They said it.
In a chapter about abortion and a medical textbook written shortly before Roe versus Wade, it says:
“Through public conditioning, use of language, concepts and laws, the idea of abortion can be separated from the idea of killing.”
Leonide M. Tanner, ed., “Developing Professional Parameters: Nursing and Social Work Roles in the Care of the Induced Abortion Patient” Clinical Obstetrics and Gynecology 14 (December 1971): 1271
Share on FacebookRayna Rapp wrote a book about amniocentesis and couples who choose whether or not to abort if their baby turns out to be handicapped. She quotes Avram Terguvnick, a medical geneticist:
“We are in a fast-moving train, and we manage to learn how to eat in the train, even sleep in the train. But I don’t think we think very much about where the train is going. Or, at the least, we are very simplistic… Of course, geneticists are the ones creating the technology. But it is being created without too much thought. Of course, if you really want to get to the social issue, you’d better get to whoever is driving the train… When I began, this work belonged in academic medicine; now it is rapidly commercializing. Pretty soon, it will just be profit-making labs offering kits. They’ll have a roving genetic counselor to pay lip service to malpractice insurance. This is not what geneticists wanted when we insisted on genetic counseling.”
Rayna Rapp Testing Women, Testing the Fetus: the Social Impact of Amniocentesis in America (New York: Routledge, 1999) 23
Share on FacebookSociologist Charles L Bosk spent time interviewing workers at a clinic that did “genetic counseling” of pregnant women and couples and sometimes encouraged them to abort. They also treated sick children and managed the pregnancies of the woman who didn’t abort, but they showed bias for abortion in many cases. Here is one example.
A couple did not know whether or not their child would be handicapped. They did not abort, and the child was born healthy. This conversation took place between two doctors:
“He [one of the doctors] says, “Look, we’ve been in this situation before with Mr. Whatsit, who had the funny 3rd chromosome. We downplayed it, and everything worked out happily; things worked out in that situation.”
At this point, Bill Smith says, “You’ve got to watch that.”
Giordano is puzzled, “Watch what?”
Bill said, “that “happily” – what if the Whatsits aborted, and the fetus had been normal? Well, it still would’ve been “happily” because it’s a situation they could live with.” Bill then said that Giordano should avoid saying “happily” for pregnancies that are carried to term, that that’s not necessarily any more of a happy conclusion than an abortion.”
Charles L Bosk All God’s Mistakes: Genetic Counseling in a Pediatric Hospital (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1992) 124
Yes, this medical doctor felt that giving birth to a healthy baby was not any “happier” than the healthy baby dying in an abortion. And these were the people who counseled pregnant women in a vulnerable state.
Share on FacebookSociologist Charles L Bosk interviewed workers and sat in on sessions at a clinic that did genetic counseling, where medical professionals encouraged abortion when women came in pregnant with children who had disabilities.
In one case where a doctor was counseling a couple about their pregnancy, an amniocentesis revealed that the baby may or may not be handicapped. The counselor did not urge her to abort. Samuels, another doctor, thought he should have:
“Samuels knew exactly what direction he would take in counseling. He described the pregnancy as “unacceptable” and then continued: “The woman is 34, she had the procedure [amniocentesis] done for high anxiety, and nothing that has been done so far would reduce the level of anxiety. In fact, given the marker, this is the kind of situation where you can’t even tell immediately after birth whether or not the child will be born with some damage”…
…You have a test result. And when you look at the whole picture, the 34-year-old woman, the high anxiety – you see she needs more direction. You have a resolvable situation; you can remove her anxiety by performing the abortion. And if you told her she could get pregnant again, they would not be in the place they are now.”
Charles L Bosk All God’s Mistakes: Genetic Counseling in a Pediatric Hospital (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1992) 120 – 121
Share on FacebookA fund-raising letter of Planned Parenthood committee of Pittsburgh:
“Have you ever stopped to consider how much the “unwanted” children of poor and ignorant parents are costing you in the community in increased relief load, state medical and mental care, juvenile delinquency, and criminality?… There is a critical need for the expansion of this work [birth control] in American slums and other areas.”
