"Why i lost faith in the pro-life movement"

[clicker dies]

I'm going to disagree with the general anti-adoption position. While I certainly do not support abuses of the adoption process and would agree that it needs to be well-regulated, it's a legitimate option that in some circumstances, may be the best solution.

I don't like the guardianship option, and I say this as someone who had worked in child protection in both cases of adoption and cases of permanent foster care. It was overwhelmingly clear to me that kids need families - not just a placement, not just a guardian, but a family to which they can belong, people who can be called mommy or daddy, and the feeling that they have parents who have a permanent connection to them so that they won't simply move on to a new home if they act up.

Not all adopted people get adopted into permanent situations. See: kids who are sent back to Russia or foster homes. Or are murdered or otherwise abandoned. There are adoptees who are abused by their adoptive parents just as non-adoptees are. Many adopted kids feel different or that they don't belong. Many adopted adults never grew out of that. And the difference between that kind of feeling different and a non-adopted person feeling different is that there are actual differences between an adoptive family and an adoptee.

Kids can have a permanent family without having their birth certificates sealed and original families completely cut off. Adoption means both of those things happen. No open adoption has to be upheld. At any whim of the adopters, the door of communication can be shut.

Not having those things happen, that's what I meant by guardianship. They can call them mommy and daddy, or moe and curly. Whatever they want. But adoption as it is done now does not take into account that children grow up and may want to find their original families. It is a billion dollar industry that caters to the ones with the power money.

[valsa]

I don't like the guardianship option, and I say this as someone who had worked in child protection in both cases of adoption and cases of permanent foster care. It was overwhelmingly clear to me that kids need families - not just a placement, not just a guardian, but a family to which they can belong, people who can be called mommy or daddy, and the feeling that they have parents who have a permanent connection to them so that they won't simply move on to a new home if they act up.

I don't like guardianship either. I've known foster kids who were just being fostered, without the intention of their foster parents to adopt (though their foster parents acted like adoptive parents in every other way) Many of them wanted to be adopted to be officially and legally part of their family.

Yes, you can argue that as long as the parents are acting the same as they would have had they adopted, the adoption is just a formality (and sometimes the child feels that way too) but to children who don't have a family (I'm of the opinion that biology is not the end-all-and-be-all of family), that formality can give them a huge sense of relief and security.

There are issues with how adoption is run in our country but the problem is not adoption itself.

[valsa]

Many adopted kids feel different or that they don't belong.

And many adopted kids don't feel that way.

Kids can have a permanent family without having their birth certificates sealed and original families completely cut off.

While I'm against having original BCs sealed, it is the right of the legal parents to decide who is or is not able to be in their child's life.

No open adoption has to be upheld. At any whim of the adopters, the door of communication can be shut.

While some adoptive parents do abuse this (promising an OA when they have no intention of going through with it), there are many, many legitimate reasons to cut off communication with bio families. Many bio families already have serious issues, which can be why the child is being adopted out (especially in foster adoption) and others can develop issues later on (not respecting boundaries the adoptive parents set, etc)

But adoption as it is done now does not take into account that children grow up and may want to find their original families.

Changing the way BCs are handled can help with this but people shouldn't be required to maintain unhealthy contact with bio families just because maybe, someday, the child will want to communicate with their bio families. I'd support keeping original BCs open and maybe even a state/national registry that bio families can keep up their contact info updated with, but I don't support forced contact.

[clicker dies]

And many adopted kids don't feel that way.

And just because many don't means that those who do, what? Should be told to get over it because maybe they'll be one of the lucky ones who can find their original families when they're eighteen?

While I'm against having original BCs sealed, it is the right of the legal parents to decide who is or is not able to be in their child's life.

So when the child becomes an adult and wishes to unseal their original birth certificate, saying "sorry honey we decided to have it permanently sealed" should suffice? Did you know that Americans who were adopted more than a year after their birth and who didn't get a passport before 9/11 can't get one now?

While some adoptive parents do abuse this (promising an OA when they have no intention of going through with it), there are many, many legitimate reasons to cut off communication with bio families. Many bio families already have serious issues, which can be why the child is being adopted out (especially in foster adoption) and others can develop issues later on (not respecting boundaries the adoptive parents set, etc)

Abusing that can be incredibly damaging to adoptees.

