Conference turris::womannotes-v1

    Suckers NEVER give up, do they!?!  
    
    Thanks for bringing the warning Karen.  
    
    					=maggie

For those who want to get involved in the fight, a good place to start would
be Planned Parenthood.  They have been in the battle for reproductive rights
for a long time, back to the dark ages when Mass.  was the last state to
legalize birth control products (hard to believe, but they were illegal
once).  I'm sure they can use people's time, and I know that they can use
money.  They have an office in Cambridge, at 99 Bishop Richard Allen Drive
(somehow, I find that address ironic).  The phone numbers are:  492-0518
for general information, and 492-0777 for counseling.

					-- hal

Worthwhile organizations fighting for reproductive rights include:

Planned Parenthood (see previous reply)
Zero Population Growth
American Civil Liberties Union
National Abortion Rights Action League
Mass. Choice (local chapter of NARAL)
People for the American Way (started by Norman Lear of
	"All in the Family" fame)

Any of the above are worthy of your time and/or money.
If you want addresses, I can get them.

	Mike

	For more information on the Mass. referendum, you can contact
	The Coalition for Choice: (617) 492-0518.  Contributions may be
	sent to:  Campaign for Choice, P.O. Box 1143, Cambridge, Ma.  02238

	The S. Middlesex Coalition for Choice is a subset of the above
	organization, and if you prefer to send them donations, their
	address is P.O. Box 3313, Framingham, MA  01701

	...Karen

        .3: There's another organization working for abortion rights in
        particular which I keep getting mail from (and yes, I've given
        them---and some of the others---money).  It particularly appeals
        to me because the Falwell/Reagan types, the primary
        anti-abortion pushers, like to put the argument on religious
        terms.  The organization is the Religious Coalition for Abortion
        Rights (RCAR), and basically seems to be just about what the
        name implies.  They're trying to fight the Moral-Majority type
        influence directly by showing people that they don't *have* to
        oppose abortion (or free choice in general) just to be "good
        christians" or whatever.  Although I'm highly non (and even
        anti) religious by nature, that seems like a very useful message
        to spread these days... 
        
        	/dave

	I attended a meeting, last night, of the Middlesex Coalition for
	Choice.  Since I have never been involved in any such organizations,
	I was amazed at what is involved.  It's going to be a tough battle,
	and I would like to encourage others to get involved.

	Even though independent polls show that more than 80% of the Mass.
	population is pro-choice (at least in limited circumstances such
	as rape, incest, badly deformed baby), only 1% of the population
	is actively involved in pro-choice groups.  This is opposed to
	15% of anti-choice active involvement.  It is this 15% that is
	being heard by the media and the legislature.

	The anti-choice group has very carefully worded the amendment so
	that it is confusing, and has chosen an election year where there is
	little incentive for voter turnout.  You can bet that they will
	be there.  The confusing wording makes it easy to be thought of as
	a pro-choice amendment at first glance because of the use of double
	negatives.  "*No* provision ... shall *prevent*..."  The anti-choice
	group is also mis-informing people that the amendment only effects
	public funding of abortion.  Their slogan is "No taxes for abortion".

	The Massachusetts Campaign for Choice said that they will need
	7000 volunteers to make people aware of the amendment and get
	people to the polls (there were only 7 part-time volunteers at
	the mtg).  Since the pro-choice groups do not have the financial
	backing that anti-choice groups have, they will need to raise
	over $500K.  I was shocked to learn that a small 1/4 page
	add in the Middlesex News (not a really great paper) costs $900.
	The cost of a 30 second TV add costs $7000.

	Although, the amendment states that they can not prohibit abortion
	if prohibited by the Federal Government, you should be aware that
	the Reagan administration has made anti-abortion top priority.
	Roe v. Wade succeeded in 1973 by a 7 to 2 margin.  The latest
	attempt to overturn Roe v. Wade was only defeated by a 5 to 2 margin,
	and we have some very *old* people on the Supreme Court.

	This is not a poll this fall, it is an amendment to a state
	constitution, and if it succeeds other states will see similar
	amendments on their ballots.  I hate to think of my children
	possibly being forced to have an illegal abortion with all its
	dangers.

	Now is the time to do what you can.  Contact your friends in
	Massachusetts, contact the organizations listed in previous
	replies to this topic.

	For further information, you can send me mail.

	...Karen

    I thought that it was recently defeated by a 5 to 4 vote,
    not 5 to 2. (Nine justices).

	yes you're right - that was a typo.
	...Karen

Voters Alert: (NOW magazine, Sept. 1986)

[ I left out Mass. since I've already mentioned it in this topic ]

In RHODE ISLAND, a proposed antiabortion amendment, known as Question 14,
states: "All human beings, including their unborn offspring at every
stage of their biological development, beginning with fertilization, are 
persons who are protected in their unalienable and paramount right to life, 
without regard to age, health, function, or condition of dependency."
The proposal would not go into effect unless Roe v. Wade is overturned.
By implying that life begins at conception, it would open a legal Pandora's
box in addition to continuing a ban on the use of government funds for 
abortion.  Planned Parenthood of Rhode Island analysts believe the bill
could possibly lead to women who have had miscarriages being subjected to
official inquiries.

In ARKANSAS, the referendum formerly known as the "Unborn Child Amendment"
is back on the ballot after its title was ruled misleading.  The current
"Limitation on Abortion and Abortion-Funding Amendment" is similar in intent
to the Rhode Island referendum.  The Arkansas measure also prohibits funding
for abortion, which is largely symbolic since the state does not pay for
abortions for poor women.  The Alliance for Family Planning, which includes
the Planned Parenthood Affiliates of Arkansas, the American Civil Liberties
Union, and the National Organization for Women, is pooling resources to
counteract the campaign, which has built support in small towns and
fundamentalist churches.

In OREGON, Oregon Taxpayers for Choice is fighting an initiative that
prohibits state money from being used to pay for abortions, except to
prevent the death of the mother.  Expecting to raise about $200,000
for a media and grass-roots campaign, the state coalition includes
46 groups and is speaking before business and church organizations.
Oregon has been targeted as a trial state by the national antiabortion 
forces, according to Joan Binninger, one of the group's leaders.  As we went
to press, the measure, with more than 100,000 signatures, was placed on
the ballot for November, when it will appear as Initiative No. 6.

In CALIFORNIA, an AIDS initiative proposed by supporters of right-wing 
extremist Lnydon LaRouche has stirred up the most furor.  The measure seemed 
so innocuous that even some AIDS victims signed the petition.  The initiative
would requires AIDS to be placed on the state health services list of
infectious communicable diseases.  Its proponents call themselves the Prevent
AIDS Now Initiative Committee, or, PANIC; those who work with AIDS think 
the very idea of the initiative is cause for panic.  LaRouche supporters
say that under the proposed law a person who is carrier of the virus could not
work in restaurants, schools, or food establishments.  Lesbians and gays
are working closely together in a statewide Stop LaRouche Committee, with
California NOW PITCHING IN funds and volunteers for what is expected to be
a $3-million campaign.

In VERMONT, some good news - a state Equal Rights Amendment cleared the 
necessary hurdles (two votes in both houses of the state legislature) and
is one popular vote away from becoming law.  The race to the finish line
has a familiar obstacle, Phyllis Schafly and her anti-ERA team.  "It's the same
old message," says Molly Yard, political director for NOW which expects 
to provide at least two paid staff workers to the campaign.  "her group 
show pictures of the gay rights march in San Francisco-two men kissing- and 
asks, 'Is that what you want to happen in Vermont?'".  Schafly has been 
involved earlier than usual - a debate in February - early enough for ERA
advocates to point out the fallacies in her warnings.  There will be 
door-to-door campaigns, phone banks, and speakers.  In Vermont, with a
population of 535,000, it's easy to hit every voter; strategist figure 120,000
would be enough to assure a win.

WHAT YOU CAN DO:

The National Abortion Rights Action League can refer you to a local branch or
an affiliate organization in your state (NARAL, 124 K Street, N.W., 
Washington, D.C. 20005)

The following local groups also urge you to help:

The Alliance for Family Planning, 2915 Kavanaugh Boulevard, P.O. Box 402,
Little Rock, Ark. 72201

The Campaign for Choice, 76 Summer Street, Boston, Mass. 02110; (617) 451-8170

Oregon Taxpayers for Choice, P.O. Box 06246, Portland, Oreg. 97206; 
(503) 777-8065

Oops, that's Ms. Magazine.
..karen

	The Middlesex NOW is having a meeting with speakers to talk about
	Referendum 1 on the ballot.  It will be Oct 16th at 7:30 pm in
	the Framingham Public Library.

	...Karen

    And for those of us interested latecomers, what WAS the result of
    the Nov. vote?

In Mass, prop 1 was defeated -- the legislature cannot ban public funding of
abortion.  

I believe a similar proposition in Rhode Island was defeated as well.  There
was a third one in another state (Arkansas?), and I don't know what happened
there.  I kept looking in the paper, but must've missed it.  Does anyone
know?
					-- hs

    It was defeated in Mass. by about 58% to 42% (something like that).

    see note 93 for more on the same topic.

    ...Karen

    
    In Rhode Island, it was an amendment to the state constitution,
    and soundly defested.
    
    DFW

NOW put out a flyer after November (just like the panic-struck one that
went out in September) that said that there were several abortion control 
issues on many state ballots and all were soundly struck down.

 	I think a statement has been made....

     Do Women REALLY have reproductive rights? What about the rights
    of the unborn child? 
    also...  
    From all the literature that I have read about abortions, it seems
    to me that there is more potential health risks to having the abortion
    then  going full-term and having the baby.
    
   
    
        

    
    

    I think the health risks of having an abortion vs. bringing a baby
    to term depend on the mother's age.

Last week during I got bored and started flipping thru the channels,
searching for some couch-potato material (I learned this technique from
my husband) when I stumbled across a medical program.  The doctor had
just said "And now we'll take you step by step through the abortion
process so you'll see exactly what is going on..."

Great! I thought.  I've never really understood the medical side of
it... I turned it up, hopped in a chair, and hunkered down for some
solid medical enlightenment.

Wrong!  The program turned out to the The Silent Scream and the doctor
started describing how the suction device tears the arms and legs from
the child until nothing is left but the head, and then THAT is broken
up by a clamp and drawn out through the suction device.

They didn't say "fetus", they said "CHILD!".

Well, I stuck with it until they started showing color photographs of
dismembered fetuses while describing what a profitable venture abortions
have become in the U.S.

The memories of those photographs are still vivid for me, and I was
upset enough to seek my husband out and curl up on his lap....

I can imagine what that program must do to an unprepared young woman,
faced with the awful decision, and not nearly as emotionally stable in
beliefs about herself as I am... (not that I'm claiming to be too stable!!).

After the upset passed, it was replaced by anger.... Anger that I haven't
been able to place well.  No one has the right to tell ME what to do with
MY body.... nor do they have the right to coerce me or play on my
sympathies...

But what I really object to is the outright lies and propaganda that
some poor woman is going to swallow....

Anyone else seen that film?

Karen

    
    34.19 "But what I really object to is the outright lies and
    propoganda..."
    
    Could you give some examples of these?

    re -18:
    
    The reason you may be angry (the biggest reason I am, anyway) about The
    Silent Scream is this:  it only shows ONE side of the story.  There
    is absolutely no mention of the pain and cost (both emotional and
    $$) to a woman who would be *forced* to carry an unwanted child to term
    should abortion not be an alternative.
    
    This movie shows nothing of the pain to a *woman*.  To be fair,
    the film should be followed by a a film of women who had to obtain
    illegal abortions or friends and relatives of women who *died* having
    illegal abortions discussing what it was like before abortion was legal.

    	-Ellen

    I remember before abortion was legal seeing photographs of naked
    dead women photographed from the rear,covered with blood, who had 
    died having an abortion. I remember the agony of friends who had
    been "seduced and abandonded by a guy" and left with a pregnancy
    - it wasn't a real baby, it was a shamefull event, that they felt
    the only solution for was to get rid of it no matter how illegal.
    
    At the time I promised myself that if there was anything I could
    do to prevent another woman from having to die that way I would
    do so. I'm not sure now if anything I have done in my life would
    prevent that but I hope it *never* happens again. Since that time,
    contraception has become much easier to obtain. I feel that the
    best way to prevent the death of both unfortunate young women and
    unexpected babies is to continue to encourage the widespread use
    of birth control education.
    
    I have chosen to adopt 4 children of women who became pregnant and
    were unable to keep their child. I wish more women in the position
    of my children's birth mother were able to make the same choice,
    but I do not feel it is fair to ask any woman to bear a child to
    give it up to another unless she truely wants to. 
    
    My 13 year old daughter told me about a year ago that if she were
    to get pregnant before she was able to get married she would choose   
    adoption, because that was what was chosen for her. But I hope I
    never have to face that decision with my kids. ......sigh
    
    Bonnie

    The abortion issue has been a concern of mine for some time.  I
    do not have a problem with the law and its concept but I do have
    a problem with the law is utilized.
    
    If a woman wants an abortion that is her decision.  This has been
    going on for years and as Barbara said in .22 we must insure that
    the women that receives one gets the best medical care available.
    As Barbara also said a pregnancy that occurred as a result of a
    shameful event is just that a pregnancy.
    
    But there is propaganda on the part of the abortion clinics.  Because
    the process should be available to those that want it doesn't give
    clinics and social workers free rein in resolving situations that
    occur as a result of an unplanned pregnancy.  
    
    Abortion is a very emotional process, it involves our bodies, our
    feelings and our religious beliefs.  What the law lacks in my mind
    is any control over the clinics.  Each patient should be required
    to visit the clinic at least one week before the procedure is
    performed.  They should at that time be introduced to all the options
    and be given a week to think about that decision.  At the time of
    the procedure they should be given birth control information.  The
    cost of the procedure should include a follow up visit to go over
    the persons new birth control plan.
    
    Young women who could choose another alternative are taking the
    path of abortion.  This is not good for their bodies or their minds.
    
    The law in my mind is right.  The Pro-lifers have a list of very
    talented people who could have been potential abortions.  As right
    as the law may be we can never loose sight of how valuable life
    is and how important it is that we make well thought out decisions.
    
    The goal of all of us should be to reduce unwanted pregnancies,
    and in so doing reduce abortions.  
    
    Although abortion clinics are non-profit they do provide jobs, 
    and income to a variety of sources.  I wish I could be comfortable
    that they were motivated to the best interests of the women they
    service.
    
    Joyce

    The abortion issue has been a concern of mine for some time.  I
    do not have a problem with the law and its concept but I do have
    a problem with the way the law is utilized.
    
    If a woman wants an abortion that is her decision.  This has been
    going on for years and as Barbara said in .22 we must insure that
    the women that receives one gets the best medical care available.
    As Barbara also said a pregnancy that occurred as a result of a
    shameful event is just that a pregnancy.
    
    But there is propaganda on the part of the abortion clinics.  Because
    the process should be available to those that want it means that
    social workers have a lot of reponsibility to insure that the women
    they are working with have examined all the options and can handle
    the procedure.  
    
    Abortion is a very emotional process, it involves our bodies, our
    feelings and our religious beliefs.  What the law lacks in my mind
    is any control over the clinics.  Each patient should be required
    to visit the clinic at least one week before the procedure is
    performed.  They should at that time be introduced to all the options
    and be given a week to think about that decision.  At the time of
    the procedure they should be given birth control information.  The
    cost of the procedure should include a follow up visit to go over
    the persons new birth control plan.
    
    Young women who could choose another alternative are taking the
    path of abortion.  This is not good for their bodies or their minds
    or our way of life.
    
    The law in my mind is right.  The Pro-lifers have a list of very
    talented people who could have been potential abortions.  As right
    as the law may be we can never loose sight of how valuable life
    is and how important it is that we make well thought out decisions.
    
    The goal of all of us should be to reduce unwanted pregnancies,
    and in so doing reduce abortions.  
    
    Although abortion clinics are non-profit they do provide jobs, 
    and income to a variety of sources.  I wish I could be comfortable
    that they were motivated to the best interests of the women they
    service.
    
    Joyce

    Is anyone familiar with Boston-area folksinger Kim Wallach's album
    "Paddle on the Rahway"?  She has a wonderfully thought provoking
    song in there which raises a very important issue which doesn't
    (to my way of thinking) get enough air time:
    
    How do we feel about the subject of abortion when it affects an
    individual or a group we perceive as "them"?
    
    How do we feel about the subject of abortion when it affects our
    daughters, our lovers, our sisters, or anyone else close to us with
    an unwanted, unplanned pregnancy?
    
