VOICE OF GLOBAL UMMAH
Volume 166, January 16, 2011
St. Louis, Missouri, USA
Editors: Mohamed & Rashida Ziauddin
In the Name of Allah, the Most Beneficial and the Most Merciful
Editors: Mohamed & Rashida Ziauddin
In the Name of Allah, the Most Beneficial and the Most Merciful
Editorial:
WASHINGTON, D.C.
LONDON:
PART V
August 9, 2010
By Hilary White
www.lifesitenews.com
(condensed version)
Thanks to Dr. Lewis for forwarding below e-mail:
All of us alive today came to this world through the process of childbirth and should be ever grateful to our mothers for NOT opting abortion. It is unfortunate that the rate of abortion today is skyrocketing at alarming rates. If one does not value the beginnings of life, then it goes without saying that such negative attitude extends to the composition of the fetus. Refer to articles on:
(1) "Premature Live Babies Taken from Ukraine Maternity Wards Sold For Body Parts?" (2) Trafficking in Body Parts a Natural Extension of De-Humanizing Abortion Culture (3) Body Parts Scandals Becoming Common in US and Abroad. (4) A horrendous industry hunger for body parts revealed in Britain.
Are you then surprised to learn about trade in fetal body parts. Does this in any way reflect the current value system that one places on the value of life ? As a pro-life couple, we would like to revisit this important issue of abortion in this E-Zine and share related articles of interest.
(1) "Premature Live Babies Taken from Ukraine Maternity Wards Sold For Body Parts?" (2) Trafficking in Body Parts a Natural Extension of De-Humanizing Abortion Culture (3) Body Parts Scandals Becoming Common in US and Abroad. (4) A horrendous industry hunger for body parts revealed in Britain.
Are you then surprised to learn about trade in fetal body parts. Does this in any way reflect the current value system that one places on the value of life ? As a pro-life couple, we would like to revisit this important issue of abortion in this E-Zine and share related articles of interest.
PART I
The Dark Side of Biotech: Expert Details Grisly Fate of Fetal Body Parts
Kathleen Gilbert
(www.lifesitenews.com)
Dec 09, 2010
Kathleen Gilbert
(www.lifesitenews.com)
Dec 09, 2010
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Every day in America, countless packages are carefully transferred for use by government, university, pharmaceutical and other biotechnology laboratories. Some of these end up advancing development of products such as cosmetics and food additives; others are used directly as a form of therapy.
The material in those packages are human body parts - eyes, ears, limbs, brain, skin - now an indispensable commodity for many U.S. researchers and scientists, and a lucrative export of America’s abortion clinics.
Dr. Theresa Deisher, a molecular and cellular physiologist and an internationally-recognized expert in regenerative medicine, explored the routine “commoditizing” of unborn human beings in modern biotechnology in a speech in Washington, DC on Friday. Deisher is Managing Member and Research and Development Director at AVM Biotechnology, and has several years’ experience as a commercial scientist at top pharmaceutical companies. Her work has led to dozens of patented medical breakthroughs.
Historically, when man wants to exploit other men, “what we first have to do is alter our way of thinking about them, and then of course we actually have to dehumanize them, and we usually do that by denying them a soul: so therefore they’re not actually human like the rest of us,” Deisher told an audience at the “50 Years of the Pill” conference hosted by Human Life International of America.
This, she explained, is precisely the scenario with the smallest human lives in medical research today - and not just embryos, but unborn children of all trimesters - whose body parts grow more valuable as they mature.
She noted that an article in the Puget Sound Business Journal discovered that the University of Washington filled out more than 4,400 requests for fresh fetal body parts from fetal tissue for the purpose of biomedical research in 2009, the first time hard numbers of such transactions were uncovered.
“It has to be approved by an institutional review board, so they think they’re applying ethics to this because they reviewed the use of this,” said Deisher. “What do you think that relationship might have to do with doctors encouraging abortions?”
She estimates that as many as 1.87 million such transactions - requesting individual body parts such as eyes and liver - could happen each year in America.
