Supreme Court allows for the Texas Abortion ban, or the “heartbeat law,” to stand until oral arguments are heard by high court officials.

The Texas Abortion ban states a woman cannot recieve an abortion past six weeks of pregnancy under any circumstances. Despite most women not knowing they are pregnant until after six weeks, this restricting and demeaning law still stands to force women to have a child against their free will. A woman chooses to not have a child for multiple reasons, such as mental, physical, and financial instability; this potentially limits not only their will to support themselves, but also the child in question to have a stable life.

But not only does this law state a woman cannot receive an abortion after the “6-week mark,” but according to The Texas Tribune, it also allows for any personnel who aided with or who performed an abortion to be sued under Section 171.208- Civil For Violation Or Aiding Or Abetting Violation. Meaning, if a person has a family member or friend who was raped and drives her to recieve an abortion, that person can be sued. A doctor who performs an abortion on a 13-year-old girl can also be sued under the law. This section also declares the state award a $10,000 bounty to any successful lawsuits under this law; this is a sick and twisted way of encouraging a law that is morally unjust from the standpoint of a woman in a somewhat “free” country.

If this law is going to be the new forced normality in America, then I question the methods the men in power plan to take to aid the victims of this ban. According to the American Bar Association, the United States does not have a universal healthcare system, but rather a system based on health insurance. This is a flawed mindset to have, for it is easily accessible to the wealthy, rather than to all social classes. How is a teenage victim of rape and incest with no access to healthcare supposed to raise a child?

Furthermore, when this new law forces a woman to give birth to a child she cannot support, that child will go into the foster care system. This is another flawed system that is overcrowded and filled with abuse as it slowly becomes ineffective. According to The Children’s Bureau, the number of people in foster care in 2019 was 423,997, more than the United States can afford to support. Regardless of this, Time Magazine states religious organizations, such as Catholic Social Services (CSS), continue to deny same-sex couples to become foster parents. Not only is this an extremely homophobic step backwards, but this also denies potential parents for any of the children in foster care.

Over the years, people have looked at the words “pro-choice” and “pro-life” and immediately tried to debunk the other person’s argument because it has been misconstrued in so many ways. The argument of “pro-choice” is for a woman choosing if she would like to have a child. If a person having an abortion conflicts with another person’s moral or religous beliefs, then that person has the right to choose not to have one. However, this should not give anyone the right to determine if another does have an abortion. Following that, there are arguments that the father of the potential life should be able to choose whether it is born. This argument could be considered valid by many, although the man is not the one carrying the child. “Pro-choice” is stating it is a woman’s body and she should have the right to do with it what she sees fit.

The argument of “pro-life” can be deconstructed in many ways, starting with if a person is even aborting a life at all. The mindset of life in this case boils down to the interpretation of when life begins; while the pro-life arguments usually state life starts at conception or when a heartbeat is detected, most pro-choice arguments state life begins at birth. Knowing where these mindsets derive from, one could ultimately consider these arguments personal beliefs rather than fact when attesting cases against this ban. Furthermore, if people use the argument of “pro-life,” then they are implicating the notion they are all pro-life. By pronouncing pro-life, are they against the death penalty? Are they against war? If not, then the correct terminology to use when arguing (this topic) is pro-abortion. Using the term “pro-life” is the start of misinterpreting the true meaning of the argument and is a sadly unsuccessful attempt to appeal to the sympathy and emotion of their audience.