Until the supreme court decision last week, I hadn't really considered what 'partial-birth' abortion really consists of, and so I thought the ban was terrible.

Then I looked it up, and it was up there with reading about death camps and darfur in the category of 'most disturbing things ever'. Check out the wikipedia article (not after a big meal, and sitting down if you know what's good for you).

A number of western european countries restrict abortion even earlier then the supreme court decision allows: Denmark, France, Norway, Austria, Belgium and Sweeden.

I don't think a zygote is the same as a person, but this may be an area where we can compromise with pro-life people. It's possible to stand for a woman's right to chose and still be repulsed by the idea of a viable living fetus having it's brains sucked out with a tube or its skull crushed by a doctor.

Maybe the pro-choice movement we need is one that is less dogmatic and can recognize that sometimes pro-life advocates have a point.

Anon you are so stupid..the issue is a woman's right to choose and nothing more

I think you're right on many counts, Amy, especially your point that male-bashing is "not the key to mobilizing young women," and that young women like men, and don't want to feel like they are being pressured to hate them or view them as the enemy—that kind of thinking has gone by the wayside. Wrong wave of feminism. But of course, you know that the term "feminism" is already so loaded, and it is one that many of today's young women (even those who ARE feminists) don't want to be associated with the term because of the very issues you raise.

But I also have another point -- I think there is a serious problem with the way we define who believes what about abortion. You're either "pro-life" or "pro-choice," and frankly the issue is much more nuanced than that, which means it's ridiculous to try to lump everyone into an either/or position. For example, I consider myself "pro-choice," though I would probably never choose it for myself. And, to complicate things further, I have to say that there may be something to the previous Anonymous comment's suggestion about partial birth (late-term) abortion being a bad idea. In the US, we shouldn't have to do them so late since there are so many other methods of taking care of the "problem" before it gets that far. As someone who was born prematurely, at 6 1/2 months, it kind of creeps me out to think that there was at least a month and a half more of a time period where I would've been considered just "a fetus" and could've potentially had my head crushed.

I don't know . . . just some thoughts.

but shouldn't it be up to a woman and her physician? This procedure, as vile as it sounds, may be the best option in some cases.

However, the most frightening thing about the ban is not that this procedure has been done away with (only 2,200 are performed each year, I think), but what might happen next in states.

I agree that Anon's got a point, but this isn't Loosey Lucy gets pregnant twice a year and then just pays a small fee to have her baby's brains sucked out at her convenience. A friend said in a private email discussion...

"Partial-birth abortion is a completely made-up phrase (which all those "pro-life groups with "family" in their names have admitted), invented so it strikes an emotional chord with gullible people. It's supposed to make you think that the child was fully developed and could be born and ready to go. Uh-uh.

0.17% percent of abortions are Intact D&X (the actual medical term), and occur in the second trimester (weeks 14-26), usually in the 19-23 range)

I can't find the stat for third trimeter (weeks 27-40), but considering only 0.08% of all abortion occur safter 24 weeks, we're talking miniscule numbers, the vast majority of which are for medical reasons, not some late whim.

In the first trimester, and early into the second, the fetus is still small enough to use the standard vacuum aspiration procedure. Into the middle of the second trimester (say weeks 19-24), the fetus is usually too large, or there may be some other complicating factor, so the cervix is dilated and instruments are used.

I asked a friend for more info, and she said:

Late-term abortions are generally recommended in cases where the fetus is severely malformed, as in cases of anencephaly, for example, where the brain and skull do not form. Such fetuses, if they are viable at all even at full-term, would need extraordinary measures to keep them alive in a vegetative state. The vast majority would die soon after birth irrespective of what measures were taken to keep them alive.

Also, this procedure is safer *for women* than other alternatives, especially waiting until the end of the term for a "normal" delivery. Carrying a terminally ill fetus to term increases a woman's chances of placental abruption and uterine rupture; if she can even become pregnant again, future pregnancies carry greater risks for both her and the fetus. (And that's to say nothing of her psychological well-being.) The procedure may seem objectionable, but it may also seem preferable to a woman who risks her life, her health, and/or her future ability to have children. The point is, she ought to have the choice.

And...the majority of women who have late-term abortions are women who wanted to get pregnant and wanted the child. The idea that late-term abortions are for fickle women who never thought about how they didn't *really* want a baby until late in their pregnancies is absolute propaganda. Late-term abortions without a valid medical reason aren't even available in most states as it is.