She estimates that as many as 1.87 million such transactions - requesting individual body parts such as eyes and liver - could happen each year in America.
The scientist also noted that plenty of scientific literature, available on the Internet, discusses the optimal age for a child’s death in order to obtain useful body parts: one such professional noted that the best heart tissue is obtained from a child of 22 weeks’ gestation.
In addition to research, Deisher said the bodies of unborn children are being used “as not only biomedical research tools, but as actual medical therapies.” “Fetuses 12, 14, 16, 18 weeks gestation are ground up and their cells are implanted in people who have had strokes or Parkinson’s disease,” she said.
Another ethical battlefield involves the use of cell lines derived from aborted children. Contrary to popular belief, today’s fetal stem cell lines derive from not one, but several abortions - many of them in the second trimester - and will have to be replaced with fresh victims as they are only useful for about 30 to 35 years, said the scientist.
Fetal cell line vaccines such as measles-mumps-rubella, chicken pox, and hepatitis A are not only morally problematic, said Deisher, but their use has a dramatic correlation with an epidemic on the rise: autism.
When examining the points at which autism diagnosis mysteriously spiked in the U.S., said Deisher, “the only thing that is associated with these change points is the introduction of a fetal cell vaccine.” She said the correlation even holds true for the U.S., Canada, Great Britain, Wales, Denmark, Japan, and southeastern Asian countries: “in every country we have looked at, they have different change points, every one is associated with an aborted fetal event.” No other variable, she said, has correlated so closely to the pattern of autism diagnosis.
Deisher blamed such commercialization, in part, on the growing tendency to see children as “a choice rather than a blessing,” due to technology controlling fertility such as the hormonal birth control pill.
“From that point, it was pretty easy for us to begin looking at children as a material thing, a new car or a mansion, a commodity,” she said.
PART II
Famous Pro-Abortion Feminist Calls Unborn Child a ‘Tumor’
Matthew Cullinan Hoffman
www.lifesitenews.com
(condensed version)
Nov 23, 2010
PART III
Newborn Saved from Dumpster by Man who Later Finds Out He’s the Father
www.lifesitenews.com
Oct 21, 2010
By Thaddeus M. Baklinski
(condensed version)
PART IV
Famous Pro-Abortion Feminist Calls Unborn Child a ‘Tumor’
Matthew Cullinan Hoffman
www.lifesitenews.com
(condensed version)
Nov 23, 2010
COLOMBIA:
The well-known pro-abortion feminist and psychologist Florence Thomas has published an account of her illegal abortion at the age of 22, obtained in the mid-1960s in France, in which she refers to her unborn child as a “tumor.”
In the account, Thomas says that she knew that there were “risks” associated with her out-of-wedlock relationship with her boyfriend.
“I remember the nights of warmth and love. Love every night, love at midday, and the euphoria of having the world in our hands,” she writes. “And yes, we took risks. The love merited it. Love always merits it.”
However, when the “risk” turned into the reality of an unborn child in Thomas’ womb, she and her boyfriend quickly agreed to end its life at the hands of a renegade doctor, “expelled and condemned by the Association of Gynecologists,” who performed abortions secretly at his house on the outskirts of Paris.
After the doctor had dismembered her unborn child, Thomas says she felt “a relief. An immense relief. This tumor went away, disappeared. I could go back to living.”
Thomas, who moved to Colombia to follow her then-boyfriend, is now a psychologist at the National University of Colombia and the founder of the Woman and Society Group (Grupo Mujer y Sociedad). She is famous for her claim that women should be permitted to terminate the lives of their unborn children whenever the child isn’t “desired” by the mother, because the love of the mother is what “humanizes” the fetus.
Although Thomas claims she has never felt any guilt following the deadly procedure, she admits that afterward she “knew that I would not ever again have an abortion in my life. I went through that once in my life, and I would not do it twice. Today I continue to wonder how a woman can have an abortion two or three times and even more.”
