ABORTION POLITICS

The Right Is Poised to Upend Every Aspect of Women’s Lives

Banning abortion barely scratches the surface

Image via Shutterstock | Text added by author

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For all the noise surrounding fetal personhood and whether life begins at conception, “pro-life” advocates rarely mention consequences beyond abortion. It’s not clear they’ve thought it through.

But that’s not good enough.

Defining an unborn child as a person in its own right will fundamentally alter the relationship between a woman and the thing growing inside her. The repercussions will be seismic. I’ll cover just a few of them.

Propositions

• Legally, women will exist in a sort of Schrödinger’s box, with the set of laws that apply to them depending on whether or not they are pregnant.
• Any pregnancy not ending in a live birth must be considered a potential crime.
• If a mother poses a threat to an unborn child, law enforcement will be forced to protect it in utero. This may lead to women being confined, immobilized, and sedated if necessary, possibly for months.

In case anyone was wondering, none of this is hyperbole. It is the logical and necessary extension of viewing an…