Bronx Democrat Michael Benjamin, a New York State assemblyman, feels bad that 41 percent of New York City pregnancies ended in abortion last year. He feels bad enough to help set up a program that would try to convince pregnant women not to have abortions, he told my colleague Brian Bolduc. He just doesn’t feel bad enough to change his belief that abortion should be allowed — that is, his belief that unborn children don’t deserve legal protection.
There is an obvious tension between thinking that unborn children are in some sense human lives worth saving, and also thinking that these human beings should have no formal right not to be harmed. But just as troubling is Benjamin’s apparent belief that trying to talk pregnant women out of abortions — while supporting abortion in myriad other ways, including Medicaid funding — is a good way to attack the problem.
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He’s not the only person to think that, thanks to a common misconception: the belief that for the most part, abortions happen because sympathetic women — women who are deeply conflicted about aborting their children — find themselves in trouble and just need someone to help. We see this in pro-lifers when they insist that while abortion is murder, we shouldn’t prosecute women for it (an argument they often make on the grounds that the women are victims, too). We see it in moderate abortion-rights supporters when they claim they hate abortion and want to work with pregnant women to lower the abortion rate, but still want to protect a woman’s choice in desperate times.
But the fact is that the majority of abortions — far from all, but the majority — serve as nothing more than routine birth control: Most women who have abortions became pregnant by willingly engaging in high-risk sexual activity, and many resort to abortion more than once. For a solid pro-choicer, this presents no problem; if unborn children have no rights, there is no harm done. But pro-lifers and moderate pro-choicers like Benjamin need to face the fact that while programs designed to talk women out of abortion are one useful tool in a pro-life strategy, they will not significantly lower the abortion rate by themselves. Those who are truly concerned about abortion should have two priorities: first, overturning Roe v. Wade so that states may ban abortion; and second, in the meantime, designing an anti-abortion program that will appeal to women who use the procedure as birth control.
The single most damning statistic about abortion in America was presented in Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner’s book Freakonomics: Following Roe v. Wade, conceptions rose by almost 30 percent, while births decreased by 6 percent. This quite clearly indicates that some women (and men) took the existence of legal abortion as a license to be less responsible in their sexual behavior; indeed, it suggests that a large majority of terminated pregnancies wouldn’t have existed in the first place if abortion hadn’t been legally available as a backup.
And the overwhelming majority of women who have abortions did behave irresponsibly. According to a survey by the Guttmacher Institute, nearly half of them didn’t use any form of contraception at all in the month they got pregnant. Of those who did use contraception, three-quarters of pill users and half of condom users admit they used their method “inconsistently.” Only 13 to 14 percent of pill and condom users claim they got pregnant despite “perfect” use.
It’s not as if they don’t know better. In the Guttmacher survey, most women who didn’t use contraception in the month they got pregnant had used it in the past. And as Benjamin notes, “comprehensive sex ed” classes that encourage contraception seem to have no effect whatsoever.
The prevalence of multiple abortions is another indicator that women who have abortions do not see the practice as a highly regrettable but sometimes necessary option. If they saw it that way, one imagines, they would be particularly careful after needing a first abortion. And yet each year, of the 2 percent of women aged 15 to 44 who have an abortion, half are not having their first.
For those who oppose abortion, overturning Roe v. Wade clearly needs to be the highest priority. In the meantime, programs that encourage women not to have abortions can work in some cases, and there’s evidence that various state laws (informed consent, restrictions on Medicaid funds, etc.) can reduce abortion, too — between 1990 and 2005, the abortion rate declined 25 percent, in part because of these laws. But what can we do to persuade women who use abortion as birth control to carry their babies to term?
I have made the case (in The American Spectator), as has my colleague Kevin D. Williamson (in National Review), that we should simply pay them to give their kids up for adoption. The specifics are debatable — I envision a program (funded by donations, fees from adoptive parents, and possibly the government) that offers a payment of a fixed amount for a healthy infant; Williamson essentially proposes a free market in babies. But the basic premise is the same: If a woman doesn’t value her child, and if the Supreme Court forbids us to pass a law protecting that child, perhaps a little cash will do the trick.
This may be crass, and it won’t work in many cases. Disturbingly, in a Guttmacher survey of women having abortions — a survey that didn’t specifically ask about adoption — “more than one-third of interview respondents said they had considered adoption and concluded that it was a morally unconscionable option because giving one’s child away is wrong.” In addition, there will be racial complications: Black women are more likely to have abortions, while black children are less in demand on the adoption market; also, some identity-politics activists oppose giving black children to white families. But this would save lives, and it would certainly be more effective than trying to talk women out of abortions.
