Polly
03-14-2007, 08:45 AM
Both articles are good think pieces about cultural assimilation of ideas.
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/thefix/
The Post site links to the Atlantic Monthly article.
Polly
I've been meaning to read this, but I just got around to it. I get the argument, but I can't say I'm sure I agree with it, in either case, but for different reasons.
I just don't think that overturning Roe and leaving abortion up to the states would satisfy anyone. I think that groups who oppose legal access to abortion would not be satisfied at all and would want to make legal abortions unavailable to all women, in all states.
Personally, I think the flaw in Roe was going in one swoop from extremely, extremely restrictive abortion laws in many states to the entire country having some of the most permissive abortion laws in the world. Most people, no matter what they believe about the legality of abortion, are more horrified by the idea of an abortion at 20 weeks than an abortion at 6 weeks. That's why images of fetuses aborted at 18 and 20 weeks are used most frequently in anti-legal abortion campaigns, rather than images of embryos aborted at 5 or 6 weeks gestation, even though the latter are far, far more common. Obviously there are people who wouldn't want to see abortions legally available at any point in a pregnancy, but I really do think that if we took into consideration that most people are far more troubled by second-trimester abortions than by first-trimester ones, and that advances in medical science have allowed us to detect pregnancies very early, just revamping abortion laws so that abortion were only available until 10 or 12 weeks would make the issue far, far less contentious. We certainly wouldn't reach a consensus, but I do think that it would cease to be something so divisive for average people. Most other industrialized countries limit elective abortions after the first trimester, and abortion is not nearly as contentious as it is here.
As for gay marriage, if you think of it as a civil rights issue, which I do, then it can't be left up to states. Civil rights can never be left to public opinion. Honestly, if they were, I'm sure there'd still be states where interracial marriage was illegal. Call it "civil unions," call it "civil partnerships," call it "marriage"--I don't think it matters--but basic rights (including the right to enter into a contractual relationship with a partner) can't be a state-by-state issue. Democracies must protect the rights and interests of minorities, even if those minorities are reviled by many. Unless there are valid, secular reasons for denying partnership rights to gay and lesbian couples, then there is no basis for a democratic nation to not ensure those rights to them, no matter where they happen to live.
But, after all that, I'm not too concerned about gay marriage. It's going to happen. When our kids are grown, they will look at the fight to deny partnership rights to gay couples and find it as inexplicable and immoral as we now consider the fight to deny partnership rights to interracial couples. Of course, as a straight woman, it's very easy for me to wait, and I can understand why gay and lesbian people aren't willing to wait quietly for people to stop hating them, but it is going to happen, because, even if we don't get there quickly or linearly, history moves in the direction of greater love and justice.
I don't believe there will be any such consensus on abortion, though, even many generations from now. It's too complicated. I would hope we could figure out a way to both show respect for developing life without using state power to require that all pregnancies be carried to term (because the state requiring that all pregnancies be carried to term is just the flip-side of the state deciding that some women not be allowed to carry pregnancies to term, and in many societies where reproductive decisions come under state control, what ends up happening is that certain "desirable" women are forced to bear children against their will while other "undesirable" women are forced to undergo unwanted sterilizations or to abort wanted pregnancies), but I don't think it will be a settled issue the way that gay marriage will be.