I'm Pro-Choice, But The Fact That Somebody Disagrees With Me Doesn't Mean They're Evil Or "Hate Women"
I find abortion creepy and troubling -- but understanding biology, I don't see a fertilized egg as a person. It's a thing that has the potential to become a person.
Or, as neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga puts it in The Ethical Brain, neuroscience tells us that "life begins with a sentient being," around week twenty-three, or around the same time that the fetus can survive outside the womb with medical support.
In Gazzaniga's view, it is at this point, and not until then, that the fetus becomes "one of us," with all "the moral and legal rights of a human being." And thus Gazzaniga holds that we should allow unrestricted experimentation on human embryos up to week twenty-three.
To explain his argument, Gazzaniga uses an analogy: the embryo is like housing materials found at a Home Depot. Says Gazzaniga: "When a Home Depot burns down, the headline in the paper is not '30 Houses Burn Down.' It is 'Home Depot Burned Down.'" Similarly, to destroy a fetus is not to destroy a human life, but merely the "materials" of life.
Regarding abortion and how the left sees women on the right who are against it, Ashe Schow has a column in the WashEx, "Why don't Democrats think pro-life women exist?"
I don't think Dems think pro-life women don't exist; it's more like they shouldn't.
Schow asks:
Why do Democrats act like anyone who opposes abortion is anti-woman?
The short answer: politics. Liberals become consumed by the topic of abortion and have decided that they are on the right side of history; so anyone against abortion -- including the 46 percent of women who don't identify as "pro-choice" -- are anti-woman.They then proceed to either pretend pro-life women don't exist, or, when confronted by a pro-life woman, accuse her of "internalized misogyny."
I agree with Schow on this:
It's okay for women to be pro-life. Women can decide for themselves what they believe and what they find moral and immoral. Telling women they must think and believe certain things seems to be the opposite of empowerment, in my view.
I also think it's okay for a woman to want to be a wife and mother and stay home with her kids, though, for me, that would be like being very slowly eaten alive by thousands of tiny insects.
Schow winds up with this:
Note to liberals: Pro-life women do exist, and their belief that abortion is inhumane and hurtful to women doesn't make them anti-woman. In fact, you could even say it makes them pro-woman.
Again, I don't agree with them, but their beliefs aren't formed out of hating women, and it's pretty childish to characterize them that way, just to "win."
Lumber at Home Depot can be made into a house, a barn, a fence, a floor. A human embryo doesn't become anything else--not a dog, not a bird, not a flower. It's human from the second the sperm meets the egg.
It's not a pleasant thought, but if you abort, you're aborting a human. Now, I think an adult woman's rights outweigh those of the embryo, but let's not pretend that the embryo isn't human.
KateC at April 22, 2016 12:58 AM
I fully support a woman's right to choose what health risks to take with her body, and to decide how much risk she is willing to take to support another person.
That said, I have to agree with Kate, let's not whitewash this, it is killing a human. Ir may not be able to think yet but it is what it is. You shouldn't be required to let aoneoneyuse your uterus any more than you should be required to donate blood to your dying child, but it is what it is
I also see it as a porgression, if a fertility clinic caught fire I would save the born peiple before the embryos. But it shouldn't be taken lightly.
NicoleK at April 22, 2016 1:39 AM
Ditto your call for tolerance for those with opposing views.
Biologically, I think human life pretty clearly begins at conception, when the zygote already has its own DNA. In 3 months, a baby "looks like" a little baby already, and just grows thereafter.
I realize that majorities of modern societies can't live with the implications of human life protected from conception, so it won't be. You've recommended one measure by which reasonable people could set limits on abortion; here are two others, both set by some obvious biological markers.
When do we say life ends? Usually, when the heart stops beating, and can't be revived; or when brain waves can no longer be measured. Could reasonable people not accept a measurable heartbeat or brain waves as the beginning of life? Those are present in the womb at about 21 and 40 days, respectively.
I know, also inconvenient; but we moderns, blessed with so many medical and technological conveniences, should be able to take responsibility to defend the lives we can recognize are there.
Neal at April 22, 2016 5:35 AM
Neal +1000
If you are going to be technical about "killing" at least be consistent.
