# Pro-choicers: would you take this abortion deal? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 30, 2013, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119 "2013-04-30T16:39:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Jman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jman/32/4416_2.png) [@Jman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jman)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/21 "2013-04-30T19:30:00Z")
Absolutely. I’d honestly even be OK with it being a little earlier, say 14 weeks. After 3 months, you should know you’re pregnant and be able to make a decision. You take too long to decide, sorry… carry that kid to term. I am just fine with that sort of restriction, provided there is a clause for health of the mother. ---
**Author:** ![Rachellelogram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rachellelogram/32/8689_2.png) [@Rachellelogram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rachellelogram)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/22 "2013-04-30T20:38:23Z")
> [@Jman](#): > > Absolutely. I’d honestly even be OK with it being a little earlier, say 14 weeks. After 3 months, you should know you’re pregnant and be able to make a decision. You take too long to decide, sorry… carry that kid to term. > > I am just fine with that sort of restriction, provided there is a clause for health of the mother. Are you sure you’re a _pro_-choicer? ---
**Author:** ![Minnie\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4bbf92/32.png) [@Minnie\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Minnie_Luna)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/23 "2013-04-30T20:39:37Z")
> [@Jman](#): > > Absolutely. I’d honestly even be OK with it being a little earlier, say 14 weeks. After 3 months, you should know you’re pregnant and be able to make a decision. You take too long to decide, sorry… carry that kid to term. I would agree with this if funding were available. One of the reasons women wait to have abortions later is lack of available funds for the procedure. By the time you gather the $$$$ Planned Parenthood wants for a surgical termination, you may be 16 weeks out. If you look at how pregnancies are dated, the number of weeks pregnant you are is the number of weeks from your last menstrual period. No one is ever 1 week or 2 weeks pregnant, you essentially start at 3 weeks. So if your period is two weeks late when you take the test, you are 6 weeks pregnant but the sex that made you pregnant was only 4 weeks ago. Sure, not a good excuse, but I doubt a lot of women who don’t want to be pregnant find out before 5 or 6 weeks that they are. Add in denial time, time to retest, decision time, etc and availability of appointments, it is not out of the realm of possibility that they don’t seen/treated until 10-12 weeks. ---
**Author:** ![donnie\_darko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@donnie\_darko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/donnie_darko)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/24 "2013-04-30T20:50:43Z")
22 weeks is pretty late. At that point, the fetus begins to resemble a baby. We’re talking 5 months here! I have qualms with it past 2 or 3 months. Before that, I’m still not totally sound with it, but I would take a limit up to that age as a compromise. I think trying to criminalize abortion is futile. ---
**Author:** ![donnie\_darko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@donnie\_darko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/donnie_darko)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/25 "2013-04-30T20:52:17Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > If my math is right, 22 weeks is more than halfway through the 2nd trimester. Unless I’m missing an exception, I’d take it. Of course, I’m a male, and not one of the sort who thinks he should have a say in such matters beyond the ballot box. Why shouldn’t a man have an opinion? If a man is pro-choice, that’s still an opinion. When people say men shouldn’t have an opinion on abortion, it really means they should share _their_ pro-choice opinion or else they hate women and love rapists. For the record, I’d consider myself pro-choice. ---
**Author:** ![donnie\_darko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@donnie\_darko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/donnie_darko)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/26 "2013-04-30T20:54:41Z")
I’m only reluctantly pro-choice though. I think that it’s better for a very small embryo to die than for a number of women to kill themselves attempting to end their pregnancy. I don’t really understand why feminists and liberals think that abortion is the greatest gift to women and justice when it’s used as a way to reduce the number of baby girls in China and India and the number of non-whites in the US. It’s really ironic. Abortion is just as much a gift to men who don’t want to be fathers as it is to women who don’t want to be mothers. ---
**Author:** ![donnie\_darko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@donnie\_darko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/donnie_darko)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/27 "2013-04-30T20:56:14Z")
> [@Rachellelogram](#): > > What constitutes a serious threat to the mother’s health? Would you permit a late-term abortion if pregnancy is making the mother actively suicidal? > > Anyway, I think late-term abortion needs to remain legal, so I wouldn’t agree to this compromise. So by that logic if a mother’s newborn is causing her to be depressed, she should have the legal right to kill him/her? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/28 "2013-04-30T21:31:52Z")
I have no interest in compromise with people I consider to be bigoted fanatic monsters. Nor do I believe for one moment that they’d stop protesting, intimidating, lying to/about, and murdering their opponents so nothing would be gained. You might as well try “compromise” with the KKK during its height. > [@donnie\_darko](#): > > So by that logic if a mother’s newborn is causing her to be depressed, she should have the legal right to kill him/her? :rolleyes: She can just hand the baby over to someone else once its born. The situation aren’t analogous. Nor is an already born infant making her suicidal by screwing with her brain chemistry. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/29 "2013-04-30T21:32:48Z")
> [@donnie\_darko](#): > > I’m only reluctantly pro-choice though. I think that it’s better for a very small embryo to die than for a number of women to kill themselves attempting to end their pregnancy. > > I don’t really understand why feminists and liberals think that abortion is the greatest gift to women and justice when it’s used as a way to reduce the number of baby girls in China and India and the number of non-whites in the US. It’s really ironic. Abortion is just as much a gift to men who don’t want to be fathers as it is to women who don’t want to be mothers. You do realize that being pro-choice means you’re also against coercing someone to have an abortion, right? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![donnie\_darko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@donnie\_darko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/donnie_darko)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/30 "2013-04-30T21:39:55Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > You do realize that being pro-choice means you’re also against coercing someone to have an abortion, right? :dubious: In principle yes but how could coercion into abortion be prevented by law? ---