    (see next note for song)

Freedom to Choose
by Bob Blue and Kim Wallach

In a clinic on Main St. in Washingtonville
Lost in thought by a window stood Mary McGill
When her eyes met the eyes of a woman outside
Was it rain on her glasses, or tears she had cried?
Outside on a picket line Rosemary Flynn
Felt the rain on her face and the anger within
As she stared at that face inside, gentle and warm
That seemed almost to beckon her in from the storm

And the two women found themselves staring awhile
Recognition, awareness, but never a smile
And there seemed to be some kind of truce in that stare
Until Rosemary Flynn recalled why she was there
Then she held up her sign that said "Thou shalt not kill"
And she pointed directly to Mary McGill
And Mary McGill, before starting to turn
Gave a nod to acknowledge Rosemary's concern

That day Mary counseled a child named Michelle
Who tried hard to seem calm in her personal hell
Mary spoke to Michelle with the tone of a friend
And her gentleness brought Michelle's calm to an end
Michelle told her story with pain hard to hide
of her mother and John and the new life inside
She had meant to show love, she had meant no one harm
But her mother felt anger, and John felt alarm

But the new life inside was a life, it was real
With a brain and a heartbeat she thought she could feel
And she wanted that child, she would love it so well
She would build it a heaven to make up for this hell
But she'd end the new life for her mother and John
I'll do it, said Michelle, for my mother and John
These words had an emptiness Mary saw through
If you do it, said Mary, Please do it for you

Michelle looked at Mary through the pain and the tears
And Mary saw all of Michelle's sixteen years
And she thought she saw something of several years more
Or perhaps she had seen Michelle's face once before
Michelle only murmured the words "I don't know"
And she stood and she turned and she started to go
And Mary made one last request of Michelle
With her parting words "Take time to think this out well"

That night Michelle's mother stormed into the place
Not hiding her anger, yet hiding her face
My daughter came here with a purpose, she said
Not to have you put foolish ideas in her head
She's too young, she's a girl, and the father's a boy
And she thinks that a baby is some kind of toy
Your job was to teach her, to straighten her out
Not confuse her and send her home riddled with doubt

My job, explained Mary, is not to confuse
But to make her aware of her freedom to choose
My job is to make sure the options are known
You are right, she is young, but her life is her own
Then Mary saw something in this woman's face
And remembered the person, the time and the place
This woman had labelled abortion a sin
The face in the picket line, Rosemary Flynn

People often accuse and are quick to condemn
When the issue is safe or does not affect them
I don't envy the job facing Mary McGill
I don't know all the meanings of "Thou shalt not kill"
It's a conflict more simply presented than solved
But the choice must belong to the woman involved
And I think that the answers come, not from above
But from us, and our consciences, tempered with love.

    Before the previous note has a chance to generate potential flames
    :-), I want to state that I know that this example certainly doesn't
    represent everyone who has struggled with this issue, but rather
    that it illustrates the point I made two notes back.  And that is
    one valid perspective among many.
    
    Holly

    
    
    Until you are in the position to have to consider an abortion, for
    yourself or your daughter, you can not be sure what your choice
    will be, BUT you and/or your daughter have to be able to have the
    opportunity to choose.
    
    _peggy

	I just read that there's a sequal to "Silent Scream" called
	"Revelation and Nightmare" that's coming out soon.  This new
	film apparently depicts a second trimester abortion in graphic
	detail despite the fact that only 7% of all abortions are done after 
	12 weeks of pregnancy, and fewer than 1% after 20 weeks.  "Silent
	Scream" was sent to every member of congress, and they will
	probably do the same with this film, as well as distributing it
	to churches and community groups.

	NARAL is planning to produce and distribute TV ads designed to
	counter the distortions in "Revelation and Nightmare" (if they
	can collect enough money).

    Ellen Goodman's column is about the sequel - this morning's paper.
    If I find time, I'll type it in.
    
    	-Ellen

    When I first read about it I wondered at the motivations of the
    woman who allowed the film to be made and at the motivations
    of those who made the film. If they were anti abortion why did
    they do it? and if they were pro then where did the anti's get
    ahold of it?

    I read Ellen Goodman's column yesterday and I to wonder about
    the woman who allowed a camera to be inserted in her womb!
    
    As far as the person who made the film, if he cared so much about
    2nd trimester abortions he would have prevented that one.  Talk
    about being a hypocrite!
    
    But put aside the man that made the movie.
    
    The law is the law and women have the right to choose an abortion.
    
    But the fact remains they are removing from their body little pieces
    of flesh that are the beginnings of human beings.  This is not
    propaganda this is real.  
    
    I will not judge those that choose this path but I will consistently
    remind those who try to ignore the reality.  Call it a pregnancy,
    fetus, embryo or baby it is the beginning of life!!!
    

RE .-1

On removing flesh, the beginnings of life.  Am I to understand that you
then are also against the surgical removal of cancerous tumors, bits of
flesh that are also the beginning of life, unfortunately life gone horribly
out of control.  I am repulsed by abortion as another method of birth
control for the careless or forgetful.  However, our lives often are
wrenched from our own control.  I cannot ask a 15 year old victim of incest
to carry a child to full term and then beyond.  I cannot ask a woman who
has been raped to carry a child to full term and then beyond.  Those people
have already had so many options taken away from them.  Taking one more is
stealing from the poor.  (Getting to be a national pastime in this
country) Throwing the blanket of life over the abortion issue is an
idealistic posture that prevents soul searching of what the rights,
responsibilities and realities of life are.

I find abortion a very difficult issue, but when it comes down to making a
choice, a statement, I believe legislation of morality at this level
always ends in tragedy. 

-Byron

    Re .-1
    
    I am stating a fact that has nothing to do with cancerous tumors,
    an abortion removes the beginning of life.  
    
    I am pro-choice, but I am also a realist and I know what abortion
    is.  I am very much opposed to the very few people who would have
    us believe that the process is little more than the removal of an
    aching tooth. 
    
    I too am Pro-life & Pro-choice.
    

    I have a lot of problems with this issue (doesn't everyone?).  I
    don't think abortion ought to be the casual form of birth control
    of choice.  On the other hand, I don't think that legislating one
    group's concept of morality for everyone else is reasonable or just.
    For example, Paul and I are Jewish.  Before we got married, we were
    tested to see if we were carriers of Tay-Sachs disease (we aren't,
    thank goodness).  THis is a horrible, incurable disease whose victims
    die by the time they are four or five years old.  The parents often
    cannot afford another child because of the burden of medical costs.
    I don't think anyone should have the right to force a woman who
    knows she is carrying a Tay-Sachs child (or any other fatal gneetic
    disease) to carry that child to term and forego having other children.
    I feel even more strongly about women carrying the children of rape
    or incest.
    
    I have a tough time, too, with the idea of when life begins, and
    whether that is even an important part of this issue.  Every month
    of my adult life, I have produced at least one human egg (since
    I have never been pregnant).  Each one of these was a potential
    human life.  However, I don't feel bad about not giving these eggs
    a chance to develop!  (Maybe I would if I were Catholic...but I'm
    not.)  And if there is a potential moral dilemma each month a woman
    menstruates, think about the millions of sperm an adult man produces
    which never get their chance either!
    
    I don't think anyone ought to have the legal right to decide what
    is moral for other people to do.

    .35
    Catholics do not have a problem with an unfertilized egg.  And my
    problem around abortion does not stem from being a Catholic it comes
    from having been pregnant and the feelings that I have experienced
    during that time.  I *feel* I have a life within me almost before
    I know I am pregnant.  I attribute that to hormones, instinct and
    other biological factors.
    
    I am very pro-choice.  I also have entered more than one reply to
    this note because I want to continue to emphasize that it should
    be the choice of the woman that is having the procedure.  And we
    have to admit to that woman that we will be extracting something
    from her body that is the beginning of life.  Even the earliest
    fetus will resemble a human if put under a microscope whereas an
    egg or sperm offer no resemblence.
    
    It would be unrealistic to think that people do not profit from
    our misery.  Abortion clinics provide jobs for doctors, nurses and
    social workers.  I am going to try to keep them honest by presenting
    other options to women who are not convinced they want an abortion
    and by continuing to express my conviction that we are dealing with
    two lives!

    
    .36
     Even the earliest fetus will resemble a human...
    
    I just finished reading a book about a woman who had three abortions.
    In the book, when she went to the clinic, they never mention anything
    about the fetus looking like a human, but just called it a mass of
    tissue. This appears real deceptive to me. If a woman is going to
    make a decision for an abortion then she should be well informed
    on all the options. This is a very important decision that a woman
    has to live with for the rest of her life and it shouldn't be taken
    lightly.

    

    
    Re -1, don't worry.  If I ever have to make the decision I *won't*
    take it "lightly", but I would like to be able MAKE the decision.
    
    Lorna
    

re: .37 re .36 
    
>   they never mention anything about the fetus looking like a
>   human, but just called it a mass of tissue. 

The early fetus looks as much like many other animals as a humam.
But in any case, I believe that mentioning this would be even more 
biased.

People considering the alternatives for an unwanted pregnancy
usually lean toward a particular solution which they feel (gut
level) is personally best.  Giving detailed unsolicited advice
("facts"), AT BEST, will usually only inflict guilt -- whether the
advice is pro or con. 

The best counseling only evaluates and addresses general "comfort"
issues, answers any questions from a non-judgemental viewpoint
(which means some questions have no given answer) and gives general
pro's and con's from a practical (not moral) sense. 

MORE THAN THIS IS PERSONALLY DESTRUCTIVE TO THE SUBJECT, AND SERVES 
ONLY THE "MORAL" VALUES OF SOME THIRD _UNINVOLVED_ PARTY.

	~Mike~

    	During the late 60's, when abortion was illegal in most states,
    I was activel involved with an abortion underground in Boston. 
    A woman seeking an abortion would come to live with one of the
    volunteers, if necessary, and would be taken for a free pregnancy
    test, a talk with a minister (no priest volunteers) and a talk with
    a psychologist or psychiatrist.  The people who talked with the
    women were all volunteering their time and risking legal problems
    because our activities were against the law.  All the professionals
    discussed in detail what a fetus was, what it looked like, etc.
    If, after all was said and done, the woman still wanted an abortion
    and the professionals felt she could handle the consequences the
    woman would be driven out of state to a clinic, aborted and then
    returned to continue staying with a volunteer until she felt well
    enough to return home.  The entire experience took about six days,
    on average.
    
    	Not all the volunteers supported abortion (I, for example have
    always been against abortion) but we recognized the ugliness of
    the alternative to a safe, clinical abortion.  While we all believed
    in supporting the women who found themselves in difficulty none
    of us, at least the ones I got to know, believed abortion should
    be trivialized.  A fetus is a fetus.  It might look like a chicken
    fetus for the first month or so but it is a human fetus.  The decision
    to abort is a personal one which should be available but not in
    ignorance.  As in all of life, undersatnd just what it is you are
    planning on doing before you do it because you will live with the
    results.
    
    Douglas 

    To comment on this topic is very hard, but as usual I will try.
    I have assisted on various abortions during my hospital training.
    It is a tramatic experience for everyone, not only the woman having
    it done, but to those assisting and performing the abortion.  I
    remember crying after, during each procedure.  I could not continue
    assisting in the OR unless there was noone else around to help. I
    could describe what was done, but I am sure everyone who reads this
    is informed.  However the sequel to silent scream is an attack
    being made(this is my opinion). 2nd trimester fetus are not aborted
    the same way that 1st trimester fetus is.  Doing a *D&C* abortion
    on the 2nd trimester fetus has not been done in years, it is too
    dangerous to the woman and there is a higher chance of infection.
    The majority of the time, labor is induced, the fetus expelled 
    whole, (let me also point out that the fetus dies in the uterus
    before it is expelled which is part of the procedure)
    and a D&C is only done if there is any tissue still in 
    the uterus.  So, my impression is that the film was a set up by
    the RTL people, with the highest gross factor added. 
    My point is that the D&C is NOT the only method used to 
    perform abortions.  Also 2nd trimester abortions are done rarely,
    usually the ones I had heard of were from desperate, health 
    threatening situations.  The majority of clinics refuse to perform
    abortions on later pregnancies because the woman needs to be 
    hospitalized due to quite a few complications that can arise.
   
    The decision to have an abortion is such a deep and committed one
    on the part of the woman, and don't feel that it is done in a 
    light frame of mind.  I also feel that the right of choice is
    a personal one and should not be dictated by one group of people.

    
    vivian

    One thing I've learned as certain in my 30+ years of living...
    
    You never truely know how you will handle a situation until you
    are actually faced with it.
    
    It is one thing to idealize, and theorize.  But for all of you
    who are adamantly opposed to abortion, I'll bet a good percentage
    of you might reconsider if faced with an extremely unwanted
    pregnancy of your own.
                         

    Then again .-1 may be right.  So at the final instance, the
    bottom-line question considered across all people involved
    and not involved, with their different and not-so-different
    views is
    
    	Can any man take the life of another ?
    
    If this question was asked outside the abortion forum, outside
    the capital punishment forum, outside the euthanasia forum, I
    hope the answer is no.  Why is the answer different in context ?
    Can anyone draw a line to say that taking the life of another
    is right in such a context, and wrong in another ?  If the act
    of taking a life is not absolutely wrong then what is ?  Can
    we next draw similar lines about taking drugs ("my body is my
    business" applies here too).  Is it a human life ?  At the risk of
    sounding crude, I do not think anyone would claim that the
    fertilised human ova is not what it is because transplanting
    the fertilised ova of another animal into a human womb does not
    achieve the same results.  The problem with legalising abortion
    is that everybody now gets to draw their own line.  The subscribers
    of this conference may represent a more responsible group of
    people but remember, everyone else gets to draw their own line
    and speaking statistically, I can say that the lines don't always
    fall at the same place.

    There are not always simple answers to hard questions.
    
    	"Can any man take the life of another?"
    
    Yes, of course they "can" but that's quibbling. "Should" they? Is
    it "right"? Is there an absolute morality, and if so, does it include
    the taking of human life? Is suicide immoral? Is a fetus a person?
    Does a pregnant woman's right to control her own body extend to
    the right to abort an unwanted fetus? At what point does she give
    up that right?
    
    To all of these questions I have to answer, "I don't know, that's
    a hard question." The one thing I DO know though, is that I will
    NOT let someone else force THEIR view of what is "right" on ME.
    Furthermore, I claim that no MAN has the right to tell a pregnant
    woman that she cannot decide for herself. I know where *I* believe
    a fetus becomes a baby, and I know that other reasonable people
    disagree. But I become furious at people who treat this complex
    problem simplistically.
    
    	-- Charles

    re .43, .44
    
    Ahem: This is womannotes, and if you think you aren't going to get
    flamed (just a little toasted, perhaps) for asking if any _man_
    has the right... using the word "man" to mean "person", well, huh!
    
    Please adjust your vocabulary, at least here, when it is not terribly
    awkward.  Questions facing _humanity_ and _human_beings_in_general_
    should be worded as such.
    
    Lee

         
    re: .43
    
    	>Can any man take the life of another ?

    Self defense?
    
    This is not completely irrelevant.  Birth is a violent experience.
    The body of the mother suffers considerable trauma.  Giving birth
    can be fatal.  There may be statistics showing that giving birth
    is less likely to get you killed than riding the subway after dark.
    There are statistics that will show practically anything.
    
    Doubtless some legal practitioner has thought of this angle before
    me.  Still, there it is.  It serves to drive home Mr. Haynes's point
    about the complexity of questions such as this.
    
    I do not believe there are legislative or doctrinal solutions for
    questions such as these.  Particularly not those concocted by the
    typical legislator or dispenser of doctrine, who are unlikely to
    ever have to face the question on anything but an abstract level.
    
    DFW

    
    Death of a child before it has a right to live...what a nasty
    thought..or so some say.  Myself - I feel an unwanted child (even
    if put up for adoption in some cases) - if carried to term - can
    ruin many lives:  the mother's, the father's, their relatives',
    and perhaps the child's as well.  The thought of killing is abhorrent
    to me, but I feel that if birth control is used and fails, (or the 
    child is born of a violent or incestuous crime), and
    there exists the possibility of severely damaging the
    physical/emotional lives of those involved, then abortion should
    be an option.  It is NOT a good thing, it is simply, in my mind,
    the lesser of two evils.  It is up to those directly involved in
    the situation to decide what to do.  I cannot decide for anyone
    else, and no one else should be able to decide for me...
    
    Jody
    

    A gift is given by the free consent of the giver. If a 
    woman does not wish to give the gift of life at a
    particular time, no-one should point a gun at her and
    force her to. This is the effect of anti-abortion laws.
    The same principle holds for any gift, that it should
    be given freely. Alas, the precedent does exist - the
    current charity-at-gunpoint that is the modern welfare
    state. 

    Response .48 misses the point of the anti-abortion ("pro-life")
    faction (by choice or otherwise): namely, that once a pregnancy has
    commenced, the gift of life has already been given. With this
    viewpoint, the question is not of withholding, but of withdrawing
    (reneging) on the gift AFTER having given it.
    
    Before I get stomped for expressing this viewpoint, be aware that I
    am simply elaborating on my perception of it. I do not approve of
    anti-abortion legislation - that's a sphere which should be under
    the control of the principals directly involved. 
    
    There will always be some gray areas - when does abortion merge with
    infanticide is the obvious one: on the delivery table? One
    minute/hour/day/week/month/trimester earlier than that? One week
    AFTER that? Not until the kid can earn its own living (my favorite)?
    There does seem to be some room for a legal definition of this
    boundary, but I don't know whom I would trust to make it for
    everybody. 
    
    Given the gray, abortion is a very poor form of birth control, and
    properly ought not to be used as an alternative to self-restraint or
    responsibility (on the part of participants of either sex). I'm not
    going to give a list of those circumstances under which it may be
    warranted, as those will differ for each individual, reducing the
    relevancy of my own opinions. As time passes, things are NOT going
    to get any easier in this arena. The more medical advances are made,
    the more opportunities for extending the gray into new and trickier
    dimensions. 

    Reducing the issue to its simplest terms may have offensive
    connotations to some.  However, everyone has already shown this
    to be an extremely complex issue, full of personal and circumstantial
    bias.  Is there any unfairness in the use of the analogy of a person 
    taking the life of another ?  If the analogy were irrelevant or unfair
    then I would categorically withdraw it from the arguement.  If the
    analogy is fair and at such a simple model we cannot arrive at an
    answer, then what hope have we of clarifying the issue by making
    it even more complex ?  
    Yes, everyone can give examples that fit the pro-choice or pro-life
    stands.  The question is do only victims of rape or incest go for
    abortion ?  It is for those unfortunate children, who are conceived
    in passion, but cannot be born because there is no love out in the
    world for them, that we should speak out for because they have yet
    no voice to defend themselves or at least to say "Let me live...".
                                                                      

>         The question is do only victims of rape or incest go for
>    abortion ?  It is for those unfortunate children, who are conceived
>    in passion, but cannot be born because there is no love out in the
>    world for them, that we should speak out for because they have yet
>    no voice to defend themselves or at least to say "Let me live...".
                                                                      
No, those are not the only ones who go for abortion.  The 70 year old woman
who thought that she couldn't get pregnant any more, who has already
brought up her own children and helped with grandchildren goes for abortion.
The responsible young couple living in poverty with 5 kids, and their birth 
control didn't work go for abortion.  The parents of 2 children who have
severe physical/mental problems, who love their kids and do all they can for 
them, who tried not to get pregnant, but just can't handle taking care of
any more children go for abortion.  The young teenager who no-one would
tell her about birth control (hey, doesn't that encourage promiscuity :-}), 
whose parents will kick her out of her house if they knew, and who would 
probably have a lot of physical problems during a pregnancy (13 year old
bodies are not ready for pregnancy yet) goes for an abortion.  And all of
these people struggle with their decision to end a life, it is *not* taken
lightly by any of them.