Btw, you might also be interested in recommending this article: http://dir.salon.com/story/mwt/feature/2003/06/07/late_term/index.html?pn=1"

Cheers Craig for the clarifications. The swirling rhetoric confuses the facts....

Being an "old" experienced woman and having lived through the first bout of 'women's rights" i would like to make one observation. Until ALL women realize our inherent power and start to use it, nothing will change. It matters not- how many laws are written. Women as a whole have little self-esteem or self-worth; and men feel much the same. "Women are plentiful and of what real worth are they?" This IS NOT my opinion, but it seems to be the general attitude in the world. At some time in our 'civilization' women where removed from being important in the continuing the speces. We are not bold enough, arrogant enough to show our true strength.

Craig's very right (it should be D&C, btw: Dilation and Curettage); and I'm afraid that Wikipedia is rarely a good source on either controversial subjects or in the humanities. Anon's comparison of late term abortion with the death camps is inadequate: There is absolutely no common measure between the two. Yes, the procedure for D&C's is quite disgusting, but frankly, so are most medical procedures if you're not used to them (because (un?)fortunately you do get used to them); and sorry if I'm a bit oversensitive here, but general bio lab was even more disgusting to me. Dissecting the human cadaver of a willing donor, or performing a medical procedure on a consenting patient poses no problem to me; vivisecting a (however poorly) sentient animal is not my cup of tea.

No, it's D&X. Dilation and curettage isn't disgusting at all, it's a routine dilation and scraping of the inside of the uterus and it's not used to abort pregnancies. Intact D&X is the gnarly one that involves sucking out brains and what not.

I'm not a fan of state regulation of internal body cavities (mine or women's), but I don't really have a problem with the term "partial birth abortion." Whether you support the right to the procedure or not, it seems a relatively accurate way to describe what's going on. "Intact dilation and extraction" is a good term for use among health professionals, but useless jargon to a general audience.

Recently there was a pro-life rally at my university, and many of the protesters were men! College-age men, older men, men of different races... Why are men so keen to protest an issue that really doesn't concern them?

Meanwhile, as we move backward, Mexico moves forward this week by legalizing (de-criminalizing) abortion.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18293610/

One point for Mexico. Zero for the US.

Is the fetus a US citizen? If not, well only pro death organizations will prefer a brain damaged fetus' life vs its mother's well being; incidentally isn't supporting war also pro death? Is here some kind of pattern?

I have a problem with the term "partial-birth" abortion because it's loaded and propogandistic. To me it sounds like babies are being killed as they're being born--and an aborting a fetus is far different than giving birth to a baby. For those who don't know that much about these medical procedures and may be on the fence about abortion, misleading phraseology may be enough to sway them.

The law just passed provides an exception to protect the life of the mother, so Craig's concern for "a woman who risks her life, her health, and/or her future ability to have children" seems a bit overblown. Granted, the law might discourage some doctors from performing procedures that are borderline medically-necessary, but how many people are we really talking about here, given the tiny number of women who have this procedure in the first place?

anyway, I find it interesting that all the comments have focused exclusively on the partial birth abortion question, which maybe involves a few hundred or a couple thousand women. The article also referred to hundreds of thousands of women who die in childbirth, millions of women refugees, millions without access to healthcare or birth control, etc.

Maybe what the women's movement needs is less attention to inflammatory passing fads that affect hardly anyone and galvanize the right, and more attention to issues that really matter to the most people throughout the world.

Amy, you are absolutely right (on all counts), but, regarding your last comment about "partial birth" being a loaded term (which is TRUE), and "misleading phraseology" being detrimental to women's rights in general (TRUE, again) -- I'm just playing devil's advocate here, but isn't it also a bit loaded and problematic to say "and aborting a fetus is far different than giving birth to a baby"? You're right here, but the context in which you say this is the context of "partial-birth" abortion, and here's where the problem with terminology comes into play. And, again, the only reason I'm bringing this up is because I myself was born at 6 1/2 months (and, I would like to believe that I'm a fully-functional human being, not retarded or anything, not missing any crucial limbs or organs), and so it's hard for me to agree that it's a fetus and not a baby at that point.

