I completely agree. I don't see how FFL is much of a feminist group. "Refuse to choose" doesn't show much respect for the individual woman or her circumstances. It's sort of dictating the choice, isn't it?

One of the things that I like about the feminist movement (the real one) is that they advocate for real opportunities and choices for all women. However, no feminist has ever insisted that every woman have a career, stay at home, have a baby, not have a baby, etc, etc. I can't say that for FFL. They say you get pregnant, you must refuse to have an abortion. I just can't get behind that message.

I am hesitant to say that it is impossible to be an anti-choice feminist. I think part of my struggle here is knowing that there are women who are pro-contraception, pro-women’s rights, but for religious reasons view abortion as murder. But these are women who are feminists in every other sense of the world and proudly declare themselves so. Despite my attempts to persuade them otherwise, they hold tightly to the Christian stricture that abortion= the ending of a life. So does this make them not a feminist?

And then you have those women who are pro-choice, pro-women, but refuse to align themselves with feminism. Are they more “deserving” if you will of the title feminist?

Didn't we just talk about this?

So you really believe that if a person believes that a fetus is a person, and that it is wrong to kill a person, then they cannot be a feminist?

I wrote a response to last weeks post on my blog here. Feminism is not about reproductive rights. Femimism is about women's rights. If you believe that reproductive rights is one of those, okay. But I do not - not because I don't think women should have control over their own bodies, but that abortion is killing a person. For me it has little to do with the rights of women and lots to do with the rights of the innocent, unborn baby.

I know this will not be responded to well. And it does not help that I am a male. But I do fully call myself a feminist, and am also pro-life. And I do not see the inconsistency.

I normally post on bush vs. choice, but I thought I would check this site out as well, I thought it could be interesting :) Anyway, this may get sort of long and rambling, so forgive me if I start getting long winded.
I grew up in an anti-abortion household and have always considered myself to be pro-life, but I will get into that in a minute. Yet, in ALL other areas I am what the right would call a radical feminist... I believe women have a right to have sex with whoever they want, whenever they want. I believe very strongly in birth control (and have used it myself for years), comprehensive sex education, emergency contraception access on demand and mandated offering to rape victims. I believe in a woman's right to work and receive equal pay, same-sex marriage (even though i am a Christian, I realize that my religion does not give me the right to force my beliefs down anyone else's throat), the list goes on and on. I myself am a working mother (my father is disgusted by this) married to a man who respects me as his equal, helps with housework, cooking and even (shock, gasp) childcare. I enjoy the fact that I am able to have a career and a family, etc... I am also a college educated woman who believes strongly in education for women. All the same stuff as many feminists I have talked to.
My abortion stance, however, has evolved a lot in the last year and even more in the last two months. Two years ago I would have been very happy to see Roe vs Wade overturned... today I am not so sure. I have always and will always believe that abortion ends a human life and I have always believed the ending of human life to be wrong. (Yes, I am also against the death penalty) However, I have come to realize over the last few months that abortion is not the problem, it is merely a symptom. We have a country that criticizes women from using birth control and actively tries to prevent it in many cases, and yet we wonder why women have abortions. The social assisstance in this country for women who attempt to keep and parent their children is beyond pathetic. The atmosphere in this country is not one that respects women or their children and yet we criticize women for having abortions. There is something seriously wrong with this. For me, the answer is no longer over turning Roe vs. Wade, because I seriously doubt it would make one iota of difference in the abortion rates in this country. Women who want an abortion will have one regardless of it's legality. I think the answer lies in prevention, first and foremost. Almost half of women who have abortions weren't using birth control when they got pregnant. Why? Well, maybe cause it's so freaking expensive, for one. Maybe they are having trouble gaining access to it. Whatever the reason, we need to expand birth control so that it is available to every woman and teenager in the US. We need comprehensive sex education, that actually teaches our teens how to prevent pregnancy and STI's, not just that premarital sex=bad. We need over the counter access to emergency contraception, so that you can have it on hand if the condom breaks or you simply forget birth control on the heat of the moment. Secondly, we need to improve choices for women in general. I read a statistic that said something like 8 out of 10 women who had an abortion would not have if they had support for their decision or help in keeping their child. The choice between having an abortion or having to drop out of school and get a minimum wage job so you and your child can live in poverty is not a real choice... it's bullshit. Expanding WIC, medicaid and housing assisstance would help a lot of women. The program that FFL has started to ensure college age moms the right to finish their education is another good start. I think these are things that all women can agree on, regardless of their stance on abortion. I don't even know what to call myself on the issue of abortion... if I don't want Roe vs. Wade overturned, I guess the pro-life people would call me a traitor... but I hardly see my view on abortion being a horrible thing to be avoided at all costs being accepted by the pro-choice movement. All in all, I don't know what you guys would consider me, but I think I am a feminist and I am proud of it!

