By Kitty Testa
Every year, on a weekend close to the anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision, pro-lifers gather in Washington D.C. to demand an end to abortion. The first March for Life was organized in 1974 and was attended by about 20,000 people. Over the years, the attendance numbers have fluctuated, with some claims as high as 650,000 for the 2013 gathering. The high numbers are contested, mostly by media, whom pro-lifers have criticized for perpetually understating attendance.
This year’s March for Life occurs this weekend, and again—no doubt—there will be argument as to how many are in attendance. It is odd that a singular event in a singular city seems to bear so much importance. After all, there are similar pro-life marches in cities across the country commemorating the anniversary. Is attendance at the D.C. March for Life truly indicative of pro-life attitudes in the U.S.?
Prior to the Roe v. Wade decision, abortion was prohibited in 44 states. Only 14 states permitted abortion in some cases, and a mere four states—Washington, New York, Alaska and Hawaii—permitted abortion prior to viability. Pro-choice advocates have since championed abortion on demand, even partial-birth abortion right up until the moment of delivery, and have fought any and every restriction on the practice. They have been largely successful, victorious to the point where one might wonder why and how the pro-life movement stays alive.
Abortions in the United States were extremely rare prior to 1966, less than 1,000 per year. The number of abortions began to climb in the late 1960s, and by 1972 there were nearly 600,000 abortions in the United States. There were 5.6 live births for every abortion that year. By 1980 there were 1.55 million abortions in the United States, with only 2.3 live births for every abortion. A decade later, the number of abortions hit its peak at 1.6 million, with 2.6 live births for every abortion. Since then the number of abortions has been declining, and estimates for the last several years are less than 1 million per year.
So is the U.S. becoming more pro-life? Yes.
The pro-life movement has not been static, and is enjoying resurgence. New voices in the cause are coming from surprising corners of society, and outreach is increasing on numerous fronts.
In very real ways, this is not your mother’s pro-life movement. Here are five reasons the pro-life movement is gaining ground.
1. It’s Not Just for Church Ladies Anymore
Well, it never really was.
The pro-life movement had already begun prior to Roe, as well as the split in the feminist movement over the rights of the unborn. Feminists for Life (FFL) was founded in 1972 as a feminist alternative to the more vocal pro-abortion wing of the movement that produced household names like Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem. FFL aimed to be true to the first-wave feminists, such as Susan B. Anthony and Pearl S. Buck, who were pro-life.
Yet the second-wave feminists (now referred to as old guard feminists) were well organized and media savvy. Steinem appeared on television often and published Ms. Magazine, so her ability to reach wide audiences helped cement the cultural association between feminism and abortion. Steinem and her contemporaries controlled the narrative about abortion through the media, and by the 1980s, with the unwitting help of The Moral Majority, all those who championed the rights of the unborn were painted as religious zealots who sought to drag women into a patriarchal past that threatened to re-emerge at any moment. That narrative survives to this day, and was witnessed in full force when the organizers of last weekend’s Women’s March disinvited pro-life feminist groups from participation. (They marched anyway.)
Yet this narrative was never quite honest. True, many religious organizations are impassioned members of the pro-life cause, including and especially the Catholic Church. But there has been a growing sector of the pro-life movement that includes atheists and humanists who present a purely secular argument against abortion. Their anti-abortion rationale is based on scientific and humanistic grounds, and doesn’t hinge on religious faith.
A big-tent coalition has formed in the pro-life movement.
“From the start, most faith-based pro-life groups have been happy to see us,” Kelsey Hazzard, president of Secular Pro-Life explained. “Of course, there are a few exceptions. But on the whole, as the ‘culture war’ mentality fades, more Christians see the benefit of taking a secular approach. After all, abortion is a life or death issue. There’s no time to waste on theological debates.”
Hazzard also stated that while a slim majority of Americans refer to themselves as pro-choice, they support limitations on abortion. “In short: the vast majority of Americans oppose the vast majority of abortions. The ‘on demand’ position is not nearly as popular as the media would have you believe.”
Pro-lifers will work with other groups where they are in agreement. It’s also worth noting that while those who are pro-life are often accused of being simply “pro-birth,” the activists I interviewed were adamant about addressing the circumstances that lead women to choose abortion.
Serrin Foster, the current president of Feminists for Life, states that her organization advocates support for women, often working with other feminists where they are in agreement. “At this increasingly divisive time,” she said, “we need a path forward to focus on ending the feminization of poverty that drives women to abortion: lack of support in school, the workplace, and from the fathers of the children. These are the same issues that Sarah Weddington cited during her oral arguments before the court in Roe v. Wade. Since then, abortion has solved nothing. The stats prove it.”
