Blog for Choice 2007

NARAL (or the National Abortion Rights Action League for those of you not in the know) has asked all bloggers to post a blog in honor of the 34th anniversary of Roe v. Wade.

So here I am, doing it....

They're asking people to write about why they're pro-choice. Most of you will probably stop reading right now. I don't know how well I'm gonna do on this one, so that may not be a bad idea. Most people don't like my political blogs anyhow.

So...leaving all personal experiences aside, because I already wrote about that a couple weeks ago. I'm just going to tell you fine folks why I'm pro-choice.

I had a professor tell me once that I had no idea what it meant to be a feminist because I had always lived in a world with Roe. While I thought that was sort of narrow-minded, I knew what she meant. I was pro-life for a long time because I had the freedom to be...I wasn't sexually active and didn't anticipate having sex till marriage. But life isn't always so cut and dry. Choosing not to have sex doesn't mean someone won't force you. And getting married doesn't mean you should have or will want to have children. It never occurred to me that I would have an unwanted pregnancy, because I lived a pretty sheltered life and didn't have much understanding of the world around me.

But the first time I waited for my period to start after I became sexually active, I knew I was pro-choice. Men will argue that they have a right to get involved in this fight because men have children too. But that's the thing. They don't. Men may help raise children. Men may be fathers. But they do not HAVE children.

The majority of our nation's lawmakers are men, yet men will never understand how it feels to know something could be growing inside you. Something that you do not want. It's like having your body invaded. For girls who become pregnant from rape, it's like being violated all over again.

Women have been terminating pregnancies for centuries. There are herbs that induce miscarriage. There are types of massage that induce miscarriage. And yes, there's the coat hanger and/or cleaning fluid method.

We hear more about coat hangers because that's what women resort to when they're desperate. And because it's taboo to speak frankly about a woman's body and reproductive capabilities and because education in these areas is so lacking, women often become desperate.

It is my belief that abortion should be safe, legal, and rare. We should educate people about their bodies and about contraception so that it doesn't happen often. Not because I think a fetus's life is more important than a woman's, but because abortion isn't a simple decision for anyone. But it should be safe and legal so that women have a place to turn to when they cannot for whatever reason bring a child into the world.

Contrary to popular pro-life rhetoric, women don't just have abortions because they're selfish, sometimes it's the best thing to do for the woman AND her child.

I am pro-choice because I trust women to take make the right decisions for themselves and their bodies. No one knows what you're capable of but you, and no one should have a right to tell you you have to bring a life into the world because a condom broke, or you missed a pill, or some asshole didn't have the decency enough to listen when you said "No."

The Personal Politics of Baby Killing

Georgia has proposed an abortion ban similar to the one that was defeated by South Dakota voters in November '06. I would write out all my feelings about the bill, but I've decided to let you fine folks just read it for yourself

Aside from the outrage I felt at many of the gross misrepresentations in this piece of legislation (i.e. the idea that we KNOW life begins at conception, that abortion contradicts feminist values, and that the economy is suffering as a result of abortion), there were a few points that struck a chord with me.

Let me say first and foremost, that I question the statistics presented about post-procedure psychological trauma. I hesitate to believe these statistics due largely to the fact that no sources are cited and I doubt the framers of this legislation looked for objective studies. I have encountered many women who have had abortions and not turned into baby-hallucinating basket cases afterwards. To claim that most women suffer these kind of extreme emotional repercussions is a sweeping generalization.

And contrary to popular pro-life belief, not all women who support abortion are thrilled with the idea of heading to a clinic to terminate a pregnancy. But sometimes it happens, despite careful planning.

That's how it happened to me.

A few years ago I discovered that I was pregnant and had no where to turn. I could't tell the father: in a moment of extreme selfish ass-headedness (extreme even for him) he told me he'd rather I "take care of it" if it ever happened. Take care of it and leave him blissfully ignorant, of course. I considered telling him just for spite, but I knew it would ultimately make things harder for me so I kept it to myself. I didn't have anyone to talk to or any shoulders to cry on because I was at a point in my life where I didn't have many people to trust, and the information about my pregnancy and decision to terminate would have made several areas of my life more difficult.

I weighed my options and knew that abortion was my only realistic choice. I had no way to support myself, much less a child, and I couldn't in good conscience bring a life into the world and abandon it for someone else to take care of. So I went the only place I knew to go: my friendly, neighborhood Planned Parenthood.

Contrary to what anti-choice propaganda tells you, they were good to me there. They didn't pressure me, they gave me plenty of information to help me make my decision and they provided support for me when I had no one else in my life that I trusted.

Because my decision was my own, because I was sure of what I wanted to do and determined to do what was best for me (and what I still believe was best for my baby), I had a regret-free abortion. Do I still think about it? Yes, sometimes I do. Am I sad? A little, but only sad that I got pregnant at such a bad time.

I survived the whole scenario relatively unscathed, but I know that many are not so lucky. One of the problems with the pro-choice movement today is that we are so busy arguing that abortion must be an option for women that we neglect to see the women around us who struggle with the decision they made or are making to terminate a pregnancy.

Acknowledging that it's a painful decision is not the same thing as saying it's the wrong one. We shouldn't be afraid to help our wounded sisters, yet we've left them to find support from the pro-life movement. Where are our post-abortion support groups? Where do we go to find solidarity? Where can we talk about our feelings about abortion after we've had one? Where do we turn when emotional consequences manifest themselves? We shouldn't be forced to turn to the pro-lifers. Not to the people who will beat us down and tell us we need to be forgiven.

We need to take care of these women within our own community. We need to tell them it's ok that they terminated their pregnancies and it's ok if they don't feel strong or empowered about it. In addition, we need to be there before the abortion. No woman should ever have to go it alone like I did. No woman should have to march down clinic stairs by herself while strangers call her a murderer. We need to find a way to reach out and we need to understand that ignoring the complexity of abortion doesn't help our fight: it hurts the women who get caught in the cross-fire between the pro-choice and pro-life movements.

With the Georgia legislature proposing an abortion ban and the nation lying in wait to see what the Supreme Court will do if/when someone challenges Roe v. Wade, this is the perfect time for the pro-choice movement to be honest about the consequences of abortion while strengthening the fight to keep it safe and legal.