Category: Quotes

Pro-Choice author: Question of whether abortion is murder is “risky”

Pro-choice author Miriam Claire wrote:

“Somehow, the key issue is not being addressed [by the pro-choice movement] and is “off the page,” because the question of whether abortion is murder is risky and unanswerable in an absolute sense.”

A few pages later, though, she answers the question. She wrote:

“When you choose to have an abortion, you are responsible for a decision to halt the development of a human life. That is the most significant difference between abortion and miscarriage. It is somehow easier to accept “fate” or “the will of nature,” than it is to accept responsibility for our actions.”

Miriam Claire The Abortion Dilemma: Personal Views on a Public Issue (Xlibris Corporation, 2013) viii, 1

Perhaps “halt the development” is an easier thing to say than “kill.”

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Parents of surgeon born with club foot are horrified late-term abortions are done for that reason

The parent of a child who was born with a club foot and is now a surgeon wrote a letter to the editor to express their shock at laws in England allowing abortion up to birth for the condition:

“We were surprised to see that club foot (talipes) was mentioned in connection with late abortions…

Our son was born with severe talipes in 1979. He was described as handicapped and mixed race when we adopted him as a baby…

His legs are still thin, but his mobility has been only slightly limited. His two children do not have the condition.

We suspect that because of his childhood experience he was determined to be a surgeon, an ambition that he has achieved: he is now a very successful senior consultant surgeon in Australia. Thank goodness his birth mother did not opt for a termination.”

Dr and Mrs C Mackay “Late abortion could have claimed our brilliant boy” The Times July 11 2021

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Pro-choicer: unwillingness to “humanize” the fetus turns people off to the pro-choice position

Pro-choice author Bertha Alvarez Manninen wrote:

“I focus on the concerns of women who either have obtained abortions or support women’s ability to choose to do so, and yet regard fetuses as deserving of respect.

This sentiment is increasingly prevalent among the younger pro-choice generation, and it is vital that the pro-choice community defend abortion in a manner that will resonate with them. Contrary to the worry that doing so will adversely affect abortion rights, the unwillingness to humanize the fetus is turning people away from the pro-choice community.”

Bertha Alvarez Manninen Pro-Life, Pro-Choice: Shared Values in the Abortion Debate (Nashville, Tennessee: Vanderbilt University Press, 2014) 6

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Coroner describes prevalence of illegal abortion in Australia

In Australia, as in the United States, illegal abortions took place before abortion was legalized. In 1890, coroner Dr. Richard Youl wrote:

“There are several institutions devoted entirely to procuring abortions. It is a demoralizing thing. Murder is a fine art, and persons who get used to it do not stop.”

Gideon Haigh The Racket: How Abortion Became Legal in Australia (Victoria, Australia: Melbourne University Press, 2008) 17

The Racket is a book that documents illegal abortions in Melbourne, Australia, and comments on the reasons abortion was legalized in Australia.

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Pro-choicer: ultrasound laws allow people to discriminate against “low income and minority women and people with disabilities.”

Pro-choice author Lisa M Mitchell writes:

“Some American lawmakers have attempted to legislate mandatory viewing of ultrasound fetal images as a means of dissuading pregnant women from having an abortion…

A growing number of feminist perspectives on this issue assert “a woman’s right to choose,” yet also reveal how the very existence of technologies such as ultrasound tend to structure “choice” in ways that “have increased the potential for others to exercise an even greater control over women’s lives” and to discriminate in particular against low income and minority women and people with disabilities.”

Lisa M Mitchell Baby’s First Picture: Ultrasound and the Politics of Fetal Subjects (Toronto: University of Toronto Press Inc., 2001) 6-7

The quote within the quote is from:

Michelle Stanworth Reproductive Technologies: Gender, Motherhood and Medicine (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1987) 4

Mitchell never reveals how the use of ultrasound allows pro-lifers to discriminate against people. In reality, ultrasound screening allows doctors to abort disabled babies in the womb – but this is not what Mitchell is talking about, of course.

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Baby born alive after an abortion, lived for 10 hours

Loran Denison was pregnant with her fourth child, who was diagnosed with Edwards Syndrome. She had an abortion, but her son was born alive. Doctors didn’t treat the baby, but his heart kept beating for 10 hours as she held him. She named her son Kiyo Bleu.

Denison tells her story:

They told me he had typical Edwards’ Syndrome so would pass away before or just after birth. My boy had a lion heart.

I thought I had done the hard bit when I made the difficult decision to have an abortion, but now it feels ten times worse.

I just want other mums to know in case this happens to them.

