Wanted pregnancies: the best defense against abortion
Jonathan V. Last published an essay in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in which he expressed dismay that there are roughly a million and a half abortions each year in the United States of America. I am disturbed about it, too. However, he failed to deal with the obvious implications of all of those pregnancies leading to live births. How would those extra million and a half babies per year be cared for? Adoption is often suggested as the solution but there are not nearly enough adoptive homes for that many babies.
Perhaps what is most urgently needed is a more effective national campaign against unplanned pregnancy. Women who want to get pregnant are unlikely to abort.
How do we bring about a situation in which pregnancy is, as it should be, a time of joy?
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August 14th, 2007 at 4:28 pm
Thats false. There is a 10 year waiting list for babies.
Further, had we not been killing off a million babies a year, maybe we wouldn’t need as many Mexicans.
August 14th, 2007 at 4:36 pm
Adoption is often suggested as the solution but there are not nearly enough adoptive homes for that many babies.
Where did you get this from? I’ll bet there would be even more adoptive families if they thought it would be possible.
August 14th, 2007 at 4:41 pm
Halo said,
Adoption is often suggested as the solution but there are not nearly enough adoptive homes for that many babies.
Where did you get this from? I’ll bet there would be even more adoptive families if they thought it would be possible.
(Denise) Do you believe there would be adoptive families for ONE MILLION AND A HALF more babies born each year in America?
August 14th, 2007 at 5:33 pm
Women in the 20 to 40 age bracket who are sexually experienced) are having illegitimate children in record numbers. I will guess they are also leading in abortions too.
When marriage is important, abortion is not necessary, and illegitimacy is not an issue either.
Policy must be changed at the federal level to reshape this tremendous problem.
August 14th, 2007 at 5:35 pm
a pregnancy can never, truely, be a time of “joy” if one of the soon to be parents is abducted by the other in an unwilling pregancy.
abortion is not pleasant, certainly. But we now have a culture that says it is OK to get pregnant against your “partners” will or wishes. the tragedy of these unplanned (allegedly) pregnancies is the destruction and damage of lives. Both the child’s and the duped, hijacked fathers.
pregnancy brings joy when it fullfills BOTH parents premeditated wishes.
August 14th, 2007 at 6:30 pm
Denise Noe wrote:
Actually, 43 percent of abortions are repeat abortions:
http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/air/air_vol2no3_1989.html#rar
A lot of women who abort would not have gotten pregnant again if they had had the baby. Some women abort twice or more in the same year, even though they could only have had one baby during that year. So the number of abortions does not indicate the number of babies that would be born if abortion suddenly disappeared in America.
August 14th, 2007 at 7:46 pm
In Oz we have adverts repeated as nauseam about DV, “Australia says NO to violence against Women’”. On and on every night. “There is NO excuse”, we are told, over and over. It is aimed at men of course. Men are bad guys that need to be TOLD!
What we don’t have, to go with our huge abortion numbers (DV sometimes kills; abortion ALWAYS kills) are adverts saying that “Women Control their own Bodies. Contraception comes in many forms. Australia says NO to unwanted Pregnancy. There is NO excuse for Unwanted Pregnancy. There is NO excuse for Abortion”.
THAT, I would put up with, night after night. Women are responsible for unwanted pregnancy. They are the bad guyesses. It is THEY who need to be TOLD!
August 15th, 2007 at 2:51 am
David R. Usher said,
Women in the 20 to 40 age bracket who are sexually experienced) are having illegitimate children in record numbers. I will guess they are also leading in abortions too.
When marriage is important, abortion is not necessary, and illegitimacy is not an issue either.
(Denise) I think it’s best not to use words like “necessary” or “need” in reference to abortion as they tend to prejudge the case of those who want to see abortion outlawed. One can hardly argue in favor of criminalizing something that is “necessary.” Rather, it is best to discuss a “demand” for abortion since that is indisputable.
Marriage IS important, always, as it forms a union within which children enjoy a greater level of security than they do when their parents are unmarried and can also help adults enjoy a greater level of security even in childless unions. However, marriage does not end the demand for abortion. Whether it is legal or illegal, married women are among those seeking abortions.
