Margaret Sanger, based upon doctor's estimates of the day (the 1920's), put the figure somewhere between 1,000,000 and 2,000,000 abortions a year in the US.
I think we should all strive for a world in which abortion is "safe, legal, and rare," but that decision still needs to rest with the woman herself. That means reproductive health care, birth control, and all the other available options to help reduce the number of abortions. Reducing options isn't going to reduce the number of abortions. It will, however, reduce the number of women who survive them.
This was sent to me by a longtime reader, who asked that it be posted anonymously:
"I should be the freakin' POSTER CHILD for antiabortionists... but I'm not.
For privacy of concerned parties, I didn't want to post this as a response to your latest blogging, but I'll tell you a story:
Pre-Roe-v-Wade, in 1963, my mom and dad were dating when there was some kind of "oops" moment. She was 21, he was 27. Dad came from "the wrong side of the tracks," while mom came from wealth... and they weren't married yet.
(Both of my parents are MENSA-level geniuses, but NEITHER completed college. (My mother went for a couple of years, but left to work for the state. My father never went to college, but one of his first jobs when they were dating (and/or first married, I don't recall - hey, I was young at the time) was as a chemistry technician for General Aniline, a/k/a GAF. We're not talking about stupid people, nor teenagers who don't know how to plan their lives.)
Again, they weren't married, and this could become quite scandalous to the country-club set of Jews (who were JUST getting admission to such exclusivity.) My mother's Jewish parents naturally got their panties in a wad. My grandmother's sister "knew ways to take care of this," and had the money and connections to do so.
My mother refused her. She married my father, and I was born 7 months later. (My younger brother pointed out this discrepancy in timing to me when I was 17. Personally, I would NEVER have noticed.)
But for my mother's decision to keep me, I would not exist. How horrible, right? No, wait I WOULDN'T EXIST, so I wouldn't care what choice she made. That ALWAYS should have been left up to her (and conceivably (pun intended,) to some extent, my father.)
But we ALL exist on a flutter of wind and a hairsbreadth of time. Without going into any details, I also owe my existence to a lightbulb that burned out at a fortuitous moment. My own children owe their lives to a late-1970s comic book ad (AND that lightbulb!)
Events (and people) collide in this world in the strangest ways. Sometimes, that's an underplanned, unplanned, or even unwanted sexual collision. Sometimes, at best, it's a PLANNED pregnancy that goes awry. I still (and always will) believe any decision in any such case should be up to the woman.
On that thought, I propose the following:
Some states have anti-abortion laws in place “except for cases in the life of the mother.”
Define “life.”
I propose that the “rest of one’s physicality on earth” defines “life.” (The laws in question generally DON'T say "imminent death of the mother.")
If any woman wants an abortion because it will affect the rest of her life if she gives birth, “life of the mother” should be a stipulation…thereby allowing almost ALL abortions.
Meanwhile, there's the 13th amendment: " Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." The way I read this, NO STATE shall have the right to make a woman "servant" to her zygote/ unborn child.
Don't even get me started on arguing the religious grounds against the overturning of Roe-v-Wade. Sharper, better minds are at work making that argument for me."
Margaret Sanger, based upon doctor's estimates of the day (the 1920's), put the figure somewhere between 1,000,000 and 2,000,000 abortions a year in the US.
I think we should all strive for a world in which abortion is "safe, legal, and rare," but that decision still needs to rest with the woman herself. That means reproductive health care, birth control, and all the other available options to help reduce the number of abortions. Reducing options isn't going to reduce the number of abortions. It will, however, reduce the number of women who survive them.
This was sent to me by a longtime reader, who asked that it be posted anonymously:
"I should be the freakin' POSTER CHILD for antiabortionists... but I'm not.
For privacy of concerned parties, I didn't want to post this as a response to your latest blogging, but I'll tell you a story:
Pre-Roe-v-Wade, in 1963, my mom and dad were dating when there was some kind of "oops" moment. She was 21, he was 27. Dad came from "the wrong side of the tracks," while mom came from wealth... and they weren't married yet.
(Both of my parents are MENSA-level geniuses, but NEITHER completed college. (My mother went for a couple of years, but left to work for the state. My father never went to college, but one of his first jobs when they were dating (and/or first married, I don't recall - hey, I was young at the time) was as a chemistry technician for General Aniline, a/k/a GAF. We're not talking about stupid people, nor teenagers who don't know how to plan their lives.)
Again, they weren't married, and this could become quite scandalous to the country-club set of Jews (who were JUST getting admission to such exclusivity.) My mother's Jewish parents naturally got their panties in a wad. My grandmother's sister "knew ways to take care of this," and had the money and connections to do so.
My mother refused her. She married my father, and I was born 7 months later. (My younger brother pointed out this discrepancy in timing to me when I was 17. Personally, I would NEVER have noticed.)
But for my mother's decision to keep me, I would not exist. How horrible, right? No, wait I WOULDN'T EXIST, so I wouldn't care what choice she made. That ALWAYS should have been left up to her (and conceivably (pun intended,) to some extent, my father.)
But we ALL exist on a flutter of wind and a hairsbreadth of time. Without going into any details, I also owe my existence to a lightbulb that burned out at a fortuitous moment. My own children owe their lives to a late-1970s comic book ad (AND that lightbulb!)
Events (and people) collide in this world in the strangest ways. Sometimes, that's an underplanned, unplanned, or even unwanted sexual collision. Sometimes, at best, it's a PLANNED pregnancy that goes awry. I still (and always will) believe any decision in any such case should be up to the woman.
On that thought, I propose the following:
Some states have anti-abortion laws in place “except for cases in the life of the mother.”
Define “life.”
I propose that the “rest of one’s physicality on earth” defines “life.” (The laws in question generally DON'T say "imminent death of the mother.")
If any woman wants an abortion because it will affect the rest of her life if she gives birth, “life of the mother” should be a stipulation…thereby allowing almost ALL abortions.
Meanwhile, there's the 13th amendment: " Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction." The way I read this, NO STATE shall have the right to make a woman "servant" to her zygote/ unborn child.
Don't even get me started on arguing the religious grounds against the overturning of Roe-v-Wade. Sharper, better minds are at work making that argument for me."