Yes, I can grieve for these unborn children who had no choice, but
I can also grieve for those born children had no choice too.  No choice
but to be born already addicted to drugs, to grow up in poverty, who
has no one to care if they are raped when only a small child.  No choice
but to grow up in an institution because you weren't cute enough, or
healthy enough or the right race to be adopted.  I'm not saying that these
children should never have been born, but I do wish that the so-called
"Pro-Life" group would expand as much energy/money on helping these children
as they do trying to get legislation passed to make it so that responsible
adults can't make their own moral choice.  You can't legislate everyone
so that you can keep the few who use abortion as birth control from
doing so.

...Karen

    Representative Barney Frank (dem. MA) said something to the effect
    of:
    
    Pro-lifers' concern for these children begins at conception 
    and ends at birth.
    
    
    Bruce

    RE -1 At last a Ma. Dem. with horse-sense. :-)

Karen:

    RE 34.51
	Your note was movingly written and shows you to be a very caring
person.  But I am uncomfortable with the possible implication that you
are suggesting not being born might be preferable to being born to 
abject poverty or to have to spend your youth in an institution because
you are not 'right' for adoption.  There is an excellent book, "City of 
Hope", which deals with the people who live in a section of Calcutta.  
The messages contained in this book are numerous, one which sticks with 
me is the vitality of people who live in a state of financial poverty 
most of us can't begin to comprehend.

	There is no true shame in being poor, even in this country of
shameless selfindulgence.  Nor is there any shame in being born to a 
mother who lived less than an exemplary life (resulting in your being 
born addicted to drugs).  The stories of people who were born into 
abject poverty and rose above it fill many shelves in our libraries, 
as do books of people so born who never improved their financial 
position but went on to contribute greatly to their others.  Putting 
aside the bigotry of the U.S. for a moment, poverty is a position from 
which we can elevate ourselves.  It need not hold us back for our entire 
lives.  Not that poverty is easy to leave behind, I know our 'roots' 
cling tenaciously.

	I believe you don't feel these children should not have born 
but the suggestion, all be it only implied, is there.  

	Your suggestion that people in the pro-life movement are not
supporting those less fortunate with sufficient time or money also
makes me uncomfortable.  One of the major forces behind the pro-life
movement in Massachusetts is a personal friend.  I know how much time
and money he gives to helping those less fortunate than he and his
family.  I also know how generous my brother and his wife are, they
are also strongly committed to the pro-life movement.  How we as a
nation treat our less fortunate citizens is deplorable to me but 
can we single out a group of people and say the problem belongs to
them because they don not support abortion?  Is abortion the answer
to the collective problem?  It might be the answer to individual
problems but surely it can't be considered a viable collective
answer.

	I can't support the act of abortion but I do support the issue
of abortion.  I do not have the right to force my values on other people.
However, your very moving note does not suggest a situation which, in
my mind, warrants as dramatic a step as non-medically advised abortion.
Surely a doctor would all but demand the 70 year old woman have an 
abortion and, possibly, the 13 year old child.

	My involvement in Boston's abortion underground during the 1960's
is somewhat qualified in an earlier note.  I am not attacking your
position, I support the issue.  I am voicing some discomfort with some
of your words and some possible implied positions.

Douglas

    First, let me state that I'm *mostly* pro-life.  I know that sounds
    like an oxymoron but bear with me.
    
    How do you women feel about the following [possible] solution:
    
    1.  Inconvenience abortions outlawed [Hold on...]
    2.  '1' prevented by more education in school.
    
    Now to the meat:
    
    3. Abortions kept legal for rape/incest/mother-in-danger/Tay-Sachs
    type of cases [I can't punish a victim, but I still feel for the
    unborn child]
    
    4. For those who were failed by birth control, too poor, too many
    kids already, offer the following; Gov't funded pre-natal health
    care followed up by adoption.  A friend [who's sterile] told me
    last week that there is a 5 year waiting period to get on a 3-year
    waiting list for adopting babies.  This might help both problems.
    
    5. Inconvenience abortions replaced by adoption.  For people who
    use abortion as a birth-control method, I say "I don't care what
    hassles you go through".  Those are the people that get me.
    
    You say "What about the 12-15-year-old who turns up pregnant"?
    
    I wish I knew.  Who's life do you traumatize?
    
    I am pro-life.  Regardless of what Rep. Frank says, my concern starts
    at conception and never stops.
    
    I am also pro-justice.  Bombing abortion clinics solves nothing.
    Abortion is legal and until that changes, if it ever does, 2 wrongs
    don't make a right.
    
    I also believe that the father should have a say.  If the father
    tries to prevent an abortion, he MUST, however, take custody of
    the child after birth.
    
    Opinions?  [Donning my asbestos suit]
    
    P.S.  For the record, had abortion been available back when I was
    born, I would have been aborted.  Take my opinions knowing where
    they come from.  It probably has a BIG impact on why I feel the
    way I did.

re: model for thinking about abortions

In my ethics class, they came up with several strange scenarios for
thinking about abortion. I offer them for thought.

1) Someone kidnaps you while you're sleeping. You wake-up in a hospital,
linked via medical instruments, to a world-famous pianist. They tell
you, you're the only person who can keep the pianist alive. You have
to stay there until the pianist dies, or gets well (prognosis: about
18 years).

2) Same as above, but you only have to wait 9 months.

3) Same as 1 and 2, but you're linked to a poor old alcoholic. [The
fact that my class included this scenario makes me extremely
uncomfortable.]  

4) Airborn particles exist. If these particles take root in your carpet
or apolstry [sp?], they turn into live aliens. You can avoid this by
keeping your windows closed all the time, or by not having fabric in
the house. An alternative is to use screens, but screens don't work
a know percentage of the time.

	Mez

    It wasn't a famous pianist, it was a famous violinist.  And
    guess what?  He got to practice every day, and it didn't matter
    if you liked music or not!
    
    						Ann B.
    
    P.S.  Or we could try defining "human", and see if we can come
    up with a definition that includes defective blastoplasts and
    excludes talking apes.  Somehow I don't think we can.

    My concern:
    
    A woman who REALLY does not want to be pregnant WILL NOT BE PREGNANT.
    
    Men cannot really control this. It may be (still) the only thing
    they can't, in some fashion. (This bothers some men very much)
    
    The method this woman uses to not be pregnant depends (unfortunately)
    on the laws of the country/state. If there is no safe way to accomplish
    this, more than one "life" at a time is lost. We can aruge til the
    cows come home about whether the fetus was a "life". The *woman*
    was already a functional human being. THAT life is a given.
    
    Women should have access to SAFE methods of abortion.
    
    Legalized abortion forces *no-one* to act contrary to their standards,
    morals, etc. Legalized enforced pregnancy does.
    
    (Thud.) (jumping off soapbox...)
    
    Dawn
    

    re .55:
    
    Just whom do you trust to implement these restrictions on abortion?
    Our wonderful government, full of honest politicians and judges?  How
    do you exactly determine whether a woman was raped, whether she
    was using birth control, etc.  Leave the decision up to the individual,
    but *PLEASE*, *not* the US or Massachusetts government!
    
    	-Ellen

    Unfortunately, there are basically only three 'reliable'
    forms of birth control.  The first is abstinence, which
    is totally unacceptable to me.  The second is the pill,
    which is medically unsafe for me.  Also, those who are
    truely concerned about preserving life from the point of
    conception can rule out using birth control pills (which
    do not prevent conception, but rather the implantation of
    the fertilized egg) and iud's (same as above-also, I believe
    iud's are no longer available).  The final solution (final
    is the word!) is sterilization.  Even that is not 100% fool-
    proof.  
    
    "Mistakes" do happen.  Not out of ignorance, or lack of taking
    adequate protection, but because the particular form of birth
    control available to some women is not 100% reliable.
    
    Abortion is not an easy decision, but sometimes it's simply
    the best of two 'bad' choices.  
    
    My final conclusion is that it is best left up to the individual.
    
    

    To answer those who replied about my model:
    
    re .56: The ethical situations
    
    In cases 1-3, you were illegaly abducted.  They [the doctors] had
    no right to violate your privacy.  Get up and leave.
    
    In case 4, the aliens 'spores' or whatever, have tresspassed on
    your private property.  They are uninvited.  In NH, if someone doesn't
    leave your property, you can 'persuade' them to leave.
    
    re .57:  What is a human?
    
    My definition is an organism that is/has_been/could_be a self
    sustaining organism that falls into the category of "homo sapien".
    Defective blastoplasts are not human because they cannot become
    self-sustaining humans.  "Crippled" people USED to be completely
    self-sustaining.  Fertilized eggs can become self sustaining.
    
    That covers most cases.  Mind you, this is my OPINION.
    
    re .58: Access to legal abortions
    
    That's the law.  In those cases I outlined earlier, [rape, etc],
    women MUST be able to get to the clinic.
    
    re .59: Who watches?
    
    Who watches the watchers?  I don't have all the answers.  It seems,
    though, that the medical professiobn is a better place to start
    than arbitrary decision by
    cops/judges/anyone_with_no_medical_background.
    
    re .60:  What works...
    
    As I understand bc pills, it fools your body into thinking it's
    pregnant so that you don't ovulate.  It morally works for me.  Like
    I said, I'm more in favor of PREVENTION.  I always live by the phrase
    "Treat the disease, not the symptom".
    
    Mind you, I'm writing this with my wife looking over my shoulder.
    She and I are at odds on this subject.  Our compromise is that she
    wouldn't have one _herself_.  This makes me comfortable because
    she's almost 6 months pregnant with our first child.
    
    I know the arguments that pro-choicers present.  I even understand
    where they are coming from.  I just can't help thinking about the
    fact that I would have been aborted had it been legal back in the
    early '60s.  I was given up and got a better life than my biological
    parents could have possibly given me.
    
    The situation:  18-year-old becomes pregnant by a Navy man who's married
    to someone else.  Like I said, I would have been aborted.

    .61 DJPL I am often very thankful that four young women did not
    have abortions - the mothers of four of my children. I also whish
    that more women would choose to either use birth control - which
    is now readily and cheaply available, as it was not when I was
    a young woman, or if they have a contraceptive failure to give
    birth to the child and give it up for adoption, rather than abort
    as a result of contraceptive failure. (Which does not mean that
    I am against abortion!) It is so easy to have an open adoption now
    a days - where the young woman can choose the parents if she wishes,
    or send letters annoymously or just pictures, and any woman who
    gives a child up can almost guarantee that she will be able to meet
    her child again at 18 or older.
    
    When I was in college, birth control was almost non available and
    I was sympathetic with my friends who chose abortions (being seduced
    by all the propaganda - as we all were  - of the new joys of sexual
    freedom) rather than destroy their lives ( as I saw it then). But
    today it is easy to purchase contraceptives and there is massive
    material in all the media about the need to use them for a variety
    of reasons. I think that under those circumstances a girl/woman
    who becomes pregnant may well have had a subconscious desire for
    a child or...what ever....
    
    But I do strongly urge that pregnant young women be supported in
    what ever choice they make....and I dearly wish that more of them
    would make the choice to allow their child to live and make a
    childless family happy.
    
    Bonnie J

    Re: .45
    
    Lee, a little patience please. I chose my wording very carefully.
    No MAN has any right at all telling a woman what she can do with
    her body. I was reply to a male poster, and in particular my point
    was that HE had no right telling women whether or not they could
    have abortions.
    
    I feel very strongly about reproductive rights, and one of the things
    that bothers me most is pompous males spouting off about the morality
    of abortion. When males start carrying babies, then perhaps they
    will be qualified to judge. Until then, "if you don't play the game,
    you can't make the rules".
    
    My replies to women who believe that abortion is immoral have a
    VERY different flavor, since I'm not qualified to judge either.
    
    I think it's sad when people who should be allies fight. I understand
    how you are sensitized to the use of the word "man" to mean "person",
    but I was not so using. I meant MAN as opposed to WOMAN in my note,
    please do re-read it, in that light.
    
    	-- Charles

    re .63 I fail to see that it makes a difference if
    the proponents or opponents of abortion are male or female.
    The question is one of violating individual rights, and
    as such, should be decided on the merits of the arguments.
    An anti-abortionist advocates violating the rights of the 
    mother. I don't believe the gender of the person making
    such an argument has any bearing on the issue. HE/SHE is
    wrong in my book.

    How ironic it is that most of us have the benefit of age and experience
    and financial support and at least some wisdom :-), while a large
    number of the women who must choose whether or not to abort an unwanted
    pregnancy are very young, inexperienced, not self-supporting, scared
    and endangered, and just beginning to develop the wisdom that comes
    with experience.
    
    Most of us could 1)avoid getting pregnant when we don't want to
    most of the time, 2)get sufficient support throughout the pregnancy
    if we chose to carry a child for later adoption, 3)make our own
    decisions based on some adult life experience, 4)get out of a dangerous
    home situation if necessary.
    
    Oh yes, and many of us are well enough educated to assume that we
    can get a job that will allow us to pay for childcare while we go
    back to work if we decide to keep the child.
    
    We don't typify the population of people who are having to make
    *survival level* decisions about abortion, for the most part, which
    is not to say we and our co-workers do not ever have them. 

    .61

    You wrote, "In cases 1-3, you were illegaly abducted.  They
    [the doctors] had no right to violate your privacy.  Get up and leave."

    Do you really feel that because party A did something illegal that
    you have a right to kill party B?
    
    Then in your reply to me, you tried the definition, "[A human is]
    ... a self sustaining organism that [is] of `homo sapien[s]'."
    Sorry, that's 1. a tautology (a human is a member of the human race),
    and 2. leaves out people who go from womb to iron lung and the like.
    
    The you wrote, "Defective blastoplasts are not human because they
    cannot become self-sustaining humans."  This happens to not be true.
    Trisomy-21 (and trisomy-23 and monosomy-21) is an error which occurs
    at conception, but which is survivable.  Other trisomies are, indeed,
    fatal.  There are many other genetic errors which occur that early.

    							Ann B.    

    Re. happy not to have been aborted
    
    I should have been aborted too.  Same sort of situation.  But abortions
    were more available in the late fifties, early sixties than you
    may suspect; my mother checked it out and could have had an MD (a
    very good one, she says) perform one in his clinic.  She thought
    about it and decided not to, taking _lots_ of flak for that decision.
    It might be very interesting for the many of you who suspect you
    should have been abortions to ask your parents if they ever considered
    getting an illegal abortion.  
    
    Lee

	Douglas,
	In .51 I stated that I was not advocating better to not be born than
	to be born in certain situations.  I too love life and am glad
	I am alive, but I am not convinced that life is always so
	wonderful that it is worth putting up with every pain.  I truly
	do not know if it is better for the child to not be born in
	certain cases.  I do know that the life that already exists (the
	mother) should be able to control her life and that includes
	a child inside her.  I'm sorry, I don't believe that the life
	of a child supercedes that of the mother.  Sure it's innocent,
	and it isn't fair, but life isn't fair.  What's fair to the
	mother?

	I am sorry that I was generalizing pro-lifers as stopping
	caring at birth, but there seems to be a lot of anti-abortion
	advocates who also advocate anti-birth-control, anti-sex-
	education etc.

	My issue is not that I advocate abortion as an alternative
	to birth control.  My issue is that this is such a complex
	issue that I don't want others to judge for me what is right
	in my situation.  If I ever had to make that choice, it should
	be between me, my spouse, and my god (and my doctor's medical
	advice) and no one else.  I also doubt that I would choose
	to abort, but then you never know what you would do until
	something happens to you.  I abhor the thought of using abortion
	as a method of birth control.  But I think that is very rare
	and that more education and birth control accessibility will
	make it even more rare.  Hey, we still haven't outlawed guns,
	and they've been known to kill a lot more people.

	The 70 year old woman I mentioned had to go out of state
	to get her abortion, since that state declared abortions
	illegal.  I don't believe a Doctor could have advised it then.

	As to those who wouldn't have been here if abortion were illegal:
	You would not be here if your mother had used some effective
	method of birth control.  You wouldn't be here if your mother
	hadn't met your father.  I definately wouldn't advocate that
	no one should use birth control just in case some life was
	denied.  I wouldn't advocate that people should have sex
	with everyone they meet just in case some life was denied.
	Life is a matter of chance.  If you never had it, do you think
	you would miss it?

	Now as to adoption:  I really feel for those people who
	want to have children and can't for some reason.  They
	have a lot of love to give and it would be wonderful it
	were easier for them to adopt a child.  But I don't think
	that they have any right to expect that they should be
	able to get a child.  The issue when deciding to have an
	abortion is not always whether the mother can take care
	of the child.  You are implying that there are others who
	will do that when you bring up the issue of adoption.  The
	mother might have to decide between abortion and having
	physical problems that could be fatal.  Or sometimes just
	the potential of physical problems that they might not
	want to chance (and you'll never get a Dr.'s approval if the
	chances are low, but there).  It might be between being out
	of work and unable to afford to help your other children, or
	maybe losing the job forever (not all companies save jobs
	for people on maternity leave).  It might be losing the
	chance to get an education to bring yourself and your
	family into a better life.  It might be becoming an outcast
	from your family and community.  And I want to stress that
	most people do not decide to abort lightly.  It is often
	a very difficult decision.

