Title X

[Nabubrush]

Article on the Title X mess from the Nation.

Not sure if anyone has been keeping up with this. You would think the anti-abortion crowd would want people to have access to birth-control so they don't, you know, end up needing abortions. Thankfully it looks like maybe things are turning around a bit.

[pmcd9]

You would think the anti-abortion crowd would want people to have access to birth-control so they don't, you know, end up needing abortions.

Even the twinkle in daddy's eye is a LIFE!

[jay-ell]

Article on the Title X mess from the Nation.

Not sure if anyone has been keeping up with this. You would think the anti-abortion crowd would want people to have access to birth-control so they don't, you know, end up needing abortions. Thankfully it looks like maybe things are turning around a bit.

As a person who would seriously like to see the number of abortions in this country reduced to as close to zero as possible, this boggles my mind also. I didn't read the article -- I don't have time at the moment, but I'll come back to it -- but personally I believe that if a woman believes her only choice is to have an abortion, she's as much a victim as her unborn child.

If our duty is to preserve the lives of infants, then it is also to protect women from being in a situation where they're faced with an unwanted pregnancy in the first place. Studies have shown that the likelihood of a woman choosing to terminate an unwanted pregnancy is the same whether abortion is legal or not. For every 100 unwanted pregnancies, the same percentage of babies will die (or fetuses will be terminated, or however lets you sleep at night). So if we reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies, the number of abortions sought will naturally fall. Is this hard math?  Do right-wingers somehow think that by saying "abortion is bad, m'kay," suddenly thousands of women will just say, "Oh, okay, I guess I'll let my life go ahead and be destroyed, then."

Seriously. Better access to birth control and better sex education (another thing the anti-abortion lobby is usually against) do far more to reduce abortions in developed nations than criminalizing abortion. Abortion is a symptom of other societal ills -- predominately poverty and ignorance -- that should be addressed. If you're not going after the cause, there's no point in criminalizing the effect.

</rant>

Sorry, one of my Issues. I don't even have this conversation with my mother any more, because even though I am far more conservative on this than on any other social issue, she is so far to the right on this one it makes me physically ill to hear her talk about it.

[Choop]

i kind of want to take a hyper-anti-abortion screed from a website and replace "abortion" with "polio" and "contraception" with "vaccine" just to see how absolutely insane it sounds. maybe also dig up an old anti-polio op.ed. and swap the terms in reverse. just as a thought experiment.

[Arachno-capitalist]

This goes back to my senior thesis where I proved children are an economic bad (as opposed to a good) that people, when given the choice, demand very very little of. I say all forms of birth control for all people.... for the sake of the economy.

[Nabubrush]

My wife works in the field of women's health, not that this wasn't already a hot button issue for me. For me, all these issues boil down to one side being pro-women, and the other side being anti, or wanting to control women, or whatever you want to call it. There is no way for me to see anything on the other side in a positive light, unlike basically every other issue that I disagree with that side of my family on. It's as if the hyper-right is just trying to sneak in this backward-ass bullshit because they know everybody is focused on the Arab world blowing up and the collapse of the world economy.

[jay-ell]

There is no way for me to see anything on the other side in a positive light

Seriously? Nothing? I can't imagine anyone in his right mind wanting to see the abortion rate increase. It is one thing to be in favor of offering women choice, and other to be in favor of more abortions being performed. Does anybody really think that having an abortion is preferable to not having an unwanted pregnancy in the first place?

Aside from the consequences for the unborn child -- and before anyone tries, you will never convince me that a fetus is not a child -- most abortions bear terrible, life-long consequences for the mother. I know women who have had abortions and remain adamently pro-choice, yet they are still haunted by the physical and emotional ramifications, even decades later.

I know a woman who had a hysterectomy at the age of 25 because her "safe, legal" abortion at the age of 17 was so badly botched that she suffered eight years of intense pain before suffering a ruptured uterus, which nearly killed her. I know a woman who is struggling with infertility and will never be sure if it's because many years ago she was raped, got pregnant, and had an abortion. I know a woman who had an abortion because her abusive ex-fiance threatened to beat her until she miscarried, and now, happily married to someone else with three beautiful kids, she still grieves for the child she never knew.

