Regan King comments on the racist nature of abortion.
Our four-part ‘Abortion Discriminates’ series was originally published in 2017 to address the often overlooked reality that abortion, at its core, is a discriminatory action. Over the next four weeks, we’ll be reposting these articles as part of our ‘More than a Number’ campaign, showing how abortion intentionally discriminates on the basis of race, sex and disability. You can follow more of our campaign on our Facebook, Twitter and Instagram channels.
Black lives matter
News of racial tensions in the United States have often featured the phrase ‘Black lives matter’. Whether people choose to align themselves with the activist group of the same name or not, only the most racially discriminatory person would disagree with the statement itself. Of course black lives matter. Black lives matter and should be treated as though they matter just as much as the lives of any other human being made in God’s image. To be pro-life is to be anti-racism and is to acknowledge that every life is important regardless of ability, ethnicity, or sex.
Recently Benjamin Watson, a black player in the NFL, caused a small stir through an interview in which he highlighted the American abortion provider, Planned Parenthood’s racist roots. Watson said:
“I do know that blacks kind of represent a large portion of the abortions, and I do know that honestly the whole idea with Planned Parenthood and Sanger in the past was to exterminate blacks, and it’s kind of ironic that it’s working. We (as minorities) support candidates, and overwhelmingly support the idea of having Planned Parenthood and the like, and yet, that is why she created it. We are buying it hook, line, and sinker, like it’s a great thing. It’s just amazing to me and abortion saddens me period, but it seems to be something that is really pushed on minorities and provided to minorities especially as something that they should do. In the public, it seems to be painted that when minorities get pregnant they need to get abortions, especially when it comes to teen pregnancy… We sit here and talk about advancing the black agenda, whatever that means, we talk about our interests, and what’s important to us – like having political power and advancement and all those things – and then we are turning around and we are killing our children. And we are buying the lie that it’s our personal decision to make…”
In condemning recent race riots in the USA and commending President Trump’s call for an end to the violence, Alveda King, niece of the assassinated Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, also said:
“As one of God’s microphones, I’m often required to say what people don’t want to hear. Abortion is racism, in that abortion takes away the civil rights and lives of our weakest and most vulnerable members of the human race, unborn babies.”
Elsewhere King quotes her uncle as having asserted:
“The Negro cannot win as long as he is willing to sacrifice the lives of his children for comfort and safety.” How can the ‘Dream’ survive if we murder the children? Every aborted baby is like a slave in the womb of his or her mother. The mother decides his or her fate.”
A recent study highlighted that in the USA, abortion is the leading cause of death in African-American and Hispanic populations (though there has been refusal to report this reality by scientists), this being coupled with the reality that the majority of abortion clinics are located in our near minority communities. This should come as no real surprise. Abortion rights pioneer, Margaret Sanger rooted her activism in racist eugenics and explicitly stated her desire to see the extermination of the Black population.
Stepping across the Atlantic to our own context in the UK, British Nigerian Obianuju Ekeocha has accused Western governments of cultural supremacy in trying to impose abortion on African nations. Saying that abortion “is against the will of the people”, and that “polls show overwhelmingly that Africans hate abortion, abhor abortion”, Ekeocha said of Western governments, particularly the UK, “By ignoring the will of the people, this is spitting in the face of the very type of democracy we are supposed to have in African countries.” She was similarly outspoken in recently challenging a BBC reporter who implied that access to abortifacient and proven dangerous forms of contraception were a human right important for Africa’s prospering.
Cultural supremacy through promoting abortion abroad is only one charge that can be substantively levied against many in British government and pro-abortion advocates. True, abortion in Britain does not appear to have the same racism-rooted eugenics background as the abortion movement in the USA. That said, statistics paint a bleak picture of racial disparity in abortion provisions across the UK. Miriam Animashaun notes:
“…racial disparity is largely missing from the debate. The uptake of abortions occur disproportionately within the black British community within the UK. In fact, according to 2013 figures from the department of health, black woman account for 9% of abortions – despite only being 3.3% of the female population. This is shockingly three times the rate of white women who account for 86% of women but only account for 76% of those who perform abortions. 49% of the women who have had two or more abortions are black compared to 36% of white woman. This should be cause not just for concern, but an active effort to reverse this trend, which will result in purposely attempting to bring down the abortion rate. The discrepancy in the participation of abortions between different races is reflective of the broader inequities black people face in every arena. If white privilege is a real thing, then it is having an effect on abortions.”
It is inarguable that abortion is racially discriminatory. In modern western society, abortion is promoted to ethnic minorities as a poverty-relief mechanism; if you are not well off and pregnant abortion is something you should consider, lest the child be a burden on you and you on society. In developing countries, western governments seek to impose their humanistic morality by introducing abortion and abortifacient contraceptives as human rights that will also help reduce a nation’s dependence on Western aid and relief. The West’s condescension and presumption as to what the developing world most needs is bad enough, but to attempt to impose abortion as the mode of aid – at times illegally – is the height of depravity.
It is truly inconsistent to speak up against racism in other spheres of life, seeing it as a systemic problem, without recognising abortion as the biggest proof of systemic racism in Western society.
Yes. Black lives matter. That means that equal to other pre-born infants, pre-born black lives matter. It’s time that we wake up and be honest with ourselves and with society that abortion is evil and is a primary indicator of a subtle and systemic racism that must be destroyed.
