The late Christopher Hitchens once wrote, “…Anyone who has ever seen a sonogram or has spent even an hour with a textbook on embryology knows that the emotions are not the deciding factor [in abortion]. In order to terminate a pregnancy, you have to still a heartbeat, switch off a developing brain, and, whatever the method, break some bones and rupture some organs.” These words come from his “Minority Report” column in The Nation written in April 1989.
Because Hitchens’ words are a correct assessment of the essence of abortion, it must necessarily be banned because it is the taking of a human life. If murder is illegal, so should abortion be. In Canada, we have no abortion laws; something unheard of in western democracies. And worse, our government will not release statistics about abortion, so citizens cannot know how many occur in Canada per year, under what circumstances, and why. Under the Canadian Criminal Code, a fetus in the womb is not considered a human. And our politicians, virtually from all of the major political parties, remain adamantly non-committal.
Thankfully one Canadian MP, Steven Woodworth, has put forward Motion 312 that seeks only to put the question of abortion law back on the table for public debate. Even this bill—which is not about banning abortion—is slowly being quashed by all members of parliament including Prime Minister Harper. Not only is this a blight on Canada in terms of our country’s failure to protect our most vulnerable, but it is also a sham of free speech and public discourse.
A new website has been set up called Pass 312 that seeks to promote this bill among Canadians, and to suggest ways to help make this an issue that Canadian politicians will wake up to. The question of when human life begins, and the corresponding consequences for law, needs to be discussed both by average Canadians and by our elected officials on Parliament Hill. Please click the link, read the material, and watch the videos to get informed.
I emailed my local MP, Bob Rae, these words: “Dear Mr. Rae, I live right near your office in downtown Toronto and pass by it daily. As a member of your riding, I ask you to support Motion 312 and to defend the lives of innocent children in the womb. Thank you, Ian Hugh Clary.” I emailed something similar to Prime Minister Harper’s office. If you want to email your local MP, click here and if you want to email the Prime Minister click here. I wrote it in haste, and I now wish that I had said more about free speech and public debate. Be that as it may, my letter was sent, and here is the response that came from his office:
Dear Ian Hugh Clary:
On behalf of Liberal Leader Bob Rae, I would like thank you for your email regarding Conservative MP Stephen Woodworth’s motion, M-312, regarding Canada’s abortion laws.
It is the longstanding view of the Liberal Party of Canada that women must have the right to choose, and this party will take no step that limits, or opens the door to limiting, access to safe medical services for women across Canada. It is for this reason that Mr. Rae will be voting against this motion when it comes before the House of Commons.
We understand this issue stirs extremely strong feelings and the Liberal Party respects the right of every Canadian to express their views freely and openly, no matter how contrary those views may seem to those of others.
Thank you for taking the time to write to the Leader of the Liberal Party.
Yours sincerely,
Colin McKone
Office of the Liberal Leader
I wonder if I was to go to a doctor and tell them I want a full hysterectomy although all those organs are fully healthy and functioning, or have one of my hand cut off just in the name of the “right to choose” if they would perform the surgery? After all, it’s MY body and I can do whatever I want with it right? But wait, the body growing inside a woman isn’t hers, how can she then decide to remove it?? The way I see it, Mr. McKone has a very weak and flawed argument…
I have often wondered what the Pro-Abortion crowd fears about this discussion. After all, if they are so firm in their faith in their science-based opinion that a fetus is not a human, why fear a bill that wants to discuss the science?
I wonder how many of those same people cling to a “science vs faith” argument on the issue of creation/evolution, but reject an examination of the science of abortion?
Thanks, Ian.
Aye.
Did you contact your MP?
@Ryan That’s a funny and ironic point. I never thought of that.
Thanks for all the hard work you did on the site. This is important stuff.
@Ryan, in all fairness I don’t think that any side that has had a political debate settled in its favour wants to re-open it, no matter how good they think their evidence is.
Thanks for this post, Ian. A few thoughts.
1. I think abortion is one area where strong emotions and verbal trickery really gets in the way. One doesn’t have to look around much to see how much damage the imprecise use of words (like “medical procedure”, “choice”, “reproductive rights”, etc.) does. I suppose they are all euphamisms to a degree trying to avoid cold realities of what abortion is, eh? Do you think Orwell might have some help for us here in Politics And The English Language, about how “the present political chaos is connected with the decay of language….one can probably bring about some improvement by starting at the verbal end.” (I’m thinking specifically in regard to those words that pro-abortion people use to change the dialog… and how often we are willing to let those usages go unchallenged).
