The Ambivalence of Abortion by Linda Bird Francke Book Review

In the book The Ambivalence of Abortion, Linda Bird Francke tells the stories of women who have had abortions, the men who are their partners, and the clinic workers and who deal with abortion on a day to day basis.

She gives an inside look at what women go through when contemplating abortion, then deciding to abort, going through the procedure, and dealing with the aftermath.

The first thing to consider is that this book was written some time ago, in the late 1970s. Many people, knowing this, would not give it a second look. However, I feel that the book is still relevant today, as the emotional make-up of women and the abortion experience has not changed much in the past thirty years. Women still have abortions for many of the same reasons- wanting to preserve an education, conflict with their baby’s father, financial pressure, etc. People still consider abortion to be controversial – some people oppose it and others accept it. It is still an emotional decision, now as well as in the 1970s.

Francke reveals in the beginning of the book that she had an abortion herself, and compiling the stories of other women may have been her way of coming to terms with it. She maintains that she feels she made the right choice, but does express some grief over the baby that might have been. In her interviews, she explores the grief that many women, even pro-choice women, feel about their pregnancies and abortions. Her book describes how ambivalent women are about ending their pregnancies and how complex their emotions are. She touches on the ambivalence of society as well- a society that decrees that abortion should be legal and available but that it is still a ‘wrong’ thing to do carrying stigma. Few women want the world to know they have had abortions- either in 1970 or today. All of the women Francke interviews use fake names.

Their reactions run the gamut- some are mainly relieved, others sad, some guilt-stricken, many are a combination of all three. The providers she interviews express their own ambivalence. Many of them speak of helping women, but also of their disgust when the same women come back for abortions five times. Some are sure that they are doing the right thing, but are upset by the remains from late term abortions, were the aborted fetuses may have hands and feet and look like babies. Francke also has a chapter where she talks about men and their feeling towards their partner’s abortions. She lets the women and men speak for themselves, often quoting much of what they say word for word.

Overall, The Ambivalence of Abortion is a powerful book, and despite the fact that it is old, it gives great insights into the minds and hearts of women who choose abortion as well as the women and men who provide abortions. It should be read by anyone who is interested in the abortion issue.

Share on Facebook

When in pregnancy should abortion be allowed?

Professor of theology and ethics at Fuller Theological Seminary (as of 1987) Lewis B Smedes believed that abortion was okay through the 6th week of pregnancy:

“Abortion should be legally permitted during the first 6 weeks of pregnancy. Since no one can reasonably be sure that the fetus is a person at that time.

Abortion should be severely restricted after the first 6 weeks, and through the 12th week, serious defects cannot be found until the 12th week.

Abortion after the 3rd month should be a crime, since by that time a fetus has obviously developed into a functioning human body like a person.”

Lewis B Smedes, Mere Morality (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1983),  143 – 144

Smedes’s distinctions become questionable when we actually look at unborn babies at different stages. What is the exact moment that it becomes wrong to abort a baby after six weeks?

Unborn baby at only 5 to 6 weeks
Unborn baby at only 5 to 6 weeks

The baby above is okay to abort, according to Smedes. The baby below is not okay to abort.

6 weeks
6 1/2weeks

The cutoff point of six weeks is an arbitrary distinction picked out of thin air. No earth shattering changes in development happens between six weeks and six days and seven weeks. So many other stages given for when abortion should become illegal are also arbitrary. For example, many people say that abortion should be legal in the first trimester, the first three months, and not afterwards. Here are an unborn baby’s legs at 11 weeks

11 week legs
11 week legs

And here are a baby’s legs at 12

Legs of an unborn baby at 12 weeks
Legs of an unborn baby at 12 weeks

So some people think those babies are ok to abort. But here is the foot of a baby at 14 weeks.

unborn baby's foot at 14 weeks
unborn baby’s foot at 14 weeks

You don’t see a huge difference here either. Nor is there a huge difference between the second and third trimester

26 weeks sonogram of an unborn baby
26 weeks sonogram of an unborn baby (end of 2nd)
28 weeks
28 weeks

You can see facial expressions on each child, even though there is a two-week difference.

Most opinions people have about what the cutoff should be for abortion to be legal become meaningless when you see pictures of unborn babies right before and after that stage. It becomes clear that the only moment, the only beginning point when babies could have rights is either birth or conception. At birth, the baby travels down the woman’s birth canal into the outside world. It is merely a change in location and dependency (although the born baby will still be dependent on his/her mother for an awful lot. It is an incident in the life of a child. Conception, on the other hand, is the moment when that baby comes into existence.  From a scientific standpoint, it is the beginning of life.  Human rights should start when human life begins

Share on Facebook

While president of feminist group praises the one child policy, Chinese woman undergoes five forced abortions

Molly Yard (president of NOW, The National Organization for Women, a proabortion feminist group, at the time) in response to a question on the Oprah Winfrey Show:

“I consider the Chinese government’s policy among the most intelligent in the world. It is a policy limited to the overpopulated areas, and it is an attempt to feed the people of China. I find it very intelligent.”

