Lat Resorts to Name-Calling

As roommates with widely divergent views on the abortion issue, we found ourselves, for the first time, in complete concurrence concerning David B. Lat's editorial, "ProChoice: Abortion to Go?" Feb. 18, 1994).

It was the most poorly written piece of drivel ever to be contributed to the abortion debate on The Crimson editorial page.

While careless orthography is regrettable, it is hardly enough to discredit an entire argument. And why Mr. Lat objects to door-dropping is beyond us; this has been a respectable form of dissemination of information for as long as we've been here.

Perhaps he hasn't noticed that numerous student publications, pizza, ads, eye exam coupons and other junk are all door-dropped routinely without people writing to The Crimson about it.

Or maybe he just thinks free speech only applies to those who conform to his point of view.

As for the "meat" of his argument, we find it completely ridiculous and offensive that he believes men cannot be involved in the pro-choice movement. Abortion is something that affects everyone regardless of gender (unless Mr. Lat believes in regular immaculate conception).

To belittle Mikes' beliefs (which we will not do since we do not know him) is to assume that it is impossible for a man to believe sincerely in the issues at stake.

If Mr. Lat truly believes that abortion is only a "women's issue," then we don't understand why he feels compelled to write an article on the issue either.

Turning to his comments on political vocabulary, it seems he has ignored the tendency to the pro-life movement (including himself) to refer to the pro-choice movement as "pro-abortion"--an accusation most pro-choice people would deny.

We cannot point to a political movement since the origin of the United states which did not use rhetoric to its advantage.

Lat also seems to believe that women choosing to have an abortion do so flippantly and without in-depth consideration of the options. We find this far from the truth, and his comments belittle the difficulty of the decision that many women have had to make for various reasons.

It is unfortunate that, considering the national importance of this issue, Mr. Lat has contributed to the growing trend of obscuring the real debate by concentrating on sophistry and meaningless said-issues.

We pity Mr. Lat for being unable to rise above name-calling and mudslinging to address intelligently the real issues behind the abortion debate. Jeannette A. Vargas '95   Clare A. Sammells '95