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" Abortion opponents say women seek abortions in haste and confusion. Pro-choicers reply: Abortion is the most difficult, agonizing decision a woman ever makes. "

Katha Pollitt

Decision

Say

Woman

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" Here is the dirty little secret about anti-abortion violence: It works. "

" I think the meaning of abortion is what the woman says it is: For a woman who wants a child but can't have this one, it can be sad; for a woman who doesn't want a baby, it can feel like a huge relief, like having your whole life given back to you. "

" Abortion opponents know full well that the public would not abide putting women in prison en masse. Politically, it's more palatable to portray them as irrational, ignorant, and childlike, perhaps even temporarily insane. "

" My mother had an illegal abortion in 1960, which was the year the birth control pill came out, but I guess a little late for her, but - and I never knew. I found out when my father, after her death, got her FBI file. "

" In the end, abortion is an issue of fundamental human rights. To force women to undergo pregnancy and childbirth against their will is to deprive them of the right to make basic decisions about their lives and well-being, and to give that power to the state. "

" Opposition to abortion was one of the ways the Christian right was brought into the Republican Party by conservatives hoping to move the party further right. Now, of course, the tail is wagging the dog. "

" Ariel may look a lot like Barbie, and her adventure may be limited to romance and over with the wedding bells, but unlike, say, Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty, she's active, brave and determined, the heroine of her own life. She even rescues the prince. And that makes her a rare fish, indeed, in the world of preschool culture. "

" Everyone will be happier if fewer women are tied to abusive men, drop out of school, and live impoverished lives because of a random pregnancy. "

" The notion that female initiative is useless because men know what they want is particularly odd - most people don't even know what they want for dinner. "

" If you have been vaccinated for polio, mumps, measles, chicken pox, hepatitis, or rabies, it may be too late for you to stand your ethical ground: You have already benefited from fetal-tissue research. This is, after all, a practice that's been legal since the 1930s. "

" We have an idea that the man should help pay for the child. But we don't have a law that says a man has to support any woman he gets pregnant. Why is that? Because she doesn't have the baby yet. But if we're going to say it's a human being, then he should be supporting her during pregnancy. "

" We need to say that women have sex, have abortions, are at peace with the decision, and move on with their lives. We need to say that is their right, and, moreover, it's good for everyone that they have this right: The whole society benefits when motherhood is voluntary. "

" There is a huge reservoir of support for abortion rights from ordinary women. I hear all the time from women who had abortions and say it made possible the good life they went on to have. Social shaming silences too many. "

" Planned Parenthood is a pretty popular organization. Way more popular than Congress! It claims that one in five women have received care from one of its clinics. And this care, despite what abortion opponents say, is excellent and not easily replaceable by 'community health centers.' Texas tried it, and thousands of women went without care. "

" Sure, men like a challenge - but so do women. And nobody likes to be challenged all the time. I know plenty of long-standing happy couples who slept together right away, spent hours yakking on the phone, split checks down the middle, and lived together for years before the wedding. "

" Most Americans probably have no idea how hostile anti-abortion sidewalk counseling outside clinics can be. There's a reason pro-choicers volunteer to escort patients as they make their way past angry crowds to the clinic door. "

" Women who give up their children for adoption are years and years later talking about how painful it was, much more than women who have abortions. "

" Abortion is part of being a mother and of caring for children, because part of caring for children is knowing when it's not a good idea to bring them into the world. "

" Women have to control their fertility for 30 years. Thirty years is a long time not to make mistakes. "

" In our culture, the shame about accidental pregnancy is inextricable from the shame about having had sex. That disapproval of sex is one reason our record with contraception is so poor. If you're not supposed to be sexual, you don't plan for sex. You cross your fingers and hope for the best. "

" I think there are a very few pro-lifers who would say that a zygote in a petri dish is the equivalent of you or me; it's just younger. If you can say that without laughing, maybe you are a true pro-lifer. But I think most people are able or willing to make distinctions that show they maybe don't quite believe that. "

Katha Pollitt

People

Believe

" A potential person is not a person, any more than an acorn is an oak tree. I don't think women should have to give birth just because a sperm met an egg. "

" Women who have abortions are people you know. Because that is the truth! One in three American women will have an abortion by menopause. "

" I think women have the right to consult their own wishes, needs, and capacities and produce only loved, wanted children they can care for - or even no children at all. I think we would all be better off as a society if we respected women's ability to make these decisions for themselves and concentrated on caring well for the born. "