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WASHINGTON, D.C., January 18, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) – Festivities for the 2019 March for Life kicked off Friday with a live broadcast of “The Ben Shapiro Show,” which the popular conservative commentator devoted to an overview of the case against abortion and common “pro-choice” arguments.
After taking the stage to enthusiastic cheers, Shapiro noted that this was the first time both at the March and doing a full hour themed around a specific issue, then quoted several pro-abortion statements from former President Barack Obama, including that God should “bless” Planned Parenthood.
“I know the March for Life has gotten a lot of flack for allowing me to broadcast from this stage because I’m a political partisan, because I don’t hide the fact that I’m conservative,” he said. “But the fact is that the pro-life position does not have to be a partisan issue. The only reason that so many folks believe it to be a partisan issue is because, unfortunately, one party in this country has decided to embrace the full-on abortion-till-point-of-birth position.”
Shapiro went on to cite a Thursday Washington Post piece quoting Obama “faith outreach” strategist Michael Wear, who said involving Shapiro and President Donald Trump “doesn’t necessarily suggest that you’re too focused on broadening the tent […] Democrats generally feel marginalized at the March for Life.”
The conservative talker noted that the March for Life welcomed pro-life Democrats such as Rep. Dan Lipinski of Illinois, and that it wasn’t pro-lifers’ fault most Democrats have taken their current position and abandoned their former stance of “safe, legal, and rare” (which Shapiro also criticized as morally incoherent).
Shapiro noted that mainstream press coverage of the March likely wouldn’t admit that the pro-life position was based on the “sheer, unadulterated science of human life,” preferring to frame it as simply a theological stance. He went on to explain fetal development with visual aids, then spent the bulk of his program dismantling common pro-abortion talking points.
The “viability” argument, that preborn babies don’t have a right to the life if they can’t live on their own “obviously doesn’t hold,” he said, because infants and many elderly are dependent on others, as well. As for the notion that the difficulty of parenting justifies abortion, Shapiro noted that raising children was difficult “because it’s the most important thing we do […] there is nothing moral about the idea that you think you’ll be a bad parent so you get to kill the child.”
Shapiro also took aim at the “bodily autonomy” argument for an abortion, which likens pregnancy to an adult who’s been connected to a violinist against his will as a form of life support. Shapiro pointed out that in the hypothetical, the person is not responsible for the violinist’s plight whereas the pregnant woman directly caused the baby to be dependent on her body. Even in cases of rape, where the woman is not responsible, Shapiro added that “abortion is not just pulling a plug,” but more akin to killing the violinist with an ax.
Further, he noted that “what about rape cases” was not a “good-faith argument” from most abortion defenders, because even if pro-lifers agreed to make an exception their opponents would not then agree to ban non-rape abortions.
Other pro-abortion arguments debunked by Shapiro included the notion that a woman’s “health” should automatically justify killing a child, that women die without abortions (Shapiro reviewed the truth behind the Savita Halappanavar case in Ireland), and that legalizing abortion reduced crime rates.
Shapiro predicted the media would pretend he didn’t make any of these secular arguments for life, but went on to add that pro-lifers should also acknowledge there is a religious proposition at the root of the issue: the innate value of all human life.
Later in the show, Shapiro interviewed Vice President Mike Pence by phone, who touted the Trump administration’s pro-life actions such as reinstating and expanding the Mexico City Policy, and signing legislation to let states defund Planned Parenthood.
“I must tell you, Ben, your voice on the airwaves across the nation, your presence at this March for Life, the presence of this pro-life generation that will gather on the national mall today, gives us great, great confidence that this will be the generation that restores the right to life in America,” Pence said, pledging that in the meantime Senate Republicans would “stand in the gap” to block the machinations of the Democrat House of Representatives.
Near the end of his broadcast, Shapiro gave his own optimistic forecast, as well.
“I do think that in the end, our movement is going to win. I think that it will win because science is moving in the direction of our movement,” he said. “And I think that as more and more people search for meaning in their own lives, and they look for a purpose to existence, and they look for a rationale for getting up in the morning, they’re gonna recognize that their own lives matter.
“And if their lives matter, then so do everyone else’s lives. And those lives include the lives of the unborn.”
LifeSiteNews will be covering the 2019 March for Life throughout the day. Readers can find a full list of events by clicking here, and watch the March live by clicking here.