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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To assume if you are anti-abortion, you are...

431 replies

Hamandcheesebaguette · 26/05/2018 20:24

...pro a full, complete and comprehensive government benefits system to fund mothers for at least the first 5 years of her child's life?

I'll tell my story, it's not particularly interesting or traumatic, but had I not had access to a safe abortion at 6 weeks then I honest to god don't know how i would have not have ended up homeless or starving.

When I was 21, I met a man. Same age as me. I was working in an airport, leaving for work at 2.45am and usually not getting home until after 4pm. My take home pay was around £980 per month. After rent in my 1 bedroom flat in the cheapest (and also not particularly pleasant) area in my expensive city, council tax, topped up my gas and electricity meters and phone bill (I didn't even have a TV!) I had £35 left to eat and pay for buses to work for the rest of the month. After only knowing this man for 6 weeks, I found out I was pregnant. I was on the pill, maybe it failed, maybe I had missed a couple, I don't know.

Should I have had that baby... how in the hell would I have been able to provide anything for it on that wage? Oh wait, I wouldn't have had a wage at all bevause I wouldn't have had anybody to care for my baby whilst I was working full time and leaving for work in the middle of the night.

So I assume, if you are anti abortion, and I had had that baby, you also agree I should have been entitled to a reasonable council property (not covered in damp or mould or other H&S issues), my rent paid, my council tax paid, plus money provided for gas, electricity, food etc. Plus some furniture (as I always rented fully furnished and didn't have any furniture of my own at 21), a TV, broadband (or maybe I should have sat in with my baby with absolutely nothing except the walls to stare at...)

Plus possible full training paid for by the government when I could have gone back to work once this baby reached school age, as I wouldn't have been a very attractive job applicant by this point.

AIBU to assume this is tour stance if you insist I should have been forced to have been a mother when I didn't want to be one, couldn't afford to be one?

OP posts:
stevie69 · 27/05/2018 17:16

I suspect you know that it is fairly obvious

Amazing! You know what the pro-lifers think. You know what I know. Wish I had some of your skills!

Pengggwn · 27/05/2018 17:17

stevie69

Yes, I know what a pro-life position entails, stevie. There is little mystery about it.

SensoryOverlord · 27/05/2018 17:21

Do I have a track record of 'having a go at the horse? No? Thought not

Is this like a Z-list celeb 'don't you know who I am' type question?

Sorry to break it to you but I have no idea who you are or what your posting track record is like 😂

stevie69 · 27/05/2018 17:22

What does remaining a virgin have to do with an anti-abortion position?

Sorry, am I missing something here? If I choose to have sex then I accept the small risk that I may become pregnant. I absolutely, definitely do not want any children. So, what would those who deny me the right to a termination have me do? I'd just like to have a sensible debate with someone who is genuinely anti-abortion. It is a debate after all .... isn't it?

stevie69 · 27/05/2018 17:24

Yes, I know what a pro-life position entails, stevie. There is little mystery about it.

Yeah, but you know fuck all about me!

Pengggwn · 27/05/2018 17:26

stevie69

This is getting bizarre. I'm out.

stevie69 · 27/05/2018 17:26

Is this like a Z-list celeb 'don't you know who I am' type question?

Sorry to break it to you but I have no idea who you are or what your posting track record is like 😂

No need for apologies. No offence taken.

stevie69 · 27/05/2018 17:27

This is getting bizarre. I'm out.

For ever? Get in!

Xenia · 27/05/2018 17:27

If I were anti abortion I might be anti sex outside marriage and sex outside the possibility of conception too, so that is obviously one position. Another anti abortion position might be that if your contraception fails then you give up the baby to adoption rather than kill it.

stevie69 · 27/05/2018 17:28

And .... it's not at all bizarre. I'd like to hear from someone with an opposing point of view. What's so strange?

Pengggwn · 27/05/2018 17:31

stevie69

You don't get to specify who replies to you, stevie. I won't be replying again because your previous posts don't make sense. Hmm

LassWiADelicateAir · 27/05/2018 17:33

stevie are you being deliberately obtuse?

