For or Against

[teleen_fiction]

Back-Alley Abortions in 2011: How Anti-Choice Zealots Force Women to Go to Dangerous Clinics Like Dr. Kermit Gosnell's

I've spoken about reproductive rights before, but always with the understanding that some people out there are Pro-Life.  I haven't been respectful of that position, but I've at least tried not to judge it too hard.

To be clear, my definition of Pro-Life is NOT someone who is against abortion, but against women having the freedom to CHOOSE an abortion.

Everyone is against abortion.  EVERYONE.  No one ever wants to have one and if there is a tiny minority out there who are using it as their ONLY method of birth control, I don't want them contributing to the gene pool anyway.

That said, the freedom to choose is continually under assault in the US, with government funding non-existent for it (can't fund baby-killing, don't ya know?) Ironically, the same asshats who are against any sort of government subsidy for abortion are also against WELFARE, which means that a poor woman who can't afford an abortion and who will be FORCED to carry a child she doesn't want and/or can't support will have no help for the child once it is born.  So they want to force women to be broodmares, but then take no responsibility for the child after it's born.

Every day, doctors who provide abortions are threatened with DEATH.  The graduating classes of medical schools are given leaflets threatening them with what will happen if they choose to help women who have been raped, victims of incest, whose lives are in danger or, MOST IMPORTANTLY, who simply don't want to carry a child.

To be very, very clear here - to me, there are no exceptions to abortion.  As Doug Stanhope once said about those who are in favor of it only in cases of rape and incest, "What, it's only okay if the father is an asshole?"

Women have the right to have sex as freely as they wish to.  Yes, they should take reasonable precautions against pregnancy but a) birth control doesn't always work and b) someone else's sex life is NONE OF MY FUCKING BUSINESS.  Or yours.  

Either a woman's body is hers or it isn't.  After seeing this MURDER case and seeing women in the US going back to a pre-Roe Vs. Wade society, I no longer have ANY gray area here.   Well, just one.

If a woman gives birth to a child with fetal alcohol syndrome or addicted to a controlled substance, I'm willing to discuss it as child abuse once it's breathing on its own outside of her body, but even there I feel as though it's a slippery slope.  It's telling a woman that her body is no longer hers once she's pregnant and I just don't know if I can be behind that.  I almost feel as though there shouldn't be any government support for women who do this if they keep custody of the child, but again, it's a VERY slippery slope, :( and I'm willing to hear other thoughts on this aspect of it and this aspect alone.  

This is my line in the sand, friends' list.  I don't mind if you believe that life begins at conception (even though I disagree) and work to give women other options.  I'm 100% in favor of women having the freedom to HAVE THE BABY if that's what they wish to do - reproduction should never be a financial concern, even though it always is, :(.  The issue here is about giving women the freedom to be able to choose what's right for them and what they will be able to live with. 

However, if you identify as Pro-Life (rather than Pro-Woman, which is how I identify because Pro-Choice has become synonymous with Pro-Abortion), and are someone who actively demonstrates against abortion, who supports politicians who vote against my right to choose and who believes that every pregnancy should end in a baby regardless of the wishes and/or physical and mental well-being of the woman carrying that baby, please defriend me now, as I don't want to be anywhere near you, even virtually. 

Reproductive rights must be absolute and the rights of the born must outweigh the rights of the unborn, 100% of the time.  Otherwise, women are nothing more than broodmares.

Neigh.

Comments

[darth-eldritch.livejournal.com]

Second this whole post so damn hard

[snufflesdbear.livejournal.com]

I saw that story in E Philli on the news the other day. I was in such a rage. I could not even articulate it all. ALL the news was concerned about was the doc killing the babies, the woman was sort of an after thought, and the *reason* he had such a business was not even mentioned.
You say things so well.

[meshell-mybell.livejournal.com]

Amen! I'm very strong willed and I hate being told what I can and can't do. I love that you are Pro-Woman. I am stealing that because I agree with your sentiments on Pro-Choice.

I know women who have had to make that choice. It is one I couldn't make but I fault no one who has.

Some women shouldn't ever be allowed to give birth and in those cases should be arrested before the baby is born. When I was pregnant with my first, I had to go to a clinic and there was a woman fighting with the nurses, very loudly. She yelled, "I did heroin with my first baby I'll do it with this one." That child didn't deserve the pain of being born to that woman and the pain it would go through dealing with withdrawl.

So, yeah, I'm all for choice.

[heeroluva.livejournal.com]

I agree with you here, though I with one exception. I have issues with woman that use abortion as a means of birth control (though I'm sure their would be exceptions to that even...).

[fiwen1010.livejournal.com]

I'm fully in support of a woman's right to choice, but the whole concept makes me feel somewhat blah. There were nearly 190,000 abortions in the UK last year, and I grew up in a youth culture where abortion seemed to be seen as a form of contraception. I'm also fully in favour of reducing the limit of 24 weeks except in cases of serious risk of physical harm, because babies have survived being born premature at 20 weeks, which suggests that they are already alive and are just on a life support system which is unfortunate enough to be a human being.

That said, I'd rather have the situation we have here than the one that exists in the US.

[ginmar.livejournal.com]

EVeryone's against abortion.

Yeah..no. You don't speak for everyone and this idea that we should apologize for abortion needs to stop. Abortion is wonderful. I'm not making excuses. That's sucking up to the anti-choice people.

And you're going to allow discussion about a woman who may have a drug-addicted baby? Isn't that kind of not your business? Besides, nice compassion there. One doesn't become drug-addicted in minutes and did you know that most drug treatment programs don't allow pregnant women in? Drug addiction is not something I'm terribly well informed on, but I do know these women have even less options than any other pregnant women and waht they need is compassion, not punishment. It's funny how often people only remember that when it's a white woman. When it's women of color they get clapped in jail, often still bleeding.