My social media is filled with men who support women who support abortion rights. One particular fellow, who I’ve had to mute because he keeps trolling me, has engaged in anti-Catholic bigotry in addition to his misogyny, which I find ironic since he’s all about empowering women and their choices. It comes with the territory, like locusts in the Old Testament.

If I lived my entire life in social media world, I’d think that any time a man helped a woman get an abortion, he would be lauded with the kind of fervor reserved for Tom Jones at a librarian’s retirement party (or Bobby Sherman at my own). But I do not live my life in that world, thank God, and so I’ve seen a lot of people piling on one man who apparently did help a woman get an abortion (even though he’s denying it.)

That person would be Herschel Walker, Republican candidate for Senate in Georgia. To those of my generation, Walker was a nemesis and then an ally. A Heisman Trophy-winner, he burnished his reputation while racking up rushing records for the Dallas Cowboys in their mid-to-late ‘80s halcyon days. That means he was an enemy of every sane Philadelphia football fan. After a stint with the Vikings, he landed in Philadelphia, which made it difficult to hate him. Now, he’s running for political office, and a lot of people do hate him.

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It has nothing to do with his football fame. It has everything to do with the fact that he’s a friend of Donald Trump, that he’s espoused conservative views and that he’s described himself as strongly pro-life. A whole new generation of liberal Philadelphians hate him because of that, and not because of the way he ran with the pigskin. And that’s fair.

What’s not fair is what’s happening to Walker in the media, an October surprise double whammy that attacks his “hypocrisy” on life issues. Walker is, by his own admission, a very imperfect man. He fathered children with different women, cheated on his wife and his “official” family, was allegedly abusive and succumbed to all of the temptations that money, fame and supernatural talent in the greatest American sport will facilitate. 

In other words, no different than a majority of the athletes we look up to in a misguided search for heroes. And by all accounts, he was not pro-life.

The latest controversy broke this week when the Daily Beast came out with an oppo research piece claiming that Walker had paid for an ex-girlfriend’s abortion. A couple days later, it added a story about how that ex-girlfriend later gave birth to the former running back’s baby. Walker, for his part, has denied knowing her, paying for her abortion, and fathering a child by her.

I do think it’s ironic that all of a sudden, the Left has discovered how horrible it is to pay for the destruction of a baby. Maybe, despite their own best efforts, we’re making progress.

I have no idea whether Walker is telling the truth, or trying to play the “He said, She said… and went to the press” game. It’s possible that he really did pay for an abortion, and that he is the father of his ex’s child. Given his past admissions and the availability of sex, drugs, and money to guys who can run with a ball, it’s even probable.

There is nothing at all honorable in lying, in being a hypocrite, or in helping someone end an unborn human life. I won’t defend any of it. But I do have sympathy for the idea that people change, and that yesterday’s abortion rights activist can become today’s pro life icon (see Johnson, Abby and Nathanson, Bernard.)

I also have a huge problem with those on the left acting like Victorian spinsters with their lace hankies held to the nose at the thought of a man paying for a woman’s abortion. Heaven forfend! How can it be that someone would actually support a woman in destroying the child they created together? How could he dare make it easier for her to snuff out that tiny spark of life? That cad! That vile creature, that inhuman scallywag!

Give me a break, libs. Not one of the people trying to present Walker’s alleged transgressions as disqualifying for office really have a problem with a man subsidizing his partner’s abortion. They, in fact, would praise anyone and anything that makes it easier to terminate innocent and inconvenient life. That’s how they roll, that’s their thing. To paraphrase an old trope: to the progressive mind, abortion should be safe, legal, and rarely paid for by the woman.

So while I don’t have a dog in this fight, not being in Georgia and not being able to vote for either the former running back or the Christian minister who has been credibly accused (though never convicted) of abusing his own ex, I do think it’s ironic that all of a sudden, the Left has discovered how horrible it is to pay for the destruction of a baby.

Maybe, despite their own best efforts, we’re making progress.

Christine Flowers is an attorney and lifelong Philadelphian. @flowerlady61