Paragraph 218: Pure prose of concern – taz.de

The traffic light government is not following the advice of a commission to legalize abortion. In doing so, she is refusing the will of the voters.

Complex and emotional matter: Ministers Paus, Lauterbach and Buschmann on April 15th Photo: Britta Pedersen/dpa

As expected, the traffic light government is ducking the idea of ​​abortion. Instead of implementing the recommendation of the scientific commission it set up and legalizing abortions, politicians from the FDP, SPD and Greens emphasize the potential for division of the issue. At the presentation of the commission’s report on Monday, the Green Women’s Minister Lisa Paus asked for understanding for political inaction. The matter is simply “complex” and “emotional”.

With such prose of concern, the supposedly progressive parties create the basis for social division. If they followed their own call for objectivity, they would only talk about facts. According to this, criminalization prevents good medical care, as the Elsa study presented last week showed.

And the commission came to the conclusion that the German legislation (abortion is prohibited, but is not punished under certain conditions) is also legally untenable: the fetus’ right to life in the early phase of pregnancy is not equivalent to that of the pregnant woman.

The fairy tale of a compromise

The traffic light parties could explain this to the Germans. Instead, they continue to tell the fairy tale that conservatives have been telling society for decades. According to this, paragraph 218 is “a good compromise” that prevents a “culture war”. That’s nonsense. A compromise would require that there are two equally strong sides: some want to allow abortions, others want to ban them.

In a 2023 survey, only 3 percent of those surveyed agreed with the latter. Even in the Union there are only a few hardliners who don’t care so much about women’s self-determination that they tend to forego their votes. According to a current survey available to taz, 77.5 percent of Union voters reject the illegality of abortion. So there is no sensible reason to sit out the topic.