Earlier this week, I interviewed author Jessica Valenti about the language being used in the battle over abortion rights. Specifically, we discussed anti-abortion Republicans’ reluctance to use the word “ban” to describe what they’re trying to do.
Rather than say they want to implement a 20- 15- 12- or 6-week “ban” on abortion, these politicians and anti-abortion advocates have begun referring to these policies as “reasonable restrictions” or arguing that they’re simply trying to set some “national standard.” “Consensus” is another term that gets thrown around, falsely giving the impression that their abortion-banning policies are popular.
“I saw that they really didn't want to use the word ‘ban’ at all,” Valenti told me. “At first, they weren't explicit about it. Then they said, ‘No, we're not using 'ban.' We don't use 'ban' because there are no abortion bans in America.’ This is their whole thing—they say that "ban" means total ban without any exceptions, even for a person's life, and therefore Texas doesn't have an abortion ban; Tennessee doesn't have an abortion ban.”