“Ethan Bronner says that when he wrote a story for the Boston Globe last year on late-term abortions, a copy editor questioned his description of a surgical procedure “destroying” the fetus by “crushing forming skulls and bones.” Bronner says the editor told him, “As far as I’m concerned, until that thing is born, it is really no different from a kidney; it is part of the woman’s body.” To talk about “destroying” it or about “forming bones,” the editor said, “is really to distort the issue.”
“Even those who do not accept that babies are killed during abortions know that, politically, graphic images of fetuses that bring to mind babies are the Achilles’ heel of attempts to liberalize abortion laws. To the extent that there is discomfort with abortion among the general population, concerns about the relationship of abortion to babies is clearly the reason.”
Gene Burns The Moral Veto: Framing Contraception, Abortion, and Cultural Pluralism in the United States (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005) 24
In this passage, Margaret Sanger speaks out against charity, which she calls “relief”:
“Relief, by its very nature is not conservation [of the race]. It may serve a destructive purpose, first by keeping alive the most unfit and encouraging them by federal, state and local aid to multiply their kind.”
Margaret Sanger “Human Conservation and Birth Control” address delivered at Conference on Conservation and Development of Human Resources, Washington DC, March 3, 1938, MSP–SS, p 5
Her belief was that the “unfit” i.e. the poor and disabled, should be allowed to die off for the betterment of the human race.
Dr. Johnny Hunter, African-American pro-lifer and cofounder of L.E.A.R.N.:
“It breaks my heart that when a young man is gunned down by a [police officer], the media runs with it like wildfire. Yet, if an abortionist kills a young black woman and baby, the silence itself is tragic.”
“Occasionally, a woman will say that she wants an RU-486 abortion to punish herself for having become pregnant, even if it was a failure of contraception. She feels guilty and wants to punish herself with what she believes will be hours of strong period pains and consciousness of the procedure. She believes that she will be aware of the miscarriage and body changes and that remembering the procedure will force her not to let it happen again. That is not a good reason for having an RU-486 abortion. I have also heard women say that they want to have a local anesthetic prior to a surgical abortion for the same reason – to remain conscious through the procedure so that it won’t happen again. Consciousness is seen as a form of punishment.”
Miriam Claire The Abortion Dilemma: Personal Views on a Public Issue (New York: Insight Books, 1995) 154
Pro-choice activist Kathleen Reeves writes about laws requiring sonograms before abortions:
“I think we can be pretty sure that a woman about to have an abortion is aware of what’s inside her womb. And in case she’s not, the doctors who counsel her before the abortion are perfectly capable of telling her….
The legislators behind these bills are arrogant in assuming they have something to say to a woman about her “womb.”
There’s no doubt that, as a woman, it’s hard to predict how you’ll feel after an abortion. But an image of the fetus sheds no light on the decision and adds nothing to the emotional process.
On the other hand, having a cadre of politicians take this image by force does add something to the experience: the sense of having been intimidated, assumed stupid, and even violated. “
So what are women aware of that is in their wombs? Reeves refuses to come out and say. She may be tacitly admitting that women know they are pregnant with babies, or she may only mean that women are aware of fetal development. A look at women’s stories seems to indicate otherwise.
The same stories will show that abortion workers do not give information about fetal development to women.
Seeing an image of a baby in the womb must add to the “emotional process” of the abortion decision or pro-choicers would not oppose these laws so vehemently.
“The results of a massive study of nearly 5,000 extremely premature babies published last Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine found that the survival rate of babies born at 22 and 23 weeks increased substantially if hospitals actively treat the babies.
NEJM study shows nearly a quarter of babies born at 22 weeks survive if actively treated; 33% for babies born at 23 weeks….
Two of the study leaders– Dr. Edward Bell of the University of Iowa and University of Iowa medical student Matthew Rysavy–talked to various publications to explain what their findings represented.
Dr. Bell told the New York Times’ Pam Belluck that at Iowa, treatment is offered to most 22-week-olds, and he considers 22 weeks a new marker of viability.
“That’s what we think, but this is a pretty controversial area,” Dr. Bell said. “I guess we would say that these babies deserve a chance.”
Chi An is a Chinese women who took part in enforcing the one child policy in China. Now she recalls how women pregnant with “illegal” children were treated:
“A positive pregnancy test spelled trouble for a woman with a child. The representative would take the young woman aside for a series of “heart-to-heart” chats. “Have an abortion immediately,” she would be told, “and you will receive a cash bonus and a week off work.” If the woman did not respond to these inducements within the next few days, the carrot would be replaced by a stick. The woman would be told that she would not be allowed to enter her illegal child’s name on the factory’s population registers after birth, so that her child would have no medical benefits, no grain rations, no opportunity to attend school, and no chance of factory employment in the future. “For the good of your fatherland, your factory, and your family,” she would be urged, “you must “think clear” about abortion.”
