Change the Conversation

Who wants to talk about abortion?  Pro-lifers don’t — not the way the Democrats, and especially the Harris campaign in the 2024 elections, wanted to talk about abortion.  Sometimes, it seemed, they talked about nothing but — and much of the media followed their lead.  (Trump and the GOP, on a national level anyway, would have preferred not to discuss it at all.)

This isn’t the conversation pro-lifers want to have, one that’s centered on and often exclusively about “reproductive rights”, “my body, my choice”, “abortion is healthcare”, “threats to women”, and such, when the defenders of the unborn want to talk about life and personhood.  It’s nothing new, of course — this is the way the coverage of and conversation about this issue have been for a very long time, and not even the amazing advances in embryology and sonography in recent decades have managed to change the focus.  There is no incentive for pro-abortion voices or forces to discuss the reality and rights of the child in the womb, not only because it works against them but also because it is eminently uncomfortable.  They are not alone in their discomfort, though, as the in-between and undecided would also prefer not to think about what actually happens to whom in abortion, especially if anyone close to them has ever had one.

It doesn’t have to be this way.  The results of the 2024 elections have presented pro-lifers with an opportunity, if they’ll take it, to change the conversation.

A change from “This is only about women’s freedom of choice!” to “The issue here is the victim — the human being with every right to life and inestimable value!” is important and necessary.  People — voters, especially, but also parents, teachers, friends, and even “influencers” — should be hearing about and talking about the lives and rights of the vulnerable and voiceless, rather than only the rights and desires of the strong and strident.

Many pro-lifers think or act as though they are part of a silent majority and the only obstacles to their success are the political power and ploys of the pro-abortion opposition.  Recent election results — especially with many of the post-Dobbs state constitutional amendments — have demonstrated that this simply is not true.  To change into a majority pro-lifers will need to change minds, and to change minds they will need to reach minds, and to reach minds they will need to get their message through and drive public engagement with it.

The pro-life political and legislative labors of the past decades, which resulted in the Dobbs decision at the Supreme Court and abortion bans or restrictions in various states, have all been good and necessary — and are by no means over.  But an emphasis on those efforts allowed a loss of focus on a more important front:  the battle for the minds and hearts of the undecided and uninterested.  

Clear communications with that group in the middle between pro-life and pro-abortion is necessary, not only because it is large and typically decisive when it comes to the ballot box, but especially to get them to see the life, safety, and rights of the unborn as an issue they should care about.  Even to get “I don’t particularly care one way or the other” citizens to understand exactly why pro-lifers care so much would be significant progress.  (This is particularly important for Christians, for whom the current conversation about abortion often presents an obstacle to sharing the gospel; presenting a clear and positive argument for life, based in love and respect, is much better than being on the defensive against accusations of uncaring opposition to women’s rights and freedoms.). A national conversation about life and personhood would be good in and of itself, but state legislative and judicial efforts to protect the smallest of humans would certainly also benefit from such a change.

Our current political moment presents both opportunity and challenge.  After many years in which pro-lifers could count on the Republican Party to at least give lip service to their values and aspirations, such language and goals were removed from its platform in 2024.  Donald Trump was happy to accept the support of pro-lifers in his run for the presidency, but offered no promises or assurances that his second term would be a pro-life one, let alone make their priorities his priority.  Some have argued that we now have two parties in the United States that favor abortion, it’s just that one of them (the GOP) is OK with restricting it somewhat and the other wants no restrictions — and there is little evidence to refute such an argument.

Pro-lifers, however, by and large gave their support to the Trump campaign, often enthusiastically.  This seems to have been based mainly on the hope that the future administration would act like the past one.   The nomination of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. to head Health and Human Services showed that hope to be unfounded.  The disappointment of having someone whose record clearly shows he is no friend to the pro-life cause is aggravated by the lost opportunity this represents:  There is likely no position in the Cabinet that could be used more effectively to change the national conversation from abortion rights to human life than HHS.  As NR’s Ramesh Ponnuru has argued, pro-lifers should reject RFK, Jr.’s nomination; insisting that Donald Trump reward their support with an HHS secretary who would work and speak for the health and humanity of the unborn would show that they shouldn’t be taken for granted and that they are serious about their values.

