Last week the Center for Reproductive Rights filed a lawsuit against Oklahoma’s own Senate Bill 1878 — a bill that will require a woman to have an ultrasound and for the doctor to describe the image to her before she can have an abortion. The law, passed by the Oklahoma State Congress last spring, is slated to go into effect Nov. 1.
It is about damn time. As the Center for Reproductive Rights stated in a press release: “the Oklahoma law profoundly intrudes upon a patient’s privacy, endangers her health, and assaults her dignity.”
Now, I had told myself that in choosing to write for a red-state paper, I would never, never write about abortion, but in light of the recent events that have unfolded, I must go back on this promise.
My biggest qualm with pro-lifers stems from statistical facts.
Every society that has been studied has been known to perform abortions. Even here in the United States, abortion was legal until the mid-to-late 1800s, when Americans were concerned that immigrants might overpopulate the country.
Even after abortions were made illegal, analysts estimate that nearly 1 to 2 million abortions were performed by doctors, abortion “specialists”, nut-jobs looking to make a few bucks and women themselves.
Because of the horrible lengths that women had to go to get abortions, scholars estimate that nearly 5,000 women died each year as a result of illegal abortions from the time abortion was made illegal until the passage of Roe v. Wade.
Today, 25 years after the Supreme Court struck down laws that criminalized abortions, nearly 1.3 million abortions are performed annually. Very few women die from these legal abortions.
If you think of nothing else, remember that. Whether abortion is legal or illegal, the same number of procedures will be performed. The same number of women will seek help.
But more women will risk serious injury or death when they do so illegally.
SB 1878 does not make abortions illegal. Instead, it makes an already emotionally difficult surgery for a woman a much more traumatic one.
If you do not believe in having an abortion, fine — don’t have one. That is what being pro-choice is about; it is about tolerating other people’s very private and very personal decisions. It is realizing that the health and safety of other women is vital to the survival of this nation.
Since I have already broken my “I’m-not-going-to-talk-about-abortion” vow, I might as well throw out another bit of information on the abortion front.
In Colorado this November, the question of when life begins will be on the ballot. According to the Washington Post, “The Human Life Amendment, also known as the personhood amendment, says the words ‘person’ or ‘persons’ in the state constitution should ‘include any human being from the moment of fertilization.”
Fertilization happens when a sperm enters an egg. That means that a little clump of cells could have the same rights as you or me.
If this change is approved by Colorado voters, it will place a mother at risk of being charged with murder if she were to have an abortion or even if her actions unintentionally caused her to miscarry.
The new definition of personhood could make the act of blocking implantation of a fertilized egg in the uterus an “abortion.”
This would make the morning after pill and hormonal birth control pills illegal despite the fact that these methods do not induce abortion, but rather keep a fertilized egg from implanting in the uterus.
There is no such mention of these two possible consequences of the amendment on the ballot.
What has happened here? Has our region of the country gotten so deeply involved the private matters of women that they have to humiliate them with costly and time-consuming ultrasounds and withhold important information about contraceptives and their consequences?
Have we focused so much on saving a few cells or a fetus that we forget about our women, and our men, who are already alive and kicking and in need of support instead of bigotry and selfishness?
I love this state and I love this country, but I cannot stay silent when personal rights are being attacked.
We have already placed enough obstacles in the way of women seeking abortions.
Don’t step outside the boundaries of your own rights and interfere with someone else’s unless you want another woman to die from a coat hanger or knitting needle abortion.
Rosie Sontheimer is a journalism sophomore. Her column appears every other Thursday.
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shavedmarmoset 3 years, 7 months ago
"Every society that has been studied has been known to perform abortions."
Just because every society has done it doesn't make it okay. Every other society also had murderers, rapists and thieves. Just because it's common doesn't make it okay.
"That means that a little clump of cells could have the same rights as you or me."
You're just a big clump of cells. I'm just a big clump of cells, too. If I have more cells than you, am I more human?
Rhology 3 years, 7 months ago
Missing from this rant is the heart of the issue - is the fertilised egg a person or not? If so, murdering that person just b/c s/he messes up your life is against the law, and morally wrong. If not, abort away! So what? No one cries about an appendicitis.
Sontheimer touches on it when she says: "Fertilization happens when a sperm enters an egg. That means that a little clump of cells could have the same rights as you or me."
That is the most obvious time for calling a person a person. Personhood cannot be adjudged on the basis of ability or performance. It must be on the basis of ontology, of essence - how a person IS a person. Not what a person DOES. If personhood is based on what we CAN DO, then what reasonable argument could we have against the following scenario?
I am stronger, larger, and older than you. (Just like a mother is stronger, larger, and older than an unborn baby.) I have a louder voice than you. (Just like a mother has a louder voice than an unborn baby.) I am more valuable to society than you are, b/c I perform a more valuable function in my job as a medical doctor than you do as a janitor. (Just as the mother is more valuable to society as a grown person, who can contribute back rather than taking and relying on others for her subsistence.) You are inconvenient to me. (Just like babies are inconvenient to their mothers, and the vast majority of abortions in the US are done b/c a baby would just mess up the mother's life. And we just can't have that!)
