I was casually scrolling on my phone when I received the notification that the Supreme Court was planning to overturn Roe vs. Wade.
Seeing the headline made my stomach turn with dread. I prayed the news was false. Such a decision would allow states across the country to criminalize having an abortion and/or restrict access to having one and allow the government to regulate a woman’s own body. However, an overwhelming majority of Americans – about 70% - believe that the decision about an abortion should be left to a woman and her doctor (ABC News). In a country that preaches democracy and the people’s choice, it’s funny that the opinion of 30% of the population can suddenly rule the lives of millions of American women across the country.
As I’m sure you’re aware of, the main argument of this 30% for criminalizing abortion is to “preserve life” and “oppose killing unborn children”. I think that the words of Peggy Noonan for the Wall Street Journal accurately sums up their stance: “I am pro-life for the most essential reason: That’s a baby in there, a human child. We cannot accept as a society … that we have decided that we can extinguish the lives of our young.”
Now, there are many counterarguments that I support against this notion, such as the idea that a woman should have the right to choose and a woman should not have to bear a child due to rape or incest, but in this article, I’d like to explore the counterfactual. Let’s explore a world where the opinion of the 30% holds true, and abortion in any circumstance is illegal. What are the impacts, and do these impacts justify such an opinion? This is a hill that many pro-lifers want to die on, and thus, I believe that addressing this argument directly is the only way to potentially sway their opinion.
Let’s start from the basics.
A child is born. A crying, anxious little thing is brought into this great, big, world – a world that it doesn’t understand the slightest. And what is the point of being born - the purpose of this new life? At its foundation, it is to survive. Meaning and purpose only become relevant if one has the basics of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs: food, sleep, water, shelter, health, and finances. These things are the bare minimum of which you need to survive. I think that we can all agree that survival is not a privilege; it is a necessity. If you cannot survive, you will die, and in that event, life itself is worthless.
You may be wondering, what is the point of discussing the meaning of life on such a macro level? The point is that if we all agree that these are the necessary foundations of life, then the argument against abortion is utterly and completely wrong.
According to a study done by the American Public Health Association in 2017, “75% of women who obtain abortions are low-income, with nearly 50% living below the federal poverty level.” The study continues to find that women who couldn’t obtain an abortion were more likely to be living in poverty four years later. This statistic was found through surveying 813 American women between 2008 and 2010 who either received or were denied an abortion and had a p-value of less than 0.001.
Impoverished women who are denied an abortion are forced to bring a child into a low-income environment. According to the Ontario Association of Children’s Aid Societies (OACAS), poverty negatively impacts children in a multitude of ways. First, through prolonged stress, which can harm early brain development and result in cognitive impairment, mental health issues, and behavioral problems. Second, through poor access to food, which results in many health conditions such as diabetes, obesity, and developmental problems. Third, through negatively impacting academic achievement due to poor access to education, inability to concentrate due to hunger, and more. These are only three impacts of many that poverty has already wreaked on our children.
Childhood poverty is not a new issue. It is a persistent one. According to the 2020 United States Census, 11.6 million children, or 16% of kids nationwide, were living in poverty. This statistic increased by more than 1 million children since 2019. Furthermore, nearly 1 in 5 children of color in America are poor. Children of color were also 2.5 times more likely to be poor than their white, non-Hispanic peers. Had abortion been illegal all along, the number of children living in poverty would surely be higher because low-income women would no longer have access to abortion care.
On the contrary, children who grew in stable families – families with adequate economic resources, job security, time, and choice of when to have children – received better educational and social outcomes (Child Trends). And the data makes sense: a parent who plans to have a child and sets aside the resources to do so will most definitely create an environment that is easier to thrive in.
I was lucky to be a part of the former. My parents only gave birth to me years after they had settled in the United States and had stable income that could provide adequate food, shelter, and educational resources. Had this not been the case, I surely would not be where I am today, attending university and writing this article on my laptop in a cozy, quiet neighborhood with no fear as to when the next meal is.