Bob in Texas at April 22, 2016 6:20 AM
(As far as the "human life" argument goes, it always feels like a kind of bait and switch is occurring. If I said "My finger is human, and my finger is alive, therefore cutting off my finger takes a human life" we would all see the leap in logic that occurred. A finger may be human life, but it is not a human life. That is to say, it does not possess personhood. A fertilized egg is also human, and it is also alive, but it is not a person.)
Chris Rhodes at April 22, 2016 6:37 AM
You don't understand the science all that well. Organogenesis is complete by week 8. All the "embryo" does from then on is get bigger and mature, all the organ systems are there and it's recognizably human. 22 Weekers can and have survived. In a few years, it'll be 20-weekers. They probably dream in the 2nd trimester. I've held a 19 week gestation "embryo", as you call it. It did not deserve to be ripped apart, or lethally injected. Don't base your opinion on someone else's stupid one. Take some embryology and neuro genesis courses, don't just read an opinion, think it makes sense, and go with it. Better yet, spend some time caring for these "embryos", as you call them. NICUS always need volunteers.
Women are adults, capable of using birth control, or at least of not dicking around half their pregnancy....or they're not adults, not responsible for themselves and their decisions, and therefor should have the same rights as children. You don't get to claim women are equal to men on one hand, but claim they can't be held responsible for their choices in this one area on the other.
momof4 at April 22, 2016 6:45 AM
That should have been "they provably dream", not probably dream.
momof4 at April 22, 2016 6:47 AM
"I don't think Dems think pro-life women don't exist; it's more like they shouldn't."
A large part of the modern left is living in a bubble and labeling anything outside your view of the world as 'evil'. So I expect many of them don't know there are pro-choice women. They don't know any personally and they have no desire to find out anything that conflicts with their world view.
I also side with a human begins at conception. But keep in mind we kill humans all the time. Most of us don't feel it is immoral for a soldier to kill another soldier on the field of war. And no one debates that both of those soldiers are human persons. The same with euthanasia. If you are in pain or so mentally damaged that life has no value killing you can be viewed as a moral option. So viewing an embryo as human and a person does not preclude abortion.
The religious Jewish view in the case of threat to the mothers life is the child is a violent attacker. So just like you have the moral right to kill someone who comes at you with a knife you have the moral right to kill a dangerous child in self defense.
Ben at April 22, 2016 7:29 AM
If men had periods, they'd brag about how much they bled. If men could get pregnant, they'd brag about how long their labor was, every family would have a dozen kids and they'd compete to see who had the bigger belly.
Men, at least in my experience, have the tendency to turn whatever they do into an arena in which to triumph.
KateC at April 22, 2016 7:34 AM
As I think crid posted in the past
http://bradhicks.livejournal.com/328184.html
Society might be squemish, but people are quite comfortable killing children AFTER birth for a few months
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infanticide#Paleolithic_and_Neolithic
Until a child can survive outside the womb it is a parasite. Its like cancer, it has the potential under the right circumstances to produce a human, and its alive technically speaking, but it isnt a person.
And the Home Depot analogy is apt, just becuase humans are a biological machine doesnt make us any less a machine.
Given the sheer number of children born with sever birth defects, or auto aborted becuase of even severer defects is proof that the "construction" process is neither foolproof of divine
lujlp at April 22, 2016 7:56 AM
KateC,
This is a feature of the male psyche, not a bug. Competition drives innovation, innovation made all the things you enjoy in life possible. And being in a majority female profession, the humblebrag of women goes on about all those things you mention, and then some. There are whole joke routines, by women, that go on brags about solely female things. Maybe your friends and family are more stoic, IDK.
Politics has always been personal, but with social media, it has become intimate and that has led to too many seeing disagreement as an invasion of intimate space. (In other words, one can not be politely silent when everyone you know can see what you think.)
MrScience_ at April 22, 2016 7:57 AM
To explain his argument, Gazzaniga uses an analogy: the embryo is like housing materials found at a Home Depot. Says Gazzaniga: "When a Home Depot burns down, the headline in the paper is not '30 Houses Burn Down.' It is 'Home Depot Burned Down.'"
Totally off topic but, have you ever noticed that when a grow op is busted, the value placed on the crop is the street value after the pot is harvested and sold by the gram?
Steamer at April 22, 2016 9:08 AM
I don't know about you but I'm doubling my investments in commercial prisons.