Therefore, I can kill you and the law should protect me from consequences.
I'm not arguing slippery slope here (though that might indeed be a reasonable argument). I'm asking what the difference is.
This law is a great call, b/c women can see that their baby is just that - A BABY. It exposes the ridiculous lie that their baby is a 'clump of tissue' or a 'glob of cells'. When they can see their baby, the baby will no longer be as much of an abstraction. Seems to me Sontheimer, as a modern woman, would be in FAVOR of MORE INFORMATION. Why is she advocating that women have LESS information, when the decision to abort is a "very private and very personal decision"? Or is she scared of the truth - that more women will come to realise that their baby is a BABY and not a glob of tissue, and that over time they might actually vote their conscience, and vote for the truth - that babies are babies? Therein lies the fear behind the irrational and bizarre antics of the pro-choice crowd.
It's been fun, Ms. Sontheimer, but all your one-liners don't justify murdering a baby. Let's get that part straight first, get that information out there, before we worry about the secondary and tertiary issues you bring up to smokescreen the central one.
stuffman 3 years, 7 months ago
I have a few thoughts after reading this opinion. First, you state that the law about showing ultrasounds is outrageous, but you don't argue why. It's not clear at all that showing the woman the ultrasound, which I'm pretty sure the doctor has to take anyways, is in any way intruding on her privacy (it's an ultrasound of her own womb), endangering her health (looking at a picture can't hurt you physically), or assaulting her dignity (not making sure she's able to make an informed decision and realize what the abortion entails seems to reflect a poor view of a woman's ability to make her own rational decision). Second, the argument that outlawing abortion would lead to a huge number of illegal abortions is not clear at all. There is a big controversy over the amount of abortions done yearly before legalization, but it seems a middle of the ground estimate is that there were a tenth the number as after legalization. This is still a lot of abortions and some of these will be the dangerous self-done abortions. But, it's not clear at all that the increased risk of abortions wouldn't outweigh this. So, anyways, it's unclear that more women will die. Your rhetoric of fear isn't backed up with data. Third, your comments on the Colorado law don't really address the real question: is it reasonable to say that human life begins at conception? I would say that it is. The person/fertilized egg or whatever you call it has its own distinct dna, so it seems reasonable to treat it as its own person. Anyways, I'm going on and on and could keep going all day, so I'll quit now.
free4all 3 years, 7 months ago
To begin, I agree with the original point of this article; I find this law to be outrageous and cruel. Let's take the worst case scenario as an example. A woman who was raped and is now pregnant decides to get an abortion. I find it cruel to make a woman see and/or be told about the baby (that's right, I said baby) that was forced inside of her. I find it outrageous that we can hold all women to our own moral/religious standards. Just because I would choose not to abort a baby does not mean that I should make some other woman choose the same, and nor should I judge her.
Rhology 3 years, 7 months ago
So what free4all is saying is that it is OK to murder a baby as long as the baby wasn't wanted. That's age discrimination. And highly cruel. One wonders whether free4all would think the same of a 40 year old who is not wanted - is it OK to murder him?
And as for not forcing others to your own standard, why stop at abortion? Why not just refuse to judge or hold anyone accountable for ANY crime? Let's just open up all the prisons in the world. Let's let Jeffrey Dahmer run free (yes, I know he's dead). Let's sing Kumbayah while Hitler shoves Jews into ovens. No big deal - we couldn't force our views down Hitler's throat, now could we?
JJanowiak 3 years, 7 months ago
BrianCBiggs, have you ever heard the phrase "serious business"? Well, welcome to the internet.
AaronMiller 3 years, 7 months ago
Janowhack got "whacked" and IS "whack." Rhology is an intellectual giant compared to you, pea brain.
JJanowiak 3 years, 7 months ago
Okay, Rhology, let's just establish that you're an idiot. Perhaps you think no one calls you on your rampant, constant spouting of BS because you're right, but in fact you fall so far along the bleeding edge of the lunatic fringe that honestly no one cares what you think. We're both posting on an internet website, but I honestly am concerned about your daily interactions with people because based on your posts here you are living in a fantasy land. A fertilized egg is a baby? Rhology, your views on women are horribly condescending, and if you are in fact in a doctor - something that seems doubtful - I can only imagine all the other patronizing ways you treat your patients. To assume that a woman doesn't treat the decision to have an abortion as anything other than horribly, terribly serious is delusional. A baby isn't an abstraction to a woman contemplating an abortion, and the only reason you think it is is because you are entirely, utterly incapable of placing yourself in anyone's shoes except your own massive blowhard nonsense of "discourse". No doubt you're going to take this to task for not offering a serious rebuttal, or logical fallacies, or whatever. Rhology, part of life is realizing that when people are stupid, asinine hacks, then maybe they don't deserve a real response.
