Inside an abortion clinic
You have to read this breathtaking piece from Esquire. It’s eight pages long, but please, bookmark it and read it when you have the time. It’s about Dr. Warren Hern, who is apparently the last American doctor specializing in late abortions. The reporter spent some time shadowing him, not long after the murder of Dr. George Tiller, another late abortion provider as well as Dr. Hern’s friend. It’s very vivid, and lends a perspective I think we should all have when we’re talking about abortion law. Take this excerpt, for example:
The patients can be upsetting too. They’re under terrible stress, of course, but sometimes they come in very angry. One had conjoined twins and would have died giving birth, but she exploded when he told her she couldn’t smoke in the office. And some treat him with contempt and disgust [Z's note: italics here indicates quotation of Dr. Hern], usually the ones who have been directly involved in antiabortion activities. They hate all abortion except for their special case. One even said they should all be killed. Only fourteen, she came with her mother. What brings you here? he asked. I have to have an abortion. Why? I’m not old enough to have a baby. But you told the counselor we should all be killed? Yes, you should all be killed. Why? Because you do abortions. Me too? Yes, you should be killed too. Do you want me killed before or after I do your abortion? Before.
He told her to leave. Her mother was very upset. But he isn’t an abortion-dispensing machine. He’s a physician. He’s a person.
Or this:
The abortionist comes in, remembers that the U. S. marshals don’t like him to use this room because the window is too exposed, and walks right back out. You follow, asking about the patients who were supposed to see Dr. Tiller.
The patient I just finished was very unhappy to see me. I think they are very antiabortion. She had a fetal abnormality, and she and her husband are just devastated. Stuff like that.
What kind of fetal abnormalities are we talking about?
One was Down syndrome, another was a lethal brain abnormality along with a lethal heart abnormality. Another one had a catastrophic — we’re not talking about cleft lip, we are talking about cleft face. There was no face.
The takeaway message, I think, is that this is an immensely complicated issue with no easy, pleasant solutions. No normal person enjoys the prospect of an abortion on its own, but many different people still find Dr. Hern’s services invaluable. If you consider yourself pro-choice, you should read this to get a feel of the reality of the situation. An abortion isn’t a magic spell that makes a fetus disappear; it can be devastating and tragic for everyone involved. If you consider yourself pro-life, you should read this to understand the difficult places that women, that couples, find themselves in when they go to see abortion doctors and how they are helped by these doctors. You should understand how the hateful anti-abortion rhetoric fuels the fire of violence, and forces doctors and their families and employees to live in constant fear.
I’m sorry to leave you with mostly these big blockquotes, but I just can’t add much to this article. It speaks for itself. Go read it, whoever you are.
Mandatory ultrasounds
Via blog.bioethics.net: 11 state legislatures are facing proposed legislation to offer or require women seeking abortions to see ultrasound images of the fetus, and in some cases listen to the heartbeat. Lest you be confused, these are women who have, in at least the vast majority of cases, already decided to have an abortion. Some of these proposals allow the ultrasound to be done right up to 30 minutes before the abortion procedure. Several of the states graciously allow an 18 or 24 hour waiting period. (The AP story lists 12 states in total, but one in their list is actually South Carolina’s extension of an existing 1-hour law to a 24-hour one. Very sweet of them.)
The goal of these proposals is obviously, in Dr. Johnson’s words, “that [the woman] might catch a glimpse of her unborn fetus and change her mind.” If only they knew it had a heartbeat! pro-life legislators are musing. They assume that women getting abortions are doing so on a whim and have never really thought about the implications. This is insulting. It’s obviously a terribly difficult decision which every woman facing it agonizes over. Admittedly there is the occasional irresponsible person, but the real effect of any of these laws passing would be to put thousands of women through intense psychological trauma, on top of what is already an emotionally taxing experience.
Unable to actually ban abortion outright, these lawmakers are erecting bizarre barriers around the procedure to serve as criminal sentences. Their intentions are plainly to punish women, but they do so in a cruel and scarring way and under the perverse pretext of medical regulation. If abortion is not illegal, we shouldn’t be punishing the act.
I know random and strange legislation gets proposed all the time without any real hope of passing. However, the fact that this has popped up in a dozen states at once makes me worry that there’s some real initiative behind this horrible idea. I hope the other legislators step it up and vote it down.
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