Overheard: Misogyny edition

Amanda Marcotte:

Anti-choicers like to defend themselves against the charge of misogyny by saying they simply believe that life begins at conception. What they fail to understand is that “life begins at conception” is a misogynist statement. It’s the erasure of a woman’s role in making new people, and a claim that the only effort that counts is the effort a man put into ejaculating.

Her arguments have become so pathetic that recognizing a scientific fact is now considered misogyny. I wonder how embryologists would respond to being called misogynists because they recognize that science not pro-choice politics teaches when life begins.

Amanda seems to have this weird view that "women make people." It’s not that she thinks women’s bodies play a vital role in providing nutrition and a safe environment for nascent human beings who are guiding their own development. Instead she seems to think that pregnant women are in the midst of a 9-month process where they transform an entity which isn’t alive into a baby. It’s completely unscientific but it’s what she (and other abortion advocates) rely on since they can’t accept what the science of embryology has taught us about unborn human beings. When people say “life begins at conception,” they’re not claiming women don’t do anything to help in the development of the unborn, they just recognize that a woman’s body isn’t magically converting lifeless tissue into a human being.

Candace Chellew-Hodge:

The scientific battle over whether life begins at conception or at birth continues unabated, but the viability of the fetus outside of the womb seems to win when all is said and done.

With such weak arguments against abortion, though loudly and constantly made by the religious right, there must certainly be a deeper reason for the veracity of the passion on the anti-abortion side. I believe the answer lies in misogyny.

The scientific battle? Do you mean those who favor legal abortion desperately trying to avoid the scientific facts? The viability of the fetus “seems to win” according to whom?

Since Chellew-Hodge never takes the time to actually look into the “scientific battle,” she can quickly assume prolifers hate women.

What’s truly odd is earlier Chellew-Hodge writes,

I am pro-life, however, in the fact that if it ever came down to brass tacks and I had to make a choice, I don't believe I could choose to abort. Even if I became pregnant because of a rape? I'm really not sure. It's certainly not the child's fault that they came into being through an act of violence.....

My only true conundrum would come if my life were in danger. I think, in that instance, I would terminate the pregnancy - but only after much anguish over the choice.

Why not have an abortion? And why such anguish if your life was in danger? If the unborn aren’t alive until viability then why couldn’t you have an abortion? If the unborn aren’t alive is “child” really the best term for them?

She ends by writing,

Let us continue to struggle together to meet both the needs and desires of the mother, as well as keep in mind what will be best for the new life that hangs in the balance.

New life? What I thought the "scientific battle" was still raging unabated

It must be so hard to be in favor of legal abortion and attempt to deny that the unborn are alive. Individuals like Chellew-Hodge can’t write a simple pro-Roe piece with contradicting themselves.