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Hardline stances won't settle the abortion debate

Dickinson County News - Staff Photo -

By Seth Boyes - News Editor

 

I'm a tired young newsman, folks, but there's no way for me to not talk about what's happened in the last week. My generation has never known a world in which Roe v. Wade wasn't the law of the land — and in which it wasn't a surefire divisive issue.

I can recall a social studies lesson in junior high. We voted in a mock version of the 2000 election and, even at that young age, my vote was based solely on the issue of abortion. In fact, I drew a cartoon on the back of my worksheet, depicting Al Gore throwing a baby in a trash can. No joke — I really did, and my teacher told me during study hall that he thought it was pretty good.

Difficult issues were easy for me back then — black or white, right or wrong, pro-life or pro-choice.

But I've found that any issue of real consequence is rarely so stark. Things get complicated yet — to borrow a phrase from our state auditor — we're often asked to squeeze our nuanced individual values inside a tiny oval on the ballot.

The issue of abortion is complicated — more complicated than many of us would like it to be.

That's what I've learned since eighth-grade social studies anyway.

As I listened and learned in the years that followed, it turned out that there were actually quite a few women in my life who had been faced with the decision of whether or not to get an abortion.

There was a woman in the next town over. She had an abortion when she was young. I listened as she held back tears, trying to tell her church family about the emotional pain of that experience and how she uses her story to bond with mothers whose own paths have led them to that very same crossroads.

There was a woman from church. She became pregnant after a rape. And, even though that's a go-to hypothetical in a lot of debates on the topic, I'm not sure abortion was ever considered in this case. Instead, this mother chose to keep and raise the child with all her love.

There was a woman I knew from school. She went on to start a family and had to face an impossible decision. Their baby was growing in such a way that it was actually dangerous for both mother and child. The family was left with only a few options — not one of them was good. Though they had been ready to welcome that child into the world, they made the difficult choice to abort the pregnancy.

There was a woman who lived within walking distance whose baby failed to develop a heartbeat by the time it should have. Even our own Gov. Kim Reynolds and former U.S. Rep. Steve King have been willing to define viable life by a detectible heartbeat. In this mother's case, an abortion was scheduled, but one last check before the procedure showed the baby had unexpectedly developed a heartbeat. The abortion was cancelled, and the baby went on to lead a normal life.

And what sticks with me about that one is that, had the procedure been scheduled a matter of days earlier, even a modern heartbeat bill wouldn't have saved what turned out to be a perfectly viable pregnancy.

It shows me that we can't — not just don't, but can't — always know the best outcome in every case, let alone write laws as if we do.

I've come to believe that some laws need to be narrow to be effective, while others need to be broad for the very same reason. And, while I struggle to accept abortion for the sake of lifestyle-convenience, laws regarding access to abortions should remain broad in my opinion.

As much as we want to legislate the specifics of the issue, there will always be situations we don't anticipate, potentially striking options off the already short list some families find themselves choosing from. Granted, those situations may be few and far between, but they will happen, and good laws should take that into account with equal value.

And the way I see it, the more the government stays out of it, the more room there is for input from the church, from the spouse, from the neighbor, from the friend, from the sibling — from anyone capable of helping, supporting and guiding mothers toward the best decision possible when all available options fall short of hope.

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