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The Battle Over Abortion Language

April 21, 2009 By Lisa Miller

The way you talk about your desire for common ground, it turns out, signals whose side you’re actually on.

Advice to would-be culture warriors in the 21st century: walk softly and carry a big thesaurus. According to the conventional wisdom, the culture wars are over in Washington—or, at the very least, reduced to sideline skirmishes. Buoyed by the support of centrist, socially conservative Christians, the Obama administration has ushered in a new era of conciliation. Ideological opponents—especially those on either side of the abortion issue—are now trying to establish common ground. This is one of the priorities of the president’s Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. (I wrote a story about this a month ago.) A first order of business is “abortion reduction,” a seemingly noncontroversial and laudable goal. By agreeing that abortion is a complex moral issue and that it should be less frequent, former enemies can work together to find ways to reduce abortions.

Filed Under: Newsweek Tagged With: Abortion, Christians, Lisa Miller

Lisa Miller

Lisa Miller

Lisa Miller is a staff writer at New York magazine. She is a former columnist for the Washington Post, former senior editor of Newsweek magazine, and author of "Heaven: Our Enduring Fascination with the Afterlife."

About Lisa Miller

Lisa-Miller-Headshot

Lisa Miller is a staff writer at New York magazine. She is the former religion columnist for the Washington Post, former senior editor of Newsweek magazine, and author of "Heaven: Our Enduring Fascination with the Afterlife."

In 2014, Lisa Miller was nominated for the National Magazine Award and featured in Best Magazine Writing of 2014.

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NOMINATED FOR THE NATIONAL MAGAZINE AWARD

Lisa-Miller-Headshot

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