The age of the digital knitting needle
There’s this internet site, called ‘Women on Web’, that sells abortion pills. A good thing? Well, no, not exactly:
Women living in countries where abortion is restricted - including Northern Ireland - are using the internet to buy abortion pills that allow them to have a termination at home. Women in more than 70 countries, including Northern Ireland, have used the internet site Women on Web to buy the drugs for £55 a time. More than one in 10 customers on one of the most well-known websites needed a surgical procedure after taking the medication, a medical study has found.
There’s even more good news about these abortion pills:
Two more American women have died after taking the abortion pill popularly known as RU-486, bringing to seven the number of fatalities attributed to the controversial drug since it was approved by federal regulators five years ago.
Going back to that first article though, the operative word is ‘restricted’. In other words, the website may be new but the news ain’t.
When abortion is illegal or hard to get, you get desperate women who will try anything to avoid having a baby. Enter the voodoo doctors, the knitting needles, the dubious websites etcetera.
Though I am pro choice myself, the above has nothing much to do with the morality of the abortion debate. It’s just a fact of life that a number of people will do anything, including life threatening procedures, to avoid carrying their babies to term. One might deplore this fact but disapproving of facts won’t make them go away.
Again, this is not about the moral superiority of a ‘pro life’ or a ‘pro choice’ stance but it is a reminder that, whatever your opinion is, people will get hurt. There are no pain-free ‘choices’ in this debate.
Having an abortion will be extremely traumatic for a number of women who have them. I’m sure there will be some women who see a visit to an abortion clinic as nothing more painful than going to the dentist but I think most women who go to have an abortion know that this is a very painful and hurtful option, which will have psychological consequences for them.
On the other hand, there are perfectly honourably reasons to be against the legalisation of abortion. However, a ‘pro life’ postion doesn’t mean an overall pro life outcome. In a world where abortion is illegal, women will still be seeking abortions and they will find ways to have them. Problem is, that because these methods are illegal, some of them will be very risky and many women (and their unborn babies) will die in the process.
It’s not the intention of this column to measure the pain and count the dead in both these possible worlds: one where abortion is legal and one where it’s not. I merely wanted to point out that there are no pain-free or death-free options.
(More survey results here)
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July 12th, 2008 at 06:19
The fact that people will “do anything” to reach some goal removes it from the sphere of moral considerations? If morality is not the measure of our actions, then what is? Efficacy? Then why not also “abort” the lives of inconvenient and unproductive toddlers, lunatics and the demented and aged?
The morality of the issue becomes clearer when you replace the victims with another class, say American Indians. If people are going to kill worthless savages anyway, then why not make it legal so they receive the benefit of protection from the cavalry when the Indians retaliate?
There is no moral equivalence in the “two worlds” of legal and illegal abortion: In one, one suffers (the baby) at the hands of another, and in the second, one causes harm to themselves in the commission of in immoral and illegal act.
July 12th, 2008 at 06:37
Thanks for the comment. To answer the first question: Of course it does not do such thing - and neither did I suggest so anywhere. I am aware of the fact that the abortion issue is something people are very passionate about but I would still ask people to actually read what I write (if they do want to have a discussion) and not to put words or ideas in my ‘mouth’.
I am not talking of the morality or immorality of abortion here; I was simply stating that whatever the law of the land may be, that people will suffer and die. That is a point of fact, and not a moral observation (or judgement.)
Morality and efficacy are probably both at the root of our actions: Even our laws are the formal crystalisation of what we think is right (or moral) and what is feasible and/or practical. The question of morality & efficacy would make a great discussion (but then without cheap similes, please) but it was not what I was discussing in this column,
J.
July 12th, 2008 at 20:00
Do you think that people on either side have denied that there is pain and suffering? How does your observation contribute to the argument, or what do you hope to gain by a common acknowledgment?
July 12th, 2008 at 20:10
I think that there are too many people on both sides of this issue who have long stopped acknowledging the basic humanity of those on the other side.
People don’t talk to each other anymore: they shout, rant & preach. They don’t even listen to what the other says - or read what they write - without getting into an automatic defensive or attacking mode.
I wrote this piece to take a step back from the fury of the debate, to simply try and state the obvious: that, despite the relentless demonising that’s going on on both sides, neither side actually is demonic (or angelic.) And that, whatever any of the sides will say or may think or hope, there will always be victims, whatever utopian views we may cherish,
J.