Comments on: Opening Up a Dialogue About Abortion

By: Claudia

Claudia — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 20:59:41 +0000

Newsbusters, Brent Bozell’s group that exposes “liberal bias” in news (yeah, right) has a piece on this. The writer claims that the article, which documents the experiences of women who have had abortions, says abortion is “an A-OK option.” The author cites bias in that the abortion counseling services that are referenced in the article are “pro-abortion” (not true) and that mention should have been made of Rachel’s Vinyard and Care Net. Of course, she didn’t mention that these two agencies actively dissuade women from obtaining abortions. As if that wasn’t enough to get my aging Irish dander up, the comments certainly were – and then some. From what I could tell, the majority of the posters were very rightwing, fundamentalist males who kept alluding to the “murder” of innocent babies. This is the kind of rhetoric that breeds abortion clinic violence. It also suggest an extreme misogyny that sees women who have abortions as sexual libertines (yup, one comment) or silly things who, if forced to see the remains of the abortions (yup, several comments) would realize the error of their ways. I actually suspect that they would love to jail (and possibly execute) women who have had abortions. These guys (whom Susan Falludi wrote about 20 years ago in “Backlash”) are so threatened by women who make their own decisions as it implies the demise of the patriarchal power structure. Every sperm is sacred! Anyway, read at the risk of increasing your blood pressure.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/colleen-raezler/2009/02/12/glamour-magazine-delivers-one-sided-pro-abortion-take

By: Alexandra Lynch

Alexandra Lynch — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 01:48:03 +0000

I regret none of my reproductive decisions. I regret the necessity for some of them, but I also don’t as a rule play “what-if” games.”

Abortion, eldest son, abortion, one boy adopted at birth, miscarriage, abortion, youngest son, tubal ligation. Seven in six years.

By: Feminist in the City

Feminist in the City — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 18:57:27 +0000

Thanks for posting about this! I saw the article in Glamour too and was very impressed because we so rarely hear about women’s personal experiences with abortion. Bravo to Glamour for paving the way to end this “culture of silence” around abortion that is so dangerous!

I came across http://www.abortionchangesyou.com after reading the article accidentally today when I saw an ad on the subway. I’d be interested in your thoughts. It seems to me that, unfortunately, this site portrays abortion as something every woman regrets which it equally as dangerous as silence since this is not always the case and paints a very negative light of a right many women exercise.

By: AshKW

AshKW — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 18:32:46 +0000

This was a great read. I hate the politicization of an issue that is fundamentally private and individual.

By: Ellen

Ellen — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 18:28:27 +0000

medical abortions use medicine within the first 7 weeks. 6 to 12 weeks is still considered an early abortion (probably because it was the earliest you could get one before medical abortions existed). Those use suction aspiration. D & C is used at 12 -15 weeks. Then D & E at 15-20 weeks. After that you have the controversial partial birth abortion which is really only ever used when the health of the mother was at risk.

And Betsy you’re right. It’s ridiculous. Especially considering that most of our birth control options are inadequate. I think it is part of our personal responsibility bootstrap mentality. It’s funny, now that I am in public health, I am even more embarrassed to admit I had an abortion.

By: Amanda Marcotte

Amanda Marcotte — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 18:14:24 +0000

Er, just vacuum aspiration. It’s actually the preferred method of underground abortion rings, because you can make a machine yourself with rubber tubing and a mason jar. (No joke.) Of course, the fancy electric machines are preferable because they work faster.

By: Amanda Marcotte

Amanda Marcotte — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 18:07:31 +0000

Ashley, it’s because it’s not a D&C. It’s a vacuum tube aspiration abortion, which is a far less invasive procedure than a D&C. For a lot of women, it barely hurts at all, and feels like a menstrual cramp.

Should abortion become illegal again, doctors who do them on the down low will have to do a D&C, because you can always chart that as done to correct menstrual problems, which I suppose is true in its own way.

By: Ashley

Ashley — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 17:10:59 +0000

Ellen, if that wasn’t a D&C what was it? Because I know early abortions are usually medical, and if they have to go in there and suction you out it’s a D&C. Later is a D&E.

By: Betsy

Betsy — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 04:32:47 +0000

And Ellen, that’s one of the reasons that I don’t think we’ll ever totally eliminate the need for abortion, even with perfect sex education, awesome social services, etc. We’re human, and humans aren’t going to use birth control 100% of the time, even if they are well-educated. (Not to mention bc failures, but that’s another story.)

By: Betsy

Betsy — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 04:19:04 +0000

Ashley, I don’t know if this answers your question because I’m hazy on the details. But when my stepsister needed an abortion (I think something like 15 years ago), she was too self-punishing to allow anyone to help her (or even know about it, probably). So she insisted on driving herself there and back. Normally they would have given her some sort of anesthesia, but they couldn’t because she didn’t have anyone to drive her home and she didn’t want to leave her car there and call a cab. She now thinks she was perversely using it as a way for her to punish herself – don’t know whether for getting pregnant, having the abortion, or something else. I don’t know what kind of abortion this was or how far along she was, so I don’t know if most women getting abortions get it. (This was also 15 years ago; procedures might have changed.)