The Deafening Silence
It's been a week since The Lancet published the comprehensive Guttmacher Institute study which found that bans on abortion fail to reduce abortion rates. The researchers of the study also discovered that countries where abortion is legal (and the emphasis is on prevention rather than prosecution) experience the most dramatic declines in abortion.
Such news should undoubtedly give pro-lifers reason for pause. What with the endless railing about the immorality of abortion, and now it turns out their way of thinking does nothing to actually reduce abortions. It's only fair to give them a minute to collect themselves. Perhaps some careful (re)consideration is in order.
But there has been nothing but silence from the "anti-abortion" movement. There have been no press releases admitting the (now scientifically proven) error of their ways. Nor have we heard that anti-abortion groups are excited to discover that at least there is an approach that succeeds in reducing the need for abortion. (Doesn't that deserve a 'hallelujah' from the religious right?) Instead, the "anti-abortion" movement is silent about the newly revealed "pro-abortion" effects of their efforts.
I came across a blog about the Guttmacher study on a site called Mirror of Justice (it's "dedicated to the development of Catholic legal theory"). It was posted the day the report was released and was written by Professor Eduardo Penalver of Cornell University. He wrote,
"Here's my question. If this study were true, and if it were the case that making abortion illegal would most likely only drive it underground, without having much effect on its actual incidence but making it far more dangerous for women to have an abortion, would that be a reason to rethink the Church's teachings, not on the morality of abortion, but on the tight connection between abortion's (im)morality and its legality? I've tried to get this conversation off the ground a few times at MOJ, but I feel like we often get side-tracked onto the question of abortion's morality or into the empirical question whether studies like this one are actually correct."
Pro-lifers clearly delight in discussing the morality abortion -- all merrily participating in the forced march to the same answer -- but when the discussion turns to prevention they're flat out of ideas. Those who can't do, preach. I wrote to Professor Penalver this morning inquiring about the responses he's so far received on this anti-abortion friendly site. He emailed back promptly to report his "disappointment" over "the general lack of a response." And so the silence increases in volume.
Now, to be fair, some spokespeople have spun. These few brave enough to go public with a reaction to this devastating study are engaged in this strategy: kill the messenger.
Randall O'Bannon, saddled with the oxymoronic title "director of education and research" at National Right to Life, said, "These numbers are not definitive and very susceptible to interpretation according to the agenda of the people who are organizing the data." No doubt Mr. O'Bannon understands how Lancet editors let the researchers' agenda trump their science. After O'Bannon is done questioning the validity of studies published by one of the world's renowned scientific journals he can explain why 5 of 15 "fact sheets" on his organization's website offer no citations and 6 of the remaining 10 use the Guttmacher Institute, the very organization he claims has an "agenda", as a source. (Apparently a source can be both trustworthy and untrustworthy depending on the reader's agenda!)
You'd think genuine pro-lifers would be interested in knowing what results in low abortion rates. The fact that the only reaction that has come from the pro-life establishment is one of disbelief, cynicism and silence indicates that's not the case. Indeed, as we've known for a while, this whole ugly conflict isn't really even about abortion. For the anti-abortionists, the goal is to re-introduce the preventable consequences to sex as a way to scare people into abstinence. If that isn't the point, then why aren't National Right to Life staffers on a plane right now heading to the Netherlands to learn how that country managed to achieve the lowest abortion rates on earth? (Because it's free birth control, comprehensive sex ed, and a universal acceptance of sex for pleasure that did it. All solutions they appear to oppose more than abortion.)
It's worth offering up a comparison. What if a whole movement devoted to curing cancer insisted on only supporting techniques shown time and again to fail? What if they supported the ones that result in the highest cancer rates? Would it even be considered an anti-cancer movement? It's time to clean up the semantics: Is it possible that the "anti-abortion" is really a pro-abortion movement in disguise? (That disguise being obstinacy.)
For breaking news on threats to birth control access and information visit birthcontrolwatch.org
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The federal goverment can't make up its mind concerning what's healthy for us to eat. And we expect it to accurately define life?