Craig's comment was particularly useful for me, especially his last paragraph:

And...the majority of women who have late-term abortions are women who wanted to get pregnant and wanted the child. The idea that late-term abortions are for fickle women who never thought about how they didn't *really* want a baby until late in their pregnancies is absolute propaganda. Late-term abortions without a valid medical reason aren't even available in most states as it is.

But here's what I want to point out: it sounds, to me, like the women who really need these procedures done for emergency medical reasons aren't conceiving of their potential babies as fetuses. They're forced to lose a baby they wanted to have, at a stage so late in the pregnancy game that the fetus, under normal circumstances, could easily be born and survive and be healthy.

My point (and this is NOT directed at you, Amy) -- let's call it like it is, and be man/woman enough to be straightforward and not screw around with rhetorical strategies aimed to further our own agendas. Let's not try to call it a fetus (in order to avoid rendering it human) at 8 1/2 months when that's simply not the case. At that point, it is a human life. I have no problem with this procedure when it is the last option, done to save the mother's life, but at least let's not try to sugar-coat it.

considering the definition of a fetus is "the young of the animal in the womb" then i would say, yeah...lets continue calling it a fetus...because cause what..that's what it is

Regarding the last bratty, immature, and grammatically incorrect Anonymous comment: So what do you call a "thing" that is both inside and outside the womb at the moment of the "partial birth" abortion?

May I ask what is bratty and immature about giving the definition of a word?
Here's an idea...GET OVER YOURSELF. I understand that you were born prematurely...now why that somehow ties you into the same situation as "partial birth abortion" i do not know.
Also, I like your "proposal" We should indeed call it a thing as it is neither a person nor technically a fetus.

real nice to completely insult someone who is interested in the website you are blogging on. i don't know about anon, but i am completely offended by you. Why don't you look at your own writing, if you want to talk about bad grammar.

Regarding the last two anonymous comments: Why are you so hostile? 

My situation in no way ties me "into the same situation as 'partial birth abortion'" -- nor did I suggest that. But I do suggest that you read more carefully, reign in your bitterness and animosity, write like an intelligent human being, and respond more politely if you want people to listen to what you say. And create a profile, why don't you -- it's always easiest to be anonymously rude and mean.

I'm actually on the level with EVERYTHING Amy is saying -- fortunately, I do, however, enjoy dialogue and raising differing viewpoints. I'm a thinker -- sorry. A differing point of view should not be so threatening.

insulting people again. i am not hostile, i agree with Amy Odell's piece. I just thought your replies to those anonymous commments were really rude. Wanted to stick up for someone speaking their mind.

I work with words -- it's what I do both for a living and for fun. My comments about what kind of terminology we use in relation to a fetus/baby during a "partial-birth" or late-term abortion procedure should be neither threatening nor upsetting. It's called dialogue -- you have none where everyone believes the same thing in the same way.

I enjoy listening to points-of-view that are different from mine when they are presented politely and intelligently -- and, often I end up changing, or shifting, my own point-of-view as a result of such dialogue. And remember, in true dialogue, all people get to "speak their mind" without beling villianized or attacked. But as soon as someone is rude or gets angry (or discounts someone else's perspective), he/she has to anticipate being called out for it (Re: FETUS FETUS FETUS).

I couldnt help but notice all of these nasty comments back and forth. I just think its interesting that Monica seems to say she likes dialogue and it shouldnt be taken as threatening, yet Monica is the one who came back with comments such as "bratty" and "immature" Gee Monica...seems like you are the one that's threatened. Seriously...take a deep breathe...its ok for people to disagree with you...but name calling? really? is that where you're at?

I actually enjoyed what Monica had to say. I definitely feel that it was unnecessary for people to attack her on the basis for that she wrote something that differed in the way they think. This is supposed to be a place where people can come and voice DIFFERENT opinions without being attacked from people who seem to have no room in their lives for someone else's opinion.

PS "Other Anonymous": If you are going to write things and pretend you are a different person then change your writing style a bit. It's just too obvious. :)

Ok Joey, so my reference is probably an hyperextension of the term, as often is the case in the medical world. However D&C's *can* be used as abortive procedures before 12 weeks and are routinely used after any type of abortion to guarantee that no tissue is remaining in the womb which could cause an infection (hence probably the extension of the initials to any abortive procedure), etc. Not-too-specialised reference here: http://women.webmd.com/Women-Medical-Reference/Dilation-and-sharp-curettage-DC-for-abortion Now I've seen the statement of the OB-Gyn's College that wants to call the more specific procedure you were referring to D&E, so fair enough. But I'll maintain my point about most medical procedures being disgusting. 

