She was 19 and he was 21. She just graduated high school and was working to save so money so she could ultimately attend the local community college. She had dreams of owning her own nail salon. He took construction jobs whenever available and had thoughts of being a site manager. They were both good Catholics so they used the rhythm method for birth control.
Then she got pregnant.
They struggled with what to do. They were too intimidated to go to their priest so, instead, they talked to a friend or two and some family members. Ultimately, they decided to have an abortion. At the time, she was nine weeks pregnant. It was a very sad occasion for both of them but neither could envision how they could raise a child on their income and cringed at the thought of sending their child to a public school in the Bronx. She knew, of course, that she could put the baby up for adoption but could not imagine carrying the child until birth then handing it over to another family. She did not want to spend each day wondering what her child was doing in some other part of the country. It was all a very sad occasion but they did what they thought was best at that moment.
Nine years later, things had changed. They made their way out of the Bronx and started making a comfortable living in Pennsylvania. She was a civil servant and he ran a local hardware store. Then, she became pregnant again. And this time they had their baby.
After giving birth, she started thinking more about her abortion and a transformation of sorts took place. She started thinking that if she had had that first child maybe things would have turned out differently. Maybe there could have been a way for her to finish college and turn things around. She couldn’t stop saying to herself: “what if?” She started reading pro-life literature and discovered resources for women who had come to regret their abortion. She dove in head first, joining organizations and attending rallies.
Like the others who had had similar experiences, she never went out and said that abortion should be a crime, that we should throw women and the doctors in jail for participating in the procedure. No, their approach was more subtle than that, on its face more “caring.” Because they knew that women knew absolutely nothing about their reproductive lives, they merely wanted to talk to them about the affects of abortion, the dangers. They just wanted women to know the “truth.” Their compassion for these women was dripping off the walls.
Of course, they never talk about the millions of women who have had abortions and who, dare I say it, are actually okay today! They don’t’ talk about the person in my family who over the course of 12 years had two abortions and today has the
most amazing family. Yes, in private conversations she will admit that she might think about the two abortions at times, but only fleetingly. It certainly has not affected her to the point where she wants to go out and join some pro-life organization or seek counseling. No, we can’t talk about those women.
Make no mistake about it – these women who have had abortions and now say they are total basket cases have one goal in mind – to make abortion illegal in this country once again. They want to back to the days when women, despite the laws, sought out abortions, often with disastrous consequences. Don’t let the sweet talk fool you. In the back of their minds, they are thinking: “You are killing a baby, my dear” but they will sugarcoat it by dangling before you the prospect that you will be totally paralyzed with guilt for the rest of your life if you get that abortion.
The irony, of course, is these women who now regret their abortion, including the one above, actually had an abortion! They made the decision based on their moment in time, based on whatever information they could gather. And this morning, there is a woman who is facing the same situation.
I have absolutely no problem if that pregnant woman wants to read volumes of pro-life literature. She can go, if she wants, to a crisis pregnancy center and talk to their “counselors.” The more information (if truthful), the better for her decision making process.
But, make no mistake about it. Behind all the nice talk and the offers of assistance, the bottom line is that these women who now regret their abortions thought they were doing the right thing at the time. And they now want to take away that decision making process from the hundreds of thousands of women each year who are in the same position.
Related articles
- Surprise! Crisis Pregnancy Centers Don’t Separate Education, Religion (hayladies.wordpress.com)
- All Pro-life Today 7/26/2011 (deaconjohnspace.wordpress.com)



July 31, 2011 at 12:25 pm
Deanna, where’d your Martin Luther King quote come from? I can’t find it.
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July 31, 2011 at 2:21 pm
Which one, I put up several?
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July 31, 2011 at 3:47 pm
“The Negro cannot win as long as he is willing to sacrifice the lives of his children for comfort and safety.” How can the “Dream” survive if we murder the children? Every aborted baby is like a slave in the womb of his or her mother. The mother decides his or her fate.”
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July 31, 2011 at 4:56 pm
It came from the written testimony of Dr. Alveda King quoting Martin Luther King at silentnomoreawareness(dot)org/testimonies/alveda-king.html
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July 31, 2011 at 3:50 pm
The so-called “pro-life” party proposes to slash WIC funding. Vote for them and starve a pregnant woman or her baby:
http://www.wjhg.com/news/headlines/Proposed_House_GOP_Cuts_Could_Affect_WIC_Program_116359399.html
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August 2, 2011 at 12:56 pm
Pro-life = we care for the FETUS from 0 to 9 months. When it’s actually a child, it’s on its own.
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August 5, 2011 at 7:50 am
Pro Lifers are just typically the dumbest group of people demographically.
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August 5, 2011 at 6:44 pm
“Skulander and Harold are just typically the two dumbest people demographically.
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August 5, 2011 at 6:45 pm
Oh yeah? Where is your documentation to prove that? Seems to me that it’s smart to say don’t kill.
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August 1, 2011 at 6:16 am
Sorry, Deanna, but if that’s from Veda, that’s second-hand and therefore hearsay and not admissible. I’m rather surprised that MLK would have said anything about abortion himself, since he died so sooner after Roe v. Wade; the “pro-life” self-help movement hadn’t really gotten underway by 1968, and he had far more important things to address. Therefore, I suspect Veda is putting words in her father’s mouth.
By the way, in order to get at that study on alleged coercion of women to undergo abortions, I have to pay for it. Would you happen to have a copy you could post on your site, or could you at least post the relevant section here?
Did you have to pay for access to all those studies you quote? If so, I can see why you won’t take on another born human being….
