Written yesterday.
Thursday, August 3rd, 2007.
(Like the last one, it was written during an interlude of cataloging)
Am I the only one these days that is still passionately pro-choice?
I mean here I am, working away at the church’s mess of a library and I’ve come across multiple “Jesus wants you to have your baby!” books.
Now, I was born and raised Catholic (although I have “opted” out of it) and I understand how and why the church views abortion the way it does, it’s just…things have to change and evolve. Religions have to change and evolve. The things preached in the 16th century were not necessarily planned to make sense in 2007, and really, many of the teachings don’t “fit” anymore.
I understand the church’s view on abortion. But must it be so absolute?
The book I’m looking at right now is telling me, outright, that if I have an abortion for any reason, I’m a weak, coward of a woman and am going to hell. No questions asked. No leeway. No nothing. There must be change. Maybe that’s why I opted out of religion. I can’t take the absolute truths religions preach.
If I was, say, walking home from class one night after missing the bus and some drunken man grabs my from a shadowy corner, rips off my clothing and rapes me, leaves me in a bloody and hurting mess behind the empty building, and I happen to get pregnant…well, according to my parent’s religion and this book, I was asking for it and I have to suffer the consequences.
I can not accept that.
There are far too many women going through literal hell in order to avoid a supposed after-life hell.
I can not accept that.
I know far too many women like that. And it hurts me to watch them suffer, knowing I can’t do anything. Knowing her child’s husband still comes around, once a year, and demands full custody. Knowing she has to fill out OSAP forms for the Catholic school she goes to, how she cringes and squirms as she fills out the sheets asking for monetary assistance for school. Watching her hide the sheets as she writes out “We live in student housing. He’s 4. He’s still in diapers. He eats. a lot.” To laugh along with her when she asks me if I think putting in that his birthday is in 2 months would make a difference to the mean men at the office.
It hurts to hear them go on about how much it hurt.
How he used his fists. How he drugged her. Raped her. Left her in the backyard. How the police would do nothing and how she hadn’t been on the pill.
To hear how fucking afraid she was, and still is. She knew her parents would never understand…or help.
I can not accept that.
I am a feminist.
I am pro-choice. Not anti-life.
I do have my limits, though.
I believe in the freedom to abort a conceived child, under drastic circumstances, not just willy-nilly.
My “rules,” as I seem to be calling them, are not absolute. Maybe one day I’ll decide abortion is bad. Maybe one day I’ll decide abortion is okay, not matter the circumstances. I don’t know. But I do know that my life “rules” are not absolute.
This is my religion. A combined mess of twists and turns. A muddles crowd of shouting women in my head. A fear of repercussion and a need to step out. A list of religion-induced morals that, even though I no longer follow the religion, have been so ingrained, nay, so infused into my being that I will not give them up.
But these absolutes? This “You are woman. You are weak. You are going to hell.” attitude? No. I can not accept that.
This is my religion, or so it seems. And I think, maybe, I can accept that.
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