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When “I don’t care” is the right response

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waiting

I’m trying to think of something more unpopular to say than “I’m waiting til marriage to have sex” but nothing springs to mind. It’s better when kids say it, as these brave young souls did in this article:

Cool and sassy, the Generation No-Sex is a splinter group of youngsters who reckon sex and marriage go hand in hand. In the last four years, 25,000 young Brits have joined a growing abstinence movement for reasons not just related to religion.

One girl in the article says “Some people may think that’s outdated, but I don’t care.” Nor should she.

In any event, is it really so outdated? “Old fashioned” is the new hip. As I pointed out earlier, other things are getting pretty old, too, namely this idea that you can and/or should traipse from relationship to relationship, without ever truly committing to anything at all, allowing cynicism and heartache to grow, while getting STIs, and possibly pregnant with someone who is not unconditionally committed to you. That’s “outdated” too.

(h/t ConservativeHome)

Late term abortions just never happen…

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…except when they do. From the UK:

Almost 3,000 were carried out on women who were at least 20 weeks pregnant, according to the latest annual figures in England and Wales, representing a 44 per cent increase in less than a decade. The vast majority were for “lifestyle” reasons; less than a quarter were because of a risk that the child would be born handicapped. 

England’s abortion rate rises

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Abortion rates are rising in the UK for teens. Pro-life or pro-choice, I’m not sure anyone sees this kind of thing as a grand success. Unless you are Dawn Primaloo, Health Minister, whose priority is decreasing wait times:

Our priority is to reduce the time women have to wait for an abortion at what is already a very difficult time for them. These statistics show that we have made considerable progress in this, with over two-thirds of women having their abortion at under ten weeks in 2007, up from half in 2002.

Bravo, Dawn, bravo.

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Rebecca adds: If only she were as eager to decrease waits for surgeries or to see specialists. You know, actually providing health care.

C for “child abandonment” in the self-help section

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A new book explains sagely how to leave your child successfully:

Expect also that your child may be “very, very angry.” Remember “even if the only thing your daughter has to say to you is how much she hates you, take heart. Hate is not the opposite of love, indifference is.” If your child sends an angry text message, “Let her express her anger without letting the content affect you too much,” writes Hart. Tell her, “I know you are very angry. I’m truly sorry that things have turned out this way.”

Very comforting for mothers in horrific family situations everwhere, I’m sure. The author is British–this is a real bang-up week for news from England, let me tell you. “God save the Queen?” God save England.

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Rebecca adds: It’s worth clarifying that this isn’t about how successfully to leave your child with a babysitter for the evening, or at a daycare during the work week. (We all know children who react with rage and betrayal at being left with a trusted sitter for three hours, once a year, so Mum and Dad can go to a restaurant.) It’s about mothers who choose not to live with their (quite young) children.

Yet another taboo that we’re well on the way to normalizing, it seems.

Medieval justice–if even that advanced

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In practice, this failure to limit abortion to 20 or 22 weeks doesn’t mean that much–most abortions are done earlier than that. But in theory, it means we are perfectly happy to kill babies that could live on their own (in spite of the fact that doctors find it traumatising). I mentioned before it’s a debate I wouldn’t want to have–because a life is a life from conception. But it is depressing to say the least, that given 3-D imaging, and all we know about life today that we maintain medieval conceptions of justice and decency into the 21st century.  

 

Dependent at 20 weeks, 40 weeks, 80 weeks and counting

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When it comes to lowering the number of weeks for legal abortion in the UK, it seems much of the debate is revolving around “the medical evidence” for survival rates outside the womb. Then there’s the view to women’s rights–the pending disaster should women not be allowed to kill their babies at 20 weeks. Finally, some crazy person claiming science can’t decide it all.

Far be it from me to comment on all things scientific, but babies delivered at full term do not survive on their own outside the womb. Not the ones I know, anyway. That’s the human predicament. We offer ourselves to compassionately care for these babies, where the mother can’t or won’t. Unless we don’t get the opportunity because all those babies are aborted, which is more the reality right now.

Saving money on special effects

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The UK votes to support animal human hybrids and saviour siblings. The negatives are many: a devaluing of human life, embryos as commodities, using people for parts. A loss of the uniqueness of the human soul, a utilitarian approach to medicine.

But let it not be said that I am always negative, a wet blanket, a downer. On the plus side, in due time, budgets for movies like the Narnia series should go way down (save on graphic designers, hire a real centaur instead.)  

Animal-human hybrids, saviour siblings and gestational limits

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The BBC reporter here asks Dawn Primarolo, a Labour MP and health minister why animal-human hybrids are wrong. (Watch the video link.) She does not answer that, but rather moves fluidly into a discussion of embryonic research, saying

This is a decision about where life begins

Well, yes, it is. And now it’s 14 days. Why? Because she said so.

She goes on to talk about how the embryo is a collection of cells under 14 days. And how we can only get certain possible treatments from this collection of cells. And how those “cells” would only be used in very extreme cases where there were no other avenues of research.

This, plus lowering the abortion limit in the UK from 24 to 20 weeks will be up for a free vote in the UK tomorrow.

I guess I find the juxtaposition of discussing abortion and embryonic stem cell research fascinating. In order to fight for late limits on abortion she uses the “woman’s right to choose” argument; in order to justify the creation of people for the sole purpose of experimentation, she uses the treatment argument–“it could save your life.”

Whose life? Certainly not the saviour sibling’s, that’s for sure. Should be an interesting vote.

We’re supposed to get used to this?

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From the UK, 12 to 15-year-olds are having abortions.

Ann Furedi, chief executive of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, which runs a chain of abortion clinics, said: “This is a tiny number of girls. Children grow up very quickly in our society. They are maturing faster physically, psychologically and socially, and society just has to come to terms with that.”

It is a small number of girls–10 to 15 each year–but we ought to be shocked, maintain that shock, increase the shock. True compassion isn’t shown by saying hey, that’s normal, get used to it! And it is entirely alarming and painful to read that someone would advocate that view. Would Furedi say that if it were her 12-year-old daughter?

This is where “women’s rights” becomes an obvious fraud. Who will start the “girl’s rights” movement–a 12-year-old is not a woman, after all.

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