jj@rabbit.UUCP (03/22/84)
I'm opposed to requiring another waiting period (what do you think happens after the woman finds out she's pregnant, have an abortion that afternoon???) for abortions because of the record of some of the anti-abortion people in the area of Ohio I was born in. These folks, at least until three years ago, would get the names of people who were to have abortions from sympathetic doctors <sure, catch them... HOW?> and then going to talk to these people, to try to "SAVE" them. They would rave about "hellfire", and such, and show the possible mother bloody pictures of aborted fetuses (not clinical pictures, but deliberately sensationalized pictures) and tell them horror stories about what happens to mothers who have abortions <i.e. they die, they are paralyzed, etc...>. (Needless to say, they didn't discuss the risks of pregnancies, which are considerably higher, but then again, why am I surprised?) The results of these tactics, in human terms, was atrocious. I suspect the suicide rate they caused would make both abortion and pregnancy look safe by comparison, and I do know that the percentage of folks that they drove to psychological collapse was around 25%. <And, yes, they tried to have some of those people declared incompetant, in order to "save" the fetus and the mother.> I've seen similar techniques used (although much less blatantly and offensively) where I went to college, and I've heard of them, although I haven't talked to victims of the same, in New Jersey, so it appears that the tactics aren't limited to one geographical area. Enough. (Now you see one of the many reasons that I suspect the intentions and abilities of many "pro-lifer"'s.) -- TEDDY BEARS ARE NICER THAN PEOPLE--HUG YOURS TODAY! (If you go out in the woods today ... ) (allegra,harpo,ulysses)!rabbit!jj