It is probably true that married women are proportionately LESS LIKELY to seek abortions than those who are single. Happy marriages tend to mitigate against many ills — sometimes literally as I believe married people have longer life expectancies than single people.
Do I sound like a “radical feminist”?
August 15th, 2007 at 4:28 am
John Dias said,
Denise Noe wrote:
“How would those extra million and a half babies per year be cared for?”
Actually, 43 percent of abortions are repeat abortions:
http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/air/air_vol2no3_1989.html#rar
A lot of women who abort would not have gotten pregnant again if they had had the baby. Some women abort twice or more in the same year, even though they could only have had one baby during that year. So the number of abortions does not indicate the number of babies that would be born if abortion suddenly disappeared in America.
(Denise) This is a good point. Women can have two abortions in a year but not carry two different pregnancies to term within a year’s time. They could give birth to twins, triplets, and even larger numbers in single births.
Thank you for pointing this out.
August 15th, 2007 at 6:53 am
(Denise) Adoption is often suggested as the solution but there are not nearly enough adoptive homes for that many babies.
(Halo) I’ll bet there would be even more adoptive families if they thought it would be possible.
(Roadkill1965) I agree that the government makes it so difficult and expensive to adopt that many people either give up or don’t try it in the first place. My former boss had already adopted a child in Arizona, then tried to adopt another when he moved to Ohio. He and his wife spent 10s of thousands of dollars in legal fees and rediculous improvements to their house to try to satisfy the requirements, but were still unsuccessful. They finally gave up in frustration. The irony is that they had already adopted a child, were very religious and upstanding citizens, he made over $100K/yr as a VP at a hospital, and their home was practically new. They had all that going for them and still weren’t able to adopt. How much more difficult would it be for someone with less resources? I just roll my eyes when someone says that adoption is an option.
August 15th, 2007 at 7:15 am
Anyone who contends that adoption is easy obviously hasn’t attempted said procedure. Denise, you have no idea.
August 15th, 2007 at 8:45 am
You could certainly make the procedures for adoption easier and reduce the costs – having said that, I don’t understand why Denise is trying to rationalize infanticide. If “inconvenience” or “unwanted” or “poverty” are a reasonable justification for murder, why can’t I execute people as I see fit? (rhetorical). Every arguement I ever here supporting abortion would be grounds for encouraging genocide in any underdeveloped nation.
August 15th, 2007 at 11:02 am
Hello Denise,
An interesting letter in the Spectator today discusses a topic close to this issue: The notion that abortion has reduced the number of criminals by reducing unwanted children in poverty. Link to letter: http://www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=11876 and link to analysis page: http://isteve.com/abortion.htm
What is clear from the statistical analysis is that abortion had, at best, a zero sum impact on crime and unwanted children based upon the illegitimacy rate skyrocketing for decades following abortion rights (and birth control). This isn’t necessarily abortion’s fault since an air bag, for example, isn’t any good if the driver thinks it makes it “safe” for them to drive 120 mph through a school zone. Also, other social attitudes towards unwed motherhood and child-support also encouraged women to have births out of wedlock or to engage in risky sex.
In answer to your question, Denise: “Women who want to get pregnant are unlikely to abort.
How do we bring about a situation in which pregnancy is, as it should be, a time of joy? “
There are two parents (the mother AND father) and until the state emphazies rights and support for fathers rather than just one-sided duties, millions of “illegitimate” children will continue to be just that: unwanted by their fathers. I love the motto on family planning sites: “Every child a wanted child”. The fact is that 30 percent of illegitimate children are probably uwanted by their fathers.
That’s why they are called bastards.
Ironically, one statistic that the right wing hasn’t heard of yet (and we should make pretty graphs as in the link above to prove this point) would be that child-support enforcement has resulted in more children in poverty or strained households than in a time when society told unwed mothers to just deal with it. What this means, Denise, is that society can’t be a both a generous sugar daddy that will run to women’s aid lest the children in her care suffer and at the same time see women act more responsibly.
For examples of the failure of this consequence-free philosophy, check out Lindsay Lohan, Brittany Spears, Paris Hilton, and Anna Nicole Smith: poster girls for the modern American woman.