That said, Rosie, I think the feminist blogosphere is blowing the seriousness of this amendment a little out of proportion. Even if a good portion of Republicans are anti-choice or what have you, birth control pills are so bipartisan that almost all sexually active women will see this as a serious attack on their autonomy. Beyond that, it totally contradicts existing federal law and if it's passed will probably be struck down or altered by the Courts. It's important for pro-choice supporters to remember that conservatives, even if they are against abortion, aren't stupid enough to sabotage their ability to make whoopie indiscriminately.
BrianCBiggs 3 years, 7 months ago
Free4all, I think everyone will agree that we ought to have compassion on the woman in your scenario. And yet, I hold that there is an objective morality (as do you, at least in practice - you're last two sentences demonstrate this). It is because of this that it is not a matter of choice (or rather preference) but of ethics. Your last two sentences are blatantly self-contradictory, in that you apply a moral standard to everyone: one forbidding the application of a moral standard to everyone.
Rhology 3 years, 7 months ago
JJanowiak,
OK, duly noted - I'm an idiot. What does that say about those of you on the other side when you can't even respond to an idiot's arguments?
-A fertilized egg is a baby?
Yes. Give me a good argument as to why not. Riddle me this: 1) When does a fertilised egg become a baby? 2) How do you know?
3) If you do not know with 100% certainty, why do you feel that it's OK to go ahead and kill it anyway, even if we're not sure what it is? Do you always shoot first and ask questions later? 4) Whenever it is, please describe the difference between that baby and the lifeform 10 minutes before the point when it became a baby. And how you know that. This should be rich.
-your views on women are horribly condescending
In what way? B/c I want them to be fully informed? You have some weird standards of condescension!
-if you are in fact in a doctor
I'm not. That was a rhetorical device known as a "hypothetical".
-To assume that a woman doesn't treat the decision to have an abortion as anything other than horribly, terribly serious is delusional.
Given that the vast majority of abortions are NOT related to extreme health danger, rape, or incest, I can only conclude that you don't know what you're talking about. And, listen to yourself. You believe this is not really a baby we're talking about. It's more like an appendage, an organ. An inconvenient organ at that, much like an appendix. "To assume that a woman doesn't treat the decision to have an appendicitis as anything other than horribly, terribly serious is delusional." How ridiculous is that?
You don't get to have it both ways. It's either a baby or it's not. And if it's not, abort away! So what?
-A baby isn't an abstraction to a woman contemplating an abortion
Then no doubt you are in favor of the bill that is criticised in this editorial. Ultrasounds merely demonstrate with greater clarity how much a baby is NOT an abstraction to be ruthlessly killed.
You accuse me of speaking "blowhard nonsense", but it's pretty clear you're engaging in a bit of self-projection. Another word to look up - "substantive". Bring substantive arguments to the table. Until then, peace and calm to you.
JJanowiak 3 years, 7 months ago
Rhology, I would appreciate it if you did not try to contact me again. I'm familiar with your tripe on several atheist blogs and how you basically had to be banned because you simply would not engage in a real debate. I'm not interested in debating you on your terms. I hate your asinine style of back-and-forth crap and you can spin this into as many logical yarns as you want but I just won't bite. I think you're an idiot, most people think you're an idiot. Screw you.
BrianCBiggs 3 years, 7 months ago
JJanowiak, you seem to have a tendency to resort to name calling and personal attacks. Under this story alone, you called Rhology an idiot, stupid, an asinine hack, and creepy. In the comments of an earlier story you accused me of bigotry - a completely unfounded accusation. You also called me a fundamentalist. I'm curios about that, actually. Am I a fundamentalist because I am a theological conservative, do you think I am a part of the fundamentalist movement (which I am not), or were you using it as it commonly is used, as a pejorative term?
Anyway, my point is that perhaps you ought to stick to the subject at hand. By the way, for several years I have seen many non-OU students comment on the OU Daily site. I wonder if you would have found his blog or have cared who he is if you had agreed with him. Do you think you would called him creepy or discredited? I think you ought to stop taking wild swings and instead start making meaningful responses.
SB 3 years, 7 months ago
"Tolerating other people’s very private and very personal decisions" should at least suggest a degree of compromise.
Regarding the statistics:
Before: During some unspecified time (say, 100 years?) 1-2 million babies were aborted. That's ~20,000(?) babies per year. During that same time 5000 mothers died each year.
After: 1.3 million babies are aborted each year. 'Very few' mothers die each year.
So we've saved mother's lives (great!), but done nothing to reduce the amount of aborted babies from ~20,000 a year. Rather, we've multiplied it several times over. Tolerance is certainly easy on the part of the one who is required to compromise nothing!
JJanowiak 3 years, 7 months ago
So in addition to being a random, discredited blogger who creepily comments on student newspaper intended to be commented on by, you know, students, Rhology has also taken it upon himself to contact posters in individual threads AND post the whole mess on his original blog. He's creepy, he's stupid, and yes, please don't feed the troll.