As someone not from USA, this baffles me

Those of us who aren't far-right chuds in the USA have a saying about right-wing policy that may explain the phenomenon: "The cruelty is the point."
- More generously, as someone who knew a large number of religious rural folk growing up, what is important to them is to avoid the prospect of someone 'committing murder'; whether society offers the born child a slow death is of no consequence, as long as no one person or group pulls the metaphorical trigger.
  If I wanted to be even more generous, I would say that they imagine a support network of nongovernment religious organizations and families to indoctrinate the struggling parents and their child... but honestly, I don't think most of them even think that far ahead.
  
  It always pisses me off when people try claiming they want to do that last part.
  Not a single thing is stopping them from setting up support networks that, while I disagree with their politics, could legitimately do good by giving new families resources. But that's not actually what they want, it's never been what they want. Because if it was, they'd have done it already.
  It's as simple as the cruelty is the point. Someone doesn't live their life exactly how they think it should be lived, they believe that person should be punished.
  
  Same people who read the parable of the good Samaritan in church and don't appreciate the irony.
  
  That's even absolute bullshit. They give "lip service" to murder is bad at best. They don't care if the "wrong" people murder each other.
- That and controlling women is the point as well.
- Yeah it's this, it's all about protecting the in crowd and punishing the rest
- Exactly. They enjoy killing people, plain and simple. They're fascists, after all. It's what they do.

I hate how modern journalism uses phrases to distance us from the harsh reality, like "mortality rates increased" instead of "people killed by government policy", "officer involved shooting" instead on "murdered by police", "abortion rights" instead of "human rights".
- It looks bad for the advertisers to use strong words or take a stance.

They just want to control women.
It's got nothing to do with morality.

It makes more sense when you realize it's not about protecting life. It's about controlling women and punishing them for having sex.

Don't forget...
Say that only people born in this country count as Americans
Refuse to pass legislation supporting maternity / paternity leave, Pre-K childcare, paid school lunches, or aid for first-time home buyers
Make the act of getting pregnant incredibly dangerous
Freak the fuck out when the youngest generation of adults starts having fewer children

Two reasons this falls apart:
Abortion is healthcare. There are conditions that can’t be helped by anything else.
They don’t give a shit about mortality rates because it’s someone else doing all the dying (until it’s not).

- Exactly. What's mortality got when everyone's going to heaven? Death, where is thy sting?

Hell, it's okay to be against abortion and advising people against it if that aligns with your belief, but legislating against it to the detriment of women too? Women who want to get an abortion will get an abortion, whether it's freely available or not. I live in a country where that is the case, and trust me, it being illegal does not "save" or help anyone. We just see more women risking their lives for something that could've been safe for at least one of the "living" beings involved in the process.
- Same thing with alcohol prohibition. People are going to break the law, legal or not. The US is said to be the freedom land, but women can't have autonomy over their bodies.
  What I gathered is that 70% of the US congress is men, so it's not their freedom that they sacrifice.
  Christian values are important to some voters, so politicians can gain free points by promising anti-abortion laws.
  The politicians who make such decisions think one term at a time and disregard the consequences as long as it doesn't affect them. If they actually cared, they would also advocate for childcare benefits.

Still, the owners of those private prisons are going to make a killing when all those unwanted kids grow up into unwanted, traumatised adults.

The only people who buy that lie are the useful idiots they got marching in the streets. The decision makers themselves know very well what they're doing. Don't mistake cruelty for ineptitude.

It's actually incredibly straightforward. The cruelty is the point

Being pro forced pregnancy is not about "saving children", its about controling women. Conservatives hate that they can vote now
- It’s even simpler than that though. It’s about keeping the poor down and making more folks poor.

If you want an actual "answer", some christians believe the following:
Unborn children are sent from God to populate his earth.
They are at birth only burdened with "original sin", which Jesus lived and died for.
They believe a child not baptized, and not on the Jesus train still have the stain of original sin. So they believe that soul is fucked, as it never had the chance to get to heaven. That's why they believe abortion is especially heinous.
Next:
Many Christians believe in prosperity doctrine, wherein when you see someone doing well, that's because they are aligned with God in some way or form, and their success is god's success.
If you see someone doing poorly, it is because they have not accepted Jesus.
Healthcare:
Many believe that illness and failure are reflections of sin at worst, or simply god's tests at Best.
As before, lack of money for healthcare is attributed to a lack of alignment with God, as if he intended for you to get that healthcare, you would.
So the conclusion of this delusional mindset is that children must be given the chance at baptism to get their soul on the way to heaven.
Adults need to align with God in their lifestyle and choices, else bad things will happen and it's all their fault. So when you see an adult failing, it's not like they didn't have a chance to get right with God!
Because this is Lemmy, be clear, I do not hold this position but was raised in Christianity.
Edit there are people that actually, truly believe a fetus killed by abortion is murder of the darkest sort: a murder that robs the soul's chance at heaven. That not only are you "killing", but you are killing in a very, very dark way.
Of those who actually believe this, I can't imagine any compromise being reached, ever. How do you compromise with "willfully casting a soul into eternal darkness?
Many fake Christians only approach this topic from a control standpoint: they want to dominate others through fear. But the real believers are on another planet.
- I believe abortion is killing, but it only becomes murder by definition if abortion is outlawed. The literal definition is "the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another."
  The fetus won't have cerebral cortex till +12 weeks; no consciousness. So it wouldn't be much different than killing a plant or bacteria. It's debated when it becomes a human.
  Yes, I justify murder as it will likely reduce the suffering. Thus, I am a monster in Christians eyes.

