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From: csdf@mit-vax.UUCP (Charles Forsythe)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: informed choices?
Message-ID: <462@mit-vax.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 25-Jul-85 18:46:19 EDT
Article-I.D.: mit-vax.462
Posted: Thu Jul 25 18:46:19 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 28-Jul-85 09:08:40 EDT
References: <13@dscvax2.UUCP>
Reply-To: csdf@mit-vax.UUCP (Charles Forsythe)
Organization: MIT, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 76

In article <13@dscvax2.UUCP> mn@dscvax2.UUCP (Matt Noah) writes:
>If your area is anything like Santa Barbara's you
>will soon realize that people are not making informed choices and that many
>of their reasons/arguments for abortion are irrational or bigoted or 
>any number of universally unappealing ...

Well Matt, from one member of the intellectual elite to another: a lot
of people don't make descisions that *we* find informed or appealing. I
even hear that some people base their entire percerptions of reality on
a book that claims to be the words of some famous deity!

>Although her opinion was
>hostile to mine the only argument she presented for keeping abortions legal
>was "If you had a 13-year-old daughter who was raped by a Black ...".

This may surprise you, but a lot of people don't give the real issues
any thought. If this woman is bigoted, it suggests a lack of any social
thought on her part. Anyway, what if you had a 13-year-old daughter who
was raped by a White?

>Just today, a couple listened intently to a number of arguments including
>the argument that an 8-week-old fetus has both a heartbeat and an immature
>but functioning central nervous system - the 'message center' of feeling.

I love your wording! Replace "feeling", a word with emotional overtones,
with "sensing", an equally accurate term. Just humor me.

>When the young man I was talking to heard that his *female
>escortee* was going to have a suction abortion and that a suction abortion
>basically uses air pressure to suck and tear limbs from the fetus he was
>overcome.  

I'm not surprised. If I used gerunds such as "sucking", "tearing",
"ripping", "maiming", "killing", "hurting" and "mutilating" to describe
open heart surgery, an appendix removal or a visit to the dentist, I
think most people would be overcome as well.

>He then walked away at the prodding of his companion only to say that "some
>things just have to be done, I guess".  Whether he believed us was
>questionable.  I believe he fell compelled to carry out what he was intending
>to do that morning regardless.

Regardless of what? Your propaganda? Maybe he was right, some things do
"have to be done." Did you listen to his story?

>In my experience as a sidewalk counselor...

"Counselor"? Reading sensationalistic literature and reciting it to
strangers sounds more like propaganda to me. What qualifies you as a
counselor?


> ...I have not seen a great number of informed or happy people enter or
>leave a clinic.

Informed of what? Informed of birth control so as not to face this
again? Why don't you do a real service and make sure that everybody
knows how to avoid this in the future? Informed that a woman does not
have a right to decide for her own body? Grrr. I personally feel that
"informed" means knowing both sides, not just yours.

"happy"?!! Why do you think that people who have abortions or believe in
the freedom of choice concerning them find them pleasant? I don't like
the idea. It wouldn't make me happy if MY girlfriend had one, but at
least she has the choice. THAT makes me happy.

-- 
Charles Forsythe
CSDF@MIT-VAX
Wang Zeep:"Lord Fred, how can I show them you are the True God?"

Lord Fred:"Because I said I am."

Wang Zeep:"Seriously."

Lord Fred:"Look, it works for every other religion."