There may be many reasons to cut off ties. But cutting off those ties is then permanent. Many original families are not any worse than any other type of family. There are many, many legitimate reasons to keep them in the loop.

Changing the way BCs are handled can help with this but people shouldn't be required to maintain unhealthy contact with bio families just because maybe, someday, the child will want to communicate with their bio families. I'd support keeping original BCs open and maybe even a state/national registry that bio families can keep up their contact info updated with, but I don't support forced contact.

It's not a requirement to stay in contact. If there is a danger, sure, go on and create distance. There is such a thing as healthy contact with original families. Not all original mothers are drug-addicted teenagers. Not every original family will be dangerous. Just because sometimes there are dangers to a child doesn't mean every child should be cut off. They've already lost a lot.

[valsa]

And just because many don't means that those who do, what?

The ones who do feel different should be given assistance to help deal with that. However, the entire concept of adoption shouldn't be vilified because of what just some of the adoptees feel (which isn't to say they wouldn't have felt the same way or worse if they stayed in their bio families)

So when the child becomes an adult and wishes to unseal their original birth certificate, saying "sorry honey we decided to have it permanently sealed" should suffice? Did you know that Americans who were adopted more than a year after their birth and who didn't get a passport before 9/11 can't get one now?

I think you need to work a little on your reading comprehension. Read the bolded part again.

There may be many reasons to cut off ties. But cutting off those ties is then permanent.

Unless the child reunites with the bio family after 18.

Many original families are not any worse than any other type of family.

And many are. If we're talking about foster adoption, it's difficult-to-impossible to be stripped of your parental rights if there aren't serious problems that prevent the child from being safety cared for in their current family situation. Every day on this site we talk about families who have horrible child-rearing practices and even they manage to stay on the legal side of parenting. Also, priority for foster care and adoption goes to the bio family first so if there were fit bio family members available to take the child, they would get first crack at taking the kid in (this doesn't always work but it's usually a case of the bio family living far away or other complications)

There are many, many legitimate reasons to keep them in the loop.

It's not a requirement to stay in contact. If there is a danger, sure, go on and create distance. There is such a thing as healthy contact with original families. Not all original mothers are drug-addicted teenagers. Not every original family will be dangerous. Just because sometimes there are dangers to a child doesn't mean every child should be cut off. They've already lost a lot.

And it's the legal parents' job to decide whether the pros outweigh the cons.

[Inky]

Thank you for posting that link to that article. It was, without a doubt, one of the most well-written, informative, things that I've ever picked up from a posting on a message board. Wow. It makes things so clear.

I've always been pro-choice, but this just blew me away. I plan to share it with my daughter who would also find it interesting.

[clicker dies]

Okay, I concede. Let's agree to disagree, and discontinue the hijacking of this thread. I hate confrontation and regardless of whether this qualifies, it's making me uneasy.

I'll go work on my reading comprehension and eat some chocolate because I am in a bad fucking mood. Not because of this thread, mind. I think if I keep talking I'm just going to go super saiyan on myself and it'll be a real mess.

[Terrie]

Libby Anne, Tom Friedman and David Frum have written a trio of articles that are - gasp! - LOGICAL. If you are truly pro-life, you should support things that both reduce the number of abortions/miscarriages, and which support life after birth. Period, end of sentence.

I'll add one more thing: if you are genuinely pro-life, you should not only sign your donor card, but have yourself on a bone marrow donor registry and donate a kidney as an altruistic donor if possible. I'm not joking. A recipient of a kidney donation is most certainly a "person", and their life cannot be sustained long-term without a kidney (since the average life span on dialysis is 5-7 years, with poor quality of life). The operation required is compared to a c-section.

Here's an article by an altruistic donor:

http://www.aish.com/sp/so/48937647.html

Note that she's basically saying why she's not crazy, and why she personally felt the negative reactions of others was not warranted. She's just encouraging others to at least think about doing it voluntarily. Compare and contrast to those who would FORCE women to undergo something that's at least as physically demanding, if not more so, without screening out those for whom it would be physically difficult.

