Continuing to quote from John Swomley’s March 1988 Humanist article. Mr. Swomley’s article gives something you don’t see too often – real-life examples of women who have had “partial birth” abortions, who would be either forbidden from having abortions at all, or who would have to choose more dangerous procedures, if the pro-lifers have their way.
According to pro-lifers, we can’t have a health exemption because “a mother could go to her doctor and say that a baby would interfere with her homework, and the doctor could then list the reason for the abortion as ‘mother’s health endangered.'” By telling each other campfire stories like that, pro-lifers refuse to deal with the reality of the ways their laws, if enacted, will cause grave injury to real life women. Here’s the reality: Women are not the hateful monsters pro-lifers imagine (“I’ve got to do homework – guess I’d better kill my baby!”). Women’s choices are typically made for good reasons – unlike the decision to block women from getting the medical care they need.
VIKKI STELLA from Naperville, Illinois. Parents of two daughters, Vikki and her husband Archer discovered at thirty-two weeks of pregnancy that the fetus had only fluid filling the cranium where its brain should have been, as well as other major problems. The Stellas made “the most loving decision we could have made” to terminate the pregnancy. Because the procedure preserved her fertility, Vikki was able to conceive again. In December 1995, she gave birth to a healthy boy, Nicholas.
MARY-DOROTHY LINE from Los Angeles, California. In the summer of 1995, Mary-Dorothy was told at twenty-one weeks of pregnancy that her fetus had an advanced, textbook case of hydrocephalus–an excess of fluid on the brain. It was so acute and so advanced that it was untreatable. Practicing Catholics, she and her husband Bill sought a medical miracle but were told that no surgery or therapy could save their baby. Indeed, the medical experts who reviewed the case told her that her own health was at risk, and so the Lines decided to end the pregnancy. Mary-Dorothy was able to become pregnant again and gave birth to a healthy baby girl in September 1996.
COREEN COSTELLO from Agoura, California. In April 1995, seven months pregnant with her third child, Coreen and her husband Jim found out that a lethal neuromuscular disease had left their much-wanted daughter unable to survive. Its body had stiffened and was frozen, wedged in a transverse position. In addition, amniotic fluid had puddled and built up to dangerous levels in Coreen’s uterus. Devout Christians and opposed to abortion, the Costellos agonized for over two weeks about their decision and baptized the fetus in utero. Finally, Coreen’s increasing health problems forced them to accept the advice of numerous medical experts that the intact dilation and extraction (D&X) was, indeed, the best option for Coreen’s own health, and the abortion was performed. Later, in June 1996, Coreen gave birth to a healthy son.
MAUREEN MARY BRITELL from Sandwich, Massachusetts. Maureen and her husband Andrew, practicing Catholics, were expecting their second child in early 1994 when, at six months’ gestation, a sonogram revealed that the fetus had anencephaly. No brain was developing, only a brain stem. Experts at the New England Medical Center in Boston confirmed that the fetus the Britells had named Dahlia would not survive. The Britells’ parish priest supported their decision to induce labor and terminate the pregnancy. During the delivery, a complication arose and the placenta would not drop. The umbilical cord had to be cut, aborting the fetus while still in delivery in order to prevent serious health risks for Maureen. Dahlia had a Catholic funeral.
Note that under the terms of the “partial birth” abortion ban the Senate just passed, Maureen’s doctor would legally be forbidden from cutting the umbilical cord, since that would be a “discreet act” killing the fetus. If the “partial birth” ban becomes law, the doctor would face a choice of allowing Maureen to be badly injured, or committing an act which could cause the doctor to lose her/his medical license and spend up to two years in prison.
CLAUDIA CROWN ADES from Los Angeles, California. In 1992, in the twenty-sixth week of a desperately wanted pregnancy, Claudia and her husband Richard were told after an ultrasound that the male fetus she carried had a genetic condition called trisomy-13. Its anomalies included extensive brain damage, serious heart complications, and liver, kidney, and intestinal malformations. Its condition was incompatible with life. After consulting with many physicians, Claudia and Richard chose the D&X as the medically appropriate procedure for Claudia and the most compassionate procedure for their would-be son.
Out of millions of American women, it’s possible that one or two exist who might have a late-term abortion for an entirely trivial reason. But that’s no reason to block off 100% of American women from medical help they may someday need to prevent real danger to their health and well-being. There is absolutely no excuse for the pro-life opposition to health exemptions to abortion bans.
ABORTION KILLS!! DON’T U KNOW HOW MANY TIMES DOCTOR’S HAVE MADE A FALSE DIAGNOSIS? I GURANTEE YOU THAT ALL YOUR BABAIES WERE JUST AS HEALTHY AS CAN BE!! DOCTOR’S FUCK UP EVERYDAY JUST LIKE U AND I!! I DON’T CARE HOW SEVERELY BRAIN DAMAGED (OR WHATEVER THE CASE IS), U WOMEN LET A STRANER MECHANICALLY DILATE YOUR CERVIXES TO AND PLUNGE A SCICCORS ALONG WITH THE SUCTION TUBES INTO YOUR BABIES HEADS?? yEP..YOU’RE A MOTHER ALRIGHT?!?!? ANYWAY, I’M PROUD OF MY DECISION TO KEEP MY HEALTHY 3 MONTH OLD DESPITE HER NOT BEING PLANNED. I SLEEP GOOD EVERY NIGHT DO YOU??? JUST REMEMBER……MURDERERS GO TO HELL!!!HEHEHEH!! I’LL BE IN HEAVEN WATCHING ALL YOU BABYKILLERS BURN!!
