An Idealist Proposal

Over thirty years have passed since the Supreme Court handed down its decision concerning Roe v. Wade, and yet, lawmakers across this nation continue to draft and vote on and pass legislation defining viability, laying down all sorts of hoops for a woman to jump through, and flat out maneuvering to make the 1973 case nothing more than a bad memory. Meanwhile, millions of Americans are still out of work, parents struggle to make ends meet, and local governments flounder. Hell, Detroit wants to file for bankruptcy!

So, in tough economic times, why are lawmakers talking about abortion at all? Why exactly did Ohio Republicans think it made sense to tack on abortion legislation to the budget, of all things?

Of all the problems we need to fix, of all the problems lawmakers should fix, why this one?

Ideological idiocy. Some twisted derivation of trickle-down theory, in which a society that homogeneously embraces a certain world view will magically become Mayberry. Good-bye unemployment, so long terrorism...all because the government of Ohio can require you to have a transvaginal ultrasound. Hallelujah.

I hear pro-life advocates such as Lila Rose speak very passionately about their cause on Fox News, and I see protesters holding up their abhorrent posters on the capitol steps; my gut reaction is to counter their points. Seriously...I wrote six pages worth. However, when I analyze the whole situation, I can’t help but believe that the pro-life movement is more pro-legislation than anything else. And isn’t that odd, considering some of these same people believe and have loudly interjected that the government cannot fix everything? (Gun violence, healthcare, you name it...)

Instead of fixing problems that actually affect most Americans, these lobbyists (to be fair, on both sides of the debate) throw millions of dollars into their campaigns, and lawmakers spend our tax dollars “debating” legislation. Just imagine what everyone could accomplish if they adopted a different strategy:

1. Stop the hyperbole. There might be another reason that pro-life representatives refer to people like me as pro-abortion besides the obvious giddiness that comes from childishly defaming your opponent. Perhaps the phrase “pro-choice” is just too damn reasonable and realistic.
2. Choice is important here. Bill O’Reilly quipped on his show last week that a woman might say “Oh, I sprained my wrist” and get an abortion. Wha??? Spend some of that money on research into why women make the choices they make. Understand the people whom you would otherwise legislate into oblivion.
3. Reach out to real women and girls facing that choice. If you truly believe that you can stop abortions and save babies, why not get out there and do it, instead of hanging around lawmakers?
4. And to those lawmakers...seriously. Have you looked at your approval rating lately? More ideology is not the answer, and some of you have elections coming up. I’m looking at you, Governor Kasich.

Let’s talk about the sort of person who is pro-choice. Not the boogeyman of the religious right: the über liberal feminist who wants to kill babies! Pro-choice people are women and men, young and old. Some are even Christian! And I can happily assert that I did not come to my pro-choice-ness by reading Planned Parenthood publications.

A wise woman once said, “Kids are going to have sex. So make sure they do so safely.” That woman was my mother. She used slightly different and more profane words, owing to the fact that anti-contraceptive politicians got her blood boiling. She was a nurse and a Christian, and it is her pragmatic take on these issues that emboldens my own idealist view.

Why is all this still a controversy? Contraception, premarital sex, abortion...it all seems already sorted to me. Always has. Sex education at my school might have been a bit of a joke; I surely didn’t change my mind about anything or learn anything beyond the obvious. Yet there are kids out there who don’t have their minds made up about it. Kids who don’t have sufficient parental guidance to navigate those issues. So they make uneducated choices, the worst kind of choice.

Whose responsibility is it? I say it’s the parents’ responsibility. I look forward to the day when gym teachers don’t have to double as sex education instructors. I’m sure they dream of that day, too. The problem with this dream of ours is that not all parents can or will take up that burden.

Call it oversimplification, but if you want your child to wait until marriage, etc., etc., shouldn’t you make the case for it? Shouldn’t you help steer your child toward that choice? Not the school. Not the government. Not the media.

Yet people blame movies for glorifying sex, blame schools for enabling it, and blame the government for taking God out of the equation. You’re the parents. If you want God to be part of your child’s decision, go for it. That’s your choice. If you want to enroll your child in a private school that better fits your morals, go for it. That’s your choice. If you want to filter what your child watches, go for it. That’s your choice.

