Pro Choice vs. ProLife

Can’t I be both?

You knew this post was coming. I even debated as to whether or not it was useful to have this post but then I realized this is the issue. This is the core and the heart of the War On Choice. The symbols that we are attempting to reshape starts with pro choice and pro-life rhetoric. An individual that subscribes to these symbols literally means that one cannot be pro-life and still endorse a woman’s right to choose. What is the alternative?

This article chooses to use the word anti-choice instead of pro life. This is an interesting choice of rhetoric. Not equating the people that oppose abortion as being for life but anti-choice. Anti agency, and anti a voice or a right a woman would have over her own body. I think this is a unique way to look at the different rhetorical implications of those word choices.  If someone asks me what are you pro life or pro choice, my response is always both. .. those are two values I hold very dearly. However, I am going to defend a woman’s right over her own body every day of the week.

Yet that may not be the case for everyone. I do not think that being pro-choice means you are pro-abortion. What I find most astounding is the ability of other individuals to dictate what should and should not be allowed for another person. I do not view myself as someone that sends a person a greeting card, “Congratulations you had an abortion”. But I would say congratulations you were allowed to exercise your agency as a person.

What strikes me as the most confusing people that are “pro-life” are most often for the death penalty as well, along with the War in Iraq and many other right-wing policies. It does not seem very much pro-life to advocate the United States invading another country, or advocating that we strip away people’s humanities at Guantanamo Bay. I do not think they are “pro” anything but more so ANTI-Choice, and Anti-Agency.

Mission: How often do we say pro-choice v. pro life? Is it merely built into our daily discourse? Do we want to change it? What is another word that could be used? Do you believe it matters?

The F-Word

When I tried to think of where to start. The notion of “War On Choice” could potentially sound daunting and too large, where do you find a starting point in that? I could begin with feminism. The history of feminism. Or I could begin with a lengthy discussion of symbols in our daily life. But that really is not relevant to this site. It is not relevant to what we’re discussing. Those are things that you can pick up in any communication class or are just basic common sense. It is ivory tower academia, which is useful and interesting it is rather hard to put Burke’s theory of symbols on an activist sign to picket the Supreme Court. What is useful is the newest curse word to the radical right, feminism.

Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner wrote The F-Word in which she described the ability of the right-wing religious fundamentalists to twist and contort the word feminism into an evil word that no one wants to attribute or title themselves a feminist. Which makes sense.

What is a feminist? What does that have to do with the war on choice? Why does it even matter?

I think asking what a feminist is like asking a person what they believe is the best movie of all time, or who they think is God. You will get a different answer each and every time from each individual. And that is okay, by no means am I advocating a static interpretation of the word. I have multiple interpretations of the word depending on the day and the frame in which I choose. Baumgardener and Richards authors of amazing feminist works such as Grassroots or my personal favorite Manifesta define feminism as…

Feminism, a word that describes a social-justice movement for gender equity and human liberation, is often treated as the other F word. Partly because it’s a word of great power, it’s nearly as unseemly as those other girl terms, cunt or bitch. This in part explains why by the time the two of us were at college learning that we were indeed feminist, the term was dropping with qualifiers. I’m a …power, postmodern, Girlie, pro-sex, Prada, academic, gender, radical, Marxist, equity, cyber, Chicana, cultural eco, lesbian, Latina, womanist, animal rights, American Indian, International diva, Jewish, Puerto Rican, working-class, lipstick, punk rock, young, old …feminist. All of these adjectives help women feel described rather than confined by a term that should simply connote an individual women’s human rights, and the possibility of liberating oneself from patriarchy.  (50)

While that definition is fairly long winded, I also feel it is fairly accurate to the predicament feminists have found themselves in. There has been such a focus on the fluidity of the movement and the word that we are finding we cannot find an accurate definition. I know I am a feminist does that mean I am against abortion? Does that mean I am for abortion? More accurately I think it means I am pro-women. But see that sounds like whoever is saying that is a lesbian, which is not in fact accurate.  What is it then? What does it mean to be a feminist without a paragraph description?

bell hooks describes feminism more succinctly as, “Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression.” I think this definition is not only all encompassing but fits rather well with that we are discussing in this ‘site. The War on Choice is a matter of feminism. I have always said that feminism is merely human decency. It is an effort to afford individual’s equal rights and abilities. It is important to acknowledge that being a feminist is an individual choice, I am not saying everyone becomes a feminist I am merely asking that you evaluate whether or not you actually are one. I think more people are feminists than realize it because of the way the media has painted feminism especially associated with abortion and women’s bodies.

Why does this matter? It matters because as Burke states if symbols are important and how we use those symbols shape the way we view the world than evaluating a symbol like feminism is uniquely important because it forces us to determine what is an effective use of symbols and what is not. To change the system we have to first question the symbol system in which we have become accustomed to. We are all sisters, we are all humans and we all share a social responsibility to one another to speak out if another cannot. Audre Lorde was correct on that.  Language shapes reality, so how do we shape reality? We shape our language and change our language first and foremost.

Mission: Are you a feminist? What is your own definition of a feminist, regardless if you fit it or not?