Recognizing a patient's basic right
to information, opposing sides of the abortion debate have come together to
support these laws in some states such as Kansas and Louisiana. As a whole,
however, abortion advocates are adamantly opposed to Women's Right to Know laws.
They argue that women will have to make more than one trip to the abortion
clinic, placing an undue burden on the woman's right to obtain an abortion. This
means that women will have to take more time off work, perhaps have to stay
overnight, find additional child care, etc. In Casey, the court
rejected these arguments, stating, "The waiting period helps ensure that a
woman's decision to abort is a well-considered one, and rationally furthers the
State's legitimate interest in maternal health and in unborn life. It may delay,
but does not prohibit, abortion." Also, as Koehler points out, the same
organizations that oppose Women's Right to Know laws due to concerns that it may
require more than one trip to the abortion clinic advocate RU-486, which
requires at least three trips to the doctor.
Abortion advocates also argue that
these laws are not effective because women will go to other states to have
abortions. "This is an argument for more Right to Know laws," states Koehler.
"We need to make sure every state has a Women's Right to Know laws to ensure
that regardless of which state the woman chooses, she will still receive the
information she needs to make an informed decision." However, most states do not
have abortion-reporting requirements, so it is difficult to assess whether women
are in fact going to other states for abortions.
According to Koehler, we need a
national reporting requirement for abortion to adequately assess the impact of
informed consent.
Women's Right to Know laws have
already begun to make an impact in reducing the number of abortions. "A recent
Michigan study showed that even though first-time abortions have decreased
nationwide, repeat abortions have increased, making up almost half of all
abortions performed," Koehler asserts. Statistically, women who have had an
abortion are at high risk of experiencing the tragedy of abortion again. When
women are educated about alternatives, they are less likely to seek a first-time
abortion, thereby reducing the potential for multiple abortions in the future.
Since the Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act was put into effect three years ago,
the state's abortion rate has dropped among first-time clients by 18.5 percent.
"The more information women are given
regarding the abortion procedure and alternatives, the more empowered they will
be to make decisions that will benefit their health as well as the health of
their child," Koehler said.
Anne Brennan
Ann Brennan is a member of FFL and recently received her J.D. from Widener
University School of Law.
Reprinted from The American
Feminist, Winter 1997-1998
"Feminists for Life" is not an oxymoron, it's a redundancy. The reduplicative
nature of the phrase is evident in the basic tenets of feminism: That every
human being deserves the opportunity to develop into the best she or he is
capable of; and that each individual be respected, however minimal or great
their development may be.
As a third generation anti-abortion feminist activist, I was raised to work
along with my sister and brother feminists in promoting a more socially
responsible world, a civilized world that repudiates injustice and violence.
Leo Tolstoy, the Russian novelist and social theoretician who profoundly
inspired the developing philosophies of non-violence promoted and lived by
Mahatma Gandhi and The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., stated in his diary of
1852, "It is true that slavery is an evil, but an extremely convenient evil."
Pro-abortionists unwittingly have chosen to justify an evil based on
convenience rather than struggle honestly and intellectually with the
philosophical, sociological, and historical aspects of this momentous
life-and-death issue.
It is much more convenient to deny our individual and community
responsibilities for social order and the development of a civilized (i.e.
non-violent) human condition than to tackle head-on the challenges of preventing
unwanted pregnancies.
Through Tolstoy, Gandhi, and King, we are better able to understand the evil
inherent in any form of violence. The violence of abortion is indisputable.
The philosophies of these three feminists help us perceive that the practice
of non-violence, inconvenient as it may be, can transcend political and cultural
boundaries and bring forth visionary, creative solutions to the most complex of
problems, including the problem of unwanted pregnancies.
As an anti-abortion feminist activist, I am an enigma to many: to the women's
right activists who assume a pro-abortion position is a prerequisite for
feminism; and to the right-to-lifers who equate feminism with abortion on
demand. Seeing their neat, albeit specious, categories breached is disquieting,
inconvenient. Labels and categories enslave the mind and dampen intellectual
curiosity, but they certainly are convenient.
So many would-be feminists, women who truly seek liberation, freedom, and
justice, abandon individualism while succumbing to peer group pressure.
Independent research, free thinking and critical analysis succumb to the comfort
and security of conformity. The male oppression they so diligently worked to
eradicate is replaced, obsequiously, by oppressive dominant groups. (As a member
of the Phoenix Chapter of the National Organization for Women, I've not been
"officially" requested to relinquish my membership, despite national president
Molly Yard's unenlightened stand against feminists making independent decisions
free of dominant group oppression. Ohio NOW forced Pat Goltz to give up her NOW
membership, and she went on to co-found Feminists for Life in 1972.)
Intellectually responsible feminists choose not to consult a laundry list of any
group's position to know what to think and what to say.
Many early feminists evolved toward their understanding of the need to work
to establish equal rights for women throught their attempt to establish basic
human rights. Sarah and Angelina Grimke, the first women to attempt to speak out
publicly against slavery, soon learned they, as white women, were also slaves
being denied even their right to free speech. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and
Lucretia Mott came to the brutal understanding of their own inequality when,
solely based on gender, they were prevented from speaking at a World
Anti-Slavery convention in London, despite being U.S. delegates.
Feminists have always spoken out against racial injustice. Why do so many now
remain silent when the iniquitous relationship between racialism and
pro-abortion legislation is errantly unabashed?
It is certainly easier for the white, male-dominated state legislature and
Congress to approve (i.e. encourage?) the elimination of the inconvenient
fetuses of poor women (i.e. women of color) than it is to work toward a)
eliminating poverty; b) increasing education standards for the poor; c)
increasing employment opportunities for the poor; d) providing daycare for the
working poor; e) funding serious research for improved contraception; and f)
developing a long-range plan to build a society that will provide adequate food,
housing, and education for all.
It is certainly easier for individual, even feminist women, to support such
legislation than to insist each woman take control of the responsibility for her
own reproduction and conception prevention. History has proved that we cannot
depend on others to take responsibility for our conception decisions.
As feminists, we must not continue to buy into the historically male world
view: the solution to sociological problems (e.g., poverty, overpopulation,
individual's sexual irresponsibility) is convenient violence-- suffered
predominantly by the world's poor.
Historically, feminists have valued human need above the non-feminist world
view of "maximization of profits." Abortion is big business, bringing handsome
profits to the usual few: white, middle-class, educated. The vociferant,
well-meaning but misguided feminists who promote abortion serve as effective
marketing tools for those businesses making money from the agony of the poor.
Our thesis bears repeating: "Feminists for Life" is not an oxymoron, it's a
redundancy.