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August 1, 2011 at 8:21 am
Actually it is from his niece Alveda and she is a credible source since she is a family member. You can’t just dismiss her because you don’t agree with her. Also, pro-choicers chant on and on about how many illegal abortion there were and the “abortion right’s” fight was heating up as well. I don’t think it is a stretch to consider that the topic was on his mind.
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August 1, 2011 at 6:28 am
“I will always vote for Republicans, because Democrats kill babies!”
That statement– or something close to it– was written here by a passionate self-proclaimed “pro-lifer.”
It’s exactly what the Republicans want– even as they try to slash her parents’ Social Security and Medicare, make flying more unsafe for all her relatives and give 30 times bigger a tax brak for other couples who only make 4 times more than her (if average-income) American) husehold.
She needs to read “What’s the Matter with Kansas?” asnd “The Wrecking Crew” to see how they are using her passion against her own best interests.
That’s why they call themselves a “pro-life” party: to turn America into a banana republic, where the American Dream will be to work hard to connect yourself to somebody rich.
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August 1, 2011 at 9:05 am
In a court of law, any witness who testifies that he heard A say that B said B did something is dismissed for reporting at second hand. Alveda is reporting what she says B said. Where is the public record that shows B saying that? If there is a public record of what he said, then I have no quarrel with her, but from what I know of the civil rights movement’s history, there was not a white effort to neuter black men and sterilize or coerce to abortion black women. This was very likely not something MLK had on his platter, and I’d be happy to be proven wrong according to the rules of rational argument.
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August 1, 2011 at 9:30 am
Honestly, who knows? I tend to believe the family members testimony but when you read some of his other writings he was definitely a fan of Planned Parenthood. But way back then the whole “it’s only a clump of tissue or cells” was generally believed so he may not have looked at it from the perspective of killing a human being. Also, way back then Planned Parenthood was saying things like “abortion kills babies”. “An abortion requires an operation. It kills the life of a baby after it has begun. It is dangerous to your life and health. It may make you sterile so that when you want a child you cannot have it.” Planned Parenthood’s 1952 “Plan Your children” pamphlet. Granted this was a bit older than MLK days but the attitude was still similar in regards to abortion in the general population. So, the point is that he may have been pro Planned Parenthood and anti-abortion at the same time. It was possible back then. But again, if I had to say I would take the word of his family member.
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August 1, 2011 at 11:52 am
Deanna, it hurts your credibility when you are careless with supporting material. If you do that often enough, you risk exposure as a victory-at-the-expense-of-truth type whose real aim is to outlaw abortion in order to stop feeling bad about it.
I’m still waiting to see what you’ve found from the list of resources I encouraged you to peruse.
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August 2, 2011 at 12:05 pm
No, I said I believe the testimony of his family member. That is not careless. It is my belief.
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August 1, 2011 at 5:17 pm
I love how some of you guys conflate refusing to give up your body and health with ‘murder’.
If you have renal failure, and you hire some thugs to attack me and try and remove my kidney, and I fight back and escape with both kidneys intact, according to your logic, I just committed murder.
Ridiculous.
Not even a grown, thinking, feeling human gets the right to infringe on another person’s body rights. Why the hell should a fetus get that right??!!
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August 1, 2011 at 5:54 pm
I love how some of you guys conflate refusing to give up your body and health with “murder.”
I didn’t get past this, KM. I could rewrite it for you, but you’ll have to give me more information. Otherwise, I’ll never know what the heck you’re talking about.
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August 2, 2011 at 10:32 am
Kaliane,
see how these ProLifers are BoneHeads?
They also want to take away Birth Control options from women.
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August 2, 2011 at 12:52 pm
Yes, and that is the huge “pro-life” irony. I can relate with someone saying that abortions after say, 20 weeks are wrong if they are not performed for medical reasons. But if you’re against abortions, you would be very well advised to be strongly for contraception! Contraception actually decreases the rate of unwanted pregnancies and thus diminishes the need for abortions. It’s a win-win situation. I’m sooo glad women will now have access to affordable birth control, so they can make decisions about if and when they become mothers, and how many children they bring into this world. The war on contraception just doesn’t make sense. Then again, anti-choicers are not known for making a huge lot of sense, either.
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August 5, 2011 at 6:47 pm
Then again, Skulander is not known for making a huge lot of sense, either.
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August 2, 2011 at 12:14 pm
Your baby is not a thug. It is a human being. That ‘fetus” as you put it in order to minimize it’s value is a human being that if left alone would grow and mature, walk and talk, got to school, get a job, have a family, be a grandparent. This is what the full life span that it is entitled to by virtue of being human looks like. Abortion cuts that short, kills the HUMAN, and deletes what could have been from history. Abortion not only destroys one human but it destroys all of those who would have been in that persons lineage. It literally alters history. That is why that “fetus” has the right to live. Not to mention that God created it and He says in Pslams 139 that it has worth. He says that the thoughts of it are “precious” to Him.
That fetus has all kind of moral rights that trump your body’s rights. Your “health”(only a tiny number are done for true maternal health issues) does not trump the life of another.
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August 2, 2011 at 12:48 pm
What baby? There is no baby in the womb darling.
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August 2, 2011 at 3:26 pm
It is an UNBORN developing baby regardless of what you call it. It is what it is. It coming through the birth canal doesn’t magically make it turn into a baby. Only what it is called changes….darling.
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August 2, 2011 at 3:34 pm
Is an egg a chicken? Is a seed a tree? This is NOT a difficult concept.
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August 5, 2011 at 6:49 pm
It has arms, legs, a brain, a heart, it sucks it’s thumb, it’s a human! Most abortions take place at 8 weeks. These “eggs” have all of the above at that point. The “seed” is the sperm or the egg. Together they make a developing human. This too is not a difficult concept to understand but it is apparently difficult to admit for some.
