Who doesn’t love a post about Abortion?

First, some background information (ie, where the hell this is coming from).

I read a post a while back about a blogger who had an abortion. This was a decision she’d made a long, long time ago and she has since become a wife, mother, etc. etc. etc. She decided to post about it because of a post that she had read. She came out and said “I had an abortion, this was why, and this is how I feel about it”.

She had no sooner hit publish when the shit hit the fan. To say she was attacked would be an understatement. She was beat over the head with the fact that she had “Killed a baby!” and she could no longer be the kind of person that the child she has now could “ever look up to!” She was told repeatedly that she deserved no pity, no compassion, and nothing but scorn. She’d made her bed, and now she’d have to lie in it.

(I’m not linking to the post or the blogger because, quite frankly, if you don’t already read her I have no interest in sending over any more haters.)

Some more background information (ie, what you should know before we go any further):

I do not believe Abortion is a Choice. It’s a baby, a life, and I don’t think any of us has the right to take a life away.

I also don’t believe Abortion should be illegal - and I vote according to that belief.

My stance on the legalization of abortion has less to do with my views on whether or not it is wrong and more to do with the reality of the social climate here in this country. Namely: making abortion illegal would do little more than further abandon a lot of poor, desperate women and children who already feel like they have nowhere to turn to. We are not, at this time, a society that is fit to care for unwanted babies and the women who find themselves pregnant with them.

And the “Pro Life” movement is a perfect example of that.

With a flagship name like “Pro Life”, you would envision a cause that is about hope and love and support. You would think this was a rallying cry for loving thy neighbor and cherishing each and every one of God’s creations. In a world that made sense, the term “pro life” would be synonymous with expressions like “sanctity” and “compassion” and “precious”.

But, no.

While there is a small slice of the Pro Life movement that wisely funnels their time, money and efforts into Adoption Services, counseling for pregnant women and healing for women who have gone through an abortion - the bigger, louder chunk is a nasty, nasty thing.

It is about black and white. Right and wrong. Condemnation and arrogance.

It is about waving signs and twisted, hateful faces screaming at would be “baby killers” as they shuffle into clinics.

It is about atrocious, deadly acts of violence against doctors and nurses who perform a medical service.

And (most appalling) it is about ripping to shreds the women that need understanding and compassion the most.

What astounded me the most about the attacks on this blogger was not the insistence that abortion was wrong. What I found most upsetting was the need to berate her for a decision that cannot, at this point, be unmade. I don’t care what your stance on abortion is, once it’s been done - it’s done. And no one should understand better than a “pro lifer” that what you’re left with is a woman who is probably steeped in her own regrets and pain.

And this is who you should be attacking? This is how you demonstrate the sanctity of life? By withholding forgiveness and compassion from the person that is left living?

It just makes no sense to me. I can understand the picketing more than I can understand the hate that is lobbed at women who admit to having had abortions. At least the picketers can delude themselves into thinking they might be able to prevent something from happening.

But once it’s done… it’s done. At that point, isn’t the best thing you can do… the right thing for us to do… to try to help those women heal?

And maybe, just maybe, turn our attention to what causes a woman to head to that clinic in the first place?

Instead of screaming about how “real” a baby is and at what point a fetus is “viable” and “not viable”, wouldn’t it make more sense to roll up our sleeves and figure out why these women find themselves so desperate that they honestly and truly feel like abortion is the only way out? Would the supposed “pro lifers” make more headway if they shed a hopeful light on a few more exit plans?

But, no. Instead they turn to fear and shame and hate as weapons of progress. They hope to bully the mind into changing and the heart into guilt ridden repentance. They wave a banner of Christian Righteousness with the assurance that their hatred will somehow be validated.

And then they wonder why no one wants to listen.

I have yet to meet a woman who can talk about her abortion without crying, or hanging her head. She didn’t do it because she didn’t think it was “no big deal”. She didn’t do it because it was “just a bunch of cells anyway”.

She did it because she felt like she had to.

She will talk to you about the nights that she wonders what she could have done differently. She might share with you the questions she has about what that baby would have been like, what she would have been like if she had given birth. If you’re lucky, you will hear her talk about the fear and the hopelessness and the panic that she wrestled with before making that decision.

And you will know, for her, that it wasn’t really a choice.

And if you really, really want to make a difference? You will stop fighting so hard against the rights of this woman or that one, and start figuring out ways to give those women - and their babies - a real chance, by giving them a REAL choice.