If you’ve ever talked with a pro-choice person about abortion (in person or online), chances are really good that at some point you wanted to yell “But it’s a baby!!” Pro-choice people often give justifications for killing prenatal children that they would never in a million years accept for killing born children, and it drives pro-lifers crazy. But as you might guess, yelling “But it’s a baby!!” isn’t going to get you very far in the conversation. Here’s what to do instead.
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What’s happening when a pro-choice person says something like “Abortion needs to be legal so women don’t end up trapped in poverty” or “so women don’t lose out on being able to finish college if they get pregnant” or “so babies don’t end up in foster care”? To a lot of pro-life ears, it sounds like the pro-choice people saying these things are moral monsters who think women should be able to kill babies just so they don’t end up poor or without a college degree, or who think it’s better to kill children than put them in foster care.
But when I dig a little deeper in my conversations with pro-choice people, I’ve found that that’s not what’s happening. What’s happening is that we’re talking past each other: we’re not actually talking about the root of the disagreement.
Imagine two friends, Ike and Frances, are having a very important debate about whether ice cream or frozen yogurt is a better dessert. Ike starts off by saying “Ice cream is definitely better—it’s way yummier, it’s not even close.” Frances cuts in, “No, frozen yogurt is better—it’s healthier.” Ike says, “No, you don’t understand—ice cream is rich, it’s got a perfect balance of sweetness and creaminess, and it’s way smoother. It’s obviously yummier.” Frances, not really listening, says, “No, you don’t understand—frozen yogurt has more protein, it has bacteria that’s good for your gut, it’s obviously healthier.”
That conversation is never going to get anywhere. Why? Because they’re not talking about what they actually disagree about. For all they’ve said, Ike might actually agree that frozen yogurt is healthier than ice cream, and Frances might actually agree that ice cream is yummier than frozen yogurt. What’s the actual root of their disagreement? What’s the premise they disagree about that’s leading them to disagree about the conclusion? What would they need to be talking about to actually make progress in the conversation? Whether it’s more important for a dessert to be yummy or healthy.
In the same way, when a pro-choice person brings up poverty, education access, or foster care, they’re not talking about the root of their disagreement with pro-life people. And in a sense, the instinct to say “But it’s a baby!” is right—you’re trying to steer the discussion toward the root of the disagreement. But the problem is that it can also come across like you’re ignoring what the pro-choice person just said. Trot Out A Toddler is a beautiful tool designed for exactly these cases—designed to help get to the root of the disagreement without sounding like you’re ignoring what they just said.
We at ERI didn’t invent the Trot Out A Toddler strategy, but here’s our formulation of it:
- A. Affirm the concern. The really important first step is to sit with what the pro-choice person just said. Don’t just say “Yeah, poverty is a big deal, but…”. That’s a sure-fire way to communicate that you don’t actually think poverty is a big deal. Spend a solid thirty seconds plus agreeing with them. If you can’t spend thirty seconds talking about the devastating impacts poverty can have on people and families, do some research until you can.
- B. Brace for the weird question. As you’ll see in step C, the central move Trot Out a Toddler makes is to ask the pro-choice person if the concern they just brought up to justify killing fetuses would also justify killing a toddler (and of course the answer’s always no). But that’s kind of a weird thing to just ask somebody, and it can come across like you’re accusing them of thinking it’s okay to kill toddlers. So to help prevent that, set yourself up for success by asking in advance “Can I ask you kind of a weird question?”
- C. Create a parallel scenario. Come up with a parallel situation that applies the same concern they just applied to abortion to toddlers, and tell a story about it. Whatever the concern was they just brought up, imagine a mother who’s in a really difficult situation that killing her toddler would make easier, at least on paper. Then ask the weird question: “Should that be legal?”
- D. Describe the logic. Explain why you just gave that parallel scenario, pulling the curtain back on your own thinking and helping them pinpoint where they disagree. I always say something like: “The reason I bring that up is that I have a view that might sound kind of weird, but I think I have really good arguments for it. My weird view is that human fetuses are people like you and me, with an equal right to be protected from violence. And if I’m right about that, then in the same way that even though keeping families from getting trapped in a cycle of poverty is really important, it doesn’t justify killing a toddler, it also doesn’t justify killing a fetus. What are your thoughts on that?”
The purpose of trotting out a toddler is not to convince the pro-choice person to become pro-life. It’s to find out what the root of the disagreement is so you can go talk about that—so that you can go talk about the thing that can actually make progress in the conversation! Often pro-choice people will have one of two responses:
- “Your weird view is just wrong, fetuses aren’t people.” If they say this, great! Now you’re in fetal personhood land, you know what you disagree about, and you can make the Equal Rights Argument.
- “It doesn’t matter even if your weird view is right and fetuses are people—no person has a right to use someone else’s body.” If they say this, great! Now you’re in bodily autonomy land, and you can make a bodily autonomy argument.
Either way, you’ve successfully steered the conversation toward the root of the disagreement without sounding like you’re saying the important issues they just brought up don’t matter.
Rebecca is the Director of Philosophy & Engagement at Equal Rights Institute. She is a PhD candidate and former teaching assistant in philosophy at the University of Southern California, where she also cofounded and co-led the student pro-life club.
A sought-after speaker, Rebecca frequently delivers lectures all across the country at academic conferences, colleges, churches, high schools, and other events.
Rebecca’s favorite part of her work at USC was teaching both her philosophy students and her pro-life club members how to cultivate mutual, respectful dialogues with people they disagree with. That work has led her to the strong conviction that if we can teach one side of an issue how to approach dialogues well, people on the other side will very often follow suit, so that we really can radically transform the state of public discourse on abortion just by helping the pro-life side to have a better approach: we can create a culture where people on both sides value each other more and perceive the truth more clearly, and ultimately we can change more minds and save more lives. At ERI, Rebecca uses that passion and experience and her philosophical expertise to train and inspire pro-lifers through writing, video content, live speaking and interviews, academic research, and individual consulting for pro-life advocates and politicians.
“You can’t fix a dialogue single-handedly—it takes two good-faith interlocutors to make a good-faith dialogue. But what you can do is make the first move. You can clearly communicate and demonstrate your care for the other person, your genuine desire to understand where they’re coming from, and your openness to considering their point of view, even while they’re not doing the same for you. It takes a little bit of work and a lot of charity, but if you do that, far more often than not the other person will meet you halfway—even people you think of as crazy extremists.”
Rebecca expects to complete her PhD in philosophy at the University of Southern California in May of 2026. Her dissertation is in metaethics; her other areas of research include philosophy of law, epistemology, and philosophy of religion. She has earned an MA in philosophy from USC, as well as a BS in philosophy, summa cum laude, from Hillsdale College, with minors in mathematics and theatre.