There are consequences to any choice. Dr. Donald DeMarco addresses a few of the consequences of abortion and an abortion culture:
Joyce Arthur, coordinator of the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada complained when actress Nicole Kidman announced to the press that she was “thrilled” at being pregnant. Ms. Arthur wants pregnant women to be less positive about their pregnancies: “It certainly shows any young woman watching these movies or following these celebrities that the best option is to have the baby and it glorifies that choice.” The choice to abort brings with it a prohibition of any public display of maternal joy. One choice annuls another. We must not glorify choices. We want to make all choices perfectly free of any outside influence. This would mean, incidentally, the logical end of commercial advertising. Nonetheless, this is a strange request coming from an organization that has done everything it could to influence the choice of abortion. The choice for abortion, indeed, as Elshtain has remarked, does bring with it a considerable array of constraints and compulsions. […]
When the choice to abort is regarded as a form of “care,” the consequences can be catastrophic. Concerning Obama’s Affordable Care Act, W. Ross Blackburn, rector of an Anglican fellowship, raises an interesting question: “When decisions about what is and what is not covered by insurance are made by an appointed administrator with a medical sheet in one hand and a balance sheet in the other, what will happen to children whose prognosis is bleak, and treatment is expensive?” (The Human Life Review, Fall 2012) Does it make sense to deliver a child who requires expensive medical treatment that is not covered by the Affordable Care Act? Rev. Blackburn fears that ultimately the back-alley abortion will be replaced by the back-alley birth! Will his words written in 2012 prove prophetic 25 years from now?
by 
Back-alley births in China.
Rev. Blackburn’s words prophetic? One can think likely. However, those same words, and for that matter PWPL commenting on them, may contribute to the ushering in of the opposite – a more life oriented culture creating good.
Here’s to hoping, David.
It may actually be happening now. There is a bit of a movement going on among the crunchy granola types called “freebirth”, where women deliver at home, unassisted. I have a good friend who delivered twins that way. I can understand where she was coming from–childbirth has become quite an industrial procedure here, and intervention is preferred to non-intervention, especially with twins. She felt that she didn’t have the strength, while in labour, to constantly butt heads with the doctors and nurses, and so she, her husband, and her mother delivered her babies at home. (This was her second set of twins. Her first set was also delivered at home with a midwife. Don’t get me into the politics of why the midwife couldn’t be there the second time around–suffice it to say, there is some nasty politicking that goes on between ob-gyns and midwives.)
I’ve been through the pregnancy, labour, and delivery process three times now. I’ve gotta say, given how over-medicalized pregnancy has become here, the idea of going it alone has a bit of an appeal to my maverick side. In three pregnancies, I’ve been suggested abortion in two of them. (The first time around, I was still in school, and this last time, at the 20-week ultrasound, a couple of markers showed up which could be indicative of chromosomal anomalies. (The kid’s fine.))
We’ve got to remember, for the last 25 years, the medical associations have been telling their members that abortion is merely another option in a set of options as to how you would like your pregnancy to be treated. And there are exceptions, but mainstream medicine, at least here in Alberta, does treat abortion fairly cavalierly. Abortion is offered as a treatment to a myriad of problems during pregnancy.
Just read Joyce Arthur’s remark again. So, by celebrating and rejoicing with new mothers, somehow we are disparaging the choices of women who have had abortiona. Got it.
Here’s the thing. Babies are wonderful creatures. Abortions are horrible. Even for the women who have confidently decided that abortion is the best choice for them (which is by no means the entire population of the waiting room in any abortion clinic) abortion is still a sad, sad choice.
If the Pro Choice Action Network wanted to, they could certainly TRY to glorify abortion at the expense of childbirth. But, somehow, those “I had an abortion” T-shirts really never quite caught on…
Friend of mine begins Midwifery this fall. That and the above comments prompted me to do some reading and lo and behold – seven schools offer the Midwifery Education Program – MacMaster/Laurentian/Ryerson and UBC, Mount Royal, Quebec Trois Rivieres, and University College of the North – that seems like good news.