Enduring the consequences of benighted minds
This week another reflection on arguably the greatest moral stain of our era. It's not going away anytime soon.
Some folks may have been upset with my strident piece last week. It’s how it goes sometimes. As the name suggests, this is a forum for TJ to reflect what on his mind, and not necessarily to provide a gentle comforting massage to the minds of his readers. Yes, one may receive the very opposite—whatever the opposite of a mental massage might be [a mind-klap perhaps!?].
This week’s bit may not be in the mould of either mental massage or clap upside the head. But it’s still on-the topic dominating my mind: abortion, which remains, probably, the most diabolical expression of our hardened hearts and benighted minds in this age.
Many years ago, when I was a student and a very passionate, energetic pro-life activist, I encountered a fellow student who shared a heartbreaking story. I believe I was the first person in whom he had enough trust to share the story. He had broken up with his girlfriend. Perhaps not the only reason, but certainly one of the big reasons for the break-up was that she had gone and aborted their child, and he had only found out about this after the fact. He was psychologically and emotionally shattered. This fellow could not focus on his studies, and was enduring nightmares in which he could see his daughter—he seemed certain it was a girl—screaming to him in agony. In the case of this guy, I think it was possible (though unlikely) that he might have gone along with his girlfriend’s decision, but that he was primarily upset at not being given the opportunity to have a say.
Of course, when it comes to abortion, there are two people nobody cares about: the baby who is “terminated” and the father who is ignored. The trauma of women who commit abortions is fairly well documented, particularly amongst pro-life organizations. (Historically, at least, even some pro-abortion organizations acknowledged this maternal trauma.) And, of course, pro-life organizations highlight the humanity and the suffering of unborn children who are killed by abortion. But the silent suffering of men who are blocked from any say in the abortion decision generally goes unrecognized.
Douglas Wilson (and others, I’m sure) has called the Roe v. Wade (1973) decision one of the greatest blows against the family as the base organizational structure of society. This is because it eliminated the father from the picture and replaced him with the doctor—a proxy for the state—so that a woman and her doctor made the decision about the fate of the child that the doctor had had no hand in conceiving. The recent Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (2022) decision that overturned Roe v. Wade has had little effect in reversing this negative impact on the family.
The pro-life movement exists first and foremost to end the monstrous barbarism that is abortion. It also exists to restore the family’s structure, position and authority as the basic building block of a functional society. Only through proper recognition of the place and role of father, mother and child in the family can both goals be achieved. Until that happens, children will continue to be the primary victims of abortion. Women will be secondary victims, even as they also function as collaborators and perpetrators. And men will be secondary victims too, even as many (most?) function as perpetrators, collaborators and bystanders.
The men who suffer as victims are generally not the ones who support abortion, but the onus is on all of them to have a change of heart and a change of behaviour. Indeed, men’s dereliction of duty in managing their sex drive has likely been at least as much of an influence in accelerating the business of abortion mills as women’s ill-advised pursuit of the feminist idea of liberation (from the functions and constraints of one’s body, and from the obligations to family arising thence). My fellow student who mourned (yes, mourned) the death of his unborn child might not have been in that situation if he’d had a more responsible attitude regarding sex. Just taking it seriously enough to have a sober conversation with his girlfriend about dealing with the possibility of pregnancy might have spared him a lot of anguish (and might have spared his child’s life too).