How do pro-choice advocates account for the fact that the two women who won abortion rights victories in 1973 are now seeking to have those Supreme Court rulings overturned?
CNN: Court won’t rethink ‘Mary Doe’ abortion case
The Supreme Court rejected an appeal Tuesday from a Georgia woman seeking to reverse a 1973 Supreme Court ruling giving her the right to an abortion.
Sandra Cano was part of the original series of landmark rulings from the high court legalizing the medical procedure. The justices without comment refused to reopen the case.
Cano, a resident of Atlanta, Georgia, was “Mary Doe” in the Doe v. Bolton appeal that was a companion argument to the more famous Roe v. Wade, both decided on January 22, 1973.
…
Cano stated in her appeal that she had never wanted an abortion in the first place, had been living in an abusive relationship, and had been forced by her attorney to fight the abortion option in court.
The high court several years ago rejected a similar legal appeal from Norma McCorvey, the “Jane Roe” of Roe v. Wade. McCorvey, a resident of Texas, also sought to overturn the case that gave her the right to an abortion.
Have Norma McCorvey and Sandra Cano been brainwashed by conservatives?
Or have they become wiser with age?
Regardless of whether or not abortion is legal, McCorvey and Cano are a tragic example of the fact that an abortion’s legacy is long. Those who would dress abortion up as a liberation aren’t being completely honest about the ugly truths about what it does to women.
Two links for the pretenders:
Wikipedia: Pro-life feminism
October 11, 2006 at 9:32 am |
I keep wondering if we can kill our babies, how soon will it be before we can kill off the old people.
October 11, 2006 at 3:57 pm |
“Those who would dress abortion up as a liberation aren’t being completely honest about the ugly truths about what it does to women.”
Although I understand this thinking, isn’t that what many famous and even fiction stories do? Even the Disney classic Pinochio could be used above. Pinochio was deceived and therefore he suffered. What about his father and those he “unintentionally” hurt?
The truth is that we who sin become slaves of our sin. What perhaps may be more important are the people we injure as a result of our sin.
My point is that although women are “hurt” in the abortion lie, it is their sin. Their sin and their enslavement to it directly causes the death of a child. So instead of arguing for the it “hurts women” argument, perhaps we ought to look at the whole thing and call it the evil that it is.
October 12, 2006 at 1:41 pm |
If there is one subject that conservatives and liberals should be able to find common ground, abortion is it. Even through a natural worldview abortion does not make sense. I have debated a few liberals on the subject to try and see why even in a “Golden Rule Morality” system, how can abortion be moral. I hear weird reasons, such as lack of sentience gives a fetus less right to moral consideration. I argue back that by that standard, a Mentally Retarded person should get less moral consideration. Or if a doctor mollest their patient while under sedation its ok as long as their sentience was not present at the time. They end up contradicting themselves in so many ways, while debating this topic, hiding under the guise of freedom and choice.
October 12, 2006 at 6:30 pm |
Strictly speaking as economic matter I think abortion is wrong. As the population ages we cannot afford to kill off the future taxpayers of tommorrow.
The sad fact of the matter is who will pay for our social security and medicare if we keep on killing off our kids?
With demographic problems looming the world over from the great birth diearth. Yes believe it or not even countries like Mexico are affected.
Abortion at this point is truly awful social policy.
What we really need are incentives for people who want abortions to have kids. Perhaps a program for unwed teens so if the teen delivers a baby she gets $4000 in her bank account.
Personally I feel that if curbing abortion is so important society should put up the money for women to have children or shut up.
October 13, 2006 at 5:55 pm |
I don’t know you, and I’ve already forgotten where I found this blog from. But I like this post.
One of the WORST pro-abortion arguments I have (very recently) heard was along the lines of killing a fetus = removing right to life. Force a woman to keep the baby she doesn’t want, then we are removing her rights both to liberty AND the pursuit of happiness. 1:2 basic rights removal ratio. Therefore, it is logicallly moral to kill the fetus.
I, sadly, was not in the position to post a reply to what I was reading. But seriously. If you kill me now, you’ve taken away all three of my basic rights, not just one. Because by removing my abliity to live, I no longer have the capabilities required to be happy or free. Not now, not in the future. A fetus might not be free after a month’s worth of growth, but by killing it immediatly, you rip away its rights of freedom and happiness before it has the chance to excersize them.
