I’m getting sick of it.
Sick of measure after measure, new legal stipulation after stipulation passing, aimed at limiting access to abortion—locally and nationally—like this past week’s Foxx amendment, which ensures that no tax dollars will be spent to train health-care providers to perform abortions. Abortion, mind them, remains a legal and crucial medical procedure for women in spite of the Draconian regulations suddenly being placed on it left and right.
[…]
A friend of mine—we’ll call her Rose—used to be on the other side of the argument. Like any good Catholic girl, she didn’t believe in abortion. Until, just as she neared her 17th birthday, the morning sickness kicked in. A hospital visit, and there it was: Her birth control had failed due to a drug interaction. She was pregnant.
“I was upset, my mom was upset and we had to tell my dad. He was really, really upset,” she recounts now, several years later. Neither she and the father (her former long-term boyfriend), nor her parents (both worked full-time) were in any way equipped to care for a baby. “It was hard, but I decided [an abortion] was the best thing.”
[…]
And so I challenge those who stand against it without understanding, those who make the laws without being there, those who spit fire at anything pro-choice without ever having had to choose: Put yourselves in her shoes. If abortion means the end of what would have been (or, to some, already was) a new life, the question is still valid: What makes that life any more important than the woman’s life, forever altered and maybe hindered by the decision to have an unplanned child? What about all the people Rose will help—the lives she’ll save when she becomes a nurse—that wouldn’t have been, had she chosen otherwise?
The comments to this article really speak for themselves (3 of the 4 I read were in favor of abortion restriction). But she asked the question, so I’ll answer. What makes a baby’s life more important than a mother’s? Nothing, and absolutely no one said it’s more important. What is important, is having a life to begin with, however altered. And those alterations, like parenting and finishing school, like parenting and working as a nurse, well, we pro-lifers have an app for that, it’s called resources. Contact any pro-life organization, or any crisis pregnancy center, and they’ll have staff and volunteers waiting to help and meet your specific needs.
And as for Rose’s potential lives saved as the nurse she wouldn’t have been with a baby (though I can’t actually think of any nurses I know who don’t have children)…I’m kind of shocked to hear someone use potentiality as an argument for abortion. What makes those patient’s lives worth more than her baby’s? And what about all those potential lives her baby could have changed?
I’m sick of it.
Sick of person after person saying women need abortion.
So, here’s my question. What makes a life as a mother so seemingly worthless and hindered that we think abortion is the favorable alternative?
Don’t let them fool you ladies, we’re a capable lot.
by 
Sure, I’ll put myself in her shoes. “Gee, I made a mistake and now I’m pregnant. I don’t think I want to raise the baby myself because I want to go to nursing school, and it’d be really difficult to do that with a child. So, I’ll give the baby up for adoption. That way no one dies and I still get to pursue my dream, while also fulfilling the dream of an infertile couple who desperately want to be parents.”
Simple solution, no death involved.
Pro-aborts speak as if pregnancy is the rest of your life. It is only nine months, nine months when someone doesn’t have to “want” the child; someone else sure does want it after that.
And many are the women who have chosen to keep their children and become incredible people because of it. Why does having a baby mean your own life comes to an end?
“Why does having a baby mean your own life comes to an end?”
It doesn’t, quite obviously. But people don’t really see abortion as being a gruesome, horrible death; that is hidden. So it appears easier to not be bothered with carrying a child you will only give away. Nine months of morning sickness for a baby you will not raise could feel like a lifetime particularly if you don’t view abortion as a horrifying, violent act.
Well, if you can’t put yourself in those shoes, try these: late 30s, married, responsibly using birth control, with a familial history of poor childbirth outcomes and a husband with genetic damage due to alcoholic parents. If I had a bc failure, would I have an abortion?
Absolutely. Because I have no interest in subjecting myself or a potential child to the risks. Because I am doing everything I can to keep from having children. Because my husband and I don’t want children, for our own reasons.
Do we hate mothers? No. Several of our friends are parents, and we’re actively involved in the children’s lives. We don’t hate kids, either, we just aren’t suited to parenthood.
And I’m not going to go to a “crisis pregnancy center” where they lie about my options, shove religion down my throat and try to shame me for being a responsible adult in a committed marriage. No one should have to deal with that.
And yes–my right as a fully-developed adult human being *does* take precedence over that of a non-viable fetus. Because women are more than baby factories, protests of the adoption industry aside. No woman should be forced to carry a pregnancy to term that they do not want.
I don’t condemn the choice of a woman to bear and keep a child — my sister is a single mother and very happy with her choice, despite the struggles she faces. But it was *her choice*.
Not mine, and not yours.
That is what choice means.
Just a Woman – so, just to clarify, you believe that the choice to commit willful murder of an innocent human being is a valid one?
I encourage you to read this blog post and share your thoughts.
Strawman much, JoAnna?
Murder requires that the victim be a natural person; that is a human being who was still alive at the time of being murdered. Human embryos/fetuses do not reach the stage of viability outside the womb until 37 weeks unassisted. The absolute lower limit with the utmost technological intervention is about 23 weeks, and that’s a 75% mortality rate.
So no, I don’t believe in murder. Abortion isn’t murder. You are, of course, entitled to your dissenting opinion, which apparently derives from your religious belief. That is not a belief I share, and therefore, I expect that your religious beliefs should not impinge upon my personal choices and welfare.
And yes, I will state here, explicitly, that I believe that the general welfare of an existing person takes precedence over the welfare of a clump of cells that might eventually become a person.
But, just to clarify, you believe that the demand to force a woman to take on a burden that carries with it the possibility of serious medical complications, up to and including death, is a valid one?
