posted on: Friday May 6, 2022
PC for Life Isn’t What You Think: Opening Space for the Abortion Conversation
Avery Schaub ‘25
2022-2023 PC for Life President
Abortion is an incredibly difficult topic to talk about. It’s emotionally, ethically, and philosophically complicated, and PC for Life strives to open up dialogue so students with different ideas can actually engage in thoughtful and honest discussion. If you just look around society, it isn’t hard to notice that people can be really bad at talking to people from “the other side,” and we want to fix that on our campus. Yes, PC for Life is a pro-life organization, but we respect and want to understand all perspectives about abortion. Sometimes, pro-life people come across (though for some this is true) as if we believe pro-choice people are dumb or our enemies; that is absurd. PC for Life does not think that. Pro-choice people make a lot of smart arguments that we like hearing more about so we can better understand and work together. We want to give all of PC’s students opportunities to talk respectfully and productively about the issue of abortion while advocating for non-violent solutions to the serious problems that those in an unplanned pregnancy may face. We work to fight against the violence of abortion in every aspect of our lives, but we have made a commitment to being respectful, peaceful, and nonviolent towards organizations or people who support abortion, even when facing aggressive or hostile treatment in return. PC for Life aims to have peaceful and productive dialogue with students, regardless of their current beliefs about abortion.
Our goal for the 2022-2023 year will not be to force opinions on others, but to share why we are pro-life, and to fully understand what others believe and where they are coming from on the difficult topic of abortion. We are pro-life because we believe abortion is a conflict of rights issue between the woman’s right to bodily autonomy and the fetus’ right to life—both of which are extremely important. We have been unable to find a consistent explanation of what gives someone the right to life that excludes fetuses but includes every category of born persons (who also deserve the right to life). Also, we have been unable to find a consistent reason to allow the right to bodily autonomy that gives anyone the right to kill another person in the case of pregnancy, but not in other cases like conjoined twins. For these reasons, we believe that in this particular conflict of rights, the fetus’s right to life outweighs the woman’s right to bodily autonomy. We understand that abortion is a very complex issue, and one which has touched the lives of many of our classmates, so we would love to learn more about your beliefs and experiences with it. In the 2022-2023 academic year, PC for Life aims to do more outreach so we can learn more about each other. We can all agree that our society needs more dialogue among friends and less debate among strangers on the internet if we are ever going to solve any controversial issues. PC for Life is here to open that dialogue on our campus.
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