If the woman resisted her representative’s warnings, activists from the Women’s Federation and the Party would step in and lend a hand. The daily chats would take on the character of struggle sessions, as the pregnant woman was attacked for her stubbornness by several activists in turn. There are heavy financial penalties for “illegal” second birth, she would be told. If she continue to resist, she would not only lose her annual bonus, but she would have to pay a heavy fine as well. The meetings also spilled over from work to home, as groups of activists visited the woman each night in her apartment. Husbands and mothers-in-law, who were often opposed to the idea of an abortion, would be required to attend these talks. “Do you want China to be backward and impoverished forever?” They would be asked. “Your individual whims in childbearing must be subject to the interest of society as a whole.”
If the woman and her family still stood their ground, the pressure would be turned up a notch. The senior leadership of the Women’s Federation and the factory Party organization would enter the fray, determined to break their will to resist. As many as a dozen officials might impose themselves on her and her family at all hours of the day and night, hectoring, blustering, threatening dire consequences. If she still insisted on having an illegal child, the local party chief would join as well. She would then hear, for the first time, the ultimate threat in China’s social welfare state: “You will lose your job if you continue to resist remedial measures.”
Stephen W Mosher A Mother’s Ordeal: One Woman’s Fight against China’s One Child Policy (Orlando, Florida: Harcourt Brace & Company, 1993) 264 – 265
“I was majoring in women’s studies at Monash University at the time. I thought I knew about abortion. One of my best friends had done her social work placement in an abortion centre. I had worked as a phone counsellor at a women’s crisis line. Several of my friends had had abortions. I saw it almost as a rite of passage.
It was only as I was slipping into unconsciousness from the anaesthetic that I realized. Until that moment the word had always been “foetus”. I had had a stressful few weeks, trying to work out what to do, cope with morning sickness, finish my degree, go to work, and keep everything a secret. But as I was slipping under from the injection, suddenly, for the first time since I learned that I was pregnant, my mind became clear. I thought, “I’m killing my baby”. And then I was lying on my side, with the nurse calling my name, and it was over, and it was too late.
After the abortion I did not return to or continue the life I had before. Instead, I developed phobias. I became afraid of heights. I couldn’t walk up mountains. I couldn’t ride as a passenger in a car. I became very scared of social situations. I spent a friend’s birthday locked in the restaurant toilet. I cut myself off from everyone. I gave up my job and my further study. I stopped answering the phone. I stopped getting out of bed. …
I believed what I had been told about abortion. I believed in my right to choose, that this was a hard-won right thanks to my feminist predecessors. I believed that what was growing in my body was a foetus. I attended counselling at the Royal Women’s to help me make my choice. I understood the physical procedure, about not having a bath in case of infection…
From my work at the Women’s Crisis Line, I knew which unplanned pregnancy support services were government run and “unbiased”. I knew which phone counselling service to avoid because it was run by “Right-to-Lifers”. I knew they gave “biased” information. I knew to avoid the “emotive” language and images the Right-to-Life movement used. I believed I was well informed. I did my best to be.
Afterwards, I realized I had not been well informed at all. If anything, I had been misinformed. At no point had I been told that going through an abortion can be extremely psychologically distressing. I did not know that women’s lives can fall apart the way mine did as a result. The “unbiased” information and language, supposedly feminist, did not make me feel empowered. It denied my truth, and saved society from the inconvenience of another single mother.
I can’t tell other women whether or not they should have their babies, but I do strongly encourage them to know the reality of abortion if they are considering having an abortion. I wish I had known more before it was too late. I am not a Christian, or a “Right-to-Lifer”, but I do know that it was my baby that I killed.
She has the following message to women who find themselves pregnant:
To find out you are pregnant when you didn’t plan to be is a big thing. You are faced with an intense choice, possibly the most significant choice a human being can face – have a child or have an abortion. There is no compromise, no trial period, no thinking time. Either way, your life will dramatically change. You need all the support and knowledge you can get. There is no turning back if you get it wrong. You have to live with your choice for the rest of your life. It is beyond me why pro-choice organisations would be against women being able to make informed decisions.
Five years on, there are days when I don’t think about the child I don’t have, but they are still rare.