The well-known pro-abortion feminist and psychologist Florence Thomas has published an account of her illegal abortion at the age of 22, obtained in the mid-1960s in France, in which she refers to her unborn child as a “tumor.”
In the account, Thomas says that she knew that there were “risks” associated with her out-of-wedlock relationship with her boyfriend.
“I remember the nights of warmth and love. Love every night, love at midday, and the euphoria of having the world in our hands,” she writes. “And yes, we took risks. The love merited it. Love always merits it.”
However, when the “risk” turned into the reality of an unborn child in Thomas’ womb, she and her boyfriend quickly agreed to end its life at the hands of a renegade doctor, “expelled and condemned by the Association of Gynecologists,” who performed abortions secretly at his house on the outskirts of Paris.
After the doctor had dismembered her unborn child, Thomas says she felt “a relief. An immense relief. This tumor went away, disappeared. I could go back to living.”
Thomas, who moved to Colombia to follow her then-boyfriend, is now a psychologist at the National University of Colombia and the founder of the Woman and Society Group (Grupo Mujer y Sociedad). She is famous for her claim that women should be permitted to terminate the lives of their unborn children whenever the child isn’t “desired” by the mother, because the love of the mother is what “humanizes” the fetus.
Although Thomas claims she has never felt any guilt following the deadly procedure, she admits that afterward she “knew that I would not ever again have an abortion in my life. I went through that once in my life, and I would not do it twice. Today I continue to wonder how a woman can have an abortion two or three times and even more.”
PART III
Newborn Saved from Dumpster by Man who Later Finds Out He’s the Father
www.lifesitenews.com
Oct 21, 2010
By Thaddeus M. Baklinski
(condensed version)
CALGARY
A newborn left to die in a dumpster in northwest Calgary was saved by a man who only later found out he was the boy’s father.
Calgary police said that the boy’s mother told them she did not know she was pregnant until she gave birth to the child. She allegedly put the living baby in a garbage bag and tossed him into the dumpster.
The 29-year-old woman’s boyfriend said he had no idea she was pregnant because she was heavy set and always had “a bit of a belly.”
On Tuesday, October 19, the man said his girlfriend was complaining of cramps and illness. He told police that on returning home for lunch a passerby alerted him to cries coming from a dumpster.
“A girl said, ‘I think I hear a baby in the dumpster.’ With no knowledge at the time that this is my kid whatsoever, I went running over there, stood beside the dumpster, heard the baby cry,” the man, who cannot be named to protect the identity of the child, told the Calgary Herald.
“I jumped in and removed the stuff. I personally opened the bag and uncovered all the stuff off,” he said.
“My first thought seeing the baby there was disgust. I just thought ‘we’ve got to get that baby out of here’ and I didn’t know CPR,” the man said.
The baby was immediately taken to hospital where he is reported to be in stable condition. Hospital staff said it appeared the baby had been in the dumpster for about two hours before being rescued and was suffering from hypothermia when brought to them.
Police questioned the man after the rescue, and later that evening informed him that he was the child’s father. “It was the most shocking thing I’ve ever encountered in my life - to find that out from police is not something I’d ever expected to happen,” he said.
The woman is scheduled to undergo a psychiatric assessment and is facing charges of attempted murder, failing to provide the necessities of life and child abandonment.
Calgary police said that the boy’s mother told them she did not know she was pregnant until she gave birth to the child. She allegedly put the living baby in a garbage bag and tossed him into the dumpster.
The 29-year-old woman’s boyfriend said he had no idea she was pregnant because she was heavy set and always had “a bit of a belly.”
On Tuesday, October 19, the man said his girlfriend was complaining of cramps and illness. He told police that on returning home for lunch a passerby alerted him to cries coming from a dumpster.
“A girl said, ‘I think I hear a baby in the dumpster.’ With no knowledge at the time that this is my kid whatsoever, I went running over there, stood beside the dumpster, heard the baby cry,” the man, who cannot be named to protect the identity of the child, told the Calgary Herald.
“I jumped in and removed the stuff. I personally opened the bag and uncovered all the stuff off,” he said.
