**The column below represents the personal views of the student journalist.
A friend of mine once shared a story that has stuck with me to this day. She was deciphering the best option for a medical procedure. She felt she had a deep understanding of the circumstances and side effects that could occur from making said decision.
When she mentioned her ideas to a male relative, instead of encouraging her to do the best thing for her body and health, his immediate reaction was to shut the idea down. He criticized even the slight thought of her taking on this procedure. He spoke with authority, as if he possessed some innate information about the woman’s body and what she was going through.
How could he assume he knew the situation, the pain, the trying? How can he tell her what she was or wasn’t allowed to do? What happened to ‘land of the free’? Especially, when it doesn’t directly affect or harm the men. Why is it their say if we are or are not allowed to ever have abortion rights?Everything women have fought for is now down the drain with the current system we live in.
Abortion is a medical procedure to end pregnancy. There are different ways of doing this procedure such as; medication abortion, aspiration, and dilation. Numbers for illegal abortions in the U.S. are difficult to determine because they are self-managed or unrecorded. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates thousands to tens of thousands occur annually. We are able to determine that with the increase in self-managed medication abortions (using pills ordered online) in states with total bans.
Based on data from the Society of Family Planning, in 2024, approximately 34,500 medication abortions were provided via shield laws. This information proves that abortion rights are necessary and that no matter the law, women who are in need will find any possible way they can to get this procedure done.
International human rights law clearly states that decisions about your body are yours and yours only. This is what is known as bodily autonomy. Yet, men still make laws on women’s bodies. History shows men have always had a say over women when it comes to laws, especially abortion laws. We believe they are aiming to empower male partners or reflect moral/religious beliefs about fetal rights.
Laws concerning women’s bodies, especially those related to reproductive health, have a direct impact on women’s lives. To have these sorts of abortion regulations made by individuals who can’t reproduce, simply shows injustice. This shows injustice specifically and especially to Roe V. Wade. It creates a dynamic where one group’s health and autonomy are governed by another, leading to policies that don’t fully consider or understand the needs and realities of women. Women feel alone and misunderstood at the idea of not having abortion to lean to in a serious manner.
What if your younger daughter or younger sister or any younger girl you know for that matter, had been sexually assaulted? What if during a trip to the doctors for a tummy ache, they run tests to find out she is pregnant and has been for a while. Imagine, in this situation, the mother of this child not being able to help her daughter in the most beneficial way possible. Imagine forcing a child to give birth to another child. Men should not make laws for us when they cannot comprehend our struggles, the possibilities, the statistics, or give breathing room in these sorts of horrendous scenarios.
The New York Times reports that these restrictions have resulted in increased birth rates in states with bans (roughly 2.8% higher) and have caused many women to travel long distances for care. Gender Equality Policy Institute reports roughly 62.7 million women and girls live(d) under state abortion bans. Who is society to judge these 62.7 million women and girls as having the same story? Who is to say they all deserve the outcome of restricted abortions? What our law can’t grasp is that some of these women and girls didn’t ask for a pregnancy. Some of them were forced. Studies from show National Sexual Violence Resource Center show one in five women in the U.S. experienced completed or attempted rape during their lifetime. The same institution explains a 2024 analysis covering 14 U.S. states with total abortion bans estimated that over 519,000 completed rapes resulted in 64,565 pregnancies. Those statistics are far too high to not have the proper resources available in case of emergencies.
On the flip side, people who are pro-life, may argue against abortion for religious or moral reasons. While this can be your own personal beliefs, they should not be placed onto those who don’t agree with you. That is immoral and profound to force your beliefs onto another so much that it may control or even ruin their life. Why would you agree with the idea of forcing a woman who was assaulted or even just simply can’t afford to bring a child into this life (money or health reasons), to have said child? You are setting them and yourselves up for failure. You can be pro-life but keep your decisions separate from people forced to make a decision on if they’ll keep their baby or not. It is never direct.
Would women ever have control over a man’s body in the way they do with ours? Think deeply about that. Who’s to say men shouldn’t be the ones getting a vasectomy? It would make more sense for men with rape or assAult on their file of the sort to be forced to get a vasectomy. It would make much more sense rather than a woman, once again, being forced to clean up the mess a man has made. Our society needs to hold men accountable for their actions, stop controlling women, learn your facts and statistics, learn how abortion laws affect women of all kinds in many spots of our world. Listen and learn.