ABORTION KILLS!! DON’T U KNOW HOW MANY TIMES DOCTOR’S HAVE MADE A FALSE DIAGNOSIS? I GURANTEE YOU THAT ALL YOUR BABAIES WERE JUST AS HEALTHY AS CAN BE!! DOCTOR’S FUCK UP EVERYDAY JUST LIKE U AND I!! I DON’T CARE HOW SEVERELY BRAIN DAMAGED (OR WHATEVER THE CASE IS), U WOMEN LET A STRANER MECHANICALLY DILATE YOUR CERVIXES TO AND PLUNGE A SCICCORS ALONG WITH THE SUCTION TUBES INTO YOUR BABIES HEADS?? yEP..YOU’RE A MOTHER ALRIGHT?!?!? ANYWAY, I’M PROUD OF MY DECISION TO KEEP MY HEALTHY 3 MONTH OLD DESPITE HER NOT BEING PLANNED. I SLEEP GOOD EVERY NIGHT DO YOU??? JUST REMEMBER……MURDERERS GO TO HELL!!!HEHEHEH!! I’LL BE IN HEAVEN WATCHING ALL YOU BABYKILLERS BURN!!
Um, well.
My mother had a friend whose baby was stillborn. This was in the late 60s/early 70s when abortion wasn’t even an option. The baby pretty much died at about 6 months gestation, and the doctor avoided telling her about it. She eventually figured it out when the baby stopped moving and pretty much lost her mind at the idea of carrying around a dead baby. I’m sure the current ban would force her into the same decision.
I have to say, I just love it when an anti-choice person fulfills all the stereotypes. It’s so nice.
Well, the all caps, misspellings and obvious lack of cognitive expression all help me sleep better at night, as a pro-choicer.
I know several articulate pro-lifers, this just wasn’t one of them.
I only wish that I could have been born to such a paragon of compassion and intelligence as “Don’t Worry.” [sigh]
Great examples.
If pro-lifers come up with some examples of women who had an “I don’t want to have a baby, so my mental health is endangered, so I get a health exception at 8.9 months of gestation” abortion, they’re free to do so. Maybe they can find one or two, maybe not. It’s sorta like when the Republicans campaigned against the estate tax, and talked about small farmers and business owners being forced to sell off their small farms and businesses, but never citing actual names of people who had had to do this.
I think the abortion is a legitimate moral concern, but I think that the women who are considering having abortions know that far better than I ever could.
Notice that the All-Caps lady leads in with “Drs. make mistaks all the time.” There is an incredibly strong element of denial among pro-lifers, a refusal to accept that enacting prohibitions on abortion will harm women. They simply assert (with no knowledge)that the baby is “probably normal” anyway and thus absolve themselves of having to consider the possibility that they will in fact be imposing real hardship.
Don’t worry about it,
If doctors make mistakes all the time, be sure to avoid them and the evil hospitals which house them the next time you’re sick or hurt. They obviously can’t be trusted anyhow.
It’s a “chicken vs egg” argument, almost literally, for some people. The problem comes down to that there is no win-win scenario, where everyone (mom and baby) is healthy and provided for.
Even after we get past the “health complication” exception, I can’t justify forcing someone to bring a child into a society that will not support the raising of that child (and of course, the Bush administration seems intent on reducing if not eliminating support available to single moms). We simply don’t have the support net, not fiscally, not socially. Until that net is 100% available (or until birth control is 100% effective/emergency contraception is available and accessible), I can’t see the justification in eliminating safe, legal abortion.
I had an abortion at 16. The day of the procedure, the doctor asked to take a look and allow them to draw some blood. I explained that I wasn’t comfortable with all of the papers I signed and with having the procedure. He told me not to worry and to just relax.
To that point in my life, I had never had blood taken or had an IV. Before I knew it, the nurse had administered the twilight without my knowledge and when I asked her what she was doing, she said she was giving me something to relax. I asked immediately to stop and to let me off of the table. The nurse and doctor told me that it was just the medication talking and that the twilight meds would make me miscarry anyway and would have to go under the same procedure later.
When I came to the decision that adoption was a better option, I was not permitted to stop the procedure even before it began. I now live every day with being party to killing a human, a human that I happened to love. At 16 I couldn’t buy a car, enter into any type of contract but you wonderful PRO-CHOICE people allowed me, a minor, to make a choice to be in a mental prison for the rest of my life. THANKS.
My child would have been 17 this year, I could have possibly met my baby next year. I say if adults want to be murderers, that is up to them. Minors should not be permitted to do this without their parents. I was impregnanted by an abusive boyfriend that I thought was my life. When he got me pregnant, he threatened my life with a gun.
There are so many people in the US that would have loved to have my baby and their rights were taken away from them as well. You assholes, we are dealing with lives, not cells. These babies have their own DNA, the live and worst of all, they are “helpless.” They are viewed as an inconvience of time and money. I wish I could kill myself, but my choosing to kill myself is against the law. Wake up and see what this is coming to.
If abortion wasn’t available to me at 16, I would have had to chose another option. And when I said to stop the procedure before it began, IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN STOPPED. But see immature 16 yr olds, don’t know their rights when they are being coereced. (Wow, I hope I spelled everything correctly, so I will be taken seriously).
Yes, I do blame myself. I spread my legs. But I feel that legalized abortion is just as guility as the one’s that created and support the laws. Think about it, you cannot afford your child, there is someone out there who will. You don’t have enough time or love for your baby, there is someone who will.
Hello???
So the rest of us have to have babies that we don’t want, and hand them over to someone we don’t know, against our will, because something terrible happened to you ?
No. I don’t think so. I am sorry that you had an abortion when you didn’t want one, but that still doesn’t give you the right to tell me that I have to have a baby and then surrender it so that your unhappiness can be in some way assauged. It’s not my job to go against my own beliefs so that you can feel better.
Yes, I do blame myself. I spread my legs.