QFT. In the eyes of the "pro-life" movement, life begins at conception and ends at birth. :( There's a reason that the Red Cross used the slogan "Give the gift of life."

As for "partial-birth" abortions, I hate the claim that, even if they are medically necessary, there's always an alternative. Often, those alternatives come with higher risks. For instance, if a fetus has prenatal hydrocephalus, this can be caused by conditions that are fatal, and, depending on the severity, the head may be impossible to deliver vaginally. So, you either collapse the skull (something pro-lifers love to proclaim is murdering a living child) or do a c-section. C-sections have a higher risk of infection, but some people think that forcing someone else to undergo that risk is better than their own squeamishness.

[Deleted03]

Thank you for the link, I posted it on Facebook and one of my friends enjoyed it and said she had a similar experience.

As for adoption, I would not go through it because of lacking any certainty of what those parents will do on a long term basis. But that's me. I understand that for some people it is right. But for many women, it also means a lot of issues with this decision.

As for adoption later in life, I am also conflicted. From my experience with a friend who wanted to adopt a little girl (her father in law is an adoptive family (he has children in his care that are given to him by the state). She wanted to change that girl's name (she is under 1) because she did not like it (it was too ordinary) and she was ranting about how that girl's mom really had no right to be in the baby's life. I agree, there was abuse. But taking the child for 18 years is a very long time. I think it does not take into consideration that people can change. I am not saying the birth mom would have a right to get her parental rights back, just that she should have the right (and the dad too of course) to have some access to the child and the child wants to (so yes it implies the child will be a little older) and I think it should be supervised by a third party - social workers. The United Nations says that children have the right to know their parents and I agree with them. I think it should be well supervised to ensure no abuse, but I don't think that adoptive parents necessarily have a perspective that is charitable on the birth parents and that may cloud their judgment.

[valsa]

I think it does not take into consideration that people can change. I am not saying the birth mom would have a right to get her parental rights back, just that she should have the right (and the dad too of course) to have some access to the child and the child wants to (so yes it implies the child will be a little older) and I think it should be supervised by a third party - social workers. The United Nations says that children have the right to know their parents and I agree with them. I think it should be well supervised to ensure no abuse, but I don't think that adoptive parents necessarily have a perspective that is charitable on the birth parents and that may cloud their judgment.

I don't think the safety and wellbeing of the child should be sacrificed on the alter of "well, people can change".

As for supervised visits monitored by social workers, that's a bit laughable to anyone with experience with the foster care system.

First of all, who pays for those social workers? The bio parents? Many wouldn't be able to afford it. The adoptive parents? That can put an undue financial strain on them, on top of taking away their right to decide who it is safe to have in their child's life (adding insult to injury) Taxpayers? The foster care system is already financially stretched to a dangerous degree in many places.

Also, supervised visitations are rarely supervised by trained social workers, even when there's an active abuse case going on. One of the saddest cases I've seen was one foster parent whose foster daughters were supposed to have very closely supervised visits with their bio mom with no electronics involved (the mother had apparently had kiddy porn of her daughters on her computer that she sent to men she talked to online) Not only did the supervisor allow the bio mom to have her phone with a camera during the visit, she stepped out the room for a few minutes, during which time the mother made a video of her daughter with the camera (thankfully not pornographic, though it easily could have been) The child was hysterical after the visit due to being recorded.

Next, even if the financial aspects of the visits could be worked out there are still other problems. Who decides how often to have the visits? What if the bio parents want to meet several times a week and the adoptive parents want a meet once a month or a few times a year? What is the punishment if the legal parents feel the bio parents aren't respecting boundaries or are acting inappropriate ways? Not everything is as clear cut as "W was drunk during the visit", or "X threatened violence", etc. What about bio parents who use drugs or drink or smoke if adoptive parents don't want that around their children? (many bio parents who smoke don't stop, even when part of the reason their children are taken away is that the child is severely asthmatic and the smoke is a health risk) Who decides who gets the visits? Bio mom and dad only? Bio grandparents too? Bio aunts, uncles, cousins? Who draws the line?

