Christian YouTuber Ruslan and singer/ song writer John Legend shared an exchange about abortion after Ruslan criticized comments Legend made in October. While speaking with NFL tight end Shannon Sharpe about his wife, Chrissy Teigen’s, life-saving “abortion,” Legend addressed his own views on the topic. “I grew up in the church, and we were taught that, you know, we were supposed to be pro-life,” he said. “As soon as I became an adult, I just realized that we need that choice. We don’t need the government telling us what to do, and women don’t need the government telling them what to do with their bodies. And life is complicated, and there are all kinds of reasons why people might want or need an abortion, and the government has no place in that decision,” he concluded.

Legend drew on his personal experiences when Teigen, who has struggled with fertility, suffered a miscarriage and required a D&C to remove the dying baby. Legend, however, characterized the experience as an “abortion.” “She was well past 15 weeks when she had to have an abortion. She was miscarrying and bleeding out. All these things were happening. Her life was in danger,” he said. The experience, he said, woke him up to the kinds of decisions women need to make. “Everything that happens in that room is private, and it’s so intensely personal and intensely physical. A woman feels every aspect of this thing,” he said. Ruslan made a response video to Legend’s comments, stating that what Legend was describing was being mischaracterized as an abortion. “You know that the pro-life position is about elective abortions. Your baby was tragically dying; your wife was miscarrying. She needed a surgical procedure called a D&C to take the tragedy of a dead baby inside of her out.” Ruslan stated that this was an intentional conflation by abortion proponents to justify abortions by mislabeling procedures like Teigen’s as “abortion” and accusing pro-lifers of denying women access to life-saving procedures.

Legend responded to Ruslan’s video on Instagram. “The ‘pro-life’ position is that the government should be involved in the most intimate decisions any woman could make. Making something illegal means the government has to enforce and adjudicate these intimate decisions and procedures. The government has the power to force someone to carry for 9 months,” he wrote. He cited instances like rape and incest, where a woman would have to first prove she had been raped to even be considered eligible for an abortion. “The government has no place in the conversation.” Others on the thread accused Legend of making a “straw man” argument. One commentor who claimed to be a doctor wrote, D&C’s were not prohibited “in the case of what’s called an incompetent miscarriage, where tragically, the baby isn’t alive anymore but there are products left in the uterus.”

Ruslan also engaged. “‘Making something illegal’ is the same thing we do with murder, drunk driving and a variety of other laws that protect people and… LEGISLATE what you’re allowed to do with your own base. So yes, the government enforces all sorts of laws,” he wrote. He also stated he was not referring to rape or incest, but the specific case Legend was citing with his wife. “I’m speaking to you specifically using the tragedy of a miscarriage to argue for [abortion] on demand. And you, probably knowing that the [vast] amount of [abortions] are not for the mother’s health, rape or incest.” He asked whether or not Legend would agree with him that abortion should not be used as a form of birth control. Legend, however, refused to concede the point, saying the two were at a “moral stalemate.” Legend said he did not believe a “fetus” has “equal or more rights than the woman.” Ruslan asked when someone is granted human rights. He also discussed the encounter on his channel, with an invite to Legend to appear and have a discussion. To date, Legend has not responded.