Justice for Girls: On the Provision of Abortion as Adequate Care*

Abstract

When the US Supreme Court rejected the constitutional right to abortion care, several US states enacted bans. This legal change exposed critical moral questions about pregnancy in childhood: What do adults owe to an impregnated girl? This article shows that both opponents of abortion and defenders of women’s rights make a mistake by overlooking that a girl is a child. Her caregivers should view her impregnation as a malady and take steps to terminate it. This article presents a novel analysis of a previously unnamed injustice—antigirlism—to make sense of the mistreatment that girls endure in reproductive care.