"The mother who carries a child to full term is subject to anxieties, to physical constraints, to pain that only she must bear. That these sacrifices have from the beginning of the human race been endured by woman with a pride that ennobles her in the eyes of others and gives to the infant a bond of love cannot alone be grounds for the State to insist that she make the sacrifice. Her suffering is too intimate and personal for the State to insist, without more, upon its own vision of the women's role, however dominant that vision has been in the course of our history and our culture. The destiny of the woman must be shaped to a large extent on her own conception of her spiritual imperatives and her place in society."
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Is this not the crux of this entire debate about women? that some people want to relegate women to being "respected due to our roles (and sacrifices) as mothers and in that context, insist that we WANT and MUST do this sacrifice" while others are perfectly content to let each woman deal with her own choices as grown ups.


I read more and more legislation (proposed and passed), and the recent Opiinion of the Carthart decision, and find myself feelign like it was written to address the needs of 5 year olds.

so, is it teh biological case that pregnance turns us into blithering idiots who cannot figure out for ourselves, what risks we are wililng to take; when we are willing to take them. how we view our own selfless and selfish sides, etc?

Oh, and by the way, honerable Kennedy, i do not need you telling me that i shall regrete my decision. 20 years and i've not regretted it yet.

(I wonder, sometimes, where the women are who are - not proud per say - but fully content, fully actualized, fully happy with thire choices to have abortions and who are willing to stand up to these right wing nut jobs (well, not so nutty any more, these are now "centrists" saying this) and say "my body, my choice, my life, my happiness. stay the fuck out !)