{"id":993,"date":"2004-07-22T09:07:54","date_gmt":"2004-07-22T17:07:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/archives\/2004\/07\/22\/regarding-amy-richards-abortion\/"},"modified":"2004-07-22T09:07:54","modified_gmt":"2004-07-22T17:07:54","slug":"regarding-amy-richards-abortion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=993","title":{"rendered":"Regarding Amy Richards & Abortion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Amy Richards has been condemned a lot this week for this NYT article<\/a>, mostly (but not exclusively) on the right half of the blogoverse.<\/p>\n

Richards – who many Alas readers are familiar with as the co-author of Manifesta <\/i>– was pregnant with triplets, and chose to abort two of the eight-week-old embryos so that she could give birth to only one child. From the article (which is not written by her, but “as told to Amy Barrett”):<\/p>\n

On the subway, Peter asked, ”Shouldn’t we consider having triplets?” And I had this adverse reaction: ”This is why they say it’s the woman’s choice, because you think I could just carry triplets. That’s easy for you to say, but I’d have to give up my life.” Not only would I have to be on bed rest at 20 weeks, I wouldn’t be able to fly after 15. I was already at eight weeks. When I found out about the triplets, I felt like: It’s not the back of a pickup at 16, but now I’m going to have to move to Staten Island. I’ll never leave my house because I’ll have to care for these children. I’ll have to start shopping only at Costco and buying big jars of mayonnaise. Even in my moments of thinking about having three, I don’t think that deep down I was ever considering it.<\/p>\n

The specialist called me back at 10 p.m. I had just finished watching a Boston Pops concert at Symphony Hall. As everybody burst into applause, I watched my cellphone vibrating, grabbed it and ran into the lobby. He told me that he does a detailed sonogram before doing a selective reduction to see if one fetus appears to be struggling. The procedure involves a shot of potassium chloride to the heart of the fetus. There are a lot more complications when a woman carries multiples. And so, from the doctor’s perspective, it’s a matter of trying to save the woman this trauma.<\/p><\/div>\n

Many folks – even pro-choice folks – have been very disturbed by this article. I don’t see what the problem is.<\/p>\n

Not being of an original frame of mind today, I’m just going to quote some of the better comments I’ve seen. From Majikthise<\/a>:<\/p>\n

As far as I’m concerned, all that need be said is that Richards wanted one baby rather than three.<\/p>\n

However, for those who argue that one needs some “better” reason to have an abortion, let’s look a the facts of Richards’ case. As a single mother, Richards felt that she could provide a good home for one kid but not for triplets. If you think it frivolous to balk at the costs of two extra babies, imagine the difficulty of securing childcare for three infants, or the expense of keeping them fed, clothed and diapered. Three college savings plans… So, Richards bravely chose to bear exactly the number of babies she wanted. If those aren’t good reasons, I don’t know what are.<\/p>\n

Besides, Richards and her partner plan to have more children when they are ready. When spacing births by selective abortion means a better life for the mother and her entire family, we should celebrate the practice.<\/p><\/div>\n

She goes on to make good comments about the medical issues – having triplets really isn’t as safe as having just one baby, for either the mother or the infant. Read the whole thing<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the comments at Unfogged, FL wrote<\/a>:<\/p>\n

I think this woman is getting a raw deal. She deliberately went off the pill after deciding, with her partner, that she would have a child if she became pregant. This is not quite– but close to– stopping contraception in order to get pregnant. Something very, very unlikely happens: she gets stuck with three fetuses, not one. Carrying all three would put her at greater risk, seriously interfere with her career, undermine her economic security, and so on.<\/p>\n

Having the selective reduction doesn’t seem crazy to me– is it crazy to have an abortion for similar reasons after condom failure? This is one of the classic test cases, and most “pro-choice” people think that abortion is permissible in such a circumstance. Are the odds of triplets that much greater than condom failure? I’m not seeing the case for hell yet…<\/p><\/div>\n

Also in the comments of Unfogged, PZ Myers – who also wrote a good post <\/a>on his own blog – wrote<\/a>:<\/p>\n

90% of all triplets are pre-term.<\/p>\n

If you want to go bankrupt, try having a premature baby. Try having three. This isn’t a matter of just having to absorb the costs of an ordinary-sized family all at once, we’re talking about a vast increase in expense.<\/p>\n

Mortality rates skyrocket with multiples. For single births in the US, death rates at birth are 2.7 per 1,000. For twins, 37; for triplets, 52; for more, 231.<\/p>\n

Pre-term multiples tend to be low birth-weight. This is strongly correlated with the incidence of disabilities like mental retardation and cerebral palsy. The mothers also face greater risks of complications like gestational diabetes and pre-eclampsia. These problems can be minimized by more intensive care during the pregnancy, which the article mentioned.<\/p>\n

Seriously, we human beings are MUCH better off having our kids one at a time. We just aren’t very good at handling more.<\/p><\/div>\n

This was followed up by a comment by Cardinal Fang, who wrote<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Let me state those statistics from PZ Myers again, in a simpler way: If that woman hadn’t aborted two of the three fetuses and hadn’t miscarried, each baby would have a FIVE PERCENT chance of dying in its first year of life.<\/p>\n

That’s more than “a little inconvenience.” Each baby has a five percent chance of dying, and even if a baby survives it’s likely to have lifelong problems.<\/p><\/div>\n

Kevin Drum writes:<\/a><\/p>\n

And if you’re pro-choice, why the sudden concern with motive? It’s unfair anyway, since the “Staten Island” crack is what most people are focusing on, even though that’s obviously just a metaphor: Richards says pretty clearly that she’s concerned that triplets would prevent her from working and make her into a full-time housewife, and that’s not what she wants. What’s wrong with that?<\/div>\n

Abortion is a means of controlling the number and frequency of bearing children. Richards’ reasons for wanting to control her reproduction were stated a bit flippantly by the writer, but they are not, as so many have argued, trivial. Wanting to have a career is not a trivial concern. The difference between raising a first baby and raising newborn triplets is not trivial. The health concerns that come with bearing triplets are not trivial.<\/p>\n

That so many people – even some pro-choice people – were prepared to make a snap judgment that these are trivial or unimportant concerns convinces me, more than ever, that it would be a disaster to place the abortion decision in anyone’s hands but the mother’s.<\/p>\n

* * *<\/p>\n

In addition to the posts I linked to above, here are some other posts discussing Amy Richards’ abortion:<\/p>\n