The Common Sense Approach to a Neverending Debate

I recently read in the newspaper that the Planned Parenthood clinic where I used to go to receive my yearly Pap smears and contraceptives on E. Washington St. in Springfield is now performing abortions. To be exact, they are not performing surgical abortions, they are only dispensing the RU-486 abortion pill, which is given to women in very early stages of pregnancy who wish to terminate. I was pleased to see that this particular clinic was broadening its services to women. This will help more women receive the reproductive healthcare that they need without having to travel long distances to Champaign or Granite City. The RU-486 pill is also a much easier, cheaper, and less invasive method of ending a pregnancy than the surgical methods. Women can receive this medication from medical personnel at the Planned Parenthood clinic and return home to go through their termination in the privacy of their own home, where it is much like just having a very heavy menstrual period. However, at the same time I read something else in the newspaper that disturbed me–letters to the editor from people already bemoaning this new service at the Planned Parenthood clinic and calling out for people to begin protesting outside of the clinic. There is a big problem with family-planning clinic protestors–they are often rude, harrassful, and unpredictable. And they also assume that every woman entering the clinic is there to have an abortion. The majority of women coming to Planned Parenthood clinics are there to receive Pap smears, contraception, and STD testing, not abortions. Millions of women come to Planned Parenthood to receive their basic reproductive health services because they do not have health insurance and cannot afford to see a regular gynecologist. Before I became employed full-time and got health insurance through my employer, I too went to Planned Parenthood for my gynecological needs where I could receive these services for a reduced fee. The women who do come to Planned Parenthood to receive abortion services are almost always in the early stages of pregnancy where it is impossible for bystanders to tell if they are pregnant or not. (Contrary to what many anti-choice people may say, women do NOT walk into Planned Parentood with big 6-month pregnant bellies seeking abortions.) Therefore, the people protesting outside of these clinics really cannot distinguish between which women are there to have an abortion and which ones are there just to get a yearly Pap smear. So they harrass & intimidate EVERYONE who comes to these clinics. Imagine walking into a women’s clinic just to receive your annual pelvic exam and having to listen to complete strangers scream at you, call you a whore, slut, and a murderer, and perhaps even physically block you from walking in the door!! Now that I have great health insurance from my employer, I no longer visit Planned Parenthood for my reproductive health services. However, after reading the asinine letters that these people wrote to the Editor, I’m thinking that I just might return to Planned Parenthood for my healthcare needs just to see if any sidewalk protestor will dare to say something to me on my way in….because any looney sidewalk protestor that dares to jump to conclusions and harrass me is going to quickly have MY face right up in THEIR face!! At the very least, I’m seriously considering volunteering as an entrance escort during my free time so that I can help provide at least some sense of security and dignity for the women entering the clinic for whatever reason. Everyone is entitled to express their opinion regarding abortion…but the privacy of a doctor’s office is neither the time nor the place to do so!!

It seems that no matter where you go, no one can ever seem to reach an agreement on this divisive issue. So let me be the one to offer a winning solution to this battle. Banning abortion will NOT lessen or stop it, it will only send it back underground where it will be performed illegally in unsanitary conditions that will be gravely dangerous to women. Studies have shown that women in countries where abortion is illegal are seeking it in the same numbers as women seeking it in countries where it is legal. Abortion bans do NOT reduce the frequency of women seeking it, but here is what WILL reduce it: birth control. And lots of it. It’s really very simple: There will be no need for abortions to be performed if women aren’t getting pregnant in the first place. All forms of contraception need to be plentiful and readily available to anyone who needs them. Every woman and girl of childbearing age who is sexually active needs to have easy access to affordable contraceptives. It should be covered by all health insurance carriers to ensure that women can afford it. There need to be more family planning clinics open in more locations so that women won’t have to travel long distances to receive reproductive healthcare services and contraceptives. Emergency contraception should also be readily available to any woman who experiences a contraception failure, and it should be available at every pharmacy counter and offered at every hospital emergency room for women who have survived a sexual assault. Furthermore, every woman should be able to fill a prescription for birth control or purchase emgergency contraception at any pharmacy without delay, hassle, or intimidation from a self-righteous pharmacist who can’t mind his/her own business. I even advise women to keep a stock of Emergency Contraception stored in their home medicine cabinets to be used or given to a friend should a misshap occur. The general public also needs to be TRUTHFULLY informed about the purpose and use of Emergency Contraception: It is NOT an abortion pill. It will NOT terminate a pregnancy, it PREVENTS pregnancy from occuring. Emergency contraception is simply a highly concentrated dose of the hormones found in regular birth control pills that works to prevent pregnancy by temporarily stopping the reproductive cycle in its tracks so that fertilization cannot occur. If a woman is already pregnant when she takes Emergency Contraception, it will not terminate her pregnancy. Some zealous anti-choice groups have been purposely promoting false information about Emergency Contraception to the public and fooling people into thinking that it is an abortion pill. Any medical doctor will tell you exactly what I have just explained about Emergency Contraception.