To anon, regarding the question of why men would be involved on one side or the other of the pro-life/pro-choice question. (Some) Men care about this issue, even though our bodies aren't involved, because it is a social justice issue. I am pro-choice even though I am a gay man who will never even possibly be personally involved in a decision about whether to keep or abort a fetus. Yet, I recognize that the notion that the politicization of a woman's right to choose relies on the same dynamic that politicizes my right to have a same sex partner, or the right of scientists to pursue potentially life-saving stem cell research.

Aside from that common dynamic, I may not live in or ever intend to visit Darfur, but I still care if the people of Darfur are decimated by war and famine.

Amy, your insightful and well written post concludes with the notion that we have yet to identify the kind of young leadership that can make feminism resonate with young women. I disagree. You clearly are that type of woman, and your well-honed arguments demonstrate that with brio. Keep up the good work.

And, no, I don't see why it should be exclusively up to a woman and her physician.

We have lots of laws that regulate many aspects of our behavior-- a woman's control over her body is not such that she's free to remove the clothes from it and stand in the middle of the street. A woman's control over her body is not such that she's free to put controlled substances in it.

All this cant about "choice" and "women's rights" is misleading-- because, in the end, there's more than just a woman and what's going on in her body involved here. There is (for the record) also a potential father and a small, human life with eyes, hands, a beating heart, a nervous system and perhaps the right to be considered as something beyond an option.

"Anon you are so stupid..the issue is a woman's right to choose and nothing more"

Behold-- the liberal two-prong argument. An ad hominem attack followed by an unsubstantiated assertion.

Here's a clue for you-- one is not an "idiot" simply because he (or she) does not share your views. Moreover, the "issue" is also a living, growing baby, and not just a made-up constitutional right to kill the child for the crime of being a potential inconvenience.

A few thoughts & clarifications:

First, someone up there said that there's a health exception in the "Partial Birth Abortion Act of 2000." Not so much. That was the requirement that the court laid down in Stenberg (the case striking down a state "partial birth abortion" ban in 2000), and that was the shocking aspect of last week's decision: the court upheld the law despite the fact that there was no health exception. Several doctors testified in the lower courts that there were situations where performing a D&X would be in the interest of maintaining the woman's health. The court said "too bad."

Next - do you really think that D&X is so much ickier than D&E? D&E - the standard procedure for second trimester abortions - involves cutting up the fetus inside the womb, then extracting the ... remains. D&X involves removing the fetus as a whole and then terminating it. I know the argument against D&X is that it just "looks" like infanticide, but if we're going on ick factor alone, the fact of the matter is that abortion in the second trimester is icky. Does that mean that the federal government should come riding in and tell a woman that she must carry a child to term, health, safety, and the rest of her life be damned? No. There are many eloquently stated arguments in favor of a woman's right to choose, and I won't pretend I can lay them out easily here. Whether you think that's an absolute, or a balance of interests, that's fine. But when you think that some general societal interest in "protecting the life of the fetus" outbalances an individual's choice about the burdens they will bear for the next nine months, if not the rest of their life, then you've got a fight with me.

Finally, an interesting question left open by the court - what the heck is the federal government doing regulating abortion? Oddly enough this issue wasn't really raised in the Supreme Court, and Clarence Thomas of all people might be a crucial fifth vote in overturning this federal law on those grounds. That being said, the door is now open for state laws banning this procedure (and Congress could likely bar interstate travel for the purpose of receiving the procedure), which means a lot of trouble for a lot of women in a lot of states. Sigh. Now at least the women's rights movement can wake up and realize that they have to fight again.

I whole heartedly agree with all your arguments. And as for the societal implications of abortion, one of them is beautifully outlined by Leavitt (references to the research to be found in Freakonomics): crime rates go down after abortion is allowed... (I'm sure I'm now going to find out soonish about the virtues of remaining anonymous on the www and not disclosing one's opinions, even if they are supported by scientific research... Oh, well).

That's my least favorite argument in favor of choice (and the most starkly utilitarian, removing any of the woman's personal interest from the equation). My current favorite way to conceptualize it is Reva Segal's - an abortion ban enslave's a woman's body to the will of the state. It's a creative argument (hinging on the 13th amendment for those of you keeping score at home) that gives a fuller account of the interest in autonomy that lies at the heart of the choice/life debate.

