In light of the recent court decision (5-4), Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) has this to say,
“This is about a procedure that any parent would want her daughter to have access to if she needed it. And to frame it as an abortion issue is doing a disservice to medicine and to our young women and our country. So I hope we can get the focus back on the fact that this Supreme Court is deciding what medical procedures are necessary for child-bearing women.”
What is partial-birth abortion? Pictures paint thousands of words.
What is partial-birth abortion? Many people are “offended” by pictures of aborted babies. Why?
Why are they not angry at the murderer of the babies or the system that allows it?
The pro-death rhetoric is always the same. The baby in the mother’s womb is not really a baby?
When does a baby becomes a “real” baby? Or what constitutes a “real” baby?
Some would say consciousness! I would say, “Can we kill the drunkards then?”
Some would say no sense of understanding! I would say, “Can we kill all the idiots in our high schools then?”
The bottom line is this, it is an inconvenient issue. It becomes an inconvenience to humans and therefore it is the humans who would exterminate them, right? How many cases is it really about the health of the mother?
Don’t click if you don’t want to see the parents of this dead baby (through partial birth abortion).
NRLC’s Douglas Johnson on National Review Online: “Is it really a partial birth?” November 8, 2006.
NRLC Media Advisory: Partial-Birth Abortion Returns to the U.S. Supreme Court November 7, 2006.
The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act — Misconceptions and Realities, by NRLC Legislative Director Douglas Johnson.
U.S. Supreme Court Agrees to Review Federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act February 21, 2006.
“Partial-Birth Abortion on Trial,” by Cathy Cleaver Ruse, Esq. (Shocking sworn testimony by those who perform partial-birth abortions).
Concerned Women for America exposes Plan B (8/22/06)
Plan B – Press Release by Concerned Women for America (8/24/06)
Family Research Counsel on Plan B overview
Plan B “Morning After Pill” causes early abortions
When I read descriptions of partial-birth abortion, I really want to vomit. That’s probably a survival instinct… because humans aren’t supposed to see the death of the young without the deepest remorse.
Pro-choicers are offended by pictures of aborted babies for a simple, and somewhat valid, reason: the pictures of ANY medical procedure are really disgusting. It is a weak spot in the pro-life movement (I do recall, as a teenager, being very turned off by the pro-lifers who would shove pictures of aborted babies into my face when I walked past the local PP clinic to get some coffee and donuts) – no one expects those pictures to be pretty. It’s also somewhat counterproductive, as babies in utero hardly look like cute Gerber children.
That all said, the war can be won with words. Any clinical description of the procedure necessarily entails more discussion about the child (which is good) and describes how barbaric the entire thing is.
I do agree that we can win the argument with words alone. Most of the time we don’t carry pictures of anything when we are having conversations.
However, the pictures shown at appropriate time and location can be helpful.
Many, many years back, our nation was shock and horrified by the brutality against an innocent black boy. His mother decided not to cover the casket up and thus allowed the photographers to photograph. With that picture our nation was abhorred. Those that were on the fence spoke out and the racist re-considered their position.
The pro-lifers who show pictures of aborted fetuses are hoping to shock and revive the people’s conscience. Social reform don’t just happen.
No disagreement about the purpose, nor the ultimate goodness of that purpose. I’m just not sure that it’s effective.
Maybe it’s just me, but all unborn children look a little weird. 😉 More than that, I don’t expect any surgical procedure to be really pretty. To reason by analogy: When I had a tumour excised, it was necessary to preserve my health and no one would deny the need and the good of the surgery. It was probably ugly, bloody, and gross, though – and the scarring/bruising was pretty heinous. Thus, the gore of a surgical procedure, IMO, is completely removed from its moral good.
I’m wondering if there’s a better way (such as those diagrams) of getting the point across of how horrific and barbaric this procedure really is – how it is NOT a normal surgery.
When does a baby becomes a “real” baby? Or what constitutes a “real” baby?
