Though Jill, who’s been on fire lately, has said pretty much all there needs to be said on this subject, I wanted to be sure to add my two cents.
I’m pro-choice because my mother couldn’t exercise control over her reproductive system, and wound up bearing seven children between 1965 and 1974, the first of whom died soon after birth and the last of whom came along because she couldn’t get a tubal after her previous pregnancy in 1970 because of patriarchal rules. Had she been able to have the number of children she really wanted to rather than the number that she had no other choice than to have, I might very well not be here — and I’m only the third of the living children. Had she been able to have the number of children she really wanted to, when she wanted to, rather than the number who simply occurred, she might have had the wherewithal to leave my father while she was still young and could get work that might have supported a smaller family.
And that is why I am pro-choice.
Wait, Zuzu, I’m really confused. I thought that upon realizing that you might never have been born had your mother been allowed to determine the course of her own life, you become filled with existential terror, become paranoid that everyone is out to get you with some kind of retroactive abortion (“You want to kill me!!!” “No, I said that I would never have a child by an abusive man.” “Yeah, see, you want to kill me!!!!”), and vow to spend the rest of your days hurling invective at every female between ten and fifty who comes within one hundred yards of the abortion clinic you picket.
That’s awesome.
So many people use the “What if your mother had aborted you?” line, as if everyone’s supposed favor forcing our own mothers through unwanted pregnancies rather than deal with hypothetical nonexistence.
Personally, that line always makes me think of the possibility of someone subjecting my mother to forced pregnancy. I love my mother very much, and am hardly likely to support someone else deciding that her body can be used against her will. In fact, they’d have to go through me, first.
And “What if your mother had aborted you?” strikes me as no more of a threat than, “What if your parents hadn’t been in the mood the night you were concieved?” I used to ‘what if’ everything as a kid, and the answer to “What if you never existed?” was always, “Then I wouldn’t care.”
I am pro-choice because I am an adoptee, born in the mid-1970s, before abortion services were completely decriminalised in my country. The thought that my mother could have (may very well have) been forced to carry me to term keeps me up at night sometimes. (That’s the other part the forced-childbirth advocates forget. We’re supposed to be grateful to be here, I think, but my reaction was more like, “My biological mother was forced to have me?!” and then I cried.)
I’m exactly the same, except in my case it was my grandmother, who wouldn’t have had my dad (or the other 4 that came after him) if she had the choice.
Just out of curiosity, zuzu….do you have acrimonious relationships with your brothers/sisters?
Zuzu — I’m the youngest of two (both girls), and my mom had me “sort of late” (not compared to today’s standards), certainly any kids she’d have tried for after me would have been a gamble. So, she convinced the doctor to perform a tubal on her after she delivered me. The nurse prepping her for surgery just harrangued her the entire time about how she hadn’t given my dad a son yet.
Who wants to know?
I am pro choice because my mother’s life was destroyed by the patriarchy and forced to have children she didn’t love or want. Though she never told me, she didn’t have to, the treatment I recieved growing up, compared to the treatment of the children she did want.. Told me all I needed to know.
Acrimonious indeed. Had the wants and desires been aired I bet I might be able to have a conversation with my siblings. But since they went unaired and taken out on in forms of abuse I could careless what happens to those who are more priviledged then I.
Another pro-choice adoptee here, whose bio-mom might have aborted her.
I posted on my LJ that I want her to have been free to choose to carry me, bear me, and give me up. I don’t know if she was free to choose or compelled to carry a baby she didn’t want, but I know I’m grateful to her for carrying me and passing me on to parents who wanted me.
Thinking about it further, I’ve also known what it’s like to be wanted passionately by my parents, and I think every child should be that passionately wanted.
I am pro-choice because I know that my mother was able to make an affirmative decision to have me: while she was pregnant with me, her doctors discovered that her breast cancer had recurred and advised her to have an abortion so she could start chemotherapy right away.
She refused, and died of cancer when I was seven years old.
If I didn’t know that she had been allowed to freely make that decision, I’m not sure how I could live with the guilt. (It’s hard enough to live with it knowing that she DID freely make the decision.)
The Beau is also a pre-Roe adoptee. He knows that, given the choice, his birth mother may have aborted him. But that doesn’t sway him from being pro-choice.
All he knows of his birth mother is that she was single and young – probably late teens. His aunt was working in the hospital when his birth mother came in to give birth, and helped “arrange” the adoption for her sister and brother-in-law. His birth mother was probably bullied/pressured by her family, friends, doctors and hospital staff into giving him up for adoption, he says.
As he does not wish to track her down and intrude on her life today, he can only hope that her lack of choice and the result of that didn’t cause trouble for her afterwards.
“and the answer to “What if you never existed?” was always, “Then I wouldn’t care.”
hah! yea i love it when pro lifers bring that one up, because the answer is so obvious. seems like a weird form of narcissism, that they think the world would be sooo diffrent (for the worse of course) if they were never born. sheesh get over yourself, pro lifers.
thanks for your interest, but this isn’t about me
I think they’ve watched “It’s a Wonderful Life” a few too many times.
Yet another pro-choice adoptee over here.
I’m glad my biological mother had the good sense to give me to a family who really wanted a child, instead of the alternative. And if she had aborted, well, not like I would have noticed, and my parents would have eventually taken in another child anyway.
IMO, it’s better for the child not to be burdened by the idea that they’re unwanted.
I’ve seen this from the other side. A relative of mine who shall remain otherwise anonymous was forced to complete a pregnancy and give up the child. She went through absolute hell and it nearly ruined her life. When I researched the subject, I found that this is the normal, expected course for a biological mother who gives up her child. Lifelong depression is the expected result. I’m pro-choice because while I admire anyone who would be willing to go through that for whatever reasons of her own, I am against putting any woman or girl through that kind of torture against her will.
What I said to Piny in her post… Concise but telling.
Again on the “what if your Mum had aborted you” theme: if I hadn’t had my two abortions, I wouldn’t have the children I have now. And I wouldn’t want to swap them, thanks all the same!
I like to think the world is a better place because I’m here. If I suspect it isn’t, I need to try a little harder. Does this make me narcissistic?
Nope. But you would be narcissistic if you believed that your existence was the reason that women shouldn’t have the right to terminate their pregnancies.
Kind of an odd twist to believing in something strongly enough to die for: believing in something strongly enough to never have been born for. Almost sounds heroic doesn’t it? A safe kind of heroism that will never get tested.