Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site uscvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!epsilon!zeta!sabre!petrus!bellcore!decvax!ittatc!dcdwest!sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!uscvax!phillips From: phillips@uscvax.UUCP (Marlene Phillips) Newsgroups: net.abortion Subject: Re: Birth Control?? Message-ID: <102@uscvax.UUCP> Date: Mon, 21-Oct-85 15:57:29 EDT Article-I.D.: uscvax.102 Posted: Mon Oct 21 15:57:29 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 26-Oct-85 04:50:04 EDT References: <1989@reed.UUCP> <367@cylixd.UUCP> <63@uscvax.UUCP> <64@uscvax.UUCP> <72@uscvax.UUCP> Reply-To: phillips@usc-cse.UUCP (Marlene Phillips) Organization: CS&CE Depts, U.S.C., Los Angeles, CA Lines: 53 In article <72@uscvax.UUCP> kurtzman@usc-cse.UUCP (Stephen Kurtzman) writes: >Most people probably do feel that selecting abortion over contraception is >repugnant and amoral. From a practical point of view it is stupid for a >woman to forego relativly harmless forms of contraception in favor of a more >dangerous medical operation. Some pro-abortionists (those that own clinics >perhaps) may advocate abortion as an alternative to contraception but they >do not represent the pro-choice side. It may be stupid for a woman to forego contraception in favor of abortion, but many do it anyway. "I won't get pregnant, and even if I do, I can always have an abortion" is an all too common line of thinking. In addition, you and I both know that abortion can be a dangerous medical operation, but many women who go in for abortions have no idea how dangerous it can be, and the abortion clinics for the most part do not give much information on the very real possible dangers of abortion. >>BTW, for those who believe that abortion after the 7th month is >>illegal: the last I heard, you can get an abortion ANY TIME if >>you can get your doctor to agree that it would be physically or >>_emotionally_ damaging for you to continue the pregnancy. >> > >Is it unreasonable to allow the medical profession to make medical >decisions? I doubt you would say that a woman whose life was physically >threatened by birth should be forced to give birth. Why should emotional >damage be different from physical damage? If there are physicians that >capriciously claim pending emotional harm to justify late abortions they are >guilty of malpractice. They can (and should) be stopped under current law. >If a fetus is viable outside the mothers body then a caesarian section would >probably be a better alternative to abortion. I have no doubt that any >physician that performs an abortion on a viable fetus could be found guilty >of manslaughter under current law unless there were mitigating circumstances. Of course medical professionals should make medical decisions. That does not make the rest of your argument valid. It is (relatively) easy to give medical evidence that a woman's life was physically threatened by childbirth. Emotional damage is another issue. That is a much more subjective problem. And while a physician _could_ be found guilty of malpractice for claiming sufficient emotional harm to justify an abortion where this was in fact not the case, who would prosecute? Certainly not the mother. And if it were not in fact the case that the abortion was justified on emotional grounds, how could that be proved? Finally, even if almost all doctors are ethical enough not to perform late abortions unless truly necessary to save the mother's life, a woman who wants an abortion will find the doctor who will claim "potential emotional damage". Unless it's possible to show that no doctor would perform an unjustified late-term abortion, the danger of abuse of the "emotional damage" argument remains as a problem. Marlene Phillips