You Heard It on Fox News: A Woman’s Body Is Her Own
When you think of reproductive freedom and women’s bodily autonomy, Fox News might not be the first thing to come to mind, but those core liberal principles were given a unanimous defense Wednesday morning on Fox and Friends. Legal experts Ashleigh Merchant and Whitney Boan joined with anchor Anna Kooiman to form a Blonde Voltron of Women’s Rights to defend 47 year-old California woman Melissa Cook‘s right to determine what happens to her body, despite a delicious-sounding “schmear campaign” being directed at her.
In fact, it was Fox News anchor Kooiman, not one of the panelists, who asserted Cook’s right to bodily autonomy:
Kooiman: Whitney, I’ll start with you. California law as it stands now says the surrogate is not the natural legal mother of the child. does she have a case?
Boan: I do not think that she does, actually. What’s happened now is she’s gone a whole smear, er, schmar campaign based on the idea that at one point he asked her to reduce the triplets to only two children as part of the contract. We’re past that now. she’s past the point in the pregnancy where that’s an issue. She’s breached the contract here. The contract was for her to carry the children to term and she’s not now wanting to give the children up. She wants to keep all three children because she’s not happy with the fact that he only wants two of the children.
She has no claim to them.
Kooiman: She’s being asked to abort this child she’s carrying. for our viewers who are unfamiliar with surrogacy may seem like a foreign concept. California, Illinois, Arkansas, Maryland and New Hampshire are the friendly states. I want to get your thoughts. Could she be forced to have an abortion? It’s her body, isn’t it?
Merchant: No. She’s never going to be forced to have an abortion. I don’t think that would ever happen.
Ah, yes, there’s always a catch, but the principle holds true, it is Ms. Cook’s body and her choice, and I applaud Fox News for taking that position. For the record, there’s no truth to the rumor that Carly Fiorina saw that third triplet in a Planned Parenthood video.
The case they’re discussing involves a woman who agreed to carry three embryos for a Georgia man, but hidden in the Apple Terms and Conditions she didn’t read, there was a provision that said he could request a “reduction,” a request he then made via threat of financial ruin. Melissa Cook is now seeking custody of the embryo the father wanted to abort.
Cases like these don’t often get the attention of “pro-life” politicians and activists because where public opinion can be easily “divided” when it comes to abortion rights, they would likely find a different result if they also went after fertility clinics, which destroy “life” just as surely, and even dispose of it the same way. It’s a lot easier to be unsure of a freedom you don’t think you’ll ever need, rather than one which is inherently desirable to the privileged. I’d like to see how this panel would have gone had Cook decided she only wanted to carry two of the embryos, and dad wanted all three.
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
