——一个亲历强制流产女性的时代启蒙与反思

作者：钱钰琳

编辑：胡丽莉 校对：程筱筱 翻译：彭小梅

我叫钱钰琳，出生在1991年的中国海南。我这一代人，从小接受的教育里，计划生育是一项正确而必要的国策，课本上说，它让国家摆脱了贫困，让社会更加稳定有序。那时候，我从未怀疑过这些话的真实性，甚至理所当然地认为，国家对生育的管理，是一种合理的安排，而不是对个人的干预。直到2012年，我第一次怀孕，我才真正明白，这项所谓的“国策”，意味着什么。那一年，我被医院查出怀孕八周，因为没有结婚，我被认定为违反了计划生育政策，随后计划生育办公室的人直接进入我的宿舍，把我带到医院，在未经我明确同意的情况下，强制实施了流产手术。那一天，我躺在手术台上，身体的疼痛远不及内心的绝望强烈，因为我第一次意识到，我的身体并不完全属于我自己，而是可以被一种更高权力决定命运的对象。那不是一次普通的手术，而是一种无声却彻底的否定，它否定的不只是一个未出生的生命，也否定了我作为一个独立个体应当拥有的选择权。

在那之后的很长一段时间里，我试图说服自己接受这一切，我告诉自己，这是国家政策，是时代的要求，个人必须服从整体的需要。可多年以后，当我看到中国开始全面开放二胎、三胎，甚至不断通过各种方式鼓励和催促女性生育的时候，我内心深处一直压抑的疑问，开始重新浮现出来。同样是怀孕，在2012年，我的怀孕被认定为错误，被强制终止，而在今天，怀孕却被赞扬，被鼓励，被视为一种对国家的贡献。这种巨大的反差，让我第一次认真思考一个问题：如果生育是一种责任，那么当年为什么不允许我承担这种责任？如果生育是一种权利，那么当年为什么剥夺了我的权利？当一种行为可以在不同的年代，被完全相反地定义为错误和正确的时候，那么所谓的对与错，究竟是基于什么标准？

我逐渐意识到，在这种不断变化的政策背后，个体从来不是被真正考虑的中心。计划生育时代，国家需要减少人口，于是女性的生育被严格限制，甚至可以被强制终止；而当人口开始下降，国家需要增加人口时，生育又被重新赋予了新的意义，女性再次被赋予新的角色和责任。在这个过程中，唯一不变的是，决定权始终不在个体手中，而是在更高层面的权力结构之中。女性的身体，在某种意义上，被当作一种可以根据需要进行调节的工具，而不是完全属于个人的存在。

这种认识，并不是在一瞬间形成的，而是在经历和时间中慢慢累积起来的。我开始明白，我曾经经历的强制流产，不仅仅是一段个人的不幸经历，更是一种时代逻辑下的必然结果。在那个逻辑里，个体的意愿可以被忽略，个体的痛苦可以被解释为必要的代价，而个体本身，只是一个更大目标中的一部分。当我再看到那些鼓励生育的宣传时，我感受到的，不再是简单的愤怒，而是一种更深的清醒，因为我已经明白，在那种体系下，生或者不生，从来都不是一个纯粹属于个人的问题，而是一种可以被定义、被改变、甚至被强制执行的决定。

也正是从那时起，我开始真正思考自由的意义。我逐渐明白，自由并不是单纯拥有某种权利，而是拥有决定是否行使这种权利的可能性。如果一个人可以被强制不生，也可以被鼓励必须生，那么她真正缺少的，并不是生育本身，而是选择的权利。当一个社会可以在短短十几年之间，从限制生育转向鼓励生育，却从未真正面对和反思那些曾经被迫放弃的生命和人生时，我开始意识到，真正需要被启蒙的，不只是个人，而是对个体价值本身的重新认识。我的经历让我明白，一个人真正的尊严，并不在于她是否生育，而在于她是否可以决定自己的命运，而不是被时代的需要所决定。

When Will My Womb Truly Belong to Me?

