Frequently Asked Questions

Yes.

All Our Lives was cofounded in 2010 by Jen Roth and Mary Krane Derr. We both have advocated a pro every life, pro nonviolent sexual and reproductive choice position for decades. We have been long frustrated at the many ways the abortion debate, especially in our home country, the United States, renders people like us invisible and inaudible—even as we have much to contribute in the way of practical solutions for women and children.

We serve as an international clearinghouse for information and action alerts that advance a pro every life, pro nonviolent choice agenda. We publish the Nonviolent Choice Directory, which lists abortion-reducing resources from all over the world.

Our vision of pro-life or pro-every-life means respect in deed:

• Encompassing both the lives of women and children, unborn and already born, as well as men’s lives
• Covering all phases of the life cycle – before, during, and ever after birth
• Grounded in universal human rights and nonviolence towards all
• Open to people of all religions and no religion

"Reproductive peace" is a philosophy that combines principles of the reproductive justice and consistent life ethic movements. Like our sisters in the reproductive justice movement, we condemn and fight the many intersecting injustices that work against women's ability to live, love, and reproduce -- or not -- freely.  And like consistent life ethic proponents, we reject violent solutions such as elective abortion and seek to respond to injustice and challenges in ways that preserve human life before and after birth.

All Our Lives was cofounded by one person who identifies as atheist and another who identifies as Buddhist and Christian. So how could we have a religious affiliation? This is different from being "anti-religious." We are open to people of all faiths and none and welcome everyone’s contributions to the struggle for social justice.

All our Lives was founded by two Americans and is a pending U.S. nonprofit organization. We hope to become a nongovernmental organization with a say at the United Nations someday. We take a global perspective. We welcome members and supporters from any country. Members of our Facebook group hail from just about every continent (we'll get someone in Antarctica yet!).

Our members hold a range of views on this subject. We focus instead on something so often neglected even though it is deeply decisive: increasing women’s alternatives in pregnancy prevention and in getting through difficult pregnancies and beyond. Expanding women’s nonviolent choices in all countries is urgently necessary, whatever the legal status of abortion in any particular nation. This is the surest way to promote respect for the lives of both women and children, unborn and already born.

Absolutely not! There is nothing "prolife" about setting off bombs or shooting people in cold blood. We advocate nonviolence in all things.

Not the last time we checked. Feel free to keep an eye on us, though!

Short Answer: All Our Lives upholds the recognized human right of voluntary, fully informed, socially supported family planning, both for its own sake and its essential role in reducing abortions. This right covers the full range of pregnancy prevention methods and affirms the need for comprehensive as opposed to abstinence-only sex education.

Long Answer: We vigorously oppose coercive practices such as contraceptive sabotage by male partners; environmental pollution that impedes voluntary exercise of fertility; government-endorsed sterilization of the poor, disabled persons, and people of color.

We recognize that comprehensive sex education and access to family planning are necessary but not sufficient conditions its correct, consistent, and thus optimally effective use.

Promoting equality within male-female relationships is critical as well. Inequalities related to race, class, disability, sexual orientation, and other aspects of identity also undermine family planning use. These must be alleviated as well.

Just as strongly, we support people’s right and ability to choose whichever method(s) they want to use or not use. In other words, we advocate the right of those with objections to “artificial” contraception to choose abstinence or natural family planning as much as we advocate the right of people with different beliefs to choose barrier methods, hormonal contraceptives, IUDs, male and female sterilization, and sexual practices that involve no risk of conception.

We have reviewed the scientific literature regarding:

• The effect of contraception on abortion rates.
• The mechanisms of action for present-day hormonal methods(including emergency contraception or EC) and intrauterine devices or IUDs.

We have concluded:

• Greater access to contraception reduces abortion in most cases. In those few cases where it does not, the answer is more contraception, not less.
• The best available evidence shows that hormonal methods (including EC) and IUDs work before, not after conception.

We include links to the evidence here:

http://www.allourlives.org/node/73

All Our Lives is not affiliated with Feminists for Life (FFL). We are a different organization. We appreciate FFL's work on behalf of already pregnant and parenting women, especially on college campuses. However, we obviously disagree with FFL that a prolife feminist organization can or should be neutral regarding women's right to access preconception measures such as comprehensive sex education and birth control which are vital to reducing abortion, among other reproductive benefits.  FFL also focuses too much on individual-level or local acts of charity for women who are already pregnant. While these are important, women require a wide range of systemic, institutional-level policy changes such as a living wage, paid parental leave, and a fully functioning child support enforcement system, to mention only a few.

We have two responses, in addition to the one we give here to MoveOn.org.

1. On the one hand, these are fair questions. If someone is concerned about life before birth, of course s/he is responsible to care about life after birth.

If you wonder about All Our Lives' commitment to already born human beings, you are most welcome to scrutinize our activities for the evidence. Although of course we could always do more and do it better, we believe we have nothing else to apologize and atone for.

We encourage adoption, especially adoption of waiting children, as one of many vitally necessary ways to care for already born children. Adoption, especially open adoption, should also be available as one choice for birth parents, with utmost sensitivity to the loss involved.

We certainly do not advocate any return to any closed, shame-ridden system of adoption. Nor do we condone the racism, classism, ablism, and LGBT phobia that shut perfectly good prospective adoptive parents out of the system, or cause certain children to be perceived as more "valuable" than others.

If you are interested in adoptive parenting, please visit the Nonviolent Choice Directory's resources on the subject.

If you are in the US, you can start with this article on adoption of waiting kids by an All Our Lives cofounder.

AdoptUSKids has resources on adoption by LGBT parents.

2. On the other hand, these questions about concern after birth are all too often asked in bad faith, that is, with consciously ill intent. We suspect that intent is to QED-prove the unavoidably, monstrously inhuman-by-definition hypocrisy of all "antichoicers." If so, then the questioners leave us no possible way to vindicate ourselves, no matter what we might be doing for the already born. One could adopt every last waiting child on Earth and still be found grossly wanting.