Let’s say their is a woman with very low risk of getting pregnant. She does not want to use any form of birth control because of side effects and convience. She is not concerned about the risk of STD’s either.
Would it be irresponsible for someone in this situation to use abortion as their primary form of birth control?
How about if she is not at low risk of pregnancy?
I don’t see anything wrong with either situation. Provided that the woman knows the risks of her choices, I don’t see any problem with her choicing to use abortion as her form of birth control. Chemical birth control can have a lot of side effects and condoms and diaphragms can inconvenient and reduce the types of lube you can. Other medthods also have doesn sides.
If a woman chooses the possible risks (she might never get pregnant) of an abortion over the definite risks of birth control, what is the problem? It seems like even a lot of pro-choice people are against a woman choosing abortion as her method of birth control.
She wouldn’t be. She would be using her natural infertility as her primary means of birth control. Abortion, in her case, would be simply an emergency measure if her birth control failed.
Then she would be irresponsible. Abortion may have fewer health risks than pregnancy and childbirth, but like all medical procedures, it is definitely not risk-free. Nor is early-stage pregnancy itself, between the conception and the abortion, entirely free of risk or inconvenience. Any woman with a significant risk of pregnancy who deliberately chooses to play sperm-Russian-roulette just to avoid the inconvenience of using birth control is being irresponsible.
And that’s totally leaving aside all moral issues. Morally speaking, many pro-choice people, including me, feel that even though a pregnant woman has a right to kill an early-term fetus if she chooses, it’s a lesser-evil solution, not a good thing per se. It would be callous and inhumane to sacrifice life unnecessarily just to avoid minor inconvenience to oneself. Even if the life you sacrifice is not a fully-developed human life protected by the law, it isn’t something that you should just disregard as negligible.
I’m pro-choice, and I’m certainly not in that “many” you speak of- I have no problem with the idea, and don’t attach any moral weight to it (so therefore not “good”, but not “lesser-evil” either.) I don’t see a sufficiently-early abortion as “sacrificing” a life at all.
I agree with Mr. Dibble. You either feel it’s wrong or you don’t. I don’t think it can be “kind of” wrong (though I know people who have chose abortion AND believed it was wrong). I have no moral attachment to it one way or the other. Birth control is birth control.
If it’s sufficiently early, then I see no problem with it (even if it’s more dangerous than other forms of birth control). The problem is, we don’t know what “sufficiently early” is, and anyone who tells you otherwise is misinformed, a dogmatist, or lying.
I guess I should have emphasized the “if”. I knew that it is more dangerous in many instances, since it’s an operation, but I didn’t know if there were any circumstances in which it was measurably safer.
Yes, over the years, all the press I’ve read indicates it is one of the safest procedures around. But obviously, invasive procedures will always carry a risk. I think there are statistics out there regarding the percentage of procedures that caused problems.
I think I fall into that camp. I’m decidedly pro-choice, but I definitely see a difference between an abortion and a tonsilectomy. I don’t think it has to be as black and white as you are implying here.
The pill can have all sorts of unpleasant side effects, from weight gain to stroke. Of course, there are many alternatives to the pill, but some are less effective (condoms and other barrier methods), and some of the more effective ones either carry the same risks (Depo Provera), or different risks (IUD), in addition to being prohibitively expensive and often not covered by insurance.
That said, abortion also has some unpleasant side effects, carries some significant risks, is prohibitively expensive, and is often not covered by insurance. Plus, it hurts.
I can’t say that abortion is an irresponsible method of birth control, but I also can’t see any benefit to using it as such.
If we take a 10 year span and say that woman A is on BCP and woman B will be using nothing, I think the risks are higher for woman B for that 10 year span. Assuming both are sexually active. Because woman B would probably have to have multiple abortions.
If they are both over 40 and smokers, the risks might shift toward even multiple abortions being safer.
To say it better, I link to Carl Sagan’s essay from some time ago about abortion. I used to be anti-abortion, but I think this essay really changed my mind.
To relate it to the OP, Sagan does argue that abortion is the lesser of two evils. As such, it would be considerably better if rather than using abortion as birth control, men and women used conception control. However, once that conception occurs, abortion should always be a viable option. But, no, responsible people should not *rely *on abortion as birth control.
I think, like all medical desicions, this is one that can be made only by an individual woman and her doctor. That’s why I’m pro-choice. I have no right pushing my nose in where it doesn’t belong.
I can imagine that some women are completely certain that there is no moral issue with having an abortion, and she’d have zero moral qualms or regrets and that she can afford a rather expensive form of birth control. If so, and she’s been properly informed (before the potential conceptions) of the medical risks of abortion, I think that’s her choice, and so be it.
I can also imagine that some women feel that abortion, is, as previously stated “a lesser wrong”. I can imagine that she’d feel guilty, if not remorseful. I’d imagine that having multiple abortions for birth control would be emotionally damaging to such a woman, and therefore not her best option.
