In an ideal world there would be no abortion, but we do not live in that world and never will. Those of us who adopt a pro-life attitude must recognise that we cannot roll back the clock and shouldn't try to. We have to be pragmatic, but that does not stop us trying to understand why the abortion rate in this country is so much higher than in most others, and then doing something about it. The question is, what. The Select Committee of Science & Technology is holding an inquiry into the subject at the moment. Health Minister Dawn Primarolo appears before it tomorrow.
Nadine Dorries, a member of the Committee, has written a blogpost today which is quite explosive. In it, she accuses the vested interests on the 'abortion industry' of manipulating a Select Committee inquiry for their own ends. In particular she highlights the role of the British Medical Association (BMA) and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG). Nadine writes...
The RCOG Committee which drew up the guidelines, that regulate the abortion
industry is made up mainly of abortion providers, both on a large and small
scale. For example both the BPAS and Marie Stopes who carry out the lions share
of 200,000 abortions per year are advisors to the Committee. Dr Kate Guthrie, is
an advisor – it was she, who when giving evidence to the Science &
Technology Select Committee, said speaking with her RCOG hat on, that she saw no
evidence to change from 24 weeks – and then said on national TV the following
night via the Dispatches programme, that she wouldn’t abort a baby over 20
weeks. When asked was this because it was too much like a baby, she said “I
suppose so.” Militant, pro-abortion groups are also advisors, but in the name of
balance, no pro-life groups. Almost every person on the committee has a vested
financial interest in ensuring that the number of abortions which take place in
the UK remains amongst the highest in Europe.I believe that the RCOG may have deliberately attempted to mislead the
Science & Technology Committee in its submission. It failed to mention the
Hoekstra study which demonstrates how with good neonatal ntervention, 66% of all babies (that is babies born naturally because there may have been medical
complications not healthy babies aborted) at 23 weeks live. It failed to mention
how in the UK at good neonatal units such as UCH London and Hope hospital in
Salford, 43% of 23 weekers live. Instead it chose to quote a study which
averages out births at all hospitals across the UK, which puts the figure at 10
-15%. The RCOG also failed to quote any papers linking abortion to pre-term
delivery which had been published after 2003 and completely ignored the recent
peer reviewed acclaimed study into foetal pain produced by Dr Anand. The RCOG
also went foolishly further than this and have in a very childish way claimed
they are not aware of Dr Anand on their web page. Dr Anand is the world's authority on foetal pain - it was his work at Oxford in the 1980’s which resulted in all neonates being given anaesthesia for general surgery today. Until he produced his work it was thought that neonates could not feel pain, by measuring stress hormones he proved otherwise. Dr Anand has been published world wide. The RCOG web site stating that they are unaware of Dr Anand is the equivalent of a group of mathematicians asking “who is Einstein?”
She then goes on to question the role of the BMA, which "voted at its conference to support the move to require only one doctor's signature for an abortion to be performed, not two".
Nadine is accusing Dawn Primarolo of coming to the Committee tomorrow having already publicised her evidence in advance. Primarolo is a known advocate of the liberalisation of abortion laws, so I am not sure that this should come as a great surprise to anyone, but if she really has made up her mind on the 20 versus 24 week term limit argument, Nadine has a point in asking why the Select Committee has bothered to have an inquiry.
On the argument in question, my own view is that the law should indeed be changed to reduce the limit to 20 weeks. Medical science has moved on in light years and it is now possible for a 24 week old foetus to be kept alive. We know this because it regularly happens. It also feels pain, as Dr Anand has proven. Those who argue against this and accuse us of having a wider agenda of banning abortion (not true in my case) need to think again and accept the fact that by arguing for an outdated 24 week limit they are arguing for the continuation of licensed murder. Even Sir David Steel, who introduced the 1967 Act agrees.
If you really want calm discussion, I'm not sure that using the expression "abortion industry" is a great way to start...
ReplyDeleteShe is a bloody good MP. If you agree with her or not you have to hand it to her she puts the bit between her teeth and gets right down to the issue.