	...Karen

    Re .66 and the "violinist" question:
    
    (I just *love* situation-ethics problems - you can keep adding
    conditions until almost any moral standards crack. But in the end I
    don't believe it really solves anything.) 
    
    The given circumstances have one glaring difference from the abortion
    question: *you* had nothing to do with the violinist's ailment.
    Therefore, no matter who hooked you up, you are not responsible
    for the person's life (well, not any more than your own value system
    would make you, anyway) and cannot be considered guilty of killing
    him if you choose to regain your freedom.
    
    In the case of pregnancy resulting from voluntary sex, it could
    be said that you *caused* this "ailment", and might be considered
    to have some responsibility for the patient. 

    Corollary to the violinist question: Right now, this very moment,
    there are people all over the world awaiting the donation of a kidney,
    the lack of which will eventually lead to their deaths. If you have
    a kidney to spare, but do not choose to donate it, are you guilty
    of the death of some total stranger?
    
    -b

    The following was sent to me by mail and the author agreed that
    I could enter it here if I removed her name.
    
    _______________________________________________________________
    
    Bonnie,
    
    Adoption is NOT as easy as you make it out to be - for one thing,
    you have to cope with agency people trying to talk you out of it
    every time you turn around - all they do is tell you how wonderful
    babies are and that you should SERIOUSLY consider keeping it
    regardless of financial status/capacity to care for it, etc.  It
    also COSTS quite a bit of money to keep the child in Foster Care
    while the paperwork and details are being worked out (again, they
    tend to recommend that you keep the baby yourself while this is
    all happening).
    
    Another thing is that now the biological FATHER must be involved in almost
    all phases of the process.  This is especially hard when the father
    doesn't want any part of this, or even worse, if HE wants to keep
    the kid, and the mother does NOT.  (even when he has no apparent
    way of supporting, nor the lifestyle condusive to bringing up a
    child).  If you do not name the father, the agency will post your
    name in the papers in a legal notice asking teh WORLD if anyone
    has had "relations" with you.  That doesn't sound terribly fun to
    me.
    
    It's not as easy as it sounds!  Sure, it's wonderful for the adopting
    parents - but it's absolute HELL on the biological mother.  Between
    the Legal, Moral, Emotional hassles, it's almost EASIER to keep
    the child, with all associated problems, than to go through this
    kind of procedure.
    
    Believe me - I know very well what happens - it's not easy, and I
    would have a hard time knowing someone who was going through this
    because it really wrecks a big chunk of your life, and sometimes
    the guilt really gets to you.
    
    I agree with lots of what you have to say, and please do not
    misconstrue this message to be a "nasty-gram".  Keep up the  good
    noting.
    
    

    re .66 [How can I justify committing murder on the violinist?]
    
    To that I say, thank you Beth [.69].  Your sentiments are EXACTLY
    what I was going to say.
    
    re .70 [Adoption ain't easy]
    
    I guess it differs from state to state.  An ex-girlfriend of mine
    gave up her child and it wasn't that difficult.  This IN NO WAY
    refutes what .70 says.  I merely state that more states should be
    easier on mother's who have decided to give up their children to
    a [hopefully] better life.
    
    ===========
    
    I don't know if I stated myself clearly enough but I DO support
    abortions when the mother's life is in danger.

    re .70
    I would like to add here the gist of what I said by mail.
    I had no idea that the agencies made things so diffcult
    for women who  wanted to give children up for adoption,
    nor was I aware that they had to pay the foster care fees
    for their children while they are making up their minds.
    
    
    additional thoughts -
    
    it appears to me that the agencies aren't really telling
    the potential adoptive parents the straigt story. We were
    told that the high fees were for the support of all the
    children in foster care because the mothers couldn't be
    expected to pay, and that very few women were even interested
    in adoption.
    
    Bonnie J.

    .70 has hit the nail right on the head.  All the mother gets for
    considering adoption is humiliation and grief. 
    
    My oldest daughter was born when I was 19 and unmarried, and I
    seriously considered giving her up for adoption. Montana at the time
    was in the middle of a serious if localized depression, I was living
    with my parents because I had no job and no hope of a job in the
    forseeable future, and I knew so many loving childless couples longing
    to have a child. Much as I wanted to keep her, it seemed like giving
    her up would be far better for her. 
    
    I arranged for my first appointment a couple of months before the
    birth. There were two agency workers at the desk when I walked in, and
    one of them looked at the other one and said, as if I wasn't there,
    "Another one who can't stand to have the baby interfere with her fun?"
    His (female) coworker replied, "At least she won't be loading down the
    welfare rolls." 
    
    I bet they still have a scorch mark on their ceiling from where
    I blew up . . . I just walked out, determined that I was going to
    do a better job on my own than those (expletive deleted) jerks.
    
    Another young woman I got to know at the same time told me that
    there was no help available at all for the grief she went through
    at giving up her child.  She was only 15 and didn't know she didn't
    have to put up with that kind of ****, so she let them bully and
    humiliate her into giving up the baby.  It was probably the right
    decision, but for the wrong reasons, and after she put the baby
    into foster care, she just disappeared as far as the agency was
    concerned.  When she tried to ask how the baby was doing, they wanted
    to know why she cared, it wasn't hers any more.

    What really rankled was their assumption that we both got pregnant
    because we were working class girls and that was all we were good
    for. The best they could hope for was to keep us off welfare and
    out of jail.
    
    Enough.  I don't want to scorch DEC's ceilings, too . . .
    
    --bonnie
        

I guess it's different in NH.  If the last two entries are indicitive of 
the nationwide climate surrounding adoption agencies, then I think it's 
time for a refocusing of ideals.

I, for one, have always supported adoption.  I had [apparently incorrectly] 
assumed that other pro-lifers shared my views.  If the aforementioned 
replies are representative of what it's like, then it's no wonder that 
adoption is not chosen more often.

I'm also beginning to believe that the 'pro-choice' people are more correct 
than I would like to think when they say that the 'pro-life' group cares 
about the pregnancy and not the situation after the birth.

If the above is true, then I think it's time for a major refocusing of 
ideas.  We, as pro-life, cannot have it both ways.  We cannot say that 
mother's have to bear the children without providing as much as possible 
for said child.  After all, isn't that our stated concern?

Personally, I think I would now push more for adoption reform before 
abortion reform.  I think it's a case where we would have to put the 
support system in place before chaging the system that would "feed" it.

For all those who wonder if noting changes anything or anyone, well, it 
has.  I'm still pro-life, but, after reading these and others, I am more 
concerned now with making the adoption process easier.

I had assumed that the problem with the "long adoption lines" was primarily 
a lack of mothers giving up their babies.  Right now, I feel that the 
adoption agencies are just as much to blame as abortion.

Why can't there ever be a happy 'medium'?

    re: .74
    
    If even a few more people were as honest and caring as you are,
    we'd soon have, if not a happy medium, at least a much more
    compassionate system.
    
    The truth is, there is NO support of any kind for an unwed mother, no
    matter what her choice.  Welfare might be survival (some places it
    isn't even that) but it isn't support.  Whatever you do is wrong. In
    fact, it often seemed to me that the entire purpose of the social
    systems for dealing with pregnancy in teenagers is to punish us for
    having dared to be sexual. 
    
    Why not abortion?  Why put yourself through months of discomfort
    if not outright sickness so some other woman can have a cute little
    baby to play with?  And for thanks you get belittled and humiliated.
    
    But if you keep your baby you have someone to share your misery,
    someone who doesn't put you down and is grateful for every little thing
    you do. You might be on welfare but at least you're in a known place. 

    Either way, you feel like a tool of the system, a slave of all those
    white middle-class women who want to take away everything you have
    and then make fun of you because you let them do it. 
    
    I managed to get an education and a good job while raising a daughter
    alone (at least at first), but that doesn't mean that all young women
    in my situation are able to do the same.  Even if they have enough
    experience in the world to know how to get the training to get out,
    they often don't have the resources to carry through.  It's tough
    enough on your own; doubly and triply tough if you have to worry about
    the child, too. I'd be the last person to tell someone else they
    could do it if they had enough guts. It's not true.

    By the time the social service system in this country gets through with
    you, you don't have much self-respect left.  You know that whether or
    not you have the baby, you're just a problem to be solved, a case
    number on the social-service docket. If you're lucky, as I was, you
    have enough anger to push you on.  Otherwise, "pro-choice" and
    "pro-life" are both equally bad jokes, with you as the butt. 

    --bonnie

    I've had trouble putting together my thoughts and feelings
    for this reply.  As someone who has had an abortion, I
    am infuriated at the thought that ANYONE can presume to tell
    me that what I should have done. My life, my body, my fetus, my 
    (potential) baby don't belong to anyone else but me, and aren't at 
    anyone else's disposal but my own.  Maybe I don't want an
    "open" adoption where some lovely yuppie couple sends me
    photos once a year.  Maybe I don't like the idea of carrying
    a child and giving birth to someone I'll never see, to be fed
    into the adoption mill as if it were a commodity I somehow
    ought to produce for the world.

    I'm the mother of two children, and had the abortion just after
    my divorce.  It would have just crushed my attempts to start a
    new life for myself after getting as close to absolute zero as a human
    being can get and still live.  Having had children, I know well enough what
    it means, and having an abortion is not a thing I could do without
    serious consideration, but I have no question in my mind whatsoever
    that it was the right thing to do, and I would do the same thing
    over again if I had to.
    
    No one has the right to rape me -- in that sense our society 
    concedes a woman's right to control the sexual use of her own body.  
    As a logical extension to that, I feel like being forced to give 
    birth is that same thing as rape -- a denial of a woman's right 
    to determine the way her own body is used.  Women's wombs do
    not belong to men, to the government, or to all those lovely
    childless couples who just need to buy the perfect baby to
    complete their perfect upper middle class lives.  I owe none 
    of them anything at all, while I owe myself the obligation
    to make the right decisions for MY life.  No one else should
    have that power over me.

        I won't classify myself as pro-life or pro-choice. I mean how
        can you be anti-life or anti-freedom? I will say with no more
        apologies than Catherine Iannuzo that I think abortion is just
        plain wrong. On the other hand, in the last 19 years I've
        figuratively and literally held the hands of lady friends who
        went through with abortions. I supported them with all my
        heart and with all my abilities, even if I could not agree
        with their decision.
        
        To my sense of ethics it is wrong. I guess that makes me
        pro-life. On the other hand, it is not my decision not my
        judgment that matters. Each of us have to make our own moral
        choices and even our own mistakes. If someone I care about
        chooses to do that of which I disapprove I will support them.
        Maybe that makes me pro-choice.
        
        I would like to see abortion promoted less than it is. It seems
        to me that it is of a sufficiently questionable moral character
        that more care could be taken in making it acceptable and in
        advocating it. I also feel that if the numbers of abortions that
        happen annually that I've heard reported are true then far far
        too many people are treating it too casually.
        
        But strongly though I feel about these issues and about the
        ethics of the act itself, I feel it is even more important that
        we not allow issues to block our vision of people. The plight
        and suffering of the girls and women who find themselves
        contemplating abortion should be our primary concern. If we can
        love and support them, then maybe we can get control of the
        problem. Issues are just abstractions. The people are the concrete
        reality. 
        
        JimB.

    re .77:
    
    Catherine, thank you *very much* for sharing your story!  Your thoughts
    on the subject match mine exactly!
    
    	-Ellen

    re .77, .79
    
    
                Ditto!!!!
    
    
    
    (Catherine, I admire your courage!  And I understand ie empathize
     completely with your experience and your feelings!  Bravo!)
    
    

	What if you have Chronic Epstein Barr (which is known to
	cause birth defects in the first trimester), and your Doctor
	didn't tell you until after you were pregnant?  Now it
	doesn't always cause birth defects.  There's also not a lot
	of danger to the mother's life.  I wouldn't want some
	legislation make this decision.  It must be very tough on
	a couple who got pregnant becuase the wanted a child to
	have to make this decision without having to get X number
	of Dr. approvals etc.

    
    
    re .77, .79, .80
    
    As a mother of two young teenagers, facing the end of marriage I
    found myself considering abortion, instead complications set in
    and I nearly died in the second month of pregnancy.  That was
    seven years ago last month.  
    
    No one has the right to tell a woman she must put her life on the
    line for anything or anyone.
    
    _peggy		(-)
    			 |	The Goddess just is ....

    No one should tell a woman to put her life on the line for anything
    or anyone.
    No one should tell a woman what or what not to do with her body.
    A foetus is a human life but that doesn't count.

re: some common sentiments

>    No one should tell a woman to put her life on the line for anything
>    or anyone.

	Whatever happened to dealing with the consequences of your actions?  
If I were king, it would be a lot harder to get in the position of having 
to make this decision without being informed UP FRONT [mandatory education] 
about the possible consequences of sexual relations.

	Although there are exceptions to every rule, the 'model' I outlined 
in .55 tries to take into consideration *how you got in the predicament*.  
If it was your own free will, that's when my dander gets up.  I also 
outlined some of the exceptions [rape, incest, health problems, etc.].  All 
"blanket statements" have an exception [well, most].

>    No one should tell a woman what or what not to do with her body.
>    A foetus is a human life but that doesn't count.

	Personal opinion, but you may have some real problems there.  Just 
when does a human life "count"?

    re: you got into your predicament of your own free will...
    
    What about birth control failure?  I made a decision to use
    a certain type of birth control that didn't work, now I have
    to have a baby? 

    What about marital rape, a concept not even legally recognized
    in many states?  Maybe I made a stupid decision because I was
    young and emotionally deprived, married an inconsiderate 
    son-of-a-bitch, now I have to have a baby?

    Having an abortion IS dealing with the consequences of my
    actions.  I'm not expecting anyone else to get me out of this.
    If god's gonna get me for it, then that's fine with me.
    As far as the fetus being a human being is concerned, if it's
    a choice between my life and it's life, I'm sorry, but it's going
    to be my life.  Men make decisions like this in war all the time,
    and they seem to be able to live with it.  In that case, they're
    taking the lives of fully developed humans who have lovers, spouses, 
    children, complete lives, but the same folks pushing for
    human rights for fetuses don't seem to be working as hard for
    the rights of adults to live in Nicaragua, Vietnam, etc.

    I notice it's mostly men that get so worked up about the rights
    of the fetus as a human being.  I expect it has to do with the
    fact that they've got no real control over the life process,
    and it's infuriating to them.  Unless women's wombs belong
    to the patriarchal society, then they can't force anyone to
    have their babies for them, can they?

    
    
    re -1 Catherine you did it again, said what I am thinking/feeling
    much better than I do.
    
    If all pregnancies were well planned by the mother for the right
    reasons then there would be no reason for abortions.
    
    _peggy
    

    Well, if all pregnancies were well planned, et cetera, there
    would be far fewer abortions.  But consider the case....
    
    "Darling, I'm pregnant!  Isn't it wonderful!"  And Darling cleans
    out the bank account, hauls away the furniture, and leaves for
    parts unknown while she's at work the next day.
    
    Different subject:
    
    Did you know that antibiotics can negate the effectiveness of birth
    control pills?  Has *your* doctor told you about this?  I have a
    friend whose doctor neglected this little datum.  So she was
    pregnant, didn't know it, and kept taking her pills (which is not
    recommended).  She miscarried, and nearly died, because she didn't
    understand what was going on!
    
    I'm sorry, but there are just too many ways for pregnancy prevention
    to fail.
    
    							Ann B.

    From a slightly different angle - I just read an article on the
    AP wire about a woman who had been given a Caesarian by court order.
    The article said doctors agreed that a normal birth would probably be
    fatal to the baby and perhaps to the mother. 
    
    The image of a pregnant woman dragged screaming into surgery isn't
    pretty. I gather from the report that this woman didn't put up a
    fight once the court order was signed, but what would they have
    done if she had?
    
    There are lots of circumstances that could have a bearing on this, of
    course. If the woman has an irrational fear of surgery, or isn't
    mentally competent to make the decision, would it be fair to let that
    cause the deaths of her and her child? But what if it's a *rational*
    fear; and what would happen if, after such an order, either mother or
    child died anyway? 

    -b

    .85,
    
    > As far as the fetus being a human being is concerned, if it's
    > a choice between my life and it's life, I'm sorry, but it's going
    > to be my life.
    
    I agree with this!  A life for a life.
    
    > Men make decisions like this in war all the time,
    > and they seem to be able to live with it.
    
    I don't agree with the analogy here.  Firstly, I don't agree with
    war either, but someone caught out on the battlefield whether willingly
    or unwillingly, is in a definite life-or-death situation.  If you
    don't shoot, the other guy most probably won't throw up his weapon
    and say "Trick or Treat?".  Secondly, if we rule out all situations
    involving a potential threat to the life of the mother, then there
    is no loss of life involved.  Hence the analogy cannot apply.
    
    > Having an abortion IS dealing with the consequences of my actions.
    
    Agreed !  However, there are actually two parties involved here
    and the party whose life is affected most by the abortion does
    not even have a say !  The act of abortion cannot be judged
    absolutely as right or wrong because of all the examples and models
    anybody and everybody can think of.  What is wrong is the legislation
    of abortion allowing people the chance to abuse it without paying
    for the consequences.  Think of it.  What are the potential situations
    that can lead to the consequence of abortions ?  Marital rape,
    extra-marital rape, incest all sound reasonable.  How about
    birth control failure ?  All because of a broken condom ?
    Instead of 
    
    > I made a decision to use a certain type of birth control that
    > didn't work, now I have to have a baby?
    
    Why can't we say,
    
    I made a decision to use a certain type of birth control that 
    didn't work, now I have to abort the life of the baby.
    