“My first thought seeing the baby there was disgust. I just thought ‘we’ve got to get that baby out of here’ and I didn’t know CPR,” the man said.
The baby was immediately taken to hospital where he is reported to be in stable condition. Hospital staff said it appeared the baby had been in the dumpster for about two hours before being rescued and was suffering from hypothermia when brought to them.
Police questioned the man after the rescue, and later that evening informed him that he was the child’s father. “It was the most shocking thing I’ve ever encountered in my life - to find that out from police is not something I’d ever expected to happen,” he said.
The woman is scheduled to undergo a psychiatric assessment and is facing charges of attempted murder, failing to provide the necessities of life and child abandonment.
PART IV
Nearly 25% of UK women in 20s have had an abortion: survey
www.lifesitenews.com
11/19/10
By Hilary White
(condensed version)
www.lifesitenews.com
11/19/10
By Hilary White
(condensed version)
LONDON:
The UK’s Daily Mail this week finished a three-part series on the sexual habits of modern Britons with a feature linking casual sex and Britain’s notoriously high rates of abortion among single women.
The Mail’s survey showed that almost half of British women (48%) in their 20s have had a one-night stand. For women in their 30s and 40s, the percentage was 46 and 45 percent, respectively. Twenty-three per cent of women in their 20s have had at least one abortion, with 17 and 22 per cent for women in their 30s and 40s.
More than one-third of women surveyed in their 50s have had casual sexual encounters.
Anthony Ozimic, communications officer for the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, told LifeSiteNews.com that the pro-abortion lobby is largely to blame for having created this sexual free-for-all that is damaging women.
More than one-third of women surveyed in their 50s have had casual sexual encounters.
Anthony Ozimic, communications officer for the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, told LifeSiteNews.com that the pro-abortion lobby is largely to blame for having created this sexual free-for-all that is damaging women.
“In every field of human activity or science,” he said, “young people are taught that good habits help them to avoid bad consequences - except in the field of sex and relationships.”
“The pro-abortion lobby is squarely to blame for the heart-breaking damage inflicted on countless numbers of young women through dysfunctional relations with men,” said Ozimic about the Mail’s findings. “It is the pro-abortion lobby that have sold young women the lie that sex can safely be separated from love, marriage and children.
The Mail quoted Dr. Andrew Fergusson of the Christian Medical Fellowship, saying, “We have reached a point where abortion is seen as just another method of contraception. For years, the effects have been swept under the carpet and evidence is only just beginning to emerge of real physical and psychological implications for some of the women who have abortions.”
“There is also evidence of increased suicide attempts and episodes of depression among women who have had abortions.”
“There is also evidence of increased suicide attempts and episodes of depression among women who have had abortions.”
PART V
Abortion Included in Marie Stopes Job Perks along with Discount Gym Membership
By Hilary White
www.lifesitenews.com
(condensed version)
LONDON
The Daily Mail has revealed that Marie Stopes employees are being offered free abortions as a regular part of the organization’s employee benefits package.
Marie Stopes International (MSI) employs 430 people in nine centers around Britain, with the bulk of its funding coming from the British taxpayer, to the order of £30 million annually.
The Daily Mail has revealed that Marie Stopes employees are being offered free abortions as a regular part of the organization’s employee benefits package.
Marie Stopes International (MSI) employs 430 people in nine centers around Britain, with the bulk of its funding coming from the British taxpayer, to the order of £30 million annually.
Anthony Ozimic, of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC), called it “macabre” and “sick” to provide employees with abortions, saying, “Abortion is the killing of unborn children, not a job perk.”
PART VI
Marie Stopes Abortion Ads Generate Protest while Org Hosts China’s One Child Czar
By Hilary White
May 25, 2010
www.LifeSiteNews.com
(condensed version)
May 25, 2010
www.LifeSiteNews.com
(condensed version)
LONDON:
“If you miss your period, you could be pregnant. If you’re pregnant and don’t know what to do, Marie Stopes International can help.” So goes the voice-over on the new abortion adverts that started airing on British TV last night.