As quoted by Gary Bauer “Abetting Coercion in China” The Washington Times, Oct 10, 1989

Meanwhile, in China, Liu Ping was the victim forced abortions in China. When she married her husband, she was supposed to be fitted with an IUD, as all married women were required to be. However, she was suffering from kidney disease and the IUD was too much of a health risk. From her testimony.

“From 1983 to 1990, because of the one child policy, I had to undergo five forced abortions on the following dates: September 28, 1984; December 17, 1985; March 20, 1986; May 5, 1989; and December 14, 1990.…. I suffered greatly at the hands of the inhumane one child policy.

In the 1980s, shortly after implementation of the one child policy in China, there were many severe methods of surveillance and punishment to prevent unplanned pregnancies and above quota births. My factory’s Family-Planning Commission used three levels of control: at the factory level, in the factory clinic, and on the factory floor. There was a system of collective punishment. If one worker violated the rules, all workers would be punished. Workers monitored each other. Women of reproductive age can account for 60% of my factory floor. Colleagues were suspicious and hostile to each other because of the one child policy. Two of my pregnancies were reported by my colleagues to the Family-Planning Commission.

When discovered, pregnant women would be dragged to undergo forced abortions. There was simply no other choice. We had no dignity as potential childbearers. By order of the factory’s Family-Planning Commission, every month during her menstrual period, women had to undress in front of the birth planning doctor for examination. If anyone escaped this examination, she would be forced to take a pregnancy test at the hospital. We were only allowed to collect a salary after it was confirmed that we were not pregnant.

The day of my fifth and last abortion, December 14, 1990, was the saddest day of my life. Because I was not able to prove that I wasn’t pregnant within the 10 to 15 day period, the birth planning doctor in the factory clinic found out about my pregnancy. That day, officials from the factory’s Family-Planning Commission forced me to be driven to the City Police Hospital and forced me to have an abortion in the birth planning department. It was my first operation in that hospital. All my previous abortions took place in the Central City Hospital.

I did not know what officials in my factory told the doctors. After the abortion, the doctors, without my knowledge, implanted a metal IUD in my body. When I learned of the procedure, I protested that I had a kidney disease and could not keep the IUD, but they completely ignored me. The doctor just gave the bill to my husband and told him to pay. While my husband argued with the doctors, I was recovering in the hospital bed. When I left the operating room, still weak, I could not find my husband. I was told that he was arrested. I collapsed crying from the physical toll of the two of operations and the emotional shock. A kind nurse tried to comfort me somewhat, but she was shood away by a man who also threatened to have me arrested by the police.

By this time, the family-planning officials who dragged me to the hospital were nowhere to be found. I felt alone, sick, and weak. Afterwards, I learned that my husband had been sentenced to criminal detention without a trial for violating and obstructing the one child policy, disturbing the normal operations of the hospital, and disturbing social peace. Fifteen days later, my husband was finally released to return home.

I was in great pain from medical IUD, and the weakness of the abortion, and almost did not want to live. The rest of my husband deprived me of the care of my family. My young child did not know what was happening and kept crying for his father. I did not know what to do and could only hold my son and cry with him.… Those painful fifteen days of separation became the catalyst of my eventual failed marriage.

My body suffered great damage from all those five forced abortions. I gradually grew afraid of family life with my husband. I tried to find excuses to refuse any intimacy demands for my husband. I grew to hate him after the IUD was inserted because I blamed my sufferings on him, on his unwillingness to be surgically sterilized. He had known of my kidney disease, but would not make any sacrifice for me, and therefore, he didn’t love me.

After the fifth abortion in the IUD insertion, my factory also gave me a serious administrative warning and find me six months wages. Afterwards, I had to go to the factory clinic every month for exams to make certain that I had not privately taking out the IUD or become pregnant again. I carry the IUD in my body for over a decade before finally came to America.”

Liu Ping eventually moved to the United States, divorced her husband, became a Christian, and subsequently reconciled with her husband. She claims to have found healing through her religion.

She told her story before the Hearing before the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Human Rights of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, House of Representatives, 112th Congress, First Session. September 22, 2011

Share on Facebook

Midwives in Indian Village are paid 10 x more money if they kill a newborn baby girl

“The village of Dewa lies in Bihar state, where fully 10% of India’s 1 billion inhabitants live. It is the country’s poorest state, with a dearth of doctors in remote areas and thousands of midwives. The midwives earn about $.50 and a sack of grain for each live delivery of a girl, twice as much plus a sari if it is a boy. Getting rid of a newborn female fetches as much as $5.”

Miriam Jordan “Brief Lives” Wall Street Journal, May 9, 2000

Share on Facebook

Only 11 to 16% of women denied abortions will seek illegal abortions?

David Reardon cited a European study that determined that only 11 to 16% of women denied legal abortions will pursue an illegal abortion.