    The issue here is making abortion, a capital penalty to the foetus, 
    free and available to the public.  By doing this, we legislate that
    the life of a foetus is now as cheap as the cost of the abortion.
    When the life of a burglar is taken in an act of self-defence, there
    is still a hearing to determine whether the taking of that life
    is right or wrong.  How come the baby doesn't get the same break ?

re: Why [in the case of bc failure, marriage rape] must a pregnancy go to 
term.

Glad to see my 'model' is generating well-thought-out replies and not 
intense flaming.

In that model, I stated that, in the case of contraceptive failure or 
'other' pregnancies, that's when state-supported health care [if necessary] 
comes into play.  Take care of the mother [if she needs/wants it] and 
SUPPORT; DO NOT TORTURE/DENIGRATE the mother!

Marriage-rape?  That's rape.  I don't care what the courts have/haven't 
said yet.  When a woman says NO, IT'S RAPE!  Therefore, in the model I 
outlined in [I think] .55, it [the pregnancy] was not entered into 
voluntarily.  Due to that, it falls into the rape/incest/life-in-danger 
situation where abortions [in my mind] are warranted [even though the 
thought still saddens me].

I guess I have to admit that I can see where pro-choice people are afraid 
of any limitations on abortions.  If I were in their shoes, I would be 
afraid that, if I qualified for an abortion and needed one, some 
beaureaucratic nonsense would misinterpret a law/whatever and put me 
through hell.

In retrospect, it's probably like religious rights.  You can't legislate 
that some religions are legal sometimes and not other times.  That's what 
allows Moonies, cults and other questionable religions.  In the case of 
abortion, you have to put up with a situation you may not like in order to 
prevent a worse situation [back-alley abortions, etc.].

I'm still looking for responses to one of my other ideas.  That is, when 
the mother wants an abortion and the father wants the baby, who "wins"?

Let us suppose, for the sake of argument, the pregnancy was entered into 
willingly, ie; no rape, no bc failure, no extraneous situations at all, 
just a pregnant woman who wants an abortion and a man who wants that baby 
that is also his.

My belief is that, if the man demands the woman have the baby, he must 
support that child.  The fact that the woman wanted an abortion might give 
a good argument to awarding sole custody to the father due to the fact that 
the mother has clearly demonstrated [by wanting an abortion] that she has 
no desire to have that child.

Opinions?

>    My belief is that, if the man demands the woman have the baby, he must 
>support that child.  The fact that the woman wanted an abortion might give 
>a good argument to awarding sole custody to the father due to the fact that 
>the mother has clearly demonstrated [by wanting an abortion] that she has 
>no desire to have that child.

    In addition to paying for the support of the child the father should
    pay hospital costs, any pay the woman lost during pregnancy and
    recovery, any difference in pay if the woman loses seniority because
    of the pregnancy, legal fees (the father must accept all responsibility
    for the child), plus a large bonus for pain and suffering.  In
    other words something similar to a surrogate mother arrangement.
    
    This might sweeten the deal enough to make an unwillingly pregnant
    woman think twice, but the decision should still be hers.
    
    			Barbara b.

>< Note 34.91 by PASCAL::BAZEMORE "Barbara b." >
>                     -< Father demands baby = rent-a-womb >-
>
>>    My belief is that, if the man demands the woman have the baby, he must 
>>support that child.  The fact that the woman wanted an abortion might give 
>>a good argument to awarding sole custody to the father due to the fact that 
>>the mother has clearly demonstrated [by wanting an abortion] that she has 
>>no desire to have that child.
>
>    In addition to paying for the support of the child the father should
>    pay hospital costs, any pay the woman lost during pregnancy and
>    recovery, any difference in pay if the woman loses seniority because
>    of the pregnancy, legal fees (the father must accept all responsibility
>    for the child), plus a large bonus for pain and suffering.  In
>    other words something similar to a surrogate mother arrangement.
>    
>    This might sweeten the deal enough to make an unwillingly pregnant
>    woman think twice, but the decision should still be hers.
>    
>    			Barbara b.
 
	It seems as if the father wants the baby and the mother doesn't,
	the mother can just "walk away" with no ties.  But, if the father
	doesn't want the baby and the mother does, the father can't just
	up and leave.  By your explanation, this seems to be a double standard.

								Jim

	I know that this does happen (father up and leaving), this is just
	food for thought...

    It seems as though (almost) everything I had to say on the subject
    has been said.  As some of you may remember, I came from WPI where
    we have a BBOARD in the DEC20 (similar to this notes file).  The 
    issue of abortion was raised and the responses were about as heated 
    as they are here.  One surprise though:  Almost everyone on the
    BBOARD is male, I would say about 3 females off and on.  Yet there
    were plenty of pro-choicers out there.  So you women here who
    complained that the male is bound to be anti-abortion, take heart.
    The younger generation of men is more liberal than you think!
    
    As for my comment, I believe I said something like:  "If they ban
    abortion I will rip it out with my bare hands."  I think you can
    guess what my opinions are on the subject. ;-)
      
    

    I understand what that person was saying.  I have thought about
    this myself.  I don't like double standards, but that's what my
    ideas on this have been.
    
    I believe that the man created the child the same as the woman did,
    and that if she keeps the child then he should have to pay child
    support.  However, I like Barbara b.'s idea about the man paying
    all the expenses plus extra if he wants the baby and the woman doesn't.
    Of course, he would have to raise the child as well.  This is a
    double standard.  I am saying that of 2 people who create a child
    that one can have all the say over whether or not she will support
    the child and that the other person should have little or no say
    in the matter.  I am saying that the man has to pay either way,
    whether or not he wants a child, and that the woman only has to
    pay if she wants to.  This is not fair.  Or is it?
    
                      Carol

RE: fairness
	Is it fair that men can't biologically bear children?  Is it
	fair that women do?  So why should the decision be "fair"?
	I too would give the woman the final word, since it's her
	body that goes through the pregnancy even if the father
	is a caring person who wants the child and is willing to
	financially support the woman.

	...Karen

    .96> I am saying that the man has to pay either way,
       > whether or not he wants a child, and that the woman only has to
       > pay if she wants to.  This is not fair.  Or is it?

    My point was that if a woman carries a baby for nine months she
    is paying a greater price than the man who invested a few pleasurable
    minutes.  After the baby is out of the womb the father can assume
    the costs for it.  While the woman is pregnant the father can not
    protect her from the physical strain and health risks caused by
    the fetus.  The woman pays this price and it should be up to her
    whether she is willing to accept it.  
    
    So the woman may decline to pay by declining to have the baby. 
    If she chooses to carry to full term, then she is paying, though
    in my previous proposal she was being reimbursed financially.
   
    I agree that the support issue may seem to be a double standard after
    the birth.  The man is not able to force the woman to get an abortion
    and end all possibility of future child support liability.  A possible
    solution to this is that there be a formal process in which the
    man may request the woman get an abortion, and if she does not then
    she is solely responsible for the child.  This is obviously pie-in
    the-sky and likely to be abused (not that women requesting abortions
    isn't abused occasionally).  
    
    			Barbara b.
    
      

        A friend recently loaned me a recent issue of the National
        Federation of Decency Journal. It contains what I think is an
        interesting article especially as it relates to this discussion.
        I doubt that many here will fully agree with the article. I
        don't. In fact some of the notes here have attempted to rebut
        its position. None-the-less, I thought you might be interested.
        
                           Copied without permission
        
                            The unmentioned word in
                         the abortion debate: adoption
        
                             By Michael J. McManus
        
            January 18 was Sanctity of Human Life Sunday, a day when
            30,000 pastors preached on the evils of abortion says
            the Christian Action Counsil's Curtis Young. The theme
            was "Defend the Fatherless," (Isaiah 1:17).
            
            On the other hand, many churches ignored the day who
            believe that abortion is a necessaryu evil, given the
            soaring rate of illegitimacy in the country. The number
            tripled from 224,300 in 1960 to 737,800 in 1983.
            
            There is an alternative that seems lost in this abortion
            debate: adoption. It is a word which ought to be heard
            from the pulpits on Sanctity of Human Life Sunday--
            regradless of one's position on abortion.
            
            "There are two million couples waiting to adopt a child
            and not more than 50,000 babies a year up for adoption--
            40 parents for one child," says William Pierce, director
            of the National Committee for Adoption.
            
            Those 50,000 adoptions are a pathetic six percent of the
            737,800 babies born illegitimately. And they are a
            substantial decline from the 89,200 adoptions in 1970--
            or 22 percent of unwed births in that year.
            
            The nation's largest adoption agency, with offices in 30
            states, Bethany Christian Services, based in Grand
            Rapids, Michigan placed only 909 children for adoption,
            589 of whom came from abroad!
            
            What's wrong? Why aren't Christians--particularly those
            who see abortion as murder--trying to convince pregnant
            women, particularly the 270,000 unwed teenagers who give
            birth, to give their children up for adoption to intact
            families headed by a husband and wife? 
            
            There are three problems.
            
            First, the stigma of being an unwed mother has largely
            disapeared. The culture's conventional wisdom now is
            that it is OK for women to bring up children alone.
            Considser Madonna's hit song, "Papa Don't Preach:" 
                
                Papa don't preach, I'm in trouble deep.
                Papa don't preach, I've been losing sleep.
                But I made up my mind, I'm keeping my baby.
                I'm gonna keep my baby, mmmm...
            
            But reality is much harsher than those lyrics or
            conventional wisdom suggests. An unwed mother who keeps
            her baby is two and a half times more likely to end up
            on public assistance than one who gives hers up for
            adoption. Only 60 percent of those with babies get a
            high school diploma vs. 77 percent of those who
            relenquish the child.
            
            Perhaps most important to the woman, her odds of
            eventually getting married increase by 50 percent if she
            gives the baby to adoptive parents! The data comes from
            interviews with 8,000 women aged up to 44, on what
            happened to them if their first child was born out of
            wedlock. 
            
            Finally, it should be added that three out of four
            single mothers under age 25 live in poverty. And the
            estimated welfare cost of supporting teenage mothers and
            their children is $16 billion.
            
            The second reason why adoption is chosen by so few women
            is that those who are counselling pregnant women are
            often poorly informed themselves, and have biases which
            lead them either to push one of two options: abortion or
            "keeping your baby." The 50,000 mothers in Christian
            Action Council counselling have the same poor 6 percent
            adoption rate as seen in the secular world. 
            
            Finally, very little real love is shown to unwed
            mothers. The pro-life and pro-choice people fight over
            the birth of the baby, but how many expectant mothers
            have the option of moving into a licensed, small group
            shelter with loving care? Close you [sic] eyes and guess
            how many centers there are in America for 737,000 unwed
            mothers a year.
            
            Did you guess 150 residences that can serve 2,000 women?
            
            In fact, there were 201 homes serving 6,000 women in
            1966; but by 1981 there were only 91 to aid 1,676 women.
            They are growing slowly again due to the National
            Committee for Adoption (NCA). Why? Some 4-50 percent of
            the residents will relenquish the babies--seven times
            the average rate!
            
            "Adoption is a byproduct of a caring approach for
            pregnant women in crisis," says NCA's Bill Pierce. "the
            percent of white women who place their children for
            adoption who receive counselling is 21 percent; but only
            2.7 percent of those who did not get counselling do so." 

            Sadly, women need such centers to get away from parents
            who pressure them to keep the baby--as a punishment, or
            because parents want to grandparents. "Boy friends" have
            the same impact. Babies of women who don't talk to
            parents are three times as likely to be adopted, and are
            five times as likely among women who avoid the boy
            friend.
            
            In Seatle, the Western Association of Concerned Adoptive
            Parents annually places 500 children for adoption. "We
            have the solution. We even allow the birth mother to
            choose her family!" said the director, Janice Neilson.
            "the mother wins, the family wins, the baby wins." 
            
            That's what Pierce says, "A residential center is needed
            to give the woman a milieu in which she can objectively
            make a decision." To learn more, write Bill Pierce, NCA,
            Suite 512, 2025 M St. NW, Washington, DC 20036. 
            
        I thought the article would be of interest to WomanNoters
        because although the values and viewpoint of the author are
        clearly not in synch with the views of most of the members of
        the file, some of what he says might ring true. I doubt his
        feeling that the lowered ability to get married might be "most
        important to the woman" will sit well with anyone who feels that
        they are a feminist, nor would most readers of the file say that
        it is a problem that "the stigma of being an unwed mother has
        largely disappeared."
        
        On the other hand the observation by a conservative Christian
        that "very little real love is shown to unwed mothers", and his
        criticism that pro-life and pro-choice people fight while the
        unwed mother is ignored sounds rather like the complaints of
        many feminists.
        
        This article seems to me to be by someone who understands the
        point that all of the arguments over the principles involved
        mustn't be allowed to outweigh the needs of the real people
        caught up in the situation. It paints, for me, a picture of at
        least one pro-lifer (as I assume Mr. McManus to be) who is
        truly motivated by compassion.
        
        JimB.

    I like that, Jim.  Thanks for sharing it.
    
    A friend of mine, who never wanted children, was raped when she
    was 21.  She became pregnant, was able to go to one of those shelters
    (this was 20 years ago), and gave up the baby for adoption.
    I did not realize how rare those shelters have become.
    
    I like the idea that more women are encouraged to give up the child
    for adoption, especially when it is stressed that whatever decision
    they make will be supported.  It seems for many teens today, it
    has become "in vogue" to get pregnant and keep the child.  I really
    do not think that most of these young ladies are really aware or
    prepared for the time, energy, and money that raising children takes.
    I hope that more people can become supportive of the mother regardless
    of her choice.
    
                  Carol
    

    Re: .69 and others. I find it hard to cry for the lives of aborted
    babies when so many of the world's children are born to starve to
    death or live sub-human lives in poverty. All of us (in the western
    countries) are helping to starve third world children every day.
    The farmers are paid to grow specialty foods for us rather than
    feed their country. Our nations dump dangerous pesticides, birth
    control devices and defective drugs on the third world so the
    manufacturer can recoup the loses when they are banned in the modern
    countries. We are very lucky to be able to worry about single deaths, 
    to much of the worlds population death is something that comes in
    mass quantities.
                liesl

>< Note 34.101 by IMAGIN::KOLBE "Mudluscious and puddle-wonderfull" >
>                       -< who's quilty of murder here? >-

	Nice way to start a note.

>					All of us (in the western
>    countries) are helping to starve third world children every day.

	Excuse me, but aren't you being a little too accusatory here?

>    The farmers are paid to grow specialty foods for us rather than
>    feed their country.

	Isn't the act of growing food [specialty or otherwise] feeding our 
country?

>			Our nations dump dangerous pesticides, birth
>    control devices and defective drugs on the third world so the
>    manufacturer can recoup the loses when they are banned in the modern
>    countries. We are very lucky to be able to worry about single deaths, 
>    to much of the worlds population death is something that comes in
>    mass quantities.

	How long are people going to continue to heap the guilt of all the 
world's problems on each and every individual as if each one was solely 
responsible for *all* evils?

	How can you be concerned with writing notes to us insensitive 
people when these problems are in the world?  That's how we can be 
concerned with those topics that touch us.

	You ask for compassion with these world events, yet ridicule those 
who feel compassionate to other issues.  You act as if that was all they 
worry about and world hunger never enters their mind.

	I feel somewhat insulted that someone has told that their 'care for 
life' is somehow more noble than mine.  You act as if I don't give a damn 
about world hunger.  Well I do.  The topic of this discussion was about 
reproductive rights and things related to that.  There are topics to 
discuss world hunger, poverty, etc.

	Through all of this, I hope I am misinterpereting you.  If I am, 
please forgive me.

    
    
    The need to be concerned with life after birth for everyone
    is what I think Liesl meant.  Many anti-pro-choice people
    do not take world hunger into consideration when they tell
    women that they are murders when they get abortions.  For
    every child born in the United States the food for (this is
    an approximation) 3 children in third world counties is taken
    away from them.  What I am trying to say is that we in the
    United States do not need and may not have the right to continue
    to exist at our present standard of living without being "our
    brothers/sisters keeper".
    
    I am an active pro-choice supporter and I am also an active
    supporter of Oxfam, Sharing Inc., and programs that feed the
    hungary in the Lowell area.  These activities are part of my
    view of the world - I think it is called "The Global Village"
    concept.
    
    BTW- Each and everyone of us is responsible for the "evils"
    in the world because the "world" is made up of each and everyone
    of us.
    
    _peggy		(-)
    			 |   The Earth is all we have
    				and we have to share it
    
    

re: < Note 34.103 by BUFFER::LEEDBERG "Truth is Beauty, Beauty is Truth" >

>    				Many anti-pro-choice people

	Dare I ask why you took steps to avoid using the term 'pro-life'?  
I'm not sure whether you are making an accusation, statement of opinion, or 
what.

>    do not take world hunger into consideration when they tell
>    women that they are murders when they get abortions.

	Well, if the child was born in Ethiopia, I would agree with you.  
However, hunger on this side of the pond [North America specifically] has 
as it's most tragic point, the incredible food surplus going on.  This is a 
problem with Administration policy and food distribution along with free 
market demands on the price of food.

>							For
>    every child born in the United States the food for (this is
>    an approximation) 3 children in third world counties is taken
>    away from them.

	We're not taking anything away from anybody.  The stuff is just
sitting there rotting in a warehouse. 

>			What I am trying to say is that we in the
>    United States do not need and may not have the right to continue
>    to exist at our present standard of living without being "our
>    brothers/sisters keeper".

	Some good point in that [my opinion, only] but before I would start 
'punishing' or 'taking away' from Americans/those-that-have and give it to 
Ethiopians/those-who-don't, why don't we try a real radical idea?

	NSA, CIA, FBI, are you listening?  Why doesn't the government take 
a LARGE portion of the food we have sitting in the warehouses [not just 
cheese] and DONATE it to Oxfam and groups like it.  It would have no impact 
on the farmer as he doesn't own the food anyway [technically, it belongs to 
We The People], you would make any more impact on the domestic food market 
[a common excuse for not distributing it here], you [We The People] 
wouldn't have to pay to store it anymore and Oxfam could take it's 
donations and concentrate on distribution rather than purchasing food.

