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Feb. 23rd, 2003 10:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ocelotIt struck me today, reading a post from a 13 year old who just found out she is pregnant, that the abortion industry can be at least as disempowering to women as the lack of reproductive choice. I realize that this is not exactly an original thought - I've heard it used by pro-lifers in the past, but now I grok it better.
There are a number of people saying that the ONLY responsible thing this girl can do is have an abortion, and I've seen the same said to other pregnant teenagers.
That's not choice. That's railroading someone into a surgical procedure of controversial morality, regardless of their personal situation and beliefs. This is one reason you get the people who speak out about abortion being a terrible experience - because it wasn't something they actually wanted to do.
It's also telling women that one of their natural body functions is an undesirable curse that will ruin their entire lives unless they fit society's ideal.
If the only message teen parents receive is that their life is over if they choose to keep their child - that they'll never graduate from high school, or at least not from college, and end up on welfare and working at McDonalds for minimum wage while their children grow up to be juvenile delinquents because a teenager can't possibly provide proper care for a child - it often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Especially when they aren't given the education, support, and resources that older pregnant women are given.
It's the same thinking as abstinence-only sex ed or Just Say No. They fear that if they present anything except completely negative pictures of teen parents, kids will be rushing off to have babies. It seems to me that a more balanced picture of the life of a teen parent would work better as dissuasion. Don't downplay the difficulties, but don't make it a blatant scare story, either. People do eventually learn to tune out blatant scare stories, regardless of what Bush and Co. thinks.
This is leading me to other thoughts concerning conservativism, the Bible, and scare stories, but it is late, and I should sleep.
There are a number of people saying that the ONLY responsible thing this girl can do is have an abortion, and I've seen the same said to other pregnant teenagers.
That's not choice. That's railroading someone into a surgical procedure of controversial morality, regardless of their personal situation and beliefs. This is one reason you get the people who speak out about abortion being a terrible experience - because it wasn't something they actually wanted to do.
It's also telling women that one of their natural body functions is an undesirable curse that will ruin their entire lives unless they fit society's ideal.
If the only message teen parents receive is that their life is over if they choose to keep their child - that they'll never graduate from high school, or at least not from college, and end up on welfare and working at McDonalds for minimum wage while their children grow up to be juvenile delinquents because a teenager can't possibly provide proper care for a child - it often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Especially when they aren't given the education, support, and resources that older pregnant women are given.
It's the same thinking as abstinence-only sex ed or Just Say No. They fear that if they present anything except completely negative pictures of teen parents, kids will be rushing off to have babies. It seems to me that a more balanced picture of the life of a teen parent would work better as dissuasion. Don't downplay the difficulties, but don't make it a blatant scare story, either. People do eventually learn to tune out blatant scare stories, regardless of what Bush and Co. thinks.
This is leading me to other thoughts concerning conservativism, the Bible, and scare stories, but it is late, and I should sleep.