Sure, Dan, I actually believe that freedom of choice should be the main argument. But when the opponents bring in societal value, I think the crime rate issue is a prettu good counter. Now, I actually think that this is a deeper argument as it has a lot of consequences in terms of public health and education. For one thing, it shows that the burden falls again on the poor and lower socio-economic classes when some rights are suppressed.

"Do you really think that D&X is so much ickier than D&E? D&E - the standard procedure for second trimester abortions - involves cutting up the fetus inside the womb, then extracting the ... remains. D&X involves removing the fetus as a whole and then terminating it."

No, I hadn't mentioned D&Es. I said that D&Xs are vastly ickier than D&Cs, because an above commenter had said otherwise. There's just no comparison. But yes, absolutely, both D&Xs and D&Es have a very high ickiness quotient. If you're doing a second-trimester abortion, either you slice up the fetus (D&E) or you crack its skull and suck out its brain (D&X). Either way you're icked.

Above commenter maintains his position on near-equal ickiness of most medical procedures. I was dealing with teenagers' feet problems for 2 consecutive weekends lately: I can still smell it. Icky. (This is to say ickiness is not a factor or should not be a factor. Ickiness is very difficult to define in medicine. Another above commenter on fetus' feet, hands, etc. misses the point: the brain development is very incomplete at early stages [http://radiology.rsnajnls.org/cgi/content/full/215/1/205], and while seeing parts that look human might be very cute, we should be aware that (a) we are actually hard-wired to not just recognise but in a sense project human features onto things [from our pets' expressions to faces on Mars, it seems; more serious references upon request] and (b) hands, feet, etc., does not in any way guarantee a viable fetus or one that would be exempt of very strong defects. Now the question of eugenics in the case of genetic diseases is an interesting question.)

I hear you on the foot problem thing. I once gave foot baths to a group of homeless people. It was awesome, I felt just like Jesus Christ, or maybe even Rowan Williams.

I agree with you that ickiness is difficult to quantify, and in any case morally inconsequential. But it's also true that the "ickiness" of the unwashed, cellulitic feet of a homeless teenage diabetic is very different from the ickiness of an intact D&X. Humans are almost universally revolted by the intense smells and sickly bodily excretions that indicate infectious microorganisms are rocking out on somebody's body. Either that's an evolutionary adaptation, or Hashem consulted with an infectious disease specialist while designing us. 

But when people are revolted by the details of D&Xs and D&Es, something else must be going on. I have to guess that opponents of the right to D&X would say that the details and pictures alarm people by violating basic, sub-intellectual human moral intuitions. And I think they're probably right about that. But I don't agree that that intuition is worth listening to. Humans have a lot of impulses better ignored, and, for plenty of reasons, my feeling is that this is one of them.       

The feet stinkyness was also a way to poke fun at the ridiculous comparisons of above opponents to abortion ("abortion is like the death camps;" "legislating on abortion is no different than legislating on clothes wearing"). I'm not so sure about the "universally revolted by such smells" (they may not denote infection, mind you), as seems to indicate some fascinating research on olfaction (see Nature 444, 295-301 (16 November 2006)). But I certainly do agree that there is more than reflection involved in the repulsion felt by many when faced with the images of descriptions of medical procedures, including abortive procedures. I also believe and hope that education and rational, calm debate can help us overcome those "impulses," as you term them. However I believe that there also plenty of non-rational reasons, compassion being the chief one of them, to be in favour of abortion in many cases.

"abortion should be safe, legal, and rare."

While some post-ers seem upset with the nature of the procedure itself, one should recall that these only (unsually) occur under very serious circumstances. If the mother's life is in danger and so on. Not too many people will carry a fetus around for nine months with a careless attitude.

If the Gov't can regulate this--what's next? Seriously. The state of things is alarming to say the least.

First and foremost, I am appalled at the childish attitude that some folks take in this discussion! How in the world can anyone ever thinnk that intelligent people will listen to them if they start off by calling people "stupid" or "idiot"? There are many people on both sides of this issue and NO ONE deserves to be insulted based on thier opinion. This is America, right? How can you argue a woman's rights to choose while degrading someone for exercising thier right to disagree? As far as I'm concerned, the only way someone can be deemed an idiot in this forum is by demonstrating that very fact by commenting like a 7-year-old!