Oh, please. Guilt and self-recrimination isn’t going to help you, nor anyone else.
I’m sorry about your experience, Still Hurting.
However, a doctor not paying attention to your wishes has nothing to do with legalized abortion. It isn’t the procedure that’s the problem; blame the doctor and his nurse. I hope you were able to at least lodge a serious complaint against them and that there was some kind of punishment.
Again, this has nothing to do with abortion. The exact same thing could have happened if you’d been having your tonsils taken out or were donating a kidney.
As for the rest of it, I won’t bother rehashing the “But an embryo is a baby!” argument. Somehow I doubt you’ll change your mind, and I know I won’t.
Sincerely,
A pro-choice “asshole”
Legalized abortion is NOT what caused still-hurting’s problems. And she did still have other options (adoption, for one).
I am not in a good position to answer the morality vs. realities of having a doped up uncooperative patient on the table.
If you signed all the papers while sober and un-drugged, then you did (legally) give informed consent. However, I feel empathy for your “when I said stop, it should have stopped” feelings as well, that’s an interesting question that perhaps a doc or nurse would be in a better position to comment on. I don’t know what the complications or limitations are on rescheduling or cancelling an appointment for such a procedure.
Looking at the problem from a “minor consent vs. adult consent” perspective, that’s an interesting argument as well, because I believe it varies from state to state, and I’m not sure at what age a minor (under 18?) is permitted to have their wishes for medical treatment (ie- chemo vs. radiation therapy) chosen over their parents wishes.
I know of women who gave their babies up for adoption and had a change of heart–they, too, are “still hurting.” Oddly enough, I don’t see the oh-so-compassionate pro-lifers sweat for them at all. No, the rights of couples who wanted to have children were important. The rights of the fetus or zygote was important. The rights of the moralists and parents and boyfriends who didn’t have to deal with the complications were important.
The rights of these girls and women, who are human beings, not an incubators or a breeding mares, are apparently not important. Nor are their feelings after they give the kid up and have a change of heart–when that happens, they are horrible, evil people.
Here’s the deal, “still hurting”–I don’t force you to get abortions, and you don’t force me to breed against my will.
Of course, “still hurting’s” comment doesn’t even touch on the original post about women who had late trimester abortions. Women whose lives were endangered by their pregnancies, whose fetuses would likely not make it to term, or whose babies would have been severely brain-damaged and lived for a very short time.
I suppose those women are assholes, “still hurting”?
Of course, according to the poster “don’t worry about it,” those babies would have been fine and the women were stupid for listening to doctors, who make mistakes all the time anyway. Keep that in mind the next time your three-month old baby is sick, “don’t worry about it.”
So some people who’ve done something have later regretted it. Some people haven’t regretted it but hurt about it, anyways. Sometimes the right thing hurts anyhow.
The morality of abortion doesn’t depend on the relative numbers of women who’ve regretted it and women who haven’t.
still hurting: I’m sorry that you had to go through that experience, but I honestly don’t see how you get from the proposition “this was bad for me” to the proposition “this should be illegal”. Criminalising abortion wouldn’t ease your pain and might not even protect others from similar pain. What it would do would be to add stigma and make it harder for hose who do have bad experiences to seek help.
My whole point was that I believe that anyone under the age of 18 should not be able to have an abortion at anytime without the parents being notified (except unless being medically neccesary). As far as someone stating that I signed my papers “sober,” well I was sitting with a boyfriend that hit me on a regular basis and later took me home and put a gun to my head warning me to not back out. So, I guess I was sober. I never said I was smart, I was 16…very young and confused.
If a baby is clinically dead, I am all for a way to remove the baby which secures the mother’s life and health. All of my friends that have had miscarriges were not given any other choice except to deliver near full-term. As for the women who wait until week 27 to decide that the baby is just not convenient, well that is a different story.
I was only several weeks when I had mine and I don’t feel abortion is ever the answer unless the baby is dead, brainless or the mother’s life is in danger. If you all think that a woman’s right to choose is such a perfect concept, then look online for the “I’m so glad I had an abortion” sites. I am sure that you will not find one.
Woman are hurt emotionally everyday while they are using their right to choose, yet you don’t hear about this side. Hey, I made a mistake. I slept with my boyfriend and used no protection, pregnancy didn’t even cross my mind. I made a poor decision, so that gives me a right to “kill?” Adoption, while painful, would have been a better choice, my child would be out there somewhere alive and breathing. Now, I have nothing, but nagging thoughts that I am just as guilty of murder as the one who performed my procedure. Many women are in the same shoes I wore at 16, they are in fear and do not know where to go for help.
If a life is so inconvenient and so easily disposable…then maybe we should just start killing our eldery, handicapped, those who just annoy us, so on and so forth. I take care of my grandma. Her hands no longer work, she is constantly in pain. Maybe I should kill her. I am mean she is sometimes a pain in the ass and she is old, not like she is worth anything, right?
I am sorry everyone, but I have been through this. I am arguing from the point that a huge part of me died when this happened. If late term is an option, it should ONLY be an option for medical reasons, not because a woman woke up on the wrong side of the bed and decides she wants to be immediately unpregnant just because that option is available. That is disgusting.
My whole point was that I believe that anyone under the age of 18 should not be able to have an abortion at anytime without the parents being notified (except unless being medically neccesary). As far as someone stating that I signed my papers “sober,” well I was sitting with a boyfriend that hit me on a regular basis and later took me home and put a gun to my head warning me to not back out. So, I guess I was sober. I never said I was smart, I was 16…very young and confused.
If a baby is clinically dead, I am all for a way to remove the baby which secures the mother’s life and health. All of my friends that have had miscarriges were not given any other choice except to deliver near full-term. As for the women who wait until week 27 to decide that the baby is just not convenient, well that is a different story.
