Lilly Allen & Miquita on abortions

[Cloud987]

Sorry for the DM link - I know it's a rag.

I'm just completely disturbed having read this article and listened to their podcast episode of them talking about having 5 abortions each. This surely is not what the 1967 abortion act was designed for. It's not some preppy girl-power feminist statement to have so many abortions you can't even remember them. And to laugh and sing about it rather than take a somber view or think about how you would make better choices or advise women and girls listening to make other choices for themselves. Or to demand that contraceptive services post-abortion are better to prevent girls from having another one. Am I wrong for thinking this is messed up and completely tasteless? And antithetical to the well-being of women and girls? Am I being excessively prude and judgemental?

Sorry didn't know where else to put this & haven't made a thread before so if I have broken rules or if this just is inappropriate let me know. This has just really got under my skin.

Article link here

Their podcast is called "Miss Me" and is available on BBC sounds - it's on their episode from this week called "Listen Bitch" at the very start. I am not a regular listener to it.

Edit: sorry I meant to post this on feminism chat not S&G discussions

FFS, it’s her body, her choice!
would you rather she was all teary and depressed about it, that it was ruining her life? @Cloud987

I didn’t have any higher expectation of either of them.

I'm pro choice but I think there is a limit on the level of irresponsible and wreckless behaviour that some individuals should allow themselves when it comes to contraception. There is a difference between someone who, say, is abused and raped within their relationship and ends up having 5 abortions because their partner denies them contraception, and someone who is fully educated about the risks, has full access to a range of contraception but who ultimately just can't be bothered with it and who ends up having 5 abortions simply because they couldn't be bothered with the effort of thinking about contraception or the interruption of their sex life.

I guess, though, that anybody who has SUCH a chaotic life that they have abortion after abortion and treat it as if it's nothing, are probably only going to be chaotic parents. So if it's a choice between an abortion or an unwanted child with who isn't looked after properly maybe the abortion (no matter how many) is for the best?

I’m pro choice but I think that using abortion as a form of contraception is appalling.
The women who died, bled out , the young girls who were left infertile because of back street abortions would have KILLED for reliable FREE contraception.
And yet women now have abortions willy nilly. It makes me want to vomit.
Many types of contraption are free.
The morning after pill if you are stupid enough to have unprotected sex is widely availiable.
Yet they wait until they are pregnant and abort.
This certainly isn’t what the 1967 act was about.
If I’m honest I think abortions should be limited on the NHS. Repeated pregnancy termination should not be available when we have free contraception.
And I speak as a woman who has had an early pregnancy termination. I only made the mistake once.
Lily Allen speaking like this is dreadful - than God she’s not someone young girls look up to. She is without shame.

I've given my answer. I don't think abortions are morally neutral. Lots of people don't. I am evidently not as feminist as you'd like me to be (if that is what feminism is). I don't think either of them have ruined their lives, and I don't think either of them think they have ruined their lives so I wouldn't expect either of them to cry about it

Exactly. I work with vulnerable young women. This is not the sort of thing I want them to be hearing and thinking is normal. So many people I know have had abortions and, although not regretted them, had a very difficult time with them: mentally and physically. I hate the flippancy in this podcast. Abortions are not contraception. We are lucky to be able to access several types of free, safe contraceptives in the uk, even as teenagers.

It’s completely fine.

Is it irresponsible of a man to believe a woman who says she's on the pill (but who fails to tell him that she doesn't always remember to take it), or that the time of the month means she's very unlikely to get pregnant, or that she has a medical condition which "probably" means she's infertile?

The pro choice argument is always "her body, her choice". Ultimately, though, it's also a woman's choice as to whether she agrees to have sex with a man if he refuses to use a condom. It's also a woman's choice if she decides to risk having sex without one knowing she has only remembered to take the pill on 15 out of the 21 days.

Thanks this is really insightful

Wrong. Please don’t judge how people feel about this. I am pro choice but the cavalier attitude to abortion isn’t okay. It shouldn’t be laughed at or be treated so glibly.

I am disgusted by Lily and Miquita.

People that say they’re pro-choice often aren’t.

Being pro-choice means supporting a woman’s legal right to make her own decisions about pregnancy.

Good for them for their candour, I say. We need more people to de-stigmatise abortion - this thread alone shows it’s still subject to judgement.

You've made me feel a lot more confident in my views, thanks for speaking honestly

I think 5 abortions is just part and parcel of the chaotic, drunken, drug-addled, messed up women they were in their 20s/30s. It wasn’t cool then and it’s not cool now. It was pitiful and sad then and is the same now. Their bodies, they can do what they like - they’re idiots for not grasping that abortions aren’t just ex post facto contraception. But I suspect that these two thoroughly messed up women have bigger problems.

Separately, there’s something deeply weird about the power dynamic between these two. Lily Allen is not a likable person imo.

No but there is teary and upset and then there is cavalier.

I feel the same abiut miscarriages. I have had them and wasn’t teary or upset. But that doesn’t mean I don’t understand how serious they are.

Nor do I understand women who are cavalier about abortion but devastated by a miscarriage.

Yes someone further up has spoken about leading a chaotic life and I imagine it applies to lifestyle and industry too even thought Lily was born to a well off family

What is sad is that after 2/3 abortions they still didn’t use the contraception that would have been readily available to them.

Yes. Their bodies their business but surely using contraception responsibly is easier?
Plus the risk of STIs.

BTW just remembered where your user name is from!

Exactly. Her remarks will be used against women having abortions. It’s usually upsetting even if it’s a choice you made and it’s safe and free no matter how many you have (which is should be) but laughing and joking about doing it so many times doesn’t seem right to me.

Some people are pro choice because they believe an embryo/fetus has zero personhood and an abortion is in effect no different from removing a mole, from a moral standpoint.

Some women are pro choice because they believe a woman's right over her own body is paramount, and to help women who find themselves in difficult circumstances. They may still feel abortion is sad, but the better option overall. It's then not necessarily a morally neutral act in all circumstances, just a legal one.

Thanks for putting it so succinctly, very helpful

Abortion is not contraception. V vulnerable women may well need 5+ abortions. They are not role models in a society where contraception is so easily available. I am neither pro- choice, since I passionately disagree with the "as late as necessary" side of that faction, nor pro life since I am passionately pro abortion.

Edited for typos

To quote one of the most prominent feminists of our time: abortion should be safe, legal, and rare.

It doesn’t help the pro-choice cause to treat abortion as a joke - it just makes feminists seem callous.

The problem is that placing a 'limit' on what you consider to be feckless behaviour is basically punishing women through the medium of unwanted babies.

The idea of effectively saying 'you are so irresponsible and incapable of looking after yourself that the only solution is to make you responsible for a helpless newborn' seems like a counter-intuitive response to their behaviour.

However you feel about Lily Allen or Miquita, restricting their access to abortion would have punished the potential unwanted babies more than anyone else.

This. I was just about to say the same. It's her body, her choice.

@DysmalRadius , excellent point.