>    I think it is called "The Global Village" concept.

	Nice concept and , in principle, I agree with it.  I just have had 
a lot of people [not necessarily here] heap a load of guilt on me for not 
personally undertaking every world problem on my shoulders.  My _opinion_ 
is that I'm a realist and too much of a good thing is bad.  I do, however, 
try to do what I can.
    
>    BTW- Each and everyone of us is responsible for the "evils"
>    in the world because the "world" is made up of each and everyone
>    of us.

	I'm not flaming or anything like that, but, isn't there a better 
way to put that?  I know that it's well intentioned, but my instinctive 
reaction was that it was another guilt trip.  I had to read it twice before 
I got, what I believe to be, the intended message.

	To tie this in with the topic, that is why I believe that quoting 
'world hunger/evils/whatever' as support for a pro-choice stance doesn't 
cut it.  There seem to be MANY better reasons as to why women should have 
access to abortions.  I outlined some way back in [I think] .55.

	I suppose that I'm trying to say is "Fine, have your abortion, but 
what good did it do the starving people in Africa" if that's what they give 
as justification.

	It just seemed to cop out on what MUST be a difficult and 
emotionally gut-wrenching decision for a woman.

    to djpl:
    
    now it it feels like we're getting somewhere. you're really listening
    and thinking about what's being said.  and at this point, we can
    start having a conversation.
    
    thanks
    liz augustine

    RE: "pro-life" "anti-choice"
    
    Using the term "pro-life" makes it's opposite "anti-life", and feeds
    into the infalammatory verbiage that surrounds this issue. I doubt
    you could find anyone who is "anti-life"
    
    I am "pro-choice" - the opposite is "anti-choice". *That* terminology
    accurately describes the situation.
    
    Dawn
    

    
    
    I did not mean to imply that world hunger was a good reason 
    to have an abortion but that world hunger is a good reason
    to keepl abortion/birth control available to women who want it.
    
    _peggy
    

    Given the fact that Americans eat a great deal of meat rather
    than the grains and vegetables that make up the diet of a great
    deal of the rest of the world it is not incorrect to say that
    one American uses enough food to feed 3 or more third world 
    individuals. Were we as a nation to eat less meat the grain we
    produce would feed up to  a potential maximum of 10X as many people
    as it now does by being first turned into cow or pig or chicken
    (beef being the most inefficient use of grain to produce food.)
    
    Bonnie J

re .107

[For the moment, lets put the abortion issue aside.]

Agreed about the birth control issue.  ESPECIALLY in Africa.  In fact, 
that's one of the contributing reasons I left the Catholic Church.

When the Pope went to Africa, I was incredulous at the idea that he could 
preach against birth control in such a starvation-wracked region of the 
world.

[We now resume our regularly scheduled programming]

    Back to women who have abortions.
    
    I recall reading somewhere several years ago that there are a sizable
    number of women who have multiple (5 or more) abortions during the
    course of several years.  It was discovered that many of these women
    had a subconscious (or, sometimes conscious) desire to know that
    there was a life inside them, living and growing, and that their
    body 'works'.  When the reality of the situation set in (money,
    availablility of childcare, opinions of family, etc.) they chose
    to have an abortion, only to later 'need' the feeling of producing
    lie, an*Oget pregnant again.  Most of these women understand birth
    control, and failure potential of various methods, and choose to
    use the *very* unreliable ones (astrological methods, calendar rhythym
    method, douching).  This supports the idea that these women really
    did want to be pregnant, but not to become mothers.
    
    Perhaps these women should be identified and given psychological
    help, rather than, as Dave (DJPL) suggests, tell them 'no dice'
    for an abortion.
    
    Elizabeth
    

re .110

Just goes to show, you learn something new every day.  Thanks, Elizabeth.

The only thing I had heard about, as far as psychological implications and 
abortion go, was the effect of multiple abortions on a woman's mental 
health.

The idea of wanting to feel something growing inside of you only to kill it 
later is incredibly repugnant to me.  However, if it *is* a case of some 
sort of mental disorder [don't read too much into that, I just can't think 
of a better word], then the woman needs help and *fast*.  After all, we 
forgive people who have committed crimes due to "temporary insanity".

I'm not comparing this with being insane, I'm just saying that the attitude 
towards those women should be the same the courts take with criminals who 
have a mental disorder.  i.e., treat the disease [the mental disorder] and 
not the symptom [whatever they did].

Again, let me state, I am not equating the abovementioned case with 
insanity.  Just as a condition that needs treatment.

    I'm so very glad to have a choice.  If I didn't, I'd have a 3 year
    old in July and I wouldn't work for Digital and I never would have
    met George (who loves me and understands what I went through) and
    I never would have got counseling and I would never be as warm and
    as loving and as close to children as I am now.
    
    I learned a lesson, a hard lesson on life and responsibility.  But,
    heck, I was scared, I was stupid, and I never felt more alone in
    my whole life.  I had the support I needed to get me through it
    as well as the necessary funds.
    
    Yes, I am Catholic but not devout enough to say that God gave me
    the chance to create a life and bring it into this world.  I didn't
    want it and couldn't possibly care for it the way I saw my two sisters
    care for their "wanted" child.  I was 22 years old, fresh out of
    college, fresh in the working world and BAM.
    
    Right now, I practice good birth control and I'm healthy, too.
    
    I learned two lessons: 1) I know that I can conceive if ever I try
    to and 2) listen to your mother and or parent very closely.
    
    I share this with you because I felt you needed to know how I feel.
    How do I feel?  Upset but better than keeping it inside.
    
    I'm so very glad to have been given a choice.
                                                             

    RE 34.110)   
    
    Elizabeth, unless you can quote a source that supports your statement
    that 'you read somewhere' that 'many' women who have abortions have
    a 'subconcious desire' to have a life growing inside of them but
    have no compunctions about killing that life, I suspect your source
    to be an anti-choice (see excellent explanation of anti-choice earlier)
    propaganda bulletin.   Anti-choice people term themselves 'pro-life,'
    implying the opposite term: 'anti-life.'   This description of women
    who like having a life inside them but don't mind killing it, certainly
    sounds like 'many' women who get abortions *are* 'anti-life.'  
    This does not support anything *I* have ever read about women who
    get abortions.   
    
    another view...
    Tamar
    	

    RE: 113 and references...
    
    Um...I am often disturbed by (what tends to be anti-choice) rhetoric
    that implies or says outright that it's the easiest decision in
    the world  - a snap - nooooo problem - for a woman to decide to
    have an abortion (kill, murder, pick your favorite inflammatory
    expression). I know women who have had abortions, I have seen
    interviews with other such women...and by and large, I do not believe
    that to be the case.
    
    I believe that this decision, for MOST women, is the (possibly)
    single most difficult decision they will ever make.
    
    I have no intention of  ever becoming pregnant. I do not want to
    be pregnant. I do not want to give birth. I do not want to be a
    parent. *HOWEVER* if I should become pregnant, I *know* that deciding
    about an abortion would be very very difficult for me.
    
    I think I resent the implication that women in general decide this
    as easily as deciding between 2 blouses. I get only a slight flavor
    of that in this file, but I DO feel it, a little...
    
    Dawn
    

    Twice in my college life I had to make a decision on this.  The
    first time I believe I chose abortion; the second time I choose
    to give birth and keep the child.  It turned out that I was not
    pregnant either time, but it was a terribly difficult decision.
    I, for one, do not think most women find this choice easy.  I do
    believe, however, that some women view it as just a pesky birth
    control measure.
    
                   Carol

        The fact that the two groups on this issue term themselves
        "pro-choice" and "pro-life", I feel, illustrates an important
        aspect of the debate and is not merely a rhetorical trick on
        either side.
        
        This dicussion is fundementally at cross purposes, I feel. This
        is to be expected as you have rights, principles and concerns
        that are in conflict. The rights and well-being of the baby are
        weighed against the needs and the freedom of the mother. Our
        culture recognizes strong values that pull in each direction. We
        are a strongly individualistic culture and put a very high stake
        on freedom. On the other hand we value babies and protecting
        those who can not help themselves.
        
        Those who are against the legality of abortion call themselves
        "pro-life", and that's what they are. Their fundemental concern
        in the issue is with the unborn child, with its value and its
        right to life. Although they value freedom they see it as
        limited and subordinate to the right to life. They hold both
        values, but the value of life is primary to them.
        
        Those who are for the legality of abortion call themselves
        "pro-choice", and that's what they are. Their fundemental
        concern is the freedom and moral integrety of the woman.
        Although they value unborn and newborn life, they see it as less
        important than the basic moral freedom and self determination of
        the woman. They often see the unborn more as potential life than
        as fully realized.
        
        Neither group is necessarily anti-life nor anti-choice. They are
        for or against the legality of a particular action, but they are
        not against a basic value. 
        
        This is a very important point, because until the pro-life stop
        seeing the pro-choice as baby-killing monsters, and the
        pro-choice stop seeing the pro-life as totalitarian oppressors
        neither side will be able to understand the other or the
        other's position. By casting the oposition as "anti-something",
        they have made them less than human, a standard lead-in to
        abuse, hatred and conflict.
        
        JimB.

    Jim, yes, you're right. Many people who are FOR legalized abortion
    also consider themselves "pro-life".
    
    liz

For What It's Worth - I [pro-life] never used the term 'anti-life'.  I have 
never even considered it.  I have always referred to the 'opposing' viewpoint 
as 'pro-choice' for the reasons that Jim mentioned.

When being labeled as 'anti-choice' I felt like I was being tagged as 
someone who favored mandatory everything and no freedom of choice for 
anything.  I know that's not how it was intended, but that's what it 
sounded like.

Re: .116

Yes, there are two groups talking at cross purposes, but there is also
a fringe (I hope) of the pro-life group that is really anti-sex. These
are  the  people  who spout pro-life rhetoric, but are also opposed to
contraceptives. 

It should  be  clear  to  everyone  that  abortion  is  a  bad  option
(possibly  the  best  available, but never ideal), and that preventing
unwanted  pregnancies is preferable to abortions or unwanted children.
When people claiming to be pro-life also protest making contraceptives
or education available, they reveal their real agenda which is to make
sex  a  punishable  offense (the punishment being to carry an unwanted
child  to  term,  and  then  have to either give it up for adoption or
continue to care for it for 20 years. Neither of which is particularly
good  for  your average teen age girl.) This is also part of an attack
on the idea that women have a place in society outside of the home.

These people  make  it  hard  for  me  to  really believe the pro-life
position  is  honestly  held  by  them,  and (guilt by association) by
others  who  do  really  believe  that  a  fetus's rights outweigh the
mother's rights.


--David

    
    i've often wondered why so many pro-lifers, so adamantly against
    a person(s) having as a choice the use of abortion......
    don't seem to mind having these children grow up into nice
    little soldiers who go off to some war for some government and
    kill and die.....
    
    before they are born....we must not kill them....
    
    but when they're 19.....prime red meat.
    

    Re: 120
    
    	Excuse me, your ignorance is showing.  All pro-life people don't
    support sending 19 year old children off to war.  The only atatement
    you can make, with any degree of accuracy, concerning pro-life people
    is 'Pro-life people are people who support the pro-life platform.'
    
    Douglas

re .121

	Actually .120 didn't claim that *all* pro-lifers support sending
        youths to war.
        
        I might add that (a) I find your reference to 19 year old adults
        as "children" to be either emotive, or patronising, and (b) though
        I have not expressed my views, I also feel that I am justified in
        condeming as a hypocrite any "pro-lifer" who is not also a vegan
        pacifist.
        
        /. Ian .\

    re: 102 well 103 translated it right.
    
    BTW- the farmers I was refering to are the third world farmers.
    I agree whole hardedly that the surplus grain in our warehouses
    should feed the hungry. I believe the argument against that is that
    it would lower food prices. Life is not as important as money in
    our society. 
    
    I'm a proponant of zero population growth. I'd rather see the kids
    that have been born fed and cared for than ensure that every
    fertilized egg sees the light. liesl 

    
    
    		Help  Help  Help
    
    I am starting to agree with others points of view
    
    re: -1, -2, -3, and so on.
    
    I have a 17 year old daughter and a 19 year old son, I do not want
    my son to go to war or even get close to the military, because I
    am or atleast I am trying to be non-violent, and it is very necessary
    for my daughter to be able to choose to have a SAFE abortion if
    she needs one.
    
    In our society money is more important than life, I wish it weren't.
    The idea that anyone can tell/legislate morals has been proven wrong
    every time it has been tried.  Face the fact that sex is part of
    being alive and many people who are alive are not necessarily 
    responsible, intelligent, stable, consenting adults.  Until all (not
    just some, cause I know there are some)
    male are willing to stop seeing women and children as their's to
    do as they wish with their lives we will have rape, incest, desertion,
    poverty, hunger and many other social problems; until women are
    seen as individuals and not objects and an air head female can make
    as good a living as an air head male a lot of the "pro-life" arguements
    are just exercises of Utopian thought.
    
    We do not live in the "Best of all possible worlds," we live in
    a society that favors the military (death to the other), that favors
    the bashing of anyone who is different (what ever is the current
    idea of different) and mostly a society that believes in punishment
    for individuals who enjoy/partake in SEX outside of the "blessed
    state of family (marriage)."  BTW - the punishment is usually put
    on the female partner if there is one.
    
    Of all the women I have know who have had abortions none have done
    it because it was easy, or because it was the form of birth control
    that was available.
    
    I guess I have flamed a little more than usual.
    
    _peggy		(-)
    			 |		The Goddess afirms all lives
     

    RE .-several
    
    I do not have the source.  It was something I *read* about six years
    ago.  I cannot quote the name of the journal, the author, or much
    else.  The tone of it was pro-choice - it was a counter to the
    pro-lifers saying "These evil women are murdering their children
    due to their lack of caring and the fun of it".  It was saying that
    *some* women who repeatedly have abortions have a mental need to
    become pregnant, but consciously know that they cannot support the
    child.
    
    I have known a number of women who have had abortions.  Most find
    it a traumatic experience and are more careful in the future to
    not become pregnant.  Then I knew another, who had nine abortions
    in three years, because she 'forgot' to use birth control.  She
    never learned...  She may be continuing to do this - this is only
    the data I have on her when I knew her (and what she told me about
    the year before).  BTW, she *did* tell every woman friend she knew
    when she was pregnant - and got support through her abortions. 
    Many encouraged her to use a different method of birth control (IUD,
    sterilization) that she could not forget.  She had reasons that
    she did not want to do this.  So, she had more abortions, all of
    which she felt bad about having.  I will continue to believe that
    the woman needs psychological help - and that she would be much
    happier for it.
    
    Elizabeth
    

    My gynecologist told me that 2 or more abortions drastically reduces
    the chances of carrying a baby to term because the uterine lining
    is depleted of the necessary matter to hold and create a placenta
    or something to that effect.  In other words, a weak womb in which
    to nurish.
    
    I don't have any supporting evidence.  I'm just repeating what my
    doctor told me (as a warning).....
    
    I believe him, especially with a first trimester abortion, D&C,
    or the vacuum process.  I don't know about saline or induced labor
    procedures.

    Re: .122
    
    " / Ian \"
    
    	"Vegan is not in the dictionary I have in the office.  Please
    define.
    
    	My reference to people in their teens as children was not meant
    to imply anything except the opinion people who are in their teens
    are children.  The word children is not a negative but, with thought,
    I appreciate how it could be construed as such when incorrectly
    used.  The people in our civilization who are sent to war have attained
    puberty and, therefore, should not be characterized as children.
    
    Douglas

    A vegan is a vegetarian who eats no animal products what so ever.
    Vegetarians who also eat cheese, milk and eggs are sometimes called
    ovo-lacto vegetarians. Vegans commonly avoid animal products in
    their clothing and furniture as well.
    Bonnie J

    
    re:121...douglas.
    	not my ignorance (why did you choose to insult me?)
    	i stated...."why so many pro-lifers"
    	so many = some of but not necessarily all of
    	so many = unidentified amount
    
    	i wonder, after your insult, if you would be mature enough
    to retract your statement and apologize?
    
    re:122...thanks.
    
    	re:124.....this is all good stuff!
    	it's ok to change your mind/points of view/opinions....
    	in fact...it's far better to change your opinions as you grow...
    gather new data..new opinions from others...than to abstinately
    stick with points of view that were given you by teachers/parents/
    peers 15 years ago and are really no longer valid are applicable.

    	too many people say "i have my opinion and you have yours...!"
    	but the truth is...they don't have "their own" opinion...they
    are just repeating the opinions that others gave them.
    
    	feel good that you are "beginning to agree" with others...
    it's a sign of growth!
    and wisdom!
    
    	

    
    re: 124 and 129
    	of course, it's ok to stick to your guns....just as long as
    you sincerely listen to other points of view....add it all up...
    divide....multiply...subtract....and draw your own conclusions.
    
    	when i was 18....i would have gone to war....had they demanded
    my presence.
    	today....they'd have to shoot me first.
    

re: Elizabeth Younger

Well, the worst I ever heard of [as far as number of abortions per woman] 
was during a documentary on PBS about life in the Soviet Union.  They said 
that 24 was not uncommon and that it was viewed as another form of birth 
control.  The thought makes me shudder.

P.S. - You're right.  That woman you mentioned DOES need psychological 
help, and fast.

re: Rik Sawyer

So True!  I used to be adamantly against abortions.  Now that I'm a little 
older [and wiser, hopefully], I find that not everything is as black and 
white as I was raised to believe.  I'm still classified as a 'pro-lifer' 
but I've qualified my views over the years.

It's at times like these when I sometimes wish for those days when things 
were a LOT simpler.  Sigh........

