Is Abortion Murder? | Middle Ground

(bright upbeat music) - Is the end goal here that abortion be illegal, and it be criminalized, and removed as a resource forever from this country? Is that the. .

. - Illegal and unthinkable. - Illegal and unthinkable.

So it is criminalized and stigmatized? (enchanting music) - If you agree, step forward, if you disagree, stay put. Nobody likes abortions.

- I don't think anyone likes it. I think they use it and they might use it incorrectly from my perspective. But I don't think anyone likes an abortion.

Like they're not like jumping for joy for. - I think it is a very physically taxing process to go through. And I don't think anyone would want to intentionally have an abortion.

I think those who get an abortion most of the time, it's because they need to. - It's a harmful narrative on both sides of the conversation to say that, you know, women celebrate abortion. I think it creates a prejudice around women who do get abortions.

And I don't think that it's good to kind of the decision of abortion from either side, from the perspective, so. - Can the disagree step forward? - I think if you asked me this question, maybe several years ago, I would've said nobody likes abortion, but I think in today's climate, it is much more celebrated.

As a pro-life person, I've had people tell me that they will dedicate their next abortion to me instead of helping women, they will have an abortion. - I've heard very similar responses to you. Things like I'll donate to planned parenthood in your name.

And there's other pages like Shout Your Abortion that openly celebrates abortion rights. - Yeah, I celebrate abortion and I think that campaigns like Shout Your Abortion aren't about like getting in your face, but women who choose to have abortions suffer a lot of stigma and trauma from people who stand outside clinics and have grotesque images and literally, you know, damning your soul abortion as a medical procedure and resource is something that I do celebrate. It's a human right and I love abortion.

My name is Rocky You SheHer, pronounced I'm from Austin, Texas. And I am very pro-abortion. I think that legislation like SB-Eight opens the door and the path towards handing over our bodily autonomy to the state.

I don't understand how anyone can justify using their personal beliefs to take away the rights of others. - My name's Abby, I'm from Orlando, Florida. And I'm an abolitionist of human abortion.

We have to ask the question of what makes humans valuable. So because my world view as a Christian gives me a foundation for human worth. And because I believe scientifically fetuses are human beings on the moon of conception, I am against abortion.

- Biological fathers should have an equal say in abortions. - Well, I think so. I mean, it's consistency.

Like if we're defining that as a life, if it is a life to put a kid up for adoption, both parents have to agree. - I agree, I have talked to lots of women who've had abortions and I've talked to lots of men who are hurting, their they're completely heartbroken they would've raised the baby. They wanted to raise baby.

They begged for the life of the baby and they obviously created the baby together but only one of them gets to decide if their child gets to live or die. - I would like to think from more of a honestly feminist perspective, men have responsibility as the other parent of that child. Ironically enough, a lot of the times when pro-choice people put the focus on the woman, they strict the man of all his parental rights and responsibilities.

And I think that's why actually a lot of men who are pro-choice, are pro-choice because they don't wanna have those fatherly responsibilities that they will have once the child is born. - You've left us, man. I wanna know why.

- (indistinct) struggle. - I'm mad conflicted about this because I strongly feel like a man should not have control over what a woman does with her body. I more so have an issue with when a man doesn't actually want that baby.

She wants it and then expects this man to like be the ultimate provider and child care and all this extra stuff, right? But in the case of it, the man wanted it, the baby and a woman didn't want it, he has no say so. I think that's (indistinct) up dynamic.

So that's why I was going back and forth. - Well, you should have stayed then. It sounds like you're for men having more rights than that.

- I just can't force women and be like, no, you have to do this. Cause I think it's (indistinct) up it's her body. - But it's also a child's life in there.

It's not just her body. It's a child's life. - And it's also your son or daughter.

- I think truly in my eyes, it's like, it's my body. I get to do what I want with it. And I don't think anyone including the person, the other person who's involved should have a say whether I wanna keep it or whether I want to get an abortion.

