Slavery Was One of the Worst Times in American History, We’re in the Same Situation With Abortion

Opinion   |   Carol Tobias   |   Aug 15, 2018   |   6:05PM   |   Washington, DC

If people are asked to name the darkest days in American history, I think most would say the period of slavery and the civil war. Black Americans were treated literally like property. An infamous Supreme Court decision (Dred Scott) declared that Black Americans could never be considered fully human, could never become citizens.

We are in a comparable situation today. Preborn human beings are considered to be infinitely less valuable than all the rest of us, not fully human. Even though our nation’s founding document declares that all are created equal, the lives of these precious little ones are treated like disposable property.

Science and human biology tell us that a new human life begins at fertilization. Life is a continuum. Why are so many willing to deny the humanity of these children?

Yes, the child starts out tiny and is growing and developing throughout the pregnancy. But the child continues to grow and develop into adulthood. The human brain is not fully developed until about age 25. Nothing has really changed except the little one’s location.

Whether it be African Americans subjected to slavery, Native American Indians subjected to forced relocation on a Trail of Tears, Jews killed in the Nazi holocaust, or various ethnic groups wiped out in a genocide in Rwanda or Armenia, the loss of life is rightly looked upon with horror. Often, the international community responds with condemnation, imposing sanctions and seeking justice.

Why should the mass killing of 60,000,000 helpless, innocent unborn children be treated any differently? These are members of the human family killed merely because they are “unwanted” or “get in the way” of a plan someone else has for their life.

I do get it. Abortion is “different” because these little ones are sheltered within a womb for nine months. When the person responsible for nurturing that new life doesn’t want to — or is pressured not to — participate, the womb becomes a tomb.

No longer are we asked to look the other way only when circumstances are difficult; when there is an extreme or rare situation surrounding the conception of that new life or there are serious physical complications to mother or baby. Now the unborn child is to be treated as if she is a kind of tumor and we must accept that she can and must be removed upon request, at any time during pregnancy.

We are told that whether another human being lives or dies is simply another “choice.”

A “choice” is going to McDonald’s and deciding whether you want the Big Mac or Chicken McNuggets. If you choose the chicken, do you want 4, 6, or 10 pieces?

There are legitimate choices—certainly some more substantial than others. However, it is fundamentally wrong, and unjust, to treat whether a baby lives or dies as just another consumer “choice.”

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Advocates of abortion argue that abortion is “health care,” just another option that must be available to women. In fact, they take it even further.

Abortion activists would like women to believe that, without abortion, their future will be that of “The Handmaid’s Tale,” treated as property and sex slaves. In their ridiculous imaginary world, if they can’t kill unborn babies, women will no longer be able to be educated, hold jobs, or travel where and when they wish.

In this dystopian nightmare, the unborn child has become the enemy that must be destroyed.

And yet, that baby is a living human being.

A study published in the journal Developmental Science looked at how the brains of babies respond when different parts of the body are tapped. The study revealed that “touch is the first sensory system to develop in the baby’s brain prenatally.”

We know that after birth, babies respond to voices and music they heard before birth.

We know that preborn babies, by at least 20 weeks gestation, are able to feel pain.

There are many important issues in the national discourse, i.e., education, foreign policy, jobs, taxes, and security.

All are important, but are any of those issues more important than life and death? Ask of yourself: are those issues more important than a “choice” responsible for the death of 60,000,000 human beings?

If this holocaust of the unborn matters to you, then do something about it. Be a voice for the voiceless little ones and make a difference.

LifeNews Note: Carol Tobias is the president of the National Right to Life Committee.