My Male Friend Voted for Trump Because of Roe v. Wade
By: Jackie Gualtieri
Tags: Election 2020, Abortion, Roe V Wade, Feminism, Women

My Male Friend Voted for Trump Because of Roe v. Wade

After four years of my friend mocking Donald Trump and calling him an embarrassment to the Republican party, I started to notice a strange shift. Though I tried to stay off of social media throughout much of the election cycle, I found myself on Twitter a few days before the election. And I found on my feed several retweets from my friend, “calling out liberals” and, above all, condemning President-elect Joe Biden, then not yet President-elect. His new, constant hatred resulted from Biden saying that Roe v. Wade cannot be allowed to be overturned.

This was the same man who months prior was retweeting memes about the “orange man,” who shared the kind of cringey cartoons all my other Republican friends who disliked Trump shared. They were superficial and I don’t particularly like them. I have a lot of reasons to dislike Trump and his tanning habits definitely don’t top them.

And now I wonder if I should have read more into why he was so focused on appearing to be anti-Trump, because, maybe, he really didn’t dislike him that much after all.

I was raised at the same church as this man.

Growing up, I was forced to attend Confraternity of Christian Doctrine (CCD) classes. I greatly disliked it and often asked my parents if I could just stop. I ended up stopping just a few weeks shy of confirmation after my mom saw me being bullied in the parking lot while I was waiting to get picked up.

My friend didn’t have the same experience I had, and was raised very, very Catholic. So it was never much of a surprise to me when he turned out to be very, very Republican.

For so much of our lives, we avoided the topic of politics, mainly because he asserted that he was the “opposite of a Libertarian.” He’s fiscally liberal, socially conservative. Those socially conservative beliefs led to many an argument about gay marriage and sex. And it led to me hiding aspects of my life from him. To this day, I’ve never told him I’m bisexual.

But I thought this year was different because it felt different.

This year was the first in which, politically, most of my friends and family were on the same page. For the first time, talking about politics was met mostly with either agreement, or civil discussions about what comes next after Trump is out of the White House. And I felt hopeful that this year meant that things would change to such a point, that maybe hiding parts of myself from the people I care about wouldn’t have to happen anymore.

And then Ruth Bader Ginsburg died, and Amy Coney Barrett happened. This friend rejoiced, celebrated her religion and condemned those who questioned her ability to preside fairly on the Supreme Court.

While I, and many others, feared for this moment, he was celebrating. He was celebrating the chance that Roe v. Wade will be no more. He was celebrating something he would never have to face. This cisgender man would never have a womb. Not only that, but his religious beliefs dictate that sex cannot happen before marriage. So, he and his long time girlfriend have never, and, should they follow their strict beliefs, will never experience a pregnancy scare. Though he had no personal stock in Roe v. Wade, he voted against the rights and the lives of myself and millions of other women, or anyone with the ability to become pregnant, in the United States.

Overturning Roe v. Wade will not stop abortions.

The reality is that Roe v. Wade has been gutted year after year, with states being allowed to determine just how much access to abortion resources they want to offer. In 2019, states passed 25 new abortion restrictions into law, restrictions which have disproportionately affected particular groups, such as people of color, queer and trans people, and members of the military and federal employees.

For many people, the concern about Roe v. Wade being overturned isn’t on their radar because they already don’t have access, legal or not.

The harsh truth, though, is that, if women do not have access to safe abortion, that does not mean that they will not abort. It only means that they are far more likely to experience an unsafe abortion. As the World Health Organization states, “Any woman with an unwanted pregnancy who cannot access safe abortion is at risk of unsafe abortion … The rate of unsafe abortions is higher where access to effective contraception and safe abortion is limited or unavailable.”

Before Roe v. Wade, abortion not only existed in America, but it was common enough that nearly one-fifth of maternal deaths recorded in 1930 were directly attributed to illegal abortions. And, yes, before Roe v. Wade, illegal abortion also disproportionately affected certain groups. A study conducted in the 1960s found that eight in 10 low-income women surveyed said that they had attempted a self-induced procedure. Unsafe abortions accounted for one in two childbirth-related deaths among non-white women.

That is what we return to if we continue on the path we are on and not reverse course. There is a correlation between unsafe abortion and restrictive abortion laws. The median rate of unsafe abortions in the 82 countries with the most restrictive abortion laws is up to 23 of 1000 women, compared to just two of 1000 women in nations that allow abortions. Further, abortion-related deaths are more frequent in countries with more restrictive abortion laws.

If you’re a man who is voting based on whether or not Roe v. Wade should be overturned, women’s blood is on your hands.

Although, as we have already discussed, Roe v. Wade cannot be our only focus when we are considering abortion access in the United States, Roe v. Wade did open the door to allowing women access to safe abortions. That door has been closing year after year.

If you’re voting for candidates that advocate for that door to be shut all the way, you need to understand you are not helping stop abortions. You are helping to stop safe abortions. Regardless of your religious beliefs or your personal beliefs, you are directly doing harm to women by voting for these candidates, and you are in no way stopping the very thing you claim to loathe so deeply.

Abortion will never simply end because you decide you want it to. It is a part of the world’s history, and, yes, a part of American history, a history that has been bloody and unnecessarily filled with the deaths of women. To my friend, you are not stopping abortions. You are just sending us back to a time in which abortion more likely meant our deaths.