Texas Abortion Law

An assault on much more than women’s rights

I am against abortion. I am also for a woman’s right to choose to have a child or not. However, that choice begins with the decision to be intimate (or not) and the choice to use birth control (or not). We have so many choices nowadays to make sure that every child conceived is truly wanted, loved, and cared for.

So I loathe abortion. But I also know that women must have control over their own reproductive lives to thrive; and therefore, as much as it saddens me, abortion must remain legal.

In addition, the Texas law does not allow abortion even in cases that are usually exempt from even the harshest abortion bans, cases of rape and incest. The trauma of having been raped, especially by a close family member, is bad enough. The right to an abortion must be preserved especially in such cases.

The fact that the Texas abortion ban makes no exceptions in cases of rape and incest shows a deep lack of empathy and a callous disregard of human tragedy and suffering.

However, there is something even more disturbing about this law. It encourages private citizens to sue abortion providers and receive $10,000 or even more. The Texas Right to Life organization does not see this as a problem.

“These lawsuits are not against the women,” says John Seago with Texas Right to Life. “The lawsuits would be against the individuals making money off of the abortion, the abortion industry itself. So this is not spy on your neighbor and see if they’re having an abortion.”

I think John Seago is very wrong. Dangling the carrot of making an easy 10k or more will make spies of many of our neighbors. Many East Germans found out after the system collapsed and they had access to their secret files how little it took to have their neighbors and sometimes even their best friends spy on them.

Is there yet another, new assault on women’s rights as many fear? It may seem so. There is no doubt whatsoever though that this law will increase the deep and bitter divisions in our country, which is so polarized already.

This Texas law is wrong on so many levels. Let’s hope that other Republican governors who are already eying this law as “inspiration” will understand that and not follow down the same path.

The Supreme Court is silent on the issue.