Here's what I have to say about this post-abortion trauma bullshit.
Once an unwanted pregnancy happens, there are basically three choices:
1. Have an abortion.
2. Bring the pregnancy to term and arrange for an adoption.
3. Bring the pregnancy to term and raise the child.
The only person who can decide which of those options is the best is the woman involved.
Might she later regret her choice?*
Maybe.
It's easy to regret a previous choice and to forget that the alternatives might well have caused as much, if not more, regret. Giving a child up for adoption can lead to a lifetime of regret and longing. Raising a child is far from easy even under good circumstances and it's easy for the single, teenaged mother to regret not going to the prom, not having a social life, not being able to give her child the benefits that she could have given if she'd been older and more financially secure before giving birth.
But we don't have an industry and a movement devoted to making women feel guilty about adoption or motherhood.
It would be wonderful if we lived in a society where every pregnancy was planned and no woman ever had to experience even a moment's regret over an unplanned pregnancy. Modern birth control, sex education, health care, and equality for women could get us very close to such a world. The same creeps push the abortion-trauma-bullshit do everything that they can to keep us from achieving such a world.
So, abortion trauma people, please, bite me.
*Obligatory notice that most women don't regret their abortions at all. However, even assuming arguendo that a given woman might later regret that choice, it's important to understand that this doesn't mean that, had she chosen differently she would never have had any regrets. That's way too easy to assume when you haven't lived through the other choices.
7 comments:
http://www.imnotsorry.net/
good point. also that there are many painful events in anyone's life. it can be easier to pin emotional pain on a choice we made, and still keep a sense of agency, than to admit that a lot of the suffering we experience is due to things beyond our control. the anti-abortion crusader in the article might better crusade against rape and child abuse, as she was a victim of both.
I find it interesting that you are making general statements about the anti-abortion crusader, railing against them making about the women who make the choice to have an abortion.
I believe that if a person is not given a choice, they cannot be free...but it is damn hard to find anyone who doesn't sound hateful towards the other side of the spectrum.
Thank you for your statement about an industry and movement condemning women to a lifetime of regret. I needed to hear that because since being in the Bible Belt for the last sixteen years I have been very hard on myself about my decision as a young woman. While beating myself on my youth, shallowness and stupidity (and I was each). I did not truely honor that I was responsible and did decided. I do regret it but not with the same amount of self-loathing I had earlier before reading your blog on this.
You show me a person over the age of 16 who has no regrets, I'll show you a moron that ought to be removed from the gene pool.
From Anne, "The Gods Are Bored"
It always suprises me how easy feminists are distracted by the smoke and mirrors of abortion prohibitionists.
The reason the religious right opposes abortion is because abortion:
1. Allows women to choose when/if they want to have a baby, thus enabling them to have a career and compete economicly with men.
2. It allows woman (and men! Hell yeah!) to have sex, purely for pleasure, without having to worry about marrage or accidental pregnancy. (and they consider sex for pleasure to be evil).
It has nothing to do with "killing babies", or "post abortion guilt"... those are just secular whitewashing for a right wing christian agenda. When you argue against it, you are giving it more credit than it deserves!
I think feminists should just say "it is my body, I will do whatever the fuck I want to do with it, and stay the hell out of my life"... unfortunatly, there are other issues where many feminists don't believe a woman has a right to do whatever she wants with her body (such as breast enlargement... drug use... prostitution, etc.), so they are stuck arguing minutia with prohibitionists because they don't want to undermine their own forms of prohibitionism that they support.
I believe that when a woman has an abortion because she got pregnant out of stupidity yeah she should regret it. But I do not like or approve of the cause celebritee' of the pro take away choice. These people donot believe in life, 85 percent support the death penalty (a version extreme late abortion)
The I had an abortion and it ruined life (regret and pain and sin) I really see Your life ruined with Your pink armani suit, Bleached blonde hair and book and circuit tour. Believe every time these women read the spread sheet on their INCOMING TOUR PROFITS and book sales and put on that make-up for the next TV interview. Yeah, regret is their abiding emotion. Them and Ted Bundy eatin up by IT.
Post a Comment