Faces of Abortion with Stephanie Lepp
Starring producer and storyteller Stephanie Lepp, Faces of Abortion seeks to integrate the insights of pro-life and pro-choice perspectives into a synthesis view.
CREDITS
Brought to you by: Synthesis Media
Director: Stephanie Lepp
Script: Stephanie Lepp
Starring: Stephanie Lepp
Music
Drunken Thrush, by Cody Martin
New Theme 86, by Hays Holladay
Kokobongo, by Alessandro Gugel
Special thanks: Frances Kissling, David Gushee, Greg Johnstone, Jill Filipovic, Cindy Wigglesworth, Jeff Salzman
POINTS OF SYNTHESIS
The values of life and choice give each other meaning — what would be life without choice, or choice without life?
“Are you pro-choice or pro-life?” is not a good question. Perhaps a better question is: “how should states navigate the trade-offs between the rights of a developed individual — a woman, and the rights of an emerging individual — a fetus?”
It’s time to reframe the debate
From: pro-choice vs. pro-life (or women’s vs. fetal rights)
To: people who want to reduce unwanted pregnancies (and the need for legal abortion) vs. people who want to restore traditional gender roles or treat abortion as just another form of birth control
Under some circumstances, abortion is the least bad option. So the task at hand is to democratically decide under what circumstances to make abortion available, while we also work to make abortion less necessary.
SCRIPT
PRO-LIFE: Abortion is a violation of the sanctity of life.
PRO-CHOICE: Abortion is an act of bodily autonomy.
PRO-LIFE: If we didn’t treat life as sacred, we would diminish human dignity.
PRO-CHOICE:If we didn’t have bodily autonomy, we would diminish human freedom.
PRO-LIFE: A fetus is a human being in its earliest stages of development. So abortion is a moral problem at any stage. But the problem gets worse as the fetus grows.
PRO-CHOICE:Well, if we want to care for that “human being in its earliest stages of development,” let’s care for them not just while they’re in the womb, but over the course of their entire lifetime! Let’s provide them with housing, and healthcare, and all the resources that a human being needs.
PRO-LIFE: Listen: abortion should be a rare last resort. Like only in cases of: rape, incest, a threat to the life of the mother, or if the baby won’t survive. If that’s what the law said, most abortions would be illegal.
PRO-CHOICE:And I’m saying: most unwanted pregnancies are preventable. And the way to prevent unwanted pregnancies is not by making abortion illegal (which only makes it unsafe).
It’s by increasing access to contraception and sex education. And it’s by making parenting easier, with things like parental leave and affordable childcare.
It’s both more effective and more just…to reduce abortion not by making it less available, but by making it less necessary.
PRO-LIFE: The truth is: even Ruth Bader Ginsburg had issues with Roe. And that’s because: the Supreme Court rules on questions of the Constitution. And the Constitution says nothing about abortion. So abortion is not the Supreme Court’s business!
If you want access to abortion, pursue it democratically. Build public support, and get some laws passed.
PRO-CHOICE: Umm – abortion is no longer the Supreme Court’s business. Roe was overturned, we are pursuing abortion democratically. And our democracy is saying – even in conservative states! – that we want abortion rights.
SYNTHESIS: Has anyone ever told you two that for having such different opinions…you really do look a lot alike?
Anyways, “Are you pro-choice or pro-life?”….is not a good question.
You can’t really be anti-choice or anti-life, right?
Perhaps a better question is: how should states navigate the trade-offs between the rights of a developed individual — a woman, and the rights of an emerging individual — a fetus?
The way other democracies do that is by generally prioritizing the rights of the woman up until a point, and then prioritizing the rights of the fetus.
And — women’s versus fetal rights is not entirely what this debate is about. If it was, advocates for fetal rights would unequivocally support birth control, and advocates for women’s rights would unequivocally admit that abortion does can cause deep emotional pain. They don’t.
So perhaps it’s time to reframe the debate from: pro-choice versus pro-life, to: people who want to reduce unwanted pregnancies (and the need for legal abortion) versus people who want to restore traditional gender roles or treat abortion as just another form of birth control.
Perhaps it’s even time to retire “pro-choice” and “pro-life” altogether, because most Americans don’t identify with those labels anyway.
Look, I think we’d all love for abortion to be unnecessary. And – I think we understand that under some circumstances abortion IS the least bad option. So the task at hand is to democratically decide under what circumstances to make abortion available, while we also work to make abortion less necessary.
This will be an evolving task, because viability is moving earlier and earlier. But if we act as a democracy, I think we can do it.
The internet wants to put you into a box. It gives you two options: red or blue. Woke or anti-woke. Pro-choice or pro-life. Don't fall for the false trade-off. Integrate more perspectives. Our view will always be partial, and we can always strive to see more faces of the diamond that is reality.
In that spirit, what if we integrate the faces of capitalism?
Faces of X is a series devoted to perceiving reality more fully. Watch the full series and make your own.
CUTTING ROOM FLOOR
Nuggets that didn’t make it into the script:
The notion that 'life is sacred’ should encompass ALL of life
Reproductive freedom — a notion that integrates the values of the right and left
-
There should neither be no abortion under any circumstances, nor no abortion under all circumstances. So the question is: under what circumstances? And…
…in a pluralistic democracy: who makes that decision: women, the legislature, or the Supreme Court?
Abortion is not the Supreme Court’s business. States are now making their own decisions. But pregnancy is complicated, and the law can be a blunt instrument.
So at the end of the day, we have to trust women (along with their doctors, and partners) to make difficult decisions. That’s precisely part of what it means to live in a pluralistic democracy
-
In the US today, only 1% of abortions happen after 24 weeks. So shifting priorities from women's to fetal rights over the course of a pregnancy is already the status quo
Since Roe was overturned, abortions have gone up, not down
-
Partners (fathers or otherwise) also have a perspective that should be included
In the same way that a woman shouldn't be forced to have a baby, should she not be forced to have an abortion even if her life is at risk? In other words, if she can choose to not bring a fetus to life, can she also choose to give up her life for her baby?
REFERENCES
First Principles and First Values: Forty-Two Propositions on Cosmoerotic Humanism, the Meta-Crisis, and the World to Come, by David J. Temple (2024)
Abortion, Freedom, and the Sanctity of Life, with Cindy Wigglesworth, Corey deVos and Mark Fischler (2022)
Institute for Cultural Evolution’s abortion policy proposal (2022)
Honestly: Why You're Wrong—and Right—About Abortion, with Bari Weiss and Caitlin Flanagan (2021)
The Dishonesty of the Abortion Debate, by Caitlin Flanagan (2019)
On the Front Line of the Culture War, with Ken Wilber and Cory deVos (2019)
Pro-Life, Pro-Choice, Pro-Dialogue ft. David Gushee + Frances Kissling, On Being with Krista Tippett (2013)
So good! What a beautiful integration of multiple perspectives played by a single person. Nice work, Stephanie!