Archives for March 2009

A heart-wrenching story in today’s Citizen:

Re: My vigil at abortion clinic is to help women not end a life, March 26.

I wish someone had been standing across street from the abortion clinic on that gloomy day in 1980s, offering an alternative. Perhaps, my girlfriend and I would have changed our minds about the worst mistake of our lives.

I had a successful movie acting career and my girlfriend was a medical doctor. She was on the pill but it failed and she became pregnant. We decided together not to keep our baby because our careers were beginning.

I thought I was being a responsible and loyal boyfriend for helping pay for the abortion and going to the clinic with her. I sat in the waiting room, hoping to escape the responsibility of being a father. She came out of the operating room a changed person and tumbled into an intense depression. No amount of medical training could have prepared her for what she experienced on that operating table.

I was also devastated and tried to avoid the pain by overwork and addiction. Like many couples who have abortions, we broke up.

I lost the two things I tried to protect with the abortion — our relationship and my career. But most importantly we lost our precious child, who would now be 25 years old, and the pain is still with me. Abortion affects men, too.

David MacDonald, Ottawa

It must have taken a lot of guts to write this letter and send it for publication. I hope it will help change the minds of other people who may now be in a similar situation.

Leonard Stern writes about us.

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Andrea adds: Hmmmm. I may have to up the ante:

Last year, a new voice emerged — a curious voice, because it is distinctly female but at the same time willing to express discomfort with abortion.

“Willing to express discomfort”? More like a complete and total emotional, intellectual and spiritual rejection of abortion, because we don’t kill to solve our problems and then pretend they serve the grander purpose of women’s rights. Anyhoo. Bygones. I’m glad to get the press, and to see people taking this topic on.

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Tanya’s trying to believe the best about people: I think Stern thinks he’s doing us a favour.  He’s sketching us as open-minded, moderate, secular, intellectual women.  If the blog gets more hits over the weekend, we’ll know why!

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Rebecca recalls that any publicity is good publicity: Nonetheless, there is a distinctly patronizing flavour to the column, which is built on some rather, shall we say, outdated perceptions. The pro-life movement is mostly led by Christian fundamentalist men? (And, abortion advocates are all women? A significant current in the abortion movement is the fact that abortion cuts the links between men’s sexual activity and its consequences.) Pro-life women are “church ladies”? I don’t know if that was even true in the 1970s, but it’s certainly not the case now.

I have yet to meet a pro-lifer who wants to put women who have abortions in jail. The number I have met who think abortionists should be jailed I can count on both hands. Rather, the vast majority see abortion as something that destroys an innocent baby, while also harming the mother, and on a broader basis contributing to a culture of death. It’s a moral, cultural and philosophical problem inextricably tied to our views about sexuality, motherhood and marriage – it’s not a criminal problem, like drunk driving, to be solved by ramped up penalties and fervent prosecution.

Religious Jews have long taken the kind of nuanced position that Stern suggests is a strange new hybrid surfacing for the first time today. (And as with lots of aspects of Jewish law, “long” is measured in centuries, not in years.) Abortion, in Jewish law, cannot be banned full stop, because when the pregnancy constitutes a mortal threat to the mother, we are obliged to put the life of the mother before the life of the unborn child. (Note that this refers to mortal danger, not mental duress, or even minor physical harm.) At the same time, halacha recognizes that a fetus is a developing human, in the image of God, and therefore sacred, and not to be harmed for any reasons but the most dire.

(Disclaimer: I am not a rabbi, some individual rabbis dissent about the permissibility of abortion in the first 40 days of pregnancy, and rabbinical positions on oral contraceptives, the morning after pill, IVF and the treatment of embryos vary widely.)

I have a voice. And I use it. And I will not be categorized, or compelled to express my voice in one way. So often, our voices are held against us, or shamed; my voice will be my voice and I will continue to voice my voice, audibly. Yes. When I think about my voice—I just know I want my voice, and others’ voices, too, to be heard. And this way, we will change the world.

For more blogging just like this, please click here. The author calls herself “pro-voice” and is attempting to reframe the abortion debate in a manner that is…almost entirely incomprehensible to everyone. I understand that labels have limitations. But let’s get down to brass tacks. She is pro-choice—rhymes with voice—but won’t acknowledge it.

In this post, she says there’s room for the voice of the unborn child. I’d have to imagine that voice is a bit quieter. All those who advocate for abortion are alive. And the rest… well… not so vocal.

I wish her—and her voice—the best of luck.

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Brigitte isn’t particularly subtle: Call me cynical, but when I read stuff like that what I hear is “if only everyone would agree with me we’d put an end to the culture wars, which would be so much nicer”. Colour me unsympathetic. And unimpressed. Try again, sweetie.

Hey! Spring is here! (“Here” being Ottawa, where I sit.) This is the first really nice weekend of the year and I am SO ready for it… Thoughts turn to t-shirts (don’t forget to buy yours), running shoes, sunshine and flower pots. Nice change, isn’t it?

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Andrea asks: Buying flowers–but did you buy the chick too? Because if so, I’m on my way over. The last bit of snow from the five foot pile in front of my house is gone now, too. Things are indeed looking up.

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Tanya says: I still have a sad, gray pile of snow on my front yard. I think I shall indeed be one of those weirdos to shovel it onto the street this weekend.
Then I’ll take my daughter outside, barelegged, and snap her annual Easter photos. We always like to involve our pet bunny. But a chick would do nicely, too…

But we did! We heard from enough guys who said they, too, would like a People for the Ethical Treatment of People t-shirt so we made one. Same price ($25, which includes all applicable taxes and shipping anywhere in Canada or the United States), same logo, different colour. And yes, girls are allowed to wear that one, too.

Pre-order yours today. Orders are expected to ship around April 5.