From the other side...

At the Correspondents' Dinner, Seth Meyers' had quite a few jokes up his sleeve but one in particular caught my attention: "The White House Correspondents' Association is an organization of journalists who cover both The White House and the president, but earlier Sen. John Kyl told me 90 percent of what they did was abortions."

Despite how great it was to see smug rich men get completely put into their place, the realities that act as inspiration for these jokes is quite depressing. In class, we watched the documentary 12th and Delaware, made by the same ladies who brought you Jesus Camp. This documentary exposed the binary nature of the abortion debate and the extreme measures taken by both sides (admittedly, more attention is given to the extreme measures taken by the pro-life camp). But what this documentary really made clear to me was the need for empathy and understanding in our debate and thinking. I find it difficult to empathize with any criticisms given by men regarding abortion because men do not have uteruses therefore they lack the ability to be in the physical situation of being pregnant.

But, I am not a devout Christian, or even very religious at all, so my challenge is to see abortion through a new light. This is a difficult struggle because above all else, I believe in a person's right over control of his/her own body.