Political rant on reproductive choice

[deborahjross]

I posted this elsewhere and decided it needed wider distribution. Mostly, I keep my political opinions to myself, but perhaps the time has come to emerge from that particular closet...

One of my greatest frustrations with the -- I can't even call it a debate because people are screaming one another -- on choice is the convenient ignoring of obstetric facts. By this I mean the huge fraction -- I think the latest estimate is 1/3 -- of conceptions that never result in a viable fetus, through spontaneous abortion (what we call miscarriage), or one of the gazillion things that need to go right going wrong, so you end up with a teratoma, a patchwork amalgam of tissues, teeth, hair, skin, organs all jumbled together. That's not mentioning ectopic pregnancies. Or deformities such as anencephaly that are incompatible with independent life. The list goes on. It is simply biological nonsense to treat every conception as if it were a baby.

(As for referring to the products of conception as "life" and then according it the rights of a person, since when does a placenta or amniotic membranes or umbilical cord -- all of which are composed of living human cells and are the direct result of the union of a sperm and an ovum -- qualify as persons?)

Comments

[the-resa.livejournal.com]

A voice of reason. Thank you!

[deborahjross.livejournal.com]

It so saddens me to see people, women mostly but not exclusively, on both sides of the issue, in so much pain, not healing, not growing, not being heard. I'd love to see the debate shifted to focus on what we wish in common -- a world in which every child is wanted and cherished. What good does it to do convince a young, unmarried teen to continue a pregnancy and then leave her and her child to shift for themselves? We know from statistics that this is a recipe for child abuse.

This will involve changes in our attitudes toward child-rearing, towards sexuality, towards contraception. Sex is one of life's healthiest, most sublime pleasures -- and one of its most destructive forces. How can we teach our young people how to make emotionally healthy, sane choices when so many cannot or will not talk it?