August 15th, 2007 at 11:39 am
The whole idea that there would still be 1.5 million unwanted pregnancies if abortion was illegal is false. If women knew that sex could lead not just to pregnancy but to having a child with no outs then more women would make a point to use birth control more effectively and be more careful. We did not have 1.5 million unwanted babies 70 years ago.
There is a long waiting list for people wanting to adopt healthy babies. Not enough to soak up 1.5mil, but likely enough to handle the amount of babies which would actually be born.
1.5 million babies murdered a year is not the problem, but a symptom of greater issues including rampant feminism, moral decay and relativism, commercialism, selfishness and the breakdown of the nuclear family as well as the extended family. This is a widespread, deep rooted problem, which making abortion illegal, while not a bad idea, is not going to fix.
August 15th, 2007 at 6:46 pm
Hello Denise.
I should mention my neighbors. Sheriff’s Deputy and Schoolteacher. Adopted a boy from Guatemala and a boy from Mexico. The mothers were young Catholic girls that didn’t want to kill their’ babies.
One reason for adopting from south of the border is the relative probability of getting a healthy baby compared to adopting an American baby. In the United States the risk is much greater.
It was difficult and expensive. The government has an inspection schedule. They didn’t just pay government fees, they also paid medical fees. These people are not wealthy by any means, but they did it and are still in debt.
I should also mention that when I told this story to a black (militant Muslim convert) co-worker, his response was indignant and sarcastic. “Why did they go to Guatemala and Mexico? To get blonde, blue eyed babies?”
There is humor in this, since Noah and Ethan both have a darker hue than most Americans of African descent.
August 16th, 2007 at 6:27 am
Oh, and btw, we would take a child which needed adopting if abortion were illegal. I am adopted myself, and consider it a great option.
August 16th, 2007 at 12:01 pm
I have to admit you’re probably right bistcuit queen. Just making abortion illegal wouldn’t necessarily solve anything. It would probably be struck down with the next Supreme Court roster change.
It’s really a war of ideas. The concept of using freedom of choice was a very intelligent one for feminists.
I think these evangelicals could have spent their money a lot better if they wanted to stop abortions. Instead of giving campaign money to Dubyah (who embroiled us in a holy war against muslims) they should have started an add campaign to try to change peoples attitudes about abortions.
The churches could have stolen from the Trojan commercials, picture this:
A man is sitting with a pig-human in an obgyn office. Across from them is a mother and her infant. The mother cooes at the baby who yields this unbelievably happy radiant smile. The pig-human turns to the man and says (in a woman’s voice):”I’ve changed my mind I’m going to keep it, let’s go home!”
And miraculously changes from a pighuman to a woman. We’ve got to win the war of ideas first before outlawing abortion will do any good.
Just as an aside I think a woman who aborts a baby has much better reason to be called a pig, than a man who doesn’t wear a condom. For starters the woman is also deciding sex with a condom is okay (not addressed in the Trojan commercial). The woman who aborts decides ALONE.
August 16th, 2007 at 12:39 pm
The Biscuit Queen said,
Oh, and btw, we would take a child which needed adopting if abortion were illegal. I am adopted myself, and consider it a great option.
(Denise) So do I. I wrote an essay about honoring birthmothers, as I think girls and women who carry to term and give their babies up for adoption are genuine heroines. I beleive we must devote time and energy to creating special ceremonies to honor those who relinquish babies so that this will be something in which birthmothers will take pride.
jackal1994 said,
I have to admit you’re probably right bistcuit queen. Just making abortion illegal wouldn’t necessarily solve anything. It would probably be struck down with the next Supreme Court roster change.
It’s really a war of ideas. The concept of using freedom of choice was a very intelligent one for feminists.
I think these evangelicals could have spent their money a lot better if they wanted to stop abortions. Instead of giving campaign money to Dubyah (who embroiled us in a holy war against muslims) they should have started an add campaign to try to change peoples attitudes about abortions.
(Denise) A pro-life group put up a very tasteful pro-adoption advertisement. It showed a group of children and said every one of them could have been aborted but their parents decided to “tough it out” and then give them up for adoption. It ended: “Life. What a beautiful choice.”