Unplanned - Abortion Film **Trigger Warning** Title edited by MNHQ sensitive content*

[Mum2386]

Hi,
Last night I watched a film called Unplanned, which is based on a true story of a lady working within an abortion clinic called ‘Planned Parenthood’. The film itself brought me to tears on many occasions and it’s made me feel very uncomfortable surrounding abortion. I had an unplanned pregnancy with my third child but knew abortion wasn’t an option for me. I am quite shocked by the amount of abortions that still take place within our society. Does anyone else feel this way? I know we all have different views but i just wondered what other people’s thoughts were on this very sensitive topic.

• prior to having an adoption should read abortion. typo

The biggest single thing you can do if you want to reduce abortion rates imo is legislate for men to pay for their children as soon as they are born. In the same way that council tax is enforced, child maintenance should be automatically deducted for all wages.

Whilst we have a system that allows men to walk away from parental responsibilities, abortion rates cannot reduce significantly as most women know that whilst it takes two to make a baby, they cannot legally force the other sex to take on this responsibility and may not be able to provide a good standard of living for a child, alone. Abortion may be the consequence.

And for all those judging a woman's capacity to manage her birth control...most women have been doing this from the age of 16 onwards without any form of support and mostly successfully otherwise we'd all be having babies or abortions every month.

I suggest that the problem is a lack of expectations upon men to exercise the same diligence with birth control. If they were expected to use condoms each and every time it wouldn't matter so much whether a woman's contraceptive failed so much. That constitutes equal responsibility no?

Saying it takes two to make a baby and then expecting the woman to do all the prevention is hypocrisy at its finest.

Solution: FOCUS ON THE MEN!

"As for all the infertile couples... pregnant women who don't want a baby owe them nothing"

For god sake leave infertile couples out of this. Just because you can’t have children doesn’t mean that you are desperate to adopt other people’s.

@Wiltshirelass20

Yes, I mentioned it because I dislike adoption being dragged into the abortion debate

@MyNewBearTotoro
Yes, I have read the entire thread. I took any general statement to be referring to the US. Most statements did not specify the U.K.
So those that said U.K. I took as applying to U.K.
The rest that were silent (the majority) I took as applying to the US. Because the film was about the US and initially OP and were discussing the film and why those US women “waited” or could not get contraception etc etc.

I guess it underlines the importance of posters needing to be accurate in what they say.

formerbabe I agree but I hate the way infertile couples are vilified when it comes to matters of adoption. It’s so cruel

@BarrenFieldofFucks well abortion isn't nice is it? I’m strongly pro choice but that doesn’t mean I have to think that abortion is a nice thing to do or the same as any other medical procedure. You can’t deny the ethical implications of it compared to other medical procedures.

The reason some women get so incredibly angry about is in my opinion because it touches a nerve (their conscious) and they don't like that. Understandably.

Why do people flatter themselves like this? It's fantasist behaviour: 'They don't agree with me, so it must be that I have personally touched them somehow.'

Nope. I never had an abortion and now never will as I am too old to bear children. That's neither here nor there to me.

I believe that no one should be forced to give birth if she doesn't want to and in keeping abortion safe and legal. That's the bottom line.

I think banning abortion bans safe abortion and is misogynistic and barbaric.

@naggynora
“The biggest single thing you can do if you want to reduce abortion rates imo is legislate for men to pay for their children as soon as they are born.”
Don’t know about the U.K., but in the US this is already the case so long as the mother puts the father on the birth certificate. It’s not affected abortion rates tbh. And besides, if I did want to reduce the number of abortions, I would rather invest in better contraception. I don’t care if it is for the male or female, but would prefer better contraception for both sexes so that neither partner is having to depend on and trust the other to prevent pregnancy. Prevention is worth a pound of cure and should be responsibility of men and women equally.

Condoms aren’t a solution as they are less effective than hormonal birth control. I think it is 15% failure rate IRL use (as opposed to the 1% laboratory rate).

@naggynora
“The biggest single thing you can do if you want to reduce abortion rates imo is legislate for men to pay for their children as soon as they are born.”

Thinking further on your solution...I think because we have this here in US already..it may have encouraged an increase in coerced abortions. Epstein is known to have forced his underage victims to get abortions. When men have more at stake if the pregnancy is seen through, they tend to then exert more influence over the decision. I’d be interested in any statistics that compare the rate of coerced abortions in countries relative to the legal ramifications of fatherhood.

@DoctorAllcome
You miss the point. If men were to take charge of their fertility and women were to take charge of theirs, the failure rate would be significantly higher.

It is not for women to bear responsibility for men's fertility. They have enough to worry about with their own. If people believe it takes two to make a baby, it follows that both parties are responsible for managing their own fertility

'An unborn baby is a combination of both parents genetic material and is a brand new human in their own right.'

Oh! Light bulb! It's because half of it belongs to someone else, a man.

Never thought of that as a driver. Obvious when you think about it.

The poster earlier who expressed the view that women who are pregnant with babies with conditions incompatible with life (no brain, for example) should continue the pregnancy and give birth because 'miracles happen'.

