One thing that deserves reiteration in the whole pro-choice v. anti-choice dichotomy is the true intentions of “pro-lifersâ€. What they claim as their main aim (i.e. stopping abortions) rarely, if ever, correlates to their actions. To you and me, the idea of reducing abortions has a simple solution: stop unwanted pregnancies. And how? By thorough, comprehensive and accurate sex education and available contraception on demand.
The anti-choice movement’s actions belie their true agenda, and that is control of women’s lives. It is a myth that they are “pro-lifeâ€. They could be considered “pro-foetus†I guess, but the foetus isn’t the only “life†that is on the line, especially when abortion is outlawed as I’ve explored before .
Exhibit A: Anti-contraception
The anti-choice movement rails against contraception. They view pregnancy and STIs as a punishment for “fallen†women, that she should be forced to endure as punishment for having sex. Their true agenda here? Stopping women from being independent and sexual human beings- that is the domain of men, and women should only have sex when the pleasure of their husband is wont to be met (and for the sake of pro-creation of course). Their “abstinence-only” education is a fast-track to increasing abortion rates, not to mention how psychologically damaging this virginity fetishisation can sometimes be to young girls.
Restricting contraception, including emergency contraception (the morning-after pill) results in higher instances of unwanted pregnancies and thus abortion. This isn’t hard to figure out so those out there who consider themselves “pro-life†surely realise this to be the case. So I will repeat: Their agenda is restricting sexual and reproductive freedom not saving babies. It is about hating women. It is about relegating women to their “proper†sphere, which to the downfall of society, they have departed from in the past few decades.
Exhibit B: The rape exemption
Many “pro-lifers†concede an abortion exception to rape and incest victims. Even the most fundie Christian variety of pro-lifer concede some sort of exemption for “pure womenâ€. As one US fundie put it an exemption in abortion criminalisation could be:
a rape victim, brutally raped, savaged. The girl was a virgin. She was religious. She planned on saving her virginity until she was married. She was brutalized and raped, sodomized as bad as you can possibly make it, and is impregnated. I mean, that girl could be so messed up, physically and psychologically, that carrying that child could very well threaten her life.
Why the exemptions if unborn foetuses are so precious? Because, women who didn’t chose to have sex shouldn’t be punished for it. It’s interesting to note that the above guy thinks that only virgins are brutalised by rape so much that it would be too traumatic for them to carry a child to term. Where as promiscuous women won’t receive the same protections under his style of law I guess.
In any case, my point is that if they are willing to make exceptions then their claims that they believe that abortion = murder are null and void. Or is it only murder in some cases?
Exhibit C: Christian opposition to the HPV vaccine.
There might be an overwhelming (public) backlash from people saying, ‘don’t you dare put something out there that gives my 12-year-old daughter a licence to be promiscuous’
That is a quote from our very own senator Barnaby Joyce, who is opposed to the life-saving cervical cancer vaccine, developed by Professor Ian Frazer, because it could encourage under-age girls to have sex . That’s right, screw the fact that it could save hundreds of thousands of lives each year around the world- we don’t want teens having sex! The human pappilomavirus (hpv), a sexually transmitted disease, causes 70 percent of cervical cancer in women and yep, those fundies don’t care about those lives that could be saved, all they care about is the possibility that it could encourage promiscuity in teenage girls- which is obviously a complete disconnect from reality in any case.
I mention all this because of a woman whose blog I have been reading ever since I came across a link to her problems trying to access Emergency Contraception after an encounter with a broken condom.
After trying to get a script over a weekend and contacting many doctors in her area only to be told they only give EC to rape victims and married women (the implications being that, with the former, you didn’t chose to have sex, and the latter, a man is involved in the decision so it’s okay then). She finally got it from a clinic a couple of hundred kms away. It turns out, it was all in vein and, because the EC was taken too late, it failed.
Now she will be forced to fork out $450 for the abortion pill and will have to walk through picket lines at the clinic four times before she is rid of this problem. The doctors that denied her EC, because of their “morals†knew full well that bb would have to endure this because of their inaction. She is now enduring the punishment that they would have meted out to every woman who has sex. Those doctors weren’t concerned with “lifeâ€. EC, as they would know, acts to prevent ovulation and implantation of the egg- it prevents abortion.
More disturbing is the kind of hate mail she gets from psycho fundies, which again belies their true agenda. She has been subject to death threats, “helpful emails†that pretended to give advice about herbs that could help bring on miscarriage but actually involved lethal plants, she has been subjected to comments such as this: “Stupid whore. You spread your legs and now you want to murder a baby. I hope you get raped and murdered. Maybe then you’ll feel what that innocent life felt†all because she wanted to have the reproductive right to chose when she gives birth, which started with trying to use a contraception that doesn’t interfere with a fertilised egg.
Even though I believe in choice for all women regardless of circumstance, the fact that she already has three children and a fourth would put them out of home, that she is in a high-risk category because of previous operations which have left her with half a cervix and that she has been in a relationship with the same man for the past few years, they still think that she is a “dirty whore†who should be forced to give birth.
