Abstract
While anti-abortion groups have been present in Britain since before the 1967 Abortion Act, there is recent evidence of an increase in activism outside abortion clinics with faith-based groups regularly organising clinic 'vigils' which seek to deter women from entering abortion clinics.
This paper focuses on how the moral objections to abortion felt by anti-abortion activists are translated into a risk-based discourse with the adoption of claims about human rights or science, rather than focusing on the notion of ‘sin’. It will argue that the inclusion of non-moral narratives may seem to be a strategic necessity when trying to be persuasive within secular public spaces.
Nevertheless, they remain implicitly developed from their faith-based beliefs about women, gender and abortion, and this underlying context is clear, for example in their use of religious iconography within their campaigns.
The paper will contextualize the ‘secular’ discourses of anti-abortion activists within the broader changes of moral regulation in society and argue that, while the emphasis on potential ‘risks’ and ‘harms’ allows anti-abortion activists to avoid being seen to impose their religious framework on others, the messages are undermined as their presentation often rests on the faith-based beliefs that underlie their objection to abortion.
Speaker biography
Dr Pam Lowe is a senior lecturer in sociology and policy at Aston University. Her research centres around women’s reproductive and sexual health. She has recently undertaken research on the sexual health of online sex workers and is currently engaged in two projects on abortion, one of which is an ethnographic study on abortion debates in public spaces