As for the rest, I will simply state that I do not beleive that abortion is right.

You can argue for one person's right to disagree to a matter, but how on earth do you disagree with a person's right to choose what occurs to their own body? Perhaps I have missed it in the commentary, but who here commented on the "bright" future that awaits any "fetus" that would have normally been aborted by its mother once it becomes a "child"? Statistics show that children that grow up unplanned, unwanted, and unloved are MOST likely to grow up marginalized, impoverished, and under-educated, ie.: criminals. Criminals, by the way, that the USA chooses not to rehabilitate.

As far as partial birth abortion, well how in the hell do you suppose a hopeful mother can give birth to children if she dies during an already doomed child-birth? We are far past the dark ages here, ladies and gentlemen. I can not for the life of me understand why, as women in the year 2008, we CHOOSE to be objects controlled by our wombs, by anyone other than OURSELVES. Perhaps the next step should be burkas?

I have no doubt however, that the women that bark "Pro-Life" today, will be the same women sending the babies off to war to fight for some propagandist dream. Good luck to you. I believe in the quality of survival, not the quantity - that and evolution.

The problem is not about whether anti-abortion laws restrict a woman's (or any person's, for that matter) right to choose what happens to her own body. While this is certainly a side effect of such legislation, this is a right that, in and of itself, very few people will actually deny. The critical issue with abortion, though, is that a woman's choice to abort a fetus affects two bodies. How can we agree that others have no jurisdiction over a woman's body, but simultaneously accept that she can have complete jurisdiction over that of someone else? However, the situation is obviously not that simple. What if that "someone else" isn't quite deserving of that turn of phrase? What I mean is that the question of whether abortion is morally right or wrong, for the most part, comes down to the question of personhood, and at what point during pregnancy a fetus acquires moral status equal to that of the mother.

The points of view on this are myriad, and come from medical knowledge, philosophical discussion, and, quite obviously, religious belief. Evangelical Christianity holds to the belief that life begins at conception, which would suggest that mother and child hold equal moral status from the point that the kid is a unicellular diploid organism. So even if elective abortion is morally out of the question, why won't Evangelicals agree to abortion in order to protect the mother's health or life? I'm no scholar of Christian theology and ethics, so the only theory I can come up with is that the Christian ethic of turning the other cheek applies here. The baby is, for all intents and purposes, attacking the mother, so she's just got to roll with the punches. Why turning the other cheek is required when we want to save a life, and not when, oh, you know, W pretends Saddam is building "nukular" weapons is beyond me. Judaism, on the other hand, is on the entirely opposite end of the spectrum. Traditionally, Judaism teaches that the child doesn't recieve a soul until eight days after birth, which is why one doesn't sit shiva for a child who dies before that time. That, coupled with the idea of pikuach nefesh, makes it a no brainer for a Jew to support theraputic abortion. The medical-ethical approach to separaring abortion from infanticide comes in several different flavors, but generally arguments in that arena come from milestones in the course of pregnancy given to us by nature. Two of the popular arguments there are for personhood to occur at the moment of viability, which is when the child could survive outside the womb, albeit with medical aid, and at the moment of birth. Interestingly, regardless of when you believe a fetus becomes a person, as long as you accept the idea of the legitimacy of killing in self defense, it is very easy, and, in my opinion logically correct, to extrapolate the idea to include theraputic abortion.

