr.: ‘Are you anti-abortion?’

Leonard Pitts Jr.: ‘Are you anti-abortion?’

“Are you anti-abortion?”

That question, from a colleague, caught me by surprise. After all, she knows I’ve written a number of pro-choice columns.

“I know you’re pro-choice,” she added, reading my mind. “But I was wondering if you’re anti-abortion.”

I knew where this was coming from. She had just finished reading the first draft of my next novel, a World War II epic in which a character wrestles with whether to abort the child of a man who brutally raped her. I reminded my colleague not to confuse the character’s opinion with mine. One reason you write fiction is to put yourself into the minds of people who are not like you.

Still, her question intrigued me because it suggested a seldom-heard perspective, a third way, if you will, in the eternal battle between pro-choice and pro-life.

We are taught that there are those two ways only. Indeed, where abortion is concerned, that’s the fundament of every policy debate and political speech. But it seems ever clearer to me that it’s a false dichotomy, a narrative of hard, diametrical opposition that, while it makes for great headlines, fails to acknowledge the mushy middle ground where many, if not most of us, reside.

- See more at: http://www.wvgazettemail.com/gazette-opinion/20160215/leonard-pitts-jr-are-you-anti-abortion#sthash.GNHng2FQ.dpuf



The reality that most all antis refuse to admit — and which, to me, shows the pro-choice crowd's more rational approach. There's very little in life that's black-&-white clear.