I respect the right of adoptees to search for their bio family when they hit 18. I would like to see some policies in place to help them do so (keeping original BCs unsealed and the national registry for bio parents I mentioned above) However, I also respect the right of legal parents to make the choices of who their minor children are exposed to.

[2xx1xy1JD]

Not all adopted people get adopted into permanent situations. See: kids who are sent back to Russia or foster homes. Or are murdered or otherwise abandoned. There are adoptees who are abused by their adoptive parents just as non-adoptees are. Many adopted kids feel different or that they don't belong. Many adopted adults never grew out of that. And the difference between that kind of feeling different and a non-adopted person feeling different is that there are actual differences between an adoptive family and an adoptee.

Kids can have a permanent family without having their birth certificates sealed and original families completely cut off. Adoption means both of those things happen. No open adoption has to be upheld. At any whim of the adopters, the door of communication can be shut.

Not having those things happen, that's what I meant by guardianship. They can call them mommy and daddy, or moe and curly. Whatever they want. But adoption as it is done now does not take into account that children grow up and may want to find their original families. It is a billion dollar industry that caters to the ones with the power money.

Adoption laws vary between states and provinces, and laws can also be amended.

Where I live (Ontario, Canada), adoption laws for changed a few years ago, so that it is now possible to make adoption orders with access to the birth family, and birth records are automatically available at age 18 unless the birth parent opts out.

No, not all adoptions have fairy tale endings, and yes, there does need to be comprehensive screening and follow up for adoption placements. Overall, though, children who are adopted will have better outcomes than those who remain in foster care (or orphanages abroad). The state has a responsibility to provide physical care to its wards - but there is no requirement to provide children with unconditional love. You get children who never form secure attachments

You know how advocates of equal marriage will list all the legal benefits that you can only get with marriage? Well, we could do the same thing with guardianship. It's about much more than labels. If a parent dies, adopted or biological children have equal inheritance rights. Adopted and biological children can both be considered dependents. Adopted and biological children are considered equal under the law. Guardianship does not make you a parent, and the children don't get those rights. They become unequal, especially if there are biological children in the family.

[Minerva]

First fo all, "partial birth" is a term made up by the anti-choice movement. It is not a medical term.

Exactly this. If you've based your opinion on abortion on the belief that "partial birth abortion" is a thing, you need to do some reading.

[ems]

A conservative Catholic fb firend of mine (actually someone I've seen morph frokm pro-choice to ardently pro-life, anti-gay marriage and Planned Parenthood, etc. as she became more and more devoutly Catholic) posted this:

http://www.ncregister.com/blog/jennifer ... e-movement

Don't have time to dig through it right now, so I'm going to just post it here and try to "digest" it later. Feel free to comment.

I will say that I feel there are some, like this woman, who do come from a genuine place of wanting to protect life from what they see as life's origins (conception) onwards. I just find the hypocricy of those who seem to care more about life in the womb than life on earth AND its dignity to be digusting. Aand I think we've established on FJ how much misinformation there is in the pro-life movement. And this article says pro-choicers are afraid of information. :doh:

[SpeakNow]

Exactly this. If you've based your opinion on abortion on the belief that "partial birth abortion" is a thing, you need to do some reading.

What the heck is "partial birth abortion" exactly?

[2xx1xy1JD]

A conservative Catholic fb firend of mine (actually someone I've seen morph frokm pro-choice to ardently pro-life, anti-gay marriage and Planned Parenthood, etc. as she became more and more devoutly Catholic) posted this:

http://www.ncregister.com/blog/jennifer ... e-movement

Don't have time to dig through it right now, so I'm going to just post it here and try to "digest" it later. Feel free to comment.

I will say that I feel there are some, like this woman, who do come from a genuine place of wanting to protect life from what they see as life's origins (conception) onwards. I just find the hypocricy of those who seem to care more about life in the womb than life on earth AND its dignity to be digusting. Aand I think we've established on FJ how much misinformation there is in the pro-life movement. And this article says pro-choicers are afraid of information. :doh:

The "fear of information" accusation:

Fetal development is not a secret. It's in pretty much every single mainstream pregnancy book, in every library and bookstore. If you didn't know the information, it's because you never wanted to read about it.

