After spending only a short amount of time following the United States’ abortion debate, it’s easy to spot the supposed injuries that will grace a woman who chooses to abort a fetus.
Prominent ideas include that having an abortion increases the risk of breast cancer, leads to death or induces irreparable trauma emotionally and psychologically.
All of these are myths. Legislation backed by these unscientific ideas should be punishable at state and federal levels.
Experts at the American Cancer Society find medical abortions are not linked to breast cancer. Research published in the peer-reviewed Obstetrics and Gynecology journal concludes mortality risks for carrying a pregnancy to term are higher than those from having an abortion. A cohort study from the Jornal of the American Medical Association Psychiatry finds the only psychological consequences related to abortion come from being denied access to one.
Anti-abortion organizations have no such scientific research to present. These groups are the fuel for legislation attacking abortion rights.
Some governments have already taken it upon themselves to halt the spread of ignorance among non-governmental groups.
The French parliament approved a bill Feb. 16 that would punish websites fronting as government-affiliated groups that purposefully disseminate false information on abortion in the form of a €30,000 ($31,684.50) fine and up to two years in prison, according to the Washington Post.
While the anti-abortion groups branded the bill as an attack on their freedom of speech, French minister for women’s rights Laurence Rossignol said anti-choice groups can continue to tout their unscientific claims if they “sincerely say who they are, what they do and what they want.”
By inciting a similar measure with a scientific standard, legislators sympathizing with such anti-choice groups wouldn’t be able to act under the façade of helping women with their bills. Their cause would become publicly noticed as unethical, laughable and explicitly misogynistic.
Despite its importance, politicians constantly attack the right to abortion with vigor. What’s more, a scientific standard in legislative bodies seems unimaginable. If government officials can’t act like adults when it comes to global warming and climate change, there’s no reason to think they would be rational about abortion.
This goal is lofty, but it’s necessary for uncovering anti-choice legislation for what it is: misogynistic. Just as politics did away with invoking social Darwinism when such evidence became known as obviously unscientific, it should handle abortion similarly.
Abortion opposition is an insidious ramification of hatred, skepticism and distrust toward women. Its purpose is not to help women, but to revoke their bodily, reproductive and sexual autonomy.
When it comes to the medical issue of abortion, legislators should only be able to act using information from peer-reviewed and credible scientific research. Without hiding behind false information, baseless arguments suggesting that women don’t have the right to make choices about their own bodies will be all that’s left.
jsbourkl@umail.iu.edu
