Well, I'll answer, Beccy.

I would hope that most women would discuss the issue with the father. However, I don't believe the father's permission should be required. There are too many times when it could present an excessive an unequal hardship on the woman. Do we track down a rapist to get his permission to let the woman abort? What about a 13 year old girl impregnanted by her father -- if he would sleep with his 13 year old, do you think he will give permission for an abortion? What if he did it because he WANTED another child? A woman involved in or trying to get out of an abusive relationship? A woman with a husband who refuses to allow her to use birth control, but is facing her 7th pregnancy in as many years and the physical drain that comes from repeated pregnancies? A woman who's life is at particular risk, but her husband/lover says no, she must risk her life in pregnancy? A man who doesn't understand the possible consequences of a second Rh+ baby to an Rh- woman?

I agree that fathers' rights are often wrongly curtailed. Even men who try to be active and supportive fathers often find themselves at odds with a system that assumes that they are somehow less capable of caring for a child than a woman. But this is an area where it is far too easy for a man to impose his opinion and then not have to live with the consequences. Who tracks down fathers who abandon children?

No man ever died in childbirth, no man has ever had to accept the physical hardship of pregnancy; even though those risks have been minimized in the modern era, that still makes a woman's vested interest in a child greater than the man's. There is a difference often between law and justice. No law can account for every possible situation. In the case of where the legal rights of one party could cause undue and measurable harm to another party, I think it would be an unjust law.