All these women were victims of terrible circumstances. Certainly, Nabu, you must have sympathy for them. The pro-lifers are concerned for them, too. (Most of us.) We want to protect other women from being forced to make the same terrible decision -- to bear a child they can't or won't raise, or to destroy it.

Some of us miss the mark and focus on the end result of the decision these women have to make, and that's a disservice to both sides. But for most of us -- the silent majority, I think -- it's very much an issue of women's rights. Not the right to choose between two bad options, but the right never be asked to make that choice.

I'm not against women, I'm against those who would force women to be forever labeled a sinner or a saint based on what she does in her darkest moment. And that means I'm in favor of explicit, detailed, and pervasive sex education; universal access to a variety of birth control methods and instruction on how to use them (including the morning-after pill, which has gotten a terrible reputation among pro-lifers because the media doesn't understand science); complete access engaging in a national dialog about the problems involved in how rape is reported and prosecuted, and handled in the media.

If we have all these things, we won't need to criminalize abortion because it will only exist in rare, extreme cases like rape and maternal medical endangerment. But as long as we're locking horns over whether or not a fetus is or is not alive, the terrorists are winning and we're all at risk.

There's not such a gap between us that we can't talk about this like adults. But it's so emotional for so many people that we as a nation rarely get past the "life begins at conception/life begins at birth" argument. I'd like to think we can work at a higher level here.

[wombat]

I don't think Nabu is saying he is on the side of more abortions.

The problem is that the other side doesn't seem to be against abortions so much as they are against women having sex. If they want fewer abortions but are also against birth control, that seems like the only way to interpret their position.

[AugustWest]

You know, sometimes I really miss having that funny cartoon about the talking cats to discuss.

[wombat]

Did there really used to be a cartoon? It's like a dream I had a long time ago.

[Nabubrush]

Thanks, Wombat. I could go down the road, but I'll just say I'm surprised that you read what I was saying as I think people should have abortions. Making it harder to get contraceptives will increase the number of abortions. Not even doctors who perform them wantthat to happen. I'll leave it at that.

[jay-ell]

I don't think Nabu is saying he is on the side of more abortions.

I don't think he's saying that either, and I think that he should realize that this could be common ground between his position and mine. I would like to start from a position of us both saying, "there should be fewer abortions," and start talking about how we might make that happen without trampling on the rights of women to do what they want to do with their bodies. What I was saying -- poorly, apparently -- is that we must have at least one thing in common, because no sane person thinks abortion is wonderful and great and that everyone should have one. I thought it was a given that Nabu is a sane person, and I was trying to point out where our ideas are similar as a jumping-off point for rational discussion.

But, in spite of myself, I got all wrapped around the axle and got ranty again, so if I offended you in any way, Nabu (or anyone else), I apologize. 

The problem is that the other side doesn't seem to be against abortions so much as they are against women having sex. If they want fewer abortions but are also against birth control, that seems like the only way to interpret their position.

I agree with you that some very vocal members of the pro-life crowd are also against women having sex. There are also a lot of people who have a certain set of stereotypes about who is having all these abortions (unwed teenage welfare queens with loose morals) that simply aren't true. (I can't quote you numbers at the moment on what percentage of abortions are performed on married women over the age of 18, but it's higher than you'd think.) People who are pro-life, but anti-birth-control and anti-sex ed (or in favor of abstinence-only sex ed) make me want to tear my hair out and scream. They make the rest of us look bad.

I just take issue with two main ideas that Nabu seems to be putting forward: 1) That he and I cannot find any common ground in this issue because I'm on side A and he's on side B, and 2) that I can't be pro-life and a feminist at the same time.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's what I'm getting from over in these here cheap seats.

[Choop]

i um don't think you're on different sides here

[Asherdan]

Did there really used to be a cartoon? It's like a dream I had a long time ago.

Quit dreaming up summer repeats, it angrifies the figments apparently.

[Nabubrush]

Sorry - I thought it was understood that the other side is not the pro-life/anti-abortion crowd, it's the crowd that considers women chattel and feels like the solution to the abortion issue is public execution of abortion doctors. I don't include any of you under that umbrella.