I was only several weeks when I had mine and I don’t feel abortion is ever the answer unless the baby is dead, brainless or the mother’s life is in danger. If you all think that a woman’s right to choose is such a perfect concept, then look online for the “I’m so glad I had an abortion” sites. I am sure that you will not find one.
Woman are hurt emotionally everyday while they are using their right to choose, yet you don’t hear about this side. Hey, I made a mistake. I slept with my boyfriend and used no protection, pregnancy didn’t even cross my mind. I made a poor decision, so that gives me a right to “kill?” Adoption, while painful, would have been a better choice, my child would be out there somewhere alive and breathing. Now, I have nothing, but nagging thoughts that I am just as guilty of murder as the one who performed my procedure. Many women are in the same shoes I wore at 16, they are in fear and do not know where to go for help.
If a life is so inconvenient and so easily disposable…then maybe we should just start killing our eldery, handicapped, those who just annoy us, so on and so forth. I take care of my grandma. Her hands no longer work, she is constantly in pain, but loves life. Maybe I should kill her. I am mean she is sometimes a pain in the ass and she is old, it’s not like she is worth anything, right?
If late term is an option, it should ONLY be an option for medical reasons, not because a woman woke up on the wrong side of the bed and decides she wants to be immediately unpregnant just because that option is available. That is disgusting.
How can any of you take a life so lightly, life is precious and cannot be brought back once it is taken away.
” If you all think that a woman’s right to choose is such a perfect concept, then look online for the “I’m so glad I had an abortion” sites. I am sure that you will not find one.”
I’m not sorry.net
Amp beat me to it :-)
I believe there are a couple of others as well, but I’m at work so my time is limited.
I do think that a woman needs the right to choose, and that the issue of wether or not a person under 18 years of age should require parental consent is ENTIRELY seperate from the issue of the right to choose.
Abortions of convenience might bug the hell out of me morally (I would not choose to have one for convenience), but I cannot deny or ignore that they are only one small part of a spectrum of what birth control, abortion and the right to choose cover. To eliminate it all because some people “misuse” that right is ludicrous.
still hurting, your situation is troubling, but by pushing for legislation that forces girls under 18 to notify their parents you are pushing for other girls to be hurt as well. Many young women under 18 who are pregnant are pregnant because of incest. Young women who are pregnant from being raped by their father should not have to turn to him for permission to abort.
Many young women under 18 who are pregnant are pregnant because of incest.
One of the things that has surprised me as I’ve gotten involved in post-abortion ministry is meeting women who regret abortion when the child was the product of incest. In the cases of the women I know who were in this situation, coerced sex was followed by an abortion about which she was offered no choice, either. I’m thinking in particular of one woman who was impregnated repeatedly by her father, and repeatedly taken to an abortion clinic by that same father.
Emily>>In the cases of the women I know who were in this situation, coerced sex was followed by an abortion about which she was offered no choice, either. >>
What’s your point, exactly? Why does that mean that the choice shouldn’t exist for any woman? There are certainly women, particularly minors, who feel coerced into carrying an unwanted pregnancy to term. That’s why pro-choicers fight against parental consent laws, and why pro-lifers think they’re such a great idea: they obstruct choice. If you really feel for these doubly forced women who have been coerced into abortion, then why are you so unconcerned about women who choose to abort?
I cannot for the life of me see why that because some women are forced to get abortions that others should be forced not to. To even the score? If abortion is made illegal, then it will be even harder for women that are being pressured into getting an abortion who don’t want one to refuse, because of the fear that the person pressuring her will be sent to jail for trying to obtain one.
As for the women who wait until week 27 to decide that the baby is just not convenient, well that is a different story.
You know, this comes up a lot in any discussion of partial-birth bans, but I never see any documented incidents of it.
Thanks Amp. There are a lot of women and girls out there who do not regret their abortions. I know of one woman who deeply regrets giving her child up for adoption–but I don’t see any moves to ban adoption.
If parents should give consent for minors to have an abortion, should they give consent for said minor to have a baby?
Like Sheelzebub and Amanda have essentially said, it’s sad when people regret what they have done–but it doesn’t make sense to ban anything based on regret.
It doesn’t make sense to say, “Since I consider my abortion a mistake, we should make abortion illegal for everybody.” Abortion is an individual woman’s choice, and she should be allowed to make that choice, period.
It also doesn’t make much sense to say, “I would be happier now if somebody had forced me to carry my pregnancy to term then.” If I got pregnant, I would be more interested in how I feel about having a child today than in how I would feel about it in five, ten, twenty years. I don’t know what kind of person I will be then; I can’t imagine my older “mother” self or my older “deliberately childless” self. So while I understand how painful it can be to regret a decision, I think women should be allowed to take that risk.
Very interesting regarding parental consent, because there are many parents who are at least as likely to coerce an abortion as prevent one from happening. Not everyone wants to be a grandparent early in life.
To still hurting, if you were truly coerced that was awful, but it should make you more not less empathetic to those women who want desperately to exercise their own free will, whether it be to have or not to have a child. You understand the despair and loss of dignity that comes with being forced to make a reproductive choice against your will. Don’t use your own pain as a rationale for imposing pain on others. That won’t make it go away.
Emily Peterson:
In the cases of the women I know who were in this situation, coerced sex was followed by an abortion about which she was offered no choice, either.
Since you also seek to deny that choice to women, you’re hardly in a position to criticize other people who do the same thing.
Imagine a country where it is legal to club baby seals to death for their fur. Charlotte lobbies for a law against it. Don thinks the law should stay the same–those who want baby fur seal should be able to make their own free choice about whether to pursue the practice. Meanwhile, hunter Billy Bob forces his 13-year-old daughter Sarah to help him club baby seals to death. Sarah objects to the practice but is terrified, with good reason, of her father.