It might, of course, feel like betrayal for pro-life forces which backed him in the election to refuse to go along with all the president-elect’s decisions, to withdraw support more generally, or to cut ties and simply act independently of the administration — and Trump would likely characterize those actions as such.  There are higher principles and more important values involved, however, and they trump any bad feelings or recriminations that might result.

Taking such a tack would also be politically smart.  As long as pro-lifers rely on Trump and his representatives to speak for them, the conversation will not be changed.  But there are Republican members of the House and Senate, and some appointees to the incoming administration, whose pro-life credentials are not in doubt.  The majorities that the GOP recently gained mean that those men and women are in a position to speak and speak with a voice that will be heard — to frame the discussion about abortion differently and to regularly get “The issue here is the human being with every right to life and inestimable value!” into the news cycle.  Even if their party and president (who will not be running for re-election) are on a different page, they can change the conversation.

In fact, putting some distance between the character of Donald Trump and their values and arguments will be helpful.  To get the people who aren’t already on the side of life to listen, pro-lifers need their trust, and that is built not just by communicating clearly who they are (and aren’t) and what they stand for (and don’t) but also that they have listened and will continue to listen to them.  The message the pro-abortion side has been emphasizing for a very long time is that pro-lifers can’t be given a hearing, let alone power, because they can’t be trusted to treat you and the women you love with respect, humanity, or compassion.  Lecturing less and listening more, then, will enable the arguments for the primacy of life to be received more as an apt and expert answer to the questions and concerns of the unconvinced and less as a platitude that has no relation to their desires, needs, and interests.

There is practical and political value as well in vulnerability.  The humility of saying things like, “Yeah, we were mistaken to align ourselves so much with a man like Donald Trump” or “We lost sight of our values” could go a long way toward establishing trust.  Sure, critics will pounce on such admissions, but they would do that regardless; reachable people might very well respect it.

Changing the conversation will enable pro-lifers to communicate their true agenda, which is not about political power or self-aggrandizement.  Speaking “out of turn” will actually put the positions of elected and appointed leaders in the government at some risk, which will demonstrate that something more important is driving them: a purpose and passion which is all about what’s best for others — unborn children first of all, but really all of society, and even mothers who see being pregnant as a problem. 

Would a renewed push for a “Human Life Amendment” to the Constitution (or a similar effort) help change the conversation?  Probably not at this time, without the majorities needed to do it, because it would once again put the focus on political organization and machinations — “How do we get this thing passed?” — instead of where it needs to be to reach hearts and minds.  A better approach would be to emphasize that such an amendment should not be necessary: a moral society will not countenance the killing of defenseless children, the pro-life principles of common law and history are clear, and science unmistakably testifies that what is growing in a mother’s womb is a unique and fully human child.

Making these arguments and changing the conversation will also help stem the tide against euthanasia and assisted suicide, because the same respect for life that protects the vulnerable before birth protects the vulnerable who have already been born.  Even aberrations like the movements for animal and nature rights are stymied when society comes to recognize the unique value of human life and its rights in comparison to the rest of creation.

Up to this time, the pro-abortion side has controlled the American conversation, not just in politics and the media, but in the culture more generally.  They have linked abortion not just with women’s rights but also with sex, so that its opponents (especially conservative Christians) are painted as prudish and puritanical, making a bold witness for life seem ever more unwelcome and costly.

Yet if pro-life leaders in government speak up forcefully and consistently, backed by pro-life groups and voters, those who argue for abortion will be forced to respond — to make the uncomfortable case that the unique and growing being in a mother’s womb is not human life that has human rights, or that the baby’s rights just aren’t equal or important because other people and their rights are “more equal” or more important.  Americans with consciences, compassion, and an understanding of the rights on which this nation was founded will recognize the irrationality and immorality of such arguments.  The argument for life is not just better, it is right, and it needs to be heard and engaged with.  

Change the conversation.