What does Mother Teresa have in common with 25 white men in Alabama?

The greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a war against the child, a direct killing of the innocent child, murder by the mother herself. And if we accept that a mother can kill even her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another?

I came across this quote on a Quiner’s Diner post trying to reconcile the horrors of war with the goodness of a benevolent creator. Clearly the post failed in its impossible objective, but was compounded in its utter failure by linking to his unhealthy obsession with controlling women’s wombs.

Needless to say, the person who made the impassioned statement quoted above about abortion never gave birth in their life. In fact, it seems unlikely that they ever had a romantic relationship that could have resulted in a pregnancy. And yet, like the 25 white men in the US state of Alabama, the person quoted above felt their opinion is of value and relevance. Mother Teresa may have dedicated her life to attempts to aid poor people, but leaving comments like that in her wake is the equivalent of chaining poverty and misery to millions.

Because the truth is that until you have carried a child inside your body, given birth to that child and raised it to an age where it can do anything for itself, you have simply no idea, no concept of what human reproduction actually entails. You are so far removed from the deeply natural and instinctive impulses that dictate the actions of humans along with every other animal species on the planet, that your opinion is plain irrelevant.

We have no words that can adequately describe the longing and connection between the biological mother and child – the deep-seated need and reliance that creates the ideal circumstances for entering this world. We have no words that can adequately describe the trauma, pain and torture of giving birth and nurturing these children that can only be endured with natural chemicals (or other drugs when nature doesn’t cut it), and still leaves sweet and beloved scars for life. Reproduction may be mundane in its frequency and cold facts, but its profound in every other sense.

And so, while many women down the tribal divide of the ‘religion and control’ camp will declare that having been through this they still think that abortion should be criminalised, a great many women within that very camp, with a full understanding of what it means to be a child carrier and biologically connected parent, understand how devastating and unrealistic banning abortion really is. Even 25 similarly conditioned white women in Alabama would have been unlikely to reach the conclusion those men did.

When a woman aborts a pregnancy, she is clearing the way for a different child to be born later down the line who can be loved and supported as every child deserves. Do you deny that child life? When a woman aborts a pregnancy, she is protecting the existing children she already has by ensuring that they will have the support they need in their life. Do you deny those children the right to a  well supported life? When a woman aborts a pregnancy, she is making a choice that no-one can legislate against. And while the ‘religion and control’ camp may find ways in rights-deprived areas to limit a woman’s options, they can never limit her actions. All they do is criminalise care and respect; condemn thousands, if not millions of children to be born to parents who resent, hate and neglect them; and force desperate women to seek desperate measures that result in unnecessary trauma and deaths.

The naive and simplistic view of motherhood that the ignorant Mother Teresa held was informed up by a lifetime of exposure to a religion built on male-dominated views and led by people with no direct experience of creating and raising children. It’s laughable that these people dare to have an opinion on how women deal with their pregnancies.

if we accept that a mother can kill even her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another?

Mother Theresa, my dear, let me explain, although too late for you to contemplate the serious errors in your thinking:

  1. A woman can kill her own developing child and all that will happen is that one potential sentient life doesn’t progress. All that will happen is that a child who would have been likely neglected, deprived and/or traumatised isn’t brought in to the world to suffer through a life they never chose to live. What very well may happen is that a much loved and cherished child will be born later on who will have the opportunity to positively contribute to human society.
  2. When people kill one another, individuals, families, communities and countries get locked in tribalistic cycles of revenge and war that cause chaos, disrupt childhoods, destroy economies, and create brutal societies devoid of human respect for actual sentient beings attempting to live peaceful lives.

When you scratch past the soundbite, there is such a gulf between these two actions and their likely consequences that her audacity to compare them is insulting to actual human life. Much like the decision of those 25 white men in the US state of Alabama.

 

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