In addition, teens should receive comprehensive, factual medically accurate sex education that teaches them everything they need to know about their bodies and how to protect themselves from unwanted pregnancy and STD’s. They should begin receiving this instruction at the onset of puberty when they begin to think about sex, and it should be repeated every year throughout their middle school & high school years until this imoprtant information is engrained into their brains. I am not advocating that we should ENCOURAGE young teens to experiment with sex. In fact, I think it’s also important to talk about the benefits of abstinence. But the cold hard truth remains that many youth DO decide to have sex instead of waiting until marriage, no matter how much we may try to scare them or guilt-trip them into waiting. And so this is where the importance of frank, medically accurate information on safe sex comes into play. This is vital knowledge that will serve to keep them healthy and safe not only during their youth, but for the rest of their adult lives. This is not rocket science or some radical idea, folks. It’s just basic common sense. Those who know how to protect themselves and effectively prevent pregnancy won’t need to have abortions. If we want to reduce or eliminate the need for abortions, we must first make sure that every female has full access to the contraceptives that she needs and erase the shame & stigma that is still attached to the use of birth control and the knowledge of healthy sexual practices. This is 2009 and there is nothing dirty, shameful, or immoral about birth control. It is a basic human necessity and it is as normal as any other medication like penicillin. Having control over our own reproduction is a basic human right. It’s what separates us from the animals in nature. And for those of you who think that teaching young people about contraception will only encourage them to have sex at an early age, think again. I received comprehensive sex education when I was in high school, and I even read up on everything I could find about sex and human reproduction just out of sheer curiosity….and I remained a virgin all throughout high school. Even though I chose not to have sex, I still wanted to know everything I could about it so that I would be armed with knowledge when the time came when I would be ready. Sex education didn’t encourage me to have sex, it just made me wiser, and that knowledge has served me well in my adult life. As I always say, the biggest enemy of us all is ignorance, and ignorance must be fought at every turn.
So for those of you who are opposed to abortion and want to see it ended, I urge you to listen to my words and join in the efforts of the pro-choice movement to make sure that every woman has the contraception she needs to prevent unwanted pregnancies that will result in abortions. More birth control = fewer abortions!!! Instead of harshly judging women who choose abortion and ranting about how it should be outlawed, make a REAL difference by doing something that will reduce/end abortion by eliminating the NEED for it!! Unfortunately, many anti-choice groups who want to ban abortion are also against the use of contraceptives and would like to have birth control outlawed, too (just like it was outlawed from the late 1800’s all the way up until the 1960’s). They want to stop women from being able to have abortions, yet they also want to prevent women from having the means to prevent those unwanted pregnancies in the first place! Well all I have to say is that these people do NOT truly care about women or the children they bear. You cannot claim to be helping women by working to ban abortion while simultaneously being an active agent in making sure that women have no control over when & if they become pregnant in the first place!! Anyone who truly cares about the lives & health of women and the lives & health of the children they bring forth will support the efforts to ensure that every child is a planned & wanted child and that women have the resources they need to become pregnant only when they WANT to in order to drastically reduce the number of abortions performed. This is not a radical approach to eliminating abortions, it’s the common sense approach.