Parallels of Veganism and Pro-lifeism

When talking about the comparisons of the issues of abortion and animal farming + exploitation, it seems that there are two similar sides that we can look at. The similarities between vegan arguments and pro-life arguments, and the similarities between animal exploitation arguments and pro-choice arguments. Similarities between veganism and pro-lifeism: *Both are centered around the idea of respecting life, especially that of the particularly innocent, vulnerable, voiceless, helpless, defenseless etc. *Right to life is present in both. With pro-lifeism, of course the unborn child is being killed so a focus is put on the fact that they have a right to not be killed and to continue their lives, and with veganism, animals get killed and thus a focus is put on them having a right to not be killed and to continue their lives. *Right to not be harmed and bodily autonomy, as well as the right to not be seen as property to be disposed of as one sees fit, is present in both. In an abortion, the child is dismembered with medical tools or sucked apart or poisoned etc. This harms them and takes away their bodily rights as their bodies are being harmed and destroyed. They are considered their parents’ property and they are at the will of their parents. With animal farming/consuming/exploiting, there are many different ways in which the bodies of animals are harmed and they are treated as objects and their bodily rights are taken away as well, whether that be abuse like being beaten over the head in some factory farms, or the stress of being artificially inseminated and having to give birth and being constantly milked, or going through training in circuses etc. They are literally considered the property of farmers and are at the will of those who farm them, train them, or are otherwise considered their owners. *Both point out that if one can't stand to look at gruesome pictures that are the end result of what they are supporting (abortion pictures/slaugtherhouse pictures), then they don't want to be supporting it in the first place. The idea is that if one finds it offensive then you are saying that something you support is offensive...so why are you supporting it? *Both see the genocide that is happening right before our eyes, and understand that it is prejudice and oppression. Both have trouble understanding why after learning our lesson with the past genocides, we still continue with this one. Some on each side make comparisons to the holocaust and slavery/racism as well as sexism. *Both mention that abortion or animal consuming/using aren't necessary, and talk about the other options that one has. For why should we go out of our way to cause all this death and destruction when we don't have to? For abortion, there is adoption (of which you can have open, closed, or semi-open, and they are free to adopt out), safe-haven/safe-surrender/baby-moses laws which let you leave the child at any police station, hospital, or fire department, no questions asked, kinshipcare or guardianshipcare, where you give the child to a family member or close friend to be raised, and this can be long-term or short-term, or a ton of options for help if the woman does think she can be a parent with the right help. That goes into various avenues such as financial, daycare, baby drives, housing, rights for pregnant women at school or in the workplace and things to make it easier like desks that fit the stomachs of pregnant women or set ups for her to work or learn from home etc. There's also talk of artificial wombs. With veganism, there's literally a vegan version of everything. There are tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of edible plants that we have discovered so far and literally a vegan version of everything. If it's possible to make it non-vegan, it's possible to make it vegan. There are tons of vegan options at every store and you can veganize fast food meals as well. Those who are poor can be vegan, as many of us are. There are vegan leathers and soaps and this and that and the other. *Right to rescue is present in both. In the 80s and 90s, the pro-life rescue movement was underway with pro-lifers occupying preborn slaughterhouses to save the women and children inside. There has been a modern resurgence of this lately, led by secular progressive pro-life activists such as in PAAU. Animal rights activists also rescue animals from factory farms and other such things, such as with the recent Smithfield Trial which was a victory for members of DXE who saved a few pigs from slaughter. *Right to continue living so as to continue to use the other rights and choices they would have is present in both. Pro-lifers often talk about how the most important right is the right to life, as all other rights would be meaningless without it as you wouldn't be alive to get to use them. Vegans often point out that animals are here for their own reasons, just like us, to have their own lives and do their own things. They aren't here to be objects for the use of humans. That brings me to a related issue on the reverse... Similarities between non-veganism and pro-choiceism: *Both use a "choice" argument, and forget the victim at hand and their choices, and act like the perpetrator needs to have a choice to harm the victim. With animal using and consuming, they think it has to be the ones partaking in the using or consuming that need to have a choice to do so. Often you'll l hear something like, "It's my choice to eat meat. You can't infringe on other people's choices. If you don't eat meat, that's your own choice, but you can't tell me what to do." With abortion it's the same thing, with the mother getting to choose to take her unborn child to a facility to be dismembered and killed. "It's my choice to get an abortion. You can't infringe on other people's choices. If you wouldn't get an abortion, that's your own choice, but you can't tell me what to do." *Similarly, both use the bodies of those committing the act instead of the bodies of the victims to act like somehow disregarding one's bodily autonomy is the bodily right of another. For abortion, "It's my body, my choice." and sometimes "If it's in my body I can kill it." For animal consuming/wearing, "It's my body, my choice. I get to choose what goes in/on my body." Both actions require harming and killing someone else's body, but only the bodies of the ones doing said harming will ever be paid attention to for these sides. Forgetting the victim and acting like it's the other side that is in the wrong because they are infringing on the rights of those taking away the rights of others is an old way to pass off discrimination. *Both exploit women, those who are pregnant, and the female reproductive system, break up the mother and baby bond, and kill children. The abortion industry and pro-choice movement tell pregnant people that they cannot be mothers in whatever hard situations they are in so they have no other choice but to abort, or that their children are not children but just clumps of cells. This is exploitative and coercive. Abortion pits mother against child, breaking up the mother-baby bond and kills the pregnant person's baby for a profit. Many post-abortive people grieve their dead children afterward and develop PTSD or depression. The dairy, pork, veal, and eggs industries exploit female farm animals by forcing them to get pregnant so that they can produce milk or more animals to farm, stealing their babies so that the milk can go to humans or to kill the babies who are of no use to the egg industry or can become veal, and send the female children back into the same systems their mothers are in. This not only exploits the mothers and kills the children but also breaks up the mother and baby bond. Mothers are known to grieve their children who were taken from them. *Both use overpopulation as an excuse to kill the victims. With abortion, they say that humans are overpopulated and thus we shouldn't have anymore, as well as that since they think the earth is overpopulated, they'll have a horrible life so we might as well not allow them to exist so as to spare them a life in the overpopulated world. With animal consuming/using, they say that animals are overpopulated so we need to kill them so that their overpopulation doesn't get in the way. *Both use things such as pain, sentience, intelligence, size, looks, and ability to contribute to society as a way to belittle the victims and excuse killing and harming. They say that those who have yet to be born can't feel pain, aren't conscious, aren't intelligent, are so small, and that that therefore makes them lesser than us and so we can kill them. They say that those of other species can't feel pain (the classic "fish don't feel pain" myth for example), aren't conscious, aren't intelligent, animals like insects are so small, and that that therefore makes them lesser than us and so we can kill them. Both of these not only are incorrect *at the very least* for some of those who have yet to be born and some animals, but also forget that there are many born humans, such as infants and other children and those along the wide spectrum of disabilities and diseases who also fall in those categories, yet they understand then that those things don't matter at all. How can you argue that if one isn't intelligent, they can be killed, if you understand that a born human who is mentally challenged needs even more protection than the average person? It's a might makes right attitude as well. "I'm bigger than you/smarter than you etc., so since I can kill you because you have less abilities than me, I should be allowed to have that choice." Discriminating against a group based off of their abilities, or Ableism, is another classic way to pass off discrimination, and is closely tied to eugenics. It has been said that you have to look at someone's differences and act like that makes you better, in order to get people to successfully oppress a group. For the unborn it's dehumanizing, for other animals it's speciesism. *Both use the arguments that these things have been happening for so long/are natural, and that people will still do them even if it's outlawed. Abortion is ancient so women will still find a way to do it they say. Animal eating is ancient and what we need to be doing they say. God put animals on earth for us to use they say. God aborts babies all the time they say. *Both try to brush off the act by talking about the fact that it is legal, as if somehow something being legal therefore makes it ok, or that somehow you shouldn’t advocate for the other side as if things can’t change from legal to illegal. *Both try to find ways to defend at least some abortion or animal killing/harming. With abortion they say "well it's ok if it's below a certain amount of weeks/well it's ok if she was raped/well it's ok if the child has a disability etc." With animal killing they usually go for the ones labeled "humane" "organic" "grass fed" “cage free" “free rage" without realizing the problems with these, or they point to specific animals. Or they'll just say "I wouldn't eat a dog but a pig is different." *Ultimately, both look at the differences we have from these groups rather than our similarities and use that as a way to exert power and control over them and "other" them to the point of death, dismemberment, and exploitation.

