Radical pro-abortion ideology is nothing new for liberal mainstream media outlets. Since President Donald Trump’s announcement that he would be nominating constitutionalist judge Brett Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court, progressive supporters of abortion have been working overtime to defend, and promote, abortion.
Today, they’re doing it in the Atlantic’s “family section”.
More specifically, an article written by 52-year-old Deborah Copaken is presently making waves for attempting to rebrand abortion as a normal, inevitable part of an otherwise healthy motherhood.
“Three Children, Two Abortions” chronicles the author’s sometimes joyful, sometimes difficult reproductive years--from unexpectedly becoming pregnant at age 17, to having three children with her now ex-husband, to making the decision to (again) abort a baby conceived while an IUD was in place. (She also attempts to justify her post-marriage abortion by saying she was on a medication for toenail fungus at the time, which could have potentially led to birth defects.)
The piece may, at first glance, appear to be nothing more than a memoir-style account of one woman’s journey through adolescence and then marriage (and, eventually, divorce.) It certainly takes the reader through the full range of emotions a woman may feel upon discovering she is pregnant, which can certainly vary depending upon her life circumstances at the time. Copaken paints herself as a thoughtful, intelligent, and even compassionate mother, navigating occasionally sub-optimal circumstances. Those circumstances, according to her, have left little choice but to obtain an abortion.
And not once, but twice.
Upon a closer reading, however, it appears more likely that the publication of such a piece is ultimately a shrewd political ploy by progressives to normalize and defend abortion--in an era when universally legalized abortion may, indeed, be drawing to an end. Penned by an apparently pro-abortion, happily divorced feminist, “Three Children, Two Abortions” contains not only personal anecdotes, but also clearly advocates for a wide range of proposed liberal policy changes.
“...Abortion should be as inalienable a right as life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” writes Copaken. “Supreme Court justices should not be chosen for their opposition to Roe v. Wade. And our country should be pouring its considerable energy and resources into creating the kind of infrastructure that supports the lives of actual babies, once they’re born: universal health care, paid parental leave, subsidized daycare, proper sex education, affordable college, affordable birth control, and easier access to that birth control to keep unwanted pregnancies from happening in the first place (should the women who are lucky enough to get their hands on it have better luck than I did in the game of birth-control roulette).”
Ms. Copaken goes on to criticize the pro-life movement as not being pro-life at all, but rather “pro-blastula, pro-embryo, and pro-fetus, not pro-baby.” Longing for the days when she and her family lived in Paris, Copaken describes a truly pro-life society as one strongly resembling the typical Democratic party platform in America: “universal health care...paid maternity and paternity leaves...subsidized daycare...and a school day that hews closer to the workday, not to some outmoded agrarian schedule designed to get kids home in time to harvest crops.”
There was a time when liberal Democrats assured American voters that they merely wanted abortion to be legal, safe, and rare. Since 1973’s passage of Roe v. Wade, however, America has witnessed abortion become a prized (and financially advantageous) component of the Democratic Party’s national platform.
The effect that radically progressive news features, such as the one in the Atlantic, will have at the ballot box in November remains to be seen. Deborah Copaken’s feminist attempt at making abortion a valid, normal, and heroic act for mothers--just as natural as giving birth to the child--may indeed further rally liberals to protect their beloved Roe v. Wade. It seems though that, if nothing else, conservatives have every reason for optimism: Judge Kavanaugh’s recent nomination to the United States Supreme Court continues to worry abortion advocates.
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