I am pro- choice. I would have voted yes if I were in Ireland.

It is patently obvious that if anyone is anti-abortion that the desire to have sex with the risk of all consequences removed cannot be accommodated.

From their viewpoint if a person has sex , pregnancy might be the consequence. What you do then , for an anti-abortionist, is either have and keep the baby or give it up for abortion.

Loandbeholdagain · 27/05/2018 17:34

In answer to your question yes I would and have always voted to pay more tax to support children and their parent/s.

I’m pro-life but express that through my socialism not through wanting to stop the legal right to an abortion. I want to make contraception better and easier to access, child support system better, benefits reflect child caring more and more training grants for returning to work. These should all be accessible at any age (not when you are 25!). I am also in favour of legalising private adoption (where the birth mum chooses the parents and the amount of contact).

I know these steps wouldn’t stop all abortion, but to my mind it’s a tragedy, so we should do all we can to make the circumstances less pressing for women.

stevie69 · 27/05/2018 17:35

@Pengggwn

Not trying to specify who replies to me; merely expressing my joy that you won't be!

My posts make perfect sense. But I'm pleased to hear that you won't be replying further. Although, you did say you were 'out' a couple of posts ago. Please stick to your word this time.

LassWiADelicateAir · 27/05/2018 17:37

My posts make perfect sense

They don't.

stevie69 · 27/05/2018 17:40

From their viewpoint if a person has sex , pregnancy might be the consequence. What you do then , for an anti-abortionist, is either have and keep the baby or give it up for abortion.

I'd like to hear their view point: not your take on it

I've made it quite clear that I don't want to have the child, either to keep or to be adopted. Should I therefore have to remain from having sex until I can be sure that I won't conceive?

I'm not the only person on the thread to raise this issue, btw.

stevie69 · 27/05/2018 17:41

They don't.

They do. Try reading a bit more slowly ....

Xenia · 27/05/2018 17:47

I think I just answered it with two anti abortion answers so hopefully one of those helps explain the position of some people but it is hard to generalise across all views.

What is very important is we don't become a UK with one view on every topic and that we understand and respect people across a wide range of issues have very different views.

LassWiADelicateAir · 27/05/2018 17:53

Should I therefore have to remain from having sex until I can be sure that I won't conceive?

You are beginning to sound like the sort of bloke who comes on to FWR and argues prostitution should be decriminalised/ legalised because otherwise what are those poor blokes who don't have partners supposed to do.

Having sex for fun is a want, not a need.

Soubriquet · 27/05/2018 18:12

I get where steve is coming from

Crude as it is

She's basically saying, that people who don't believe in abortions, should she has a women who wants a sex life, abstain from having sex just in case she falls pregnant?

Now obviously yes, sex is a want and not a need but it's part of a normal healthy sex life and no one would turn round and say never have sex until you are 100% sure you will not fall pregnant

Pengggwn · 27/05/2018 18:15

Soubriquet

It is perfectly obvious what she is saying. It is equally obvious that a person holding a pro-life position would say yes, she should abstain rather than abort. But she won't accept that that is what the position entails. She keeps asking the question, rejecting the validity of the answer unless someone who is pro-life comes on here and defends it.

Soubriquet · 27/05/2018 18:16

But surely it's a silly solution

There's plenty of married women who do not wish to have children. Are they to abstain too? I don't think their husbands would be very impressed at never having sex until she's menopausal

Pengggwn · 27/05/2018 18:18

Soubriquet

That argument is unlikely to convince someone with a pro-life position. To them, by definition, the right to life is the highest consideration. It trumps stevie's sex life, it trumps her husband's sex life.

LassWiADelicateAir · 27/05/2018 18:25

It is perfectly obvious what she is asking. Pengwwn has given perfectly sensible replies.

So far as married people- there are numerous contraceptive options available, including doubling up to make doubly sure. We used condoms only for years with 100% success. Or there is always the option of a snip or tied tubes.

Soubriquet · 27/05/2018 18:29

Some forced birthers are very strict when they come to what they deem acceptable.

And contraception is never 100% guaranteed. It's pure luck