ReplyDeletePerhaps Ms Dorries could also quote the Quality of Life these extreme prems have? Not so great, generally, I believe.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree on your comments about repealing the law so that the limit is less than 24 weeks. In this day and age any opposite argument cannot properly stand
ReplyDeleteThis debate centres on whether 60 Million people are killed each year in the world by just a handful of those who are living!
ReplyDelete''abortion industry'' is exactly the term to use! That's what it is.
ReplyDeleteAn industry to exterminate unwanted babies.
I wonder how 'Lord ' Steel sleeps at night? His guilt must surely keep him awake?
Well done Nadine !
Let's also put this particular debate - the reduction from 24 to 20 weeks - into context.
ReplyDeleteThe 1967 Act - David Steel's act - set the limit at 28 weeks. The 1990 Act reduced that to 24 weeks on the same grounds on which the current amendment is proposed, so nothing radical, just a further alteration in line with advances in medical technology.
The scale of those affected is also small; of some 180,000 - 200,000 annual abortions in the UK, only 1.5% are terminated at over 20 weeks. So a change in the law is hardly going to disenfrachise women from 'the right to choose'.
I get the feeling that the time limit reduction debate is only a proxy for the whole pro / anti debate, which is not resolveable on grounds of evidence or rational argument; this is fundamentally a freedom of conscience issue, you're either for or agin.
What hope have I that the 24 / 20 week debate won't get drowned in the overall moral arguments? Absolutely none.
Iain, you have expressed yourself calmly and clearly.
ReplyDeleteI believed in abortion on demand until I had my own two children. I felt both of them move at the twenty week mark of both pregnancies and the idea of either of them or any other unborn child being aborted at that point fills me with horror.
However, all those who are anti-abortion and 'small-state' have to consider what an appalling and repressive state apparatus would have to be set up in order to force women to continue with pregnancies they did not want.
Sorry - I missed something. Why should we have the same abortion rate as other countries?
ReplyDeletedynamite, whether you like it or not it is an industry and a lot of people are making big money out of it.
ReplyDeleteI think the limit should come down to 16 weeks, which in itself is nearly half way through the pregnancy.
There is no such thing as The Abortion Industry. There is the Gynecology and Obstetrics "Industry" if you like. But there is not an "abortion industry". If you give a man the skills to control a woman's reproduction he will use them.
ReplyDeleteThe people who rant and rave about abortion are rarely capable of having a baby. Either menopausal childless women or men.
Abortion is not a decision any woman makes lightly. But she makes it alone, with all the consequences. It is her body. I think it is a worse crime to remove a child from its mother at birth (rather than allow her to terminate the pregnancy early on.) But that is what so called "pro-lifers" find a more palatable option. Sick.
A couple of really very clever comments so far but don't kid yourself that this is not going to get messy. I think Raedwald is right, this will never be a debate. A deate suggests that you may change someone's mind but discussions on abortions tend to be two groups shouting at each other.
ReplyDeleteNadine has been having an argument with Evan Harris on the pages of the Guardian recently.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,,2194607,00.html
Worth looking at.
Nadine menopausal? Dont think so,we aren't talking Widdi here. Nadine is hot. Speaking as a gay man she is the one woman who would turn me, whoever her man is is one luck b*****d.I am also speaking as someone who has met her, one look into those eyes and you fall.
ReplyDeleteDoes being gay preclude me from having an opinion on this issue Lilith? Waht if Dawn decided that it was ok to abort on the basis of sexual orientation? What happens when the science states that we can detect the gene that makes me a gay man?
I can't see the logic in accusing the medical profession of vested interests in being pro-choice.
ReplyDeleteFewer abortions would generate more work for obs and gobs delivering the non-aborted babies. And requiring only one signature would mean less work (and presumably less money) for doctors.
If, in your world it is "licensed murder at 24 weeks" but, also in your world, you accept abortion at an earlier stage, would you please explain the precise moment when a termination moves from a legal abortion to murder?
ReplyDeleteIn other words, please tell us the precise moment when a foetus becomes a seperate human being?
i agree the limit should come down, but given the gravity of what is at stake 20 weeks does not seem far enough. Many of our neighbours in Europe have a lower limit of 13 weeks. We need to be moving in this direction, if it works elsewhere, why not here?
