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White Males and Abortion
Sen. Doug Jones (D., AL) tweeted in response to anti-abortion legislation passed by the Alabama legislature: “I refuse to believe that these Republican men represent the views of most Alabamians. Their action is both unconstitutional and shameful. The people of Alabama deserve to be on the #rightsideofhistory – not the side of extremists. Women deserve better.”
It seems much more likely that Senator Jones is the one who is out of step. A 2014 Pew poll found that Alabama is among the most pro-life states in the country, with 58 percent saying the procedure should be illegal in “all or most cases.” It’s possible that among the 58 percent who oppose abortion in Alabama, some will find the legislation passed this week to be too extreme, but don’t count on it. Just last year, voters approved a state constitutional amendment declaring that it is “the public policy of this state to recognize and support the sanctity of unborn life and the rights of unborn children.” Fifty-nine percent of voters voted in favor.
Since the vote making abortion illegal in Alabama, Republican members of the Alabama senate have been targets of accusations — mostly that they are male and white. A number of outlets pointed to the fact that all 25 votes in favor of legislation were white, male Republicans. Ok. But the Alabama house has lots of Republican women. The bill’s sponsor in the lower chamber was a woman, as was the governor who signed the bill.
Unplanned is the true life story of Abby Johnson, a director of a Planned Parenthood clinic who went on to become a pro-life activist. Being a “Pro-life” or “Anti-Choice” film means some people won’t even give it a chance. Looking at the Rotten Tomato scores you can tell this is controversial. The critics, who tend to be left-leaning, gave it a 50 and the viewers gave it a 93. Both of those scores are skewed by politics. I have no doubt that if this was the story of a pro-life woman who went on to become a Planned Parenthood director that the critic score would be about 15 points higher. If it was about a pro-life man who became a female director of her local Planned Parenthood clinic that score would be 30 points higher.
Last year’s Gosnell and the recently released Unplanned present a thorny problem for Conservatives who choose to write about film. The morals that drive these films are undoubtedly in line with the cultural right since both are anti-abortion. That is their sole raison d’etre. It is the reason the films were made and the reason viewers bought their tickets.
Spend more than five minutes with a teenager and you’ll likely notice a fairly obvious observation: teenagers don’t always make the best decisions. There’s a reason God gave kids parents. We know, without a doubt, from study after study and personal experience that an adolescent’s brain is actively developing on the daily. According to 