Perhaps the opposition will argue that a child can merely climb their way out of poverty, but this is not the case. According to the National Center for Children in Poverty, “poor families are much more likely to be poor in early adulthood. Moreover, the chances of being poor in early adulthood increase sharply as the time spent living in poverty during childhood increases.” Poverty is a cyclical, and most people who are born into poverty will not be able to escape it.
I believe that a life of mental, physical, and economic security is not a privilege – it is a right. We have a duty to our children to provide them an environment where they can grow and thrive. Children do not ask to be born in a world where they do not have their basic needs of food, water, shelter, and stability met. When we bring children into such an environment, we are directly placing this burden of survival on them, and this is a responsibility that no child should ever have to bear. To do so is the greatest form of disrespect, disservice, and neglect for a child.
In a country where 16% of our children currently live below the poverty line, it baffles me that our efforts are not concentrated on helping them first. I don’t understand why so much emphasis is placed on the unborn rather than the living – it’s as if we are protecting the rights of the dead and turning a blind eye to those that currently exist. 75% of women who received an abortion were low income because they knew that they did not have the resources to adequately care for a child. They did not want to hinder their children from the moment they are born.
This, to me, is one of the greatest acts of selflessness and service. These women did not have the intent to kill – they had the intent to save these children from a life of poverty.
In a country where many Americans do not have access to healthcare, food security, and stable shelter, the argument against abortion holds no merit. If we cannot provide a stable environment for our children, then a child should not be born at all. To do so is to forever imprison a new life – and the lives after them – to a life of poverty without consent.
There is an overwhelming amount of evidence and counterarguments against the pro-life opinion, but it seems to me that pro-lifers are people with blinders on, only caring about their singular argument about “preserving life”. I pray, for the safety of women across America, that these people – this 30% – will take a step back to fully analyze this belief. The argument does not end at conception. There is still a full life after birth for this child to live: a life that needs food, water, shelter, and most of all, a stable family to support them. A life without any of these things is a hindered life, and we must do our best to bring our children into a world that has all these necessities already there for them. Our children should not have to deal with the consequences of our current lives, as these are consequences of our own.
A mother, at her core, will always put her child first. This is a biological fact. And because of this, a mother will also protect a child from a world that cannot support them. To go against this is to deny the biological principles that a woman does not know how to properly handle a life that she has created, which is the biggest hypocrisy that scarily enough, has the potential to be supported by the highest court of the land.
Control over one's body is the most basic of human rights, and the argument cannot be simplified down to "killing a baby". There are so many repercussions for women and children - economic, health, mental, emotional, developmental - that go unaccounted for. The overturn of Roe vs. Wade goes completely against what we have always understood the purpose of life to be. A life without the means of survival is not a life at all. The result is a world where we feed these unborn children to the wolves, forced to live in a world that cannot adequately care for them, while leaving women in the dust, forced to suffer the financial and health-related consequences associated with having a baby.
This potential judicial decision stands to test democracy and personal autonomy at its core. For the safety of our women and children, I pray that this decision will not materialize.
Works Cited
Bureau, US Census. “Income and Poverty in the United States: 2020.” Census.gov, 1 Mar.
2022, https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2021/demo/p60-273.html.
“Home.” Child Trends, 11 May 2022, https://www.childtrends.org/.
Noonan, Peggy. “The End of Roe v. Wade Will Be Good for America.” The Wall Street Journal,
Dow Jones & Company, 6 May 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-end-of-roe-will-be-
good-for-america-supreme-court-draft-leak-decision-abortion-pro-life-choice-
justices-alito-11651787057.
“Poverty and Child Welfare: Effects of Poverty on Children.” OACAS Library Guides,
https://oacas.libguides.com/c.php?g=702168&p=4990142.
“Socioeconomic Outcomes of Women Who Receive and Women Who Are Denied Wanted
Abortions in the United States.” American Journal of Public Health,
https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.2017.304247.
“With Supreme Court Poised to Reverse Roe, Most Americans Support Abortion Rights:
POLL.” ABC News, ABC News Network, https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/supreme-
court-poised-reverse-roe-americans-support-abortion/story?id=84468131.
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