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August 3, 2011 at 9:58 am
Skulander giving DeAnna the intellectual Hammering again!!
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August 5, 2011 at 6:50 pm
“There is no baby in the womb darling.” — Sku, are you gay? I’m beginning to think that most of you killers’ helpers are sexual perverts too! Am I right?
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August 2, 2011 at 2:26 pm
“Not to mention that God created it and He says in Pslams 139 that it has worth. He says that the thoughts of it are “precious” to Him.”
Proof? I don’t believe in God. I’m afraid you’ve disqualified yourself here. We don’t make laws based on God or religion: that goes against my right to be free FROM religion. Which is why we make laws based on facts and logic
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August 2, 2011 at 3:28 pm
Then don’t believe in Him.
Laws should be passed based on facts, logic, decency, morality and the right to life for all HUMANS. Not just those deemed important enough.
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August 2, 2011 at 3:33 pm
And how is an abortion immoral? What about women’s lives? And how does comparing a 10-week old fetus to a grown-up woman, how does putting the rights of both on the same level, makes an ounce of sense?
I don’t happen to think that abortions are immoral. Millions of women around the world don’t, either. Plenty of anti-choice women have had abortions. Clearly, you can’t just say abortions are immoral and expect us to gobble this up.
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August 2, 2011 at 3:54 pm
“And how is an abortion immoral? ” It kills a human
“What about women’s lives?” Abortion is not about women’s lives. that is pro-choice propaganda. Only a teeny tiny portion of abortions are for the life of the mother.
“And how does comparing a 10-week old fetus to a grown-up woman, how does putting the rights of both on the same level, makes an ounce of sense?” Because they are both human beings therefore both their lives should be protected.
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August 2, 2011 at 4:12 pm
Suuuuuure. So just because a clump of cells happens to possess human DNA is it TOTALLY a human being like every human on this planet, it is TOTALLY a person just like you and I. No. It doesn’t matter how you chose to call it. A fetus is not a person. It is a potential human being, at best.
Given that the said embryo is inhabiting my body surely I am entitled to make decisions about it.
Besides, banning abortions do not stop them. And where would anti-choice women go if abortions were banned? Which is why 70% of the American population do not want Roe vs. Wade overturned.
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August 5, 2011 at 6:53 pm
Your stats are wrong. According to May 2011 Gallup Poll Americans are rather conservative in their stance on abortion, with 61% now preferring that abortion be legal in only a few circumstances or no circumstances. By contrast, 37% want abortion legal in all or most circumstances.
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August 5, 2011 at 6:56 pm
Sku, you’re so stupid. Don’t you realize that people out there think sexual perverts should also be put to death. If they get the upper hand, you’re dead! Protect yourself and defend those the killer’ helpers are after now!
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August 6, 2011 at 9:37 am
Ever hear of the pink triangle?
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August 2, 2011 at 1:02 pm
I’m also curious if so-called “pro-lifers” would be a-okay with forcing individuals to give up their bodily autonomy after death and be forced to give their organs to someone who needs it to go on living? People die every year because they wait too long on organ donor lists. After all, a life is a life, isn’t it. If an organ can be used to save the life of a real, living and breathing person, why not force someone who is no longer living and breathing to surrender one of his/her organs?
Or are only women required to surrender bodily autonomy? Are only fetuses the ones whose “life” is worth fighting for, at the expense of women’s lives, well-being, bodily autonomy, options in life? I’m sorry but a 12-weeks old fetus (at which point 90% of abortions will have occured) don’t get to have more rights than I do.
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August 2, 2011 at 3:59 pm
No one is asking for them to have more rights than you. Only the same rights as all other humans. The right to live.
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August 2, 2011 at 4:12 pm
Funny how you didn’t answer the question. As for the “right to live” it will be granted this right once it’s born.
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August 3, 2011 at 10:00 am
She never answers questions.
Her religiosity overpowers any sense of reason she has.
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August 5, 2011 at 6:55 pm
I answer questions that are not a huge waste of time and have some sort of relation to the topic at hand. Derogatory questions for the sake of bashing are a waste of my time.
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August 2, 2011 at 12:48 pm
OF COURSE abortions are a valid, moral choice. Lots of so-called “pro-lifers” have abortions anyways (have you read the article “The only moral abortion is my abortion”? Very enlightening about anti-choice hypocrisy). If abortions really were immoral and a murder, if a zygote really WERE a child just like any child there is, then pro-lifers wouldn’t have an abortion. Period. Fact is when a woman faces an unwanted pregnancy and really feels she cannot keep the fetus then she will get an abortion. Whether a safe one, or not. Whether an illegal one, or not. BTW, did you know that 12 Irish women A DAY (where in Ireland abortions are illegal under almost every circumstances) go to England to have an abortion, where they are legal up to week 24? Did you know that in Poland, also a strongly anti-choice country, there is a flourishing underground abortion industry despite the laws?
Besides I really wonder WHY anti-choicers need to lie about pretty every aspect of abortion. Risks of cancer, risks of the procedure itself, the doctored pictures of abortions (all of which, of course, are late-term abortions when only 1% of abortions occur, for purely medical reasons, and some pictures are not even of abortions but miscarriages)?
But I suspect U.S. women like to be manipulated and lied to. Have we had enough? Are we fed up yet with anti-choice manipulations and lies?