Some would say consciousness! I would say, “Can we kill the drunkards then?”
Some would say no sense of understanding! I would say, “Can we kill all the idiots in our high schools then?”
Well, one group of feminists say that the baby becomes a baby when the mother wants it. (Sounds a bit like pre-Civil War jurisprudence: a black is a slave in some areas and free in other areas.)
Kill drunkards – or the mentally retarded – or those who are in a coma or a persistent vegetative state.
It’s interesting to watch the other side get all upset when a man assaults a pregnant woman and kills her baby. The mental gymnastics required to condemn that act but permit abortion are astonishing.
I appreciate your comments especially your position on the side of the babies.
I think Scott Klusendorf says it well regarding the visuals whether videos or pictures.
http://prolifetraining.com/Articles/Graphic-Visuals.htm
Theobromphile,
Thank you for your comment.
Much have already been discussed in this conversation already, and I appreciated your comment that you shared with us.
I want you to point out just one thing,
“More than that, I don’t expect any surgical procedure to be really pretty. To reason by analogy: When I had a tumour excised, it was necessary to preserve my health and no one would deny the need and the good of the surgery. It was probably ugly, bloody, and gross, though – and the scarring/bruising was pretty heinous. Thus, the gore of a surgical procedure, IMO, is completely removed from its moral good.”
I’ve got to ask any pro-death (of babies) people what really is it, that just don’t vibe them–pure aesthetics or is it something with ethics?
I don’t know of any surgery that is deem just only as unpleasant aesthetically, on the basis that the procedure is an ugly sight because a neck was snapped, or the brains were crushed, or the other ways babies are aborted.
Just my two cent.
Thanks, once again, for your comment here.
I think you correctly observe that “Pro-choicers are offended by pictures of aborted babies for a simple, and somewhat valid, reason: the pictures of ANY medical procedure are really disgusting.”
However, I think, there’s an underlying reason that, “ANY medical procedure,” may be seen as disgusting.
Abortion pictures or any medical procedure shoved to our face is not repulsive only because the images are not pretty but why they aren’t pretty. Similarly, the issue is not simply how we’re built (i.e. surival instinct) but who built us that way. The fact that medical procedures are disgusting and not pretty is really a “God fact” because God has placed in us a sense of how the world ought to be.
Thus, though pro-choice may not acknowledge it is wrong, the reason anyone is offended is because their God-given instinct and God-given consience tells their heart and mind that something is inherently wrong in seeing a fetus being ripped apart or an impaled construction worker being operated on.
You’re right: The reason why people are offended is because of the disturbing images. However, the reason why the images are disturbing is because of God.
And because of this God-given commond ground between all people, images of what really happens can jolt a deluded mind and hardened heart back to reality, pointing to morality, and ultimately, to God.
The reason you may find images ineffective is because it is offending. But the reason why you find it ineffective (attributing the disgust universally to ANY medical procedure), is incomplete. The reason WHY is is universally offending IS WHY it is effective. Don’t misunderstand. I’m not saying we should use images because they offend per se, but because the reason it offends was given by God.
Read the article provided by Andy. Also, I would add that the TV anti-smoking campaign, as well as anti-drug campaign, showing the consquences of cigarette and drug-use were effective because they showed what really happened and because what really happened was repulsive. (e.g Person talking with a voice synthesizer, or smoking through the hole in their throat.)
I’d only like to ask you what you think the pictures of “Baby Chelsea” would look like if her grieving parents had been restricted, under the Partial Birth Abortion Act of 2003, to NONintact dilation and evacuation. Those are the pictures no one wants to see, that do not allow parents to mourn their loss and find piece, but they are what’s now the law of the land. Justice Kennedy explained it very clearly in his majority opinion, down to the word “dismembered” and the phrase “ripped apart.”
bks
Barbara,
Thanks for commenting! If I’m reading your comment correctly, are you saying the reason why intact D&E should be allowed, is so that the parents can mourn a baby that’s in one piece instead of pieces? In effect are you saying the reason why the procedure should be allowed is because it allows an open casket funeral instead of a closed casket funeral to give the parents peace during the mourning process?