    About 18 years ago I was friends with a woman who had just immigrated
    to the U.S. from Checkoslavakia. She commented that abortion was
    the most common form of birth control there. When I asked her how
    women delt with the pyschological problems of abortion she had
    never heard that there were any such problems. I have since talked
    to several other women who had lived behind the Iron Curtain who
    confirmed that in their experience abortion was common (other forms
    of birth control - or rather birth prevention were often unavailable)
    and was not considered to be a big deal. Is this a cultural difference
    or rather lack of opportunity to share what people really feel?
    
    Bonnie J

    Re 132:
    
    One suspects that abortion is legal in Iron Curtain countries because
    the governments find it convenient.  Less mouths to feed, less unrest
    among the people whose children get meat only when it's available. More
    years for mother to work on farm or factory floor.  Are these country's
    production and distribution systems so strained that it's cheaper to
    have medical people spend time and resources on abortions, instead of
    manufacturing and distributing birth control?
    
    Interesting that these reports relate no psychological trauma to
    women who've had abortions.  How much of our "humanity", or our
    moral sense, comes from the human emotions we are born with and
    how much comes from our cultural mores?  I'll bet these countries
    don't have any abortion debate.  No one is reminding people that
    the blob in one's womb is alive and that, given nine months, it
    will very definitely be a person.  So, few people who have abortions
    think of them as taking a life.  If one's society says that wartime
    killing isn't murder, then a soldier is not a murderer.  If one's
    society says that abortion is preventative, not destructive, then
    one can believe one is not....
    
    Killing a fetus?  Removing an embryo?  Preventing a birth?  Cleaning
    out the uterus?  Just what is it we are doing in an abortion?
    Different segments of our society are sending us different messages.
    No wonder we're confused.  In early pregnancy we may not have
    identified with this thing inside us yet, especially if its presence
    spells personal disaster.  Recently our society has been taken to
    task a lot for its "cult of the individual", because the attitude
    of "I'm going to do my own thing regardless" has given us our Oliver
    Norths, Secords, Meeses as well as our more creative or independent
    thinkers.  We are told that we are being selfish, petty women when
    we choose to get rid of this pregnancy.
    
    I believe in individual responsibility.  We need to be given the
    ability to choose to make our decision.  Yet I believe that the
    correct decision is usually to let that blob grow into a baby.
    So many situations that seem absolutely abysmally impossible don't
    turn out to be that bad.  We need to offer abortion alternatives,
    not scare tactics or coercive laws that only fuel an individual's
    resentment or make a person feel trapped.

    Back to those Iron Curtain women...  For a person willing to be
    sensitive to it, even early pregnancy can give a feeling of creation
    and life.  I wonder how many women from these countries are forced, by
    culture if not physically, to have abortions they would rather not
    have?  Beware of ANY coercive society.
    
    						- Dotsie
    
    

    It's not just "iron curtain" countries. Abortion is extremely common
    in Japan too. I find the automatic assumption that women in "iron
    curtain" countries are coerced into having abortions simplistic
    and uninformed.
    
    Perhaps abortion is popular in some countries because it is safe,
    easily available, and not freighted with the moral baggage it comes
    with in the "enlightened" United States.
    
    In some countries "exposure" of newborns is still used as "birth
    control". Now I think that all of us agree that this is a terrible,
    shameful situation. But it does raise the extremely hard question,
    "when does a fetus become a human", there are two (or three) obvious
    positions, at conception, (at the point the fetus becomes viable
    independent of the mother), and at birth. What makes a newborn baby
    any more human than a nine month old fetus in the womb? How can
    you decide? What criteria can you use FOR IMPOSING YOUR VALUES on
    someone else?
    
    Shall we discuss logical positivism?
    
    	-- Charles

	Reply to previous question on Eastern European issues...

	Sure to draw lots of uninformed/misinformed/naive fire
	on several issues...  Not even female...


	First, I can only speak of Romania, not sure about Czechoslovakia,
	Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary, etc. I suspect Yugoslavia is quite
	different. Never been there. (Yet).

	According to some of my sources, abortions have been correlated to
	population rate planning factors. The planning is  of course done by
	the government which is so kind to think of the welfare
	of the MANY. (Interpret this any way you want).

	In the past there have been attempts to encourage population
	growth. The problem seems to be of a longer duration.
	As a result, there have been several decrees ruling abortions
	illegal. Under-population and over-population control measures.

	I no longer live there, friends do. Friends are far away,
	Distance distorts information.  Please do not try to 
	interpolate their feelings. There are many factors involved
	which will take forever to explain. It's a different culture.


	-- Bedo. ( of Agopia)

    Once again I put my foot in my mouth.  Some is never all.  I do
    apologize.

    I saw a documentary about the People's Republic of China once.
    The Chinese have a stop-at-one policy which is meant to retard
    the growth of their population.  With a population of 1 billion
    people in an area about the size of the USA, the government has
    good cause to be serious about their population control program.
    The documentary centered around the life of a couple who had
    purposely "exceeded" their quota.  Apparently, every living
    community has a representative, usually an elderly woman, whose
    official job is to keep an eye on the number of babys born in
    that community.  When the representative got wind of the new
    arrival, she started paying visits to the parents trying to
    persuade them from having another child for "the good of the
    country".  The parents were actually quite adamant on having the
    second child.  Furthermore, the couple was relatively better off
    than most of the community.  Failing in her persuasion, the
    community representative reported to her superiors.  If I remember
    correctly, one or some of them even paid visits to the expectant
    couple.   In the meantime, the community was organised to
    brain-wash the couple into the abortion via peer pressure and
    constant persuasion from neighbours and friends.  Finally, the
    couple did consent to the abortion.

    I recently read an article based on the experiences of an American
    student who had been in the PRC. The article indicated that in
    many communities women pregnant with a second child are put under
    a tremendous amount of pressure to have an abortion. Daniel's
    documentary coroborates this information.
    Bonnie J

I saw the same one.  It spooked me because of the casual attitude taken
towards a mother having an abortion at 6 months.

re abortions abroad:

Hearing about the Iron Curtain reminded me of the documentary just mentioned.
I wrote a reply off-line, and when I came back to the note, I found several
people had just mentioned it!  I was surprised no one mentioned it when it
first came out; I was going to, but I'm "shy" about putting in long notes.
I'll just leave my note as it originally was, rather than editing it to comment
on what others have said.

I saw a PBS special several months ago on China and their population control
project.  I believe it was called "China's Only Child".  It discussed their
one-child-per-family philosophy.   The special showed how life was in a
specific "model town".  You needed a "permit" in order to become pregnant,
and you might have to wait years for your turn.  If you became pregnant out of
turn, you were all but forced to have an abortion.  Ditto with any second
pregnancy.  You were treated as an outcast by "friends", you were visited
very frequently by members of the "system" who tried to talk you into the
abortion which you would probably end up having in the end.  They had it all
set up well.  They taught women about birth control, and how important it was to
their country to follow the rules because of their limited resources.  The birth
control program and work were well-integrated, and they had a very good child
care facility at work.  Your group got special "awards" for not having
extraneous births (talk about peer pressure!).  There were economic incentives
for playing by the rules, I think some kind of bonus for agreeing to have only
the one child (and aborting any future pregnancies).  The part that got to me
the most was the extremes they went to.  Maybe they did have a need to be so
inflexible to avoid everyone wanting a second child, but "forcing" women who
were 5-6 months pregnant to abort (and the ones they showed on TV did abort)
is horrendous.  To get that far with all the pressure, they must really want
that child.

Jill

    
    re: douglas....accepted!...thanks!
    
    this has nothing to do with the topic but i just felt like putting
    it in here....
    
    	womannotes is the best notes!!!!!
    
    	the most advanced people in dec, in personal growth and
    independence, with the most compassionate ideas and attitudes,
    can be found in womannotes!
    
    
    	an island of tranquility in a sea of desperate competition!
    
    	a sparkling champagne glass in a sea of dirty dixie cups!

    	if i could change the world i'd populate it with womannoters!
    

    Back to the topic...um....sort of...
    
    I found the comment (soryy, I forgot by whom) about "what's the
    difference between a 9-month fetus and a just-born" thought-provoking.
    
    I remember the studies done (in the late 60's? the 70's?) in which
    a newborn monkey of some kind had the "mothering" withheld to various
    degrees and died (worst case) or was not properly socialized and
    became (for all intents and purposes) psychotic.
    
    I believe this happens with humans, and so to give birth and withhold
    the necessary caring does not make the child "human" - I believe
    this child could NEVER be socialized. I believe this is *worse*
    than having an abortion.  Y'all may believe differently, but it's
    an interesting situation...yes?
    
    Dawn

    I also saw the PBS special on China and it was a scary look at what
    all overpopulated countries may face in the future. Which is worse,
    the forced abortion (cause we aren't talking about folks that wanted
    one) or the starvation of thousands of children? But also remember
    something about the society in China. It was not at all uncommon
    for *excess* female babies to be left to die or become slaves in
    old China. In some ways the new government there is much more humane.
    liesl

    I've also heard that in China (and perhaps other overpopulated
    countries trying to decrease their growth) that the state will pay
    for voluntary surgical sterilization.  In some cases, in addition
    to the service and follow-up care free, they even
    give you a free personal stereo (walkman, boom box, whatever) as
    a gift.  (.....free with your paid subscription....)

    -Jody
    

    re .145:
    
    In China, I believe all medical care is already free.
    
    What I found frightening about "China's Only Child" was the constant
    reminder that no one there is considered an individual, each is the 
    property of the state. 
    
                                                   
                  /
                 (  ___
                  ) ///
                 /
                          

            <<< RAINBO::$2$DUA11:[NOTES$LIBRARY]WOMANNOTES.NOTE;1 >>>
                        -< Topics Of Interest To Women >-
================================================================================
Note 332.17                   Watch what you say...                     17 of 17
USATSL::CARNELL                                       3 lines  10-JUN-1987 10:49
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    I don't find the abortion situation as bad as the fact that they
    kill baby girls!  That's the real tragedy.
    

    re .122 b:
    
    And if there was any validity to the movie, "The Secret Life of Plants,"
    you might have to condemn even vegans as hypocrites.
                  
    Brenda

    
    This seemed the most appropriate place to mention this, as it seemed
    to be the place to discuss the last piece of anti-abortionist maneuvering.
    
    It appears President Reagan has recommended Judge Robert Bork to
    fill the seat vacated when Justice Lewis Powell.  Judging from the
    debate inspired in SOAPBOX, Judge Bork is a nemesis to the Bill
    of Rights in general, and to the right to abortions in particular.
    
    All right, all right, so SOAPBOX is hardly the font of wisdom.
    But an awful lot of news programs are saying that Judge Bork is
    not what some of the members of this community would call an
    enlightened thinker.  He's what I'd call a reactionary, monarchistic,
    tyrannical buffoon, but that's me.
                                        
    The relevant note in SOAPBOX is number 353.  Those who find this
    a concern may want to do a little checking into what Judge Bork
    has had to say on the abortion issue, etcetera.
    
    This message brought to you as a semi-public service to those
    WOMANNOTESreaders that don't get into SOAPBOX.
    
    DFW

    There was a column in the Globe today by Ellen Goodman that 
    discusses the issues raised in the previous note. Ms Goodman 
    states that the court is now split four and four on abortion 
    as a constutional right...but the four dissenters do not 
    agree with each other. She goes on to say that the best case
    would be that the court would increasingly errode access to 
    abortion by limiting access i.e. upholding states restrictions.
    The worst case would be that the new court would overthrow
    Roe vs. Wade and throw the issue back to the states. This would
    end up with a patchwork where some states allowed abortion and
    others did not. Once again abortion would be the provence of
    those who had the money to travel to places where it was legal...
    or who were lucky enough to live where it was legal.
    
    

    Now's the time to pray to the Goddess...
    
    Lee

           Couldn't you write to your senators and SCREAM to them?

            <<< VIKING::$2$DJA6:[NOTES$LIBRARY]WOMANNOTES.NOTE;1 >>>
                       
This was forwarded to me to post in the file
 
Subject: Courts ponder issue of forced Caesareans
 
An item from the _New York Times_ on 22 November, 1987:
 
NEW YORK -- Ayesha Madyun, a 19-year-old Washington woman, had been
in labor two days when she arrived at D.C. General Hospital to give
birth to her first child. Eighteen hours later, her labor had not
progressed and the doctors decided that Madyun needed an immediate
Caesarean section: the baby's likelihood of developing a fatal
infection was steadily rising.
 
But Madyun, wanting a natural delivery, refused the surgery.
 
The hospital would not accept her decision. Instead, it won a court
order authorizing the surgery. ``It is one thing for an adult to
gamble with nature regarding his or her own life; it is quite
another when the gamble involves the life or death of an unborn
infant,'' wrote Judge Richard A. Levie of the District of Columbia
Superior Court.
 
The Madyun case last year and similar court fights around the country
pose harrowing problems for lawyers and doctors alike, forcing them to
balance a woman's right to refuse treatment against society's desire
to protect babies only an operation away from birth.
 
According to a survey reported in the May 7 issue of The New England
Journal of Medicine, there have been at least 21 cases since 1981 in
which hospitals have sought court orders to override the wishes of a
pregnant woman -- by performing a Caesarean, detaining her against
her will, or treating the fetus inside her womb.
 
In all but three cases the courts granted the orders, deciding, as
Levie did, that they could not ``indulge the desires of the
parents'' when there is ``substantial risk to the unborn infant.''
 
In one of the most extreme cases so far, George Washington
University Hospital sought and won a court order last June requiring
a Caesarean section before her 26-week-old fetus was viable, for a
woman who was dying of cancer. The woman and the baby died soon
after the operation.
 
``The woman and her husband had said that they didn't want the
operation, and the doctors on staff agreed,'' said Lynn Paltrow, an
attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union who fought the
order.  ``But the hospital legal staff called in outside counsel and
within six hours, they had a court order.''
 
This month, the District of Columbia Court of Appeals affirmed the
order, ruling that since the woman had ``at best two days left of
sedated life,'' the court was correct to place the interests of the
unborn child over her right to avoid bodily intrusion.
 
``They treated this woman as if she were already dead, as nothing
more than an incubator who is supposed to sacrifice her life,'' said
Paltrow.
 
The question of how much treatment a pregnant woman can be forced to
undergo is likely to become even more controversial with the
development of more sophisticated prenatal diagnostic tests and
treatments for fetuses still in the womb. Already, there is
considerable debate about which groups of women should have genetic
screening tests and whether doctors can require their patients to
undergo such testing.
 
The issue of forced treatment is complicated by the continuing
debate over abortion and the extent to which fetuses are entitled to
legal protection.
 
In addition, there is a growing consensus that many unnecessary
Caesarean sections are being performed. The percentage of Caesarean
births in this country has quadrupled in the last 16 years to almost
one in every four births.
 
The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recently
issued a policy statement that doctors were ``almost never''
justified in going to court to compel treatment for pregnant woman.
 
Some feminists and civil libertarians argue that compelled treatment
is never justified because it violates a pregnant woman's basic
rights of privacy, bodily integrity and self-determination.
Fetal-rights groups, meanwhile, say an unborn child deserves as much
legal protection as a pregnant woman.
 
Civil Court Judge Margaret Taylor of New York City, who sits in
Manhattan, says she is convinced that there is no legal basis for
forcing a pregnant woman to undergo medical treatment when any other
legally competent man or woman would be allowed to refuse surgery
that would benefit a third party.
 
``I don't think a judge has the right to force a man to undergo the
risk of surgery to donate a kidney for his child, and I don't think
the legal analysis is any different just because a woman is
pregnant,'' said Taylor, who turned down a hospital's request for an
order authorizing a Caesarean.
 
St. Vincent's Hospital asked her to order a Caesarean section for a
35-year-old indigent woman who had borne 10 children and had seen
many women in her neighborhood suffer complications from
gynecological surgery. The hospital said the surgery was necessary
because the umbilical cord was wrapped around the baby's neck. But a
few hours after Taylor refused to grant the order, the woman
delivered a healthy child.
 
``I really sweated it out, but I felt comfortable with the decision
even when I accepted the doctors' assessment that there was a
probability that the baby would die,'' said Taylor.
 
George Annas, a professor of health law at the Boston University
School of Medicine, said the question of forced Caesareans usually
comes up in cases involving poor women, foreign women, or women who
have religious beliefs the doctors do not share. ``Some people say
it's because of the doctors' fears of getting sued, but I think
that's wrong, since these are not the kind of women that sue,'' he
said.  ``What I think happens is that a lot of doctors identify more
with the fetus than with a woman who is different from them.''
 
According to The New England Journal of Medicine report, almost half
the maternal-fetal specialists surveyed last year said that women
who refuse medical advice and endangered the life of the fetus ought
to be detained in hospitals and forced to follow doctors' orders.
 
But attitudes may be changing in the wake of the American College of
Obstetrics and Gynecology statement against forced treatment, issued
in August. ``Obstetricians should refrain from performing procedures
unwanted by the pregnant woman,'' the statement said. ``The use of
judicial authority to implement treatment regimens in order to
protect the fetus violates the pregnant woman's autonomy.''
 
Dr. Kenneth J. Ryan, whose committee wrote the statement, said it
represented a compromise between ``people who think about the
protection of the fetus at all costs and the people who think about
women's rights at all costs.''
 
``What we were trying to do was to get people to remember our
fallibility in making these medical judgments, and become a little
less cavalier about overriding what the woman wants,'' said Dr.
Ryan, the chairman of the obstetrics and gynecology department at
Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. ``Going to court has to be a
last resort kind of thing, since it destroys the physician-patient
relationship.''
 
Some doctors and lawyers, however, argue that when a woman endangers
her fetus by refusing treatment, society must act.
 
``I'm not saying we should seize women and strap them down if they
refuse treatment -- especially Caesareans, which are so overused --
but I think it's silly to say women have no obligations before the
baby is born,'' said John Robertson, a professor at the University
of Texas law school. ``If a woman refuses medical help, and her
child is born damaged as a result, maybe she has fallen below
acceptable standards and should be punished. Maybe she should be
turned over to the child abuse authorities, who could punish
prenatal child abuse just the same as postnatal abuse.''
 
