One of the great (ironic) truisms of human nature is the tendency of our species to condemn others for doing the same things we (guiltily) enjoy ourselves. The
first blog entry I ever posted, more than five years ago, was a (poorly-written) piece offering the opinion that what we dislike most about others is something we see in ourselves. Humans generally maintain an internal narrative, in which we are the heroes/heroines of our own story. Hardly anyone believes they are a bad person, and that what they're doing is wrong; we always find ways to justify it in our case, with special circumstances, or higher understandings that we apply to others grudingly, if at all.
A more than perfect example of this can be found in an amusingly-depressing essay I read this morning. It's about abortion rights and protestors, and includes numerous anecdotes of anti-abortion women getting their own abortions, while continuing to rail against the "baby killers" who perform and receive abortions.
A quote:
"I've had several cases over the years in which the anti-abortion patient had rationalized in one way or another that her case was the only exception, but the one that really made an impression was the college senior who was the president of her campus Right-to-Life organization, meaning that she had worked very hard in that organization for several years. As I was completing her procedure, I asked what she planned to do about her high office in the RTL organization. Her response was a wide-eyed, 'You're not going to tell them, are you!?' When assured that I was not, she breathed a sigh of relief, explaining how important that position was to her and how she wouldn't want this to interfere with it." (Physician, Texas)
"In 1990, in the Boston area, Operation Rescue and other groups were regularly blockading the clinics, and many of us went every Saturday morning for months to help women and staff get in. As a result, we knew many of the 'antis' by face. One morning, a woman who had been a regular 'sidewalk counselor' went into the clinic with a young woman who looked like she was 16-17, and obviously her daughter. When the mother came out about an hour later, I had to go up and ask her if her daughter's situation had caused her to change her mind. 'I don't expect you to understand my daughter's situation!' she angrily replied. The following Saturday, she was back, pleading with women entering the clinic not to 'murder their babies.'" (Clinic escort, Massachusetts)
I don't think this is really all that surprising. As I said in the intro, the things we hate most in society are usually things we hate about ourselves -- who hates cigarettes more than a smoker, or booze more than a suffering drunk? Furthermore, people who are virulently anti-abortion are generally buy into the whole pro-abstinence fairy tale too, and therefore are less likely to use birth control. It's a well-known factoid that Catholics have far more abortions than Protestants.
It does make me wish that doctors didn't have to adhere to ethical principles about anonymity, and amazes me with the level of cognitive dissonance humans can internalize while continuing to function. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to return to my crusade to ban the written word and computer games. There really are
no greater evils in our society.
Labels: abortion, psychology