If so, I would respond that the rationale misses the point. The pro-life’s position is not what’s the most humane way of aborting a baby, but that aborting a baby is wrong. By analogy, “let’s gas them instead of shooting them in the head” because the corpse will be in one piece and allow the parents to mourn in peace. Additionally, what peace did it give them? Their baby is dead. Not only so, but they regretted the abortion.
All the Partial Birth Abortion Act of 2003 did was remove one way of killing. Because the Supreme Court basically affirmed they would not get rid of abortion, I consider the Partial Birth Abortion act a pro-choice victory!
If you look at the Supreme Court’s opinion, throughout the entire document, they argue many times that the reason it should be approved was precisely because it DID NOT pose an, “undue burden (Opinion of Gonzales vs Carhart 2,3),” to the woman’s right to choose. To further support the Supreme Court’s opinion it restates they upheld the Nine Disctrict Court of Appeal’s decision to strike down Nebraska legislation banning D&E abortions precisely because it was too broad and caused an undue burden (Opinion of Gonzales vs Carhart 20) in Stenborg vs Carhart.
Dizzy,
Good point… although as someone who approaches the pro-life position from an atheistic/legal perspective, that’s not something that I argue. (Mostly, I think that pro-abortionists see “God” and think, “Sorry, this country doesn’t legislate religious tenets,” and turning this into a religious argument makes it seem like the ONLY argument against abortion is religious. That, IMO, is ridiculous, as everything the Bible tells us to do is good for us on an objective level.)
I’m a pro-lifer, and I find those posters to be obnoxious. (Some of this is from having sanctimonious people shove them in my face and start screaming at me, simply because I happened to be a young person who needed to walk past Planned Parenthood on her way to Dunkin’ Donuts.) Mostly, though, I don’t think they really show the damage to the fetal body (i.e. it’s hard to see where brains were removed to collapse a skull), and, more importantly, undermine our position because unborn children don’t look like cute Gerber babies. The pro-abortionists really believe that fetuses are so underdeveloped so as to not warrant protection, and I hate doing anything that helps out that position. Oddly, I think that preemie kids would be a much better way of making the point that what is in the womb is alive, human, and worth protecting – and to not feed into the Leftist theory that it’s just a freakish blob of cells.
I wholeheartedly DISAGREE with your Carhart analysis, though. First of all, the Scalia/Thomas concurrence would do away with Roe. More importantly, there’s correct ways and incorrect ways to decide cases. First, If you don’t need to overturn precedent, you don’t do it. Second, you are limited to ruling on the case in front of you.
Why is this important? Sure, this is fun, sexy stuff for nerdy law students, but what does that have to do with Carhart being a pro-choice or pro-life victory?
1. Overturning precedent (Casey, Stenberg) would result in the same result as not overturning it, in this instance: the abortion ban stands. Ergo, it is improper to overturn the precedent, as the current case does not require that the Justices do so and the precedent is not unworkable (i.e. the “correct” result is achieved anyway). Liberal justices tend to ignore this; conservative justices tend to obey this. The majority was written by conservatives… and Hell would sooner freeze over than see those five blithly overstepping their bounds.
2. Yeah, this whole “judicial activism” thing! The issue before the Court was limited to late-term abortions and one particular method thereof. The decision reached CANNOT extend to all abortions; it CANNOT extend to first-trimester abortions, normal D&E, or any other form of abortion than the one litigated in the case before it. If the Court were to take the intact D&E ban and then start talking about the constitutionality of other restrictions, like a First Amendment case, we would all recognise that as entirely improper conduct. Likewise, using a D&E case to rule on all abortion is wrong.
It’s a huge victory, judicially, and a small victory, legislatively. The justices determined that the entire restriction before it met constitutional muster.