Pro-Choicers, Please Kill This Meme

Last week, Donald Trump was asked about abortion and the right to privacy. Talking Points Memo tries to explain: 

In an interview with MSNBC's Savannah Guthrie, Trump was asked if he believes there's a right to privacy in the Constitution.

The question is an important one in the abortion debate. Pro-lifers say there absolutely is not a Constitutional right to privacy, which means Roe is a travesty and abortion should once again be permitted to be outlawed in the states that choose to do so. Pro-choicers strenuously disagree, stating that the right to privacy is guaranteed and is extended to a woman's choice to have an abortion or not, the central basis of Roe.

This is a classic example of a pro-choice blogger obfuscating the pro-life position in order to help his cause. Pro-lifers don't argue that there isn't a right to privacy (for example, there clearly is a right to privacy in the Fourth Amendment's prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures). They argue that the right to privacy doesn't include the right to an abortion.

Individual rights do not include the right to harm others. The right to religious freedom does not include the right to perform human sacrifices. The right to raise one's children as one sees fit does not include the right to sexually abuse them. Abortion is not just about the rights of the mother. It's about the rights of the mother and the fetus. The issue with abortion is: Does the mother's rights trump the fetus's right to live?

Pro-choicers don't want to discuss fetal rights. They wish to limit the argument to the mother's rights. Hence, they constantly misframe the issue, ignore that they are limiting the rights of fetuses, and pretend the argument is about something else.

Anyhow, one can believe in a right to privacy and be opposed to abortion rights. There isn't a contradiction if you believe that the fetus has rights too. If you don't think the fetus has rights, it's much easier to view abortion as permissible. Guthrie's question is a complete obfuscation of the issue (my belief in a right to privacy doesn't include a parental right to rape their children). I don't understand why pro-choicers think this is a great "gotcha" question. This isn't the first time I've seen it asked, and it's so easy to refute, I don't understand why this meme hasn't died yet.