I love when someone challenges me, presents me with different sides of an argument or issue and gives me something meaningful to mentally and philosophically grind on, something I did not have before to incorporate into my own beliefs system and/or opinions--especially when that someone happens to be a person whom I admire and deeply respect as I do Shannon.
In one of my recent rants, I went off half-cocked and more than a little pissed and, unfortunately, offended her. I will not apologize for my opinions, since they're mine and mine alone and I don't expect others to embrace them, only to respect them as being mine. However... because I failed to express myself adequately - too much going on all at once in my head and my fingers couldn't get it all out, much like a mush-mouth that can't speak fast enough to keep up with racing thoughts - and the lack of clarity with which I presented my opinion left it open for interpretation as offensive, I do apologize for that. I should have expounded on my statements and explained my feelings.
Shannon left an amazingly thought-provoking comment regarding that post:
As a 34 year old adult, it's easy for me to say that nobody could force or coerce me into anything but I'm not at all certain that confidence of self is easy to find in any 16 year old pregnant girl. Especially a 16 year old unwilling or unable to tell her own parents about the situation with the mother of her boyfriend so married to the idea of aborting that she forged a consent form. That's some pretty powerful persuasion in my opinion; no the mom didn't drive her there but it doesn't sound like she encouraged the girl to explore all of her options. Being able to have sex doesn't imbue with intelligence, obviously, but being 16 means by virtue of limited life experience the people who are advising you should actually have your best interest at heart. This was obviously not the case.
While I'm not sure what having the other mother in jail will solve, at the end of the day if it's all about responsibility then it would seem right that she should do the time for doing the crime.
I won't get into the logistics of what electing McCain could well do to a woman's right to choose, as in yes you're technically correct about his ability to ''pass a law'' but it's
no secret that any ruling effecting choice (or making it an issue of states rights) would come from the Supreme Court and we all know who appoints those judges.
And as a point of fact, without involving the Supreme Court, a law was passed banning so-called ''partial birth abortion'' (a medical procedure that doesn't actually exist, by the way) which effects not just a woman's right to choose to continue a pregnancy but effects the right of families to choose life or death for mothers with pregnancies that go horribly, horribly amiss. I cannot fathom anyone reading Cecily's story http://www.uppercasewoman.com/wastedbirthcontrol/losing_my_twins_or_how_i_became_the_internet_poster_girl_for_partial_birth_abortion/index.html) and speaking so easily of women who somehow need to take responsibility or the implied judgment of somehow learning a lesson by continuing an unwanted or worse, deadly, pregnancy.
Obviously, I am pro-choice but I am also apparently one of those you feel need to take responsibility because my first pregnancy was both unplanned and a complete surprise (pill + condom) which ended with my son dying after a month of intensive care. By your math, because in this ''birth control saturated society'', I am no brighter and am, in fact, just as ''stupid'' as the 16 year old. Months later, I was again pregnant after again practicing safe sex to a ridiculous degree KNOWING that any future children would meet the same end as our Jackson. The decision to not continue the pregnancy was taken from me when I mis-carried but there is no way in hell I would have continued that pregnancy knowing the end result would be another infected child, born only to suffer before succumbing as did his brother before him. To know that in your opinion my option had I not had a mis-carriage would be a wire hanger saddens me at a visceral level.
To which I respond, respectfully:
As a 35-year-old adult, I can reflect on myself as a 16-year-old with nearly 20 years of hindsight. At 16, at 18, at 21, and even now at 35, I was and continue to be a strong-willed individual with a solid beliefs system, not rigid and inflexible but resilient enough to be open-minded without fear of being easily swayed into complacency, compliance, and conformity. I equate that to "confidence of self" and it is part of what defines me as an individual. I knew then and continue to know now that the consequences of my silence, as I stated previously, would be far more grave than owning up to the reality of the current situation - not just physically but emotionally and spiritually. Anyone who does
NOT know or understand this has been failed by those whose duty it was to teach them this and other invaluable life lessons.
Persuasion or not on the part of the boy's mother, some part of this girl WANTED that abortion, whether she acknowledges it or not - she may not even realize this and is likely having conflicting feelings about the pregnancy, the abortion, and every action and reaction occurring since - or she would not have gone to the lengths she did, seeking the forged consent and then using it. "Persuasion" was probably also a factor in her parents' actions against the other mother and yet one more set of circumstances this girl fell into and allowed herself to be swept away by.