Johanna Choen Choice & Coercion: Birth Control, Sterilization, and Abortion in Public Health and Welfare (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2005)
This is an old letter from before abortion was legal, but it shows the disregard Planned Parenthood had for minorities and the poor.
Share on FacebookA letter a crisis pregnancy received from a young woman:
“My abortion is something I wish I had never done. I can remember looking at the doctor when it was done, and saw him putting my baby in a plastic bag and then, throwing it away in a garbage bag. Do you know how that feels?… Have you ever lost something you loved dearly? I did, and I’m not proud of it… If I had a place to go and people who cared about my baby and me, maybe my baby would be born and alive… You people are against abortion, but are you willing to help young girls and women who don’t have the money or a place to live?… Some of us women and girls are not killers. We’re human too. And I tell you, having an abortion is killing me slowly.”
Quoted in Paul B Fowler Abortion: Toward an Evangelical Consensus (Portland, Oregon: Multnomah Press, 1987) 167 – 168
The pro-life answer to this heartbroken woman’s question should ALWAYS be yes. Give to crisis pregnancy centers as well as charities that help the poor. Many poor people are single mothers who are at rick for abortion if they get pregnant again. No one should abort because they have no where to go.
Share on FacebookDr. Charles Hartshorne, professor at the University of Texas (as of 1987) and self-proclaimed Christian:
“Granted that a fetus is human in origin and possible destiny, in what further sense is it human? The entire problem lies here. If there are pro-life activists who have thrown much light on this question, I do not know their names…
It [the unborn baby] cannot speak, reason or judge between right and wrong. It cannot have personal relations, without which a person is not functionally a person at all, until months – and not, except minimally, in 2 years – have passed….
Of course, an infant is not fully human… Persons who are already functionally persons in the full sense have more important rights even than infants.”
Charles Hartshorne, “Concerning Abortion: an Attempt at a Rational View,” The Christian Century, January 21, 1981, 42 – 45
Share on FacebookDr. William Rashbaum was a late-term abortionist who performed over 20,000 late-term abortions are taught over 100 doctors how to do these procedures. In an article about him, the author describes a woman who came into abort her pregnancy at 18 weeks. She was aborting because the baby was going to be handicapped. From the author:
“She’s not sure she wants to know the details. It’s difficult to relinquish her role of protecting a fetus that has grown inside her for four and a half months. Welling up with tears again, she asks if it will feel pain. She doesn’t want to hear much more. “I just want to make sure you get all of it out,” she pleads. “Don’t leave anything in there.”….
REBECCA PALEY “Cruel to be kind: In the twilight of his career, a late-term-abortion doctor tells all” The Boston Phoenix Dec 2003
Dr. Raushbaum killed her baby by the D&E abortion method. Here is a chart that shows how that type of abortion is performed
From a D&E at 18 weeks:
From former abortion clinic director Abby Johnson:
“Most of the time, there is no communication between an abortionist and a woman having an abortion. None. Usually, the doctor comes in without introducing himself, mask on his face, sits on a stool, performs the procedure, and walks out without saying a word to the woman on the table. We never had any complaints. I guess women don’t expect the doctor who will take the life of their child to have wonderful bedside manner.”
Abby Johnson “Abortion Doc Told Patient “I Will Take Your Sin” LifeNews.com 7/26/11
So much for abortion being between “a woman and her doctor.”
Share on FacebookA 2007 article gives one possible reason why many doctors are not offering the abortion pill (medical abortions) when the pill was first being made available, pro-choicers rejoiced, thinking this would greatly expand the access to abortion, and while this is happened to a certain extent, many doctors, particularly general practitioners, have not been on board with offering the pill.
From one article:
“But Dr Fiona Cornish, a GP in Cambridge and vice president of the Medical Women’s Federation, said that even liberal, pro-choice GPs would not want to take on medical abortions because of time constraints.
“We’re already doing minor surgery, a lot of hospital follow-ups, coils, family planning clinics,” she said, adding: “No doubt there would be no extra funding.”
Abortions could be available from GPs. (2007, Dec 05). Aberdeen Evening Express.
