pushmedia1: What she said

11.08.2005

There's a belief among more radical pro-choicers which I truly do not emotionally understand: that anything that makes women feel bad about having an abortion, from telling an unwilling spouse to having protesters shout that she should reconsider, should be discouraged By Any Means Necessary. Intertwined with this is an assumption that we shouldn't try in any way to discourage women from having an abortion once they've gotten pregnant.

That's pretty repellant to me. I think that abortion should be legal, but I also think that it should be a last resort, and I'm all for the government using any non-coercive methods it can to encourage women to carry their pregnancy to term, including things that will make them feel bad about aborting. I think, for example, that sonograms should be mandatory before termination, I'm in favor of waiting periods and parental notification laws, and I'm agnostic on spousal notification.

¶ 7:54 PM

Comments:

I often struggle with this issue.
I think it is a horrible that women must (sometime) make the choice to abort a child. Having said that, I cannot help but to think of those women who are victim of rape. Not only the physical and mental damage they take from the rape, but also to raise a child, whose father damaged them so deeply, cannot be an easy task.

I was at some point thought about parental notification being a relevant point, especially for teenagers. Nevertheless, Gavin got me thinking of girls who are raped by their own father. In that case, the father will probably be the one approving the abortion.

While it is a good idea for everyone to understand the miracle of conception and having to teach them the joy of brining one being into this world, but at the same time, realize that not every child will be brought into this world with joy. For those rape victims, why should anyone make them “feel bad” about aborting a child?

# posted by *fumiko* : 11/11/2005 10:26:00 AM

Should we make rape victims 'feel bad' for aborting? Of course not.

Should abuse victims have to notify their abusive parents? Of course not.

But these are exceptional cases. The *norm* should be that abortion is rare. We should have institutions that discourage abortion by preventing unwanted pregnancies (e.g. increase birth control awareness) or encourage women to take their pregnancies to full term.

"Jane" wrote a lot about abortion after I linked to her. Go there if you want to read more (and she responds to some of these issues).

# posted by Will : 11/11/2005 11:09:00 AM

Links to this post:

<$BlogBacklinkTitle$>: <$BlogBacklinkSnippet$>
posted by <$BlogBacklinkAuthor$> @ <$BlogBacklinkDateTime$>

Create a Link