Insight

Justice for whom?

Women must have right to self

It's a scary time for folks like us. John Roberts, a man whose stance on female reproductive freedom is anything but certain, was sworn in as our new Supreme Court Chief Justice last Thursday. By the time this column is printed, we will be facing the inevitable confirmation of yet another conservative judge.

According to The New York Times, "Senator Sam Brownback, Republican of Kansas ... told the White House that he wanted the next nominee to have a demonstrated record of willingness to reconsider Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court's 1973 abortion decision."

Could this landmark democratic decision be overturned in the next few years? For those of us who believe the government has no right to enforce maternity, the prospect is a frightening one.

Female reproductive freedom is probably the most passionately debated issue on our national agenda. It divides us like nothing else-more so, even, than the Iraq bloodbath (everyone now sees that for the fiasco it is, right?).

The debate has often centered on whether or not a fetus is a human being. The answer to that question then, presumably, determines whether or not abortion is killing, and so, whether it is right or wrong.

For years, pro-choice liberals have maintained that, indeed, a fetus is not a human being; therefore, abortion is not the taking of a human life, but merely a bit of simple (if fairly invasive) outpatient surgery.

I would like to suggest that we liberals give up this weak argument and focus on the real issue: a woman's inalienable right to control what happens to her body.

Let us then concede that a fetus, or even a zygote, is human (for what else, really, could it be?).

But let us demand a woman's right to expunge from her body anything, or anyone, she does not want there. After all, a woman's body belongs to her-not to the federal government, not to her lover, and not to her child.

Perhaps abortion is, in fact, killing. But when a woman's body is invaded, whether the intruder is innocent or not, she must have the right to stop that invasion.

Abortion is horrific business. The recent campus demonstration showed us this rather plainly. So be it.

What's more horrifying is the thought of returning to those dark ages when a woman's body was the property of her husband or her father or some other man, and thereby, the property of the patriarchal state.