Not a strawman at all if you believe that human rights begin at conception, as I and many others do. The link I referenced in my earlier post goes into that concept in more detail; I invite you to join in the discussion there and explain why human persons are most often dehumanized when another group has decided that they should be able to be killed with impunity.
Also, abortion is not a religious issue, nor is the belief in the personhood of the unborn child from the moment of conception. Please see http://www.secularprolife.org I didn’t mention religion at all in my post so I’m puzzled as to why you would bring it up.
Viability is a very arbitrary line. At 21w5d a fetus not a person, but all of a sudden she is one at 21w6d? That makes no sense. What magical event happens in that 24 hour period that changes a non-person into a person? Is this true for all feti, or just for some? How do we make that determination?
“But, just to clarify, you believe that the demand to force a woman to take on a burden that carries with it the possibility of serious medical complications, up to and including death, is a valid one?”
I believe that we should all act responsibly when it comes to dealing with the consequences of our actions. In over 98% of cases, pregnancy occurs due to a consensual act between two partners. If the partners in question did not want a pregnancy to occur, then they should not have engaged in that act in the first place. Otherwise, they need to accept responsibility for their own choices.
I’m very pro-choice. I just believe that the choice has be be made prior to the sex act. After that, the death of any child that results is murder, because it is a human rights violation.
You’re also kidding yourself if you believe abortion is risk-free.
Starting with the risks: In developed nations, abortion is significantly more risk-free than childbirth: 0.2–1.2 per 100,000 procedures. Compare that to childbirth, which has a rate, in the US, of 11-30 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births.
And yes, viability is an arbitrary line. I know that. But it’s the best line we have, from a medical and scientific standpoint. Conception is an extremely poor deciding point for the simple reason of statistics: 25% of embryos are spontaneously aborted before the 6th week, and another 8-10% before the 8th week. How can we give embryos human rights when Nature destroys a full third of them in the first trimester?
You say that we all should act responsibly when it comes to the consequences of our own actions. I am. I have. I do. And yet what you are saying is that, even if a couple does everything they can to prevent it, and a conception occurs (and I know people to whom it happened), the woman must bear the child.
Are you *really* telling me that if I absolutely don’t want children, if my husband absolutely does not want children, a choice that we made after long discussion about what was right for us, a choice that we back up in multiple ways, but that still carries a minute risk of failure, that we should deny ourselves one of the most magical and intimate acts of a marriage?
That’s not choice. That’s just splitting hairs very, very finely. That’s still imposing your notion of morality upon others who have made different decisions.
Just a Woman, if the risks are that great, perhaps people should not have sex unless they’re willing to accept those risks.
Do you know the difference between natural death and willful murder? Since elderly people die naturally of old age all the time, is it then acceptable to willfully murder an elderly person? You must think so, since that’s what you’re arguing with your “nature destroys a third of embryos” line of reasoning.
Yes, that is what I’m saying, since non-surgical birth control is not 100% effective. Sex is the natural biological act that creates babies, no matter how much we as a society try to deny that. If you aren’t prepared for a pregnancy, the only way to ensure one will not occur is to not have sex. That is the only 100% guarantee. If you chose to risk a pregnancy, then you need to accept, responsibly, the consequences of that choice and not kill any innocent human beings that result due to your choice.
Yes, because that is the responsible thing to do if the alternative is murdering any children who happen to be conceived by you.
No, that’s recognizing the biological facts of nature, as well as the fact that no method of contraception is 100% effective. As for an imposition of morality, you seem to have no problem imposing your own morality on an unborn child, so your argument rings false.
Considering that I explicitly said upthread that murder requires an existing natural person, then, yes, I do know the difference, and no, I don’t think it’s ok to willfully murder an elderly person. Another strawman.
So let me put it in tiny little words so that it will perhaps penetrate your aura of willful ignorance, breathtaking arrogance, and moral superiority:
You do not have the right to tell me what to do with my body. I don’t have the right to tell you what to do with your body.
You see how easy that is?
I was hoping to point out that the choice between pregnancy and abortion isn’t a simple one, and that both choices have consequences. I was hoping to actually have a conversation. You don’t want a conversation, you want unquestioning agreement.
Won’t darken your virtual doorstep any further. I hope you enjoy it up there where you have all the answers in black and white.
It’s not a strawman when you come from the position that a human being is a person from the moment of conception. You’ve provided no evidence other that arbitrary points of development to support your claim that an unborn child magically turns from a non-person to a person at some point during their development.
I absolutely agree that I don’t have the right to tell you what to do with your body. However, your baby’s body is not your body. A baby has his/her own, separate body with its own, separate, unique DNA from the moment of conception. Unless you mean to say that when I was pregnant with my son, I had a XY chromosomes for 9 months, not to mention a penis.
I agree that the choice isn’t a simple one, but it doesn’t change the fact that willful murder of an innocent human being is inherently wrong, no matter how difficult the circumstances. That’s why I support crisis pregnancy centers which, unlike your bizarre caricature, actually do help women and provide concrete assistance as well as factual information.
This is not my blog, so feel free to do what you want. I feel nothing but pity for you, as you are dehumanizing an entire class of people based on your desire to sanction their deaths. That’s happened before in history, you know, and now we look back on those times with horror. The same thing will happen with abortion one day.
“Because women are more than *baby factories*, protests of the adoption industry aside.”
Baby factory, breeder, brood mare, cow.
What we call women who have inexpedient or more than the socially acceptable number of children.
It’s not just the unborn child that is dehumanized.