Of Birds And Bees, And The Free Oppression Of Women, Part I

Before our foray into the topic at hand, permit me one small divergence, though this aside bears a tangential relationship to what I will be discussing today. Various plaintiffs, most notably the New York Times, have lamented President G.W. Bush's "recess appointment" of John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations. It is no small appointment. And for those of you who do not know what a "recess appointment" is, it is nothing more than a presidential appointment that occurs when the Senate is in recess. Ideally, the Senate would confirm a nominee. But if the Senate stalls or threatens to stall its procedural obligations, the president is constitutionally permitted to appoint someone, in this case Bolton, to a post while the Senate is out jet-skiing off Nantucket. It is not an act of demagoguery.

Do you know how many times Bill Clinton exercised this executive privilege? Once? Twice? Three times? No. He exercised this power 140 times.

***

[This series actually begins here.]

Contratimes' readers know without me telling them that the nomination of judge John Roberts to the United States Supreme Court is almost entirely controversial because of Roe v. Wade. If confirmed, will Roberts vote to overturn women's right to abortion, or will he protect that right? It is a good question. But what I want to focus on here is why the right to abortion is so important to pro-choice Americans, particularly why it is so important politically.

I can sum the whole thing up in one word: equality.

The political aspects of 'equality' are important, and thoroughly essential to the pro-abortion lobby. I will discuss this further in a moment. But first, my thesis: Abortion rights, or "reproductive freedoms", do not liberate women. Abortion oppresses women.

DEFENDING MY THESIS

The political attractiveness of the right to abortion is in abortion's alleged power to liberate women from the tyranny not only of nature, but men in general. Women gain equality in having the power not to be enslaved to nature's majestic rhythms, and in having the power to determine their reproductive fate on their own terms. Abortion provides a "level playing field" for women, ensuring that they can pursue education and career and all that life has to offer in a planned and deliberate way. Abortion makes men and women equal in the workplace and in the workforce, as women can "choose" to be freed from the burdens nature places on them through pregnancy, and thus follow their career without detour.

Here's a question: Does abortion make men equal to women, or does it make women equal to men? Think about it for a moment.

Now, this question. What can women do better than men, by definition? The answer is simple. Women can produce babies better than men, infinitely better than men. Hence, let us answer the question I asked a moment ago: Abortion makes women equal to men, but it does not make men equal to women. I apologize if I am stating the obvious, but there is power in the obvious, particularly when we have forgotten the rather plain facts.

Let's put this all another way. Abortion rights advocates are not trying to protect a law, or certain abortifacients, in order to make men like women. They are not insisting that Roe v. Wade commands men to have babies in order to guarantee equality between the sexes. No, abortion rights activists want to ensure that women can be like men: Women can have sex and not have to deliver a child. Ever.

What do we know about sex that is as plain as the genitalia that comprises sexuality? We know this: Men transcend the consequence of sexual intercourse. Men cannot ever get pregnant after ejaculating in the wondrous womb that is the incubator of all human life. Men can hit and run, so to speak. And they don't have to worry if their period is late.

Women, on the other hand, are completely different in the reproductive dance. They can be literally transformed by the relatively simple act of intercourse. They are not transcendent; they are not "outside" the post-coital experience. They, by their very natures, must be part of what happens next.

Can you see where I am going with this? I hope so.

Abortion masculinizes women. It gives them a medical, man-made option to be something other than a woman: It gives them the power to be like a man. In short, they can have sex, all the sex they want, and not HAVE to bear forth the consequences of the pursuit of so much endless pleasure. They can have sex and not fret about career, or education, or the annoying things associated with pregnancy. Women can be like men.

And you know what? Men love abortion for THIS very reason: It means that women can be reduced to sex objects all the more. It means that men can also have all the sex they want, as long as they find pro-choice women who will be complicit with them in their wanton lust for pleasure. It means that men are more likely to find sex easier and more available (it is) because women, now freed economically and reproductively (like men), and accessible in the workplace (again, like men, where the men once dominated), can participate in sex that does not "mean anything" (or as much), as it once did (or was supposed to).

No wonder (and here's a fact) more men than women support abortion rights! It gets men off the hook sexually. It sets them free to seduce and conquer. It sets them free to reduce women to well, men with vaginas and breasts. Amazingly, the post-modern woman even embraces this reality (as depicted in shows like "Sex and the City"), where women, long unable to do so because of the constraints of biology, now celebrate casual sex as empowerment. (I recall a moment in Animal Dreams, a novel by Barbara Kingsolver, when the heroine, doing spoons with a man she's been having sex with for weeks, responds with surprise when he suggests more depth to their relationship. "I never led you on," she replies. Feminists everywhere shout a triumphant cheer: Women can be shallow too! Such power!)

The fact is this: "Reproductive freedom" for women means that women can choose to define themselves in a male way in a male world. There is nothing feminist about this idea. The idea is entirely masculinist.

A true feminist, in trying to rescue women from hordes of caddish men, would call women to do what they do best, and create a nursery out of the world. Women, instead of participating in the post-modern, male-dominated sexual morés, should do what their very bodies do better than anything on the planet: they should make the world a place where every child is IN FACT wanted, by women, and bring forth all the children they can. And that, I declare, would bring men to their knees. That's the revolt we need, led by fecund females everywhere.

Hear me, sisters! Your bodies are sacred temples. Stop letting men, and imitative feminists, treat your bodies like a toy or sports arena. Make a man EARN the right to enter your sacred halls. Stop letting the men–and the society they've created with your help–dictate the conditions when your hallowed sanctuary is open for pleasure. You do not open your womb because a man is cute, or has a nice car, a big wallet, a great job, or has made you feel good about yourself with flowers and gentle whispers. You do not open your cathedral because it might feel good, or end your loneliness. Nay, you open yourself when you find someone who can appreciate the cathedral, and is ready to help care for it when it fills up with life and responsibility.

It's time to transform the world. It begins with a choice, and that choice is to see a woman as a sacred being, as a sacrament. She is not to submit to the very male idea of equality and abortion, even when that idea is couched in terms of liberation and choice.

Emptying the womb does not set women free. Protecting it does. Legalized abortion is a chain around the neck of women everywhere, keeping them right where men want them. It's time for a change. A truly feminine one.

Contratimes

To continue this series, read here.

©Bill Gnade 2005/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.
[Photo: Bee-like Tachinid Fly on dandelion, Sharon, NH. Camera: Canon A2. Lens: Sigma 300/4 APO macro, with Sigma 1.4 EX APO extender. Film: Kodak Ektachrome 100VS Exposure: not recorded. Tripod. Click on image for larger view.]