Rebuttal: Let’s Talk About the Racial Disparity in Abortions

I read this today. I was sort of shocked at how intellectually dishonest it is. So, Jason Riley, okay! Let's talk.

       Why isn’t it more a matter of concern to the left that so many black        

        babies aren’t brought into the world?

To begin with, pretty much no liberal is going to be on board with increasing population growth. Overpopulation is an enormous burden on resources, and it is terrible for the earth. To be clear on the race thing, though, we don't want extra white babies either. No extra babies, please and thank you. If the abortion rate were to go down (and that would be great), we would want it to be because there were fewer unintended pregnancies in the first place.

Also, statistics are... statistics. It may be true that the black abortion rate is higher, but the black birth rate is higher, too. It's not like abortion is leading to declining numbers of black people.

After videos surfaced that show Planned Parenthood officials discussing the sale of parts from aborted babies...

Back up, holmes. That needs to say "doctored videos," and "donation of tissues" instead of "sale of parts" if you want any degree of accuracy. Planned Parenthood didn't do anything wrong, and it is certainly not selling baby body parts for profit. And I know you get to define your terms -- you wrote the article -- but technically it isn't a baby until it's delivered at or near full-term.

Most Republicans, however, realize that a government shutdown over abortion would be no more successful than the one in October 2013 over the Affordable Care Act. The GOP majority in the Senate today is too narrow to overcome an inevitable veto from President Obama, and a sympathetic Washington press corps will be eager to ensure that the left’s shutdown narrative prevails.

This is one of my favorite bits of the article. It basically says "Republicans shouldn't shut down the government because then the liberal media will tell everyone that we shut down the government." Like, really? Can you hear yourself?

In all likelihood, it will take a Republican in the White House to reverse ObamaCare and a pro-life president to end taxpayer-funded abortions. 

Ugh, "taxpayer-funded abortions." This is one of those things that conservatives just keep saying until someone believes them.

Shutting down the government when Republicans control the House and the Senate would only allow Democrats to argue more credibly that the opposition cannot be counted on to reduce legislative gridlock and govern responsibly.

So increasing gridlock and failing to govern responsibly might allow people to argue credibly that you contribute to gridlock and... I give up.

The political left obsesses over racial disparities in bank loans or college admissions or police shootings, but “largely missing from the debate,” wrote Zoe Dutton in the Atlantic magazine last year, “is discussion of abortion’s racial disparity.”

Perhaps to Riley's surprise, I agree that this disparity is a problem. Abortions are often expensive, difficult to obtain, and come for some women with a difficult emotional component (though almost all women express later that they do not regret their decision). I would support working to reduce abortions by increasing the availability of birth control, making sure women have proper access to health care, making sure students have appropriate and accurate sex ed... As a pro-choice person, I would like to see abortions be rare. I think they're not the best method of birth control. I'd like to reduce unintended pregnancies. A pro-choice motto I am really on board with is "Every child a wanted child."

 A popular explanation for the racial divide is that abortion rates are a function of poverty. Low-income women are more likely to terminate a pregnancy, and black women are more likely to be low-income. 

Yes, can we work on fixing that? You've probably heard that the wage gap between women and men is that women make 78 cents for every dollar a man makes. You may not have heard that black women make only 64 cents on the dollar! I think Riley and I have different priorities, but I would definitely prioritize fixing that disparity.

Yet there are limits to this argument. Hispanic households are comparable to black ones in finances, sexual activity and use of birth control. Yet Hispanic women choose to abort at a rate much closer to that of white women than black women.

Hmm... I wonder if there is anything about Hispanic women that might explain that?  Just thinking out loud...

The sad truth is that many black women are not acting irrationally when they decide to terminate an unwanted pregnancy. They are playing the odds. Out-of-wedlock Hispanic birthrates are above average, but Hispanic marriage rates are comparable to those of whites, which is not the case among blacks. Most Hispanic children are raised by two parents, while most black children are not. Many black women may be choosing to abort because they don’t believe the father will stick around to help raise the child. 

Oh! Oh shit! Do you realize how hella racist this sounds? It's also completely mythical.  Can I get a Jeopardy-buzzer-sound up in here?

But if liberal activists and their media allies are going to lecture America about the value of black lives, the staggering disparity in abortion rates ought to be part of the discussion.

You're not hearing us. Black lives matter. Black women's lives matter. Their ability to choose the size of their families, to decide when to carry a child, those matter. That's why we fight for safe, legal abortion.

I agree that the racial disparity is a problem, but not for the same reason this writer seems to. He seems to be framing it as "look at all the babies that aren't being brought into the world" and I'm seeing it as "here is a health issue that disproportionately affects black women." I have the same concerns about tobacco use among African-Americans (it's much higher than average, by the way), and I think it should be addressed.

But Riley's article is full of inaccuracies, half-truths, myths and outright lies.