What they need are other options

One of the most annoying things about the pro-choice side, and I have been hearing it more and more as time goes on, is that they talk about how abortion should be available because lots of women can't work and have a kid at the same time, or don't have the money to raise a kid, or can't be single mothers, and so on, so essentially they say women need abortion because the system is screwed up and there aren't perfect other choices for women.

This is bad for several reasons. For one thing, it stops people from actually helping women and giving them these things so that they can have an excuse to say "this is why we need abortion" and for another thing, it essentially forces women to have abortions as they feel like they have no other choice. Those on the pro-choice side are usually the ones to say women only choose it when they feel like they have no other choice, yet they try so hard to make sure a bad choice that no woman ever wants to choose stays around, and especially at the expense of actually giving them other choices. They are clearly not pro-woman. When mentioning that women need abortion because sometimes they can't be, or don't think they can be working mothers, single mothers, student mothers, poor mothers etc. I try to explain to them that this is why my liberal/feminist pro-life side is in support of the other choices and social safety nets for mothers, and an overall support for motherhood, and it's weird because it seems like they've accepted it and don't care for helping those situations, but rather use it as an excuse to say, "Well see this is why abortion should be available." I don't know why Liberals or Feminists would do that, as it fits those ideologies better-and is always better-to help all the other choices instead of accepting them being faulty so that you can push your one poor choice agenda. That doesn't sound very pro-woman to me. When you have women who feel like they have no other choice than to abort, and you are using that to say, "This is why we need abortion" instead of, "This is why we need to fix the system and make sure there are so many options, and good ones at that", that sounds neither liberal nor feminist. 

