We Had Abortions Petition!
As a survivor of Adult Rape and Incestuous Sexual Abuse, I am all for Women who have been raped having the right to get an abortion, and I want that abortion to be safe, legal, and the choice of the woman involved.
But I have to wonder about the intentions of the Ms. Magazine Editors with their petition for the We Had Abortions campaign.
I’m not sure that publicly declaring the fact that you ripped life out of your womb is healthy, normal, or empowering. Many women who have had abortions suffer horrible guilt and trauma, often years after the fact.
This excellent Essay from the late Jeannine Baker, is a timely rebutal.
A Spiritual Feminist Ethic on Abortion & Conception:
Woman is Shakti
by Jeannine Parvati Baker
“Arising from the Great Cosmic Song are the growing voices of feminists who respect
life in all its forms–even down to the “unplanned” pregnancies. For too long the
spiritual communities of the pagans and the yogis, the two philosophies I have
studied for many years, have neglected to re-vision abortion.
Lingering still is the rationalization that an “unwanted” child somehow was worse
than abortion–that a “fast death” was better than an entire lifetime of feeling
“unwanted” (with a personal history filled with emotional and/or physical abuse
from immature, irresponsible parents). It seems to me that abortion really is the
ultimate child abuse. And death, whether it be fast or slow, is still death.
In fact, I have left particular “spiritual” communities because of this basic anti-life,
pessimistic perspective on abortion. It seemed to me that on the most primal level, a
person has much more to learn about spirituality by accepting WHAT-IS (i.e., a
pregnancy) than by forcefully “re-cycling” the soul (i.e., terminating the baby). And
besides, having an abortion undermines any and all possibilities of changing the
culture’s basic anti-life/anti-children attitude; much less a personal miracle, wherein
the reluctant parents-to-be learn to accept their coming child.
Allow me first to first turn my attention to the Yoga community wherein it is all too
common for women yogis (yoginis) to abort their babies so that they can get on with
the “real” spiritual work: i.e., a meditation practice. Babies are sometimes seen as a
distraction to a heroic spiritual practice.”
Jenny Hatch