Well, it may seem smart, but not everyone is smart. Everyone is different. This illusion that people in general all have the same common sense, intellectual IQ, background, and privileges is simply untrue. What would seem like a good choice to you does not mean everyone is capable (or wants to) make the same choice. Sometimes people make mistakes. Sometimes people don't know their options. Sometimes people or immature, or don't consider the consequences because consequences don't dawn on them or their hormones have control. Sometimes folks are guided by their emotions. Some people unable to make wise choices. Sex is, after all, a biological imperative.
And sometimes women are raped and after that major trauma, don't want the baby. Ah, adoption is the option. Well, not for everyone. I would not let a baby of mine be adopted, because I just could not. If I were inadequately financed to be a mother, well, where's Dad? Where's family support? Government support? The foster system sucks, so I'm not going there.
I don't think the government should have decided that Roe v. Wade is unconstitutional. I feel very sorry for women who are trapped in states in which they no longer have a choice. I don't care about religious arguments or pseudo-science arguments that have come up in general discussions about abortion because they are simply wrong. Arguments based on religion and just plain fallacious information do not merit discussion in my view.
It is not the government's or anyone else's business to decide for a woman what she should do regarding her pregnancy. That is my view, and I have never waivered from it. When GA first allowed abortion, I took someone to get hers. She was a prostitute who had gotten pregnant. She needed emotional support. It didn't matter whether I agreed with her decision, it mattered whether I respected it.
My son asked me yesterday why I cared that Mass and CA have already taken steps to give women their reproductive rights, since I can't get pregnant. And the answer is that my daughter is moving to CA where other fertile women and teens also live, and other daughters similarly situated live in Mass, and I support their right to choose. That does not mean I would get an abortion. I was offered a "pregnancy reduction" when I was pregnant with my triplet sons because twins or a singleton baby would be more likely to survive, and both my husband and I were horrified at the very suggestion. I had a choice, and I think all women should. Keep in mind, that choice includes not getting an abortion.
This also doesn't mean I think that viable, healthy fetuses should be aborted. I don't. My sons were born at 27 weeks gestation, and they are all alive and well. For those fetuses who have such severe birth defects that their lives and that of their family would have no quality of life ... I leave that decision to the parents. I worked for someone who had a baby who could not see, hear, talk, walk, had to be fed by tube, and who had no quality of life. His mother took care of him until he died at age 6. I cannot tell you that I would be against an abortion in cases like this because I saw the toll it took on his parents. The child, by contrast, had no idea there was a toll, because he only had a partial brain.
I am also sick of people who are "pro-life" (a misnomer) because very often their great concern does not result in making sure the babies are well cared for after they are born. The same people who hate abortion are many times the same people who are unwilling for their tax dollars to paying for the needs of children.
When the alleged pro-lifers are also a mass of vocal advocates who are for feeding hungry children, for sheltering homeless children, for educating poor children well and in a safe environment, for providing childcare for children whose parent(s) work, for passing laws that give a good amount of maternity leave, and that give enough sick leave so that a parent can stay home to care for a sick child, for raising the minimum wage to a living wage, then, and only then, do I want to discuss what pro-life means. I am talking about a nice enough home so you or I would not be horrified to live in it, food that you or I would want to eat, childcare and public education that is way more than adequate - it should be stellar. These are children we are talking about, not pawns on a chess board. And they are our children, too. Part of our nation.
And I never want to hear religious reasons for advocating a particular solution to social problems the government can and should solve. Because... separation of church and state. It should be a very thick wall.
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