(LifeSiteNews) — Most pro-life groups argue against punishing women who willingly kill their preborn child through abortion, arguing that they are the “second victim.”
But the recent brazen comments by a rapper, backed up by his baby mama, suggest that people are callously choosing abortion.
Rapper Tekashi 6ix9ine recently held a gender reveal party to celebrate his girlfriend’s pregnancy. He said he would have an abortion if the baby turned out to be a girl instead of a boy.
The rapper, real name Danny Hernandez, said his baby mama was on board with killing their innocent preborn baby if it was not a boy. (The couple, it turns out, is having a baby boy.)
While this could easily be written off as simply the ramblings of yet another pro-abortion celebrity, the comments underscore why the pro-life movement should not be so quick to dismiss punishing the women who have abortions (and certainly any partner that aids in the abortion).
Are women the ‘second victim’?
A common argument from pro-life leaders is that women are the “second victim” of an abortion.
The preborn baby that the woman pays an abortionist to kill is the first victim, and then the woman who just handed over the cash to the Planned Parenthood employee is the “second victim,” pro-life leaders argue.
In 2025, Students for Life Action helped defeat a South Carolina bill that would include potential prison time for women who had abortions. President Kristan Hawkins argued a better approach would “recognize both victims of the abortion industry, children and mothers.”
“Mothers,” the national pro-life group said, “are often the second-victim of the predatory abortion industry.”
Catholic groups have taken the same position.
“The women who seek an abortion, however, are typically in a much different situation than the medically trained abortionists who should know better and are often motivated by profit,” the North Dakota Catholic Conference said in 2024.
The bishops argued “women seeking an abortion are often frightened, confused, and under tremendous pressure to have an abortion” and “[i]n most, if not all cases, the woman is abortion’s second victim.”
A vast array of pro-life groups also signed onto a 2022 letter, released after the leak of the Dobbs decision, that declared, “Women are the victims of abortion.”
It is interesting to note that the mainstream pro-life movement’s description of women choosing abortions differs from how abortion advocates themselves describe women who kill their babies.
‘I’m happy’
“I’m alive and I’m happy. I wouldn’t have been able to say that if I didn’t have access to abortion care. I’m happy,” one woman wrote at the website “Shout Your Abortion.”
The premise of the group, as you can guess, is to celebrate the killing of preborn babies. While some women say they do have anxiety or regret over the decision, they still gladly share how they killed their own child.
The pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute, citing a 2018 paper, also argues women are not often coerced into having an abortion.
Data from the group also undermines the argument that “most, if not all,” women are killing their baby out of fear.
“The reasons most frequently cited were that having a child would interfere with a woman’s education, work or ability to care for dependents (74%); that she could not afford a baby now (73%); and that she did not want to be a single mother or was having relationship problems (48%),” a 2005 survey stated.
A 2010 paper from pro-abortion researchers similarly found: “The predominant themes identified as reasons for seeking abortion included financial reasons (40%), timing (36%), partner related reasons (31%), and the need to focus on other children (29%).”
Notably, few, and nowhere close to 99 percent, said, “Because my boyfriend is coercing me into having an abortion.”
What about those who are coerced?
Still, it can certainly be the case that some women are coerced or even tricked into having abortions. Abusive men do put abortion drugs or other pills in women’s drinks to cause them to have an abortion.
And we can think of a 15-year-old girl who is legitimately scared or is given bad advice by her similarly immature friends and told to have an abortion.
But the law can differentiate between mature, educated women who proudly walk into a Planned Parenthood and scared teens who make a bad choice.
The concept of mens rea means courts can consider whether someone intended to commit a crime.
Consider how a judge might send a 14-year-old boy to a diversion program if he was selling a few ounces of marijuana in high school versus how a judge would treat a 40-year-old cocaine drug lord. The law can look at the individual circumstances of a case and render justice.
Furthermore, it is entirely possible, and indeed should be the point of legislation, that fewer women will have abortions under the threat of punishment. This is a good thing because it not only saves preborn babies from abortion, but prevents women from suffering the consequences of abortion.
As philosopher Perry Hendricks argues, “if someone is prevented from performing a morally wrong action, it’s good for her” and “since abortion is morally wrong, it follows that it’s good for women when they are prevented from getting an abortion.”
While he was arguing in a different context, the same logic should be accepted by pro-life groups when it comes to punishing women – fewer women will kill their babies if they face jail time, and therefore more women and babies will be saved.
If pro-life groups believe what they say about the physical and mental consequences of having abortions, they should support any efforts to deter women from having abortions.
Similarly, the language of how we describe abortion further backs up that, deep down, pro-life leaders must know women have some complicity in abortion.
Consider that in 2018 and 2019, Pope Francis said abortion is like “hir[ing] a hitman.”
Reflecting on his death last year, Lila Rose praised the pope’s comments.
The comments have been approvingly shared by Catholic Vote, Priests for Life, and by EWTN for its March for Life coverage.
But someone who hires a hitman is also guilty of the crime. Therefore, if Pope Francis was correct that abortion is like hiring a hitman, and he was, then the person who hires the hitman is also culpable.
Pro-life leaders would likely say that Tekashi 6ix9ine should go to prison if he coerced his girlfriend into having an abortion.
But it would also be appropriate to imprison his girlfriend for having an abortion, since she also would be guilty of “hiring a hitman.”