By Carol Tobias, President
Editor’s note. This appears in the July issue of National Right to Life News. Please share with your pro-life family and friends.
For 50 years, the abortion industry has told us that women should have a “choice” when it comes to abortion; that women had the “right to choose” whether or not to end a pregnancy.
It has been clear, over the years, and is becoming even more clear now, that even though women are supposed to have “choice,” they shouldn’t be allowed to choose life. The abortion industry wants dead babies and that requires assembly-like proficiency. No room for second thoughts.
Many states have enacted informed consent laws to make sure that women seeking an abortion are fully informed about the abortion procedure, its potential risks, and alternatives — something required for every other surgical procedure performed in the United States. Along with the provision, several states require that she be allowed to view an ultrasound of her preborn baby if she wishes to.
The abortion industry has vigorously opposed these laws. Why?
They seem to think that if she gets information about her baby and the abortion process, she’ll change her mind. So, of course, at the top of their “to-do” list is rushing the pregnant woman into the abortion facility and rushing her through the abortion.
You can see how much they fear real “choice,” which is what pregnancy resource centers provide. The abortion industry detests anyone who provides valuable free services to women who want and need help. The abortion industry claims the pregnancy centers are “deceptive” because they advertise pregnancy help but don’t do abortions. Abortion supporters assume that every woman who becomes pregnant is looking for information on how to get an abortion. Nothing or no one should be allowed to interfere with the deadly outcome.
Some states have tried, and others are still trying, to shut down pregnancy centers or make them become purveyors of abortion information. The US Supreme Court, in NIFLA v Becerra, overturned a California law that required pregnancy centers inform women, among other things, that the state will pay for her abortion. And, yes, that is crazy but the vote was 5-4, not (as it should have been) 9-0.
Democrat members of Congress, led by the rabidly pro-abortion Senator Elizabeth Warren, are pushing legislation that would require the Federal Trade Commission to prohibit what they call “deceptive and misleading information” by the pregnancy centers. They are upset that the pregnancy centers provide women with the information they deserve to have before making a life or death decision for their babies—information the abortion industry refuses to give them.
Many of these same members of Congress are pushing Google and other tech companies to limit (censor) information from the pregnancy centers when someone searches for information on abortion.
If a woman contacts a pregnancy center but tragically follows through and has an abortion, the center can’t stop her. They will, however, let her know that if she experiences post-abortion syndrome, they will welcome her back with open arms for counsel and support.
Along with lobbying to obliterate pregnancy centers, abortion proponents have also set their sights on another real choice: Abortion Pill Reversal (APR). Here’s how that works.
If a woman takes the first of two pills (mifepristone) in the chemical abortion process then changes her mind about the abortion before taking the second pill (misoprostol), she can seek treatment, getting a heavy-dose progesterone treatment to counteract the effect of the mifepristone. The process is effective about 2/3 of the time and more than 4,500 babies are alive because their moms changed their minds and these precious babies survived.
So, of course, abortion advocates hate Abortion Pill Reversal! They say it’s “junk science” and doesn’t work. It may be that they don’t want to acknowledge that any woman would regret her abortion.
Colorado has gone so far as to pass a law to charge doctors with “medical misconduct” if they help a woman reverse her chemical abortion. “Choice” anyone?
What this all indicates—not wanting women to get information that might dissuade them from going through with the abortion, wanting to shut down and/or censor pregnancy centers, and not wanting women to know about the APR process—is that “choice” is no longer an option, if it ever was.
If abortion partisans actually supported “choice,” they would acknowledge that many women don’t want an abortion, that they would prefer support with the pregnancy.
“The Handmaid’s Tale,” a novel by Margaret Atwood, is a story about women impregnated and forced to give birth by a controlling patriarchal society. Radical abortion supporters have shown up in various places over the last few years wearing long red dresses, bizarrely claiming that pro-lifers want to force this lifestyle on women.
What is ironic is that the predominate philosophy coming from the abortion camp seems to be that women shouldn’t give birth.
They are not to be given information that puts pregnancy and childbirth in a positive light.
They are not supposed to enter the door of a pregnancy center willing to provide various services, programs, and love.
They are not allowed to change their minds and seek help if they start the abortion pill process but decide to save their baby.
That isn’t choice. That’s looking more and more like coerced abortion.