Conservatives Don’t Believe Their Own Pro-Life Rhetoric

Oklahoma lawmakers just exposed the lie at the heart of the anti-abortion movement

Image: Seattle City Council, Flickr, Creative Commons license 2.0 (Generic)

This week, the Oklahoma legislature passed a new law making abortion a felony, subjecting anyone who performs one in the state to a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a fine of $100,000.

In so doing, lawmakers no doubt believe they have struck a blow for the sanctity of unborn life.

But what they’ve actually done is prove how little they believe in their own rhetoric.

The new law, far from elevating the status of the unborn to what the right would claim for it — full legal personhood, on par with the already-born — actually undermines the moral case for such status. It proves that even those who most loudly proclaim the equal worth of fetal life don’t believe it.

Because if they did, two things would be different about this law.

First, it would also seek to punish, with prison, any woman seeking or obtaining an abortion — not merely the doctor who performs one.

And second, it would not punish such an act — cold-blooded murder if you believe the anti-abortion position — with a mere 10-year prison stint and a financial penalty.