Once we get rid of abortion we can get rid of birth control and thus guarantee a never-ending flow of low-income bodies to the for-profit hoosegow.
Screw human misery. Let's make some money off these losers!
We can always blame the mothers for having sex. Mmmm. Smug moral superiority AND profits!
Also, Jesus. So there.
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at April 22, 2016 9:38 AM
I didn't say male self-aggrandizement was a bug. I'm all for tooting one's own horn, so to speak. I am as Stoic as is necessary.
But the received wisdom is that is if men could get pregnant, they'd be clamoring for abortion, and I think that's a false assumption.
I'm pro choice, but am not interested in trying to push aside the uncomfortable truth of killing a human. Women have abortions for many reasons--some profound, some stupid.
KateC at April 22, 2016 9:38 AM
There's no way this will have as many posts as the thread about bathrooms, but here are new questions:
1) What do you want to happen to a woman who has an abortion?
2) Who and what should pay for exceptional medical care to make sure a conception results in a live birth?
2a) Who and what should pay for access to the technical assets to perform an abortion?
3) How do you expect any law you might make prohibiting abortion (with the expectation that life be preserved) to be extended to remote areas, absent any sort of advanced medical care?
4) A woman miscarries - according to her. Do we take her word?
5) Is society or the woman punished or rewarded more by either the abortion or the birth?
6) What happens to the average child of a woman forced to have a baby she did not want?
A tornado of drama swirls around the woman who makes that choice. Single motherhood, despite some efforts to paint these people as saints, is a dismal failure with some exceptions.
I'll make you a deal: you choose, and then I will choose your company based on your choice. Yes, I know you may not have been ready for either path - and may never be.
Radwaste at April 22, 2016 10:31 AM
If men were the ones having babies and periods, and had wombs and lots of estrogen and vaginas, they'd be women. So the whole "if men could get pregnant" conversation is kind of stupid if you think about it beyond the initial declaration. I'd imagine that many, many men are pro-choice not because they "support women," but because if they accidentally impregnated someone, they would like for her to have an abortion.
ahw at April 22, 2016 10:33 AM
No one's claiming that embryos aren't human. The argument is that until they've reached a certain level of development, they're not persons with the legal and moral right not to be killed. Regardless of whether you agree about when personhood begins (I believe that one pro-life stance is that personhood is there at the moment of conception), acting as if pro-abortion advocates don't understand that a human embryo can't grow into a horse or platypus is disingenuous.
Szoszolo at April 22, 2016 10:45 AM
It is the same thing that happens with most issues (guns, climate change, feminism, race, deficit spending, you name it): the left is not only sure it is correct, it does not believe there is any other position that a rational person can have, like one's position on the sun being in the sky. Only crazy and evil people could disagree with them, and are thus not to be taken seriously. Since there is no other view possible but theirs, it makes sense for them to say "shut up". So, instead of granting that others might not agree and politics is about negotiating the best compromise we can find, politics has become about screaming and crying until you get your way, with ultimatums being made (look at all the campus protests where a tiny group makes non-negotiable demands).
Craig Loehle at April 22, 2016 10:51 AM
"it does not believe there is any other position that a rational person can have"
The best way to win an argument is to state the other's position for them and then attack your statement of their position as though it were theirs. Of course, never provide a link to support your contention.
Could someone clarify whether this is the "straw man" fallacy or just B.S. of a general nature?
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at April 22, 2016 11:00 AM
Good points, Gog.
Also, one thing I really wish would stop is a habit of those supposedly pro-choice editorial cartoonists; they portray women seeking abortions as women who seem to be at least six months pregnant or so. Anyone will tell you that 90% of abortions happen in the FIRST trimester - you know, before it begins to show. The percentage would be even higher in the U.S. if it weren't so difficult for so many poor and rural women to get the money, time and resources to get to the clinic.
lenona at April 22, 2016 11:03 AM
To follow up: From what I've heard, the restrictions on second-trimester abortions are just about as strict in Europe as they are here in the US. Why do Europeans put up with it? Because it's so much EASIER in many parts of Europe than it is here to get a FIRST-trimester abortion, so pro-choicers accept the trade-off.
Sounds like a fair deal to me - but how many anti-choicers, here, are willing to have that arrangement?