ReplyDelete"my own view is that the law should indeed be changed to reduce the limit to 20 weeks. Medical science has moved on in light years and it is now possible for a 24 week old foetus to be kept alive."
ReplyDeleteWell, a 20 week foetus removed from the womb can only be kept alive by using advanced life support techniques. On the other hand, if it isn't removed from the womb it generally has few problems staying alive, as does a 10 week or a 1 week foetus.
If abortion is allowed at all (except in the case of the direst medical emergencies) the time limit comes from a balance between convenience and revulsion. It's an unpleasant fact that in every abortion a human life is taken.
I'd have a great deal more respect for pro-"choice" campaigners if they admitted this. It might however be difficult for them convincingly then to argue in favour of the vast majority of abortions in this country in which one person's convenience takes precedence over the very existence of another.
Every abortion should have with it sterilization end of problem.
ReplyDeleteAround 5% of foetues are aborted after the 20 week mark, and often these are those with severe abnormalities.
ReplyDeleteLowering the abortion rate would have a snowball effect, with people like Ms Dorries campaigning to lower it again in the next five years. Some babies have been born prematurely at 14 weeks and survived, yet it is inconceivable to put the abortion limit at 14 weeks.
This is tool used by our mysoginist society to try and roll back womens rights half a century.
I imagine Lord Steel sleeps like an angel.
Surely the debate is not about abortion, is it not whay are so many, particularly young, women having abortions.
ReplyDeleteWe should be looking at improving sex education in our schools.
The use of the term 'abortion industry' is provocotive, but correct - and I appluad her courage for using it, given that there will now be lots of anger expressed towards her.
ReplyDeleteBut at the end of the day, there are providers of abortion which - and sorry to be brutal here - kill unborn children for cash in very large numbers! That's an industry!
It is as simple as that!
I don't think doctors who carry out abortions get up in the morning, stretch, open the curtains ahd think 'oh joy, another day of assisting the afflicted and resolving a social problem" - and if they do, I suspect it is a way of dealing with the horrow of what they are really doing, ending human life for repayment!
lillith: If it takes a man and a women to create a child, and most people agree it takes a man and a women to sucesfully raise a child, why is abortion ONLY a women's issue?
ReplyDeleteThe child is equally as much the mans as it is the womans? The fact that the woman is the one who carries the baby is significant, but not all encompassing.
The rights of men have long been ignored in this issue.
"Primarolo is a known advocate of the liberalisation of abortion laws, so I am not sure that this should come as a great surprise to anyone, but if she really has made up her mind on the 20 versus 24 week term limit argument, Nadine has a point in asking why the Select Committee has bothered to have an inquiry."
ReplyDeleteMs Dorries has clearly also made up here mind - has she excused herself from the enquiry herself?
Primarolo is only giving evidence - Dorries is part of the Committee decision making process.
I am not going to get into the slating Nadine Dorries thing. She has her point of view, and fights her corner, although I happen to dis-agree with it.
ReplyDeleteHowever, Iain, you say abortion should not have the clock turned back on it. Dorries is saying that there needs to be a reduction from 24 weeks. However she will not say what she thinks the maximum term should be.
She is on record as saying that she would like it to be down at 12-13 weeks. Yet if you asked the women of this country if they would put up with such a restriction, they would be up-in-arms.
In fairness, she has now fronted up to this, so one cannot accuse her of having a 'hidden agenda', but she has been 'hoist by her own petard', as it is obvious that if she were able to agree a reduction to 22 weeks, she would be back the next month wanting a reduction to 20 weeks.
This is simply misleading the public, as there may be some people who would like a 22-week limit who are adamantly pro-choice, and don't want further erosion of women's rights beyond that.
Whatever one's views on abortion, I would urge people to watch the film 'Vera Drake'. This is not an easy topic, but abortion has been around for a long time, it is not going away, and we owe it to women to give them the choice for a safe abortion, rather than one which may end up killing them.
