One of the most wounding accusations that abortion supporters like to throw at pro-lifers is that we don’t care about babies after they are born. This can range from fairly reasonable sounding questions about what we personally do to help disadvantaged children, to cries of "you’re not pro-life, just pro-birth!", "You only want to protect the unborn, and don't give a damn about those living and suffering", and, most disturbingly "foetus fetishist!".
Of course, there is legitimate debate to be had about what pro-lifers can do to make things better for mothers and babies, in addition to opposing abortion (although this can often descend into categorising a whole host of political and social opinions into the "pro-life" category, in a way that makes the term far too broad to be meaningful). However, when you’re facing people throwing the above terms about, that’s not the level the discussion is at.
Red herrings
Indeed, the accusations can be so ridiculous as to be laughable. Alyssa Milano (she of sex-strike fame) said that pro-lifers who would deny migrants asylum in the US are hypocrites because "Asylum seekers have heartbeats. So take your fake ‘pro-life’ hypocrisy and shove it where the sun don’t shine."
As commentators were quick to point out, unless she actually knows of pro-lifers who advocate killing asylum seekers with heartbeats, this is rather a red herring.
However, if you’re in a discussion with someone with slightly more sophisticated arguments than Ms Milano, there are clear answers to the "pro-lifers don’t care about children after they’re born" slur. In fact, two very easy answers. A) it isn’t relevant to the abortion debate, and B) it isn’t true.
So what?
What the pro-life position boils down to is that unborn babies are human beings, and it is wrong to kill innocent human beings. Whether or not I care about born children, and what I personally do to help them, makes not the slightest difference to this moral argument. And actually, I think most people know this. In a debate, it might even be worth asking: "Ok, let’s suppose for a minute that I’ve adopted two children, fostered dozens more, run classes for disadvantaged kids, and help at a homeless shelter. Does that change your view that it’s a woman’s right to have an abortion?" 99% of the time, it won’t. It’s just a rhetorical trick, and people should be called out on it.
However, the key point does need to be emphasised. Whether or not I care about someone doesn’t give you the right to kill them. Perhaps there are some strange "pro-life" people out there who really only care about the unborn and couldn’t give a damn once they’re born. That makes no difference to whether it’s right to kill the unborn. It makes just as much sense to say "Unless you personally house every homeless person in the country you aren’t allowed to be against us killing homeless people in the streets."
"I'll wait"
The second point about the "you’re just pro-birth" argument is that it just isn’t true. In fact, it’s so blatantly not true that it’s hard to know how anyone can seriously make such an argument. This was gloriously illustrated last month when a Jerusalem-based author tweeted sarcastically: "Dear Pro-Life friends: what have you *personally* done to support lower income single mothers? I’ll wait." She clearly wasn’t expecting the question to be answered, but by the next day more than 13,000 Twitter users had chimed in giving stories of adopting, fostering, donating money, running organisations to help teen mothers, and much more. One said: "Housed and fed over 450 pregnant and parenting young moms who were homeless or in danger of becoming homeless as a result of their pregnancy. How about you?" Another replied: "I’ve adopted a special needs child, in the works to foster, give to crisis pregnancy centers, volunteer in community activities and care for women and families in my community." (If you want to be cheered up, have a look through the thread!)
Support through pregnancy and beyond
If you want to focus closer to home, organisations across the UK provide crisis pregnancy counselling, housing, and financial support to mothers in need. The Good Counsel Network, which is constantly vilified for supposedly "harassing" women outside abortion clinics, offers heroic support to mothers and their families, not just during pregnancy, but for as long as they need. One counsellor remembers a family being supported until the baby saved from abortion was 12 years old. Good Counsel’s website and the Be Here for Me Campaign showcase the stories of dozens of women who have been helped. Betty says: "The Good Counsel went well above my expectations. Not only did they give me a home to live in, but they also helped me apply for a UK visa. Now we have a home and a visa to stay in the country."
"My child got everything"
Another mother, from the Punjab, said: "So GCN provided me with a two bedroom house. They were paying all the rent and everything, and even they were paying for all the groceries as well and diapers and, you know, baby cots. My child got everything. I couldn’t even believe…I couldn’t afford those things and he got all the things from there. From birth to now. Whenever he needs like winter coat or anything. And I just want to add one more thing, because of my little one, my elder daughter is having a better life as well. Whenever I need something for her she gets it from them as well. No, even if I need something or my daughter, whoever in the family."
Who's priviliged?
Recently, Emily Milne of the Alliance of Pro-Life Students debated Anna Veglio-White of Sister Supporter on Sky News. Ms Veglio-White made the astonishing claim that pro-lifers can hold a pro-life opinion because they are "privileged". This was from the woman whose middle-class group of activists successfully lobbied to stop some of the most vulnerable women in Britain and their children being offered help by the Good Counsel Network.
So, next time someone accuses pro-lifers of not caring about born children, don’t be fazed. It isn’t true, and even if it was, does that give your accuser the right to kill babies or defend that?