This is why I can't accept the "pro-life" side's moral argument as bona fide: "Black women [in the U.S.] are about 60 percent more likely than white women to deliver babies early, and black infants are about 230 percent more likely than white infants to die before their first birthdays." If pro-lifers really cared then they'd do something to help pregnant and new mothers to care for their babies.
"But churches and private charities offer these women help!" they might reply, but obviously this help is insufficient (see statistic above). At the same time, pro-lifers object to government spending on prenatal and neonatal care because they think, with some justification, that such programs might encourage some poor women to get pregnant and have babies. But this contradiction in their moral terms again forces me to doubt pro-lifer's bona fides.
Religious pro-lifers' views can be summarized as follows:
1. Don't have sex outside of marriage.
2. Don't tell people, especially young people and minorities, about birth control because they shouldn't be having sex in the first place; knowledge of birth control will only encourage them.
3. If women do have sex and get pregnant, they must carry the child to term, regardless of their personal circumstances.
4. The pregnancy and child are the mother's problem; government should not help women out before or after birth, it should only forbid them from getting abortions.
If you want to encourage life, then you should support the most effective means of doing so: making sure every child is wanted; and giving needy women support during and after pregnancy. If you are against the state providing help to pregnant women and mothers, then you are not really pro-life, you're simply a moral prude.
By Michelle Norris
July 8, 2011 | NPR
URL: http://n.pr/o4vdxk
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