Chaz the guest wrote:

Americans, Educate yourselves on abortion. --okay, I have. Now what?

In Congress they're debating as to whether or not an infant has the right to life and many democrats are saying no. --a fetus is not the same as an infant. The one cannot live outside the womb; the other can. Big difference. That's why the law is what it is.

This debate arose from an awareness of the NUMEROUS times that an abortion was unsuccessful, and so the abortionist needed to finish the job in order to collect his salary. --what??? This is utter hogwash. If you knew anything about the relaity of abortion providers in this country, you would know that enough of them believe in making the service accessible to women in communitites hwere it is problematic, that they provide these services as volunteers, with no pay, or minimal pay. Educate *yourself*, why don't ya?

There really isn't much difference between eliminating the life of a child inside of the womb or outside. --I would have to beg to differ on that. A six-week old cell-divider isn't conscious. A six-week old infant, that has reached full term development, is conscious. Why you can't figure this one out is beyond me.

If this isn't THE most important issue in this election, than I don't know what is. I'm scared. --me, too. I don't much cozy to the idea of a buncha white guys in suits telling women what they can do with their own bodies.

Why, precisely, are YOU scared?

It often happens that when people actually investigate the reality of abortion, not only do they change their minds on the issue, but they become vehemently pro-life. --oh, really? Any documentation on this? Just curious to know what these statistics are in your carefully-researched argument.

Know what the reality of abortion is? The reality is, birth control is still pretty much in the stone age. The reality is, women get pregnant even when using birth control. The reality is, women in abusive relationships find themselves pregnant even when trying to extricate themselves from those relationships. The reality is, accidental or unintentional pregnancy is a way of life.

The reality is, the "right to life" movement, this whole debate on whetehr or not life begins at conception, was never antyhing anyone gave a second thought to...until the 1960s, when abortion became a safe surgical procedure. Woemn had always sought out abortions, from the village wisewoman to the back-alley doctor. They often died trying to end their pregnancies, but the risk was worth it to them.

Once abortion became a safe procedure, people like yourslef, who cannot fathom a world where women are able to ocntrol their own reproductive freedom, well, they got upset. They thought it was wrong of women to have this sort of control over their bodies. And thus the idea that somehow, abortion was the killing of an innocent life was, you'll excuse the expression, born. This handily coincided with the rise of the anti-feminist religious right wing, and the idea that women who were starting to attain equal pay for equal work, and focus on careers over domestic life, were somehow overstepping their true fucntion as laid out in the bible.

The rest is history. People (mostly men, I am sorry to say) who have no idea of what the *reality* of an unwanted pregnancy is like, should nto go shooting their mouths off about whether a woman has a right to control this most personal matter.

Please educate yourselves, my friends. --Done. You do the same.

There are 4400 abortions everyday in our country alone. --I would imagine htere are a similar number of children born to poverty, drug abuse and neglect. Which makes our already-overpopulated world a worse place?

I can't look myself in the mirror and call myself a man if I don't do everything in my power to stop it. --I wonder what you would say if, instead of a penis, you had a vagina, and thus were forced to call yourslef a woman when looking in the mirror? I think your tune might be a different one.

Thanks for listening. --yeah, you bet.

By the way...I used to get my gyn exams and birth control supplies from a little Planned Parenthood clinic at 1031 Beacon Street in Brookline, Massachusetts. It was a great place to go, except for those annoying protestors who screamed at women from the sidewalk and threatened them and threw things at them. Those crazy protestors who yelled at women not to kill their babies, that they'd raise the baby for them (though oddly they never offered to put this in writing).

Then one day a nutcase who thought abortion was murder (much as you yourself do) walked in with a sawed-off shotgun and tried to blow everybody away. He killed a receptionist, not an abortionist. (One might conclude he was actually anti-reception, as opposed to anti-abortion). Thereafter I had to submit to a body search and walk through a metal detector every time I wanted to get a pap smear or some birth control pills. Most inconvenient.

The nutcase went a couple miles up the road to another women's clinic and did the same thing.

It is a thin line between ill-informed indignation and fanaticism.

Thank YOU for listening.