Over twenty-five years ago the Supreme Court ruled that an anti-abortion law violated a woman’s constitutional right to privacy. The right to privacy and the choice for abortion is solely dependent on the person(s) involved and should not be rescinded by a superior authority. The two following articles highlights the basic points οf each oppositions sides on what the authors base their decision on.
Pro-Choice, Faye Wattleton describes what outcomes might take effect if this right is overturned. Οf these, her main argument is that women will be forced away from safe and reliable sources and into the hands οf unsafe and uncaring opportunists.
Part οf the article shows how this is already being demonstrated by allowing states to impose severe restrictions on access to abortion services, particularly for poor women. Wattleton sums up her article by stating, “without the right to take charge οf our personal lives and our destinies, our other rights are virtually meaningless.”
Anti-Abortion, she writes that abortion is not a solution to break poverty or overcome planned goals to ones education and careers but that is undermines the ideals previous black leaders stood for. She relates to her own abortion and how it placed guilt and depression upon her.
She quotes facts such as 400,000 black babies are aborted each year. In the United States, black people make up 12 percent οf the population yet 25 percent οf abortions are by black women. Plainly stated, she believes that an abortion cheats us οf the future that can never be recovered.
Both articles have depicting points that relate to the respective sides. It is apparent οf how one, such as Pamela Carr, is anti-abortion. Carr believes in fixing and coping with the situation and not ending it in termination.
But at one time she, too, was pro-choice, having to learn on her own before proclaiming a concrete decision that what she did and what she believes others do is wrong. My decision favors more towards the pro-choice decision. Let others make their own decisions in life.
If someone believes they will not make a good mother or parent, that it is not the right time, that they are unprepared, or a pregnancy will infringe upon their future, they should have that right.
Just as vows from a wedding read, for better or worse, give those individuals that chance and allow them to learn from lifes mistakes. Safety, unintended pregnancies, contraceptives, and education are just a few οf the reasons οf constituting the mood that expresses the will to influence the behavior οf others οf giving women this right.
First, safety rates as one οf the highest reason for pro-choice. Abortion is extremely safe in this country-far safer than it was prior to Roe v.Wade, when the procedure was illegal in many states. But before it was legalized, less abundant women who could not afford to travel to states where abortion was legal commonly turned to illegal, secretive procedures, which often resulted in serious health complications and sometimes death.
Even some wealthy women who could afford to travel suffered consequences associated with delaying their abortions, and complications οf abortion were a major cause οf hospital admission.
Opponents attempt to limit the choices οf American women in a number οf ways: mandatory waiting periods before the procedure can be performed; biased counseling sessions; parental consent laws; limited public funding for those who can’t afford the procedure. These and other limitations on freedom οf choice have made it increasingly difficult for women to obtain safe, legal abortions.
Not far behind safety, unintended pregnancies are another major supportive focal point for pro-choice. The reasons most often given by women for choosing to have an abortion are concern about how having a baby would change their lives.
The feeling that they are not mature enough to have a child and having financial problems also is a great concern. Steve Henshaw’s, Unintended Pregnancy in the United States, states that οf the estimated 210 million pregnancies that occur annually around the world, nearly four in 10 are unplanned.
Contraceptives also come into play when discussing abortion issues. In the absence οf stronger contraceptive programs, however, women may turn more frequently to abortion, even unsafe abortion, if it is the primary means available to limit their childbearing.
To avoid this situation, better and more contraceptive services are essential. In much οf the world, abortion rates have already declined or are beginning to do so. In most cases, the declines have been made possible by the increased availability, greater acceptance and more effective use οf contraceptive services.
Although some women still want relatively large families, they, too, are increasingly expressing the desire to have fewer children than their mothers did. These beginnings οf a desire for fewer children and a shift in ideas from traditional family planning methods to more modern ones are driving a rising need for contraceptive services.
Works Cited
Gosh G., Krueger, K. (1997). Crossfire an Argument. In Pamela Carr (Ed.), Which Way Black America? – Anti-Abortion (pp. 374-377)
Gosh G., Krueger, K. (1997). Crossfire an Argument. In Faye Wattleton (Ed.), Which Way Black America? – Pro-Choice (pp. 370-374)
Henshaw, S. K. (1998). Family Planning Perspectives. Unintended Pregnancy in the United States, 30 (10), (pp.24-29 & 46)
“An American Right”. Online. Netscape. World Wide Web.