Marie Stopes, one of the world’s largest abortionist groups, claims the ad is all about giving women information on “reproductive services” on their telephone consultation line. But pro-life advocates have called the ad nothing more than “deceitful propaganda,” pointing out that 90 per cent of Marie Stopes’s business is abortion.
“If you miss your period, you could be pregnant. If you’re pregnant and don’t know what to do, Marie Stopes International can help.” So goes the voice-over on the new abortion adverts that started airing on British TV last night.
Marie Stopes, one of the world’s largest abortionist groups, claims the ad is all about giving women information on “reproductive services” on their telephone consultation line. But pro-life advocates have called the ad nothing more than “deceitful propaganda,” pointing out that 90 per cent of Marie Stopes’s business is abortion.
Anthony Ozimic, communications manager for the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) told media today, in reference to the Marie Stopes ad, that, “The advertisement… doesn’t explain what Marie Stopes is and what Marie Stopes does,” which is “the killing of unborn children.”
Marie Stopes’ “consultation line,” he said, is nothing more than an “abortion booking service” that fast-tracks women into an abortion facility.
Marie Stopes is one of the world’s busiest abortionist organizations, responsible in 2008 for almost 600,000 abortions overseas. Most of its £100 million annual income comes from abortion and is spent on abortion, including extensive political lobbying for lifting legal restrictions.
“Marie Stopes advertises itself as an abortion provider on the London Underground but has soft-soaped its image in this Channel 4 advertisement,” Ozimic told LifeSiteNews.com. “We are still examining the legality of the ad.”
Marie Stopes has claimed that the government has approved their ads; but according to the broadcast regulations, advertising for abortion is not allowed if the intention is to make a profit. Marie Stopes has skirted the rules because it is officially classed as a charity.
“Women deserve better than abortion. We want the government to ensure that women are not misled by this kind of deceitful propaganda.”
Marie Stopes has claimed that the government has approved their ads; but according to the broadcast regulations, advertising for abortion is not allowed if the intention is to make a profit. Marie Stopes has skirted the rules because it is officially classed as a charity.
“Women deserve better than abortion. We want the government to ensure that women are not misled by this kind of deceitful propaganda.”
“What they won’t show is the horrific reality of unborn children killed by abortion, or the physical and emotional harm suffered by women after abortion. Abortion is not a 'service' - it is a dis-service to vulnerable women.”
Marie Stopes is one of the major players, along with the United Nations Fund for Population and the International Planned Parenthood Federation, who have supported China's one-child population control program. That program has resulted in a disastrous gender imbalance in the population, since unborn girls in China are routinely targeted and killed due to a cultural preference for boys.
Marie Stopes is one of the major players, along with the United Nations Fund for Population and the International Planned Parenthood Federation, who have supported China's one-child population control program. That program has resulted in a disastrous gender imbalance in the population, since unborn girls in China are routinely targeted and killed due to a cultural preference for boys.
Tibet Truth said Marie Stopes “would appear oblivious to the horrifying women’s human rights violations caused by China’s coercive birth-control policies.” Marie Stopes, they said, “seems unable to offer a word of public condemnation, concern or opposition to such medical atrocities.”
PART VII:
VIETNAM
After decades of involvement in coercive population control measures, including abortion, contraception, and sterilization of women, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is admitting that policies it has championed are causing a serious imbalance in the ratio of male to female births in Vietnam.
In a series of public statements that began in June of this year, the UNFPA notes that “Vietnamese parents’ long-standing preference for sons, increased access to sex selection technology and declining fertility rates, which have increased pressure on smaller families to fulfill their wish for a son, are the main causes for the rapid changes in Viet Nam’s sex ratio at birth in favor of males.”
The agency adds that “in Viet Nam, ultrasound and abortion services are legal and easy to obtain. However, the identification of the sex of a fetus and sex-selective abortions are illegal. Nevertheless, these services are available in private clinics.”
As LifeSiteNews reported in March, Vietnam’s own statistics indicate that about 112 boys are now being born for every 100 girls, with localized increases to between 115 to 123 boys for every 100 girls in some areas.