Obviously, though, making a woman unhappy for a few short months is worth more than a lifetime of happiness pursuit by the fetus.
October 14, 2006 at 3:00 pm |
I think ultimately, for many prochoice women, it is simply their body, and they see that a baby should not have a right over it.
The problem with this argument is at the presuppositional core. We should not be starting with what we think our rights should be. We should be starting with the Creator and His revealed purposes for men and women and the creaturely order.
We are sinners in rebellion against God’s Law, not some morally neutral creatures. Until we have peace with God through Christ, men will always be at war with God and other men, including our children.
October 14, 2006 at 3:00 pm |
Alex,
I am glad you are against abortion, but your reasoning is a little shakey. I am not sure how much abortion is going to affect our social security checks, how about the fact that abortion is killing a person?
$4000 dollars for teenagers who deliver a baby? Yeah thats a great Idea. Why not give her $100 every day after the baby is born if she can refrain from killing it. And if she doesn’t kill anyone for the whole year, she gets a new car. I am not sure why you think someone should get paid for not commiting murder?
Infringe,
You are right on. Especially with your last line. Think about it, abortion is allowed to happen just for a womans convienence. So that she is not forced to carry a baby for nine months. A life is taken, just for someones convienence.
October 16, 2006 at 10:20 am |
I’m with JimFish; Alex, you are right to want to instill in people a desire to preserve life instead of destroy it, but I don’t think a $4000/baby bounty is the right answer. Welfare already basically does that, and it creates more problems than it solves.
October 16, 2006 at 10:56 am |
Still, Alex has targeted a legitimate question: is enough support out there for women who choose against abortion in favor of life? Perhaps that support is financial, perhaps not. What if some women make the decision to abort based on financial worries that would be quelled if only they knew a modicum of help were available? Do we conservatives sit back nevertheless and say, “Sorry, I don’t support welfare — her baby’s blood is on her own hands, not mine!”
Of course no one wants to enable women who would say, “Sure, give me $80K and I’ll have this baby — and at $80K a head, a lot more, too!” But if a small pledge of financial support — say $200/month for the first year — would ease a woman’s fears and encourage her to choose against abortion, is life worth it? Is it worth it even at the potential risk of enabling welfare-like behavior?
What is the value of life? What if only $20/month would tip the scale against abortion? Are children worth it?
A corollary question: if the support is out there, do women know it? I ask because of a conversation among my students from several years ago. They were discussing abortion and one liberal spat, “It’s not as though conservatives are out there adopting babies!” First I thought, “No fair — why should conservatives have to bear the consequences of the irresponsible sexual decisions of others?” But then it hit me: conservatives are out there adopting babies, even embryos. In fact there are many, many crisis pregnancy centers around the nation available to support women. So was this student speaking out of bad faith, trying to score a rhetorical point in violation of the facts? Or was he simply ignorant that a great many conservatives are, in fact, going to great lengths to help women choose life?
October 18, 2006 at 9:18 am |
“‘It’s not as though conservatives are out there adopting babies!” First I thought, “No fair — why should conservatives have to bear the consequences of the irresponsible sexual decisions of others?’ ”
“What is the value of life? What if only $20/month would tip the scale against abortion? Are children worth it?”
I agree that conservatives need to follow through (and I agree with you that they do), but I think the whole “hypocritical” argument by the prochoice side is fraudulent. Simply because Prolifers are perceived as doing nothing to help pregnant girls is somehow a legitimate argument FOR abortion is assuming a worldview and argumentation that leads to utter chaos.
God is Creator, man is made in his image, and truth is truth no matter who believes it. It does not matter what Prolifers think or DO about helping pregnant women (as far as whether abortion is right or wrong). Our nation MUST give an account, whether we want to or not, for the murder of our children.
Yes, I said murder.
October 19, 2006 at 8:09 am |
Mike, the questions you ask are legitimate if there is somehow a difference between an unborn baby and a born baby. We wouldn’t even entertain such questions for a 3 month old baby.
the issue is not to motivate someone to follow through to birth. It is to make them understand that not following through is REALLY murder, not something else. Something they will learn the hard way if they don’t follow through. just ask almost any woman that has done it if they don’t regret it 10 years later
October 19, 2006 at 8:37 am |
Call me a pragmatic in this case. Although I agree that this …
… is important in the long-term, grassroots, person-by-person culture change that we need, I would want more than such a persuasive effort at work if I were in the womb of a woman considering aborting me. I am a person; I want to live. Once I get out I can be abused and neglected — that’s the gamble of life, and I’ll take my chances. But if I don’t get out of that womb I don’t have a chance at all.