- My name is Asher, currently reside in Las Vegas and I'm for pro-abortion. I used to be against abortion until an unwanted pregnancy happened to me. If you know for a fact that you're not even gonna be the best parent for that child or you can't provide for that child, or maybe you're just fearful and don't wanna pop a child outta you or just whatever reason that you have.

I feel like you shouldn't have to go through that. You still have that choice over your life, your body. - I have had an abortion.

- A few months ago I found out that I was pregnant. So when I imagined myself finding out I was pregnant for the first time I wanted it be celebrated. And in that moment I felt such severe anxiety and having that, I felt, like the entire time I was just in a lot of emotional pain, grieving.

I was debating about myself, about how I would be looked at or how I would view myself after getting the procedure done. - I ain't gonna lie, I'm nervous. So I'm be real careful in my words.

Clearly as a man, I can't have an abortion, but my girlfriend, we've had two abortions. She didn't really want to have a baby. I didn't really want to have a baby.

And I know for me, I don't want to be that seen as that deadbeat father person, but I knew I wasn't really trying to sacrifice my own dreams or what I was trying to accomplish to be a dad at that point. - I think that's definitely like one of the biggest things to consider because I wasn't in any kind of position to be a mother, you know? So it's like, I wanna get my shit together before I can have a baby and give it a life that it deserves.

When I found out I was pregnant, the person that I was with at the time, they were like, I will support you in every way, but I will not be able to be there for you if you decide to keep it. And that definitely influenced my choice. It was one of the hardest decisions I've ever had to make.

I like to think I'm a pretty generous, like loving person in the names that I've been called for even getting one. I've gotten evil, psychotic, demented. My name is Christine.

I'm from Denver and I am on the anti-abortion side. So when I was 20 years old, I was a college student and I found myself in an unplanned pregnancy. And I was pressured to abort very heavily, not only by my child's father, but by those around me.

And I heard my son's heartbeat and there was no debate, it was a life. His life was not mine to take. This is part of why I am very pro-life because I know many women are pressured to abort when they don't want to.

- Can the disagree a step forward? - Your story is absolutely powerful and your story as well. I think something we probably all can agree on is abortion usually is a symptom of a bigger problem, whether it's finances, whether it's stability of housing, whether it's relationship issues, my perspective is that we address those issues instead of ending the life of a child.

- I disagree, I don't think that abortion is a symptom. People should be able to access abortion when, how, wherever they want or need. I don't think that it's a problem to be fixed.

I think that is still stigmatizing. - But I think the biggest thing is that there are birth control methods out there, and abortion should not be a birth control method. I think that that's very critical.

And to hear that, you know, you weren't celebrated, I think life should be celebrated with everybody. - I'd like to call attention to that point too. Just the fact of using abortion as birth control.

I thank you for everyone sharing their stories so far. I didn't step forward, I haven't had an abortion myself. But I am a survey ever of rape.

I was on birth control at the time and I still made the decision with my medical team that birth control is not a hundred percent effective. And I wanted access to emergency contraceptive to take on top of that. And had that pregnancy or any of those methods failed, I would've chosen to have an abortion and I'm very grateful that I had access to those resources and I'm so mindful that and many women who don't.

- Well, I think it gets down to the heart of the issue here. You know, what is the unborn? Which scientifically the embryo is from conception, a living whole organism with distinct DNA.

As a Christian, I come from a worldview that says that every human being is, has dignity and worth. - Not to disrespect any religion in general, but in my eyes, that's just pushing a belief onto someone rather than actually stating a real concrete fact. - So, scientifically I'm pro-life because of science, not because of religion.

But scientifically, I believe that life does start at conception. I don't think it makes sense to put life beginning at any other place during pregnancy, doing so usually ends up saying that the already born in person isn't alive, such as consciousness, heartbeat, et cetera. There are many pro-life people here here from the science perspective who are not led by religious motives at all, or partially.