I don't. That is why I decide women should be free of government interference when they say they want an abortion.
I don't understand why many of us are arguing in favor of abortion, but are so interested in funding health care with the tax dollars we already can't afford to sacrifice.
*I am not anti-children's health care. I just think the people ought to be able to hang onto their hard earned money so they can afford basic necessitie
At what point do we accept a child as actual life?
I mean, that fertalized egg has nerve endings and joints and a brain. Do you mean to tell me that when it's being suctioned from its mothers womb that it isn't life?
What, then, constitutes life? And who says? And why do they say so? And do you know for a fact, in your heart of hearts that they are 100% correct?
If not, why would we ever gamble on a life?
crossja,
pro-choice policies lead to a *reduction* in abortions. Please repeat that sentence at the top of your next post!
I care about protecting the life of women, children and their families. That is why I am pro-choice. The prochoice policies protect the health and well-being of women and families.
Please review your embryology. Fertilized eggs do not have nerve endings, joints or a brain.
crossya- about one third of all pregnancies abort naturally. Does that fact bother you? Do you go to the religious leaders and ask that a funeral be held for these aborted cells. Do you cry for them? Do you pay extra to doctors to prevent them? Would a doctor if he could? What I know is children die from lack of medical care in the United States. Children who are running and jumping and then dead from lack of medical care. Put you money where your mouth is and save the children who walk and talk and breathe.
Dear Christina: I see you don't at all understand millions of us who know that abortion is murder of an unborn child. All that you wasted your time on analysing and assessing will not influence us. We cannot change facts. I've spent many hours in operating rooms with mothers having c-sections on premature babies. Ten to twelve medical personnel working to save this pre-me. Whether this baby comes from 'sex for fun' or a solid marriage doesn't change anything about the baby. He deserves a life. Janie Nurse Anesthetist
Oh go away. Take your relgious fantacism and belief in super-natural fairy tales and leave the rest of us alone.
A blob of cells is not a person.
A thing that can not exist on its own is not a person.
The woman was here first and her life and health win
BTW, how many disabled kids have you adopted? How many times did you call your Congressman and beg him to vote FOR SCHIP? How much money do you personally hand over to homeless shelters and foodbanks?
Oh - I forgot. What happens after birth doesn't matter.
Another BTW, the Catholic church did not prohibit abortion before the fetus was 'quick' (moving in utero) until the 1860's and after a lot of the male population had been killed off in wars in Europe and the US and the population needed replenished.
I didn't read anything about daniebordo commenting on religion or God.
What happens after birth DOES matter.
And at what point would you say the blob of cells becomes a person? Is it the average jestation period, which is somewhere around nine months?
If so, than what about babies who are born prematurely?
Most of these babies cannot survive on their own. They require the sustenance of machines. Are their lives also of no value?
You are a fraud, daniebrodo, because if you were really a nurse, as you claim, you would know that "pre-me" is spelled wrong.
Even talented professionals can be crappy or lazy spellers.
Dear Daniebordo, When there is a line around the block to adopt serverly handicapped kids MILLIONS OF ABORTION RIGHTS PEOPLE WILL AGREE WITH YOU.
Also, when you tell the truth about partial birth abortion only being done 1 time in 4.3 million pragancies because the child if born would be hospitalized for life with extremely server birth defects because of poor or non existent prenatal care.
Janie,
Women do their best to protect the health and well-being of the children that they bring into the world. WOmen will go to great length to protect their children. That may mean that in some situations, she will have c-section for a premature baby. In other instances, when she feels that continuing an early pregnancy threatens her ability to take care of the children she already has, it means she will seek an abortion. I agree, it doesn't matter whether a pregnancy comes from a solid marriage or not--plenty of married women need abortions to protect their ability to take care of the children she already has or plans to have.
Lcubed - when abortion was illegal, most abortions were done on women who were married.
