Have we gone too far?

that’s what a poster on BART asks.

In reference to laws about the woman’s right to terminate her pregnancy.

This morning on BART I saw a asian woman in her late twenties or early thirties fiercely responding point by point on the poster with her pen.

A guy watching said: “tear it down.” She replied that it was better to educate.

Hurray for her, and for laws that protect a woman’s right to choose.

I understand that there are many who are deeply opposed to abortion. I once was, as well. I could not understand how anyone could justify what I considered t that time to be outright killing.

As I got older, I started to understand how much life changes when a woman bears a child, and what a big responsibility it is. As a teacher I started to understand the comfort of parental support and the cruelty of parental neglect.

Some argue for the fetus: we are taking away its right to live. I do not deny that it is so. There is potential being denied at the very start. But that is what life is: we deny one future so that another may prosper. I read the paper at the expense of… I help my son with his homework instead of … I leave one lover for…. I quit a promising career to… I end this pregnancy and start …

Life denies potential every moment, so that it can nurture another potential. Animals are driven by instinct, but humans can shape their potential and their lives. To deny women the right to choose is a denial of their humanity.

(Human desire, that rebuking of the hungers of instinct, has raised us up from caves and into temples, up from the sea and out to the stars. It constantly dreams and invents a better future–and it always does it while denying some potentialities in favor of others.)