**Author:** ![donnie\_darko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@donnie\_darko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/donnie_darko)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/31 "2013-04-30T21:43:51Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > :rolleyes: She can just hand the baby over to someone else once its born. The situation aren’t analogous. Nor is an already born infant making her suicidal by screwing with her brain chemistry. Except that adoption isn’t an easy process. But you’re right, there’s places where you can legally leave your baby if you don’t want it. Still, after 6-7 months or so the baby can be induced prematurely. This is hazardous to its health but better than getting an abortion. I think that’s very much comparable to leaving a baby on a hospital doorstep to a questionable future. The thing that would make her suicidal is the fact the baby exists, not some kind of depressant transfused through the umbilical cord. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/32 "2013-04-30T21:56:39Z")
> [@donnie\_darko](#): > > Except that adoption isn’t an easy process. But you’re right, there’s places where you can legally leave your baby if you don’t want it. Still, after 6-7 months or so the baby can be induced prematurely. This is hazardous to its health but better than getting an abortion. No it isn’t, it’s harder on the woman. And she doesn’t have to give the baby up, she can give it to the father or some other relative to take care of until she feels better; that’s not an option with a pregnancy. > [@donnie\_darko](#): > > The thing that would make her suicidal is the fact the baby exists, not some kind of depressant transfused through the umbilical cord. No, a pregnancy is perfectly capable of causing major psychological problems in some women by the way it alters their biochemical balance. A fetus and its placenta aren’t just passively sitting there, it and the mother are in constant biochemical/microscopic conflict. The fetus pours out chemicals to manipulate the mother’s body to benefit itself at her expense, the mother produces other chemicals to counter it, the fetus pours out counter-counter chemicals and so on. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/33 "2013-04-30T22:14:15Z")
Nope. No provision for the third trimester “you fetus is severely deformed and unsustainable.” While I would never force a woman to abort in those circumstances, I’d also never force a woman to carry to term, knowing that she was giving birth to a baby who might only survive minutes. I have other issues, but that is a huge one. ---
**Author:** ![donnie\_darko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@donnie\_darko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/donnie_darko)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/34 "2013-04-30T22:20:41Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > Nope. > > No provision for the third trimester “you fetus is severely deformed and unsustainable.” > > While I would never force a woman to abort in those circumstances, I’d also never force a woman to carry to term, knowing that she was giving birth to a baby who might only survive minutes. > > I have other issues, but that is a huge one. So it’s better if it has an 100% chance of dying than a less than 100% chance? What is it about birth that suddenly converts a “non-person” into a “person”? :dubious: I think many pro-choicers are just as irrational and sentimental as pro-lifers are on this subject. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/35 "2013-04-30T22:27:13Z")
Do those who can’t have abortions get tiny American flags? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/36 "2013-04-30T22:28:58Z")
> [@donnie\_darko](#): > > So it’s better if it has an 100% chance of dying than a less than 100% chance? You assume that it doesn’t have a 100% chance of death either way. You also assume that it isn’t already dead. I think forcing a woman to give birth to a corpse is disgusting. > [@donnie\_darko](#): > > What is it about birth that suddenly converts a “non-person” into a “person”? Nothing. however, it does mean the infant is no longer directly dependent on its mother, and it means that all the physical trauma caused by pregnancy and childbirth have already happened. You can’t retroactively abort a baby and make the pregnancy never have happened, so what’s the point? The damage has been done. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/37 "2013-04-30T22:33:44Z")
Yeah, I’d take it. But only because it’s less restrictive than what we’ve got in most states now - by both legal mandate and TRAP laws making it too difficult to actually operate a clinic that provides abortion even if it’s legal in theory. If what we had now wasn’t worse, I’d say “hell, no”. But I think this is about the best deal we could hope to strike at this point…except I’m pretty sure it’s the _pro-lifers_ who wouldn’t take the deal. ---
**Author:** ![donnie\_darko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@donnie\_darko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/donnie_darko)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/38 "2013-04-30T22:35:04Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > You assume that it doesn’t have a 100% chance of death either way. You also assume that it isn’t already dead. I think forcing a woman to give birth to a corpse is disgusting. If it can be proven to be dead it’s not really an abortion. ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/39 "2013-04-30T22:36:10Z")
I would not take the OP ‘deal.’ I do _not_ concede the ground lost to anti-abortion forces in the past 20 years as a permanent reality. I’m surprised to see several “status quo” comments that apparently do. > [@donnie\_darko](#): > > I don’t really understand why feminists and liberals think that abortion is the greatest gift to women and justice when it’s used as a way to reduce the number of baby girls in China and India and the number of non-whites in the US. It’s really ironic. Abortion is just as much a gift to men who don’t want to be fathers as it is to women who don’t want to be mothers. No, because it isn’t (properly) a man’s choice. And whatever the choice _is_, it won’t be his body that has to sustain it. Pro-choice is not pro-abortion. Being genuinely pro-choice means opposing coerced abortions just as much as coerced pregnancy (or, supporting the choice to give birth just as much as the choice not to), and for the same reasons. In the United States, however, the most abiding threat to women’s reproductive freedom is coerced pregnancy. I am pro-choice, but I don’t think there’s anything specifically ‘good’ about abortion… except that, freely chosen, it may be better than the alternative. Like chemotherapy, say. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2013, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119/40 "2013-04-30T22:49:21Z")
> [@donnie\_darko](#): > > If it can be proven to be dead it’s not really an abortion. Yes, it is. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pro-choicers-would-you-take-this-abortion-deal/657119.md?page=3)