2. You might find this interesting. http://www.arcc-cdac.ca/action/M-312-letter-anti-choice-MPs.html — It’s from the “Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada”. The sample letter they provide is astounding. They even twist it to try to make it sound like this motion could threaten all pregnant women. They even claim that it could be used against women who have miscarriages!
3. Question: Do you think the unwillingness to deal with this will do any lasting damage to Stephen Harper’s (and the Conservative Party in general) reputation among evangelical Christians. Based on experience and history, I believe that most evangelicals have pretty short political memories and will either reward Harper in the future (either wholeheartedly supporting him or throwing their support behind him because they are afraid of who else might get in power.
4. In Canada, as I understand it, there is no Supreme Court ruling that affirms a women’s right to an abortion like there is in the U.S. (ala Roe vs. Wade). Canada merely had rulings in which the law against abortion was struck down for various reasons not directly related to the abortion issue itself. This is a point that I think is underestimated. The law against abortion was struck down and the Supreme Court invited them to try again. AND NOBODY DID. It’s not like the Conservatives have brought in new proposed legislation and it failed by being overruled by the Supreme Court again. That didn’t happen at all. Rather, it’s that they just haven’t introduced any legislation. You could call it lack of moral courage. Or maybe just the game of politics? Or maybe all of the above?
4. As much as I would love to see a proper definition of human life, from a human perspective at least, the probability of this even getting support from the Conservatives in general is very slight. Not as long as they want to remain in power. I don’t want to be cynical, but given the political options, it isn’t hard to be cynical.
5. Even though I am against abortion, I believe I am among the more “pro choice” people out there when it comes to issues of “self government”. And I believe that is consistent with being against abortion, because the unborn baby, though highly dependent, is a self too! I think we should reclaim the phrase “pro choice”. I’m thinking of along the lines of that reason.tv video you posted showing how anti-pro-choice many supporters of abortion are. Who is more “pro choice”, someone who allows choice in 50 areas of life, but not abortion, or someone who supports abortion but believes the government should make just about every choice for you and outlaw almost everything? I think this is another area where pro-abortion evangelists have won verbal battles that they should have never been allowed to get away with.
Anyways, just some musings from “down south”.
@Dan: I think that misses the reality of the situation. Harper, esp. in Reform Party days, would have aligned himself with the pro-life cause. This isn’t about “sides” for him, but political expediency. I don’t get it, though, because he now stands protected by a majority government. Rae can take a strong pro-abortion stand because he has nothing to lose. His party is near dead.
I happened upon your blog through Pass 312 on facebook. Thank you for taking time to lay out such a thoughtful reflection. I will be following your blogs from now on. From where I stand Motion 312 has opened a discussion and the subject will not be put back in the box now. We cannot let that happen.
@Ian, Harper has always been about political expediency, the reason he quit his seat as a Reform Party MP in 1997 was that he wanted to make Reform run more efficiently and he considered Preston Manning’s affection for “grass-roots” politics to be a waste of time. Manning wanted to change politics on a sort of meta level in Canada with more citizen involvement and so on (at least that’s what he claimed to be doing) but Harper wanted to win.
Without wanting to get into a strident defense of Harper, my understanding of why Harper left the Reform Party to join the National Citizens Coalition — a major critic of government — was due to his frustration with the amount of compromise that Manning had to give. At that point in his life, Harper was actually intending to get out of politics in terms of party involvement, so I don’t know how that would help him “win” as you say. If anything, the irony of his earlier “no compromise” stand, and his much more compromise-soaked centrist move is more stark. Now that he has a majority, and the Liberals are near death, he could definitely reflect his old Reform days, which he has yet to do.
I don’t know if he necessarily had a plan to get to the PMO in 1997, but given how much he’s run his party with almost the opposite style to Manning, I have to believe that part of his rift with Manning was tactical. As a leader of a group like the National Citizens Coalition he was obviously freer to say what he really thought, but when it came to running a party, he was all about tactical discipline.
Absolutely. Manning the populist; Harper the policy wonk.
most important is to never get so discouraged that you stop the fight. We may never stop abortion, after all it is big business. Personally I feel our biggest step would be to defund abortion. The government doesn’t want to open the debate but they use our tax dollars to fund 100,000 abortions every year http://www.campaignlifecoalition.com/index.php?p=Defund
This years defund rally in Toronto was cancelled because of the recent storm and will be rescheduled in the Spring. Show up for the Pro-Life Rally in Ottawa. Last year there were 20,000 pro-lifers. Make the effort to attend both of these events. You will see how much support you have.