I think it's safe to say, too, that what makes so many people angry is the way anti-choice women make things so difficult, in so many ways, for women getting abortions under all sorts of terrible circumstances, but then those same anti-choicers have abortions themselves or bring in their daughters for abortions. Many clinic workers will tell you of seeing those people protesting outside the clinic one day, getting abortions the next, and protesting again, the next day. As in: "The only moral abortion is mine."
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/02/opinion/campaign-stops/abortion-and-punishment.html?_r=0
(regarding Trump's words on punishing women for getting abortions)
Excerpt:
"...If abortion is murder, as abortion opponents are always claiming it is, how can society let the woman off the hook? We take murder pretty seriously in this country, especially the murder of children, which is what the anti-abortion movement deems fertilized eggs, embryos and fetuses to be. True, punishing women sounds cruel and misogynist. But if ending a pregnancy is murder, how can we not treat it as such?
"Abortion opponents answer this question by insisting that the woman is a victim, too — “broken and wounded,” in the words of Penny Nance, the president of Concerned Women for America. The woman is desperate, confused and alone. Someone pushed her into it — her parents, her boyfriend or husband, the “culture of death” that tells her an embryo is just a clump of cells, Planned Parenthood. Yes, somehow, the mere existence of a clinic forces her to enter its doors, even if she has to drive all day to get there, sleep in her car to fulfill a 24-, 48- or 72-hour waiting period, listen to a script full of anti-abortion propaganda and pay a month’s wages for the procedure.
"If you consider how determined a woman has to be to get an abortion in much of the country these days and how much energy states expend trying to dissuade her, it’s hard to see her as a frail flower. If abortion is murder, the woman is less like a victim and more like someone who hires a hit man. In law, both parties are culpable.
"Abortion opponents know full well that the public would not abide putting women in prison en masse. Politically, it’s more palatable to portray them as irrational, ignorant and childlike, perhaps even temporarily insane. They are, in any case, incompetent to make their own decisions. If a woman thinks having a baby as a college freshman or a mother of five is a terrible idea, if she has health problems or is trying to escape a bad relationship or feels unready for motherhood, well, she just doesn’t know what’s good for her.
"Emotional distress, immaturity or pressure from others don’t work well as defenses in ordinary murder cases, though. We put actual children in prison for killing, and many people who kill are under the sway of others. We rarely count that as an excuse."
Same author, 1988:
"Here are some reasons why women I know became pregnant: because her IUD came out one morning; because her husband failed - once, in 13 years! - to put on his condom in time; because she and her live-in trusted to the calendar and had a diaphragmless tryst on the beach; because she thought breast-feeding prevented ovulation and, anyway, she'd given birth just six weeks before. Stupid, trivial reasons, the same sort of reasons you might give for missing a train. (I'm sorry, you apologize later, I misread the schedule, I couldn't find a taxi, the meeting ran late.) Most of the time, people catch their trains, and most of the time, adult, middle-class, sensible women take care of birth control, and birth control takes care of them. (I'm not talking about teen-agers or the poor or the helpless here.) But a woman has about 30 years of potentially fertile sex - that's a long time to go without a slip-up. That's one reason why more than half the pregnancies in this country are accidents, and why, if you follow 100 women over their reproductive lives, 46 of them will have had an abortion by menopause, and many will have had more than one.
"The abortion rate is always discussed in terms of values, to use the current cliche. Are Americans (by which is really meant American women) too promiscuous, too selfish, too frivolous, too in love with control? But surely we are not more so than Swedes, those fabled hedonists, or less so than the tradition-bound Greeks. Why, then, do Swedish women have fewer abortions than Americans, and Greek women more than twice as many?"...
lenona at April 22, 2016 11:25 AM
And from Gail Collins (also about Trump's words):
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/02/opinion/trump-truth-and-abortion.html?action=click&contentCollection=Opinion&module=RelatedCoverage®ion=EndOfArticle&pgtype=article
...The rest of the religious right howled in denial. A woman who chooses to have an abortion is, apparently, not taking responsibility for herself. She’s … misled, poor thing.
“On the important issue of the sanctity of life, what’s far too often neglected is that being pro-life is not simply about the unborn child; it’s also about the mother — and creating a culture that respects her and embraces life,” said Ted Cruz. “Of course we shouldn’t be talking about punishing women; we should affirm their dignity and the incredible gift they have to bring life into the world.”