[shesinsane]

A conservative Catholic fb firend of mine (actually someone I've seen morph frokm pro-choice to ardently pro-life, anti-gay marriage and Planned Parenthood, etc. as she became more and more devoutly Catholic) posted this:

http://www.ncregister.com/blog/jennifer ... e-movement

Don't have time to dig through it right now, so I'm going to just post it here and try to "digest" it later. Feel free to comment.

I will say that I feel there are some, like this woman, who do come from a genuine place of wanting to protect life from what they see as life's origins (conception) onwards. I just find the hypocricy of those who seem to care more about life in the womb than life on earth AND its dignity to be digusting. Aand I think we've established on FJ how much misinformation there is in the pro-life movement. And this article says pro-choicers are afraid of information. :doh:

I can sum up the linked article - if you don't want to get pregnant don't have sex.

I was looking through a Time magazine article whose infograph cited data from the Guttmacher Institute about the most common reasons women have abortions. It immediately struck me that none of the factors on the list were conditions that we tell women to consider before engaging in sexual activity. Don't have the money to raise a child? Don't think your boyfriend would be a good father? Don't feel ready to be a mother? Women were never encouraged to consider these factors before they had sex; only before they had a baby.

The fundamental truth of the pro-choice movement, from which all of its tenets flow, is that sex does not have to have life-altering consequences. I suddenly saw that it was the struggle to uphold this "truth" that led to all the shady dealings, all the fear of information, all the mental gymnastics that I'd observed.

[Minerva]

What the heck is "partial birth abortion" exactly?

I don't exactly know myself. It's a political buzzword created by republicans, because it's harder for people to support abortion rights if they believe in a grizzly procedure used to kill fully developed babies. Because it's not an actual procedure, different anti-choicers will define it differently. It's like a unicorn...

[Guest Anonymous]

I don't exactly know myself. It's a political buzzword created by republicans, because it's harder for people to support abortion rights if they believe in a grizzly procedure used to kill fully developed babies. Because it's not an actual procedure, different anti-choicers will define it differently. It's like a unicorn...

Yeah, I know, Wikipedia, but it seems on point to me.

Intact dilation and extraction (IDX) is a type of late term abortion. It is also known as intact dilation and evacuation, dilation and extraction (D&X, or DNX), intrauterine cranial decompression and, vernacularly in the United States, as partial birth abortion. The procedure may also be used to remove a fetus that is developed enough to require dilation of the cervix for its extraction.[1]

Though the procedure has had a low rate of use, representing 0.17% (2,232 of 1,313,000) of all abortions in the United States in the year 2000, according to voluntary responses to an Alan Guttmacher Institute survey,[2] it has developed into a focal point of the abortion debate. In the United States, intact dilation and extraction was made illegal in most circumstances by the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act in 2003, which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld in the case of Gonzales v. Carhart.

...

The term "partial-birth abortion" is primarily used in political discourse — chiefly regarding the legality of abortion in the United States.[6] The term is not recognized as a medical term by the American Medical Association[7] nor the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partial-birth_abortion

[2xx1xy1JD]

Reading the Catholic Register article"

Re lack of information:

Fetal development is not a state secret. It's in every single mainstream pregnancy book, in every single library and bookstore. If you didn't know the info, you weren't looking for it.

Re lack of discussion of when fetal protection should begin:

First, these discussions do exist among some. Second, they sort of miss the point for those of us who object to the whole idea of fetal protection, not because the fetus lacks value, but because it is impossible to pass "fetal protection" laws that don't result in intense government interference with the body of a pregnant woman.

Re Supreme court case and "partial birth abortion":

The case involved a discussion of methods, bearing in mind that it was only the safer of the two methods that was being outlawed. The law was also flawed because it didn't provide an exception for the health of the mother. Abortions this late are very rare, and generally related to extreme health issues with the mother or fetus.

