Good Bye to Pro-Life and Pro-Choice
Kavanaugh’s views on Roe vs. Wade, pro-lifers shouting the mantra “abortion is murder!”, and pro-choicers defending Planned Parenthood are but three indicators of how powerful in the great social and political divide brought on by American conservatism are the issues over a woman’s reproductive rights and the alleged rights of her fetus. Yet in this melee of charge and counter-charge, little biological, medical, and pre-natal information seems to be used. It is as if people would rather demonize the other side than to find out information that possibly can make this whole divide over abortion in our country both silly and moot.
In the posts The “A” Word — Don’t Get Angry, Calm Down, and Let Us Talk [April, 2013] and The “A” Word Revisited (Because of Gov. Rick Perry of Texas), or A Word on Bad Eggs [July, 2013] — both written in 2013 and published on my website www.ronniejhastings.com — I suggested a solution to the controversy that so far does not seem to satisfy either the pro-lifers or the pro-choicers. However, in these posts I present my reasons I think the pro-choicers have a much preferred position than that of the pro-lifers. The history of modern prenatal care has put the pro-life position on the road to extinction, in my opinion. There appears to be a general public ignorance of this care, brought on by the failure of virtually all religious institutions and public or private schools to provide our children a respectful and comprehensive sex education program. This post plans to eliminate as much of that ignorance as I can and talk about the apparent future of having children in our species.
From this point I will assume the reader has read the two posts cited above on my website or read them on my FB notes.
Here is what can happen NOW for any woman who through a home pregnancy test knows she is pregnant: A sample of her amniotic fluid can be taken in her pediatrician’s hospital and attendant lab and the genome of the fertilized egg (or even of the blastula) can be displayed to look for any genetic defects. The discovery of any defects places upon the mother-to-be and her pediatrician (and the father, if involved) the decision to either abort (a very safe and routine procedure at this stage) or not abort and see if the defects can be eliminated by generic engineering, using techniques like CRISPR, which technically turns the baby-to-be, or baby-in-the-making, or proto-baby, into a genetically modified organism, or GMO. The cycle of amniotic fluid analysis and applied engineering can be repeated if the first attempt did not produce a “normal” genome. Repeated failures to reach a “normal” healthy genome increases the likelihood the mother would choose to abort. Of course, she has from the very beginning and each cycle the choice of NOT aborting, but this choice says she is bearing the financial and emotional responsibility of birthing and rearing a child afflicted with a congenital problem (Downs syndrome, etc.).
Of course, even if the proto-baby genome is normal, the “normal” risks of any pregnancy — miscarriage, still-birth, or forced abortion due to endangerment of the mother’s life anywhere during gestation — apply.
In other words, today any woman who can reach a delivery room with modern medical technology and attendant laboratories can be assured that the establishment of a normal proto-baby genome assures the birth of a healthy baby, outside unforeseen miscarriage or undetected trauma at birth . This is already a reality in the larger cities all over the planet, and with increased communication and transportation abilities in areas outside larger cities, an increasing number of women worldwide can choose the benefits of large-city births. As the number of hospital prenatal and natal programs equipped with genetic engineering technology increases and as the rights to medical care (medical insurance) expands to even third-world countries, this assurance spreads and grows, hopefully, exponentially. The greatest social effects would center about temporary “9-month” housing needed to house women living great distances from the large-city birth centers and who need multi-month monitoring.
Why then, would any woman want to take the risk of bringing upon their children-to-be a life afflicted with congenital defects? She never, ever has to risk that, technically speaking. This certainty of a healthy baby (not 100%, but very close for any woman who conceives) renders, in my opinion, the pro-life position almost absurd. Pro-lifers would suggest that a mother-too-be must “suffer the judgment of God” or something like that if her proto-baby has a congenital defect. No she doesn’t! If she cannot offer even a healthy child a good life and if the pro-lifers try to talk her into taking the proto-baby to term as they usually do (without willing to “foot the bill” until the child is 18 for a poverty-stricken mother who, say, is an addict and can’t afford to feed a child probably afflicted with the congenital defect of being born an addict), she should have the right to an abortion, right up to the time of birth and the umbilical cord is cut. (See The “A” Word — Don’t Get Angry, Calm Down, and Let Us Talk [April, 2013] and The “A” Word Revisited (Because of Gov. Rick Perry of Texas), or A Word on Bad Eggs [July, 2013]) No unwanted proto-baby, genetically defective or not, has to be born. The pro-life position is rendered moot and useless, except for making mothers-to-be’s lives miserable with unnecessary doubt and guilt. Pro-life is becoming extinct, like the flat-earth movement, the creationist movement, and the intelligent design movement.
