Governor Charlie Crist’s veto of a measure requiring women to see an ultrasound before getting an abortion was a blow to pro-life forces in Florida.
Anti-abortion advocates and Crist’s Republican critics in the Legislature immediately pounced on the decision. John Stemberger, head of the Florida Family Policy Council, called the veto “profoundly disappointing” and said it’s now “crystal clear that he’s pro-abortion.”
But one good thing to come out of the debate leading up to the veto and the national attention the measure garnered was that it made people think about abortion, talk about abortion, and examine what an ultrasound really is. Even some pro-abortion people were forced to examine what they were really opposing—mothers being required to look at ... a picture of a baby.
The horrors!
I was impressed with the level of self-examination and honesty in “pro-choice” advocate Mary Elizabeth Williams’ commentary at Slate:
But the tactic, despicable as it is, does raise an uncomfortable issue. Abortion is a deeply personal enterprise riddled with conflicting emotions, one few women take lightly. Among those of us who are pro-choice, I’ve long considered my own simple belief that life starts at conception a verboten topic. And I’ve been disappointed when I’ve heard friends taking the convenient semantic dodge of referring to an abortion as a decision regarding “a clump of cells” and then calling a planned pregnancy at the same stage “the baby.” Aren’t a wanted and unwanted fetus made of the exact same stuff, even if the Times quotes a Birmingham clinic patient saying, “You almost have to think of it as an alien”?
Did you catch the part where she admits a belief in the fact that life begins at conception? It’s just that she stops short of valuing that life enough to protect it from those who would destroy it. I am astonished by both her clarity and coldness:
It’s not for me to tell anyone else what defines personhood. I’m just pretty confident it isn’t one’s desire for it to be so or not. The fight over ultrasounds starkly shows exactly what anti-choice forces have glommed onto, and what unnerves some of us on the other side so deeply: that having a choice and seeing that choice are two different things. Because, uncomfortable as it may be for many of us to acknowledge, a human heartbeat is a powerful thing.
So. Williams isn’t ready to say that she has any kind of authority to define personhood, but she is firm in her belief that women should “have a choice” without “having to see that choice.”
In that case, may I propose a new feminist mantra? More freedom! Less information!
We’re grown women. We know it’s a baby, but no one has the right to make us think about the fact that it’s a baby. Stop bothering us with all those pesky facts and education.
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Williams contradicts herself here; “having a choice and seeing a choice are two different things”. How is it a choice if it is not an informed choice? What ever happened to informed consent?
If you refuse to look at the facts; that the baby is a living human being with a hearbeat and a defined body, then a decision to abort is simply a thoughtless act of pure emotion, withno logic involved. Hardly seems proper for a feminist who wants to be respected for her intellect.
This is the product of moral relativism; the destruction of logical thought.
I wonder if she is just as comfortable with killing her neighbor that is bothering her? What justifies the abortion if you admit it’s human?
“Killing her neighbor” buy lobbing a grenade through her window, so she doesn’t have to look at the horror on her neighbor’s face as she is torn to pieces.
A choice without seeing that choice…
Hmmm, right up there with other brilliant ideas such as mail-order brides, pre-emptive strikes, and ordering food in a foreign language in a third-world country.
Williams could be on the verge of a conversion. Let’s pray for her. She admits abortion is killing a life. Let’s pray she receives the grace to understand it isn’t the woman, but God who is forming this child. Let’s pray she comes to realize the horror of a mother forced (by so many cultural sins) to kill her own child.
I love Micah’s comment! Thanks for posting this DB, I linked to it from my page.
I’m 11 weeks pregnant right now, and having had two ultrasounds already, I know for certain, with no exception that my little one is alive. How can we stop the movement and heartbeat of something and NOT be killing it? The hypocrisy is astounding.
This is exactly what I was talking about regarding full disclosure in other articles. If women or girls going into a clinic for an abortion are given all the facts their decision may change. For example, we need to know what stage the baby is at the time of the abortion, along with what is developed in the baby, will it feel pain for instance. We need to be given all the risks both emotionally and physically, both long and short term. Abuse or incest needs to be addressed, not just swept under the carpet. Full disclosure needs to be given for abortion just as in any other medical procedure.
I sometimes pray outside of a clinic in NJ, they do abortions well into the second trimester and often into the 3rd. I see women come out of the clinic hysterical because while the abortionist was injecting the digoxen into the babies heart, the baby is on an ultrasound, or sonogram. So the mother is actually watching a fully formed baby being killed, a slow death.
Next she is told to go home, or into a hotel, which is already established, and to return in the morning for the suction. Nice! Now she has to spend the night while her baby is dying inside of her.
I have sat on the curb as girls and women sit and cry their hearts out because the mother actually saw her child, FOR THE FIRST TIME, just as the needle was being administered into the baby’s heart. Some of these girls try to get the abortionist to stop after seeing the image but they continued or it was too late.
I feel that in order to get an abortion, first all the facts need to be on the table and the mother, father and anyone helping or pressuring her to abort needs to see exactly what is being aborted.
I highly doubt this will ever happen, too many people may change their mind, and the abortion industry would lose money.
I know first hand that abortion is never the right choice and I also know that a baby’s heart starts to beat at 10 days!
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