Why I Hate Debating Abortion

The 2012 Presidential Election is almost upon us, and like every election year abortion is a major issue. As always, there seems to be two main camps with regards to abortion: those who are pro-choice and those who are pro-life. Those on the pro-choice side believe that having an abortion should be a legal option for women facing unwanted pregnancies, while those who are pro-life believe that abortion is ethically wrong and should be outlawed.

This argument is not new; it has been around since before the landmark Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court ruling in 1973, and I don’t think it will go away anytime soon. If abortion were made 100 percent illegal with no exceptions until the end of time, there will still be people fighting tooth and nail for a woman’s right to choose.

Yes, the debate over abortion rights is a complex one that often leads to some spirited arguments, and I hate it with every fiber of my being.

It’s not that I don’t think abortion is a complex issue or that it isn’t worthy of discussion. It’s a very complex issue with a lot of grey area, and there are few things I enjoy more than a spirited debate over a complicated topic. I should be happy to jump into an abortion debate and come out swinging, but I’m not. Aside from this blog post, I try to avoid the issue like the plague.

The only high-profile politician who has said anything about abortion recently that I can totally get behind is Vice President Joe Biden. At the recent vice presidential candidate debate, he said that he believes abortion is wrong. However, he doesn’t believe that he or anybody else has the right to make decisions regarding abortion for other people, and I agree with him. I don’t believe in abortion, and if I were a woman I would never consider it for myself except in very extreme circumstances, but I won’t force my beliefs on others. If someone were to tell me that she’s having an abortion, I wouldn’t stop her. I’d tell her that I disagree with her decision if she asked me how I felt, but in the end it’s her decision to make. Besides, outlawing abortion will create its own problems. There will always be women seeking to terminate their pregnancies, and if they can't do it legally and safely they'll resort to dangerous methods that could endanger their lives.

Technically, I would be pro-choice; I’m all for letting women make this personal decision on their own without interference from the government. Sadly, I don’t think I can tell people that I’m pro-choice, because all certain people will hear is that I’m perfectly fine with killing babies. I could clear things up and say that I don’t personally believe in abortion, but that would place me in the pro-life camp, which means that I don’t believe women should have the right to make decisions about their own bodies.

That’s the problem I have with the abortion issue: too many people see it in black and white while ignoring the shades of grey. Like I said before, abortion is a complex issue, and expecting someone to take one of two opposing stances makes absolutely no sense to me. If I were to take any hard-line stance on abortion, I would be seen as a horrible person by those taking the opposite stance. Since I don’t completely agree with either side, I just choose to not take a side even though that’s apparently not good enough for a lot of people.

So that’s all I want to say about abortion. I understand that it’s an important issue, but until people can talk rationally about it and see how complex it really is I prefer to keep out of it.