Let's see, if I were a deontologist, and believed that the rock bottom of morality is respecting critical rights, including the right to life, I would believe something very many people who share my leftist inclinations claim to believe. I do not see why it would be inconceivable that I might further believe conception is the point at which rights begin (I really don't understand how deontologists decide who is supposed to have rights, and which rights they have; that's why I'm a consequentialist. But they apparently have some way of making such decisions. It all seems rather arbitrary to me). I don't see that either of those views are incompatible with feminism. Admittedly, they also don't yet add up to a pro-life position, as Thomson's brilliant essays in the 70s make clear, but anyone who believes those two things is going to be extremely uncomfortable with abortion, and I'm not convinced they'd have to be anti-woman to disagree with Thomson's conclusions about how to weigh the respective rights involved. Now, you might say that when they are combined in such a way as to yeild a pro-life stance, then things have gone beyond what feminism can accept, but depending on how one conceives the right to life, it seems one could potentially give quite a lot of weight to the pregnant woman's rights and still consider them to not be overriding.

Still, it is possible that I'm being too generous here. As I say, I find the lines these deontologists draw crazily arbitrary, and certainly the drawing of crazy arbitrary lines is a place where biases can easily have serious distorting effects. Perhaps the reasonable default assumption should be that such biases are at work in pro-life deontologists.

I actually disagree on this one. I think that "refuse to choose" means "refuse to settle": that is, from their point of view, refuse to make the false choice between, say, family and career. While I think that ultimately their presumed agenda--to create a world in which no one would want or need an abortion--is impossible and false, I also think that they are a refreshing feminist organization in the sense that they are using the anti-abortion impetus to push exactly what so many of us have been saying for years: if you don't like abortions, work to improve conditions for women and children. I think that their not taking a stand on Roe v. Wade is probably a sincerely felt position: given that we live in a world where childbearing is a distinct disadvantage, opposing Roe v. Wade--even if you do not like abortion--is unconscionable.

I was a lot more wigged out by the WaPo including "Concerned Women for America" as a feminist organization, since the CWA is explicitly anti-feminist (as the quotations the WaPo cited demonstrated).

It seems to me that FFL will not take a position on many women's issues unless it relates to reproduction so I find their narrow focus not very feminist. Their goal seems to be limited to getting women to have babies. Their refusal to advocate birth control is telling in that regard. Seems more focused on the fetus than on advocating for women.

I agree with Dr. B. They couldn’t find another conservative feminist organization that CWA to use as a comparison? Lazy research by the tribune. And why is FFL depicted as the “moderate” position? They hardly seem to me to represent the middle road between conservative and radical. If one can even call the FMF radical.

There may be a lot more women than we realize who believe strongly in feminist principles, but oppose abortion. When we come to sites like this, we come to get useful feminist information on a lot of topics, not to start arguments about abortion. Perhaps that's why we're not as visible as anti-feminist pro-lifers.

If I may say so though, it does get on my nerves when people make sweeping statements saying that all pro-lifers "think that women should have no other role except to be sperm repositories" or "care MORE about the fetus than about the woman who's carrying it" (if I opposed abortions that are necessary for medical reasons, THEN I would be caring more about the fetus than the mother).

Just like it is unfair when people try to paint all pro-choicers as bloodthirsty profiteers, it is unfair to say that anyone who believes that life begins at conception is trying to punish women for having sex.

Concerning Feminists for Life, I suspect that they will never take any position on any issue that might be unpalatable to Catholics. The issues that I am aware of where they have been vocal are abortion, pregnancy rights and mothers' rights, and violence/exploitation issues.

Ann wrote: -

"Is there such thing as an anti-choice feminist? Not by my definition of feminism."
and
"..I don't object to anti-choicers like Feminists for Life calling themselves feminists,.."

Did you mean to write 'do' instead of 'don't' there?

No. I just meant that, while I wouldn't consider them feminists, anyone who is not pro-choice is free to self-identify as a feminist. It's just that I, personally, see that as an inconsistency.

I'm sick of ceding ground on the choice issue. The article seemed to place FFL in the middle of the road (feminism-wise), and I have a problem with any anti-choice group being portrayed as "moderate" feminists. FFA does take feminist positions on some issues. But reproductive choice is not one of them.

However, I think many of us can agree that the scariest thing about the article was seeing Concerned Women for America under a headline about feminism's "big tent." Shudder.

I think many of us can agree that the scariest thing about the article was seeing Concerned Women for America under a headline about feminism's "big tent."

Yeah, that was weird. Maybe the reporter considers any group that's run by women to be feminist.

I am totally pro-choice, but otherwise I agree with jmcchesney. Comprehensive sexual education and access to birth control is the only way to reduce unwanted pregnancies. America has one of the highest abortion rates of industrialized countries, is it really that hard to figure out? Abstinence only my ass!