08-20-2015, 08:50 AM
The pro-life movement has been using images depicting fetuses in their campaigns forever, user. I'm surprised you considered yourself firmly pro-choice and had an abortion without seeing similar fetus pictures. That's not a criticism, it just surprises me a little because I'm older than you and I've seen fetus pictures for as long as I can remember and I've never been pregnant.
In some cases, like sally noted, the anti-abortionists and pro-life movement uses highly magnified early stage photos. Sometimes the organization mislabels pics of living and dead fetuses, and sometimes they're accurate. In either case, advancement in sonogram technology makes fetal pictures clearer than ever before and I think the pictures continue to be effective in their campaign efforts.
Anyway, if the emotion they invoke spurs you or anybody else to think and learn more about the issue, including the scientific and medical aspects of it, I think that's a good thing -- whether it helps define your informed position or changes it altogether. If you research, you'll see there is no scientific possibility that fetuses feel pain in early stages. There's also no scientific possibility that the "thing" or "clump of cells" is developing into anything other than an innocent little baby, obviously.
I agree with you and Duchess when it comes to the importance of earlier and more effective sex education and ease of birth control accessibility. What Colorado was able to accomplish in terms of reducing unwanted pregnancies (down by 42%) through free birth control via their Public Health System is really impressive. The Affordable Health Care Act's coverage for contraception is a good thing too, in my opinion. Preventing unwanted pregnancies is certainly preferable to aborting them, at any stage.
Even though the teen pregnancy rate is too high and there's more we can do to reduce it, better sex education and birth control access over the last 20 years has had a significant positive effect. In 1990, the U.S. teen birth rate was 61.8 births for every 1,000 adolescent females, compared with 26.5 births for every 1,000 adolescent females in 2013. It's still one of the highest rates for developed countries, but there's been a lot of progress.
Abortions are also down by over 30% over the same period; fewer unwanted pregnancies, more restrictive abortion laws in some states, more free and low-cost birth control...
Aggressive and sincere commitment to reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies is, for me, something that both sides (and everyone in the middle) should embrace. I support women's right to choose, but would always rather she wasn't in a position to have to make that choice. Unfortunately, many in the anti-abortion camp are ironically also the loudest voices when it comes to opposing sex education in schools and free or low cost birth control (typically citing moral or religious or financial objection).
In some cases, like sally noted, the anti-abortionists and pro-life movement uses highly magnified early stage photos. Sometimes the organization mislabels pics of living and dead fetuses, and sometimes they're accurate. In either case, advancement in sonogram technology makes fetal pictures clearer than ever before and I think the pictures continue to be effective in their campaign efforts.
Anyway, if the emotion they invoke spurs you or anybody else to think and learn more about the issue, including the scientific and medical aspects of it, I think that's a good thing -- whether it helps define your informed position or changes it altogether. If you research, you'll see there is no scientific possibility that fetuses feel pain in early stages. There's also no scientific possibility that the "thing" or "clump of cells" is developing into anything other than an innocent little baby, obviously.
I agree with you and Duchess when it comes to the importance of earlier and more effective sex education and ease of birth control accessibility. What Colorado was able to accomplish in terms of reducing unwanted pregnancies (down by 42%) through free birth control via their Public Health System is really impressive. The Affordable Health Care Act's coverage for contraception is a good thing too, in my opinion. Preventing unwanted pregnancies is certainly preferable to aborting them, at any stage.
Even though the teen pregnancy rate is too high and there's more we can do to reduce it, better sex education and birth control access over the last 20 years has had a significant positive effect. In 1990, the U.S. teen birth rate was 61.8 births for every 1,000 adolescent females, compared with 26.5 births for every 1,000 adolescent females in 2013. It's still one of the highest rates for developed countries, but there's been a lot of progress.
Abortions are also down by over 30% over the same period; fewer unwanted pregnancies, more restrictive abortion laws in some states, more free and low-cost birth control...
Aggressive and sincere commitment to reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies is, for me, something that both sides (and everyone in the middle) should embrace. I support women's right to choose, but would always rather she wasn't in a position to have to make that choice. Unfortunately, many in the anti-abortion camp are ironically also the loudest voices when it comes to opposing sex education in schools and free or low cost birth control (typically citing moral or religious or financial objection).