Taking a moral position comes with a price. Or, more accurately, prices. The cost of holding a position and the cost of acting upon it are usually different prices. There is also the cost of professing a moral position because one might hold a moral view in secret or lie and profess a moral view that one rejects.
This assumes someone can hold a moral position while not acting upon it, which raises questions about what it is to hold a moral position. Intuitively, it does seem that people can do this. For example, a person might believe they should help others in need yet drive past someone in need because it is raining a bit too hard. It might be objected that a person who does not act upon a moral position does not hold that position, so the driver in question thinks they believe in this principle but are lying to themselves. But we could see morality as analogous to law: a law that is not enforced is still a law. Or maybe it isn’t really.
The price of holding a moral position usually varies between people. For example, the cost of holding and acting on a belief in free speech is usually low in the United States and higher in China. While the notion of cost in this context could be discussed at length, I now turn to discussing the cost of the anti-abortion position.
The cost of holding and acting upon an anti-abortion moral position obviously varies. In some cases, the cost could be very high. For example, imagine a young girl living in poverty impregnated by rape who is morally against abortion. For her, the cost of acting on her moral position will be very high. After all, the “pro-life” Republican party and the “pro-choice” Democratic party have done little to help single mothers. But, to be fair and balanced, Republicans are often actively hostile to helping mothers in need while Democrat tend to be merely indifferent.
In other cases, the cost could be absurdly low. For example, an elderly wealthy man who has no children could be anti-abortion at no meaningful cost to himself. But it must be said that the cost of a moral position can be inflicted on others. For example, an elderly wealthy man who is a politician could see to it that his view became law and thus his moral position would impose a high cost on women and girls while costing him nothing.
In the United States, most Americans have consistently supported legal abortion. But in the United States of Oligarchy and MAGA, the majority does not rule. As would be expected, while 55% of men claim abortion should be legal, 64% of women hold that view. As would also be expected, most of the politicians who are anti-abortion are men, although there are female politicians who also have that view. But women are still in the minority when it comes to holding office or being a national pundit.
It is also interesting, but hardly surprising, that those who take the anti-abortion view tend to be social conservatives or religious (or both). For people in these categories, the cost of their position varies.
For example, the Catholic Church takes a strong stance against abortion. However, the Catholic Church pays a tiny price for this position in that Catholic charities do provide aid and support to girls and women who seek help from them. As such, the church has been willing to bear at least a tiny fraction of the cost of holding and acting on their anti-abortion moral position. Obviously, the Catholic Church can still be criticized for its position.
Many of those who hold to the anti-abortion position are social conservatives. They also profess to be fiscal conservatives, at least when it comes to social programs aimed at helping those in poverty or need—such as infants, pregnant women and girls.
While some women can afford to have children without undue hardship, there are many women and girls who cannot. For example, girls in the lower economic classes will struggle with cost of pregnancy and raising a child. There is also the matter of the cost of an unwanted pregnancy in terms of a person’s life. For example, an unwanted pregnancy can put an end to hopes of an education or career. There is, of course, also the matter of pregnancy inflicted by rape and the potential costs to the victim. While even most conservatives will allow abortion in the case of rape an incest, not all will.
When the anti-abortion politicians prevent, cut or eliminate funding for programs aimed to help pregnant women and girls, this imposes the costs of the anti-abortion position of these politicians onto the women and girls. That is, the females are paying the price of the politician’s “moral” positions. I am, of course, being charitable here and assuming these politicians are anti-abortion as a moral position and not just anti-abortion because they are misogynists.
The anti-abortion view is generally cheap for conservative politicians. After all, they are unlikely to be in a situation in which they or someone they care about is experiencing an unwanted pregnancy and lacking financial support (or to be cynical, lacking access to abortion). As such, they can hold their view with little chance of having to pay a significant price. It is effectively a free moral stance for them. However, for the women and girls who experience an unwanted pregnancy and lack adequate means of support, the cost is high when the anti-abortion and anti-social support views became instantiated in law.
One interesting (and ironic) way to characterize the approach of conservatives who are anti-abortion and anti-social support is that they are engaging in ethical parasitism: they are holding to moral positions they expect others to pay for. A milder characterization is that they are living on ethical subsidies: the costs of their moral views are subsidized by those who pay the actual cost. Since I am opposed to such freeloading, I am morally opposed to these moral welfare kings (and queens) who are unwilling to pay for their own ethics.
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