By Amy Kohli
Well, here we are again, 1972.
A draft of the Supreme Court opinion to reverse Roe v. Wade has been leaked by the news site Politico – to a seismic response from pro-choice advocates across the country.
The Supreme Court draft claims to have displayed a majority opinion suggesting that they intend to strike down Roe v. Wade. For context, Roe was a 1973 Supreme Court decision that used the commerce clause to ensure a pregnant woman’s right to choose an abortion on a federal level, regardless of state bans.
Roe v. Wade has been a site of political contention for far too long. Since its inception in 1973, the women’s rights movement has had a tangible marker and indicator of its progress.
Finally, a woman has the security, liberty and right to choose what she does with her body. Abortion was federally protected – meaning states that would otherwise jump tooth and nail at that opportunity now had to provide a woman with access to an abortion.
The problem is that not only is abortion itself an insignia – or a fundamental element of the women’s rights movement – but it is also a functional and a deeply necessary procedure.
Abortion is an emergency method that protects women from crossing the threshold of unintended pregnancy to the trap of bearing a child you weren’t ready to have, and a life of motherhood. Personally, I believe that being “Pro-life” is more about means of control over women’s bodies, rather than being concerned about the fetus. Pro-life exists and persists simply because reproductive rights are an insignia of women’s liberation and equity. The very idea that women want to protect themselves and their bodily autonomy seems to feel almost exclusionary to pro-lifers.
What makes this issue so harmful to women is that my right to my body is what makes free speech possible. This makes it even more foundational than other kinds of rights.
Whether or not a woman wants to birth a child is no ones business but hers. I strongly dislike the concept of demonizing women for not wanting to be pregnant. There are many reasons why a person with a uterus would not want to give birth. What a woman does with her body to keep herself healthy and safe is no ones choice but her own.