Pro-life or pro-choice?

A look at abortion from both sides

Imagine being faced with the decision to either save your life or the life of your unborn child, a choice that should be in the women’s hands, seemingly continues to get called in to question, or changed. The topic of abortion has been prominent in both public opinion and in government through the form of laws.

Recently, New York state passed the Reproductive Health Act which allows abortion until the due date. This law legalized late-term abortion for women who will not make it through childbirth if the fetus will not make it outside of the womb, or the fetus has already passed away in the womb. The Reproductive Health Act caused a big uproar between the pro-life and pro-choice movements and also sparked my attention.

My viewpoint is that the Reproductive Health Act is helpful for mothers who do not want to go through the pain of a stillborn or having the fetus suffer. It is also beneficial for mothers who would not make it through childbirth. That ties into the idea of pro-choice because they have the power to choose what happens to them of the fetus.

In Michigan, the law for abortion is before you have the procedure you have to attend mandatory counseling. After the counseling, there is a 24 hour waiting period so you can make a decision. If you are under 18 years old, you have to have parental consent. Insurance only covers the procedure if the mother's life is in danger. In Michigan, there are currently 20 legal abortion clinics. Michigan also banned the use of telemedicine to obtain an abortion. Telemedicine is receiving diagnosis and treatment through technology. Some of these laws can be restrictive to the woman, because the abortion may be urgent and life-threatening to where they cannot wait that long, or it can stray them away from something they may need.

Illustration by Chloe Mayes

The laws in Michigan are less restrictive than others. The mandatory counseling and 24 hour waiting period is something that I believe is effective to help the mothers see if they want to go through with the procedure or not, and see if it is the right decision for them. These laws that some of the states are to woman lean away from having an abortion because they are subtly telling them it is not the right choice.

When you look at this from both of the sides, you can see why people are happy or disappointed with it. I stand in between pro-life and pro-choice, but I mostly believe in pro-choice.

When you look at abortion from the pro-choice standpoint, there are numerous reasons why the mother chooses abortion: to save herself, to save the baby from living a painful life, sexual assault, or not financially stable and cannot provide a proper life for the child. When a woman has an abortion, she is often criticized as being a murderer. What many people don’t see is the reason why the mother is having it, so they criticize her before they know the real reason. When you look at it from the pro-life side, you can see that adoption is always an option. Adoption is a wonderful thing, especially when you can afford to give the child the life it deserves. Another argument for pro-life is that most of the women who get an abortion are young and do not know what they are fully doing. The women may also have regrets about what they did.

Mainly, I agree with the pro-choice side because it is the woman's choice to choose what she does with her body. Abortion is not the right choice for every woman, but it can be the best option for what that woman needs. In some cases, people who choose to have the procedure can be criticized by outside sources that may not know what is going on, and that may cause the woman to regret what she did, even though it may have been the best choice for her. Much of what I believe in is on the pro-choice side of things, because no one but the woman should have a say on what she does with her body, especially if it concerns her health and has life-threatening tendencies.

Abortion has its pros and cons, depending on what side you look at it. At the end of the day, it is always the woman's say on what she does with her body. People may not agree with it at all, but you have to look at what is best for the woman and the unborn child. Whether you support it or not.