It’s important that we call the anti-choicers on their bullshit whenever we can. The lack of any logic in their arguments and their aim to impose their belief systems on all women is dangerous. There’s a reason they’ve been dubbed the “AmTaliban†in the US.
Your right about the “AM-TALIBAN” in the US.
Seems they have a man in the top job. Get rid of him and his bible bashing mates and you could regain some sanity. They are fundamentalists, wanting wanting to impose their beliefs and ideals on everyone. A good christian heart would not do that. They are more likely to serve the people in any way they can, providing assistance to those in need. At worst they may hope that some might appreciate their efforts and want to be more like them.
I have some figures and some thoughts I’d like to leave for all to concider.
Something for Pro-choicers and Pro-lifers to concider…..
World estimations of the number of terminations carried out each year is somewhere between 20 and 88 million.
3,500 per day / 1.3 million per year in America alone.
50% of that 1.3 million claimed failed birth control was to blame.
A further 48% had failed to use any birth control at all.
And 2% had medical reasons.
That means a stagering 98% may have been avoided had an effective birth control been used.
I am a 98% pro-lifer, 2% Pro-choicer, who has no religious convictions at all . I didn’t need the fear of god or anything else to come to my decision, just a good sense of what is right and wrong.
You see we were all once a fetus. Is it beyond the realm of possibilities that when your mother first learned she was carrying you, she may have considered her options? What if she had decided to terminate? Would that have been OK?
You would not exist, if you have children they would not exist, and your (husband or wife) would be married to someone else. You would have been deprived of all your experiences and memories. In this day and age with terminations being so readily available and so many being carried out, if you make it to full term
you can consider yourself lucky. Lucky you had a mother that made the choice of life for you. Don’t you think they all deserve the same basic human right, LIFE?
I’m all for contraception, prevention is certainly better than termination.
Did you know you can get an implant that is safe, 99.9% effective, and lasts for three years? Just think girls not even a show for three years, wouldn’t that be great? I think too many people rely too heavily on the last option (abortion), I think if abortions weren’t so readily available people would manage their reproductive system far better resulting in a fraction of the number of unwanted pregnancies.
World wide there are over 50 MILLION aborted pregnancies each year. In America 3,500 terminations carried out every day, that’s over 1.3 million every year, 50% of all cases claimed that birth control had been used, 48% admitted they took no precaution, and 2% had a medical reason. That’s a staggering 98% that may have been prevented had an effective birth control been used. Don’t get me wrong, I suspect the percentages in Australia would be much the same.
Just a lot of unnecessary killing.
At the point of conception is when life began for you. This was the start of your existence. Your own personal big bang. Three weeks after conception heart started to beat. First brain waves recorded at six weeks after conception. Seen sucking thumb at seven weeks after conception.
I am convinced that in the not too distant future, people will look back at many of the practices of today with disbelief and horror.
Want to know how to find humanity-?
True humanity can only be achieved, by concidering others/ caring about others, as much as, if not more than yourself.
Until we do we are no more than an uncivilisation, with all the uncivilised things that we do…
I’m going to explore this comment a bit further but first of all, in response to this argument that we hear so often from those of a “pro-life” persuasion:
The mind boggles. There are so many ways that I could not be existing now.
If my mother had made the difficult decision not to go ahead with her pregnancy when pregnant with me well I wouldn’t know about it because I wouldn’t exist, so I couldn’t really have much of an opinion on the matter could I.
When faced with our own mortality and the extremely unlikely chance that I’m existing now because of whatever circumstances has allowed that to happen, it’s easy to boil it down to the above argument. But in response: The butterfly effect and all that. There are so many decisions and circumstances that led to each one of us existing that this argument doesn’t make much sense to me. I mean if my great great great grandfather didn’t go for a walk that one time and because of that decision didn’t get hit by a horse and cart whilst crossing the road, I could not exist right now…or whatever. Do you get my drift? By the above logic people are destroying potential life everytime they use contraception.
I’m going to address your other points later, suffice to say, whilst early prevention is obviously the best way to reduce abortion rates: Our planet is struggling to provide for those that already exist on it, let alone having the forced birth of, according to your figures, an extra 50 million people a year.
On this point, I don’t think you can judge people’s contraceptive choices too much without knowing circumstances. The above injection involves hormones which have quite an effect on some women and doesn’t work for others. I also don’t agree that people rely heavily on the last option and from what I hear about the US, abortions aren’t exactly easy things to come by these days.
No woman wants to have an abortion, it’s just that sometimes their desire not to have a child is stronger. I think the reason that contraception isn’t being used as much as it should be is this renewed focus on abstinence only education, not because women or girls think that they’ll have access to an abortion so it doesn’t matter. The misinformation that teens are currently getting fed about sex and contraception obviously is a big factor in why contraception isn’t being used as much as it should be.
Thirdly, please read a post I have written before about what restricting access to abortion actually does.
Here’s some figures for you to contemplate:
The rate of death in the States is .6 per 100,000.
