OPINION:
We’re coming ’round the 100-year anniversary of when women earned the legislative right to vote in America — when suffragists who rallied outside President Woodrow Wilson’s White House and who were thrown behind bars at the Lorton Workhouse in Virginia and force-fed finally won Senate passage of the Right to Vote Amendment.
And it’s an interesting time in America because abortion is one of today’s most talked-about matters.
Is this what suffragists truly fought to win — the legislative right to abort on demand?
Is this what founders fought to accomplish and secure with all their late-night bickerings and banterings about the rights of the individual versus the interests of Big Government?
Personal views of abortion to the side, the fact that abortion is one of America’s heftiest debates is such a sad commentary on the turn of today’s society. Nothing underscores degradation like angry debates on the fate of a baby — meaning, on something that morally speaking, should be a non-debate.
Heck, in today’s turbulent times, we can’t even agree on the terminology of human life. To some, it’s not a baby; it’s a fetus — it’s fetal matter.
America can do better.
America is better than this.
When a caustic pro-choicer put out on Twitter a challenge to the pro-life crowd to explain what they’ve personally done to help lower-income single mothers — those most adversely affected by unplanned pregnancies — the response was immediate and overwhelming.
As The Washington Examiner noted, one Twitter user responded, “Volunteered at a center assisting with the wellness (fitness, meals) of mothers, Babysat, Donated to adoptions, Drove moms to appointments, Was a friend (listened, talked, met up with, called).”
Another tweeted: “Donated a well working car to a pregnancy support center, which was given to a single mom who chose life.”
Others tweeted about applying to adopt, providing transportation for single moms and their kids, paying for medical expenses, serving as surrogate fathers and male role models, helping with monthly expenses — and more.
The point?
America is one of the most giving, charitable countries in the world, filled with Christian-minded, service-minded, compassionate, generous individuals. They help — and then, after they help, they help again.
That’s the best of America, right there.
The counterpunch is this: “Illinois Reproductive Health Act Would Allow Unlimited Abortion,” ran on National Review headline from March.
Or this, from the Susan B. Anthony List in February: “Senate Democrats Double Down on Infanticide, Block Popular Bill to Protect Born-Alive Abortion Survivors.”
It’s hard to believe a country with so much to offer, that started with a root of Judeo-Christian ideas, that fought and forged a path to equality in politics, equality in votes, equality in opportunity — would come to a time when the raging debate on the national scale is about abortion.
When the major matter to decide is actually whether a creation of God, a child, has a right to live.
Abortion, perhaps unlike any other topic of modern debate, shows as the stark, dark symptom of America’s cultural and political falls and failures. We should seriously, seriously consider the cure.
Examples, at least on Twitter, seem to abound.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley.
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