'Abortion industry' (even acknowledging the comments in this thread) and 'pro-life' are certainly not objective starting points but then Nadine has never been coy about this issue. Personally I consider myself anti-abortion but pro-choice, by which I mean I personally would not countenance the option for my own spawn but refrain from judging others on the matter. My preference would be for a 16wk (or even 12wk) limit; not sure I understand why 20 is the flavour of the month, is that just because it is arguably more attainable than 16 at this point?
ReplyDelete"I do not stand at zero weeks. I believe life begins and ends with the first and last heartbeat, which is around 9 - 12 weeks.
ReplyDeleteWhat I do believe in, is women being in full possession of the facts and at the moment they aren't, because the woman might change her mind and that would get in the way of the abortionist waiting for a payment.
A woman seeking an abortion in this country is the victim of a well organised industry.
You are right about one thing, I do want to go lower than 20 weeks - I would settle for the European average of 13 weeks, but would prefer 9."
[Comments by Nadine Dorries on the Spectator 'Coffee House' blog].
Iain, it is disingenuous of you to refer to the following in your post, without reference to Nadine's views that she would like the limit for abortion cut down to NINE WEEKS - when many women might not even realise that they are pregnant. -
"In an ideal world there would be no abortion, but we do not live in that world and never will. Those of us who adopt a pro-life attitude must recognise that we cannot roll back the clock and shouldn't try to. We have to be pragmatic, but that does not stop us trying to understand why the abortion rate in this country is so much higher than in most others, and then doing something about it."
Even more alarming were people arguing that there should be no limit on abortion, as 'life begins at conception'. Given that at that point the fertilised egg has not even implanted in woman's body, I find that view rather extreme.
Stop trying to pull the wool over people's eyes - if you are trying to turn the clock back to 1966, I would respect you having at least the honesty of saying that is your intention.
I saw Nadines blog post on her blog and had to comment: That's a very large cross she's wearing in the picture she's chosen to publish over and over again. Are we to understand her opinions are motivated by religious doctrine? In which case she is a "salami slicer who will be back for another cut tomorrow, and the day after until the reasonable wishes of the majority of women are at risk"
ReplyDelete'Lilith' was spot on.
A completely pointless conversation, you just can't argue with the pro life lot, they are a on a mission from God to impose their moral viewpoint on everyone else.
ReplyDeleteIt's either a sensible limit such as we have or knitting needles in a bedsit - which sounds like the bigger social problem to you then?
btw, a pro-lifer once asked me my views, and then in conversation announced - 'I am pro-life, I think abortionists should be hung....'
I rest my case.. they are fruit bats
With 6.7 million abortions since 1967, 200,000 a year, one for every four pregnancies many people feel it has all gone too far. The Dispatches programme on Channel four last week will have made many more people think again especially about late abortion. It is time for a change in the law.
ReplyDeleteBut is also time for fully informed consent. Many women choose abortion because they feel pressured into it by partners, parents and 'friends' and then come to regret it later. Women deserve better than this - to be given space, help and full information about fetal development, alternatives such as adoption, knowledge about complications and proper support so they can have a real choice and make a fully informed decision.
The abortion industry encourages a conveyor belt approach that doesn't give women the time, space or support they really need.
There was an item on R4 about this issue (at 8:52 - click the red text to 'listen again') here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/listenagain/zthursday_20070419.shtml
ReplyDeleteAdrian Yalland - "The rights of men have long been ignored in this issue"? That's because you don't have any rights in this issue sweetie and until you can get pregnant you shouldn't get them either. The 'rights' you have is to choose whether to put your penis in that womans vagina. If you haven't BOTH discussed having a baby then don't do it! Don't wantonly get a woman pregnant and don't then pressure her into putting her health and wellbeing, physical and mental, at risk. SHE is the one who will have to feed this being, perhaps this interloper in her body, with her own. It will probably rip her apart when it arrives in this world and she will NEVER remove the scars of being pregnant. EVERY SINGLE PART OF HER BODY WILL CHANGE. And it will hurt. Oh boy will it hurt. And then she will have to care for it. Forever. It's not like having a verrucca you know. She can die.
ReplyDeleteHer body, her choice.
