I am not a fan of abortion. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, abortion stops 500,000 lives from coming into existence every year. Truth is, 79 percent of abortions occur because of irresponsible premarital sex in which the mother or father or both are too young or not ready to start a family. If a girl does have an abortion, it is my belief God will ask her about it one day.
If I ever had sex before marriage and the girl got pregnant, I would hope that she would go through with it and give birth. Keep in mind there are numerous couples who desire to have children but cannot for whatever reason, hence they are looking to adopt a child. In my case, I would suffer the consequences and raise the child. So I am pro-life, right?
Wrong. Politically, I am as pro-choice as they come. It would truly be a tragic day in this country if abortion were ever outlawed by the government. If America learned anything from Prohibition, it is that we suffer when we try to legislate morals. Although President Bush might feel abortion is sinful, he has no business signing a bill outlawing abortion and forcing all Americans to abide by his moral code. Remember, Bush thinks he is sent by God to give God's gift of liberty to all of mankind. How great of a country would we really be if the laws in our books forced us all to think like our dear president?
To me, being pro-choice is not necessarily about being pro-abortion. Rather, being pro-choice is about being pro-First Amendment. Pro-choice entails allowing people to do their own thing or, as John Stuart Mill desired, allowing people to have their own private sphere. The personal decisions people make are between them and God, and are none of my business.
Furthermore, outlawing abortion is not the proper way to reduce teenage pregnancy. Instead of trying to solve the problem on the back-end by dealing with abortion, we should be more concerned with educating our children on the front-end. Why should we even let it get to the point where our children are thinking about abortion?
Children should be encouraged to partake in abstinence. America won't have to worry about whether or not a girl should have an abortion if she has never had sex. Proper contraceptives and their usage should also be taught as part of the sex education curriculum in high schools across the nation for those individuals who are against abstinence.
Alcohol-related traffic accidents injure 600,000 people each year according to the U.S. Department of Transportation. So while the congressmen are getting drunk in Washington (studies show that numerous members of Congress are alcoholics), the conservative right is busy telling America about how they are "pro-life." Yet, can you truly be pro-life and pro-alcohol simultaneously, whereby alcohol has proven to be anti-life over and over again?
Outlawing abortion, like outlawing alcohol, would cause much harm to society. Let's face it. There will always be pre-marital sex. And there will always be accidental pregnancies. Can you imagine how crowded our prisons would be if young girls who tried to have an abortion because they were afraid of having a child at age 16 were thrown in? Prisons are already overcrowding. Are we willing to pay to build new prisons to house these young girls? Or instead, should prison be the place where dangerous individuals are locked away from society?
Outlawing abortion, like outlawing alcohol, would not prevent people from committing the deed. Americans during Prohibition still drank alcohol, they just did it illegally. Pregnant girls who don't want to have a child will still actively seek abortion, except they will use methods that are dangerous to their own health - for example, using coat hangers or other sharp objects. As long as they will have an abortion, legally or otherwise, why not send them to a clinic during their first trimester to ensure that their own health is not at risk?
As a Muslim, I agree with many of my Christian brothers and sisters who say life begins at conception. But Christianity isn't the official religion of America, nor is Islam. Moreover, thousands of Christians exist who say abortion is permissible. While my personal morals put abortion in the same category as murder, others say life does not begin until birth. Tolerance encompasses allowing people to believe as they believe, not legislating what they should or shouldn't believe. As long as the First Amendment stands, and as long as Congress continues to make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, abortion should not and cannot be outlawed in the United States.
Farhan Bhatti is on the executive board of the MSU College Democrats and is the Chair of the Programs Committee on ASMSU's Freshman Class Council. Reach him at bhattifa@msu.edu.