Try imagining something more horrifying than this:
seedlings: the woman who shouldn’t have happened
Babies in the womb are entitled to life — for many reasons, but at the very least because mothers respected our entitlement to life. So really, if I’m in the womb I don’t care whether or not my mother has the right motivations in allowing me to be born — I just want to be born. We can sort out all the ideologies later.
Please note that I am not making redemptive arguments here, only common grace. Aborting a baby doesn’t send a woman to hell, just as deciding not to abort a baby doesn’t send a woman to heaven. Our ultimate outcome is an entirely different issue that must be taken up with Jesus Christ. I’m focusing instead on the common grace that God sheds upon all people, including devout atheists, in allowing us to participate in the miracle of birth. As you rightly point out, most women regret abortions later — and this is because they destroy a natural process that gives, as all natural processes do, glory to God.
(For those who would argue that death is a natural process — read this.)
October 20, 2006 at 1:12 pm |
“I’m focusing instead on the common grace that God sheds upon all people, including devout atheists, in allowing us to participate in the miracle of birth.”
“Common grace” is certainly a truth, and perhaps needs to be used in this argument for Prolifers who wish to get everyone to understand before they not kill their babies. So your “pragmatism” may be something that needs to be considered more thoroughly?
“Aborting a baby doesn’t send a woman to hell, just as deciding not to abort a baby doesn’t send a woman to heaven. Our ultimate outcome is an entirely different issue that must be taken up with Jesus Christ.”
Right on. Although there are fundamental issues that society needs to grapple with when it comes to understanding the basis for law, standing on a sidewalk telling women they will go to hell because of a particular sin is an opposite error.
I remember talking with a woman who told me she had a one way ticket to hell because she had an abortion. The reality was that the abortion was a particular sin that made her REALIZE that she was enslaved to sin and already on her way to hell.
I think the most difficult problem with the abortion issue is that we live in a pluralistic society that for the moment is controlled by secularists. Although many conservative Christians would like to get that power back, I often wonder who will be in power next after secularism has run its dead end course.
October 20, 2006 at 2:24 pm |
Interesting. Have you been following Ruberad’s posts (and lengthy discussions) on theonomy? Pretty heady stuff. (Don’t go too far down that rabbit hole — it’s a scary ride.)
Agreed! Excellent employment of bothism here — both parties can be (and often are) at fault. On the other hand — and I think you’ll agree with this — I don’t have a problem with people standing on street corners arguing that abortion is wrong, or holding up large posters depicting abortion’s horror in graphic, bloody detail. Hiding the truth does no one good, and the truth needs to get out somehow.
Very astute! And as we both know, we all have those particular sins in our lives that (hopefully) bring us to precisely that conclusion.
The Muslims, of course!
Actually, that’s an irresponsible joke — but it’s a lead-in to a post that I’ve had drafted for two weeks now, and still haven’t found the time to revise for the world at large. Stay tuned …
October 23, 2006 at 10:34 am |
“Interesting. Have you been following Ruberad’s posts (and lengthy discussions) on theonomy?”
I haven’t read Ruberad’s post. I am a fan of Greg Bahnsen’s presuppositional apologetic work. He was also a big defender of Theonomy. It is my understanding that theonomy is just a more serious “post-millenialism” (if I can state it that way).
Sam Waldron’s critique of theonomy I think is quite sound. I lean to the Amillenial position. Any position that tries to unite church and state again is a place I simply don’t want to go back to.
However, what I meant by the statement “society needs to grapple with when it comes to understanding the basis for law” does not mean that we need to become some kind of Theocracy. Yet I think no matter what a Christian may argue for, the “other side” will always see a Jerry Falwell “Theocracy”.
“The Muslims, of course! Actually, that’s an irresponsible joke”
It may be a joke here, but I wonder about certain European nations. Although they may still be a generation or two away from that problem coming to fruition. But if any nation can find a way to make the problem occur now, France will show us.
God Bless