I think that patient calm study will find that the 1.5% of the total aborted after 20 weeks are not some kind of flippant designer abortions - any more than the vast majority of the other 98.5% of all abortions - as pro life forces would suggest. Manipulatively.
ReplyDeleteIndeed many of these operations would take place for the same medical reasons they do now if the law were changed to 20 weeks.
The term "Abortion Industry" is obviously hugely partisan, manipulative and loaded as hell. It's not appropriate.
You could even things up Iain by heading another post calling for a calm discussion:
"Are Religious Fundamentalists manipulating a Select Committee?"
or
"Are Atrocious Scientists manipulating a Select Committee?"
If this was a more caring, selfless, less bigoted society, we would not have people demanding the right to have IVF on the NHS or demanding the right to murder babies. Am I the only one who thinks there is an obvious, humane solution?
ReplyDeleteInstead, this society of ours could accept that caring people, regardless of gender or sexual orientation could be found who were willing to take these unwanted souls and love them.
Abortion here has been reduced from a medical necessity to a lifestyle choice. It is a sad reflection on our selective refusal to admit the science behind the issue.
As for the politics I understood this was always a free vote.
I admit that I am always amazed at the way that those who support a woman's right to choose can assert that the foetus is 'her body'. This is to all intents and purposes a medieval view of the biology and amounts to a wilful blindness to the truths that science has revealed, especially in recent years.
ReplyDeleteI would have hoped that with the developments in our understanding of DNA etc that the pro-choice lobby would have revisited their argument but no. Instead we have this antiquated assertion that somehow the foetus remains an indistinguishable part of the woman's body. It seems to be a type of fundamentalism - refusing to adapt a view to the plain and obvious reality.
Whatever the arguments for abortion, let's not pretend that the foetus is indistinguishable from the woman. Everything that is unique about us is there from conception. That is rock hard science and has to be taken seriously by pro-choicers.
Annonymous 11.16. Damn, you mean being prenant isn't like...er...you know......a verucca! Jeez, well thanks for that enlightening bit of information - I will run and share this with my wife and two kids who be delighted that I have now understood what pregnancy REALLY involves!
ReplyDeleteAnd what a shame that the 'nature' has been so cruel as to afflict only women with the curse of bearing children. Perhaps you should take God to court for sex dicrimination? Perhaps we should demand that in future, at least 50% of all childen be born by men - and then of course, men would be able to have a say on the issue!
And of course, because (at the moment at least) only women have to 'tolerate' the 'alien' life form inside them for nine months, then it follows that only they should decide whether it lives or dies - regradless of who helped create it, and men should learn their place, shut up and stop interfering in 'wimins stuff'!
Well, that is total crap, and no sane person really believes it - and women should get over the fact that like it or not, it is they who have to bear babies because that's the way evoltion made it happen. But this quirk of nature doesn't mean they have a monopoly over the life of the child.
Just bacuase I cannot get pregnant doesn't mean to say I should be denied my right to be a father.
It is immoral that if my wife/girlfriend/lover fell pregnant through consensual sex and decided to kill my child, I would be able to do exactly nothing to prevent her and save the life of my child?
Why is this? because we have come to see an unborn child as less than human (especially a disabled unborbn child), a mere accessory, an inconvenience which can be abandoned with ever easier ways, and a whole industry marketing death to us in a way where by we don't even have to feel guilty about what we do.
The rights of the unborn are not worthy of counternamding the rights of people - especially those who treat abortion as a contaception - to live a selfish and self-centred life! Almost all abortions are carried out for 'social reasons' and are nothing to do with the women's health. Therefore, they are strictly speaking, illegal under the terms of the 1969 act.
And as for women being the one to feed, clothe, and care for the baby - if that is your expereince of motherhood, change your husband, cos that's not my expereince of being a father.
In short, you are not allowed to murder children after they are born, so why are we allowed to murder them before they are born. What's so special about birth that it is able to change the status of a human being from 'untermenschen' into something into which all the rights of man have been bestowed?
Afterall, as you have tried to point out, a baby is no less dependent upon its mother post birth than it is pre birth? So why the change in its legal status just soc it's out of the womb and kicking.