Re comments about contraception:

I'll agree that sex carries a theoretical risk of pregnancy, and I would tell that to any child of mine (male or female). It is a point to be seriously considered. Her argument falls apart, though, when she simply dismisses contraception because it sometimes fails. Well, if you fail to have comprehensive sex education and fail to make full and frank discussion of contraception acceptable and fail to make it normal to carry a condom without being seen as a slut and fail to educate people about common causes of birth control failure and fail to encourage methods with lower failure rates and fail to educate about the effect of using more than one method of contraception and if you demonize the more effective methods such as the IUD or Pill - you are encouraging contraception failure.

NFP is a method of birth control, period. It may have the blessing of the Catholic church, but otherwise it's really no different - there is also a failure rate, and issues of user error.

Re crisis pregnancy centers:

How much effort is spent helping pregnant women vs. scaring or shaming them into not aborting? How many of them will provide assistance if abortion is not a possibility?

[To get credit where it's due, I do know a few Catholic organizations that provide genuinely useful assistance to young mothers - but they aren't called crisis pregnancy centers. Most evolved out of the old "homes for unwed mothers" and now help young pregnant women and young mothers to parent.

I found the comments somewhat interesting, esp. the issues between them and Protestants. [As someone who is neither Catholic nor Protestant, I'm sort of eating popcorn on the sidelines.]

[formergothardite]

When I was pro-life I was told that partial birth abortion was when they delivered the baby half-way, jabbed scissors in the skull and then sucked out the brain.

And this was taught as the gospel truth, that it happened all the time and that people at like 40 weeks were getting this done because they just woke up one morning and didn't want to be pregnant.

[Minerva]

Yeah, I know, Wikipedia, but it seems on point to me.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partial-birth_abortion

Yeah, it's generally thought of to mean intact dilation and extraction, but the hype surrounding it is inconsistent with the reality of the procedure. For instance, cranial decompression is often referred to as the standard way of performing "partial birth abortion", whereas it's not used in all procedures where the fetus is delivered intact. "Partial birth abortion" is as notorious as it is because a lot of people believe that cranial decompression is what kills the fetus in an IDX procedure, whereas that's not the reality. Many people believe this hyped up, gruesome version of IDX is used throughout the 3rd trimester up until birth, which is incorrect for a variety of reasons, including the fact that cranial decompression is pretty much limited to second trimester procedures. It has a legal definition in the US - an IDX procedure in which a cranial decompression is performed on a live fetus - though that hasn't stopped bans on "partial birth abortion" from making doctors stop doing IDXs and revert to less safe methods of removing dead 2nd trimester fetuses from people's bodies. It's like a unicorn even to pro-choice doctors because they have had to change their practice to accommodate this vague law not knowing exactly how it could be applied.

Cross-posted with FG - Exactly! I still know people who think that way.

[RosyDaisy]

I still believe that the best way to be "pro-life" is to support things that protect the dignity of life on earth - available food, shelter, health care, and education for all. And I believe that this will actually reduce the number of women choosing to abort.

+1

This is exactly why I'm no longer pro-life. It's not just about the babies.

[No Cure for Stupid]

I am pro-life, but I also believe in using birth control and the morning-after pill. I also believe that people should take care of each other and am a registered organ donor.

Abstinence is the only way to 100% prevent pregnancy and disease, but people should use condoms if they're going to have sex, not just to prevent pregnancy but to prevent the spread of disease.

[luckystone]

I really liked this article, was much better than I'd been expecting. She was very logical and methodical and thorough and went through her thought processes and it made sense.

I also hadn't been up with the new research that it looks like the morning after pill DOESN'T prevent implantation.

[Guest Anonymous]

I am pro-life, but I also believe in using birth control and the morning-after pill. I also believe that people should take care of each other and am a registered organ donor.

Abstinence is the only way to 100% prevent pregnancy and disease, but people should use condoms if they're going to have sex, not just to prevent pregnancy but to prevent the spread of disease.

The bolded is great. Please have an internet cookie for not being a totally crappy human being.

Abstinence is 100% until someone gets raped. So, not that much. I've said it before and I will continue to say it - be just as pro-life/anti-abortion as you like for yourself, I have no issues with that whatsoever. But the moment you start being anti-abortion for everyone else, I have a huge problem. You just don't get to decide that for other people.