President Joe Biden said the following about abortion in his State of the Union Address (February 7, 2023):
The Vice President and I are doing everything to protect access to reproductive health care and safeguard patient safety. But already, more than a dozen states are enforcing extreme abortion bans. Make no mistake about it: If Congress passes a national ban, I will veto it.
In other words, U.S. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are telling us that abortion is not only “health care” but also “reproductive” health care.
But Biden and Harris are gaslighting Americans, i.e., telling lies so citizens will doubt truth and believe the Biden-Harris abortion ideology.
I see (at least) two instances of gaslighting.
Gaslight #1
Abortion is “reproductive” health care? Nope.
Abortion has nothing to do with reproduction. Abortion is downstream from reproduction. Abortion destroys the outcome of healthy reproduction.
In other words, the truth is that healthy reproduction occurs before abortion occurs. Healthy reproduction occurs at conception, when the union of sperm and egg form a new human being.
Medical treatments/procedures have different purposes, which need to be made clear with language that accurately describes reality.
Abortion, on the other hand, occurs after healthy reproduction has occurred. Abortion is the deliberate destruction of the pre-natal human being already created by the union of sperm and egg. When sperm and egg unite at conception we have a new human being. The mother and father have reproduced.
Again, let me emphasize: Abortion occurs after conception, after reproduction, whether immediately after conception or months later. (A contraceptive prevents, or is intended to prevent, the union of the sperm and egg.)
Gaslight #2
Abortion is “health care”? Nope.
Abortion is not health care, certainly not for the vast majority of abortions.
It turns out the hard cases — rape, incest, threat to life of the mother — to which many abortion-choice ideologues point as justification for abortion account for fewer than 5% of all the abortion cases. (In his 2015 book Beyond the Abortion Wars ethicist Charles Camosy reports that the number for the hard cases is 2%.)
Also — more importantly — abortion is not even needed medically.
Dr. Kendra Kolb, a neonatologist, stated this in 2019: “There is no medical reason why the life of the child must be directly and intentionally ended with an abortion procedure.”
Yes, treatments for ectopic pregnancies occur, but they’re not abortions per se, if we use language accurately. Yes, treatments for heart disease or cancer can involve pre-term deliveries that might result in the death of a child, but they’re not abortions per se, if we use language accurately.
When we accurately define abortion as the direct and intentional killing of a pre-natal human being — which is how the word “abortion” is to be understood in the context of Biden’s speech — abortions are not medically necessary.
Accurate Use of Language Matters
Medical treatments/procedures have different purposes, which need to be made clear with language that accurately describes reality. This is important to remember, especially when we are being told, misleadingly, by politicians and others, that abortion is “reproductive health care.”
Biden and Harris are gaslighting Americans. Abortion is not reproductive health care.
Hendrik van der Breggen, PhD, is a retired philosophy professor who lives in Steinbach, Manitoba, Canada. Hendrik is author of two books: Untangling Popular Pro-Choice Arguments: Critical Thinking about Abortion and APOLOGIA: The Columns: A Defence of Mere Christianity.