While I’m willing to counsel and provide people with food for thought, in the end the only abortions I want any say over are my own.
(FTR, I personally fall into the second camp. While I don’t believe a zygote is conscious or feel pain or is truly “alive”, I would be very sorry to see the potential for life ended, and be eaten up for a long time seeing other people’s babies and children, imagining my own aborted potential child. It wouldn’t be mentally healthy for me, so I’ve never chosen an abortion, despite a pregnancy at age 17.)
Why are all these comparisons being made with the pill? There many other non-medicative birth control methods. Someone doesn’t want to use a condom or diaphram or whatever else because its inconvenient? But somehow its less inconvenient to get an occassional surgery? To my mind, this is akin to not putting on your seatbelt (because its inconvenient), but you justify it because you’re a good driver, drive the speed limit, and almost never get in accidents. Or perhaps not brushing your teeth because you eat a perfect diet and no sugar, so you will almost never get cavities. Whether you agree with the legality of abortion (or seatbelt laws, for that matter), and putting all potential moral issues aside, these scenarios seem equally irresponsible to me. Shrugging aside a minor inconvenience and hoping that the odds of the lower probability major inconvenience won’t happen is naive, irresponsible, and, quite frankly, stupid.
Now, one could argue its not irresponsible if she honestly believes she’s infertile because of a particular diagnosis, or one or both of the partners has been snipped. In those cases, the probability of pregnancy is as low or lower than any common birth control method.
This really boils down to an abdication of responsibilty for the pregnancy to probability. At what level does that probability become responsible/irresponsible? Taking extreme examples on which I think most of us could probably agree. First, a woman, knowing she’s in her fertile period, and having a viable, non-medical contraceptive available (eg, the guy has a condom with him, with neither having allergies to the material or needing any form of lubricant), and choosing not to use it because its inconvenient, that she’ll “take the risk” that she’ll get pregnant and get an abortion. Meanwhile, a married woman who wants no more kids, and both her and her husband get snipped. In the first case, the woman has a probably 80-90% chance (WAG, I don’t know much about these probabilities) of getting pregnant and needing an otherwise unnecessary abortion; I think this is pretty clearly irresponsible. In the latter, she probably has <<1% of getting pregnant and needing an abortion; this is clearly responsible. Where does one draw that line between these two examples of responisble use of abortion, all moral issues aside?
I guess I don’t see how an abortion is “irresponsible.” Ever. She’s taking “responsibility” for her actions. She doesn’t have a choice but to take responsibility.
To use the above example, how is it irresponsible not to brush? It might not be dentally wise, but how is it irresponsible? I guess I don’t understand how that word is being used in this context.
Dictionary definition: “Showing a lack of care for consequences.” But this assumes that she hasn’t just chosen one set of consequences over another. If she would simply rather have an abortion than use a condom, she isn’t showing a lack of care for consequences. She’s making a choice. I might think it’s a crazy choice because of the risk, hassle, money, and pain, but hey, it’s not me.
I’m pro-choice, but I’m kind of surprised that nobody has called you to the mat on this one. In fact, a couple of people have quoted or paraphrased you in this thread without asking what, to me at least, is a glaring question:
I agree with your points, and think this is exactly why one only draws that line for herself. The answer to the OP is then, “Yes, abortion **can **be responsible birth control, but it’s not always.”
Is gastric bypass surgery responsible weight control? If a person has tried every diet and exercise program under the sun and still can’t maintain a healthy weight, I don’t know anyone who’d say no. What about a person who eats bags of Oreos and frozen pizzas every night and won’t exercise? What about a person who eats right, but doesn’t exercise? Like abortion, people do a lot of moralizing around weight. If a fat person won’t exercise, does he “deserve” an “easy” surgical option?
Medical decisions are not one-size fits all. They should only be made on a case-by-case basis.
Firstly, expense. An abortion costs a couple of hundred dollars, a sum which isn’t easy to come by for poor women.
Secondly, access. Some states have no abortion clinics at all. A woman seeking an abortion would have to travel, and for poor women, travelling out of state can sometimes be almost as impossible as travelling to the moon. They may not have access to reliable transportation, and they may not have friends with good cars, either. Public transportation doesn’t always reach rural areas, and paying a taxi fee to drive hundreds of miles would be out of the question. Add to this that some states have no abortion-on-demand. A woman may have to wait a certain time period (hotel rooms would add cost) or go through counselling.
Thirdly, the danger involved. An abortion is not a completely risk-free procedure. There’s always a chance of infection or complications, especially if the woman is unable to go back to the clinic for follow-up care. The “abortion pill” has certain risks as well-- that all of the tissue might not be expelled.
In those cases, I’d say abortion really isn’t a birth control option for these women. You’ll either see them using other forms of birth control or having lots of surprise children.