Reply #68: I think you really hit that nail [View All]

squarely. The human condition is such that almost NOTHING is ever black and white for everyone.

As I said, I think almost everyone would like to see abortion stop altogether. I mean I'm pretty adamantly Pro-choice, but let's face it, we're not talking about clipping a toenail here. It's surgery for the woman and death for a potential child.

It's a sad situation that we leave women in a position to have to choose life or death that way, but that's the way I see it. We don't pour money into perfecting birth control, we don't pour funding into caring for children who don't have decent family or family at all, we make it difficult for even near perfect children to be adopted, we ensure seeking mental health care is humiliating in the extreme for most people. There are just too many factors that have to be addressed before we start yanking away the most drastic of all the solutions.

As determindly pro-choice as I am, I've stated the only way I would have an abortion a second time would be if I would die giving birth. The sole reason I'd do it then is my two born children. I, personally, wouldn't do it again even if I were raped and impregnated.
One of the reasons I do talk about this issue a lot is because I have a lot of experience with almost every facet of unwanted pregnancy. I was the product of an accidental pregnancy myself, I was adopted by my Dad after my mother chose to keep me and raise me alone for the first 6 years of my life, I've watched a teenaged aunt give birth and keep her baby only to have it die hours after being born, I've faced unintended pregnancy myself and made the choice to abort, I've been raped prior to emergency contraception and been worried sick for weeks that I was pregnant, and I watched my sister go through hell when she handed over her baby to me to raise only to find she couldn't stand to be near him and not have him with her.

I think one of the things that disturbs me about the most rabid of Pro-life folks that I've run across (and you don't seem to fit that title), is the complete lack of compassion for other human beings, whether it's the pregnant woman or other people who will be affected by that pregnancy. That's where Dennis Kucinich (and you as well) impresses me on this issue. He clearly DOES have that compassion and always has, even when he was solidly Pro-life in his voting.