The Gift of Choice

I am not posting this graphic to be controversial but it may inevitably be so. What comes to mind most about this image is that there is a growing generation of young women who will NOT understand its meaning. They have not grown up in a world where the choice for abortion was NOT a reality. They have not grown up with pregnancy termination being illegal. They have grown up with an assumed cushion that many can't even acknowledge.

It does not matter whether or not one agrees with abortion. It does not matter if one would make that choice. What matters is that the option exists, freely, to be exercised. And this option creates a world of sexual freedom, physical control and personal choice that women did not always possess. What a world that would be.

The choice to terminate pregnancy is now available to Canadian women in almost all provinces (PEI excepted) through provincial health care in hospitals or hospital-based clinics. And many major cities in Canada also have private abortion clinics that charge for the practise. These facilities are the direct result of the efforts of Dr. Henry Morgantaler who established the first clinic in Canada and continued to perform "illegal" abortions until all remaining legal restrictions against abortion were abolished. (It is important to note that Morgentaler's delivery was not pristine. And the practise has improved beyond the black-market operations and medical impropriety for which he was charged in the 1970s.)

The legal status of abortion changed in 1988(!!) due to a case involving Dr. Henry Morgentaler. Prior to that date (for about 20 years), a safe, hospital-based abortion could only be granted if a hospital therapeutic committeed determined the pregnancy a danger to a woman's health. This process was deemed constutionally unfair in the Morgentaler case and the last hurdle to a woman's right to choose was removed.

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the important ruling. As such, a group of pro-choice groups in Canada mounted a campaign to have Henry Morgentaler invested into the Order of Canada. (It is the third such attempt to have the doctor honoured.) The Order of Canada is given to recognize a "...lifetime of outstanding achievement, dedication to the community and service to the nation. The Order recognizes people in all sectors of Canadian society. Their contributions are varied, yet they have all enriched the lives of others and made a difference to this country."

This week the Globe & Mail posted a poll asking if Morgentaler should be nominated. The results were overwhelmingly in the negative (85%). You can see the results here.

As of today, it appears that the advocacy for Morgentaler has fallen on deaf ears as his name was not amongst those to be recognized this year. It is time to really think about how we perceive people's achievements and what their actions truly do for our nation as a whole. As women move forward in their lives let them continue to live in a free space of personal life choices and the challenges that such a choice must surely bring to the individual. Let us not move backward into a world that regulates one gender because of a biological mechanism beyond its control. And let us recognize the contribution of the man who fought for the right to choose a safe choice.