In this short essay I touch on the two types of abortion and how to access them. I then ask why abortion, a private medical procedure, is a red-hot political issue. I invite men to imagine themselves in the position of a woman denied an abortion. I conclude by proposing a traditional American approach to the abortion controversy.
A child shouldn’t be made by accident. When there is an accidental pregnancy it’s appropriate to seek an abortion.
Practical stuff
There are two types of abortion: medication abortion and surgical abortion. The advantage of medication abortion is that it can be administered in the privacy of the home. The advantage of a surgical abortion is that it’s carried out in a clinic with qualified medical personnel in attendance. As of this writing it is estimated that more than half of abortions in the United States are medication abortions.
For help obtaining a medication abortion in the United States see Aid Access. A related organization, operating in Canada and Europe, is Women on Web.
Surgical abortion is typically a minor procedure conducted on an outpatient basis. For help obtaining a surgical abortion see Planned Parenthood.
If you’ve been sleeping with a woman who gets around and she tells you she’s pregnant you might wonder if you’re the man who is responsible. If you slept with her for the first time on Monday and on Tuesday she tells you she’s pregnant then your concern is legitimate. Ask her, politely, how likely it is that you’re the guy. Maybe she’ll pull out her calendar and get to work computing probabilities.
If it’s likely you’re the guy, or if you’ve been sleeping together for a while, be a gentleman and offer to split the cost of the abortion, just as you split other expenses. If she opts for a surgical abortion, offer to take her home from the abortion clinic. She may be a bit shaky after the procedure.
If the clinic is apt to be picketed by anti-abortion protesters, offer to take her there as well. You don’t want her to feel vulnerable as she enters the clinic. Hold her hand or put your arm around her to help her feel secure. You may be tempted to break the heads of one or two of the picketers, but focus on getting your lady friend safely into and out of the clinic and avoid getting arrested.
Freedom of speech doesn’t cover harassing and intimidating people entering or exiting a medical facility. The thugs who engage in this behavior should be arrested, fined, and jailed. Anti-abortionists are free to express their opinions — just not within sight or sound of an abortion clinic. If an abortion clinic is being picketed in your community you might ask the district attorney to bust the picketers, or at least move them well out of range of the clinic.
After an abortion, medication or surgical, your lady friend will need a few weeks to recover before she can resume sex. She should ask her abortion provider for guidance on how long to abstain from sex following her abortion. During this sexual downtime don’t bother her with requests for blowjobs, hand jobs, and anal sex. Think about it this way: If you had a minor operation and were told not to have sex for a few weeks, would you want your girlfriend whining and moaning about how horny she is and begging you to get her off? It won’t kill you to jack off for a few weeks.
Following an abortion there’s no reason the relationship shouldn’t continue as before. Given that the birth control method you were using didn’t work, maybe the two of you should research other options. If you’re not into babies, think seriously about a vasectomy. Then you’ll be the one who has to abstain from sex for a short while.
Abortion politics
Why is abortion a political issue? Why are some people obsessed with other people’s personal medical decisions? The anti-abortionists are people beset by personal demons, in particular, sexual demons. Rather than confront their inner demons they seek to persecute innocent people who, in fact, have nothing to do with them. It’s an old story.
According to the anti-abortionists, if a woman has sex it’s for the purpose of making a baby, even if she’s raped. What is more, her reproductive organs are not hers to control; it’s the business of the state to regulate her sex organs. In their zeal to repress women and sexuality the anti-abortionists are in the mold of radical Islam; they’re America’s Taliban.
The prettily named “pro-life” movement is more accurately termed the “fetus cult”. It seeks to crucify women upon a cross of fetuses.
Suppose a quadriplegic is raped and impregnated. Carrying the fetus to term will certainly kill her. According to the fetus cult, that’s of no moment. A woman’s life is nothing; the fetus is everything. Anyway, it’s her fault she was raped. If she were chaste this wouldn’t have happened. She must have wiggled her wheelchair provocatively. Or she had dirty thoughts.
Like our quadriplegic friend, thousands of women will die in pregnancy or childbirth because they were denied medically necessary abortions. The fetus cultists, among them the Supreme Court “justices” who casually ripped up abortion rights, are their assassins.
Some who are denied an abortion and survive childbirth may wish they’d died. How would you like to be a high school sophomore forced to undergo pregnancy and childbirth? And how good, or bad, would be the prospects of your child?
The fetus cult would bar a woman from aborting a fetus diagnosed with a congenital disorder. This is supremely vicious. It curses the mother with a permanently sick child, possibly needing full-time care for its entire life, and it brings into the world a child condemned to disability, chronic suffering and, in many cases, early death.
There are women in the fetus cult, so can it really be anti-woman? Every oppressed group has its self-haters and traitors. Think about it: These women demand that the state eliminate their bodily autonomy. They demand to be reduced to the status of a slave or a farm animal.
The moment a fetus becomes a child the fetus cult loses interest. It can be neglected, it can be abused, it can be abandoned. Who cares? It’s not a fetus.
If you’re sexually active and are averse to fathering unwanted children, it’s in your self-interest to advocate strongly for reproductive rights and to donate generously to organizations such as Aid Access and Planned Parenthood.
You should also support reproductive rights if you love women and believe that they should be in control of their bodies.
I suggest that you not vote for anti-abortion politicians, regardless of their merits on other issues. Let them know that this is the reason you’re not supporting them. Send them email or call their office. If they speak in your community, tell them in person. A vote for an anti-abortion politician is a vote for the brutalization of women.
Are you a man who is unsure about the rights and wrongs of the abortion question? If so, perhaps the following thought experiment will yield clarity. Suppose someone waved a magic wand and put a growing fetus inside your body. Would you want the state to dictate what you could and couldn’t do about it? How would you feel if the state forbade you from doing anything about it at all, with a lengthy prison term if you disobeyed? Would you feel like a free citizen, or like the inmate of a factory farm, like a sow in a cage?
I’d want the damn fetus removed immediately. “What if it’s the second or third trimester?” Fuck the trimester. If something is growing in my body, whether it’s a tumor or a fetus, I have the right to have it removed. If its life is so precious, put it in the body of a “pro-life” male politician such as the governor of Texas.
I imagine the governor would run crying to his doctor:
Governor: Get it out! Get it out!
Doctor: Sorry, Gov. It’s against the law. You gotta carry it to term.
Governor: Wahhhh!
Doctor: Don’t fret Sweetie. You’ll look cute in maternity clothes.
There’s a simple solution to the abortion dilemma. It’s called “freedom”. Let women who want an abortion have one. Let women who don’t want an abortion not have one. Let doctors who want to perform abortions perform them. Let doctors who don’t want to perform abortions not perform them. The state needn’t and shouldn’t be involved in any way. Freedom, what a simple, wonderful thing.
This post is excerpted from Al in Wonderland. Buy it now for only 5 bucks on Amazon.
If you liked the post, share it. Use the share button below.