I thought Hillary Clinton (who I don't love on most issues) got it right years ago when she said our goal should be to make abortion safe, legal and rare. Pro-choice can also be anti-abortion, that is, a commitment to preventing unwanted pregnancies, thus elimiating the need for and incidence of abortion. I don't know any woman who was happy to have an abortion. Relieved, because the alternatives were unthinkable, but not happy... If the pro-choice movement can acknowledge this reality, we might get more traction with those people of good-will and common sense who oppose abortion -- and they do exist, I know some -- who are being viciously manipulated by a deeply cynical "pro-life" movement that is at its core anti-woman
Thank you for your Post. It was great to get an update.
Putting the cart before the horse, I think that's the correct analogy for the Christian Right's (though I hate name calling) sin. Do they have so little faith, that they can't convince people to choose abstinence, that they can't clean up the smut that's on TV, that they can't work the "abortion issue" effectively, according to God's will, except by putting a roadblock at the door? Seriously, change the culture dumbasses (I repent), believe in yourselves and God enough to show people how they can be saved through God's grace. Making abortion illegal is too little, too late. Cowards!
Very well stated. Unfortunately, there is little chance that "faith-based" anti-abortionists will ever be caught "admitting the (now scientifically proven) error of their ways." The most fanatic anti-abortionists will dismiss your claims automatically the instant they read "scientifically proven"). Like our non-compassionate, intellectu
As I have been saying for decades the hypocracy of the "moral" Religious Right should have been transparent all along. The "Anti-Abortion/Pro Life" movement is not and never has been based on an agenda of "Pro-Life". The term "Pro-Life" is an advertising ploy, born on Madison Avenue by right wing political strategists to name a "wedge issue" useful in assembling a voting constituency that could win elections. The term "Family Values", another advertising term, was also utilized for the aforementioned purpose, winning elections. This has been Right Wing political strategy.
If one looks closely at the details of our recent American history, going back towards World War II, patterns emerge. The decades long assault on human life and families has been a strategy of the Right Wing. Dirty little Wars in the Middle East, South East Asia and the Southern portion of the Western Hemisphere, leaving millions dead, were Right Wing political strategy.
The decimation of our American economy is due to Right Wing political strategy carried out by the Right Wing political establishment.
I have always said that personally I do not fear "homosexuals", "promiscuous people" or any other sexually charged group as a danger to the "Republic for which it stands..." They are not encouraging me to have sex, they are just having sex. On the other hand, I am very suspicious of Right Wing Religious moralists. They refuse to have sex, and then they insist that no one else has sex. That difference became apparent to me decades ago.
The bottom line is that the so called “Christians” who support and enable Right Wing political strategy are the same people who populate the Pro-Life/Family Values axis. They don’t give a damn about human life nor do they give a damn about any families, mine, yours or anyone else’s
After Roe v. Wade, the number of out-of-wedlock births went up dramatically. I haven't heard the anti-life hysterics address that fact.
And the idea that all those Christians and right wingers "don't give a damn about human life nor do they give a damn about any families, mine, yours or anyone else's" is as brazen as it is preposterous.
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Well, considering that there is no "anti-life" movement, it's no wonder you haven't heard any of those "hysterics" addressing your "fact". (Well, there is one "anti-life" movement I've read about--IN COMIC BOOKS! Somehow though, I don't think anyone in the real world has started a "Darkseid for President" campaign.)
As for your second paragraph, the facts seem to speak for themselves. The Christian Right DOESN'T show any support for the post-born; their WHOLE campaign is to get more fetuses make it to the delivery process (but not if they have to pay for the pregnant woman's health care or the fetus's prenatal care) and once the fetus emerges through the cervix, their concern comes to an end. They've espoused policies which would outlaw abortions (even those that are NECESSARY to save the mother's life).
In fact the ONLY case since Roe v Wade where the so-called "pro-life" movement has shown one iota of concern for someone outside the womb was the Terri Schiavo case. There, they proved that not even a legal marriage is enough to stand in their way (of course, I'm really sure that had Terri been "Tim" and the case had been in Massachusetts, that they would have been rallying to support "Tim's" right to life against his husband's plan to end life support--sarcasm off now).
