Around election time, in India, politicians fuss about building temples and reseravtion policies. In the US it is the abortion issue. It is right there next to troops in Iraq and before gay marriage. The abortion issue gets dusted up, the presidential candidates are expected to express their opinion every time there is a debate and these politicians carefully pick a stand that would work well with their own political agenda. Just because a person argues that he is pro-life it does not mean that he/she is such a loving caring human being who cannot stand a life being taken away. Every one has an ulterior motive. It is as simple as that. But why don’t you all go play with something else, instead of playing God with someone else’ life.

Let me give you a quick summary.
Pro-choice: for abortions
Pro-life: against abortions
Types of abortions. Partial birth abortion is the one in which an alive fetus is pulled out through the birth canal and its brain is sucked out with a vacuum. The other method is where they inject the heart of the fetus with Potassium Chloride, terminate the life and then pull it out.
1996 – Republicans asked to ban the partial birth abortion, but president Clinton decided that the ban does not make allowance for the mother’s health. He said that the physician must be the judge of what procedure must be used, it is not for the court or the congress to decide.
In 2003 president Bush approved the partial birth abortions ban.

The idea is to make abortions tougher and finally, and at some point of time, ban it completely. In some states like South Carolina they have made it optional that the woman watch ultra sound videos and pictures of the fetus before the abortion. This is to impress on the humanity of the fetus aka, emotional blackmail. “You want an abortion? Cool, let us first see what kiddo is up to then we can go ahead and kill him, if you still feel so. Hey do you see how great that kick was, may be the kid will grow up to be a soccer star some day. Awww, he is waving at you. Ain’t that cute? Okay, now let us discuss if you still want to proceed with the abortion?” According the pro-life people, this law is a milder version of their original request. They wanted that the ultrasound viewing has to be mandatory before an abortion procedure. I mean where do these people get off? I have gone through three D&E procedures. At least in my case the fetus was not a viable fetus, there was no heart beat. It was still tough. No body has any business impressing any kind of humanity in to a mother who has made the tough decision to abort. There might be genuine scenarios like the baby being diagnosed with a birth defect such as Down’s syndrome. Or may be the mother is a rape victim and simply does not want to keep the child. Or may be the baby’s physical development is not normal?
Or the mother is mentally/physically incompetent to have the baby? If at all for some vague reason the mother is an absolute physco who wants to have an abortion for fun, phlueese let her have one, not for her sake, but for that poor child’s sake.

There are so many loop holes to this whole pro-life scenario.The AFP procedure that tests for genetic abnormalities like Downs is and can be done only around 16 weeks. Why even go through with this charade, if you are pushing for banning late term abortions? What is the sadistic pleasure one derives by saying that the kid is not normal and is clearly going to suffer for the rest of its life and the force the mother to bring the kid in to this world?

Now congress, courts and pro-life activists being the smarty pants they are discuss about what options the woman might have. Actually it is not option’S’. It is singular. The woman has only one option – to deliver the child. After birth the woman can either keep the child or give it away. Then they go about painting rosy pictures of orphaned children growing up happily, chasing butterflies, in orphanages and foster homes. I have heard enough of blood curdling stories about foster care abuse to believe these people.

And how does the government care for a new mother? It gives her 6 weeks of paid vacation and then magnanimously says that she can take 12-16 more weeks of unpaid vacation. If you are a single mother, oh you are screwed and if your baby is a special needs baby, you are doubly, royally screwed.

All this bunch of baloney from the same pro-life people who were involved in massive arson, 1700 acts of violence against abortion clinics resulting in the death of 5 health care providers and 18 bombings against abortion clinics. Now what exactly does pro-life mean? Just because they are doing something that you believe to be bad, they don’t deserve to live? So you can choose who lives and whom dies, but a pregnant woman cannot make that decision about her baby? Sounds quite unfair.

Choice has to be in the hands of the woman and her health care provider. Every person has his/her own faith or believes. Let us keep those value systems to ourselves. We have to learn to co-exist believing in our own value systems and also respecting believes of others. If we start deciding for others and start stuffing others with our values, we are engaging in an act of violence.

PS: There was this very well written article in the Mercury News. Do read it of you get a chance. My post might contain shades of the author’s opinions. Purely a case of thinking along the same lines.

The author talks about how this might affect assisted reproductive procedures like invitro. I hadn’t thought about this angle.