If the pro-life movement is to have any success without overturning Roe v. Wade, it has to see the problem clearly. And thus it has to face the fact that many women use abortion as birth control.
— Robert VerBruggen, a National Reviewassociate editor, runs the Phi Beta Cons blog.
Isn't there a risk that some women will get pregnant simply to get money from selling their child? And that's another thing: aren't you talking about selling human beings?
Interesting article. But, for most people who have been involved with the Pro-Life movement for a while, there is not much new here.
Wasn't there a survey by the Guttmacher Institute a couple of decades ago that stated ~96% of the abortions they surveyed were for matters of economic or social convenience?
And that always reminds me of a conversation I had with my brother and his wife (both pro-choice Catholics). When I mentioned the numbers from the Guttmacher Institute, they both responded "why should we believe numbers from an obvious pro-life source?"
They were a little embarrassed when I pointed out that GI is closely tied to Planned Parenthood and its mission is decidedly "pro-choice". ;-)
A lot of the problem comes from the changed standards about relationships and responsibilities. Putting a condom on a banana is no substitute for talking about character and what one wants and should expect from a mate.
I'm not aruging with any of VerBruggen's facts and statistics, but I've never seen a waiting line extending out the door to one of these "clinics." I've never seen a long line of women on their phones while waiting as I see at movie theatres and music concerts on weekends.
Are the lines hidden? Or do most abortion clinics concentrate themselves to serve high population areas?
I confess, as a beta-male, this is all foreign territory to me.
MR. VerBruggen, thanks for the article...we should remind ourselves, "The one day-old child is protected with the full force of the law. The proposition that he is without rights when he is minus one day-old is nothing more than a social convention conflating various concerns." William F. Buckley Jr.
As for stupid choices...people should be free to make any and all sorts of "stupid choices"...just don't ask for us to pay for their stupidity...moral or otherwise.
What kind of moral reasoning is operating that allows a woman to conclude that giving away your child is wrong, but killing it before it's born is ok, even preferable?
"I envision a program (funded by donations, fees from adoptive parents, and possibly the government) that offers a payment of a fixed amount for a healthy infant"
Unfortunately, your idea is corrective in nature, not preventative. What we should be doing is offering cash incentives for women on Welfare to get sterilized. That would save our tax dollars from being spent on Planned Parenthood funding and Welfare babies in one fell swoop. Offering such a deal to men on Welfare would help the cause even further.
I do, in part, agree with your premise. I have to ask the question, what do we do when women keep getting pregnant on purpose at the prospect of more money in their pockets?
Offering financial incentives sounds good in the abstract, but in reality they will not work. And once a new federal program is implemented, it will only grow, In the end, many women will concieve for no better reason than to perversely collect another government paycheck. Once you subsidize a behavior, expect that behavior to grow.
In my opinion most women who procure an abortion know full well what they are doing, and to whom they are doing it to. The problem is quite simple. Many unmarried people are partaking in the pleasures of marriage without having to live with the "self-giving" of marriage. It isn't just the urban or rural underclass that are procuring abortions. Many middle class professionals do as well. And more than one woman said she didn't want to lose her boyfreind.
This entire issue is a moral one. Economics and financial incentives will not cure what ails us. If anything, subsidizing adoptions will make things worse.
Should our gov't imprison them and force feed healthy foods until delivery? Might be expensive.
We could contract a security officer to watch her every move and make sure she doesn't do anything to endanger the unborn child. He'd obviously need to be armed to make sure she doesn't try anything.
Its hard to say. Of course, when you're using the police powers to force citizens to do what they don't want to do, the options are unlimited.
As a former medical transcriptionist for several OB/GYN doctors, I can testify to the fact that many women use abortion as their preferred method of birth control, and do indeed have multiple abortions. In one case, this choice was made after the patient underwent laparoscopic surgery to improve her chances of conception - when she then became pregnant, the "timing" was wrong and she sought an abortion.
I have also witnessed the moral confusion that allows someone to conclude that it is unacceptable to adopt out a child, so abortion is the best option. In the case with which I am most familiar, there was an ownership element in the arguments employed - "giving away" something that "belonged" to you was bad, but murdering the unborn child was not.
