In the United States of America (Amerika), there exists a movement of so-called “Pro-Life” advocates. These advocates state that a child's life begins at the point of conception and that Abortion should be illegal on the grounds of Abortion being an act of Murder. The notion of life beginning at conception is nothing new, as the Vatican (The Catholic Church) has adopted this as its official stance since at least verifiably the 19ᵗʰ Century, and a similar but less restrictive “ensoulment” since the 5ᵗʰ century. You see, this movement has no root in this belief; The opposition to abortion came first, followed by the conception theory. So what then, if not rooted in conception theory, are the actual, possibly more sinister, grounds for the opposition to this medical practice?
There exist two popular models for the analysis of politics. First, there is critical theory, a form typically based on the immediate identity of individuals and groups. This Is often better known as “Identity Politics” as is the preferred method of analysis of liberals of all stripes. The Second is Class theory, which bases its analysis on Class conflict.
The Particular line of analysis here will be based on Gender, Particularly the role of Patriarchy. Patriarchy, or Masculonormativity for a less catchy title, places Men as the Dominant Class in Society. The Identity theory on this suggests that an objection to abortion is derived from an urge to prevent women from having autonomy.
There are some things to support this. Abortion was legal in most areas for the longest time. A woman seeking an abortion would often go to a female physician, as women would understand women better than men (not complicated to put together). After a point, a woman could become a competent physician. Men, who had no interest in being bested by women, outlawed their most common practice. Additionally, the Vatican conveniently adopted its “Life begins at conception” line shortly after many of the laws went into effect. Additionally, white supremacists proclaimed that the ‘Coloreds’ was going to go and out-reproduce white people (great replacement conspiracy theory is nothing new) and elected to ban abortion under the guise of getting white women to rear more children.
This is similar to the invention of gender-segregated sports. In days gone by, women and men were in the same team. However, beyond a point, some women began outperforming their male counterparts. The sports were then segregated, and women’s teams consistently were less funded than their counterparts, and as it is with other things, the less funded groups fell behind, and in a cycle of defunding that continues to self-justify.
In short, anti-abortion laws seek to uphold patriarchy, keep women subordinate, and uphold white supremacy(Because white supremacy is seemingly inescapable).
The version of this proposed by German Philosopher Karl Marx analyses is based on Capitalism, described as having two distinct classes. First, there is the proletariat, who sells their labour power (and thus their output) to a capitalist in exchange for a wage. The Capitalist buys labour in a deal for the proletariat’s output. The proletariat has the incentive to get as much from as little labour power as possible, whereas the Capitalist has the incentive to payout as little as possible for as much labour power as possible. This drives the class conflict that occurs in Society.
For the purpose of this analysis, we will be analyzing the concept of the “Surplus army of labour”. The Surplus army of labour, as explained by Albert Einstien in his article “Why Socialism?” where he states “There is no provision that all those able and willing to work will always be in a position to find employment; an "army of unemployed" almost always exists. The worker is constantly in fear of losing his job”. The Capitalist is understood to benefit from unemployment. If there is always a more hungry, more desperate worker than the one he has now, the capitalist will use this to stomp down on any attempts by his workers to improve their condition. The analysis here states that if there is no means by which to opt out of pregnancy, more people will be born than are sought, thus bolstering the Surplus Army of Labour (SAL). This notion is, in part, bolstered in its immediate credibility by the fact that these people oppose a comprehensive education about safe sexual practice, as well as opposition to access to protection. These things, in general, tend to reduce abortion more effectively than an outright ban. However, banning abortion does induce a jump in the birth rate. This suggests an interest in increasing the SAL, corroborated by the recent relegalisation of child labour in certain states where abortion bans are also coming into effect. This suggests, according to this line of analysis, that the current labour force is maximally exploited, and they seek to expand the reserve army of labour to continue holding the worker down
In short, class theory states that the banning of abortion is used to expand the army of unemployed, and thus hold the worker down.
In shorter, the call to ban abortion is either to hold specifically women down or to hold the working class down in general. The notion this movement is based on a concern about life is most likely, if not almost certainly, a pure façade.