The overall abortion rate in Vietnam is skyrocketing, and women now have an average of more than three abortions during their lifetime; the practice is especially prevalent among teenagers.
In addition, the Vietnamese government actively encourages abortion with a coercively-imposed two-child limit, although enforcement measures are more lax than China’s famous one child policy.
Abortion causing huge gender imbalance in Vietnam, UN admits
12/10/10
lifesitenews.com
Matthew Cullinan Hoffman
(condensed version)
12/10/10
lifesitenews.com
Matthew Cullinan Hoffman
(condensed version)
VIETNAM
After decades of involvement in coercive population control measures, including abortion, contraception, and sterilization of women, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is admitting that policies it has championed are causing a serious imbalance in the ratio of male to female births in Vietnam.
In a series of public statements that began in June of this year, the UNFPA notes that “Vietnamese parents’ long-standing preference for sons, increased access to sex selection technology and declining fertility rates, which have increased pressure on smaller families to fulfill their wish for a son, are the main causes for the rapid changes in Viet Nam’s sex ratio at birth in favor of males.”
The agency adds that “in Viet Nam, ultrasound and abortion services are legal and easy to obtain. However, the identification of the sex of a fetus and sex-selective abortions are illegal. Nevertheless, these services are available in private clinics.”
As LifeSiteNews reported in March, Vietnam’s own statistics indicate that about 112 boys are now being born for every 100 girls, with localized increases to between 115 to 123 boys for every 100 girls in some areas.
The overall abortion rate in Vietnam is skyrocketing, and women now have an average of more than three abortions during their lifetime; the practice is especially prevalent among teenagers.
In addition, the Vietnamese government actively encourages abortion with a coercively-imposed two-child limit, although enforcement measures are more lax than China’s famous one child policy.
PART VIII:
Doctors highlight Korean abortion problem
www.cathnewsindia.com
December 13, 2010
(condensed version)
A group of young obstetricians campaigning against abortion in South Korea have highlighted the country’s high number of pregnancy terminations and has suggested ways to redress it. Korean Prolife Doctors Association member Kim Hae-suk said there were some 340,000 abortions in 2005.
“This means about 1,000 babies a day and some 72 percent of new-born babies were killed,” she noted.
The obstetrician, speaking at a symposium marking the group’s first anniversary on Dec. 11, asked people, society and the government to remind “a fetus is already a human being” and urged medical doctors to recover their duty to respect life.
Doctors highlight Korean abortion problem
www.cathnewsindia.com
December 13, 2010
(condensed version)
A group of young obstetricians campaigning against abortion in South Korea have highlighted the country’s high number of pregnancy terminations and has suggested ways to redress it. Korean Prolife Doctors Association member Kim Hae-suk said there were some 340,000 abortions in 2005.
“This means about 1,000 babies a day and some 72 percent of new-born babies were killed,” she noted.
The obstetrician, speaking at a symposium marking the group’s first anniversary on Dec. 11, asked people, society and the government to remind “a fetus is already a human being” and urged medical doctors to recover their duty to respect life.
PART IX:
How dare you as a man…
www.lifesitenews.com
Celia Wolf-Devine
(condensed version)
Dec 10, 2010
Certainly the experience of pregnancy and childbirth is unique to women. And although a man can try to understand empathetically, both the joys and the pains women go through remain a closed book to them. The wonderful sense of heightened life that comes with feeling that there is a new life within you, the first experience of the baby’s motion and the unique sort of intimacy that develops during pregnancy are things men can’t experience just as much as the morning sickness, the discomforts of late pregnancy, and the violent pains of childbirth are. But this proves nothing at all about whether men are entitled to make moral judgments about abortion.
We each began life in a woman’s womb and can therefore say for every abortion “it might have been me.” By virtue of our shared humanity, we all have an obligation to come to the defense of innocent and helpless human beings.
If we saw an infant about to be run over by a truck, our duty to rescue it would be obvious.
