I was riding the bus in Ottawa last week when I saw people lined along the main thoroughfare holding huge, poster-sized color photos of “aborted babies” with slogans like; “this is what choice looks like” written on them. One of these looked like a fully-formed baby with its head torn away from its body.
This does not correlate with my impression of what your typical abortion looks like.
So what is that photo really of? What can we know about the circumstances under which it, and others like it, was taken? And where do the loonies who walk around waving these images get them in the first place? What is the genesis of these photos?
In front of Nortel right? My buddy and I were in the Harvey’s next door when they arrived, and I saw them too… I found it bad that we could see them from the harvey’s dining room area…
There are places online to get them, such as :
As for whether they are legit, I would guess that they are… It seems silly to me to support a cause, enough to make posters of it, but to use fake photos for that cause… I would guess they are real…
Upon what did you base this initial impression of yours?
Upon what do you base your assumption that this is not, in fact, what a genuine aborted fetus ends up looking like?
Ok, that website just freaked me out… but I guess that was the point right?
I have seen similar photos (maybe even the same photo) being carried by people around Chicago for the same reason. I don’t know for certain but the picture is likely the result of a late term abortion. Late term abortions do happen (although I think they have recently been outlawed in some places) but they are very rarely done and when they do occur they are done under extreme circumstances (i.e. the mother will certainly die giving birth). A woman who would opt for an abortion is not likely to do so after carrying the fetus for 8+ months. Even if such a woman existed most doctors won’t do them at that point merely because the mother chooses to have one. The vast majority of abortions are performed late in the first trimester or very early in the second trimester. At this point in a pregnancy the fetus is quite small although it may well look like a teeny baby (arms, legs, toes, head, etc.).
The Centers for Disease Control reported in 1998 that 12% of all abortions in the U.S. are performed past the first trimester. 12,380 (1.4%) were performed past 21 weeks, the point of viability. “The overall number, ratio, and rate of abortions from this analysis are conservative estimates because the numbers of legal induced abortions reported to CDC for 1998 were probably lower than the numbers actually performed,” according to their report.
The Roe v. Wade decision does not prohibit second-trimester abortions, nor stipulate for what reasons they may or may not be performed. In Colautti v. Franklin (1979), a challenge to a Pennsylvania law, the Supreme Court reaffirmed the principles established in Roe and Danforth and elaborated on its views concerning viability: “Because this point [viability] may differ with each pregnancy, neither the legislature nor the courts may proclaim one of the elements entering into the ascertainment of viability?be it weeks of gestation or fetal weight or any other single factor?as the determinant of when the State has a compelling interest in the life or health of the fetus.”
In answer to the OP, we used to have a carpenter who drove a large panel truck which carried on one side–the left side, I think–a grisly cartoon, showing a Catholic priest in full regalia, arms linked with Hitler’s, standing next to a large bowl full of dead babies, dismembered pieces of slaughtered babies, and blood, and with text condemning abortion. Apparently this got such shocked reaction from onlookers that after a while the picture disappeared–either he took it down himself because of complaints, or some outraged onlookers literally tore it off his truck. He claims to be a “born-again Christian” opposing abortions. (I do, too, but I won’t freak out like he did…)
Even if they are real, and definitely not pretty to look at, well, so? I’m not too fond of the chunky placenta or alien-like umbelical cord of live birth, either, doesn’t mean women shouldn’t give birth.
If these photos are meant to humanize the anti abortionist viewpoint, perhaps more pro choicers should post autopsy photos of the bodies of Andrea Yates’ children, underfunded orphanages, police picture evidence of abused and molested foster children. No, wait, that would be a little sick.
Walloon:
I think stating 21 weeks as viable is pushing it. That is barely viable if at all. In college I visited a hospital in the course of work I was doing for a charity (The Variety Club of Iowa) and saw a baby that missed the record for being the youngest ever born and survive by one week. The baby was born 25 weeks into the pregnancy at that point (making the youngest ever to survive 24 weeks along). Mind you, most babies born this early died within hours or at most days of birth so this child was something of a miracle. I will say, however, that this was back in the late 80s so perhaps medical science has gotten better in the intervening time at enabling younger and younger children to survive a very early birth.
As to the 12% figure of abortions done past the first trimester realize that most of those are performed very early in the first trimester. I worked for a women’s health clinic just after college and abortions were allowed to be performed there up till the 14[sup]th[/sup] week (or two weeks into the second trimester). It may seem odd but many of the women who had an abortion at that point did so because they didn’t realize they were pregnant till well into the pregnancy. In general they didn’t just laze about waiting longer than necessary but sought an abortion as soon as they realized they were pregnant. Given timing and a bevy of other possible issues some women simply weren’t aware of their pregnancy till the first trimester was nearly through.
I don’t see why an abortion would cause a baby’s head to be torn from its body, unless the fetus were already malformed - which would be one of the most common reasons for a late-term abortion.
21 weeks is not viable - the lungs do not have enough fluid to function at that stage. The earliest viable stage is 24 weeks, and that’s with the mother being prepped with high doses of steroids (to mature the baby’s lungs), and good medical care being available. Even then, the child will almost definitely suffer from hearing, sight, and neurological disorders. This is probably what leads to courts being uncertain about defining ‘viability’. However, the extreme end of viability is 24 weeks, not 21.
My impression of the pictures is that they are genuine, 11 weeks sounds about right too.
What?
I think it was meant to read ‘very early in the second…’
Aren’t some of those pictures actually of stillborns?
Ask someone who’s had an abortion-perhaps they can clear things up.
:smack:
Thanks for the catch Mangetout…that is what I meant to say.
The earliest surviving premature birth, according to the Guinness Book, was at 22 weeks, or as I wrote, “past 21 weeks”.
At least they didn’t have any fucking pop-ups.
We lost two children at around 20 or 22 weeks; they were very much bigger than what you see in the images in that link; I would say a figure of about 11 weeks seems quite reasonable for them.
The New York Times, May 16, 1997, sec. A, p. 18, citing the National Center for Health Care Statistics, reports that approximately 15% of babies born at 22 weeks will survive, 25% at 23 weeks, 42 % at 24 weeks and 57% at 25 weeks.
So I reckon the answer to the OP is that yes, aborted babies (fetuses or whatever the proper term is, IANAOB/GYN) do look a lot more like full term human babies than something else.
I personally think they could have made their point more effectively if they had chosen a picture of an aborted baby with the head still on. As I say, IANAOB/GYN but I would think that a part of the normal abortion process is NOT to twist or cut off the head of the aborted fetus or whatever. My first thought would be that that particular one (on the sign in Ottowa) was the product of some extrordinary circumstance or procedure.
It may be that the photo is of a real child, but not an intentionally aborted one.