David C Reardon Aborted Women: Silent No More (Westchester, Illinois: Crossway books, 1987) 290

Unfortunately, I have been unable to find the study he is referring to

Share on Facebook

Planned Parenthood gives kickbacks to clergy members to steer women towards abortions

The Clergy Consultation Service is an organization of clergy  members – priests, rabbis, reverends, and pastors – who help connect women with abortionists. These clergy members refer women in their parishes to local abortion clinics. Planned Parenthood utilizes many such clergy members. However, the clergy members do not do this for free:

In one year alone, the Los Angeles Planned Parenthood clergy consultation service received $250,000 in kickbacks from clinics to which they referred women for abortions.

John and Barbara Willke Handbook on Abortion (Cincinnati: Hayes Publishing Company, Inc., 1979) 98

Remains from an abortion at just 7 weeks – most abortions are done at this stage or later

Many Christians would believe that these clergy members are not acting the way Jesus would want them to.

 

Share on Facebook

Maternal mortality rates Ireland Vs.United States

Ireland, with laws restricting abortion, has a maternal mortality rate of one death per hundred thousand live births.

America, with abortion on demand, has 11 deaths per 100,000 live births.

This would seem to fly in the face of pro-choice claims that abortion is needed to save the lives of pregnant women.

World Economic Forum, 2009 “You Can Stop Injustice” Human Life Alliance Supplement, 2010

Share on Facebook

Woman changes her mind about aborting baby after seeing ultrasound in abortion clinic

Ultrasound of baby at 10 weeks, a little younger than the baby in this quote

A pro-life website received the following testimony:

“I have one child (2 years old). He is my heart and soul. I contemplated having an abortion with him. I went all the way to the clinic and proceeded with the preparations. However, I when I [sic] was given the sonogram, I asked to see my child living and breathing through me. I was 11 weeks pregnant. I saw my son on the screen kicking and moving his arms! I could not believe it. At that point, I asked for my money back (I could only get a portion), and I left that clinic and did not look back.”

While Planned Parenthood has been promoting a study which purports to show that seeing an ultrasound image does not influence women’s decisions of whether or not to abort (conducted based on the records from one abortion clinic by researchers who likely never actually set foot in that clinic to observe what was going on), one has to wonder why, if ultrasound viewing really has no impact on a woman’s decision, pro-choice groups oppose these laws so strenuously and spent tens of thousands of dollars fighting them in court.

Read more about women who change their mind after seeing ultrasounds of their unborn babies here

 

Share on Facebook

Statistics on the dangers of amniocentesis: a risk factor of 3 per 100

Some interesting statistics on amniocentesis and its dangers  cited in Randy Alcorn’s book Why Pro-Life?

“In 2000, the National Vital Statistics Report indicated that 28.9 women per 1,000 suffered complications from amniocentesis, placing the risk factor at nearly three per hundred women. The Centers for Disease Control estimate that in early amniocentesis the rate of death to the unborn through miscarriage is “between one in 400 and one in 200 procedures.” The study also found a striking tenfold increase in the risk of clubfoot deformity after early amniocentesis. Ironically, then, a procedure designed to identify fetal deformity actually has a considerable chance of causing it.

Amniocentesis is frequently done to identify Down syndrome children so parents have the option of abortion. The risk of miscarriage as a result of amniocentesis is almost exactly the same as the risk for Down syndrome.”

World Congress of Families Update, vol. 3, issue 1119, March 2002, www.worldcongress.org/WCFUpdate/Archive03/ wcf_update_3 1 1.htm citing R. E. Gilbert, et al., “Screening for Down’s Syndrome: Effects, Safety, and Cost-Effectiveness of First- and Second-Trimester Strategies”; and Euan M. Wallace and Sheila Mulvey, “Commentary: Results May Not Be Widely Applicable,” BMJ 2001; 323:1-6 (25 August 2001); www.bmj.com.

Share on Facebook

Breakdown of abortion doctors by religion: what percentage of OBGYNs of each religion perform abortions

According to a study in the Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology, 97% of obstetrician-gynecologists have encountered patients wanting an abortion, but only 14% performed them.

The study determined what percentage of OBGYNs performed abortions based on religion. Here were the results:

  • 40.2 percent of Jewish doctors say yes, compared with
  • 1.2 percent of Evangelical Protestants
  • 9 percent of Roman Catholics or Eastern Orthodox
  • 10.1 percent of Non-Evangelical Protestants
  • 20 percent of Hindus
  • 26.5 percent of doctors who said they had no religious affiliation

The study was based on a self-administered confidential survey sent to a sample of 1,800 ob-gyns practicing in the United States.  A total of 1,144 doctors responded.

Jenny Gold “Study: Fewer Doctors Are Offering Abortions” Kaiser health news blog AUGUST 22ND, 2011

It is interesting that almost 10% of Catholics were willing to perform abortions.

Foot of an aborted baby at 9 weeks. Thousands of abortions are done at this stage every year. Over a 3rd of abortions are done after this point
Share on Facebook