This week Mississippi voters will weigh in on a state constitutional amendment that defines legal personhood at fertilization. One New York Times writer described the initiative as a new tactic in the abortion fight, but as far as I can tell, there’s nothing terribly novel here. Anti-abortion groups long ago staked a polarizing claim in this debate by pitting the needs and rights of pregnant women against those of their embryos and fetuses. In doing so, they created the framework for an adversarial campaign between what they purport to be two entirely separate beings: selfish, irresponsible mother and innocent, unborn child. In reality, however, these two lives are inextricably linked, physically and otherwise.

Desired or not, pregnancy begins a relationship, and a woman must decide how to best manage that relationship – based not only on her own interests, but also on those of the potential child, her existing family and her larger community. Women alone carry this privilege and this burden, not because we are alone, but because our biological role cannot be shared or traded with men. For this very reason, a woman must have ultimate decision-making authority over the outcome of her pregnancy. Abortion opponents perhaps take solace in their view that women make impulsive and frivolous decisions about pregnancy, but this is a broad mischaracterization. Women do not abort because we devalue new life; to the contrary, we plan the size and spacing of our families out of respect for humanity, out of an understanding for the complexities and complications of our lives. Ending a pregnancy that is undesired and for which one is unprepared is in fact a very loving – even “motherly” – thing to do.

Our reproductive decisions are central to our individual identities, but they are also crucial to our group survival. In fact, maintaining control of our reproduction is one of the ways that we preserve the health and longevity of our human existence, for it allows us greater opportunity to create and maintain the ideal circumstances in which to conceive, bear and raise children (or not to, as the case may be). When our families thrive, so does our society. Ironically, limitations on our reproductive rights are not subject to the same scrutiny as other matters involving infringement of bodily integrity, even where actual children are concerned. For example, a parent cannot be forced to provide an organ or bone marrow to his or her child of any age, even if that act is necessary to save the child’s life. How, then, can we morally or legally justify compelling a woman to unwillingly donate her uterus – her body! – to the unborn? How can we even debate the personhood of a fetus, an embryo, a fertilized egg (!), if that categorization necessarily reduces a woman’s status to the equivalent of a vessel? Ain’t I a person, too?

The culture of shame and secrecy that has developed around abortion has enabled society to superficially isolate it as a separate and distinct act, void of any context and disconnected from the rest of our sexual and reproductive lives. But abortion is actually a very natural part of our biological cycle. A significant number of pregnancies (estimates range from 10-50%) end in spontaneous abortion, oftentimes before a woman even knows she’s pregnant. Even nature (or our Creator!?) understands that all pregnancies cannot and should not result in children. Abortion is as much a part of our social history as any other sexual or reproductive event. Women have sought and developed “organic” methods of abortion since the beginning of time – or at least long before the strict regulation and “medicalization” of the procedure and the ensuing cultural and political wars. An objective and compassionate understanding of the human condition includes a recognition of the rightful place of abortion along the continuum of experiences that make up our “childbearing” years. Sure, abortion is a tough issue – but so are many matters that we confront related to our intimate relationships and our reproductive health. That doesn’t make abortion wrong, evil or sinful – and it certainly doesn’t make it murder.

The only “new” thing about this ballot proposal is the backtracking of the debate’s starting line from conception to fertilization. This would outlaw not only abortion, but also certain birth control methods, and could create murderers out of miscarrying women and the doctors who help them. It’s such an extreme measure that even some “pro-life” leaders oppose it, and, if it passes, our (conservative) Supreme Court will undoubtedly strike it down. But the amendment itself is surely not the point. There will be months, years of litigation; there will be similar initiatives in other states, generating more opportunities for the spread of misinformation and abortion-related stigma; and there could be an immediate – albeit it temporary – negative impact on healthcare services for women. One supporter of Proposition 26 told Diane Rehm of NPR last week that “actually, it [the amendment] doesn’t change anything.” Even if, when all is said and done, that’s true, the collateral damage will have already been done. Just ask any woman struggling with an unplanned pregnancy: it changes everything.