I had to watch his heartbeat getting slower and watch his life draining out of him.

You just want to keep your children alive. It was like torture.

None of the doctors thought he would be born alive.

When my partner picked him up after he was born he said ‘his heart is beating’, and they said ‘no way’.

When I took the first tablet on the sixth they said it would stop the pregnancy, heartbeat and everything, so we expected he wouldn’t be alive when he was born.

They didn’t check for a heartbeat before inducing labour, and I wish they had.

I don’t have words for how awful it was…

They said his heart will stop in the next half hour, and I kept ringing the bell to say he was still alive, and I said ‘do you just leave him’ and they said ‘yes.'”

I don’t even have a word for how horrible it feels. There is a person I’ve read about who has survived with Edwards’ Syndrome to 40.

Kiyo Bleu was so strong now I wonder if he would have survived. His heartbeat was so strong you could feel it.

If I had known he would be born alive I probably would have made a different decision.

I thought I was doing the right thing but now I think I have done the wrong thing.”

Katie Pounds “MUM’S AGONY My abortion failed and I had to give birth to a live baby who died 10 hours later – it broke my heart” The Sun 10 May 2021

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Severely disabled child had life “full of joy”

Pro-life activist and abortion survivor Claire Culwell wrote about a little girl she took care of who had severe disabilities.

In her book, Culwell wrote about four-year-old Riley–Jane and her mother Gayle. She says of Riley – Jane:

“… Her muscles didn’t function normally; her bones were soft; she had a tracheotomy; she was on oxygen and had a feeding tube.

Gayle said that the doctors didn’t think she could experience a good quality of life. However, despite all her challenges, Riley-Jane’s life seemed full of joy. Her parents wanted to nurture that apparent joyfulness and enable her to live as well as she could. They decided to ask me to be her caregiver as much as my schedule would allow. I was eager to help. Riley- Jane could do nothing for herself. I fed her, bathed her, dressed her, and just tried to help her feel loved and accepted.

Right away I saw the joy that her mother had talked about. As I rocked Riley- Jane, she would grin up at me, communicating without needing to say one word. I wasn’t sure whether she could really see me, but something inside Riley- Jane generated a spirit of happiness that was awe-inspiring. Her vulnerability and trust fulfilled and blessed me more than I could have ever imagined. I saw beauty that radiated from her soul, surpassing the usual physical definition of beauty.

Riley- Jane passed away a few years ago. It wasn’t surprising to see so many people who had been touched by her life – and the lives of her parents – gathered to celebrate her… Her quality of life here on earth defied what the doctors had said, and I am grateful for the opportunity to have been blessed by Riley- Jane.”

Claire Culwell, Lois and Steve Rabey Survivor: An Abortion Survivor’s Surprising Story of Choosing Forgiveness and Finding Redemption (WaterBrook, 2021) 35 – 36

All human life is valuable, even lives lived with a severe disability.

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Clinic worker talks about living aborted baby holding on to mother

Pro-Choice author Magda Denes quoted an abortion worker who said that two babies were born alive in her clinic in one week:

“There was one week when there were two live births in the same week. And just, you know, there’s this baby crying on the floor while all these women are in the process of trying to deal with their feelings about aborting their babies. One survived for a while.

[Denes] how did the mothers react who gave birth to the live babies?

Well. This one, she didn’t talk much. The mother delivered when there was no one there and there was some period when the mother was holding the baby. And it was grabbing onto her.… She was extremely upset by this whole thing.”

Magda Denes, PhD. In Necessity and Sorrow: Life and Death in an Abortion Hospital (New York: Basic Books inc 1976) 79

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Abortionist says abortion is a “tragedy” for women

Abortionist Jane Hodgson said:

“Abortion is nothing but a tragedy for the women who go through it.”

William Dudley Issues on Trial: Reproductive Rights (New York: Thomson, Gale, 2006)

Nevertheless, Hodgson did illegal abortions, then went on to do them when they became legal.

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Indian woman aborts baby because astrologer says child is bad luck

A woman from India gave the following reason for having an abortion:

“When I became pregnant for the second time, my husband injured his leg in an accident. He consulted an astrologer, who said that the (unborn) child may be inauspicious and suggested that we terminate the pregnancy. My in-laws and husband compelled me by saying, “Is your unborn baby’s life worth more than your husband’s?”

P Balasubramanian, TK Sundari Ravindran and US Mishra “Induced Abortion: A Study of Rural Tamil Nadu” in Leela Visaria and Vimala Ramachandran Abortion in India: Ground Realities (Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2007) 268 – 269

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