While I originally wrote this as a response to a comment, the following are my beliefs and reasoning for why men should have the equal right to choose parenthood. My goal in this post is to:

  1. Provide a logical framework and reasoning behind the Men's Right's push for equal reproductive rights.*\*

  2. To display how the desire for women's equality and abortion rights, including the logic and reasoning used to support them, aligns with introducing male reproductive rights.

  3. To sharpen this argument, add to it, and seek opinions and critique. I envision this hopefully being the start to a unified, available, and reasonable ethos for the men's reproductive rights movement, and perhaps eventually the backbone of a clear manifesto.

So tear it apart, praise it, add to it, completely rewrite it--I really hope to see change one day, so give me your best and your worst!

\*)If you are ANTI-abortion, while I respect your beliefs and am happy to discuss elsewhere, I sincerely request that you refrain from commenting in line with that belief here as it will muddy the water. If you're able to approach this from a pro-abortion perspective, then I welcome your input.

On Reproductive Rights

To me, for one sex to have the option of becoming a parent, and also have the option to force their sexual partner to become a parent, is heinous. The idea that a woman can walk away from sexual encounter knowing it's ultimately consequence-free in regard to having children, to the next 18 years of her time, and the next 18 years of her finances and other resources, is wonderfully amazing. However, from that same encounter, the fact that a man can break into a cold sweat over a missed period, knowing that his life could be unequivocally changed, against his will, for engaging in the exact same sexual activity with the exact same amount of consent, is beyond tragic.

A common talking point in favor of abortion rights is to lament how pregnancy and children can prevent a woman from so many opportunities. Children at the wrong time can deny her university since she doesn’t have the money, they can prevent the rise of her career as she doesn’t have the time, and a number of other life-circumstance related reasons—most of which are good and valid support. Yet at the same time, those same people completely ignore the men who have fallen into exactly the lamentable situations they describe and decry. To add a personal anecdote, one of my acquaintances works two jobs just to make ends meet after child support, one of which carries a significant amount of danger. He is constantly exhausted from all the hours he must work, and college and many career options are totally out of the question. He isn’t paying for children that come from a previously wedded or long-term couple, this is all the result of a casual relationship and a failure of birth control.

The right to abort is currently based on the "undue burden" clause, which can apply just as easily to men as it can to women. Undeniably, women are the ones able to become pregnant. However, in return for shouldering this risk, women are given the unilateral decision to abort with the consideration of no one else—and this is right and commendable. Even if a man desperately wants that baby to be born, it does not matter--she can eject it. She has and should have full rights and autonomy over her body and her life. Unfortunately, there is no equivalent decision for men. If he desperately doesn't want to be a father, it simply doesn't matter—she can legally bind him, his time, and/or his finances for the next 18 years and irrevocably alter the course of his life.

This is starkly terrifying. I believe that if the roles were reversed, people would cry out that "you're punishing women for sex!" As evidence of this, The Supreme Court overturned Roe V. Wade, which returned the choice of legalizing abortion to the state level, and the outcry against this decision has been overwhelming, sweeping away the political spotlight, engaging activist groups into full gear, and affecting men and especially women on a deep and emotional level. Having their right to choose potentially taken away was an abominable thought to droves of women and men—as it well should be. Now, please take a moment to consider that while women have had this legal right that for the last 50+ years, enjoying sexual, social, and financial liberation from unconsented, reproductive burdens, in all this time, men have never had these same reproductive rights.

If women want equality and the right to abort, they must also accept the consequences of being a free agent. If one invests in stocks with a friend, they cannot force their friend to pay their losses simply because they invested together, regardless of whether one invested more or took more risk. Each takes their own risk, unless there is a mutual agreement beforehand to pool resources and risk. One person also can't make a friend pay for their broken leg because both went mountain biking together, even if one bike poses much greater risk to the rider. Each individual takes their own risk in hand when they make the decision to engage.

In the same way, women do indeed have the unique risk of becoming pregnant through sex, however, it is their own risk to manage, and they are rightfully given unique options to do so. The common rebuttal to women having the choice to go through with the pregnancy or not, while the man has no choice in his own parenthood, is "he made his choice when he had sex" or "he should have thought of that before putting sperm in her."

However, these ideas both denigrate women’s independence and contradict’ s feminism’s stated goals. Are women free agents? Do they have autonomy? Are women equally capable as men to both make their own choice and to endure the consequences? Indeed, it is my official position that women are every bit as capable and autonomous as men in making decision and in exercising free agency. When in agreement with the previous statement, the questions must also become "why didn't her choice also end when she had sex?" or "Shouldn't she have thought about it before she took sperm?"

This disparity in choice implicitly infantilizes women. Giving more choice to women. beyond the absolute authority she should retain over her own body and life, while at the same time denying it to men implicitly demeans female agency. It is to implicitly state that one party involved is less capable of making their own decisions, or that one sex lacks the foresight or intelligence to make an informed decision, or that one sex is less capable of bearing the consequences of their actions."

Giving men the same reproductive autonomy is not a threat to women or inviting irresponsibility on the part of men—granted that one does not believe women inferior in cognition or agency. It is, in fact, empowering not only to men, but it is a further recognition that women are both as capable and as responsible as men. Instating men’s reproductive rights—Men's Right to Choose—is a boon for the sake of true equality, for men's basic human right to equally choose the course of their lives, and for having fully actualized women who truly are and are truly considered equally competent in the public mind and social sphere.