Indeed, many good arguments can also be put forward in support of elective abortion, before the point in time at which a fetus becomes a person. The scenario you outlined, previous poster, is not one of them. Specifically, I mean, your suggestion that unwanted children group up to become criminals. While I have no idea on the statistics on this, I will, for the sake of argument, grant your presupposition. The only argument I can see in which it would be right to abort a child because he is likely to become a criminal is a utilitarian one. This assumes that becoming a criminal will bring about an overall negative state of affairs for the universe, compared to that which would occur from aborting a would-be criminal. However, by the same logic, the world's governments would also have a moral obligation to execute telemarketers, for example. More seriously, if a certain demographic, say, a certain school's 6th graders, have a 75% chance of becoming criminals in the future, and criminals, as we agreed earlier, will always bring about an overall negative state of affairs for the universe, then this school should execute all their 6th graders, since this will have an overall greater effect on the universe (at least enough to offset the grieving of their families, let's assume). If you truly are a utilitarian, you won't have any problem with this scenario, but most people have a gut reaction that this is wrong, regardless of how good the effect on the overall state of affairs of the universe will be. Even on a level of personal wellbeing, a bastardization of utilitarianism if there ever was one, I think that the only state of being in which one has negative wellbeing is a state which could be considered "worse than death." Living as a criminal, or, on the other side, being the victim of a criminal act, is very rarely grounds for considering one's life to have negative well being, so I can't see this sort of mercy reason as a legitimate excuse for aborting probable criminals. As for the problem of rehabilitation, I don't see how one morally inexcusable act (aborting future criminals) is a legitimate method of repairing another (the country's failure to provide rehabilitation). Overall, I have little tolerance for utilitarianism as a moral system, so I can't throw my support behind pro-choice arguments that rely on utilitarian arguments. I myself am more of a Rossian moral pluralist (not to be confused with moral relativism), and based on my discussion above of the concept of personhood, I see no reason why elective abortion (before the point at which the fetus becomes a person) should be consistently either morally right or morally wrong. As a matter of personal opinion, I'm not sure elective abortion is ever morally right, but rather I think it is merely permissible: neither right nor wrong.

So, while we're fighting on the same side, I can't help but find myself in disagreement over the reasons why. I think a lot of people on both sides of the debate miss the point that the issue is not over a woman's control over her body, but whether by exercising that right she is choosing to act wrongly towards another body. I hope this contributes to the dialogue, and we can all come out with better arguments in the future, when we really need to articulate ourselves against those who are pro-life. (I do acknowledge that there are pro-life people reading Jewcy as well, so for you, feel free to rip my argument apart.)

I apologize for the double post, but I think my response to the original article, rather than to the subtopic of abortion, deserves to be separated from the ridiculously long essay I seem to have just written.

As someone who, as a male, no less, has been described by a few people as a feminist, the idea of the feminist movement and its subsidence interests me. I do prefer to call myself an egalitarian, but the idea is the same: men and women are equal, except where biology says otherwise, and should be treated as such (I know gender theorists will find flaws in that statement, but that's not the topic at hand). The problem with calling a modern movement "feminist" is that it alienates approximately 50% of its supporters. Certainly, that was the goal of the "angry feminists," and their radicalism still takes its toll on would-be supporters from the other side of the mechitzah (I'm actually quite opposed to the mechitzah in principle, although I have attended one congregation in Israel, Shira Chadasha, where the egalitarian service leading, and down-the-center mechitzah was an ideal blend of egalitarianism and traditionalism that would offend none but the most hardcore feminists/egalitarians). My mother raised me pro-choice (and I willfully acknowledge that that upbringing colors my philosophizing above), and she and my father always had an equal hand in running the household and raising the kids, so it never made sense for it to be any other way. I grew up, and still am, a Reform Jew, so the deal was the same for me in the religion department.

I think modern feminists need to go further than just avoiding the men-bashing; it needs to become a full-fledged, multi-gendered, egalitarian movement. Sure, women are still marginalized in many aspects of American society (after all, the partial-birth abortion ban only affects men periferally), so they certainly have much more of a vested interest in the promotion of equal gender rights. But, that being said, there are still plenty of compassionate men who are willing to put the effort in. Some of us will stand at the protests with you and lobby our legislators, and others will simply treat women in the workplace with the respect they deserve. Certainly, all men can't be counted on to join in a modern egalitarian movement, but there are plenty of us who can, and it's time to bring us on board.

Hmm.  This one is kind of long too.  I'll have to work on that for the future. 

abortion is just as bad as kicking babies

I am coming in way after the fact, but I have something to add. There is always the 'unless it threatens the health of the mother' clause. All pregnancies threaten the health of the mother. When we talk about late term diagnoses of malformed fetuses, there is not only the physical but mental damage caused by carrying a known nonviable fetus to full term.

Labor and birth can always cause complications. I think part of the flaw in the thinking by pro-lifers is that the mother is only a factor in the equation if the woman's death is certain. This is opposed to the reality that even in apparently healthy women, birth can cause complications leading to death. It also assumes that death is worse than 4-5 months of the knowledge that a brain dead fetus is being carried in the womb and the psychological damage and physical damage that can be incurred due to this.

It seems if we could somehow impart the reality of pregnancy, and the inherent risks, it might at least lead some lifers to begin understanding why the woman whose body is directly affected should have an important say.

But it's not quite as badASS as kicking babies.