Oh yes - cos it looks like a human, but when it's in the womb, it's just a few cells floating in a blob of jelly!
And let's all of us keep God out of this. Plenty of babies have been killed in the name of religion, so I find the Catholic church's position a bit hypocritical since they used to burn children at the stake just for being born a protestant! This is about secular rights, not religious moral codes.
You are an unsual man Adrian, in that you give a shit.
ReplyDeleteDon't worry, your mummy would not have aborted you had she had the choice, but what if she had fallen pregnant at say, 55?
Most blokes, faced with unwanted pregnancy, say "Get rid of it". There are very few women (I have never met one) who would abort a healthy foetus if they had the resources and support to raise the child.
freedom to prosper said...
ReplyDeleteEvery abortion should have with it sterilization end of problem.
October 23, 2007 8:56 PM
Are you a Gynae, f to p? A lot of them work like that.
In the New Scientist of the 20th of October this year there is an article showing that the only sucessful strategy for reducing the total number of abortions, (legal + illegal), has been freely available contraception.
ReplyDeleteIt is a logical extension of this that the easier you make it to have an abortion early on the less late ones there will be.
Your opinions please on over the counter methotrexate?
If you reduced the time limit, how would Boris get rid of his sprogs?
ReplyDeleteThe more freely available contraception has become, and the more "sex education" there has been, the more abortions have multiplied.
ReplyDeleteAlan Johnson, Dawn Primarolo & Evan Harris are spreading death with evangelical zeal. (And coming to you soon in Northern Ireland so that you can be just as happy as us.)
What raedwald said
ReplyDeleteAdrian Yelland said "But this quirk of nature doesn't mean they have a monopoly over the life of the child." - yes it does because it is part of her body.
ReplyDeleteand "Just bacuase I cannot get pregnant doesn't mean to say I should be denied my right to be a father." - yes it does because you have no right to endanger the life of another human being and until you can get pregnant yourself your stuck with this situation - get over it.
and "It is immoral that if my wife/girlfriend/lover fell pregnant through consensual sex and decided to kill my child, I would be able to do exactly nothing to prevent her and save the life of my child?" - well 'immoral' is an interesting word isn't it? Don't some muslims consider it immoral for women to go without the veil? And to go against the wishes of her husband? And to abort his child? Such 'crimes' attract death in the form of 'honour killing' even in this country. And this is your view is it? You're not a muslim? What does that matter, you seem to have this opinion - just how would you force a woman to have your child big man? Strap her to the bed? No, emotional blackmail or intimidation is the preferred tool of sophisticates isn't it? If you can't get a gaggle of misogynists in Westminster to reverse a law for you.
Safe procedure or back street knitting needle - you choose then.
An interesting problem will arise in a few years time.
ReplyDeleteResearch in cryonic techniques will make it possible to freeze embryos at a latter and latter stages of development.
Eventually we will see a situation where every foetus aborted for choice reasons rather than abnormality could be "iced" rather than killed.
How does the moral situation change then?
Iain, well done on conducting this debate sensibly.
ReplyDeleteI am a little bit confused by what you mean by this though: "In an ideal world there would be no abortion, but we do not live in that world and never will. Those of us who adopt a pro-life attitude must recognise that we cannot roll back the clock and shouldn't try to".
I'm not sure rolling back the clock is the right expression given abortion has never been fully banned in this country... but what exactly do you mean by "in an ideal world". Those of us who are pro-life are so because we think abortion involves killing a human being. In an ideal world there would be no murders, but there still are. It does not mean we allow murder.
Adoption seems to have become the new taboo. Sometimes this debate is put in terms of either 'abortion or look after your child forever'. But we must not forget adoption. Ironically, the same liberals who love abortion and think adoption is too traumatic often support allowing surrogacy - i.e. bringing a child to term to give it up.
Annon 11.50: Firstly, please refrain from comparing me to muslim extremists. There is a huge difference between a misogynistic religion forcing women into demeaning acts, and standing up for defencless people who cannot speak for themselves. You can have a moral view withour being an extremeist!
