The Non-Debate Over Abortion

Life Begins at Conversation: Those of us who support reproductive rights like to say that polls show most Americans are on our side. The truth is that they are on our side, but ...

By Anna Quindlen

Nov. 29 issue - I've been an opinion columnist for 15 years, and the public debate that has advanced least during that time is the one about abortion. (For the record, the discussion of gay rights has come the farthest.) From the time Roe v. Wade was first handed down by the high court, leaders of the opposing sides have been frozen into polar positions. Autonomy versus maternity. Coat hanger versus cradle. Constitution versus church.

Those are oversimplifications, but too often oversimplification has seemed to be the ruling principle on this extraordinarily complex issue. And so many of the discussions of abortion from both sides have felt remote from everyday concerns. Maybe you know someone who watches the little stick turn blue and sits down on the toilet to think about a culture of life or the right to privacy. I don't. Lots of women have decided to end a pregnancy wondering why the so-called debate seems to have no connection to what they're thinking, feeling and doing.

We talk about how the country became so bitterly divided. Abortion is the issue that first set the template for this schism. The public dialogue hardened into ice long ago. In the most recent issue of Conscience, the journal of Catholics for a Free Choice, the leader of the group tries to break the impasse with a wise and provocative manifesto. Frances Kissling asks those who believe in legal abortion to publicly acknowledge competing interests, writing, "Are we not capable of walking and chewing gum at the same time; of valuing life and respecting women's rights?"

She goes on to raise some compelling questions. Is it helpful to concentrate solely on legal arguments when moral imperatives are so much a part of the equation for many people? Is it useful to refuse to consider the emotional pull of the fetus even as we conclude that the rights of the mother ultimately take precedent? Is there a dangerous disconnect between our public positions and our private sentiments, a disconnect the public suspects is dishonest?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6542344/site/newsweek/

or the extreme polarization will continue.

The whole point of choice is, that it's a *choice*.

I've lived through this choice (as a husband), and the author is absolutely right that it's a hell of a lot harder, and less obvious, than some people assume.

In fact, we chose to have a baby. And we're very, very glad. And we're all the more healthy as a family because we had the *choice*. Because we signed on together, and worked through our feelings about the decision. Without any government intervention forcing our decision one way or the other.

So what is the disconnect? These difficult feelings and decisions are exactly *why* allowing individuals to choose is the right thing to do.