Despite death rates from botched abortions being higher in countries where it is illegal, abortion is also a much more common occurence than in countries where it is readily available:
Additionally, a century of medical estimates of Western abortion rates puts the ratio of abortions to pregnancies at one to three or four during the late nineteenth century through the early and mid-twentieth century - i.e. when it was illegal. [Luker, K. Abortion and the Politics of Motherhood, 1984]
The curious morality about the type of woman that is “allowed” to have an abortion- rape/incest victims, “pure” women reflect some very disturbing ideas about guilt, punishment and fault that are very outdated and irrelevant to the argument. (ps- you’d be very surprised who the recipients of abortions are- i’ve know married muslim women with 8 kids who have had abortions, not to mention the mistresses/gf’s of these right wing pro-life politicians (probably!).
The pro-life argument is seductive- pro-choice advocates cannot explain the difference between infanticide and reproductive freedom- how can women claim to be nurturant and at the same time show disregard for the rights and feeling of fetuses?
Robin West a fantastic feminist legal scholar says our idea of harm/our law is constructed around male paradigms- which cannot understand the damage of a mandatory pregnancy- from a female point of view it is self-defense - but from a male point of view abortion cannot possible be a form of self-defense as a fetus - is not one of Hobbes “relatively equal” men we have a right to defend ourselves from- the fetus is unequal and dependant so to speak.
NSW law criminilises abortion if there is no immediate harm to the mother posed byt he pregancy. This harm has been construed narrowly- as immediate physical danger.
West says the harm is much more than “physical” - the dangers of mandatory pregnancy are invasion of the body by the fetus and the intrusion into the mother’s existence after childbirth- the right to abort is the right to defend against a particular bodily and existential invasion.
The harm the unwanted fetus does is not harm of annihilation, nor anything like it- it is not assault , battery etc a fetus is not an equal in nature- it is however a “harmâ€.
The law and people must understand the nature of this “harm” and not treat women’s bodies as incubators but also a “life†worthy of respect.
At the same time I agree with Anna that the focus should also be on contraception and empowering women to be in control of their fertility and choices from the beginning- abortion is a right- it is also represents a failure along the way.
Abortions should not be the mess women have to clean up as a symbol of their lack of sexual freedom and choices rather than exercise of it - (see also women aborting female fetuses in China/India due to family pressure which is a whole another post).
If health and well-being of women are feminist concerns than we do realize abortion is a right- but it also a sad right- that represents a failure somewhere- too much glamourisation of abortion garbed in the mantle of a civic right gives too much ammo to those pro-lifers who love to parade a repentant soul- a traumatized female who has visited a Dr.Sood (http://www.abc.net.au/rn/lawreport/stories/2006/1724391.htm#)
like character.
(Dr.Sood like atrocities can also be avoided if this issue was more open, less hysterical and practical- what about when a woman dies? Does anyone care then?)
Openess, transparency, good counselling and no judgment (and less demonisation and harassement) can prevent deaths and debacles.
Some women are organising right now for a big Canberra rally against women’s reproductive choices, using women-centred language to organise. The coalition includes some feminist-identified women, but they are from a very particular part of the spectrum of the women’s movement:
http://www.acl.org.au/pdfs/load_pdf_public.pdf?pdf_id=701&from=NATIONAL
I see ausblog’s done his regular technorati or whatever search on abortion and decided to repeat his posts here this week. I’m curious as to what possible satisfaction can be gotten by cut-n-pasting the same stuff every single week on different feminist blogs with just an added top or tail to each comment to pretend it’s an on-topic considered response to the blogger.
He’s not worth engaging: no matter what you post he just pastes in some boilerplate as a response.
hmmm, thanks tigtog. I wasn’t familiar with him.
Deborah: Cheers for the link and heads up. It’s interesting that this appropriation of women’s lib language is happening here. From what I understand, it’s been happening in the US. Seems our very own pro-lifers are getting some tips of their US couterparts. Bastards.
I do not Tig Tog…
World estimations of the number of terminations carried out each year is somewhere between 20 and 88 million.
3,500 per day / 1.3 million per year in America alone.
50% of that 1.3 million claimed failed birth control was to blame.
A further 48% had failed to use any birth control at all.
And 2% had medical reasons.
That means a stagering 98% may have been avoided had an effective birth control been used.
Bill Clinton once said that abortions should be available , safe and RARE. He is a very wise man.
I’d like to see an ultrasound in every clinnic to provide a more informed choice, before going through with something they may regret.
I’d also like to see effective birth control made available to all who can’t afford it.
I have since seen your same comment elsewhere ausblog. And why exactly are you posting the same comment twice on here? If you continue I’m going to take administrator’s liberty of creative editing.
You’ve been warned.
Have you seen ( HOT OFF THE SHOW! Throw-away babies )
a blog by Sharon Hughes?
20 to 88 million terminations each year!
Thank fuck! 20 to 88 million human cabbages we don’t need to feed and who won’t be hogging my oxygen.
See you in Hell! Mmmmm. Nice and warm, and I hear the food’s good. I’ll have the aborted baby skewers for starters, followed by aborted baby salad and then baby steak. Mmmmmmmmm.
You know which side your bread is buttered, don’t you Cranky?
Ha!