After reading Red Handed's vehement support of abortion , which she has explained with so much poise, I somehow felt that it had hit one nail on the head , but failed to touch the broader issue at hand. This and some of the comments posted by readers , prompted me to think and I decided to answer to Red's PS and post my views here.
1) Abortion is probably the only reasonable path of action if either the foetus is not healthy or if the mother's health is in danger or in case of rape. I do not think many people disagree on that.
2)Abortion is also the path of least resistance for an unmarried girl who becomes pregnant because of the harassment from the society that she will have to face if she had decided to raise the child on her own.
3)While I do agree with couples who decide to abort , when even after the best of precautions taken, the girl still gets pregnant, I believe that while it is entirely possible , the probability of it happening is very low.(Come on guys and Gals, the egg is available only 24 hrs in a month).Neither do I agree with the way abortion is becoming increasingly used as a method of contraception.(What if I get pregnant, We can always have an abortion na..).
4)Many people commented that they support abortion because it prevents unwanted and unloved babies from being born and it was actually a good thing to abort such babies anyway. Who are we to decide if that is what is good for the baby? Think for a moment , If Virgin Mary had decided to abort Jesus ,Christ? Or if Steve Jobs' parents had aborted him instead of giving him up for adoption ?
5) A lot of people said at the same time , that they supported all but gender based abortions. If the above point is valid(Which I question in the first place), how can this scenario be different? A prostitute aborts her girl child because she wants the kid to escape from the life that is awaiting her.A woman who has been harassed all her life by her in laws decides to abort a girl child so that her daughter does not have to go through the same ignominious life that she faced.
6) A lot of people seemed to think that the fetus is not a baby before 20 weeks. That is absolutely not true.The baby is very much alive at 12 weeks, I saw my son's ultrasound scan at 12 weeks and the baby had everything including an attitude.
What I wanted to convey is that doing it for the good of the baby is utter tosh. If you make this decision you are doing it for yourself. You are just reiterating that your life is important to you and you are as any being in this universe , bound to even take a life , when your life or right to live is threatened. Ultimately it is a choice that you have to make for yourself and love or hate yourself for it. Which is why I hope and pray I never have to take such a decision in my lifetime.
P.S : Red Handed is an amazing writer and I am a big fan and this post is not meant to insult her in any way. Just my personal opinions in the matter.
1) Abortion is probably the only reasonable path of action if either the foetus is not healthy or if the mother's health is in danger or in case of rape. I do not think many people disagree on that.
2)Abortion is also the path of least resistance for an unmarried girl who becomes pregnant because of the harassment from the society that she will have to face if she had decided to raise the child on her own.
3)While I do agree with couples who decide to abort , when even after the best of precautions taken, the girl still gets pregnant, I believe that while it is entirely possible , the probability of it happening is very low.(Come on guys and Gals, the egg is available only 24 hrs in a month).Neither do I agree with the way abortion is becoming increasingly used as a method of contraception.(What if I get pregnant, We can always have an abortion na..).
4)Many people commented that they support abortion because it prevents unwanted and unloved babies from being born and it was actually a good thing to abort such babies anyway. Who are we to decide if that is what is good for the baby? Think for a moment , If Virgin Mary had decided to abort Jesus ,Christ? Or if Steve Jobs' parents had aborted him instead of giving him up for adoption ?
5) A lot of people said at the same time , that they supported all but gender based abortions. If the above point is valid(Which I question in the first place), how can this scenario be different? A prostitute aborts her girl child because she wants the kid to escape from the life that is awaiting her.A woman who has been harassed all her life by her in laws decides to abort a girl child so that her daughter does not have to go through the same ignominious life that she faced.
6) A lot of people seemed to think that the fetus is not a baby before 20 weeks. That is absolutely not true.The baby is very much alive at 12 weeks, I saw my son's ultrasound scan at 12 weeks and the baby had everything including an attitude.
What I wanted to convey is that doing it for the good of the baby is utter tosh. If you make this decision you are doing it for yourself. You are just reiterating that your life is important to you and you are as any being in this universe , bound to even take a life , when your life or right to live is threatened. Ultimately it is a choice that you have to make for yourself and love or hate yourself for it. Which is why I hope and pray I never have to take such a decision in my lifetime.
P.S : Red Handed is an amazing writer and I am a big fan and this post is not meant to insult her in any way. Just my personal opinions in the matter.
hey great post and I repect you more now...hell more!!
ReplyDeleteAbout the eggs being thr for 24 hrs, instances or accidents happen. Protections used and still results negative. yes chances are rare, but they still exist. I dont think ppl luk at abortion as a way of contracenptive. It does leave a scar inside u especially if abortion is doen after 2 mths of the pregnancy. The medicines given by the doctor also has huge side effects which can be harmful for the woman. Noone logical or practical would eer resort to use of abortion as a contraceptive way. People can be naive but those can be counted out in fingers and thus deemed to be next to inexistent.Yes we are more concerned with the life at hand and the trauma and the risk the woman wll have to go thru. Its a personal choice which is mostly as a result of societal stigma attached to it plus personal choice of living.
