The Crucial Facts of Life

Today is the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, when abortion was made legal in the United States. Since then, America has lost over 50 million lives; the population of California and Texas put together. The thought of all these helpless children being slaughtered against their will makes me sick to my stomach and fills my eyes with tears. Of course, the main reason is because I cannot believe that we, the land of the free and the brave, have ended more human lives than Hitler and Stalin. The other reason is because I feel so ashamed of my country. Is this really what our nation has become? We believe in upholding the rights of every citizen. But without sustaining the right to life, all other rights are meaningless. 

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Today I will touch on some arguments supporting the pro-life position. I do not intend to hurt anyone's thoughts or opinions, but as a Conservative, pro-life supporter, this is what I believe.  An unborn citizen is entitled to the right to life. These children will never have the opportunity to exercise their rights as citizens as they grow up; they will never be able to contribute to society as they normally would. When a pregnant woman is killed, it's labeled as a double homicide and the child is entitled to the rights of the court and the right of equal justice while still unborn. I am a feminist who will fight for the rights of the unborn women. 
Over population does not exist. See more here. This website has a series of short videos that are very interesting to watch outlining why this world needs more births! Without their contribution to this world, we lose so much potential for growth as a community. Instead of viewing it as one more mouth to feed, we need to view it as two more hands to work and one more mind to provide for ideas and furthering the intelligence of this world. 
Just because a baby requires it's mother's uterus to survive doesn't make the child any less human. It's unbelievable how a life is defined by "intentions", and that the definition of a life is subjective. Many pro-choice supporters claim that because the child depends on the woman for their life source, they are unable to live on their own and thus not considered a human being. But just as a child depends on their mother's uterus as a sustainable environment, so do we rely on the atmosphere and the providence of the earth to provide for our source of life. 
The baby is it's own person, but cannot make it's own choice. Having a completely different set of DNA from the mother starting at conception, the child is not a part of the mother's body. It ought not be the right of the mother to determine when the end of life should be for her child. 
It is a baby, a life, a child. It is amazing the lengths a pro-choice supporter will go to to not refer to their unborn child as a baby. It is not human to them until it is born, it is a fetus. But just as we are referred to as fetuses, we are also referred to as infants, toddlers, children, teenagers, adults, and the elderly. It is another stage of human life. The beginning of human life. 
Pro-life supporters are not anti-women. We should not tell women that in order for them to be successful, they cannot have children. It is demeaning. Being able to bring life into this world is what makes us women. Saying we can only be successful without children is like saying a woman must become a man in order to succeed. That is not a very feminist approach to success because we are eliminating that which makes us women. We need to empower women. We need to support them as women and show them they can be a mother and an employer and a wife and a successful entrepreneur. 
The Catholic Church is pro-life before and after birth. I often hear that Catholics only care while the baby is still a fetus, and once it's born they walk away. This is so wrong. This article articulates the statistics much better than I can, and I encourage you to read it. It outlines the multiple institutions and millions of women they serve in the United States each year.  
A child who is the product of rape is still a child. Ask any child who was conceived through rape if they hate their life. They were given the opportunity to live and they have made the best of it. When a pregnancy is in crisis, you don't eliminate the pregnancy, you eliminate the crisis. If the crisis is the price of raising a child, adoption will always stand as a safe and viable option for a mother. There is no doubt they will receive support from those around them to carry their child to term, and they will be grateful they gave their child the opportunity to live. 
We are missing 1/3 of our entire generation. Think of the contributions and radical changes we could have made as a generation in the last 40 years to our society. And it could have been someone you loved; your best friend, husband, sibling, coworker, role model. They aren't here and we never had the pleasure of meeting them. This isn't merely another one of my political rants, this isn't about Democrats or Republicans or Catholics or Buddhists or Atheists, this isn't about sixteen year old girls or low income families. None of that has anything to do with the abortion issue. At the end of the day, a baby is a baby, a life is a life, and the more lives our country continues to take, the more difficult it is to remember that this is supposed to be the land of the free and the brave. I realize that this is a controversial issue, however I also realize that the cold hard truth is that life cannot be overlooked, ignored, or tossed in a biohazard receptacle. 
On this day, January 22 2015, forty two years after Roe v. Wade was passed, let us take a moment to remember all the empty seats in the cafeteria, the diapers that don't get purchased, the open spots on the bus to a student government conference and the half empty cubicles at our parent's offices. Let us thank our parents for choosing life and let us make an effort to live our lives to the absolute fullest each and every day. 
{This post was co-written with Rachel Ward, my lovely roommate and best friend}