The other day on Twitter, I received a reply to a Catholic meme I posted. The meme was a picture of the Virgin Mary with the caption “Call Your Mom.” The reply was not about Mother Mary but a pro-abortion rant. There was so much I wanted to say but there was no way I could possibly reply in 140 characters. I decided to blog my response, or I should say responses since it will take me more than one post. I have decided not to include the woman’s Twitter handle because I’m not trying to call her out; I’m just trying to reply in a truth with charity.
Each post will address one statement and/or question. I will highlight the area of her rant that is addressed in that particular post. I’m going to highlight each post with a separate color. Also, I’m going to skip around, so if it looks like I missed something, don’t worry, I will be coming back to it.
Statement/Question for me (highlighted in pink in the graphic)
“Because making it [abortion] illegal everywhere will cause that number to skyrocket even more. Is it really all that pro-life to let pregnant people die because you don’t like their choice?”
My Answer
This doesn’t really read as a question, but is more of a statement or rather an accusation. However I will treat it like a question and try to answer it.
This question is referring to your claim that “47,000 pregnant people die every year from unsafe abortions.” Which, I explained in the first post how that number is misleading and false.
Legalizing abortion just allowed the “back-alley” abortionist into store fronts. Their motivation is not to help women but of greed and oppression. Kermit Gosnell, serial killing abortionist, who maimed and killed woman as well as beheaded and killed live babies, is now serving a life sentence for his crimes. From 1973 until two years ago he was allowed to carry on his crimes in what media called his “little shop of horrors.” In 1972, Gosnell was the doctor in the Mother’s Day Massacre. They bused women in to Philadelphia and used this device that was invented by a guy who had no medical training but had the backing of International Planned Parenthood. The device was called the super coil.
Of course, even though abortion was illegal at that time, Gosnell got totally away with this. Gosnell would still be working in his little shop of horrors if he wasn’t raided in 2010 for illegal prescription drug activity. His abortion clinic wasn’t inspected for 17 years. His clinic is not the only one that is not regularly checked for safety. In this country, tanning and nail salons are inspected more than abortion clinics. This is not pro-woman.
Nick Reynosa wrote an excellent piece in the LifeSite News titled “Legalizing Abortion Did Not Stop Women From Dying in Abortions.” I think it does an excellent job of explaining the numbers of deaths from the pro-choice stand point vs the pro-life. You can read the full article here.
“According to the National Center for Health Statistics, in 1972, the last year before Roe, 39 women died in illegal abortions. Emergency medicine has advanced since then, but to give pro-choicers the benefit of the doubt, I will assume that the number would be the same if abortion were criminalized today. Since Roe v. Wade, more than 400 women have died obtaining legal, state-sanctioned abortions: an average of 10 per year. Those ten deaths obviously would not occur after the right to life is restored.
Revisiting the Life Equation
Pro-Choice Life Equation
Current # of abortions (1.06 million) minus # of abortions prevented by contraception (estimated one half, or 530,000) minus # of women saved from dying in illegal abortions (39) = 529,961 annual abortion-related deaths under pro-choice policy.
Pro-Life Life Equation
Current # of abortions (1.06 million) minus # of abortions prevented by contraception (estimated on half, or 530,000) minus # of abortions prevented by legal ban (using Chile’s 67.5% reduction, 67.5% of 530,000 is 357,750) plus # of women dying in illegal abortions (39) minus number of women not dying in legal abortions (10) = 172,279 annual abortion-related deaths under pro-life policy.
Thus if the pro-life movement is successful in outlawing abortion while supporting effective contraception use, the net result will save, in my estimation, 357,682 more lives per year than the implementation of pro-choice policy.”
Disclaimer – As a practicing Catholic, I do not promote the use of contraceptives.