In addition to objecting to the practice of clubbing baby seals to death, Charlotte also objects to the way Sarah has been treated.
But Don says that Charlotte is hardly in a position to object to the fact that Sarah’s freedom of choice about whether she will kill baby seals has been removed from her by her father, since Charlotte herself is in favor of removing freedom of choice from others, inasmuch as Charlotte wants to remove from this society the legal right to club baby seals to death.
In Don’s world, Charlotte and Billy Bob are morally equivalent.
Congratulations are due to Emily for the worst analogy that I’ve seen this week. Good job, Emily. Keep up the good work!
(So let me get this straight. Charlotte is analogous to an anti-choicer. Billy Bob is a doctor who performs abortions and he is forcing his 13 year old daughter, Sarah, to take part in performing abortions. Is that right?)
A beautiful imaginary statue of a blank look is on it’s way to you right this very moment.
Jake, that was kinda rude – please try and be nicer to Emily.
I think that Emily’s analogy was perfectly good at communicating Emily’s point of view. She’s right that in some cases, it’s valid to advocate taking away people’s choices – such as the choice to sadistically club a baby seal – and such advocacy doesn’t make the person disqualified to speak on choice in general. I thought it was a good response to Don’s post. (Don will now post to say that I only thought it was a good response because I’m biased towards the pro-life position, presumably.)
* * *
One problem with Emily’s analogy is that the entire course of 13-year-old Sarah’s life is not likely to be determined by whether or not she is allowed to club a baby seal to death. We can reasonably expect that, with luck and hard work, Sarah will be able to lead the life course she wants to, even if she is not allowed to make her own choice regarding baby seals.
In other words, the decision over if and when to start a family is a hell of a lot more personal, lasting and essential to real freedom and self-determination than the decision to club a baby seal or not.
Also, needless to say, people don’t actually seek or perform abortions for the sadistic pleasure of it. (Although perhaps it’s not “needless to say,” since many pro-lifers believe that abortionists are mean, heartless people who are only in the abortion racket for the money.)
* * *
For me, what puzzles me is that banning abortion brings about a very large reduction in freedom in exchange for a trivial reduction in actual abortions. Some laws pro-lifers favor – such as the recent federal “Partial-birth” abortion ban – would, according to the standard pro-life interpration of what “partial-birth” means, bring about absolutely no reduction in abortion, even if they ever pass court scrutiny.
Despite this, pro-lifers continue a huge amount of energy pursuing bans, because they’d apparently prefer the high abortion rate of Poland (where abortion is illegal) to the low abortion rate of Belgium (where it’s legal, but they’ve pursued other programs which successfully reduce unwanted pregnancy, so the abortion rate is the lowest in the world). That makes no sense.
Pro-lifers consistantly support politicians who fanatically oppose income transfer programs that would make it more viable for low-income women to choose to have children while not giving up their other life goals. Apparently having a politician who opposes programs that might actually reduce abortion isn’t what’s important; what’s important is having a politician who supports symbolic bans that have no chance of becoming law and opposes policies that might save more fetal lives. That makes no sense to me.
Not to metion the consistant support of politicians who are fanatically opposed to the distribution of birth control and programs that teach teens to use birth control effectively (i.e., two or three methods at a time). That makes no sense to me.
Not to mention the slanderous, untrue attacks on UNFPA, which have led to the defunding of programs which prevent thousands of abortion a year. That makes no sense to me.
Wait, where was I? Sorry, that was an irrelevant digression. My point is, it’s not Emily’s analogy of baby seals to zygotes that makes no sense to me. It’s the utter failure of pro-lifers to ever stop and evaluate whether or not pursuing a ban is actually an effective way of saving zygote lives that bewilders me.
You’re right, Amp. It was rude and I apologize. It comes from my hatred of analogies. And it seems that analogies are unavoidable, I even find myself using them.
I dunno, I think that whole issue is, or should be, an absurdly small part of the abortion debate. Do I really care enough about whether a guy who rapes his daughter forces an abortion upon her to change my position? The guy is evil and sick. Would making abortion illegal prevent this man who has broken the law from forcing his daughter to have an abortion? I don’t think so.
Is the issue of abortions for incestual rape victims really a big part of the debate on either side? I thought that we all (except the extremely extremist) pretty much agree that victims of rape should be allowed to get abortions.
Emily:
But Don says that Charlotte is hardly in a position to object to the fact that Sarah’s freedom of choice about whether she will kill baby seals has been removed from her by her father, since Charlotte herself is in favor of removing freedom of choice from others, inasmuch as Charlotte wants to remove from this society the legal right to club baby seals to death.
In Don’s world, Charlotte and Billy Bob are morally equivalent.
No, they are not morally equivalent in Don’s world, because Don considers clubbing baby seals to death to be (in general) immoral.
Your seal clubbing analogy doesn’t work for the obvious reason that your criticism of the forced abortion cases was not that the women were denied only the option of completing the pregnancy, but that they were denied the choice about the abortion, period. You said, “…coerced sex was followed by an abortion about which she was offered no choice, either.”
If Sarah is pregnant, and is denied the choice about whether to terminate or complete that pregnancy, it is just as great a restriction on her liberty if you deny her that choice as it is if Billy Bob denies it to her. Since you do also want to deny Sarah that choice, you should have said so, instead of pretending that what you object to is the denial of choice rather than abortion.
ampersand:
Don will now post to say that I only thought it was a good response because I’m biased towards the pro-life position, presumably.
I don’t think you understood my criticism of what Emily said. Basically, I’m saying that her statement misrepresents her beliefs. See my response to her above.
And no, I don’t think you’re biased toward pro-lifers. But you do seem oddly defensive of Emily, on the rare occasions she shows up here.