Remember, people, that Ted Cruz does not believe that a 12-year-old rape victim should be allowed to have an abortion. But that’s all part of affirming women’s dignity.
In reality, the anti-abortion movement is grounded on the idea that sex outside of marriage is a sin, and the only choice a woman should have is between abstinence and the possibility of imminent parenthood. It may be politically unwise to say that the sinner ought to pay, but she should at minimum have to carry an unwanted child to term.
Look at it this way and it’s easy to understand why abortion opponents have shown virtually no interest in working to make contraceptives and family planning universally available. It’s the sex, at bottom, that they oppose, and the politicians they support feel no pressure — or even any freedom — to try to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies through anything but high school abstinence lectures. Contraception may not be illegal, but it’s certainly not something you want to treat with respect...
lenona at April 22, 2016 11:29 AM
Hey, Lenona,
"Safe, legal, and rare."
Where are the efforts of pro-abortionists to create the third leg of that stool? We put great amounts of effort and money to dissuade society from engaging in the perfectly legal conduct of smoking, right? Where is the effort to spread the message that abortion is something to be avoided, if at all possible?
Are progressives happy or sad that more than 50% of black human beings conceived in this country every year are killed before being born? I do note that Planned Parenthood clinics have always tended to be located in "colored" neighborhoods.
And crickets chirp ...
Jay R at April 22, 2016 12:02 PM
Another thing ...
For those who harp about a human being not being a "person" until they can survive unaided outside the womb, I have a suggestion: Let's drop you into the forest, naked and alone, and see how many of you can survive without aid from another human being -- the "womb" of human society. I'll bet we find very few "persons" indeed! For those who can't survive ... oh, well, we haven't lost anything, or anyone, important, right?
Jay R at April 22, 2016 12:12 PM
"6) What happens to the average child of a woman forced to have a baby she did not want?"
Radwaste, you have heard of the Donahue-Levitt hypothesis?
Insufficient Poison at April 22, 2016 12:50 PM
The PP I volunteered at was in a heavily white and Jewish town. I am sure some black people lived there , too, but...
The left is trying to make abortion rarebby encouragig sex ed and birth control.
Nicolek at April 22, 2016 1:20 PM
"oh, well, we haven't lost anything, or anyone, important, right?"
Conflating a two week old mass of cells with an adult human? Game, set, and match.
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at April 22, 2016 1:38 PM
I've seen too many kids by too many people who shouldn't have kids end up in group homes and foster care.
Though I have no idea if their mothers considered abortion or not.
The majority of those girls at least ended up as teenage parents (when abortion was legal) and many of them grandparents before 40.
I know one who had 7 children all of which were taken from her for various amounts of time.
I have 16 yo relative who has a 1 yo, I have another relative is 21 with 2 kids from 2 daddies and she doesn't let either see the kids (they had access to abortion).
I'd like to see these kids having far less kids.
On the other hand, we saw my daughter's heartbeat at 7 weeks. When a child is wanted that 7 week old embryo is a baby.
I'm pro-choice because I do not want people to have kids they don't want.
I suspect kids that are not wanted are even more likely to end up in the system than kids born to parents that poor parenting skills but still wanted the child. Kids that end up in the system have very poor outcomes.
While I am very pro-adoption (as an adoptee) I can completely understand preferring abortion to adoption.
Aborting early is far less mentally, emotionally, physically, and financially taxing. I had a fairly complicated pregnancy that resulted in a lot of missed work and pretty high medical bills (and this is with pretty good employer sponsored insurance).
I don't know if I could do that if I didn't want keep my baby. While some of that is my age...it still does happen to younger women.
Up to a certain point the mother's rights outweigh the rights of the baby. As science advances that point get earlier and earlier.
Katrina at April 22, 2016 1:53 PM
"Conflating a two week old mass of cells with an adult human? Game, set, and match."
So weight is the important criteria? Or is it age? Fat old people are the most valuable to society for you?
Ben at April 22, 2016 2:58 PM
Ben, for me the important criteria is nervous system development. A two week old mass of cells doesn't have a nervous system. A 3-month fetus has the pathways laid out, but there's no functionality yet. At 5 months, it can produce twitches and brain waves, but the brain isn't anywhere near as functional as a new-born puppy's brain.
markm at April 22, 2016 3:29 PM
I'm fine with it until age 18, frankly.
