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"The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion"

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Blue_Tires Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 03:55 PM
Original message
"The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion"
pure hypocrisy from the right...i had posted this elsewhere and thought it belonged here as well...a lot of great stories at the link

http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/anti-tales.html

quote

"I have done several abortions on women who have regularly picketed my clinics, including a 16 year old schoolgirl who came back to picket the day after her abortion, about three years ago. During her whole stay at the clinic, we felt that she was not quite right, but there were no real warning bells. She insisted that the abortion was her idea and assured us that all was OK. She went through the procedure very smoothly and was discharged with no problems. A quite routine operation. Next morning she was with her mother and several school mates in front of the clinic with the usual anti posters and chants. It appears that she got the abortion she needed and still displayed the appropriate anti views expected of her by her parents, teachers, and peers." (Physician, Australia)

"I've had several cases over the years in which the anti-abortion patient had rationalized in one way or another that her case was the only exception, but the one that really made an impression was the college senior who was the president of her campus Right-to-Life organization, meaning that she had worked very hard in that organization for several years. As I was completing her procedure, I asked what she planned to do about her high office in the RTL organization. Her response was a wide-eyed, 'You're not going to tell them, are you!?' When assured that I was not, she breathed a sigh of relief, explaining how important that position was to her and how she wouldn't want this to interfere with it." (Physician, Texas)

"In 1990, in the Boston area, Operation Rescue and other groups were regularly blockading the clinics, and many of us went every Saturday morning for months to help women and staff get in. As a result, we knew many of the 'antis' by face. One morning, a woman who had been a regular 'sidewalk counselor' went into the clinic with a young woman who looked like she was 16-17, and obviously her daughter. When the mother came out about an hour later, I had to go up and ask her if her daughter's situation had caused her to change her mind. 'I don't expect you to understand my daughter's situation!' she angrily replied. The following Saturday, she was back, pleading with women entering the clinic not to 'murder their babies.'" (Clinic escort, Massachusetts)

"We too have seen our share of anti-choice women, ones the counselors usually grit their teeth over. Just last week a woman announced loudly enough for all to hear in the recovery room, that she thought abortion should be illegal. Amazingly, this was her second abortion within the last few months, having gotten pregnant again within a month of the first abortion. The nurse handled it by talking about all the carnage that went on before abortion was legalized and how fortunate she was to be receiving safe, professional care. However, this young woman continued to insist it was wrong and should be made illegal. Finally the nurse said, 'Well, I guess we won't be seeing you here again, not that you're not welcome.' Later on, another patient who had overheard this exchange thanked the nurse for her remarks." (Clinic Administrator, Alberta)

end quote

(many more stories at the link)
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Bethany Rockafella Donating Member (916 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 03:59 PM
Response to Original message
1. If that's not an example of a hypocrite, I don't know what is.
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pelagius Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 04:23 PM
Response to Reply #1
6. Saw a lot of this with "young Republican" types in their 20s...
...back when. Snort coke like a fiend, fuck like a rabbit, and generally debauch it up, then deliver sermonettes about "decling moral values" and the "psychopathology of poverty".
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Blue_Tires Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 04:39 PM
Response to Reply #1
8. some of their comments, attitudes and quotes
are the biggest WTF?? moments I've had in a long time...many of them deserved to be slapped with a dead trout
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The Doctor. Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 04:01 PM
Response to Original message
2. These morons just don't get it...
If they drive safe proceedures underground, they may well lose a family member.

I don't like the Idea of abortion, but making them illegal carte-blanche is pure idiocy.

What I like to ask those who believe they should be made illegal is, "Do you know if anyone in your family has had one? - I guarantee you would if they died from an unsafe proceedure."

Don't they get it?
Obviously not.
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Dookus Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 04:05 PM
Response to Original message
3. I wish I could say this surprises me
but it doesn't at all. Church-going fundie pro-life christians have abortions at the same rate or greater than other people.
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Warpy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 04:17 PM
Response to Reply #3
4. I'd suspect at a greater rate
since fundies think preparing for sex by using birth control means they are less than moral, and because out of wedlock pregnancy is much more shameful for them.

Fundy states also have higher incidences of divorce and other social problems, too.

Yet they cling to their bizarre morality, that it's limited to sex and only applies to all those other people.
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Jackie97 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-29-05 01:03 PM
Response to Reply #4
19. I agree.
Not only has this self-righteousness probably led out to more abortions, but it's a known fact that it leads out to real babies being thrown in dumpsters and so forth. Do you ever hear the excuse the teens give when they do that? They say that they didn't want to disappoint their parents by letting them know they screwed up.

Hey Religious Right, get off your high horse before more real babies are killed.
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pelagius Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 04:18 PM
Response to Reply #3
5. Yes, but these are "good girls" who made a mistake...
...not like those sluts from poorer, darker neighborhoods. God will forgive them and they can get right back out on the picket line!
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WildClarySage Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Jan-27-05 07:34 AM
Response to Reply #5
17. That's right, because Christians aren't *perfect* just *forgiven*
and the other girls there aren't fundies (ie. REAL Christians) like us so they won't be forgiven. And also 'cause like they're sluts, ya know?
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mpendragon Donating Member (210 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 04:34 PM
Response to Original message
7. abortions: a mistake for me but a sin for you
Even the old bans on abortion only meant that poor, poorly connected women couldn't get safe the safe doctor-provided abortions that their wealthier counterparts would receive.