I am Ayala, I am 18 years old. I am from Charlotte, North Carolina. And I am anti-abortion.

One misconception that I deal with pretty frequently is that we are all Christian, white, old men. And as a, you know, Jewish woman younger, I really want more voices like mine to be seen in the anti-abortion movement because I think we have new perspectives that would help kind of bridge the gap and have us find a little bit of middle ground between our two opposing sides. - Abortion is murder.

- I think it is murder. I think for the abortionist more so than the woman, I think a lot of women don't necessarily know exactly how an abortion procedure is formed. I've had a girl even tell me that at 20 weeks a baby is just a clump of cells and that's just not true.

I do believe now there might be cases where, you know, some women might be unaware of what's going on in an abortion. But by and large, I think especially with the advent of the internet and so much education out there, many of them do know that the life, that there's a life inside of them and they want to end that life. Whether they call it murder or not.

- Hard disagree, absolutely disagree. - Okay. - I've definitely met a lot of teenage girls who grew up in our generation who believe that abortion is normal.

A fetus is Columbus cells and there is no human life in the womb. They don't tell you when you go into an abortion consultation, this is a child and this is a human life. And then that's, what's going to be happening.

I have a hard time believing that if most women knew they were killing a child, they would do that. I don't think women in America are that malevolent. I think it's very irresponsible and very hurtful to say, oh, this woman's a murderer because she had an abortion.

- At least my personal experience, the people who worked there were very understanding. They let me know there is a child that could come out of you in nine months. Are you sure you want to do this?

I knew there was a child in my body. I knew I could have a child in nine months. And I knew that that child can old and be their own person.

But I made that choice because I'm allowed to have that choice. And especially you, you are a white man. And you are not allowed to say what I can do with my body, nor any of these other women who are able to carry a child.

- I think that's so dangerous. I think that's so dangerous to say that you can't say because of your sexuality, who you are as a male or female, or how you believe as a religion, you can't define what's right or wrong. I think that's misguided and we shouldn't take that in the policy.

- I think what you's saying is whatever your morality is, I think that, you know, folks are entitle that we have freedom of religion, we have freedom from religion. Whatever your moral value is, the issue is trying to turn into legislation and putting on someone else. - We legislate what's right and wrong all the time.

- Thinking even medically, you know, like for indigenous women, there are two times as likely to die from pregnancy related complications. Who's responsible for that murder if she's forced to carry that baby? - Well, I would be off working on legislation altogether where, you know, if the woman's been taken advantage of, or if they've instance situations or if her life's at risk, we can keep those options on the table.

- So all of a sudden, because she could potentially die, we'll make legislation to where she can abort that baby. And all of a sudden you're pro-abortion. - No, I'm not pro-abortion I personally would not like her to choose that option.

I think science is, no, no, no, no. I think science has come a long way where that's actually not the case anymore within our medical community. And we need to continue to increase funding for those mechanisms to provide more research on how to keep the woman alive in this situation.

- What is the end goal here that abortion be illegal and it be criminalized and removed as a resource forever from this country. Is that the. .

. . - Illegal and unthinkable.

- Illegal and unthinkable? - Yeap. - So it is culturally (indistinct) - Culturally for women.

We want women to have resources first of all, to where they don't need an abortion. And then abortion for the abortionist is criminalized. So an abortionist could go to jail for performing it.

Women should not be criminalized because at the end of the day, women are victims of abortion as well. - My name is Sebastian king, and I am anti-abortion side. My mom had an unplanned pregnancy because she was taken advantage of from the time she was 12 to 15.

And she was in and outta state custody. And a judge even encouraged her to have an abortion and told my mom that she won't amount to anything life if she goes through with this pregnancy. Because she chose life, that's the only reason I'm here today.

And that's my mission is to ensure that all life is protected. - Abortion should be accessible to rape and incest survivors. - If you're pregnant from your brother or your cousin or your father, especially if it wasn't consensual, or even if it was, you should still have that option to abort the baby.