Abortions are morally similar, but they are performed in special facilities by people in white coats. The distinctively human features of the embryo or fetus are downplayed and hushed up. But they are there for anyone who chooses to look.
Second, for every pregnancy there is one man who has a particularly strong obligation to protect the new life – namely the father.
The embryo didn’t just fall out of the sky or arrive via a stork; it came into existence as a result of an action performed by both of the parents. Parents have an obligation to care for their children – to protect and nurture them.
Once pregnancy has occurred they are already parents; the time for “reproductive choice” has passed. Their son or daughter may be still tiny and immature, but it is there, and they are obligated to care for it.
The impact of abortion on fathers, especially, has been hushed up in order to make it look like abortion concerns only the woman who should therefore have the freedom to terminate the pregnancy. A number of men (in addition to aborted unborn males) are damaged by abortion and not just the father. The grandfathers, uncles and brothers of the aborted individual can be scarred for life as well. But the father is most deeply affected.
The effect is immediately felt when the woman gets an abortion against the father’s wishes. There is a certain pride in being able to make a new life spring into being. A mystery and sense of power – whether or not the pregnancy was desired or intended. When the father tries to protect his baby and she goes ahead with the abortion anyway, feelings of rage and powerlessness flow naturally. (I was once on a radio talk show abortion debate in San Francisco, whose host was going through this sort of anger and powerlessness but felt too intimidated by aggressive feminists to say so on the air.)
In destroying a man’s baby the woman is rejecting him on a deep level, and abortion usually terminates the relationship between the parents, even if the man went along with it willingly.
How dare you as a man…
www.lifesitenews.com
Celia Wolf-Devine
(condensed version)
Dec 10, 2010
Certainly the experience of pregnancy and childbirth is unique to women. And although a man can try to understand empathetically, both the joys and the pains women go through remain a closed book to them. The wonderful sense of heightened life that comes with feeling that there is a new life within you, the first experience of the baby’s motion and the unique sort of intimacy that develops during pregnancy are things men can’t experience just as much as the morning sickness, the discomforts of late pregnancy, and the violent pains of childbirth are. But this proves nothing at all about whether men are entitled to make moral judgments about abortion.
We each began life in a woman’s womb and can therefore say for every abortion “it might have been me.” By virtue of our shared humanity, we all have an obligation to come to the defense of innocent and helpless human beings.
If we saw an infant about to be run over by a truck, our duty to rescue it would be obvious.
Abortions are morally similar, but they are performed in special facilities by people in white coats. The distinctively human features of the embryo or fetus are downplayed and hushed up. But they are there for anyone who chooses to look.
Second, for every pregnancy there is one man who has a particularly strong obligation to protect the new life – namely the father.
The embryo didn’t just fall out of the sky or arrive via a stork; it came into existence as a result of an action performed by both of the parents. Parents have an obligation to care for their children – to protect and nurture them.
Once pregnancy has occurred they are already parents; the time for “reproductive choice” has passed. Their son or daughter may be still tiny and immature, but it is there, and they are obligated to care for it.
The impact of abortion on fathers, especially, has been hushed up in order to make it look like abortion concerns only the woman who should therefore have the freedom to terminate the pregnancy. A number of men (in addition to aborted unborn males) are damaged by abortion and not just the father. The grandfathers, uncles and brothers of the aborted individual can be scarred for life as well. But the father is most deeply affected.
The effect is immediately felt when the woman gets an abortion against the father’s wishes. There is a certain pride in being able to make a new life spring into being. A mystery and sense of power – whether or not the pregnancy was desired or intended. When the father tries to protect his baby and she goes ahead with the abortion anyway, feelings of rage and powerlessness flow naturally. (I was once on a radio talk show abortion debate in San Francisco, whose host was going through this sort of anger and powerlessness but felt too intimidated by aggressive feminists to say so on the air.)
In destroying a man’s baby the woman is rejecting him on a deep level, and abortion usually terminates the relationship between the parents, even if the man went along with it willingly.
