I just read Dena-Kay Martin's column about President George W. Bush's latest pro-life act, "Where Will Protestors Be After the Baby Is Born?" in the Nov. 17 issue, and I am in total agreement. Although I myself am pro-choice, I do not condone the use of abortions as a common birth control practice. Abortions should be used only in last-case, worst-case scenarios. Ultimately, it should always be up to the woman.
For whatever reason, pro-life advocates such as Bush always seem to overlook the ever-possible occurrence of a last-case, worst-case scenario. Martin's examples of an unwed, impoverished teenager being legally forced to carry her baby to term and the example of a woman whose life will be sacrificed if her baby is carried to term, are exactly the scenarios pro-life advocates seem to ignore. Perhaps pro-life really means being pro-fantasy-of-a-world-that-does-not-exist, in which every child is born into a loving family of two parents, with relatives and neighbors willing to help raise this child. As much as I wish it did exist, this world does not. Her article says exactly what needed to be said about why such acts for pro-life legislation are wrong.
Furthermore, bills like these add to the general societal phobias our generation must face. In a recent conversation with an older friend who experienced the freedom of the 1960s and 1970s, I pondered how odd it was to envision a time in which free love existed, and coexisted, with an absence of sexually transmitted diseases and HIV. Such a thing is preposterous to me, since all my life I have heard perilous warnings about the dangers of unprotected sex. Now we must fear something else. Even amidst our wholesome education of birth control practices, we women of the new millennium must fear the possibilities of becoming prematurely pregnant.
With Bush and many of his pro-life cronies in control, what will happen to these women who are not ready to carry their babies to term? Bush has two daughters. I wonder what he would do if one of them came home, unwed, broken hearted, and pregnant. Oh wait, I know the answer to that. Even if Bush's daughter carried the baby to full term, it wouldn't affect their family much at all. After all, he's the president. He doesn't have to worry about things like welfare payments, or food stamps, or studying full time at college while working two part-time jobs to pay the bills, and a couple college loans.
It's okay though, with his publicly known "C" average in college, we know that Bush doesn't value education all that much. Only the lives of the children of the future matter. Excuse me, not even their lives matter - only their births.
You hit the situation right on the head.
Now if we could only get Bush to read your article.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