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August 2, 2011 at 2:31 pm
Skulander while you overstate to some degree about so-called pro-lifers lying “about pretty [much] every aspect” of their case, you do touch on their little-noticed compulsion to do so. No matter how blatant the claim, how disparate the difference between what they say and what they do for children, they cannot close the gap between their fantasy and their reality. They are driven, they cannot stop, and they can neither re-assess nor apologize. They are so focused on abortion that they cannot care for human life anywhere near the way they care about fetal life. Whence this aborticentrism?
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August 2, 2011 at 2:36 pm
Re: a spurious Martin Luther King quote about abortion, you said: “No, I said I believe the testimony of his family member. That is not careless. . .”{could not copy the rest}
You should have made it clear then that it was Alveda’s opinion rather than Dr. King’s. Otherwise, you’d be guilty of furthering what might well be a lie on her part. By the way, Pat, the “reply” funciton is messing up again. I have to post, exit the site, re-enter, find my posted comment at the bottom of the page and post it as a new thread….
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August 2, 2011 at 2:40 pm
re: “your baby is not a thug.” She always overlooks the baby who grows up to be the next Ted Bundy. Why is that?
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August 2, 2011 at 3:24 pm
Because it’s a stupid, idiotic, illogical argument that you and I have had repeatedly. Not interested in going around the same old mountain again.
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August 5, 2011 at 7:01 pm
This will only stop him for a while, d. He has three other “stupid, idiotic, illogical arguments” that he’ll also repeat endlessly. But at least he’s literate. That’s not to say smart people are any better than dumb people but at least they’re more fun to deal with.
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August 6, 2011 at 9:47 am
But I’m getting to like this guy Sku. If he fulfills his promise, we’ll have five articulate people here arguing that we should continue legally to kill the weak. Pat, Chuck, Kate, and Rog are the others. Now if we could just get rid of those irritating adolescent illiterates, like Feather Time, we’d be set.
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August 2, 2011 at 3:59 pm
Skulander, it HAS to be a baby, a person, a fully-formed human. Otherwise, they would be casting themselves as rescuers of something with the self-awareness of a slug or possibly a frog– and who would not laugh at them?
I used to think mouse breeders were the kookiest type on the planet, but I came to realize that for them, it’s an important exercise of their talents– and so it is.
So-called “pro-lifers” want to know that they too exercise important talents– and to call a fetus anything less than a baby, a person, a pre-born human diminishes themselves and their abilities in their own eyes. Never mind that what they claim to do and what they actually do for human life are so far apart that it’s risible; it is important to them that they both see themselves as players in a titanic struggle, but that they convince the world that they are.
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August 2, 2011 at 4:17 pm
Oh it doesn’t matter at all HOW they chose what is in the woman’s womb. It really doesn’t. They STILL cannot change scientific facts about the various stages of gestation. And they still cannot give any compelling and convincing reasons as to why women should be forced to carry the fetus to term and to give birth to it against her will. Again, as I say, a first-trimester fetus does not get more rights than I do. (And yes, it DOES get more rights if you deprive me of my right to bodily autonomy.) Neither does an 8-month old fetus, BTW: if it puts the woman’s life at risk, or if the said fetus will not survive outside the womb, there simply are no moral arguments anymore as to why the woman should pointlessly continue to be pregnant.
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August 2, 2011 at 7:32 pm
The moral argument is that it is wrong to kill a human….especially by dismembering it and decapitating it.
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August 2, 2011 at 8:14 pm
I don’t see too many anti-choicers going after the death penalty.
I don’t see many anti-choicers forcing others to give up one of their organs after death to someone who will die without it.
It’s very convenient to scream “murder!” and “killing!!!” for effect. But you cannot hide from your hypocrisy.
Oh, and it would ALSO help their credibility if anti-choicers cared as much about real, living and breathing babies so that women would make pro-life decisions than they would put into harrassing women who made a valid, legal decision.
It would ALSO help if anti-choicers didn’t call women facing unwanted pregnancies “sluts” to shame them and insult them. I went once to a pro-choice demo and a woman told me of the vile names she was called when she had her first kid at 19. She did not have an abortion. And yet, she was treated like crap from those same “pro-life” people.
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August 2, 2011 at 8:40 pm
“I don’t see too many anti-choicers going after the death penalty.”
Maybe we can take up this cause after abortion is outlawed.
“I don’t see many anti-choicers forcing others to give up one of their organs after death to someone who will die without it.”
Again, one cause at a time.
“It’s very convenient to scream “murder!” and “killing!!!” for effect. But you cannot hide from your hypocrisy.”
What hypocrisy is that?
Oh, and it would ALSO help their credibility if anti-choicers cared as much about real, living and breathing babies so that women would make pro-life decisions than they would put into harrassing women who made a valid, legal decision.
“Who says we don’t?”
“It would ALSO help if anti-choicers didn’t call women facing unwanted pregnancies “sluts” to shame them and insult them. I went once to a pro-choice demo and a woman told me of the vile names she was called when she had her first kid at 19. She did not have an abortion. And yet, she was treated like crap from those same “pro-life” people.”
I have never called a woman facing an unplanned pregnancy a slut.
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August 2, 2011 at 8:46 pm
Thing is, abortion will never be outlawed. Dream on, honey. And where will the anti-choice women begging for abortions go if it is outlawed, lol??? I don’t know in what world you live in. But in the real world, we don’t force women to be pregnant against their will. We didn’t thought that was a good idea in 1973. It is still a bad idea today.
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August 5, 2011 at 7:58 am
If it is a matter of priority, DeAnna, why don’t you focus on the millions of live children dying of simple diseases like diarrhea and dehydration?
Or are they less important than the much fewer numbers of unwanted embryos?
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August 5, 2011 at 6:58 pm
Kayla, what makes you think I’m not?