If the man pressured her into an abortion, severe guilt is likely to result at some point. (A friend of mine working on a suicide prevention hotline received a call from such a man.) And even if the woman insists on the abortion and the man feels relief at the time, feelings of grief and shame often surface many years later (as happened to a friend of mine in his late forties after his son died prematurely).
A man who marries a post abortive woman will have heavy emotional baggage to deal with even if he had nothing to do with the abortion, and a woman’s capacity to bond with subsequent children can be seriously compromised by an earlier abortion.
In short, the poisonous ripple effect that spreads out from the violence of abortion touches the lives of many people, and not just the woman. Men as well as women can look at what is destroyed in an abortion and reflect about this in light of moral principles, and take a searching look at the consequences that result from abortion for those directly affected by it and for society as a whole.
(Note: Celia Wolf-Devine is an extensively published author and lecturer in Philosophy. She, along with her husband Phil Devine are co-authors of a book on Abortion published by Oxford University Press).
A man who marries a post abortive woman will have heavy emotional baggage to deal with even if he had nothing to do with the abortion, and a woman’s capacity to bond with subsequent children can be seriously compromised by an earlier abortion.
In short, the poisonous ripple effect that spreads out from the violence of abortion touches the lives of many people, and not just the woman. Men as well as women can look at what is destroyed in an abortion and reflect about this in light of moral principles, and take a searching look at the consequences that result from abortion for those directly affected by it and for society as a whole.
(Note: Celia Wolf-Devine is an extensively published author and lecturer in Philosophy. She, along with her husband Phil Devine are co-authors of a book on Abortion published by Oxford University Press).
PART X
ON THE LIGHTER SIDE OF LIFE
Thanks to Dr. Lewis for forwarding below e-mail:
The meal
The sharing of marriage......
The old man placed order for one hamburger, French fries and a drink.
He unwrapped the plain hamburger and carefully cut it in half, placing one half in front of his wife.
He then carefully counted out the French fries, dividing them into two piles and neatly placed one pile in front of his wife.
He took a sip of the drink, his wife took a sip and then set the cup down between them. As he began to eat his few bites of hamburger, the people around them were looking over and whispering.
Obviously they were thinking, 'That poor old couple - all they can afford is one meal for the two of them.'
As the man began to eat his fries a young man came to the table and politely offered to buy another meal for the old couple. The old man said, they were just fine - they were used to sharing everything.
People closer to the table noticed the little old lady hadn't eaten a bite. She sat there watching her husband eat and occasionally taking turns sipping the drink.
Again, the young man came over and begged them to let him buy another meal for them. This time the old woman said 'No, thank you, we are used to sharing everything.'
Finally, as the old man finished and was wiping his face neatly with the napkin, the young man again came over to the little old lady who had yet to eat a single bite of food and asked 'What is it you are waiting for?'
She answered
(Continue below - This is great)
'THE TEETH.'
THE END
The sharing of marriage......
The old man placed order for one hamburger, French fries and a drink.
He unwrapped the plain hamburger and carefully cut it in half, placing one half in front of his wife.
He then carefully counted out the French fries, dividing them into two piles and neatly placed one pile in front of his wife.
He took a sip of the drink, his wife took a sip and then set the cup down between them. As he began to eat his few bites of hamburger, the people around them were looking over and whispering.
Obviously they were thinking, 'That poor old couple - all they can afford is one meal for the two of them.'
As the man began to eat his fries a young man came to the table and politely offered to buy another meal for the old couple. The old man said, they were just fine - they were used to sharing everything.
People closer to the table noticed the little old lady hadn't eaten a bite. She sat there watching her husband eat and occasionally taking turns sipping the drink.
Again, the young man came over and begged them to let him buy another meal for them. This time the old woman said 'No, thank you, we are used to sharing everything.'
Finally, as the old man finished and was wiping his face neatly with the napkin, the young man again came over to the little old lady who had yet to eat a single bite of food and asked 'What is it you are waiting for?'
She answered
(Continue below - This is great)
'THE TEETH.'
THE END
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