‘On the wet side of the womb’: The construction of ‘mothers’ in anti-abortion activism in England and Wales

Abstract

Across the UK, there has been an increase in anti-abortion activism outside abortion clinics. The activism deployed includes explicitly religious activities such as 'prayerful witnessing' and 'pavement counselling', which aim to discourage women from entering clinics. This article stems from a wider ethnographic study of public activism over abortion to determine what claims about motherhood are being made within these debates. Two arguments are presented. First, how women's role as mothers is central and essentialised in anti-abortion discourses, with the body of the mother often disappearing as activists seek to erode the distinction between a foetus and a baby by constructing pregnancy as a foetal environment. Motherhood is constructed as 'natural' and sacred, therefore abortion must be damaging because it destroys women's 'natural' position. Second, the article argues that although the activists' arguments are always religiously framed, their activism takes place in a largely secular context, meaning that they have to find ways of appealing to secular audiences. This leads to a complex interrelationship between secular and religious discourses, where theological viewpoints sit alongside 'scientific' claims to buttress activists' views. This article explores how the presence and absence of mothers within activists' narratives is due to the tensions between religiously based understandings of motherhood, and the need to appeal to a secular audience.

(Re)imagining the ‘Backstreet’: Anti-abortion Campaigning against Decriminalisation in the UK

“…More broadly, they suggest that 'abortion culture' has 'damaged' society. Whilst individuals vary as to the exact reasons, this can include ideas about encouraging a denigration of responsibility, population loss, encouraging promiscuity, a threat to 'natural' gender roles and defying God's will (Lowe and Page, 2018a;Munson, 2002).…”

“…Those who hold an anti-abortion position expect women to sacrifice all other aspects of their lives and continue with pregnancies regardless of their cost to themselves (Lowe, 2016). The emphasis on retraditionalisation can be seen within their appeals to individual pregnant women to reject abortion, particularly amongst the anti-abortion groups that target women directly outside clinics which often focus on women as 'mothers' (Lowe and Page, 2018a). Their encouragement to individual women to reject abortion clearly also includes an element of self-help, through recognising themselves as 'mothers'.…”

“…It is important to understand that whilst this does position women as potentially self-governing citizens, it is only in the context of choosing to proceed with the pregnancy. Those who elect to have abortions are always 'victims' as they have acted outside the traditional roles for women that the anti-abortion activists believe are 'natural' (Lowe and Page, 2018a). Hence reducing the risks to women would mean, for anti-abortion activists, decreasing or eliminating abortions either through legal changes or by 'saving' individual women through activities outside clinics or other crisis pregnancy interventions.…”

“…Caulfield suggests that this is the way that women make 'informed choices' (HC 13/03/2017 Vol 623 C30). Within anti-abortion discourse, an 'informed choice' is usually one in which women choose not to have an abortion, in line with their beliefs that women are always coerced (Lowe and Page, 2018a). The belief that it is the role of doctors to support women into potentially not having abortions was part of the medical paternalism build into the current law in which doctors rather than women formally make the decision.…”

“…These points signal the ways in which they position motherhood as central to women's lives, and access to abortion is seen as a risk, undermining of women's position as 'mothers'. This arises from their beliefs in abortion coercion in which cultural pressures on women which causes them to deny their 'natural' inclinations towards motherhood (Lowe and Page, 2018a). In addition, when juxtaposed to the vilification of doctors, this 'women as victims' position implicitly implicates the providers of abortions as providing or supporting the coercion (Lee, 2017).…”