Many years ago, and very randomly, I took part in a focus group about abortion. I was never terribly sure on what grounds we participants had been selected – we varied in age from late teens to sixties, and in experience from never having had children, never having had an abortion, to having had several children and indeed, in one case, several abortions. Nor was I ever terribly clear why the focus group was held. But it was interesting to hear other women’s thoughts and experiences, and it clarified a number of things for me in what I thought about it.
The key thing that I had never really thought about before was that I – as a female growing up in the emancipated late 20th and early 21st centuries – absolutely took it for granted that abortion would be amongst the options from which I would be able to make a choice at some point if necessary. Not everyone wants to be a mother; not everyone is suitable to be a mother; and, let’s face it – it IS still, of course, women who carry the vast majority of the responsibility for raising children.
Control over your fertility is one of the key advances in feminism, and as I’ve argued before, control (in general) over your life and your situation is one of the major ways in which people feel happy, optimistic and fulfilled.
Nadine Dorries’ proposed changes to the way abortions are offered in the UK have two main dangers. The first is that – as with her abstinence nonsense – she suggests something that sounds relatively reasonable until you question why she is suggesting it, and what it really means. Her claim that there would be 60,000 fewer abortions each year in the UK is dangerous and disingenuous – what sort of situation would those children be born into?
The second is actually far more dangerous to feminism, women and indeed people in general. It is that she is suggesting that we cannot make decisions for ourselves, and that we cannot be trusted to decide for ourselves what sort of information we want.
I am all for sensible discussion of medical facts. But I absolutely defend my right to decide for myself whether I want children and when I want them. And I think the fact that a woman is able to have children with no interference from anyone if she so chooses means as well that there is absolutely no case for anyone else to decide what sort of information or persuasion I must be given if I exercise my right to choose one way or another.
New blogpost: I have the right to choose. So I should also have the right to choose where I get my informatio… http://t.co/vqOSoAI #fb
I have the right to choose. So I should also have the right to choose where I get my information from http://t.co/Edj0RvS
Fiona, being a bloke I don’t share your gender or many of the challenges of fertility that you describe. So I write this post in trepidation. But having been a governor of an inner city school in an area with very high rates of teenage pregnancy I’d take issue with your view that Nadine’s view on abstinence is nonsense. It’s a sad fact that the UK has horrifically high rates of teenage pregnancy and vd such as chalmydia. The highest in Europe I believe. And one of the reasons is that many young girls feel pressured into sleeping with the first bloke they meet, and they don’t have the confidence to say “no” exactly because people scoff at abstinence. I’ve seen the results an inner city schools in Portsmouth and Havant.Yet in Europe say in Italy where I used to live it’s perfectly normal to teach abstinence as a sensible way of controlling peoples desire to sleep with one another until the time they feel is right. So whilst confident, educated, middle class Londoners might feel it’s some type of anachronistic throwback, I’d politely suggest that there is a quite a lot of evidence which suggests that Nadine has a point. Just a thought.
Hi Bruce
Nadine’s view on abstinence IS nonsense. I have no problem at all with abstinence teaching being part of proper sex education but her plan to only teach it to girls?! Please… That’s sexist, outdated, short-sighted and only serves to provide excuses for boys.
Girls must absolutely have the confidence to say no. But equally, boys must understand why as well, and that no means no (I think we’ve been over that one before…)
I completely agree with you that our rates of teenage pregnancy are shockingly high. But girls don’t get pregnant on their own. And part of sensible sex education must – surely – be shared responsibility and shared decision-making?
I think Bruce made a much more general point from which you are trying to divert attention with an obsessive focus on the thoughts (real or imagined) of Nadine Dorries. For a certain type of Tory, Dorries has become a bogeywoman about whom it is obligatory to say “boo”. At bottom, much of this antipathy is snobbery.
Nice to see you back, Michael. But I’m afraid I completely disagree with you. Anyone suggesting teaching abstinence only to girls is talking nonsense. As I said, I think abstinence SHOULD be part of proper sex education but to EVERYONE as only saying it’s ok to girls means you’re suggesting that boys can’t say no as well. It’s suggesting that girls are the only ones who can be damaged by inappropriate (in whatever sense) sexual relationships. And it’s sending the message – still – that pregnancy and so on are ONLY the responsibility of girls. Which is not how it should be.
I am not a fan of Nadine Dorries for many reasons, but snobbery is absolutely not one of them.