The University of California Berkeley’s student government organization passed a resolution last week that pushes for the provision of abortions on campus as part of student “health.” The bill, Resolution 69, states that abortion is essential to women’s health and that elective medication abortions should be given to students free of charge by the college. And at least one student has suggested docking administrator pay to provide for these acts.
Says Aanchal Chugh, sponsor of Resolution 69:
I believe the University should reorganize funds from the administration’s paychecks to university health services. Many of the administrators at UC Berkeley receive more than generous paychecks while they continue to put student health on the backburner. This resolution is demanding that the university reconsider and reprioritize its funding. Instead of investing money into the administration’s paychecks, the university should be investing in students’ health and safety needs… The resolution does not expect students to pay for these services as I, and those who voted for it, believe that health is a right not a privilege. The university should be providing this right to all students.
The medication abortion that Chugh argues is necessary for women’s “health and safety” actually has a pronounced history of endangering women – including numerous instances of maternal death. The abortion procedure involves the ingestion of two pills – mifepristone and misoprostol – which kill and expel the preborn child, respectively. The process occurs without the direct supervision of a physician, and health risks include hemorrhage and septicemia, to say nothing of the psychological trauma women have experienced in seeing their emaciating children in the toilet during the drug-induced abortion at home.
Nevertheless, the bill insists that abortion is necessary for women to succeed in college and beyond. Though Chugh is a self-proclaimed feminist who even eschews the “man” syllable in the word “woman” by using the terms “womxn” and “womyn,” she seems completely oblivious to the contradiction in her militant demand for free elective abortion as a necessity to achievement in life. Namely, Chugh and her compatriots have seemingly accepted that women must become just like men in order to achieve success.
But women shouldn’t have to turn on their own bodies in order to achieve success, and advocating a culture in which that message is paramount only serves to stunt the progress of the real feminist movement, which pursues equality – which is quite different from sameness.
Fortunately, Pro-Life organizations are rejecting this misogynistic notion that pushes male sameness on women by promoting abortion as the key to their own freedom and success. Programs like Students for Life of America’s Pregnant on Campus Initiative are working to increase the availability of support and resources for mothers and fathers experiencing pregnancy and parenting during their college years.
A number of schools right here in Texas have begun scholarships for pregnant and parenting students to help them stay in school and complete their degrees. Members of the Dr. Joseph Graham Fellowship for Pro-Life College Leaders, a program run by Texas Right to Life, have established successful initiatives for students who parent on three campuses (Texas A&M, Angelo State University, and Stephen F. Austin University). Fellows are also in the process of establishing similar projects at the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Texas at Arlington. These initiatives give students the tools they need to pursue all of the opportunities available to them and empower them to reject the health and safety risks associated with elective abortion. Through these programs, students are empowering their peers to reject the lie that they must choose abortion to achieve the same level of respect, success, and happiness as non-parenting students.