[The following article, entitled "Women's Liberation and
Abortion,"
was published in the February 16 issue of La Gauche, the weekly newspaper of the Ligue Révolutionnaire des
Travailleurs (Revolutionary Workers League), Belgian section of the Fourth International. The translation is by Intercontinental Press.]
Throughout the world, the problem of abortion is causing a stir, and in several countries new laws have been passed.
In the United States, the Supreme Court has OKed abortion and authorized it to be legally performed until the sixth month of pregnancy, with the stipulation that it be performed in a hospital facility after the third month. Any repressive law on abortion is now illegal in the United States.
In Austria, abortion has just been made legal up to the third month.
In France, 500 doctors have just signed a manifesto stating that they have performed abortions regularly and without financial gain—a courageous decision in light of French law, which is even more repressive than Belgian law in this matter.
On the other hand, there is increasing discussion about abortion techniques, and especially the American Karman method of abortion by suction. This method can be used during the first eight weeks of pregnancy and makes abortion into a mild operation, practically painless, involving no subsequent risks; it takes only a short time to perform (approximately a quarter of an hour). The simplicity of this technique and the extremely low cost of the equipment it requires make it the kind of technique that could be used quickly and easily on a wide scale.
Moreover, in Belgium, the results of a public opinion poll carried out by the Inusop (ULB) in 1972 in a context in which passions played no role show that a sizeable majority in Belgium favor a liberalization of abortion.
Nevertheless, here as elsewhere, the reactionary old guard, backward members of the clergy, and conservatives of the far right are shamelessly trying to maintain the existing legislation and even to see to it that it is more strictly applied.
In keeping with its opportunism, our new government included in its program the problem of revising the abortion legislation. What will really come out of this? Just one more farce, probably.
Meanwhile, they are trying to take the steam out of the Peers affair [See Intercontinental Press February 12, p. 137] by playing a waiting game.
At the moment, it is the provisions of the Callewaert proposal that are receiving the greatest support from the Belgian public.
It can be assumed that this is the proposal, perhaps in somewhat modified form, that will end up being adopted. The Belgian government can allow itself the luxury of polishing up its image as an advanced democracy by adopting legislation that is already outdated and unacceptable.
The Callewaert proposal is unacceptable because it does not give the freedom of decision to the woman but to a committee of doctors. Thus women are being dealt with as if they were reproductive animals who are too stupid to be given the right to decide what to do with whatever is going on inside their own bodies.
What goes on inside a woman's body will still be decided by the law, but through the intermediary of doctors.
If the Callewaert proposal is adopted, the oppression of women as such and as workers will remain; it will simply be humanized. More hypocritical, and less shocking, that oppression will nevertheless still continue to exist.
The aim of softening the laws will be to throw a bone to the women's movement and calm down its struggle for its demands.
The politicians have just discovered that women, like young people, exist. That they should be listened to and coddled during an election is one thing; but they must under no cir cumstances be given the power to make decisions on this!
But women are emerging from too
But women are emerging from too long a servitude to still agree, as they once did, to keep quiet and let others make decisions that affect their lives. They are finally aware- though perhaps not yet clearly - of the fact that they have been cheated, that they are in a way only the private property of men, a means of reproduction, a docile instrument of the capitalist system, which bases its exploitation in the patriarchal family.
The women's struggle is a new revolutionary front, for it is the rising up against oppression of a group that is particularly exploited by capitalism, and it in essence undermines the system by destroying little by little the foundations of the "sacred" family institution.
There are, nevertheless, certain nuances that should be made clear. We cannot accept the motivations of some, who call for the right of abortion and contraception, believing that it is more important to give the masses of people the means for not having children than it is to build decent housing for them, or to open child-care centers and schools.
Our demands for the right of free contraception and abortion are part of an overall analysis of society. These demands are aimed against a class-oriented medicine that excludes purely "social" considerations by serving the function only of creating and repairing workers.
We call for better living conditions, child-care centers accessible to all and open longer, and an end to sex discrimination resulting primarily from the prevailing conditions of procreation and maternity. We demand a freedom of sexuality in which pleasure and procreation are dissociated from one another and in which the sex act would thus no longer be steeped in fear and guilt for the woman.
In this sense we demand the complete right to free contraception and abortion as a condition for the liberation of women in their struggle for emancipation!
Another Day, Another Lie
Air France has disproved Israeli claims that Jacques Bourges, pilot of the Libyan airliner downed by Israeli jets, wasn't licensed to fly the Boeing 727. On February 26, the airline published Bourges' license, which qualifies him to pilot a Boeing 727.