Along with Secular Pro-Life, organizations such as Atheists Against Abortion and Pro-Life Humanists are locking arms with those who object to abortion on religious grounds.
2. Libertarians Are Increasingly Pro-Life
Not only is Austin Petersen, the runner-up of the 2016 Libertarian presidential nomination, a pro-lifer, but there are numerous libertarian groups that are pro-life. Libertarians for Life, Pro-Life Libertarians, and The Libertarian Catholic are a few of several groups that promote libertarian ideals and a pro-life stance.
Many Libertarians oppose abortion based on the non-aggression principle, and they have a friend in New Wave Feminists, whose drop card pictured above relies on the NAP to make the case against abortion.
The official Libertarian Party Platform addresses abortion as a matter of one’s conscience, and many libertarians are pro-choice, approaching the issue as one of ownership of one’s body.
Like all debates among Libertarians, this will likely go on for years without being settled, but a pro-life Libertarian is no longer a pariah.
3. Changing the Culture is Paramount to Today’s Pro-Lifers
When the pro-life movement was born, most Americans were still avidly resistant to legalized abortion. Bear in mind that abortion did not become legal through legislative means, but rather through legal challenges.
The culture changed significantly in the following decades, especially among progressives. Yet even into the 1990s, abortion was not culturally seen as a positive. Even Bill Clinton’s stated policy on abortion was that it should be “safe, legal and rare” (despite the fact that his actual policies were quite the opposite).
Millennials were born into a world of abortion-on-demand, but judging by the declining number of abortions, they certainly are demanding fewer of them.
Destiny Herndon-De La Rosa is the president of New Wave Feminists, incidentally the same group that was chased out of partnership with the Women’s March after complaints from pro-choice feminists. When asked if her goal was to make abortion illegal, she explained that her goal was to change the culture, not the law. “I’m not out to make abortion illegal; I’m out to make abortion unthinkable.”
4. The Outreach is Changing
Many long time pro-lifers have engaged in activism such as protesting with signs and sidewalk counseling, along with prayer. This kind of outreach can only go so far, and millennial pro-lifers are bringing a different set of tools to the cause.
Herndon-De La Rosa’s message is one of empowerment, one that appeals to women’s strengths. She revealed that as a teenager she became pregnant herself, and was fortunate to have a support system that enabled her to have her child. She recalled that other teenagers she knew who chose abortion did so because they felt that they “had no choice.” Her goal is to foster feminist courage in the face of unplanned pregnancies, and help create the support systems necessary to assist pregnant women who would otherwise choose abortion.
Herndon-De La Rosa also believes that new tactics are needed to make the pro-life case. She tries to inject appropriate her speaking appearances without trivializing the seriousness of her message. She makes NWF’s drop cards available on Vista Print for anyone who wishes to distribute them. She points to success in bringing mobile sonogram units to pregnant women so that they can see “literally see the humanity inside the womb.”
Feminists for Life has started a college outreach program, not only to spread pro-life ideas, but also support services onto campuses. Foster observes that new tactics are helping the movement gain ground, especially among millennials.
Kelsey Hazzard also observed that outreach tailored to millennials is seeing success. “Millennials are leading the way forward, building on the strong foundation gifted to us by the pioneering generation of pro-life activists. There’s no doubt young adults strongly prefer pro-life arguments grounded in science and human rights rather than religion.”
5. Social Media
Facebook and other social media have been indispensable for these pro-life groups in sharing their message.
“Millennials are more pro-life than our parents’ generation,” said Hazzard. At the same time, the pro-life generation is married to social media. The influence social media has had on the pro-life movement cannot be overestimated. Secular Pro-Life itself couldn’t have come into being without Facebook; pro-life atheists and agnostics are geographically scattered don’t have a physical infrastructure (like churches) to find one another. Social media has allowed us to band together and speak with a unified voice.”
Herndon De La Rosa also commented that her organization relies on social media, and that it brings out closet pro-lifers when they realize they’re not alone. She believes that the old guard feminism is “contrived,” and “exploits women.” “I call them tumblr feminists,” she said, “they’re always shutting down dialog.” She wants to convert women from a mentality of victimhood to one of independence.
Social media provides not only a platform for dialog, but also a camaraderie among pro-lifers themselves.
“We have a direct megaphone to pro-lifers who would not see themselves as feminists, and feminists who had no idea that they walk in the shoes of their pro-life feminist foremothers,” said Foster, regarding Facebook and other social media.
So the March for Life 2017 will occur in D.C. this weekend, and, as usual there will be complaints that the mainstream media barely notices except to downplay attendance. But perhaps pro-lifers should stop worrying about whether CNN pays them any attention. They’re making progress anyway.