Women’s Reproductive Rights are Rights; Let’s Treat them like It

Women's Reproductive Rights are Rights; Let's Treat them like It

Abortion right protesters outside the supreme court. From Forbes. 

On June 24th of 2022, Roe. V. Wade was overturned by the Supreme Court. This led to masses of women and men all over the world protesting, asking questions and demanding answers. Why should the government have control over women’s bodies and their reproductive rights? 

Women’s reproductive rights are simply that, rights. They should be treated as such and protected. In no way is decriminalizing abortion unconstitutional, what is unconstitutional is denying a woman of her bodily rights. It is not only unconstitutional but also immoral to withhold a woman’s right an abortion if she should need one for any reason. 

Cracking Constitution. Image from Planned Parenthood

According to Planned Parenthood, when you outlaw abortions, it only turns safe health care into the same healthcare but with greater legal risks. "Banning abortion does not get rid of abortions, it simply gets rid of safe abortions." This puts women at greater risk if they ever need an abortion for any reason, they may seek illegal ways to get one or even go about it in a way that could seriously harm them. 

There is no point in criminalizing abortion when all it really does is create an environment where women are scared to reach out for help. It instills a fear in women across the US, a fear to share their situation because if they do they might be penalized for it. If our own government is not willing to protect our rights then who are we going to turn to? It leaves women of the United States with very few options when it comes to their own reproductive rights. 

According to the planned parenthood article, nearly 80% of Americans think that abortion should not be illegal. This means that a vast majority of the population disagree with the overturning of Roe v. Wade. The women and men of this generation who are in favor of legalizing abortion are powerful and they are making sure their voices are being heard. The overturning of Roe v. Wade has sparked many rallies and protests for “My body My Choice” and “Keep your Laws off My Body.”  It does not seem like the people participating in these rallies and protests are going to stop until they get what they want. 

Protest rally. Image from The Boston Globe

According to a an article entitled The Fight for Abortion After Roe Falls when Texas banned abortions in September, New Mexico saw a large increase of out-of-state patients seeking an abortion.  This very accurately depicts how eliminating abortions does not mean that you are putting an end to them, you are simply changing the area in which they take place. This goes to show that if you make abortions illegal, there is no stopping patients from going out of state to get an abortion or go so far as to get an illegal abortion. 

The reasoning behind making abortions illegal is mainly that of saving the life of an unborn child. This is most commonly referred to as the “Pro-life” standpoint. Many of those who side with Pro-life over Pro-choice will defend the child’s right to live over the mother’s right to an abortion. They do not consider how the mother may want to get an abortion to save her own life. Many women have severe health issues that prevent her from carrying to term or prevent her from making it through childbirth. The banning of abortion all together with no acceptations does not represent the pro-life standpoint because it is not necessarily pro-life when it comes to the life of women, only their unborn children. 

According to The American University of Washington DC, "the only alternative to abortion is childbirth, and that has a 14 times higher risk of death than abortion does." Childbirth could also end in the death of both the child and the mother if there are complications severe enough. With the current trend of states putting abortion bans in place, there is a predicted increase in maternal deaths during childbirth since many women will be forced to carry to term due to not being able to gain access to an abortion service. 

This seems much less like a pro-life standpoint the longer you look at it. By banning abortion, a higher mortality rate is predicted amongst mothers. Forcing women to give birth could unfortunate end fatally for many mothers all over the United States, especially women of color who already have an alarmingly high mortality rate during childbirth. 

Image from KFF.org

While there are still plenty of states where abortion is legal, in the states where it is not, in the article by the American University of Washington DC it states how there are plenty of women scrambling to find other ways to resolve their issues. They are traveling out of state in order to find an abortion clinic that will take them, or they are fighting to reinstate appointments with abortion clinics that they had made prior to abortion bans being put in place. 

This further proves the point that simply because abortion is illegal, that does not mean people will stop getting them. They might simply go about it in a different way that might not me as ethical as a normal, legal abortion would be. There are plenty of ways to still get an abortion if they are illegal in the place you live in, such as traveling out of state or finding a facility in sate that will conduct an illegal abortion. These are all options that are being exploited by women who live in states that abortions have been banned. 

Women’s reproductive rights have sadly been stripped away from many women living in the US today. Their lives are not seen as valuable as those of their unborn children in many cases. It does not seem fair that the pro-life standpoint holds an unborn child’s life at such high regard, but not the life of that child’s mother. Women should have the right to choose what to do with their own bodies, and they should not have to be told by the government that they cannot do what is best for them. Currently, women’s rights are being stripped away from a large amount of women in the US. Women’s rights are rights and they should be treated like it.