The act of abortion positions women at their most powerful, and that is why it is so strongly opposed.
a method of political activism and control that perverts Christian ethics at their root. The Victimist who wants to wield power over others … identifies himself with the forces of justice. He will right the old wrongs. He’ll avenge those whose ancestors suffered in the past. What’s more, he will punish those who represent the old, onetime oppressors. That is, their innocent descendants, or those who simply share their race or sex.
a tissue of rationalizations for accumulating power, imposing collective punishment and scapegoating the innocent. White males must pay for the sins of their ancestors. Christians must be punished and marginalized because of events in the Middle Ages. Traditional families must pay for the self-loathing which sexual deviants suffer with. Europeans living in their own countries must be subject to violence and intimidation at the hands of Muslim interlopers who live on public welfare.
Does the fetus not impede a woman’s tendency to maintain her own existence? Is it not an unjust aggressor, threatening the survival of the mother? Is not a woman’s choice of abortion an act of self-defense? … [T]hose who deliver abortion services have not only the power to give women control over their bodies and lives, but also the power — and the responsibility — of taking life in order to do that. Indeed, acknowledgment of that truth is the foundation for all the political and personal work necessary to maintain women’s reproductive freedom.
The act of abortion positions women at their most powerful, and that is why it is so strongly opposed by many in society. Historically viewed as and conditioned to be passive, dependent creatures, victims of biological circumstance, women often find it difficult to embrace this power over life and death. They fall prey to the assumption, the myth, that they cannot be trusted with it.
________________________________
John Zmirak is a Senior Editor of The Stream, and author of the new Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism. He received his B.A. from Yale University in 1986, then his M.F.A. in screenwriting and fiction and his Ph.D. in English in 1996 from Louisiana State University. His focus was the English Renaissance, and the novels of Walker Percy. He taught composition at LSU and screenwriting at Tulane University, and has written screenplays for and with director Ronald Maxwell (Gods & Generals and Gettysburg). He was elected alternate delegate to the 1996 Republican Convention, representing Pat Buchanan.
He has been Press Secretary to pro-life Louisiana Governor Mike Foster, and a reporter and editor at Success magazine and Investor’s Business Daily, among other publications. His essays, poems, and other works have appeared in First Things, The Weekly Standard, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, USA Today, FrontPage Magazine, The American Conservative, The South Carolina Review, Modern Age, The Intercollegiate Review, Commonweal, and The National Catholic Register, among other venues. He has contributed to American Conservatism: An Encyclopedia and The Encyclopedia of Catholic Social Thought. From 2000-2004 he served as Senior Editor of Faith & Family magazine and a reporter at The National Catholic Register. During 2012 he was editor of Crisis.
He is author, co-author, or editor of eleven books, including Wilhelm Ropke: Swiss Localist, Global Economist, The Grand Inquisitor (graphic novel) and The Race to Save Our Century. He was editor of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute’s guide to higher education, Choosing the Right College and Collegeguide.org, for ten years, and is also editor of Disorientation: How to Go to College Without Losing Your Mind.