A False Cure
The Misguided Beliefs Behind Abortion Advocacy
Preface
This editorial addresses one of the most sensitive, emotionally charged, and politically divisive topics in North American society. It is not written to provoke, but to interrogate. The data presented here is sourced from national and regional reports, legal case law, and governmental statistical agencies. Where estimates are used, they are clearly stated and modeled transparently.
If I have misrepresented any fact, misread any trend, or failed to give a voice to legitimate nuance, I will revise this editorial accordingly. My goal is not ideological dominance — it is clarity. And with clarity comes accountability.
I welcome constructive critique, and I remain open to amending my conclusions if better information is provided. Until then, this represents my honest effort to understand what’s happening on the ground in both Canada and the United States.
Rough Draft: Abortion, Assault, and Accountability in Canada and the United States
I. Introduction: A Tale of Two Nations, One Narrative
Both Canada and the United States have framed abortion access as an issue of women’s rights, bodily autonomy, and protection from violence. But behind the talking points, there’s a pattern: statistics on sexual violence, abortion rates, and legal prosecution rarely align with the emotional weight carried by the “rape exception” argument. This draft unpacks what the numbers actually say about abortion and sexual assault across both nations, cutting through the narrative to confront what is — and isn’t — being protected.
Sidebar: The Case That Shouldn’t Have Been Decided
In 1973, Roe v. Wade was decided not on solid constitutional ground, but on judicial improvisation. Here’s why the ruling — despite being historic — was structurally unsound:
No explicit right to abortion exists in the U.S. Constitution. The Court anchored Roe in a vague notion of “privacy” inferred from the 14th Amendment’s Due Process Clause. That privacy right had never been clearly defined or limited.
The Court legislated from the bench. Roe didn’t just interpret law — it wrote one. By outlining trimester-based rules and viability thresholds, the Court bypassed Congress and state legislatures entirely.
It ignored judicial restraint. The Court could have said: “This issue belongs to the states. The Constitution is silent. Let elected representatives decide.” But it didn’t. It stepped in and overruled 50 states with a sweeping ruling based on a shaky foundation.
Why? Because the cultural moment demanded a release valve. Feminism, civil rights, and the sexual revolution had created a tipping point. SCOTUS gave the nation a temporary ‘solution’ — one that didn’t solve anything.
This was legal hypocrisy: a supposed victory for rights that bypassed the very system meant to uphold them. Roe wasn’t constitutional law. It was crisis management disguised as principle.
II. U.S. Update: RAINN Confirms the Scale and Failure of Response
RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network) confirms:
Over 423,000 people aged 12 and older are sexually assaulted or raped in the U.S. every year.
1 in 6 American women has been the victim of attempted or completed rape in her lifetime.
1 out of every 10 rape victims is male.
More than half of all sexual assaults occur at or near the victim’s home.
The highest risk age group: 18–34 years old, with troubling spikes beginning in early adolescence.
Only 310 out of every 1,000 sexual assaults are reported.
Of those reported:
50 lead to arrest
28 result in felony conviction
25 lead to jail time
The deeper horror? In many states, the highest-affected age groups start as young as 12 or 13. Rape on its own is an atrocity — but sexual violence against children exposes a darker, festering rot. Even in a country with layers of legislation, federal oversight, and public awareness campaigns, the actual systems meant to protect people from sexual violence collapse at nearly every step. And yet, the fallback is still abortion.
Sidebar: The False Cure — The Illusion of Abortion as Justice
Abortion is often framed as a remedy for rape. But what does it really resolve?
Premise Reality “Abortion gives closure” Rapists rarely face justice — the trauma remains. “It lets her move on” Many women suffer compounded grief and silence. “It’s the compassionate option” Yet legal systems fail to remove paternal rights from rapists. “It protects women’s rights” But ignores their right to safety and due process.
Real prevention isn’t elective termination. It’s:
Prosecuting offenders.
Ensuring support services exist.
Teaching consequence before conception.
Removing rapists from legal parenthood discussions.
Until those pillars are in place, abortion is not a cure — it’s a convenient escape hatch masking systemic abandonment.
III. Canada’s Numbers: Silence, Disparity, and Denial
Unlike the U.S., Canada does not require clinics or provinces to report the reasons for abortion. That absence is not a neutral policy — it obscures patterns. Using American data as a proxy, we estimate that between 74–92% of abortions are elective, not related to rape, incest, or medical necessity. Applied to Canada’s 2021 numbers (over 87,000 abortions), this implies between 64,000 and 80,000 elective abortions per year — many occurring in provinces with high access and low reporting scrutiny.
Self-reported workplace harassment stats show nearly 1 in 2 women aged 25–34 have experienced some form of workplace sexual misconduct. Among Indigenous women, that number is even higher — reaching over 57% for Métis respondents. But this epidemic is rarely addressed alongside abortion access. The policy conversation isolates abortion from the broader systems that failed these women before they ever stepped into a clinic.
Therein lies the deeper hypocrisy: a fetus may have legal protections, but once born — if that fetus is female — she enters a system where her body is less protected, her voice more doubted, and her pain often ignored. The cycle becomes a paradox: we defend unborn rights loudly while sidelining women’s rights silently.
IV. The Reality for Men: Legal Fatherhood Without Consent
In some U.S. states, and in legal grey zones across Canada, rapists have successfully sued for custody or visitation rights of the children conceived through their crimes. This not only re-traumatizes the victim, but creates a permanent legal tether to the attacker. Overturning Roe has triggered public debate, but these cases are where the legal system’s incoherence shows its teeth — because abortion law alone can’t fix a court system that allows a rapist to claim fatherhood.
V. Education vs Ideology: Where Is the Real Reform?
Sex education in both countries remains inconsistent, moralized, or incomplete. Comprehensive access to contraception is far from universal, particularly for young people, low-income populations, or rural communities. If the goal were truly to reduce abortions, the policy would start here — not with judicial rulings, not with clinic protests, but with prevention.
Final Thoughts: Control, Narrative, and the Manufactured Crisis
The modern feminist movement has, in some circles, replaced advocacy with absolutism. The cause becomes the identity — and when the cause is resolved or restructured (as with Roe’s overturning), the goalposts shift. The outrage stays.
But outrage without structural reform is noise. The boogeyman wasn’t the overturning of Roe. The real threat is a culture that has elevated abortion to a political altar while ignoring the failing systems surrounding it — from sexual violence prosecution to education access to parental rights reform.
If anything, the end of Roe revealed the system’s nakedness. Now the question is: do we clothe it in actual protections? Or just keep pointing at ghosts?