I note that this would also be a reason to deny a woman an abortion to save her life.

You can’t deny the ethical implications of it compared to other medical procedures.

I guess that the problem is whilst most people agree there is a point at which you have to take into account ethical implications there is no consensus on when the conjoined egg and sperm becomes a human in its own right.

Is it at the moment of conception? In that case what about embryos created for IVF etc - is disposing of a frozen embryo the same as abortion? Or is an embryo not considered human until 6 weeks? 8? 12? 20? Or is it only when it’s viable? If so, what counts as being viable? A baby has survived at 21 weeks 5 days but to be viable at that stage is incredibly rare. So at what point can we agree is viable - when 25% of babies would survive? 50%? 75%? 90%? And what do we mean by survival - do we mean to be healthy or just to live? Many surviving babies born so premature will have complex disabilities and/ or health issues. And what about if the baby will be born with a disability? Should the cut off point for termination be different? If we say yes does that mean a disabled person’s life is less valued? And what about if the woman’s life is in danger if she carries the foetus to term? At what point (if any) does the life of the foetus become more important than that of the woman carrying it?

It’s not black and white. Every person’s stance will be different, which is why pro-choice seems the obvious stance. Each pregnant woman can make her own decision on whether she thinks an abortion is ethically right for her based on her own understanding of the situation. And if you believe that abortion is wrong nobody will force you into having one, but it’s readily available for those whose ethics say that abortion is a reasonable action to take.

Just catching up.

Why the fuck are we being bombarded with irrelevant stats?

First the ops which were totally made up.

Now a load of stuff about America. We're not American. This is a UK site. We are miles away from America geographically, culturally, you name it.

Maybe some stats from Venezuela would help? Where their abortion laws are so strict, they imprison women for miscarrying. Just as relevant, probably.

Nobody should ever be forced to have, or to perform an abortion.

Nobody should ever be prevented from having, or performing an abortion.

Apologies el Salvador.

Although it's illegal in Venezuela too, so their stats on women dying through unsafe abortion might be relevant?

There are more abortions generally in counties that ban it, usually because it comes with difficulty getting contraception, and very misogynist views, including about the value of a woman who is pregnant in circs society disapproves of.

'Condoms aren’t a solution as they are less effective than hormonal birth control. I think it is 15% failure rate IRL use (as opposed to the 1% laboratory rate).'

Oho.

I see you.

Telling women on a website this size that condoms are crap so don't bother, has come up before. On threads about other things. Very interesting.

@Fraggling

why the fuck are we being bombarded

Please calm down. The OP initially started the thread about Unplanned which is a US documentary about US women. The situation in the US regarding contraception access, abortion access, costs, is vastly different from the U.K. There is no reason why an inclusive site that welcomes moms from the US cannot discuss abortion for both US and U.K. using statistics from both countries.

Mum2386 Are you a bit thick? Do you know what the word choice means? I mean I already posted a picture of a dead woman due to an illegal abortion, should I post some more? The fact you want to force women into these situations because they don’t want to have a baby because it’s not what you would choose is disgusting.

I'm perfectly calm thanks.

Just irritated with all this stuff about state laws and us stats on a UK website.

I find it continually intriguing and not a little irritating that so many usa people charge around in the internet seemingly thinking that what happens in the USA is universal and default.

It's not. This is a UK thread on a UK site populated mainly by UK women. You pontificating about state laws is totally irrelevant and a distraction.

If you believe its useful to have info from other parts of the world maybe you can give us some insights on the law in China, India, Romania, Brazil? That would be interesting.

There are other countries in the world than the US of a.

@Fraggling
“Telling women on a website this size that condoms are crap so don't bother, has come up before. ”

It’s a good thing I did not say that then, isn’t it? You are plucking my response to naggy regarding how we need better contraception since the majority of abortions occur due to contraception failure not the misogynistic myth of irresponsible sex. I have never said don’t bother with contraception, something is far superior to nothing.

formerbabe I agree but I hate the way infertile couples are vilified when it comes to matters of adoption. It’s so cruel

I think a lot of people see two problems...

1. People who can't have children
2. Women who are pregnant and don't want to be.

And think they can solve both of their problems through adoption.

It's unfair to both groups really

UK pro-lifers frequently use anti-abortion propaganda films from other countries so I don’t think this thread has taken a wrong turn by referring generally to the situation in the UK.
I believe that was OP’s intention. Propaganda to scare women into not having abortions by focusing on the medical procedure itself. As I said previously, it’s not as if any other invasive medical procedure is a walk in the park. Watch a video of a traumatic birth and you might feel it’s not for you.

'Condoms aren’t a solution as they are less effective than hormonal birth control. I think it is 15% failure rate IRL use (as opposed to the 1% laboratory rate).'

Condoms aren't a solution.
You literally said that.
If used properly they are 98% effective.
Many couples use them in combination with hormonal birth control.
They also protect against many stds.

They are a solution, or at least a very big help, to lots of issues.
The 15% failure is if not used properly and as only form of contraception.

Many many women, couples, use condoms as primary form of contraception with no issues.

The above is scare mongering and out of order.