The fact is that the "Christians" (those who use their religious beliefs for purely political gains) are scum and do nothing but insult the REAL Christians (those who actually abide by Christ's actual teachings, not merely those established by the later writings of Paul--who presumably lived DECADES after Yeshua's crucifixion). As to the right-wingers, well, that's a given. Show me one piece of legislation, initiated by a right-winger, which truly benefitted families or human life. (I imagine you'll be Googling a few weeks before giving up that quixotic task. Even Don Quixote would recognize the futility of that task.)
Oh lord, where do I start? Ok, first of all, you conservatives are the ones who foam at the mouths about children born to unmarried parents. Your whining about it directly refutes your last sentence. You obviously are anti-choice, as your cute little moniker for the pro-choice faction is "anti-life
If out of wedlock births went up, then it is possible (not certain) that the number of abortions went down, which doesn't contradict the information that the author presented. In order to make whatever argument it is that you are trying to make, you would need to state something about the number of unplanned pregnancies and /or number of abortions before and after Roe. Out-of-wedlock births are sort of tangent to the issue.
After Roe v. Wade, the number of out-of-wedlock births went up dramatically. I haven't heard the anti-life hysterics address that fact.
Proving the point that legal abortions leads to better choices for women. More women obviously had their babies.
Most of that crowd heavily favors the war and its' diproportionate response to 9-11 and the death penalty. So I guess they feel some lives are worth more than others.
The right-wingers are having sex, too! That's what is truly wrong about their message. They pretend to never engage, never get pregnant outside of marriage, never have abortions and are never gay. In other words, they lie about sex and we're all suppose to think they are moral so they can then preach about abortions they pretend to never have.
Hey, as long as it's brown babies/people dying (in wars, in hurricanes, whatever) then they're okay with it.
Doesn't matter.
They're against abortions, period. Children are the punishment you deserve, in their eyes, for getting pregnant.
"It's not a child -- IT'S YOUR SENTENCE."
That's not true or fair. I apologize on behalf of the "conservatives" you've consulted. Childred aren't a punishment. Children are lives.
If a murderer, well, murders, we seek justice, revenge, whatever.
It's not a question of punishment for getting pregnant. It's a matter of defending life. If we rob the unborn, living of their rights, how then do we expect to protect the rights of those who have been born?
Christianity has never been about a "Culture of Life", but a "Culture of Salvation"!
The whole "Culture of Life" thing came about after abortion was legalized.
It is part of a political agenda, not God's teachings.
If you believe that things like abortion or homosexuality are abominations to God, and that people committing them are going to hell for all of eternity, it is a Christian's job to witness to them and offer God's salvation.
Very few people have been saved by someone screaming murderer in their face as they walk into a healthcare clinic.
Almost 1/3 of the women in this country get antepartum and postpartum care for themselves and their babies paid for by MEDICAID. Over 1/2 of those women work for big companies like Burger King, McDonalds, Pizza Hut, Manpower, Kelly Services and Walmart.
So if you vote for a party that regularly tries to cut funding for Medicaid, school lunch programs, WIC and Head Start, you aren't really "PRO-LIFE" you're really just "ANTI-ABORTION"!
Not even anti-abortion. Just anti-choice. They want the government to have the power to say you can not- or you must- have an abortion, not the individual women.
Maybe the conservatives are "anti-woman as adult human being". Maybe they're "anti-life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" for women.
Maybe they're "pro-let me mind your business", or "pro-let me shove my fairy tale religion down your throat because I'm childish and can't think rationally".
They're definitely "anti-democracy", "anti-American", "pro-fascist, radical, religious nut-jobs".
