ABORTION AS A HUMAN RIGHT : OPINION by MISSY

I'm for CHOICE of ABORTION. It's a choice very many women have made, sometimes under pressure from the man, or family, or simply economic pressure, sometimes because the woman herself knew she was not up to carrying, birthing, or raising another human being to adulthood, at least not based on what she knew of her life at the time. I'm for choice of abortion because of rape and incest, especially of women and girls who are unable to make their own choices due to age, innocence or ignorance, or because they are of low intelligence, or some other factor. Because of sex trafficking and abduction. Because a pregnancy should never be a punishment for being the victim of predators or violence.

I'm for planning - to not have children at all - to the number and spacing of wanted children; however I know that contraception, even the pill, is not 100% guaranteed. I've met those women who got pregnant despite using contraception. A friend of mine has a cousin who had three children and got her tubes tied and still got pregnant again...They joked about the fertility of her family.

I've seen the photos of aborted fetus.  I've seen the photo of a woman who was left to bleed to death in a hotel room where an illegal abortion had been performed on her. I know she had to have been desperate.  Men are almost always involved in the impregnation, if not the decision. Men who do not want a child have been known to assume that the woman would abort if she got pregnant or to hand her cash to go have it done. 

Yet, as difficult as it is to admit, there are so many children who were born unwanted, children whose parents cannot provide for them, children whose parents are irresponsible, so we also must ask ourselves about the pain that person experiences growing up in such circumstances.

It's still complicated and difficult. Yet, I've met those who said an abortion was an easy decision if not an easy experience.

One young woman who is on the pill after having been raped by a stranger, showed me her contraceptive pills as well as the abortion pills she was sent home with from a clinic, telling me she had been advised to take them immediately should she have unprotected sex -wanted or unwanted - again.  (This I wondered about. It seemed excessive to me.) Abortion pills causing an early miscarriage taken at home are not without pain, but apparently not as dangerous as waiting and having a surgical procedure. They became available in the year 2000.  I do wonder what hormones given for any condition including menopause do to the body.  The longer the wait for any form of abortion, the more dangerous it is.

I believe that today everyone but those who intend pregnancy, cooperatively, should be using protection, to not only avoid pregnancy, but SIDS, including HIV, herpes, and chlamydia. This in itself should significantly cut down on the numbers of people having to face THE CHOICE. I'm sure that drinking or drugging to the point where you have a 'what the hell' attitude about unprotected sex is stupidity - if you're smart enough to be stupid. So I question how often the need for abortion started with an unwillingness or inability to obtain and use contraception.

What I think people are reacting to is that in the years since the 1973 Roe Versus Wade decision, medical science has improved to the point where surgery can be done on a fetus before birth.  Babies who were once doomed because they were born just so premature are being kept alive and eventually thrive. So the question of when conscious and viable life begins is there.  As a result, I think there may be some determination that abortion past a certain point in fetal development be illegal.  However, that illegality will once again push such surgeries into the hands of those who do so illegally and dangerously.  (Along with the medical doctors with training who have provided abortions for those who can afford it all along.)

My understanding is that the Supreme Court was considering not banning abortion, but moving that decision from a federal decision back to the individual states' decision. It would be much more difficult for the states to return that decision back to the Supreme Court. 

C 2022  Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

Update June 24, 2022  My understanding is now that the Supreme Court of the United States did overturn abortion and that did automatically end abortion in states where there was a "trigger" response.  I was unaware that states had this in place.  Looking at the map, I'm glad to see that states along the West Coast and some in what we call New England, still provide.  However I will post in another place about this.