It seems like a big no duh to me. "Well some mothers are poor and wouldn't be able to take care of a child"...um yeah, that's why we should tell them of all the other choices, and help make sure there are financial availabilities, and giver her some help, and give more support for being a mother, for the woman personally, and in general, so that eventually our country would have to change into one where mothers would have lots of paid maternity leave etc. and can actually easily be mothers. The fact that abortion would even come into their minds when talking about the injustices that pregnant women, mothers and children face, is rather telling. That on top of constantly acting like all people against abortion want to force the woman to raise an unwanted child (especially since most abortions aren't about the children being unwanted but the women feeling like they can't be the mothers they want to be) when there are such things as adoption and safe surrender, really make me think they only care about that one choice. If all the energy spent making sure women have the right to abort went into supporting all the other choices, and the act of being a mother in general, abortion wouldn't even be an issue.

Here is a post on how the pro-life side does support women's other choices and give support for pregnant women vs. how little the pro-choice side does.

Sometimes I actually think that it is the abortion industry keeping it this way because they know that so many less people would be pro-choice if there were much more options and better options available and there wasn't really a need for abortion. Think about it, a lot of people find abortion horrible but say women need to be able to choose it, but they still hate it being used basically as a back up contraception or it used easily and willy nilly. They say it has to be around for women in tight situations and with good reasons, but greatly frown upon women who just want to go out and do it for the heck of it. If people were already aware of all the options, or there were more and better options, so many more people would be pro-life because abortion would be left to women who could have very easily chosen a different choice yet didn't, and if there are more pro-lifers, and more/better/women knowing of choices, not only would you have people voting pro-life more and not voting pro-choice, but you would have less and less abortions, and eventually abortion would be outlawed, so abortionists would lose a whole bunch of money, and so many people would be out of work, and pro-choice politicians would have way less of a voice and be less likely to get elected. The abortion industry would crumble, and it has spent 40 years building itself up on the lies it tells people to try to get support. I'm not saying that's definitely what has been happening, but it's something to think about. We saw this clearly in Texas. Even most pro-choicers hate late-term abortion and would vote against it, yet the media and even some of these pro-choicers painted the Texas laws like it was so horrible and "stand with Texas women" even though Texas women especially didn't want that, but oh no, since it was the pro-lifers who were trying to get rid of abortion far enough along that nobody wants it and get abortion clinics up to code and doing exactly what pro-choicers always wanted and said should be done, they rejected it. They acted like it was so bad just because it would stop some abortions THAT ARE DANGEROUS IN THE FIRST PLACE AND WHAT YOU GUYS ARE ALWAYS COMPLAINING ABOUT and passed it off, and acted like pro-lifers must have some ulterior motive and suddenly changed their tune just because it would of course stop some abortions from happening and it was proposed and supported by pro-lifers. They  always say they want it "safe legal and rare" yet they really only care about the legal part. They have to have it by their people for their reasons or else they'll be hypocritical and not want it, even if it is the main reason they argue abortion should be legalized. I bet if pro-lifers did have a lot of laws they were trying to pass that totally helped out pregnant women and mothers and made it so less and less women would choose abortion, especially if that meant some would close down because of lack of need for them, pro-choicers would be against it because of that and because it was pro-lifers who did it. In fact, I bet you that has already happened. They don't care about women at all. Well ok, a lot of them don't. I guarantee you there would be some thinking this is so stupid right alongside us.

Also, I find it so odd that in a feminist society where they successfully made abortion illegal and have kept it legal and they have gotten so many other things for women, they couldn't secure more rights for pregnant women and mothers and children. That truly shoes where their priorities lie.  If feminists really wanted support for pregnant women, they could easily get it. They are just more concerned about that one choice. Mind you I'm a feminist too, so I'm only talking about the pro-choice feminists, but pro-life feminists need more people to support pregnant women in order to get anywhere with it. Feminism should change it's path to support women who actually want to be mothers yet feel like they have no other choice. What about their rights? What about pro-choice in that sense?

As the saying goes, abortion is a band-aid solution to a much bigger problem. It takes women and puts them right back in the situations they were in before they got the abortion. Abortion doesn't solve anything. 


Here is a good quote from Pro-Life Humanists...
"Feminist author Frederica Matthews-Green once pointed out that “No woman wants an abortion as she wants an ice cream cone or a Porsche. She wants an abortion as an animal caught in a trap wants to gnaw off its own leg.”    The challenge for our ever-evolving society  is this:    Are we going to hand the woman a hack-saw and help her amputate her leg?   Or are we wise and capable enough to come up with creative ways of removing the offending trap, without destroying the leg in the process  -  especially when that “leg” is a fellow human being?"