Kevin at April 22, 2016 4:27 PM
Markm,
I was mostly poking Gog's classic poor logic. For me having a nervous system is not enough. I view this as a more complex issue.
As far as science is concerned life beings at conception. And that is not a parasite, it is a zygote or baby. When that creature gets legal rights is not a scientific question but a political one.
As a political question I raised two issues. One, is this life a threat to another. If so killing it is a form of self defense and is moral. Two, what is the quality of life for this new person. Say the embryo has a nervous system, but it is deformed. The child will live a life of pain and retardation. Is euthanize it at this stage immoral? Both of these questions have nothing to do with the age or even current capabilities of the child. They apply at 1 week as well as at 1000 weeks. At 1 lb as at 215 lbs. But trying to avoid admitting to yourself you are killing someone by denying that someone personhood is a classic immoral act.
Kevin, I know you are being flippant, but there is historical precedence for that view. Though the more common age was 12. Before puberty you were a child and were therefor property of your father. He could kill you without consequence. After puberty you were an adult and there could be consequences.
Ben at April 22, 2016 7:40 PM
Remember, people, that Ted Cruz does not believe that a 12-year-old rape victim should be allowed to have an abortion.
I appreciate that. Its consistent.
I despise hypocrisy, and anyone who tells you they are pro life but allows for a rape or incest exception is a piece of shit.
Why does it matter how a human life was created if all life is sacred?
Why are they willing to allow people who willingly engaged in incest to abort a kid for fear of genetic problems but not the two unrelated carries of the cystic fibrosis gene?
Pro life people who think rape exceptions are OK arent pro life, they are pro punishing that filthy whore who dared to have sex willingly
lujlp at April 22, 2016 7:45 PM
@Ben -- I'm not being flippant. Just dreaming of a world where the little nippers were constantly aware that their existence was completely probationary. Now that's a behavioral incentive.
Kevin at April 22, 2016 8:10 PM
Several months ago I saw a news story where a house frame had burned down. The title was something like "House under construction burns" not "Home Depot burns" - the home depot example given would be more like the food which mom is about to eat.
The Former Banker at April 22, 2016 8:39 PM
"...Donahue-Levitt hypothesis..."
IP, I had heard of the studies, but not by that name. My question stems from the layman's view that an unwanted child acts out, and the correlation between single motherhood and crime seems to support this.
Wikipedia's article addresses a bunch of statistics problems without mentioning variables very well.
Radwaste at April 22, 2016 8:54 PM
"I'm not being flippant. Just dreaming of a world where the little nippers were constantly aware that their existence was completely probationary. Now that's a behavioral incentive."
That's amusing. Everyone's existence is probationary and the only way to extend it it is to procreate. No procreation and you are a fail. It's even more amusing when it is by choice and you lament all those idiots having kids.
Caustic at April 22, 2016 9:21 PM
@Caustic - If producing children is a "win" instead of a "fail," then I'm happy to be a fail. And I never said that people who reproduce are idiots. I'm sure you're quite intelligent and content with your choice, desire, irresponsibility, whatever it was. God knows I am. Take care.
Kevin at April 22, 2016 10:14 PM
Disagreeing with me doesn't mean someone's "evil" or that they "hate women."
It just means they're wrong. That's all.
Patrick at April 23, 2016 5:11 AM
It just means they're wrong.
Continuing in error after I've told you you're wrong is evil.
dee nile at April 23, 2016 5:54 AM
Caustic,
Having a kid doesn't make your existence less probationary. And there are plenty of species where a minority provide the procreation for the next generation. That doesn't mean that species could survive without the non-reproducing members.
But I also fail to see why 18 is the magic number where that behavioral incentives are no longer needed. There are plenty of 30 and 40 year olds who are a waste of skin.
Ben at April 23, 2016 6:45 AM
Single motherhood, despite some efforts to paint these people as saints, is a dismal failure with some exceptions.
Radwaste at April 22, 2016 10:31 AM
It's been pointed out more than once that anti-abortionists are heavily responsible for de-stigmatizing single motherhood.
lenona at April 23, 2016 10:09 AM
Nicolek: You beat me to it, re the effort of the left to make birth control more available to the poor. (Is it any surprise that in states where abortion services are hard to access, so is birth control?)