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August 5, 2011 at 7:04 pm
“Thing is, abortion will never be outlawed. Dream on, honey.”
Sku, you’re so stupid. Don’t you realize that people out there think sexual perverts should also be put to death. If they get the upper hand, you’re dead! Protect yourself and defend those the killer’ helpers are after now!
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August 2, 2011 at 4:30 pm
“Levels of cognition.”
At the Site Which Dares Not Speak Its Name there’s a more detailed explanation of how cognition works. But since I’ve been referring to Level Three, Level Four, etc., and been getting hostile befuddlement, I thought I’d do a quickie here.
Cognition is one’s sense of how reality operates. We are born without a clue,we develop internal rules that explain for us how things work, and as we get more experience, we modify or discard those rules for better understanding. For example, Santa Claus. First we accept that he exists, then we find out he doesn’t really and understand that it’s nice to get presents from people who think of us, and in our later years we come to see the value of enchanting a child by pretending there is a Santa.
We do this with everything in our lives: meet it, make a blind assumption about how it fits into the world and then make progressive changes as we learn more.
Mary Belenky and her associates explained this as five levels: silence (where we are too unformed to do anything more than suffer what comes our way, good or bad), Receiving (where we set our course solely on the basis of what we are told (“Do that, and you’ll go blind,” etc.), Challenging, where we find out we have an opinion and we flaunt it to the world (usually our middle-aged parents as we struggle to adulthood), Processing, where we learn that using tools that are already there will make us more powerful (e.g., laws, logic, parliamentary procedure, advertising), and Integrating, where we learn to identify within others the same wants, needs, feelings, hopes, dreams, fears, strengths and failings we find in ourselves.
By looking at the postings on this site, you can identify where the so-called “pro-lifers” are coming from.
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August 2, 2011 at 7:33 pm
I hear Charlie Brown’s teacher again. blah blah blah blah. I hear sounds but none of it is discernible as words.
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August 4, 2011 at 3:41 pm
Your loss, Deanna– you will never understand the state of a woman goes through with an abortion; you will never see reality as a tapestry of immense complexity and treasure the significance of your role; you will never appreciate the lives of others who don’t think the way you do. It’s a good thing you won’t understand the loss.
The woman who started the so-called “pro-life” movement in my state died so thoroughly that nobody remembers who she was.
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August 5, 2011 at 7:43 pm
“The woman who started the so-called “pro-life” movement in my state died so thoroughly. . . ” — Probably I, Chuckles, in one of my many disguises. (I love “thoroughly.”)
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August 2, 2011 at 4:35 pm
Skulander in 12: They have a terrible time admitting that the fetus can kill the woman (eclampsia gets about 1200 women a year), and they dismiss the 600 or so babies killed in post-partum psychosis as “part of God’s inscrutable plan.” (It happens outside the delivery room, don’t you know?)
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August 2, 2011 at 7:36 pm
So lets kill 1.2 million per year to prevent 1200 cases of preclampsia and save the 600 from psychotic mothers because that makes sense.
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August 2, 2011 at 8:03 pm
I’m glad 1.2 million women a year have a CHOICE. Sure, the risks of being pregnant are absolutely minimal. Some women die but in countries with good health care there is usually no problems with most pregnancies. Sure.
STILL. That doesn’t allow YOU to make a choice for the woman, to force her into carrying to term a fetus she doesn’t want and she cannot care for. And nope, adoption is not the answer (see the original article above). You can only force YOURSELF to being pregnant. No one else. You don’t want a big government? You don’t want the government micro-managing our lives? Then keep the government out of it, and keep abortions safe and legal.
By the way, “killing” is a loose term. We also “kill” germs. And we also kill very real breathing and living human beings on death roll.
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August 2, 2011 at 8:42 pm
It’s about the morality of not killing. There is no justification for killing an unborn baby.
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August 2, 2011 at 8:44 pm
Again: what baby?
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August 2, 2011 at 10:01 pm
The unborn one that does not change what it is just because it exits the birth canal. Only it’s name changes.
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August 2, 2011 at 10:02 pm
Riiiight… Sure. A 1st-trimester fetus IS a baby. Riiiight…
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August 2, 2011 at 11:04 pm
“It is morally and ethically wrong to do abortions without acknowledging what it means to do them. I performed abortions, I have had an abortion and I am in favor of women having abortions when we choose to do so. But we should never disregard the fact that being pregnant means there is a baby growing inside of a woman, a baby whose life is ended. We ought not to pretend this is not happening.” Abortion provider Judith Arcana
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August 5, 2011 at 7:45 pm
“Riiiight… Sure. Skul IS a person. Riiiight…
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August 4, 2011 at 3:42 pm
For aborticentrics, it’s always about death, never about life.
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August 2, 2011 at 8:50 pm
Deanna: just listen to the far-right screaming and squealing about the new birth control without co-pays regulations. Of course, now ALL women will be sluts because birth control is available. That was EXACTLY the rhetoric of Faux News.
Besides anti-choice don’t really want the death penalty outlawed. They don’t want to force people to give up their organs after death, either. Maybe you want to get rid of the death penalty and want to force people to give up their organs after death to someone who needs it. Maybe. I don’t know you. But it doesn’t change the fact that most anti-choicers are pro-death penalty. I trust your intelligence to see my point in my comment above.
As for “causes”: what about the cause of real women living in the real world? Their lives always get overlooked. Like I said, a 1st trimester fetus doesn’t get to get more rights than I do.
