Every time someone talks smack about Planned Parenthood, I basically want to scream. It seems like the people doing the most talking are the ones who don’t know what they’re talking about.
Maybe I let the stupid things people say on Facebook get to me, but yesterday I saw that someone had posted misinformation about Planned Parenthood, government funding, and abortion. The post said that every 94 seconds, an abortion was performed, and commented on how sick it is that this is where our tax dollars are going.
Maybe it would be sick, but that’s another topic, except here’s the thing: government funding cannot cover abortions. See for yourself. Learn something before you go off talking about it.
On another note, I can honestly say that I know nobody – NOBODY – who is an abortion enthusiast. Do you? Are girls sitting around at brunch these days talking to their girlfriends: “Yeah, so last Saturday, I went out with Jimmy to the movies, and then I went shopping, had an abortion, and pinned a new recipe on Pinterest! What a great time! I can’t wait to do it again!”
Is this realistic?
NO. NOBODY IS ENTHUSIASTIC ABOUT ABORTION.
People tend to forget that abortion is a really tough decision that some people find to be the right one for them. The decision is often not arrived at easily, and comes with emotional distress and heartache that we don’t know from the outside world. Guilt. Shame. Fear. Sadness.
I REPEAT. NOBODY IS ENTHUSIASTIC ABOUT ABORTION.
The fact of the matter is, plain and simple, that if people want to get abortions, they’re going to get abortions. Abortions happened during times when they were not legal, during times when they were not safe. Backed into a corner, frightened people often make irrational decisions, back-alley decisions, the kind of decisions that could lead to infections and death for more than just the unborn. Before abortions were legalized and regulated, some estimates say that 15,000 women died yearly from botched back-alley jobs. Imagine your sister, your niece, your daughter, your mother, pregnant, afraid, seeking a way to get out of their situation by hitting up a rando coat-hanger operation and losing their own life? Wouldn’t you rather have the safer option available for them? Chew on that for a hot second.
My last piece is this: chill out about Planned Parenthood. They’re a good organization. They’re doing good work in the world. They’re not all about abortions and they do not advocate for abortion; they simply provide the service as a safe option for women who’ve determined (and not lightly, we would hope) that it’s their best option. PP educates; they screen; they are a resource and a familiar name for men and women who may know no other option, who may not be able to afford anything else, and who need help.
I love babies and children. One day, I want to be a mother. In fact, I can’t wait for it. They are a beautiful blessing and an absolute joy. But some people don’t have the room in their life for pregnancy or parenthood. Who am I to tell them that their choices in life are wrong because they may not be the same as mine? Planned Parenthood is doing no wrong by providing a service. They are not applying government funding to abortion procedures. They are not promoting abortion; they are simply providing the service without bias or judgment to the people who need it and would seek it elsewhere if the option didn’t exist. Ask yourself, isn’t it better that they’re there? Knowing that abortion is going to exist with or without Planned Parenthood, with or without government funding, with our without Roe v. Wade, how can anyone possibly disagree with this?
Give Planned Parenthood a break. Get your facts straight, people.
And for goodness sake, if you hate abortion so much, then don’t get one, and leave the choice alone for the people who need to make that tough decision. Get out of someone else’s uterus and mind your own.
Great post. I totally agree with you!
Katie, are you familiar with reblogging? Someone tried to reblog this and it was associated with some dead fetus images, and I’d like to have that not happen. Pro advice?
To tell the truth, I’m really not. I haven’t ever reblogged anything, and there’s only been a few occasions where someone has reblogged something of mine. The reblog itself was somehow linked to dead fetus images?!
People may not be abortion enthusiasts, but a small (small!) number of women out there use it as birth control – and a perhaps greater number of men brag about having been “saved” by it, including one guy we went to high school with who bragged senior year, “Yeah, abortions have already saved my ass twice!” to which his friends were like “ahhahaha you’re so awesome man, I wish I was cool like you, you da bomb, let’s pillow fight and make-out” (or whatever it is guys say to each other). Those people are misusing something that is supposed to be there for emergencies, so that women and girls who either do not want or are not ready to be mothers aren’t forced to bring unwanted/unplanned children into this world. It used to be that women risked death to get these procedures. Now, they are safe (well, safer. No surgery is 100% safe). What I think we need to focus on, though, is WHY there are so many unplanned pregnancies in this country still. Birth control should be readily available and affordable for all who desire it. Diminish the number of unplanned pregnancies to diminish the number of abortions performed each year. Just my opinion.
Nevertheless I don’t see PP as being a bad organization. They do so many good things in the world but yet it seems people only think about the negative.
I don’t think they’re bad, either.