Can't believe the Eugenics Party would do this.

This is surprisingly dense with info https://youtu.be/yts2F44RqFw
- That was a good watch, I can see binary view being at least part of the problem. I did think that religion might be part of the reason for some laws, but somehow didn't realize how big. And the video had many other good points worth of the watch.

Logically one must conclude that it's not at all about saving lives.

Making money > Everything else. Once we concede that America is hyper capitalist most other problems can be explained.
- Not this one. Banning abortion doesn't gain anyone money, so it's just pandering to right wing Christians.
  
  Which is a base they need to win the elections. Which they want so they can give out tax breaks… to the rich. And that’s the circle of life.
  
  Banning abortion doesn’t gain anyone money
  It's hugely lucrative for religious organizations and their affiliated political donor recipients. Also, creates a rich vein of for-profit adoption centers - particularly religiously affiliated ones - to effectively sell infants to older childless adults in the congregation.
  A bunch of those "You don't have to choose adoption, there is another way!" billboards are paid for by for-profit adoption groups and their intake organization affiliates.
- Making money > Everything else. Once we concede that America is hyper capitalist most other problems can be explained.
  Always has been...

What you're witnessing is a travesty to be sure. As someone that doesn't think like these assholes, I'm left as confused as you are. That said, I'm sitting in this frying-pan and have had some time to think about it while the heat rises.
An optimistic view would have me think: these are religious fundamentalists that are focused on the present and are not at all future-focused on outcomes or unintended consequences. As die-hard religious types, data, logic, and sound reasoning are all superseded by faith and feelings. It's no conspiracy, but rather an outcome of The Southern Strategy which is more or less an artificial "movement" generated by the GOP. Hopefully, a major shift in politics would see this all go away or greatly diminish in the public eye.
A pessimistic view has me thinking that this is an artifact, a symptom, of an upper-class funding policy to punch down on everyone in order to create a robust underclass to rule. This means saddling the middle-class with more debt, expenses, and fewer options than before, rendering them poor and less of a threat. For the whole abortion issue, it means eliminating all but the most expensive and labor-intensive option for pregnancy: birth and child-rearing. This may also be a ham-fisted way to force positive (or more positive) population growth which also translates to more economic activity an profit for the top. This is also fueled by a very expensive child-care and healthcare markets. These days, parents get horribly crunched trying to balance two household incomes, health expenses, and basic workday supervision for their kids. People are being asked, more and more, to either settle for a lower standard of living, spend their way to being poorer, or just have fewer children. The latter stops being an option with right-wing policy like the topic at hand.

I would be much less against pro-life if the movement would focus on better care for would-be-mothers, easier adoption and better oversight, financial support for girls who give up their children, increasing adoption numbers, better sex ed, etc. instead of banning abortions.
They are exclusively focusing on the worst way to reduce abortions.

What pseudoscientific ideology has to day that life doesn't beging at conception? Is left denying science now?
- Life began billions of years ago.
  This phrasing is meant to hide a religious argument as a scientific one. The question they're really asking is "When does God insert a soul into a body?"
- It's just a poorly written description of the argument. If I understand the argument correctly there's a difference between a blastocyst (collection of cells not yet developed) and a fetus.
- Even if it did start at conception, the real argument is about bodily autonomy. No one can be forced to donate any part of their body to keep someone else alive. Nobody can take your blood without your permission, why should women have their bodies taken without theirs?
- This is fun. With that logic you'll be naming a tumour or parasitic infection.
- I agree with the biological definition, "organism that can survive as an individual". Even if the fetus has a parasitic relation, it is capable of developing all functions to fit the full definition.
  There are other definitions of 'life' and anyone is free to believe either way, but the more subjective question is: When does the fetus become a person?