And I never said a fetus is not a baby in 20 weeks. Never have I written such a thing. The Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act allowed one doctor to confer abortion is the fetus is below 10 weeks old. 2 doctors got to confirm if the fetus is below 20 weeks old but above ten weeks. After 20 weeks, u need to approach the court of law..and tey allow abortion only if the life of the woman is at stake as in hlth wise risk. If the child in the womb is gravely deformed or suffering from incurable disease, still the court will not allow abortion. This shows that th present life, is what is important and should be respected. It is a choice and each individual going thru it has a right to make it or not.When I say I support abortion, I in no way mean that a woman shud abort a fetus even if she wants to keep the baby..it is the last resort and shud be respected if taken. Our society is still backwards to accept a single mother.An I never said anythign about gender biased abortion. Yes the commentors said. But I wud like to clarify what they said....Every abortion is situational. No doctor will say no to abortion if the fetus is a girl. Noone ever finds out the motive behind the abortion and noone enquires about it.The intention is silent. But yes if a woman is forced to abort a fetus only because it is a girl, I am agaist tht. If the women chooses to abort a fetus just because it is a girl, I am against tht. But again this is situational like ur examples given. But we never find out the motive behind the abortion..Gender bias or not, we never know. Doctors have no right to ask. Its a personal choice which our law allows.
Yes it is ur personal choice like u said.
Thankyou for writing this. I am so sorry for the long comment :P
a very thoughtfull reply indeed.....nice read.
ReplyDelete@Red, your comment is a post in itself. Thank you so much. Yes I wrote this post after reading all the comments that people wrote and my intention was not to belittle anybody, just express my point that we do not need a fake morality of hypocrisy of deciding what is best for the baby.We have a right to choose what is good for us.
ReplyDelete@Guilty Conscience, Thank you for reading and glad you found it interesting.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on some points when people do behave recklessly but I feel if someone did take a plunge without protection then after 72 or some sort would be their choice rather than abortion.. So abortion in cases of unwanted baby is the very last resort.. Also many women rather prefer to abort the baby with some age old methods (yes they are still prevalent, like raw papayas) rather than face the option of approaching a doctor.
ReplyDeleteYou are right again with the point of people thinking more about themselves than the child.. But if they were mature enough to think about the child, wouldn't they want to keep it?
A child comes with a lot of financial responsibilities and given the conditions in which we live I don't think a single mother would cope up with it until she is totally sound in finance..
So it involves a lot of decisions actually even though the question is "To kill or to Keep". In that sense we are never too fit to judge others about this decision unless we ourselves face it..
P.S: I feel the essence of all these problems is the way our society is progressing.. Both men and women want to explore careers and take time to settle but the same thing doesn't apply to sexual relations.. In fact they are now starting at a younger age..
Sunitha, I probably am reading your blog for the first time. I like when people stand up and speak for what they believe.
ReplyDeleteThis post is articulated well without any personal remarks or judgements, hence applaud you for this.
As far as my take on abortion is concerned, I had written long back, Condoms Please. Men, women, as you mentioned look for abortion as a contraception method. Not acceptable at all. I am even against Pills. Pills in the long and short run, hurts female body and so does abortion. My mother has undergone abortions and she suffered mentally and physically both. This is one reason why I believe, stop when you can, take precautions.
And, I agree to the point when we say, it was for the child's sake. It is never for child, it is for parents and their inability to accept the child at the moment. Gender based abortions are ridiculous.
Anyways, at the end of the day, I still say, it is indeed couple's prerogative. They know what they are doing, why they are doing. God bless such people.
Wow... great points.
ReplyDeleteSpecially the point about the girl child... that's a new perspective for me.
@Maithili,your P.S is right on the mark. Our society is in a transition state which is part of the problem, which is accentuaed by the taboo on sex education.
ReplyDelete@Blunt Blogger, Thank you for reading my blog and commenting . Yes ,Ultimately it is the choice of the parents what is best for them.
ReplyDelete@jojo, Thanks for reading. I am not for gender based abortions in any way. But just wanted to point out the hypocrisy in saying in one breath that unwed couples abort for the best inerest of the child while people who support gender based abortions also have the same twisted logic for doing it.
ReplyDeleteOK, so u covered every minute thing that i intended to say; hence saving me the entire effort of writing a post :P
ReplyDeleteand somehow u said my mind even better than I would have.
so, Hats off to you!
also, there is something that I always wondered.. If pre-marital sex is ok with the society, why isnt pre-marital pregnancy?
I mean, everyone (more or less) has accepted that pre-marital sex exists and its ok till it isnt casual. Then why do people have 1001 opinions about getting pregnant before the marital rituals?
I'd love 2 know ur opinions on this matter.
@Express-Thanks. I think the answer to the question you posed is this. There is an older generation that expects sex to be always sanitized by marriage and the younger generation that doesn't really care , but hides it from the older generation. While pre marital sex can be hidden parents,pregnancy can't be hidden.
ReplyDelete:P
ok.
ReplyDeletemore like, parents can act like sex doesnt exist but they cant really ignore the outcome of pregnancy! :D
Sunitha,
ReplyDeleteI am late here. Read Red Handed's post, and came over. I have to agree with you more than her post. Honestly put, there are still people who look at abortion as a means of contraception. It is sad, but so true.
If I ever had to have a child as a single mother, I will raise the kid pretty well - thanks to the education, job I hold. That said, I do know there are so many who can not do it.
It is to be understood that this is a societal issue, and not a very good one at that!