In denouncing abortion, may we simultaneously deplore single motherhood?

The wording, images and jokes in this video may offend some. When I saw the title ‘The Hilarious World of Abortion’, I thought it was a pro-abortion comedian poking fun at pro-life arguments. But this video, furthers the debate by, instead, finding inconsistencies in the pro-abortion position, and making fun of discrepancies such as a woman having the right to kill anyone in her body… The video does have its own grave incongruity; it might show that abortion and ‘illegitimate births’ (that word ‘illegitimate’ insults many people whose mothers struggled to bring them into the world alone) have both ‘skyrocketed’. The video is from the pro-life position and states that children from single parents are at ‘enormous risk of ending up on welfare or in prison’. But, as pro-lifers, can we have it both ways? In denouncing abortion, may we simultaneously deplore single motherhood? And associate their children with high rates of unemployment and imprisonment? The visible single mothers chose life for their children. If fewer abortions were to be done; there would be an instant related rise in single mothers. There are factually speaking, millions of invisible single mothers, although their children’s lives were snuffed out in the womb. Being fully pro-life involves practising that which we preach; if we teach that pregnant women (often panicking at the thought of being a single mother) can avoid abortion, it’s our Christian duty to know how they may get enough practical support. If we don’t, then yes, it’s very easy to remark on the attendant woes of single motherhood.


In the US, videos like this contribute to the debate about the public funding of Planned Parenthood. But here in the UK, we have yet to see a proper debate, happening in society at large, where we question why our money should finance social abortion. I suggest that the lack of debate about (our) taxes funding abortions is due to apathy of how much money is spent on abortion, and perhaps a deeply entrenched acceptance in our British society that abortion is a necessary evil. Consider this; I have attended pro-life vigils, and both pro-life and pro-abortion members of the British public have stopped to speak to me. They would tell me of a friend, sister or girlfriend who had an abortion, and that they could not oppose the tax-funding of abortion, because someone close to them had got an abortion free on the NHS.   
Once a man said to me, ‘you’re Irish; you have no business being an anti-abortionist here in the UK!’ I asked him why and he said that ‘a lot of English money has gone to Ireland, and with your history you can’t come here and tell us how to spend our money.’ My nerves didn’t stand up to telling him that yes, I am Irish, but in London I am a tax-payer, so now it’s actually my money too…

Comments

  1. No one can't have ite both ways.

    As a separate issue we can of course attend to nfp awarenes and abstinence promotion.

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  2. Why has adoption become so taboo? I guess people are too
    proud to admit that they made a mistake that they can't (or shouldn't) handle on
    their own. They think that they take the more difficult road by raising their
    child alone, but it is more difficult to give the child to someone else to
    raise, and then stand silently by, waiting for that phone call that you hope
    never comes because you want them to have a full and secure life; yet you would
    be beyond happy to get none the less. Birth mothers are seen as heartless, when
    the heartless ones are they who for selfish reasons cause misery to their
    children.
    Sorry for the rant, but it just makes me sad that the right
    consequences for wrong behavior are being ignored. How many girls would fool
    around knowing that marriage or adoption were the only options? It worked for
    our grandmothers.

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  3. Well, it is a provocative video but at he has tried to address the issues clearly.

    It is true that the pro-life movement sticks up for single mothers more than anyone else even though we are generally thought of as angry religious bigots!

    This is ironic in a way but in another way it convinces me that we must be on the right side of the argument, defending the vulnerable (single mothers and children) when everyone else (liberals, athiests etc) are (literally) attacking them!

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  4. Gloria, what a completely self righteous comment. Would you encourage your own child, if they became pregnant to have their baby adopted? How does it feel to be adopted Gloria? Have you any experience of this? How does it feel to give a baby up for adoption? How does it feel to be pregnant and desperate to be able to love your baby, yet believe you do not have the right? Have you any personal experience in these matters, or just cold opinions.

    I am glad you are not my mother, or grandmother, for that matter. Seriously, some Catholics! No wonder the world sees no love in us, just judgments.

    I hope you are perfect yourself. You'll need to be, with that attitude.

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  5. @Shadowlands, thank you for joining the debate. Gloria is a mother and she knows that giving a child up for adoption must be extremely difficult, but not impossible. It’s just that sometimes; a woman might consider that she loves her baby more if she gives it up for adoption.

    Some years ago, when I was a teenager, I for one, would have given a baby up for adoption, because I would have no material, financial or experience to care for a baby on my own. Or even a place where I could have raised the baby. I may get called heartless for my willingness to give a child up for adoption, but if you saw me as a teenager, then you might agree.

    But I see where you are coming from, that too often we don’t look at how heartbreaking it must be for the biological mother to give her child up for adoption, or how hard it might be for the child not to know their real mother.
    It is very enlightening, though, to look at the testimonies of people like Gianna Gessen and Mellissa Ohden, who both survived late abortions, were adopted and loved their adoptive parents so much.

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  6. Mary,

    I have tremendous sympathy with mother's who have to give their babies up for adoption.

    However, Gloria seems to be saying adoption should be almost the sentence passed, of the righteous (her and her grandmother's sort) to be put on single mothers, not an option. At least that's what I read in these words of hers...

    'Birth mothers are seen as heartless, when
    the heartless ones are they who for selfish reasons cause misery to their
    children.'

    To me, she is making an absolute black and white judgment and distinction with those words.

    She goes on, in her summing up....

    'Sorry for the rant, but it just makes me sad that the right
    consequences for wrong behavior are being ignored.

    Once again, she states adoption as a 'right consequence' not an option, but a punishment deserved.

    She ends by suggesting adoption be used/issued as a threat to women, although she also refers to marriage aswell, as the only available alternatives.

    'How many girls would fool
    around knowing that marriage or adoption were the only options? It worked for
    our grandmothers.'


    The Catholic Church, may I remind her, (feverishly fervent Catholic though I am convinced she is) does not allow coersion as a means to get people to the altar. Infact, it is a cause for annullment of marriage, in some cases.

    Also, how many adopted children has she actually talked to? How many children raised in single parent homes? What does she base her loveless judgment of single mom's raising their kids on? A solitary example? Public opinions? Coffee, biscuits and gossip amongst the morally female elite? Just wondering....

    ReplyDelete

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