I recently read a letter to the editor of local newspaper in which the writer complained that, by enacting restrictions on abortion, the government is essentially forcing women to bear children. He went on state that this, in his opinion, is tantamount to slavery. This characterization of pro-life statutes is utter nonsense. To say that women are forced to bear children is to imply that they are required to become pregnant.
However, except in the case of rape, women are not compelled to become pregnant. They have a free will to decide whether or to engage in sexual activity. Even when they opt to have sex, they can choose to use birth control. When a woman becomes pregnant, it is almost without exception due to choices that she has willfully made.
To place restrictions on a woman’s “right” to abort her unborn child is something completely different. Since another life is involved at that point, the government has every right to protect that life as much as legally possible. But to claim that this is equivalent to forcing women to bear children is absurd. It’s like saying that people are being force-fed by the government because there are laws that ban them from spitting out their partially chewed food on the sidewalks.
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