I agree with you 100%, the woman who signed that form failed this girl in every way imaginable, but that was not what had me so pissed off at the time, and I stated as much. Although the girl was not her own daughter, this woman took on a modified role beyond that of "boyfriend's mother" the day her son impregnated the girl--and she had a responsibility not only to the girl but
TO HER OWN SON to (as you perfectly worded it) "[encourage them] to explore all of [their] options." I also agree, sexual capabilities and intelligence have absolutely nothing to do with each other. In fact, I've witnessed situations where they were mutually exclusive: While working in an OB/GYN office, I encountered a 19-year-old patient in the midst of her 4th pregnancy who had no clue that sex caused her "condition," and obviously neither did her boyfriend - unless he did and was withholding that information from her, which to me is an act of malice.
No, having this woman in jail will solve nothing in the end. Judging by her actions, she seems the type of person willing to do anything to accomplish her own goals, no matter what the cost, an entirely selfish motivation and desire to manipulate others including her own child and another child under her care, and she will likely never change. She violated the law. She violated the children's trust. She violated the parent-child relationship within another family. She deserves more than just a year in jail, but unfortunately that is what she got. In no way was I defending her actions, because in reality I think she's even more stupid than the girl: She was manipulating people in order to satisfy her own needs and desires (the larger part of me seriously doubts her claim that it was in her son's interest so he could go to college, the case more likely being she wasn't "ready to be a grandma," while the girl was only manipulating people at the behest of her own parents).
As for the McCain discussion, I only pointed it out because of the literal terms it was presented on the message board: "If McCain does pass the law..." Too often I see the failings of the education system in action in general ignorance of how the government actually works. What you say is true about the Supreme Court and appointments of justices and the ramifications of their decisions for all of us--their interpretation of the "law" subjective based on their experiences, education, beliefs, and particularly politics, but that is just the icing on the cake in my argument that the law and lawmakers and lawyers need to be less consumptive of people's decision-making ability and less destructive of people's lives as a result.
I consider myself to be "pro-choice" as well, but I apply a different definition to this term than most do. By
MY definition, pro-choice is not strictly tied to the abortion issue but in securing every individual's right to make their own choices, no matter what the topic of discussion. Each of us must make life-changing decisions and
WE are the ones who must live with the consequences. Some faceless lawyer or panel of judges should never have the right to dictate those decisions to us, forcing us down a path of consequences we as individuals - not the judge - must live with, without having made that choice for ourselves. If I want to have an abortion or not, choose to vaccinate my children or not, send my children to a public school or not, wear my seat belt or not, smoke cigarettes or not, consume salt and grease and candy and caffeine or not - those decisions are mine to make and I am willing to live with the consequences, but they should not be made for me and I should not be forced to live with the costs when I had no part in choosing. In the ultimate decision-making process, we must each choose for ourselves:
Enter ye in by the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many be they that enter in thereby. --Matthew 7:13
No politician or judge can make
that decision for me, and this is a driving power guiding me in every decision I must make; I don't need SCOTUS attempting to push me through what I believe is the wide gate, ya know?
Thank you for the link to Cecily's story. I did read through some of her posts and agree with some of her points but would also like to expand upon them with my own, colored with my own "pro-choice" standard, the
most profound being this:
So it's easy to read my story and say, oh, yes, in case LIKE YOURS, abortion should be legal. But... when laws are passed that make it difficult for that teenage girl to get to exercise the right to control her own body--hey, I'm looking at you, Ms. Clinton, for not standing up harder against the parental notification laws--or for the professional woman to be able to fill a prescription, quietly, for RU486 at her local pharmacy so she can make her choice as well, or that harried mother to do the same thing--when those laws are passed, it's women like me that die. When you cut corners, you don't save babies lives. You kill women like me.
Let me say that again. When you compromise on abortion--when you sacrifice even the smallest corner of choice--you kill women like me. You create a culture of fear among doctors that puts lives like mine at risk.
There should be no abortion debate. There should be no compromise on abortion. There should be no concessions or sacrifices regarding choices and absolutely NEVER be a manipulation of the doctor-patient relationship by ANY branch of the government - from the legislature to the judicial system. A decision like this should be made strictly by a woman and her partner and her doctor. PERIOD.