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August 2, 2011 at 10:38 pm
Again, we should all have one universal right which is the right to life. One life doesn’t trump the other. We are all humans, made in the same way. No one should be able to snuff another out early just because they don’t “want” it. We are not talking about cattle, dogs, or cats that one does away with when they are done with it. We are talking about human beings. Tiny little growing human beings. In the first trimester the unborn baby is formed with arms, legs, a brain, and a heart. It can suck it’s thumb and gets the hiccups. It is fully human, simply growing. If left alone for another six months it will be born and short of a disaster live a full meaningful life and be the beginning of a long lineage. It deserves to live just like you did when you were in the first trimester.
But my your own admission 10% of abortions are done after the 1st trimester. That’s 120,000 per year in the USA. One Hundred and Twenty Thousand babies dismembered and decapitated. What would happen if 120,000 born babies were slaughtered? There is no difference. The only difference is that they exited the womb. That is not a difference that should determine value or a person’s right to life.
Let me ask you a question. Have you ever seen a twenty one week fetus in real life? I did. It was a perfectly formed little baby. He cried, sucked his thumb, tried to eat, then died eight hours later because his lungs weren’t formed enough. He was perfect and beautiful. His parents wanted him desperately but he was born premature. He had a moral right to live but in the end did not make it. He was given a proper burial with a funeral. He has a grave with a tombstone that his parents visit often. All of the other 20 and 21 week babies that die in abortion clinics around our country daily are no different than he was. The only difference is that he was wanted and they are not. but they are just as perfect, and just as sweet. Given the chance they would try to eat, cry and suck their thumbs as well.
Their deaths are nothing but feticide. No woman’s bodily autonomy is worth their deaths. They don’t have to die, there are other options. But pro-choicers want to make it all about the woman. It’s all about her while the baby bleeds to death as they dismember him. It is insanity to justify this. There is no way around it. To justify the deaths of innocent babies for the sake of bodily autonomy is insanity, selfishness and defies logic.
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August 2, 2011 at 11:19 pm
And do you know how many abortions occur at 20 weeks? Less than 1%. And those abortions are not done because the woman simply wants it. They are always very, extremely tragic cases because they are WANTED pregnancies. They are done to literally either to save the woman’s life or because the fetus is not viable and would have died anyways.
So don’t give me this crap. Those cases you mention are not what an abortion is. You know it. I know it. No woman gets an abortion this late in her pregnancy unless it is absolutely medically required. I’ll tell you what an abortion is: 90% of abortions occur during the 1st trimester. Have you seen an embryo/fetus at this stage? I certainly isn’t a baby and it won’t get more rights than I do. I’m glad 120 000 women had a CHOICE. Then again, lack of decent sex education and lack of affordable birth control has been instrumental in the high rate of unwanted pregnancies in the U.S.
Oh, yes, because I forgot. Not only there is a war on women. There is a war on contraception. WHY ON EARTH are pharmacists allowed to deny women access to birth control because of so-called “conscience clauses”? It’s pure insanity.
So I’m not very moved by your anti-choice tantrums. Women have more rightst than fetuses. Women are not slaves to their bodies and must retain control over their reproductive options. And it’s pretty much non-negotiable.
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August 3, 2011 at 9:00 am
According to the Guttmacher institute 1.5 % occur after 21 weeks with 3.8 % occurring between 16-20 weeks. But id you just take the smallest number of 1.5% and multiply that times the 1.2 million per year you get a large number of viable babies that die a horrible death just because “a woman wants it” . They shouldn’t be dismissed so quickly from the conversation. .guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.pdf
Those late abortions that you speak of that are “always tragic cases where the baby was wanted” is simply not true. There are many abortion clinics in the US including several in my state where a woman can get an elective 24 week abortion. All she has to do is walk in and ask. Furthermore, where these abortions are restricted to fetal anomalies or maternal health issue there is mounting evidence that abortionists are simply stating that the maternal health issue that justifies the late term abortion is a mental health issue (the baby stresses her out). The Kansas State Board of Healing Arts (KSBHA) is conducting formal disciplinary hearing of Ann Kristin Neuhaus, an abortionist who formerly provided George Tiller’s abortion patients the second referrals required for post-viability abortions in Kansas. Neuhaus is accused of the following in each of the eleven counts against her:
• Failure to perform adequate patient interview.
• Failure to obtain adequate patient history.
• Failure to adequately evaluate the “behavioral or functional impact” of the patient’s condition and symptoms.
• Failure to meet the standard of care to the degree of constituting ordinary negligence.
• Failure to keep adequate medical records.
So anotherwords, she was simply signing off on the paperwork stating the abortion was necessary without doing proper medical workups on the patients. This is not Neuhaus’ first encounter with the KSBHA. Neuhaus came under Board discipline in 1999 and again in 2001 for medical abuses, which included an alleged forced abortion on a woman who had withdrawn her consent, shoddy record-keeping, and lack of proper patient care. The KSBHA declared at that time that Neuhaus was a “danger to the public” and limited her ability to practice medicine.
That same complaint also netted an 11-count disciplinary petition against George Tiller for committing illegal late-term abortions, which was pending against Tiller at the time of his death. While Tiller had been acquitted of similar criminal charges, the KSBHA made it clear that their case was based on a different standard than criminal cases and would proceed. However, when Tiller died in 2009, the case against him was closed.
So the point is that they were doing illegal late term abortions and got caught. Tiller died before anything was done about him but Neuhaus is undergoing hearing now.
deseretnews(dot)com/article/700051310/Kan-medical-board-files-complaint-over-abortions.html
This story was also carried by ABC news bit their link is broken.
There are also documented cases like this for other late term abortion providers so it’s not as cut and dry as you think.
