In response to an April 19 letter published in The Northern Star, we would like to present the pro-choice side of abortion, factually. Let us first say something about when a life begins.

According to Jane English in the book Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Moral Issues, a life does not begin until the eighth week of a pregnancy. On this eighth week, the baby finally develops a heartbeat and brain waves. Before that eighth week, then, there is no heartbeat, no brain waves.

As far as humans are concerned, without a heartbeat, there is no life. Most abortions take place before that eighth week. Therefore, there is no “murder of a precious life;” there is only the termination of an embryo. No silent scream.

Take, for example, the case of rape. Why should a woman be denied the choice to rid herself of a loathed and unwanted pregnancy bestowed upon her by a man who intensely violated her, not only physically, but emotionally as well?

Pro-choice supporters would allow a woman who has been raped the option to terminate that unwanted pregnancy. Pro-choice would allow the woman the right to choose.

Pro-life, on the other hand, would not allow a woman to terminate that pregnancy. Pro-life does not allow a woman the right to choose, to make a decision that concerns her body, her life. Pro-life supporters claim to be concerned for a woman’s feelings, but they are not concerned enough.

They claim to feel compassion for a woman who has had an abortion, yet how many pro-lifers actually talk to women who have been placed in the very delicate position of choosing to obtain an abortion?

They claim to feel compassion for a woman who has been raped, yet they condemn the woman who has been raped for opting to choose abortion over bearing a child they do not want.

Why, we ask, should a woman be forced to carry the child of a man who so violently ravished her? Do the pro-lifers expect the woman to look at this baby with warmth and love? To hold this baby and experience feelings of great joy? It is highly debatable that any woman who has been raped will feel anything but contempt and hatred for the baby. Shouldn’t she be able to terminate the pregnancy? Shouldn’t she be able to have a choice, the right to make that choice? Shouldn’t she be able to have the right to make a choice in any instance? Is that not what rights are for? To allow a person the right to make a choice?

Pro-choice is not pro-abortion. Pro-choice is just that, pro-choice.

Pro-choice aims to retain a woman’s right to make a choice concerning HER OWN BODY, not the life of a baby, because, as we previously stated, there is no life.

Pro-choice supports women’s rights. Pro-choice allows a woman who is faced with an unwanted, unplanned or dangerous pregnancy the right to choose an abortion to end that pregnancy.

In 1973, the Roe v. Wade verdict allowed women the right to safe, legal abortion. It kept women off dirty kitchen tables, away from dirty, unsterilized knives, and the butchers that often left them to die or unable to bear children in the future.

You see, pro-choice protects a woman, and her right to choose. It does not kill babies. It allows a woman rights concerning her own body.

We ask of those who support pro-life to respect a woman’s right to make a decision, to respect a woman’s right to choose, to allow women that right. The right to choose.

Karri E. Christiansen

sophomore

pre-journalism/psychology

Kay Branson

sophomore

communications

uth Giloy

sophomore

interior architecture

Elizabeth Ryan

sophomore

journalism

Ruben Rivera, Jr.

College of DuPage

sophomore

pre-law