My own view is that she is a thoroughly dishonest person who routinely and deliberately misrepresents facts and evidence on her website. You can find my lengthy critique of her “research citations” on the psychological aspects of abortion here (scroll down and read through the comments.)
I am a long time lurker who was finally moved to post by still hurting’s comments. I am sorry that she feels regret about her abortion. Regret can be devestating.
Not that it should have any bearing on whether or not abortion is legal, but many women, myself included, are extremely thankful for their opportunity to have had an abortion, and are still relieved that they did it.
The oh-so-charming first poster says that she will see me burn in hell from up in heaven, but I say that my life on earth would have been hellish had I been denied a safe and legal abortion.
To give you some background, I am a rather unique abortion story. I was very happily married with a wonderful one year old child, when I went to the doctor for a minor routine problem. A urine test showed that I was pregnant (so much for the pill, and no, I didn’t skip any- it isn’t 100% effective!) I was extremely surprised about the pregnancy, due to both my consistent use of birth control, and to the fact that I had no symptoms of pregnancy whatsoever. In my first pregnancy, I knew right away that I was pregnant with some pretty big symptoms.
When I went for my first exam, I was horrified to find out that I was not brand new pregnant, as I thought, but FOUR MONTHS pregnant. This had me in a frenzy. Four months of a completely symptomless pregancy? I thought back to the last few months, and was even more horrified– I had been under the impression that I had gotten a period about a month ago. I had several days of bleeding. When I told the doctor this, he was concerned. I had also been in the hottub nearly nightly for the past few months, had drunk alcohol, taken 4 different presciption medications, and had been on a diet to lose weight- about 15 pounds lost in those last 4 months.
I was terrified for the health of the baby (to me, it was a baby), and the doctors could not give me any guarantees. My gut instinct told me that my baby was damaged. The doctors (I got second and third opinions), said that there was a chance that was so. I was terrified that I would end up with an extremely disabled child, and despite my respect for disabled rights, I was in no condition to parent an extremely disabled child.
I knew that for the next five months, I would be paralyzed with anxiety and depression over the possible health of the baby, and didn’t feel that would be a very good situation for the child in my womb or the child outside of it. After discussing the situation with my husband, we decided to have an abortion. I lost two friends over that decision- I was called horribly selfish and immoral- but many more friends were supportive.
Was I selfish? Probably, although my concern for my one year old was forefront in my mind as well. My understanding is that the four month old fetus/unborn baby did not have any sentience yet, and did not feel pain when the abortion was done. I feel that it was much more moral to stop the development of this potential sentient human being BEFORE he became sentient and capable of pain than to allow him to continue his development and bring him into the world possibly damaged. That could hurt not only him, but his mother, father, and sister as well.
I might be wrong about the morality of my decision. It would be hubris to assume that I know the absolute right or wrong of this situation. But I do know that I am extremely thankful that my very difficult and traumatic situation was made somewhat more bearable by the option of safe and legal abortion. Every time I get to spend quality time with my little girl, every time I think about my second pregnancy, I am relieved and grateful that I wasn’t forced to carry my pregnancy to term, or risk my life and health illegally. It was a difficult decision, but the right one for my family and I.
I just wanted to provide a different point of view, since all I ever hear in the debate are women who regret their choice- I am indebted to mine. Now I will go back to lurking.
Don, responding to Emily: >>Your seal clubbing analogy doesn’t work for the obvious reason that your criticism of the forced abortion cases was not that the women were denied only the option of completing the pregnancy, but that they were denied the choice about the abortion, period. You said, “…coerced sex was followed by an abortion about which she was offered no choice, either.” >>
Exactly. Here’s a better analogy.
Charlotte and Don both live in a society where recreational drugs are illegal. Charlotte thinks that they should remain illegal. She thinks that they’re dangerous and immoral. Don thinks that people should be able to choose what they put into their bodies. He also believes that laws against drugs are costly, abusive, and a total failure at preventing drug use or addiction.
In response, Charlotte brings up the suffering of children whose mothers use drugs while pregnant, and says, “The little babies didn’t have a choice! If you’re so concerned about choice, you’ll make drug use illegal for everyone, minor and adult, pregnant or not. Then you’ll be defending people’s right to choose!”
Don scoffs at Charlotte, because Charlotte’s argument is disingenuous (she herself obviously couldn’t care less about choice) and illogical (it’s senseless to restrict choice for all in order to protect one choice for a relative minority).
I am sorry everyone, but I have been through this.
Then when Roe v. Wade is overturned, you will presumably turn yourself into the police and plead guilty to first-degree murder for killing your child, correct?
I am sorry for your pain. I also believe that trying to soothe your pain by saying “Nobody else is allowed to make that choice” is despicable.
Anyone who prattles about hell ought to read their Gospels carefully. The parts about pretending to speak for God are particularly instructive.
Thank you for your comments, Still Thankful. Please don’t stay just a lurker, as you have a very coherent and clear writing style and well-reasoned opinions.
One of the things I like about this blog and its comments is that, with a few exceptions, people on both sides of issues offer well-reasoned and well-thought-out opinions. I may not agree with them all, but I certainly appreciate the thought process and respect that goes into them.
“I am sorry everyone, but I have been through this.”
I don’t know how I missed this gem. This isn’t directed at you personally, still hurting, because I am truly sorry if you have faced long-term psychological consequences of an abortion, but that hasn’t been my experience or the experience of my friends and family members. I resent that there are so many people out there vested with the idea that women “should be” sorry, and selectively focusing on those who are as a pretext for taking away the freedom of all. I am not sorry.
Looks to me like every example cited was a baby already dead — therefore NOT an abortion at all. Just another miscarry that needed cleaning up…
Is this the best you’ve got???
