This article is part of Upstream, The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you. *** YouTuber Jesse Ridgeway, who goes by McJuggerNuggets to his over 4 million subscribers, has sparked heated debates over the last week after announcing that he and his wife had chosen to get an abortion. They couple recorded themselves explaining that decision after discovering the unborn child had a high likelihood of being born with Down syndrome. The pro-life crowd rightfully called out this evil for what it is: eugenics. Even some leftists seemed to grapple with the larger ramifications, with several X commenters expressing their cognitive dissonance that abortion on demand for any reason is good, but also people with disabilities should be protected. Ridgeway said when he first found out the baby may have Down syndrome, he was “optimistic” and would try to “make it work” if the child was just “a little slow intellectually.” But he decided against it. “I just didn’t fully understand what Down syndrome entailed,” he explained. “I didn’t realize just how rough it is for the child, let alone the family … more often than not, they would be fully dependent on others for the rest of their life.” The one thing no one seems to be talking about is how Ridgeway opened up a conversation that should be seen as a gift to the pro-life argument. That is, he exposed the reality of why abortions are happening, and it’s not the extreme situations that so often dominate headlines. Pro-abortion advocates would love for the general public to picture abortions happening only when the baby was going to die anyway, or when the woman was raped, or very, very early in a pregnancy when the fetus was supposedly nothing more than a meaningless clump of cells. For years, pro-lifers have pushed back on that narrative with facts and reason. But it took a random YouTuber to show the reality of who is getting abortions and why. Per the National Library of Medicine, the most common reasons women seek abortion include “financial reasons (40%), timing (36%), partner related reasons (31%), and the need to focus on other children (29%). Most women reported multiple reasons for seeking an abortion crossing over several themes (64%).” Studies show that at least 67% of babies diagnosed with Down syndrome in the United States are aborted. In Iceland, there are almost no cases of Down syndrome because those who have it are killed before they have the chance to be born. Between 350,000 and 400,000 Americans have Down syndrome, meaning they were born with an extra chromosome. When polled, these individuals consistently say they are satisfied with their life and were happy they were born, as The Daily Wire previously reported.  The Ridgeways going viral for the killing of their unborn child has prompted parents, siblings, and friends of people living with Down syndrome to post stories of why their lives are amazing. They speak of challenges, yes, but also of a surprising joy that can only come from accepting reality. People of faith would call this following God’s plan. However, even non-religious people can understand the futility in trying to control the world and the peace that comes from embracing life as it comes.  It also points to a larger question: Who is qualified to determine what makes a life worth living?  Stories such as the Ridgeways’ are gleefully held up by the pro-abortion crowd as proof of why abortion should exist. But this viral Down syndrome story is a bridge too far for many people who recognize that Trisomy 21 isn’t life-limiting enough to warrant a death sentence. They are pointing out how people with Down syndrome are often the happiest individuals they know. Why do they deserve to die for being “differently abled,” as progressives would say? I used to have a distant acquaintance who was an ob-gyn who performed abortions. We would get into surface-level debates all the time about abortion. I will never forget the one time she conceded to me on one point: sex-selective abortions. She recalled a time her patient, who only wanted two children, came into her office to schedule a second-term abortion after finding out she was pregnant with a second girl. “All I could think about was this woman’s adorable toddler, with blonde curls and big eyes, and think she was making a huge mistake terminating a healthy pregnancy,” she told me. Even someone participating in such an evil act had a moral standard. Most Americans who believe abortion should be legal also have lines they won’t cross, which are commonly determined by gestational age. But the thing about lines is that they are incredibly arbitrary. If we tell mothers only to abort for life-limiting medical reasons, then who gets to decide what counts as life-limiting?  Ridgeway has made it clear that the real justifications people give for abortion — Down syndrome, my boyfriend broke up with me, I wanted a boy instead, I’m just really tired — are flimsy excuses when it comes down to it. Abortion is never the right choice. Now that the reasons it keeps happening are out in the open, we can start having honest conversations about it.