I would add: No one LIKES having an abortion; it's safe to say that at least half the time, the woman is thinking: "I'd much rather have had access to a contraceptive that's safe, affordable, and that WORKS more than 95% of the time." (Using two methods at once often means that you don't get all three benefits.)
Here's what I posted elsewhere:
It's nice to see that at least ONE governor is brave enough to refuse to let the Colorado vision of birth control fade away...
In this case, it's the governor of Delaware, who wrote an op-ed. If any other governor or senator is working in this direction, please let me know.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/12/opinion/what-states-can-do-on-birth-control.html?_r=0
Excerpt:
...In a national survey, fewer than 20 percent of respondents said that their community health centers (on which many low-income women rely) offer the full range of contraceptive methods. And unplanned pregnancy rates among women at or below the poverty level are more than five times as high as among the most affluent women.
To address these problems, Delaware has formed a public-private partnership with Upstream USA, a nonprofit group that provides training and advice to health centers to improve reproductive health care and access to contraception. The initiative has raised millions of dollars from philanthropic sources, while the state has reallocated about $1.75 million from the Division of Public Health budget for the project. By the end of 2017, we will ensure that the nearly 200,000 women of reproductive age in our state have access to the full range of methods.
When Colorado pioneered a similar program, in three years it saw savings of $5.85 in Medicaid costs for every $1 invested, because mothers and babies ended up healthier. Although the State Legislature's failure to pass a bill providing further funding has hampered Colorado's efforts, the program's benefits -- better birth outcomes, a reduced teenage birthrate and millions of dollars saved -- are cause for celebration. With luck, the Legislature will change course this year.
Delaware's initiative will be subject to a rigorous evaluation process that will not only track pregnancy and birth outcomes, but also assess its impact on birth-related spending in Medicaid and private insurance plans. Changes in reimbursement policy can help...
(snip)
lenona at April 23, 2016 10:27 AM
Oh, and fathers' rights activist and lawyer Robert Franklin said, in 2013:
"Every year in this country, there are only about 125,000 adoptions completed. Of those, only about 75,000 are stranger adoptions and the rest are done by stepparents. Meanwhile, over 400,000 children live in foster families, their biological parents having had their parental rights terminated. In other words, we have far too few parents who want to adopt."
And, he might have added, it strongly suggests that Katha Pollitt was quite right when she said, in 2014, that if all the women seeking abortions chose adoption instead:
"...there would be a surplus of babies in about five minutes. There are not as many people who want to adopt as adoption organizations
want you to think there are."
lenona at April 23, 2016 10:36 AM
(If anyone wants to know, Franklin was talking about the right of single fathers not to have their kids put up for adoption. He also supports male birth control, which would, of course, help prevent unwanted adoptions AND unwanted abortions.)
lenona at April 23, 2016 10:41 AM
I can't agree about life being at the point of viability.
It doesn't make sense to me, because the age of viability changes with technology AND with society's willingness to use it (one reason US death-rate for infants is much higher than many European countries is that we consider 23 weeks viable and they simply do not, so we try interventions and they will not even consider it a live birth in some cases). So, that definition doesn't work for me. It also is a slippery slope to saying that adults (or older children) who are on life support aren't alive because they aren't "viable" on their own.
I also can't agree about it from a "sentient being" aspect, because I, personally, doubt there is any real sentience in bacteria or plants - at least not as we think of it. And bacteria and plants are definitely alive, so I cannot use sentience as a criteria and find it consistent with science.
Shannon at April 25, 2016 6:02 AM
There was some hiccups dating one of my pregnancies, so they sent me off for a high-end ultrasound at around 6 weeks. I saw something moving and said, "what's that?" I was told it was the beginnings of baby's heart. That doesn't jive with what you tend to hear in the pro/con abortion camps, but it'll tell you, it certainly did seem to beat like a heart (I thought it was maybe a vein of mine or something).
Shannon at April 25, 2016 6:05 AM
lenora, I think there are plenty of folks wanting to adopt... Healthy infants.
When I was having fertility issues we considered adoption and I started browsing the ads. They were almost all post-pubescent teens with serious physical or mental disabilities. Of course they need homes too, but most people are not up for that kind of challenge, which does not mean they wouldn't want to adopt a baby.