There is a general moral confusion in our culture, which I believe began with redefining commonly understood language. Terms have been intentionally changed to allow for such "rights" as abortion on demand. And, it continues. When one term (e.g. "blob of tissue") is debunked by technology, yet another euphemism is employed.
I have always wondered: Why do old-time feminists give womanizing male politicians cover for being "pro choice"? Isn't that a rather self-serving position for such men to take?!!
A wise friend long ago commented to me that abortion is the only form of birth control, everything else is conception control. This issue has for decades been plagued by fuzzy thinking, fuzzy language, and fuzzy statistics. A life-long Catholic, I cannot see anything wrong with terminating the fetus afflicted with anencephaly or renal agenesis...conditions incompatible with extrauterine life. But the pro-life folks have managed to make sure those cases are not covered by Medicaid! I wish the amateurs would get out of this issue.
If we analyze this as a math problem, it is easy to conclude that women are using abortion as birth control. 1 abortion + 1 abortion = woman who finds abortion more convenient than birth control or abstinence. In many case, the formula is unfortunately more like 1 abortion + guilt + shame + lack of support + fear = 2 abortions. Women who undergo an abortion are under a tremendous amount of stress at the time and the majority believe they are not receiving counseling they need, they are unsure about their decision and/or they are being pressured into it. They are seeking a way to end what they might think of as a problem and they likely have many friends or even their doctors encouraging them to use this legal practice. “How do I make the stress go away”, “I am scared”, “How do I feed the child”, “What will my parents say”, “What will my friends say”, “My boyfriend doesn’t want the baby”. They believe the abortion will end their crisis instead of beginning their crisis. People under stress and pressure don’t always make good decisions. Later comes guilt, trauma, anxiety and feelings of loss that are not allowed to be grieved. They may end up doing the same behaviors that they were doing before their first pregnancy. If they become pregnant again, many women consider that they don’t deserve the new baby or that they are going to go to Hell anyway, so they end up re-enacting the traumatic experience. I work with an organization that helps women heal the wounds left by abortion (sometimes multiple abortions). They are wounded from the lies they were told and their choice (if it were their choice). Their grief is difficult and their pain is real. These are wonderful women who have paid a terrible price for their abortion, but they have been renewed and reclaimed their spiritual life. These same women many times become eager to help other women avoid this terrible choice.
If we analyze this as a math problem, it is easy to conclude that women are using abortion as birth control. 1 abortion + 1 abortion = woman who finds abortion more convenient than birth control or abstinence. The formula is unfortunately more like 1 abortion + guilt + shame + lack of support + fear = 2 abortions. Women who undergo an abortion are under a tremendous amount of stress at the time and the majority believe they are not receiving counseling they need, they are unsure about their decision and/or they are being pressured into it. They are seeking a way to end what they might think of as a problem and they likely have many friends or even their doctors encouraging them to use this legal practice. “How do I make the stress go away”, “I am scared”, “How do I feed the child”, “What will my parents say”, “What will my friends say”, “My boyfriend doesn’t want the baby”. They believe the abortion will end their crisis instead of beginning their crisis. People under stress and pressure don’t always make good decisions.
Later comes guilt, trauma, anxiety and feelings of loss that are not allowed to be grieved. They may end up doing the same behaviors that they were doing before their first pregnancy. If they become pregnant again, many women consider that they don’t deserve the new baby or that they are going to go to Hell anyway, so they end up re-enacting the traumatic experience.
I work with an organization that helps women heal the wounds left by abortion (sometimes multiple abortions). They are wounded from the lies they were told and their choice (if it were their choice). Their grief is difficult and their pain is real. These are wonderful women who have paid a terrible price for their abortion, but they have been renewed and reclaimed their spiritual life. These same women many times become eager to help other women avoid this terrible choice.
I racall reading a quote that was printed in a work by Hugh Thomas: Slave Trade. It appears that, in the early 19th century, when the British and Americans were trying to stop the slave trade between Africa and the Americas, they tried to impress upon the African tribal leaders who were selling their unwanted people to the slavers that such was undesireable. The chiefs merely asked the Brits and Americans, what was preferable, to sell them or kill them. That is the choice. Is death better than being sold or bartered?
It has always been my view that the woman was the murderer and the Doctor merely an accessory to the murder. It is the remnant of the Paternalistic infantilization of Women that makes them victims of any negative interaction. Capital Punishment should be use extensively to discourage the practice since a woman who would murder her child for convenience is a amoral monster that needs to be removed from society to protect societal norms.
