Last week, the Obama administration made clear their intentions to reverse a former Bush regulation on abortion. This may not seem like a regulation that affects you, and most likely at the college age it does not. However, the reversal of this regulation will affect most of us far more than we realize.

The original regulation protected jobs of health officials, such as doctors and nurses, if they refused to participate in an abortion for moral reasons. Critics of the regulation stated that it was too vague and could even apply to pharmacists who could refuse to sell abortion pills. It did not punish those who chose to participate, and it did not stop anyone from participating. It only protected those that chose not to.
The new administration is set this week to officially state its intentions of reversing this regulation. The regulation will be lifted. Therefore, if a doctor or nurse refused for moral reasons to participate in an abortion, they could be fired, lose their job, sued, or even lose their license to practice.
So what does this mean for you? Whether or not the abortion issue is any concern for you while voting, the fact that this regulation will soon be lifted should concern you. One of the greatest freedoms we have in this country is that of objecting for moral reasons. You may object to any number of things. If you choose to object to it, you do not have to say the pledge of allegiance. Moral objections are the basis that keeps students from being required to pray in a public school. Moral objections allow an individual to celebrate an important religious holiday that others may not, adding to the wonderful diversity that is this nation. By removing the right of a health official to refuse participation in something that is morally wrong to them, you make the way to remove all other moral objections.
Imagine you are a chef. You love cooking, and you enjoy it. By feeding others, you save lives by providing them with a necessary good. However, you are also a vegetarian and you refuse to cook meat. Should you be required to cook it? Most of us would say no. Most of us would also agree you should not lose your job over something like this, either. If a customer comes in and orders meat, another chef can prepare the dish or they can go to a restaurant where meat will be prepared by more chefs. Now apply this same scenario to abortion. Despite being the same scenario in a different setting, public opinion would change dramatically. Those who support lifting this regulation do not realize that when we change one scenario where you cannot apply the moral objections option, then you open the door to lift all.
If you enjoy your freedom to morally object to something you don’t want to participate in, then it would make sense to be against the reversal of a regulation like this. As laws constantly change in this country, if you do not currently use your option to morally object, there may be a day when you do. This regulation – or rather the removal of it – may not seem to be important. But what about other regulations that protect those that morally object to other things? If one regulation is lifted, what stops the others from having the same fate? Think the reversal of one little abortion regulation does not affect you? Think again.