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Nov. 18th, 2002 10:22 pmToday, i'm going to break new ground and talk about something here that i haven't talked about here before.
We (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
damashita and i) had our second appointment with the midwives tonight, and, for the first time, got to hear a heartbeat.
This takes something that was pretty theoretical and makes it very real. After twelve weeks in utero, enough of the magic of cell division and what not, the baby has an audible heartbeat. It's [She's] alive.
I am passionately pro-life on a personal level. Having interacted with the miracle that takes two half sets of chromosomes and results in a completely new being, i can't help but find something magical and sacred about the process.
I'm equally as fervent that making the decision to carry a child to term or not is an intensely personal decision that no governmental entity has the right to legislate, either in favour of or against.
Histrionics and the rhetoric of both sides of the issue do little to address the matter. If anything, both hurt their respective causes, although the anti-abortion crowd does more damage to itself. It is a question of life. Even more so, it's a question of choice. Being a parent is a long-term comittment. It's not something that one can opt out of when it's inconvenient. Maybe more of the teen-age mothers need to be educated- preferably before they get pregnant- to the degree of committment that is involved. Maybe more of the pro-life extremists need to stop trying to force their morality on other people, and start providing real, grass-roots support for the sometimes unwanted product of sexual union. If you want to preach, walk the talk, and get down from the heights of the ivory towers and provide something very real out of love. If you're not willing to make that sort of sacrifice for someone else, shut up until you are.
We (
damashita and i) had our second appointment with the midwives tonight, and, for the first time, got to hear a heartbeat.This takes something that was pretty theoretical and makes it very real. After twelve weeks in utero, enough of the magic of cell division and what not, the baby has an audible heartbeat. It's [She's] alive.
I am passionately pro-life on a personal level. Having interacted with the miracle that takes two half sets of chromosomes and results in a completely new being, i can't help but find something magical and sacred about the process.
I'm equally as fervent that making the decision to carry a child to term or not is an intensely personal decision that no governmental entity has the right to legislate, either in favour of or against.
Histrionics and the rhetoric of both sides of the issue do little to address the matter. If anything, both hurt their respective causes, although the anti-abortion crowd does more damage to itself. It is a question of life. Even more so, it's a question of choice. Being a parent is a long-term comittment. It's not something that one can opt out of when it's inconvenient. Maybe more of the teen-age mothers need to be educated- preferably before they get pregnant- to the degree of committment that is involved. Maybe more of the pro-life extremists need to stop trying to force their morality on other people, and start providing real, grass-roots support for the sometimes unwanted product of sexual union. If you want to preach, walk the talk, and get down from the heights of the ivory towers and provide something very real out of love. If you're not willing to make that sort of sacrifice for someone else, shut up until you are.
