After years of excluding men from abortion decision, pro-abortion activists lament lack of men in movement

Pro-abortion activists have begun to lament that men are not getting involved in their movement. This change comes after decades of abortion advocates discussing abortion as a “women’s issue,” a decision in which men play no part.

A writer at Jezebel complains men aren’t doing enough to promote abortion

In an article for Jezebel, pro-abortion activist Charlotte Shane wrote:

I’m furious to know that the vast majority of cis [straight, non-transgender] men in my life just can’t be bothered to do anything about abortion accessibility, not even when they’ve benefitted from the procedure in the past and may benefit again in the future.

She complains that men “don’t care about our oppression, the oppression they helped to create and still maintain, through action and inaction alike. Since they can’t arrive at caring on their own, how are we supposed to ‘make’ them care?”

Shane seems blind to the fact that accusing all men, without exception, of oppressing women may not be the best way to win sympathy for her cause.

More pro-abortion complaints about men not being involved

Ashley Fetters writes in The Atlantic:

Abortion-rights activists… have recently been calling for a level of male involvement similar to that of the anti-abortion movement — and expressing dismay at the lack of male voices speaking out about how abortion has affected their lives.

Fetters links to several other articles by pro-abortion women talking about the same issue.

She mentions the case of a pro-abortion man who attended a NARAL Pro-Choice America meeting in Atlanta. He reported that, out of an estimated 80 people, only three attendees were men.

Pro-abortion activists admit they’ve excluded men

Fetters asked Emily Bonow, cofounder of Shout Your Abortion, why she thinks men aren’t getting involved in the pro-abortion movement.

Bonow said, “I’ve seen all these signs that are like, you know, No uterus, no opinion… I think that approach has spooked some men out of the conversation who we really need to be a part of it.”

Fetters elaborated:

[T]he construct of abortion as an expression of a woman’s right to bodily autonomy can make it seem like a topic only women are fit to address… And it hasn’t helped… that some supporters of abortion rights have all but insisted that the abortion-rights movement be a no-men zone.

Pro-abortion activists have insisted, again and again, that men should have no say in the abortion debate. Usually, these claims are made against pro-life men. But the constant refrain that abortion is a woman’s issue and that men should have no right to influence a woman’s decision has had an impact on the pro-abortion movement.

Another pro-abortion activist, Alison McQuade, has said, “Men are so eager to join in the ‘WE are pregnant!’ and ‘WE are having a baby!’ party, but suddenly become deafeningly silent when it’s ‘WE had an abortion.’”

Our society expects men to provide for their children. Laws mandating child support highlight this responsibility.

But men are completely excluded from the abortion decision.

Fathers have no rights

Men have no way to protect their preborn babies if their partners want to abort. The decision, they are told, again and again, is solely hers.

This leads to tragedy when a man wants his child to live.

One man whose partner had an abortion wrote, “I’ve never felt so powerless in all my life. The depression and anger really worry me. The trouble is, I am not sure I have the right to feel this way. She never even asked what I wanted. I felt I didn’t have the right to voice my feelings.”

READ: Men describe suffering from post-abortion trauma: ‘I was totally destroyed’

RDF’s girlfriend was pregnant with twins, and initially, the couple was happy about the pregnancy. At about 20 weeks, however, she decided to abort. RDF begged her to reconsider:

I tried to reason with her. She wasn’t having it. I refused to take her. She called a cab. I thought to myself, “If I let her get in that cab, she’ll surely go through with it.” So I agreed to take her to Planned Parenthood in hopes of talking her out of it.

She wasn’t having any of that. I tried to talk. She was silent. Not a word. I drove. She stared out the window. She was stubborn. She was a “modern woman,” nobody was going to tell her what to do… Not me… Nobody.

RDF has suffered deep emotional pain over the loss of his children.

Men grieve the children they couldn’t save

Another man wrote:

I tried everything, I offered to marry her, to take the baby myself, or to offer it up for adoption. She said she could never give her child up for adoption – it didn’t make cognitive sense…

I’ve thought about what happened every day for the last 32 years.

Kevin Albin was happy about his wife’s pregnancy and thought she was too. He said, “I had started making plans for a nursery, and we started buying things for the baby! She was just as excited as me.” But at 19 weeks, she decided to have an abortion and told him “that [he] had no say whatsoever in the matter.”

He begged her not to abort:

… I pleaded with her. I begged her to let me adopt the child, but she refused to listen. She wanted me to take her to the procedure. I said no, and I began to pray that she would change her mind or chicken out. Two days later, she came back home and said it was over and that “it was a boy.”

He writes:

[T]here is not a day that goes by that I do not grieve for my lost son… In most cases, abortion advocates scream that men do not have an argument in the fight, that we have absolutely no say because we are just ‘sperm donors’ according to their logic.

The reality is that men feel an immense amount of pain as well, and we hold on to our own fair share of demons, whether it was our decision or not.

For years, the pro-abortion movement has told men that their opinions about whether to abort their children don’t matter and that only women should have a say.

It’s not surprising that men have internalized this message. After putting so much effort into excluding men from the abortion decision, pro-abortion feminists are now complaining about the results.

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