Last year, in a widely publicized San Diego case, Pamela Rae Stewart
Monson faced criminal charges of child abuse for ignoring doctors'
advice during her pregnancy and for not summoning medical help when
she began to hemorrhage. Her brain-dead son lived only a few
months.
 
The charges against Monson, a 27-year old indigent woman who had
received no medical care until late in her pregnancy, were dropped
in February. But many lawyers and doctors saw the case as a
harbinger of problems in the area and warned that it was only a
small step from court-ordered treatment to criminal penalties for
those who refuse treatment.
 
`` It created a lot of revulsion,'' said Janet Gallagher, a New York
lawyer who writes on the subject of fetal rights. ``It showed just
how brutal the legal process can be.''
 
Ryan said he had the Monson case in mind when drafting the part of
the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology statement that
says court intervention in medical treatment may lead to
``undesirable societal consequences,'' such as making it a crime not
to follow doctors' orders.
 
``There are some real problems with the whole fetal-rights
argument,'' said Taylor. ``It's absolutely clear that cigarettes and
liquor are harmful to babies, that bad nutrition brings brain
damage. So do you prevent a woman from doing those things the minute
she gets pregnant?  And as a practical matter, how is the judge
going to enforce the orders?
 
``If a woman says a month before her baby is due that she won't have
a C-section, do you put her in jail or chain her to a hospital bed
until it's time to deliver the baby?''
 

    Interesting point about how the legal system wouldn't force a man
    to have surgery to donate a kidney for his child...
    
                Carol

re: .154

This is because men are genetically endowed with bigger lawyers.

Martin.

    One could argue that a woman who had been in labor for nearly three
    days and *still* wanted a natural childbirth was temporarily
    insane. 
    A friend of mine tried for natural childbirth. She is very small,
    and after about 10 hours she was exhausted. Her blood chemistry
    was getting poor and she opted for a C-sec. Since the unborn
    child still shares bloodstreams with the mother, fatigue byproducts
    adversely affect the child. Why take risks ?

    
    	Hmmm...    Reminds me of the Latrile cases, where parents who
    have wanted to use alternate therapy for their children's cancer,
    were legally forced to submit their children to chemotherapy.
    Parents in the early '70s were smuggling their children to clinics
    in Mexico, where the non-toxic therapy was available.   The
    standard chemotherapy forced by the court order has many toxic 
    side effects.

    	Medical Freedom of choice is becoming a big issue.   Also
    there are related cases where mental patients do not seem to
    be allowed all the normal constitutional rights. 
    
    	I think these medical freedom of choice issues go far beyond
    the single issue of prenatal care and childbirth.   *Anyone* can
    have their freedom removed by the medical establishment, and it
    will ostensibly be FOR THEIR OWN GOOD!    I think it is getting
    to the point where we are needing a "Medical Bill Of Rights".
    
    	Alan.
    
    PS.  On the woman with 10 children who refused the cesarian;  She
         had a very good reason to refuse.   She felt her life was
         more important than the fetus's, since she had to remain
         alive to raise her other ten children.   She felt that the
         cesarian that was ordered, not only valued the infant's life
         above hers, but also threatened the well-being of her other
         children.

    wow...one in four children today are born by c-sec...when I was
    born (way back in the 60's...) the rate was one in 200...I just
    happened to be one of the ones...placenta praevia and umbilical
    cord wrapped around my neck and such like.  Is the increase due
    to people with herpes/other type disorders/whatever wanting to avoid
    contaminating the baby?  Is it due to doctors' imminent fear of
    malpractice?  How does this affect our insurance costs?  
    
    questions...questions...questions...does anyone have answers?
    
    wondering -
    -Jody
    

    Are there any women out there who think it's an unfair
    analogy ("silly game") to equate a man being forced to
    donate a kidney with a pregnant women being forced to
    submit to medical treatment?  
    
    I'm asking because I think it's a good analogy, and
    indicative that men ARE genetically endowed with bigger
    lawyers (thanks, Martin).  
    
    Karen

    Of course there are a number of things that a woman (who is not
    even pregnant) can do to endanger the well being of a potential
    baby, including smoking, alcohol, poor nutrition, exposures to
    various chemicals, etc.  Some of these things endanger the well
    being of a potential baby if the father-to-be does them.  Where
    do you draw the line?
    
    I am very concerned about the idea of charging a woman who is negligent
    about her health during pregnancy with child abuse.  When we have
    so many abused children who are undisputedly born, intelligent,
    feeling people.
    
    I also see it as one step between being forced to follow a doctor's
    orders, and having all hazardous activities (as determined by some
    medical and/or government agency).  Mountain climbing, skydiving,
    scubadiving, etc., are all rather hazardous to the person doing
    them.  But, assuming that the person is an adult, he or she should
    be able to make the decision whether or not to do them.  It may
    endanger the future well being of someone else - if you die and
    leave young children, they will be without a parent.  
    
    Since the mid 1800s, there has been an increasing trend of giving
    MDs increasing power.  There was an article in the November '87
    _Utne Reader_ on the history of various medical fields, and stated
    that at one time, there were more homeopaths then MDs (I forget
    the XXXXpath term they used for MDs).  Then, the AMA got started,
    and convinced congress and legislatures to pass laws restricting
    the other branches of medicine, giving a monopoly to themselves.
    This included outlawing of midwives in many places, outlawing many
    other types of practices.  Much of this was done under the guise
    of "Quackery Laws", although some of the practices they outlawed
    had as good of a success rate as the 19th century MDs that were
    pushing this.
    
    I don't want to see them given absolute power over anyone's life!
    They make mistakes.  We all remember various accepted medical
    treatments being proven dangerous or ineffective.
    
    Elizabeth                                        

    re: .158 C-sections
    
    I asked my doctor what it used to be like, before so many C-sections
    were done on women, and her response was that there was a 20-25%
    fetal mortality rate.  (?)
    
                 Carol

RE: .159

I don't think that it's right on target, but it is pretty close.  The difference
that I have always seen between pregnancy and any other dependancy is that:

1:  It's pretty self limiting, generally only lasts 9 months
2:  The provider presumably did consented to have sex, of which pregnancy
    is a known possible consequence.

On the flip side, I would *not* think very highly of anyone who refused to
donate a needed-for-life not-needed-for-life-for-them to a family member.

Of the cases cited, I would probably decide about half one way, and half the
other way. 

I wonder if it has ever come up that someone tried to sue another person for an
organ.

Jim. 

If the news story said that a woman was forced to donate a kidney to her
child, but that a man was not so forced, there would be prima facie
evidence for discrimination.  The situation as described is less clear,
however.

The risk/benefit analysis for the mother/child in a Cesarian delivery is
quite different than for the donor/child in a kidney transplant.  A
doctor can quite legitimately argue that a Cesarian delivery is necessary
to save the life of both patients, while a prospective kidney donor may
argue that he/she should not be forced to risk his/her life in order to
help the child.

Martin.

    re the issue note.
    
    Hi gang I have a loaded gun in my hand.
    It is pointed at your head.
    It will go off ..... the only question is when.
    While you are waiting you will get weaker, you will lose more and
    more of your ability to reason. Your physical, emotional, and
    biological reserves will diminish.
    NOW WHAT WAS THE QUESTION ???????????????

    Last night I had the oddest dream.  I think it was spurred by this
    topic.  I dreamt that I was in a car following an ambulance and
    I had just heard the ambulance given orders to go to an ocean inlet
    to watch over the Kennedy's as they swam.  When we got to the inlet
    I was overwhelmed by the beauty of the place - lush, green, tropical,
    and in the water swimming along with the Kennedy's were some whales.
    They were frolicking in the water; it was a beautiful sight.
    
    Then the ambulance people got the rest of their orders: to kill
    one of the whales because she was menstruating and one of the Kennedy
    kids might get an eye infection.  The ambulance workers did not
    want to do this, and one could not, but the other one got a syringe
    and called the whales.  When the whales came over, then the ambulance
    worker injected the killer drug in the whale's head.
    
                       Carol

    The following response was written by a member of our community
    who wishes to remain anonymous at this time.
    
                                                =maggie
    
    ===================================================================
    
    I am writing this long note for all, pro-life and pro-choice, so that
    we all may help those who must make the abortion/adoption/motherhood
    decision. In this notes file you have all talked about the special case
    abortion (mother's life endagered, rape, incest, etc), well this is my
    special case: 

    From the beginning...I met my future husband at the age of nineteen.
    We were both in school at the time and struggling to get through via
    school loans and night jobs.  After a few months of getting to know one
    another we decided to date... our relationship grew stronger.  We
    became engaged and later made the conscious decision to have a sexual
    relationship.  This we did not take lightly or at least we didn't think
    we did.  We discussed the forms of birth control and I went to a doctor
    to discuss it with him as well.  I wanted to go on the pill but the
    doctor wanted to know when we were getting married.  We had not set a
    date yet since we still had a lot of schooling left and wanted to be
    economically stable before we did get married.  Had I been a little
    older and wiser I would have lied to the doctor or would have hunted
    out a sympathetic doctor...but since he would not help we decided to
    use the condom/foam method which was theoretically 99% effective. It
    worked well for 10 months.  I felt in control of my life and was happy
    with where I was going. Then one fatefull night after my fiance and I
    had intercourse, he withdrew and we noticed the condom had broken.  We
    started to panic.  I had read some where if this happens, insert more
    foam and we did.  We both started to cry and try to comfort one
    another.  We were so afraid. 

    I had a hard time living through the next 16 days before my period was
    due. When my period was a day late I called my doctor to make an
    appointment.  He laughed at me saying it was probably late because of
    stress and to wait a little longer.  Needless to say I had to find a
    more sympathetic doctor.  I contacted the nearest femminist health
    center and set up an appointment for the next day.  My fiance
    accompanied me to the appointment, half to support me and half to be
    there when we found out. The results were positive.  I was 18 days
    pregnant - no they couldn't tell me that - but we knew the day of
    conception. The clinic was very sympathetic and supportive.  They
    immediately asked me to set up an appointment for counseling on my
    OPTIONS.  The couselor again, was very supportive.  She listened and
    coached but did not preach, force, coerce or try to convince me of
    anything.  I did most of the talking and in the end it was decided that
    what I wished was an abortion.  My fiance said he would support me in
    whatever I decided.  I asked for his inputs but in the end it was my
    decision. 


    Believe me it was not easy.  I tried to think of all the possibilities
    and choices.  Neither of us could get support from our parents for
    school, much less a grandchild.  My parents had made it clear at 17 "I
    don't want you coming home pregnant".  My only support was my fiance,
    both of us already worked full time and went to school full time and
    barely had enough to live on...could we support one more? Could we
    afford to finish our education?  If we got married we could no longer
    live in the school provided housing, our options were very expensive. I
    even considered running away so I would just ruin my life and my childs
    and let my fiance continue with his school. This was not fair to anyone
    but I was desparate. I considered adoption, but I would lose my
    housing, whether I kept the baby or not.  I would also become an
    outcast to my family. My family was against me getting pregnant and
    against abortion, but an abortion could be kept secret. 

    They let me think about it for one week and set up another counseling
    session, this time they explained the details of the abortion.  They
    referred to my child as a fetus not a blob. They also discussed with me
    the options for birth control and we decided upon the pill.  They also
    told me about the morning after pill...had I known I would have gone to
    the clinic the morning after...lack of information. Well my decision
    was still the same and the abortion was set up for the next week. I
    still had a hard time surviving day to day, I began to gorge myself
    with food. By the time of the abortion I was 4� weeks pregnant and had
    gained 15 pounds. 

    The day of the abortion we headed for the clinic.  Protesters were
    outside with signs, bibles, literature, young babies and a aborted
    fetus in a plastic bag. ( Their literature also contained,
    anti-sex-education literature, anti- birth-control literature and
    pro-adoption literature.) When we approached the clinic they started to
    chant at us and call us murderers. One woman kept trying to put her
    baby in my arms so that I would know what I was killing. Clinic
    volunteers quickly surrounded us and wisked us inside.  My fiance was
    able to be there the whole time, throughout the operation he held my
    hand.  Afterwards recovering he was there holding my hand and
    professing his love for me. We were crying and we vowed never to let it
    happen again. 

    How could those people preach at me... they didn't even know me.  But
    they got to me...the dead fetus got to me... they made me feel guilty.
    Every time I felt I was over the abortion and in control of my life, I
    would read an pro-life article, run into the protesters (one of them
    lived on campus), see a protest on TV and I would lose control again. I
    felt attacked by conversations with others about abortion, even though
    they didn't know about my abortion. I kept losing control of my life
    everytime I heard the word "abortion" and "convenience"; losing control
    meant gorging myself and gaining more weight. Losing control meant
    crying endlessly, not for my unborn child but for me. 

    I felt like an outcast, one of the abortion statistics so often talked
    about. I was not one of the special cases, I was not raped, there was
    no incest, and my life was not endangered.  It was an abortion of
    "CONVENIENCE" and people in this country would not let me live with it.
    It was an abortion of "SELFISHNESS".  I couldn't talk to anyone for
    fear they wouldn't understand. I even felt my fiance didn't understand
    - he wasn't an abortion statistic - I WAS. This put a tremendous strain
    on the both of us. 

    After two years of counseling and dieting I lost all my weight and
    regained control of my life.  I became more secure with myself and my
    decision. I learned to like myself again despite what others might
    think of me and MY DECISION. 

    We both graduated from college and have good jobs.  We are happily
    married and happily have no children YET.  I don't regret the decision
    and neither does my husband. I will fight until the day I die for women
    to have the choice.  And I will try my best to help those who
    afterwards have to live with everyone else. 

    It still feels like a stab in the gut when I pass some protestors or
    hear of a march of 50,000 in Washington.  But it is not a stab of guilt
    any more, but a stab of fear.  Fear that my sisters and maybe daughters
    will have that choice taken from them or have the control taken from
    their lives. The only problem with legislature for banning all
    abortions except in special cases is that every case is a special case. 

    And for those of you who think the abortion clinic workers profit from
    our misery, think again.  They deal with those protestors every day,
    they deal with the fear of bombing, they deal with being ostracized by
    their friends, families and religions, and they deal with their doubts
    and fears.  They are there because of their conviction that a woman
    must have a choice, it is not just some job that brings in a pay check
    every week.  Many of them must go through the same counseling I did, to
    deal with their stress and/or guilt. 

    I apologize for the length of this letter, but I wanted you to have
    all the facts of a "CONVENIENCE" abortion.  I imagine this will bring
    many flames from the pro-lifers.  Please don't bother, I have heard
    them all. Think before you flame, many women like myself aren't as
    lucky to have a supportive partner, and many don't ever regain control
    of their lives. Before you preach to a women like myself about
    destroying life, think of what you may be doing to hers.  She has made
    a painful decision and yes she must live with it.  But the hardest part
    is living with the pro-lifers. 


    Keep up the good work, woman noters...woman like you will make a change
    in this world. Perhaps when attitudes change, I will have the courage
    to write to the notes file and put my name on it, until then... 

    anonymous 

    re .166
    
    Anyone who didn't have the time to read .166 all the way through
    should go back and read it as soon as possible.  An astoundingly
    powerful testimonial.
    
    Thanks for sharing that with us.
    
    Lee

    Yes, I agree also.  Wonderful.  I agree with the author 110%.  It
    is the decision of the woman NOT the decision of others and their
    opinions.  I am glad for you anon, you have overcome a terrible
    ordeal.  I only hope others can have the strength that you have
    to overcome the pain,confusion,frustration,anti's and continue with
    your life.  Horay for you.
    
    one last note,  If you think that it was thr right thing to do,
    then it was.
                                                          @l

    see also note 390 and following

RE: .0

In many ways your situation is much like when my first son was conceived.

"I even felt my fiance didn't understand - he wasn't an abortion statistic - I
WAS."

Your fiance was an abortion statistic, merely a different one.  I wish I
knew how he felt through the experience.

"It was an abortion of "CONVENIENCE" and people in this country would not let me
live with it."

I wish more people could "Hate the 'sin', love the 'sinner'"...

Jim. 

	From NARAL:

	"** In Arkansas the anti-choice forces have placed a referendum
	on the November ballot to determine whether or not state
	Medicaid funds can be used for poor women in need exercising
	their right to abortion.

	This was the same measure we defeated in 1986 -- but by a margin
	of only 600 votes.  This time -- with a rekindled fervor
	inspired by Pat Robertson's presidential bid -- the anti-choice
	forces are even better prepared.

	** Colorado voters will be asked to restore public funding of
	abortions when they go to the polls in November.  This is also
	their second vote on this issue.  But unlike Arkansas, Rhode
	Island, Massachusetts, Oregon and other states where we have
	prevailed, Colorado stands as our only defeat -- a state where
	we lost by a heartbreaking .5 percent ... and where we are hard
	at work right now in an intensive organizing effort to ensure a
	victory in November.

	BUT ... the greatest battle we face at the state level this year
	will occur in Michigan.  For the first time in history, voters
	in this generally progressive, industrial and hugely populated
	state will vote on a referendum to restore state medicaid funds
	for poor women's abortions.

	This is a battle we must not lose, yet we are fighting an uphill
	fight.  An alliance of heavily funded anti-choice forces and the
	well-organized backers of Pat Robertson's presidential bid
	present a formidable opposition.

	I must emphasize again that what happens in the states this year
	is critical.  We nolonger have the security of a Supreme Court
	-- or even a Congress -- to fall back on.  We now must fitht a
	three-front war -- in the courts, in Congress, and in the states
	-- if we are to defend the right to choice."

	The letter talks about how Congress passed the Civil Rights
	Restoration Act which had an anti-abortion ammendment tacked
	onto it (how ironic).  They then go on to ask for funds to help
	in the fight.

	...Karen