Nicolek at April 25, 2016 8:32 AM
I think there are plenty of folks wanting to adopt... Healthy infants.
_____________________________________
In one sense, yes, of course, or else Dan Savage wouldn't have quoted the adoption agency he used (one that only placed US couples with US babies, IIRC) as saying that the average couple has to wait one to three years to adopt a baby. If there were more babies available, they wouldn't have to wait that long.
But just as many people are not willing to adopt foster kids over the age of five, there are also those who would rather not adopt even a healthy baby, if they can't reproduce, because to them, it's either too alien, too risky or too much like getting second-hand goods, and so they milk the fertility clinics for all they're worth. Plus those would-be parents who don't want to adopt or even spend five figures or more on one fertility treatment after another. In the meantime, from what little I've heard, doctors are working like mad on more and better treatments, since that's where the money is - and so it's no wonder that there aren't as many adoptive parents as one might think. It's all part of the American attitude: "I want what I want and I won't settle for less."
lenona at April 25, 2016 9:13 AM
And just as importantly, an awful lot of birth mothers would much rather not choose adoption, so pushing them into it instead of supporting their wish to keep their babies would seem anti-choice. Almost any woman you talk to who gave up a child for adoption will tell you that it's not something you can ever easily put behind you, especially if you were bullied into doing so.
lenona at April 25, 2016 9:18 AM
Finally, if all women seeking abortions chose adoption instead, that would obviously dash what little hope foster kids had of ever being adopted, given the numbers I gave above.
lenona at April 25, 2016 9:20 AM
Oh, I forgot to say - I found this funny video some days ago:
http://nymag.com/thecut/2016/01/watch-some-bros-debate-going-off-birth-control.html
It's satire, of course, and ultimately pro-condom - but how many condom-hating teenage boys will interpret it that way?
Also, I have to wonder if there ARE some - many? - drugstores left where you have to ask for the condoms before buying them. In the Bible Belt, maybe?
lenona at April 25, 2016 9:23 AM
Shannon
"There was some hiccups dating one of my pregnancies, so they sent me off for a high-end ultrasound at around 6 weeks. I saw something moving and said, "what's that?" I was told it was the beginnings of baby's heart. That doesn't jive with what you tend to hear in the pro/con abortion camps, but it'll tell you, it certainly did seem to beat like a heart (I thought it was maybe a vein of mine or something)."
Since I was seeing a fertility doctor (I managed to conceived naturally) but they follow through with regular blood test 3 days a week and "release" you to an OB after they see the heart beat on ultrasound.
I pushed off the US until 6 and half weeks because I had read it could be seen by 6 but not always so pushing it closer to 7 would not required a second trip.
Katrina at April 25, 2016 11:31 AM
"the average couple has to wait one to three years to adopt a baby. If there were more babies available, they wouldn't have to wait that long."
Umm, no Lenona. It doesn't work that way. That is just how fast the bureaucracy works. There aren't enough infants for demand and there are far too many older kids for the demand. But increasing the number of infants wouldn't shorten the wait time. It just takes what it takes.
Ben at April 25, 2016 7:27 PM
A one-year wait makes bureaucratic sense, but three? Hardly. It would be very bad for the child, if the baby is available at birth. I've never heard of such a case - aside from those cases of newborns given up by their mothers only to be fought for by their birth fathers.
lenona at April 26, 2016 8:48 AM
It varies a lot from location to location and even over time, so your mileage may vary. But from what I've seen you have to first get into the system. They have to get used to you and often you have to foster some of the older kids for a few years to prove you aren't a loony. Then you get a crack at an infant. The older kids need homes and they don't want to give up that free labor if they don't have to. So no, adding more infants into the system wouldn't help. And then there is the issue of parental rights. Many kids in the system are not currently adoptable. They've been taken away from mom but her parental rights haven't been severed. As soon as she cleans up her act she can take the kids away again. You may run into issues of being the wrong color or speaking the wrong language (I know kids and especially infants can learn, but there are stupid rules out there) or other cultural issues.
I understand things are much better than they were 10-20 years ago, but there are still good reasons to adopt from overseas. The kids may have more health issues but the parents can't afford to get to you.
Ben at April 26, 2016 7:38 PM
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