“Only 9.4 percent of late abortions at clinics that responded to the U.S. News survey were done for medical reasons, either to protect the mother’s health(a rare situation) or, more commonly, because of fetal defects such as spina bifida and Down’s syndrome (box, Page 32)…for post-20-week abortions generally, about 90 percent were classified by the clinics as “nonmedical.”(1) Us News and World Report , “When Abortions Come Late in Pregnancy”
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August 3, 2011 at 10:20 am
No, darling, obviously you don’t know about late-term abortions. A woman doesn’t get an abortion because it “stresses her out.” She has a late-term abortion because either her life is directly at risk or the baby has no chances of survival outside the womb or carries an extremely serious defect. I trust women, and I stand with Dr. Tiller and Dr. Carhart. Again, no woman gets an abortion this late unless that’s the only option for her at this point.
But even then. EVEN IF stricter regulations were put on late-term abortions (and we all know the hurdles women must go through simply to have a regular one… it’s not like she can simply walk into a clinic and get one, as you imply…) anti-choicers are crazy and nuts. They’ve made it clear that they want to outlaw ALL abortions whatsoever, putting the lives of thousands of women who would seek unsafe abortions at risk purely for religious/political ideology. And there can be no compromise with those crazies and terrorists.
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August 5, 2011 at 9:21 pm
Pro-choice groups insist that late second and third trimester abortions are only done for dire medical reasons, such a serious deformity in the baby or a risk to the mother’s health. Many sources, however, dispute this.
In one article, a survey was done at 18 late-term abortion clinics. These clinics comprised of one third of all clinics that do late abortions.
The article says:
“Only 9.4 percent of late abortions at clinics that responded to the U.S. News survey were done for medical reasons, either to protect the mother’s health(a rare situation) or, more commonly, because of fetal defects such as spina bifida and Down’s syndrome …for post-20-week abortions generally, about 90 percent were classified by the clinics as “nonmedical.” It further quotes a clinic worker saying that most of these abortions are done on 10-18 year-olds in “total denial” of their pregnancies. “When Abortions Come Late in Pregnancy” US News and World Report.
“Peggy Jarman of the Pro-Choice Action League stated that about three-fourths of Tiller’s late-term patients were teenagers who denied to themselves or their families that they were pregnant until that fact could no longer be obscured.” Alan Bavley. “Abortions Late in Pregnancy Push Public, Doctors to Moral Dilemma.” Kansas City Star
Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline initiated a review of Tiller’s records of late-term abortions. One of the nation’s most distinguished psychiatrists, Dr. Paul R. McHugh, Johns Hopkins professor of psychiatry, was asked to determine if Tiller’s patients satisfied Kansas requirement that they were likely to suffer a substantial and irreversible impairment if not allowed to abort. Dr. McHugh reviewed Tiller patient records and determined that they were not. Dr. Paul R. McHugh, M.D., is the University
Distinguished Service Professor of Psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
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August 4, 2011 at 3:44 pm
So, what with sonograms, laparoscopy and all, why haven’t the so-called “pro-lifers” interviewed a fetus at say, 24 weeks to see how it feels about abortion? Should be a piece of cake.
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August 2, 2011 at 11:24 pm
“It is morally and ethically wrong to do abortions without acknowledging what it means to do them. I performed abortions, I have had an abortion and I am in favor of women having abortions when we choose to do so. But we should never disregard the fact that being pregnant means there is a baby growing inside of a woman, a baby whose life is ended. We ought not to pretend this is not happening.” Abortion provider Judith Arcana
Yep, we’ve all heard it. Hypocritical women who had no qualms making that choice then who are now seeking to deprive other women of making the same choice than they did back then.
And you know what? They would do the EXACT SAME THING if again faced with the exact same situation. Because guess what? They don’t really believe a first-trimester fetus is a “baby” or a “child.” “The only moral abortion is my abortion” so it seems. Again and again. All cheap emotional rhetoric while absolutely forgetting about the real women hurting because of lack of accessible and safe abortions, in the U.S. and around the world.
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August 3, 2011 at 9:15 am
Sorry but Judith Arcana is still a very vocal pro-choice advocate. She is just an honest one. She speaks at Universities calling for honesty from pro-choice advocates about abortion euphemisms. She is also an author of pro-choice literature.
“I think there is a need for us to talk more about what it is we are doing, when we carry out or support abortion. We – in the states – have dealt heavily, up to now, in euphemism. I think one of the reasons why the ‘good guys’ – the people in favor of abortion rights – lost a lot of ground is that we have been unwilling to talk to women about what it means to abort a baby. We don’t ever talk about babies, we don’t ever talk about what is being decided in abortion. We never talk about responsibility. The word ‘choice’ is the biggest euphemism. Some use the phrases ‘products of conception’ and ‘contents of the uterus,’ or exchange the word ‘pregnancy’ for the word ‘fetus.’ I think this is a mistake tactically and strategically, and I think it’s wrong.. And indeed, it has not worked – we have lost the high ground we had when Roe was decided.
My objection here is not only that we have lost ground, but also that our tactics are not good ones; they may even constitute bad faith. It is morally and ethically wrong to do abortions without acknowledging what it means to do them. I performed abortions, I have had an abortion and I am in favor of women having abortions when we choose to do so. But we should never disregard the fact that being pregnant means there is a baby growing inside of a woman, a baby whose life is ended. We ought not to pretend this is not happening.”
She is right. Abortion is tragic and it should be faced head on with out all of the euphemisms and manipulative speech to hide what it is. If you are going to be an advocate for it then at least admit what you are advocating for. You aren’t doing yourself or anyone else any favors by pretending as if what is..isn’t. No matter what you call it be it a blob of tissue, a product of conception, contents of the uterus, a pregnancy or a fetus, it still remains a developing unborn baby.
