The Saint Louis University Students for Life need to rethink its
sales pitch.

The group’s new flier hanging on bulletin boards around school
reads, in big letters, “Pro-Life!” under which is written, in no
larger than 14-point font (which may suggest its creators
understand they shouldn’t be saying it), “What else is there to
say?”

Well, ahem, there are a few other things to say.

When dealing with a subject like abortion, which has been so
manipulated by the left and the right for various economic,
political and, sometimes, moral reasons, I would think the Students
for Life would want to do everything it could not to simplify the
matter with exclusive, black-and-white language.

Of course there’s nothing really wrong with that method of
rousing support. SLU’s Amnesty International, of which I am a
member, does the same thing as well when petitioning to commute
death sentences.

“Would you like to save a life today?” we ask, as if people who
support capital punishment wouldn’t save a small child drowning in
a lake.

But it has been my experience with the pro-life movement that
the tagline is usually where the similarities end.

When passersbys of the Amnesty table respond to our question, we
present them with our group’s literature, researched and compiled
by internationally-accredited investigative teams who function with
one objective: ending human rights abuses, according to the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

We present objective research because we want people to make
their own decisions.

The most dangerous thing anyone could ever say on any issue is,
“There’s nothing more to say,” which is the implication of the
Students for Life flier. First, it emphasizes division, but second,
it says, “We’re right, you’re wrong, and that’s it.”

Now I would hope college students aren’t cowed into the pro-life
movement by this sly little jab–but younger people are much more
susceptible.

I should know–I’m one of them.

The January of my senior year in high school I found myself in
Washington, D.C., protesting at the Supreme Court. I was there
because I thought abortion was murder and that was that.

During my short stint with my school’s anti-abortion group (and
in Washington) there was no talk of socioeconomics, no talk of
education factors and certainly no talk about why abortion still
existed.

The pro-life movement hooks in people when they’re young with
very simple moral reasoning that has become the societal norm, even
though it sometimes flies in the face of the situation on the
ground.

It takes the perspective of one, narrow group of people–the
educated. Ironically, that is the group that has to deal least
often with the problems of sexual assault, deficient sexual
education and neglect for mothers and children in the United
States.

For starters, rape is trivialized in this country. Only 16
percent of rapes are reported. Only half of those result in an
arrest and three percent of those arrests lead to a conviction.

Not only do statistics on sexual assaults in the United States
omit more than 80 percent of rape cases, but they also neglect
things like marital rape, which is still legal in a number of
states–and goes easily unreported even where legal.

When you ask yourself, “What else is there to say?” about
abortion, don’t think of yourself, a college student in charge of
your body and what happens to it. Instead, think of women who have
lost their control.

What about a woman who is married to her rapist? She and her
children are dependent (partially, if not entirely) on this man for
financial support. He certainly feels no incentive to practice safe
sex. What will this woman do? Sue her husband?

Not all women are so helpless, but it is those who are more
helpless who would be hurt the most by the abolition of the legal
choice to have an abortion.

The old Puritan fear that reinforces the sexual double standard
in our country–which will place blame for what is seen as deviant
behavior on a woman ten times before placing it on a
man–perpetuates the notion that men are not responsible for acting
on their sexual desire.

U.S. patriarchy bolsters the situation, suppressing voices that
defend women’s rights. If you don’t believe me, take the case of
rape again. In the case of women who are raped, it is often of no
interest to men. In the case of men who are raped, it is swept
under the rug because the notion of a male rape victim contradicts
the image of the strong, heterosexual man.

Is it no surprise that rape is the least-reported crime in
America? These issues simply mean next to nothing in our
male-dominated society. And so, too, the issue of abortion rights
and women’s health care when confronting dominantly conservative
movements, like the pro-life cause.

There are legitimate medical and ethical cautions against
abortion, as well as for it. The last thing we should do, though,
is take away the last legal marker that says women’s rights do
matter, that the government will not sweep them under the rug.
Ideally, it would exist always as a choice, yet seldom be
exercised.

We must remember, though, that there’s always another voice, and
there’s always more to say.

Andrew Ivers is a sophomore studying English and political
science.