And especially if you've been raped, there are some people who have that thought like, oh my God, like, what if I, when I look at my child, I relive that trauma. - Just to remind you. - And not saying that's how all rape victims view it.

But it's just like some women have that fear. - Okay, so I was raped for four years of my life violently. More times than I can count.

And I did get pregnant when I was 15. My rapist threatened me with abortion multiple times. Used it as a tool to keep me in his power.

He had the power to terminate evidence, he had power against me. I did end up losing her, but I wanted her very badly. I named her Rahi, which is Rachel in English.

And I think it's very important to humanize people who are conceived and rape because they're walking around right now. - There's a lot of them. - There's a lot of them.

And I think it's been very insulting to place that on a human being. I think that humans no matter how they are conceived are human beings and they deserve to be respected and their lives deserve to be respected. - And I agree because that's me.

I agree a hundred percent. And my mom has always told me she doesn't view me as his. Even on my birth certificate, he's not my father, so.

- Oh, so I want tap on what you said though. Cause you said you really wanted to keep your daughter. And although you don't, you know, see it as the right baby and stuff.

Other people who also go through that traumatic experience may actually see it like that, right? You wanted that. But there's other people that had their choice taken away from them.

They shouldn't be shamed at going through this and even having to live through that experience of the rape baby, you know what I mean? - Here's the thing, when you get an abortion as a reaction to rape, you are continuing the cycle of violence. So you were raped, that was a violent experience that happened to you.

That wasn't your fault. You're hurt, you've been victimized. Why is it fair to further victimize someone else because you are hurt.

Why is it not. . - But you're seeing it as a someone though, man.

I'm putting myself in a woman's shoes or a human being's shoes, right? You take my choice away. You write me and for all, you know, I might be a struggling human being, making $8 an hour or something like that.

Crazy bills. I might be living in my car. I might be sleeping under the dumpster behind McDonald's.

But now, because of your opinion and my traumatic experience, I get shamed because I don't wanna bring this life into the world, bro. Oh, but you should give birth and then put in foster care if you don't want it, bruh. - I Wanna touch on that too just for a second.

Like for trauma. I think absolutely what I am passionate about is giving people the choice. And for you, you thought a lot about your choice and you wanted that pregnancy.

And I'm really sorry that you lost that child. And I also thought a lot about for myself when I went through that experience, what choice would be best for me? And for me that was not carrying the child.

And I think trauma is such an interesting thing. For me, not having control over a child, growing inside of me and changing my date of my life. You know, that would be more traumatic than the initial experience.

We don't know how people are gonna react, but I do fight and would want them to have the choice to do what's best for them. I think a strange misconception that people have about people who are pro-abortion is that we don't have respect for life or we don't care about children. That's a absolutely not true.

I respect life very much. Unfortunately, I've also seen a lot of negative aspects of our systems in the US, like the Foster Care System. It's out of that respect that I believe people should have the right to choose an abortion.

- America offers resources to help you raise a child. - There's tax benefits to having children. I think there was also, you know, in the latest round of COVID money, there was funding for women who've had children.

- Yeah, and there are so many Christian charities and so many different organizations that want to help women, you know, and the resources are there. - Also government resources, there are government resources that help you take care of children. Are there enough?

That is a different question. - I was basically just agreeing with what you said, cause section eight, food stamp, free healthcare, school programs and whatnot. Like there are resources, are they enough, oh cool.

- That's how my mom survived when she had me because of government assistance. So that's the only way she made it because of that. - I have been a pregnant teenager and I've also been a teenage mother on welfare and unemployed.

The number of resources that are available state to state is something that is atrocious. But what it comes down to is a lot of time and energy, the choice between do I go to work and get the money to pay rent or do I go and I sit in the office or do I go to this nonprofit who's requiring me to fill out this application and come to a meeting in the daytime when I'm supposed to be working. - So you see it kind of like a job, like you're clocking into filling paper with you receiving your (indistinct).

