[that stable fulfilling family life "must [be] built on love, not on coercion"], I will join in the suspicions of many feminists that the right-wing antiabortion agenda is not so much about life as about patriarchy. And I'll join those women in resisting any restoration of patriarchal practices and in exposing the hypocrisies of those who claim to be pro-life but who are unwilling to provide economic and political and social supports for children once they are born, who support American military interventions in which tens of thousands of innocent men, women, and children are killed, who support the death penalty, and who are remarkably unconcerned about the between 20,000 and 30,000 children around the world (according to different estimates) who die each day from malnutrition or preventable diseases. While I acknowledge that there are a small group of Christians who are more consistent in opposing the denial of life in all these forms, the majority of pro-lifers seem not to care about all these other ways in which life is being undermined. This inconsistency suggests that we look a little deeper and uncover the not-very-well-hidden patriarchal restoration that many right-wingers yearn for. (270-271)-from Rabbi Michael Lerner's The Left Hand of God: Healing America's Political and Spiritual Crisis
I agree that there are many who are inconsistent on this. It saddens me that someone would fight for the rights of the unborn and then do so little for the rights of those living in abject poverty.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I see the same inconsistency on the other side. I see many on the left courageously fighting as a voice for those who have no voice. They fight for the poor and downtrodden. They fight for the lives of refugees and those affected by wars. And yet they do nothing for the most helpless, the unborn who literally have no voice.
Quotes like the one above seem to say that the left's inconsistency by support for abortion, that is, killing the unborn is justified by the inconsistency of those on the right. It fails to take on the real issue at stake in the abortion argument, namely, are the unborn human beings who inherently have all the rights of other human beings?
Why do we have to choose? Either support the rights of the unborn or support the rights of the poor who are born. I reject this dichotomy and want to be one who fights for justice for all human beings.
Blessings,
Dustin