While I do not generally agree with the practice of abortion (including "partial-birth abortion," which although is not medically classified as such - there is no CPT code for a procedure by that name - there is, in fact, a late-term abortion procedure to which this is referring, as Cecily stated in her post), I believe there are cases in which it is warranted - those "acceptable" cases, as she describes them. I have found myself exceptionally disgusted, seeing a
young woman denied an abortion simply because she was a Medicaid recipient, refused while at their expense, yet the state was willing to provide for prenatal care and delivery and "heroic measures" made in an effort to save a severely deformed infant (who would be the recipient of intensive, aggressive, EXPENSIVE medical care FOR LIFE) as well as the mother, whose life was jeopardized by continuing the pregnancy and carrying to term, let alone trying to deliver - a cost of potentially hundreds of thousands of "taxpayer dollars" versus a couple of hundred and at immense emotional distress to the woman. For what reason? Policy. Dictated by politicians. Enforced by the courts. Consequences of which lived with by the patient. It's not a conversation I take lightly by any means, and the point I was trying to make was not at all about "somehow learning a lesson by continuing an unwanted or worse, deadly, pregnancy."
As for you and your situation, I must mention that I have been reading your blog for a while and am aware of your circumstances only insofar as you have chosen to share them with [us] me. I must at this point, as politely as I can, tell you that you have taken out of context my "responsibility versus birth control" argument and applied it to a completely different situation. Apples and oranges and all that. I stated, "She got knocked up. It happens." It DOES happen, and I think few would argue that point. However, I was not implying her stupidity factor as being related to her failure to use (or lack of efficacy of) birth control methods and her resultant pregnancy, but to her willingness to kowtow first to her boyfriend's mother in having the abortion and subsequent willingness to go along with bringing charges against her, claiming she was "coerced." Maybe she was and maybe she wasn't forced (she was definitely poorly counseled, as you pointed out). I don't know, I wasn't there; but again, a part of this girl must have wanted the abortion or she would not have done it, nor would she have gone to the lengths she did to have it done in the first place, then aggravating the situation by casting blame elsewhere. AGAIN, maybe she didn't understand her feelings and desire to terminate her pregnancy and didn't know how to deal with the emotions that followed. The point is, she is stupid in that she seems to lack ability to think for herself, doing what everyone else tells her to do.
You, Shannon, are nothing like this girl. "By [my] math," you were exercising birth control and got pregnant. It happens. No method of birth control (other than abstinence) is 100% effective. You
were being responsible in your actions to try to prevent pregnancy, yet when it happened you stepped up and accepted it, courageously by what I gather, so there is no correlation between you and this girl whatsoever. With your next pregnancy, you
continued to act responsibly, prior to, during, and after the fact. You were faced with a decision that I honestly cannot say how I myself would have reacted, but I understand and respect your (as a mother, I will say
NEED) need, wanting to spare your baby the same fate as his brother. I applaud your ability to do this in a capacity that seems (to me) compassionate and caring and MOTHERLY. There is no way stupidity would enter into a reckoning of you and your actions -
EVER - and nowhere in my reading of what you have posted have I ever gleaned any inkling that you laid the blame for your situation at anyone else's doorstep.
Finally, as to the wire hanger, I feel you have misconstrued (due to my lack of clarification) my objection to the original comment in this regard. First, I was appalled that someone would believe that women would need to "resort" to
anything, particularly something as vile as a coat-hanger abortion (as a result of a decision forced upon them by bureaucrats who have no one's welfare in mind besides their own) when there ARE other options available, even in the event that abortion were illegal, if one is resourceful enough to seek them out. With that in mind, if a woman is ignorant enough to "resort" (I hate the context in which that was used, and I generally just don't like that word anyhow, it implies weakness) to just lying down and accepting mandates from the dictators, without seeking other alternatives or just standing up for her right to be a
cognizant human being, then she gets what she deserves. I know it's harsh, it's cynical, it's probably even an ugly way to think, but if we don't stand up for our own rights, who will do it for us? Where we have allowed ourselves to be led as a society saddens ME on a visceral level.
Thank you, Shannon, for inspiring me to think deeper on this subject, for your comment, and above all for your willingness to challenge my opinions and thereby giving me a chance to grow in my beliefs.