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August 3, 2011 at 10:01 am
Oh but darling, WE’RE not the ones lying to women about abortions, lol!!! We have nothing to hide. Nothing at all. We base our views on the latest findings in science and biology, and on the fact that women’s human rights must be respected.
So again: what baby? Saying a 1st trimester fetus is a baby is simply ludicrous. BTW what’s with this contempt of women? What IS IT with this assumption that women do not know what they are getting themselves into when they have an abortion? WHY do anti-choice folks always assume women are so stupid? Somehow I have the feeling men wouldn’t let themselves be bullied that way if they were the ones being pregnant.
Abortion is not tragic. You know what’s tragic? Forcing a woman to remain pregnant against her will. IMPOSING your views and your values on her. Lying to her and pretending YOU know better at this point in her life.
The problem in this whole debate are the extremists. I’m not against trying to find solutions for the cases where it might be possible for the woman to keep the fetus. Childcare for instance. Better social programs. The possibility for the woman to still continue school and still work. Sure. But there are some cases where an abortion will be what is best for the woman at this point in her life. That choice MUST be respected.
It’s her body. It’s her choice. You’ve got a body. Leave me mine.
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August 5, 2011 at 7:01 pm
It’s her body, it’s the baby’s body. Neither deserves to die!
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August 6, 2011 at 4:16 am
“You’ve got a body. Leave me mine.” — Course, I will, Sku, but some killers’ helpers out there have you on top of their list.
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August 3, 2011 at 9:10 am
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/aug/02/abortion-poses-few-health-risks
CPC Mills are disgusting
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August 3, 2011 at 10:02 am
They really are. I’m glad something is done about them. It should ALSO be one of our battleground, to make sure women are not mislead by false information.
Women deserve better than CPCs.
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August 3, 2011 at 9:24 am
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/aug/02/abortion-pregnancy-counselling-found-wanting
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August 3, 2011 at 9:33 am
Hard Pill To Swallow DeAnna?
http://www.theday.com/article/20110803/OP01/308039917
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August 3, 2011 at 9:45 am
It’s definitely sad that a human life will die at tax payers expense and you are gloating about it.
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August 3, 2011 at 10:12 am
No taxpayers money goes for abortions unless in the very narrow cases of rape, incest, or to save a woman’s life.
SINCE 1978. Hyde amendment, anyone?
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August 3, 2011 at 10:34 am
DeAnna is one of the crazy Pro Lifers that wants to get rid of some forms of Birth Control!
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August 3, 2011 at 10:55 am
And it utterly baffles me how some anti-choicers are against sex ed and birth control. Those two things REDUCE the number of unwanted pregnancies and thus REDUCE the number of abortions. AND they actually save the government money. It’s a win-win situation. Being against this simply doesn’t make sense, however you look at it. Which shows how this is not simply about “cute little babies” (actually fetuses) but a totalitarian attempt to hijack women’s bodies and deprive them of reproductive options. This is WAYYY beyond simply abortions.
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August 3, 2011 at 11:56 am
Yes I do, the ones that cause abortions. I am pro-life and will not apologize for it.
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August 5, 2011 at 8:03 am
We know you won’t, you are robotic, egotistical non thinker.
You do not have original thoughts. Why would you apologize? You consider yourself the arbiter as what is moral, and your version of your minority religion the one true religion.
What an idiot!
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August 5, 2011 at 7:03 pm
Again Kayla, I am unapologetically pro-life. Cal me an idiot, a freak, a moron and any number of derogatory terms if it makes you feel better. But none of this will change the fact that abortion kills babies. Two humans enter an abortion clinic, one comes out alive (usually) the other dies. This is in no way moral.
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August 5, 2011 at 7:51 pm
“We know Kayla won’t, she is a robotic, egotistical non thinker.
Kayla does not have original thoughts. She considers herself the arbiter as what is moral, and her version of her minority religion the one true religion.
What an idiot!
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August 3, 2011 at 9:44 am
Finally, everyone realizes how evil the CPC Mills are.
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August 3, 2011 at 9:47 am
Yeah, because the New York Times is non-biased and you can believe every word they say. They aren’t slanted at all. Bahhahahhaaahhahahah!
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August 3, 2011 at 9:55 am
YES! I saw this too. I’m glad serious measures are taken so that women are aware what CPCs are, how they lie, and that they are in fact forced-birth centers and won’t let women any options. If that’s what a woman wants, fine. But she shouldn’t expect any truthful information in any of those CPCs. Only fears, lies, deceit. Women have the right to know.
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August 3, 2011 at 10:05 am
I agree Anonymous,
this DeAnna is nuts.
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August 3, 2011 at 10:12 am
I know! I’ve been arguing with her since yesterday. Her perspective is naive, like that of most anti-choicers. Banning abortions won’t stop them. Women will have them anyways: only under unsafe circumstances. She thinks an abortion = murder and a fetus = baby: the overwhelming majority of people know that’s intellectually dishonest. BTW, 70% of people STILL want Roe vs. Wade on the books. They LOVE to scream and squeal about women who have abortions. Truth is: they want the option to remain because THEY want to have access to it if they ever need it. Ohhhhh, sure. They’ll say “well MY case was different” but in fact, every woman’s case is different. Their reasons are no more valid than that of any other woman.
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August 5, 2011 at 7:06 pm
Wrong again. According to the May 2011 Gallup Poll “Americans are rather conservative in their stance on abortion, with 61% now preferring that abortion be legal in only a few circumstances or no circumstances. By contrast, 37% want abortion legal in all or most circumstances.”
Only 37% want abortion legal in most or all circumstances. 37% is not 70%.
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