Gee, you need to read more carefully. In only one of the cases listed (the case of Correen Costello) is it likely that the fetus was dead before the abortion took place.
How entertaining. When the truth isn’t enough, someone challenges the issue begging for gruesome stories. How about you go find some that can be verified as legitimate and we’ll talk then. Pffft.
Still hurting, I am very sorry to hear what you went through and hope that you have had access to some good grief counselling to help you deal with the pain you continue to feel. However, I think that you misunderstand the pro-choice position. I don’t think that anyone here would be in favor of allowing an abusive boyfriend to force his unwilling 16 year old girlfriend to have an abortion. The pro-choice position is not that every pregnant woman should have an abortion, it’s that every pregnant woman who for whatever reason either does not want to have a child or is concerned that either the child she is carrying is severely damaged or that continuing with the pregnancy will put her own life in danger should be able to decide for herself whether or not to terminate the pregnancy.
From a pro-choice point of view what happened to you is an outrage. You did not have any choice, your choice was stolen from you by your ex-boyfriend, by your doctor and by your nurse. None of them had any right to make the decision about whether or not to terminate for you or to override your choice. The choice should have been yours to make. What we pro-choicers are fighting for is to ensure that no-one is ever put into the position you were in which their right to decide whether or not to carry a pregnancy to term is taken away from them. I wish that you were able to see that.
I would also like to point out the irony inherent in the fact that many MRAs and some pro-lifers have recently begun to argue that fathers should be more involved in making decisions about abortion, and even that they should have a legal right to be involved in the decision. I would like to point out that allowing that to happen would inevitably lead to more situations like that faced by still hurting. I often wonder if this has occurred to the pro-life people advocating paternal involvement in decisions about abortion.
My sister, brother and myself had a heated discussion this pm regarding PBA. My sister said that it is happening all the time and a women could wait up until the 9 months, regular delivery and then decide that she doesn’t want the baby and the MD can kill the baby as long as just the head is out. I cannot believe this. I would like to have a realistic, non partial answer. I do not believe this solution, nor do I believe this happens all the time.
Still Hurting: “I was only several weeks when I had mine and I don’t feel abortion is ever the answer unless the baby is dead, brainless or the mother’s life is in danger.”
In other words, you’re not opposed to abortion- you just want the right to decide who should have one- since apparently you know better than other women.
A question for “pro-lifers”: If I should happen to become pregnant, one of the following will occur.
(a) I will abort it
(b) I will kill it immediately after it is born
(c) It will live for months or years with someone (me) who hates it and will eventually kill it, probably by bashing its head against a wall when it screams too many times.
Which of those would you prefer? Which is the most humane? How about if I leave it in a hot car on a summer day and it roasts to death? Would you say that’s better than allowing a doctor to terminate it before it has developed the neural capacity to suffer?
Still Hurting:
If your boyfriend found nothing wrong with coercing you to have an abortion and holding a gun to your head in order to frighten you into doing so, do you really think that, had abortion been illegal, he wouldn’t have found someone who did illegal abortions and forced you to have one anyway? He doesn’t seem to be the type to care all that much about the risks to you.
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(Ampersand: obviously you can tell who this is since you have my e-mail address. It’s a true story that I sometimes tell. I’d prefer not to have my regular handle attached to it. I hope you understand.)
Many years ago my ex-wife and I were a newly married couple. She was a single mother of two, having lost her husband a few years earlier to cancer. I was a recent college graduate trying to get established in my career. We were in love and married.
Very shortly after we married, she became pregnant and had an abortion without asking me. I found out about it the evening it happened and came unglued. After talking about the abortion with her, I slowly came to understand that with everything going on, pregnancy was not a good idea.
A few years later she became pregnant again and this time we both wanted to bring the child to term. A couple weeks passed by and what started as light spotting progressed to heavy bleeding. She contacted her gynecologist and tests were run. The test results showed that she was in danger of miscarrying and made a follow-up appointment the next week. The bleeding ebbed and flowed and the next week the test results were better. Another follow-up appointment was made for the next week. She was still bleeding and when she returned the second time, the tests showed that she was again in danger of miscarrying.
This continued for several more weeks. By this point she was anemic and her health was in serious danger. She asked her doctor to perform an abortion as she was becoming very ill. The doctor said that if her test results were bad the following week, he’d schedule the abortion. When the time came, he refused and she sought out an abortion at a clinic some 10 miles or so from where we lived. During the abortion her heart stopped, and thankfully was restarted. The cause was the loss of blood from the previous weeks’ bleeding and the blood she lost during the procedure.
She and I were both upset that we’d lost the child. After grieving for a while I realized that the doctor wasn’t just playing with the life of my unborn child, but also with the life of my wife. She would never have been able to carry that child to term. She would have died long before then.
The worst part of this is that the pro-lifers anti-abortionists aren’t saving any fetuses, they are just driving the medical establishment underground putting people at risk too.
What they should be doing is investing heavily in biomedical research, specifically, the very many technologies, and pursuit of the understanding of those technologies, that will perhaps someday enable the eventual creation of a completely functional, transplant-compatible artificial uterus.
Only then can they achieve their goal of attempting to hatch every single fetus.
I believe thats how Jesus would have answered this problem; Jesus was both compassionate and a healer.
In the meantime, I believe its right to put the privacy and safety rights of actual living people first.
For Claudia Crown Ades, the one with the boy diagnosed with trisomy-13 the mutant that was better dead “what a compassionate choice” ha,ha made me laugh the boy that all the smart doctors said her boy would never survive, go to living with trisomy-13.org and look at all the hundreds of brain dead malfunctioning little miracles that were never going to make it. You guys like to call your self pro-choicers but are the esiest ones to be influence to make somebodyelses choices, the doctors choice. If you really want to make your own choice don’t take the easy way out what a brave choice ha,ha. Stand up for your self girl.
