Abortion advocates court men's voices

NEW YORK >> If Donovan Atterberry thought about abortion at all as a young man, it was perhaps with some vague discomfort, or a memory of the anti-abortion protesters outside the clinic that he would pass on his way to the park as a child.

It became real to him in 2013, when his girlfriend, now his wife, became pregnant with their first child together. She'd had a healthy pregnancy before, his stepdaughter, but this time genetic testing found a lethal chromosomal disorder in the developing fetus, one that would likely result in a stillbirth and possibly put her life at risk during a delivery.

“As a man, I didn't know how to console her, how to advise her,” Atterberry, now 32, recalls. “I said, `If I had to choose, I would choose you.' ... It wasn't a matter of do I believe in abortion or I don't believe in abortion. At that point, I was thinking about her life.”

She chose to terminate the pregnancy and “it changed my whole perspective ... on bodily autonomy and things of that nature,” said Atterberry.

So much so, that he now works as a voting engagement organizer for New Voices for Reproductive Justice, which focuses on the health of Black women and girls, with abortion access among the areas of concern.

“What I'm trying to convey is that it's a human right for someone to have a choice,” he said.

That Atterberry is a man in support of abortion rights isn't unusual; according to polls, a majority of American men say they support some level of access to abortion.

Still, there is room for a lot more who are willing to speak out and be active in the political battles over abortion availability, Atterberry says.

Where men have always played an outsize role is in pushing for and enacting abortion restrictions.

Women have always taken the lead in the fight to preserve abortion rights, for obvious reasons: They are the ones who give birth and who, in so many instances, are tasked with caring for children once they are brought into the world.

No one is calling for that leadership to change, said David Cohen, a law professor at Drexel University who specializes in law and gender.

“Men should not be out there trying to run the movement or take away leadership positions,” he said. “But being a part of it, supporting, listening and being active are all things that men can and should be doing.”