In the wake of the Notre Dame controversy and a flurry of polls attempting to assess public opinion on abortion, we’ve been treated to the most media coverage on the issue we’ve seen in a while. But amid the maelstrom, another story was quietly reported in California: more women are seeking abortions
and long-term contraception.  And that leads us to the obvious conclusion that no matter what the political climate, abortion isn’t going away.  No matter how we seek to explain and understand the issue–as a matter of privacy, morality, autonomy, or all of those–women will continue to terminate unwanted pregnancies.  This is a stark reality in the United States, but also throughout the globe.

And the silence surrounding that fact while the big boys duke it out is a reminder that the judgment, values, and decisions of women–the most important part of the debate–are often pushed aside.  Over the past month we’ve had a male president, a male university president, a number of male bishops, a couple of male extremist protest-leaders, and any number of male pundits loftily debating "pro-life" and "pro-choice" in a way that completely obscured the real lives and real dimensions of the women walking into clinics every day, many of whom may not have an ideological dog in the fight except their own. (The public comments of the female Notre Dame valedictorian were a notable exception.)

The submersion of women’s realities and voices makes me wonder whether President Obama cedes the high ground to
the right wing when he frames abortion as a "moral" issue.  Is he throwing away an opportunity to change the public frame of reference, or is it just smart politics to defuse the conflict by throwing that linguistic bone to his rabid opponents.  Is he, in essence, offering, "You take morality while I make policy"?

To his credit, I love the way the "common ground" rhetoric has gotten the media genuflecting to the president’s position–the American press takes to a new spin on an old method like “common ground” –like a child takes to a new toy.  I appreciate his catering to the public hunger for solutions-based discussions on the issue.  But I worry deeply that the president is not doing a good enough job justifying his own position as a position of strength, based on those same practical considerations that move the "common ground" discussion.  Obama needs to explain to the American public in vivid terms why he chooses to stand his own ground when it comes to legalized abortion.  I’d like him to paint a picture of why it’s important to protect choice, so important that he tells the right wing "we may never see eye to eye" on the matter of Roe, “and I was elected on the promise to protect it.”

The truth is, he’s been offering us vague statements that muddy his position and obscure reality.  In his April 30th press conference, he discussed the "morality" of abortion and cast aspersions at women’s rights activists:

I think abortion is a moral issue and an ethical issue. I think that those who are pro-choice make a mistake when they — if they suggest — and I don’t want create straw men here, but I think there are some who suggest that this is simply an issue about women’s freedom and that there are no other considerations. I think, look, this is an issue that people have to wrestle with, and families and individual women have to wrestle with.

He
followed this up with his "reason" for being pro-choice:

The reason I’m pro-choice is because I don’t think women take that — that position casually.  I think that they struggle with these decisions each and every day, and I think they are in a better position to make these decisions, ultimately, than members of Congress or — or a president of the United States, in consultation with their families, with their doctors, with their clergy.

This is a man who chooses his words carefully–and so I think he positions himself extremely intentionally on this issue.  And we can parse his language to uncover the correct justification that women are capable of being their own moral agents.

But I think that the president’s constant reference to morality is too easily—or, perhaps, meant to be–misconstrued.  If you look at the order of his words and the projected effect on the viewer or listener (in this case the press and public), you notice that the president spends much more time reaffirming the opposition’s position than his own.  First he calls the issue "moral and ethical," then immediately belittles and undermines the notion that it’s about women’s freedom (setting up a pro-choice activist straw-woman even though he says he won’t). 

This juxtaposition seems to posit women’s freedom and their rights in opposition to morality rather than underscoring that women can exercise their rights and freedoms within a moral framework.  Furthermore, he points out the "mistakes" of pro-choicers, whose decades-long work on sex ed and contraception is the very foundation for the common ground he embraces, while stroking the egos of pro-lifers, who have bred a remarkable machine of harassment and violence and worked assiduously to undermine the very programs that form the basis of “common ground.”

So while Obama ends up affirming women’s moral agency, that crucial affirmation comes later on, in the midst of that tired "woman, her doctor and her clergy" cliche that everyone has heard before.  What leaves the strongest impression is his take-down of the imaginary activist and his discussion of abortion’s "ethical dimensions," resulting in what appears to be a strike against pro-choicers.

Furthermore, his constant use of the words "clergy" and "moral" will continue to play right into the media narrative of anti-choice religious voices being the primary arbiters of morality.  "A moral issue" turns the debate into an abstract philosophical back-and-forth of the kind that makes Will Saletan rub his fingers
together in glee.  One of the reasons it doubtless makes Saletan and his ilk happy is that it takes out the most important part of the equations: those pesky women, with their pesky rights, situations, and stories.

Obama could give a number of explanations that would suffice to show why, no matter how desirable it might be to find common ground, he won’t back down from being pro-choice.  He could point out the consequences of an abortion ban–from forced pregnancy to back-alley procedures.  He could tell the stories of women who have chosen to terminate for a variety of reasons and point out the inadequacy of blanket legislation to tailor itself to such personal medical circumstances—and use that to illustrate why choice should be a fundamental right.   He could simply say that the government interfering in the medical decisions of any citizen is a dangerous precedent to set. He could say he respects the opinion of people whose religious convictions compel them to oppose abortion but point out (as even Saletan does) that the health services they so vehemently abhor actually prevent unintended pregnancies. In other words, he could affirm the “morality” of the organizations like Planned Parenthood that have been unfairly demonized and of the women seeking to determine their own futures.

The President doesn’t even have to use the phrase "bodily autonomy" (though wouldn’t that be nice?). But all of the above approaches would confirm women’s realities, agency, and moral conscience as the primary considerations, and remove abortion as an abstract moral question that’s "above his pay grade,” or as a product only of “radical feminists.”  The latter phrase cedes the high ground to the right wing by taking the issue away from the realm of individual moral agency and human rights, not to mention evidence-based rationality, to place it in the “radical feminist agenda.”

It’s clear from public opinion polling–whether or not the recent ones are accurate–that many people see being pro-life as the moral position while pro-choice as the practical one, and so personally embrace a mixture of the two.  But Obama has the chance to change the game, to reassure the American public that their sensible position on legalized abortion is in fact the moral one, and to give women control over their medical decisions isn’t just a hold-your-nose decision, but the right thing to do.   He has the rhetorical chops and the pragmatist bona fides to do so, and it’s a shame that he’s using those skills to reinforce the "moral" credentials of a movement that lost its moral authority decades ago.