ReplyDeleteSecondly, the baby within is not 'part of the women's body' any more than that a test tube baby is part of the test tube! It is a seperate and disticnt human life, and the mother is simply the vehichle which carried the baby until it is born. If the baby was 'part of the women's body' how come the baby often has a different blood group and is not genetically identical. It is a baby - not a clone!
Stating this doesn't make me a misogynist or unreasonable. It is just stating a truth.
Thirdly, trading-off the right for a man to 'force' a women to bear his child (the direct of a women's right to unilaterally terminate) has probablt lead to women being unable to force men to be responsible fathers. There is a direct correlation between the growth of the number of abortions and growth in single parents and irresponsible fathers who refuse to take responsiblity for supporting their children, or raising their kids properly. The reason why we have feral youths running wild today is largely because the family unit has broken down. I am not sure if abortion is a cause or a sympton, but there is a correlation.
Well, one woman with a disabled child burnt herself and and the kid to death in a lay-by yesterday. Lord knows what hell they suffered before she decided on to commit suicide and kill her kid, but you should remember that there are thousands of mothers and fathers just like her in the UK -- lumbered with a disabled child with high care dependency, without adequate support.
ReplyDeleteDisabled kids can destroy people's lives and families, and many people understandably simply run away from the monsterous responsibility, leaving the state to 'care' for those kids, and not many people want to adopt them.
Rich people can afford specialist childcare and days off and know how to badger the state into meagre handouts and special help for their kids condition, but normal people end up going without respite and support, for years, and as they get older, they are often worried what'll happen to their disabled adult child after they are no longer able to look after and protect it.
But that is of no concern to the crusaders, who want to 'save the children' from the 'Abortion Industry' Because they are not the ones who life gets destroyed and who'll have to live in poverty. And it's not only the parent(s) but also the siblings who lose out, as the disabled child uses up the families resources more than it's normal share.
Btw, I recommend reading Boris' excellent article in the Telegraph today -- all about overpopulation and how this is far worse than global warming. If you Tories were true Conservatives who are interested in conservation, you'd be pushing for a law that limits child support in forms of money and free school and health care to at most two children or more precisely, to one child per person in their lifetime. See here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml;jsessionid=VLQBNMX2ZU3T3QFIQMGSFFOAVCBQWIV0?xml=/opinion/2007/10/25/do2501.xml
Btw, 'Abortion Industry' such an emotional term, how very left-wing too -- Industry, the sinister organisation structure that turns oil, tobacco, food, water and whatever else humanity needs to survive into the evil that will enslave us all (or so).
Ps.: Maybe the Abortion Industry does exist: http://www.soylent-green.com/
those biscuits look tasty and sure will be our only hope if Boris is proven right.
Adrian, I had 4 abortions (and such fun they were, I've been trying for fifth!) and in each case I asked the father if they wanted the child, as in, I drop the baby with them when it arrives, and send them a nice postcard, and if I make enough money, some alimonies too.
ReplyDeleteFunny enough, every potential father was very quick to offer to pay for the abortion, and rather adamant that they have other plans than single parenthood for their life.
My abortion -- their decision to not want the kid. Whose 'murder'?
Btw, when abortion was made legal in the US, there was a clear drop in crime 13-18 years later. Now, what could be the reason for that? Surely not the cruel, politically incorrect assertion that unwanted, unplanned kids are more likely to be trouble than wanted, wished for children?
It's a rather disturbing thought that whilst sumultaneously importing Millions of 'EUropean Voters', seduced by Generous Welfare handouts, Our Govt appears to be telling our Own Women how difficult child rearing is, early Pregnancies etc, and actively Encouraging our Own Women to Abort.
ReplyDeleteCurrently One in 5 Pregnancies in the UK are Aborted.
Our Women have 1.8 Births which is Below replacement levels, Asians have on average 3.8....Demographically we are to become extinct, yet Our Socialist Govt Does not mention this. But it Must Know. Yet it does and says Nothing. In fact it encourages our Own Genocide.
http://bfbwwiii.blogspot.com/2007/10/frankfurt-subversion.html
http://thejournal.parker-joseph.co.uk/blog/_archives/2007/10/3/3269034.htm