Let me start by saying that the intention of my post is not to insult anyone, but to have an honest discussion. Pro-lifers don’t hate women and yes, they actually do think about the hardships, etc. However, the point we are trying to make is that most abortions result from too many people having too much casual sex, resulting in unwanted pregnancies. To us, it does seem pretty selfish that to engage in a moment’s desire is worth more than a human life. People should value life enough to not go there if they don’t want to deal with the potential result. I don’t want anyone to have a child they don’t want, but we cannot ignore the broader consequences of supporting abortion on demand. For those who consider unborn children nothing more than fetal material, you couldn’t be more wrong. Unborn children hold the potential for many great things in life, the greatest of which are family members, friends, lovers, and spouses. When we kill future babies, we deprive ourselves of our own future. Some people will never find “Mr. or Mrs. Right” because they were never allowed to exist. Others will miss out on meaningful, supportive friendships. The nation as a whole has suffered. There are currently over 50 million people missing from our country, and people worry about who will pay for their social security in retirement. These are just a few of the examples of how it has hurt us. Just as pro-choicers want pro-lifers to think about the woman, which again, we do, pro-lifers would like to see this issue thought about in broader terms as opposed to just reproductive rights. What we do in our lives affects everyone, not just ourselves. Again, I am not saying that people have to be “incubators”, however, it would be nice to see people own up to their responsibilities, because I do believe that taking part in the creation of a life is a resposibility. We like to use the saying “you can do anything you put your mind to”, but it seems that when it comes to an inconvenient pregnancy, we think it’s just too hard. Personally, I have had a pregnancy that didn’t come at the most convenient time in life for me, but I felt that it was my responsibility to my child to give him his birth right. He did not ask to be conceived. Due to perserverance and faith in God, my life feels very blessed. I know that it can be done, and perserverance develops character. I would have missed out on an opportunity to grow as a person if I chose otherwise. One last thing for those who do believe in God, in case you weren’t familiar with what is said in the Bible, there is not one verse supporting abortion, which did take place in those times in non-surgical ways. However, in Psalms, King David (who was of the same bloodline as Jesus) says to God, “For it was you who created my inward parts. You knit me together in my mother’s womb…My bones were not hidden from you when I was made in secret, when I was formed in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw me when I was formless; all my days were written in Your book and planned before a single one of them began.” I think if God thinks of us this way, then it cannot be right for us to decide who lives and who dies. Thank you for reading my post. God bless.
You know, I’m having my period right now. Consequently, a child that might have been conceived in my womb will NEVER EXIST. That child is MISSING FROM OUR COUNTRY. Someone will NEVER FIND MR. OR MRS. RIGHT BECAUSE THAT CHILD WAS NEVER ALLOWED TO EXIST.
I certainly hope that you are constantly pregnant, Ms. Stacy, and that you have been since you first became fertile. I also hope that you forbid your partners from spilling seed by masturbating or having wet dreams. After all, if you are not constantly pregnant, and if your partners are wasting ejaculate, then you are DENYING CHILDREN THE RIGHT TO EXIST. You may think that ova and sperm are only reproductive material, BUT YOU ARE WRONG. THEY ARE FULL OF POTENTIAL THAT YOU ARE WASTING.
Every sperm is sacred,
Every sperm is good.
Every sperm is needed
In your neighborhood.
This is a great example of why I can’t take the anti-choice position seriously. This statement carries as much weight (and truth) as, “Every time a bell rings an angel gets its wings.” This is a Quayle-worthy quote along the lines of, “What a waste it is to lose one’s mind. Or not to have a mind is being very wasteful. How true that is.”
When we kill future babies (which happens with every wet dream, by this logic), our future still exists. Our future still happens. In the future. Time has not yet, as far as I can tell, stopped.
WOW- a lot of extremely strong feelings on both sides- as their should be. I myself, would not choose abortion for any reason- but i have to see both sides of the court, and i do- a lot of women DO choose to abort for convenience- (which i do not personally agree with or condone..) but a lot of women ALSO choose to for many other logical reasons- health, incest, etc.. And i think to BAN a woman of those rights is simply wrong- Are their cases even involving serious health matters or incest or rape that i would PERSONALLY still choose to carry to term, based on my religious beliefs, YES!!! But should that alone, make it illiegal for all women across the board to make that decision, FOR THEMSELVES?? No i dont think so. I believe that we were created to have a mind of our own, to have the ability to make decisions for ourselves– regardless of whether it is concidered RIGHT or WRONG in anybody elses opinion- and i believe that we all live with the decisions that we make. U see- i truly believe that if all abortions were banned tomorrow- their would be such a LARGER problem at hand.. Medically necessary abortions would then be taking place with dr.s or random people that would illiegally and very potentially do so in an unsafe manner- or even in those convenient abortions. Do you think without all the medical equipment that all of these women would live.? I can guarantee you that if a woman wants or needs an abortion badly enough, it will take place- in or out of a clinic, safe or unsafe, whether i agree with it or the president agrees with it. Should women opt for abortions without a need for it, in my personal opinion NO- but what gives any of us the right to make that decision for anyone other than OURSELVES???? Just the same, do i think men and women should rape people, NO- but it is going to happen, legal or illiegal- we can all choose for ourselves wether to participate in that, and each and every one of us will live with OUR own decision, not anybody elseschoice. I believe that everyone will be there on judgement day and we wont answer for anybodys choices, other than our own… (as far as this topic goes..) i think out of all the “proo-choice” people i read from tonite, none of them were truly “PRO-CHOICE” —take care- and i hope that maybe i made sense to at least somebody… Julia