Of course, the mother-to-be can listen to sacred arguments that can doom her and her future child to unnecessary misery. That is part of her right to choose. She can have all the counseling from different sources besides her pediatrician she wants. But as information like the above becomes more widespread over the years and mother after mother has healthy children, taking advantage of miscarriages and abortions, the number of such women dooming them and their future child will get exponentially smaller — hopefully one day to practically zero worldwide. And also decreasing will be the number of mothers who want to be “surprised” and learn little about their proto-baby, not even the gender; for, what loving, responsible mother would risk something tragic for her child, all because she wants some serendipity in her life? How loving is it not to know all you can about your proto-baby?
So it is good-bye to pro-life. “Pro-choice,” by default, becomes a redundant and unnecessary wording, as child-bearing women species-wide choose the singular healthy, ever improving way to become mothers. So it is good-bye to pro-choice also.
Already available to couples who can afford it, is the opportunity to plan and control all the children with which they want to bless their marriage. Imagine a universal medical insurance covering all couples in future, to go along with generous features like maternal leave compensation from both the insurance and the employer. Knowing I am neither a prophet nor a prophet’s son, the following is a possible option to all couples, instead of to the elite few today who have the finances and the facilities nearby; this is not fantasy or science fiction:
Mr. and Mrs. X, soon after their honeymoon, set up a multi-year plan with her pediatrician that collects all the fertilized eggs (actually “eggs” up to the blastula stage, perhaps) they produce over a chosen period of years before they practice some form of contraception. The couple may choose to intersperse this period with bringing a child or two to full term under the conditions described above, or they may not. The eggs are kept frozen, but before being put in “deep freeze,” each is mapped genetically for congenital defects and for the characteristics the proto-baby will have when it becomes a baby. The couple agrees that any eggs having verified defects can be disposed of or donated to the hospital for medical research. When a number, say N of the frozen, healthy eggs is collected to the satisfaction of the couple, Mr. and Mrs. X can then start ongoing contraception.
The time comes when Mr. and Mrs. X want another child. If Mrs. X is on any type of female contraceptives, she ceases them. They then go to their N-long “egg list” and, with the pediatrician, select exactly the kind of child they want — the gender, the hair and eye color, etc. Each selection from the “frozen egg basket” is assured to be free from defects and “designed” by the loving parents. The selected egg is “thawed” out and inserted into Mrs. X’s uterus at the “perfect time” of a natural or induced menstrual cycle. Or, in the far future, the couple can opt to have the proto-baby grown “in vitro” to full term. This is not to mention the techniques that will be developed that will allow a mother-to-be to avoid a Cesarean if she carries the fetus inside her body (e.g. Removing the proto-baby with attached placenta prematurely through the birth canal and placing it in an artificial uterus that will bring the proto-baby to term with computer-controlled feeding of optimum nutrients). After one birth, there will be N – 1 eggs in the X’s “basket.” The cycle is repeated as often as the couple wants and only at the precise times for which the couple has prepared. If for any birth the couple wants to be “surprised,” they can give permission to the pediatrician to “randomly” select any one from the remaining eggs on the list.
Say Mr. and Mrs. X want in their marriage C children and they at the beginning opted to have children only from the “basket” of N frozen eggs. When the “basket” contains N – C eggs, then the couple can opt to donate the basket of eggs to childless couples, donate the basket of eggs to medical research, or request the N – C eggs be disposed of. The nuclear X family with C children exists throughout its span with the assurance of optimized health for life. The concept of “pro-life” is like a Jurassic dinosaur among concepts.
(Here is an interesting thought: What if Mr. and Mrs. X, before they have the C planned children, get a divorce? What is the legal and moral status of the eggs still in the frozen basket? Not only am I not a prophet, I’m not a lawyer.)
Two closing thoughts: 1) The above scenario has NOTHING to do with those living today with any kind of congenital defect. This is NOT some ghastly resurrection of euthanasia. Any human being who survives birth, whose umbilical cord is cut, regardless of medical condition, is fully human, with full rights and privileges. My point is restricted to saying that lack of knowledge and information has obscured the opportunity we NOW have to eliminate tragic congenital defects in all children yet to be born.
2) If you are an adult, and reading and considering the above makes you embarrassed, squeamish, or uncomfortable (presumably due to lack of comprehensive sex education in your home, your school, your place of worship, and/or your many social circles), let me suggest you inform yourself about the basics of mammalian sexuality and reproduction, especially that of Home sapiens. It is NOT pornography, you know. The enlightenment I suggest can began by simply Googling.
RJH