Newsweek reports that some pro-choicers are attempting to answer the question, is abortion bad? And, perhaps more importantly, should we say it's bad? As if this is a new debate.

The article kicks off with a description of the post-abortion-counseling group Exhale (which Jill at Feministe blogged about awhile ago, in the context of more typical, judgmental "Crisis Pregnancy Centers"), then moves on to Peg Johnston, a New York clinic director who uses words like "killing" and "baby" when discussing abortion.

Johnston has often been at odds with the pro-choice leadership. That’s why her inclusion in this week’s small gathering—which includes the president of NARAL, Nancy Keenan— suggests a movement finally willing to re-examine itself rather than just blame the right (though there is still plenty of that).

The pro-choice movement has been discussing ways to talk about abortion for a long time. Maybe the debate hasn't made it onto a broader public radar, but it's certainly been going on. So to portray Johnston as some sort of renegade, one of the few pro-choicers who's tackling these issues, is misleading.

Abortion, it seems, has become an ethical matter for pro-choicers as well as pro-lifers. In Pittsburgh, clinic director Claire Keyes took a survey that showed that nearly 30 percent of her patients have spiritual concerns about their abortion.

Abortion is and always has been an ethical matter for pro-choicers. It's ethical for a woman to have the right to make decisions about her own body. It's ethical to provide family planning services to all women. And, in the event a woman should choose abortion, it's often the most ethical decision for her personally. The choice is often between abortion and another child she cannot support financially.

Newsweek also doesn't get into the fact-- and most people don’t realize-- that the Roe decision itself takes ethics into account. It's a compromise that acknowledges abortion is less and less ethically acceptable the further along in pregnancy a woman is. So where will we be if we further compromise on the compromise? Maybe it would be OK to talk in terms of "killing a baby" if rights weren’t already so restricted and 99.9% of abortions happened in the first trimester. But until restrictive state legislation is rolled back, 2nd-trimester abortions are going to be a necessity. Before you to get all up in our grill about ethics, start working for better access to family planning and early abortion services, like pro-choicers do.

And speaking of state's restrictions on abortion, the piece totally misses the boat on parental notification:

One issue that may come up: parental notification. Providers know that having a teen’s parents involved is key to a healthy recovery both physically and emotionally. But interest group leaders are fighting the parental notification laws that are spreading throughout the states. "This is a huge area of abdication," Johnston says. "In the clinics, of course we want parents involved."

This completely disregards the fact that the vast majority of teenagers who have functional relationships with their parents DO tell them they’re getting an abortion. Of course clinics want supportive parents involved— and personally I’m all for the momimpregnant.com website idea. But the bottom line is that parental notification laws hurt teenagers who are alienated from their parents. Why don’t pro-lifers get that every woman does not have an ideal home life?

The bottom line is that most pro-choicers have understood for a long time that there needs to be space both for women who are barely affected by their abortions, and for women who are traumatized by them. Like most things, abortion is something that no two women experience the same way. So I don’t necessarily disagree with individuals starting to use phrases like "killing a baby" rather than "terminating a fetus" or whatever. As long as we understand that to some women it’s a clump of cells, and to others it’s a baby. Although as a movement, or as part of a party platform, using pro-life terminology is a tricky, tricky thing. It’s hard to say "killing a baby" and maintain the broad abortion access. But it's certainly not impossible.

Thanks to Jonathan for the link.