- Low resources and creating these sort of impossible hurdles and more barriers for people who are already experiencing them to overcome, to get the help is not a help at all. - And I feel like a completely like separate conversation is it is extremely hard to be a single mother who is also a woman or person of color and to get resources, especially black woman. They are notoriously even in that room where they're giving birth, they aren't taken seriously.

- Well, I just wanna say one thing because I think it's important. So I might not look it, but I'm native American, have my Cherokee card and everything. We have universal healthcare in the Indian community.

And when she went to have me as a child, they told her in that universal healthcare system that she's not allowed to have pain medicine because that's a luxury. So she got it through government assistance. So that's a big deal that the United States is more for than the native American community.

- That is such a low bar. - No, no, no, I'm not saying that's acceptable, but I'm saying like. .

- It exists. - It exists, that story exists. - But there are literal reservations out there that do not have water, do not have electricity, do not have internet that is in 2021.

Are those not resources to raise a child? - So let's address that instead of killing the baby. - The question was does the government provide resources?

No, does America provide resources? No, that's unacceptable. - Abortions will continue to happen regardless of the law.

- Of course. - All right, well. - That ain't never going to change.

- I think of course they'll continue to happen. Law doesn't mean that something is not gonna happen at all anymore. Just like rape, just like murder, just like anything else we've outlawed.

Just because they're still going to happen doesn't make it right. - But if you criminalize doctors and abortion providers, right? That means we no longer have providers.

That means abortion is no longer an option. And that by default the way that this country and especially my state legislates will mean, and it has happened. We have precedent, a woman who tries to self induce or who tries other non-medical methods to have an abortion can and has been criminalized.

What is the policy that doesn't just absolutely take away the right that people have to access an abortion regardless of what their beliefs are. - If that child is a human being deserving of the right to life, then yes, it should be criminalized just like murder of two year olds and five year olds. And adults is criminalized, right?

- But that's so different though. You have people that's two years old, already out the womb, they been here for years, right? And then you got these cells.

- Can I ask you something? - Go ahead. - When does it stop being a clump of cells.

- Personally, I'm not worried about the clump of cells. - Decades of medical research has not been able to land on that answer. - And I'm trying to answer your question.

As far as cells. . .

- Do you believe that abortion should be allowed on nine months of pregnancy? - I do feel that's a bit more extreme. So I will agree on that as a.

. - But let's not act like women are just deciding to get abortions at like during their second or third trimester. And the woman who are doing it, that's either that they're going to die giving birth or it's under some men to circumstances, cause I doubt even myself, I doubt that I would get to a six month, seven month mark and then decide I don't wanna make this commitment.

I feel like there's a lot of this conversation. Like when does it become wrong? As if we're actually going to get an abortion at that time.

- A lot of the, what pro-life people would consider hostile pro-choice comments and things like that are a response to hostile pro-life people. And I think that doesn't get talked about in our side because we don't like to fight each other. But I think it's an important point because I've seen absolutely disgraceful comments made towards women who are going into clinics, you know, who are obviously in a very traumatizing situation and you don't know what that woman is going through.

And they're shouting obscenities at her. And that's appalling. And I think that we need to take responsibility as pro-life people to understand they've experienced so much hurt from our side of the community.

- And I agree with that. I think, but from our side of the aisle folks who are very passionate because they believe that's a life, they believe that's a baby and they wanna do everything they can to save that child. But I agree that our rhetoric needs to be there as a resource and another option.

And we can do that peacefully and respectfully as well. - I think on any side of any controversial issue, you're always gonna have those extremists, same thing on the pro-abortion side, people are always gonna have feelings and people are always gonna fight on that level, right? But I think it's about coming up here and saying like what actually makes common sense and how do we come up with policy that doesn't force folks to live by other people's values.