I was talking to a high school history teacher last week and he made a very interesting point I hadn't considered. Supposedly Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves during the Civil War and thereby ended slavery in the US. Yet a form of slavery continued, that of women. Women were not allowed to vote, own property, in fact they were considered property. And even now that notion has not entirely disappeared when you see white, religious men demanding that they have control over what a woman does to and with her own body! Imagine what would happen if the men getting getting women pregnant were punished for doing so without the State's permission. Imagine the outcry by those very same men who want to punish those women for having sex which is really what this is about. This is about men wanting total control over women. If I were a woman I would spend all of my spare time tracking these ignorant wannabe slavers and kick them in the nuts!
Proper distinction. Pro-life is a political term. How many pro-lifers are for the death penalty and for war? Not very "Pro-life" if you are for the death penalty. The only pro-lifers are probably Quakers. I read a bumber sticker, "The right to life doesn't end at birth".
Sometimes only the truly religious are the only ones capable of being truly wicked.
Let me get this straight:
Unwanted pregnancies and the often devastating personal, social and economic consequences are bad.
Contracting HIV/AIDS or a host of STDs is also bad.
Rising insurance costs is bad.
But Birth Control is WORSE??!
History will rank this unholy stance on a par with the Spanish Inquisition and the burning of witches.
I looked at the study. It concludes that the number of "induced abortions" has declined in countries where abortion is legal. The study did not look at how many pregnancies were artificially terminated. Since, 1995 (when the study was initiated) women have gained access to RU489, and where abortion is legal women generally have access to this method of terminating pregnancy and they are using it. This study didn't address this and I suspect that this has had the most impact on the reduction in "induced pregnancies". As a result, you cannot correctly conclude from this study that anti-abortion groups through their advocacy of making abortion illegal are inadvertently causing the number of abortions to increase.
Using RU486 requires involvement and monitoring by a medical professional in all countries in which abortion is legal and this method is available. RU486 is considered and counted as an induced abortion ("artificially terminated" is the same thing as 'induced'--you present them as if they are different). Abortions using the method RU486 are included in the numbers of induced abortions referred to in this study.
Thanks for clarifying this, cristina. To go further, the term "induced abortion" refers to anything that is not a "spontaneous abortion", which is a synonym for miscarriage.
There is NO SUCH THING as a "genuine" pro-lifer on the right. If they were truly pro-life, they would be against war, for universal health-care and pro-peace (in other words- liberals). That ain't never gonna happen, so we women all have to suffer through the rhetoric, which is really ALL about control of women and their bodies.
(Because it's free birth control, comprehensive sex ed, and a universal acceptance of sex for pleasure that did it. All solutions they appear to oppose more than abortion.)
OH MY GOD! Such a blasphemy! If everyone finds out we're all headed for H..E..L..L
When you stop to really think about it, have we really come that far intellectually speaking from our ancient ancestors beliefs, in spite of science? We've known for at least 500 years that War doesn't solve anything, yet we continue to engage in it. I can't tell you how many articles and stories I've read about over population and what it is doing to this planet and yet fools still demand that others bear children whether they want to or not.
I am an Atheist who finally saw the stupidity and the morbidity of letting nonsense direct my life. If there is a GOD, or a whole slew of them, then they will decide what is and is not appropriate. I doubt that HE/SHE/IT/THEY will be anything like us thoughtless humans.
Continued below:
Religion is about control. Have you ever wondered why there are no prohibitions on eating dog shit? It should be obvious. All the prohibitions that religion places on humans are those things that they are compelled by (evolution) very nature to perform! To me, it just does not seem likely that a GOD would afflict humans with the need to do certain things and then tell them they couldn't do it. Personally, this is just another example of the unreality of it all. You have, on one side, some very learned people who have studied thoroughly the whole process and they have come to a reasonable conclusion about to deal with a problem and on the other side you have a group of ignorant, pagan believers in an imaginary being telling everyone what GOD said thousands of years ago even though there is no proof, and it is treated as if these were 2 legitimate points of view! How absurd is that?
A huge amount of the abortions performed are so preventable, but only with a well educated and sensible society. And you cannot have that as long as religion is allowed to intervene in matters where they don't belong, which in my opinion is everywhere except in their churches!
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