There’s that pesky word...choice. And I propose, modestly, that both sides work toward affecting choices outside the halls of government. Educate parents. Empower girls and boys to talk openly. That’s where this abortion issue really starts. Not in the ob-gyn exam room, but in the Victorian awkwardness and avoidance of how babies are really made. They aren’t made with the blessing of the Church or Congress, but as a result of the choices two people make. 

One might look to the Church, like Sarah Palin did when she discovered her son Trig would have special needs. While her faith was a big part of it, she had the right to choose. Wendy Davis also made a choice to keep her baby at 19 years of age. Yet she would not then turn around and deprive other women from that same freedom of choice. Would you like more women to choose your way? Explain to them why. Support them. Do not demonize them or subject them to scrutiny that is medically unnecessary.

Sadly, for both Lila Rose and Planned Parenthood, my proposal will not result in any groundbreaking law or court decision. There will be no balloons, no posters, and maybe even no television appearances. There will simply be a generation of men and women who have been equipped with the knowledge, faith, and understanding (or some combination thereof) to make the choice that is best for them and their families if the time comes. And lawmakers can shove it.

We are a nation that likes its big events: mostly the scandalous and controversial with the occasional utter catastrophe. So, perhaps it is far too idealistic to take the choice of having or not having babies out of government hands, out of the public sphere completely, but you conservatives are always so enthusiastic about limited government...

What's that John Lennon line about life?...

I was about to settle in for the night and begin to reread The Black Swan, when all of a sudden I thought it would be both relevant and fruitful to write about the weekend’s main accomplishment: reorganizing the boxes of my possessions currently stashed in the walk-in closet of my dad’s basement. Yes, this is another episode in the chronicle of being a boomerang child (with a hopefully more lighthearted feel).

Now, the rereading was itself a distraction from reading the new book, Age of Insight, so it only seems fair to be distracted from the distraction. I’ll write about whichever book wins the battle for my erratic attention span later.

While charging in to that basement closet, swiping away cobwebs and pulling out obstacles like an old mini-vacuum cleaner and suitcases, I began to reacquaint myself with my own stuff. Stuff I haven’t been using...so I had every intention of putting at least half in a Good-Will pile.

I did not end up with a Good-Will pile.

This is in part due to genetics; both my mother and my father passed along the predilection for holding on to everything. But it was also due to the fact that this great stuff, my prized possessions, was and is meant for my future/hypothetical/imaginary home. The home that is mine. And perhaps shared with a special someone. But primarily mine.

• I have throw pillows with pretty prints, still wrapped, from Target
• Three boxes of kitchen implements, including a great 50s-60s era dish set from my grandparents’ house (which my sister Rachel couldn’t wait to part with...crazy)
• Three more boxes of Christmas ornaments, baskets, vases, and such collected from both grandparents and mom’s own stash, just waiting to be my heirlooms someday
• Posters that will probably prove to be too “college” once I unroll them
• And most importantly, my desk.

Add my books and everything upstairs, and I have all the fixings for a home crammed into someone else’s house. Yet I haven’t allowed myself to feel at home here. I’m waiting for, pining for that future/hypothetical/imaginary home.

In the past, I would focus on how I’m never going to get that home. How my career and education choices have soundly beaten that goal into dust. Not so, this evening.

I’ve always been waiting, with the expectation that things will finally start to “happen” once a certain mark is passed. First it was graduating high school, then finding employment during college and moving off campus, then working full-time, then moving to New York...you get the picture. While I was living those days and weeks and months, I did not let myself feel like I was living. I was always working toward something else, and saving things for the next future magical period of time when I would start to feel like I joined the living. The real people. Not the students, not the interns, and certainly not the unemployed.

That's totally photoshopped...

The boxes in the closet are a symptom of this waiting: a toaster that isn’t toasting, a flute that isn’t being played, a desk I’m not typing these rambling words on. We all do this, to an extent. Heck, storage companies in Manhattan base their business models on our inability to part with our stuff from/for another life.

While I have the inkling to live more minimally, whether by squirreling my stuff away or donating it, I can choose to see my boxes in the closet as symptoms of hope, as well. Like the picture of a car my mother carried with her until the day she bought the car.

And while I carry the picture of the future/hypothetical/imaginary home, I’ll try to let myself feel like I’m living because of my stuff, not in spite of it.