Maybe they believe that "sluts" are using abortions as a means of birth control and they'd just made a mistake or had an accident. I imaging that peer pressure probably plays a role in it too. It's probably hard to fall out with that kind of crowd like a gang.


At any rate it is easier to pretend you didn't have an abortion than to pretend you didn't have a baby.
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Blue_Tires Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 04:42 PM
Response to Reply #7
9. two anecdotes which illustrate your point:
"My first encounter with this phenomenon came when I was doing a 2-week follow-up at a family planning clinic. The woman's anti-choice values spoke indirectly through her expression and body language. She told me that she had been offended by the other women in the abortion clinic waiting room because they were using abortion as a form of birth control, but her condom had broken so she had no choice! I had real difficulty not pointing out that she did have a choice, and she had made it! Just like the other women in the waiting room." (Physician, Ontario)

"The sister of a Dutch bishop in Limburg once visited the abortion clinic in Beek where I used to work in the seventies. After entering the full waiting room she said to me, 'My dear Lord, what are all those young girls doing here?' 'Same as you', I replied. 'Dirty little dames,' she said." (Physician, The Netherlands)
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theresistance Donating Member (595 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 04:45 PM
Response to Original message
10. That's almost hard to believe
get an abortion and then protest the next day? Wow...
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NorthernSpy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 06:14 PM
Response to Reply #10
14. some pro-lifers I've encountered are *obsessed* with abortion
Not just the political issue, as you'd imagine. I mean really, really obsessed with the procedure itself.

Of course, in most cases of pro-lifers having abortions, we more likely are looking at good old-fashioned hypocrisy, rather than anything particularly outré.
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theresistance Donating Member (595 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 10:33 PM
Response to Reply #14
15. What I don't get is when
anti-abortion people start talking about the actual procedures involved in terminating a foetus and saying how bad it is etc. I mean, of course the actual procedure is going to be "bad" and a bit gross, but to me that is not really relevant to the debate...
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iverglas Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 05:14 PM
Response to Original message
11. that's our Joyce Arthur
She's one of the best sources for pro-choice opinion you can find. And oh good grief, she's a babe. I never knew.

http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/

Of course, she's Canadian. ;) Another perennial favourite, well worth reading, is:
http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/civilize.html
"Legal Abortion: the Sign of a Civilized Society"

I also didn't realize she was so identified with Pro-Choice Press (which I now see that she edits and publishes), an excellent source of news and views about events and issues in both Canada and the US. Unfortunately, the link on her page is out of date. It's here:

http://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/
http://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/prochoicepress/newsindex.shtml

The latest edition, Spring/Summer 2004, includes these articles (there had just been a federal election in Canada, and the first few articles refer to that):

Election:
A Discouraging Victory
Free Votes and the Future of Abortion Politics
Abortion in the Election: A Chronology
The Political Is Too Personal

Features:
Who Are the Crisis Pregnancy Centres?
New Pro-Choice Post-Abortion Support Group
Fetal Pain: A Red Herring in the Abortion Debate

Canada News:
Canada's Day of Action for Choice
More Evidence Links James Kopp to Canada
Canada News Bytes

U.S. News:
March for Women's Lives Largest in History
Extremely Trying Times
U.S. News Bytes
I don't think there's anything quite as comprehensive and right-on, on the net in the US.


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pelagius Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 06:12 PM
Response to Reply #11
13. Her article on the Bible's view of abortion...
Edited on Mon Jan-24-05 06:15 PM by pelagius
...is quite excellent and shows sound scholarship. Since most anti-abortion people are so because of (Christian) religious reasons, this one is worthwhile to print this one out and have on hand to confront the Bible thumpers.

There's far, far less in the Bible about abortion than there is about homosexuality, which only merits sparse mention, too. As opposed to the 3000 or so verses decrying the mistreatment of the poor and oppressed by the rich and powerful.
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Jackie97 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-29-05 01:08 PM
Response to Reply #11
20. She doesn't look like a babe to me.
Why would that surprise you? Oh that's right. The only "good" pro-chociers supposedly aren't "babes". "Babes" aren't good for much. :)

She's of course a favorite author of mine.
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TlalocW Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Jan-24-05 05:25 PM
Response to Original message
12. On a somewhat related note
Someone posted a link a couple weeks back to a Christianity Today (I believe) article that talked about how born-agains and Evangelicals own polls show that they're no better than us "heathens" when it comes to owning porn, living together before marriage, sex out of wedlock, divorce, and raising kids "morally."

But I guess all that is secondary when there are ballots to keep them homos from marrying.

TlalocW
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ellie Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jan-25-05 02:58 PM
Response to Original message
16. Wow, all that hypocrisy
was breathtaking. I read an article in Self a couple years ago about how women in the south often have to drive to other states to obtain the procedure. There was a young women interviewed who believed abortion was wrong, but her's wasn't. I thought she was an isolated case. I was wrong. Thanks for the link!
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bleedingheart Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Jan-29-05 12:24 PM
Response to Original message
18. Sadly these stories don't suprise me...
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