Bodies still the long game
husband’s funeral pyre. She was his! Ever see a man burnt with his dead wife? Never! Women have been conditioned into giving their bodies (even to dead men) and men to receiving. Today many still move to the Neanderthal impulses of the Torah. What would happen if a woman controls her body as a man controls his? Armageddon? Peace on Earth?
A Gallup poll says 48 per cent are pro-choice and 48 per cent are pro-life in America. The former aver that a woman should decide her reproductive matters, and the latter say abortion is murder. The State must affirm life begins when sperm meets egg; but most think the mother’s life is valuable. Half say, “Abortion should be legal in some circumstances,” and “slightly more say it is more morally wrong than morally acceptable”.
Americans with extreme views “come down on the side of abortion being legal under any circumstances (29 per cent) than being legal in all circumstances (18 per cent).” (Gallup, Jeffrey Jones, 11/06/ 2018) What do Jamaicans think? How much is pass-through from America, informed conviction or patriarchy?
Abortion is not about sperm, egg, foetus, unborn child, it is about the death rattle of patriarchy. If women control their wombs the Abrahamic paradigm shifts. Old truth dies; new truth is born; and women, men may freely grow in equity, respect and love.
Jamaica is not a player in most intellectual or ethical duels, and not on abortion. Our philosophers are pastiche, pedestrian; weak leaders, unproductive people; we cannot even protect our women, kids or feed ourselves, yet men rule. Can women do better? Let’s try!
Is what is right for America always right for us? Patriarchy may adopt new tactics. Abortion is the issue, but control of women’s bodies is still the long game. We must pick our fight. Stay conscious!
Franklin Johnston, D Phil (Oxon), is a strategist and project manager; Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport (UK); and lectures in logistics and supply chain management at Mona School of Business and Management, The University of the West Indies. Send comments to the Observer or franklinjohnstontoo@gmail.com.
Conflict on abortion is new as man’s rule on women’s reproduction was never disputed. Medics, priests, philosophers weigh in, but abortion is old hat for many reasons. Some nations saw daughters as detritus, despite modern living and science. My own church was founded by a King who wanted a son and had serial wives, miscarriages, and abortions until he got one. Today science enables what soothsayers could not