As Ohio and other states decide on abortion, anti-abortion activists look to rebrand themselves as not religious
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Tuesday, November 7, 2023
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Ohio voters will cast ballots on Nov. 7, 2023, to determine abortion rules in their state, joining six other states that have put the decisions before voters in ballot initiatives since 2022.
Key Points:
- Ohio voters will cast ballots on Nov. 7, 2023, to determine abortion rules in their state, joining six other states that have put the decisions before voters in ballot initiatives since 2022.
- Ohio residents will vote on “Issue 1,” which would amend the state constitution to explicitly protect an individual’s right to get an abortion.
- Some anti-abortion activists in Ohio have said that Issue 1 is “too radical” for the state.
- But I found that these activists also recognize that framing abortion as a human rights issue may appeal to a broader audience.
Perceptions of the anti-abortion movement
- In my interviews, anti-abortion rights activists said they understood that the public views their movement as anti-woman and driven by conservative Christians.
- These organizations are increasingly choosing to speak less about religion and more about human rights and science to combat the narrative that the anti-abortion movement is solely a Christian movement.
- In the 1980s, Operation Rescue, which blockaded abortion clinics and had thousands of their activists arrested, brought an evangelical religious fervor to the anti-abortion movement.
The changing role of religion
- While evangelicals remain a powerful voting bloc for Republicans, the percentage of Americans identifying as Christian has declined over the past 50 years from 90% to 63%.
- At the same time, the percentage of Americans who identify as religiously unaffiliated has increased from 5% to 29%.
- One activist I interviewed put it bluntly: “Why talk the Bible to people, many people, who say the Bible is a fairy tale?”
What anti-abortion organizations say
- I analyzed how anti-abortion organizations use Facebook to promote their work.
- At least on this social media platform, most anti-abortion organizations do not use religious language.
- Some organizations use religious references in nearly all of their Facebook posts, while other groups make only passing references to religion.
- More than 15% of the 193 anti-abortion organizations in my sample, however, make no religious references in their Facebook posts from June 2022 through September 2023.
Other findings
- Approximately one-quarter of the 45 activists I interviewed, however, said their organizations are explicitly Christian.
- When asked about the choice to frame anti-abortion arguments around faith, one advocate said, “We 100% present the faith and the theological argument of things.
- For them, any loss of human life is tragic, whether it is from abortion, war or the death penalty.
Ohio’s vote
- But Ohio is the first red state to vote on adding a right to abortion to the state’s constitution.
- Ohio voters will be the ones to decide which way to move the issue forward.
Anne Whitesell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.