In life, many people have to experience reconciling new information with their personal beliefs, whether or not those beliefs are religious. This process is personal to everyone. While religion and spirituality often carry negative connotations, they are subjective and not inherently negative; it is natural for human beings to want to explore life’s many existential questions. However, society runs into problems when people try to force their subjective philosophies onto everyone.
Nowhere is this more clear today than in the constant attack on abortion rights. Millions of Christians and conservatives believe life begins at early pregnancy, and want to eliminate women’s abilities to terminate those pregnancies. They lie that life begins at conception, despite the argument falling apart at the slightest interrogation. If 20 percent of pregnancies end in miscarriages (which is an understatement, as many miscarriages happen even before the woman knows she is pregnant), why would God “kill” so many unborn children with souls?
This kind of deductive reasoning should be taught in any high-school-level science course. Most Americans are unfortunately taught to memorize facts without real thought about anything, let alone their personal beliefs. Furthermore, most teachers and schools are not paid or supported enough to even begin to be able to teach critical thinking.
While many pro-life people do genuinely believe that fighting abortion care saves babies, pro-life people should not be regarded as simply “stupid.” I believe that very few of them are genuinely ignorant to the fact underdeveloped fetuses are not babies. Most anti-abortionists are just violently unwilling to separate their spiritual beliefs from rational thinking or see the value of doing so. If they did, that would open them up to the possibility that their beliefs that give their lives meaning might be wrong, something prior educational experiences may have failed to do.
Yes, that child just might be the next (insert famous person here), as pro-life advocates often point out. However, the fact is that many women are being forced to carry dead fetuses because they could not legally get an abortion before their due date. On the flipside, children are being born to families that do not want them or cannot support them, and are handed off to a foster care system that is dysfunctional and underfunded. Ideas held by a minority about what might be true should not take priority over self-evident realities. The abortion debate should have ceased to exist after Roe v. Wade; the fact that this issue has been revived is a result of people in power using close-minded people as weapons on their crusade for greater control.
So long as there are politicians willing to pander to the false ideas they don’t truly hold in order to get votes, and so long as there are maliciously stubborn people that are willing to support them, we will see such bans implemented and reinforced. That the minority of “pro-life” advocates exists in as great numbers as they do is a testament to the lack of quality science and sexual education in American schools. The only solution is to elect people who believe abortion is healthcare and that public education is worth investing in. Eventually, that will help slow the flow of people into groups that peddle fear, rather than fact.
What is actually a “Reflection of the Dismal State of American Education” is how poorly written this piece is. This is one of the most disjointed, non-sequitur filled six paragraph essays I’ve read recently. Let me just give one example: “society runs into problems when people try to force their subjective philosophies onto everyone.” Do you know what a society is? (FYI: broad grouping of people having common traditions, institutions, and collective activities and interests). Do you realize that whether you are pro-life or pro-abortion you are “forcing your subjective philosophies onto everyone? The lack of a cogent argument here is astounding.