To the Editor:

Unfortunately, anti-abortion supporters named themselves pro-life, thereby labeling pro-choice supporters pro-death. This serves to demonize the pro-choice movement, increase division, promote intolerance, and incite violence, as in the bombing of Planned Parenthood clinics and murder of their clinicians who provide low-cost healthcare for women and access to contraception, which results in fewer abortions. 

The point of contention between these two groups lies in definitions of when life begins. It is at conception for the anti-abortionists, and for pro-choice supporters it is either when an embryo becomes a fetus (occurring the earliest at the end of the first trimester) or when capable of sustaining life independently, at about 24 weeks. 

The pro-choice movement maintains that these beliefs and choices are personal decisions not to be decided for them by any government entity or any group or individual. They support the right of women in the anti-abortion movement to their own beliefs. 

Some members of the pro-choice movement personally do not favor abortion but concede that every woman has a right to choose for herself whenever it concerns her own body. 

Judy Stockinger

Franklin