— The Awakening and Reflection of a Woman Who Experienced Forced Abortion

Author: Qian YulinEditor: Hu Lili Proofreader: Cheng Xiaoxiao Translator: Peng Xiaomei

Abstract:The author recalls her experience of being subjected to a forced abortion in 2012 after becoming pregnant while unmarried. Through this experience, she reflects on the shifting policies from restricting childbirth to encouraging it and raises questions about individual choice and bodily autonomy.

My name is Qian Yulin. I was born in 1991 in Hainan, China. For people of my generation, the education we received from childhood taught us that the family planning policy was a correct and necessary national policy. Our textbooks said it helped the country escape poverty and made society more stable and orderly. At that time, I never questioned the truth of these statements. I naturally believed that the state’s management of childbirth was a reasonable arrangement rather than interference in personal life. It was not until 2012, when I became pregnant for the first time, that I truly understood what this so-called “national policy” meant. That year, a hospital examination confirmed that I was eight weeks pregnant. Because I was unmarried, I was deemed to have violated the family planning policy. Soon afterward, officials from the family planning office came directly into my dormitory and took me to the hospital. Without my clear consent, a forced abortion procedure was carried out. That day, lying on the operating table, the pain in my body was far less intense than the despair in my heart. For the first time, I realized that my body did not fully belong to me. It was something whose fate could be decided by a higher authority. It was not merely a medical procedure. It was a silent but complete denial. It denied not only an unborn life but also my right, as an independent individual, to make my own choices.

For a long time afterward, I tried to persuade myself to accept what had happened. I told myself that it was state policy, that it was the demand of the era, and that individuals must obey the needs of the collective. But years later, when I saw China fully open the two-child and three-child policies and even begin encouraging women to have more children through various measures, a question that had long been buried deep within me resurfaced. The same pregnancy that had been judged wrong in 2012 and forcibly terminated is today praised, encouraged, and even regarded as a contribution to the nation. This enormous contrast made me seriously consider a question for the first time: If childbirth is a responsibility, why was I not allowed to assume that responsibility back then? If childbirth is a right, why was my right taken away at that time? When the same action can be defined as completely wrong in one era and completely right in another, then on what standard are these judgments of right and wrong based?

Gradually I realized that behind these constantly changing policies, the individual has never truly been the central concern. During the era of strict family planning, the state needed to reduce population, and therefore women’s reproduction was tightly restricted—even forcibly terminated. When the population began to decline and the state needed more births, childbirth was suddenly given new meaning, and women were once again assigned new roles and responsibilities. Throughout this entire process, one thing never changed: the decision-making power was never in the hands of the individual. It always belonged to a higher structure of authority. In a certain sense, women’s bodies were treated as instruments that could be adjusted according to the needs of the state rather than as something that truly belonged to the individual.

This realization did not come in a single moment. It accumulated gradually through experience and time. I began to understand that the forced abortion I experienced was not merely a personal tragedy. It was the inevitable outcome of the logic of that era.

Within that logic, an individual’s will be ignored. Personal suffering could be explained as a necessary cost. The individual herself was only a small component within a much larger goal.

When I later saw propaganda encouraging childbirth, I no longer felt only anger. What I felt instead was a deeper clarity. I had come to understand that within such a system, whether one gives birth or not has never been purely a personal matter. It is something that can be defined, redefined, and even forcibly implemented.

From that moment on, I began to seriously think about the meaning of freedom. I gradually realized that freedom is not merely possessing a certain right; it is possessing the possibility of deciding whether to exercise that right. If a person can be forced not to give birth and later encouraged—or pressured—to give birth, then what she truly lacks is not the act of childbirth itself, but the right to choose. When a society can shift within just over a decade from restricting childbirth to encouraging it, yet never truly confront or reflect on the lives and futures that were once forcibly taken away, I realized that what truly needs enlightenment is not only the individual, but society’s understanding of the value of the individual. My experience taught me that a person’s true dignity does not lie in whether she gives birth. It lies in whether she can decide her own destiny—rather than having it decided by the needs of the era.